Editor's Note - Mea Culpa For The Absence and Low Posting

Good Evening Garlic Fans

I hope all is well with you.

I wanted to touch base and offer some reason on why The Garlic has been quiet the past week, or so.

Yours truly has had a real life, serious family situation to deal with, that has required all energy and attention.

For some time now, going on 12-years, I have been caretaker to an elderly relative, an aunt, now 94.

It's only been the last six-or-seven-years that she has started the descent into age dementia and memory loss (as well as significant hearing loss). A very vibrant woman, someone who averaged walking 5-10-miles per-day into her late 80's, an advocate, long before it was popular, or had titles and categories of market share, of eating healthy, vitamins, holistic approaches to medicine, was slowing down.

Roughly eight-years ago, she fell, breaking her shoulder (but didn't tell me about it for nearly six-hours).

Two-years ago, she suffered a 'TIA Episode" or small stroke.

And last Friday night/Saturday morning, she encountered, what turned out to be, Congestive Heart Failure, a small heart attack. Which soon became exponentially more complicated, within 30-minutes of being admitted to the hospital, she took a fall, breaking her left wrist.

So, I have been dealing with this, as she was discharged from the hospital this past Tuesday, and now it's been about getting her comfortable and figuring out, with the heavy plaster cast, and on Lasik to diminish any remnants of fluid build-up, which makes her tired, what her baseline is going to be.

I wanted to present this, to assuage concerns anyone had, fearful that the gas tank was empty and I was giving it up, and that I hope, with this post tonight, and, perhaps a few over the weekend, to get back in the groove.

It may be light - Top Ten Cloves, or riffs pointing to other hot news or great writing - and it could still be erratic, but I am eager to get back to work.

So, please bear with The Garlic and, if it's a light or empty day, scroll down the right column to the vast array of links or highlighted posts you may have missed.

Peace
JTD