Vaxxed

Checking every day last week with Walgreen’s, where vaccine and appointments were available, but just not in my area; while simultaneously checking Costco for vaccine availability, on Saturday I saw that Costco finally showed "vaccine available" and immediately began the process of snagging an appointment.

I was ready to get it done that day, Saturday, but today was the earliest appointment day available and, thus far, there are only three appointments available per day — 10:15 am, 10:30 am, 10:45 am.

That seems strange and, to me, reads as an indication of there might not be a lot of vaccine available, they are limiting how much they use in a day to make what they have last until more becomes available.

At any rate, I was lucky to have snagged the 10:45 am at not my regular Costco, but a different Costco within driving distance.

So, not only are appointments limited to 3 slots per day, not all the local Costco’s have vaccine available.

I guess we can thank JFK, Jr. for the chaos, but at least I got it done.

The price went up a bit — from $139.99 last year to $141.99, not reimbursable by my medical provider, but it is what it is.

Once the friendly pharmacist jabbed my arm, complimented me in "looking so good for my age", to which I replied, "Divine Grace, the Grace of God", I browsed the holiday decoration isle. Halloween was up one isle, Christmas down the other side, with Halloween already sold out on some decorations.

I don’t need any more decorations; actually, I don’t have room for anything other than the usual spiderweb stuff and a pumpkin for my skeleton to trick or treat with, but I still like to look at what’s out there.

This was cute ……

I did actually think about buying it for the great grandkids, but I don’t think I’ll make it down that way by Halloween. In fact, who knows when I’ll make it down that way again (Long Beach). Hopefully, it’s before they forget I even exist.

Driving back into the complex, I drove past what looked to be a uniformed caregiver pushing a woman in a wheelchair, with another woman following carrying groceries.

I flashed back to just yesterday, when seeing Not Dead Nancy’s next-door neighbor out and about, asked if Nancy had returned, she'd said "Yes. She's in a wheelchair now".

For newer readers, Not Dead Nancy is thus named because, at one time, we had two Nancys — a Black one and a White one. When the White one passed away and there were conversations where the name Nancy was mentioned, the talker clarified which by saying, "The Nancy that’s not dead".

Not Dead Nancy came to us from New York, and was a hoot and a holler with her relationship with the financially well off alcoholic resident, who passed away, and her pursuit of other males on the complex after he was gone. Like the time she walked up to my old buddy Apache, asked "Do you need a girlfriend?", LOL.

NDN was bold, brash and a lot of fun until, in 2021, she suddenly disappeared. When asking if she'd moved, I was told she'd been hospitalized.

Since then, asking about Nancy, it's been that she’s been in/out of hospitals, for what I never knew, but was technically still a resident here.

Yesterday, seeing Nancy's next-door neighbor when I went to pick up mail, I was told Nancy was back, but was now wheelchair bound. I thought to pay her a visit, but had not yet gotten around to it.

Driving past that group with a woman in a wheelchair got me to thinking, "Is that Nancy?".

I hurried up to park, fast walked to catch up with the group, arrived at Nancy’s door just after the group had entered, called out to her.

What I saw was heartbreaking. I didn’t recognize her. The voice was the same, but gone was the vibrant fit Nancy I knew. She’s aged considerably, but that's understandable because illness will do that to a body. I know when I have a gut episode, the constant discomfort begins to take a toll on my body, I begin to look and feel worn down, ratchet.

When telling Nancy that I've not seen her in four years, she said she kept getting hospitalized but had seen me in the Community Room a few weeks ago.

I didn't remember seeing Nancy in the room but later, after thinking about it, I flashed back to that Pizza Tuesday when the seniors were arguing, I’d seen what I took to be a new resident in a wheelchair at the door, told everyone to not fight in front of company, THAT WAS NANCY!

OMG! I didn’t even recognize her and they wheeled her right by me, which tells you how much she's changed.

I don’t think I’ll be visiting Nancy again. It hurts my heart to see her the way she now is. In fact, right now, I’m feeling a throbbing sensation on my left temple, like a lopsided headache.

Is that from the shock of seeing Nancy looking nothing like the Nancy I knew, or from this morning’s vaccine ?????.

So far, the arm only hurts when I move it.

Hippy Dippy

Today was the event I was unclear as to whether it's a Labor Day Luncheon or Bingo with Lunch at noon. So, I suited up and headed down early, to scope out the scene, see which it was and if it was something I wanted to get involved in.

Early being 11 a.m. wasn’t early enough because, standing outside the door peering in, I saw residents already seated.

I didn’t see any bingo cards, so I decided to step through the door, spend time in the free A/C and, as I entered, who did I see seated right next to the entrance but Meat Man — the resident who so annoyed former resident Home Girl. She'd moved out and to Sacramento in October ’24 to be closer to family.

Long time readers might recall when formerly named Handsome Man, here on the blog, was downgraded to Meat Man because, at Pizza Tuesday, he had flirted with Home Girl in a disrespectful manner ... when the then Activity Director asked what kind of pizza he wanted, he’d responded "Meat", then looked at Home Girl (who had enormous boobs and an equally enormous behind) in a leering manner and added "Because I like meat".

Thereafter, every time Home Girl ran into him, she went out of her way to be rude, show her disgust and, in camaraderie, I renamed him Meat Man, LOL.

So, anyway, Meat Man had never crossed the line with me, Home Girl is no longer living here for me to support her, so I sat down and, in between my moving around snapping photos for the Residents’ FB page, Meat Man and I chatted.

I did tell him that he’d been persona non grata for a while because of his sleezy approach to Home Girl and, rascal that he is, he laughed and laughed and laughed, saying "Well, I do like meat".

You can’t stay upset with a good-natured bad boy who knows he’s bad and is proud of it.

I ended up taking a photo with him.

Residents are gonna talk.

I didn’t see much Labor Day in the event. It was more like a birthday bash for the Baker ... the room decorated in colors and items she likes.

I was asked to sign cards for two others, so I guess those two lucked up to be included in such an elaborate birthday party as, normally, they would have just gotten cake and an off-tune song at bingo.

Lunch looked to be Spanish themed, but I didn’t stick around long enough to see exactly what was on the table. I just took a few photos, chatted with Meat Man, headed back to my never-ending needlepoint project, and other stuff.

I imagine Talker will take over where I left off, send me photos of the cakes and video of the singing to post.

During the week, having decided I wasn’t happy with that pouch I’d made for the medical device, I flashed back to the Hippy Dippy days when Indian styled medicine bags were the thing. Nixing the idea of replacing the rope with a chain, I picked up suede cord, wooden beads, and reworked the pouch into a medicine bag.

I can fit the entire device, rope and all into the bag and no problem being able to access the button through the bag.

Much more stylish, hippy dippy type jewelry and, with plans to make a neutral faux leather version that will go with every outfit, I won’t have to make more than just the two medicine bags.

MEME OF THE DAY

Human Pincushion

At the medical center this morning, to get the doctor-ordered blood work off my bucket list, I saw a sign for flu shots.

It was a walk-in clinic, so I didn’t have to go back to the desk, register for the shot, but I did have to wait an entire hour because the workers had just gone to lunch.

Wasn’t a horrible wait. I made myself comfortable in the air-conditioned building, watched kDramas on TikTok.

I usually get my Moderna booster around this time, but the vaccine is listed as "currently unavailable" and, the way things are going under this looney tunes administration, who knows when or even if the vaccine will become available.

Arriving back at the complex, I found this month’s Activity Calendar posted to the door, saw I’d missed a Health and Palliative Care Services breakfast presentation scheduled for this morning ... "Starbucks coffee, milk and donuts will be provided".

I don’t know what "palliative care is", but I definitely would have pivoted on the medical center, gone to the presentation just for the coffee.

I wonder how many others missed the presentation because management can’t issue the Calendar in a timely fashion.

I also see on the Calendar that a Community Meeting is scheduled for September 23 to "discuss questions, concerns, suggestions".

Those sessions are boring and pointless, but I’m so sick of missing events because management can’t or won’t get the Calendar out on time that I’m going to go, just so I can bring up how annoying it is to see events after the fact or on the day of, giving no time to arrange to attend.

Adding fuel to my current fire is they’ve got the unmitigated gall to once again push Rent Café with a blurb on the Calendar that Rent Café is the way to "Stay connected with everything going on".

BULL MANURE!

Rent Café was formerly touted as the way to get an electronic version of the Activity Calendar in order to "stay connected", but that’s not what's happening. I've only twice received an electronic version since signing up, and those too were late, after the fact.

If she repeats that lie about Rent Café in the Community Meeting, I’m going to challenge her on it, because I’m done with their bull crap.

Other than that, not a lot going on around here, except the Usual Suspects are planning a luncheon this Friday to celebrate Labor Day.

The event has twice been brought to my attention, but I’ve made no commitment to attend because I’m not sure if it’s bingo, with lunch at break time, or just a luncheon and I don’t want to get trapped back into bingo.

Curious, I think I’ll walk by the entry door, take a quick look and, if I see bingo set up, keep on stepping through the mail room, back to my unit.

In other news, this ....

Outage

I was on the laptop yesterday, around 1:30 in the afternoon, watching a reborn to revenge kDrama entitled "My stepsister killed me, so I stole her billionaire boyfriend".

Don’t judge by the silly name, those kDramas are addictively good.

I was just at an on the edge of my seat part where both the reborn heroine and the billionaire boyfriend were in serious jeopardy when the movie shut down because the internet went out.

BLACKOUT!!!

Fortunately, it wasn’t a complete power outage — power in the unit was still on, but the internet and television were mysteriously unavailable remainder of the day.

Waking up this morning, I saw service to both had been restored, but I’ve not yet had time to get back to the movie.

The blackout turned out to have been "area wide", with no explanation as to what had occurred.

The outage made for a quiet day, as I worked on making a mini drawstring bag for the Alert device.

Took four 30-minute tries before I successfully created a workable pouch to match my kente cloth buff headband.

Now knowing what I’m doing, it only took 20 minutes this morning to knock out a pouch that matches a pair of leggings.

When I remember where I stored the camo and denim fabric, I’ll make pouches to match corresponding outfits. I’ll probably also make a black pouch for when I need a neutral look to match what I’m wearing.

Now, I just have to find a gold chain long enough and strong enough to support the device, so I can get rid of that unglamorous rope.

All in all, even enclosed, the device seems a little too noticeable, since I'm not wearing a boho skirt which would make the colorful bag make sense. Consequently, there will be times — especially if I notice a good-looking man checking me out, when I’ll tuck the covered device, so all he sees is the gold chain I’ll eventually be adding to replace the cord.

Time got away from me on Pizza Tuesday, so I never made it down to the Community Room to babysit the seniors for Kesha, but I’m sure that by now she’s got the hang of things and has the seniors falling in line.

After two sessions of bingo were shut down due to that covid scare, bingo is back on tomorrow. Lu tells me it’s a combination of bingo and a birthday party for the Baker.

I don’t have the energy to deal with the seniors tomorrow, so I’ll pass on attending.

BTW, some weird stuff is going on with blogger .... Settings is set to "not allow search engines", buy somehow "Google search entities found" keeps popping up when I blog AND, even though I hit "Dismiss", Google is still crawling, indexing, and screwing with my readership — causing it to rise from a few hundred to thousands. I’m not comfortable with that. Are you also all of a sudden getting the "Google search entities foumd" message?

Bad for My Image

Having long enjoyed being considered the "Hot Girl" amongst us old folks, the new jewelry Twin 1 ordered is putting my image in serious jeopardy.

After looking into Will Jay’s suggestions to "design some jewelry or fiber art to hide/disguise the Life Alert device" and thus far drawing a blank, I thought maybe I’d just tuck it in.

But then Will Jay’s story about a friend’s mom setting off an accidental alert by tucking the device in her waistband got me to thinking how easily it would be for the device to get squeezed into an alert tucked in such a snug place, not to mention it sometimes gets hot in there and that alone might set off a false alarm.

Maybe I can just shorten the rope, turn the device into a choker, thought I.

Nope! That makes the device even more obvious.

I looked into exchanging the pendant for a bracelet or watch, but Life Alert only offers the option of a necklace pendant with its systems.

So, I dunno but, heading for the market today, I decided to give tucking a try.

Crossing the parking lot, I ran into Next Door Neighbor. The device, tucked inside, she never even noticed there was something attached to the rope as we chatted for a while about what a great job my boyfriend in my head Dark Gavin is doing ("Dark" because, taking a step from blog friend Dawn who, when pushed transforms into Dark Dawn, and now seeing my boyfriend transforming into a version of The Punisher, I've rewarded him with the superhero name of Dark Gavin).

I did have to be careful in placement of the car’s seat belt, because the normal position was right across the device, sure to put pressure on the button, set it off.

I had to position the belt above the device, across my throat.

I can't get a ticket for the awkward, probably unsafe, position as the law only says to wear it, and it's being worn.

While in the market, I did some bending, stooping, reaching. None of these motions seemed likely to result in an accidental alert. So, thus far, it seems tucking is the way to go.

One of the items on my marketing list was kale. I eat a lot of kale, I mean a lot, a lot and saw it today was selling $3 for two bunches, but who do they think they’re kidding.

Kale aficionado that I am, I noticed right away the price is not a bargain, that what used to be one healthy bunch at $2.50 is now selling as two slimmer bunches, i.e., the two smaller bunches at $3.00 is the same amount of kale in one bunch previously sold for $2.50, but disguised as 2 for $3.00 — $0.50 cents more.

No matter. I'll buy kale however bountiful or not the bunch, whatever price.

Not on my grocery list were these Aloha bell peppers, but they called my name. So wanting to see if they taste any different than regular bells, and because they’re pretty, I purchased two.

BTW, under the title of Work Smarter Not Harder, did you know you can dispense with hand massaging, and instead use the mixer to massage your kale.

The Thunder Rolls

I woke up this morning to rolling thunder followed by rain. A welcome relief from the unrelenting heat, generally already pushing 90 degrees in my unit by the time I wake up.

I had plans to do marketing today, but decided to make do with what’s in the house.

I did, during the week, make that run to the bank, transferred money from my regular account, deposited it into the Rent account. That done, I won’t have to think about that account for two/three months.

Even though having to physically walk into a bank is a pain, I do enjoy the bank’s riddle board.

I don’t know where they come up with the dorky riddles, but there’s a board with riddles like, "Why did the football coach go to the bank?".

The riddle on the board when I walked in on Wednesday was, "Why did the fish blush?".

I didn’t get either of those. In fact, since the board went up two years ago, I’ve only solved the puzzle once. I don’t recall what the puzzle was that day, but I guessed correctly the answer was "because the turkey had drumsticks".

So, anyway, that errand off my bucket list, the only thing remaining is to schedule an appointment at the medical center for Lab work the doctor ordered.

Twin 1 is still freaked out over the medical scare I had that sent me to the E.R. at midnight a few weeks ago. Now needing constant reassurance via text messages or telephone calls that I’ve not yet kicked the bucket, Twin 1 called Tuesday to say that in order to alleviate her worry, she’s gifting me with Life Alert, the "I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up" thing.

"Jesus! I’m not that kind of old", protested I.

However, inasmuch as she said it would make her feel less worried, I’ve agreed to accept the gift, walk around with a necklace that announces to the world I’ve crossed the threshold, am now considered an old lady.

The things we do for our kids.

Debra, over at She Who Seeks, today posted memes of our Governor mocking Donald Two Dolls.

I’m piling it on with two of my favorites thus far.

Oh, and in case you were wondering ...... Why did the football coach go to the bank?

To get his quarter back.

Why did the fish blush?

Because they saw the ocean’s bottom.