I don’t know what type of virus/bacteria it was, but I’m just coming off one of the sickest six-day stretches of my life. The doc assures me it was not any type of flu, and it closely resembled a two-week illness my oldest son, Jake, finished up before I came down with it. It involved lots of chest congestion, nausea, and mind-warping sinus headaches. I went on antibiotics by the third day, and as late as Saturday I thought I might be developing pneumonia.

But Sunday I made a big turnaround, and Monday, after 8 hours of sleep tonight, I’ll be recovered enough to go to the high school District Golf Tournament in which my middle son, Robby, is competing for Gold Beach High School. I was to be an official “marker” but don’t have energy enough to do that. I’ll ride around in a cart for a couple of hours and watch.

Annie has been slugging away on deadline, even while enjoying the reunion with her Marine Corps husband, Erik, who recently returned from Iraq. Magazine deadline shows no mercy to the main editor, even if she’s in love and been deprived of her husband for eight months. But I’m now able to jump in and help.

While sick, I had a chance to do a lot of research on swine flu and what it may hold in store for the fall, so I’m also in position to help John Silveira with his swine flu article. That was a kick — reading about a potentially killer flu while gasping for air with a blinding sinus headache. It was easy to empathize with the direst scenarios.

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No wonder people have little faith in the news media.

John Silveira just called me to point out a misleading news story now being
carried by CNN. The story claims the current swine flu scare has a long way to go to match the 36,000 flu deaths that occur annually in this country. It’s the 36,000 figure itself that is so misleading, because the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) lumps influenza AND pneumonia deaths TOGETHER. There are actually only about 1,000 deaths from flu each year, not 36,000.

Silveira wrote an extensive article about the potential for a flu pandemic in BHM’s Issue #97 (January/February 2006). Unfortunately we never put the article online and we are now sold out of that issue, but here’s a quote from page 58:

The CDC reports 36,000 influenza deaths a year. This is higher than the
number that occurred in 1968-69 (a pandemic year) when 34,000 died. So, why isn’t every year a pandemic year? Because the CDC lumps flu deaths and pneumonia deaths together. The actual number of flu deaths is about 1,000 a year, although in a bad year it can approach 3,000. Why are the flu and pneumonia deaths lumped together? I don’t know. But there are those who feel it’s a scare tactic provided as a favor to drug companies so they can sell flu vaccines.

This is why people read BHM, I think, because we try and research our facts before we print them.

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This “what if” scenario video on CNN is a reasonable portrayal of what may lay ahead for the United States if swine flu takes off. This could become a very serious pandemic, and if you haven’t gotten your prescription for Tamiflu, I’d get it now before pharmacies run out. My local pharmacy has already run out of Tamiflu.

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I assume you are all as alarmed as I am about the onset of this swine flu virus. BHM has written fairly extensively about the possibility of a pandemic involving a 1918-flu-like virus, and have even published a book about how to prepare yourself against this and other society-wide threats. But I always hoped we would never actually have to face such a threat. This swine flu, unfortunately, may be the real thing.

My daughter, Annie, the managing editor of BHM, told me this morning, “Dad, this is like the Perfect Storm. We have the possibility of a disease pandemic, the country is in a severe recession, and there is widespread political dissatisfaction on the right with the Obama administration. I hope we don’t get a cataclysmic weather event on top of this.”

We are battening down the hatches here, preparing to isolate our family against the outside world, and making plans to produce the next issue of BHM with a staff that can isolate themselves in their own homes. I hope it won’t be necessary, but isolation is the only real protection against a virus from which humans have no immunity. We are also buying Tamiflu and Relenza, which will help fight off flu.

We have plenty of food, fuel, and guns and ammo in our home, and we live way out in the woods. Today we’ll buy as much meat as we can, and jerky and freeze it. If this swine flu develops into a pandemic, the supermarket shelves will empty quickly. I advise anyone reading this to take this pandemic threat seriously.

. . . . . .

A comment on this post from www.realselfreliance.com has a link to an excellent video on swine flu from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control): Click here to read it.

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With my knee healing well on antibiotics, my friend, Dave Anderson, and I went steelhead fishing on the Rogue River. Now he may be a pretty good river guide, but I caught the fish. Dave and I plan to do a video fishing column for the eissue when it is launched. I don’t think a column about fishing would work well in the print issue, but a video column about fishing is a natural for an eissue.

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It’s been nine days since I fell through my living room ceiling, and my ribs and side are still sore. So the doc (Ted Taylor of Gold Beach) suggested I have a CT Scan to see if I either cracked a rib or bruised my liver. Negative! But the scan coincidentally showed I have a bunch of small kidney stones in my kidney.

How lucky! I’ve passed kidney stones before, and it’s like someone shoved a screwdriver in my back and twisted it. It’s pain tantamount to giving birth. Thank God women do that!

But these days they have an utrasound machine that can target and break up the stones so you can pea them out rather than have them tear a blue streak across your kidney. Tomorrow morning I’ll get a “still x-ray” to make sure the stones are large enough to target. How lucky can you get? The chance to avoid kidney stone pain! What a great age we live in.

And my side pain? The doc says I’m probably working so hard on my remodel that I’m not giving my ribs and surrounding muscle a chance to heal. I’ll slow down in another week or two. But I’ve got a lot to do between now and then.

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I should be flying to North Carolina right now to see my daughter, Annie, her husband, Erik, and my two grandchildren, Olga and Gavin, but instead I’m at home with a totally &*#$#@ back. I had to cancel my flight at the last minute. The Doc prescribed Flexeril, Ibuprofen, and rest. Rats! Double rats!

At least it snowed today, so my sons, Jake and Rob, who were due to go with me, got to play in the snow as a consolation prize for their wrecked vacation. My wife had also smartly insured the tickets so we’ll get our money back. I’m pretty much confined to my rocker/glider in my study at home.

Like I did the last time I threw out my back, I have vowed to get in top shape so this never happens again. I hope I keep my promise this time.

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Hope you got your flu shot. Thirty thousand people a year die of flu. It only takes one unlucky season, or one particularly nasty flu, and you might wind up dead. You’ll at least get sicker than a dog. Lots of towns give the shots for free. Why take a chance? I got mine.

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Deadline is over and so is my periodic colonoscopy. Thank goodness on both counts!

No sooner did we got off deadline for the upcoming Jan/Feb 2008 issue than I had to go in and get this necessary test. My father died of colon cancer at age 57, and ever since my brothers and I have had this colon checkup on a periodic basis.

So what is a colonoscopy?They put you to sleep and the doctor shoves a thin flexible tube up your butt so he can examine the colon for any potentially precancerous polyps. He even takes photos on the inside of the colon. It takes about 20 minutes and is completely painless, even if he finds a polyp or two and has to snip them off for a lab exam, which he had to do with me.

The only problem with having a colonoscopy is you have to drink two bottles of this awful cleansing goop before the procedure so you are completely flushed out. Not only does the goop taste terrible, but you’ll be sitting on the pot half the day until you are cleansed. For more details, click here.

But despite the taste of the goop, you still should get one, no matter if you are a man or a woman. Colon cancer is largely preventable if you eat a diet high in fiber, and it’s curable if it is caught early enough by one of these exams. Colon cancer used to kill a lot of people — my Dad for example — but it doesn’t kill so many now because many people have gotten wise to this easily accessible preventive measure. The procedure itself is simple and quick. They put you to sleep, so you feel nothing. It can be embarrassing to some folks, like me, but it’s over with so quick that it’s not that embarrassing. In another 10 years I’ll go in for my next one.

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I’ve always strived to stay healthy by exercising and eating properly. Ever since my heart bypass surgery nearly two years ago, I’ve tried even harder and have armed myself with more knowledge by reading several good health-related books. The books all have three main messages: (1) Exercise (2) Avoid bad fats such as saturated fat and trans fat (3) Eat lots of fruits and vegetables a day. Exercise Anything will pass as exercise as long as it gets your heart rate up for a half hour or more. When I work around the house, I approach it as exercise, not as a chore. The other day I decided I wanted to increase my firewood supply from two years to three years, so I chose a storage spot on the side of my house that would be convenient to my primary wood storage area, a covered area off the kitchen that allows me to chop wood out of the rain. I’ve already worked several days on the spot, cutting out a big bush that still has massive roots in the ground that must come out. Then I drove in 12 metal posts with a post driver, over which I placed wooden pallets that will serve as a backstop for one side of the woodpile. I’ve got another couple of days of good exercise waiting for me. It’s better than going to a gym, at least for me. I get bored at the gym, or riding a stationery bike, but I feel as though I’m accomplishing something while getting my heart rate up when I do chores. Avoid bad fats Avoiding bad fats is easy. Don’t eat a lot of meat, except for chicken, and then don’t eat the skin. What could be simpler. Of course, you have to become a label reader when you shop at the grocery store to make sure you don’t buy packaged and canned stuff that is loaded with saturated fat or trans fat. Other fats–the polys and monos–are not so bad. The omega 3s you get from fish are the best. They are fatty acids. Eat fish three times a week and you‘ll live long, unless you get unlucky. Japanese eat lots of fish and have very low rates of heart problems; Americans eat lots of meat and have very high rates of heart problems. With these facts I convinced my wife that I needed to buy a fishing boat so I could live longer. Which goes to show that healthy living is good on many levels. How many guys can convince their wives that blowing $50K on a boat is a good idea? Eat fruits and veggies Eating fruits and vegetables is on a par with the first two. The research varies only in the amount you should eat. At least five servings a day, but more likely about nine. No one really knows. Eating healthy has to involve a lifestyle commitment to fresh vegetables and fruits. We have a big garden and a number of fruit trees so we’re positioned well to eat healthy as a way of life. The other day we had a stir fry consisting of tomatoes, cukes, squash, and Swiss chard picked fresh from our garden. Some skinless chicken chunks made it a protein-rich meal. On the side we had corn on the cob, also picked from the garden. My boys and I make a big deal of our many stir frys, taking out our private sets of chop sticks to eat them. Lenie likes to put up some of our garden veggies, and she’s made it an enjoyable break from the usual routine of running the magazine. The other day she and her friends spent the day on our deck pealing and cutting up our apples after our sons had harvested them from our several trees. She also made a bunch of jars of sweet pickles, which is probably my favorite treat, out of our garden’s cucumbers. While John Silveira was visiting the other day, he, my sons, and I picked all of our kale and blanched and froze it for future batches of kale soup. Kale soup is probably the healthiest soup on the planet. You’ll have to do a search of the website if you want the recipe. I’m making some tomorrow. We’ve still got some ears of corn in the garden, which I eat without butter or salt. Plain corn on the cob is delicious. Most people have convinced themselves that they have to smear corn on the cob with butter and salt. Not so! You just have to let your taste buds adapt to the wonderful flavor of plain corn. We also have plenty of cherry tomatoes, Swiss chard, squash, and pumpkins left in the garden. But the growing and harvesting season is almost over. In a few weeks we’ll begin letting our chickens free-range in the garden and all over our property. That will enrich their eggs with the many phytochemicals pharmacy houses have yet to synthesize in pill form. More healthy food in the form of phytochemical-rich eggs! And remember that an egg a day does not cause a cholesterol problem; a number of studies have shown that. Well, it’s raining now in Oregon. That means winter and woodstove fires are soon to come, which I welcome as more opportunities for healthy exercise for me. I am the main wood cutter in the house, although my 16-year-old son, Jake, has lately taken to this delightful pastime. Chopping wood is a mix of aerobic exercise and transcendental meditation, which I’ll explain in a future blog.

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