April 9 through 12

[chochiyo_sama]

Friday, April 9

Jack took Mom to Owatonna today.  He stopped here and brought me my mail since Lily has been gone to South Dakota for several days and has not been available to get it for me.  She has been hungry for fried chicken, so he took her to Pizza Ranch for lunch.  They have really good friend chicken.  Then they went to the Medford Outlet where she bought two recliners, a couch, and a new mattress and box spring.  Her couch is over thirty years old and is so broken down that you feel like your butt is on the floor and your knees are up around your ears when you sit on it.  Still, she LOVES that couch—it is in the old “country” style where it has a very high back.  I have been trying to talk her into getting a new couch for years without success.  Jack commented that she should get the couch that matched the new recliners and she immediately decided to get it.  Sigh. 

For supper tonight I had a Schwan’s freezer dinner of Sweet and Sour Chicken.  It was better than I thought it would be.  I will have to order it again.

 

Saturday, April 10

It was a pretty quiet day.  I watched a good movie set in WW2 called Hope and Glory.  It was based on the memoirs of a young boy about his family’s experiences from the declaration of war through the blitz attacks and the destruction of their home to the unwed pregnancy of his older sister via a Canadian soldier and their moving in with their grandparents in the country.  The movie was very well done, and now I am going to have to look for the book it was based on which, I am sure, will be much better and more detailed than the movie.  There was a funny part where the kids marched to their school where a rather brutal headmaster ruled supreme and discovered that the school had been blown to pieces in one of the blitz bombings.  There was much enthusiastic rejoicing.

I also watched How the West Was Won, which I have seen several times before.  I was doing other stuff while watching it but I didn’t need to pay too much attention as I have seen it many times.  When that was over, I finished reading the third book in the Faerie series—Faerie After.  The first book was the best.  The other two were okay. 

Jack and his family took Mom to Rochester where they met Tammy and Caleb at a restaurant called Knewtz for lunch.  All of them except Cora had been vaccinated for Covid, so they were okay to go, I guess.  This was the first time Tammy had seen Mom in over a year, so they had a joyful reunion.  Apparently the food was delicious.  Tammy had been in Winona for a horse show.  Her horse, Junior, won a lot of ribbons.  She was flying high.  Junior is a very handsome and big boy. 

It was a cloudy spring day—nothing too impressive happened in my life.  I had a bowl of tomato soup for supper.  I need to remember to order saltines in my next grocery delivery order.  I only have enough for one more bowl of soup.  I must have crackers in my soup or chili. 

 

Sunday, April 11

I got up early as DeAnn and I had set up a Zoom meeting for 10 am to discuss the introductory reading of The Artist’s Way book.  Neither of us had made it all the way through our assigned reading, but we still managed to have a good session.  We talked about everything else that was going on in our lives as well as what we hoped to get out of this commitment.  We ended up being on the Zoom meeting for over three hours.  It was only the need to feed her child that caused us to break it off.  I miss DeAnn.  We used to do so much together.  I miss Jim too.  He had such a sly, dry sense of humor.

Matthew called later.  He is adjusting to his invisaline braces and hoping that they work to straighten out his underbite.  We didn’t talk too long, compared to other conversations we have had.  Afterwards, I watched a few videos on YouTube—mostly about American Girl doll collectors and the rooms they made for their dolls.  They had some very creative ideas.  The dolls I am currently spending the most time on are much smaller than the American Girl dolls.  American Girls are 18” tall and must be between the ages of 10 and 12 according to their body types.  The LeeAnn dolls (created by Denis Bastien) are between 10-11” and are supposed to be 10 years old and in 5^th grade, according to Denis.  I have been collecting stuff that “works” in their scale for some time.  I consider my doll work “art” that I can work on via my Artist’s Way book as well as my fiction writing work.

I also sacked up the garbage from my bedroom, bathroom, and living room and dragged it into the breezeway to haul it to the bin outside later.  I made a grilled ham and pepperjack cheese sandwich for supper.  While it was cooking, I washed the small sink full of dishes I had in the kitchen.  I also opened a can of sliced peaches for my dessert.  Both the grilled sandwich and peaches were very satisfying.  I have to start eating better.  I generally end up eating only one “healthy” meal a day and snacking on junk food or cereal when I feel hungry at other times during the day.

I watched Fear the Walking Dead and was very unhappy with the story line.  I need to watch it again as I am not sure WHY it played out like it did.  The main thing is that Dakota, the sister of the nasty woman who runs the current group of survivors like an evil overlord, SHOT John Dorie in the chest because he confronted her about a knife that she apparently used to kill someone whom John was blamed for killing.  Anyhow, at the end of the episode, John, who had fallen into the river after being shot, floated up to the cabin where his beloved and the evil overlord were.  His beloved, June, rushed out to help him, as he crawled out of the river…but when he looked up at her, he had zombie eyes and was now a walking dead dude.  So she stabbed him in the side of the head to end him.  I was so mad that those asshole writers killed him off.  He was such a good character.  I suspect they jerk the fans around, just killing off the characters we like to manipulate our emotions.  Fuckers.

 

Monday, April 12

In the middle of the night last night, a loud noise jolted me out of sleep.  It sounded like a loud gunshot.  The neighbors who live behind me are basically assholes who are always doing loud, obnoxious crap in the middle of the night.  I lay in bed listening for other loud noises.  I would not put it past them to murder each other as they are always having screaming fights with each other or their drunken guests.  I was fully prepared to call the cops on them if they were shooting off guns at 3 am. 

I heard nothing else, so I went back to sleep.  In the morning, I discovered that Peaches had knocked a plastic tub full of stuff off my little pop fridge. When it hit the floor it made a very loud concussive noise that woke me up, apparently.  So the neighbors were innocent—at least this time.  It took quite a while to clean up all the little things that spread all over the living room when they hit the floor.

Lily called but when I answered the phone, it disconnected us.  I called her back and she said her phone wasn’t working right.  It would not let her call anyone.  It would ring but then drop the call.  She was on her way home from South Dakota, and she likes to talk to people on the phone as she drives as she gets sleepy on long drives and has gone in the ditch occasionally when she dozes off.  She asked me to call Rhonda, her daughter, and tell her about her phone issues.  We talked for a while, then we hung up so I could call Rhonda and inform her about her mom’s phone issues.  They have their granddaughter Sophie for a few days, and Sophie is currently obsessed with the Troll characters from the Troll movie.  In fact, she now refuses to answer to her name as she identifies as a troll named Branch.  If you do not refer to her as Branch, she will not answer.  Anyhow, I had a little fun with her, telling her that there were two trolls running around in my yard.  She asked which ones, and I said I didn’t know but one had pink hair.

“Poppy,” she said.

I told her I was feeling sad and kind of grumpy today.  “I heard that if you eat a troll you will feel happy.  Is that true?”

She told me it was true, but that I should not eat trolls.

“But they might taste really good,” I said.  Then I pretended to catch Poppy.  “I really want to eat her,” I said. 

“WEllllllll, you can eat Poppy but don’t eat Branch,” she said.

I told her that Branch was fast and it was hard to catch him, so I would just eat Poppy.  Then I said Poppy was so nice that I didn’t want to eat her—I would just lick her and taste her instead. 

Sophie was giggling. 

I told her Poppy tasted like strawberries.  Then I told her I HAD to catch and taste Branch.

“Just don’t eat him,” she warned.

So, I pretended to catch him and lick his ears.  She wanted to know what he tasted like, and I told her “Applesauce.”

“That’s silly!” she squealed.

Then I told her that he tasted sooo good!  “I am going to eat one of his ears,” I said.

“No!  Don’t do it!” she said.

“I’ll just eat one,” I promised.  “He has another!” 

She was quite horrified at that prospect, so I promised I would not eat his ear—but maybe one of his toes.  So I pretended to lick his feet to taste them.  “Yuck!” I yelled.  “His feet taste like toe jam!  That’s really gross!”  So I pretended to let Branch and Poppy go.

Once we were no longer talking about trolls, she lost interest and ran off to do other things. 

It was pretty amusing.

I ate some toaster waffles for lunch and worked on the clutter in my living room as well as using my electric broom to sweep it and deal with some more living room clutter.  When Lily got back to Ellendale, she stopped and got her mail then came to my house to drag my very full recycling bin to the curb for me.  I made another grilled ham and pepperjack cheese sandwich for supper and washed the raspberries I had in the fridge for dessert.

Mom called and told me that Deb (Cornelius), a much younger cousin of my mother’s, had come to get her recliners, even though Mom’s new recliners will not be delivered until some time in May.  I had asked Mom if I could have the one that I always sat in when I lived there as she complains that she doesn’t want to come to my house because I don’t have a recliner for her to sit in.  I am not surprised that she never even discussed it with me when Deb called and asked for them.  I don’t really care about the recliner as I only wanted it for HER, but it is just another example of how little she cares about me—I would have told her to go ahead and give it to Deb, but it would have been nice to be treated with consideration, since she had told me that I could have it.  She is such a disappointment as a mother.

Comments

[the_godiva]

She could have had it reupholstered.

My Mom wants to replace the two love seats in the family room by the fire place but I advised her to just get them reupholstered because they are curved and she wouldn't be able to find curved ones. I'm wondering if all they need is the pillows replaced as they have a zipper and better foam could easily put inside. Then the bottoms reinforced with something. They are hardly sat on anyway. The two chairs needs some serious work but they can also be reupholstered. Dolly tore the skirts off of them or at least one of them and they are so faded the light blue is now lavender. She doesn't like the one that turns and rocks. She wants that plat form replaced with bun feet or something solid. That's fine but I don't think they should be replaced, just reupholstered. I urged her to do it last year but she put it off. Now it will likely never get done.

I'm glad you and DeAnn are going to ZOOM regularly. Whether it is The Artist's Way or something else, you should keep it up. I hope this is going to get you writing again. You were always going to write stories and books. You're retired now and your life is going pretty well. Plus, what else do you have to do other than clean? Plus you have a beautiful new journal and some lovely pens that write so smoothly it will be a joy for you to poor your stories onto paper.

I wouldn't be too angry at the writers of those Walking Dead series. It is likely either the actor wanted to move on to other projects or their contract was up and they were asking for a raise. They either get it if their character is popular or they don't because their story line is petering out and they don't have anything more to write for them. Like when they got rid of the guy on Downton Abbey. He didn't want to return for the next season as he wanted to do other stuff. He ended up doing the live action Disney Beauty and the Beast.

Did the city every do anything about the asshole's propane tank that violates zoning laws. Time to start harassing the code department. Call them every Monday morning like clockwork until the neighbors are cited or the tank is moved. Just be a bitch about it. These assholes just expect people like you and me to suck it up and be sheep and allow ourselves to get shit on.

You can always rub your Mother's nose it in. "Well, I would invite you over but I don't have a recliner for you to sit in" and leave it at that. NOt that she'll remember you wanted it. Just don't buy one just for her. I've certainly stopped buying stuff for my family except for my Mom and my brother and sister. Three less slippers to knit for Christmas.

It's cold and damp today but will warm up into the 80s by this weekend. I moved more stuff today. I'm working on the path from the back gate to the kitchen as in the last few months it has narrowed with crap again. Pots with plants and some recycling that has to be carried out to the front. I'm also still cleaning out the refrigerator. Eating through some and tossing expired other stuff. A few things I'm keeping for Diana. Plus periodically stopping to watch a little on the iPad and knit. As soon as I finish both sets of slippers to match my robe, I'm going to back to crocheting the squares for the first animal afghan. I'm going to give that one to my Mom. Maybe for Mother's Day if I can finish it fast enough.

I'm watching The Great Race now. Later I'll watch Finding Your Roots and Prince Phillip on PBS live. Not sure I can take Rachel tonight. Just more depressing news from Minnesota.


But of course, since JACK advised her to replace the couch, she did. She'll probably do nothing but complain to you and cry that she wishes she had her old couch back.

I've got How the West Was Won on my TCM list. Last night I watched More than a Miracle. Cinderella period piece with Omar Sharif and Sophia Loren. Worth it if you've never seen it. Produced by Carlo Ponti and even though it takes place in Spain was very likely filmed in Italy. Right now I'm watching "It's Always Fair Weather" which I haven't seen in years. I love the dancing with the trash can lids.