Collapsed Lung

Incision where the doctors cut through my rib cage to inflate my lung that had collapsed. I had the same lung collapse the second time before it was inflated again but this time they deflated the sac that encases the lung and put some talc in there to irritate the lung lining and force it to grow around the lung. It is like putting a balloon inside another balloon so the one inside is supported by the one on the outside.

Colorful Landscape

Most of our area is covered in trees but they are still green and offer a lot of shade. It isn’t that hot or muggy now but it was for about two weeks and I didn’t go outside. This morning, Pepper Jax went to the vet for a shot to relieve some of his itching and scratching and ended up getting a shot for the itching and we hope it works.

It is supposed to work for 4 to 8 weeks. He will be pleased with that as he has been scratching all the time. I was afraid he would end up with raw skin from scratching so much. But we got him to the vet before it got that bad.

Thinking it Over

When I was growing up during World War II, I thought about a lot of things related to us and the enemy. Our U.S. Government sent out and posted signs about the Japanese where people meet. The so-called “Japs” all wore thick glasses in black frames grinning back at you with large buck teeth.

Gordon, Ohio was my birthplace and my home. I went to school there and grew up in Gordon during the Second World War. We experienced rationing stamps, tokens, steel pennies and candy cases without candy. We laughed at performers in the medicine shows that came to town and the town provided us our daily needs – it was a perfect place for me.

Space Alien

Cicada on Spruce Tree

I have heard these guys since my days in diapers. I remember my mother was so upset with me for wanting to pick one off the old maple tree in Gordon. I didn't get it but watched it buzzing like they do. I had a chance to take this picture of this one shedding its shell and thought, at the time, it looked like a space alien with those big eyes.

My best friend is also my wife's best friend. He is the best Jack Russell Terrier that Darke County had at the time and it took every dollar I had in my wallet to buy him. I wouldn't trade him for all the gold in China.

https://www.facebook.com/pepperjax.lincoln.7

Abraham at 83 years old

It doesn't get any better than this when you are 83 years old and in October, on the 25th you will be 84? And on October 27th, your wife of the past 63 years will be one year older than she is now at 81. Imagine that? The next time you hear someone talk about getting married show them this picture.

This is my "strombrella" that came to mind one day when my son, Chris, up from Florida with the kids (Justin and Brittney), and I enlisted their help in digging holes for the feet or legs (there are four of them) in the ground and a deeper hole in the middle where the post go that holds the legs up. It has stood there all these years and gone through all sorts of weather, including Hurricane Ike that destroyed the cherry tree standing in this picture, but left the strombrella intact.

My Oxygen

My oxygen comes through a cannula. After years of smoking cigarettes and then a pipe, I discovered that both my lungs are "shot" or not any good. My wife, Patty, asked the lung doctor if I could get a lung transplant and the doctors told her that I could not because neither of the lungs is good enough to work if the transplant didn't work. So, I left the hospital wearing a cannula and began using those small metal tanks with oxygen in them. After a year or two of that, my doctor wrote a prescription for a machine that makes oxygen for me at home and a miniature version on wheels that I can tow around with me or carry it wherever I go.

Brookville on County Map

I made a series of maps of our location in color that could be and were used by the city of Brookville, Ohio to find or locate people of interest.

This is an overall map and not one of the detailed maps that shows all of the streets by name and their location on the map.

One Degree Days

A big 1 degree this morning at 8:30 a.m.

Ella Rice Feeds Pigs on Perry Street in Gordon, Ohio

This is the way the store looked on South Main Street in Gordon, Ohio when Ella Rice was feeding the pigs on Perry Street. The building in the background behind the boxcar is the Gordon Railroad Station House. The large building is the Ammon General Store that sold everything people needed for the home and for the animals on their farms. The larger building was sold to Harry Gunder who was a chicken farmer and went bankrupt in the Great Depression so his family moved into the old Ammon store. When I used to go there, the walls still had shelves and the large center section was a space made into rooms by hanging sheets on a clothesline wire from wall to wall. 

The Gunder family consisted of Shirley, their only girl, Bill, their younger boy, Marion who went into and back out of the Army with some deformity that made him unsuitable to serve, but he rode around town with a big Harley Davison motorcycle. He married a beautiful Indian girl from Oklahoma and they had one son, and then he divorced her and sent her back to Oklahoma. The kids in Gordon called Marion a "Slacker" which was a slang term for somebody who uses a physical excuse to avoid being drafted into the service.

Pepper Jax

Pepper Jax got in bed with me again this morning. And he did it again today, December 22, 2017.

Breakfast

Grape Jelly on Toast

Just washed my hair

1st Cavalry Division Cap

Me and my 1st Cavalry Division cap.

Pirate Patty

My wife, Patricia Ann Custer Lincoln, of 62 years with a stye in her eye.
Eventually went to hospital for double vision in one eye.

Chris and me when they came up to see us for a few days.

Me going-on 83.

Thinking about it?

It was 61º outside this morning when I left the dog outside to do his business. He got in bed with me at 2:00 am and got up at 6:00 when I got up. He went outside while I did my breathing treatment. It was warm and had rained but wasn't raining when I got up. I cut most of my beard off last night and thinned what is left so it looks better.

Pat and Abe

Christmas Eve at Sonny and Eva's get together

I had no idea that I looked like this. It is like the first time you get up to speak in front of a large audience and can hear yourself talking in a voice you do not hear when you are talking to someone. But record it and play it back and you become a stranger.

Good Luck

Clover in Grass

I could and did spend hours looking in a patch of clover for a single 4-leaf clover. But in my lifetime I may have seen one or two.

My mother, Vivia,  would come out and look at the same clover and reach down and pull off a 4-leaf clover. I was always astonished. She said it would give us some good luck.

I know we grew all the food we ate because we had no money to buy food with. When we needed something like a pound of coffee or a stick (quarter pound) of butter I would have to take a dozen of fresh eggs to the store to trade for the butter. Sometimes we traded eggs for a pound of bacon or coffee. We sold some eggs and used those pennies to buy things at the store and often mother would give me a dime (10 cents) to go to the post office for a couple of postal cards or some stamps for letters. If there was any leftover money she would tell me I could buy some candy. For pennies, during the War Years, the candy case was empty but they always had a bad tasting chocolate drops. Instead of them I would get a handful of Spanish peanuts.

Lung Collasped

I had both lungs collapse ten years apart. You feel like you are going to suffocate and would if you can't get air into the chest cavity for them to re-inflate, you die of suffocation. So it is a serious thing for anyone to have happen to them.

This is an example of the scar, under my left arm that led into my chest where they stuck a tube with a one-way valve on it. It would let new air in but no air from the chest could come out.

When the lung healed and was able to hold air, I was allowed to go home.

Fly, Ant Eating Pear

I call this Two For One or the Fly and Ant eating the Pear slice. I saw it and switched lenses to 18mm and took a couple of shots, I got close enough laying down on my stomach to get the picture and sometimes the lens hood would touch the fly and it would fly away but return almost immediately. So, this shot was planned and not a kind of happy accident where you get more than you saw as in this example.

Warnke Covered Bridge

The Warnke Covered Bridge near our town and still being used today. The logs used to span the creek were cut from the trees that stood around the spot where the bridge was built. There were covered bridge building specialists who cut the logs, shaped them and used them to build these covered bridges. The name of the bridge builder is usually the name given to the bridge. "Warnke"

Brubaker Covered Bridge

The Brubaker Covered Bridge is a beautiful bridge and still in use. I have painted this bridge many times beginning back in the days when the kids at home were still small. They seemed to enjoy walking across the bridges and peering through the openings to see the stream flowing past them.

See my Facebook pages:
http://www.facebook.com/popslinc

Rainy Day Cardinal

Cardinal on a rainy day--looking like he is tired of the rain. I think these are among the most colorful birds that we have. This and the yellow birds we call the Goldfinch. The male is brilliant yellow with leading edge of wings a coal black. The female cardinal has the same basic shape but her colors are more muted and not so bold as the male. They have a cock on the top of their heads that can be raised and lowered as it is in this snapshot.

Geeting Covered Bridge

The Geeting Covered Bridge. Notice that this bridge does not have any open sides. It was made this way so farmers could drive herds of cattle or sheep across the bridge without them being able to see the water below. Usually an animal will not cross or walk on a bridge if it can see water under it.

Hummingbird Moth

Hummingbird Moth in flight. They are small but about the same size as a smaller hummingbird and have all the actions in flight as the real hummer. I like them around the flowers.