It’s now been close to a month since I was tested. VA wasn’t able to do this. So, they sent me to a giant local hospital to do it. I’ve had a good many of these kinds of tests where you lay down on a platform that’s on wheels and you’re transported into a tunnel. You probably have done this too. I had the first one done about 15 years ago. They gave me headphones to wear and they asked me what kind of music I wanted to hear. The Kingston Trio wasn’t on their list. I wasn’t able to hear much of the music. The machine was too loud for this to be possible. The machines aren’t loud anymore. This was the second one where the injected color fluid.
What was different this time was the size of the platform they had me lay on. It was like a 2x6. I didn’t know if I’d be able to stay on the darn thing. And, I’m not overweight. I asked the guy… “What happens when you have someone that’s obese?” He said, “It’s never been a problem.” After I finished the test and I got off the platform, “He said, “Your results will be ready after noon tomorrow.” I was glad to get out of there. They kept me waiting almost an hour before calling me for the exam and I had to wait a half an hour for the fluid to get to my brain. Which was what I was having tested.
After not hearing from anyone after two weeks, I called VA. Three times. Each time, I was told that someone would get back to me. I’d told several people that I’d gotten my head examined. They all said, “Why’d it take so long for you to get it done?” When I talked to them again, they said, “What gives? Did they find anything?”
Then, one day last week I got a call. I asked why it took so long to get the results? She said, I just got your results about 15 minutes ago. This explained what happened. The big giant hospital dropped the ball. They didn’t send the results to VA. Isn’t this how life is now?
She said not to worry. Only 10% of the people who have MCI have Alzheimer’s. I think I first had the symptoms in 2010. I’ve been telling VA about them for about 5 years. They finally sent me to Geriatrics. That’s who ordered the test. My short term memory is shot to hell. Large blocks of things from the past are disappearing. Gone like they never happened. Many names and faces are long gone. I can’t remember words. Heavy brain lifting is very difficult. My head hurts.
For about three weeks I’ve been working on a book I’m writing. Except, it’s not much of a book. I’m on page 173 and I only have about 30 more pages to write. I’m sure it would be a “Best Seller” if I could make it longer. I could do that, but then it would end up being a lot of BS. Which is what most books become to have enough pages to satisfy publishers. I’m going to self-publish it. So, this won’t be a problem. I’ve spent the last day or so trying to figure out where in the heck I am in it. I lost track a while back.
Here’s what ChatGPT says about MCI.

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a medical diagnosis for noticeable problems with memory or other thinking skills that are more than normal aging but not severe enough to interfere with everyday independence (paying bills, managing medications, living alone). It’s essentially the “in-between” stage between typical aging and dementia. Alzheimer's.govMayo Clinic
Common signs
• Memory lapses (appointments, recent conversations), word-finding trouble, or difficulties with planning/complex tasks—while daily activities still get done. Clinicians also classify MCI as amnestic (mostly memory) or non-amnestic (attention, language, visuospatial, decision-making). Alzheimer's.govAlzheimer’s Association
How doctors diagnose it
• Medical history (including input from a family member), brief cognitive tests, mood screening, medication review, lab tests (e.g., thyroid, B12), and often brain imaging. When Alzheimer’s is suspected, biomarkers (spinal fluid, PET, sometimes blood tests) may be used to label it “MCI due to Alzheimer’s.” Alzheimer’s Association
What happens over time
• Risk of progression varies; roughly 1–2 in 10 people ≥65 with MCI progress to dementia each year, but many remain stable or even improve—especially if the cause is treatable (medications, depression, sleep problems, etc.). Alzheimer's.gov
Treatment & what helps
• No medication is approved specifically for general MCI. Focus is on risk-factor management and brain-healthy habits: regular physical activity, controlling blood pressure/diabetes, good sleep, staying socially and mentally active, addressing depression/anxiety, and treating hearing loss if present. Alzheimer's.govMayo Clinic
• If testing shows MCI due to Alzheimer’s, disease-modifying antibodies (lecanemab/Leqembi and donanemab/Kisunla) are FDA-approved for “early Alzheimer’s” (MCI or mild dementia)—they require confirming amyloid pathology and careful discussion of risks/monitoring. U.S. Food and Drug Administration+1Alzheimer’s Association
When to talk to a clinician (sooner is better)
• New or worsening memory/thinking issues, mood changes, safety concerns, medication side-effects, or if you simply want a baseline checkup. Regular follow-up (every 6–12 months) is recommended once MCI is diagnosed. Alzheimer's.gov
Now, what in the heck has this got to do with Redford dying?
It’s been scientifically proven that humans need heroes. Some of us need them more than others. Dave, Nick, Bob, and John were our heroes.
But, they weren’t the first of the lot. For me, first came Roy, Hopalong, Gene and the masked man.
After that … came the Cincinnati Reds. On the radio. I can still picture it now. At my father’s business, there was a little radio. They were images in my head long before I was able to watch the games on TV.
We didn’t have kids. I don’t know what that would be like. So, for those of you who did … maybe it’s different for you.
For me, the best two years of my life involved baseball. The summers when I was 13 and 14. I was the coach of a minor league baseball team that played at the field behind MortonSchool. These were kids age 8 to 12 that weren’t good enough for Little League in Lexington, Kentucky, where I grew up, where Little League was very big (it still is).
For these kids, the ones on my team, it wasn’t this way at all. They were plenty good enough. The older ones. Like everything else in life. There just weren’t enough slots on the Little League teams to accommodate all the kids.
I wanted my team to have uniforms. Minor league teams didn’t have them. So, we went to the little shopping center near the ball field and went store-to-store to get $6.00 to sponsor a kid so he could have a uniform. My team won the league championship both years I was their coach. Both years, we got beat in the city tournament by teams from a tougher neighborhood where they played “hardball.”
Nevertheless, we had a great team. Johnny Murphy was our catcher. With a name like “Murph” what else would he be besides a catcher? Scotty Holdaway played first base. He was tall. Robert Core played second base. He was tall too. His father was an FBI agent. He lived across the street from the ball park. So, he kept the Army duffle bag that that had the catcher’s equipment and our bats in it. I can almost see the kid that was our shortstop. Same for third base and our outfielders. Our pitcher was a kid named Rollin Fishback. Like Murph, with a name like Rollin … what else would he be besides a pitcher? Rollin could really pitch, but he could never get out of bed. In the afternoon !!! I can’t tell you how many times I rode my bike to his house to get him out of bed, dressed and off to the ball park. Rollin lived in a very upscale neighborhood in Lexington. Someone on his street built an incredible tree house that was high up in the air and you could see it from several blocks away. There was a story about it in LIFE magazine with photographs. The entrance to this neighborhood was hard to find. It’s been a long time since I’ve gone back there. I used to visit it regularly because being there was very special.
I left Lexington in 1963 to “go away to college.” We returned in 1990. Twenty-seven years later. The saying is true. “You can never go home again.” I spent the first five years that we were there trying to find the place where I grew up. You could say that “Mr. Peabody’s coal train had hauled it away.” The only thing that ever came close to things being like they once were took place on the day Murph came over to our house. I called him after we’d been there for a month or so. He brought the catcher’s mit. I told him to hang on to it at the end of the summer. Of course, I still had my glove. A MacGregor Gus Bell model. I just looked at it. It’s on the top shelf of my closet. That afternoon, Murph and I went out in the back yard and we played catch.
There have been some good baseball movies. “Field of Dreams” There’s that great line in “Bull Durham.” “Baseball is a very simple game. You throw the ball. You catch the ball. You hit the ball.”

But, there’s nothing like “The Natural.”