More Turtle Mtn Pix

Ok, one more update. Call it Needles to Chico

Then we can get into the good stuff.

P and I headed back to Turtle Mountain Wilderness Area. She had planned to stay for 11 days and ended up extending it another 8 or so. We had a great 3 weeks at Turtle Mtn, I took her to Vegas for the flight back to Chico.

I had planned to stay for another 2 months near Joshua Tree and pick her up at LAX on April 2, but after a week or so I developed some symptoms that concerned me and P and I had begun conversations about relationship so I headed for Chico to see my doc and continue the conversations with P in person. I arrived in Chico on Feb 7 and will be seeing my doc on the 24th, this Thursday. I'd like to get some blood tests, and talk about the rapid tumor growth. Basically check in and see if there's anything new going on and what I might be able to do about it.

Needless to say there has been lots of discussion between myself and P about relationship, my prognosis, concerns for the future and all of the usual angsty and sweet and loving issues about life on the dirtball.

Update

I arrived in the desert in early December. Found a 177k wilderness area near Needles where I could park for free and was mostly alone there for two weeks. As soon as I got there I put out food and water for the birds and instead was visited first by antelope chipmunks, then birds, then apparently a kit fox. There were also desert ravens that would stop by. I used the time to work on jazzy, do inquiry and meditate.

After ten days or so I developed an infection in my mouth. Tried to take care of it with more extreme dental care and goldenseal, but woke up on a Tuesday with face swollen and in extreme pain. I looked up a dental clinic in Fort Mohave, near Needles and started driving the 35 miles. I called them, they got me in and suggested a week of antibiotics to get the swelling down. I drove to the drug store, took double the dose of antibiotics before leaving the store, drove the bus a couple of blocks to an empty parking lot near the hospital emergency room in case it didn't work, took a valium and a dilaudid. An hour later the dilaudid hadn't worked so I took a second one and an hour and a half later, a third. Amazing pain. It finally broke about 9 pm and I was able to sleep.

The next morning drove back to my wilderness area. Went in the next Monday to have it pulled and then back to Turtle Mtn for a few days of recovery.