I did give a gift today to my best friend, Lynn (see January 4), as a slightly belated birthday present, when we met for lunch today after my doctor’s appointment. The gift was some hammered silver earrings bought from a local artist at a sale in our neighborhood a few days ago. She loved them, which was great, but since the earrings were gifts that I bought and didn’t already own, I can’t count them in my Giveaway.

Instead, I dropped off a couple of classical music CDs at Out of the Closet a few minutes before it closed this evening. It was all I could manage today – a day of painful memories for the United States and beyond, stifling heat-wave temperatures again in Los Angeles, and a day of mixed diagnoses from the doctor. Though the results of the mammogram that had caused anxiety for me last week were negative for the time being, I have a recurring acid reflux condition that is upsetting my stomach and making me cough a lot, giving me flashbacks to earlier this year. The heat and dust-filled air isn’t helping. Still, two more CDs are gone, I had some quality time with my best friend, and the heat wave should break in two days! Enough there to be grateful for…