A new letter to learn

I'll tell you why I haven't been writing that much lately. It's fall, and I've been busy at work and covering fall sports at night.

Then, my mom's injury stole a lot of free time from me, what with driving back and forth multiple times per week--it's a one-hour drive each way, you know, plus all the time in between. Besides sucking up a lot of my spare time, many of you know that dealing with this saps your mental and spiritual energy.

(An update on my mom appears later. She's back at the nursing home and getting better very slowly.)

Plus, I've been writing B regularly, and I've been writing S regularly ... and I have a new letter of the alphabet to tell you about, too.

This name starts with an N. I've been writing her, too. I have even visited her a few times lately.

Unlike B, N doesn't live thousands of miles away. In fact, she's only about a hundred miles away, which isn't so far in these wide-open reaches of the Upper Midwest. She lives in a very rural area. That's good because the love of her life are her dogs--she takes in rescue dogs, and some of them like to bark. She has about 10 dogs right now, though that number goes up and down as she adopts new dogs and others go over the Rainbow Bridge. Her oldest dog is about 18. That's even older than our elderly kitty, Maggie.

What else can I tell you? She is three years older than me and a widow for the last three years. Works part time. Has a DirecTV dish. Doesn't have a DVD player, which really limits the movies I can bring along when I visit. Methinks she will be getting a DVD player as a gift sometime soon. She doesn't have a lot of money but is wise enough to know money never can buy happiness. And she enjoys my visits.

I have visited her several times, once while my wife was gone on her trip and twice since. Both of the latter visits coincided with football games I covered in her area. The first time, I drove over for a visit, late supper and sleepover after the game. The other time, I visited her before the game--she cooked a steak for us over a grill. That time, I didn't return after the game--I made the two-hour drive home.

There are no more games in that area this fall, so our next visit has to wait until some time in the future. Best guess: maybe mid October.

We write each other about once a week. B and I still write each other about every day. B knows about N, and N knows about my wife, and my wife knows about N, and B knows about my wife, etc. In case you were wondering ... no secrets.

****
Let's move on to the news. My mom has been back in the nursing home for the last two weeks. She was in the hospital for a week after breaking her elbow. When we visited her last week, she was awake only for a few minutes during our one-hour visit. Maybe, suggested B when I told her about it, it's because of the meds they are giving her.

We went again this Wednesday. She was more awake but complaining that she wasn't feeling well. Her forehead and hands did feel warm--but later, before we left, they felt more normal. She's still sleeping a lot.

My wife went with me to a football game in Houghton a week ago--a really nice day for a fall drive, with temperatures in the low 70s and the leaves really showing color. Last Saturday, I took her to a quilt show at a little town about 70 miles away. The colors on the maples were really vivid under the September sun, but it later clouded up and started a light rain.

We had a spectacular September, with temperatures into the 70s most of the time. No rain, sunny days, warm weather. A much nicer month than July was. But as the final week of September started, a front went through, with rain, cold and a chilly wind out of the northwest. For the last two nights, we woke up to temperatures in the mid 20s and heavy frost. Won't be so cold for my football game Friday night--instead, heavy rain is moving this way.

OK, it's getting late again, and I'm still typing. Time for bed. But I wanted to say hi and let you know I'm still alive. At least I think I am. I must be. Dead people don't yawn.