What a day! by Randy

11/16/15  What a day I have had.  I want to tell you about it.  Listen to a stroke survivor who does it all.  I have aphasia and will not be silent.

When waking up it was a usual day for me.  It takes time to figure out how the day is going to go.  The first thing is to take some meds and then coffee is needed.  Now it is time for Rudy my dog to go and check it out.  Time for him to have breakfast and back out he goes.  He is a barker.

Second cup of coffee and time to check some email as well as a payment.  By the way my morning started at 7.  My stroke survivor fitness workout was at 9.  At 10 it was my clinical trial from Georgetown.  Time spent looking at pictures and saying what they are.  Done with the trial and out to mow the lawn.

Okay it is lunch time and out to go into the grocery at Wegmans.  Back in the car and heading to my Mom’s condo.  She is having some TV problems.  Having trouble with Comcast.  This is becoming a regular with my mom.

On the phone with help from Comcast.  Always a challenge for me to get help but it seems to really help.  This women was great, she was able to talk to me about what was needed.  Lots of question and it worked.  Getting the TV’s to work correctly took about 3 hours. 

Left my mom’s at 4:15 and off to Walmart to get some new light bulbs on my car.  Noticed that the left front light was out.  Googled it and purchased two new ones.  Of course by the time I got home it was getting dark.  Get it done in the morning.

Left Walmart and stopped by Giant to pick up a few more items and headed home.  So now enough is enough.  I just spent about 3 hours to blog this one. 

 

Talk to you soon.

Pumpkin Galore! by Christie

Looking forward to pumpkin in the Fall season.  It is a new fad that has blown up the last few years.  Their are fans and haters.  For me, I am a fan but my husband is a hater.  I like to bake and have pumpkin coffee.  My favorite coffee is Dunkin Donuts so I frequent often and purchase pumpkin coffee and a pumpkin donut!  It's so tasty! 

 

I have made many recipes with pumpkin in the ingredients.  I made a new recipe called Pumpkin Chocolate Chunk Pecan Cookies.  I only did the cookie part, I didn't do the frosting.  I'm not a big fan when it comes to icing.  It was delicious!  I brought some to my Oma's house because she likes pumpkin.  She said they were too rich for her and she suggested swapping chocolate for raisins.  I am going to try it some time soon. 

 

The other grocery store I frequent is Trader Joes, because the have anything you can imagine relating to pumpkin.  I've tried pumpkin biscotti, pumpkin cranberry scones and pumpkin chai.  All are fantastic.

 

Some facts about pumpkin.  It was born in North America.  It is usually orange in color.  It is used both for food and recreation.  Typically it weighs approximately 6 to 18 pounds.  The biggest pumpkin in history weight 75 pounds. 

 

I truly think you should either purchase or bake something pumpkin during the fall season. 

Army Ten-Miler 2015 by Pat

This was our Pat's Team weekend for 2015. It was October 10th to the 11th. It was fun again! The greatest family, friends, New Jersey cousins and a old friend showed from Trinidad. Friday I stayed at the hotel. On Saturday Will and I put out the shirts and people we know came by. I was there for 6 hours. Then I went back to our house for a party. About 40 people showed up. That was great fun! Patty and I made the food. There was pasta and pies that were delicious. My Uncle had his birthday at the party. Some Army friends I haven't seen in years showed up. It really was a good time. But I needed to go back to the hotel to get some sleep.

The next day I woke up at 5:30am. By 6:00 I was downstairs and my brother Chris and my friend Grooove were there with my trike. Then we parked next to the Pentagon. I got on my trike and we went to the start of the race. When I got there 50 wounded warriors were getting ready for the race. Even some PT and OT people I know were there doing the race. I started getting motivated!

The race started and I felt good. I left Virginia and went to D.C. I was right behind a trike for 5 miles. At the 7 mile I started to go back to Virginia. At the same time the runners were at the 5 miler. I decided to go faster! I past five or six trike for the last three miles. The runner never caught me. My time was only 1 minute slower than last year. Then I went to our tent AAFMAA/RWB Team. My brother-in-law, Steve, was there and showed me they had tons of food. For the next hour friends wearing "Pat's Team" T-shirt and we took pictures.

Then we went to Samuel Beckett's restaurant for the party. This year was fun again. We sat in the back or outside. The weather was perfect. There was a lot of rugby on the TV. One of my soldier from 9 years ago, Russell Vidler, came by. It was just a great gala.

At 7 o'clock I went to the hotel to sleep. Wilson and I needed to pass out. I stayed at a hotel. I went upstairs and opened the door. Then got in bed. 10 minutes later I was about to sleep. Then I heard a noise in the bathroom. It happens with these people for Pat's Team. I got nothing to say thank you for the Pat's Team weekend!

Scary Trip to New York City by Chris

 

I'm frightened but it's really awesome to go to train, it was heading north to New York City!  

 

I've never been to New York, I thought it's basically the exact same thing DC. I didn't realize how big buildings are and the traffic is such a nightmare. So I went to catch a cab and every cab is full, so I ordered a Uber.

 

Looking around I thought it's DC but it's so so so not... It's a lot of people, cars and big buildings. I got to the hotel and checked in I'm going to go to 9/11 memorial. It's so hard for me to go there, steps, trying to slam a lot of people.  It was sad and inspirational.