Another Rainy Monday

Not loving having to leave my cocoon, head out on a Monday … in the rain to work out, but I’m glad someone is enjoying the wet weather.

Today is also President’s Day.

Hang in there Papa Joe

Plan for the weekend was to try out a recipe for gluten free Fastnacht's (also known as donut holes), but the recipe looked to be too much work. Not to mention that, when I picked up the can of baking powder — that I recently used in a recipe for gluten free blueberry cupcakes, oat flour pancakes, et al., I happened to notice the Best if Used by date.

May 11, 2022

I’m not wasting anything by tossing this long-ago expired product, because I found it all used up, empty.

I'd like to blame my lack of baking skills on having used an expired ingredient, but fact is cooking and baking in general are just not my thing. I do so only because my sensitive gut requires it.

So, morning workout over and done with, it's back into my cocoon until Wednesday, which btw, the weather people predict it will still be raining.

Tale of Two Thieves

The corner market is redlining us again — providing shoppers in this area with the least freshest fruit, vegetables and eggs soon to expire .... sometimes set to expire the very next day.

So, after this morning’s workout, I drove to the market in the chain that’s not taking advantage of shoppers, the one that had a Find the Hometown Elf named Elfonzo.

While in line to check out, I saw a little girl, around 6/7 years of age, grab a candy bar, look back to make sure her mom wasn’t looking, shove it under her jacket at the waist level.

As she was holding onto her jacket to make sure the candy bar was secure, she looked up, saw me staring at her. I shook my head like no, don’t do it.

She smiled at me.

Guess she thought she was being cute. I didn’t.

At one point, mom took her attention away from putting groceries on the belt, looked to see where her daughter was, saw me staring at daughter and asked her, "What are you doing?"

"Shoplifting" said I, even though I wasn’t the one being asked.

The kid was still holding the spot where she'd stashed her ill-gotten gains, so mom had no problem finding, removing and putting back on the shelf.

Once they were gone and it was my turn at the register, the casher found she had not enough money to make change.

Calling a manager over, telling him "I don’t have any money" she asked me to step to the side while she helped the next customer who’d said "I’m using a card. I won’t need change".

No problem, I stepped to the side and watched as that card using customer completed her transaction and an old lady was next to step to the cashier.

As the cashier rang up her purchases, I noticed the old lady had 10 cans of cat food still in her cart (I counted them).

The cashier could not see from her vantage point that there were items still in the cart.

From the way the old lady was dressed and purchases she was making, she didn’t seem like the sort that needed to do what I assumed she was doing.

If she had looked like she couldn’t afford to feed herself AND her pet, I would have offered to pay for the cat food. So, it was on my mind to ask the casher if she knew the items were there, but then I thought ….. snitches get stitches, I’m not the police or security so, after ratting out the little girl, chose to mind my business on this one.

I watched the girl bagging the old lady’s groceries drop the bagged items in the cart, right next to the cans of cat food.

As the Bagger put the last bag in the cart, and the cashier was finishing the transaction, with me thinking the old lady was going to make a clean getaway, the Bagger grabbed one of the cans, held it up to the cashier, asked if she’d rung them up.

Cashier froze, looked at the can, looked at the old lady, leaned over her station to look into the old lady’s cart, looked back up at the old lady with a look on her face that was a combination of amazement, disappointment and what the hell.

The old lady went "Oh" like she’d forgotten those items were there.

That very possibly could have been true, but I doubt it.

Interesting time at the market it was.

Thank God it's Friday. I can cocoon up in my little unit, not have to see or deal with another human being, young or old, until Monday rolls around.

A Handful of Sugar

Walking out the door yesterday, heading for the morning’s workout, what did I see but management’s latest posting attached to the door.

Not a notice this time. Instead, it was a cute little candy filled Valentine’s Day card.

"Never look a gift horse in the mouth" it is said, but my first thought was this has something to do with that $500 rent increase that has so many moving out.

Every single day I’m seeing folks moving out in other quads — thus far, it’s been no one I know personally; but I can’t say for sure because, with no contact with others via bingo and no access to the view of the courtyard area, due to that window being covered with bubble wrap, I’m out of the loop.

However, in my comings and goings, I’ve observed that just as quickly as someone moves out, just as quickly new people move in.

It’s becoming like a residential inn around here. We no longer know who our neighbor are.

So anyway, to some degree, residents probably appreciate this gesture from management. However, inasmuchas the rent increase is essentially funding it — giving Corporate extra money to spend, I'm sure residents would have rather no increase in rent instead.

After that morning’s workout, I dutifully checked the ingredients in the packet of sugary candies and found, sure enough, not edible as they contained three of the many ingredients my sensitive gut cannot handle — corn syrup, modified food starch, cornstarch.

Waste not Want not, so rationalizing it was just a handful, I took a chance and turned the handful into lunch with a cup of coffee.

No problems after, so it’s good to know the rare sugary cheat won’t hurt me, but I’d never buy jelly beans or gummies for anything other than gingerbread house decorations anyway, because I prefer chocolates.

I hope this sugary treat isn’t management setting us up for something else coming — leading us lambs to the slaughter so to speak.

Time will tell. It always does.

Shame about what happened in Kansas City Chiefs' parade.

Guess no place is safe — even with snipers on the roof and a kazillion cops on the ground; and to think, we'd just had that conversation about people carrying, unbeknownst to those around them.

Valentine’s Day

It’s that time again … the day I dredge up the gif which expresses how I feel about today's hoopla.

Not only is Miley Cyrus still singing my anthem — Flowers, she’s singing it with a Grammy for Record of the Year.

It Ain’t Pretty

This is what the bedroom window looks like from the outside.

It ain’t pretty, but the bubble wrap is doing its job, seems to be effective in keeping the cold air out of the bedroom at night.

I did not have to run the heater last night, and woke up without sniffles and feeling chilled to the bone.

Because the outside view isn’t all that pretty, I did look into a window installation kit, as suggested by DrumMajor (Thanks friend) and liked that it was touted as "crystal clear", but was turned off by the mixed reviews ……… some purchasers liked it, others complained it did not live up to "crystal clear", tape didn’t hold, and the panels are not reusable when taken down.

Under the theory of "If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it", now that I see bubble wrap is doing the job, I’m gonna stick with it.

Pun intended, LOL.

Besides, the shrink wrap touted a 30/35% reduction in heating bill. Bubble wrap is estimating a 50% reduction.

As for the aesthetics, I’m good with losing my view and the window looking unappealing through the Winter months.

I had errands to run after this morning’s workout.

The weather was perfect for a drive, so out of the area I went — looking for new pokémon characters at each stop.

Bass Pro Shop was crawling with pokémons, but nothing I needed in my deck.

They did however have a sign at the entrance that one does not see every day.

I asked the young lady at the desk if people actually come in with weapons on them. She replied in the affirmative, adding that it scares her when the weapons are placed in her hands.

I’ll bet, but that lets me know there are perfectly normal looking people walking around armed to the teeth with more than just pepper spray.

So, no pokémons at Bass Pro, but they did have a fun looking poke stop, where I snagged game tools.

The next stop was my reward for having worked so hard cleaning up the place over the weekend.

After a stop at Sprouts, for items I can’t purchase locally, finding no interesting pokémon, it was off to the hardware store to replenish cleaning supplies.

In the parking lot, I captured one I did not already have in my deck — a Frogadier.

I think this is where I also captured a problem because, just moments after jumping on the freeway, heading home, bells and whistles went off on the car's instrument panel, indicating the left rear passenger side tire was down to 28 psi.

Panic … Fright … and it had been such a nice day up until then.

The good news ……… I was in the right area — the tire place was just down the street from where I’d just been at the hardware store.

Getting off at the next exit, holding my breath I’d make it before the tire gave out, I jumped back on the freeway, headed to where I’d been, passed the hardware store, made it a mile further to the tire place.

They found a rather large nail, said it’d be like a 2-hour wait, because it was a busy day, did I want to wait and be serviced.

I said no, I did not, but had no choice.

More good news ………… the tire was fixable, and no charge.

Good news because I’d spent most of my cash and, had the nail been embedded in an area where the tire was not patchable (that has happened to me in the past), I'd have been SOL because I'd left my credit card at home.

It's a blessing to have a car, not rely on public transportation; but it's also a headache as so much can go wrong, at any time.

I'm still not over the terror of the blowout I had a few months ago, and now this.

So, that was the agony and ecstasy of my day. More like ecstasy then agony.

Chocolate was intended for days like this. Fortunately, I’d just stocked up.

I did not watch yesterday’s game, but had timed it just right to tune in and catch halftime.

It was okay. At least Usher’s performance didn’t lull me to sleep like Rihanna's did last year.

My only criticism …… half time was just too short. It felt to me like Usher had been cheated on allotted time, compared to other halftime shows I’ve seen.

Worth a Try

Seems we’re out of the woods insofar as rainstorms. Weather folks predict a few sprinkles Thursday and Saturday of next week, but the worst is over and done with.

Other than the annoying sound of water continuously falling from the sky, I didn’t mind the wet weather all that much. It’s the chill factor before the rain, after the rain, in fact this whole season, that’s causing difficulties for me.

In order not to catch pneumonia, I’ve been running central air heating during the day.

At night, even though I’ve tripled up on clothing — wear two night shirts, my camo onesie pajamas and the bed is covered with two quilts, I’m freezing. Consequently, I’ve been running a little bedroom heater at night.

All these measures to survive the Winter season has caused a jump in heating bill to $188 — double what it usually is this time of year.

I don’t know how you people who live in cold climates manage … how you can afford to stay warm.

At any rate, in between sit down squats last week, I was complaining about the high bill to Trainer, saying that I had to find a way to lower it.

The Universe was once again listening, manifesting my thoughts into things, because, having a moment to read this week’s Woman’s World magazine yesterday, what did I see but an article entitled "Easy Ways to slash your heating bill".

Here we go again with that superpower working for me, or finding myself in the 4th dimensional pocket where thoughts become reality, but why does the Universe not listen in when the conversation is about my desire to win millions in the Powerball, Mega or SuperLotto????

The only suggestion applicable to me, in the article, was to insulate the windows with bubble wrap.

"Bubble wrap creates a barrier between the glass and the warm air in your home, helping you retain 50% more heat … Simply cut a piece of wrap the same size of your window, spray water on the bubbly side and place it against the glass".

It just so happens that I have bubble wrap on hand, so worth a try.

I don’t recall seeing the part that said to wet the bubble side until I just now typed those instructions into this post. So, even though I screwed up and wet the smooth side, the wrap went up easy peasy.

So we’ll see how it goes until it looks like I may have to reverse sides.

It’s still a mystery as to why TinTin has that strip of tinfoil in her window. The article did say heat rises, that you can insulate your attic with foil and save $1000 on your heating bill, but said nothing about a strip of foil on a window.

As for me, should a neighbor inquire, I've a good explanation as to why I’ve bubble wrapped my bedroom window.

Once word gets around, more than a few will begin bubble wrapping their windows because more than a few have commented on how the cold cuts straight through at night.

We once had a Complex Manager that liked working with old people, was nice to us, tried to make living here better for us.

She was looking into getting double pane windows installed to protect us from the Winter cold/Summer heat.

It got her fired.

Corporate wants its managers to collect as much as they can, spend as little as possible. They didn't like that she was spending money on bettering our living situation with activities, events, repairs and when she wanted to spend even more money on double pane windows, they summarily dismissed her.

Corporate greed.

So, I double dog dare them to do an inspection and complain about the bubble wrapped window.

Go bother TinTin about her aluminum and the dresser drawer still on her patio, even though that "friendly reminder" was included in this month's calendar.

My friend Q posted a meme from a site called Modern Art last night that sent me down a rabbit hole. The artist puts an unusual spin on artwork and everyday photos. Lots of his work to enjoy, but these are the two that made me laugh the loudest.