Today I’m expecting the delivery of a new 2TB external Seagate hard drive. Back on August 22, I wrote a post that said I was getting a Western Digital 1TB HD and would be backing up my Lenovo computer before I sent it in for repair. Well, that small WD (Western Digital) HD didn’t work. Instead I backed up everything to the wireless Black Armor 2TB HD I’ve used for years. Since I didn’t trust the Black Armor, I also created a slew of thumb drives to get a second backup I could piece together but I didn’t have enough space to copy everything.

When I got my Lenovo computer back, the Black Armor hard drive wasn’t accessible using the Windows 10 version that was re-installed. Thank heavens I had those thumb drives. I’ve limped along but kept trying to think of a way I could get into the old Black Armor. Many of my photos and a lot of extra files were only on that HD.

But a couple days ago, I discovered that my old Viao computer, which we’d left here over the summer, can access the old Black Armor hard drive. I can copy the back ups I made of my computer before it was sent in for repair. All the files are there. (YEAH!)

All I need is a way to transfer the files and photos to my Lenovo computer. That’s where the 2TB Seagate HD drive comes in. I’ll copy from the Black Armor to the new Seagate, and then I’ll move the new Seagate USB HD to the Lenovo. Voilà I should be able to have all the files, including all my photos, on my Lenovo.

Of course I’ll keep an updated backups of the whole Lenovo computer. I’ll ditch the Black Armor. It’ll be wonderful to have an easy way and reliable way to keep backups of everything. No more dozens of small thumb drives. No more inaccessible Black Armor. The new Seagate should be reliable and fast, and with 2TB of space, I should be able to use it for all backups.

Our friends have been doing a lot together but we’ve passed on a lot of the activities. Actually I love being home with John so it hasn’t been a hardship at all. We have enough on our calendar. I have no desire to be constantly on the go.

We went to Shelly and Richard Brook’s for Thanksgiving. They’ve hosted this event for several years but this year it was much smaller than normally. There were only eight of us.

Dinner was really good. Tonight we’re going to have the left-over turkey Shelly sent home with us. It was really good! We had contributed a large dish of from-scratch dressing. It really turned out much better than we could have hoped.

It was a fun evening.

Yesterday I suggested something to John that I think surprised him.

John needs a lung transplant. At 78 he’s considered too old for the procedure. It’s reported that younger recipients do better and therefore the older patients aren’t considered.

My suggestion: if I’m compatible I’d donate one of my lungs to him.

After reading up on the topic, I found that in order for a living donor to donate, there need to be two donors who are matches. Each would contribute half a lobe.

So let’s say I could do it and one of John’s siblings or children would contribute. His survival would still be risky and according to statistics 40% of those with transplants die within the first two years. (Note: It’s also a risk to the donor.)

Looks like I just need to take good care of him because I’m sure he’ll survive longer than two years with the lung function he has left.

Yesterday I did a blog post covering our time here in Florida since arriving October 15th. (It’s below.)

You will notice that I skipped the election results.

As I said on Facebook, “I’m sad and frightened. Our landscape with a ‘wall’ will obstruct the view I had of freedom.)

I can’t see someone with Trump’s personality in charge of our country. Hopefully he’ll surprise me.

John was for Trump (or more accurately, he didn’t want Hillary). I was a Clinton supporter (but actually I didn’t like her but didn’t want Trump under any circumstance.)

We were gentle with each other. We both had reservations after the outcome was announced.

I’m very fearful. Trump’s finger on the button alarms me.

I don’t look at the election as a victory for Trump. I think of it as a loss for the nation.

I was in a massive funk Wednesday. But it didn’t take long to realize that I can’t give in to the emotions I felt immediately after the election. John’s health is too fragile and being “down” would hurt him. John needs to live in the presence of an upbeat attitude and I will do the best I can to be supportive and show hope. Negativity is not going to help anything and it would definitely impact my husband’s health.

I’m still disappointed, but I’m avoiding critiques of the situation we find ourselves in. I’m concentrating on helping John and making our lives as great as possible.

We’re enjoying our leisure time here in Kings Point. Not that we have had a lot of leisure. John’s been going to doctors since he arrived which is helping him have a better understanding of his health condition.

October 26th he had an appointment with his primary care physician who basically said that he’s doing as good as he can expect. He’ll see John again in March or April.

November 2nd, he went to a new pulmonologist at the University of South Florida. He assessed John’s situation and put him on another medicine which is intended to keep his lungs from deteriorating. It may have side effects so we’re holding our breaths.

Wednesday of this week, on the 9th, went to Brandon to meet with his cardiologist. The best part of the past month medically was that he was told that he probably no longer suffers from congestive heart failure so he is now off a couple of his medications. One was lowering his blood pressure to dangerous levels, so he will probably feel more secure when standing up and walking. The low blood pressure was causing him dizziness.

Wednesday he also went to University of South Florida in Tampa for a chest CT scan.

Since June, John had been trying to get a portable oxygen concentrator from his oxygen provider (Lincare). I can’t begin to tell you how much time we spent calling Lincare, evaluating different units on line, and talking with sales people on the phone.

A couple weeks ago Lincare finally delivered a portable concentrator but it was heavy and bulky. After all that waiting, he returned it. That unit wouldn’t work for him. It wasn’t sensitive enough. If he breathed through his mouth, no oxygen was generated.

He had been checking on a unit made by Inogen. He ended up buying one (with our money). It was an expensive purchase but has a 30-day return policy with a “rental” provision. We’ll probably rent it for a month and return it so he can get most of his $$ back. Hopefully he’ll eventually get a similar unit from Lincare (same low weight and other provisions under a different model name. (If Lincare supplies it, Medicare will pay for it.)

The portable concentrator frees him to do a lot more than he can do when hauling heavy, bulky tanks. The concentrator does require batteries that last only about 2 1/2 hours each but he has three of them so he could get by on them for 7 1/2 hours. (With the car battery charger, he can charge while driving.)

The oxygen generator wasn’t the only big item we needed to spend money on this month. When we got down here our golf cart wouldn’t charge. We finally worked with the cart repair places and got it charging but we could see that the batteries weren’t really up-to-snuff, so we shopped for another golf cart. We ended up buying a custom Club Car with a large (fast) engine, a rear seat, fancy side curtains, and all the bells and whistles we felt we’d like.

We took delivery Tuesday. There are a few items that still need to be finished or replaced: side curtains aren’t done (so they put a temporary top with sides on it), seats are the wrong style (we ordered shaped seats, and got regular bench seats) and the pin-stripe/decorating guy hasn’t done the fancy stuff yet to make it even prettier. It has a red body with black trim, black with gray and red strip seats and the side curtains will also be black with gray and red stripes. The top is black. On the cherry red, the black and gold pin stripes, will look great when it all comes together.

On Monday, before we got the new cart, we were driving our old one to town and a lady in her golf cart turned into us. We were totally innocent so she paid for all damages. Since our tie-rod was broken, the cart had to be hauled to the place where we were getting our new one. The old one had $300 damage. I’m sure it’s been fixed and someone is enjoying it. Thank heavens the new one was on order so we could get it quickly.

Let’s see, what fun stuff has happened since we’ve been down here?

We attended the Michigan Club Welcome Back Party and a Baby Boomers Halloween Party. We went to an Oldies but Goodies Dance with a great band, Lattitude. November 4th, I went with about 20 girlfriends to a 75th birthday luncheon for friend, Judy Reintsema.

Three times, we’ve attended country couples hour on Thursdays before Rockin Rendezvous at the clubhouse.

So that’s a review of our past 27 days here in paradise.