Jeremy Herndon Blog

There was an article that I read in the New York Times recently about how to save money on eye care.  I guess there are going to be a lot of articles in the papers (and television news) about how people can save money now that the economy is so bad and not getting any better any time soon! The article was educating the general public about how people really don’t need to have their eyes checked as often as they have been taught to think, and the article was talking about shopping around for deals on eyeglasses.  One of the mistakes many people make is to buy their eyeglasses straight from the little store attached to their eye doctor’s office. Those glasses are always really expensive!  And many insurance plans cover the cost of the exam, but not of the glasses!  I know that’s how MY insurance works!

Mother is happy with the new and improved address plaque that we gave her for her birthday last week. We have been trying to convince her to start looking at alternative address plaques to replace the one that almost cost her her life last year. She was home alone one evening and started having chest pains so thankfully she was able to get to the phone and called 911. She was in such bad shape that she was having trouble talking but with all of today’s technology the emergency operator managed to get the information out of her in order to get an ambulance out and on the road to come to her rescue. But since it was dark and raining and the address signs that are out in front of her house were so old and faded that the ambulance couldn’t read the numbers and had to take extra time, when every minute counts, to turn around and try and read the darn address plaques to find the correct house.

Thank god they found her and got her up and out of there and to the E.R. so that the doctors could tend to her condition. She did have a small minor heart attack and is now having to change her lifestyle drastically and is taking several meds that the doctors have ordered. She seems to be doing much better, as long as she keeps doing what the doctors say she should be just fine for a good long time. So for her birthday we gave her a new sign, as I stated earlier, and now we all can feel a bit more comfortable and sleep a little better at night knowing that if she calls for help again that they won’t have a problem finding her in a timely fashion.

It has been a long time since I have put on a wetsuit and all the other gear that is necessary to enjoy the sport of scuba diving. So when I got an invite to go scuba diving on a weekend of good weather some time in the month of May with a good friend, I decided to drag out all of my scuba equipment to make sure I still had everything and that it is all in good working order. I know that I have put on some weight the last couple of years but I had not idea that I had gained more then my wetsuit could handle safely, so I either have to start dieting and losing weight or start looking around and pricing wetsuits in order to go ahead and enjoy a weekend of fun in the sun and the water with a friend that I don’t get to spend much time with these days.

I should be getting a decent amount of cash back in the next couple of weeks from doing my taxes and I could use some of that money to buy a new wetsuit, but there are so many other things that I really need and want. So I think I should start watching what I eat and get off of my butt and get some more exercise, it seems to be the best idea all the way around.

Every summer my parents took us all down to their summer house for fun in the sun and the river. Those were the days that were the best times for us all and I have thanked my parents a million times for giving us this wonderful opportunity back then. They still own that property, and have actually moved down there permanently, although the log cabin (which my dad always bragged to us that Davey Crockett helped him build it) is long gone and a nice modern house has been built right on the waterfront for them to enjoy all year round with plenty of bedrooms for us to use when we come down for the holidays and family functions when we can travel that far.

We spent most of our childhood summers playing in that wonderful river water, swimming, diving, boating, fishing, water skiing, tubing, crabbing and any other type of water activity that we could think of. The only problem was the darned jellyfish that would come out towards the end of July, all most every year. Getting stung was a real bummer and we would go to great lengths in order not to get stung, but it was inevitable no matter what we did. The only real way not to get stung was to go to the private pool that my folks paid the hefty membership dues for so that we could be in the nettle free water that we so enjoyed whenever possible.

Back in the real world when we were not down there by the river we would nag our parents endlessly to please buy a pool for us and our friends to use in the back yard, but they were not having anything to do with that idea. They really were not interested in finding and purchasing all of the pool supplies and all of the numerous pool accessories that go along with owning, operating and maintaining your own residential pool, besides the liability issues that kids just don’t understand. Instead of a pool in the area that would have been perfect for a pool we ended up with a garden that kept us busy with all the weeding and all the other hard labor that a good sized vegetable garden requires. At least we learned the value of a home garden full of all kinds of wonderful fruits and veggies that we enjoyed all year round thanks to my mother’s large freezer in the basement that was always over flowing with the fruits of our labor.

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