HUSBAND FOUND ME AN EXTRA WEEK FOR WORK - AND THEN HE USED IT UP

 On March 28 I started to panic – it was almost the end of March and I still did not have information from clients to do their taxes and was in the middle of one return which was taking longer than it should – plus I still had to do our taxes and those for our craft business.  In my mind I had ONLY TWO WEEKS to finish the returns and two of the clients live in other states – and with USPS running as slowly as it is I wanted to get the out of state returns out 2 weeks before they were due – so clients would receive them, have time to review them, and not have to do any of this in a panic – which I was already in.  

I had not looked at a calendar – just “it is the end of March already and taxes are in 2 weeks!”.  When my husband asked why I was in a such panic and I told him, he told me that there were 3 weeks, not 2.  Amazingly this was correct – taxes are not due until April 18 and that is a Monday so I had the week I was starting plus 2 more weeks.  After he kept saying that he found me an extra week.  

Sounds good right – an entire extra week!  How did I spend that extra week?  Husband's birthday is this week and he decided we (he) were getting a big (not a BIG, just a big) screen TV as who knows when or if we will ever be able to go to the movies again – not only due to Covid, but we don't like the new recliner seats and the local independent theater we had been going to which did not have same has no information about the future other than that is “temporarily closed”.  

So most of the week he “found” was spent going out and looking at tables to put the TV on in addition to looking at TVs.  Towards the end of last week we went to Ikea and bought the table he figured out would fit where we needed it (both in terms of length, width, and height – but also clearance under it so we could keep the DVD chest he made a number of years ago as the table would be going in the same space – with the chest sliding under it (where the chest has always been).  We then drove to the Costco in the next county (the one here is much too busy even in normal times for us to deal with) to order the TV to be delivered to us – as we could not carry it home nor could we carry it into the house.  They do not allowing ordering in stores – take home only, so we had to then call their ordering service and order the TV.    This process took 2 full days (such as short as our days are) last week.

Then another day was taken up with assembling the table from Ikea.  This is always a simple process – which isn't.  We have assembled a lot of Ikea furniture in the past 20 years and while most make sense to me – he is always confused and there is always “discussion” over whether I am handing him the correct pieces, screws etc to him.  Luckily once it was assembled it fit where it needed to go even better than we thought it would.  

Today the TV was delivered and physically setup by the delivery people (extra US$20 for same).  I will say that we are very happy with Costco's delivery.  We were told the tentative date when it was ordered.  Late yesterday afternoon we had a computer call giving us a 2 hour window for the delivery – since their delivery time for TVs starts at 7am and we normally do not go to bed until 4 am, we were concerned about having to be up and dressed at 7am to wait for them to show up, so we were very glad of being told which 2 hours they would be here (and thankfully it was late morning).  We then had another phone call today from the fellows delivering it to tell us they would be here in 20 minutes.  So, their letting one know when to expect was great and the fellows were very nice.  

So we had the TV sitting on the table and husband was ready to start setting up what he has for it.  This included running to Walmart to exchange a DVD player he had bought for the TV which was lacking its cord in the box – it was listed on the instruction sheet, only to find out after we exchanged it that it did not come with the cord – all of their players apparently have the same sheet and there was an asterisk he had not noticed saying only one of their players comes with the cord.  Luckily we had a cord in the house.  He then spent several hours setting up the information and such of the TV and of the DVD player – much of the time I was needed to help him.  

So now it is less than 2 weeks until the taxes have to be filed and I still have 3 returns to do, though at least the client is in the metropolitan NYC area and our returns can be mailed on the 18th!  BUT – a client who mailed the return to out of state mailed me a notice she received from her state government – a refund of her overpayment on her 2020 return …. which was suppose to be credited to her 2021 return and has been taken as payment on same.  So, now I have to redo part of her paperwork.  Luckily she is overpaid more on her 2021 return than the amount not credited to it, so it is her estimates for 2022 which have to be changed – and I emailed to her and said I will do so after the 18th as it does not affect what she is filing now.

I used to do so many returns with so many less problems than pop us these days!   

And yes, I have pointed out to husband that he used up almost all of the extra week he found for me, so the extra week he found helped him – not me.


THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

It is amazing how the little things take up/waste time.  

TRYING TO FIT THINGS INTO SMALL SPACES OR LITTLE TIME

 Have you ever had to fit more in a space than fits?  Yes, I know – that is what is organizer is about, not having to do this, but sometimes…

Back in the normal times before Covid husband and I would go to the movies just about every week.  There was (is?) an independent theater in a nearby community that we would go to. While it had become a multiscreen theater it had not changed over to the terrible lounge seats – still had old style movie theater seats (same type as in school auditoriums, Broadway theaters, etc) and having once sat in lounge seats at movie theater, we vowed never to do so again.  It is currently still “temporarily closed”.  We went to “late showings” - which at this theater means the movie starts 9:30 to 10:30 pm, as opposed to when we used to go to midnight movies in the old days.  While it has some theaters which are rather small, it does have just about full size theaters.   And it was reasonably priced (even for so for seniors) and had a very nice staff.

This is something we have missed – last time we went to a movie was in late February/early March 2020.  We have instead been having our movie night at home watching movies on TV – which is not the same, not only due to small screen, but missing in the atmosphere of a movie theater.  

Husband has recently got into his head to buy a large screen TV for our living room.  I was shocked.  Husband spent a good deal of time decorating our living room in – more or less – colonial style – which is why I was shocked that he would put a big screen TV in it.  (The TV which is in there – not digital – is in a period looking piece of furniture to hide it.  It does not have a cable hookup as we tend to only watch TV in the living room while putting up and taking down our Christmas tree  - when we watch specific Christmas DVDs and New Year's Eve – when, most years we watch “the ball drop” in NYC through Roku – though one year we watched Animal Crossing's New Year Party instead – I actually liked that better. )  

Between this and the price, the idea of a big screen TV in our living room to watch Saturday night movies shocked me.  This discussion has been going on for about a month or so.  He has decided that the theater we used to go to will never reopen and we are too uncomfortable in the lounger seats in other theaters.  (Though we have found one other theater with “real theater seats”, but it is not near us.)

He has been going back and forth with ideas on what to do – then deciding they are no good, then a new idea and then back again.  Just when I thought he had given up – it is becoming reality.  He has bought one for his birthday which is coming up in a while.  

In doing this we had to figure out a lot of things.  His first idea was to have the TV hung on the wall.  Only wall possible was where the TV set furniture is now.  BUT – that is too close to the heat, would have to be hung off center on the wall, and he found out that one has to help the installer hang the TV – if we could do that, we would not need the installer.  

His second idea was to stand it on something.  An obvious choice to me was a large wooden chest he built – it looks like a hope chest – top lifts, lock on front – but on this one, the key in front is the handle to pull down the front and drawers come out with DVDs in it – so the top is stationary and can have (and does have) things put on it.  That is too low for what he wants – he want to “look up at the TV like one looks up at the movie screen in a theater”.  He went looking for a stand to put the TV on – either one that stands on the floor or one that stands on a piece of furniture.  

He found a stand that he liked how it held the TV at a chain computer store's website.  Problem is that the dimensions are obviously wrong – how could something 4 inches tall hold a TV which is so much longer than that?  We drove to the local location of the store – none on display.  We asked a manager about the dimensions – he went to his computer and looked it up – on their website and read the numbers off to husband.  Husband, a bit impatient, pointed out that he had read the same on his computer and how could the stand be 4 inches tall?  Manager agreed that had to be wrong (both he and husband decided it had to be the shipping box dimensions) – but when husband if the boxes “in the back” could be checked for the dimensions – he was told no, “It is a brown box with no writing on it” - then how do they know which item is in the box.  We left.  

He started thinking again – the TV comes with feet, if we got the smaller size than he was looking at (65 inch instead of 70) and we could figure out what to put over the chest of DVDs to make it longer for the feet – it should work.  

We looked at an assortment of ideas of what we could put the TV on.  (In this entire process since it started we have, in our minds, rearranged the furniture in the living room end wall to end wall, side wall to side wall, end wall to side wall and so on.)  

He finally had an  idea and in his words “went back to works” - Ikea.  We bought today a table from Ikea.  It should fit over and around the chest of DVDs – box stays in place and is usable.  Table is extremely modern in design, of course – but if it makes him happy…

We then drove to Costco to buy the TV and have it delivered – believe me, he has done extensive research on where to buy the TV, warranties, service contracts, setup etc.  Problem is that one cannot buy it at the store and have it delivered – it can only be delivered if it is bought online – we hate to order things and have them delivered, but that is what we had to do – after wasting about an hour and a half driving there and home – even worse these days – the gasoline that was used for the drive there and back!  He has ordered the TV.  The table will sit in our van until early next week when we bring it in and assemble it.  

In addition to this mess we had a “discussion” with our cable company over a 20% increase in price (which they lowered for us), the cold water started dripping in our downstairs bathroom sink – after an hour and a half on hold – they could not help us as they no record of our faucet model and were the Canadian office of the company (reached through the US 800 number) and transferred me to their US office – I hung up as I did not have another hour to wait.  And it is tax season and getting closer to when I have to finish returns for clients – and us.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK – Doing anything today has become hard to do – nothing seems to be easy to do any longer and not just do to Covid and limitations arising from it.  Who ever thought buying a TV would take weeks – maybe even months – of planning, needing to change the plan several times including buying the TV?

WHEN THERE ARE PROBLEMS FROM EVERYWHERE TIME IS USED UP AND WASTED -

 Sorry to post so late – we had one of those weeks which seem to be coming more often these days.  

We went Friday a week ago to buy buy vitamins at Costco.  While there we spoke with the assistant manager of the tire department about buying new tires for our RV and having them put on same.  He said that they were no longer working on RVs (despite their website saying they do) and husband explained that it was a not a large RV, but a Chevy van converted to same.  We had to bring it into for him to look at and did so on Monday – sounds simple, right?  To back our RV out I have to stand in the middle of the 4 lane major road on which we live with a walkie talkie.  When the roadway is clear I yell for husband to back out and run to the curb.  He pulls over the curb after backing in so I can get in, which has to be done quickly as the RV/van is wider than the parking lane and vehicles are coming almost constantly.  Biggest problems are weight and the fact that it cannot be raised up on one of those platform lifts due to 4 water tanks and a generator attached underneath.  It is also taller than normal vans, but that was not anticipated to a problem as they were set up for taller vans.  He took some photos, and said he would call us.  If they could do it we would need to bring it in at 6:30 am on Sunday so they could work on it in the empty parking lot before the store opened – Huh?  This was like telling a normal person they would have to bring it at 1 am or so – we are not morning people to begin with and over the past year have been staying up later and waking up later – but if only way to get this done, we will have figure it out.  The tires had to be changed using jacks to lift the RV and it would take longer than normal.

Tuesday he called us and said it could be done – we had to come in and order the tires which we did (in our car of course, not the RV.  The tires were to come in on Friday and on Sunday morning they would put them on.  (So as of this point – we have made 3 trips to the next county about the tires – ½ hour drive each way, allow ½ hour to back out of driveway, etc each time.)  

Friday we received the call that tires were ready  - but instead of being reminded about 6:30 am on Sunday we were asked “3pm or 4pm appointment today?”  I explained what we had been told and reply was “We never do that – all work has to be done in our work area”.  I picked 3 pm and we scrambled to get dressed, eat lunch and get out in time to be there for 3 pm – fully anticipating being told to come back on Sunday at 6:30 am.  It was suppose to rain Friday night – but as we arrived at the store the rain started.  The parking spaces set aside for the tire center were filled and we cannot just pull the RV into any parking space as it is LONG.  We managed to find a usable space along a side aisle (front end could be drive off the pavement to fit) and parked there.  The assistant manager was there – no explanation of the change in when the work was being done.  We left the keys and went into the Costco store to use up 2 hours as they had said 2 to 2 and a half hours.  We  v e r y  s l o w l y w a l k e d around inside the store – separate trips for each side of each aisle – and then started over.  At 2 hours we went to the tire department to check and leave my cell phone number in case of problem and when the work was done as they had our home number.  At 3 and a half hours total time we went back again and the work was done – we don't know how long we were meandering in the store as they never called us to let us know it was finished.  (We kept expecting security to ask why we were in the store for that long a time without buying anything – the seating area for their snack bar was gone due to Covid -19 rules.)  But at least we have new tires and that is done with.

Overlapping this – husband does some work online and his pay is paid to a checking account at Credit Union “A” in his name and we then write a check from same to our regular checking account.  He was paid the beginning of the month but the payment was rejected by “A” as account inactive.  I called and straightened this out – he was paid and we took the money by check in January – so it is has been used recently and well within a year.  He then setup the account on the payer and again it was not able to pay him as the account was inactive.  I spoke to a manager and was told the craziest story I have heard in decades of being an accountant – they only count deposits made by the account holder towards activity – we could write a hundred checks a month and have 100 credits to the account – but it would become inactive without us making a deposit.  Not only was the checking account inactive – his entire membership and all of our accounts were inactive – strangely an electronic form we had to come in and fill out which could not be mailed to us (per an employee we spoke to before him - with no concept of people not going out to Covid) no longer seemed to be needed.  I then checked on the accounts in my name – also inactive, again despite transactions in January in and out – but no deposit.  He fixed those accounts also.  THEN – I realized I have the accounts for my embroidery club there – deposit was made to checking last May – but nothing since, and nothing deposited to the savings account where a deposit had to be made to keep the account active in years – which makes me wonder why this problem did arise with same years earlier.  He reactivated these accounts also.  

This is on top of a variety of other problems which have arisen with “A” since it changed its name (including no more live tellers for those needed deposits).   Husband was furious and this was the end.  We put on our masks and drove a location of Credit Union “B” where he also accounts – but not a checking account.  We opened a checking account there.  We have now set up everything which used to be sent for credit to the checking accounts at  “A” to be sent to the account we opened at “B”.  We will now have to check and make sure two transfers were made to that account.  

All of this took so much time this past week that I only was able to check email twice during the week.  What this proves is that no matter how well organized one is – the disorganization and stupidity of others can take up too much of one's time and make one disorganized.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK (OR THE HALF WEEK LEFT) -

Keep good track of your finances and always expect the unexpected to happen.

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.

COVID 19 # 27 - A WEEK WHEN EVERY DAY THERE IS SOMETHING TO DO - OUTSIDE THE HOUSE OR SOMEONE COMING IN

 We are having a busy week of it - for the first time since early March.  We have been staying home better than 90% of the time. But a variety of circumstances has hit us all at once.

Since husband has felt comfortable enough, we have been going out late on Sunday nights to post the outgoing mail for the week if we have same.  We are still not going to the post office for this or to check mail at our PO Box, but he drove around until he found a USPS mail collection box in a quiet enough area that he felt comfortable to go to - and even so we go only go after 11 pm at night.  So Sunday night we went and mailed out our mail for the week.  We received a call from the commander of our reenactment that he had a check from an event that some members of the unit actually attended.  He has had the check for about a month - his wife gave birth to their first child about the same time, so his mind is elsewhere - and the group which put on the event contacted him that we need to deposit the check - NOW - or the funding will be lost.  So he left the check in our mail box on Tuesday and we drove again to the USPS collection box and mailed out a deposit which included the check (and some other checks for the unit the past several weeks).

We are entitled to a discount on our real estate taxes due to our age.  We need to file the paperwork by the end of the year with our county.  We don’t like to file it at the last minute.  Two years ago there was a problem with the county and we were not sure if they had the paperwork - we had mailed it by Certified Mail, but there was a telephone mixup and they had called every property owner in the county to say they had not received their paperwork, instead of just those who had previously filed the paperwork and had not filed, so last year we dropped the paperwork in person to get a receipt directly from them that they had our paperwork.  Since we each have an extremely small business (both of which lose money generally) we have to file extra papers - this year’s paperwork was 157 pages - it takes some time to assemble it all - this year I started early as I was looking for something to do during the year - and I had the paperwork finished.  We have debating over the past several months - it is Covid-19 safer to go into the post office and mail it by Certified Mail to the County and hope it gets to right office or drive to the County office building and drop it off in person this year.  As we debated this we received a notice that due to the pandemic and the need to distance from others they would open late on a handful of Tuesday nights and open on many Sunday and Saturday mornings for the paperwork to be dropped off to help those concerned about going out in public, as well as there would parking spaces in their normally (during the day) overcrowded parking lot (last year husband dropped me off at the building and drove to a department store and sat in their parking lot as we could not park at the County building).  So, our decision was made - we would drop it off on Tuesday night.  Deciding it would be a lot more crowded in December - we figured to drop it off in November.  Last week was the first of the two Tuesdays for this month - but then we had to go to the doctor the next day, so decided that going out 2 days in a row was too big a risk (ha, ha in retrospect over this week). Of course one has to go through a metal scanner, so I prepared ahead - cell phone in a small plastic zip bag, wallet in another - and I brought a pen -just in case I needed to sign in as I would not want to touch a pen others have touched.  My keys I left with husband in the car.We drove there last night - there was one person ahead of me and one other came in after me - good choice.

Tomorrow (Thursday) we have an appointment to replace the tires on our car - we were told by our mechanic earlier this year that they woulld not survive the cold of this winter.  Costco has them on sale so we called and made an appointment for tomorrow.  Boy, this was getting exhausting for how our life has been this year!  

And - on Friday, we have an appointment for the phone company to change our phones from copper wire to cable - something we don’t want - both because the copper wire is more reliable and keeps working on the many times our electricity goes out for days in storms and - really - change it right now? I wouldn’t let family in the house and I have to let in someone from the phone company who has been in other houses and may have the corona virus (let alone my fear of his having bedbugs on him since we had same)?!!!  But if we don’t do this NOW they will cut off our service except to call 911 and them.

Husband realized yesterday that we need to food shop in general - our once monthly food shopping these months - and also saw people panic shopping again on TV.  (Back in early March he insisted on panic buying a large package of toilet paper, one of paper towels and every bottle of liquid hand soap he could find.  Did we need them - no, but I figured they will go not bad and if makes him feel better...  Last week I put out the last 2 rolls of the toilet paper in the package that was already in the house when we did this as spares - means about another month before they will be used, I still have not started and will not for awhile the paper towels or the liquid hand soap - a later purchases of bars of hand soap has had 2 bars started, so I pointed all of this out to him to prevent his running out to buy more of all this.) Plus Thanksgiving is next week.  We used to make Thanksgiving dinner for our two families, but since we had bed bugs, we just make it for ourselves.  I had printed out the recipes for what we usually make and added the items needed for same to the shopping list.  

So today we ventured out to buy food.  It was 25F here - a surprise drop in temperature.  Food shopping these days has a procedure that my husband came up with to keep us safe.  Of course we wear masks and gloves - but we also spray the cart before using it - he pushes the cart, I “touch the food”...  I have a listing of where which food is in the store - but of course that is my laptop which had to go for repair ( which is actually back - but still “sitting” before we touch it) and I had to wing it on this older laptop so foods were out of order.  People were out panic shopping so there were a lot more people there than has been, but by the end of our shopping (a few hours worth) there was no wait at checkout.  In the middle of bringing the food to our porch and wiping it down with alcohol before bringing it into the house - the cold of the weather hit me and I apparently had hypothermia according to husband.  He dealt with most of what was left to bring in other than some canned/bottled items that he left in the car overnight.  (And tomorrow before we take the car for tires - we have to deal with what was left.)  

Tomorrow (Thursday) after moving the food to our van as temporary measure, we will go and have the new tires installed.  We then go to the store where we have been buying our turkeys for Thanksgiving  - one of their 2 locations here is near where we are going for tires - they start selling their fresh turkeys tomorrow and then we will deal with wiping down and bringing the turkey and the rest of today’s food.  

Then the telephone person will be here on Friday.

Saturday, we will again go out and pick up Chinese food

So after not even going out once a week or seeing another person once a week (sometimes we see and wave to a neighbor though) we have 8 days in a row of being out or having someone in our house.  These days this much too scary!  


THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Well, what has to be done has to be done somehow.  Hopefully we will survive the week and neither of us will have contracted Covid- 19.  I hope all of you do also. 

COVID 19 #8 - FOOD BUYING

Husband is getting serious about our needing to buying food.  Last time we went food shopping was in mid March.  As far as I am concerned we have plenty for another couple of weeks.  He was looking at BJs (similar to Costco in case you don't know BJs) website to order from them as he had a coupon for free delivery.  It is a nice company.  Periodically, in normal times, they put the chicken patties we buy on sale and we go and buy the 3 pack of packages.  We also normally buy our gas from them as it is much less expensive (when gas was still an expensive thing compared to right now) than the other stations.  There are few Costco stores which have gas stations here and they are not conveniently located.  But it is rare we find anything else to buy from them.  There are only two of us and many of their food items are in packages which involve cooking the entire package at the same time and would be months worth of the particular item for us. 

But the seem to meet his current criteria – they will deliver, they seem to have time slots available in a reasonable time frame (any place else he looked at is a 6 week wait), and they seem to have food items that he thinks would be good to have.  As we sat at our desks this afternoon he was reading off the foods which interested him.  I told him to make a list of what looks interesting – in this case, peanut butter (2 huge jars in a package, he does not normally eat same, and I am only eating it as we are eating lunch home and want to leave the better lunch foods (such as canned soup) for him.  I am not sure if we will actually get to another jar of peanut butter and how long the 2 jars will last us – years, a decade?  And BREAD!  We normally do not go through a lot of bread, often do not even any in the house and he has always refused to freeze bread.  He looking at buying “2 or 3” packages of 2 loaves each.  I am guessing we will sit and draw up a list of what we would buy from them tomorrow and figure it out.  My attitude has mostly been through all of this whatever he needs to feel secure as long as it too not far out there. 

Back in November the weekend before our last food shopping trip we had picked up Chinese food from  our normal place for the last time also.  We picked it up on Friday night and the wife told us that they would be open the next day and then would be closed until April 1.  Both of us thought that we would go back the next night and take out again as it would be a couple of weeks before we could go there again – and eating in restaurants, still open for eating in at the time, we did not feel comfortable going to.  Of course then our brains kicked in ' Why are they closing for 2 weeks?  Is someone sick?  We did not go back the next night.

Week before last husband decided that we should pick up Chinese food for dinner – it is a small place and would be much safer (in his mind) than going to a supermarket and he would not have to eat my cooking for one night, well two nights, which will make sense soon.  I tried calling them a week ago on Sunday night.  The phone alternately kept ringing or was busy.  We figured that they must be terribly busy and were no longer taking orders for the evening.  During the following week I telephoned during the day and spoke to the wife and they were open, though closing 2 hours earlier than before – which should not have affected us when I called.  We decided we take out on Friday night and we would buy 2 meals plus extra rice.  (Husband has found out how nice rice reheated in boiling water so the grains expand big and it is filling.)  I tried telephoning them – again it was either ringing or busy.  This time for some reason my cell phone would cut off the call as I waited to see if they answered the phone after 4 or 5 rings “the party is not available”.  So we tried using our land line – we don't normally make outgoing calls with it as it has no included minutes (why pay for same and for unlimited cell phone minutes on my phone when we can just pay for the latter and use my phone for outgoing calls and the land line for incoming calls.)  This time when I called a message -“This party does not accept calls from hidden telephone numbers.”  Husband was starting to panic.  We went upstairs and called on his Magic Jack line (he has for business).  We got through to the place and found a message telling us to order through their website.  We did so – technically through a third party site accessed through their website.  It was fairly easy and straightforward to order with – even had a place for husband to specify bok choy instead of broccoli in both main dishes.  Paid through the site with our “use online, by mail and by telephone” credit card. 

We then went downstairs to prepare for the adventure that we anticipated was to come,  Husband had read to wipe down food containers coming into the house with alcohol wipes – we only have one – old – package of same, so I cut 2 paper towels in quarters and found the spray bottle of alcohol in the basement – we use it while making sure we don't get bed bugs again.  I put all of this together in the kitchen on the counter near the door.  I then pulled out an assortment of plastic containers and a bowl.  He had also read that the food should immediately be put in one's own containers and the restaurant's containers be throw out outside.   I took our masks, 2 plastic sandwich bags (I use them as disposable gloves – cheaper than same and we have a lot more of them and they fit my small hands better) and 2 plastic shopping bags and we set off.  Our idea was that I would go in and he would wait in the car.  I would open the door to go in and then out with one of the bags and have the other one on my hand as I carried their shopping bag to the car. We would then put their shopping bag(s) in ours so theirs did  not touch our car floor. 

When we arrived in their parking lot I noticed 2 things – lots of people with masks on waiting around outside the store and the door was propped open. I walked in to give them my name and found out why they had closed for 2 weeks.  The inside had been converted to non-contact pickup!  Oh, did that make me feel good.  Over their counter was a plexiglass wall with a small slot opening for ordering menus to be passed out to people and then returned for those ordering in person.  Were there had bee a walk through from the customer area to kitchen was filled in by wood making a door with a trap door in it and a shelf attached to our side of the wall with a railing around the shelf.  I started to wait off to the side and noticed a sign that if one had ordered one should text to a phone number, wait outside, and would be called when ready.  I went back out and texted my name to the number with the info we had ordered online.  I then figured out that was not enough info.  I texted additional info as I waited after explaining to husband what was going on.  People waiting did not have, to put it mildly, the best concept of staying 6 feet apart – or they had no idea how far 6 feet is.  One woman came up and started approaching me (I always look like I know what is going on – I inherited same from my dad.)  A woman started coming closer to me  - about to be too close.  I told her to stop she was coming too close and she did though seemed to not really understand.  I answered her questions.  As I stood their waiting it occurred to me that I should have included the order number in my text.  I texted again, apologizing that I had not done this sort of thing before.  Finally my cell rang and it was my turn.  I went in.  A young woman I had not seen there when things were more normal held up their copy of our order, pointing at our name, and I shook my head yes.  She passed the bag through the trap door and after it closed I picked up the bag – wearing one of the sandwich bags on my hand.  When I got to the car husband was waiting with our bag and we put the bag of food in it and drove home.

I stopped in our small side porch with the bag.  I took out an item with the second sandwich bag on my left had and wiped with it down with a piece of paper towel soaked in alcohol.  I then passed it through the door and husband transferred the contents to a plastic container in the kitchen.  (Most of the containers are old soup containers from the same place, from when life was normal.) We kept doing this until all of the food was in containers, except the main dish we were having that night was in a big bowl. 

Oh, what a treat!  Soup and big main course. No cutting back on what we would normally have as a meal to make the food last longer.  After they cooled down soon and we finished eating the rice and second meal were put I the refrigerator to keep them until we were ready to eat the food on other nights.  Last night we had the second meal.  We will definitely pick up again and pick up for one meal now that we know it is safe enough to go there.  - Yum.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

We are fortunate enough to be able to continue to pay for our food. But I never thought the luxury of a full meal instead of smaller than we normally eat meals would be so wonderful.  I guess it is true that when one is deprived of their regular life, the little normal things mean a lot.

Please continue to stay inside if you are in area with these rules.  I would like for all of you and your loved ones to continue to be well.

LIVING WITH THREAT OF COVID-19

Well  - it has gotten much more serious dealing with the Corona Virus or COVID-19 as it is now being called.  I certainly hope that all of you and your loved ones are well and stay so. 

Last week I called and canceled a follow up doctor visit for mom as she should NOT go out – she will be 91 the end of this month.  Doctor's office was very nice and told me the  - very good  - results for mom.  I have not made appointments with two other doctors she needs to go to – they can wait until it is safe for her to go out. 

During this past week our lives changed.  We had changed to going to the post office, lunch at Wendys, an attempt to find comfort items for my husband – more hand sanitizer, more hand soap, more alcohol, and/or more food – did get some more hand soap in small bottles and a bit more food.  Shelves remain empty day to day, though I did point out to husband that we do go late in the day and that may be the problem.  One of the local supermarket chains is opening early – 6 am to 7:30 am – special for only senior citizens – we just qualify for same, but 6 am?  I fall asleep at 5 am.  We may go if they continue to do this and we continue not to find things.  We are not in danger of running out of anything for a few weeks – but my husband is from a very nervous family and panics easily.  I keep reminding how much of these things we have, which always ends with “and we have more in the RV”.  We then would go home without going to other kinds of stores to walk around.  Last Sunday we did not go out to our usual Costco, BJ s , big Walmart as we normally do for fun, but it was the same as the other days. 

This week we went to the Post Office once to mail out paid bill payments,  still daily to Wendys for lunch – but, of course, we can no longer eat in Wendys – just home and eat at home.  One day went back out to supermarket – still the same. 

Last Saturday night we took in Chinese food (no dinners out any longer and that was before they ordered to only have to go/delivered orders) for dinner.  We did not go to the movies.  The theater we go to is an independent and they had sent out an email that they were going to spread the showings out further and clean/sanitize between shows – especially the seats and arm rests, bathrooms and food counters, but we still decided not to go.  We stayed in a watched a movie on TV. 

Now, everyone has been making fun of people running to buy toilet paper right?  In the middle of the movie we each received a text message.  MY sister texted me to see how my husband was doing as she knows he panics. HIS sister texted him as she never knows what is going on in the world and – yes – she suddenly found that there is toilet paper available and she is out of same for her family, let alone the news is also, but we would never be that on toilet paper ever, and she needed her big brother to help her find some.  (Eventually her husband found someone selling toilet paper at a 7-11 and bought for who knows how much money.)

Well, I have our food organized  - cans all in rows, lists of what is in the basement freezer on the refrigerator, - and we are eating less than normal at dinner.  Husband said that he would stop going to Wendys and picking up lunch – but each meal we do same, leaves more food in the house.  I am no longer using paper towels to wash the dishes – but husband did not want me to go back to using a sponge – it swirled around in my head – then I remembered – I have my old kitchen towels that are raggedy and  use for cleaning up in the kitchen – I cut up one and I have 6 pieces to use – one a day – to wash the dishes and then they will be washed. 

I normally put out clean towels on Monday and on Wednesday and Friday do so again in the kitchen and on Thursday do so in the two bathrooms.  I am now changing the towels every other day. 

My hands are raw from washing them – the cuts on them from same worry me – but what else can I do. 

Oh, today husband had a text from his sister – do we know where she can buy fish – she suddenly claims she can only fish or she gets sick (in the past it was because it was less fattening) – I guess she will be getting sick often as one will have to eat what is available.  Then again, I had expected him to hear from her upset that they could no longer eat out (every meal) and her gym (she goes daily) was closed. 

On the other hand – being in the house all the time, I am getting work done – on client's taxes and  household clearing up. 

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Please stay safe – listen to what the instructions are for where YOU live and follow them.  Stay away from those outside your home as much as you can and far enough away for safety.  If we are all careful there should be fewer people ill or worse.  One day this will all be over and we will be able to put our lives back together again. 

Oh, and for something to relieve the stress – do a search for penguins at Chicago aquarium .  Since there were to be no visitors they were allowed out to walk around the building  - they look like tourists seeing the other exhibits!

LIFE LAUGHS AT US

Good thing we did a craft event last week and husband sold weaving. I was short $220 (rounded up a few dollars and sense) to pay the last of our bills for September. Between $80 in cash we had sitting around to take on trips or use if cash needed beyond what we have in our wallets, $40 of the cash I had in my wallet, $60 from cash sales, and $40 from our change box for when we do events I managed to find the $220 and cover the bills. And that was after my Social Security for the month, $400 from a client for her taxes, and money still in the accounts from husband's Social Security for the month. Next week hewill get his Social Security payments and be solvent again. Ouch. But as Mama would say in “Mama's Bank Account” (movie – “I Remember Mama”) we did not have go to the bank, well we did have to go and deposit the cash, but did not have to take additional money out of savings.

I was to be short on time this past week – the Jewish New Year started and it is an evening plus 2 day holiday. (Remember from past years - feel free to use this New Year to start anew in your organizing if you need a reason to start now.) We were to drive our RV back to the place that installed our new RV batteries at the end of July as they still do not work properly to have them look at it. We were told that we had to leave it for 2 weeks – makes sense as the problem is that they are not holding the charge – worse the old batteries we got rid of. Husband was in a panic - we would have to bring our car and the RV to the battery place. I would be driving the RV and he the car, but we have only been there once before and got lost at the end. He was so upset that I was very worried about him. We could not figure out who to bring with us that could ride with him and help him the find the way. Basically no one. I was awake at night even after he fell asleep trying to figure out what to do and I was starting to have panic attacks worrying about him.

Then I had an idea, one I was sure he would refuse as waste of money. If he was upset because he did not know where to turn etc. (even with GPS he was upset), why not take a trip down to the place in advance? He would be able to see the route, see where turns would be, we could figure out where to meet up before we left the Garden State Parkway, and in general reassure him. It costs us around $40 in tolls per vehicle to make the trip plus gas and I figured he would argue with me about spending same. When to go? This was Friday overnight. Well, the holiday was to start Sunday night and end Tuesday night, my embroidery meeting was Wednesday and we had made arrangements to go the next day – Thursday to the RV place. Only day to go was Sunday. Our holidays basically are suppose to be days of prayer and I try to keep away from things like trips, TVs, computer, cell phone and such. But I also know that health is more important than anything else. If husband was ill or injured and needed something there would be no question that I would take care of him – holiday or not. And basically he was ill, just not physically. I proposed the plan to him – drive down leisurely later in the day, see the route, and then have holiday dinner at Golden Corral (normally one does not eat out on our holidays). I was ready to point out that money was minor compared to how he was and that if he had to go somewhere locally and was this upset we would go in advance just like this.

He thought about the plan and did object and thought it a good idea. We started out after lunch on Sunday. I let him do the driving guided only by the GPS and kept my mouth closed other than to point out landmarks when he was already making turns. We were riding on a main (limited access 3 or 4 lane) road in NJ and had to get off of it to get onto the Garden State Parkway. As he was about to exit we saw that the exit was blocked off and closed. I had to get involved as he started to panic- what do we do? I told him to keep going and get off at the next exit. The GPS kicked in and sent off at same and had him turn around and head back to the road we had been on – in the opposite direction of course. Why I hate and don't trust GPS – the road it told him to turn onto to reverse direction back to the main road was one way – the opposite way – panic again – I told him take the next road – we did and were turned around and back to the main road – the exit to the Garden State Parkway was open in this direction. (The GPS also had no record that the exit between these two major roads was closed and it had been closed for over a week and will remain so until November!)

We drove on. The Garden State Parkway has rest areas and there were two of them before we would get off of it. I had figured we that we would meet up at the second one which was about 10-15 minutes from where we were going. We got off there (and having been on the road for 4 hours for a trip that should take 2 hours) used the rest room. We realized that this rest area was too close to where we would get off the road – the rest area is to the left of the multi-lane road and the exit to the right, traffic might well stop us from being able to get across the exit – so we figured we would meet at the first rest area when we actually go. We found the RV place easily and then rerouted the GPS to take us to the restaurant for dinner, even though it was two hours too early to eat, so we went to a Costco (where we bought gasoline) and a Walmart we know in the area to spend the time. Coming home after one of the GPS devices refused to route us the way we wanted to go as a major bridge was closed – it was not and we ignored the GPS.

Husband was calmer as he was more comfortable driving there on his own. Then a problem popped up so that we had to push the trip off to Friday and he sent an email letting them know. Monday I prayed, I read, I kept the holiday as well as I could. I also made and served the dinner I had planned to serve Sunday night and which had been partially cooked before the idea for the trip came up. The second day of the holiday (Tuesday) I am normally a bit looser in what I will do.

Monday night husband was on the computer and suddenly found post after post about the place we were going – almost everyone calling them a scammer – things they put in don't work, they break things and say they need to be fixed, they over charge by thousands of dollars, etc. Husband went back into panic mode. Tuesday I called the woman at our RV dealer and left a message (okay two messages) asking her to call us back. Overnight since we had not heard back, I called again and left a message explaining the situation in the short version. We missed picking up her call – her message was to call the new general appointment number and they would make an appointment. I had to go to my embroidery meeting – did not go out for other errands - and then I called her and left a message again. Husband went out and bought our usual lunch at Wendys and brought it home. I eventually called the appointment number and the very nice fellow said that he had been told I would call and that we needed to make a 4 hour appointment – I explained that 4 hours would not be enough and needed to speak with her. When time passed and we still did not hear from her, we decided that appointment could always be changed – I called and made the appointment for next week. We decided that husband would send her an email with all of the details. She called back later in the afternoon and husband was calm enough to talk to her. We are bringing the RV next week – with the car also – and we leave with them to find out if the batteries are good and if so why they are not holding a charge and if they are no good to see about the warranty or if that falls through – put in new batteries. Another thousand dollars plus is not easy for us to deal with, but it is that or never be able to use the RV again.

Now, at the same time I still had to make an appointments for mom at doctors. I managed to call and make one at the cardiologist's office that is to take an image of her leg to make sure her blood clot has not moved – and it will be done by a nurse practitioner as he needs to be booked over a month in advance (strange he could see her the first time in less than a week and when the appointment was wrong – there was an open appointment with him later the same day). I was also suppose to get the name of one of the other type of cardiologist who can test her pacemaker and asked for same – we have to come in to get that info? This is a big deal practice that is in a center from a local hospital chain - suppose to be the newest and best thing. Husband in his former job used to sometimes go with children in the program to Medicaid clinics – they did not treat their patients this poorly.

I am doing the laundry. I sent out info promised today to the members of my embroidery group as to how to sign into our National group's website to download embroidery designs/instructions that we are going to use at meetings. I have written this post. I did not make dinner – we took in Chinese food. So much has been left undone again - Oh, I forgot to mention that I had to call one of our credit card companies as we suddenly got – unrequested by us and with no prior info from them – a new type of credit card from them. I had to call them – first to make sure it was legitimate and not a scam, and then to change it back to what we had (miles card? We don't fly or even take a train or bus and don't stay in hotels) but they cannot change it back yet – husband's card is being mailed tomorrow so I have to call again in two days or later to get it changed back!!!!! There was much yelling by me. Another time waster.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

The world lately seems to be trying to waste time and have everything go awry. I can get myself sick dealing with it or try to take it as comes and try to keep husband from getting sick from it. One has to try to go with the flow even when it is driving one crazy and keeping one from doing anything that they need to do.

ILLUMINATING LIGHTS, BUT ALMOST NO WORK- WORK, DONE

Well another week gone  - and nothing much done of what I planned to do.  Husband had plans. 

We have a solar outdoor light fixture that we bought at least a year ago - if not two years ago - at Costco to put up in the backyard.  We have electricity back there and at one time husband put up a light, but he cannot deal with heights - could not back when put the put the light up (nor can I deal well with heights) - but it is worse now.  The fact that we are both on the short side and have to climb up higher to reach what others can reach adds to the problem.  The light he had put up has not worked in a long while and we did not want to climb as high as the old light to replace it.   So our logic was that we would buy a solar fixture and replace it by putting the solar fixture lower down the wired fixture.  The fixture has been sitting in our dining room since we bought it waiting to be put up. 

When we had our garage finished we had electricity added.  You know the idea of ask around and find someone friends recommend?  We hired a contractor who had done work several times for husband at his job and were extremely happy with.  Our garage - not so much.  To leave out the extensive details, the (supposedly) licensed electrician the contractor had hired did the wiring rather oddly.  The outlet boxes inside the garage move as they are not attached to the studs. He put in 2 circuits - but rather than put half the outlets on one and half and half the lights on one and the other half on the other - all the outlets are on one circuit and the lights he put in were all on the same circuit.  The air conditioner - which we added later is also on one of the circuits.  (The ac installer said he never put one in a garage before.)  Oh that reminds me - the garage is husband’s wood workshop.  We did have the electrician put in a light next to the side door into the garage (something added when we had this work done - before there was only the large front garage door) which has a switch and a front spot light which has its own switch.  We have replaced the front spot light a few times - high up, but not as high as the light on the back of the house - when the motion detectors have gone bad.  Well, in the garage there are work lights - the two long flourescent bulbs type.  The front two are hung from the inside of the roof - one of them, for unknown reason, much further towards the center of the garage and therefore much higher up.  This fixture has been flashing and not really coming on, also for about a year.  We had a box with 2 of the LED replacement bulbs for this particular type of feature, but could not reach the fixture to replace them. 

The latest problem was that the light next to the side garage door stopped working completely.  Husband decided that something had to be done as he could not see in the backyard at night to go in and out of the garage, there was no light there for security, and he was getting a headache working in the garage. 

So while I am planning to work on tax returns for clients and for us, he was planning to work on lights.  He bought a fixture to replace the one next to the side garage door.  He then turned to the question of being able to reach things high up without fear of falling off a ladder.  He found a ladder of about the right height that had platforms for the two stop steps and we set out to buy one.  We had to go to one of major home store chain stores and then three of the other home store chain to find and buy one.  It was really worth the cost - but it did take a lot of time over 2 days. 

He was able to put the new light next to the side garage door.  He then figured he could reach the bulbs in the fixture inside the garage and was going to buy a pair of LED ones - I surprised him with a box of them that was in the basement and it was done (and I don’t have to worry about breaking them when I move the Christmas boxes around). 

That left the solar fixture that has been here for years. Problem is that where we planned to put it he decided after research, was not the place to put it.  He finally figured out where to put it - reachable, facing the sun, and lighting up the backyard.  So yesterday we put it up.  The light fixture first and then the solar panel.  Biggest problem was that where he put the light is where our TV antenna stands in the backyard.  I was in constant fear that he would lean back or fall back and the long metal prong of the antenna would be through his head.  He managed to avoid it and it is all in place.  It apparently needs to charge a few days before we can test it.

Tonight - after dinner - I finally got to start the first return.  It went easier than I thought with the new forms.  It is not finished yet, but done enough that I am not worried about it.  (Client lives on the other side of the country and I want to mail it out to her Monday if I can.)  Meanwhile I have heard from a client who normally gets an extension - same this year as he is away until after April 15.  Another client, a friend, contacted me last week - she has a return from 2015 that needs to be done or she will lose her refund from same.  Problem is that she has no access to her house as there is a problem with a support wall and the ground may fall away.  Luckily I have enough of her 2015 info (from when we filed the extension) to do a fairly correct return - but I sent her a form that will have IRS mail me copies of the forms sent to her by banks, etc.  from that year’s return just to make sure.  I am still waiting for other clients to mail their info to me.  I keep wondering if I will hear from the client who disappeared to do her taxes.  I really worry about her.                     

I have kept up on laundry - clothing load in the washer as I write and will go in the dryer as soon as my - yes - cell phone rings to tell me that the wash load should be done.  I also need to do a load of towels afterwards.

Husband is again hoping and planning to go away Friday for the day - but it looks like rain again.  We need a gift for my mom for her birthday on Sunday - she will be 90 and my sister is having a dinner for her.  No ideas of what to get for her.  I was going to embroider something, but husband talked me out of it.  He doesn’t like the idea of giving her gift cards for the supermarket she goes to either (I don’t normally give gift cards, but I am stuck for ideas.)  I had actually hoped we will go away as we maybe we can find a PA Dutch food item to bring her back as a gift. 

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

One cannot always do what wants/needs to do when one plans - especially if there are others involved in one’s life.  One can only do the best one can and not go crazy about it.

The timer in the cell phone just went off.  So I will copy and post this when I come back up from switching loads.  Okay laundry switched - now I can post.

DO YOU BACK UP?

You know “the curse” I have been talking about?  Well it hit again.  Due to all of the craziness and lack of time in general plus time lost to the craziness and need to do things over and over, I had not backed up my main computer or my work laptop (the old one, not this new one which is still being slowly fed software) for the last quarter of 2018 - which I would normally have done around January 15 - nor did I do a monthly backup for December either.  So last Friday I decided to do both.  I backed up one computer to the quarterly hard drive and the other to the monthly hard drive at the same time.  All went well.  I also backed up my calendar, client who I have a separate flash drive for, and my data to each.  All went fine.  Saturday we were home as there was to be rain so I backed up each of the computers etc to the opposite drive.  Still all okay. 

I then went to back up for the week.  I have a flash drive which holds 6 weeks of data, client, ad calendar files.  I update the oldest one each week.  This week if the data drive went bad and both of the regular “every session alternately” backups went bad I will have data from a week ago to work with.  I back up with a software program that updates the files already in the file I am updating to.  It finished running while we were out having dinner on Saturday.

When we got home the backup file did not show everything as finished.  There were problems with several older tax client files - this is pdf copies of the returns, info used from the clients and my work papers.  When I opened those files - it was all gibberish.  Husband looked at them and told me that the drive had gone bad and the files were corrupted. 

I did not panic - I have backups and they must be right as the backup program had not had a problem when making them.  The back up from Saturday afternoon had the same corrupted files. I should say that, luckily, I had not gotten around to do any actual work on the computer for a couple of days - checked email, updated calendar, started one letter.  I tried the backup from Friday and it was fine - whew!! 

Husband tried to format the bad drive and it could not be done.  So he broke it with a hammer to dust and threw out the dust.  (Security is important when financial records are involved.)  I had a new, larger flash drive and copied the backup from the day before to that drive.  Husband suggested I use all new drives and change them annually from now on.  I also have an archive drive - I will soon copy my 2018 files into my archive and remove them from the data drive I use to keep it more compact.  Robert suggested that I get a new archive drive also.  When I update the archive drive I also make 2 DVDs of it - one goes into my regular disk box and one goes into my “grab and go” accordion folder.  This holds copies of our house and car titles, stock certificates, last month’s reconciled bank statements, wedding licenses (we actually have 3 - one government, one from each of our religions), medical insurance and the like.  In case of an emergency we can grab this folder and have copies of our important papers to take with us - including DVDs of the archive and of my monthly backup to take offsite. 

So I planned to go on Monday to a MicroCenter - a location of the chain and buy 3 new flash drives - one each for the session backups and a larger one for the archive.  However, while at Costco on Sunday, husband noticed that my laptop dropped $50 in price since we bought it, so Monday we forgot about buying the new drives and went to back to Costco as they will refund the difference with the receipt.  (This is a actually a very good idea.  I could have returned the laptop and bought it again to take advantage of the price drop, and they would be stuck with a used laptop, this way I keep my laptop, am happy to get the lower price, and they don’t have to deal with a used laptop - and extra credit card fees for a return and another purchase.)

So yesterday, Tuesday, we bought the new drives.  I made two new regular backups yesterday of data, client, and calendar files.  I still have to check the hard drive backups and make a weekly backup for last week - though at this point, I will probably not bother and just do this week’s weekly backup on Friday.  I also still have to copy the archive to the new drive.

I feel as if I am not getting anything done. I generally can tell how much I have been getting done by the number of papers I have to file at the end of a week, the number of items I have to mail out, and how deep the dust is in the house (okay, there is always too much dust in the house).

 I have not finished client’s tax return yet - due March 15 - and need to have it finished and go to her with it before then.  I have not heard from my other clients yet - they tend to contact me in March.  I am still trying to get missing papers for our personal returns - one corrected IRA 1099 has not come yet - called yesterday about it - to be sent to us.  I also have not received a corrected summary statement - but that is for something later this year.  I did not get a dividend 1099 either, called up and I am not sure one was sent as the first thing the computer talked about was how much our dividends were and that we don’t need a 1099, but if we want one, they can send “a replacement”.  So hopefully that will come soon.  I know the amounts for all of these and can do the return without them, but need the paperwork for the same thing later in the year.  We have two business returns to do for ourselves. One is due March 15 also and has no income - it is inactive, but we don’t want to close it down.  So yesterday, just to get something done I did the inactive company’s tax returns.  Well, something is done at least. 

And - husband is thinking about going to a woodworking show out of state this weekend - which means Friday as we have the annual party for our reenactment unit on Sunday so we cannot go then and we cannot get up early enough to do that on Sunday and go to the woodworking show on Saturday.  We will see.  This was a nice show, but the venue it was in was closed and it moved to one that is not at all convenient to deal with.  (A quilt show at the same old venue moved elsewhere and was awful and is no more.)

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
BACK UP!  No, not away from the computer.  Make sure that you are doing backups of at least important data and things like your important photos.  We don’t use “the cloud” for anything including backup as another name for the cloud is “someone else’s hard drive, which is more attractive to hack than yours as they will get so much more” and most of the cloud drives have been hacked.  An external hard drive is fairly reasonable to get and one can back up to it on a weekly or monthly basis if they don’t need to back up as often I do.  (Remember a lot of this is work stuff I am backing up.)  An external drive would also let you take the drive with you in an emergency. 

TRIP OUT OF STATE FOR DINNER

Last Thursday we finally took a trip to Golden Corral in Freehold, New Jersey.  Now, if you have never heard of same, Golden Corral is a chain of family oriented reasonably priced (depending on the location around $14-$15 for adults).  It is not a destination restaurant.  But, there are none near us and the two restaurants here from a similar chain closed over a year ago - and this is one of the two closest ones to us.  This is not a cheap trip - in addition to gas it is over $20 in tolls round trip.

I am not sure if I posted about this when it happened, but we tried this trip in July and ended up spending 5 and half hours going and coming with no dinner.  We had gotten stuck in traffic and the anticipated hour and forty minute trip (per the GPS with traffic considered) ran a bit more - we had been driving for 4 hours and for the last two hours had steadily been half an hour from the end of our trip sitting in traffic.  What finally turned us around and sent us home was the fact that by the time we got to the restaurant it might be too late for dinner and there were warnings that the occasional showers due late night, were now dangerous thunderstorms, hitting within the hour with two tornadoes so far and we were sitting in traffic in the open.  So we had worked our way off the road and turned around and spent an hour and a half driving home.

What does this have to do with organizing?  Well, in addition to having to organize everything for the week around this day and have to organize for the trip (we even over pack for a day trip), it is a loss of an afternoon and evening when other things could have been done. 

I normally do our banking on Fridays - and we were short on money to pay bills and had to make a withdrawal from husband’s IRA accounts (hopefully the last of the year as it is the last of the planned money from same for the year).  But, in anticipation of going away - and in need of some pocket cash for the trip, we went to the banks on Wednesday.  I paid the bills on Wednesday night so they could go out on Friday (this was all the bills that were due by Sunday of the following week as I pay all bills a week before they are due).    I did whatever else was sitting around waiting to be done.

I plugged in my other (smaller and a tiny bit newer) laptop to charge in the kitchen before going to bed on Wednesday night.  I had our “travel zipper bag” downstairs with the laptop - this has a spare wallet with spare cash and a credit card (and some affinity cards for restaurants etc when we travel - other cards are in the car and the RV) and I add our checkbook just before a trip.  Our logic in having extra cash and a credit card that neither of us is carrying is that if we were robbed or other similar problem, we would have cash and a credit card to use.  I packed my old Palm Centro in its case - spare info of what is in my cell phone and easy to reach in the car to keep track of tolls paid, etc.  We put out rain jackets and sweatshirts - weather was iffy.  This way when we woke up Thursday all we needed to take was together in the kitchen on our way out. 

Last time we had left after lunch at 3 pm and thinking that was the problem as we were traveling during evening rush hour, we planned - well I planned and he agreed - to eat lunch along the way.  I was pretty sure that there were a couple of Wendys in NJ and I knew about one in Staten Island.  So we set off.

In New Jersey I did see a Wendys on the road - just as we passed it.  We kept going.  We had a couple of basically time wasting stops along the way as we would (hopefully) otherwise be at the restaurant for dinner about 2 or 3 hours too early.  Before I knew it we were at the first place to stop - there was a Costco with a gas station there and a Hobby Lobby craft store (we just got got our first Hobby Lobby here so that is still a place to stop for us).  Since we had not eaten we went to Costco and had lunch and took a quick walk through - looking for some items they no longer have at the ones near us and didn’t have here either.  We then gassed up the car (in New Jersey no self-serve allowed) and drove to the Hobby Lobby. 

Now, the Costco is on the north bound side of the road we were headed south on.  It is north of an intersection and the Hobby Lobby is on the same side, but south of the same intersection.  How the roads in New Jersey are designed, one can generally not make a left turn on a main road.  One gets off the right on an angle or something known locally as a “dog leg” and then turns left on the cross road to do so.  So, to get back to Hobby Lobby we had to go out on the southbound main road, turn right at the next corner, then attempt to turn left onto the cross road  - a four lane road with no additional traffic light to help, which we were able to do only by the kindness of a stranger who let us in.  Then we had to turn left from that road onto the main road.  We then had to turn right off the main road at the same place we did before and turn left - but into the right lanes - of the cross road we had turned left onto, to get to Costco.  We gave up on trying to turn left onto the crossroad and turned right, then went up about a block, turned left into a parking lot, drove around in the parking lot, drove back out and turned right onto the same crossroad.  We drove across the main road and about a block up turned right into the shopping center that Hobby Lobby is in.  This trip from Costco to what is more or less the next shopping center took us 15-20 minutes. 

We walked around awhile in Hobby Lobby - I went through their large Christmas department looking.  No buying done though.  And then we left.  Now, to get back on the road we had to head back to the exit that led back to that same cross road and turn left onto the cross road - luckily there was a traffic light to help - and then turn left from same onto the main road headed south again.

So basically we drove in 3 circles to go to these two stores.

Our next planned stop was a Walmart we knew about.  (We come to this Golden Corral for dinner about twice a year when we go to the woodworking show and the quilt show we go to in late February and early March so we know what is around it and on the road to it. These two attempts were our only ones to go there just for dinner - I guess I cook that badly that he wanted to go.)     The jeans that husband wears has been discontinued at our local Walmarts and we hoped that other ones might still have them, plus some other items we had not found in our local ones, as well as it is a larger one than the ones near us.  It is off to the west of the road we were on.  I knew how to get there by turning right just before we got to the restaurant, but found a shortcut to it by following the signs and, I admit, the GPS.  Nothing there we were looking for, but husband did find a DVD to buy.  By the time we were done it was getting late to go to dinner so we hurried off after buying the DVD.

Yes, we made it the Golden Corral.  He was so happy.  I don’t particularly like the chain, but he does.  Dinner and then we drove home. Of course to head back north we had to drive south, turn right onto a cross road, then turn left on the cross road and then turn left onto the main road north.

Now all the time we are driving and going places, my mind was thinking “I could be cleaning the bathrooms.”  “I could be scanning the magazine articles.”  “I could be doing laundry.” and so on.  But his happiness at having the meal was worth the trip.  Then again, when we got home he told me - “Next time I say I want to go to dinner there, tell me I want to go to dinner at the Casino in Connecticut instead.”

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Sometimes time wasted is worth it if it gives happiness to someone else or to you.