Now it’s April!

Yesterday began the first official month of Spring. It has been long awaited. Not that our winter has been all that bad, it’s just that it would be lovely if we could count on the weather being decent and the sun shining everyday. This morning there was fog! It wasn’t terribly dense in this neighborhood and burned off rapidly. In other parts of the city it was reported to be quite heavy.

¶ If you look really hard at the picture included today, you will see some tulip leaves that have emerged. So far there are amaryllis, daffodils, and day lilies and the aforementioned tulips showing that they are brave enough to face the “spring” weather. We will trust that they know what they are doing. ¶ I have continued to fret over what my sodium count might be, and what it means that it has dropped. Mostly, it’s the unknown that bothers me. Fretting about my health was something in previous times I never did. After going for my walk today I realize how out of shape I’ve become. Not only am I overweight but have to fight with myself to do something about it. At least, so I tell myself, now that it’s decent weather I can do more outside. Something has to change. In days past I was at the fitness center five days each week. Starting with COVID that stopped. I’m still hesitant to go back. The therapy pool works wonders and I long for it. Right now, that would be the biggest draw. ¶ The war in Ukraine is quite simply insane. It is for no good purpose (wars seldom are) and merely demonstrates who is in power. It appears from the reports that Vlad is not doing well on the war front. Whether he knows it or not is a big question. How can the rest of the world continue to question whether he should be accused of war crimes? Watch any newscast and the pictures of the refugees in the country should be evidence enough that civilians are being targeted. ¶ A trip to Costco is nearly like a journey to a war zone itself. I have almost been struck so many times by people pushing their carts from a side aisle into the flow of traffic not looking right, left, or ahead. A lady was trying to beat me into a turn. I stopped and allowed her to accomplish her deed. Did she even nod or say “Thank you,” or acknowledge in anyway that she had been helped? In a word, “no.” ¶ Perhaps people follow the example of the people they elect to congress. Or, their elected representatives represent the general

public. What hits the news nearly everyday from Capitol Hill is simply not to be believed. Is it necessary, I ask you, for the junior representative from North Carolina to share the information about a party to which he was invited? One might think that he would be embarrassed to be thought of as one interested in such an invitation. Then, possibly, it was the only party to which he has been invited in his brief time in Washington and sought to receive some kind of acknowledgment of his arrival on the social scene. Whatever. I’m not really sure that the whole nation needed to be informed. Given that he has won no rewards for truthfulness, one could question if he ever received the invitation or it was merely a figment of his imagination. ¶ Sophia continues her concern for her wildlife. I put out four corn cobs for the squirrels yesterday afternoon. By evening they had all been stolen. She has welcomed a rather large rabbit to her menagerie. All this concern is manifest in the few hours of wakefulness each day. ¶ On the whole things have gone well this week. I treasure your thoughts and prayers and your kind deeds.