MISSED ANOTHER POST LAST WEEK - SORRY, BUT SO OVERWHELMED ALL OF A SUDDEN

 My apologies for missing last week's post – seems to be happening more and more.  Amazing how staying home a lot more (almost all the time) results in not getting things done in the house.  Always thought if we stayed home more (instead of going out daily for lunch at Wendys and wasting time walking around in stores for no particular purpose other than for husband to get out of the house) I would get so much more done – ha ha!

I was caught up last week in preparing for Thanksgiving,  For about 30 years I made Thanksgiving dinner for our two families.  Then when we stopped having our families (or anyone else) in our house due to having had bedbugs (and not wanting to EVER have them again) I made  Thanksgiving dinner for the two of us for 8 years with no problems.  Last year and this year husband has helped me with dinner – which for some reason leads to problems making the meal and finishing it on time – and a much bigger mess in the kitchen.  

Never buy a turkey bigger than one's baking pan – go smaller, not larger.  Husband has a particular market chain (two locations in our greater area) that he likes to buy the turkey from as we can get a fresh turkey instead of frozen – less figuring out the logistics of turkey cooking if one does not have to deal with defrosting.  Normally they have several categories of turkey sizes – this year they had two – 12 lbs and 20 lbs.  I had checked my notebook of past holiday dinners and knew we should buy 14-26 lbs (and even that I a lot for 2 people) and suggested a 12 lb turkey.  “NO NO!  That will be all bones and not meat!” I was told.  Rather than get into an argument in the store – we bought a 20 lb turkey, though I knew it was too big to deal with.  Somehow it all worked out though the turkey stuck over the end of the pan and its weight collapsed the rack it was on.  His solution - “We need to buy a big roasting pan and not use your baking pan.”  Oven floor is a bit of a mess and needs a cleaning from the drips.

In addition over the past several weeks we have taken my mom to the doctor 3 times (with another trip tomorrow).  This is the doctor with the office I call “the office from hell” as nothing ever goes right on their end (yes, I would take her elsewhere, but my sister insists on this doctor, who is her husband's doctor).  Though these 3 visits the office was not overcrowded and we did see the staff person we were seeing in a very reasonable time instead of multiple hours of waiting we experienced before the pandemic.   We also visited our doctor twice – once for blood work (before Thanksgiving of course) and our annual checkup this past week.  

At the same time I have my usual 2 year end urgent projects to deal with. I have to take courses (online) to be able to prepare tax returns in 2022 and I also have to complete the paperwork for a senior partial exemption of our real estate taxes.  These courses have to be completed by December 31.  Real estate taxes here are rather higher than elsewhere as same is just about the only taxes collected for our township and our county and costs are high here.  In other counties in the state each township handles this exemption with a minimum of paperwork.  Our county handles the exemption paperwork and determination of exemption.  I usually end up dropping off the application in two stacks of paper as I cannot figure out how to attach it all together  - over 100 pages.  This paperwork has to be completed by and at the county assessor's office by January 2 – which means by December 31, especially since January 2, 2022 is on a Saturday.  We drop the exemption papers off in person as one year there was a great deal of confusion, in general, about whether or not exemption papers had been received from people, so basically these papers have to be filed, in person, before December 24.

I have finished in advance a good part of copying the items I need for the tax exemption and have only the proof of expenses and income for our 2 businesses (which each make next to nothing) to finish copying and then I have to assemble all of the papers and add my summaries to it.  So, I started working on taking the exams online.  I have 2 of them finished – 5 credits of 20 required.  

It suddenly dawned on me that I HAVE to get the exemption papers done much sooner than I was thinking – as I said before December 24 if we are going to drop them off in person – and I have to switch to getting same done and prepared to start finishing it up do so today – but a new situation popped up.  I had to write and email out the newsletter/meeting notice for my embroidery chapter – and that took preference – and all 3 versions of it are out (members, prospective members, region newsletter editors).  

I also have an unusually large load of laundry to get done – normally one load of general clothes, this week 2 loads, plus a load of jeans.  Not sure why so many clothes – we did not dress any differently than we normally do or for more days.  

But yet – I have stopped to make sure I do not go 2 weeks before posting to all of you.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

When overwhelmed – stop, step back, figure the order things have to be done by and pick the one with the closest deadline.  

MISSING OUTGOING MAIL - BORROWERS?

We had a busy day today and while out and about I was composing my post for you for tonight's post.  Now it is all gone.  I know that the theme of it was things that are missing, but aren't, so I will go from there.  

I try to be careful not misplace or lose things.  As an accountant (since I was 12 and started helping my dad) I have learned to be extremely careful and organized with work items.  I strive for the same care and organization with personal items also.  I have written previously about “borrowers” - as in the series of children's books about same.  The “borrowers” are tiny people in who live in people's houses and borrow things  - they do not take or steal, they only borrow and then return the items.  

Husband and I say that they have taken things when items are not where one or both of us knows the items were put, and then they reappear exactly where they should have been, but were not.  Okay, we probably missed the items sitting where they should the 10 or so times we – taking turns – looked there for them and they did not disappear and reappear, but it does make us feel that it was not our fault we could not find items which were they belong and where we looked multiple times.  

Our latest occurrence was this past Monday.  Before the pandemic we went to the post office daily as we have a box there and would go to check what was in it.  Mid March 2020 we decided that we did not want to go out or go into the Post Office.  After a long period of time we managed to change the mailing address for any mail that went there to our home address and did not really have a reason to go the Post Office on any sort of regular  (or almost any) basis. We went late night on the last two Sunday nights of that March and were not inside the Post Office again until about two months ago and have been there once since – both times after receiving an email from the Post Office that there was something in our box.  (A wonderful service of the Post Office.)  

We had not been in the Post office while it was open during the day since mid March 2020 until this past Monday.  Husband sold one of craft tools that he no longer was using and we had to go there during open hours to ship it out (would not fit in an outgoing mail box, especially since there is now a slot instead of the pull down opening.  

As long as we had to go into the Post Office anyway, we had been about to renew our passports when everything shut down.  We don't plan to travel out of the country nor have we done so in decades, but it is good to have alternate ID to our driver's licenses, just in case.  In addition to go into IRS if needed for clients I need to either have a special driver's license or a passport – the passport is easier to renew then get the special license (for which I would have to go to into the DMV office and bring alternate ID with me – such as my passport….).   So I filled in the forms to renew our passports, wrote the checks,  and we each signed our renewal form.  I had each set of passport renewal papers in a different envelope  - one for me and one for him – and was mailing them separately.  I also had 3 regular pieces of mail which in a regular week we would have posted late Sunday night either at a local USPS collection box a couple of blocks away or in same outside the Post Office, so instead of making an extra trip Sunday night, we were posting them at the same time as the rest of the items on Monday afternoon.

I have been putting our outgoing mail in a gallon size zip bag to keep it all together.  Sunday night I put the two passport mailings and the three pieces of mail in the bag, counted the number of items in the bag – 2 larger envelopes (the passports) and 3 regular #10 envelopes – just what should be in the bag.  I then went downstairs and put the bag next to the item husband was shipping.  I opened the bag and counted again – 2 +3 is 5.  

Monday afternoon we took the bag (which I did not open and check again) and husband's item and set off the Post Office.  We parked as we normally did every day in the lot of an adjacent park and walked through the park with the bag and husband's box to the Post Office.  Dropped the three regular items to be mailed in one of the boxes in front of the Post Office.  No customers inside and we felt good that the normal huge waiting line was not there.  We handed the clerk husband's item – found out that one no longer fills in the little form for insurance – done through the computer.  No problem.  I went to take out the two passport envelopes and ----- THERE WAS ONLY ONE!!!!  It was husband's.  We paid for it at the clerk (found out that Passport does not sign and return Certified Mail and had to mail by Priority Mail – a lot more expensive – to be able to track it.  

We then started back home – looking carefully as we walked along.  No sign of the envelope with my passport renewal anyway along the way to the car or in the car.  Drove home.  Checked all the way to the house.  Checked in the house to the table in the living room everything had been on.  Checked the floor – nothing (well,  a lot of dust of course, but not what we were looking for).  I went up to our office looking at the floor as I went.  Where would it be in the office?  Not in the outgoing mail basket, not on my desk or under my desk or in the sorter trays on my desk.  Not by my computer or calculator.  Husband has been following me and double checking every place I look and look for alternative places.  If I lost this envelope I cannot renew my passport (at least not easily and by mail) and will be worried about what happened to it and WHO HAS IT?

Husband is thinking and looking around.  “Did you scan the envelope before you dropped in the bag to take it?”  “Yes.”  He lifts the top of the scanner – there it is!!!  How could it be there when it was counted twice in the bag while downstairs?  We have no idea, but at least it was found.  A trip back to the Post Office and it was on it's way also and we were on our way to Wendys for lunch.  

Why would the borrower's want my passport envelope – just to see it?  No idea and it makes no sense at all as so many of these incidents don't.  

The passports have arrived at the government office - “whew” - per the USPS packing.  On the other hand, the package husband shipped still shows only that it was accepted at the Post Office – three days ago!  It is suppose to be delivered by Friday and we are hoping that  it is not sitting in the back of the Post Office and someone will scan it and let us know where it is!

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

No matter how many times one checks something – another check is not a bad idea – even better if one gets someone else to check it for them – just to be sure.

ITS THE LITTLE THINGS GOING WRONG WHICH TAKE UP OUR TIME

 Sorry for posting so many days late.  

As I have mentioned in other recent posts, for some reason husband and I are going through a period of one small problem after another.  None are life changing, but it is a constant thing.  As soon as everything is dealt with and I think I can ease up - something else goes wrong.  

This past week I managed to mostly put to rest the problems of dealing with the renewals for both organizations of which I am treasurer and I started to breath normally again.

We went for our second meal out of the house (lunch at a different Wendys).  The plan was to go to two major stores near the Wendys and buy some plumbing items for our RV and some paper goods and two food items for which we had coupons from the other store. 

We went to the store for the plumbing items - they did not have them.  We had lunch.  We went to the other store and were able to buy all the items  - except for some reason they do not carry the paper towels which their main office had on sale.  A quick stop home to put the food in the fridge and we were off to another are where both chains had stores.  We were able to get one of the two plumbing items husband needed at one and the paper towels at the other.  We then drove past our house to a different chain's store to buy the needed plumbing piece.  An entire day gone - again.

Yesterday (Saturday) husband suggested we change the registration sticker for our RV as it comes due in early July.  I don't have it.  I checked my records of what has come in the mail.  (Life has been so confusing that all non-junk mail is listed in a computer spreadsheet with date received and date opened (as husband has me wait 3 days with the mail in a sealed plastic bag before opening.) We have not received the registration.  

I keep track (for years) of when outgoing mail is posted in my organizer files.  I did mail out the registration and payment.  Our van renewed a month ago - it took 20 days from when I mailed the renewal until we received the registration (based on my records mentioned). It is now almost a full month since I mailed the registration for the RV.  I called our bank and checked on its computer - the check has not yet been cashed.  UH OH!

Now in normal times this would involve a trip to the DMV, enough of a problem.  But our DMV offices are only open with an appointment and there are very limited things that one can make an appointment for - where is my registration (or even, I need to renew my vehicle) is not one of them.  

I could check the status of the renewal online - but I would have to open an account for my husband and we don't want to put all the information they ask for online.  Sooo, I will be spending tomorrow - Monday - on the phone trying to find out what to do.  There goes tomorrow!

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

It is amazing how little things can mess up our lives.  Breath deep and keep working away at them. 

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.)

HOW WAS YOUR FIRST WEEK OF THE NEW YEAR - I CAUGHT A COLD

So here we are, a week into a new year.  Hard to believe.

First, something I heard on TV, that is very true.  Many of us date things in this format – 01/01/20 for January 1, 2020.  Do not use the 20 on it's own for the year.  Why, when you have always done this?    Well, if you write 01/01/20, the year part of the date can be changed in the future to any year in this year in this decade – such as 01/01/2021  or 01/01/2029 – see what I mean – in theory the date would not run out for 10 years on say a blank check or memo note, etc.  So instead date things as 01/01/2020 to avoid problems.

So how has your organizing, cleaning, etc. been going this year?  Mine not so much.  I managed to come down with a cold last week – not anything major, just enough to make me miserable.  Husband is  a hypochondriac.  So when I get sick he does not want me to touch anything – I even get my 2 liter soda bottle with an X on it so he does not touch it.  Biggest problem is cooking and dishes. 

We normally eat lunch out so that is easy.  But he does not want me to cook dinner with my germ covered hands.  When we were younger, had more money and there were more places at which we could afford to eat dinner, we would go out for dinner or bring stuff in.  Not really a choice any more other than the weekly dinner at Ikea, at Wendys and at the Asian buffet.  One night in a week we can deal with deli turkey (even though we ate same 5 times in 2 weeks while doing the event with our reenactment unit in the last 2 weeks).  But night after night?   We brought in Chinese food one night  - husband looked around for the paper goods – something new for us, we never used to have paper plates, bowls, cups, etc. as we considered it wasteful – last year he bought all of these for use in our RV and we had used them last time I had a “bug”, but when I finally was able to clear out the dining room – it all went out to the RV.  He found plastic plates in the basement – intended for craft use – and there is plastic tablewear in the secretary in the living room.  But as he unpacked the Chinese soup he was upset about not having a paper bowl for the soup – my suggestion - “there” is a stack of previous soup containers brought in – all washed and ready for use – he was not happy, but it did the trick.  He keeps saying that we need to replace the (non-working) dishwasher if just for when I am sick.  (I had figured out that it took me the same time to wash the dishes, etc as it did to load the machine and then rewash what did not wash – plus reading about the new machines they seemed too much work with the need to clean filters and other things.  (Our original dishwasher came with the house or we never would have had one – though we did replace that one once.)  My solution is to put on disposable plastic gloves when I wash the dishes.

We were not sure if we were to have snow today (report changed constantly and TV news did not agree channel to channel) so we made sure that we had lunch for today and dinner when we shopped yesterday.  (I used to be organized – read the store circulars, had a shopping list, bought stuff on sale and used the saved coupons – but now with him along – we food shop just about day by day and due to changes in the coupons available and what we can eat and use – coupons that match what we buy are rare.  I still have a shopping list, instead of being a paper on the fridge (if we need more – add it or we won't have it) it is in my cell phone – the other day I tried to remove an item as bought it – and the entire list erased itself and since it can only synced automatically – the computer version was pffft also.  Luckily husband managed to bring up a list from the day before for me.  Some things really are better on paper.

It did not snow enough to matter, went out for lunch and tonight we were having turkey sausages with macaroni (pasta – he is Italian by background all types of pasta are called macaroni).  He is cooking as I am sick.  Despite my hinting “am I cooking tonight or you?” about an hour before dinner, we did not get downstairs to cook until about 20 minutes before we would normally eat dinner.  I was out of tomato “gravy” (sauce to you and me).  I had mentioned this when we picked this dinner and he said “no problem”.  So we are very late starting to make dinner and he has to make “the gravy” - something he actually taught me how to do from his mom's recipe (which for some reason is simpler and quicker by about 5 and a half hours than the recipe his sister makes which she says is how their mom made it.)  He should know what he is doing since he taught me – right?

“What do I start first, the gravy or the water for the macaroni?” he asked.  “Heating the pan for the sausages” - my reply.  I tell him which (cast iron) pan to take out - “you need the one without the ridges.”  He starts to take the one with the ridges – the one that last time I used it, filled our kitchen with smoke and the smoke detector would not go off for hours and I have still had not had a chance to clean it http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2018/07/not-in-pennsylvania.html  He took out the correct pan and put it on the stove – turned on the burner for it to heat.  Then I had him start the water to boil – I have to tell him which pot for which food.  Then we started making the gravy.  I make 2 large cans of tomatoes with 2 small cans of tomato sauce.  Lately I have been using one large can of petite diced tomatoes and one of puree – gives him the pieces of tomatoes and also a thicker liquid than if I just used the tomatoes.  “What do I add to it?” - Sheesh – he taught me – and I point him to the spice cabinet (built by him to fit our apartment kitchen, but fit perfectly here also – noticed that I need to clear it out as there is a lot of stuff that we have not used in decades and will not use again, such as “Mrs. Dash” - I mostly just stick my hand in and pull out what I need – showing him where, made me notice this – new job to do.  Macaroni added to the boiling (no salt no oil) water.  “What now” -he said exasperated.  I told him to take some water on his finger and drop in the pan - “If it dances it is ready”.  It did and he added the sausages.  Now, it took him longer to add the items to the gravy than it would take me to cook the gravy, so we are even further behind.  Next though, was to heat the leftover half can of soup for him to have soup before dinner. 

So eventually we had dinner.  I got sick – I won't say it was his cooking… Then to wash the dished I put on disposable gloves and washed them – they are air drying now. 

My embroidery group met today.  I did not go.  I thought and thought about where I could sit in the relatively small room we meet in and not infect all of the other members, then realized that the proper thing to do was not to go.  So last night I telephoned the group president and told her and that I would email the treasurer's report to her and to the secretary.  I wrote it and emailed it.  This afternoon I checked my email – I had sent them both the January 2019 minutes instead of the treasurer's report – so now I will email to the chapter members. I have to stop messing up and needing to do things over and over. 

I had planned on running errands today that are easier to run without husband, but since I did not go to the meeting – we were together – he actually did not complain about the errands, some of which annoy him.   We went to our reenactment unit's bank and I redeposited some cash as I had needed to take out some cash and we needed less than we thought.  I also got a copy of the cash check as we have a grant and the cash was for part of the costs of same and we need to submit all copies of all checks, deposits and a lot of other paperwork – with a check sending back the excess of the grant money to the non- profit which gave us the grant and when I got home later I emailed copies of everything I had to the member who got us the grant and is handling the paperwork. Hopefully something done on the first try.   

We went to our bank vault – I keep my “offsite data backup” in it.  I used to make a data backup once a month and send to work with husband and he would bring home the one I sent with him the month before.  When he quit his job, I needed an alternative – our bank vault became the alternate.  (I use 2 USB flash drives – one is at the bank, other is here to update the next month.)  We got one of the “platform” employees that is good and I figured, okay husband won't be getting upset. But when we went to go into the vault area with the employee – we had to wait as other employees were in there on bank business – that annoyed him. 

Not doing laundry tonight (I start on Wednesday nights and continue into Thursday – Friday if needed) due to my cold – I figure to give it another day of recovery before I start.  Since the washer and dryer were not being used, husband washed a scarf he finished weaving  ( just a minute – I have to double check that he shut off the water to the washer – afraid if the hose breaks it will make a mess in basement, so we keep the water to the hose shut off when not in use. …… He did shut the water off, but did not push in control of the washer to make sure it was off. 

So how was your first week of the new year?

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Treat the new year as a new opportunity for a clean slate – but don't go crazy trying to change everything at once – change one small thing and keep at it – then when that is going well – change another and continue and so on.

WHY MY POST WAS SO SHORT LAST WEEK - MOM AND ANOTHER DOCTOR

Sorry for last week. We ended up having to take mom to an oncologist on Wednesday – the day before Thanksgiving and the day that I normally would write my post and post it – and I had to cook for Thanksgiving that night.

I realize that taking mom to a doctor is more time consuming than you might think. Remember – mom is 90. We have to allow an hour and a half to get her out to the car, up, drive her to whichever doctor we are going to (all with 30 minutes of her assisted living residence, most within 20 minutes), and get her into the doctor's office.

Why does it take this long? Well, when we get to her residence we park in the lot. We walk to the building and walk in – have to stop and sign in. Mom's apartment is – literally – the furthest one in the place. She is on the top (third) floor and is in the last room on the furthest hall – if we are running late picking her up and have to run - getting to her apartment is a good cardio workout. We go the elevator, go to the third floor and start walking (unless as mentioned we have to run).

Mom will be sitting in her wheelchair waiting for us. She uses a walker around the building, but when go out it is quicker and easier to take her in wheelchair. But – first she has to stand up with the walker so that we can take the two large wheels off the chair. In case you did not know this – the large wheels on the sides of wheelchairs can be removed (on hers we push in the axle and then pull the wheel off) and there are 4 smaller wheels. The big wheels are there so the person in the wheelchair can reach the wheels and push them to get around. (Mom will “walk” the wheelchair – sitting, but walking her feet to make it go when she uses it alone.) If we leave the big wheels on it is too heavy for us to lift into the back of our car and does not fold as flat. Big wheels off the chair she sits down in it again – we check that she has her room key, her medical insurance card and her driver's license (to be changed this coming year to a non-driver's ID). Even when one has been to a doctor before they need the insurance cards and her ID again. (One doctor is in the local hospital and we all need to show ID to enter and have to allow time for same as there might be a line – we each get an ID tag good for a day with the photo and info from our licenses on them.). When she is back in her wheelchair we head out her door to the hall.

There is what is called a wellness office in the building which, luckily for us, is on the same floor as mom. It is set up like a small clinic – receptionist, nurse's office, 2 examining rooms, and a medication room. In this last there are file cabinets with loose leaf books with pages with plastic bubbles on them with the medications for a month for each resident – each time during the day that the resident needs to take a medication there is a separate page. One thing that impressed me is that there is a photo of the resident in front of her/his pill pages so they can be sure that the correct person gets the correct medications. If mom has not been at a doctor that month I call ahead and ask for them to give me a copy of her medications – easiest way to given them to the doctor. The first time the nurse added mom's height and weight and since she cannot stand without holding on to someone or something and one doctor's office insisted that they had to take her weight, I now ask for her height and weight to be listed. Sometimes it is waiting for us when I call ahead, often it is not – so we often need time to pickup the info pages or wait for it to be done. If mom will be away from the residence when she is to take a pill, they will give ME the pills (they cannot give them to her per them as the resident might forget them or take them at the wrong time). Lately I already have the meds from last time and she will not miss medications so we can avoid this stop.

We then go back downstairs in the elevator and head back to the front desk. If mom will miss a meal we have to stop and we are not able to take her out to eat that meal, when we stop at the front desk to sign her out – and sign that we are leaving - we order a tray for her to be delivered to her room – this can take awhile for her to decide. We go out to the car and help her get in the front passenger seat. Ahead of time we clear out the hatch area at the back of the car for her wheelchair – it takes both of us to load and unload it. I ride in the back seat. That is at least a half an hour gone.

We then start driving to whichever doctor we are going to. At this point we are taking her to 4 different doctors – on different days - and still need to set up appointments for her for hearing aids (so we don't have repeat everything the doctor says by yelling it to her) and for spot on her face that has to be removed. She also wants to go and “get the shots” in her knees so that they don't hurt or least not as much.

Depending on the doctor (well his/her location) parking may be easy or hard. Generally it is not too bad – except there is one doctor whose office is “heck” and seems to be the worst organized place we have ever been and sometimes husband has to drop us off and then go look for a parking space.

The doctor we went to last Wednesday is in a temporary office and the building is on a hill – with most of the parking in the rear – uphill. Husband dropped us off at the back (main) door and went to park so we would not have to deal with the hill. We went in on the second floor as a result. There was a very small hallway area – basically a large room and we went through all of it and could not find an elevator. Husband said to me “I told you always check that the office is wheelchair accessible. “ we decided that since the front of the building on the right side had a big sign for the group that the doctor is part of, maybe we had to go there. So we went back out and around the building – downhill trying not to let the wheelchair and mom get away from us. The front of the building had stairs! Husband went in and asked and they told him to use the rear door – where we had been = there was an elevator and they could not understand how we could have missed it (none of us saw it). We each took a handle to wheelchair and huffed and puffed our way back up the hill. We went in the building second door on the left was the elevator! (I would swear it was not there before). You know the expression - “if it was a snake it would have bitten us?”). Rest of the visit went well and we took mom out to lunch at Wendys – she insists on paying for us.

We allow the extra half hour for things like this – not being able to find the elevator or problems parking or whatever. Some doctors say that if one is there 15 minutes or in one case, half an hour, before your appointment it will be canceled – why the heck don't they just make your appointment for the earlier time, especially as they don't tell you this until you are at the office.

We also have to allow time to get to mom. It is a half an hour minimum to drive out there – if there is traffic, especially rush hour – morning or afternoon, or an accident we need to allow extra time. The time we were going to the doctor who is half hour from her, there was an accident on the road after we picked her up and were on our way – the extra half hour saved us from being late. Of course if it is early (for us) we have to get up and get dressed and sometimes eat lunch before we go.

After the appointment the entire process is done in reverse - including signing mom back into her residence – sometimes ordering a tray for her then, taking her back to her room and putting the wheels back on her wheelchair. We may also have stop in the Wellness office with instructions from the doctor or to let the nurse know to expect same to come. Sometimes we will walk around a bit if we have time before her dinner.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

When you do something over and over – even with slight variations – take note of how long each part takes and use that information for doing whatever it is again in the future. But – always allow a bit of wiggle room as one never knows when there will be a accident on the road to the doctor or they actually want you there earlier than you are suppose to be there.

RV, VAN AND OLD PAPERS

Another week, another post.  Mom had 2 surgeries within a week and is now back in her apartment at the assisted living facility.  We will taking her Friday back to the doctor who changed her pacemaker for a checkup and I have to make an appointment for same with the doctor who did her cancer surgery as well as with the one involved with her leg scan as it still has not has been discussed with her.  We did squeeze in appointments with our doctor for us last week – dealing with mom, we had forgotten to make same until the doctor refused to renew our prescriptions because we were so late in doing so. 

Friday we drove to Pennsylvania and picked up our RV – the batteries are working and the entire electrical system was checked and was fine.  Husband is concerned about driving such a distance alone (as I probably mentioned when we had to drive it there) and also concerned about driving alone in the dark – the combination of the two, even more so.  We kept calculating when to go and what to do coming home.  We figured out that we had two choices – both involved trying to get the dealer as early as possible, having lunch at Wendys very quickly and starting home.  In one version we would immediately drive home, this way we would miss Philadelphia rush hour and hoping to avoid rush hour from NYC headed towards our home. The other version involved again leaving immediately after lunch to avoid the Philadelphia rush hour and driving to near the Golden Corral in New Jersey that I am sure I have mentioned before.  We would then go to some stores in that area to spend some time, then have dinner at the Golden Corral and then head home. With this version we should avoid the rush hour from NYC to home, but would be driving in the dark home from Golden Corral.  We figured we would decide after we picked the RV and while eating lunch.  The golden morning time to leave home and head off Long Island for us seems to be 8:30 am – we are following at the end of rush hour and are before the construction work on two of the major roads starts.  We we were out at 8:20 -since we were driving only our van, we did not have to waste time backing the RV out of the driveway (a process that involves walkie talkies and me standing in the middle of a 4 lane road road that has traffic that all speeds – which is why it a problem to begin with.)  We had figured we would get to the dealer between noon and 1 pm.  We got there just after 11 am.  We picked up the RV - “schmoozed” a bit, gassed up the RV and the van for the trip back, spent about 15 minutes having lunch and started home – confident that we would miss the rush hour traffic at both cities.  We did fine in PA – no traffic, NJ not bad almost no traffic.  One very quick stop at a rest area for me to use the facilities – so fast, I left my cell phone in the RV and husband waited out there so we did not have to shut everything did – I ran literally both ways and we were off again.  Then we hit Staten Island  (NYC) and there was traffic, but it was not bad – 15 minute part of the trip maybe was 25 minutes.  We then crossed the bridge to Long Island.  The limited access roadway we have to taken home was BAD.  How bad?  The signs on the bridge said not to exit to it, to exit to a local street that allows later connection to the roadway – which we take anyway.  It took us 2.5 hours to the dealer – it took us 5 hours home – and that was with arriving in NYC at 3 pm.  Another day of our lives – gone.

But the RV is home and working properly again – so all is well – right?  Driving home husband found that the brakes were squealing so today they were at our mechanic again.  He said they were okay to use – a problem sometime down the road as there is rust. 

Wait a second, have to run to the basement to switch laundry loads and check the heat in the PackTite.

Back.  Normally I have a load of clothes, a load of towels, and a load of bed linens each week with a load of jeans every few weeks.  With all this going on, I have not changed the bedding in a couple of weeks – no time to do so and saves a wash load (yes, I think ewwww also, but it will done soon).  This week I have a load clothes, a load of sweatshirts and nightgown – I bought 3 new ones and have worn a few of them and they don't fit in the general clothes load, a load of towels, and a load of jeans.  I also have a load of white reenactment clothing (much “small clothes” - undergarments, all of which are white) from our last couple of events and a second load of the rest of our outfits – next time we will need them is December and I want them clean so I don't have to run at the minute to wash them – some of the pieces need ironing also.  Just put the general clothes load into the dryer and the sweatshirt load into the washer. 


At the same time I have been going through the bags of stuff from the family home.  Being a crazy person who had bed bugs. I fill (lightly) our PackTite heater with some of the stuff and heat at it night – mixed with whatever fabric or paper items we have in addition to be heated.  Then the next afternoon I go through the stuff from the house after putting away the stuff from our house that was added in.  Today I went through the papers from our wedding – 40 years ago.  All of the response cards & envelopes – shredded, set up invitation with all the papers which were included and put it in the shoebox that I have as a “memory box” of the stuff I am finding and want to keep from all this, shredded the other invitations, tossed out the other response cards (no names, etc. on them), I kept the blank envelopes for the invitations – can always use larger envelopes, have set aside the unused response envelopes they do have my parents and name and address, but I will see if labels will cover same and decide if we are keeping them or they are being shred, shredded the receipt for the wedding (what a waste of $8,000 – I was right, we should have just gotten married & not bothered with a wedding), and shredded the seating charts and other papers.  I kept the box that it was all in.  Good box.  Apparently there is much more than my stuff in what my sister set aside for me – work papers of my dad's and other financial stuff.  I have a found a certificate given to my other sister when she graduated from high school (she is 55 now).  I scanned it, emailed it to her and asked if she wanted the certificate or what.  I found old bank statements and similar of mom's and even some of dad's (he died in the mid 1990's).  I found a dividend check for $4.50 that was never cashed – I will see if it can cheaply somehow be replaced – but 1994 was a long time ago.  More to do tomorrow after the current load is heated – this load also has some yarn husband bought for weaving project to sell and a new sweatshirt that I bought  - both today. 

At least every year I go through the papers from 10 years before and get rid of almost all of them – 25 years is a long time to keep bank statements and a check.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

So progress is being made on the stuff from mom's house. I am trying to keep up on household chores – dishes washed after dinner and after night snack (only meals we eat home).  Obviously laundry being done.  Towels changed and into the laundry.  (If only I did not hate changing the bedding and folding same after it is washed even more than more than cleaning toilet bowls – I figured it out – my arms are too short to deal with sheets easily.)

Any suggestions for my family and me about dealing with all of the stuff from the house?

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.

REFRIGERATOR AT LAST? AND ON TO THE NEXT PROBLEM

We arrived home last Friday night - much earlier in the evening than usual.  It was a combination of exhaustion, the heat, possibility of heavy rain later in the evening, and knowing that we might have to be up and about early on Saturday for the delivery of our new refrigerator.  Normally no matter how late it is when we arrive home we clear out all - or just about all - of the stuff in the RV.  This time we only brought in what we needed to have for the night and Saturday morning.  We did not want more stuff in the house - which was still discombobulated from when the new fridge had been delivered the week before.  There was no computer phone call with the time that the delivery would be made the next day as we were suppose to receive and had received the night before the first refrigerator was received.  Knowing that the crew also calls about half an hour before they actually come, we went to bed expecting a call the next day. 

I was woken by someone ringing our doorbell and pounding on the door at 7:30 am.  I was unsure if it was the delivery as no one had called and was physically too exhausted to get up and look out the window.  At 9:30 am my alarm went off. I telephoned the store and was told that I was not on the delivery list for the day.  (Glad I didn’t force myself out of bed at 7:30.)  The delivery manager who told me this seemed to have no memory of who we were and what was going on.  He put me through to the appliance manager.  She remembered us, but it was as if we had not been told the week before that it would be delivered on Saturday - the day I was calling her.  She told me that she had the fridge and it would be delivered the next day - Sunday.  (Quite frankly we were surprised that they deliver on Saturday or Sunday - it used to be week days only.)

The time frame for the first refrigerator to be delivered was 11:30 am to 4:30 pm. We figured that there was a delivery time which ended at 11:30 am and one that started at 4:30 pm. We were called and told that the time range was 12 pm to 5 pm.  Lunch was problematic - there was food in the basement freezer and some packaged food in the house - but we had not had a properly working fridge in over a week and a half and did not really have food in the house for the lunch, but we figured we could hold out  - and what were the chances we would be one of the last deliveries of the time frame? 

We woke up before noon and dressed and went into our home office to work on our computers, sort mail that arrived while we were away, catch up email etc.  Around 3:00 husband said that he really needed to eat something as his blood sugar had dropped.  Crackers were not enough - so I made him a can of pea soup.  I had a small individual applesauce.  We went back upstairs.  Now, I did get work done - I managed to transfer files to a DVD for my annual archiving of last year, caught up on email, etc.  At 4:00 the phone rang.  It was the delivery company’s computer again - delivery was now to be 4:30 pm to 8:30 pm! 

I telephoned the store - they had the same info, but they did give me a phone number for the delivery company.  I called same - 3 times as the first two times I was dropped off hold.  I got a nice woman named Becky.  I explained that entire saga- damaged refrigerator delivered, having to wait a week for a replacement, delivery not set up for the day before as we would be told, the change in time at the last minute, we are both Diabetics and have not eaten and are becoming ill...  She went and checked.  There had been a problem on an earlier delivery that set the crew back 90 minutes!  She also told me that there were 4 deliveries ahead of us so it would be an hour to an hour and a half before they came and we should be able to go out and eat something.  I thanked her.

We did not go out for lunch as we did not trust doing so.  Glad we did not.  We received a call around 5 pm that they would be here within half an hour.  Husband went outside to wait.  Good thing.  The numbering is odd on the houses here plus depending on the GPS it can show us up the street or about 5 + blocks of where we are.  Husband saw a truck stop about 2 houses up the street from us with the men in the truck looking confused and he waved them over. 

As opposed to the first crew which was just the other side of perfunctory - meaning a little short of same - this was the type of the delivery we expected (other than the time problem).  Two friendly delivery men. Robert had explained to them that they were taking back the same model that we had recently received because of damage.  They came in and measured the doors again.  (The last one came in, so this one had to - they were twins.)  The one in charge looked at the damage and shook his head that it had been delivered like that. They took the old one out.  They unpacked the new one.  The one in charge called husband over - there was a scratch in the freezer door of the new one - he and we had the same idea - the freezer doors were switched.  They brought the new fridge in.  They removed the plastic wrapping from it.  It was plugged in so all knew it was working.  They saw that it was not level and leveled it.  (The prior crew had told us it could not be leveled when we asked them to do so.)  They did not set up the inside, but I had been told by the manager that they are not suppose to do so.  If this crew had come with the original fridge and same had not been damaged and had worked right - I would be just as happy with this store as I was after I bought a washing machine from them.  (Which is why we bought from them again.)  We tipped the two men - husband is not one to tip for deliveries and such, but we agreed that they did that good a job - especially compared to the last crew.  After delivery and setup the fridge is suppose to sit set at the middle range for 24 hours without opening and closing the door or putting any food in it.  We shut it off and set up the shelves inside, put in the remote thermometer and shut the door.  We went out for a much needed dinner at the Asian buffet we go to.

It is more or less working properly.  Apparently it is suppose to go up and down more than our older fridge to keep the proper temperature - although not as much as the first one did.  It is also suppose to do so less after it is filled - it is suppose to be at least half filled and food added a little at a time.  We have put a lot of bottles of water (made by us, not commercial) in it to add food to it as we have not yet been food shopping and even then, do not have a lot of food in the fridge at any one time in hot weather (in case storm takes down the electricity), and not that much in the winter either other than at certain times as there are only two of us.

So Monday afternoon after picking up the mail at our box - from over a week - and lunch out at Wendys, we came home and I was ready to start catching up on work at my computer.  Our bank statements, as well as those for our business and for the two clubs of which I am treasurer had all come in and I planned to work on them.  ( I had caught up on email on Sunday while we waited for the delivery.)

I turned on my computer.  Some message went past too quickly for me to read.  I then tried to go to the Win XP virtual machine in my computer to catch up and sync my Organizer entries in my old Palm Centro with Organizer - but the computer would not switch to the XP side.  Husband came to figure it out.  Unfortunately I have been having problems with my old, analog monitor recently and it decided to die in the middle of this.  We managed to turn my computer sideways and hook it up to the monitor from husband’s second computer - hanging on the wall on his side of the office.  He fixed the computer problem.

He had been looking for a new monitor for me.  I really did not want a digital one, but that it is all there is.  The big problem was that unless we were going to rearrange a good part of the office, I needed a small monitor - about 18 inches across - or it would not fit.  There were two candidates he had found.  One was Walmart and one was from Staples - but the latter had to be ordered.  So Walmart it was.  We went in to a local Walmart.  We found the monitor we had been looking at - on our trip last week we actually had a chance to see it running and it looked okay.  We also found one that he had not seen anything about that was smaller.  He looked it up online on his cell phone - well rated and only US$60 (plus sales tax).  We decided to go with same.  It could be returned and at that price if we decided that I should have the other monitor (it can be turned vertically which might be good for me when reading full page things such as IRS manuals), this was cheap enough to keep as a spare emergency monitor around the house.  We took it to the electronics desk - it was $90?  Husband pointed out that it was $60 online - we were told that we had to ask for a price match (to Walmart’s own online price).  He walked away in reference to a call he had taken.  Husband checked and he told him that we should take it to customer service and buy it there, asking for the price match.

This Walmart is in the middle of being updated.  The entry now has a gate that when closed only lets one into the store, not out, and when open bings when one someone walks out.  Plus there is a security device on the box - how do we get to the service desk - without security descending on us?  He decided that he would stay inside of the entrance and I should go out, get in line and explain and ask what to do.  I walked over to the first register aisle (empty of customers) and walked out and got on the service line.  I was 3rd in line.  But there were problems with everyone ahead of us.  Finally after he watched people walk out the entrance, set off the alarm, and have nothing happen, he met me at the line.  We bought it for the online price and started home. 

My old monitor sat on a small plastic shelf, which I do not want to get rid of.  (I keep my 2 external hard drives for backup under it, as well as it having sections to hold both kinds of paper clips, pencils, pens, etc. ) Apparently the old monitor bent the shelf and the new monitor rocked.  We finally got it balanced and working.  I then ran to cook dinner and add some items to the refrigerator after shutting off the computer.

Yesterday, Tuesday, we finally went for our annual eye exams.  We were due last November - back when husband’s shoulder was in pain and we could not go that far.  Since then this and that has happened, so it took until now.  (All was good at the appointment - thank you for asking.)  We drove home afterwards despite the drops in our eyes. 

On arriving home I helped husband set up our portal air conditioner in the living room so he could finish a weaving project on his loom and went upstairs to try to catch up on computer - and pay a bill.  I had trouble seeing anything on the screen - it all seemed overwhelming (husband had changed the settings to make the icons larger - something I really did not need or want).  Colors were too bright.  The white was too bright.  I figured it was all related to the eye drops.  I managed to work around it - checked email - first time since Sunday, paid the bill, etc.  Husband later changed the icon settings back for me.

So today when we came home from a couple of errands I was ready to go to work on my computer and get work done.  It was still too bright - the white too bright, the colors too bold - and I am talking about type - not pictures.  I ended up switching to my distance glasses (normally use reading glasses - as I am doing now with my laptop - when working on the computer) and pushing my seat back as far as my arms could reach.  He spent a good deal of time - dinner was late tonight - trying to get to the colors and white so that they are not too bright/bold for me, but not so that the white is grey either.  Not sure if he/we are done with it with yet.

And he does not understand why I say - change is never good.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

For some reason change is easier for some people.  There are people who look forward to something new - new clothes, new car, new computer, new household appliance, new house, going someplace new on a trip.  Are you one of them?  Or are you like me - someone who wants everything to stay as it is and has trouble adjusting to change?

TORN BETWEEN TWO RESPONSIBILITIES

In trying as we all do to try to keep our homes and lives organized.  Sometimes it is easier than others.  Sometimes two (or more) responsibilities conflict and we must decide what to do.

I recently had a situation like this.  My mom is 89 and just recently gave up her car as she did not drive it that often and wanted to save the costs of insurance and maintaining it.  I have started driving her to her doctor for appointments - so far around every 3 months.  She sees other doctors also and needs to run errands, but even letting me drive her to these appointments is a major step in her giving up a bit of control and (supposedly) the reason she asked me to drive her to these appointments is that the doctor is 3 communities away and the taxis fee would be expensive.  (Taxis here do not charge by the mile, they charge by how many zones one travels in.)  Personally, hearing what she pays for a taxi ride, I think that they are too expensive in general.  She is signing up for the county service for seniors and handicapped people for transport, but that has to be reserved in advanced and involves traveling to pickup and drop off others enroute.

After 2 trips to the doctor we seem to have a pattern for the day.  I pick her up, drive her there, get her into the doctor’s office and then park the car and come back to the office.  When she is finished and making her next appointment, I walk into the office area to make sure that I can also make the next appointment (and I put the info in my cell phone calendar).  I then get the car (she has trouble walking distances - mostly due to balance, with a walker she would be able to walk much longer distances) and bring it back and help her into the car.  We then go to lunch - both times we had pizza at place near the doctor’s office. 

Mom had a doctor’s appointment scheduled for this past Tuesday afternoon and I was to take her to see him and we planned our usual lunch afterwards.  Our last visit to her doctor we stopped at the bank to make a deposit for her and she again asked if we could do this - no problem.

I have mentioned that my husband has developed a weather phobia.  He is only in his mid-60s, but in some ways seems to be older than my mom - he is much more fearful of things beyond his control.  He does not like to be alone in general, but especially when he is anticipating an upcoming problem such as weather. 

He also greatly builds up problems in his head about anything that needs to be done.  You might remember my tale of trying to winterize our RV in November.  Well, spring is coming and he wanted to set up an appointment at our RV dealer’s service department to have whatever it is that is broken, fixed.  The cost alone scares the heck out of him (and me).  We made an appointment for late April.  The dealer is 2 states away.  There are RV dealers here with service departments, but none who work with this brand of RV and we want someone who knows about it, so we take it back to “our”dealer.  Normally we would make an appointment and drive there, getting there between 11 am and noon - it is about a 3 hour drive and we are not morning people.  No go for this trip.  The service department now shuts at 3:30 and we have to be there by 9 am, 10 the absolute latest.  We can drive there the night before and plug in the RV on the outside of the service building and have done this before, but we had working toilet in the RV when we did so and do not have same now.  Or we could leave around 6 am to make sure that even with traffic we are there in time (and I rarely can fall asleep before 5 am).  Husband went into a panic.  I came up with a solution - find an RV park near the dealer which has (as most do) a bathroom on the grounds and ask for a space near it.  He is looking for same as the nearest one we know of it is about 45 minutes away and the bathrooms, while nice, are a distance away from the spots we like.

In addition there is a large scandal about the RV manufacturer (not the dealer who is independent) such that if something is not figured out it will be out of business and any items it makes or has made for its RV’s that are not items made for an RV in general, those parts may/will no longer be available.  All of the parts for the problems we are having, as far as we know, are general RV parts so there should be no problem at this time.  He was, though, in a panic over the company being closed down.  I told him (a big fan of James Bond) “never say never” as well as he should not worry about this before it happens as often the original family which owned a company come back when there is a problem to save “their” company. 

There was also to be a snowstorm today (the day after the appointment) which was upsetting him no end, despite all weather forecasts showed that it would turn to rain and between the rain and the 50F + weather tomorrow (the day after the storm) it would all melt.

So with all this going on, I had to tell him that I would be out yesterday with my mom for her doctor’s appointment.  “PLEASE, you have to come home early!!!”  I told him that I would be home as early as possible.  Problem is that he sits and it all runs through his head and scares him and then thinks about it more and starts to head towards panic if he is alone.

I did have a solution to needing to be with him to take care of him and taking care of my mom.  I thought about it - and then thought again.  My mom is a bit, well, a woman who is about to be 90.  I love her.  Husband if he does not actually love her, likes her in general, but an afternoon with just the 3 of us.  But I offered last weekend that he could come along if he wanted/needed to. His face said it all.  Then, Monday night, he asked if he could come along.  It was the only solution to my needing to be with two people at the same time. 

It actually went much better than I (or husband) though it would.  Mom even went along with our suggestion to go to Wendys for lunch.  She had never been there and was raving about it.  Whenever I say we eat there she says the burgers must be greasy, but she raved about them.  All in all it was successful day - her report at the doctor was good.  Husband was not left home alone.  And, we made another bank deposit for mom. After we settled her in at home we ran to the post office for our mail and then the supermarket as husband always needs “more food” in the house when it will snow. 

Another thing he worries about  - I did the laundry a night early so it would all be done - “just in case” to reassure him.  Snow is now over, rain has come, and he keeps looking out to see if the snow is melting - it is.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
If you are caught with competing things to do figure out if they can be done together.  I think this actually worked out to be one of the better visits with my mom for me and for husband also.  I am not planning to invite him again, but if need be, we will know what to do.

ANOTHER STORM COMING

Well, another week of not getting anything done easily.  My client’s payroll taxes are filed - and I only needed to open one of the kinds of forms I bought - it had the second one I needed included.  Now we need to make a trip to the store to return the other ones. 

I went to the client this past Monday.  She is located in Manhattan.  I drive to Queens and park in a municipal parking garage near a subway stop that is one stop from Manhattan - I only have to travel 3 stops total to the client.  (For those who might not know both Manhattan and Queens are boroughs of New York City.  Manhattan is what most people think of as New York City - it located on Manhattan Island.  Queens is a more suburban part of New York City and is one of the two boroughs of New York City on Long Island (which also has Nassau and Suffolk Counties which are not part of New York City).  Parking in Manhattan is prohibitive.  Not only is the per hour rate charged by the garages and the few lots left high, but there is something like a 16% tax on parking in garages/lots.  The lot in Queens costs me less than $10 for the several hours I am parked - less than an hour would cost in Manhattan.  The other alternative I have is to take the Long Island Railroad into Manhattan from my home community and then switch (at additional cost) to the LIRR in Manhattan to complete my trip.  This is not cheap even with the fact that I generally would be traveling off peak (cheaper than on peak) and am entitled to a senior discount (from both trains).  In addition neither of these trains companies have been having a lot of luck lately - breakdowns, etc. and I can walk from the client to my car if I had to - it might take awhile, I might have to stop, I might have to leave my laptop at the client - but I would get home if for some reason (to put it politely and in a way not to scare anyone if you think about things which have happened in Manhattan in the past 20 years) something happened and the trains - both types) were not running.  So I drive to Queens, park, and take the subway.  It is normal for me to arrive at the garage and have to wait in a line to get in - maybe 3 or 4 cars might be waiting ahead of me.  The garage is located next to a court house and normally people will leave after their business at same is finished and it is not a long wait (shorter than writing this post will be).  This time when I arrived there I got on the end of a longer line than I have seen there - at least 7 cars ahead of me - and there is a second entrance which had 2 more cars waiting to squeeze into the line.  It took an HOUR before I drove in.  (I did let one of the two cars in the other entrance ahead of me - the other had left and, well, he was there before me.) I had arrived there on the early side - but due to this arrived at the client late.

To save time at the client - the weather was to turn bad on Tuesday and I wanted to make some stops on the way home - I not only had the forms client needed to sign, finished and printed, but had also printed out envelopes to mail them in (as opposed to printing them at the client).  This was not to be.  She had a form I had forgotten about for disability insurance for employees (her) and our state has added a family leave policy to this.  The form was 2 weeks late (it arrived while the business was closed as she was away), there were no instructions for the new family leave premium - instructions said to go online for same - no Internet connection there. I tried calling the number on the form for help, was on hold for about 20 minutes - finally when the call was answered the person had no idea what I was talking about - he had not even heard about the type of policy I was talking about.  He went away, came back and said he was transferring me to the right department.  Another 15 minutes on hold - the woman was very nice, but she also was the wrong department.  She also transferred me - after another 10 minutes on hold, I gave up!  I filled in the form as well as I could.  I told the client about this and that if there was a problem, I would straighten it out. Not only did I want to get out of there and home to my husband who was having a breakdown over the coming weather this week, but the client has a car service which picks her up at 3:30 and it was close to same.  I had her sign the forms and the checks I had prepared and made my goodbyes as she packed to leave also. 

I made a stop at a bank (they would all be closed by the time I was in my car).  I remembered hearing a ring in my cell phone from my husband who was suppose to be running a couple of errands and buying some food items in case we were stuck in the house the rest of the week and had figured he had a question on what to buy - plus at that time I could not get to my phone as the I could was on the wrong side of the desk I use and was blocked from it by the client packing.  So I checked my phone.  He had not gone anywhere - when he went to leave - there were no brakes in his car!  So I texted him back - almost crying over what had gone on - it was that messed up a day and asked if I should come home before running errands - he agreed.

The drive home was not too bad - about 2 hours.  We got in the car I had been driving and went out to run errands.  I suddenly remembered that the items I had to mail out - bill payments for us and the forms for client - were still in my brief case ... in the house.  So we had to drive home to get it and then drive to the post office to mail them out (and I checked our box - still no forms from IRS).  I then made the best suggestion of the day - “Wendys for dinner?”  Neither of us had defrosted anything for dinner, plus we figured to be in the house most of the week, so we went.

Yesterday I filed the clients New York State forms online.  I gave a deep breathe - all of the clients payroll taxes filed on time - with 2 days to spare.  Then I remembered - it had never asked me for her bank account information to debit the payment.  I went back in to the site - it does not seem to have anything else to do?  I have an email out to the state asking about this - nothing seems to get finished on the first try any longer? 

We had been able to go out yesterday - rain started late in the day and it was horribly heavy rain with much flooding around.  We had the other car towed to our mechanic - about 4 - 5 blocks away.  We told the tow company when we called it had to go on a flat bed - it has all wheel drive - and was glad to see that they had listened and sent same.  Fellow who was towing insisted it was not needed “I HAVE been doing this for 10 years and know when a flat bed tow is needed - see the wheels are in the air in the front, no problem.”  Glad he has done this for 10 years - we have had the car for 20+ years and it was not our first all or 4 wheel drive.  He had to turn around (he was facing opposite to where the mechanic is) and told us to drive there and he would meet us.  This mechanic (and another before him) has been at this location well over the 40 years I have lived in this area and is generally known in the area - I was surprised that the fellow did not know which mechanic and where we were talking about.  We drove over and waited and waited and waited.  (I could have walked there in less than half the time it took him to drive there).  Our mechanic and another customer there were shocked that the driver did not know where he was.  The fellow finally showed up - the wheels had locked and he - HAD TO PUT IT ON THE FLAT BED!!!   

The rain was the leading edge of the weather to the west of us across the U.S. - this is that freezing temperatures and huge storm that you had first.  Today we managed to get out for lunch just ahead of a “snow squall” which is apparently like a thunderstorm with snow instead of rain.  Our area was lucky as it was quickly and we only got about 2 inches of snow - we went out and pushed it off the driveway and then husband salted around as it was in the teens and heading colder until late next weekend. 

It is now 6F outside and still dropping.  Not as bad as the -40sF I have heard about to the west of us across the country, but cold enough for husband to be in a major panic.  We now have the cabinets under the kitchen and bathroom sinks open and the faucets are set to drip, as is the basement to keep the water from freezing - just in case. 

I did the laundry Monday night so we would not have to worry about doing same tonight and tomorrow.  I sent out my embroidery chapter’s newsletter by email tonight - and in searching for textile related exhibitions to list for them, found one of interest to some of our reenacting group members and sent it out to them also.  I thought I was doing better - then my dinner (not husband’s - we had different dinners) was refrigerator cold from sitting after it was cooked and I reheated it - of course part of it then was so HOT that I burned the inside of my mouth.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Well, in 2 days there is a new month - maybe it will be better.  There is an old adage - “Man makes plans, God laughs”.  I sort of feel like that right now. 

One has to look at the good in one’s life as even as all heck seems to be breaking loose.  We are both okay. We have a place to be in the cold and food to eat.  The cold will end over the weekend (even if it will be raining then). 

Everything works out - some way, even if not as one planned.  Hopefully I will get some work done in the house while we are keeping warm inside.  Oh, and hopefully the weather will be nice enough next week for a bunch of us “old ladies” to go out to our embroidery meeting.



   
   

THANKSGIVING IS HERE AGAIN

For those of you in the U.S., Thanksgiving is tomorrow, at least as I write this (by the time you read this, it is probably today or yesterday for you).  Rather than retell the story of organizing for Thanksgiving past, I will post links to my prior Thanksgiving posts at the end of this post.

This year is rather worse than even most recent years.  Until this past Monday we were still debating - cook dinner or go to an Asian buffet (they do put out a turkey for carving - and each person carves their own serving). 
On Monday we bought our turkey.  It is from the same specialty supermarket that we bought from last year and the year before.  Due to our letter about our problem last year  with the turkey not being fully cooked (the breast was blood raw) after following their directions, they sent us a gift card for about 3 times the price of the turkey.  So this year’s turkey (and next year’s and part of the year after’s turkey) was free.  Due to the warnings this year about problems with turkeys and salmonella, I was concerned about putting the turkey - even though it is still in its packaging - on the right hand top shelf of our refrigerator, the only one tall enough to hold the turkey - even though it is lying down.  So I was going to put it on one of my platters - but then realized that they are pottery and might absorb any leaks and any salmonella in the leaks.  I thought and thought where I might have a large enough glass plate to hold it.  So it is sitting on a lovely large dessert serving plate that we received as a wedding gift.  (Yes, we have used it to serve dessert over the decades.)  That left 2 small corners at the front of the shelf to put anything on it.  Husband, a few weeks ago, had decided that the caffeinated diet soda he has at lunch made his shoulder/arm feel better.  So we have a started bottle of decaf soda and one of caffeinated soda in the fridge.  I put the decaf one on the right corner of the shelf.  I then went to put the caffeinated one on the left corner of the shelf - I had forgotten that one of the reasons I hate this fridge (even before we bought it, but it was the closest to what I wanted that we could find in the emergency situation of our old one - around 30 years old - dying) is that the light bulb is in the front of it - in the middle of the fridge and one cannot put anything tall there - so the soda bottle could not go there.  I managed to balance it - 3/4 of it on the center of the shelf and the front end sticking off.  I warned husband - so he would be careful not to knock it off the shelf  - and made him repeat to me what I said - so he cannot say I did not tell him.  Of course right after this, he stopped drinking soda and switched to ice tea, so I have been drinking the decaf soda to get rid of the extra bottle.  It is down enough that the bottle can lay on a lower shelf as there is so little soda left, it does not reach the neck of the bottle while it is lying down.

Yesterday (Tuesday) we went out shopping for the other things we need for the dinner.  Of course the stores (we went to 2 different supermarkets and a Walmart) were jammed and out of things.  I am annoyed that since we waited this long items - milk, stuffing, eggs and such - that I would normally buy in Walmart as they are cheaper there, had to bought at the supermarket and we probably blew at least $5 on the difference.  (I think I have said that I am cheap.)  We had to go out again today for items we did not find yesterday - another Walmart and a different supermarket.  I never did get the mixed (green) beans I wanted.  Somehow everything we picked is what he wanted, the mixed beans were what I wanted - plain green beans it is. 

I have not cleared out the dining room yet.  Nor have I cleared off the kitchen counters to have room to work.  I guess whatever is in the way in the dining room will be pushed to far end - hey, it’s only us, I would like it nicer, but between dealing with his shoulder and the RV winterizing mess (which will be continued next week) I am soooo behind in getting ready.  In reading my prior Thanksgiving posts (I found I already repeated myself at least once, and not repeating myself was why I read them) I was reminded that I have to go to the basement, move all the boxes of Christmas decorations in front of the very small closet that has our gas meter, a blanket cut in half for reenactments (in sealed plastic bags and rarely used kitchen stuff and get the platter for carving out and wash it.

I don’t know if you go shopping on Thanksgiving or Black Friday, we do not.  Never found anything worth getting.  I have to wonder if people buy new TVs every year as that always seems to be the big draw.  Then again, as I have mentioned, we do very little gift shopping, as well as little shopping for us.  For us if we are shopping something needs replacing or there is something very new (and not expensive) that husband has decided he needs.

Remember that what you buy has to be paid for and you don’t want to be in debt forever for something that is gone in a year or two or less.  Also - everything you buy has to be stored - either by you or the person you give it to - think about that when buying items for yourself or as a gift. For example husband decided last week to buy a chair at Ikea. It is a small kitchen table chair and it has a low back and is smaller than our regular chairs.  He had noticed the chairs at Wendys where we have lunch are more comfortable for his shoulder and arm - after jokes about maybe since we go there so office we can borrow/rent a chair from them, he decided to look in Ikea after dinner last week.  Now, we are the type of people who can shop for a package of hair pins for a week or two, but he sat in several chairs and then announced one was perfect (and “only $39") and we bought it and assembled it that night and he loves it. This left me with the chair he used before (and hopefully will again).  It is now in the dining room against the wall (we keep furniture against the wall in the colonial “room at rest” manner) - out of the way until we need it again and looks decorative.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK -

Those of you in the U.S. - have a nice Thanksgiving. 

All of you - think before you shop during the holidays (and in general) before overspending or buying unneeded items which will quickly be unwanted - by yourself or as gifts.  One of the movie theater chains we used to go to had a trailer to sell its gift cards for holiday gifts.  It has people receiving gifts that were not appropriate and of course those who received their gift cards were happy.  I will never forget one sequence - a man receives a sweater as a gift.  The sweater is huge - his arms are lost in the sleeves and the sweater covers him to below his knees and he is so sad and upset and shaking his head.  You don’t want to be the person who gives a gift like that!  (And no, I am not pushing movie gift cards.)

Prior Thanksgiving posts -
http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2015/11/thanksgiving-and-other-holidays.html
http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2016/11/
http://wheredidileavethat.blogspot.com/2017/11/semi-unorganized-thanksgiving.html