Quick Update on Suzy and Jerry

We are still amazed at the wonderful support from you folks out there, and the support we are finding here in our extended family community at this SKP Saguaro Co-op park in Benson, Arizona! We've even picked up more Followers than I can count, much less find room for putting their names in this post! Welcome all of you, and thanks for being with us.

So how is Suzy doing? Splendidly. She's eleven days out of surgery, all the six entry points for the laparoscopy are healing well. She is currently still on all liquids, this week three protein "shakes" a day plus all the water, CrystalLite, and hot herbal tea she can drink (at least a half-gallon a day is required, but she's way beyond that). It all has to be taken slowly, a sip at a time, because her tiny stomach is still healing from the surgery.

The protein shakes are from 8 to 12 ounces, they are absolutely delicious (especially after the vile stuff she had to drink last week!) in chocolate and vanilla. Other flavors are available, but not as readily. For additional variety, she adds in neat sugar-free flavorings made by Watkins and available in the spice section at WalMart. What flavors? Well, so far she has tried cherry, raspberry, cinnamon, peanut butter, root beer, almond and coconut. If you take a chocolate protein shake (available from Costco or WalMart) and add coconut and almond flavorings, you have an Almond Joy bar! With peanut butter you can approximate a Reese's peanut butter cup. Root Beer Float! Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream! Dream up your own combinations and have at it.

Next Tuesday, she will eliminate one of the three daily shakes and replace it with --- half a scrambled egg! (Have you ever tried scrambling half an egg? Which half do you use?) Instructions are to take tiny little bites, chew the heck out of them before swallowing. And she may not be able to eat the whole thing, believe it or not. This will go on for a week, and then she can graduate to a variety: a quarter cup a day of one food such as tuna fish slightly moistened with mayonnaise, cottage cheese, canned chicken, tofu, yogurt, lentil soup, even string cheese! Yay!

Suzy still needs to increase her activity, especially walking, and we are working on that, but walking has been difficult for her for years, so it's a slow go.

As for Jerry -- Thursday I was elected Secretary for the park's Board of Directors. It was kind of a shoo-in, as no one else wanted the job. The outgoing Secretary was working many hours a day on it, and I expect to do no less, as this is easily the hardest and most demanding of all jobs on the Board, more so than even the President's job. I'll have to be the detail guy, the "go to" person for policy, procedure, notifications, the tough letters to write -- and the one who must not let anything fall through the cracks. I've been preparing for this for a few weeks, so perhaps you understand why you won't be seeing much from ... Our Life on Wheels.