charliedoggett.net
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| Year-around blooming flowers for my terrace rocking chair view. |
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| And behind my terrace planters are three layers of plants in my yard and another in the neighbor’s. Soon we will be separated by a jungle! 🙂 One of the round pots I moved from inside because of a lack of sun there. The other had ornamental grass which I will replace with something green. Like my garden, the yard and terrace are always a work in progress! And my poinsettias are still blooming to the right at terrace entrance! |
The Standard First Level Treatment
She gave a diuretic to take for 10 days to see if that would reduce the foot inflammation. It did not.
(Side Note on Heel Spur)
You may have caught my earlier report on bone spurs in both heels but hurting only in the right one. This was taken care of by me stopping my 8 month habit of walking all over town in nothing but sandals. (Like walking barefoot!) I now wear tennis shoes, hikers, or regular shoes with a gel orthopedic insert in the heel. Absolutely no pain or problem now from the bone spur! And two doctors now say my new problem is in no way related except for being in the foot! 🙂
Complete Physical
Dr. Candy, my primary care doc, is very thorough and systematic and said it was time for a complete physical with an EKG because she now thinks the problem is circulatory. And I may have done a post on going to the Atenas Laboratorio Clinico for the blood and urine analysis. I walk these reports back to Dr. Candy and she says everything is normal or healthy including blood pressure EXCEPT that the EKG shows an arrhythmia which she thought she heard when listening to my heart. She emailed the EKG to the cardiologist in San Jose she works with and that doc wants me to come in and get wired with a 24-hour heart monitor.
24-Hour Heart Monitor
That was done last Thursday and Friday for my first two bus trips to San Jose and only saw a nurse to be hooked up and then uninstalled. Today I went back for the cardiologist to give me her evaluation. (Note that with a female primary care I’m being sent to female specialists! 🙂 Dr. Bouzid is so good, professional, thorough and explains everything so I can understand it! In English! Thank goodness! I’m slowly improving with my Spanish but not ready for this! She is a part of CIMA, arguably the best private hospital in Costa Rica. My private insurance covers everything after the first $300 which I reached today only when the ultrasound was added! Wow! medical costs are so much less expensive here! And when I get the CAJA, free! And by the way, some people come here from the states for cardiology including heart surgery. They call it “Health Tourism.”
The reason for 24-hour EKG basically is that it shows my real life and not just a couple of minutes in a doc’s office. I do have Heart Arrhythmia as shown in these two contrasting clips from the 24 hours:
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| This is a fairly regular rhythm which is good – what we want. |
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| This one shows the irregular rhythm and other pages were worse. |
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| This is actually 5 photos taped to a sheet of paper. Ultrasound of my heart today. Whatever it means. |
More Blood Tests
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| 🙂 Well, a different kind of rhythm! 🙂 But you should know that they celebrate Elvis’ birthday here! And most Ticos have lots of rhythm! And love music! |
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| Dinnertime view from my terrace reminds me of the mountains Psalm . . . |
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Tomorrow night (Tues) I will give you a report on my physical and cardiologist visit which is in the morning. (I’m writing/posting this Monday night.) Pura Vida! -Charlie
The CDC Website basically says that for Costa Rica travel you should just be up-to-date with your regular vaccines just as you would in the states. The most common diseases for tourists to get here are the sexually transmitted diseases, so simply avoid that kind of tourism! 🙂
It is interesting that our neighbor Panama is on the Zika no-travel list above and have had many more cases of dengue. And somehow North Americans think Panama is more developed than Costa Rica! Take note if considering Panama for retirement instead of Costa Rica! 🙂
PURA VIDA!
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| A miniature version of the 30-chair line at Banco Nacional. It has been a line of standing which is hard for some old people, I guess! For every transaction the clerk goes back to his/her desk to enter it into a computer, even the purchase of postage for a letter. Can’t get stamps here, they print a postage strip and stick it on each letter. Sloooow! Like the bank, when next person is served, you all move up one chair. |
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| Millipede He comes looking for water, But dries up and dies. I sweep him out the next day. Almost every day. |
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| It will soon be a flowering hedge |
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| From my kitchen window |
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| Nice! |
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| Reminds me of a very large tick, but I don’t think so. 6 legs = insect! Please Comment if you know its name. |
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| A different view, both shots on my terrace table. |
I love insects. They are amazing.~Andrea Arnold
I did what I thought was pretty radical pruning of the overgrown giant Porter Weeds and some of the Overgrown Red Ginger. But my “TuttiFruti,” which had been my most colorful plant, was apparently dying. So the gardeners cut it to the ground which I would have had trouble doing, though we had been pruning it some. They also sprayed for a leaf-eating insect. If it does not come back healthy, we will pull it and plant something different on my border. But we will probably have nothing blooming along the border when Reagan visits in just 4 weeks. Sorry Reagan! Though plants fool you here and some grow really fast!
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| The colorful border (inset photo) was dying, maybe insects for which he sprayed, but it is cut to ground now, hoping for a beautiful renewal or revival. If not, I’ll get a different border. But waiting is hard! 🙂 |
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| Even without the border and the heavy pruning, the garden looks okay. The Red Ginger and Purple Petunias will always bloom, even when cut. And also the Plumbago, though it blooms on new growth, so cutting it back diminishes blooms briefly. And though not seen above, I am getting new blooms on my Heliconias as seen in below photos. |
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| The tall plant in the back of garden photo above is where this large Heliconia sports 4 blooms right now! This is the biggest of the four. |
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| This smaller Heliconia by my kitchen window also has several blooms. The other plants like it have red and orange blooms but are dormant now. |
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| I cut back the two big Porterweeds the hummingbirds love, BUT I still have one smaller plant blooming and attracting hummers! Though the hummingbirds are mainly in the Yellow Bell Trees now. And very few butterflies are around this time of year. May-July was the most butterflies last year. |
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| The TriqueTraque or Orange Trumpet Vine has not done well, but now that I started feeding it fertilizer I’m seeing it grow a little and getting a few flowers, so there is still hope that it will cover that big massive concrete wall in time! That’s my goal! |
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| The Maraca blooms at the base of a very tall plant. |
Also once my Planta Maraca or Shampoo Ginger gets established, I expect to regularly have more blooms, which is more exotic to me than the heliconias! And every time we trim the Blumbago it shoots out new growth with lots of blooms, so everything will have its ups and downs but as I wanted, something is blooming year-aroung, all the time! And it is fun to watch it change, though I have learned (what I really already knew), that maintaining a garden this big and a yard with lots of flowers is a lot of work, even with a hired gardener a couple of times a month! And for any reader living here, my most constant and prolific bloomers have been the Red Ginger and Purple Petunias. And I still don’t have all the Spanish names for these flowers and that sometimes that changes depending on who I talk to or which website I check! 🙂
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| Last night on wall in my bathroom. I left him there. |
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| This morning he had moved to my bath towel. I removed him before my shower. 🙂 |
“Matchstick” is not a conclusive identification, but the closest I could find online. He is not in my books. There is also a “Stick Insect” in the dry savannas of Guanacaste, but they aren’t suppose to live here and in photos they seem to have skinnier bodies. And I don’t think it is a spider. Anyone who really knows what it is, please contact me, charlie@charliedoggett.net.
Emailed from Kevin Hunter:
It’s a spider – 8 legs
Insects have 6 legs
If you want to live and thrive, let the spider run alive.
~American Quaker Saying
and separate gallery of Costa Rica Butterflies & Moths