I don’t want to go into too much detail about the genius which is my talent at scheduling medical tests.. How seemless the two days of appointments went, as we visited Doctor after Doctor, lab after lab… But that would be boastful and as E’s Grandmother always said. “Self praise is no recommendation” …. Suffice it  to say I am a genius.

With fifteen years of experience, my scheduling of appointments and secret parking tricks (how to park next to St. Paul’s for four hours of appts. and pay only $6.00) allows our annual check up to proceed seamlessly. We each have two more tests to take but they can be taken on the island…

We saw eight doctors, went to three labs and drove 260 km… We had a great dinner in Yaletown celebrating our sons 25th birthday with J and his sister. We had dinner two nights in the local pub in L with our friend and generous hostess… We lost at trivia (at the pub), our dogs were well cared for by my sister and I got to see my Mom…

Aside from the clean bill of health from the Doctors the best score of the three days came from E’s sister and her husband. Their neighbour in Point Grey is tearing down their house and J and S were able to get us a few things for the island.. E met S  at their house and picked up an on demand hot water heater, seven windows (2 of them are leaded glass), a huge azalea (colour unknown).. all for free!!!

E is going to rebuild my cold frame using two of the windows as the current lid is too heavy for me to lift. I am going to hang the two leaded glass windows in the garden… The heater will come in handy at some point, whether as a back up for one of the two houses or for our studio when we build a guest room. Score!!!             

We are so glad to be home. The sun is shining and there is no sign that we missed the herring hatch. The dogs are smiling and we have refilled the bird feeders. Food is put away, hockey is on the tv and our feet are up…. We can relax for a couple of weeks now and get to work in the garden.

Fifteen years ago I had never stepped foot in St. Paul’s hospital. I had a vague idea that somewhere in South Africa a Dr. had invented heart transplants and we didn’t have so much as an aspirin in our house. We were 40’ish, healthy but a bit naive. Now we know more than we ever dreamed about Drs, tests, drugs and heart transplants. We are now 50 ish and healthy but just a

bit more wise

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