Hey Frank,
I hope you are doing well. Those darned things were in my eye, and half my head. When I got home, the next morning I went to my friend, a doctor, she immediately sent me to the best opthamalogist in town, he thought I had an infection in my brain, and sent me to the hospital for tests. They told me 'You're OK, you can leave' the next day the blisters start to appear, less than a week later I'm diagnosed with Hutchinson's disease. I'm pretty ticked off at that hospital, as Hutchinson's can be fatal or cause blindness, without treatment, that is the infectious disease the eye doctor was concerned about. I've been going to the VA medical center, and they found some stuff that the hospital wouldn't look for, but, there is no right hand column on the menu for me at the VA, they can spend all they want. One of my doctors there told me she could make me the million dollar man with my rating. I don't know if she was joking or serious, but they sure have been taking care of me. At least I got something from Uncle Sam. Well, the VA is better equipt to deal with problems that are a result of service environments, and are specific to veterans, I feel pretty lucky with that, should have gone there first, a steriod shot early would have made a great difference. I'll know better in the future. I'm gaining weight, feeling better, and can see to read and drive, that is a pretty significant improvement in view that I got this stuff last August. I don't have an immediate family, just parents and siblings. I guess the closest thing is Nikki, she has been on and off for about 25 years, kids have always been a problem for us, I say yeah, she says no, but after I turned 50, 5 years ago, that became less of a problem, who wants to raise teenagers in retirement. But, she is OK for a city gal, she don't like tractors, country living or anything like that. I did take her to one tractor show, big mistake, ruined the show for me, they can be that way. She would rather go to the mall and do the touchy feely thing with everything in the stores, I don't care at all for that. I go to the shows, she stays at her house and goes to the mall, we get along better that way. Ya gotta know your limitations. My closest brother joined and was elected as our chapter President, he is pretty well educated, got a bachelors in engineering, and a Juris Doctorate specializing in patent law. But he justs like to tinker. I have him working on trademarking our name, logo, and magazine, all we will have to pay for is filing fees. Jim is taking an enormous interest in our association, asking me everything under the sun about Oliver, Hart-Parr, etc. I'm pretty happy with the interest Jim is showing. But, I didn't know much about Oliver when I joined either. It just wasn't a very good tractor for our terrain, too big. It was the crawlers that went big around here, for use on the hills, and those little 8N fords, with the pick up implements for the small fields. I farm 18 acres of soybeans, folk around here think that is huge. I guess most flat land is around 4 or 5 acre fields, it takes alot of those to do anything. I'm interested in a southern show for winter some time, some place like Louisiana, or Mississippi, I don't know if there are any. That show in Florida went pretty well, I enjoyed that kind of winter weather. One year I lived south of New Orleans, but I don't remember any shows, lots of festivals though, I liked the crawfish festival in Breaux Bridge. I just wonder about a winter show in Arcadiana, well, probably wishful thinking. Yeah, when you don't get bad sick and then you do, I'd call that a rude awakening, it certainly changes your perspective!
Take care!
Andy