Ten apples and a flat sponge

I spent all day yesterday avoiding people and it was great. Until last night. I was watching the baseball game and it was extra innings and the teams were swapping the lead back and forth, so quite riveting, when Martha stopped in. I was not in a Martha mood and I wanted to watch the baseball.

And then Martha started talking about Hazel and how I need to let Timber Ridge take over what their sons can't/won't do. In Martha world, this is like a switch. In the real world this is not going to happen ever. "Well, Hazel needs to... " "Timber Ridge should..." While telling me that I need to be careful about doing too much.

I do love Martha and most days, I'm delighted to have her input. But, last night was not most days. So I missed some key baseball action and went to bed grumpy. Oh and also, I ordered caramelized onions as a side with my dinner and they left them out and replaced them with spinach! In what fucking world is spinach an acceptable substitute for caramelized onions?????????

But, today I'm all better.

The shades installer is supposed to come today to rehang my window shade so that I can, once again, open the window. His office says he'll be here sometime between 12 and 4. Based on the last time, that means I can expect him about 4:30 or 5. Oh, wait, the woman who called said 12-4. BUT the email says 12-1 and the text just says 12. Soooooo arrival time is not this morning but any-time-is-a-good-guess this afternoon. I'm not looking forward to dealing with him because of the sloppy job he did last time. But I am looking forward to having my shades fixed.

And while I'm being snarky and bitchy... did I say I was all better this morning??? ... my tendinitis is back in my right elbow. I felt it a little last Tuesday when playing volleyball. I mean to wear my elbow brace this morning and left it in my closet. So I played with my right arm behind my back. I used it for a couple of shots but mainly used my left hand/arm to play with. I was actually kind of surprised at what a nice job it did. It certainly earned its keep. BUT my Pixel watch was exhausted after 2 hours. It detected 2 car wrecks and 3 falls. I kept having to stop and tell it that I was fine. I suspect I have now fucked up their detection data but good.

Next up, I need to get dressed and then go down to the front desk and pick up the copies of the Timber Ridge Times for our floor and distribute them. John has done it for a long time but I told him I'd take over. They usually have them out and ready on my way back from volleyball but not today. No prob. I can use the steps.

I suggested to Hazel that she just let me drop off the pee but, no, of course. She said she wanted to go and John was fine and she wanted out of the house. So we went. But, in the car, I told her she needed to include Bonny. That Bonny's feelings were getting bruised because she always came to me. She seemed like she understood. time... will tell.

I did get to hear - for the 8 millionth time - about how her sons delivered papers when they were kids and then picked up the old papers and sold them to recycling and then were able to buy their own first cars. Both of these 'kids' are now in their 60's. And about her hip replacement (30 years ago) and the problem with the pin, which she calls a nail, 5 years later.

We stopped at Safeway on the way home and I picked up a few things but totally forgot the one thing on my list and that is after I looked at my list once we were in the store. So I'm clearly heading for Hazelville myownself.

I have 2 hours before the cleaner comes. Yahoo.

My monthly subscribe and save order of cat food arrived and now I have, on hand, more than a month of the same cat food they have loved for a year. And they seem to have fallen out of love with it. Of course. I just wish they had let me know before the order.

Hazel came over yesterday. Mainly I think she just wanted to get out of her apartment and stretch her legs. She didn't stay long. But, she did tell me that her son came to get them this morning and they got a guy from security to come up with a wheel chair for John to go to get blood drawn. They got there and it was closed and only then did they figure out it was today and not yesterday. They are sinking fast. I did get Martha to bring them up a wheelchair to have for a while. She runs a loaner closet where she keeps walkers and wheel chairs and all kinds of paraphernalia. Then Bonny came in for an update. So it was busy-ish. But, fine.

Our mailroom has locked boxes for each apartment for our USPS mail and a cubby for each apartment. The cubbies are not locked and are used for anything - menus, private notes, TR announcements, etc. I have a little fabric pouch on my phone that I carry my mail key in. It's always been annoying because it keeps the phone from lying flat. BUT way more annoying not to have the key when you are in the mailroom. Myrna was always having to make a special trip back home because she forgot her key. A fair number of women carry little purses around with their keys and, of course, men have pockets.

Something came up Saturday when Martha and Bonny and I were chatting about mail keys and Bonny said 'I keep one in the back of my cubby.' GENIUS!!!! She said when she first moved in she saw a woman get hers out of the back of the cubby, open her mail box, and then return the key to the cubby. 'I thought it was a great idea.' Me, too - why the fuck did you wait so long to share it??????

So. That means I now only have to carry my card key. The key that unlocks lock down areas. Like the pool after working hours. If you punch a hole in the card key, it breaks it. I think I can slip it between my phone and the case but my current case is too thin. And I will probably, may, might, could maybe, am thinking about getting a new phone when Google makes the next one available in August/September. So I don't want a new case. But, Amazon has one for $4 that will work so ok.

No aqua yoga today which is fine by me. The new guy is way too much inner peace and world saving and not nearly enough stretching. On the up side, his voice doesn't carry well in the pool room so I don't have to hear his crap but still, I'd sure like more good stretching. We rarely have more than two or three people in class and one of them told him the music was distracting. The music was about the only thing interesting and now it's gone. I'm guessing/hoping that soon the class will be, too. I could just quit going but I would love for their to be more water classes so I go to show support and, besides, I was the one who asked for a water stretching class.

I need gas in the car and a trip to the charity shop. I broke my heavy tissue box for the bedroom and I want another and I haven't checked for 'hair' sweaters recently, but I think I might wait until tomorrow when the house cleaner is here.

Volleyball was very good today. An excellent number of people and no assholes. Elbow Coffee was pretty good, too. Last night I hit on the idea of using it to unravel sweaters. So I took my sweaters and my vacuum (cause unraveling makes a huge mess of little yarn bits) and unraveled while we coffeed. I thought one or two might want to join in but they did not which was fine. They enjoyed watching me and it was good conversation.

Last night I watched my first Mariner game of the season and it really was fun. When the broadcasters started saying stupid shit, I just hit mute until after the commercial and then turned the sound back on. It worked fine, plus I had closed captioning on anyway. At bedtime, I watched more on my tablet while listening to my book in bed. Glad I spent the $25.

My neighbor across the hall - the Jim who moved in a month after I did - is declining pretty fast. Physically he's fine. Mentally, he's melting. His doctor has told him he cannot drive any more. And he's apparently going to take the advice. He asked me this morning if I'd help him sell his car. He has a Tesla. I just 'chatted' with the local Ford dealership and they will buy it. Yes, I know there are many more ways and he could get lots more money with some of the other ways but... the point is to make the car belong to someone else. That is the only point. So I'm going to suggest the way that is easiest. I may have to end up driving it myself.

Living with old people is a constantly changing environment, that is for absolute sure.

Now I need to go find a remote. I have this wall clock that needs the time changed and taking it down would probably involve wall repair so I need to find the damn remote. It's not in the obvious places so I need to start on the non obvious places. Sigh.

Today I have nothing. No volleyball so I could sleep in. Nothing on the calendar. No promises to anybody. Luxury. And baseball starts again. Double bonus.

Last night's picnic was fine. The fried chicken company did not bring the ordered potato salad or coleslaw and the woman in charge of ordering it all was flummoxed. After most everyone was served the chicken and beans they did have, she came over to me and wanted me to order potato salad and coleslaw from them and have it delivered by Uber Eats. The place is a good 20 minutes away and it was still rush hour. I assured her that it would not get here until after everyone had gone home. Plus, who cared. She got on the mic and asked and turned out, no one cared. It was fine.

My job was Gail. I had to go over to the nursing wing and check her out. She was all ready but a bit confused about where we were going and why. But, she was up for it so we went. Turned out she was the perfect dinner companion. We sat with a table of not very obnoxious people and then after the eating was done, we just sat and watched everyone. I asked her a couple of times if she was ready to go back and she said she would love to stay if I didn't mind.

She's very bright and with it in the moment. She kept saying 'have I told you this before?' which she had not and it was fun. We were over at the edge and so could see everyone (and her eyesight and hearing are great) so we talked about outfits and who was married to whom and what they were doing. We had lots of good laughs. It was way better than trying to make smalltalk with some of those randos. Plus, it meant I didn't have to do any of the prep or any of the clean up. So win win win. When we got back to her area, the nightly movie had just started and she was excited to watch it so I signed her back in and came home.

There's a winter 3rd floor social but I dodged that last year - can't remember how - and plan to this year, too.

The guy is coming to unhang and rehang the shade next Thursday. No clue who's going to pay for it but I have a sneaking suspicion I will get the bill.

Yesterday I was downstairs at lunch time picking up a package and when I got home, I put the cart into the closet. About mid afternoon, I was aware of Julio making constant meowing noises. And then I heard Biggie. And I figured they were having a conversation. But, it did not stop so finally I got up to look and Julio was laid out next to the closet door telling me that Biggie was in the closet. Sure, enough, I opened the door and the two of them went off to commiserate. Well done, Julio!

[edit: My attempt to make this a two Wednesday week has not gone undetected by NC Wayne. Plus, I just learned tomorrow is Friday. Sorry, Thursday, I didn't mean to dis you.]


Last night's dinner was canceled. The air conditioning in the dining room was out so they closed it. Bonny pivoted to drinks in the elbow with Jackie and added Jan and Dick.

I think there might be issues with Jackie. She seems to resent other people talking and I've already heard repeats of her life story and I've maybe only spent 2 hours with her. Plus she does not approve of animals as pets and Bonny thinks she heard her say that Timber Ridge 'sure has a lot of Jews'. Now that last bit is a showstopper for sure and I'm assuming Bonny heard wrong but after spending an hour with Jackie last night, I'm wondering if maybe she hear correctly.

So we're having dinner on the 30th and she added Dick and Jan so we will be 5 in an already loud dining room with everyone talking at once and Jackie trying to talk over everyone. Oh Goody.

Maybe the apocalypse will happen before then.

Today's excitement is the 3rd floor picnic. My job is to go over to the nursing unit and guide Gail down. Gail lived here on this floor until her husband died last winter. She comes to Saturday coffee sometimes and someone made arrangements for her to come to the picnic but she can't come on her own. So my job is to go to the front desk there in that unit and "check her out" and then return her before she turns into a pumpkin. She's always so bright and cheery and enjoys everything. She has zero short term memory but is very present and happy to be where ever she is.

I hit a major network glitch yesterday with my TV. Half of the apps said there was no internet. The other half were happy to stream whatever I wanted. It was so weird. Finally, I sucked Gemini into the issue. It worked really well. I was able to describe the problem and list my troubleshooting attempts and so Gemini quickly zoomed in on the issues - DNS. Swapped that out and BOOM! All the apps were happy. Interesting to see which TV apps really dig into your own personal connection DNA. Netflix and MLB and YouTube - they rest probably check the IP address and call it good.

No pre-picnic requirements of me so I can just enjoy the day and I plan to!

Julie aka Daniel Boone

I've gotten into this annoying pattern of bad sleep on Mondays and Wednesdays and, sometimes, Fridays. The night before volleyball. Maybe it's because I sleep too late on the other days - usually it's only an hour longer if that. Or sleep too well. Last night was also interrupted by Hazel. John is back in the hospital and she'd forgotten to bring home the phone number and wanted to call him but also couldn't remember how to work the phone. Mainly she was just exhausted and frazzled and worried. I was in bed listening to my book when she came in. So we went back and I played her voice mail messages for her and found the number and we called John. And she seemed much more calm and settled when I left. Her son is coming over this morning. They cannot seem to control John's excess fluid retention. Hazel says he's peeing every 30 minutes but is still swollen up everywhere like a whale. Heart or kidneys, I'm sure and neither option is that good at 89.

We talked some last night and she said she understands that this may be it and she's prepared. That was comforting to hear. They've been together for 65 years.

Laundry is laundrying.

I watched most of the home run derby last night so I could see Mariner Cal Raleigh and his family participate. His dad did the pitching and his 15 year old brother did the catching. It was cute. And he won which was cool since no other catcher had ever won. That's it for baseball for me until Friday.

When they were here, my friend, Scott, used my phone number every time he was asked for one. It was just easier than saying no. For some reason, it tickled him to use it at Walmart to get the receipt. And now, every time they stop at Walmart, I get the receipt. They are buying some weird shit and not nearly enough Krispy Kremes but it is fun to track their trip which I am now dubbing the Walmart/Family Dollar Tour. He sent me a text yesterday that they had found HUGE Dollar Tree and he hadn't spied Julie in a long time. I told him it was 911 and not 111 for emergency if she never showed. They are off to Soux Falls today.

It's house cleaner day.

And I have an Amazon return plus I am perilously close to running out of mayo so a stop at Safeway is in order. I would wait until house cleaning time but I think I'll go when the clothes are done in hopes that it will be a little less hot.

I started a new book last night. An random shot from the library. I had read other stuff by the author years ago but don't remember a thing. This book, however - at least the first 40 minutes - is captivating because of the narrator. I mean she just got right into my brain like she was sitting next to me telling me about the most amazing thing that had ever happened to her. It was wild. Even if the rest of the book sucks, I'm so delighted for that first part. I hated to go to sleep. How It Happened by Michael Koryta. Read by Christine Lakin.

Oh the other big news from yesterday was brought to you by Ingrid. My neighbor who is just whacked and not in a good way. As we began elbow coffee, Bonny reminded Ingrid that she still needed the $15 for the 3rd floor gathering next week. It was due 2 weeks ago and everyone has paid but her. She then proceeded to have a melt down/tantrum that would have honestly made a 3 year old proud. She ended up literally pounding on the table. It was pretty funny. Then everyone pretended it had not happened for about 30 minutes and this pissed her off so when we started passing around the snacks, she got up and marched through the gathering and left, muttering very loudly and venomously "I've lost my appetite due to Bonny."

I was delighted because the last time she had a tablet pounded tantrum it was due to me. (I had not checked in on her when an alarm went off.)

She is such a piece of work.

I pulled out another sweater from my stash and unraveled the sleeves for more hair. It was a sweater for about a 3 year old. Here is one sleeve and the hair already gotten from the other one. I'm guessing the one sleeve is hair for probably 7 or 8 dolls. And I still have the whole rest of the sweater. And one other one (pink). That should be enough to get me to the end of August when they start putting out the sweaters again in the charity shops.



And Dick and I worked on the puzzle. We've gotten a lot done but 1. Not all of it is correct. It's one of those where the same piece will feel like it fits and look like it fits but turns out to belong elsewhere. and 2. We still have grass and sky to do and I'm not sure how in the heck those will get done give #1.



My Costco membership expired in February. Two of the items I normally buy when they go on sale are now on sale (coffee and AREDs2) but, actually, I don't really need either one right now or soon ish so I was going to go reup this week and buy them but I think I'll let it slide some more. If I were going to go this week, it would be this morning. Sunday's first thing is THE only time according to me, but, not today, Costco.

Today will be some knitting. Some baseball. Some TV. Some puzzling. And whatever else happens.

As I written about here about a million times, the food scheme at the cult involves my getting an allowance of $600 on the 10th of every month. It does not roll over. So I have to eat $600 worth a month or lose it.

This is designed to be more or less one meal a day. Breakfast is $15 Lunch is $16 and Dinner ranges from $16 to $28. Once in a blue moon I have one of their lunches and one of their dinners (like today, probably) but more often, I skip entirely. This is mostly because their portions are generous and I have so many leftovers.

I have, in past months, trended towards skipping early on and then madly trying to cash in later. But, now I have a new plan. I'm going to strike when the iron is hot. Next week's menus do not look enticing. This week's teriyaki is still great so today I placed 6 orders. I ate one and put 5 in the freezer.

So now I have $502 and 26* days to eat it. So my spreadsheet says I have to eat more than $19 every day. See the problem!? It's so not easy living in the lap of luxury. *They serve brunch on Sunday but I never eat it.

The dinner buffet looks good tonight so that will help.

Also I went to Safeway and got ice cream and some other frozen stuff. So now my freezer is packed to the gills. Which is perfectly fine.