Entry for March 19, 2006

I'm writing this early Sunday morning because I'm not sure if I want to do anything on the house today.
It's been a long and tiring week. On Monday Gin went to Dr. Mathis (Podiatrist) to see if there was something he could do with her toe nails on both big toes. Both had been stepped on by horses on different occasions (years ago) and the nails were pushed up in an arch. He took some x-rays and found the bone tips had turned up and also a growth of scar tissue under neath. The next thing we knew she was scheduled for outpatient surgery to correct the problem. She went in Wednesday morning and all went well with the procedure and we were home by 11 am.
Dr. Mathis gave her a perscription that basically wiped her out . She was also sent home with a new ice cast device that helps with the swelling. The ice cast has a plastic boot with a hose attachment, and a water cooler with a hose to connect to the boot. You fill the cooler with ice and water, then connect the hose and push a start button. The system fills the boot with ice water and also compresses the foot. Technology is great.
Wednsday night was a long one for both of us. Gin was sick over night and pretty restless. Thursday I was going to try to go back to work but with all the running around to do and making sure Gin was comfortable and not having to get up for anything, I skipped out. I was able to keep up with work via email. Friday and Saturday went fairly well. I went to work Friday and set things up for Gin to be able to take care of the basic needs with little or no effort.
Saturday after sleeping most of the morning and making the weekly trip for groceries. I baked a batch of banana muffins and cinimon biscuits, thenI started to work on the Blazer. I was replacing the air conditioner compressor and radiator. It's pretty bad when you loose heating and cooling on the same vehicle. The compressor was easy to replace with no tricky moves. The radiator was also equally easly to replace until I lost a retaining clip for one of the oil cooler lines. It flew off the pipe and into the grass. So I figured I could use my nail magnet stick to retrieve it. I'd spend a little time trying to retrace it's flight path and scan the suspected area. This went on 4 or 5 times with no luck. I kept returning to the task of installing the new radiator and stopping every so often to try the search again. Then I thought, maybe it isn't a steel part. Sure enough, after checking the other clips, it wasNOT made of steel. Abort search! Important lesson here:"Think logically before you act".
I needed to return to the parts store eventually to return the old compressor and get my $10 core charge back. I returned the compressor and found the replacement clips. $13 dollars for a package of 12 clips of assorted sizes. Well my $10 return turned into a $13 dollar loss. The funny thing is the new clips are made of steel, imagine that. All is OK and the lines are all connected and the system is filled with water. The truck starts up and warms up fine and I let it get hot enough to open the thermostat. After that happens I drain the system down and disconnect the upper and lower radiator hoses to empty the remaining old fluids. The next opportunity for meis to figure out how the drain valve works. Of courseI thought of looking at the old radiator and learning it's mechanism prior to fiddling with the new one. NOT! I did it all bass ackwards and nearly broke the new one off. It's working properly and all is well.
I still have one situation I'll fix this morning, the lower hose clamp is in such a difficult location thatI was able to remove it but can't get it back on. It's easy when the plastic fan housing and all the lines are out of the way, but I'm not taking that road. Yes, it's time to get a new tool. I'll hit the hardware store this morning for a new pare of straight nose pliers.
This may actually be a day of rest after I connect that darn hose.
P@
"If women don't find you handsome they should at least find you handy". - Red Green