New Life Chapter: April 2025

4/1 - April Fools!

I met up with Anna (1st cousin once removed), who is living/working in SF temporarily. She's not loving it and wants to move back east. It's certainly not for everyone and her family is in the east, so it makes sense. I kinda thought she'd love it though.

I had planned to meet Anna near the Golden Gate park. The day before, Martha had toured me around town and we thought that I'd be able to park in the park and walk to where I'd meet Anna. Well, even though it was pretty empty on Monday, when many museums and arboretums were closed, it was super crowded on Tuesday. Parking in the park seemed out of the question except for somewhere where it would take too long to get to our meeting spot. So, I drove down the street (Folsom?) that Martha thought I might be able to find a spot, but no such luck. I was getting ready to message Anna and say that I couldn't find parking for Big Bertha (a major stressor when in a city/town) when I happened upon a spot that I thought might be a good place to park. I did and left Zoe and met Anna and all was good. Phew! After breakfast, we walked back to the van and got Zoe out for a walk in the park.

Zoe seemed quite concerned about Anna leaving on the bus (even though they didn't interact a whole lot)

Golden Gate park:

I eyed this when rain came in and managed to get shelter during the shower.

I really appreciate folks beautifying the sidewalks with their gardens

4/2 -

Arrived Sebastopol where Juliann is house sitting for the month. It was fun to hang out again and have access to a house. I stayed here until April 11th. I had booked an appointment with a podiatrist for May 3rd, so I finally got a diagnosis. I have a stress fracture in my 3rd metatarsal and need to wear a boot for 4 weeks! Only time to not wear it is when driving (right foot), bathing, and sleeping. She said that I am prone to them because of the structure of my foot that made the arthritis in my big toes happen. One good thing is she said that I basically have fused the big toe joint, which is the surgical option for this issue. I have noticed that it hurts less these days and I guess that's cuz it's basically fused. 😲 I guess I'm good at tolerating pain...

I realized that I had mites in/around my toilet again and became pretty convinced that they were in the coconut coir. I hadn't thought so because they didn't appear for quite a while after the first block from that batch was used. I think they were there, but not enough for me to be aware of them. Yuk! Anyway, so after 3 blocks and continuing to have them, I decided I needed to order new coconut coir. I hated to do it, but ordered from Amazon because you can get 5-6 blocks in one box and it's so much cheaper! One block costs about $10, even from Amazon, and 5 or 6 costs around $22, and I need multiple blocks so that I have them when I need them. Amazon is basically my last choice, but sometimes I just have to do it. So, I cleaned out the toilet again with bleach and let it dry in the sun. I let the solids bucket sit out in the sun for several days to ensure any mites were dead and gone. After using the new coconut coir, I haven't seen anymore mites. 🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞 No pictures. 😂😂

Maggie eyeing our cheeses. She's so cute!

No comparison to a normal foot, but look at that big toe joint! Lots of arthritis and no gap.

Zoe managed to find a comfy chair right away!

We went for a drive with the pups to Point Reyes National Seashore.

It seems weird to see the sand blowing across the road so far above the beach

We walked to the lighthouse (dogs not allowed) quickly and got to see a couple of whales, so that was fun!

I love what the wind does to the trees

Lunch spot in Marshall

I don't often see Turkeys with the fans displayed like this. I guess it's courting time!

We had signed up for the April 5th protest in Sebastopol. This was my first protest ever! The two sides of my sign:

Start of poison oak rash (one of the spots)

vineyard across the street on our walk

We went to Armstrong Redwoods State preserve. It was super peaceful. Of course everything is driven by how much I can do in my walking boot. We didn't bring the dogs, since they aren't allowed on the trails, but we could have walked with them on the road, which would also have been beautiful. Good to remember.

Colonel Armstrong - 308' tall, 14.6' diameter, Approximately 1400 years old!

They don't know when the last fire was here, but most of the trees show burns at the base. Redwoods are super tolerant to fires and fires are good for their germination. Some trees burned on the inside at the base of the trunk and are hollow, but they still stand.

There's a Zoe nose peeking out. I guess she likes Papaya.

Lovely! I react to Poison Oak way worse than Poison Ivy.

When I was in SF, staying with Martha, I started to itch, but I didn't know what it was at that point. Apparently I must have gotten it at Pfeiffer Big Sur SP. Laura told me that that is the worst strain of it. I didn't know I got into it and it probably came from Zoe. I had this area on my right shin, an area on my right forearm and a little on my chest. The area on my shin was definitely the worst. I did have a couple of single bumps that on my legs, which is how I normally react to poison ivy, where I get a rash, but then additional spots elsewhere.

4/8 - Shad and Jody came back from their month long trip and are super nice people. Totally open to have a stranger in the house and a dog that barks at them in their own home! Silly Zoe, but as far as she was concerned they were invaders. We went to a movie at the local Rialto theatre in town. It was the Janis Ian documentary. I learned a lot about her and it was a really good movie. The theater also sells food, so we had dinner there. I guess you can eat in the theater, but we just ate first. I had a yummy salad.

4/9 - I was having a problem with my left eye - super irritated in the inner corner and very red. After ignoring my foot for so long, I decided I should find an opthalmologist to take a look. I was afraid that the drain plug (put in for my dry eyes so many years ago) was causing problems. She said it was either allergies (I doubt that since my eyes didn't itch) or a cyst on my eyeball. Neither concerning. I tried the allergy eye drops, but it didn't seem to make a difference so I stopped after a couple of days. My eye did end up getting better on it's own, but how would I know?

4/11 - I left Sebastopol and headed to Napa to meet up with my cousin Charlie and his family. They came from Houston, Denver, and Redding, CA to do a weekend of wine tasting. I met them on Friday for one wine tasting at Hendry's, as did Anna, who came from San Francisco for the tasting and dinner. I liked the laid-back atmosphere of Hendry's. We had a great dinner and I was able to park the van in their airbnb's driveway. I stayed in the van and Zoe wasn't allowed in the house, which was a bit of a bummer, but we didn't spend much time there. They did 3 days of 2 wine-tastings a day. I'm not sure I'd want to do that. It all just blurs. Plus, I bought a $54 bottle on wine and when I had it a few days later, I didn't even like it. I'm much happier typically with the usuals I get at the store for between $12-$18. I guess I'm not a real wine connoisseur! Fortunately the wine wasn't in addition to the tasting fee ($75) because they waive it if you spend the equivalent on bottles and between all of us, we covered all our tasting fees.

These photos loaded in reverse order multiple times and I gave up.

artichokes. I've never seen them growing before

me, Charlie, Jan, Katherine, Anna, Laura, Paul. Fabulous food at Mustards Grill in Napa.

4/12 - I left Napa after a luxurious shower in the Airbnb, and headed to Bodega Bay, which was just gorgeous. More coastal photos. I just cannot get enough of this beautiful water. I stopped in Duncan Mills and wandered around (small), but ended up going to Sophie's Cellars for a glass of wine because there was music that was really good. I rarely do this, but really enjoy it and need to do it more often!