Heart surgery cont...

It's now over 48 hours since dad had his heart surgery and he didn't seem quite as good today as he was yesterday. He was out of bed and sitting in a chair - he couldn't do that yesterday - but he just didn't seem to be so bright. It turned out he'd been given some high potassium medication that had upset his stomach and he was feeling pretty nauseous. He decided he wanted to go for a walk so Sheila took him out to the lobby, but when they got back he was not looking too good, and was ill. We were all told to go outside while the nurses sorted dad out. I think it must have shaken him up quite a bit as, although he said he felt much better, when we got back in he was quite quiet for a while.

When we left he seemed OK and was ready to settle down for the evening. They're planning to change his medication so hopefully he'll be OK in the morning and will be ready to carry on with his physio.

Heart Surgery

My dad's just had major hear surgery today. We took him into hospital last night where he seemed amazingly calm and collected considering what he was about to go through. I on the other hand, was a complete bag of nerves and I can only imagine what I would have been like if I had been him! His surgery was scheduled for 8:30 this morning and at 12:00 the surgeon called me to let me know how things had gone. He said that his valve really was in bad shape so it's a good job that he was able to replace that now before it had become a major problem. He also did one bypass and that was the only extra work that was necessary. He expected him to make a good recovery.

Surprisingly we were able to see him tonight as the nurses in Intensive Care said he was awake and talking. He was asleep when we got there but he woke up after a few minutes and was pretty lucid considering how drugged up he must be, but anyway he was awake enough to know he was missing a football game on TV!

The nurses said he required less medication than most people of his age which was a good sign and showed that he must be in pretty good shape for his age. They gave him a few more pain killers and he was asleep again. We'll be back to see him tomorrow....

SkiTime

We've been planning a ski vacation with John and Dave - two long time friends who live in New York - and Deborah and Mark - two new friends who live in Boulder. We last skied together in 2004 so it's been a long time since we've seen each other and had major fun on snow. This is a short video of our last trip - and an appetizer for our next trip in Jan/Feb 2008...

Maldives again

We've just returned from our third year in a row at Royal Island in Maldives and were there this time for almost 3 weeks. Once again we had a fabulous time and have to say that Royal Island has been amazingly consistent over our three visits providing excellent service each time. Each time we've returned the staff have remembered us and many make a special effort to come and see us and spend time with us in the bar during the evenings. The whole place seems to run like clockwork and there seems to be a lot of good teamwork going on between everyone to make sure the guests have the best possible time.

We were hoping to meet some friends there (Kath and Richard) but they said they couldn't make it, however 4 days into our vacation and bingo, there they were, standing right in front of us one evening when we went to dinner. Apparently they just had to be there and did some rapid last minute arranging!

We spent a lot of time swimming, reading, listening to music, and just hanging out. Sheila spent a lot of time in the spa and snorkelling - she took hundreds of underwater pictures. I did some snorkelling but not as much, but I did play squash a few times with our friend Richard. I has my first ever session in the spa paid for by the hotel manager who insisted that I went after I told him I'd never been.

I'm pretty sure we'll be back there again in October 2008.