Bow Wow Wow Yippie Yo Yippie Ye

Skelly got a dog over the weekend … a Golden Retriever.

Meet Cujo.

I’m currently having a real fixation with skeletons, wish I had more and almost added a skeleton planter, I saw at the market, to my menagerie.

It’s a planter I can leave on the patio all year round but, since the sun kills every plant I try to raise on the patio, I couldn’t justify the purchase.

Also inside the market, I spied a clever way to "carve" a pumpkin … I ininitially thought it was a mask glued on, which would have been a great idea, but painting does just as well as carving.

Leaving the market, I spotted a Rubicon tricked out with a Halloween display, driving in. Of course I turned around, took a few pics as the occupants walked away.

I'll be sad to see the month of Halloween end, because seeing seasonal decorations is so fun.

In other news — knock on wood, I think the angry tree spirit, with a little kick from an old remedy, has left the unit.

I got serious about speeding its exit when the timer on the cellphone failed — another act of electronic vandalism. The timer would tick off the minutes I'd set for cook time but, when the time was up, it emitted no sound/no signal to let me know time had run out, after which an old remedy came to mind.

Back in the day (around 2005), when I was up against the Klan at that racist agency (CEO Klansman, various Klan Department Heads, their Klan secretaries), I’d get to the office early, before the racist arrived, walk around and into various offices with a ying yang mug of Gadatsu Holy Tea, speaking out loud, "Evil spirits, chew on this" as a way to draw their dark energy out of the atmosphere in which I was working, because that’s what Holy Tea does. It’s used in rituals to bring peace and salvation to unrested spirits, effective in purifying negative energy.

One morning, as I was working the ritual, I failed to notice my boss was in her office, saw me, yelled out, "Shirley, what are you doing?"

"Getting rid of evil spirits", said I.

She was cool, knew I was different, liked me, sometimes helped me by giving intel on what the Klan was planning. So, she just accepted what I was doing, like it was normal, went back to whatever it was she was doing. LOL.

I only had to do the ritual a couple times before I felt a shift in the energy … the Klansmen, Klan girls not so sure of themselves, more leery of me because I didn’t seem to react with the fear they’d expected. Instead, I was always smiling, walking around looking smug, like I knew something they didn’t.

I did.

End the end, the racists could never get me or get to me and, eventually, all the bad energy they directed at me bounced off my wall of protection and hit ‘em. The racist CEO resigned ahead of an indictment for financial fraud, the various racist Department Heads, like rats jumping a sinking ship, fled to other jobs. One committed suicide, and those remaining — because they couldn’t find other jobs, went on the downlow with their racism, were no longer a problem for me.

So, anyway, when the timer on the cellphone went out, I decided to get serious about sending the tree being on its way, thought back to the Holy Tea, which has been with me, in the cupboard all these years.

I’ve never had to use it since those days with the racists, but it doesn’t hurt to have such a powerful antidote to unruly forces on hand, so I’ve kept it all these years … when I moved to Long Beach to help Great Granddaughter out, when I moved back to where I am now, the tea was always with me.

On Friday, I performed the ritual, sent the tree being — knock on wood, packing.

In even more news, it appears Lu and Dream Lover are back on; as daily, since trucks arrived, carted Lu’s hoarding stuff away, I’ve observed him heading for her unit and, looking at posts on Facebook, Dream Lover has been gifting Lu with some of his Crafts Day artwork.

That’s all she needs … more stuff.

At any rate, Happy Monday, the game continues.

Spooky

In addition to a lightbulb, three different chargers, and the emersion blender failing in a few short days, one of the burners on the stove went out and, in the middle of watching a Chinese drama last night, a notification popped up on the laptop "Trend Micro no longer supports this software".

I’m beginning to think this place is cursed, that cutting down the trees released an electronics hating, kitchen appliance hating demon.

Why it's chosen my unit to vent it's displeasure, is anyone's guess.

Burner on the stove is no biggie as I’ve three other burners, except it is my favorite burner, the one predominately in use — right front.

Is that weird that I have a favorite burner, or is it common … all of you have favorite burners as well?

I’ve yet to hear from management about that $15 lightbulb, so I’ll hold off on putting in a work order for the burner until after that issue is resolved.

The laptop is a different situation. Still operable, but without cybersecurity software, I’d be vulnerable to data theft, so I quick made an appointment with Tech Support for this morning.

Having purchased the laptop in 2018, maybe even before that, I figured it couldn’t be upgraded to Windows 11 to recapture the cybersecurity program, so I was prepared to purchase a replacement.

Luckily, Tech Guy Dan was able to download a different version of the security program which, he believes, will allow secure use of the laptop. Secure, at least long enough to wait for a big sale he says will be coming up on laptops.

While in the store, I checked prices and was surprised to see how reasonably priced computer equipment is.

I was expecting two dolls donnie’s tariffs would cause prices to go sky high. Instead, if and when I have to upgrade to Windows 11 to get the cybersecurity program, the laptop will cost a couple hundred dollars less than I paid back in 2018.

Go figure.

The drive cam caught a funny thing on the freeway as I travelled to the computer store.

So far so good on not receiving text messages from Crafty Lady, and no Kesha knock on the door.

Waiting to Exhale

Nerves still on edge, I’m afraid to wake up tomorrow morning — learn I can breathe again or if we’re screwed.

I need to drive to Redland today, have my cellphone looked at because it’s been tech heck with not being able to first swipe to accept calls and then, when I changed to tap — which worked for a while, but now doesn't work either and, when a call comes in, the phone goes to some kind of Assistant that reverts the call to text.

Absolute tech heck.

Problem with driving to Redlands is, I can’t trust myself to be around people while nerves are on edge because, if I run into poor service, I can’t promise I’ll be able to maintain. Not turn into a Karen.

I did yesterday — turned into a Karen that is. Asked to speak to the Manager, made a complaint, walked out without picking up a prescription and then Yelped a bad review for the local pharmacy.

Stopping at the pharmacy after yesterday’s workout, I was pleased to see it was a slow day — only three of us in line. I'd be in/out lickety split.

The first customer was at the counter already, picked up his package and walked away. When he walked away the young lady at the counter, instead of taking Customer No. 2, walked away and began a conversation with a coworker about something personal I wish I’d paid attention to or recorded, because she left Customer No. 2 and I hanging for 10 minutes or more.

Customer No. 2 kept turning around, complaining to me, making yak yak yak fingers with her hands to indicate the girls were ignoring us, talking instead.

"I know, I can hear them talking", said I.

When counter girl finally acknowledged Customer No. 2, took care of her pick up order, she repeated the poor lack of customer service process.

Instead of calling me to the counter, she went back to her personal conversation, picked up a few prescription packages, filed them, at  which point I was talking outloud ……… "I can’t believe she’s filing when I’m standing here ... Can she not see me? .... Am I invisible?", I said to myself.

By then, I’d been standing in line on a slow day for at least 20 minutes or more, leaned on the wall for support, thought about taking a chair from another section, dragging it over, waiting it out, but then decided screw it, walked away. But not without stopping to make a complaint with the Manager, who began walking towards the Pharmacy saying "I’ll have a talk with them" (counter girl and the coworker she’d been chatting with, while ignoring customers).

Later that night, I yelped the heck out of that Pharmacy. So, I’d best stay home today, shampoo the carpet or something, keep away from the possibility of running into more idiot people, because I’m all out of suffering poor customer service without making a fuss.

On another note, patio Halloween decorations are back in storage; except, seeing how some had turned their skeletons into lamps, the plan was to order a lighting kit and turn Skelly into a lamp.

Dragging Skelly inside, having researched the process of making a base, running electrical cords through Skelly, yada yada yada, I came to the conclusion too complicated for me, and decided to go another way.

Running the pole of the sun lamp I'd purchased a while back through Skelly's body, I've got a hilarious year-round lamp that makes me smile.

Open up and say Ahhhh

It works.

3-Day Weekend

This morning wasn’t the usual Monday routine ….. not because Trainer took a day off — he never takes a day off, not even holidays, but because I had to stay home, once again wait for the cable company’s technician.

It wasn’t the TV this time, and it wasn’t something idiotic on my part … like when I’d not realized the cable box was turned off. This time it was the internet network.

On Saturday, we’d experienced two back-to-back complete power outages in the area. The outages didn’t last long as coverage was restored within 15 minutes each time, but I surmise the outages screwed up my network because, everything seemed fine that evening, but when I tried to log-into the laptop on Sunday, the message was "cannot connect" to the network.

No amount of rebooting the network from my end, or the cable provider sending a reprovision signal from their end, cured what ailed the network so, when given an 11:00 - 12:00 time for a technician, interfering with my 11 am workout time, it wasn’t even a difficult decision. Much as I like and need my workouts, I like and need the internet even more.

I might as well have worked out and then returned to wait for the technician, because he didn’t show up until close to 2:00 pm.

From there it was showing me how to do all the things logic had already prompted me do to get the network restarted and, just as when I previously ran through all those avenues, they didn’t work ……… the laptop continued to display "no connection" to the network.

Technician then pronounced the problem was not the network. That because my phone still connected to the network, the problem had to be the laptop, and he couldn’t help me because the laptop was not in his wheelhouse.

I disagreed.

I’m no expert but, being a logical thinker, I’d considered that possibility and had checked the other two laptops.

Yes, I have three laptops.

Why?

Because I’m lazy, don’t want to move laptops from room to room. So, instead, I have one on the coffee table for when I’m lounging on the couch, one in the bedroom for browsing the internet and Tik Toking when in bed, and one on the work table in the main area, attached to the printer.

So, anyway, when technician tried to blow me off/end the visit because the network was "working fine", I pointed out his conclusion wasn’t logical because it wasn’t just this laptop I was unable to connect to, but the other two as well.

"It has to be a network problem. Maybe I should disconnect altogether from the network, set it up again, but I don't know how to do that", said I.

He looked nonplussed. Didn't shrug his shoulders like oh well, but might as well have.

So assuming he just didn't want to be bothered I said perhaps the solution is to switch from his company’s internet to an internet provider that’s offered me $30 off.

Guess he didn’t want me to call the company and discontinue service because the network was in my estimation broken, with him being the technician on the call. So, without further ado, he gave me a different network. Went down to his truck, came back with a new router and all.

Surprise surprise, internet connection restored.

He looked shitfaced when it turned out it was as I’d surmised ……… the power outages had fried the network.

He also looked exhausted, because it had taken him over an hour to set up the new network.

So, anyway, I’m back up and running.

I’ve since learned, from the resident I refer to as Big Friendly Guy, that the outages fried his roomba.

While waiting for the technician, the Baker called to say the Community Room has reopened, but she and the other organizers would no longer be hosting bingo (insert happy dance here).

Reasons being she herself is ill and Red Light is moving.

The Baker said she’d been experiencing pain and tests show she has cirrhosis of the liver ………… non-alcoholic cirrohosis, because she doesn’t drink, has never touched alcohol.

I suggested it might be the result of certain medications. "That’s what my daughter thinks" said she.

As for Red Light, she wasn’t joking about getting out of here. She’s found a place (don't yet know where) and will be out by April.

It’s looking like Not Dead Nancy may also be gone, but no one know the meaning of "gone" with her ....... if she’s gone for good, like crossed over the rainbow bridge, or living with a relative or placed in a facility or temporarily gone/hospitalized and will return.

Her next-door neighbor tells me Nancy had an issue with one of her legs that caused her to be hospitalized, and that her daughters are now removing items from Nancy’s unit. Neighbor says she’s not sure if Nancy knows the daughters, who never visited or cared for Nancy when she needed help, are taking things out of the unit.

That has happened before. Shortly after I moved in, we had a resident who’d been hospitalized, returned to find her family had jumped the gun — cleared out her unit, thinking she’d not make it back from the hospital.

Unless Nancy returns, we may never find out what’s actually happened to her. She'll be another unsolved mystery, like what's happened to Greedy Grabby's husband who has not been seen for almost two years.

Nesting and Holy Heck

The cable technician arrived at 11:16 this morning.

"What seems to be the problem?", asked he.

I picked up the remote, turned the TV on, showed him how the cable box was not connecting to its source.

I then handed him the remote and, as soon as it touched his hand, the TV came on.

"What did you just do?"

"Turned the box on. It was off".

So that was embarrassing.

As to how it got turned off in the first place is a mystery. Maybe I hit a wrong button when turning the TV off the previous night.

He showed me how to tell when the box is off, how to turn it back on, asked if I wanted him to show me anything else; at which time I thought about asking him to show me how to get to Netflix on the TV, so I won’t have to watch on the phone, but thought I’d better leave well enough alone. Stick to the basics and not confuse myself further.

There’s just too much technology.

Heading out later to pick up mail, I found the front drive full of rescue vehicles — not one, but two fire trucks and an ambulance.

The ambulance was loading up the gurney, but no one was on it.

Turned out, they were here because a resident had fallen in the office area.

Two fire trucks AND an ambulance seemed overkill for a fall, and proved to be so because, as I approached the mail center, the gentleman who’d fallen was being escorted back to his unit by Head Maintenance Guy.

He looked fine and, in fact, told HMG that he could make it to his unit on his own from there.

Maybe he was embarrassed by all the hoopla.

While chatting with others there to pick up mail, my attention was drawn to a naked tree.

I've never seen it like this before. It's lost all its leaves overnight, but looks quite beautiful this way.

One of the guys pointed out a bird building a nest on a bare branch.

The bird flew away before I could capture a photo of it tending the nest, so I’ll be checking back from time to time to see how the nest goes, if/when any babies appear.

Seeing flyovers around my patio lately, I figured it was nearing that time again when I’d have to chase birds away from nesting in the eves over the patio door.

There was all that drama last year, when I had to keep chasing birds off, telling them not to build and that one couple began building and settling in when I wasn’t looking, then got upset when I blocked off the entrance.

Having since purchased holographic scare tape, I’m ready for them this year.

So, that was my day — the TV got fixed, I finished another photo book for the family ...

Watch Me Grow No. 4

.... and, when I settled in to watch TV a little while ago, all hell broke lose.

The couch began shaking up/down, dishes and other items began rattling and the entire building felt like it was being lifted off the ground, then dropped.

It was the mother of all earthquakes we’ve had to date — a 4.4 @ 7:43 pm centered a mile away in Fontana.

Nothing broke, but one more like this and the building is coming down.

Now I know why it was, just last week, I began rethinking what to save in case of emergency. I'd decided to grab important papers, the cellphone, as many photo books as possible and my makeup bag, of course. Figured anything else was unimportant, could be purchased again.

Besides, I keep wanting to downsize, go minimalist living. I'd like it not to happen by way of a disaster, but what will be is what will be.

I can feel something big is coming. In fact, I'm hearing a rumbling, and small shakes, as I'm typing this. Aftershocks?

Be Careful What You Wish For

I didn’t exactly wish, it was more like I’ve been craving more time. Time enough in a day to do all that I do — cooking, cleaning, working out, Creative Memory scrapbooking, Needlepoint, blogging, TikTok, Pokémon GO, Candy Crush. All those things and more, with time left over to read, as books are piling up.

Author Walter Mosley is coming out with a new installment of the Easy Rawlings series, which I’ve already preordered, so I do need to finish one or two of these books.

I’d have preferred more time would come in the form of days miraculously becoming longer. Instead, it's come as waking up this morning to the cable box malfunctioning. It won’t connect to the source, says I need Internet to view TV, which I do have internet because here I am blogging over the Internet.

So, anyway, a call to the provider for a technician to come out turned into the same old same old of them trying to get me to fix it myself … questions, answers, disconnect this, wait, reconnect that, so on and so forth.

All I wanted was a technician, so when questions continued, and it got to "Can you tell me which HDMI channel you are on" is when I had to use my tried-and-true ace — the Age Card.

Playing the helpless little old lady, I replied, "No, I can't. I’m 80 years old. Hardly know which planet I’m on. Can you please just set up someone to come out".

Worked, like a charm ... always does.

Questions and instructions ceased instantly.

Technician will be arriving between 11 and 12 tomorrow, which means I’ll have to give up tomorrow’s workout, but oh well. Getting the cable box up and running trumps working out.

Heading outside to pick up mail, over the wall I could see flashing lights in the area where our Outside Neighbor has been residing last few days.

I suspect it’s one of those trucks the cops show up with to haul away property belonging to the unhoused in order to get them out of the area, but since they can’t do that for the time being (which I doubt the person in the tent knows) maybe it was just an intimidation tactic or maybe, when the truck initially pulled to the curb to haul what looked like junk away, the driver hadn't initially realized there was a person inside.

At any rate, no cops showed up, I never saw the driver exit the truck, and the person in the tent didn’t seem perturbed. The truck eventually drove away.

Talking to the guy standing in the smoking section, while we both watched the goings on, without thinking he did what I assume he always does ... pulled out a cigarette, put it to his lips. Except, it was a joint.

As he went to fire up, I got ready to surreptitiously snap a photo, but he seemed to suddenly realize I wasn't of the usual gather on the lawn for a smoke type and quickly pulled it away from his lips, tried to hide it between his fingers. So, I left so the guy could enjoy his smoke.

Before he pulled out his smoke however, he'd informed me the occupant of the tent is a female.

He further said people driving by have been pulling over to the curb, dropping off containers with food, which I said was nice and that I'd thought about taking food and a warm blanket out myself, but didn't because one never knows what kind of reception one will get these days, how good deeds go bad, and one gets hurt.

He said something about my having done so would have been like feeding a cat, caused it to hang around, come back.

I dunno.

Somebody has got to do something, and it was the second time in two weeks that my heart told me to be that somebody, but my head said don't be stupid.

The other incident was when I picked up photographs from the photo lab, found someone else's photos mixed in with mine.

I didn't want to just toss them in the trash so, when I saw there was a telephone number on the summary sheet, I picked up the phone to call, see if the person wanted mailed to them.

But then, my head said I'd end up with a headache. That the person would probably think it was some kind of trick, a scam, don't get involved. So, I didn't complete the call.

My heart wouldn't let me toss the photos in the trash, so I instead drove back to the photo lab, turned the photos over knowing full well they are not going to call the person, will themselves toss in the trash but better they than I, my hands are clean.

It's a sad commentary on life when one has to harden one's heart and listen to one's head.

The guy hiding the joint also said that one day, when a group of the smokers were out on the lawn, the woman in the tent came out, walked back to the wall, and there in plain view, pulled down her pants, squatted, and did a No. 2.

Ewwwwwww.

He also pointed out areas where people have been parked, living in campers for weeks.

At least they have shelter.

Even with no TV eating up the hours, time seems to be slipping away without my having picked up one book to finish reading, and tonight will be watching the last two episodes of Fool Me Once on the phone.

The Netflix series is not as slow as I thought it would be, and nowhere near as predictable as it first seemed. So full of red herrings that I'm completely clueless as to who, what, why, but soon to find out.

Ooey Gooey

Another weekend nearly gone and gone in a flash, most of the time eaten up in trying to resolve technical issues.

It took me all of Friday evening to set up the new printer, most of Saturday and Sunday trying to get the Smart App to recognize the new printer.

Evidently the app isn’t all that Smart because, though I did finally get it to print, I can’t get it to scan or copy.

I may have to call in the geek squad for a home visit.

In between technical issue, I did find time to make a run-down Route 66 to pick up fabric for what I hope is the last baby quilt, in this family, I will ever have to make, cause we don’t need to bring in any more people into this family or into this crazy world.

Walking out of the craft store, fabric in hand, I heard music and realized that, because it was Saturday, the Farmer’s Market was in progress, within walking distance.

Checking the event out, it was the same old same old — all kinds of cakes, cookies, drinks, scrumptious looking foods I can’t eat that I’d seen last time I visited, which I think was April of last year.

One new addition was a vendor offering free grow kits.

What a great idea, thought I, but I’ve got my hands full with the plants growing on the patio, don’t need any more, but it was fun watching the little kids learning all about plants, getting to dig in the dirt, plant seeds in a little pot.

I was wondering how the vendor made any money on this venture as, even if she wasn’t looking to make money, just educate the public, she still had to pay for the spot, but I didn’t take the time to ask or figure it out.

Today, Sunday, started off with giving scanning and copying one more try. After giving up on that happening without technical assistance, I gave up and finally got around to shampooing the carpet.

Hours later, deciding that, after the technical frustrations and the hard heavy-duty work of moving furniture around to shampoo the carpet, inasmuch as all the ingredients had arrived, I treated myself to my first ever S’more.

Ooey Gooey, a little messy, but delicious

First time I've ever used the broiler in all the years I've been living here.

While relaxing on the couch, drinking coffee, enjoying the two little S'mores, I saw someone off in the distance, quickly walking away down one of the walkways. As the person turned a corner, I got a good look at his profile, left side, and would swear it was my old buddy Apache.

Where could he have been coming from? Where could he have been walking to?

I'll have to ask around to see if it really was he I saw, rushing from and to, before management found out he was on the property.

Verified

I don’t know which could be worse — being stung by a wasp or being pepper sprayed. However, after having been pepper sprayed, I can verify it’s no joke.

Due to the paving project/car in storage, I’ve not been out of the neighborhood for weeks, not since the day I saw the goats used as lawnmowers on the hillside.

I had to drive a few cities over yesterday, to pick up a new printer (because the old one died) before the order was due to cancel.

After stepping out onto the porch, locking the door behind me, I became aware of something flying over my head.

It was a wasp!

Panicking, I quickly pulled the pepper spray from my pocket and began spraying at it and, as it moved around to get away from the spray, headed towards my face, I sprayed again. Then, as it veered around me, towards where I had to exit down the stairs, I sprayed again. The wasp flew off at this point, but the wind blew the spray back into my eyes and mouth.

Next Door Neighbor — hearing a commotion, opened her door, asked if I was okay.

I couldn’t respond at first, because I was choking and gagging from swallowing pepper spray. My eyes were burning, but I managed to get the key in the lock, got out a "Wasp, pepper spray" response to my neighbor as I ran inside, headed to the bathroom, used a face towel and water to clean my eyes, followed by eyewash.

It only took a minute or two to recover, so I’m guessing being stung by that wasp would have been worse and, now that I've pepper sprayed myself, gotten to verify what it does, it’s good to know how well pepper spray works.

Suffice it to say, I’ll now be peeking through the door, looking to see if it is wasp free, before I step outside, as there must be a nest nearby.

The new printer was way heavier than I’d expected, so I had a store employee put it in a cart, but didn’t ask the employee to leave his post, take it to the car.

I was just gonna struggle best I could to get the box in the car. But then a young man, looking to be around 17/18, walked over and asked if I’d be interested in buying a candy bar to support something or other.

"No thanks", said I. "But, I’ll make a deal with you. If you put this box in the car for me, I’ll pay you for a bar and you can keep the bar".

"Deal" said he.

Once back at the complex, I checked the porch for wasps before I stepped near the door, retrieved the dolly, slide the box from car to dolly, tied it securely with cords and no problem rolling it upstairs.

When I was walking through the parking lot with the dolly, I heard a voice behind me. It was Meat Man (formerly Handsome Guy).

He was driving into the complex, saw me heading to my car, paused, rolled down his window to say, "Looking tasty, looking tasty. Have a blessed day" and then continued on around to his side of the complex.

Knowing what I know of him now, just hearing his voice rendered me speechless. My delayed reaction, as he drove away, was to laugh and shake my head in amused disbelief.

Such a naughty boy he is.

I’m so amused at his antics that I can no longer be disgusted. I just find him hilarious and will say so next time he gives me an opening, without going into detail.

Running into Home Girl later that day, she tells me he’d yet again tried to talk to her.

Seeing her out and about, he began walking towards her, whereupon she says she gave him the evil eye.

Didn’t deter him any, he tried to greet her.

She walked by without returning the greeting.

"So, it’s like that?" said he.

She kept walking, no reply, ignored him.

He yelled out to her, "I already have a girlfriend you know".

Oh really! He’s not acting like a man who already has a girlfriend, but I guess he thought if he said he was already taken, Home Girl would think him safe — that he was not trying to do with her what she full well knows he is.

It seems the worse Home Girl treats Meat Man — curse at him, refuse to speak to him, the more of a challenge he finds her to be and the more determined he is to win this game he’s trying to play with her.

I see a lot of my ex-husband in Meat Man, so I know the game he’s playing is to charm her into a relationship. Then, once he’s satisfied that he’s won her over, he will then exact his revenge for her initial treatment of him, as my ex-husband told me he had exacted revenge on a woman named LaDonna.

LaDonna was a girl he was interested in dating in high school. However, she was miss popular, way out of his league and let him know it.

After high school, my ex enlisted in the army, came out bulked up. No longer the geeky kid no girl looked at twice, he'd become a handsome devil that turned women's head.

In the meantime, LaDonna had married, birthed children, her shine was gone, no longer the miss popular she was in high school.

When their paths crossed and she now saw this handsome man, with a career (cop) who owned his own home, he didn’t have to work too hard to charm her into infidelity and eventually away from her husband.

Once her husband learned of her infidelity, LaDonna and her husband split, with one or the other filing for divorce. It was then my ex dropped LaDonna like a hot potato, began dating me.

One day, my ex decided to visit his grandmother, took me along for the ride.

There was a woman there already visiting — LaDonna, who looked a little beaten down by life and uncomfortable with me, embarassed, hurt looking.

I didn't know why but didn't dwell on it.

My ex seemed overly joyous during the visit and later, as we drove away, told me LaDonna was an ex-girlfriend.

Okay by me. I wasn't the jealous type.

My ex then seemed to relish in telling me the story of how he’d exacted his revenge, screwed up LaDonna's life, for how she'd dismissed him in high school.

Red Light?

Absolutely that story was a red light, but I was young, naive, having fun dating this older more experienced guy, had no clue he was telling me what a sick hateful man he could be. In fact, it wasn't until years later that I had an epiphany and realized the visit to his grandmother's was a setup.

He somehow knew LaDonna would be there. Now that I think about it, he probably told her to be there so they could talk things out, but then dragged me along to flaunt his young girlfriend in the face of this now older lady to hurt her further, which is why she seemed so uncomfortable and hurt by my presence and he overly joyous of it.

Problem with Meat Man’s playing this kind of game is that he will never win, never accomplish the goal of screwing up Home Girl's life, one way or another, but it’s fun to watch the scoundrel try.

Cinco de Mayo

Can’t have Cinco de Mayo without tamales so, just before I left the unit for the Pain Cave yesterday, I set corn husks in the sink with hot water to soften.

Returning 45 minute later, I cleaned the husks, let them dry out a bit while I mixed the masa and inasmuch as tamales can be filled with just about anything (I once filled with black eyed peas) and they come out great, I filled these with refrigerator leftovers — turkey chili, jasmine rice, salsa.

I used to have a tamale pot, two pots to be exact — one large, one medium. However, inasmuch as I only make a handful of tamales at a time, the pots were overkill, not to mention I didn’t have space for them in my little unit. So, instant pot steaming it was.

Tamales are to be steamed upright but, once I add the steamer basket to the instant pot, there’s not room for upright. Slanted works just as well.

Thirty-five minutes later, I ended up with 14 tamales, at least seven meals out of refrigerator leftovers.

I ate two for dinner last night.

They were yummy.

I’ll probably eat two this morning for breakfast, with an egg AND, if I can control myself, I’ll freeze the remainder for my road trip on the 20th — the meditation retreat.

The hotel has a refrigerator and microwave — unusual for a 5-Star hotel, usually only found in residence inns but, inasmuch as I can’t take advantage of eateries in or around the hotel, these appliances will make life much easier for me. Pack a couple boiled eggs, tamales, I’ll be good to go.

If I can't control myself, I'll just have to make more for the trip — probably chicken filled.

One of these days I’m going to give a try at sweet tamales — pineapple maybe.

Looking at the news, I guess we have Will Smith to thank for the scary thing that happened to Dave Chappelle. Comedians will now have to be on guard for crazies storming the stage to do them harm.

In other news, it strikes me strange that the Supreme Court Justices are more concerned in discovering WHO  leaked that draft document than the fact THEY tried to slip the reversal through without our knowledge.

What else are they going to run through behind our backs — a reversal on gay marriages?

I was locked out of Instagram, considered age 13 until 7:00 last night when I received a message "It appears your account was suspended in error".

Ya think?

So, to answer your question Mitchell ... "How long do you have to wait to be over 13?", the answer is about 48 hours :-)

Star War Day

Nothing special going on to commemorate the day, at least not around here.

There was something special going on yesterday, but us residents didn't find out about it until after the fact.

Activity Director had arranged for a Mother’s Day Social — lunch and gift bags, 11:30 – 12:45. ONLY us residents didn’t find out about it until the Activity Calendar was posted to our doors 3:30.

Consequently, if anyone showed up it would have been dumb luck that brought them to the Community Room OR they went down for the weekly Pizza Day (donated pizzas from Pizza Hut) and lucked up on the Mother's Day thing.

Oh well but, second time in a row, I can imagine Activity Director is at the point of pulling out her hair that she prepares the calendar in advance, but No. 9 can’t get it distributed on time.

They tack on $50 as punishment for submitting rent checks late. There should be some kind of penalty for posting the calendar late.

Other than that, there's nothing else on the calendar, except Activity Director's short bingo session, which I see is not weekly, but once a month.

I suppose the hours long weekly bingo session being run by the residents is still going on, but Activity Director isn't promoting it on her calendar.

Tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo, which used to be huge around here .... tons of tamales, but looks to be just another nothing day.

On another note, there was an interesting message left on my phone yesterday.

It was the office manager from the dental practice I left in my rear view wanting to talk to me about the note I attached to that supplemental payment asking to be removed from their patient list.

What's to talk about?

You can't tell me the dentists are not lying to patients, encouraging expensive unnecessary dental work, because I've not only read about it but experienced it for myself. So nope, don't hold your breath waiting for a return call from me.

Read the Yelp and Google reviews. If that doesn't clear things up, then there's nothing more I can say that wasn't included in the note to make it any clearer.

The new CAPTCHA algorism that’s sending non-spam comment to spam in Blogger has hit Instagram. My Instagram account has been suspended until I appeal and prove I’m over 13 years of age.

Oh well, one less social media platform distraction, more time for needlepoint.