Take Me to Your Cabog

I have a coworker who I think is just barely 60 and he was out for a few weeks. Here are two versions of his story.

1921
He gets a cold and within a week it turns into pneumonia. After another week, he starts getting short of breath and has a hard time doing anything without losing his breath. Doctors treat him with chest compresses to try and get the fluid out of his lungs. He's confined to bed rest for weeks. Within a few weeks or months he dies, presumably from the pneumonia.

2008
He gets a cold and within a week it turns into pneumonia. After another week , he starts getting short of breath and has a hard time doing anything without losing his breath. Doctors do medical tests on him and determine that he has 90% blockage in a coronary artery. They schedule an immediate surgery to expand the artery. They make an incision in his leg, feed a wire up into his heart, expand the artery and put a stent into the artery. He is also given antibiotics for his pneumonia. Now that sufficient oxygen is getting to his heart and the rest of his body, he heals quickly. The next week he's feeling fine and is back to work.

We've come along way in 87 years. Amazing.

Tuesday we're having the heating guys come out again. This time it's for a bit of preventative maintenance though. They'll be putting some chemicals into the boiler system. It circulates through the pipes and helps clean them. Then we'll flush the system in May and we should have clean pipes. This will help keep the hot water flowing and increase the life span of the new pump we put in last January.

There have been several bad thunderstorms hitting us as of late, like a good portion of the U.S. And the basement has stayed dry. There's a bit of darkness at the base of the walls where moisture is wicking it's way through the walls, but no running water, which is good. The soil is completely waterlogged. It rained an inch to an inch and a half (2.5 to 4 cm) and now there's a good two to three inches (5 to 8 cm) of standing water out in the front lawn. which reminds me of a funny story...

There is a children's book written by Sandra Boynton called "But Not the Hippopotamus." It is a good book and our eldest likes having it read to her. The first pages starts "A hog and a frog cavort in the bog, but NOT the hippopotamus," and it has a picture of a pig and a frog dancing in a mud puddle.

Wednesday I was outside with our eldest, carting sticks to the curb. Our city has this fantastic service where they will do curb pick up and chip any branches you have, up to a 12 inch diameter, for free. And then even better, if you call them and make a request, they will drop off wood chips at your house too, for free. But I digress.

As I was carrying sticks to the curb, Pumpkin had found a puddle, as all children do, and was splashing in it. This particular puddle was in the middle of our lawn and of course, as she splashed in it, it got muddier and muddier and deeper and deeper. She was in heaven and she noticed me watching her. She said, "Yook, yook, I'm in the cabog! Daddy, Daddy, I'm in the cabog!" It took me a bit to realize what she was on about.

"Ohhhh. Honey, do you mean you're cavorting in the bog?"

"Yeah! I like to vort in the cabog!"

It took several tries, but eventually we got it sorted, and I was smiling the entire time.


Thanks to Ms. Huis, below is a picture of the front yard, with the location of the Cabog marked.