Ridiculousness

News broadcaster yesterday morning had me laughing out loud when he announced, “A staggering number of people are facing charges in connection with the January 6th riot on Capitol Hill. The Justice Department has charged over 300 people.”

Three hundred out of thousands?

Big Whoop!

Staggering?

Don’t be ridiculous.

The good news yesterday was that Lady Gaga got her pets back.

I’m kinda sorta maybe buying the story about a woman, not involved, finding the dogs tied up in an alley.

Further news, that Lady G is perfectly willing to give the woman the half million dollar reward, got me to thinking ....

If it were me, I’d be happy just to have been the one to find the dogs, return safe and sound. However, a half million dollars can change a person’s life, change the life of their family, would look great in a retirement plan, so I’d have to take the money.

I do hope, however, they find the culprits because, shooting the dog walker in the chest, they meant to kill him and how ridiculous was it that they were willing to do that ... kill someone.

Further ridiculousness is that I drove all the way back to the mall yesterday to curbside pick up what I thought was a new coffeemaker I’d ordered.

My old school camp-fire-style percolator is on its last leg, so I upgraded to a little 2-4 cup electric.

After braving the 25-mile drive in windy weather, turned out it wasn’t the percolator I was picking up. Instead, it was a free makeup brush I became eligible for with that last makeup order.

Nice, but not worth the drive.

The wind wasn’t as bad as that last time, when I was too scared to drive on the freeway for fear of the jeep being tossed around like a wet rag or trucks turning over on me, so it was freeway all the way up. But I could see there was a problem with traffic on the other side ─ the return drive, so I took the streets back.

It’s good to have options, know my way around impediments after all this time in the area.

I don’t want to jinx myself, but it’s more than odd and ridiculous that the utility company cut our power so often due to heavy winds last few months but now, when the wind is heavier than its ever been, we’re not getting noticed up the wazoo of planned Public Safety Power Outages.

I’m calling B.S. on necessity of the previous outages.

The mall was jam packed and I’d plugged in the drive cam to capture interesting scenes. It couldn’t be more ridiculous that I couldn’t get the device to operate.

Did I do something wrong last time?

Did I break it?

Won’t know until next time I give it a go ─ which will be when I get an email to pick up the coffeemaker.

No word on what Apache did with the letter I provided. However, running into The Baker, I learned management had given him a 3-day notice to move out prior to my providing the letter.

Apache didn’t tell me about that, but the Baker said Apache followed up on the notice by taking it down to the courthouse, where he was told it wasn’t legal, didn't mean anything because “We (the court) didn’t issue this”.

Evidently, management made up their own notice and tried to scare Apache out with it.

Their next move may be to try a lawful eviction, go through the process, which will probably fail.

No telling how this saga with Apache vs. Management/Apache vs. Bike Boy will end, but my guess is that Apache will go postal and end up hurting one or all of them.

Speaking of postal ... coming back from the Pain Cave on Friday, I saw the mail delivery truck pull up and got a glimpse of the guy doing such a poor job on distributing mail.

And, yes, it was a guy. Not our normal lady carrier.

I snapped his photo, so I could turn him in if I saw packages on top of the mailboxes, instead of inside; but, upon following up on his delivery, I didn’t see anything amiss.

Hopefully, our regular lady carrier is just on vacation and will return soon. If not, I’m on this guy like Management and Bike Boy are on Apache. LOL.

I Scared Myself

Puttering around in the kitchen this morning, my eyes landed on the pill case where I keep my daily blood pressure medication.

I really don’t like relying on a pill and resisted having to do so until, after research, talking it over with Twin 2 and thinking it through, decided taking a pill a day was a better choice than having a stroke, possibly not dying but ending up living and dependent on others for care.

That’s a fear of mine, that I’d end up like that ding ding uncle character in Breaking Bad ─ Tio Salamanca, the uncle confined to a wheelchair due to a stroke, unable to speak, dependent on others, resigned to communicating by taping on a bell. Consequently, I take the pill, check my pressure most days ... just to be sure, exercise and try to eat right ─ or at least as right as my gut issues will allow.

The pill case should have been empty this morning, ready for me to place the pill I am to take today, but it wasn’t.

OH NO! thought I. I forgot to take yesterday’s pill.

Realizing I’d missed a day scared the bejeebers out of me, but it was just one pill, one day ... how bad could it be.

Evidently, I should have died in my sleep.

Speaking of fright, of scaring myself, I had to laugh last night, when I was watching TV shows I’d recorded, one of which is a little known show called Tales of Terror.

It’s not a very good show, I wouldn’t recommend it, but the TV Guide advertised the episode as having to do with mysterious phone calls from the dead, which interested me enough to set it to tape.

Turns out the calls were being placed 3:30 in the morning from a phone situated in the empty office of a grave yard and, at one point, it looked like I was going to see who or what was placing the calls and realized I was scared enough to have pulled the covers over my eyes so as not to see, but yet to see.

Realizing what I was doing caused me to laugh at myself inside, and though I didn’t stop shielding myself until the scary part was over, I did grab the phone, took a selfie, so I could show you how it was for me, a grown woman, watching a scary movie.

This morning, 30 minutes later .....

Still a little high, but looks like I’m going to live.

It’s a good thing today is not a Pain Cave workout day. Wouldn’t do to exert myself until I’m back down to something like 124 over whatever, which I should be by days’ end.

A Royal Mission My Arse

It so bothered me a week or so ago when I saw something advertised on television that I recorded and set aside for blog fodder.

Today is as good as any to get this off my chest.

He speaks of ... Reconnect us?

Speaks of ... A planet for us all?

Dares to speak those words after the way the royals have treated, and continue to treat, Megan ... and Harry.

They treat the couple in a manner that speaks of so not reconnecting ... a planet for us all except Megan in particular.

Phooey on him. What a hypocrite.

Needless to say, I did not watch the broadcast.

In other news ... months and months ago, I thought it would be a good idea to invest in an automobile dash cam, as I frequently see things on the road I’d have liked to have captured on film.

After receiving the device, I couldn’t spare the time to learn how to use it because my focus was completing Twin 2’s needlepoint.

Which needlepoint, by the way, was displayed on Twin 2’s Facebook page, with many commenting with adjectives such as “beautiful ... amazing”.

One over the top commenter called the canvas “a spirit lifting love fest”, to which Twin 2 replied, “Indeed. I’m so moved that she would spend so much time on me”.

That made me laugh because, all us mothers do ─ to a certain age, is spend time on our children.

Guess she didn’t think of that.

Even, after our kids are grown and on their own, we still end up devoting quite a lot of time to them.

The Spock part of my brain prompted me to Google just how much time.

Turns out, I spent 3,594 plus hours on that needlepoint and 157,680 hours on just the first 18 years of Twin 2’s life. Some of it hard time ... very hard time. Not as hard as Twin 1, but nevertheless sometimes difficult.

So, anyway, back to the dash cam. Now that I’m not consumed with finishing a needlepoint project, I’ve slowly been working my way through the dash cam instruction manual.

First I found I had to order, pick up and install a memory card. That done, next was to consider placement, on the windshield, for the adhesive mount.

Having worked that out, while attaching the dash cam to the mount, I realized it was to be a permanent placement and quickly detached the dash cam from the mount before it took because I didn’t want to temp the criminal element into smashing my windows to get to the dash cam.

I couldn’t get the adhesive mount off the windshield, it’s there for perpetuity. But at least I was quick enough to be able to get the dash cam off.

Researching and not finding a portable mount that wasn’t too complicated for me to figure out, I came up with my own solution and, yesterday, took the dash cam for a trial run to/from Best Buy, where I had an appointment for the Geeks to work out why a nearly new iPod would not recharge, why the battery registered as dead.

Redneck Portable Dash Cam Mount

Can you tell what it is?

That it’s wadded up duck tape?

At any rate, it worked ─ I position the dash cam on top of the wad when I head out, lift it off the wad when I return, and this solution cost me nothing ─ as I have all manner of duct tape on hand.

As for the iPod, it turned on and worked perfectly when the Geek took a look at it; and, when he ran a diagnosis, he could find not a single thing wrong with the battery.

Go figure.

The Wind, a Drive, and a Letter

Woke up yesterday annoyed with the world because I didn’t feel sufficiently rested. It was Monday already and my weekend felt just so short.

Time is moving way too fast, thought I. There’s just not enough weekend in the weekend, lamented I.

Imagine my surprise and relief when, after laying out workout clothes, running bathwater, I logged onto the computer and learned yesterday was Sunday not Monday.

No wonder the weekend felt so short.

At any rate, after a do nothing, nowhere to go Sunday, I was feeling well rested when I woke up this morning, much better prepared for another week of life, i.e., workouts and errands.

First errand was, after the Pain Cave, to drive 25 miles to the mall to pick up beauty products I’m running low on. 

Since I can no longer trust USPS, I had to set my order for curbside pickup, rather than mail. Wind was kicking up so hard, I didn’t feel safe driving the freeway, so I drove the streets all the way up and back, which made for a long drive, but it’s done.

Returning to the complex, I ran into Apache, whom I filled in on photos having turned up ... twelve days after having been delivered to the wrong box, but at least they turned up.

”That’s nothing”, said Apache. “I found packages placed on top of the mailbox ledge, right out in the open, and had to go tell the people that they’d better get down there and pick them up”.

WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON?

Returning from the Pain Cave on Friday, I’d actually seen a package on top of the mailbox ledge. I almost took a photo, but I was tired from the workout, my phone was deep in my workout bag, the package wasn’t for anyone in my quad so, not feeling like doing a good deed that day, I didn’t get involved.

The fact that Apache saw this dereliction of mail carrier duty as well, plus additional packages, indicates we’d better get used to it. It’s our new normal and looks like that long drive was the right thing to do.

Apache went on to say he was happy to have run into me because he needed a favor ... that Bicycle Boy and management are double teaming him with Bicycle Boy spreading rumors that Apache has threatened him, management with sticking the lawyers on him about posting to what management says was their website.

If you long time readers will recall, that came up way back in April 2020, and I used managements b.s. as an excuse to get out from under being administrator to the Residents’ Volunteer Activity Committee's facebook page and deleted it.

If, as management says, the page was theirs then where is it? How did it get deleted?

Lawyers are once again involved ─ management’s lawyer and Apache’s lawyer, so Apache asked if I’d provide a letter for his attorney explaining the nexus of that page and how management had nothing to do with it.

No problem. The letter has been written, signed and is ready for delivery to Apache’s attorney.

Apache had better hand-carry, rather than depend on USPS to deliver, but I’ve got copies ... just in case.

Former legal secretary that I am, it’s a whole two pages and designed to make management look like the fools they are.

No end in sight to the drama between Apache and Bicycle Boy, between Apache and Management.

On that long drive back to the complex, while stopped at a light, a house caught my attention.

Is it just me, or do the planks painted blue make it look like that area doesn’t belong to the same house? I was thinking white would have blended in, looked less jarring.

It’s terrible to have your home located on a corner, by a traffic light, where folks have nothing better to do than judge you for curb appeal or lack thereof. LOL.

Six Degrees of Lady Gaga

That was me yesterday, when I stopped into the market after the morning’s workout.

As I was coming out of an aisle, an old guy passing in front of the aisle coughed. I stopped dead in my tracks.

His one cough turned into another, and then it turned into one of those old people phlegm coughs.

He was well beyond six feet from me, thankfully was wearing a mask, yet and still I said to myself “NOPE”, did a 180 and walked all the way around to the opposite side of the store to get to the check stand. I wanted nothing of the air surrounding old guy ...... just in case.

Before this incident, I was heading from the refrigerated section (eggs) to veggies and a display of oreo cookies caught my attention.

How cool is that! Lady Gaga Oreos.

It later occurred to me that instead of snapping a photo, I should have taken a selfie with the cookies because ─ six degrees from Lady Gaga, I was wearing one of my mask guy creations and he’s one her costume designers.

Once back at the complex, I tried my hand at something I’ve seen on John’s Going Gently blog ... a scotch egg.

John’s recipe called for “lean pork mince”. I don’t eat pork or beef, so I substituted lean ground turkey.

So far so good, as I decided to bake in the oven, leave off the panko bread crumbs.

Still seemed so far so good, when I removed from the oven.

Moment of truth would come when sliced in half.

Success!

Not as lovely as John’s scotch egg, but good enough for me, tasted great, and I’ve got one left over for today’s lunch.

In other news ... I don’t know about anyone else, but I am thoroughly enjoying the Ted Cruz Cancun debacle.

Talk about Karmic Justice.

After failing to put country ahead of party at the second impeachment, country ahead of his political aspirations, after all his many hypocrisies, could it be that a trip will be his undoing?

I doubt it, but one can hope.

Other than enjoying the bashing Ted is getting in the news and on twitter, I’m also ROFLMAO while reading Snowflake’s (Ted's dog) thoughts about being left alone. Snowflake has a twitter page and talks about how he didn’t care much for dad being shamed into coming home early because, though he missed the kids, dad not so much. Snowflake also posted “The only treats I’m getting are the memes bagging on dad”.

Such a fun twitter page. I hope it lives on.

Lesson Learned

I feel guilty about enjoying such near perfect weather while folks in Texas are freezing to death.

Guiltier still that I’ve been so annoyed with the utility company’s continuous energy shaming.

I first brought up being energy shamed back in 2019. The utility company was emailing me a monthly report indicating I was using more than my neighbors.

Since then, it’s been continuous monthly email reports of my being an energy hog and, just this month, I was also subjected to a mailer indicating the same.

My thinking has been I need what I need and, so long as I’m paying the bill, what’s the big deal. Besides ... how can a person use too much energy. Energy was out there, available for use. I even considered lodging a complaint, with the utility company, about their harassing me with not only the emails, but now double tapping me by snail mail.

Well, reading about the Texas power outage this morning, how it’s the result of the state’s infrastructure not being able to handle the inclement weather and how California was, in the past, mocked for its energy policy, which urged us to turn off unneeded lights and limit use of appliances, I got woke.

Lesson learned. I get it now. So, today finds me turning off lights and being mindful of which appliances are plugged in.

This morning’s workout at the Pain Cave was preempted by a dental appointment.

Everything went well. I felt pandemic safe in the dental office, and with the hygienist. However, Dr. McDreamy was not in office today. Instead, in comes a DDS I’ve never seen before who looked to be about 15 years old, let’s call him Doogie Howser DDS.

”You’re a young one”, says I.

”I get that a lot”, said he.

"You remind me of that television show about a kid doctor, Doogie Howser MD I think it was".

He looks puzzled, like he's trying to remember, so I said, "That was probably before your time".

"No" said he. "I think I heard of that ... Neil Patrick Harris?"

"Correct", said I, after which Doogie began his examination.

While he was doing so, another DDS, that I couldn’t see because he was behind me, came into the room, and what proceeded sounded to me like a script the two were running.

The second DDS said to Doogie, “You did a great job on that root canal”.

Color me suspicious, but I right away felt the compliment was for my benefit, so I’d be confident Doogie knew what he was doing. And, I have to admit, I was a little impressed that Doogie got high praise for a root canal.

Then Doogie said he found an area up front, lower teeth, that appeared to be spacing. That it looked like it once had a filling, the filling fell out and that it was an easy fix. “We wouldn’t even have to numb the area”.

I must have made a face because the second DDS said, “Oh, oh. I don’t think she’s going for it”.

He was right but only because I never had a filling in that area.

Doogie should have looked at my chart before making that pronouncement.

I didn’t call Doogie out on it though. Instead, I told Doogie that in all the time I’ve been examined by my regular dentist, he’d never mentioned a problem in that area. That I didn’t want to insult him (Doogie) but I’d be asking for a second opinion, and I be asking it from Dr. McDreamy. Whereupon, the DDS behind me told Doogie to put a “watch” on it. So Doogie said he’d mark it as such.

At home now, looking in the mirror, I don’t see a hole or anything different than usual, but I’m not a dentist.

At any rate, I told the hygienist to be sure to set my next appointment for when McDreamy is in the office. If McDreamy agrees with Doogie, I'll have the so-called spacing filled in.

However, if and when McDreamy retires I’m going to be in a pickle because, if Abbot and Costello (Doogie and that other DDS) are primed to take over, I'm already feeling distrust and will be looking to go elsewhere ... maybe find a female dentist.

Twelve Days Later

Well, whatdoyaknow ... the two missing packets of photos turned up in my mailbox yesterday.

I don’t know if it was a guilty conscious or the grapevine that moved the confiscator into turning them over, but turn them over the individual did ... and the packets were not opened, seal was still in tact.

So where were they for twelve days?

And what was the confiscator doing with them for twelve days?

My guess is the confiscator wasn’t sure the delivery couldn’t be traced back, so they were holding onto and would open when they felt it was safe to do so.

I dunno.

Inasmuch as the packets were not left at my door, I’m assuming the confiscator didn't want to risk being seen returning and, as the individual did not want to be seen, I seriously doubt they handed the packets to the mail carrier saying they’d received by mistake ─ especially since so many days had transpired.

Instead, the confiscator probably just surreptitiously dropped them into the outgoing mail slot and, when the mail carrier opened outgoing, saw the packets already had a completed tracking label, put them into my slot ─ the correct slot this time. If it was the regular mail person, she would have recognized my name and known which mail slot to drop into.

At any rate, even though I no longer need the photos ─ because I reordered and completed my scrapbooking project, I’m happy to know where the photos are .... with ME, not in the possession of some creepy guy.

Nothing else going on around here except, I forget which day it was, the Activity Director did drop a craft kit off at my door.

Inside was the makings of a valentine door wreath, supplies to paint little wooden hearts, a wood picture frame for painting, and a brown wood heart for painting.

I’ve no use for the little hearts or the picture frame but, inasmuch as the kit contained instructions for the wreath, I gave it a try.

Heart and flowers are not my thing, but it came out cute, so I posted it to the door so Activity Director can feel good about her efforts and perhaps come up with other drop off craft ideas for us.

The brown heart turned out to be a refrigerator magnet, and I so liked the grain on the wood that I kept it as is and stuck it on the fridge door.

Valentine's Day

That is all.

Second Time’s the Charm

The rain storm I woke up to yesterday morning, thankfully ran its course, eased up and stopped altogether before I had to leave for my workout. However, when I was getting dressed, I dressed for rain and I had a moment of ─ what can only be called excitement, when it occurred to me ... It’s raining. I should wear my rainbow hair band and rainbow face mask. Thinking about that thought later, it seemed such a sad commentary on life, as we now know it, that one is excited about deciding which mask to wear.

I think it was April when I first began wearing a mask. It was one of the in-demand and hard to obtain N15's, that I was fortunate to have a supply of on hand ─ left over from when I’d required protection from the poor air quality we were left with after multiple fires broke out around us. From there, I moved onto homemade masks, until I hooked up with glamour mask guy. Since then, inasmuch as masks are a necessity, I try to have fun with them ─ matching to leggings and such, but yesterday was the first day I actually got excited about wearing one.

Fauci says we will be in masks for “several several more months”, so the fun and excitement will continue, whether we want it to or not.

After yesterday’s workout, I captured a rainbow selfie on the way out, with Trainer in the background.

Arriving back at the complex, I headed straight for the mailbox.

Lo and Behold, second time’s the charm, USPS got it right, pictures were in my mailbox ..... well, USPS kinda sorta got it right because, along with my photos was a key to unlock one of the lock boxes indicating I’d received a package too large to fit into the mail slot.

I couldn’t remember having ordered anything else, but it’s not uncommon for me to forget, so I used the key, opened the lock the box and there was a box labeled "beauty items" ─ not for me, not my name, not my unit number, but for a resident in one of the other buildings.

WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!!!!, thought I.

First the scrapbooking supplies, then the photos, now someone else's package.

Is the mail carrier on drugs?

It can’t be our regular mail carrier. She knows me and has been so good at her job ─ seeing to it I get my deliveries, even walking deliveries to my door, that I gave her a Starbucks Gift Card for Christmas in appreciation.

She must be on vacation.

Must be someone new.

At any rate, I immediately walked the box over to the correct unit and thought to myself how easy it would have been for the individual who confiscated my first set of photos to do likewise. You look down at what you have, see it’s not yours, no need to even take it into your unit, just walk it over to the correct unit. Easy Peasy.

The man at the door was a resident I’d seen around for maybe three years. I’d even blogged about him once, named him “The Preacher” because, though I hardly said anything more to him than good morning, one time we did get into a discussion about something No. 45 was doing or had caused to happen, and Preacher’s response was, “I always go by the bible”. After which, he began to refer to the Book of Revelations and how everything that’s happened with No. 45 was prophesized.

He wasn’t wrong, but it felt like he was coming from a high place, talking down to me ─ mansplaining like I was some idiot woman and he this all-knowing male.

At any rate, the delivery was for his wife, who I don’t know but who he says I’ve probably seen around. We talked a bit about how deliveries are going wrong and how not everyone around here does the right thing with what they receive, and how those that don’t do the right thing don’t realize they bring bad luck upon themselves. I mentioned my photos.

So, word about the missing photos is slowly making the rounds on the grapevine.

Inasmuch as USPS deliveries are going so wrong around here, unless I can find another delivery service, I may have to take the risk and return to in-store shopping for my beauty products and craft supplies.

Out for Delivery

To say it’s raining cats and dogs this morning would be an understatement, and I think I brought it on myself.

How you ask.

After that last rain storm, expecting the wet weather wasn’t through with us yet, I’d kept my umbrella and boots near the front door. However, we’ve had such nice weather since that, yesterday, I decided to return the umbrella and boots to the back closet. While doing so, I thought to myself ... if I move these, it will probably start raining again. Sure enough, I woke up to cats, dogs this morning.

Not wanting to swim to the Pain Cave, I’m tempted to opt out today, but no. Not exercising nearly as much as I should, on off Pain Cave days, I can’t afford to not workout today.

The second set of photos is due to arrive today. Checking tracking I see the status is “out for delivery”. Hopefully the photos make it to the correct mailbox this time.

As for the first set of photos, the ones placed in the wrong mail slot and can't be traced, I haven’t yet run into my buddy Apache to ask him to keep an eye out for who has possession of the photos when chatting it up with the fellas or visiting other units. I did, however, run into Handsome Man, who made a good point — that the individual keeping the photos was not only violating my privacy but committing a theft of property crime.

At any rate, Handsome said he’d keep an eye out, let me know if he sees or hears anything, then started in again on how he’s looking for a “good woman”.

We’d already established in a prior conversation that woman would not be me, because I’m much too happy with my status quo to risk letting some guy enter my life and disrupt its peaceful flow, so I suggested he might take an interest in my Next Door Neighbor. After all, she did express interest in him years ago. She'd invited him to dinner, he accepted and I heard no more about it, but I didn't tell him I knew all this. Instead, I said "_______ is single".

“Oh nooooooooo” was his reply as he looked away from me, shook his head and shuttered.

Whaaaaaaaat?!, thought I.

What’s the extreme reaction about?

I continued with “Why? …. She’s nice looking”.

Again, he looked away, shook his head and uttered an emphatic, “Nooooo! ... No thanks!”.

Puzzling.

“You’re just too hard to please”, said I as I turned to head to my unit.

“As are you”, he replied.

Touché ... I am, but how did he know? LOL.

On another note, I’m not watching any of the Impeachment proceedings. It’s a bad movie. A movie we already knew the ending before the movie even started. A movie with a zero % rotten tomatoes rating.

Holding My Breath

Received tracking notification that the second set of photos has shipped, due to arrive on the 12th.

I’m holding my breath that the two photo packets are placed in MY mail slot this time. If not, there will be a third print request indicating “pickup” rather than mail to home.

I have a feeling that, sooner or later, I’ll know who it is that’s confiscated the first set of photos because one of two things will happen.

One, when I pass the culprit on the property, he will have a twinge of guilty conscious that will cause him to look down at the ground, rather than up at my eyes OR, instead of a twinge of conscious, he will be the kind of person who feels they’ve put one over and smirk.

Either way, when I see the tell tail sign, I’ll know and have decided I’ll point at the person in a way that says “It’s you. I know it and you know it”.

That should make him feel uncomfortable thinking that somehow I’ve found him out if he's guilty, think nothing of the pointing as anything other than a greeting if innocent.

Two, the culprit will brag or show and tell or another resident visiting the culprit’s unit will see my pics, spill the beans, and the grapevine will do the rest. To this end, I’m going to alert my buddy Apache and Handsome Man to keep their eyes and ears open.

In the end, somehow I’ll find out or the Universe will just let me know … it generally always does.

Other than trying to get photos to complete the Creative Memory album, this month is all about appointments.

First is a dental appointment for a cleaning. Hopefully Dr. McDreamy is in office, so I can get my fix of handsome.

Another appointment is computer related.

I don’t know if the puter has a virus or it’s just a symptom of the latest unsolicited unwanted Microsoft upgrade, but it keeps locking and shutting itself off.

Getting an appointment for tech service is much like getting an appointment for the Covid virus shot in that appointments are few and far between, but I’ve got one towards end of month. That is .. an appointment with the Geek Squad, not anywhere for the shot. I’m not planning on getting the shot until I learn more about what the long-term effects are.

The other appointment is for that Apple iPod. Less than a year old, it stopped working little over a month ago, won’t recharge and the battery light indicates dead as a doornail.

Pre-pandemic, I could walk in and get both items serviced same time. Now it all by appointments only and separate appointments for separate items.

So many petty annoyances this month and, with so many desperate people on the loose in the neighborhood, it’s not safe to get out and walk it off. In fact, crime is on the rise all over. It’s not safe anywhere.

All in all, I’m looking at a risk-taking month — going places I really don’t want to go but of necessity must, while holding my breath pics are delivered correctly.

Eye of The Beholder

It’s been a frustrating few days as three different deliveries went awry.

I’d been awaiting a Creative Memory product necessary to complete pages in the scrapbook. USPS delivery was scheduled for Thursday night, before 9:00 p.m. Around 8:00, I checked tracking and found the item supposedly had been left at my door 6:15. I did not hear anyone come up the stairs that evening, had not heard a knock and, upon checking outside the door, found no package. Obviously, the driver delivered to the wrong door and, inasmuch as not everyone around here is honest, I worried and contacted USPS because I felt driver error should be corrected by driver. That he or she should retrace where the delivery was made and retrieve the package.

USPS felt otherwise, said tracking indicated the package was delivered to the correct location. I countered with the fact that I am on the receiving end and the package was absolutely not delivered to the correct location. Whereupon, USPS suggested I myself check the neighborhood. 

Not wanting to further frustrate myself, I decided screw it and prepared myself for locating a different supplier for the product, a supplier that did not use USPS for delivery. But then, lo and behold, a day or so later a neighbor from another building walked the package over.

So much for USPS insisting it was delivered to the correct location. It was delivered to the right complex, but wrong building in the complex. 

Thank goodness that neighbor, a woman I’ve never seen before, was honest. It doesn’t appear the neighbor who received the last delivery, which was two separate packets of photos I had printed, will follow suit.

Though I also received email notice the photos had been delivered, I’m assuming the mail carrier put them in the wrong mail slot ─ no way to trace that. So, I can and have already processed a second request for those prints, hope they make it to my mail slot this next time, but the idea of someone with those photos ─ most likely a guy, because I can’t imagine a woman has all these photos (of mostly me in different masks, me participating in different 5Ks, the medals, the swag, photos of me in those face shields I recently acquired, photos of me with family) is really creepy.

At any rate, customer service sucking so hard last few days has been frustrating, but I soldiered through without heading to See’s Candy Store to medicate myself.

Unable to continue with the Creative Memory project, until the photos arrive, I pulled out my next needlepoint project and put together an embroidery stand to work with, because holding and manipulating stiff aida cloth in my left hand, needle in right hand, was beginning to stress my wrists. I’m not sure how long it was supposed to take to put the stand together ─ maybe an hour but, for me, it turned into an all-day 9:00 to 5:00 Ikea like project, but I got ‘er done.

It’s getting pretty crowded here in my little unit, what with both scrapbooking supplies all over the place and a needlepoint project going at the same time. If I ever have to relocate, it would behoove me to get a two-bedroom unit, so I can turn one into a room for crafts.

I titled this post “Eye of the Beholder” because the purple and green face shield was seen entirely different by my millennial Trainer. Kathy saw the shield as me looking like a fly. I likened it to me looking like a bug. Trainer saw Power Ranger and asked me to wear it for his Instagram posting of Friday’s session.

I guess our beholding eye is dependent upon what era we were born into.

Granddaughter tells me all Power Rangers are named after colors, and dubbed me the Bling Ranger.

You can’t really tell what I’m saying through the mask in the video below, but it was “Power Ranger Activate!”

Signs of Life

Yesterday found me once again running so as not to get too close to our previously having tested positive Head Maintenance Guy (HMG).

Returning from the Pain Cave, I saw him posting what looked to be packages to the upstairs doors across the quad.

Looking up at my door, seeing he’d not yet posted in that area, figuring we were next, I tried to hurry over the grass and up the stairs.

HMG appears to have recovered from his diagnosis, probably because he’s young, and was thus moving rather quickly. Quicker than I because I’m older and had just experienced another full body workout at the Cave. It wasn’t as intense as that last full body workout ─ the one that made everything hurt and had me walking like Frankenstein, but I was feeling it and couldn’t move as quickly as I was trying to move.

At any rate, just as I reached the stairs, HMG ended up right behind me and went first to post to the two first floor doors. I grabbed the stair's rails, pushed and propelled myself up the stairs to get to the door and inside with him hot on my heels.

Luckily, I had keys in hand and was able to open the door, get inside, slam the door shut, just as he got to next door neighbor’s door.

Sometimes I think I’m over reacting because he’s finally wearing a mask when out and about on the property, but better safe than sorry. I’ll continue to avoid him like the plague. Pun intended.

It was hours before I got around to opening the door to see what was posted, which turned out to be the Monthly Calendar, along with a package of Cheddar Goldfish (yuk!), a square of fabric ─ label says “Made in China ...Distributed by Oriental Trading” and two elastic hair bands.

Weird.

I don’t get the fabric square or the hair bands, but okay.

The enclosed calendar tells me we have President’s Day coming up on the 15th.

Thank the Lord that day no longer involves No. 45.

The calendar also indicates Activity Director is hosting “February Craft Kits” Tuesday, February 9 ... call Activity Director if interested.

It was “crafts” so I was interested, called and found it’s not a group session.

That’s good, because I wasn’t doing a group session. Not even if it was outdoors and we were spaced.

Activity Director tells me the kit is a painting craft and the kit will be dropped off at the doors of those who’ve requested.

Works for me.

Continuing to check on status of Old Guy ─ upstairs, across the quad, I’m seeing signs of life. Lights have been turned on at night, turned off early morning and, returning from the Pain Cave yesterday, his car was gone ─ indicating he was out and about.

So it appears all is well in the quad.

On another note, my mask guy has outdone himself by coming up with a line of fabulous sunglass style face shields. Of course, I had to order one or two.

I ordered a holographic rainbow clear.

I also ordered a purple green holographic.

Sweetheart that he is, he threw in an orange green holographic for free.

A nose bridge allows the shields to fit comfortably on my nose, even over my glasses and there’s 100 percent anti-fog visibility.

These will be great for when I don’t want anyone to see my face not made up and to add as an accessory to my cosplay outfits once the pandemic is done with us and group run/walks start back up.