The Needle Biopsy

Let’s backtrack for a quick minute.

I’m at the breast surgeon’s office. I’ve had my mammogram, ultrasound, and bone density test at a brand-new center, and they referred me upstairs to the third floor to meet the breast surgeon. I’m not sure why I need to meet the breast surgeon if I have calcifications on the lower left side. I don’t know what any of this means.

I’m speaking with the doctor’s nurse, a nice lady named Elaine with pretty hair.

She was arranging an appointment for a needle biopsy to be performed the following week. I asked if I would have the appointment on a Wednesday, since I have started taking that day off. My original intention of taking that day off was when I realized that I was approaching retirement age and I wanted to ease myself out of the work system. I had that thought back in December 2020 while I was sitting in the dermatologist’s office waiting for my lupus appointment with the PA, a nice lady named Beth.

Elaine left the room to make the appointment, and when she returned, she said that she was able to get a Wednesday appointment at 9:20AM, but it would be in Beaufort. Needle biopsies at the new center were on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so it looks like I’m going to Beaufort the following week. Then I realized that the following Wednesday was the same day I had an appointment with the dermatology PA, an appointment that I had made back in December 2020. I decided to change the dermatology appointment, but I needed to keep it soon because I was almost out of Plaquenil and the refill required a doctor’s authorization. That appointment was in the afternoon, but I’m not sure that I can go from a needle biopsy appointment in the morning to a dermatology appointment in the afternoon at 1:15. I might be feeling under the weather by the afternoon.

Elaine gave me a sheet of instructions. She said that I could eat a light breakfast the morning of the biopsy. No aspirin or other pain relievers besides acetaminophen, because we don’t want to promote bleeding. She made sure to write her name and phone number on the instruction sheet.

On the way home, I call the dermatology office and ask to reschedule my appointment. The earliest appointment was for a month out, and I don’t need to go 1 month without Plaquenil. Even though I know the appointment is going to be a follow-up and take about 15 minutes from start to finish, there are no openings. I ask to be put on a waiting list, and was told that they don’t have a waiting list and that I have to keep calling back to ask if there is an opening.

Now, don’t even get me started on how inefficient it is for an office to not have a waiting list. All large modern medical offices use up-to-date electronic programs that are internet-based or networked with their other offices. You click a button on the appointment screen to add someone to a waiting list. Boom, it’s done. All the manpower and time and annoyance of your patients calling to ask if there are openings available is avoided. So I decided to drive in to the dermatology office since it’s on the way home and present myself front and center.

I received the same exact treatment at the office. Granted, the young receptionist looked terrified and helpless. She checked with the woman next to her to see if there was something they could do so that I could be seen sooner. I asked for a waiting list. Nope. I asked for a telehealth exam. Nope. I asked for another appointment in the near future. Nope. I asked to leave a message for the PA. Nope. I even said sotto voce “I am having a needle biopsy that morning” in the hopes that could shake something loose on the schedule, but it didn’t so I left.

*****

Leslie and I had a discussion about whether he should go or not. I said no. He said yes. I said that we could be gone all day, and that could be hard on his schedule. He said he was going.

The day dawned and we went off to Beaufort. Elaine had told me to eat a light breakfast and to take my usual meds, but not to take any meds that would promote bleeding. She said to make sure I ate something because they wouldn’t want me to pass out. I thought that was a strange statement. Maybe she thought my blood sugar would drop.

Leslie agreed that he would wait in the car. We found the entrance to the building and he dropped me off. The imaging center was just inside the entrance off to the left. I got checked in, presented my ID and insurance cards, and filled out the paperwork, and proceeded to wait.

A nice technician came out to get me. She told me her name, but I can’t remember it so I’ll call her Sarah. She led me back to the undressing room outside the mammogram room and we had a little chat. There was more signing-off to do, and she told me that the reason for the needle biopsy was because the mammogram shows some calcifications, about the size of grains of salt, and Sarah took her pen and made some dots on the upper left corner of the page to show me how big the calcifications were. She asked me about any food I had eaten or meds I had taken. I told her that I had eaten toast at 6:30AM and taken 1 naproxen sodium the night before for pain relief for knee inflammation and arthritis. She got very still and stared off into the distance like she wasn’t sure about the naproxen, and asked me if I had taken one that morning. I said no, and she stared off again. Her eyes were bright like she was wearing contact lens, or maybe she was just tired and her eyes were bright with fatigue. Maybe she had a small child, maybe two, and she was worn down with the fatigue of life and work, and now she had me in front of her who had taken a naproxen sodium more than 12 hours prior. She tapped her pen on the clipboard and thought about it and said that she would tell the radiologist.

She said that I would be seated for the procedure, and that they would get me positioned to take some views to make sure that I was in the right position. The radiologist would give me several injections to numb the site, the needle would be injected to take a sample, the sample would be taken next door to the lab to make sure they had what they needed, and when that was okayed, the would withdraw the needle, and the procedure would be over. She said the machine, which was like an auxiliary unit on wheels, makes a lot of noise and some strange clicking and popping and they would let me know before an exceptionally loud pop would take place. She placed her right hand behind my left shoulder as if to brace me to show me how they would let prepare me and tell me that the pop was about to happen.

Sarah gave me the gown to wear in place of my blouse. I asked for a ladies room, and she directed me around the corner. I sent a final text to Leslie in the car, telling him that I was in the ladies room, then back to the changing room to get ready for the biopsy.

I got back to the changing room, got changed, and saw the bag of cheddar bunnies in my handbag. It was mid-morning and that’s my hungry time of day. I contemplated the cheddar bunnies, but decided against it, even though I really, really wanted some.

A nice lady named MaryBeth opened the door of the mammogram room to check on my progress. She said they were getting everything ready and that the radiologist would be in to speak to me. She asked me where I lived, and said that she lived nearby and at one time her husband worked for the police department for 20 years, but he was retired. Typical small-town conversations of total strangers making connections.

The radiologist came in, a nice doctor named Eric, and he told me they were going to be taking a needle biopsy to obtain calcifications to determine if I had DCIS. He told me that it stood for Ductal Carcinoma In Situ. All I heard was the word carcinoma.

He left, and I went into the mammogram room with Sarah and MaryBeth where they asked me to sit in an exam chair while they got me settled in. MaryBeth decided that the mammogram machine was in the wrong position like the compression would be from right to left, so she changed with machine 180°. Sarah produced a folded sheet which she draped over my lap in case I got cold, and a large absorbent pad across my lap in case there was bleeding. I thought it was an unusually large pad. They wheeled me up to the mammogram machine which was the elephant in the room, sitting there like a giant vice-grip, with a unit like an ice chest on wheels attached to it with electronic connections. The chair was a bit wobbly, and I thought, “Great, I’m in a wobble chair while part of my body will the clamped immobile.”

I was positioned; they took a view. It wasn’t adequate, so they repositioned me.

Another view, inadequate, and another repositioning. MaryBeth stepped on the footcontrol which increased or decreased the pressure, inadvertently increasing the pressure. I winced; she decreased and apologized. They demonstrated with loud popping which sounded like the cork on a champagne bottle popping out.

I noticed during the periods where the device was clamped on that there was a digital gauge in my near vision that was turned to my left, perhaps so that a person monitoring on the left side of the machine could view it. I couldn’t take a deep breath and I wanted to yawn but I couldn’t get enough air in my lungs. The part of the gauge that I could see said 9; when I breathed in and expanded my chest, it went to 10 or higher. The tiny words read something about pounds of pressure. So I figured that I had been compressed with approximately 10 pounds of pressure. I experimented with breathing in and out and watched the numbers change.

Another view, perhaps okay. They asked me to state my name, date of birth, and the location where the needle device would go in. I stated my name, date of birth, and “left lateral”. They called the radiologist. He came in the room, and I was able to turn my head to the right just enough to see him at the computer station. He said it was the wrong location for entry and to reset to the opposite side of the breast. He left the room. Nice Sarah asked me if he had actually come over to look at the location. I said that he had not.

They had to unclamp me, push the chair back, reposition the machine 180°, and start the process all over again. At one point I heard the word “lavage”. During the re-clamping, I realized that they had to be really precise and they were very serious. Another woman came into the room to make sure another computer gauge was set properly.

The radiologist came back in the room, approved the location, and started the procedure. They were going to go in at a 8 o’clock position to get to the site at a 6 o’clock position. I was sterilized at that area and the injection site was marked.

This is my impression of what happened. MaryBeth showed me on the machine where I could place my left hand to get a grip.

I was injected with two injections of numbing solution, then the radiologist made a cut in the skin for the needle to go in, then the big device, as big as a gigantic screwdriver attached to giant water pic, that was attached to the actual mammogram machine in a stationary position was injected, and the process began.

The hollow needle, the thing that’s as big as a gigantic screwdriver was injected. I could feel the pressure and a sensation of the deeper numbing solution being injected. They told me that the machine was going to make a loud pop. It did, and I realized the popping was a pneumatic release to send the needle further in. A horrible sensation of burning warmth flooded the lower side of my breast, like a power washer. Have you ever heard a vacuum cleaner? There was a vacuum feature inside me, also, vibrating and extracting. This was the most intense painful feeling, and someone in the room started moaning. I realized that it was me, and thought perhaps we were nearing the end, because Dr. Eric said this would take about 12 minutes, because really, how much more must this take? I had to exhale another moan and another, and I was counting how many times I was breathing, and I realized I had to get in control, and I remembered that cats purr to make themselves feel better. Once I was working in an exam room with a vet who was examining a cat who had been hit by a car and his skull and body were badly damaged, and the vet recommended euthanasia, and the owner said, “But he’s purring.” They purr to make themselves feel better. I exhaled another breath, trying to make it purr-like, trying to breathe through it, and it took 3 more breaths, which probably sounded like groaning instead of purring. MaryBeth was to my left, patting and rubbing my upper arm to say that it would be over soon, and they were so sorry that this was hurting.

The sample was extracted but the needle had to stay in while the sample was taken next door to pathology to see if they had an actual sample. I waited, still seated and clamped to a machine with a needle injected that I couldn’t have gotten away anyway. I had an image of a still-living butterfly, with pins in its body and wings, pinned to a display board under glass, still breathing and fluttering a bit. I thought I was going to be sick, right in my mask. It was a feeling of sickness, not nausea, not like I’d ever had before. There was a high bright feeling in my upper stomach, and the same feeling went into the back of my throat. I wondered how they would handle someone vomiting in their mask all over the mammogram machine.

It was determined that they had the sample they wanted, and a “clip” was injected to mark the site. The breast surgeon said this was in case they needed to go back in. At that moment, sitting under glass in the chair, I thought if I have breast cancer, I might just have to die with it if the procedures are this painful. They took more mammograms to make sure the clip was in the right spot. It was.

The needle was retracted, and the radiologist left. I was unclamped and wheeled back a bit because they had to reset the machine to take more views. Sarah put surgical tape closures on the mark where the needle went in. I must have looked a bit green, and I told them I might be sick. They reclined my chair back, and I now understood the need for the giant pad across my lap. It was meant to catch any variety of body fluids. Sarah brought me a ginger-ale, and I was genuinely relieved that I hadn’t eaten any cheddar bunnies.

They took 3 more views, and Sarah called Leslie and told him he could be at the front in 5 minutes for pick-up. I wasn’t sure who he would be picking up in five because there was no way I could get dressed and outside in 5 after having part of my breast vacuumed out. She led me outside, and he was waiting in the lobby. He was parked close to the door, and I walked with him out.

*****

The surgeon called 2 days later to say that the biopsy results had come back. He took a breath, and I knew what he was going to say.

I have DCIS, and the surgeon says this is not necessary bad news. It’s stage zero. If it leaves the ducts and enters the breast tissue, it can be considered a higher stage. He said that I would be getting phone calls for appointments from the oncologist and the oncology radiologist and the breast care consultant, and that we would come up with a plan.

He called it pre-cancer, but I still hear that word carcinoma in the description. So it’s off to do some research.

In Which The Girls Get a Workout

Last year I saw the doctor for an annual exam, one of *those* annual exams. He gave me a list of things to do after, like a mammogram and a bone density test.

I did zero of those after things. Covid was becoming A Very Big Deal, and tensions and uncertainty were running high. I said You Know What, I will do that later. I don’t have a family history of breast cancer.

So later became now, and I went to my annual exam, and we talked about those big, weird lumps I get, this time on the right side. In 2012, the lump was on the left, and because I was unemployed with no income except those small unemployment benefits, I qualified for exams based on a grant to cover just those things.

In 2013 I was partially employed, and when I went for my annual, the costs were going to be $800, give or take, and that was only for the physical and pap smear. So here I am without a mammogram since 2012.

I agreed that I would go get all the things: the mammogram, the ultrasound, and the bone density.

During the mammogram, two views were taken of the left and three on the right.

The nice scanner lady used her magic ultrasound device first left, then right. The right ultrasound showed not one, not two, but three cystic lumps, because apparently I am an overachiever in the lump department.

Then she went back to the left side, slowly and carefully looking and scanning again. I thought now won’t this be a surprise if the quiet, unassuming one had the problem. That thought flashed at me like a subliminal message in a movie, the kind that shows an image of popcorn that comes and goes so quickly you don’t even see it but all you can think of is popcorn. I pushed that thought down. I saw the image flash, a message of text like a PowerPoint slide, and even though I couldn’t read all the words, I knew the message.

We finished, the nice scanner lady left, I got dressed, and the nice scanner lady came back in the room and said that they were going to send me upstairs to see the breast surgeon after the bone density test. The mammogram showed some “calcifications” on the lower left side.

I went along and checked in and presented my ID and insurance cards and filled out more of the same paperwork.

The nice technician is was named Elaine. She introduced the nice doctor, who did another exam. He seemed shocked at how lumpy I was on the right.

He started talking about a thing called DCIS and that he wanted me to have a needle biopsy to determine if I have this thing. He said it was appropriate to do this testing to rule out DCIS.

Elaine made arrangements for the needle biopsy at the hospital the following week.

I stopped at Dunkin’ Donuts on the way home and got a medium iced coffee with cream and sugar. Caffeine can contribute to those tendencies for my body to create lumps, and I decided that this was probably my last coffee, ever. I’ve hardly had any coffee since the pandemic started, but I do drink a lot of iced tea.

So let’s kiss the caffeine good-bye and see what happens.

Manns or Batesons

Hello, friends and family, let’s talk about the Manns and the Batesons.

We first learned in 2014 that Leslie has distant Bateson cousins buried in Bonaventure. This news came to us by way of another distant cousin, Julie, in Brussels, Belgium, through a message to me on the ancestry.com’s messaging system.

If ever you have been reading the blog, you will know that the learning about this Bateson family is Savannah has taken a lot of twists and turns. Most recently, someone found me because of the blog.

Her grandmother was Alice Bateson, an orphan of Savannah when her mother Martha Mann Bateson and then her father Thomas Bateson died in the 1870s. Alice Bateson and her sister Georgia grew up, married, and had families and descendants of their own.

Would you expect that an orphan girl would have family keepsakes and photos of her family? I would not expect this.

So the new blog reader, who was named for her great-aunt Georgia Bateson Lengnick, has old photos, including tintypes. I don’t know anything about tintypes but the internet helped me sort out how old these tintypes might be.

The issue is that we don’t know who the tintypes are. I know that Thomas Bateson’s father was deceased before tintypes became a thing. One of the tintypes is a middle-aged man. I’m going to go out on a limb, and guess that the tintypes are not Batesons, but rather the Mann family. There’s a man, a woman, and four other tintypes of children and young people. Daniel and Agnes Mann had 12 children, several who didn’t live to adulthood.

Let’s use the theory that these are tintypes of the Mann family. Someday, somewhere, we might know more conclusively, but I’m going to live in my little fantasy that this is the family of my girl crush, Agnes Reis Mann of Germany and Beaufort, South Carolina.

But that’s not all. Georgia has photos of Thomas and Martha Mann Bateson.

Martha Mann Bateson

Thomas Bateson

Genealogy friends, do not give up. Put yourself out there, and you just might be rewarded.

The Box of Misfits

I think I need more vegetables in my life, but I don’t want to go to the grocery store.

There an ordering site for just such a thing. It’s called https://www.misfitsmarket.com/.

I signed up for the smaller box every two weeks. Every other Saturday starting at 4pm we can build our box out of the available produce. What makes the produce earn the title of Misfit is because it might be too big, too small, or an odd shape. Then you can shop their pantry to add fresh and shelf-stable items.

Among the items I ordered in the first box were 2 green peppers. One was a little lopsided, and the other was a bit too long. The would not stack nicely in a store display. I already had some Seeds of Change rice mix and some Whippoorwill Farms sausage. I sautéed some scallions and mushrooms from the box, added garlic and diced green pepper and sausage and rice mix. Can you tell I’m making stuffed peppers?

At the end of the baking I added some blue cheese as a topping and browned it.

Not pretty but deee-lish

I ordered something called Napa Cabbage which, when steamed, is delectably tender and tasty, and is also good made into slaw.

Two weeks after that, we got this…

I had added Brussels sprouts, mushrooms again, and ginger cookies from the pantry section.

There’s a mango!

A wee pineapple plus winter squashes with friends

Leslie didn’t know how we were going to store all these veggies so he got out an enormous cooler which was purchased for hurricane prep. This was just the thing to store on the porch.

Blueberries and mushrooms from the pantry section

This was a ridiculous amount of food for less than $40, including shipping and the extra pantry items.

The next box was overflowing with greens. I ordered nine different kinds of lettuces, chards, and cabbages. Some of the mixed head lettuce was small. Honestly, some we can’t eat in time, and bits go into the compost. Have you eaten chard? You must. Steam it or chop it to add to pizza or make it a salad ingredient.

Misfits has a blog with recipes and suggestions. One of the suggestions was for apple tart. I found another recipe on the internet that likened their tart to a rustic one that a French grandmother might make “au pif “. Since we’ve been looking at old postcards and letters written in French, let’s try that one. I cheated on the crust. I did go to the grocery and got ready-made pie shells. Let them set out for 2 hours or so until they are softened because you want to be able to fold them. I made 2 tarts.

Slice 3 apples, thinly. You already know to remove the core. Leave the peel if you want. I’ve done it with or without the peel and had good results for both. Toss with 1/3 cup sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 2 tablespoons butter, melted. Pile in the middle of the crust and fold the crust toward the center, making pleats and leaving the middle exposed. Bake in 350 degree oven for 55 minutes.

Eat it right out of the pan.

If you move it to another dish, it might be a disaster but we couldn’t wait for it to cool.

If you try Misfits, keep in mind that some items are too big or small or possibly unripe. For $20ish plus shipping and tax, it’s a good deal, and you are helping eliminate food waste since these items are considered blemished by the supermarkets. You can add those extra pantry item like chips, breads, oat milk, and dozens more. Stay out of the stores. Y’all be safe.

Now don’t you want an apple tart?

The most recent box came Friday, and it’s in the cooler. Lots of greens for good salads, with walnuts and pecans and blue cheese added. I don’t even know what else I ordered. Oh, two kinds of potatoes and two kinds of apples plus d’anjou pears. It’s a whole box of goodness especially when you can’t or don’t garden.

Try them. Use this code https://www.misfitsmarket.com/?promo=COOKWME-IX2UXE and you’ll get $10 off your first box.

Happy eating!

COOKWME-IX2UXE

Did the Chocolates Arrive?

We’re thinking of chocolates that were sent from Switzerland to Savannah, Georgia, about 100 years ago.

You can read more about that HERE.

Nothing would do except to order chocolates, and unbeknownst to me, Leslie did.

There are postcards inside!

This box of beauty is from Amazon.

And y’all? They have Autoship…

And That’s a Wrap

Covid19 vaccinations, that is.

The first one was on 1/26/21. I was on a list submitted by work to a division of a a local hospital. The process was simple: register on site, wait your turn, complete the screening, get a jab, wait 20 minutes for possible reactions, go home. Packaged snacks, canned soft drinks, and bottled water were provided. I was provided with an appointment in 3 weeks.

At the 3 week mark on 2/17/21, oh my goodness. I had an annual exam that morning, and with time in my hands, I arrived a full half hour before the vaccination appointment. The line was snaking around the building. People with walkers and canes and limps inched along. The facility is near a large retirement community, and they were out in force, analyzing the situation and longing for happy hour.

People continued to arrive. I had brought along some knitting.

Knitting steadily here. It was getting cold. There are probably 100 people ahead of me and more in the building.

Near the turn

More paperwork, more screening.

Second jab accomplished! On to better days.

The Goldmine in the Closet: Postcards

I have been encouraged, nay *nagged*, for several months to help a certain someone go through his old photos and arrange them. The plan was to do this when we were quarantined almost a year ago for 10 weeks. This did not happen, and it turns out that saying you would do something if you had the time is simply not true. I had time but not inclination.

We did start a couple of months back during the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays when I had some time. I gathered some small boxes and cardboard trays, the kind that cases of cat food come in. If you do not know what these shallow boxes with no lid looks like, you clearly do not have enough cats.

I assigned a surname to each box. Things were going swimmingly for the first 10 minutes, then we came to some papers. The unnamed party (okay his name is Leslie) refers to his collection as his archives. I’ve considered downloading museum archival quality software, like PastPerfect, to organize this mountain. I have not done so because I was hoping that I could paw through his photos and not have to donate any real effort. But this was not to be. The papers told me so. He had gone through a phase a few years ago where he printed everything he thought he needed to keep, in spite of me telling him that it was going to be on the internet forever. This means we have scraplets of information that might not even be true, because they were written by people, perhaps ordinary bloggers like me, who didn’t really document things. He seemed to be able to sort out the unverified articles from the verified ones, but still, one article might not be 100% documented and what to do about that? Let’s print it and worry about it later.

The early Virginia stuff was the most problematic. Should that go into a surname box or should we just make a Virginia box? He has too many ancestors. We made a Virginia box.

Then he found an old postcard written by an unknown person to his grandmother, Mrs. Lawton. It’s a postcard of a school in Switzerland, Ecole-Foyer des Pleiades sur Vevey.

And it’s in French.

I don’t speak French.

I tried the google translate app, and it is only as good as the user who doesn’t speak, read, or write French.

This calls for the hive mind. I scanned the front and back and put it out there to the Facebook world. I knew that several of my friends were native French speakers, so I messaged them. When I didn’t hear back from them, I posted it to my page.

Do you see how there is writing along the bottom and up the side?

Mrs. Lawton, c/o Mrs. Garrard, 324 Abercorn Street, Savannah, Georgia, U.S.A.

I got several interesting responses. The general consensus was that the writer was familiar with the receiver.

CousinSusan translated what she knew plus sent the images to her friend in France:

It says I am your great aunt and is asking if the young brothers would write

FriendRebeccah contacted her teacher friend:

“Merci chère madame pour vos vœux. Acceptez aussi les nôtres pour vous et toute votre famille. Je m’ennuie? De mes petits Édouard et William. Ed ne sait-il plus écrire? Vous m’aviez maintenant à parler Cliffe? Mieux que les garçons français. Je les ai ? La lettre que vous me promettiez. Bien des amitiés à Ed et William Chargez chère madame ? Les enfants ont ils reçu le chocolat ou s’est-il perdu? “

Thank you for your wishes. Please accept ours for you and all of your family. I miss Edward and William. Does Ed no longer know how to write? (???)Better than French boys (I told them?) the letter that you promised me. All the best to Ed and William – (then typical closing of a letter that is cut off) And the text on the photo = Did the children get the chocolate or was it lost?

FriendSusan offered this:

“Thank you (dear Madame–a tad formal), for your good wishes and please accept ours back to you and your family.” I can’t read the verb, but something like, “I haven’t (forgotten? think of?) your young ones, Edward and William…” something about (not?) writing any more? Something about Cliff being just a boy.

Chantal thinks it says this:

Susan’s translation is pretty good! She thanks the lady she writes to of her “voeux” (meaning I think in this case Happy New Year wishes) and she wishes her the same! The verb hard to read is “Je m’ennuie” – meaning in this case that she misses the two boys mentioned – she calls them “mes petits” (familiar term which could mean her children or grandchildren) and she wishes they would write more  – must be a very old postcard as my grand-mother in France used to write that way!!! ♡

Most people were in agreement that some chocolate was sent, but was it received or lost?

We still don’t know who wrote the postcard. Leslie remembered that his uncles went to boarding school in Switzerland, and there was something in Uncle Edward’s book.

My father favored Switzerland as the best country for an American family to live economically. We settled down for our longest stay at a small hotel overlooking Lac Leman in the little town of Territet, which is a projection of Montreux. Afterwards our parents took us up to an attractive country pension they had discovered above the Vevey-Montreux coast not far from the Chateau de Blonay. The landladies there had a brother, Monsieur Nussbaum, who planned to open a small school in a chalet higher up, on the slope of a mountain called Les Pleiades. He made a good impression on my parents; the result was that my brother and I became his first boarders. Having learned Spanish we were now, aged 8 and 6, to get a thorough grounding in French – or at least spoken French.

So the side of the card says something in closing. “Cordially. M. Nussbaum.” It’s almost off the page. But the receiver knew the sender, and the sender barely had to sign the card, if only to be cordial.

Were the children home in Savannah on holiday? Or did they live in Switzerland any more?

Are these photos of M. Nussbaum and his sisters and Leslie’s grandmother in a blog post I wrote 5 years ago?

And did they receive the chocolate?

The Eight-Pound Bowling Ball

About a month ago, Leslie heard a yowling in the bushes outside his house one evening. He searched under the foliage, but the intruder was gone.

A half hour later, he heard it again, this time by his open front door, and when he went to the door, a cat scampered away. It was not one of his cats, because they were all tucked in for the night.

He set the trap and by morning had caught the trespasser. I told him I could take the cat to my colony.

I say it’s a girl

The issue with a trapped cat on a Thursday evening is that they cannot go to the spay/neuter clinic immediately because there are limited, if any, surgeries since Friday is generally a pick-up, non-surgical day. This cat was going to have to go to the shelter and stay for a few days before his/her surgery on a Monday.

Which is what happened.

The shelter reported that he was ready for pickup on Tuesday and that he seemed calm. Leslie recovered the cat and got him settled into the Jaxpety condo with food and water, bedding, and a large litter box.

He sent me this photo to show that the cat was perfectly calm.

I checked on him that evening after work. He had flipped the litter box on its side, but had eaten all the canned food. He was hiding inside the condo, which, if you remember, is of lightweight construction reinforced by Leslie.

The next morning about 7am he seemed wary. He has wrestled the litter box back into an upright position during the night, and I supposed that he was going to have an adjustment from being free range to confined. But if everyone thought he was calm, then this could work until he became aware of his surroundings, and I could let him go. He might even get along with Jersey or at least be subservient.

He was hiding in the top compartment. When I looked in the little window at him, he took one look at me and stepped to the compartment’s doorway and launched himself at the latched condo door like an eight pound bowling ball shot out of a cannon.

Imagine my surprise when the aluminum sliding latch failed and the door shot open and banged against the side of the shed, and he kept going.

The last I saw of him, he was running for the far side of the fence, bounding like a deer in his escape.

Note to self: do not judge a person’s personality until the sedative has worn off.

Polluters in Our Midst: the Pellet Industry

Soon it will be a year when Sugar and I started quarantining.

To be transparent, he is a self-described recluse, so he stays home day and night except for the occasional excursion to the local feed and seed for birdseed, the grocery for foodstuffs, the Petsmart for dog and cats supplies, and the doctor for himself or the animals. Sounds like a lot but it’s not, considering that we also make online purchases from ChewyDotCom, Misfits Market, Amazon, and Whippoorwill Farms SC.

Being home a lot means that he is aware of his surroundings. His neighbors on one side have regular fiestas with vehicles coming and going, dogs barking, people making noise. His neighbor on the other side is retired but gone a lot; when the neighbor is home, he walks around his yard talking on a cell phone, and the conversation carries. Sometimes people ride four-wheelers along the back of his property, and Sugar goes out and tells them that they are trespassing.

Around the time we quarantined, he was contacted by the Coastal Conservation League regarding a pellet mill close to his house. The mill is on a dirt sideroad about 4 houses away on the other side of a wooded and swampy area, off the beaten path, about as far away as a football field. You wouldn’t know it was there because the only other thing on that little road is a turf farm. People don’t shop in person for turf; you just call up and make an order to be delivered.

It seems that the pellet mill is operating without proper permitting. There’s a thing called the clean air act, and the mill is not complying.

They also got a PPP loan in April 2020 for more than $190,000 as an “aircraft manufacturer”. This seems like a fraudulent description. “Based on their reported 18 jobs retained, this equals an estimated average yearly compensation of $50,709 per employee.”

That man working in the yard at 3:29 on a Saturday afternoon doesn’t look like he’s earning $50,709 a year.

We took a little drive by. We drove past the operation and photographed it on the way back.

Sawdust. That is what you are burning for heat. Sawdust.

The office without a name

We agreed to be interviewed by phone by the Coastal Conservation League and their attorneys. They explained the process and what could happen.

Here’s the intent to sue.

This is scary for me. If my name is reported in these proceedings, could someone try to cause harm to us? How big is this industry? I had a lot of personal worries but decided that this is the right thing to do. I grew up in an area that is located to what became a nuclear facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. So many of my classmates and friends died of cancer. My brother was diagnosed in his fifties with leukemia. I have lupus.

Here’s the write-up in the Post and Courier.

We read up on the harm the pellet industry causes to people and the environment. It turns out that other people in some neighborhoods on the other side of the pellet mill’s road also were tired of the sicknesses and coughs they were having, the noise of the trucks, the debris from the sawdust and pellets, and the odor. The odor is particularly prevalent at night, and when I drove past on my way to work with the car windows open in the early morning hours during the spring after the quarantine was lifted, the smell was thick and acrid and gagging.

The company has been fined and must come into compliance. The fine is small considering what amount could have been decided, but the victory is large. This mill is on the radar, and this sends a message to other pellet mills in the state of South Carolina. The mill chose to not go to court.

Here’s the latest news story dated January 2021.

These pellets are sold overseas to the European market for heating. I’ve seen wood pellets for sale as cat litter with the touted benefit that it breaks down into sawdust. I suppose that is a better use than breathing the fumes of burning pellets, but the volatile organic compounds created and released into the atmosphere poisons more than one person or animal.

What’s in your backyard? And can you do something about it or are you afraid?

The Accidental Comedian

The Butter is an accidental comedian.

All I have to do is take a series of photos, and the jokes write themselves.

In which The.Butter regrets his lack of opposable thumbs, Basil Cowper regrets trying to sleep in on a Sunday.

*****

That time The Butter specifically asked for “vine-ripe tomatoes”…

And Basil Cowper brought home “vine-gar”.

*****

The Butter: “And I told him, you come around here again, and I’ll kick your ass again! I don’t care if you bite my other ear off!”

Basil Cowper: “Umm, Butter? Nobody bit your ear off. You had an ear mite infestation, and you shook your head really hard, and your blood vessels in your ear ruptured and your ear healed all crumpled.”

The Butter: “That’s not how I remember it.” Basil Cowper: “And Butter? Jersey’s right behind you.”

The Butter: “Well, crap.”

Sue: “This scenario seems familiar.”

Sue: “Will our hero persevere? Will good triumph over evil? Which one is good? Which one is evil? Who’s gotten into the catnip?”

*****

Basil Cowper: “Butter, I seem to be stuck here! Can you lend a paw?!”

“Butter? BUTTER, are you there?!”

*****

The Butter: “She told me to get off her counter and I told her to get off my ass.”

The Butter: “I don’t see her. Do you see her? She can’t hear me, right?”

Basil Cowper: “Dude, you’re on your own.”

*****

That time The Butter called a staff meeting, and no one came.

Who knew having The Butter around would be this much fun?