ONE NEEDS TO HAVE PLANS WHEN ONE IS STUCK HOME DUE TO AN INJURY OR ILLNESS

 My foot is much healed  - though not completely yet – since last week.  

It has been hard staying off my foot as much as possible.  This means, of course, sitting in one place or another and greatly limiting switching to other places – though we did have to go out for a bit of food shopping.  Staying off my foot seems to be working as it seems be about half better already.  

Husband has been trying to help as much as possible – he even washed the dishes for a couple of days.  He has always been upset that I did not replace our dishwasher when it died – as much as he did not want me having to wash the dishes by hand, he did not want to have to do so himself when I could not.  Even long before Covid I would put on a mask (he has them for his woodworking) or tying a towel around my face and putting on disposable plastic gloves when ill so he would not have to do the dishes.    He also cooked – but he has always been the cook of the two of us.   

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

One needs to be prepared for when cannot do the normal housework – or other jobs which one normally does.  What sort of plans do YOU have for when you cannot deal with house, cooking, or work for a period of time.  

Do you have someone else to take over or help you – spouse, child, parent, housemate or really good friend?  Do you have disposable goods – paper plates, cups, napkins to use when you cannot deal with washing up after meals?  The telephone number of a place which delivers for an affordable price?

Whether an injury or an illness which keeps one home one needs to be prepared to be able to eat and deal with one's house should something happen.

LIFE IS TOO OVERWHELMING THIS WEEK TO TALK JUST ABOUT CLUTTER AND ORGANIZER

 As I sit here tonight writing this post I am having a problem getting my brain around what is going on simultaneously here in the United States.  I grew up in post World War II United States of America. Never in my life have so many major problems being affecting our country at one time.  We have the 11pm news on and the news rolls on and on.

Our problems that accumulated from centuries of not treating all people in our country (and in the colonies before them) have come to a head.  Our population is separating in one of the most divided and angry elections we have had in recent memory to the point where I fear the violence if the candidate I don't support coming to office as well its result, while also fearing what will happen if the candidate I do support comes to office and the violence that may result from that also, with whichever side loses the election not accepting same and rousing up their supporters.  

We have an illness that is overwhelming to our population, medical systems and further splitting the people of the country apart between those who appreciate the danger of the illness and try to keep from catching it or passing it along to others and those who think it is “just the flu” and not serious and do nothing to prevent it being passed along. (And by the way, the flu is not “just the flu” either and can be lethal.)  

Our weather has also been a problem this a year.  As mentioned in prior posts, our area of the U.S. went through what should not have been a bad tropical storm passing through.  Due to our local utilities it took over 2 weeks to get almost all of those who lost electricity back on line – electric utility claims all back, but some people apparently still do not have their electricity back.  There are a substantial number of people still do not have telephone, Internet service and cable TV service back – some weeks after the storm.  Our electric utility has figured out how to deal with the fact that most people with outages could not reach them during and after the storm for future storms – they will not take any calls, emails, texts, etc. in future storms as they “will know” where the outages are due to their “smart meters”.  This despite the fact that less than half of their customers have smart meters and they did not know during this storm and in its aftermath who did not have electricity.  

And now what has pushed me to write this post.  There is a hurricane bearing down on the south-east portion of the U.S. - with Louisiana and Texas to bear the brunt of it.   Luckily the second hurricane that was traveling more or less the same path as this one, has fallen apart or those in these areas would be facing a one, two punch of horrendous storms.  I am hearing that some areas will have sustained winds of over 120 miles per hour for over 3 hours – can anything stand up to that?  Hopefully the populace will listen to what they are being told and get out of there for other states to their north and west as the storm will heading turning in a large curve to the east after wards.  (Expected here on Saturday and I am concerned for friends in the Carolinas, Virginia and Delaware as it passes through their areas.)  Of course the need to social distance is adding to the problems of this storm as fewer people can ride on each of the buses intended to move them to safer areas, fear of riding for an extensive time with other on buses will lead to more people driving their own vehicles – which make more traffic and slow the process of moving people away from the danger, down even more.  Plus the shelters which are set up for those who have no place else to go when they evacuate the area can hold many fewer people than they normally would due to the need to space the beds, etc. further apart from normal.  

Life is starting to seem more and more like a biblical tale, in this, wrought by nature.  

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -

My prayers, fears and thoughts are with those about to hit by Laura.  I can think of little at this time.  I hope that the storm breaks apart somehow or travels through must faster so it causes less damage.  If you are in the affected areas – please make sure that you leave and stay as far away from the path of Laura as you can.  Your life and those of those around you are much important than anything else.

YET ANOTHER WEEK OF NOT GETTING ANYTHING DONE

Another week gone by and little to show for it – again.

Husband had planned for us to go to a quilt show in Pennsylvania last Thursday, the first day of the show.  We normally will go to this and other shows from the same company on Thursday as it is less crowded and items are not sold out – not that we normally buy anything there.  While we both have done quilting, we go for something to do and because there are no other sewing or embroidery shows in this part of the country and I do sew and hand embroider.  Since we – and our RV – really need a trip we had planned to stay overnight and go to the farmer's market we like in Lancaster on Friday. 

So, of course it poured on Thursday – here and there.  We changed our trip to just go for the day on Friday to the quilt show, but drove there in the RV so it was driven and would keep the engine and RV batteries working properly. 

Husband's sister has self-published a book and somehow managed to get a local bookstore to give her a reading/signing event on Thursday night.  Since we were home, husband decided to go to the signing – in heavy rain.  We could not figure out where to park – hard to see in the rain – and ended up 3 blocks away.  I am “made of sugar” - when I go out in the rain, I get sick. 

So Friday midday a cold hit me.  Luckily it is a relatively light cold and will soon be gone.  But husband is a hypochondriac and does not like me touching things that he will touch or eat when I am sick.  We ate out as usual on the weekend.  Monday night we had reenactment unit meeting and bought deli sliced turkey for dinner.  But last night, Tuesday, dinner needed to be cooked.  Understand, husband is, or at least was when we cooked more elaborately, a better cook than I am.  But he is out of practice, was worried about the batteries in the RV (which are still not right) and an oil leak under the RV, and I have stand there and step by step tell him how to cook and where things are – so dinner and clean up (done by me with plastic gloves on) took forever. 

In addition our reenactment unit has an event this Saturday that originally husband said we were not going to.  Now not only are we are going, but he found out he can sell the items he has been weaving.  So he (and thereby also I) are involved with getting ready to do so – we have not done a craft show in 10 years and this has to be setup differently and we have never sold items he has woven before so we do not a have setup at all for same, let alone one that will pass for a country fair.  So we are running around trying to put together a setup and also finishing the woven items.  Finishing them consists of washing and drying them and then cutting the start and end threads and doing something with the fringe ends.  Not something that can be quickly done for about a dozen scarves and table runners.

He also decided that we need to be able to take credit cards – something I agree with – so he filled in the required info to be able to take credit cards from Paypal. We have an account with then that we use for online sales that exists for about 10 years, so we are not strangers to them, it should be easy to get a card reader and use with our existing account.  As of today – a week after he filled in the info – we still don't seem to have the account for sales with a card reader and they seem to be sending the wrong card reader.  The day after he originally gave them the info and we saw that there were problems he signed up with Square – who we had never done business with before - and we were able to immediately sign up and pick up a card reader at one of an assortment of stores locally that sell them.  So much for loyalty to customers by Paypal. 

So I have not get anything done as we were away and we have been trying to get everything done for Saturday (which to our minds mean that it will rain Saturday and the event will be canceled or they will have it and we will not go due to the rain). 

In addition I have the cold, plus a couple of weeks ago I started having pains that we think are from my lifting the last analog monitor we got rid of – the pains come and go depending on if I lift something else heavy – and last night I was terribly ill after dinner so I have not been of much help, particularly since husband will not let me lift anything “heavy” which has much lighter threshold than it does for most people.  (I am not sure how we will be able to setup Saturday as he will not let me carry any of the setup or the weaving and we cannot park close to where the reenactment unit is setting up.

I was suppose to take my mom to the doctor this week – but had to speak to her about when she is available to go so I can make an appointment, so I had not done so, plus I did not want to her give her my cold – so I called tonight to check her schedule and will try to make an appointment for next week.

I also have to go to client this week or next. I would greatly have preferred this week as she is in Manhattan and next week the U.N.  will be in town and it will be a travel and security mess, but she is also older woman in her 80s and I did not want to give her my cold either. 

Oh, and the RV battery is not keeping its charge so we were “playing with it” all week and now our car mechanic has it – he fixed the oil leak and will see what he can see about the batteries tomorrow.  (Husband spoke to RV company that installed the new batteries – batteries have warranty, but does not cover labor and we will need to leave the RV there for at least a week – ouch, at $100+ per hour… - plus we will have to drive both RV and car to New Jersey, come home with car, when it is fixed drive car to NJ, pick up the RV and then drive both home – and tolls for each vehicle for each round trip is about $30 – so the tolls alone are almost $100, plus the gas.)

So I have gotten some computer work done I managed to trace and resolve problems in the posting of our Etsy sales and fees – mostly only have fees, few sales – from using their new payment account that handles both fees we pay and sales we make (terrible idea from an accounting point of view).  I did scanning of tax return recently finished for client.  That sort of thing. 

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Sometimes one just has to go with the flow of what is going on.  Great to get stuff done, but when life has other plans – don't go crazy, just go with the flow and catch up when one can.

WHAT IF YOU OR YOUR OTHER HALF WAS UNABLE TO DEAL WITH THE HOUSEHOLD OR FINANCES?

Gosh darn!  I did it again!  I forgot to post yesterday! 

Now, I was doing well, at the beginning of the week I had an idea for what to post about - which I forgot, but as I wrote this very line, the idea came back. 

Husband has been having a bad week - his back now is down to an ache and it varies from worse to better - twice it disappeared completely for a couple of hours - but sometimes it gets worse when he takes the medication or when he soaks in a hot shower, the idea our doctor recommended.  We happened to be at the doctor’s office today - before all this with his shoulder, I had made appointments for our annual visit and its bloodwork, and today was the bloodwork.  Doctor said it could take 6 weeks for his shoulder to stop hurting completely - 4 more to go and neither can take much more of this - for him the pain and inability to go out and do things as he gets too exhausted and it makes his shoulder/arm/ - and now also - neck hurt more.  He is frustrated with it all and I am exhausted from trying to help him. Every thing is a bit confused.  I am not completely sure what day it is unless I check.  (Good thing we have our pills in several day of the week boxes, so it helps remind us what day it and whether or not we took our medications.)  When we go for lunch at Wendys I order and get the lunch while he gets the table - the opposite of what we normally do - which also confuses the employees - one fellow there lists me as Mrs. “husband first name”.  Others just list with me his name.  And then again, the weekend crew which does not know us as well asked for my name - I gave him my middle name to avoid having to spell my name. 

On the other hand I have gotten a lot of decluttering done as we are home so much.  I have finished scanning in the articles from the older reenacting magazines that we decided to scan the articles he wanted into the computer and then get rid of the magazines.  They are now stacked up to take to next month’s reenactment unit meeting and pass them along to others who have joined more recently and not had a chance to read them.  In one magazine he only had one article marked to scan - and that was two pages - see, we really did not need to keep the entire magazine at all.  As these magazines leave, I have room for the newer ones.  I started today scanning in the articles from the magazine from the national of my embroidery club.  These magazines after they are scanned go with me to the meetings or places where we do a “stitch in public” and I give them out to people who might be interested in joining us so they can see the nice magazine they will get from national and also get rid of them without throwing them away (ditto the other ones we bring to the reenactment unit meetings).  I also have been making telephone calls that I put off as we are not home and awake enough time to make the calls.  I still have to call our eye doctor and make an appointment for us - but not sure when to do so as he can’t drive out there.

Okay, now the idea I had for this week.  Have you done anything to allow someone else to take over running your household if they had to? For decades I tried to get my husband to pay attention to our finances - where we bank, what money comes in, what bills have to go out, etc.  He never wanted to talk about it  - it would be bad luck.  I started paying his bills for him before we got married and kept doing so - “You’re an accountant.  You do it.  You are better at it.”  I would say to him as I tried to get him to look at things and how I do them “What would happen if I was kidnaped and you had to find the money to pay them to get me back?”  Death was not allowed to be mentioned.  “I would tell them that have to put you on the phone to tell me where the money is so I could pay them.”

In December 2012 we were in a bad car accident - in front of the house next door to ours.  We luckily were not only still alive somehow, but also uninjured.  This scared him.  He suggested to me that I should I make up a notebook with all the information that someone would need to take over our bills, deposits, running the household, etc.  By this he meant, even more than himself, if someone had to take it all over because we were injured. 

I started doing this and in the ensuing 6 years I have done parts of it and then redone so.  To date it is in my computer and not in a notebook, but I am working doing so.  I found a old looseleaf book to use.  (Better to recycle it to this than have it sit in the closet and buy a new one.)

My first go around with this - back in 2013 - was to write copious notes about when each bill comes in, when it has to go out, how I write the check, and how I post it in my financial software.  Second go around, I scanned one of each bill into the computer as an example. 

Currently I am scanning in each bill (first page only) when it is paid along with the check that pays it, anyway, as part of my bill paying.  I have to make new notes about each bill and put it the notebook.  I also figured out that I would put in the information we receive annually about our garbage pickup, with written instructions to go along with it.  I want to write up information about how to use the washer and dryer.  How and what I clean (okay, plan to clean and don’t always get to).  When things such as the oil burner inspection needs to be done (the company we have a contract with did not call last year - or this year and with dealing with husband and still trying to get to my client to go to work there (for 2 months work now) I never had a chance to call them to ask why I haven’t heard about an appointment for 2 years or set up an appointment.  Where what Christmas decorations are stored in the basement and so on.

What prompted to me to write about this now is an article I read in a publication reminding me how hard this can be on the survivor(s).  I have had several clients who had their home/family run traditionally.  The wife took care of the house and the husband took care of the finances.  In each case the husband died and I had to help the widow figure out what they had.  This was in the pre-Internet days which was an advantage as for some items we just had to wait until the widow received something in the mail.  In January/February one receives all the papers for income taxes so that helped.  In addition in some cases we had to check the state unclaimed/abandoned property office (each US state has one - not sure what is done in other countries) to see if anything had slipped by us and had been turned over to the state for the state to hold until it was claimed.  Especially important for all spouses (and/or someone else) to know about is any life insurance which has its premiums  paid off as nothing may come in the mail from the insurance company.

In addition these days the items maybe sent by email - and one may not be able to check the spouse’s email.  Generally items online are not something that can be inherited.  By this I mean if your spouse had an (or more than one) email accounts and you do not know how to sign into them, you may not be allowed to get into them as they were your spouse’s account not yours.  In addition if there is a Facebook account etc. you may not be given the information to sign into it - it is their account not yours.  Do you and your spouse (by which I mean any significant other) share a book download account?  If it is in your spouse’s name you probably lose the books in it as they are not for sharing and cannot be inherited. 

So if you and someone share accounts make sure that both of you know how to sign into them and what the passwords are.  In the article I mentioned, the poor widow was going crazy trying to figure out her husband’s security question answers to be able to set new passwords when she did not know what the passwords were to the accounts.  Her husband’s first pet’s name - she put in what she thought it was, but it did not work.  His first school - not the one she thought it was. 

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

None of us likes to think about injury or illness or death of ourselves or those we love - and we think that we have lots of time to deal with it.  One never knows.  Make sure that you and your other half -if you have one - or someone else who is close and responsible - know about each other’s accounts and log in info.  Make sure that you both know what your (joint if applicable) financial situation is and how and when money comes in and goes out and from where it comes and where it goes.  Make sure that both of you know about all insurances related to each other.  Try to have a list of bills you pay monthly, quarterly, annually, etc. for reference.  Have a list of incoming money and when, how and where it comes- especially money that is not a paycheck.  If you own a house, car, stocks, etc. make sure both (or all) of you know where the ownership papers are for it.  Bank Vault?  Locked box in the closet? The back of several drawers?  Also if you (or your other) has jewelry include the information about where it is, what it is, and if it is valuable.  (My husband knows that the jewelry in the jewelry box on top of dresser is all junk jewelry of no value, but there is a small box stashed with minor items that are real jewelry and the rest is in our bank vault.)

Also if you have all this information organized, in case of an emergency you can take the information with you if you have to flee your home from any of these horrible weather situations which have become more common in recent years.  I have a copy of the computer data backup I put in the bank in my “grab and go” folder which has copies of our car and house titles, insurance policies, and I put the bank statements when I reconcile them in the folder - and take out the prior month’s statement and file that one away.  This way I have the most recent bank statement to come with us - including the ones for the two organizations that I am treasurer of. 

BACK TO HOUSEWORK - PREPARE FOR POSSIBLE TRIP

After 2 weeks husband has decided that the tail end of cold is too much to deal with and I am back to cooking and cleaning on my own as of yesterday.  So tonight I am catching up on 3 weeks of laundry backed up.  I washed the clothing, he put in the dryer and then in the laundry basket.  He then pulled out his clothing and put it away and left mine for me.

 I think the final blow was yesterday was “change the bed linens day”.  Last week we only changed the pillow cases.  Last night I figured I would change the sheets, I would change my pillow cases, he would change his, and I would change the sheets and remake the bed - other than him dealing with his pillowcases.  So yesterday morning, I pulled off my pillowcases, folded the blanket and pulled the top sheet off the bed.  I would normally have pulled off his bottom pillowcase in the morning. I pull the top pillowcase and the bottom sheet off when we are going to bed at night and remake the bed then.  (I used to pull everything off in the morning, but a couple of times he was dizzy and ill during the day and I had to quickly put his side of the bed back, so this is our compromise - he can lie down as the bottom sheet and his top pillowcase are there and then pull the top sheet - lying on the bed - on top of him if he does not feel well. ) So last night I put the last (of 3) set of clean sheets on the bed and put the blanket on.  I went to pull 2 pillowcases for my pillow and he would do his pillowcases afterwards .... but there were only 2 clean pillowcases!  We each took one. 

I went down tonight to start the first load of laundry and did so.  I was also going to run our “Packtite”, a device intended to heat suitcases and their contents when one returns home from a trip so that if one has picked up bed bugs they will be killed by the heat.  We set it up with a laundry basket with holes in it and I heat anything coming into the house we are concerned about.  Normally I run it when it when I do the laundry as it is near the washer and dryer in the basement and the timing for a load of laundry to wash or dry and to check the temperature on the thermometer in the Packtite is about the same. There is a small number of things to heat.  I noticed that the thermometer reading for the Packtite was the same as last time I used it .  (We have an indoor/outdoor reading thermometer and the dohickey for the outside is in the Packtite so I can see the temperature and make sure it is high enough, long enough, but does not go to high.)  No new reading - or a blank reading - for the dohickey means that it needs new batteries.   I walked up 2 flights of stairs to the office to get new batteries and then back down the same 2 flights.  It still did not work.  I texted husband to help me.  (Yes, we are lazy enough to text each other in the house - much better than running up and down the stairs to tell each other something, especially in summer when doors are closed to keep air conditioning in the room and the ac units are running and making noise.)  We spent over half an hour playing with it, but the dohickey still does not work.  My solution?  We have the same setup on a thermometer in the kitchen to read the temperature in the refrigerator, I brought that set up downstairs and took the working main thermometer from the basement and stuck it in the refrigerator and read it by opening the door.  Tomorrow I will switch the setups back - and we will look for a new thermometer for the basement.  (I pause here to run down and switch laundry loads.)

Okay, I am back.  Over last weekend I reset the number of days for my Quickbooks to remind me of memorized transactions (mostly bills to pay, some direct deposits to come in) to cover everything through the end of the month (normally it is set for one week).  I wrote checks for all the bills and calculated how much we needed to transfer from savings (which is a holding account for money for bills) to pay all the bills to the end of the month.  I transferred the money yesterday and today mailed out the bill payments. Well, everything but the cable/Internet bill which will not come until the last minute at the end of the month - and the money for it plus a bit more is now is now in the checking account.  Why did I pay it all at once?  Husband REALLY wants to go on a trip of more than a day or two.  He keeps checking the upcoming weather in the several places we might go and it continues to follow the pattern of a day with no rain - maybe two days if lucky -and then two or three days of pouring rain and thunderstorms.  (Although the weather is not as bad as it is in some parts of the country - I hope none of you are in the areas of the wildfires or the flooding.) When we prepare for a trip we pay any bills that need to be paid while we will be away and need to transfer money for same and then mail the payments.  This way we do not even have to think of the bills until the cable bill at the end of the month.  We can leave with a just a quick stop at the bank for cash for the trip.  One less thing that has to be dealt with.  Actually the only other problem is the newspaper - if we go at the last minute there will be a paper sitting in the delivery tube while we are away - I guess one paper will look like that day’s paper so it is not bad.  Most of our mail goes to our box at the Post Office and we put in a large locking mailbox at the house so that we do not have to stop the mail that does still come to the house.  Clothing can be washed and dried and then packed the night before and just tossed on the RV bed when we go.  Food, etc can be stuck under the RV bed in a holder that is there.  It can all be unpacked when we get where we are going.  So if he finds a place to go we can leave the next day.

He has had another project he has been working on and frustrated with, which affects me.  He has been trying to convince me to stop using this laptop and buy a new one.  I have some problems checking posts on some websites - the laptop runs Windows XP.  We have been looking and have found some laptops at the price we can pay - actually more than we can pay, but we can stretch the amount another $100 or so t buy.  I am still resistant as there are only one or two websites which are affected and I have software I like which may or may not work with Windows 10 and at least one I know will not work with same.  Yes, it can take up to 20 minutes for the laptop to boot and takes awhile for programs to open, but I am used to.  The alternative he comes up with is installing Linux on this computer to use when online.  He has found and set up about 5 versions of same on USB stick drives and DVDs in the past week or so.  The latest version on DVD actually works - but one of the sites I have a problem with only partially opens.  I have not have my laptop at least part of each night as a result as he loads the new try.  (Notice I made sure to write and post on time this week since I was late last week, but some friends on an embroidery site and some friends on a comics site will not hear from me - and I normally am on the comics site on Monday nights.)  I am guessing that I will be giving in and getting the new laptop - but not until after the cutoff for the credit card bill this month, so we won’t have to pay for it until October - the house insurance is in September, plus any travel bills if we go away.

Oh - I did finally vacuum up all the shreds of paper from my big shredding of 2008 last week.
                               
THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

One may fall behind due to illness or other reasons.  Don’t panic.  One can always catch up. 

WEEK OF FALLING BEHIND AND TROUBLE GETTING THINGS DONE - ACHOO!

Well, it has been one of those weeks - you know them - everything takes longer than you figure it will and it is hard to get anything done and then it all goes along like a ball rolling along and picking up more delays and problems.

I hate when I don’t have time to do something right or time to finish it and I have to set it aside and go back and finish it.  When I started today I felt like I had added another 5 days of backup to what I have to do.  The pile on my desk was growing. 

Last Sunday our reenactment unit had its annual party.  While we are no longer involved in the party planning and buying for it, I am still the treasurer and I am chasing down members who have not renewed as I need to send paperwork and payment for our members to our national group - by March 1- over week ago.  So the end of last week I had to gather all my paperwork for same and call those who have not responded to emails, of course the phone call is more than just “you must renew now” as we are all friends - “is everyone okay” “what is happening”, etc.  Then two of the people who promised to renew at the party still have not done so and did not come to the party and I have to chase them down again.  Also the party, while I enjoy going, took up an entire afternoon when I could have been doing other things.

On the other hand a craft related group I belong to was contacted by a stranger in reference to something that was found on ebay related to our chapter and I spent time, also the end of last week, to deal with contact between the person who contacted us and the various members of the group until we resolved it - sort of - we are still discussing the situation.

As an accountant “in real life” I have corporation taxes for clients due out by March 15 and sales taxes for clients by March 20. I spent part of last week getting one corporation return in particular done to the point where I knew it would get finished in time to go to the client this week when I went for the regular monthly trip to do her books and get the return in the mail to the government on time, as well as calculate her sales taxes to then come home and redo same online as required by our state. 

So bills I paid last week were paid, but not posted to my computer.  Other similar items.  I have bills to pay to members of the craft group for items they purchased for same - just sitting in the pile and I really should reimburse them.

Then came this past Monday.  What I had hoped was just a dry throat from the furnace heat, had finished developing into a cold.  So now I feel rushed and I am coughing and sneezing and my brain feels like it is enveloped in “stupid”. (Actually just stopped to sneeze.)  My husband is trying to avoid me to avoid getting sick - but I am still cooking and washing the dishes and doing the laundry.  I am using hand sanitizer like crazy.  I am using my tv/cable remote from upstairs  - downstairs, so we are not both touching the same controller, but the TV is different and has to be worked manually and I like the TV much lower in volume than he does and that has to be changed on the TV itself and it is driving me crazy.

My husband just finished a weaving project on his new loom and is trying hard to deal with the aftersteps alone, but I usually help him and, unrelated to him doing it alone, the piece has creases in it which he cannot get rid of, and with my brain stuck in stupid, I cannot really help - or even hear him half the time.  Today we spent the entire afternoon looking for large white bath sheets to buy for him to roll the piece in after wetting it again - after several hours and giving up, we realized that we had towels useable for the purpose in our RV.  So time which could have been used to catch up - was gone.  He is very excitable and managed not only to use up most of the afternoon, but get himself so dizzy with what he did with soaking the piece and rolling it up in the towels, that he got sick and had to go to bed for a couple of hours.  And we never did the grocery shopping we needed to do.

I finished the corporation return for the client on Monday.  On Tuesday I decided that there was no way I would be able to deal with going to the client in Manhattan on Thursday as planned, especially if it may rain then, as well as the client is an older woman and I would hate to give her this horrible cold.  I called her and explained and that I would mail the returns to her, she would send them out, and I would be in late next week when I was better.  She agreed.  I then had to finish assembling the returns and write instructions for her - my normal forms would just confuse her.  I spent yesterday afternoon and evening doing this. (Which is why I did not write this post last night as I normally would have done.)  Just as I was finishing - I was writing the instructions for the last form, a NYC form, I found out that the payment has to be sent separately with a different form - and I could not find that form online as a paper form.  After about a half hour of looking I found what must be an example form as it said “company name, company address” etc.  A couple of labels to cover the information and a quick scan and fill in her information on the form and that was done.  Her return went out to her today.  I still have to finish scanning my copy of her return and my paperwork for same and it is sitting in “the pile” in a folder.       

We had dinner out last night to save on my cooking and washing the dishes and spreading germs.  We planned to go to the chain buffet we normally go to, but the company just closed around 50 or more of their locations and this turned out to be one of them.  So we ended up driving to the next county to their other location - an extra 45 minutes between going (during rush hour) and returning. 

After we came home today I managed to catch up on my email - I don’t have much, but like to check it every day on weekdays, I then paid 3 bills due out now - will be out in tomorrow’s mail.  My husband has said that he will go out and run errands tomorrow so I can catch up (though he did it before he felt ill). 

I have been working on setting up information about our bills and paying them for my husband or anyone else who might need to do it - just in case something happened to me.  A car accident three years ago started this project and I am now scanning in one of each bill with all the info I fill in on it filled in, as well as a scan of the check that pays the bill and the envelope it is sent in. So I had to stop and do this for each of the 3 bills and add them to a spreadsheet of when bills are due that I also just started to go with the step by step directions written in the past. 

I then went to post a bill I paid last week for our business.  Quick thing to do - do it all the time.  Hah!  We had returned something to a store and I had posted the credit “memo” on the computer.  The software automatically subtracted same from what needed to be paid, something which should not have been done as the return was done after that statement’s cutoff.  By the time I was done I had to delete the entire accounting software file for our business and replaced it with the one from the last backup (yesterday - that’s why I backup a lot) and started over.  I had to remove the entry for the return and then after posting the payment, reenter the entry. In the middle of all this my husband came up and told me he was so sick from the weaving that he was going to bed - Oyyyyy!

I did a few other things on the computer and cut the pile down a bit.  I then went and checked with my husband about dinner - could he eat?  What did he want to eat?  And then came downstairs and made dinner, did the dishes, and then started writing this post at 11 pm. 

Husband just came down and does not feel well again.  I hope I have not given him my cold as he is not good at being ill.

Well, we have a saying “It could be a lot worse, and probably will be” so I will go back to trying to catch up. I hope the week to come lets me catch up and all is better here by next week.

I am sure you all have weeks like this.  Hopefully the coming week will be better.