THIS DOCTOR'S OFFICE IS NEVER ORGANIZED

 Sorry to post late again.  Yesterday was a short day as we had to get ready to take my 93 yo mom to a doctor today.  

Before the pandemic my husband and I had been “the schleppers”.  Since both of my sisters and their husbands work full time and we are mostly retired and both self-employed, we can better spend time, normally, to take mom to assorted doctors and similar.

During the pandemic it has been tried as hard as possible for mom not to leave her assisted living residence to decrease her contacts with people and her chances of getting Covid.  (Her residence has done what we think is an excellent job of keeping the residents safe and well from the pandemic.)

Since my husband and I are also “seniors” and both have medical conditions which further make us high risk for Covid, my middle sister, who handles most of things involving my mom, had to take over as schlepper also for some medical emergencies which arose.  

But schlepping mom in addition to sister's needing to deal with her husband's medical conditions and her own, meant that she used up all of her allowed time off from work.  So we had to step up and take mom today to one of her doctors.  

We don't mind taking mom – my husband says he even enjoys it somewhat as it is something different for us to do – but we REALLY don't like take her to one doctor's office.  Doctor is a good doctor – that my brother-in-law is alive is proof of that as brother-in-law has heart trouble and very nice - but his office is in a building which houses doctors who are part of a network.  It is dealing with the network that drives husband and me crazy.  

Our first dealings with this doctor and this setup was a nightmare – in organization and it this continues to be true.  We took mom there after she had been in the hospital and had to go for followup (he had not seen her in the hospital).  The followup was the day after she had been to the hospital and my sister had made the arrangements.  We arrived for her appointment and the appointment had been made with a different doctor.  After a telephone conversation with my sister – it was to be Dr. Q or no one.  With my sister, my husband and I all complaining the office staff setup an appointment with Dr. Q for mom – some hours later in the day.  We had lunch.  We ended up spending the time between in Barnes and Nobles – husband walked around looking at what he wanted to and I pushed mom in her wheelchair aisle by aisle through the store.  When we saw the doctor basically he said nothing needed to be done – and mom should be retested at a (fixed) future date.  

When I try to make appointments for mom they cannot be made with the doctors' office, but need to be made though the hospital system's setup – for a doctor appointment in New York State I have to telephone to Florida!

No appointment up to now has gone well and all involved sitting in the waiting room for this group of doctors for hours.  Nothing is done at the appointments – each time they take mom's information again and try to weigh her (she can barely stand – how can she stand on a scale and not hold on – I have learned to get the wellness office at her residence give me in writing her last weight taken there, as well as copy of her meds).

Mom had a problem two weeks ago and was taken to a local hospital as an outpatient – and was referred back to her doctor.  Since, my sister could not take her – it was up to us.  I told mom about the appointment during our weekly telephone call last week and again by telephone, reminded her the yesterday.   We over allowed time to get to her and get her to the doctor as we never know what the traffic will be driving out there (about 45 minutes away from us) or how long it will take us to get her ready and out to our car.  

Everything went fine picking her up and getting her into the car (not an easy thing to do).  Drive to the doctor went fine – but all this is the easy part.  When we arrived at the building his office is in (again, a building offices of doctors all associated with this hospital group – a one story building) there was havoc in the parking lot.  The lot was completely filled and they were parking one's car for one so they could move it as needed.  This has happened before, but never saw so busy as today.  Husband dropped mom, in her wheelchair, and me off at the door to doctor's office – we had figured on this problem and he had planned to stay in the car if he could not park, though he likes to come in with us as he worked in a medical related field and talks “doctor”, as well as it is good to have two people listening (mom's hearing is not good).

When I mom and I entered the waiting room of doctor's office I was shocked at how empty it was.  I had to sign her in on a tablet (theirs) based system – I remembered to bring my soft tip stylus to use on the tablet as I don't show up on it when I use my finger, let alone I did not want to touch a touch pad that other people have touching.  One problem is always asks for one to put their hand on it for sign in – not sure why and while my hand does not, of course, work for this – neither did mom's when she tried it our first trip there.  I made sure to wipe my hand down well with hand sanitizer after wards – is this the best idea, for everyone to touching their hands to these pads during the pandemic?  Husband came in rather quickly – he had been lucky a car pulled out and he pulled in.  

We were shocked when we were actually called into to see the nurse practitioner a bit early.  I had taken an appointment with her as the doctor did not have any open appointments until December.  Hmm, maybe things were not as bad as they had been?  

Nurse who took us in started taking doing a test on mom.  She talked with us about why we were there and then left room.  Yeah, there had to be a problem.  The nurse practitioner we had the appointment with was not associated with mom's doctor and did not work in the same medical field as we were there for!  As I was getting ready to scream and yell – “not easy to take mom out, not good for her to be out at all...” they said that they were making arrangements for a correct person to see her.  So we did get to deal with the exam today.  Told that what she came there about – she was okay, changed a medication to help with the problem – BUT – she has an entirely different problem!!!

So we now have 3 more appointments for mom – two for testing (3 tests – 2 given together) and one to see the doctor – himself.  

Not the most organize place to go and I am not sure if they had not made the mistake they would have done the EKG at all – and her medical tests at her residence's doctor have not shown any of the problems they say exist!

On the other hand – it was good to see her.  

Tomorrow it is suppose to rain, first day it does not, we have to put our car back together as it normally is and I have to move things I keep in the front for mom to sit in the front passenger seat as that is hard enough for her to get into, the back seat would be impossible.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Sometimes things go well, sometimes we have to deal with stupidity and there is nothing we can do about it.  As husband once said to me when I was upset when he was in medical office with similar problems - “stop getting them upset – they are going to be giving me shots!!”

NICE WHEN A WEEK ACTUALLY GOES RIGHT

A better week.  

Day after I wrote last week's post I was surprised to receive the renewal for our van – since it was suppose to take until sometime next week to reach us.  Weather has been terribly hot and we are not going anywhere, so we have not changed the window sticker yet.  (Van parked on our driveway so not a problem that the old sticker is still in the window.)

And – after being told that I could not renew that prescription both by our pharmacy and our medical insurance – we received a call Monday asking why we had not picked up the prescription yet and we only had 2 more days to pick it up before it went back into stock!  We went in to pick it up – I was sure that they were going to charge the full price for it – after all, it was the only insurance saying it would not pay for it yet that stopped it from being filled – and if that was that was the case – I would say to put back into stock for now.  Surprise!  It was charged at the usual co-payment.  Not exactly sure how this happened, but it did.  

When we went food shopping last week we stopped at a Wendys near the supermarket for lunch.  This particular Wendys has never been the best, but it is greatly lacking right now – not sure if change of management or if we just never had lunch there before – we used to go for dinner on some Saturday nights.  

How nice it was to go in the supermarket, make only one trip into it, and do our entire food shopping and not even have a problem fitting all the bags in the cart after we shopped.  We have not shopped for a normal sized shopping order in over 15 months.

And then, also on Thursday, we did something else we have not done in over 15 months – we went out for dinner!   Back in the normal times we would go to an Asian buffet for dinner on Friday nights.  We went on Thursday night as we figured it would be a lot emptier than it would be on Friday night.  Very pleased that they handed us large gloves to use when going to the food bar and masks were required for same.  A number of unused serving trays on the food bars  – but not sure if this is due to it being now or if this was always the case on Thursday nights, though we presume the former.  

Everything we do these days continues to involve being organized.  We have to remember to bring our masks (no longer required by state or local government, but often required by the various businesses we are going to  - plus we feel safer with them on.  I carry at least two plastic sandwich bags in my pocket when we go anywhere – we can open doors (at stores without automatic doors) etc with them on our hands instead of touching the doors with our bare hands.  The Corona virus counts here may be very low and we may be fully vaccinated, but I know of too many people who will not the vaccine and feel safer not touching doors that everyone else is touching.  

When food shopping to prevent needing to continuously up and down the same aisles or need to go back to the store in a day or two as we forgot something – we make sure to shop with a list.  I have a strip of paper on the refrigerator for us to list items we are going to run out of – try to do this in time not to run out.  Unless we are going for less  than 10 or so items I write them into a computer spreadsheet.  On one of our early trips into the supermarket during the pandemic I listed by type items that we might use by aisle number – though it is my numbering system – the first aisle we go to in the store I have as aisle one, the next one as aisle two and so on through the food items.  After food is listed non-food items -  cleaning, vitamins and such.  Next on my list is refrigerated items – which involves walking back to the far end of the store, followed by meat items and lastly frozen items.  As we walk through the store we can pick easily find the items we need to buy.  I try to keep each section of the list to match the order in each aisle.  Putting them in this list also helps as my handwriting is terrible and I can always read what I printed out – while I cannot always figure out what I hand wrote on a list. While we are a bit more comfortable walking around in the store, we don't want to be in it longer than we need to be.  I am packing the cold items in different bags than the non-cold items as I am still wiping everything down with alcohol when we come home and want to make sure that I get to all the cold items quickly.  

When we go out food or other shopping we have to remember to bring bags with us these days.  Just as our area went into the pandemic last March, it became illegal for stores to provide plastic shopping bags and either a county or large city could impose a fee for paper bags or the stores in area which did not do so were allowed to charge up to 10 cents a bag for paper bags.  Our areas does not have the fee so it is up to stores if they are going to charge and whether they charge the entire 10 cents (plus a penny a bag in sales tax) or not.  Most, of course, are charging the full 10 cents.  One dollar store which is location of a chain store will automatically put one's items in a paper bag and charge for it – not ask if one wants a bag, even if one is buying one item.  They got me once with this.  The two times we have back I quickly say that we have our own bag.  What we have been going is carrying some of the old plastic shopping bags with us into stores other than when going into the supermarket for more than a couple of items when we bring double bagged paper bags with us.  If the plastic shopping bags are folded down correctly I can fit 4 of them (maybe even more) in each of my two back pockets leaving my hands free until we are done shopping and I am bagging the items we bought after we ring them up.    So, I have to organize our bags also.  When I first read a book about organizing the author said that one does not keep bags - “Have you ever walked into a store and they did not have bags available?”  I still went on keeping most of the bags we got which were normal sized or larger.  Husband made the same comment to me as the author had printed and I replied “you never know”  Up until this law went into effect I had been using those plastic shopping bags as free garbage bags for our bathroom and bedroom little garbage pails.  I now still use them – but dump them into (upstairs) the office pail and (downstairs) the kitchen pail and put the shopping bag into the little pails to use again unless they are messy.  My stash of bags that I would “never need as the stores always have them” will last us for years at the minimum, since they are being used over and over again.

What have you been doing differently to deal with all of these sorts of things this past year plus?

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Who ever thought that going food shopping for just what one needs in the coming week would become something looked forward to.

ITS THE LITTLE THINGS.... CONTINUED

 Here's another example - 

I had renewed our reenacting unit's insurance - did the paperwork, paid for it and paid dues to a group that unit has to belong to get the insurance.  I was done for the year!

Or was I?  

A couple of weeks ago I realized I had not received the "Certificate of Insurance" which proves we have coverage and what the coverage is.  So, I sent an email to the insurance agent and he emailed back the certificates to me.  We get a certificate for our unit to prove we have the insurance from them and 3 more certificates as 3 different venues require us to have them added to our policy (in case something happens due to us) and we have to send them their certificates (I keep a copy of each).  I mailed out two of these certificates to places where we are actually doing events.  The third place I do not mail their certificate until just before the event or they lose it, so I did not mail that one.  Done with mailing the certificates out until the fall.  Check it off my list - take a breath.

The certificates had the wrong expiration date on them!  The policy expired two months before it started according to the certificates!!   New ones emailed to me with the correct dates on them and a big apology and I received them over the weekend.  I printed out the two which have to go out right away with a cover letter explaining why they were getting a second certificate and I put the envelopes in my outgoing mail basket to go out next Sunday night when we again go out and post outgoing mail.

Well, there is an event this coming weekend and the venue contacted our president - did we get a new certificate for this year?  He contacted my husband.  I explained to husband that it had been mailed to them, but was wrong and corrected one being mailed out with the mail to go out Sunday.  He scanned it into the computer and emailed it to them and we went out late tonight and posted our outgoing mail to date so they would have it sooner (hopefully before the event) - extra trip out and time spent.

 AND - we mailed in the renewal of our van's registration over a month ago and have not received the registration yet - we realized this last weekend. I checked with our bank's computer and the check had not cleared the bank. So Monday I telephoned the DMV, the hold was not as long as I thought it would be.  Now what is strange is a month before we mailed this registration renewal in, we mailed in the renewal of the registration of our RV - which is basically also a van -that came in 2 weeks.  The automated message said that they could not help with registrations mailed in less than 4 weeks ago. Since it was more than 4 weeks I waited put through the computer system to find out what was going on.  Nice woman came on and told me that it had been "processed".  If it was process why hadn't the check cleared our bank?  She did not know.  It was processed on June 21, I should call back if I do not have it 14 days.  I pointed out to her that the registration would expire before then - what should I do if it is not here before the expiration date - can we drive the van - NO!!  So we are waiting to hopefully receive the registration - at least the check is finally clearing the bank as of today.  If we don't get the registration before it expires, hopefully our car will not have problems and we won't need to drive the van.

I then had to call our medical insurance as one of my prescriptions was turned down - as past  6 months, need to go to back to the doctor for new prescription?  Huh, never had this problem before for self or husband - and why did all of other prescriptions go through.  Found out doctor had written the prescription for too long a time and I have to call him to fix it - why did they give the first renewal?  Our state passed a terrible law some years ago.  In an effort to stop the theft of prescription pads, all prescriptions must go directly through a computer system.  In the old days we would get the prescription, make sure they were correct and take whichever ones we needed filled right away to the pharmacy.  Now we have no idea if they are correct and if we don't need a medication renewed as we have, still get it anyway - if it is one of the expensive ones, we tell them to put it back and we call when needed - more work for pharmacy staff and time wasted picking up prescriptions. 

We need to go food shopping and plan to do so tomorrow. So in addition to writing to all of you nice readers and doing our laundry I took inventory of what food we have and what we need.  How nice to do something normal - we may even go out lunch at Wendys first - our third time doing so since mid March 2020. 

 THOUGHT OF THE WEEK - Is it the pandemic which is making everything weird and resulting in all of these stupid small problems one after another after another after...?

Are any of you finding you are having this same problem of one stupidity after another?

 

    

BUSY WEEK, BUT NOT MUCH ACCOMPLISHED!

 A busy week, but not much accomplished.  

For example -

I have mentioned that we have a very small RV (a Chevy van converted to same).  When one has an RV one must deal with the toilet waste from when one has used the toilet during their trip.  In this type and brand of RV it is a different system than in most RVs which use gravity to empty the tanks as the tanks are too low to the ground for gravity to work well.  In this RV a pump is used with a macerator to grind up any (ahem) solids being pumped out. There is a hose in a small compartment at the bottom of the driver's side of the RV located immediately behind that side door.  When emptying the tanks the hose is pulled out the hose end is put into the tank in the ground where the tank contents will end up and then a valve is opened before the macerater/pump is started.  

Since we first got this RV we have not been able to turn the valve.  The original hose which came with the RV was very stiff and hard to put in and out and took up almost the entire section where it is stored.  As a result we were able to leave the valve open as we would make sure that the end of the hose was pointing up so nothing left in the hose could pour out into the compartment (ick).  This worked very well for the first 8 years we had the RV.  In 2019 we had to have the macerator replaced as it stopped working.  While this was being done we asked them to replace the hose with one which was easier to maneuver.  What we did not take into account is that the end of the RV would not longer be able to kept pointing upward.  Husband managed to close the valve at the end of the hose and we have not traveled since due to other work needed on the RV, winters, and Covid-19.  

Husband is now thinking ahead to traveling again (drooling with happiness at the thought of traveling on our short trips again).  He realized something has to be done to be able to close the end of the hose.  Any replacement valve we can find intended for this purpose will not fit into the small opening of the section the hose is kept in – what to do?  Husband spent a good part of 2 afternoons measuring the hoses and the connections. His idea is to replace the valve with a piece of pipe which can have a cap screwed onto it.  He made a list of what we need and checked at a chain home supply store that they carry all of the needed parts and same was in stock at the store close to us.  

We went there this afternoon to buy the pieces.  This store's section of plastic plumbing fittings was a mess.  Bins were empty and items were mixed into the wrong bins.  There is another store of this same chain in the community to the south of us and we headed there.  We were eventually able to find everything he says we need.  We were in the department for such a long time I am guessing that employees thought we were moving in.  Hopefully all of this will work when we put it together.  

This shopping event took almost the entire afternoon – I did not even get to check email today.  

Lest you think we are going to work on this project tomorrow, tonight after dinner we drove the RV to our car mechanic (4 blocks away) as it needs its state inspection – fingers crossed that all goes well.  This will, hopefully be done tomorrow.  

I figured that tomorrow I will catch up – ha, ha!  Tomorrow we are going food shopping, just a fill in trip not one of our marathon “there is a pandemic and we don't want to walk out of the house again for as long as possible” trips of the past year, but a fill in trip.  When I am finished with this post I will update and check the shopping list I have been updating in an Excel spreadsheet (piece of paper on fridge, list items as we run out and then copy to spreadsheet to print out – much easier to write when not written by hand and list is in order of aisles (more or less) at supermarket.  Sooo, there goes tomorrow also!  

On the financial side of life, I have spent the past week chasing down a direct deposit to our bank account which was suppose to be made by a company which handles same for the company through which husband does online counseling.  Deposit was 4 days late – with me telephoning their computer each evening to check – when husband received an email that the deposit was not made as the account does not exist.  HUH?  We have had this account for decades and they have made the deposits to it since they took over handling same for the company through which he does the counseling.  Granted we are not talking big money here – about US$100 -  but still…   I telephoned the company which handles the payments and spoke with a woman there – we each kept getting silence or voices were too low to hear.  At one point she had to call me back as the connection was so bad.  Finally we were each able to provide information to the other – and husband had to confirm he was him and I could talk to her.  We emailed a copy of the last bank statement (with other account info blacked out) and are waiting to hear back.  I checked the bank again tonight – just in case – still no deposit to the account!  This took up most of yesterday afternoon!  Deposit is now a week late.

That's 3 afternoons gone this week and then add tomorrow – and that is 4.  

In between all of this I am trying to track down an IRS refund due one of my clients,  and deal with renewals for our reenactment unit and my embroidery chapter.  I am now at the point where I am pleading with members to get their renewals in as both sets of renewals must be mailed by May 31 to the national offices.  In one case a member says she mailed her dues “weeks ago” (I only put out the notice to renew the beginning of May), but I don't have them.  I emailed her 2 days ago to find out if she mailed to my house (as they were told to do) or our PO Box (which means it should be forwarded, but often is not and we went 2 weeks ago, but not this past week).  She has not let me know where she mailed it.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Well, what has to be done gets done and everything else waits for it.  I am not a magician, if something has to wait, it wait.  Today is all I can deal with today!

Did you get Covid-19 shots yet?

WHEN EVERYTHING GOES ON AND DOWNHILL AT ONCE...

 OOPS!  Somehow I lost Wednesday - and Thursday - this week.   

I finally finished doing tax returns this week – except for a client who wanted an extension, so I finally had time to devote to my embroidery chapter and our reenactment unit.  

In normal times I would be working with the membership chair of my embroidery chapter on renewals as the national group for same has renewals due by May 31.  

Normally the reenactment unit has its membership renewal period at the start of the year as our national group wants its renewals and dues by March 1 and the unit renewals are done at the same time.   BUT this year – our chapter is rolling over dues from last year as the unit did almost nothing last year due to Covid-19, so that part is easy, but our national group pushed their renewal period back to now – also due in May – as they were redoing their membership records system.  So I have to get the members of both groups to renew at the same time.  I had emailed to members from my embroidery chapter an those members of our reenactment unit who belong to the national group (not all unit members belong to same) to renew.  I have received some renewals from each group and all week have been intending to send a second email to those who still have to renew in each group.  (Yes, personally my dues/our dues have already been paid to both groups.)  

Throw into this mix that week was the monthly Zoom for the embroidery chapter and a last minute Zoom board meeting was called for the reenactment unit.  I was so confused that I thought they were both the same day – embroidery in the morning and the board meeting at night.  I was working at my computer late in the day – long after the embroidery meeting – and suddenly realized that the meeting had already started.  I yelled to my husband to come up and sign in (he is also on the board) as I started my laptop (no camera or microphone on my desktop computer) to quickly sign into the meeting.  Husband yelled back that the board meeting was the next day- phew!!

Now add into this the embroidery chapter has its face to face meetings (when we used to have and will in the future) in a town park's community room.  The one we have been using is much too small to be able to social distance (January 2020 I did not go to the meeting as I had a cold and could not figure where I could sit and not pass along the cold.)  We have been in talks with the town to use a different meeting room for the rest of this year – if and when it is opens up – and we had to change our meeting date to do so.  A vote had been taken by the members as to which day to meet instead.  I suddenly realized the day before the meeting that we had not setup the meeting dates with the town.  I double checked with the chapter President and telephoned the town parks department – call went to voicemail.  I left a message.  Next day I was called back – we took too long, the room was already assigned.  I grabbed the alternative they still had – the same meeting room we had before on a different day – in the interim.  Chapter President said the room was too small even before Covid, and to call again.  

So I have been in a panic most of the week – a large IRS refund due to a client which has not come yet and does not show on IRS records, plus the 2 sets of renewals, plus the two meetings, plus the we lost the meeting room we wanted.  Little by little over the week things started to resolve – the client's refund is finally showing up on the IRS website, the board meeting for the reenactment unit went much better than I thought it would and the unit is not disbanding, and today I received a call from someone else at town parks, that we can have the room we were asking for on the days we wanted it.  (We are hoping that later this year we can meet in person.)  Breathe a big sigh of relief!

Now add into all of this – husband and I have been working on cleaning up in the garage.  Late last week I had been using my leg to measure how tall the small trash pails he uses to hold smaller pieces of wood are, as one broke and we needed to replace it, and I leaned forward to see how tall it was against my leg and smashed my head into the end of husband's lathe – OUCH!  As of now it still hurts if I touch it.  And on Tuesday my right thumb started to hurt.  I don't think it is computer or cell phone related as I tend to use my fingers much more than my thumbs on both.

All of this has been in my head and Wednesday slipped past me and then Thursday slipped past me.  Now I can get back to the renewals for both groups, hopefully my head and thumb will feel better and maybe tonight I will be able to sleep and remember what day it is!


THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Even when everything is hitting at once, try to deal with the various problems one at a time with the most urgent one first – and in today's pandemic world – try to remember which day it is – all day!

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID TO THE TEMPERATURE ONE IS READING WHEN COOKING

 I make lunch – peanut butter sandwich for me, ½ can of soup or a cold cut sandwich for husband.  I wash the dishes after lunch.  

But then I forget to do most important thing – figure out what we are eating for dinner.  I forget to ask my husband what he wants or “feels like” for dinner.  This is all a “since Covid” thing – before that we ate lunch out at Wendys (under US$4 for both of us) and we would discuss what to have for dinner as we went to the supermarket and shopped for that day's dinner.  So I forget even though this has been going for over a year.  

Some days this does matter as we will have something for dinner which does not need to defrost– on Mondays, for instance, he usually has hot dogs (which are generally not frozen) on bread and beans – while the beans are frozen they can be quickly defrosted as they cook on the stove and I have a chicken patty which can be cooked directly from frozen with leftover Chinese takeout rice and left over gravy of some sort – which can also be cooked directly from frozen.  Most days at least one item needs to be defrosted.  

Today I remembered and asked what husband wanted for dinner – sausages and spaghetti with tomato “gravy” (sauce).  Plenty of time to defrost the sausages and I took them out and left them in their plastic bags on a plate to defrost.  I had cooked tomato gravy last week, so I had plenty of extra frozen in the freezer in containers and I took one out also, even though it can be cooked from frozen.  I thought I was doing great.  

We went out for a walk in a local park as the weather was pleasant (last week we tried to do and it was much too windy).  When we came home I took in today's mail and sealed it in a quart plastic zip bag and put it in the plastic box that due to the pandemic our mail sits in for 4 days before I open i and took the Saturday bag of mail out of the box and took it upstairs to our office.  I spent the rest of the afternoon at my desk in the office.  

I came down an hour before we would eat dinner.  I made three phone calls to computers – checked that we had not forgotten that we had used any of 3 credit cards we normally don't use, which if we did I would need to pay and mail out on this Sunday's run to a USPS collection box with outgoing mail(since our mail delivery is not doing well, I have been checking just in case we used an unusual card and forgot so that no bill payments are missed) none of them have been used.  I then telephone our bank's computer and made sure that 2 direct deposits to our bank account are there, so we can spend the money and then started on cooking dinner.

I put up a pot of water to boil the spaghetti.  I put a small amount of water in the smaller of my two cast iron pans to start cooking the sausages and put the tomato gravy in a small pot (technically a sauce pan) to heat it, knowing the mess the sauce can make I put a lid on the pot.  When the water in the pan for the sausages started to boil I added the sausages and covered the pan – set the timer on the stove for 8 minutes, per the package of sausages.  The spaghetti water started to boil and having weighed out the amount of spaghetti I needed, I dropped same in the boiling water and turned it down a bit.  I then set the table.  When the timer went off I took, the lid off of the sausages, removed them and dumped out the remaining water and put them back in the pan to brown. All was going well.

Tomato gravy was heated and I shut it off with the lid on.  I checked the spaghetti – it needed more time. I was keeping an eye on the sausages and turning them so they would each brown on 4 sides.  I tried the spaghetti and it was done so I put into a strainer it and set aside in the kitchen sink to finish draining.  
The sausages looked done.  I took out my trusty oven thermometer and put it into one of the sausages to check that it had been cooked to over 365F so it would safe to eat.  It was only at 85F?!  Tired another – same thing … maybe they had not be completely defrosted when I started cooking them?  I put them back in the pan and let them keep cooking.  I tried them again 10 minutes later – they were now 91F?  Put them back into the pan.  

Husband came down for dinner, I explained what was going on.  He tested them – still in the 90Fs?   We decided to cut them in half and cook them that way to speed up the cooking.  He had cut two in half and the other two were sitting on a plate as cut in half only 2 fit in the pan.  We let them cook a few minutes and then tested the temperature – just about 95F .  What the heck was going on?

Then I looked at the thermometer.  OH NO!  Somehow it had to be reset to Celsius from Fahrenheit – so the temperatures were considerable hotter than we thought they were! 

I had the two which had been cut open and they were rather overdone and hard to chew.  I let husband have the two which had not been cut open as they had been cooked slightly less.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK
Always check your equipment when something does not seem right.  Had I looked closer at the thermometer when I was first getting these odd readings I would seen the problem right away.  Dinner would have been on time and not overcooked.  

(95C = 203F – much above the 165F I was looking for, so no one has to calculate this out.)

COVID 19 #29 - SECOND VACCINATIONS IS WHY I DID NOT POST LAST WEEK - THIS GETS WORSE AND WORSE - IT WAS NOT POSTED LAST WEEK!!

 Okay, now I have not posted in 2 weeks.  My apologies I posted the following last week, at least I thought I did.  It was held a draft and never posted, though I swear I posted it and saw it on the blog.  My GREAT apologies.  When you read this week's post, it might explain why my brain is turning to oatmeal and I only thought I posted -

 Two weeks ago I apologized for posting a day late.  Today I apologize for posting an entire week late.  Last Thursday my husband and I got our second vaccination.  I normally post late Wednesday night to me – early Thursday morning to everyone else.  This was the first time (I think) that I did not post for entire week.  My husband is very nervous about a number of things, two of them being medical matters – especially those which involve him getting a ”shot” and another being doing things one does not normally do.  So going to get a Covid vaccination at a chain pharmacy, even though we had done so for the first one, is high on his list of things to be nervous about.  Last Wednesday evening was spent “packing” for the trip to the pharmacy and “hand holding”.  

We pack to go just anywhere – even these days for a trip to the supermarket.  We over think and over pack most things in life.  Doing anything away from our house (even before the pandemic) involves planning and packing.  If there is a possible problem or situation that one of us does not think of – the other will.  

Pack?  To go and get a shot at a pharmacy?  Yes. Understand that we wanted to make sure that we didn't catch the corona virus from going to get our vaccinations.  

First – papers – Our first vaccination we had downloaded and filled in the information/questionnaire which the pharmacy had its vaccination page.  The pharmacist (a wonderful, understanding, nice woman) had been handing us the blank questionnaire forms to fill in when we went for our first vaccinations, but when she we had them filled in, took our filled in forms and told us to take the blanks she had to use for our second ones.  (Our thought in filling in the form in advance was to spend less time out of the house and in the pharmacy and lower our chances of coming in contact with Covid – or anything else – from those in the pharmacy store.)  So we filled in the papers again the night before our second appointments.  (We also kept kept scans of both sets of forms, just because it something we would think to do “in case”.)

We had needed our driver's licenses and medical insurance cards the first time – not sure if we need them again.  We again put each set of license and insurance cards in a snack sized zip bag.  Easy to take out and hand to the pharmacist and not need to fish our wallets out of our pockets.  After the cards were given back – easy to put them back into their bags and then let them sit a few days at home before taking out of the bags.  This second trip we also each put our vaccination record card into the bag with our license and insurance cards.  

The cards in their small bags were put into the larger gallon sized zip bag that we our completed papers into.  This way when we were at the pharmacy, everything we needed was in one bag – that if we wanted to we could just toss out afterward or could use to keep the papers together on our way home.  

The papers were all assembled and put in the bags on Wednesday night (instead of posting to you).

Second – clothing -  since it still cold weather, my husband is wearing his long sleeved shirts and I am wearing a sweatshirt over my tee shirts.  But, we had to be able to uncover our arms.  I had pulled a short sleeved shirt out for him when he went for his first shot and after it was washed, put it in his closet (as opposed to where it had been with his stored short sleeved shirts) for him to use again.  I did not wear a sweatshirt (tee shirts are short sleeved).  We did each wear a winter jacket – but while each one of us had their shots, the other one could hold the jacket of the one getting the shot and then switch for the second person to get their shot.  

Third – clothing for when we came home.  We each brought down a shirt, jeans, and socks so that when we came home we could take off same that had been worn when sitting in the chair at the pharmacy to get our shots and toss it in a clean garbage bag for awhile to let any virus picked up somehow from the chair die before we touched it.  (Right now, a week later, the clothing is being washed in my weekly laundry.)   

Fourth – laundry.  I do the laundry starting on Wednesday night and continue at night until all of it is done for the week (generally continuing on Thursday night, sometimes Friday night or even longer).  I am actually doing our laundry as I write to you – clothes first, then a load of towels. Last week I wanted to make sure that all of the laundry was washed and dried or drying when we went to bed.  I then fold laundry in bed when we go upstairs up for the night.  I folded the clothing/hung up his shirts before going to bed as usual and I knew if we needed towels they would be dry even if I could not carry all of them upstairs to fold on Thursday night (which neither of us could do).

Luckily the store was almost as empty (it had been completely empty of customers the first time) as the first time we went.  We had the same nice pharmacist to give us our shots.  She remembered us when we walked towards her (two old, short, fat people, overdressed for the weather) and everything went off easily.  (She did not need our insurance cards or ID this time, so I dropped them back into the larger bag.  She did need the questionnaire forms.  It all went off quickly and easily again.

When we had our first vaccinations husband's arm swelled and hurt.  Mine did neither.  This time the same thing with happened with his arm – but bigger swelling and more pain.  My arm hurt also, but I get the impression his hurt or more.  It took until Monday (4 days later) until I could lift my left arm all the way to the bottom shelf of the kitchen cabinets without feeling any pain.  And I had to deal with cooking and clearing up for Easter with it hurting.  

The dealing with the packing to go to the pharmacy along with sitting and keeping husband company the night before we went made me forget to post to you.  Then the ache in my arm and getting ready for Easter made me, well, forget completely that I had not posted.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Please go and get and YOUR vaccination when it is your turn.  I want to keep my readers as long as possible and I worry about all of you.   It was much easier around here to get an appointment at this particular chain pharmacy than at state or county locations or at either of these other two large pharmacy chain locations around here.  

Be organized and plan before you go.

COVID 19 #28 FOOD SHOPPING

 Another week gone by  - and I am a day late, my apologies.  

We went on one of our Covid food shopping sprees yesterday.  The shopping took about 3 hours and then wiping down and storing the items another couple of hours when we got home.  We last went food shopping in mid January on a similar adventure.  We have been doing our food shopping trips to a Walmart Neighborhood Market.  The Walmart stores around here are much smaller than elsewhere and have only small food departments not the large supermarkets that Walmarts have in other area.  Walmart has among their other chains, one called Neighbor Market.  These stores are supermarkets and pharmacies and what is normally carried in stores such as this – not the big assortment of items carried in their regular stores.  This particular Neighborhood Market is their highest grossing in the US and has been turned into a “retail lab” to find out why – I could tell them why without all the work of making it someplace I really don't want to go, it is the only Walmart supermarket in the bi-county area! The Neighborhood Market is 2 miles along the road from the local regular Walmart near us (where we get our prescriptions) – so it is sort of an add on to the local regular Walmart.   We did fill in bread and some items once or twice between January and now at our local Walmart when we went to renew prescriptions or needed something right away.  

When we started doing these food runs last May (2020)we were not as organized as we thought and yesterday's trip was actually the most organized and relaxed of all our shopping trips since we started staying at home last March (2020).  I am guessing that I have written about our first trip – by the time we were done shopping husband felt so bad that he had to wait in the car for me while I checked out – we later figured out it was due to his blood sugar having fallen from the (negative) excitement, his panic, and the sheer amount of running around we had done.  

After our third shopping trip I figured out that what we needed to do was to make TWO shopping trips at the same time.  First we go into the store and buy all the items we need which do not have be kept cold – canned and jarred foods, boxed foods, bagged foods, cleaning supplies, OTC medications, soap if we need, any office supplies and such.  We then check out and bag all the items – we have to bring our bags or buy paper bags from the store due to a change in law which went into effect in the middle of the pandemic and the paper bags they have are small.  I bring A LOT of bags and pre double bag them.  We take the bags out to our car, in this case our van as our car is in for service for over a month as they cannot figure out what is wrong, and our van is better for this anyway as it holds a lot more.  We then locked the van and took our cart and more bags back into the store.  We then bought all of the cold items – refrigerated, meats, and frozen items and then checked out again.  We even remembered to use 2 coupons for several dollars each – sent to us by a manufacturer due to a problem with a product a few months ago.  By the time we were done we had 16 double bagged bags plus 2 (not really) “gallon” pails of ice cream.  Amazingly we were not exhausted and not yelling at either as we have been on these food runs in the past.  Two good is that I drink as little water as possible with lunch as I don't want to have to visit the ladies room in a store right now and – husband finally realized this – he has to eat enough for lunch before we go to have enough glucose in system for his blood sugar not to fall while we are out.  We also go around 2 pm so the stores have smaller crowds in them – people working, children coming home from school etc then – easier to move around and almost no line checking out – plus not as many people means more space between us and them right now.

When we come home we wipe down most items with alcohol on paper towel.  I say most items as some items are double packaged – such as dry cereal in a bag in a box or fruit bars which are individually packed in a box – with these items we open the outside packaging and dump out the inner packages instead of wiping down the outer package and toss the outer packages right away.  It is an exhausting process and I came up a way to make it a little less.  Since I don't have to worry about canned and jarred goods being out as they will not attract bugs or other vermin, I leave the cans and jars in their bags and set aside the bags until later in the evening.

This entire process took us about 5- 6 hours this week not including later wiping down and storing the cans/bottles.  But we won't need to food shop again, other than some fill ins for about 2 months.  Why do we do this?  Well, we don't want to go out more often than we need to.  Hopefully by the time we need to do a full shopping trip again – it will be safer for us to do so, especially as we should get our second vaccinations next week.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

How organized are your shopping trips, especially now?  Do you buy only items which are needed (to be honest we were doing that  before “stay at home” came into being and I did not like it)?   Do you plan ahead to make sure that you don't run out of things?  Do you make a list as you run low on food and related items so you will know what you need.  (Since we started doing these food runs I actually inventory everything we have and make a list in computer spreadsheet than sit with husband to decide what and how much we need to buy of items – also since stay at home, I sort the list by, more or less, which aisle in the store the items we need are in – and print out the list of what we need to buy and take it with us.)

WHAT A DIFFERENCE HALF AN HOUR OF CLEARING THINGS UP CAN DO

 I have probably mentioned that my husband and I are crafts artists.  One of the reasons we bought this house is that there is a family room off of the kitchen through a large squared off arch. I could cook dinner while working in our “studio” and we could (back then) turn the kitchen TV around to watch it from the studio.  Of course like every other room in a house it becomes a mess and needs organizing – again.

Early last year I had been working on clearing it up – and then Covid-19 hit.  I stopped working on the room.  I ended up bringing my sewing machine into the kitchen to sew our masks – and of course the patterns and fabric for it were dropped on top of paper cutter on one end of a storage dresser near the entrance to the room.  It had already had my various embroidered and sewn items from when I lived with my parents tossed onto my worktable – along with projects in progress.  

When the room is maintained it serves its purpose well.  We can easily get to supplies, tools, books, magazines and storage. But when it is not maintained – well, you know that how it is.  

We were doing okay with the room basically usable and then this past Thanksgiving was approaching.  I wanted – no, needed to have Thanksgiving in the dinner as normal. In addition to wanting to make it as normal (and as nice) as possible, we need our kitchen table clear to be able carve the turkey, put things we will need for dinner and so on.  But when last May we had ordered food delivered we had no place in our small house to store the canned, bottled, jarred and packages of food in the quantity we had purchased it. Our dining room table was covered over with towels and the canned, bottled and jarred items were put on the table.  Food in packages was put into very large plastic containers on the floor and smaller ones on the table. There was no way we could have Thanksgiving dinner in the dining room as it was – but where to move it all – especially the items on the table?  

Of course, they could go on my work table in the studio - if was cleared off of course.  So I did a quick job of clearing items off of work table – some, such as husband's sewing machine, were pushed onto his worktable, others stacked on the chair I use at the table and items put on the floor.  My work table chair area backs to a wall with with some storage, so there was not a lot of room there.

This all worked okay for Thanksgiving… - for Christmas husband's weaving items including loom were added to what was stored in the studio - and Christmas…  and New Year's, but it has become a giant mess in the studio.  When doing some household sewing I had to lean over a good deal of the mess to get out a different color of thread – and managed to drop the holder on which all (well, mostly) the started spools are stored onto the floor – behind the mess.  Luckily I could read a spool of light gray and since it was a work item I was making, that was close enough to the light blue I needed.  

But this cannot go on.  It is one thing not to be able to use my work table, but not to be able reach and find the items I need is not alright.  But like everyone else I look and sigh and think  - oh my!

A couple of weeks ago I went to work on a laundry basket in our studio. It held various toys and other items husband's niece used to play with when she would come here one day a week for us to watch for her mom.  This is back when she was maybe 4 plus or minus – she is 19 now, she will not be playing these items again.  I went through the basket and sorted it out.  I threw out items which were, well, actually garbage even though she played with them - no, we did not give her garbage, but children, well they find items to play with which are not toys – for example, the first time she came for us to watch her it was just after my husband's birthday.  He had received a HUGE birthday card.  She loved it and carried and carried it around the house and drew on it – garbage – out it went. Some items are things we want to keep – such as toy train set of my husband's which she had appropriated, some stuffed bears and such.  They were put upstairs in “the teddys” room to find a permanent home.  The other items, mostly stuffed toys are not something we want and are not garbage.  They have been set aside so that when the corona virus is under control they can be donated as they are in excellent condition.  The laundry basket was washed and dried and put in the basement as a spare, well, laundry basket.  

This week I went to work on one corner of the room.  This corner has a bookcase with our needlework and sewing books, some related magazines, and the bottom shelf holds the cookbooks I kept after a purge of cookbooks about a decade ago (and no new ones added since),  It also has loose shelves – wire ones that husband uses to dry woven items on after he finishes them and wooden boards we use as shelves at craft shows.  Also stored on the floor here are a few plastic bags with framed cut paper pictures that my husband made and exhibits – though no exhibits in a few years.  There is room for all of this in this area while still allowing access to the book shelves.  But of course, until the area was cleared out of unrelated items which had been dropped there – the books shelves have not been easily accessible in years – the books and magazines which had been pulled out had been stacked on a Ellison cutting machine – so, of course the Ellison was not that easy to use as it could not be accessed.  Once the book shelf area was cleared out – the books and magazines were put away where they belonged.  The paper cutter mentioned before had also been moved to this pile (on the opposite end of the same dresser) to put our studio Christmas tree. It was put back where it belongs.  

In doing this I found a package of paper towels near my work table.  A mystery solved.  In January husband saw me replacing a used up roll of paper towels and asked how many more rolls we had (remember he thinks we use about 10 times more of everything we use) and I told him that we had at least 2 more rolls in both size sheets we have.  To me this means “we have plenty” to him this means “we are about to run out of paper towels any minute now”.  I reminded him that we had also bought a new package of paper towels, but of course could not find it when he asked where it was. So we bought a new package of paper towels – not the brand we like as it was out of stock – when we went out to pick up prescriptions.  As I cleared these items out of the studio I found the package of paper towels I knew we had bought under some of the mess and of course showed it to husband to show that I was right.  Both packages of paper towels are now in the basement in the area where we keep replacement paper goods.  

I plan on continuing working on getting the area around my work table cleared out so even if I cannot actually work there for now due it being a food storage area, I can at least get to and use the various supplies stored next to it in the corner of the room and under it without any problems.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

It is amazing how moving something for temporary storage can cause problems that seem huge.  In less than half an hour  of work last night, I now can access my bookshelves and books, can use our Ellison machine and our paper cutter, and made a big dent in the clearing away of items temporarily stored  and blocking access to supplies and tools.   A HALF AN HOUR!  That was all it took.  Can't wait to see what the next half an hour of clearing away stuff manages to organize and clean up.  

A TRIP NOT TO THE PARK - SNOW, SNOW, SNOW

 Well, as of now all of the Christmas decorations are not only down- but stored away.  

We were lucky and the snow storm which was to come through on Tuesday (yesterday) was just rain which ended in the early morning – and the temperature went up into the 50Fs!  What a pleasant day!

Husband was upset, as usual, about the storm due to come in tomorrow (Thursday) – very upset.  I looked out and the saw the sun, felt the (relative) warmth and suggested to cheer him up - “Let's go walk around in the park.”  He was concerned that the snow from prior storms might not have been cleared or that the park might be soaked and did not want to go.  I suggested as an alternative we take a drive.  He thought about and agreed.  We got our “going out bag” - holds masks, bag for mask, hand sanitizer, plastic gloves, plastic sandwich bags (as alternative to gloves for me), and spray bottle of alcohol and started out.  

We drove to a different, nearer park and all looked well cleared.  BUT whenever we had to stop – at red light or otherwise – the car was surging – he would need to shift the automatic transmission into neutral to stop it.  So home we went – now very upset, so much for a nice day out.  This is apparently the sort of problem which is either a US$200 repair for a switch or thousands for a new transmission.

We have a driveway which is shaped like an “h”.  We keep the car at the foot of the long side of the “h”  (RV at top part) and our van on the grass, well really dirt, all the grass died, between the bottom legs of the “h”.  All extremely organized, this way either car or van can be driven out – if the van is being driven before we go out the car is put on the curve of the “h” so we can the van back in place.  He was concerned that if the car did not drive next time, we would be stuck and not able to get the van back in place – so we decided to switch the two on the driveway.  First he paced out that the wheels of the car would be on the bricks that the van's wheels are on – yes, they matched okay.  Then he drove the van off the driveway and parked in the street in front of a neighbor.  Then he had me get in the car to drive it so he could direct me.  I am actually the better driver – no, really, he would say so even more than I do, but I have not really driven the car since the first Wednesday of last March.  I have driven a couple/few times to or from our mechanic who is 4 blocks away, when we have needed to take one of our vehicles to him and it was too cold or wet to walk home (if going there or walk there if picking up), but that's it.  I did fairly well with the driving, but did not end up on the bricks.  We did not figure into this that the ground had melted after being frozen and wall sheer mud.  In going back and forth to get the tires on the bricks – I was getting stuck in the mud and the tires were throwing mud up.  When husband asked me to open the passenger door so he could talk to me – well, I had forgotten how to do so!!  I did open that window and by the time he asked again, I had found the button on the dashboard (I could have sworn it was the door near the armrest – that must have been our last car).  He had to shovel the mud around so that there were not deep cuts in it when it freezes back.  He then had to go and drive the van onto our driveway – which involved driving it to the next street and back.  We will take the car in for it to be looked at next week – after the ground freezes again!

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Apparently we are in time where anything that can go wrong - will do so.  Try to figure out what can happen and what you can do if does.  Hopefully your problems, like ours, while perhaps terribly annoying (and possibly expensive) will not of the type which threatens health or life or financial security.  We have to learn to “roll with it” as much as we can.  

I hope all and theirs are stay well and survive this winter weather – especially those in areas such as Texas which are not used to winters like this.

TWO WEEKS OF CLEARING SNOW

 Somehow this week got away from me, so this is just a short post a bit late - my apologies.

We have been dealing with shoveling snow for 2 weeks have the possibility of more.  Over the past 2 weeks there have only been 2 days we did not go out shoveling snow.  

Today we went out to work on the snow around our small RV.  (It is what is called a class B - a van, in this case a Chevy Express, made into a rather small RV.)  It sits at the top of our driveway and is not driven except on trips and when needed to drive it to keep it in good shape so we have not bothered to get rid of the snow around it.  (We have driven it on 2 hour round trips three times since the start of the pandemic to keep it doing and it really needs more driving.)  

Why clear it now after it has sat for about 2 weeks since the biggest storm?  Problem is that the storms which are coming are to be ice and mixed precipitation.  If the electric lines come down – we need somewhere to warm up and to cook.  We have used the RV in the past for cooking and watching a bit of TV after hurricanes took out our electricity.  It has a 2 burner propane stove and a propane furnace  - one of the places we ALWAYS clear of snow right away is the center of its back bumper as that is where the propane is turned on and off, perfect to use in an emergency.  

But while we could get to the propane to turn it on – the snow still covered a good part of the RV's doors.  Husband was very nervous about the coming storms, so we went out and shoveled enough snow from the sides of the RV to be able to open all of the doors – just in case we need to go in it to keep warm or to cook.  

We carried part of the snow being moved to our backyard to get rid of it.  Since we had cleared a path to back yard to do this, I also cleared the snow in front of the garage entry door in case we need to go in the garage.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Prepare in advance for bad weather you know is coming.  We even had our Saturday night “dinner out” substitute – Chinese takeout these days instead of our normal Saturday night dates – tonight, Friday as we are pretty sure we won't be able to go out tomorrow night – and if we can, well, a second date night is never a bad idea.

WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT? AND PACKING AWAY CHRISTMAS FOR THE YEAR

 Where is what coming from next?  

Last week my husband complained that the basement that the basement smelled and I should come down and check if it smelled like (natural) gas.  It did not and the smell was coming from the other room in the basement – near our oil burner.  (In this area fuel oil is one of the common heating sources – it is the same as diesel.  It is dyed so that if one uses it in one's car because there are less taxes on it than on diesel it will obvious. ) We contract with a company to deliver our oil automatically so we don't run out and also we have a service contract with them to deal with any work any needed on the furnace.  It is a hot air furnace (meaning hot air is blown through vents running through the heat to heat the house). The smell was not of the oil itself, but sort of like it smells when burned.  We looked around the furnace and saw nothing and figured it was a one time thing.  Our carbon monoxide monitors had not gone off – even when we took one to the basement and put it near the furnace.  

Friday we went out for one of our corona virus food shopping sprees – 4 hours for a 15 minuted drive each way and shopping.  An hour and a half to wipe it all down and store it.  Smell still there.  It was still here over the weekend.  Monday husband decided that “we” had to do something about it.  I telephoned the company that we contract with for this and explained -also that we had forgotten about the annual cleaning and checkup.  (Okay, a bit of a lie.)  They were very nice and when I said - “in the afternoon, please” gave us an appointment for Tuesday afternoon.

We are entitled an annual cleaning of the furnace – replacement of filters, etc and they check that the furnace is running properly.  It would normally be done in the spring or summer  - their slow time.  I did not call to have same done in 2020 as we did not want anyone in the house due to Covid-19, and figured by the time winter was taking hold the pandemic would be over and we could deal with it then – ha ha.  So we figured the problem was that the furnace needed a cleaning and the filters needed replacement, but were afraid of a major repair or the need to replace our 70 year furnace and pandemic or not it had to be done. 

I spent a good part of Monday evening making room for him to walk around and work.  In addition to the usual items out in the basement – husband's foldable work table, laundry sorting cart, sewing machine cover, and such – I had moved things around to take out our Christmas tree and the Santa/elves figures we keep down there – under the staircase.  This also involves moving our Packtite heater (to kill possible bed bugs in items coming into the house) which is about 5 ft long.  It sits out of the way in a corner of the basement – but right in front of the Christmas items stored.  When we are dealing with decorating inside for Christmas I put the Packtite on top of the large piece of wood we use for its base normally, on top of the portable worktable and then put the Packtite on the piece of wood.  This stays like this until I finish putting away the inside Christmas decorations.  I had finished taking the ornaments off the tree – but not had not chance to move these items to get to the box to store them in.  So I had to move the Packtite and board back to where they belong so he could move around where he needed to.  I also moved a number of items to the other side of the basement including my wheeled laundry sorter and the portable work table.  (I folded up the work table before moving it – easier to carry and smaller to store – husband was surprised, it had not occurred to him to do so.)  

We woke and were getting dressed just before 11 am – the appointment was for 12-4 pm, so an hour before seemed like plenty of time.  I heard a vehicle door close outside and looked out the window – it was the serviceman.  Since I sleep in jeans and tee shirt (and these days sweatshirt also) I went downstairs to let him in while husband got dressed.  

When we got down to the basement I explained.  He immediately found the cause of the smell – the exhaust pipe from the furnace had partially popped out of it's mate in the wall – the furnace exhaust had been leaking into the basement!  I was astounded that we had not noticed this.  Later husband said that he looked at the exhaust several times and did not notice it.  The pipe was put back into it's mate and taped into place (it has always been taped into place).  The furnace was cleaned, tested, and everything changed.  In the interim husband and I had changed places  - with me going upstairs to get dressed and him staying with the serviceman.  (Having worn my sleep clothes around someone I through them in the laundry.)  Most of the smell was gone from the basement.  

After the serviceman left – due to the crazy people we become – I sprayed where he had been, left his jacket, his tools, etc. with a bit of our precious Lysol just to be careful.  The next day when I went down to the basement I smelled the Lysol with perhaps a whiff of the other smell.  Husband insisted he still smelled the smell.  Finally today – 2 days later the basement has cleared itself of the smell and all is well.  We cannot open the windows in the basement for a variety of reasons to air it out and I did not want to leave the door to the kitchen from the basement open as that would bring the smell into the rest of the house.  

Tonight I put back what I had moved so I could store the Christmas items away.  I like to do move the heavier Christmas items up and down the stairs while I am doing the laundry.  A trip down with laundry – throw it in the washer, bring up a box when I come upstairs.  Trip down to shift load to dryer, put new load in washer – bring up another box.  I had meant to bring the first box down when I came back down – but was not done with it yet.  I took the ornaments off the tree in our dining room and put them in the box in which they are kept (one of the fancy boxes we put under the tree to make it look like there are gifts for us).  I stored that tree in its box.  I then brought up the box for the tree in our studio – the ornaments were already off them as I took them off when I took the ornaments from the main tree.  I took apart and packed that tree in it's box also.  I taped both boxes closed.  Next trip down I will bring them to the basement and put them aside – they store on the main tree box so cannot be stored until that tree has its light removed and is dissembled and boxed – I did bring up the plastic bags to store the lights from the main tree on one of these trips – that is the next step in storing the main tree in it's box in the basement.  (Box remains in the basement as it to large and would be too heavy to carry the entire tree in it's box and sections are put in the box down there – one by one, each a trip down to due size and weight.)

Tonight we went out and drove the USPS mail collection box we are using – we are to get a snowstorm and we did not want to pay our real estate taxes late.  I had wanted to mail it last Sunday as it was the only mail for this coming weekend's trip to send mail, but husband had said to wait, so we had to go out tonight.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Okay, two of them -

First, make sure that all service and cleaning is done timely on your large appliances.  Second – make sure to allow time to pay bills before snow or other bad weather.  

AS LONG AS I AM STUCK HOME FOR THE PANDEMIC - I AM CLEARING OUT MY FILES OF OLD ITEMS

 I have been figuring that while we are stuck home most of the time due to the pandemic I will get some long undone projects done.  One that I have actually made some progress on is cleaning out my filing cabinets.  

We have 3 half height (2 drawer) filing cabinets.  I say “we” but basically they are mine for files for my husband and myself.  When we lived in our apartment there was no room for full height filing cabinet so we bought 2 half height ones and used the top for a place to keep needed items which had to be kept out.  When we moved to our house we kept the 2 cabinets and added a third.  This has been a good idea as our computer printers/scanner is kept on top of them – a solution to 2 problems, where to put the printers and where to keep files.  Our desks sit facing each other with one side of the desks along the all and the cabinets on the other end of the desks – facing away from them into the room (basically into the walkway between the filing cabinets and the book shelves across from them which are along the wall.

I use the top drawer of the first cabinet for our personal items.  I use regular manila folders in this drawer.  I have been using the bottom drawer of that cabinet for two sets of folders – instruction manuals/warranty papers for items around the house and for travel brochures/maps and such.  The top drawer is fine as I go through our personal folders annually.  (Note – paid bills for us are NOT kept in this cabinet  - I have an accordion folder next to my desk chair for same.)  

The bottom drawer below that is rarely gone through, though I have been working for a couple of years on scanning the instruction manuals and warranty papers into my computer to make them either and quicker to find – unless they are complicated manuals such as for the refrigerator or a major tool.  I have gone through and removed duplicate travel brochures to only keep the most recent one.  These two drawers are generally very full by the end of the year.

The top drawer of the middle cabinet has been used for financial matters for our craft business.  Bills for the business do go into this drawer and I go through it every year to remove bills and store with our personal ones.  It also has information about craft shows we have done or want to do, and stores/online businesses that carry items of interest to us.  

The  bottom drawer of the middle cabinet has two different sets of files – in the front is the files for my embroidery chapter and in the rear are the files for our reenactment unit.  (There are less files for the embroidery chapter which is why they are in the front.)  Since this drawer is almost on the floor and I am getting older it has become more problematic to get to the reenactment unit files – if nothing else when I lean down my progressive lens eyeglasses shift and everything goes out of focus.  I have wanted to shift one or the other to a different drawer to help get rid of this problem. I also have to sit on a small step we keep in the room to see the files which are further back in the drawer.

In the top drawer of the third cabinet was some additional files for our craft business and catalogs – lots of catalogs – mostly for our craft business, but some for us also.  We rarely order from catalogs or otherwise, but when we need something for the craft business we can go through and find what we need and who sells it and decide who to buy from and how to do so.  Of course we have not received a new catalog in probably over a decade, so the catalogs are not current.  

In the bottom of the third drawer of the third cabinet are my files for accounting clients, etc. and some files for husband related to his certifications and websites through which he has done counseling plus some files left from his former job - he quit over 10 years ago.

I figured that as long as I am stuck home anyway whenever I have some time while in office I would work on going on through the catalogs to see what to keep and get rid of the rest so I could put the two files for the 2 clubs into separate drawers.  Yes, Covid-19 is giving time at home to clear out old papers.  

I started a new spreadsheet for the catalogs.  I take some out and decide if we would still be interested in what each if for.  No longer interested – catalog info is put in the spreadsheet (after checking that the business still exists) and then the catalog goes into a pile to recycle.  With the spreadsheet info we can either go the website of the company or call for a new catalog if we need it.  Catalogs we are still interested in I check to see if the business still exists and how well their items are shown on their website.  If the company still exists, again I put the company's info in the spreadsheet.  If the website shows the items they carry – catalog gets recycled.  If the company is gone – catalog gets recycled.  If the website does not show what they carry and we are still interested, I keep the catalog even though it is old.  Amazing how many catalogs were recycled –  of course I remove the mailing info first and shred it.  

Today I started going through my old accounting files.  If I have not worked for the client in several years I make sure that all of the info in the file has been scanned into the computer and shred what is in the file.  (I keep copies of client's taxes other than the most recent year done as pdfs in my computer.  I keep the most recent year on paper as it is easier to refer to the following year when preparing that year's return.)  I also have been going through the other files in this drawer – forms I have to file for me to be able to prepare tax returns, proof of classes I had to take, returns shredded before I started keeping the record of same in a spreadsheet, etc. are being scanned into the computer (this is what I worked on today).  Clients who I go to and “do” their books have more papers retained than those who I just prepare income taxes for, including a traditional file folder that I take to them when I am working at their location so anything related does not get lost.  I filled my shredder basket today.  

I have a few more accounting files to go through and then I will go through the files I keep for husband for his counseling practice.  For convenience the two businesses will continue to share a file drawer.  

I plan to separate the two clubs into separate drawers and move the travel items into back of the drawer with my embroidery chapter's file since (as mentioned) there a lot less of them than of the reenactment unit's files.  We will travel again one day – when the corona virus is in control and it is safe.

I will continue to scan in the instructions and warranties books for things in the house and hope to get it down to a limited number of items which have too much info in them to get rid of.  Since small parts that came with items are also in this drawer, I will end up bagging and labeling them and keeping them in this drawer also.  

The drawers are so much emptier than when I started and easier to use.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

If you are stuck in the house anyway – use your time to work on getting rid of unneeded things.  There must be some papers that sit where they are just because of lack of thought of them.  Try to find them.  Decide if you need them.  If you need a copy of them and NOT the originals – scan them and shred the originals (birth certificates and marriage licenses are among the items that one needs to keep the original).  If you need to keep them – set them up so they are kept in some sort of order.  As someone raised in business I prefer papers in a file folder in a file drawer – what works for you to keep to track of the paper originals you need to keep?

CHANGING ONE ADDRESS FOR MAIL - EVERY TIME I THINK I AM DONE - OOPS

 First, I should mention first that we still have bills, statements, etc. delivered to us in hard copy by USPS mail and we do NOT do anything financial online unless there is no other option – we are old school computer users (back to main frame computer programming) and know that there is NO such thing as a secure connection.  

We have had problems in the past with mail delivery at our house and had transferred almost all of our mail delivery to a USPS box we had for our business at a different local Post Office to deal with it.  We found this worked extremely well – go on a trip, no need to have mail held as it would automatically be held when there was too much in the box, need to have something delivered other than USPS – with street addressing it could go to our box.  

Then along came the corona virus.  We don't want to go out at all, let alone into a crowded Post Office – whether to send mail out or get our incoming mail.  More about that from last March 26 at http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2020/03/   and from last April 16 at http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2020/04/ and I am sure there is more at other post inbetween.

So we started changing our mailing address back to our house address with any and every one we could think of.  Every time I think I am done changing our address back to our house – something else pops up.  

Latest things which popped up -  Our car insurance renews soon and I checked to make sure our house address was the mailing address for same – it is, but that started me thinking about other insurances  and I checked our homeowners' insurance comes to our house but our RV insurance goes to our PO Box.  I telephoned the insurance company and changed the address – would not want to take a chance on the policy renewal being mailed to our box and never finding its way here.

We are members of Costco and a similar warehouse company called BJs.  My excellent computer records for bills reminded me that our Costco dues are due during January – usually paid by now – but no renewal received and the renewal goes to our PO Box.  So today I called Costco and, yes, we should have received the renewal by now.  I changed our mailing address with them and checked the amount due for the dues and the mailing address to which I should send the check – I paid it, as I have paid so many other bills this past 9 months – with a cover letter.   Our BJs  renewal is next month – I called them also and changed our mailing address with them also.  Strangely, the various ad circulars from both of them all come to our home address.

I am well organized, well at least as far as paperwork, especially bills.  I went through all my papers, all our credit cards, etc. and made a list – I contacted each company to change our mailing address to our house – but each time I think I am finished doing so – something else pops up.  Worst of all, some day, soon I hope, I will have to reverse this and change all of the mailing addresses to back to our PO  Box so it does not go astray and we can again go on our little trips with the mail snugly and safely in our little box at the Post Office.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK-

We will soon have a new control of our government here in the U.S.A.  I hope that they will be organized and get control of the pandemic so we can all go out again and be with friends and family as we did before (and go to the Post Office again for mail) without fear of getting of getting Covid-19.  

Until then- please be careful and safe and keep yourselves and your families well.

NEW YEAR TO COME AND ADDEDUM TO LAST WEEK'S POST

 Before this weeks' post a followup –

I finally found the rest of the Christmas ornament hooks I wrote about last week (about 5 times more hooks than we used on the tree).  I always store things logically – problem is the logic is often forgotten.  I have two open plastic boxes under part of my teddy bear village which I keep various small items which are used at different times during the year – such as little park benches, chairs, tables…  I had been turning the idea of what would I consider a logical place to put the tree hooks under the circumstances of last year.  The idea entered my head that I have a bear in an airplane attached to the tree in the village (so he doesn't fall off and it looks like he is flying around the tree) with Christmas tree hooks and I did that since last year.  Yep, the hooks were in one of the brown baskets.  So the teddy bear village Christmas tree is decorated, but, sitting here the night before New Year's Eve, the rest of the village is only partly set up for the “Winter Festival” - okay it is called that instead of the “Christmas Festival” so it can be left up after Christmas.  Things keep happening.  


Now this week's post -

Of course a New Year's post is needed at this time.  I don't believe in making resolutions – they tend to be too big and grand and one does not carry through one feels like a failure.  Those of you who read my blog on an ongoing basis know that I believe that each day is a start of a new year.  

I like to work with the idea of trying to do something better, not making resolutions.  Pick something – relatively small and think how can you do better at dealing with it.  It may be organizing related or family relationship related, or work related or just something that you do or don't do which drives you crazy.  Decide that you will try to do better – and see what you can do about it.  Small steps – not big jumps.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

May the year to come be better for all of us.  

Please keep separate with your immediate family and wear your masks and gloves for awhile longer so you and I and most of us will be here a year from now and will be looking at back at 2020 at the end of 2021 thinking “Thank goodness Covid 19 ended this past year and we can all be together safely.”

CARS, MAIL, HOLIDAY DECORATING, AND YET MORE TURKEY

 Well, we have had leftovers from Thanksgiving twice again this week – did have to add some side dishes and we are almost out of turkey gravy – he doesn't like the jarred gravy, only the canned and we have one jar left and one package mix.  What is left at this point will likely be used in a soup or a turkey pot pie.  Last week I asked husband what we should we make for Christmas Eve and for Christmas Day dinners – I suggested ham.  (I know he does not like home cooked roast beef.)  Nooo, he wants turkey – again.  

I have set up some of the Christmas decorations in the kitchen, dining room and hall after storing my (much fewer) Thanksgiving decorations.  Husband has finished his weaving project and we stored his big loom folded up in our studio.  I still have some small items to put away and have not figured out what I will do with his (heavy, wooden) gate leg table.  I am working on ideas.  

We were planning to go food shopping next week, but due to rising number of corona virus cases and fear of people clearing the food store shelves, refrigerators and freezers again we have moved up the shopping trip to tomorrow.  I inventoried the food in the freezers and fridge, as well as canned, bottled, jarred and packaged foods.  I entered the counts in a computer spreadsheet.  Tonight we sat down and went through the list – we change the number of items we have of each item to how many we should buy and deleted the items we are not buying – whether because we have plenty or do not want the item again.  I then printed out the list to use while shopping.  

We discussed the idea of splitting the shopping into 2 trips into the store (my idea).  We end up with a huge number of items when we shop these days (as we try not to shop more often than monthly and have made a month and a half between trips sometimes) and it  hard to deal with all of it in the shopping cart and then ringing it up (we prefer self checkout even before Covid-19) and bagging it and getting all the bags into the cart.  My suggestion was that we go through the store and buy all the items which are not refrigerated or frozen, then ring it up and bag up and take it out to the car.  We will then go back into the store and buy the remaining item and repeat the process.  While it may take a little longer, it will be easier to deal with ringing up and bagging the items this way.

Tonight we made a trip to the gas station (less people, if any, around late night) and filled our van's tank as well as two gas cans for our snow-blower.  There has been talk on and off of snow coming and we figure we would be rather be ready and not need it, then not be ready. When we got into our van and husband started it and released the parking brake – the brake light did not go off and the brake pedal was at the bottom.  Earlier in the year our mechanic told us we are not driving the van enough and for the brakes, as well as the engine, it needs to be driven more.   We used it as we needed it for the gas cans, but no one was around and husband drove very slowly and carefully.  

The main reason we out tonight is to post outgoing mail – yes, we normally do that on Sunday nights.  We have an Etsy site of some of our craft items.  We have most of the inventory not listed now as we don't want to have to go to the Post Office to ship items out.  We left listed items which are mailed with regular postage in a regular manila envelope as they can be dropped in the outgoing mail box and downloads.  After all this time since the pandemic and stay at home started, we sold our first item of the year and had to mail it out to the customer.  (We did also have one download this year.)  So as long as we had to go to mail same, I paid the bills for the week and we mailed them out also – unless something comes up we won't have to go out Sunday night to post mail.

With all of this excitement I did not get a chance to post until rather late – around 2 am on what is actually Thursday not Wednesday night, hence the shortness of this post.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

As we head into the holidays, please continue to be careful – wear a mask, avoid crowds and so on as we wait for vaccines to be made available.  It is more important that we all are still here when we can again live life normally.  Take advantage of the time you are stuck in the house to go through various items and see what you can get rid of.  Straighten up a small area  - and then another.  Use the time you are stuck in the house to get some decluttering and organizing done.  One step at a time is all takes.  

For those who like me celebrate it – A happy Chanukah – may your candles shine brightly.

THANKSGIVING IN A YEAR WHICH IS NOT NORMAL

 First, a big OOOPS – and an apology.  For the first time since I started this blog in October 2015, I missed posting last week.  I may have otherwise posted a day (maybe 2 days once) late, I have not missed any other full week.  Even worse, I did not realize that I did so.  I was starting to write this post and since it about Thanksgiving last week, I looked to see what I posted about our holiday last week – and there was no post for last week.

I have mentioned before that husband and I used to have both our families for Thanksgiving dinner from 1984 through 2008.  I have probably mentioned that since we are of different religions Thanksgiving was the only family type holiday that both families wanted us to come to them for dinner.  (Meaning his family for Christmas, mine for Chanukah, his family for Easter, mine for Passover – plus mine for other Jewish holidays which are big family meal occasions.)  The first several years we generally ended up with husband's family for Thanksgiving.  

But in 1984 we decided to try something different – both families would come to us for dinner.  My husband thought the idea was crazy.  We lived in a small 3 room apartment and between the 2 families (including grandparents)  and us there were  about a dozen people (his sister and brother in law were on their honeymoon).  I had thought it all out.  His parents had 2 large folding tables – we could set up the 2 tables as one running the length of the living room.   My good china, glasses, silverplateware served 14.  (The china pattern was discontinued after we started buying it and we bought 2 extra settings in case anything broke.)  It could work if we borrowed some extra folding chairs in addition to the tables.

But the menu?  Surveys taken in the U.S. of what people have for Thanksgiving dinner all sounded the same - “turkey and all the fixings” until people were pressed in later surveys about which “fixings” they have.  It was then discovered that while turkey was generally a given (short of vegetarians or such) the side dishes varied greatly by the part of the country people were from, as well as their ethnic backgrounds – some even had chicken instead of turkey.  While my in-laws had been going out for Thanksgiving dinner for a number of years, when they had the dinner at home of course there was a macaroni with tomato sauce course and Italian pastries for dinner.  My family when Thanksgiving was at home would have chicken soup and then turkey, vegetables, mashed potatoes, stuffing, pies... My family though, for some time had been going out to a kosher deli for Thanksgiving dinner as an aunt was kosher.  Since mom would make a turkey for dinner (with lots of leftovers for other meals) a couple of times a year, when confronted with dinner in a kosher deli – my sisters and I went for corned beef sandwiches as we did not get them as often as turkey.  So compromise was needed in the dinner menu.  We settled on a traditional menu – turkey, corn, green beans, stuffing – I think the first year was the year I tried to make my own stuffing which included chestnuts which I had never cooked before – mashed potatoes, and I baked pies for dessert.  Somehow it all worked and worked well, so we continued making the Thanksgiving dinner.  We moved into our house during October – finishing up October 31 and still made Thanksgiving dinner in our newly bought house.  There were adjustments – dining room would not hold the two long tables end to end or next to each other, so we built a setup of plywood which clamped to our old kitchen table (which was in the dining room as it was too large for our small kitchen) to make a large, square table.  (Eventually we bought a dining room table which fit 14 if we squeezed in.)  Nieces and a nephew joined our number along the way.  Once or twice husband's best friend from high school joined us.  Husband's sister's mother-in-law joined us.

The annual dinner came to an end the year we had bed bugs.  Of course that year we could not have anyone as the house had been recently treated for the bugs and was in disarray (real disarray – sofa cushions and such all over the floor clothing, towels and fabric out – all due to the treatment) and we did not have the families in for Thanksgiving and we went to an inexpensive restaurant for our dinner.  Since then we have not felt comfortable having people in the house as we cannot deal with having bedbugs ever again and terrified of getting them.  After a few years of going out for Thanksgiving dinner, we started cooking dinner for ourselves.  

This year was a challenge.  Our dining room table was covered with the excess canned, bottled, jarred, and packaged foods we have due to the pandemic.  Husband suggested we eat at the kitchen table this year.  I pointed out to him (and after the holiday he agreed) that we needed the kitchen table for carving, filling bowls, storing items waiting to be used as we have very little counters pace and only 1/3 of it (about 30 inches long) would be available to use.

So I had to clear off my work table in our studio (dining room is on one of the kitchen – studio on the other side) and move all the food there.  Two evenings work – but everything was going well.  I even managed to put out my Thanksgiving decorations (not all of them are bears) including paper ones my niece made for me decades ago (she is 30 now).  

By now the setup is repetitive – I know which bowls and platters I will use for serving which food.  I know I need to add one board to our dining room so it is large enough to hold the bowls and platters.  I baked the pies the night before.  I got up early (well, for us) on Thanksgiving and took the turkey out of the refrigerator and turned on the oven to preheat.  Back to sleep for an hour and then down again to put the turkey in the oven and then back to bed again.  Everything was going according to plan – as it always does.  Each item being cooked at the time it needed to be – or so I thought.  

The turkey had come out and cooled off.  We were almost ready to eat.  Husband asked me where the mashed potatoes were – uh oh!  Normally I make mashed potatoes from scratch and use boxed stuffing mix.  This year as we are avoiding buying fresh produce due to the corona virus and not wanting to get items which were unwrapped when purchased and had been touched by others we had decided to go with instant mashed potatoes.  Well, at least they and the boxed stuffing were quick to make when we realized I had not made them – and while we were waiting for the water for each to boil – husband noticed that we had not heated up the (canned) gravy.  Yes, there is a reason I was so disorganized this year – actually 2 reasons – I had not bothered to periodically check my list of what I was making.  (I keep the list each year for each holiday dinner I make in a spiral notebook – I filled it front to back and am now using it back to front – the list was there, I just did not look.) The other reason – while this year husband is bored from staying in so that we don't get Covid-19 and decided to help. In telling him what I needed him to do, I lost track of what I was doing.  

Of course it was a great meal anyway.  So far we have leftovers for dinner 3 times and he had a turkey sandwich once.  2 people, one turkey is a lot of leftovers including turkey broth made with the carcass late Thanksgiving dinner.  

Every item used was washed that night & air dried in 3 groupings, some help with drying on the first 2 groupings.  The dining room was back to its prior state by the next day.  The good china, etc, was put away by then also.  

I have spent the week since clearing up what was around in the dining room before we started – reenacting items not stored in their box benches, stuff from my family house sitting on extra chairs as we did not know where to put it.  Small amount of stuff to go back out to our RV as we brought them to use them in the house in the past year.  Excess pans and racks which had been removed from the oven over the past year.  Dented food cans that husband still not will get rid of and we want to keep away from the ones in the studio that are okay to use are in a line under one of the box benches in the dining room.  3 large boxes of food still in dining room – I will try to move them to the studio, but need to move things from the living room there first or we will not be able to put the tree and other decorations in the living room.  If worse comes to worse, the food boxes can stay in the dining room (perhaps a table cloth over them?)  Yes, the dining room is back in better organization than it was before the holiday so that I can decorate it for Christmas.  

Next I start on the living room.  Husband has until the middle of December to use it as his “loom room” for his weaving (our agreement is he gets it from mid January to mid December as his loom room and I get the other month for Christmas decorating), but I can get started moving out his inventory and the large DVD chest (latter stores in the dining room for the holiday against the side wall and he made it on wheels so it is relatively easy to move) in the interim.  Since last year we did not get around to decorating in the house – I know if we don't this year, we may never do so again.  

Outdoor lights went up the day after Thanksgiving.  We found ourselves short 4 strands of lights  - they had expired last year or in the interim – one set only half the bulbs lit.  We did not want to the store (as we go out rarely these months for health safety) so decided to work with what we had.  Our the trees on each end each have only 2 strands not 3, the bush next to one tree has only the lights from that tree traveling over its top on its way to the electric outlet.  On the other end – we normally wrap red lights (with white wires) around the white post of our mail box – this year instead those lights are on the bush in front of the mail box.  On the other side of the front steps (back towards that first tree) are the remaining set of lights.  Not bad considering.  Our door wreath lights with batteries and is up on its magnetic hook (left from last year) and is lit up.  The battery candle lights are in the front windows on their timers.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

This year we need the holidays – whichever holiday or holidays one celebrates this time of year – more than ever to try to spark some joy (and a bit of almost normalcy) in our lives.  If one can not put up/set up everything one normally does, we must do our best with what we can setup.  It is a year like no other in the memory of most of us.  We must try to do what we can to make our holidays as normal as we can while staying distant and safe so we will be here for next year's holidays and celebrations.  

NOTE -

When I went to publish this post – I found  I had written a post last week – but since it duplicates part of this weeks post – I have deleted it.