Down on the Fish Farm

 Because I have, on more than one occasion, presumptuously imposed my own grim healthcare information on the citizens of this village, it seems only right to report that the news arising out of the latest set of labs was very good.

It was clear that BP of 109/69 was positive but the results of the blood work which, if I stop for coffee, sometimes beat me home to the computer, were slow in coming.

Instead, they had a renal pro call to explain that he had been asked to review the case history and was in agreement that a downward spiral that ought to have been explained to me, had pertained for years. He couldn't imagine how my internal guy had managed to overlook the obvious and he had talked to him about it.

Having already submitted that information to somebody like him and been told: "You, my friend, are in a pickle," I wasn't about to argue and the shock and bitterness of being diagnosed, out of the blue, with advanced kidney disease had gone away.

Then, yesterday, the results came through and though there are a couple of numbers that leave a lot of room for improvement, the trend is so positive that my doctor is unwilling to take credit for a successful plan. "It just doesn't work this way," he kept repeating.

I know, one set of numbers is not sufficient to declare a cure particularly for the incurable, but they did their testing twice and I am, after all, a guy who is willing to take yes for an answer. Okay, so nobody, if I tip over from something else, is going to be anxious to harvest my organs and maybe this is a fluke but excuse me if I choose to take the most positive possible view.

So, thanks to you all for your continuing kind thoughts, good wishes and prayers and to MissIve for tugging angrily at the hem of the garment of God. No matter what the future holds, for now, when I am lead through green pastures and beside the still waters, I'm taking an ultralight spinning rod and a can of bait.

Thanks for a great start to this day, Stoney.  You make my usual fifth of Jack seem almost superfluous.   Believe it or not, I am reminded of a story. A guy is dying and he takes his son out for golf with the usual foursome. At the end of the day, he tells the assembled company "friends, I don't know how  much longer I'm going to be with you. I have AIDS." Nobody says much. On the ride home, the son says "Dad, I knew about the cancer, but do you really have AIDS, too?" "Naah, son, it's just cancer, but I don't want any of those guys messing with your mother when I', m gone."

 Willie,

Dark AND funny.

Thanks!

Stoney, you might be referring to my coffee, which is fairly dark and well, funny TASTING. .   BTW, when PeterLake's credtied me with  your comment yesterday, I took it as a compliment. We are in full sunshine down here, but they are calling for a low of 29 on tuesday night. "They" are likely to be wrong, but we know how that goes...  I would gladly wager that there are ten thousand blossoms in my yard today, maybe even 700 Billion.

May good news and good health continue to be with you!  You and Willie T. both gave me a reason to smile as you so often do. Be well, peace out

Georgia is Off Topic, overlook it please, for she is ignorant of fish farming but interested and always, always ready to learn. As John says, You learn something new every day, dont'cha know. 
Stoney, fine fine news, but we both know you gotta keep imbibing liquids; never miss a lab or doc date, 'specially lab. Thanks sincerely for telling us. Hang onto your new doc, who seems to know what he's about. And to CARE.
 
Dark and funny both, yes, Willie, the best combination. There must be another 700 billion blooms in even the yard of this pared-down-into condo, and everywhichway you look they're there, every hue, species, personality. We locals are rushing to get any errands done that require proximity to Washington Road, where The National is, for this weekend They come, and we've long had our routes learned for Masters week.  Helpful signs on I-20 and everywhere in town, and Lord knows those grounds are already breathtaking. We, too, keep being warned of low temperatures, and for the sake of people from the world over who've spend dollars and dollars on accomodations, tickets, parties for The Week I always hope it's wrong.  Usually is, but once it actually snowed (our kind...) on my birthday, March 9, so I'm never surprised; rather, I live in surprise, in wonder at not just that but a thousand other magics.
 
I wrote to y'all, this morning, all over yesterday before finding today, but you'll find it.  Stoney's labs, John's sweetnees (not to be confused with 'saccharine-ness,' no, never), Willie's humor brighten this day already. As does JP's gestalt, no: his vision.

ps I join John in congratulating photo-contest winners. A daunting task it must've been to choose from much talent.  No photog I (husband a darkroon type; I buy the occasional throwaway at Eckerd's), I lack that talent, but deeply appreciate the gifts of others. Thanks JP for the contest.
 
Stoney, I didn't tell you at the time(s), but I not only pulled at the hem of God's garment, I ripped it often. And well. I'm happy for you and your family: Dark news hangs over all, and respite is overdue y'all. 

arghh -- darkrooM.  Big Editor's going toget me. And I've done more editing than I can name...well, you know how that goes, right, Stoney? No: WILLIE!  I continue getting y'all mixed up, a superlative compliment to you both.

big smile for stoney!!!!!  mind over matter might have a little wait to it.
 
 

collective energy can move many.
 
just coming from the mat, the yogini i am, believe that perception is reception.  if your not inclined to perceive the unlimited possibilities that lay before us, how would you ever be available to receive.
 
visual imagery, for me, has the same foundational principles, no matter the application, be it sports to anything you can perceive.
 
they're beaming me back down now........lol......just saying!
 
 

Stoney: why are you renally insufficient? I am interested and would be happy to help in any way I can. If you like send me a personal mesage via this site, or just e-mail me at markswaim@msn.com

Help...can't seem to load photo contest winners.  Advice?

Neptune---I just got a message from the site that it is experiencing technical difficulties today, and that someone is working to fix it.

Ian Anderson the flautist and frontman of Jethro Tull, moved long ago from Aqualung to aquaculture. He has been famously successful for his salmon fish farms in the Scottish highlands. He was an early adapter to this industry, and as of the nineties, if you ate restaurant salmon on the east coast, it was highly likely to have come from his farms.

what's the bottom line? wild or farm? 

i know that there's a definate difference in fresh catfish and farm raised, even pond catfish taste different than out of a river or stream. 

Cuukoo: MY bottom line is SUSHI!

Dear all: I uploaded a video to the site today that is a 50-year-old short documentary, originally shot on 16mm black and white, shot and produced by my father (a cinematographer). I have had it digitally cleaned up frame by frame, and have tweaked the audio to make it less crackly.
 
No one could ever accuse my father on non-originality, and his short film has inspired me to make several short films that have been broadcast.

i like all the different varieties of rice, just not on raw fish.  when i look at raw fish i can't help put wonder if it was someones gold fish.  my husband loves oysters too.

Mark Swaim,

Very subtle: Projector sound. Loved the black and white and inhaled the boozy smell of the deep autumn woods.

Just great.

And thanks for the above offer. I will be in touch privately.

Stoney:
 
I will pass that on to my father, now 73. It'll put a bounce in his stride for a month. He has always been the single most creative and inventive person I have ever known. He grew up professionally drumming for a dance band, and recorded several albums. There was nothing special about his upbringing. He has always been a person sort of like I picture J. Isles to be. I've told him people should pay and admission fee to be in on of his conversations, just because the listeners all end up totally rapt.

Neptune:
 
I uploaded that photo I shot on your land in its form as a magazine cover. The NCMJ editor was a friend and colleague, and I was an unofficially designated cover shooter.
 
I have the negative---somewhere in this house, as well as a larger print; to digitize that, however, I would have to dismantle its frame.
 
The place as tagged isn't right. I don't know how to zero in on exactly where I shot it, though remember where I shot it. Trespassing on your land was bliss and heaven!

To J. Isles: I really really apreciate your recent offer to help me upload pictures. Just after that, however, my computer really began behaving in strange ways, and needed some professional work done on it. Anyway, I meant no "snub" in not getting around to incorporating your help; when I FINALLY got my computer behaving as it should, now flashplayer loads with ease, and down/uploads are not a problem. You have a broad, ubercool, generous character, and I would MOST DEFINITELY like to hang out with you some time 1:1, over a bottle or 3.

I don't know which fish-loving nation I like better: Spain or Japan....Both appreciate the fruit of the sea!  Here's a great and super-simple way to have some fantastic-tasting salmon: Take the fillet, drizzle it with olive oil, lemon juice, and salt, and stick it in the microwave for about eight minutes at a 60% setting (per pound).  It's ready when it's flaky).  Unlike broiling it, you don't get that burnt flavor -- just the fine tasting and very healthy fish... 

my kind of receipe doc.  thank you!

Ditto on the receipe Doc, thanks...love salmon, really love sushi.  

Stoney, may that ultralight spinning rod get a lot of use.  I was hoping to get out today but the weather up here decided otherwise, the creeks were a mass of rushing brown foam and it managed to snow a pitiful wet snow all day.  So if nothing else I appreciated you Southerners here having a beautiful day.  Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and warmer and will be a good day for starting seeds since the creeks will still be brown.
 
Cuukoo, I am a fan of wild fish, particularly salmon.  My cousin worked for a while as a translator for an importer in Russia and would ship some east, but that was before I knew I was getting Ian Anderson's salmon.  Sadly about every fish you catch in the great lake tributaries here have too much mercury in them to be healthy.  The state reg books are full of limitations on what you can eat.  But I dont worry about that, my fly cast scares most fish away anyways.

does anyone have a cook who is able to make trout taste like salmon?
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Greetings:  I will be MIA for a few days due to the monkeys being on "spring break".  Going to take them sailing just a little ways south to Bald Head Island.  It's located at the mouth of the Cape Fear River.  Will sail offshore around Frying Pan (really) tower.  Should have nice weather.    Mark Swaim:  That photo is awesome.  Yeh, I know exactly where that is.  Use to play in that area when I was my boys age.  Thanks much!

Great, todays topic is shipwrecks....

YAYYYYY STONEY!!!!!!!!
I love getting good news!

 Willie, Georgia, cuukoo1, Mark Swaim, unhinged and Olivia,

Thanks all.

And Olivia~

My wife, reporting during a phone conversation with one of our daughters on the condition of an ill friend: "He's on a respirator."

"Make that: ventilator," I suggested.

"Really, you sure?"

"Yes, yes I am."

 

Stoney-Thank you! We haven't invented respirators yet, since that's gas exchange at the cellular level. Some masks are inexplicably referred to as respirators. We use crude positive pressure air-pushing machines with lots of exciting high tech monitors (we like the gadgets-they convince us that what we're doing is cutting edge science) to move gas into and out of patients (ventilation), in a manner which is the opposite of natural ventilation, or negative pressure breathing.
Whoa-deja vu. End of lecture...

Was that, like, off-topic? I'm never sure.

I'm thinking these fish farms aren't yet all they're buttcracked up to be...
Help! I'm obsessed! I'm buttcracking up!

I love these people