A Seasonal Affliction, I Guess.

An annoying side effect of my move to Nebraska is that of allergies. I've never been allergic to much of anything except citrus products, an allergy that affects me and both my daughters. My mother was terribly allergic to citrus, also. I thought I had been suffering head colds last winter and this winter. Nothing terribly serious, but my nose would not stop running and I was going through enough tissues to cause a national paper shortage. The sneezing and the constant nasal draining was awful. I had a siege earlier this winter and then went through it again two weeks ago, then three days ago it hit me again. All this time I firmly believed those incidents were head colds, but it suddenly occurred to me yesterday that it might be allergy related. I went to the local pharmacy and picked an over the counter allergy med and it stopped the "cold" in its tracks. I have no idea what It is I am allergic to, but it seems that whenever we have significant winds this winter, I've come up with these symptoms. I have a regularly scheduled appointment with the doctor in a couple of weeks and I'll discuss it with him to see what I can learn. The town doctor actually takes time out to talk to his patients at length if need be. What a refreshing change for the "get them in and out" philosophy of most doctors in the L.A. area.

We have had some winds recently, but this remains an extremely moderate winter. Yesterday the high temp was 54, today it will be 56 (and may hit 60) and tomorrow is the same. There is a weather dividing line, however, that is not too far north and above that line it is bitterly cold. My apartment manger, Denise, told me that there have been years when January high temps above 70 have been recorded here in Alma. It's not a common event, but it has happened more than once. I noticed this morning that my bad weather boots are feeling neglected. I wore them for a couple of days in early December when we got some cold and snow, but they've just been sitting unused since then.

I'm taking my youngest, Valerie, to Kearney this afternoon where she will board a bus for Dallas, TX, to spend time with her youngest, my grandson Vani who lives there and is in training to be a fireman. He seems to be doing well. His fireman class started a couple of months ago with about twenty people and is now down to six, so he's hanging in there.

On the subject of buses, there are none locally. If you want a bus you must drive north 60 miles to Kearney or south 95 miles to Hays, Kansas. For the seniors and disabled in town, there is a service that delivers them to the hospital complex in Kearney if they need specialized medical services. The city of Alma senior center has a nice sized van with a wheelchair lift and is
available at no cost, not even for the driver, who is a terrific lady named Trish. But for the general public, you can add buses to the list of things that are near at hand in metropolitan areas but are not available to the rural populations of this country.