12-14-06 Boulder City, Nv

My faithful Dell laptop finally bit the dust, well actually only the screen went bad and I could see the thing was on but it was so dark it was not readable. I took it to the local computer geek, Virgil and he said I could use it with a separate monitor but hauling a monitor and having to plug that in to use my laptop seemed like too much to handle. I went down and bought a Toshiba which so far is doing ok. Like anything it has its ways of doing things that I find unexpected but so far we are getting along. It weighs about half what my old one does. I will probably use the old one back in my Montana camp with a monitor but this new one is much better for on the road for sure.

As I said before this area that I am camping in has quite a variety of folks living and working here. This is one of the race cars that another guy across the street brought out the other day.

Drag racing seems to be a big thing with several of the locals. He ended up getting out another race car as well.

To get the cars out he had to move some of the ‘soft’ hot tubs that he sells. I never did get to see one of these in action, but Tom has been trying to get him to get one set up and see if some women would stop by for a dip. No luck there yet…..

One of the cushions in the pod was starting to disintegrate and I took it to another of the locals who does upholstery and had him make a new one for it. I found a dumpster with some cushions in it and with these he made a nice one. He said that the foam for cushions is getting so expensive now he, didn’t have any in stock, that is why I scrounged the dumpster for the old foam cushions.

When I had the motorcycle accident in Miles City in June, one of the things that got screwed up was my knee. I have been trying to just get by the way it was and thought it would get better even though the doctor in Miles said that it wouldn’t fix itself. It got a lot better but there was still something wrong with it deep down inside the knee joint. Tom’s wife Karen just had her knee operated on a couple of week ago and Tom was able to get me in to see her doctor. With the MRI’s from my Miles City doctor, he determined that he could ‘fix’ it with arthroscopic surgery. I decided to go ahead and have him do it. About three weeks ago now I went  and had him fix it. The next day i took this photo of the leg with bandage, elastic wrap and full length stocking.

After three days I took the wrapping off and even though it was still swollen it sure felt better. The doctor had me go to physical therapy the day after surgery.

Notice that the knee was marked ‘yes’ as that is the one they worked on as well as the surgeon initialed it before I went into surgery. The other knee was marked ‘NO’. I guess this keeps some of those horror stories from happening where someone gets the wrong leg amputated. There were only these two little entry points. The doctor trimmed the cartilage and removed some of the meniscus that somehow had torn loose and folded itself into the joint. It was amazing that three days after the surgery, it felt better than before. I am thrilled with the operation. I am sure that it helped that I worked out under Tom’s advice to strengthen the knee before I went in to surgery. The knee is still somewhat weak, but it is coming along very well.

Tom finally had me move my camp over to a friends construction site. Duke is rehabbing a building and there is a huge parking lot that he has let me camp in. I am sort of a night watchman other than I cant hear anything and I sleep soundly. It has turned out to be a pretty good camp and much quieter than Tom place. I have small herd of quail that come through now and then as well as a few little bunnies.

This is in an area that is on the edge of the old part of town. The town was built in the thirties when they were building Hover Dam. Across the street is a place that is the community garden. It was getting down to frost temperatures a week a go and you can see that some of the gardeners have put up some frost protection.

I like this gardeners spot. Not the best eating here but easy on water.

I think this is the old water works building. Not much happening here now but it looks like they might have some future plans.

After I got back from the surgery, I got out my little work bench and started pounding around on copper and silver again. To get a polish on things I make I have to use an inverter hooked up to the truck battery that allows me to use my electric grinder/polisher. Mostly I am just using the solar panel you can see at the front of the pod for lights in the trailer. I have a small inverter in the cab of the truck that I use to charge the batteries in my laptop and cell phone.

It has been several years since I have made anything on the bench and it is taking me some time to get my hand and eye back in working order. There is a lag in my brain function too it seems. I sure like working on the bench, sitting in the sun and I usually have the radio tuned to NPR or one of the local stations. I started working with copper and have finally move on to silver, but I really do like the copper to work with and of course I like the looks of it in some hair. Nevada is the silver state and Arizona is the copper state.

I have been trying a few new things like the combs and these little snap hair clips. The combs I like but those little clip things I will have to think more about. I made a few little hair clips as I am all out of anything but the big clips.

The swelling in my knee finally had gone down quite a bit and I went in to see if the knee brace that I had made for it would fit. I went in before I had surgery and had a cast made of my leg that was sent off and they made a carbon fiber, top of the line, brace to those specifications. It is interesting that in Nevada they give you one third off any medical procedure. Even with the discount for cash this thing cost a thousand dollars. The idea behind it is that my knee is susceptible to side and twisting stress so now if I am going to be in those situations, I need to wear this brace. Most of the time I will not need it but if I am going on rough back trails I should wear it for preventive reasons. The thing is light and doesn’t seem to interfere with walking at all. I do notice that when sitting like on the bike it sort of bunches up behind the knee. I have an idea I will just have to get used to it and then it will be alright. I have a friend named Ken in Colorado that has had the same knee surgery and also has this knee brace. He is a skier and bike rider and he says it has prevented damage to his knee in major skiing crashes. It should fit a little better after all the swelling goes down.

A roadrunner came cursing through camp the other day. No knee problems with him…. They are a really interesting bird and this one didn't seem overly cautious. i suppose that he may be a regular at the big houses up on the hill above me where he may get fed. Tom says that they can really become a pest if you feed them.