Dudleys Diary

If you save the animated Gif below to your hard drive and then set it as the back ground on your desk top in the tile mode, it makes a cool animated screen saver. I know Dudley is easily amused.

Dudleys daughter Lizzie got her first real job today at a local Pizza Parlor. She has been looking for a job all summer at local fast food places and had put in a bunch of applications without any luck. She is 16 with no real job experience other than baby sitting. She is excited about the new job as are we. She starts her training tomorrow. Not sure yet how many hours she will be working or how much she will make but the experience will be the main thing. Hopefully she will be able to continue working part time after school starts next month. She is looking forward to having a little more spending money for gas and clothes and such. Dudleys baby girl is growing up, It was bound to happen but the thought of her doing so makes Dudley a little sad.

it is called SlingShot Thought and is where you will find Geology Joe. He has a nice blog and he and his wife are expecting their first child, a boy. They are currently agonizing over the decision to circumcise or not to circumcise? He is asking his readers to vote in an online poll presumably to help them make the big decision. Please go by and check out his blog, leave a comment and be sure to vote.

the big news is that Dudleys daughter will be home sometime later today. We can't wait to see her and hear all about her trip to Chicago, Michigan and Saint Louis Missouri. I hope she took some photos. We have not spoken to her in over a week and are anxiously awaiting her return. Last night, Frank and Dudley watched the UFC fights on Spike T.V. There were some pretty good fights and the best part is watching was free, not the usual Pay Per View. In the last fight, there was a brutal knockout by a high leg kick to the opponents neck. Dudley used to enjoy watching boxing but it seems the best fighters are in MMA these days. It seems there is trouble in paradise. Dudley heard on the news this local swimming hole voluntarily closed after an outbreak of Crypto. Sounds like some nasty stuff. The health department is currently running tests to try and verify the source of the outbreak. The Texas Rangers have gotten their ass kicked the last two days by the Minnesota Twins, hopefully the Rangers will win today and avoid being swept in the series. Frank took the Jeep to get it inspected last Friday afternoon and came home mad because they failed it due to the high beam indicator light being out. I wonder if this is something new they just started checking. I don't think that light has worked in over ten years and that never kept it from passing inspection before. they also tried to say the Jeep has an exhaust leak. I have my doubts about that. I think they are just trying to drum up some business for the mechanics in the shop. Frank is going to take the Jeep on Monday to a different place for a second try at getting the Jeep inspected. Dudley will cross his fingers, hopefully it will pass the second time around.

this week. Dudleys daughter is still in Michigan with the youth group from our church. Dudleys son is still mowing 20 to 25 yards each day in the wonderful Texas heat. Dudleys wife is having to deal with a failed program at work that that those in charge spent untold millions of dollars on and her and her co workers are scrambling trying to clean up the mess while those in charge are scrambling trying to cover their asses. Reminds Dudley that there are advantages to being retired. Yesterday, Dudley went by his barber shop but he did not need a haircut. Dudley had told his barber about the place in northeast Texas he and Frank went for a vacation last month and he had said he might want to take his grandson up there for a little R & R. So Dudley printed him a brochure and took it by and dropped it off. Yesterday afternoon, we got some much needed rain, Dudley and dog went out and sat on the front porch and watched it rain for about fifteen minutes. It was nice while it lasted. We sure could use some more rain though. Yesterday a lady with the medical supply company called and asked how the new bipap machine was working for me. I told her not too well, I advised the machine was wanting me to take breaths to quickly and that the doctor had prescribed me sleeping medication to try and get used to the machine. She told me that she could talk me through changing the settings on the machine over the phone. I had her call me back on the cell phone and put her on the speaker and she told me how to unlock the machine and change the rise time. I changed it from 3 to 6 and she told me she would call and check with me today. Last night I tried to go to sleep and quickly figured out I was having more trouble than before. So Dudley got up and unlocked the machine and saw that the rise time could be set from 1 to 6, it initially was on 3 and 6 was worse so Dudley went the other way and lowered the setting to 1. It worked like a charm, Dudley slept much better last night than he has been sleeping. I do think this new machine is allowing Dudley to sleep much deeper than he has the last several years on the old machine. The reason I think so is Dudley has been having some really weird dreams since using the new machine. Perhaps Dudley will finally sleep better and he can only hope actually feel a little better for a change. Just don't tell Dudleys neurologist as he would no doubt have a fit if he knew Dudley had the key to the castle ie the unlock code for his new breathing machine.

for him to call me. I got my new Bipap machine last week and have not been able to sleep very well at all. The damn machine won't let me breathe when I want to. I will try to take a breath and it will cut me off, when I want to breath in it wants me to breath out and vice versa. After a couple of nights of fit full tossing and turning and fighting the machine, I gave up and went back to using my old Bipap machine and oxygen concentrator. The doctor called me back within an hour and I told him that I was not doing well at all on the new machine. I got the impression from the doctor that if we don't figure this out, Dudley might better start working on his Bucket List before too long. The doctor said that perhaps I needed to take a couple of sleeping pills to help me tolerate and get used to the new machine. I did take two sleeping aids as he called them at the sleep clinic and he said I slept over seven hours, and went through all of the stages of sleep you are supposed to and that my oxygen levels were good during the test without the supplemental oxygen. So I agreed to try the sleeping pills to see if this will enable me to use this new machine. I do not like the idea of taking sleeping pills to sleep but the doctor flat out told me I will live longer using this new machine than the old one. I do trust this neurologist, I have been going to him for years, he is a very smart man, and he suffers from the same form of Muscular Dystrophy that I have been diagnosed with. If anyone can understand what I have to deal with on a daily basis, I think he certainly is well qualified to that task. Dudley will just keep on fighting , that is what he has always done. Frank took Dudley for a ride in his old Jeep CJ-5 today. It was fun to ride around and feel the wind through Dudleys hair. We are getting ready to watch the Home Run Derby. Good Luck Josh Hamilton! Go Rangers!