Everything Fred – Part 243

23 February 2024

I almost took a nosedive in the shower today. I was tired because of the Herceptin treatment on Tuesday and my usual Friday chores of raking leaves, cleaning the pool filter, watering plants, and cleaning the patio deck.

About the time I finished, Edgar from Dinnen Electric came to change out the old flourescent light in my closet. The old light’s ballast was going and you had to turn the switch on and off a few times to get a dim light. Edgar put in a new LED version. There’s a lot more light and at least I don’t think I’m going blind.

For him to get to the light, I had to remove all the top row of the clothes so he could get to it. That tired me more. The only reason I wanted to shower was to get the Off, off. I don’t go outside to work in the yard without spraying down for mosquitoes and I don’t like having it on me for too long.

Anyway, I had just climbed into the shower (I’m very careful to always hold the grab bars) and had turned to face into the stream when I got dizzy and almost went ass over tea kettle. At the last minute, I recovered. It was a wake up call.

While Edgar worked on the light, I had my version of avocado toast for lunch. I had a nicely ripe avocado that I spread over the toast made with Pugliese bread and then added sliced rounds of Roma tomatoes, topped with red onions and salt and pepper. It was pretty good.

If you remember, yesterday I did Yucatan Style Braised Pork. It turned out better than I thought. First, the 3 lbs of pork butt was very fatty. That’s good in a way because I knew it would probably be tender but after trimming some of the fat, there didn’t seem to be much left.

It basically calls for a homemade Mojito sauce by calling for 1/2 cup of orange juice and the juice of two limes. Since the recipe calls for garlic anyway, that’s pretty much a Mojito sauce. The problem is even though I thought I ordered 3 oranges from Whole Foods, I must have only ordered one. I was short on orange juice by a lot.

I debated as to whether to use tangerine juice to make the two cups (too expensive) and then it dawned on me I have a sour orange tree in the front yard with sour oranges on it. I usually make orange marmalade with them but haven’t been up to it. Anyway, most orange marmalade recipes call for regular oranges since sour oranges are not common. To make the regular orange sour, you add limes or lemons to your marmalade mixture. Three sour oranges later and I had two cups. I added the lime juice to my recipe anyway because I like sour.

I cooked it for an hour and the pork definitely was pull apart tender. I made tacos.

Tonight I plan on making vegetarian enchiladas. A recipe I saw called for broccoli florets and baby spinach leaves along with onions and black beans. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

I think I can now say that my neuropathy is definitely better. It no longer feels as though I’m walking on hot coals. It’s more of a numbness than anything and I still cannot feel my toes which affects my balance (hello shower!). If the burning stays away, I’ll count it as a partial victory. I do get sharp pains in the feet on occasions but anything is better than the burning. The same goes for my hands.

Today’s the fourth day after the Herceptin. I feel pretty good just tired and weak. Hopefully the next few days will allow me to gain back some of what the Herceptin took away. As far as I can tell, I’ve had not side effects from the Tamoxifen. Then again, a major side effect is blood clots and I’d rather not have any of those.

I called Hollywood Chrysler/Jeep this afternoon. I wanted the parts department and they answered. However, they wouldn’t give me any information and shifted me over to Neyma. No answer and sent to voicemail. I left a message and I’m 100%, absolutely sure she’ll call me back.

Stay tuned!