December 8 through 22

Tuesday, December 8

Today I gathered up a bunch of clutter, paid some bills, recycled some junk mail and other stuff, and just tidied up the place.  I wiped down three of the 6-packs of Diet Coke with bleach wipes and filled the little pop fridge.  Once again, I watched and deleted a bunch of stuff from the DVR while eating potato chips as a very pathetic lunch.  In the evening, I warmed up a can of corned beef hash and made toast for my supper.

Once again, I caught up on my DW journal and then dug my Christmas cards out from under the bed.  Now I just have to catch some motivation to send some out.

 

Wednesday, December 9

Lily called me from Walmart this morning.  She had been to a doctor’s appointment then went to Walmart to pick up some groceries.  Suddenly she began to feel very ill, got sweaty and felt like she was going to pass out or throw up.  She said she didn’t know if she could drive home. 

I asked if she had eaten breakfast, and she hadn’t eaten much.  No protein at all.  I told her it was probably low blood sugar again.  She’s been having issues with that a lot.  I have been nagging her to start carrying nuts or protein bars in her purse.  But, of course, she never does.  I even gave her a box of individual servings of nuts.  Stubborn thing.

So, I suggested she go to the deli counter, explain her situation, and ask for a sample of ham sandwich meat or some other sliced meat.  That would give her enough protein to bring her blood sugar up, and told her to just grab whatever was essential, forget the stuff I had asked her to pick up for me, check out, and go to McDonalds to get herself a breakfast burrito or something to raise her blood sugar up more.

She hung up but told me later that the lady at the deli counter did give her a nice slice of ham which immediately helped.  The ding-a-ling finished her shopping, including the things I had asked her to pick up for me, and drove home without stopping to get something else to eat.  I told her not to bother dropping off my stuff—that she needed to eat something then just rest a bit.  There was nothing that I needed urgently.

I spent the day doing laundry, cleaning up the stuff that accumulates around my recliner, sweeping the kitchen and living room, and cleaning up five puddles of puke, two of which were “hidden” from view, so they had to be scraped up.  Mom needed to get her mail, so I picked her up and took her to the post office, then got my own mail.  On the way to take Mom home, I stopped at Lily’s to give her the Shopper and pick up the onions, canned shrimp, and French bread she had picked up for me and the tube of Neosporin I had asked her to pick up for Mom.

We had another gorgeous, sunny, unseasonably warm December day which ended with a stunning sunset.  The sunsets have been amazing lately.  In the evening I watched and deleted more stuff from the DVR.

 

Thursday, December 10

A very quiet day.  I ate caramel popcorn for brunch and scrambled eggs, toast, and a whole container of raspberries for supper.  I washed dishes and took some recycling out to the bin.  Today was cloudy but pleasant.  Not much else to report.

 

Friday, December 11

I have been very disgusted with my lack of productivity.  So when I got up this morning, I swore I was actually going to get something worthwhile done today.  I made a pot of chili and a cheeseball. The chili tasted especially good.

I took the kitchen garbage and the scoopings from the litterbox out to the garbage bin.  Then I went through my mail and dealt with any bills or junk mail that was there.  The Schwan’s man delivered our orders, and Lily came to get hers and take Mom’s to her.

It wasn’t a gloriously productive day, but it was a heck of a lot more productive than my average day lately.

 

Saturday, December 12

Lily brought over cinnamon rolls from Mary Groth again.  She makes them every Saturday and has a regular group of people that she brings them to.  She doesn’t bring them to me personally, but she gives Lily enough to bring me a couple every Saturday now too.  Lucky me!

I went on Amazon and ordered the complete series of Alien Nation, 21 Jump Street, and Third Rock from the Sun.  I also ordered a package of ink pens and two packages of lined notebook paper.  A while back I ordered a trilogy that sounded good.  The first book in the series is Faerie Bones, then Faerie Winter, then Faerie After, all by Jannie Lee Simner.  I have not read any of them yet, but I do look forward to reading them.  They were delivered yesterday. 

 

Sunday, December 13

 I watched and deleted more stuff from the DVR.  I texted Cora to see if she would come over and drag my garbage to the curb.  She stopped here on her way home from work and took it out for me.  She also looked through the boxes of yarn Nola had given me from Alice’s stash.  I told her to take as much as she wanted since she has been learning to crochet.  She only took three skeins of yarn, but I told her she was welcome to take as much as she wants.

I made a huge batch of my pasta salad and a pan of oatmeal bars that did not turn out as nicely as they normally do.  They never raised.  Usually, I frost them with cream cheese frosting, but today, they were so flat that I didn’t bother.  They tasted good, but they just didn’t look normal.  They really are just as good without frosting, so I saved the calories.

I made “care packages” of no-olive salad for Kari, a huge bowl of salad for Jack whose love for this particular salad is epic, two small bowls for Mom and Lily, and the rest I kept for myself. Sadly, it wasn’t ready when Cora was here, so I could not send it home with her. 

When I was done with the cooking and storing, I washed the dishes and called it a day.

 

Monday, December 14

Today is my mother’s mother’s birthday.  She would have been well over 100 years old today if she was still alive.  She was an obsessively neat person who would surely either drop dead of shock or have an angry fit if she saw my cluttered, dusty domicile. 

In an attempt to restore order and cleanliness today, I used my electric sweeper to clean up a lot of crumbs, cat hair, and random small particulates from the area around my recliner.  I discovered two dried up piles of puke on the carpet in the office which I seldom enter.  I got those cleaned up then I filed my prayer journal pages in their three-ring notebook and the medical bills that have not been filed yet in their notebook.  I tidied up the desk a bit, since I was already in there.  It looked much better once I had worked in there a while.

Caleb went over to mom’s to see why she wasn’t able to access the internet.  Turns out she was still trying to use Netscape Navigator.  I don’t think I have used that in twenty years or more.  Caleb patiently hooked her up to and educated her on the use of Google Chrome. Then he stopped at Lily’s to pick up the wireless printer she is gifting me for helping her do her trip to Israel scrapbook and her recipe collection last year.  Because he is a helpful lad, he hooked the printer up for me.  He also delivered a big container of clam chowder from Lily.  She made it from scratch.

I sent the olive-free ad regular pasta salad home with him as well as several bottles of strawberry-lemonade Gatorade that I had in my pop fridge.  Last year, the kidney doctor told me I should drink things with citric acid in it and mentioned Gatorade as a good thing.  So, even though I am not particularly fond of Gatoraid, I bought it from time to time and drank it, since I thought it would be good for my kidneys.  Well, my dear friend G. informed me of how bad Gatoraid is for diabetics and sent me a couple of articles that verified that.  Caleb is an athletic young soul, so I sent all of my Gatoraid home with him too. 

I had to go on Amazon and order ink cartridges for the printer.  Since it had not been used since Jerry took sick, the cartridges had totally dried up.  He had bought it just before he got really sick and had hardly used it.  It was nice of Lily to pass it on to me, since my printer just quit working. 

 

Tuesday, December 15

Another quiet day.  I gave Lily the container of pasta salad, which she was very glad to get.  Everyone loves my pasta salad.  She had picked up my mail for me, and my package of pens had come in the mail.  Yay.  I was running low on working ink pens.

It’s the middle of December and we still have not had a snow that has stuck around. That’s fine with me. The longer we go without snow and/or cold temperatures, the shorter winter feels.

 

Wednesday, December 16

Today I took Mom to the post office and the bank and gave her a container of my salad.  She called me later and told me she ate it all for lunch as soon as she got home.  While I was picking her up, the lunatic cardinal who lives in her pine trees attacked my car and tried to rip the mirrors of the side of the car.  He is insane.

I had to clean up another pile of Peaches’ puke and cleaned the litterboxes.

The Lerberg’s sale bill was in the mail, so I used it to make my grocery list and called in my order.

Today provided more sunshine and moderate temperatures!  Yay.

 

Thursday, December 17

I put away my clean laundry from last week, gathered up a bunch of recycling, and took it out to the bin.  Then I sorted and started this week’s laundry.  I had two chicken kievs in the freezer, so I put both of the in the oven and baked them along with a “hobo” packet which is just chopped up veggies wrapped in tinfoil and baked in the oven. Mine just had potatoes and onion in them today.   I ate one of the kievs and put the other in the fridge for another day. 

I saw that some movie studios were going to be putting their new releases on HBO, so today I called my cable company and signed up for HBO.  There are a few movies coming out soon that I really want to see.  They said it would be hooked up by 5 pm tonight.

Then I called Costa’s Candy Store where they make fabulous hand rolled chocolates.  I haven’t been shopping in eons, and I haven’t seen anything in Amazon that felt right, so I ordered two pounds of chocolates to be delivered to G.  The clerk said she couldn’t guarantee it would arrive by Christmas, but that’s okay.  As long as it gets there.  I may send other things later, if I find anything that is worthy.  I don’t want to send a bunch of stuff that she would not need or want.

HBO was NOT hooked up by 5 pm.

 

Friday, December 18

My grocery order arrived much earlier than normal today.  Usually it doesn’t come until after 2 pm.  Today it arrived by 10:30 am.  I got everything wiped down with bleach wipes and put away.  Then I could just take it easy for the rest of the day—not worrying about anyone coming over with an order.  I was in the dishes washing the dishes, someone rang my doorbell.  When I went to the door it turned out to be the Stitt kids—all masked—singing “Jingle Bells” and handing me a paper plate full of cookies that they had personally baked.  They were the first carolers I have had at this house.

Last night I dreamed that I was teaching at Triton again.  But in my dream, instead of a parking lot in front of the school, there was a beach and the ocean.  It was cold and snowy, and I stood on the edge of the ocean watching the waves roll in.  It was an odd but peaceful dream.  There wasn’t much of a plot to it, but it was visually stunning.

Still no HBO.

 

Saturday, December 19

 

Got another pair of cinnamon rolls from Mary.  She’s as regular as a good clock. 

I made some Schwan’s General Tso’s Chicken and fried rice. I ate a plate full of it, but threw the rest away.  It was unbearably salty.  I just  can’t eat food that has been salted so heavily.

I had hoped HBO would be hooked up by now, but NOPE.

 

Sunday, December 20

 I got a text from my sister-in-law Kari telling me that she had left something on the breezeway door for me.  It turned out to be a ziplock bag of lefse.  I am not a huge fan of lefse, but this lefse was pretty good.  It was nice to be thought of.

I finished the laundry and washed the dishes.  I microwaved the remaining chicken keiv and a tub of microwavable mac and cheese for supper. 

I discovered that HBO was hooked up tonight.  I watched a couple of movies that I had not seen before.  My Facebook jail term had expired, so I rejoined the ranks of tRUMP haters on facebook.

 

Monday, December 21

Lily had an appointment with her physical therapist this morning.  She stopped here after it and gave me a loaf of French bread and a carton of egg nog.  She said those were my Christmas present. She is always thoughtful.

I made a batch of the cauliflower and broccoli salad.  It didn’t make a big batch, but it was enough for three or four meals.

At 7 pm, Sue J, DeAnn, Tammy H, a nurse who works with Sue and I met on ZOOM for a virtual cocktail party.  We had a nice chat.  DeAnn announced that she had sold the farm that Jim had inherited from his mother.  He had hated living up in Hastings and was looking forward to moving back to the farm, but when he died, DeAnn had no interest in returning to the farm. She likes living close to the college she teaches at.  For quite some time, she had rented the farm out, but it became kind of a nuisance and she was worried about upkeep.  The guy that rented the pasture for his sheep bought it. Now she can relax and stop worrying about the farm.

It’s kind of sad as the farm was so lovely, but it just wasn’t a place DeAnn wanted to spend the rest of her life without Jim.  I miss Jim.  He was a wonderful person.

I watched a couple more movies on HBO.  It’s nice for a change of pace.

 

Tuesday, December 22

I folded my last load of laundry and put the basket in the bedroom.  It’s still sitting there, not put away.

My mother called, full of self pity and grievances.  I don’t know what set her off, but she started out with “I have lived too long.  I just want to hang it up.”  I asked her what brought this on, and she said, “I’ve been hurt too much.  I just don’t want to be hurt any more.”  So I suppose she has been running over her massive lists of “hurts” that she has suffered since the dawn of time.  I think that is all she does all day long is review the list of real or imagined insults and wounds—from the time her mother beat her when she was six because her older brother dumped her younger brother into a mud puddle to Lily’s granddaughter not inviting children to her wedding ceremony.  When they chose a childless service, Jack and Kari refused to go, and then Jerry felt bad that Jack, who was best friends with my cousin Lee, didn’t come to the wedding.  Mom and Joni went, but they were seated in the very back of the reception, and of course Mom took that personally and as a deliberate insult.  And this has been probably close to ten years ago.  But I still hear about it several times a week.  Sigh.

I don’t even want to go to her house for Christmas because I know it will be a never ending rehashing of every one of those dreadful wounds that she has suffered.  UGH. I am so sick of it.