Lake Tahoe

John, those **gondolas up Heavenly are not air conditioned, and in fact quite stuffy, if that could compromise your breathing. And they move veeerrryy slowly. There are some little bitty windows at the top to open, but those didn't do that much to make it more air-ish. You might limit the number of humans riding in your gondola to 2 of you. Good idea to get off at the midlevel overlook exit, walk around, get some air, get back on for the rest of the ride to the top. No similar stop on the way back down.

The lake cruises are way more interesting for my money, amazing view/vistas. Great narration/history of the area. You can buy food and drinks during the cruise, though it ain't gourmet to say the least, but much more peaceful (and cheaper) than lunch in the big cabin atop Heavenly, which is kind of a zoo.

**Do what you can to get your hgb up before the trip. Do you take Epogen? Can they let you bump the dose up a bit? I don't know if an upcoming vacation is a medical indication for a blood transfusion, but you could ask. Keep your fluid weight as low as you comfortably can. Everything to support your respiratory status.

I suggest a room on a lower floor of the hotel, not the highest floor. A few hundred feet at those high altitudes could make a difference. And a vaporizer at night might help, since it is so dry up there. My friend who lives in Colorado puts one in my room when I visit her, since I'm not used to the altitude and low humidity.

Sorry, John. The evil nurse (retired) in me just had to come out.
I'm praying you'll have a fabulous and trouble free time in Tahoe!

Well we made it and man o man is it beatiful up here. I'm no stranger to mountains, being from W Va but the mountains here are so much different, more bouldery? haha. Glacier leftovers,very cool.
It turns out I was worried over nothing concerning my breathing, to tell the truth, I can't really tell that much difference. I suppose I have gotten much stronger and lungs are vastly improved from when I went to the Grand Canyon(YEAH!). The place we're staying is right at the top of Dagget mountain (Kingsbury grade Rd.), elev 7333. I have to say I was really,really worried bout it,whew. Turns out the biggest hangup was all my dialysis supplies didnt show up,we hadxto run to Carson City this morning for some saline. Alls well that ends well. Being able to be mobile with my equipment is really great, if I have to be tethered to the damn machine at least its now on my schedule and inthe comfort of my own place.

We had our Anniv. dinner atop Harrahs at their steak and seafood place, little pricey, but man was it good and thecview unbeatable. My son and I both had thexbroiled seafood platter, it should be called the broiled seafood challenge, haven't been that stuffed in a long time(4am and I'm still full).
We're doing the dinner cruise Sun. night, should be fun, I don't expect much from the food,but I am looking forward to the sights.

Tomorrow should be interesting,we're going golfing in the morning (my idea) and combined,my wife and I have played maybe a dozen and half holes? Our son probably twice that, but his g/f has played some so she's the "experienced"one.

I did break off with everyone for awhile, I wanted someplace kinda quiet where I could sit, gamble a little and have a few drinks. So after finding a beach, I hung out a little while then had M drop me off at Harveys where I had to check in and proceed to find a nice quiet spot to play a little. Turns out the Hard Rock cafe was right around the corner from registration and they had bartop VP. I'm not a vp player, but it seemed like the perfect fit for the moment, nice batender (and cute),only a few other people and perfect drinks. Now the most I know about vp strategy is from I've read on here, so I just played JOB, that seems like the easiest game.I switched to BP for a short bit until I screwed up a couple times and went back to JOB. I don't mind losing as long as I get some entertainment/play time, the first twenty lasted me at least an hour and the subsequent 2 twentys lasted a few more, I'll take it. Also, kept getting one or two to the rf I don't know how many times but, wasn't meant to be.

WHEW! I had no intention of writing a novella here at all, I was just going to comment on the scenery and how it turned out with my breathing, sorry 'bout that.

Candy,thank you for all the advice/concern, if noone knew you were a nurse before, they sure got it now HAHA Concerning my hgb, I'm on and off epo, my hgb is always borderline but albumen and hgb have been doing pretty well. I did get my weight down as much as possible, I haven't much idea what my dry weight is because I've been gaining a little weight(finally!, they put me on megstrol), I can barely button my pants now, had to buy some new stuff

John, yea!

Yep, that period when health is improving is tough to determine "dry weight", target weight.

Good thing you are running your own treatments, or the "one-way" nurses would just fuss at you and squeeze you until you were spitting sawdust. I had to un-brainwash a few over my 34 years in the business.

So glad all is going well!

I suppose I should write up a little TR since there was a bit of gambling involved, most importantly with my recently turned 21 son. We were legal this time after the last fiasco, he finally came home, gave us all our money back and promised to only gamble responsibly from now on, still drinks tho .
Seriously, it was a blast gambling with him, showing him his first foray into gambling, we set an afternoon aside for it whilke the girls went to the beach. Started off with a little VP at the HR café, good way to get into the gambling "groove", for me anyway. Also fun just sitting shooting the breeze and sharing what limited knowledge I have of VP. Ah well, enjoying the company and the time togother was the main point anyway. I had staked him with a benji and he quit after being down 40 but it had lasted 3-4 drinks and a coupla hours ,worth much more than that to me, I'll take it.

The one thing that really blows, I haven't been able to sleep since we've been back. I caught some kind of bug and it went to my chest, really messing with my breathing. I think there's been 2 or 3 nights I actually got a solid 3 hrs sleep(if anyone noticed my late night ramblings on here, that's why). It seems I'm on the tail end and it's just about gone, but it keeps lingering. Ended up being able to breathe fine up there, get back to sea level and wheezing and hacking my brains out.Sucks.

I suppose there's more to say about the trip, it really was a lot of fun, but I guess I'll try and do it when I'm up rambling around the house tonight. I'm sure I'll have to remember a bit also.

It was a fairly uneventful flight, much less than I expected. Friend dropped us off at Dulles(we have a mutual chauffeur agreement, whoever's flying, Balt or DC). I was a little worried because of my med equipment, my machine alone fits in an alum. case that's about 2 1/2 x 2 1/2 and just shy of a hundred lbs., and there's three "support bags". SW had assured us it was considered medical so there'd be no charges. When we got there a very nice man wasn't sure so called his sup. and sure enough Ms. buttinski from the next kiosk left her customer to come over and "inform" us that we had to %75 per piece, about that time nice guy hung up, turned with a smile and said, "no charge", is there anymore to add? Ms. B kinda fumed a little and went back to her customer. Who does crap like that? Ya old hag. Anyway we had a transfer in LV (killed me a little landing and seeing the strip knowing it was just a layover. Lost 20 bucks, felt good ).

I've already mentioned the breathing issue, no need to rehash that. I have to say the lake and the scenery was breathtaking, I was being amazed by it every time we left our condo. Speaking of which, We've never ever experienced a nicer person than the lady who ran the place here(RAVC@ Tahoe). I had been in touch with her before we arrived of course so she knew what was up. Well part of my supplies arrived before we got there and she stocked it all in our place. Those boxes are dialysate and weigh about 40 lbs per. Unbeleivable and it wasn't the last either. She was just a genuinely super nice person, we got her a gift card for the local seafood house in a card, hope she enjoyed it.

After getting the lay of the land a bit, of course went shopping for food and supplies. That was a hefty bill, but it's vacation and happy to shell out. To say we had a well stocked bar and a fridge full of food would be an understatement. We ate and drank merrily in our little home for the week. It really was nice to be able to do dialysis on my own schedule, my wife is truly an angel when it comes to this. Spending so much time with our son and his g/f was really awesome, she really is a dear and we think the world of her. Kinda funny, way back when I booked this trip and it was a 2 bed, M was way up in the air on this issue. I'm a realist, M is sort of a denial type, she knows but just doesn't want to hear. When I reminded her of what we were doing at that exact same age..hands clasped over head.."NA NA NA NA, I can't hear youuu..." . Funny. She knows, just doesn't want to acknlowledge.

As mentioned, getting the room at harveys was pretty cool, very top floor with an awesome view. We could see the fourth set up going on on top of the parking garage, rats, that's where I wanted to see them. Naïve, only for some diamond and 7*. Actually the fourth kinda sucked for me, did dialysis in the morning and felt horrible the rest of the day. I had bought a massive amount of seafood too figuring it would be better to have a feast in the afternoon, let it wear off and then go see the fireworks. I ate a little and finally told the others to go on w/o me, sucked(I love fireworks and S Tahoe is supposed to be in top 3). Oh well, such is life.

Golfing was interesting. I had researched and tried to pick the cheapest course with all open tee times, figuring it would be least busy. Cheap and all open tee times? Makes for on open course ,right? Wrong. I think I've mentioned before, M and I have played a couple dozen holes at most, son about double, G/F, plays with her dad some. Well of course we suck/sucked. Hard. Chopping the top of the ball and worse, but we were having fun, it's what we paid our 200 or whatever for. We get on the third hole and there's this group of 10 yr olds swinging like tiger woods. Turns out course Nazi (read, "course manager"),was telling them to stay on our ass. Of course we let them play through, had planned on letting people through anyway, he was just a dick about it. Well this continued throughout our entire game and I started getting really pissed off at the golf cart with the little red flag racing up to us. WTF else do you wany form us, we let everyone play through if necessary, no big deal. Richard.

The day we were going up on the gondala my BP dropped pretty hard(sorry, sounds like I have continuing problems that hold me back. While there's issues, I get through them, takes a bit to hold me back) so I sat while they stood in line for passes up the mountain. A&S (son and G/f) bought passes for the ropes course too, they said it was awesome and had a great time. Made me happy to hear. Odd thing happened while M was in line with them, she comes running out and says, our savings acct. is drained, the money was moved out of our acct. FUCK! WTH is up. First thought was ID theft of course. Bottom line was I had opened a new MM acct and funded it with our savings, I thought it would be a seamless transzction. NAH, just heart attck material. Anyway M and I missed the gondala and ended up at the HR café relaxing and playing a little VP. Enjoyable.

I think that's enough and about all anyway. See if I can go get some sleep.

Yep, that little bug I got upon returning finally landed me in the Er the other night, theyw ent ahead and got me breathing ok again and checked me in for the night. I was so worried about being at the high elev. and not being able to breath. Blows. Thankfully much better now.