Okay, Tom got to ride the white taxi to Portsmouth Regional Hospital around 1 pm today. And after schlepping his stuff to the car (it decided to be 90 degrees today -- it was 30 less than a week ago! spozed to be 60 tomorrow) and coming back to deal with financial forms and photocopying of every document you can think of and stuff and whatever (cuz we've got no insurance, no savings and no income right now), I headed off to Portsmouth to get some other financial matters taken care of, etcet, and then joined him after he got settled in to his new digs.

Looks like the heart surgery won't be until later this week. First thing tomorrow morning he'll get rid of his problematic lower teeth to eliminate any possible future infection, which, in the case of a valve replacement, could be life-threatening. And the surgeon said he'd also really like to give Tom and his heart a few more days to get a bit stronger before the surgery.

So . . . he's now at Portsmouth Regional Hospital, 33 Borthwick Ave., Portsmouth, NH 03801 -- phone # 1-800-685-8282 and he's in Room 230A.

And guess what -- our local grocery store has been running a big drawing for a mess of 50 buck gift certificates and I've been filling out entry blanks every time I've been in the store for the last coupla weeks, both in my name and in Tom's name. This evening after I finally got home and fed and insulated the cat (Mort's diabetic), I started going through the bag of mail I collected Saturday -- and there was an envelope addressed to Tom from the store. He's won a $50 gift certificate!

Hey, all your prayers and good wishes are starting to work! And it's going to get lots better.

Love you all,

Linn