AG: Aunt Granny's Advice, or How to become an elderly cyclist:

On Tue, 22 Oct 2019 13:10:18 +0700, John B.
wrote:

Re rust in tank? I thought that now days all hot water heaters had
either glass lined or stainless tanks?

Re drinking rusty water... Don't people take "iron pills"?

The filth is stuff that has settled out of the water.

Which might include rust -- well water around here has a very high
iron content. The first time I saw the spring behind the highway
garage, I thought it was coming out of a rusty steel pipe. It was
plastic pipe that splash from the spring had been settling on.

I feel a disconnect when people who have always lived here complain
that the water is hard. I can wash my clothes in it without any
treatment, and I can leave dishes in water until I get around to
washing them -- that's *soft*. Where I grew up, we got flowstone in
the tub and sink, and water left in a glass would precipitate on the
sides and bottom.

But it was really great for the teeth of growing children.

--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/

On Tue, 22 Oct 2019 21:23:29 -0400, Joy Beeson
wrote:

On Tue, 22 Oct 2019 13:10:18 +0700, John B.
wrote:

Re rust in tank? I thought that now days all hot water heaters had
either glass lined or stainless tanks?

Re drinking rusty water... Don't people take "iron pills"?

The filth is stuff that has settled out of the water.

Which might include rust -- well water around here has a very high
iron content. The first time I saw the spring behind the highway
garage, I thought it was coming out of a rusty steel pipe. It was
plastic pipe that splash from the spring had been settling on.

I feel a disconnect when people who have always lived here complain
that the water is hard. I can wash my clothes in it without any
treatment, and I can leave dishes in water until I get around to
washing them -- that's *soft*. Where I grew up, we got flowstone in
the tub and sink, and water left in a glass would precipitate on the
sides and bottom.

The water here has considerable lime content. I don't know whether
that is "hard" or soft but it is "hard" work to remove the lime
deposits from the toilet bowls.

But it was really great for the teeth of growing children.
--
cheers,

John B.

This thread began in August of 2014, at

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!to...nUwU%5B1-25%5D

with

This post is the first of a weekly series of grandmotherly aphorisms.
Each subject line will begin "AG:" for your killfiling convenience.

I ran out of grandmotherly aphorisms years ago, and should have ended
the thread before it devolved into an embarrassing series of desperate
fillers.

I'll still be around taking random pot-shots.

--
Joy Beeson, U.S.A., mostly central Hoosier,
some Northern Indiana, Upstate New York, Florida, and Hawaii
joy beeson at comcast dot net http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/
The above message is a Usenet post.
I don't recall having given anyone permission to use it on a Web
forum.

On Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 3:19:23 PM UTC-8, Joy Beeson wrote:
This thread began in August of 2014, at

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!to...nUwU%5B1-25%5D

with

This post is the first of a weekly series of grandmotherly aphorisms.
Each subject line will begin "AG:" for your killfiling convenience.

I ran out of grandmotherly aphorisms years ago, and should have ended
the thread before it devolved into an embarrassing series of desperate
fillers.

I'll still be around taking random pot-shots.

--
Joy Beeson, U.S.A., mostly central Hoosier,
some Northern Indiana, Upstate New York, Florida, and Hawaii
joy beeson at comcast dot net http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/
The above message is a Usenet post.
I don't recall having given anyone permission to use it on a Web
forum.

After seeing some of the postings on these groups rather than embarrassing fillers you seem to have some of the rather better advice for people.

On 2019-12-22, wrote:
On Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 3:19:23 PM UTC-8, Joy Beeson wrote:
This thread began in August of 2014, at

[trimmed URL]

This post is the first of a weekly series of grandmotherly aphorisms.
Each subject line will begin "AG:" for your killfiling convenience.

I ran out of grandmotherly aphorisms years ago, and should have ended
the thread before it devolved into an embarrassing series of desperate
fillers.

I'll still be around taking random pot-shots.

After seeing some of the postings on these groups rather than
embarrassing fillers you seem to have some of the rather better advice for
people.

Agreed. I've learned a number of things reading your posts and responses
from others in this thread. Thanks to you and all who have contributed. I
look forward to your future "random pot-shots".


Tom

My plastic surgeon (now retired) was very big on putting Vitamin-E oil
on a healing wound as soon as the stitches came out.

He left beautiful scars. Every time he took a cancer off, I'd say to
my friends "Look at my beautiful scar!" and they would say "What
scar?", and I can't find the most-recent scar myself.

So I figure he knows a little something, and start putting E-oil on
minor wounds as soon as they scab over, or immediately, in the case of
burns. It works really well on burns; the skin stays flexible and
doesn't crack or peel off. Maybe olive oil would work the same way,
but a ten-dollar bottle of E-oil lasts for several years.

I started putting E-oil on my scraped knuckle as soon as I stopped
putting triple antibiotic on it, and it appears to plan on healing
without leaving a mark.

The oil should be rubbed in -- "massage it a little".

--------------------------------------------------------------------

There's another trick I thought up by myself, and I *know* this one
works.

Sometimes a scrape bleeds so slowly that you get a bead of blood that
dries up into a spherical scab that's inclined to catch on things and
tear the wound open. Even when you get a nice flat scab, the wound
heals around the edges first, the scab lifts at the edges, and you're
at risk of tearing the un-healed middle open.

What you do about this is to take a long hot bath (or wash a load of
dishes, depending on where the scab is), then put a thick layer of
soap on a plastic pumice such as is sold for smoothing calluses, and
rub the scab VERY GENTLY until it's worn flat, thin, and flexible.

I imagine that keeping the scab oiled would help to keep it flexible;
I haven't had road rash since long before I got cancer, so I can't
say.

Come to think of it, that scraped knuckle, which I faithfully kept
oiled, never cracked or tore. But then, it was such a small wound
that I didn't notice it until I wondered where all that blood was
coming from. (I didn't realize that it was blood at first, and
thought it was red ink from the bag of chips I had just retrieved from
behind a cabinet.)

--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/

On Sat, 11 Jan 2020 19:38:15 -0500, Joy Beeson
wrote:


I haven't had road rash since long before

Not a wise thing to say. I strode over black ice on the bridge on my
waw to church this morning, and got a 100% genuine case of road rash
on my right elbow.

I thought it was a bruise, but when I got to the church and took off
my shirt, I found a big oval red patch where the epidermis had been
scraped off -- not quite deep enough to bleed.

There is supposed to be first-aid cream in the box beside the freezer,
but I couldn't find it -- I should have left a note for the Kiddie
Kollege teacher, come to think of it -- so I rinsed the wound with
sterile saline, then coated it with some of the A&D ointment I carry
in a lip-salve box in my right pocket at all times.

It had stopped stinging by the time I completed my abbreviated stair
climbs after the service. Abbreviated because I had noticed that
there was no hat on the coat rack, thought it might have fallen off on
the bridge, and couldn't keep my mind on my exercise. I did go up and
down enough to get a little out of breath. All on one staircase
instead of making a vertical loop hitting all six staircases.

My hat was in the closet; I'd forgotten to wear it. (I got distracted
after pinning on my wool scarf.)

The red spot was less than half as big when I very carefully took off
my shirt, but darker and angrier. Seems even smaller now (13:22), but
that could be the light in here. I poured some peroxide on a wash
cloth, rubbed it with soap, then rubbed the soapy rag on the wound to
get the A&D off -- standing by the sink so I could rinse it *real*
fast; I knew it was going to sting. Then I rinsed the tap water off
with a squirt of peroxide.

Then I hesitated between first-aid cream and Bacitraycin. The
Bacitraycin is supposed to be put generously on a dressing, and I
couldn't see a way to secure a dressing on an elbow, so I used
first-aid cream.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Later I remembered that we have some pieces of one-on-one ribbed
stretch tubing left over from one of Dave's incidents -- he can't
remember what either -- and wore one of those the rest of the
afternoon and evening.

When it neared bedtime, I washed with just peroxide on the rag. The
red is now still smaller, but the distal edge still foams up when
peroxide hits it, and washing made it resume stinging. Then I put a
bandaid coated with Bacitraycin on it and covered the bandaid with a
clean piece of tubing.

And so to bed.

--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/

Tuesday, 14 January, 2020

but the distal edge still foams up when
peroxide hits it,

That should have been "proximal"; it was the far edge of the wound
when I was looking at it with my elbow bent.

Sometimes bad design is good. The water lines in our house run
through the slab -- and where else could you run them in a slab house?
So even the faucet closest to the heater runs cold if you turn it off
for a minute, and it takes so long for the water in the master bath to
run hot that I've resigned myself to shaving with cold water. This
has been handy for wound washing: I don't keep boiled-and-cooled
water around, but I can wash for quite a while in water that's been
hot.

It hasn't been all that hot (the water heater is set to be "safe" for
old folks and small children) but I figure that the germs will come
down with heat exaustion if they stay slightly above incubation long
enough.

Soap and plain water; no peroxide after the first day because our vet
says that peroxide kills off the cells that are trying to make new
skin.

It was Dr. Snyder who told us to put a big glob of antibiotic ointment
on a dressing.

I found bandaids big enough to cover the wound and stretchy enough to
stick to an elbow in the first-aid drawer. I put the last one on this
morning, rode to Meijers (about five miles), and bought another box.
They have been "improved" since we bought the old ones; I'll find out
whether they work as well when I get ready for bed tonight.

I also threw the last of the stockinette sleeves into the wash this
morning -- I've been wearing them in bed to keep the bandaid from
getting scraped off -- so it's lucky that I washed two yesterday.

Today was my first real ride of the year -- I rode the Fugi home from
the shop, and had a quick two-mile dash the next day -- and I may have
improved my speed. I won't know until I ask Google how much the wrong
turn added to my trip home. [An even six miles, making my speed 7.8
mph.] But when I was coming through the village, my right knee
(which has been worrying me during my sciatica exercises for months)
said "I don't want any more sprinting, thank you very much" and my
left knee said "Now that you mention it . . ."

Luckily, traffic in the village was light. Slightly amazing at five
o'clock.

--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/

I forgot to mention that the E-oil is used only once per day, but Dr.
Ashton said there was no risk of overdosing if I used it more often.
(I'd been re-applying it every time I washed my face.)

--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/

On Sun, 12 Jan 2020 21:54:35 -0500, Joy Beeson
wrote:

The red spot was less than half as big when I very carefully took off
my shirt, but darker and angrier.

Would you believe that that spot is *still* red? It isn't sore or
anything, but the skin is slightly shinier than the uninjured skin
beside it.

Just looked out the window and saw two couples ride by on
around-the-park bikes.

Then two cars came out of Boys City Drive, but neither had a bike
rack.

I walked a mile and climbed a few stairs this morning.

--
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/