MISSED LAST WEEK'S POST TO DUE TO EXAMS AND LAST MINUTE CHRISTMAS DECORATING

 I hope that all had a good Christmas.  

Sorry I missed posting last week.  Having managed to get the paperwork (per my last post) to the county for our senior real estate exemption the day I posted last, I started on taking the courses I need to take – and pass tests about – 20 hours of classes and 10 hours of tests done online.  I passed all of them and can continue working in 2022.  I took them over the week and had planned to take the biggest of the tests on last Wednesday (12/22) evening but husband had something that had to be done – so I did not get it to it until last Thursday evening.  

I had managed to work at putting out our indoor Christmas decorations over the several evenings before last Thursday – small items which are put out in our kitchen, dining room, front hall and living room.  I skipped many of the decorations such as hanging (fake) greens along our staircase banister and small items due to time limitations.  I also had brought up all three of our Christmas trees (large living room, small dining room and small studio trees) and set them up earlier in last week – also in the evening.  One problem is that since it all kept in the basement and, in particular the big tree sections, much of it is rather heavy, so I have to carry up one of the 9 tree sections (plus lighter tree pole to hang them on) at a time and rest before going back down for the next section.  Then, of course they have to be arranged on the pole, extension cords setup to bring electricity to the tree (and of course the extension which runs up the tree with outlets in 3 different spots -  decided to fall off this year when I set up the pole and I had to wire that back onto the pole).  I did not get to work on the ornaments until the following day – Christmas Eve– and each of the 4 boxes also has to be carried up from the basement with a rest in between – though at least I can hang ornaments while resting.  Again, for the first time since we were married 40+ years ago, not all of the ornaments went on the tree.  Around the equivalent of a box of “lesser” ornaments (plain balls and such) did not make it onto the tree due to time limitations.  

December 26 (Boxing Day to those of you in the UK, Canada, and related countries) I went to work on my Teddy Bear Village.  Yes, I managed to get it set up.  I did some sections differently than in year's past to spread the bears around the 4 sections of the Village a bit more and leave some “breathing” room for the bears in the main section.  Husband guesses that there are 300 bears – I am pretty sure there are a lot less – maybe I will count them when I put them away.  Yes, that is the problem with having fun decorating – in a couple of weeks I will have to take down the tree and decorations downstairs and store them back in the basement (with many trips down and breaks between them again) and store away the decorations from downstairs.  The Teddy Village will stay set up until into early February and then it's residents also have to be stored away to make way for the Valentine Bears (much, much less of them).  

So, all of this diverted my mind from visiting all of you.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
Sometimes work comes first – such as my classes and exams.   Sometimes what one enjoys has to take precedence over work which can be postponed.  One has to know the difference between the two.  

As I sit here is it December 29 – I wish a good New Year to all.  Keep in mind that small changes and specific ideas are more likely to continue to be done throughout the coming year, as opposed to making resolutions which are too big or non-specific to be kept.   

MOM MOVED TO A NEW RESIDENCE - AND WE HAD PROBLEMS TAKING HER OUT TO THE DOCTOR

 I am guessing that I have mentioned before that I have an older mom – 93 now. She has been living in a very nice assisted living residence which is run by a non-profit organization of our faith. I mention the last part of that sentence as due to same it has been a very comfortable atmosphere for her – the rabbi's wife comes in late Fridays to light the Sabbath candles, the rabbi comes by for holiday services – they have a synagogue for same, the seats are fold up chairs so the space can be used as multipurpose room – including setting up tables and chairs for a New Year's party. Each floor has on the wall 2 Sedar plates (ceremonial plates used for Passover) framed and hanging on the wall – a comforting thing to see and helps one remember at which floor to get off the elevator. Familiar traditional foods for holidays and in general are served. While the residence is non-sectarian (I had a friend who was Roman Catholic who lived there for some time before she passed away and when I would talk to her – she would talk about how nice it was (and feeling uncomfortable due to her religion to go inside she would sit outside the synagogue to hear and see the services), it is very comforting to older Jewish people to have this atmosphere of their life as it had been around them.

Unfortunately it is also rather expensive and mom (being 93) has come to the point where she no longer can afford to live there, as well as reaching the point where she needs more care. The organization also has a rehabilitation and nursing home building on the site (and are currently building apartment buildings for those who are not in the need of either type of facility, but are looking to live with some help available to them). The nursing home does not have any vacancies – but the non-profit just took over another nursing home at a different location and it did have vacancies – so last Friday my sister and her family moved mom to this nursing home.

Two months ago I had made an appointment for mom to go yesterday (Tuesday) to a doctor (the one husband and I cannot stand their disorganization). I may have mentioned that husband and I are the “mom shleppers” we take mom to her doctor appointments (except during most of the pandemic as we are limited in going out due to same, but we had to start doing so again to help out my sister). Over the past two months mom has gone for tests at this doctor's office but now she was finally going to see the doctor himself. I checked with my sister when she told me that mom was being moved as to mom continuing to see her doctors and my sister told me that it was not a problem – “you just go and pick her up – same as before”. Well, yesterday we found out – not so much.

My sister told me over the weekend that we had to be “certified” to take mom out in our car. She has spoken with mom's caseworker and it would not a be a problem – she would do it when we came to pick up mom. (Implies that she knows we are taking mom out and when?)

I called the nursing home on Monday (first business day after mom moved in) to talk to mom's caseworker – voicemail that she would call back the next day, left a message. I called again and spoke with the front desk and was put through – another caseworker, then nursing director, then nursing supervisor – all went to voicemail with same message. Then I was put through to the physical therapy department (as they would do the certification) and spoke with a woman there – who said that they, not the caseworker do the certifications. I was concerned as we had been told it was a 15 minute process – and we would be on a very tight schedule. Mom is now living a half an hour further away from us – and from this doctor, along with allowing for getting mom into the car we were leaving at 2:30 for her 4pm appointment – we added another half hour for certification instead of 15 minutes – just in case.

Sounds organized – right?

Quite literally as we pulled off our driveway into the street my cell phone rang. It was the caseworker telling me that I could not take mom out as no arrangements had been made in advance to take her out and who was this doctor anyway – they know nothing about him – arrangements have to made 72 hours (3 days) in advance! I explained to her that this appointment had been 2 months ago, “yesterday” (Monday) was the first business day since mom had moved there, etc. I gave her the doctor's name and where he was located for her to talk to and we continued on our trip.

We were using GPS to find the location of the nursing home. Our timing was about to right to get there – but husband got confused about the GPS directions when we got off the main road (despite my figuring out where it would be located and explaining same in advance – so we had to make 2 U-turns (went wrong way, then passed turn on way back) and he hates to make U-turns. The location is on the service road of the main road – limited access highway – on the Island. As we drove we passed a senior residence from another company – just before it the GPS told us to stay right and then turn right – the road ahead of us split to the right and to the left was the entry back onto the highway in the direction we had come from, so we stayed right – boy, oh boy was that an error! It took us another 15 minutes to get back to the expressway service road. Go figure, below the sign for the other senior residence was a sign for mom's. There at last!

When we went in the entrance and I said mom's name the woman at the desk said “Oh, yes!”. She knew why we were there and who to call. Someone showed up in a couple minutes with mom (the caseworker I found out) and two people showed up to certify us to take mom out. (This did impress me a lot.)

I was given papers to sign and papers to keep and a large envelope to give to the doctor's staff for info from them about mom's visit. The certifying us to take her in car was just watching us help her get in the car – and mostly they did so. And we were off!

The doctor's visit was annoying as always – and I will skip the details other one of the two us had to leave when the doctor came (room too small, my fanny we have been both together with her in that room before) and I left husband as he better understands what doctors are saying (from years running a medical facility he speaks “doctor”).

We then brought mom back to her new home. It was rush hour and we were traveling in the direction that most of the rush hour travels so it took awhile. When we arrived back at her nursing home we wheeled her in – very impressed with them again – my error, I left mom's “pass” out in the car and ran out and got it for them. I explained that mom had not had dinner as when I made the appointment and she was at the old location her dinner was 6:15 and I had timed it out for her to be home for same, now that her dinner is 5 pm, I will try to make future appointments to take same into account. In normal times we would have taken her out for dinner (would solve our dinner problem also), but due to Covid we did not want to do so. No problem, they would make sure she had something to eat.

We then started our trek home in rush hour.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK – Always find out in advance about what needs to be done when going somewhere for the first time. Per the paperwork from the certification they need to know 72 hours in advance if mom will be going out to okay it with her doctor and they have to know at least that far in advance about any medical appointments.

I made the mistake of relying on my sister and not calling when she first said that mom would be moving here to find out about taking mom out and so on.

An aside – I did finish the paperwork for the real estate tax exemption over this past weekend and we drove today to the County building and I delivered it to the County Assessor's office and received a receipt for it. This office is normally jammed out the door, especially this time of year. There was one person in there talking to an employee, when they left, I was next and when I was leaving one other person walked in. When I commented on this to the employee who helped me he said “You should have been here an hour ago – the line was huge.” I guess going places late in the day has an advantage.

NOT FINISHED YET WITH THE TAX PAPERWORK AND ERRANDS TO RUN ALSO

 Have spent two more days working on the tax exemption paperwork – though to be honest, “a day” around here runs 3-5 hours and is really just an afternoon.  

When I left off the first day all was basically done except the hard part – getting copies of all the bills for my accounting practice – some of which are split bills with personal, club, etc expenses.  Some expenses even need to be split several ways.  When I left off at end of this first day I was missing several bills for car expenses – I actually went to a client once last year and also drove the car to post mail to clients, to pick up same from our USPS PO box and for some needed supplies.  As I panicked over the missing bills – one was found and I felt better.

Today I found and made copies of the missing bills – except one which remains missing. It is for less then $30 and I will not go crazy looking for it.  

Tomorrow we plan to go to the bank to make deposits.  In addition we used to go weekly and would replenish the cash which we had used during the week – since we collect checks to deposit and go less than a once a month (don't get a lot of checks these days) we have not been going to the bank a regular basis and he has used the cash he had.  We don't like to be cashless in general and he needs singles to leave a tip for Friday night dinner at an Asian buffet.  

I plan to work Friday on finishing the paperwork for the exemption.  I needed to write covers for some section as well as summary explanation of what I have for them.  And the form – I still have to fill in the actual form.  I wait until the last to do so to make sure that numbers on it are correct and match the paperwork.  Then we can go next week to drop it off and get a receipt from them for it.  

Then back to work on taking exams so I can prepare tax returns next year.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Small steps planned out make a big job easier to do.  

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.  

REMEMBERING WHAT HAS TO BE DONE TO CHANGE SEASONS - JUST NOT IN TIME

 Changing seasons -

Well fall came in – and rather quickly around here, though we are to have a burst of warm weather to come this week, before it leaves again.

Of course every year for the two big seasonal changes – to cold weather and to warm weather, of course – we plan to be ready to make the change, but never do.  

Our house has a hot air furnace, something neither of us grew up.  We both grew up in houses that had hot water heater – furnace heated water which then ran through thin pipes throughout the house and the  hot water doing so would heat the air in the rooms, finally returning back to the furnace to be heated again and return to heating the air in the room again…  With the furnace we have in our house hot air is blown through vents to the various rooms in the house and then after it cooled it is sucked back down to the furnace to be reheated…  Seems the same, but it is not.  

Both kinds of furnaces need to be cleaned for the heating season.  When husband was still working I would remember to call the company which delivers our fuel oil (same as diesel) to run the furnace to come and do the annual cleaning of the system.  In the most recent years (even before the pandemic) I seem to keep putting it off until when I call they are all booked and we get it cleaned late.  So, it has not yet been cleaned this heating season and by the time it is – April – the heating season will be either mostly or completely over – unless they have a cancellation (or actually enough cancellations) as we are on the wait list.  I put a reminder in my computer calendar to remember to call them in June starting next year (though if they don't service it until April, I will just skip next year's cleaning.  

Husband has some tall sticks (made for this purpose) which he sticks in the ground around our two driveway entrances to mark where they are so he can see where the ramps are when there is snow and it has to be cleared.  Last year – a terrible year for snow with many storms of deep snows – he had forgotten to put them in the ground – before it froze.  They never did go in deep enough to stand up properly.  So for this year I made a notation in my calendar in early September to remind him to put them in the ground.  I have put back the date by 2 weeks 4 times now as the weather is far from cold enough for the stakes not to go into the ground or to have snow (at least no snow of any sizable amount).  

And now the big problem that causes me to post about my lack of preparing for winter.  Our humidifier.  Since the house is heated by hot air the air in the house gets extremely dry which is not good for me (nose bleeds from dry nose) and not good for the house or furniture.  In the past we had a humidifier in our furnace, well at least in it's outgoing vent, to deal with this.  But several years ago we changed oil companies and the new one told us that a humidifier in the furnace system is NOT a good thing as it helps rust it.  I should mention that our furnace is original to our house which was built in 1949 so, depending on when the former owners (there were several of them) had the furnace humidifier put in – it has worked well and not, apparently rusted.  

So now we only have a humidifier in our bedroom as nighttime while sleeping is the major problem – at other times we can just put out some water if we find the air too dry.  This humidifier only runs while we are going to sleep, sleeping, and waking up.  It needs to be refilled from the kitchen sink about once, maybe twice a week.  We had the sink spout setup with a piece on the end of it that allowed us to snap a hose on it to fill the tank of the humidifier.  It is not a huge tank, but it is not small either – I can lift it when full much easier than husband so it tended to be my job to do so.  At the end of last winter the end of the sink spout cracked – so, due to the pandemic – the sink has tape around the spout, which means we can no longer snap the hose on it.  

In addition there comes the problem which I am in the midst of dealing with and caused me to write about it.  Gunk builds up in the tank, the filter and the plastic holder of the filter from minerals in the water.  It is suppose to be cleaned on a regular basis during the heating season as well as at the end of the season.  Not something we do.  Normally I clean it once a year as the heating season starts and I remember it needs to be done.  To clean it a mixture of water and vinegar has to be put in the tank and swirled around – then it sits in same.  Then the tank is rinsed out several times and hopefully both the gunk and the smell of vinegar are gone.  The base also needs to soaked in the same manner (without the swirling).  The filter – a web of very easily breakable thin metal – also needs to be soaked in the same manner.  As I started to write this post I was going to tell you that I know we bought vinegar for this and something else (in another season) which needs to be similarly cleaned – but I have searched my kitchen pantry closet, as well as my work table in our studio which is being used during the pandemic to hold cans, bottles, cleaning supplies, and paper goods in excess of what we normally have so it does not all fit where it should.  I looked through everything several times – I then gave up and just put in water in hopes that it would it at least loosen the “gunk” I can see.

We are looking for a replacement unit that will be easier to deal with and clean since we can not refill it from the bathroom sink until we can replace the sink spout.  Of course this process of finding a new humidifier has just started – a bit late in the season.  Husband is looking online on his computer (upstairs in our office) and came down to ask what model our unit is – perhaps he can at least find a new filter for it.  I mentioned to him that I am just soaking it all in plain water and have put vinegar on the list to buy tomorrow (shopping run – especially for Thanksgiving items).  He reminded me (that is the polite to say what he did) that we had bought a half gallon of it.  OH!  That means it is on the floor of the pantry closet – did not think to look there as looking for a quart or so bottle!  There is was.  So I paused mid writing this post to redo the soaking of all the parts in a proper mixture of 1 gallon water to 1 cup of vinegar.  Hopefully this will get rid of the gunk – though I doubt it.  

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -

Try to remember to get needed seasonal things done on time.  Holiday decorating we remember to do, but this sort of grunge stuff we don't want to do and forget it has to be done until the last minute.

Most thing such as this I have a reminder in my computer calendar – set to repeat for 5 or 10 years at time – so I don't forget, but as everyone else I tend to use the “snooze” on the reminder – and not for minutes or hours.

THIS DOCTOR'S OFFICE IS NEVER ORGANIZED

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

SOMETIMES IT TAKES AN EMERGENCY...

 Sometimes it take an emergency to push us to do some clutter removal.  I have probably mentioned that we have been having water in our basement after the various big storms we have had since Hurricane Ida came through.  The water appears as wet carpet (indoor/outdoor carpet so the carpet has not been ruined) in front a bookcase in our basement.  The bookcase is in front of a window.  Our hope is that the problem is caused by the fact that the basement windows sit below the grade of the land and there is a window well outside the window.  It used to have a plastic bubble over it, but a few years ago the bubble burst  (okay broke) and we have not been able to replace due to the fact that this is where poison ivy grows.  

Husband decided that we need to move the bookcase and pick up the edge of carpet and see “what the story is”.  The bookcase not only is filled with books – most related to his profession and many of them college textbooks (ie, big and heavy).  On top of the bookcase are some shelves husband built to hold a stereo and small TV (video player for TV on the other bookcase next to this one) as he has an exercise bike there and would listen to music or watch TV while he rode it more regularly than he does now.  

First job therefore was to find an alternate location for the stereo.  He redid part of the top of a long, low bookcase in our bedroom (on his side) and managed to fit the stereo there – without having to get rid of the stuffed bears (his bears, not mine) on top.  We then had to bring up the CDs for the stereo and the rack they are kept in.  He found a spot under the bedroom TV for that – problem is that he cannot read the titles without sitting on the floor and can barely read them there and barely get up from the floor – but they have a new home.  

Next came the BIG JOB.  We had to get the books off the shelves and do “something with them”.  I have mentioned before that I have trouble donating items as all of the locations I used to go to have all been closed over several years (actually over a decade since they started closing).  The last one closed in late 2018 as I had items to bring there in October 2018, but had to come home as husband was unwell, and when I could back out in December 2018 to donate them – Goodwill had closed the location!  Husband went looking online and Goodwill has opened a collection center where the store used to be – so we could bring the books there as they accept books.  

First he sorted through the books – a good number of them he feels he can sell online (as if that idea has ever worked for us) and he moved them to a nearby table.  The rest of the books had to be packed in some way to take and donate – and the packages of books had to be light enough for us to lift.  I myself would gone with stacking them and tying the stacks, but he decided to use kitchen garbage bags – which could only be about half filled due to the weight of the books, being a problem both in ripping the bags and our being able to lift them.  We packed the books over the past weekend.  After they were all packed we started carrying the bags up from the basement.  They were put in our dining room.  After all were upstairs and we took a brief rest to recover, came the next part.  I would carry a bag of books to the front door and he would be outside to carry the books to our van (parked on our driveway in front of the house).  That gave us a van filled with books.

Yesterday, Tuesday, I added the 2 bags of stuff I had from before and we set out to donate it all.  When we got to the Goodwill location there was actually parking near their location.  When I have been there in the past the parking lot was always full (it is in a strip mall with stores and restaurants), but apparently between their store being closed and the pandemic it was far from full.  There was even a shopping cart nearby that we could use.  (Supermarket at other end of parking lot.)  Problem was the drop off center was closed!!!

Apparently they have not updated their open times on their website.  They are closed Tuesdays and Thursdays (and of course Sundays) now.  So we turned around and drove the van home.  We then ran the errand he planned to today (Wednesday) buying new eyeglasses as his vision had changed.  

Today we went back and they now have all of the books and my miscellaneous stuff from 2018.  (The 2018 stuff is some household items and also – we used to babysit his niece when she was young (now in her early 20s) one afternoon a week and had a laundry basket filled with toys for her.  I had gone through the toys back in 2018, kept a couple of them that I liked, and bagged the rest to donate, along with plastic tissue box covers that had not been used in some years and other similar items.  

So it took a flood to convince husband to donate stuff and get rid of it!  He has not opened these books in decades – and certainly not since he quit his job, a little more than 10 years ago (before that the books were partially in his office at work). Now they are gone.  

Today he took apart the shelves he made for the top of the bookcase and we will put it in his wood shop (our garage) for future use.  Next thing to do is take apart the bookcase so we can put it out for trash pickup – will need a call for them to take it.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK -
What has been taking up room in your home for years/decades only because you have not bothered to deal with getting rid of it?  Don't wait for a flood to deal with it.