Turkey tails on a log


We drove to Clark's Creek again today. It is a beautiful place this time of year, but there was barely water in the stream. Didn't get many decent pics, but it was still worth the short trip down there.
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My mind is a bit more peaceful since the election. All we can do now is cross our fingers and hope for the best. Just a couple more months and President Dick Cheney and his mouthpiece—George W. Bush—will be a good lesson in bad history.
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Now, I'm going to go look at some photos on Flickr ...
Have a good evening everyone!

One Fine Day

Unaka Mountain Beauty Spot


After yesterday's election slaughter, one might think it is time for this nation to heal old wounds and move on as a leading partner in the free world. I hope the new government will act wisely (snicker) and use its power of checks-and-balances to benefit the people of America and the world without any party ideologies or lobbyist $influences$ (LOL!) in setting legislative agendas.
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Tennessee is still safely redneck and Republican along with most of its Old South neighbors. I am proud that Florida and Virginia seceded from the hard core Bible-belt conservatism that has strangled and driven this country into the disgraceful status it now "enjoys". North Carolina is also leaning toward Obama, but as I write this it is too close to call. At least the hateful Dole woman got her ass and her hat handed to her! She can go back to her real home in D.C. with her loser husband.
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Carolyn has gone to the hair dresser and on to the grocery store. She will wind up beautiful and flat broke.
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I dread to see the holiday season begin; everything is so expensive. I expect we shall have hamburger meat at Thanksgiving this year due to the financial crisis that is affecting us and a lot of other people. Last year we had to forgo turkey (which we really don't care much about anyway) for a pot roast that we already had in the freezer. It was delicious with dressing and cranberry sauce, candied sweet potatoes, green beans, and other goodies. Meat isn't necessary anyway; Carolyn is a great cook and makes the best potato salad and baked beans I've ever eaten. She also makes a super-good meat loaf and her own macaroni and cheese dish. The only thing I give thanks for during the holidays is that every day is another day closer to springtime! For all the other good things in my life—especially people—I am thankful everyday.
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Carolyn made vegetable soup yesterday, along with a big skillet of cornbread. It was perfect, even in the warm weather we are enjoying! There is enough left for us to have today, and I am heading to the kitchen!
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Life is good when one has a reason for optimism!

Willow Springs Park


I'm so excited! I happened to go out on an errand this morning and I happened to drive by my polling place and I happened to glance in and I happened to see a fairly long line of pilgrims lined up to vote. If I had happened to vote, it would probably taken no more than 48 minutes in line. A happening, fer shur!

Upon my return home, I read where a couple of very small towns in New England had gone to Obama in a landslide. The last two times these villages voted Democratic, the Democrats lost the red state-blue state election.

Snow on Unaka


Tennessee football head coach Phillip Fulmer was fired from the University of Tennessee today.

I hope the nation will follow this by firing the Republican Party from Washington DC. Fulmer was dismissed for taking high school All-American players and turning them into a mediocre (that is being generous) football squad. The Republican Party has taken all of America and turned it into a financial and diplomatic wreck.
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I was a little leery about going into the mountains last Saturday for photo making. The woods on the Limestone Cove side were full of hunters, and we didn't have a thing with loud colors to wear. These fellows have been known to shoot each other even when they are covered in blaze orange.
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I read where a woman was wounded by a rifle bullet falling from the sky while she was inside her motor home at yesterday's NASCAR race in Texas. The shot was probably fired into the air by an NRA member or supporter!
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I received an email from moveon.org explaining why I should vote for Obama in a state that is obviously Republican. Following is one of the reasons:

People died so you'd have the right to vote. Self-government (by) voting to choose our own leaders is the original American dream. We are heir to a centuries-long struggle for freedom: the American revolution, and the battles to extend the franchise to those without property, to women, to people of color, and to young people. This year, many will still be denied their right to vote. For those of us who have that right, it's precious. If we waste it, we dishonor those who fought for it and those who fight still.

They also fight for the right of "choice"! I have the right to choose not to vote if I don't want to for any or no reason. My dad fought and bled for you and I to have the right of choice, and he never voted in his entire 65 years of life! It is called FREEDOM! You are sounding more and more like what you say you are trying to change. The Republicans use fear tactics and you use shame propaganda! I expect no one to march to the beat of my drum, and I sure as hell am not marching to to anyone else's! Give me an honest candidate whose heart isn't consumed by the greed for power! Give me an honest candidate whose heart is devoted entirely to what is best for the United States of America and not some party ideology, and that candidate will have my honest vote. If I can't trust the person whom will be commander-in-chief, I cannot vote.

I still support Obama on the principle of needed change, but I trust neither candidate.

Buffalo Mountain Park


We went riding yesterday with not much idea of where we wanted to go, so first place we went was Buffalo Mt. park. I got a few decent photos there and we left via the VFW road where the light and colors at Tipton-Haynes Farm were so good I couldn't resist a few shots from the roadway. We left there and ended up atop Unaka Mt. and Pleasant Garden. The view was again obscured by haze, only worse this time than usual, and Johnson City had a thick, brownish looking layer of smog hanging over it, LA style. There was some snow in shaded areas of the mountaintop. We traveled on over to the Beauty Spot, and I walked up the bald to where the Appalachian trail crosses at the TN and NC line. Carolyn has a bad cold and wasn't able to enjoy many of the sights.
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Hope everyone had a happy and safe Halloween. When we first moved into our subdivision 14 years ago, the streets were impassable for close to two hours with outsiders driving their little ones (and not so little ones) here for treats. The neighborhood isn't very large, but the houses are on small lots and close together. The city was threatening to close some of the streets to outside traffic becuase emergency vehicles couldn't get through. The last few years haven't been so crowded on the streets as more and richer subdivisions have sprung up, especially in the north side of town and between Johnson City and Jonesborough.
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This election is about over; I hope! Whomever wins has got to better than what we have now.
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I think I saw Phillip Fulmer filling out his resume in the fourth quarter of last night's massacre in South Carolina.

No matter how many hopes and dreams I have; no matter how high my head is in the clouds; no matter how well I feel; when that little needle pricks one of my arms each Friday, reality manages to sober me from any intoxicated belief that life is good and somehow worth the effort of staying alive. All my years of building a tolerance to pain, all the days of making believe that I am really ok, and all the minutes of self-satisfied perception come crashing down with the stick of a very small needle that most of the time causes me negligible—if any— hurt. The needle prick is just a symbol of what my life has become over the past twenty years. I was once a fairly strong man, even though my mind never was a bastion of fortitude. At 6'5' tall and 220 pounds, I didn't dream of anything I could not accomplish. I didn't have the big, broad shoulders of Joe the Plumber, nor the biceps of Ahnold, but I did have some awesome leg strength, and if someone told me I couldn't do something, I went ahead and did it, not so much to prove them wrong, but to prove to myself that I was a man in control of his body and mind. Doing things I should not have done proved to be my undoing, or at least a big part of it. Then the RA I've had since childhood hit me hard in the late 70's, but I was able to get on with a semi-normal life until about 1987, when I had to have the bottom two knuckles of each finger on my left hand "cleaned out", and a plate implanted in my wrist to strengthen it after having some of the bone removed. Everything went down hill from there until in 1993 I found myself unable to walk without crutches. My hip joints had deteriorated so much that any movement caused great discomfort. In June and December 1994, I had the diseased joints removed and replaced with metal and plastic. In 2001, I had my left knee replaced, and now the right one is in dire straits, and I have a mental problem making myself do anything. Maybe a notion of "doom looms" is the best way to describe how I feel most of the time. You can help me overcome this living dread by voting for Barack Obama for President of the USA!

Happy Birthday!

Sweet William

Happy Birthday, Colleen Marie!
I hope this one isn't quite as traumatic as the last.
My friend, may YOUR day be wonderful!

Watauga River ... Wilbur Impoundment


I don't have a thing to do today, and I plan on doing a lot of it.
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Forgot I had to go to the bank!
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Elizabeth Dole! Shame on you, you hypocritical hussy! You epitomize the glory of Republican politics. The last time George W. Bush shit in the woods, your soul oozed from under a diarrhetic turd! You are the one whom obviously doesn't believe in God! If you did, you know He would kick your scrawny mean spirited ass all the way to Hell! You are a disgrace to American womanhood!
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I didn't watch the Obama infomercial, but I did listen to President Bill Clinton address a large audience in Florida just before an Obama speech. If Hillary hadn't been such an idiot for supporting the attack on Iraq (Bill did too), and if she hadn't gotten into the name calling of the primaries, Bill could have again been in the White House. We damn sure need him.
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If Obama gets elected, I wonder which one will be president; the good honest American we see now, or the mud slinging sleeze bag from the primaries? I am supporting Obama without voting for him, but I still dislike and distrust both he and McCain.

Watauga river



Friday past I wrote about my doctor being ill and canceling my appointment for that day. Today I went to my heart doctor for a quarterly exam, and damned if he didn't call in sick. I feel like Typhoid Mary; shunned by the world!
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In my younger days, I subscribed to Playboy Magazine for many years; only for the brilliant articles, of course. My how times have changed! I now subscribe to Popular Science which has no girly pictures and no articles of interest to a man about town. I read a lot of the articles, but my favorite part is the classified ads. Some offer legitimate products, and some are come-ons disguised for the sale of snake oil. Following are a few snippets that I like from the November '08 issue (italicized words are my thoughts):

• Save the planet with Motorsilk® oil treatment. Save your money by not buying.
  
• Abacus® wrist watch ... has no hands. Hell, why not?! I have a wallet with no money!
  
• The Rouge Wallet® designed for the front pants pocket. Good idea but not at $29.99+.
• Liquid Trust® fuels intimacy! Compels others to trust you! The hormone of love! They should have put a scratch-'n-sniff with the ad.
• Male enlargement: Four to five inches in four to five weeks! How big is big enough? Ladies, don't answer that; it will only embarass me!
• Xomax® for even bigger pricks.
• Athena Pherom♥ne! 10♥13® for women and 10x® for men! This one has been around for many years, but no scratch-'n-sniff samples.
• Invisible Glass® makes glass invisible! Duh!
• Restore libido with Eroxil® Fer shur!

Don't laugh! A lot of these misleading ads sell a lot of crappy merchandise! We are gullabile for a quick fix!
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I wish this election crap would go away. At least Obama's info-ad won't pre-empt Spongebob!

Meanderings

Watauga River, Wilbur impoundment


We've been having snow showers this morning, and the highs today are to be in the mid 40's. There was some overnight accumulation in higher elevations. I just ain't ready for this. Never will be.
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I just noticed this story from the Associated Press: Employees of a Chinese restaurant were caught butchering an American deer in the kitchen of the establishment. The scarfing joint is in Hamburg NY, just south of Buffalo. Chinese? Deer? Hamburg? Buffalo? No telling what else these people served!
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This Presidential election is looking just too good for Obama, so I look for McCain to win by a small margin. If either camp has a big secret on the other one, it will be exposed within the next few days. It has to be revealed late enough that the other side cannot mount an effective defense before election day, but early enough so that it can be the theme for the closing push. Whatever it may be—if there is anything—it doesn't have to be based on pure fact.
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Another AP headline: 6-8 NFL players probed! I hate when that happens to me!
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I see where a pair of redneck neo-Nazi skinheads kids have been arrested for plotting to kill Mr. Obama and other black people. One of them is from Arkansas, and the other from Tennessee. I bet no one saw anything like this coming! I'm surprised it took this long for it to happen. Don't forget, that fine American civic organization called the Ku Klux Klan was originally formed in Tennessee.
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A final thought: Rachel Maddow on her MSNBC show last evening was accusing the Bush administration of trying to start more wars for sending troops across the Iraq-Syria border and killing a terrorist, and killing terrorists inside Pakistan. This seems like a knee-jerk reaction to discredit Republicans (as if Republicans need any more problems). Ms. Maddow, I am a liberal's liberal, and have been so since long before you were born, and I shall not defend the Bush Middle East policies. What I will defend is the right of America to protect itself. Just after 9/11, Bush told the world that any nation whom supported terrorism in any way would face the wrath of the US military. It is probably the only coherent thing he has said in the past eight years, and I agree with him 100 percent. The only thing I disagree with is that he waited so long to do it. We must take the fight to the terrorists, be it in Syria, Pakistan, Jordan, Iran, China, Korea, Russia, Venezuela, or anywhere on the globe. If we don't act and react swiftly and decisively, they will again carry destruction to us and we may not get by as easily as we did with 9/11, as horrible as that was. Ms. Maddow, if you wish for John McCain to be elected president, keep talking nonsense!

I'm Ken Anderson and I approved this message.

More Rambling

Wilbur recreation area


The RA doc and I agreed I was doing pretty well controlling the advance of the malady, so she scheduled me to return for my next checkup in four months instead of the usual three. She is another person whom wants to retire but can't afford to. Her husband has a type of leukemia and will never be able to work again at his practice.
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Saturday was pretty well a do nothing day. I was able to endure Alabama mopping the floors with the Vols for three quarters before going over to watch Spongebob Squarepants. Coach Fulmer and his staff still have the blessings of the Athletic department, and I imagine he has a lifetime job of dispensing mediocrity.
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Yesterday, we went back to Wilbur Dam to see if all the ducks had arrived for winter, but very few have. There were a few mallards and several Canada geese, and I expect some more duck species to arrive within the next two weeks, along with a lot more geese. The small impoundment was down two-to-three feet, and there was no water coming from the Watauga Dam to fill it. The river was low, quiet, and missing all its water just below the dam. We didn't go on up to Watauga lake to see it it was filling, so I don't know what the situation is; just that it is unusual.
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Some of the campers have left the area, but most are still living in their units along the river. I don't know how this all works out, but they pay $10 per day for the campsite and it includes furnished electric and a community shower building with toilet facilities, but last year the toilet was locked for the winter months and no one was allowed to camp. Carolyn found out the toilet was locked the hard way; she needed to use it ... badly!
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After leaving Wilbur, we drove on to Roan Mountain State Park, and up to the old Miller homestead and cemetery. I made a lot of shots at both Wilbur and the farm, but very few that I like; very few.
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Happy Birthday, JJ! Our youngest son is 36 today.

Musings

This year has quickly slipped by ...


Another shot day has rolled around, and I must also see the RA doctor this afternoon for a checkup. I was supposed to see my family doctor for a six month check up this morning, but her office phoned yesterday and said she is ill and postponed me until December. This will make more than a year since I've seen her. My last appointment in April was postponed until now because my doctor was ill. I think I see the light! She checks her appointment list, sees my name and gets sick. I make a lot of people sick.
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I suspect that between McCain and Obama, more than a billion dollars will be spent in purchasing the presidency. Directly or indirectly, this is money that was hard earned by taxpayers, and I don't hear either candidate giving more than lip service to campaign reform. Our nation should not be allowing this deceit to go on. At least Sarah Palin got a new wardrobe.
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Why is the stock market still in free fall after having been given all that bailout money to help bolster it? Glad you asked. The market itself did not get the money; it has to wait for the old Republican whimsey of trickle-down economics to bolster it. Big time movers and shakers are getting the cash infusions from our treasury.
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Alan Greenspan, the former Fed chairman that helped W create this financial crisis, is saying it isn't his fault, but that his thinking was flawed. Rocks don't float!

Actually, ordinary citizens are the only ones whom face a crisis. The super rich could care less about anyone's economy. The ordinary rich will benefit from this; some as the meltdown happens, and others on down the road. I've never seen a poor or middle class rich person, and the smart money stays with the smart rich.

A Memory

Arney store


Some of my earilest memories are of my visits to this country store near my childhood home. The owner and proprietor was Doran Arney whose house was adjacent to it. Doran was a car salesman in Johnson City, and his father ran the store for him in the daytime and Doran relieved him of the evenings. Generally, it was open six days each week from daylight to dusk. Back then, no retail stores were allowed to be open on Sundays.

The store is located just more than a mile east of Jonesboro (the town reverted to its original name spelling of Jonesborough in the late 60's or early 70's) on the Boone's Creek Road, and is about three-tenths of a mile from my home on Headtown Road (which is now renamed Union Church Road).

The porch was accessed by a set of wooden steps on the right. Like a lot of similar places of the time, they depended on window light for most of the interior illumination, although there were one or two bare light bulbs on the ceiling. The back of the store had a small storage room for sacks of flower, feed, and other large items.

The furnishings I most remember were the counter that ran along the left side with its candy dispaly, and the ice cream freezer and soda cooler. The ice cream consisted mostly of Brown Mules®, Fudgesicles® and small cups of either vanilla, strawberry, or chocolate Pet® brand that was eaten with a small, wooden, paddle-like spoon. There were also some pint containers of the delights. The soda cooler, or pop cooler as we called it, was a large, red cola chest that had a rack inside that held the bottles just off its bottom. The sodas were removed by sliding each one to the end of the rack and then to the front. It contained Pepsi®, Coke®, RC Cola®, Nehi® orange and grape, Frosty® root beer, Cheerwine®, and Dr. Enuf® along with a few other brands. They were always ice cold.

The store closed in the late 1950's when another competing one with gas pumps opened just up the road from it.

Clark's Creek


There is definitely a virus making the rounds here. Diarrhea is the first major symptom, then comes nausea. I've felt bad since yesterday noon.
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Texas Instruments (TI) is laying off 650 workers worldwide. This is a company of 30,000 employees, and it will be just a drop in the bucket unless you are an affected worker. I seem to recall that TI had about 70,000 employees worldwide when I worked at their now defunct Johnson City plant in the mid-seventies, and most of these jobs were in the USA. If my memory is correct, that constitutes a lot of downsizing in the past 35 years.
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An update on what I said yesterday about a new stimulus plan for taxpayers. Looks like we may be bypassed on this one as the money will be mostly used for other things like infrastructure improvements. This is sorely needed and will create jobs, at least for a while. Why would they even consider leaving out the people whom most need help? Because we are easy! We are patsies! After all, they got by with the giveaway to banks and Wall Street, so they assume—and rightly so—that because they weren't tarred and feathered for their actions then, they can keep doing it. Another thing; a lot of us whom received the stimulus checks actually went against the grain of wholesome American capitalism and used the money to pay debts. That alone probably caused the Wall Street meltdown! Bullshit! We shall wind up getting screwed again, and we deserve it.

As I can never forgive Hillary for voting for the invasion of Iraq purely for political reasons, I can never forgive Obama and McCain voting for the bailout to help their corporate friends. We don't need knee-jerk government.

Colorful Clark's Creek


King George the Wise has decided it is time for another economic stimulus bailout for we Joe the Plumbers, even though it be a minuscule one compared to what the campaign contributing banks and Wall Street received. This time it may work, if they go far enough with enough money and not waste time talking about it. It won't be a cure, and will probably hurt in the long run, but something along this line is surely needed. Whereas most people whom received the last stimulus weren't hurting too badly at the time, they are now for sure uneasy about their futures. We haven't been buying big ticket items and have cut back dramatically on everyday commodities. This time it may work to alleviate the sorry shape we and our blind-eye government have gotten ourselves into. A lot of people want to get reelected, too.
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We went back to the markets on 107 yesterday and bought the last bushel of potatoes any of them had. We then drove on down to Clark's Creek where I made a few photos, including the one shown here. Although it was only about 3:00 pm, the sun is so low to the horizon now that there wasn't sufficient light in shady places to make photos with my slow lens, even at ISO 400. I used the flash, which leaves shadows I don't like, but I got one or two decent fungus photos.
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It is just mid-fall, and I'm already tired of winter! The free air temp today is in the 60's, but the wind feels like it is off an iceberg. I may have to trade in my shorts for long pants and a thicker shirt!
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Thanks everyone on Flickr for your encouragement while I get some other things done. The consolidation of notes is about finished, and I've actually written a couple thousand coherent words about my meager life.

October 12, 2008


We didn't go to Cade's Cove Friday. The weather was too crappy to do any of the things we had planned. This is the fourth time we had plans for going, and have yet to get out of the door at home. If I do get there, it will be on a spur of the moment thing.
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The Tennessee Volunteer football team won an SEC ballgame! Coach Phillip Fulmer deserves a fat raise and a long contract extension. Mediocrity should always be rewarded ahead of ability. Ex-coach John Majors has been bad-mouthing Fulmer of late, when in fact he was just as mediocre as his nemesis.
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Fall sure fell yesterday and last night, it is still chilly outside today, and there was frost scattered around this morning. I have now begun the countdown to glorious spring. I am much like Pete, the protagonist's cat in Robert Heinlein's science-fiction novel The Door into Summer. Pete doesn't like winter, and is forever scratching on doors, looking for the one that opens into summer. Humanity too seems always to be searching for some kind of summer, and the search usually becomes a religion.
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I see the McCain/Palin ticket is gaining in the polls on Obama/Biden; clear proof Americans would rather see a dirty fight than to know the facts. I'm still not overly proud of this country. We seem to be pleased with complacency instead of repairing the wrongs that plague us. The only way I will ever consider voting again is if the Electoral College is done away with and each voter's vote counts. I am a Blue voter living in a Red state, so what is the point of wasting my time at the polls? I have decided to support a candidate, though. I shall back Obama, even though I don't think he is the best person for the job. McCain is still and forever shall be a Bushite, and that alone keeps me from considering him. I will vote with this blog.

Extinguished Memories

Succumbing to age

I am planning to leave Flickr as far as posting photos goes, at least for a while. I shall continue to vist my friends and contacts photos as much as I can. I want to do some writing, such as bringing my life story up to date. My story isn't about me, but all the people, places, and things I can remember—including the many friends I have on Flickr—that made me whom I am. I have hundreds of bits and pieces in hand-written notes, computer notes, and things on this and my writing blog I need to put together coherently.

Why would anyone as insignificant as I want to journal his life? Many times I've asked myself this question and I don't have an answer except to say 'I am of little significance to the Cosmos, yet my life is unique amongst men'. This is certainly true of all humans.

The real things that are pressing—and depressing—me are that I am losing my memory faster than I think I should. My old memories are fading to the point I am having trouble figuring what was real and what is imagined. New things aren't sticking with me like they used to. My attention span is almost nil. The bit of dyslexia from the mini-stroke I had years ago is becoming quite a nuisance, and I have to continuously edit anything I write, including comments made on people's photos. The arthritis in my fingers makes it impossible to know which key I will hit when I aim at one. Sometimes it takes minutes to write a simple sentence that I can understand. It generally takes an hour or more just to put a few readable (I hope) paragraphs in this blog. Creating and answering email is a problem, but I don't receive much ot it anyway. I would love to IM with my friends, but they would never know what I was trying to say. If not for a spell-checker, I wouldn't even try to write. None of this is a good sign, and I feel it will only worsen.

I do plan to keep this blog going as long as mentally and physically possible, and I hope it doesn't become more incoherent than it has been since I started.

Thank you dear friends for sticking with me all this time.
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Early tomorrow Carolyn and I will leave for a day trip to Cade's Cove at the southern end of The Great Smokey Mountains National Park. I have a GPS or I probably wouldn't find my way down there.

Happy Birthday ALICE

Alice and October ... always beautiful!


Happy birthday, Alice. You don't know how good it feels to have a friend as old as I! We got you a card, but then senility set in and I forgot to mail it 'til last evening.
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I am better I reckon. Went for blood work this morning, but it was not for the ailment that had me down for a few days. Had to see if my rat poison is working correctly.
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The tiny Asian critters that are killing hemlock trees in the Appalachians has finally hit our highlands. We saw many dead trees on Walnut Mountain during our Sunday excursion.
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The economy has faltered in a big way, yet the DC Dumbasses refuse to admit we are in a recession.

Beech


I'm about 90% well today; it takes longer than it used to to get over one of these "spells".
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Poor Sarah Palin. She can't seem to catch a break from anyone. She is doing the best she can under the circumstances. Her biggest sin is allowing them to draft her on the ticket to begin with. She's finding what big time politics is all about. If the Republicans lose, you can about bet she will spend the next few years learning the political system. I look for her to be a Senator come 2010 or maybe a little later.
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The doors to the US Treasury vault have swung wide open to banks that have mismanaged other peoples money. I'm not too awfully proud of my country!
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Yesterday was my eldest grandson's 25th birthday. Jeremy is a good young man.
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A must read!
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After feeling poorly for several days, I was well enough (I thought) to get back into the mountains yesterday. After cleaning the building in Elizabethton, we went on to Dennis Cove, stopping at the picnic and camping area for a short time. The tree colors still aren't good, and nothing like they were this weekend one year ago when we were there. The drought is still screwing up everything.

Same as last year, the farther up Walnut Mountain we went, the better the colors got, but they were still not great. There were many hunters in the woods as it is bow season for deer. I don't know if they were hunting, baiting, or looking for deer sign, but they were all over the place. We met several going in the opposite direction from us on the narrow road, and the first two refused to back up out of our way even though they were closer to a wide place in the road than were we, so I ended up backing a long way so they could pass. For the third one, I stood my ground, so to speak. He didn't want to back up even though he was within ten feet of a wide place, and I wasn't about to back more than 100 feet so he could pass. Finally he did back up, but he didn't want to; we exchanged salutes as I went by.

I started feeling badly again at the top of the mountain, and Carolyn drove the remainder of the way home via Buck Mountain, Hump Mountain, Elk Park in North Carolina, and Roan Mountain, Tennessee.

I am feeling much better today, and should be ready for our planned day-trip to Cade's Cove come Friday.