Fretworthy

The person that cut my hair last week cut it way too short on the top and I have cowlicks sticking up all over the place - Fretworthy?

I found a bug in the carpet piece I keep just inside the door. It was the type of bug Megan called a roly poly. We found one like it in July when she was here. This is about the 5th one I've seen in the house since I moved in - Fretworthy?

Last Monday (9/11) I made a pot of soup called 15 Bean Soup. I had made this before and always omitted the garlic because I didn't have any. This time, I had allocated my overflow to Kelly and decided to follow the recipe. I bought some minced garlic. The package said that 1/2 teaspoon was equal to one clove of garlic. The recipe called for 2 cloves. I used one teaspoon. The house still smells like garlic - Fretworthy?

I sent in a reply postcard to TV Guide saying they could send me 8 free issues of their magazine. I had cancelled my subscription when they changed their format. After the free issues I am under no obligation to buy any more. All I have to do is write "cancel" on the invoice. The invoice may get here while I'm in California and go astray - Fretworthy?

I have only one bottle of ketchup. - Fretworthy?

The VCR in my kitchen is making funny noises as it records - Fretworthy?

My health plan is changing our prescription provider as of December 1st. When I get back from California in November, I will have to make a Doctor's appointment to renew my prescriptions before 12/1 - Fretworthy?

Holliday Park is throwing a thank you dinner for committee members on 10/7. They require that we send in a $10.00 deposit which is returned to us when we show up at the dinner. I don't want to go. Rita really enjoys those dinners and I usually go to please her. The deposit is due tomorrow. I'm not going to send it in. - Fretworthy?

Balanced toolbar

Thanks to Marcel my toolbar of favorite places is balanced. I still check Amanda's blog every day (at least on days that I am not rushed off my feet) and if she gets to a full year without updating I'm going to take her off my favorites. Then there will be another opening.

In other news. the tree out my living room window (of the red leaves) is starting to turn red again. Those clingy red leaves that refused to go away did finally become either gone or not visible among the greenery. Now all the leaves at the outside edges of the tree are red.

I am beginning to prepare in ernest for my three weeks in California that start on October 12. Ernest preparations at this stage involve more of a mindset that actual packing etc. Reservations are all in place and actual packing takes 20 minutes tops. Not counting the after-period wherein you start to think of all the things you forgot to put in. So, taking those 20 minutes a week or so in advance gives plenty of time for the afters.

The mindset involves fretting over all the things that could go wrong, or even if they're going right, at my age and condition many facets of travel are uncomfortable and/or painful. I need to have plenty of small bills for tipping. I need a wheelchair and a pusher at the Detroit end. I have plenty of pushers at the LA end.

I allow myself a few minutes every day to fret and then I go about my business.

favorite tools

First of all yeaa. My old format is back and I have spell check and preview on this page.

About the tools. I have these icons for each of your blogs and they appear on a toolbar at the top of my screen. There are an uneven number because there is room for six icons at a time. I check six blogs then move them all over and check the next six etc.

I mention this just in case one of my favorite brothers (you know who you are) decided to start blogging, I have an icon space available.

Homescan

I have in my kitchen a laser bar-code reader with which I scan everything I purchase. I do this for the A.C. Neilson Company. They collect the information (I report via that same gizmo by phone once a week) and probably sell it to merchandizers for tons of money. What I get out of it, besides the satisfaction and its kind of fun, is that I earn points for every week that I report. There are also bonus points for taking periodic surveys that they send in the mail and others that they ask us to take online.

I have approximately 150,000 points and I've never seen anything in their catalogue of prizes that I am interested in.

I got an email from them asking if I had any friends or family that might be interested in being contributors to this program. So if any of you are, just go to homescan.com and fill out the questionaire and they will contact you if they need a household like yours.

P.S. since Erika changed my format, I no longer have a spell check on new posts and I don't know how to get it back. I don't have a Preview either.

Life in the Dead Zone`

The dead zone I'm talking about is two toes on my right foot that due to back disks and nerve damage from years ago have been useless and have no feeling. They are the little piggy that had roast beef and the little piggy who had none.

Now flashback to a time when my darling granddaughter, Marisa, for some school or girl scout project made me a brick. Its painted white and has felt glued to the bottom and pretty pictures all around it. It has lived up against the wall in my bedroom until the time that I moved into this new unit.

Now, in order to keep my front door opened wide, I need a doorstop. Finally the brick can fulfill its destiny. And, its fair to say, part of the destiny of a brick doorstop is that someday, somehow, someone is going to stub a toe on it.

Well, I'm here to tell you that there is life in those dead toes. I just never dug deep enough before.

The AA show

Boy Andre Agassi is sure giving us tennis fans a treat this week. Whatever they are paying him, its not enough.

Jackson be'd here

That's my new favorite word. After Jackson had spent the night in the living room with Erika he was watching TV with me in my bedroom and I asked him if they had fixed the couch in the living room. "It already be'd a bed", he told me, "and we made it into a couch."

It was so fun to have him here for 3 days in a row. I got to see most of his moods and accomplishments. Some days he eats good, some days not so much. Some nights he sleeps good, some nights not so much. Sometimes he's very very cute, sometimes--- No, he's always very very cute.

He recited Bah Bah Black Sheep while we were in the car and Erika said "Do Twinkle Twinkle Little Star". He said "I don't know how to talk that one, just to sing it."
He told Erika to talk it for him, and she did.

Reality imitating reality TV

When I woke up this morning the TV was on and they were reporting the news. Of course the news was all about the UN passing a resolution for cease fire in the middle east and the fact that al quieda (sp)plans to blow us all up and I had the weird feeling that we are all living in the big brother house.

The UN is HOH (Janelle at her best)and doesn't have a clue. Hezbullah and Al Quieda are Will and Boogie (Chill Town) and are laughing it up in the diary room. Israel is Danielle, give her some power and she can straighten this out but as she said in her isolation room "I'm playing with idiots." I can just see Israel saying that.

Kaysar is the Iraqi and Lebanese everyman, feeling that if he doesn't antagonize Chill Town they might be his friend and then wondering why he's having to evacuate.

Coping

Life is getting hard and I am barely coping. You young people think it is difficult to raise kids, try coping with these problems.

There is the Rodger's Masters men's tournament in Toronto, the Morgan-Chase women's tournament in LA, and the Little League World Series. And this is all in prime time. Even if I tape all my reality shows and everything I can't watch in real time (and I have three VCRs) there are just not enough hours in a day to watch everything. My watching is getting sloppy. I fast forward more than I should and I am going to MISS something.

Thank God some of my judge shows are on reruns and I can watch other judges on other channels. Except that now I like those judges too and when they all start new seasons I'm going to have to tape them too.

eight decades

I think it is interesting and worth comment that we had eight decades of ages at Four Winds, the timeshare on Longboat Key in June. For these purposes I'm assuming that all in-laws are in the same decade as their spice.

0's Jackson, Austin, Sarah
teens Jonathan, Colton, Daymond, Ryan
20's Brittany, Danny, Janna
30's Krista, Doug
40's Mitchell, Angie, Debbie, Erika, Lyle, Kathy
50's Kim, John
60's Paulette
70's Monica, Rita

This won't happen again for a long time since I am rapidly leaving the 60's and those in their 50's are just barely there.

Madison anyone?

Rita and I had a great overnight trip to Kewadin on Monday. There were heavy clouds and winds all the way up there and they were escorting trucks and busses going across the Macinac Bridge. The heavens opened up just as we got to our first casino stop in St. Ignace. I got three drops on me between the bus and the casino. When it was time to re-board the bus, all that was left were puddles.

One of my past blogs made reference to the fact that I can still sing and dance in my mind. Well, during a couple of wakeful hours Monday night I found some music in my head and I was dancing with Bill. We were doing the Madison. Its a fun dance. We learned it in a ballroom dance class and were pretty good at it.

What I'm thinking is that my body should get credit for all that exercise. Who do I see about that?

Couch Potato Heaven

What a great TV day. I spent all morning with my Coronation Street tapes and then after a brief nap I found the Hall of Fame Tennis Tournement from Newport, RI on Fox Sports Network and they had two semi-final matches. I expect to see Gimelstob and Philipousis in the finals tomorrow.

For my back-and-forth viewing there was a marathon of the World Series of Pop Culture on VH1. They stopped in the middle of the quarter-finals and I'm afraid I will have to watch my local listings to find out when they will continue.

Then for icing on the cake, when both channels went to commercial at the same time, I still have my tape of all last week's Jeopardy shows.

Stuffing it

Stuffing seems to have been the right thing because I felt way better in time to go to Pat and Lee's anniversary party on Friday night. And what a swell party it was. We tried to teach Jackson the Chicken Dance the next day and he was fascinated by it. By us doing it.

Caugh, caugh

I have a cold. Its been a really long time since I've had a cold and it would seem that in the meantime, I got really old. When old people have a hacking caugh, the kind of caugh that proceeds to gag reflex, their bodies take that as permission to expell any excess air that has been hanging around inside.

So, I've got this cold. Should I be stuffing or starving? What the heck, I enjoy stuffing, I'll stick with that.

Soccer by the card

Yellow card, red card. How about SAG card. The more agony the foulee can convey, the more likely a yellow card. Do they learn that at soccer camp? Writhing 101. I realize they are on the field and not on the screen but it seemed too mean to substitute an F for the S.

But, oh, the tension. Agassi is serving at 4-5, the score is at deuce. Too tense, I turn to soccer. England is lining up for a free kick, Hargreaves is taking the kick. Too tense, back to tennis. Agassi has held for 5-5.

Fast forward, its the first set tiebreak, Agassi is at 5-2. Nadal's service brings it to 5-4, then he takes one of Agassi's serves, its 5-5 in the tiebreak. Back to soccer. They are in the second overtime. Portugal is very agressive. Robinson is blocking shots left and right. Portugal sends the ball into the net, but someone is off-sides and its not a goal. Back to tennis, they are in a commercial. I don't know who won the first set. The second overtime in the soccer game is over. They are going into penalty kicks.

OMG, I need a nap.

The Clock Struck 44g

I got a cramp in my leg last night. While I was repositioning, I glanced at the ceiling to see what time it was. I love my clock that reflects the time on the ceiling. The clock said 4.4g. I would have been OK with that, but the cramp persisted and I started to wonder what the g stood for. By the time I decided to get up and take a pill, the clock said 4:51.

By then I was awake enough and I turned on the early morning news to see what had gone on overnight. I said a prayer for the poor people caught in floods on the east coast. I was still awake when the clock said 5.5g. I dozed off sometime after that but woke in time to change the channel to ESPN2 at 7:00 where they are covering Wimbledon.

I am loving that tournement. All my favorite people are still in.

I've got my Megan. The bad news is that it is because of a crisis in Gordon's family. His mom came through her surgery as well as they could expect but she is not a happy invalid. I understand that she is resisting tests and medication which adds stress to her family but they are coping.

Just as I was getting ready to brag about having Megan, Gordon and his sister Tanya came and whisked her away. They are going someplace in Detroit from wence the fireworks will be visable for the big show tonight. Gretchen is meeting them there after work. I'm glad they are going to see the fireworks as long as they are down here. I, myself, am content to view them on TV.

In other news, the deposit has been made on the Scandanavian Cruise and since the Cruise dates are 6/16/07 thru 6/30/07 I will not be going to the time share in Florida next year.

The sadness of missing Florida is rapidly being replaced by the excitement as I track our ports of call on my globe. The ship leaves from Dover, England and goes to Oslo, Norway: Stockholm, Sweden: Helsinki, Finland: two days at St. Petersburg, Russia: Berlin, Germany: two days at Copenhagen, Denmark: Helsingborg, Sweden and back to Dover, England.

We got a great cabin assignment close to the Grand Foyer, which means close to the main elevators. Eat your hearts out.

Basement Woes

I have, not just one, but two daughters at my disposal. Jackson wants to go down the basement anyways so they may as well do my laundry. What did we find down there. A river of rusty water leading from under the furnace to the drain. The water was rusty because the bottom of the furnace panel and a leg of the hot water heater were all rusted. Who knows how long that water has been running down the drain.

I may have mentioned in a previous blog about this motor that is mounted on the side of my furnace encased in an uncovered metal box. That enclosure was now full of water and it was dripping onto the floor from there. There is an electrical cord running from this motor and there is an electrical outlet very close to the cord but the cord is not plugged in. No one, not maintenance people, tradespeople, friends or family has been abel to tell me what this motor was and whether it should be plugged in.

So, I called maintenance Monday morning. Yes, they would come out, but if the problem turned out to be A/C related they would charge me for their time. So I called the A/C people. Last time I needed them it was $85.00 to come out and extra if they had to do anything. I was envisioning needing a whole new A/C unit. The City of Westland recently changed their code requirements and I have heard that the cost of installing A/C has tripled.

They couldn't come out until the next day (Tuesday). So I called maintenance back and said never mind, I had the A/C people coming out and that if it was not A/C related, I would call maintenance back. But in the meantime, could they send someone by just to tell me what that motor was for because no one seemed to know.

So the maintenance guy showed up. Erika went downstairs with him. He plugged in the motor and all the water disappeared. That was the pump to get rid of excess condensation while the A/C was running. He is a new guy with maintenance and he comes from Florida so he said he knew all about those kinds of things.

I cancelled the A/C repair guy, and alls well that ends well. Except for the huge rust stains on my brand new basement floor and all the diluted tile glue coming up through the cracks in the tiles. Erika tried to get the rust stains out with CLR but it didn't work. No biggie.

The best laid plans

Erika should be in her car with Jackson peacefully napping in anticipation of getting to Grandma's pool and going swimming with Aunt Gretchen.

That part of the plans has changed. Gordon't father died a little while ago and someone is driving Gordon from West Branch to Birch Run. Gretchen is on her way to Birch Run to pick him up and bring him down here.

I don't know how the rest of Gretchen's week will unfold. My deepest sympathy to Gordon and the Gerth family.

Ikea, Ukea, everybody kea

Our Ikea opens tomorrow morning. Steph called me yesterday afternoon to let me know she was in line and had been interviewed by the local news shows. I saw her on Channel 2, and saw her in the background on Channel 4. The first 100 people in line are promised a chair that sells for $72.00. Steph said she was number 5. There are lots of other incentives like mystery envelopes with ascending amounts of money and percentages off. When I first saw the circular I thought to myself that if I were an able bodied person I would like to go there. But I envisioned getting in the car at 8:45 to get there for the 9:00 opening.

The roofing people just set up all their paraphernalia in front of my house. What with the trucks, tarps and ladders, I'm glad I don't have any flowers and shrubs out there, and pity the folk who do.

Happy Birthday Kathy