Loose Ends

Thus far, the only things I've done this weekend, besides try to beat the intense heat, is to have tied up a few loose ends.

Remember that coffee mug I wanted to buy, but didn’t trust the vendor as my card had been hacked last time I’d ordered off that site?

Figuring the mug would eventually show up on a site I trust, it finally did and arrived in yesterday’s mail.

The purchase doesn’t mean I believe Johnny's side of the story, I just think the quote is hilarious and a great souvenir of the latest Trial of the Century.

I need another coffee mug like I need a hole in the head. I don’t even have sufficient space for the mugs I currently own — mostly Starbucks mugs, but who know if some or all will be worth something in future.

My blog friend Dawn recently did a post saying mugs are top sellers at the Antique Mall where she buys, sells, works. That "people have a penchant for mugs and cups to drink out of or display", so my mug collection might be of some little value in future.

This is where life took me yesterday …

Get Your Kicks

The song says to "Get your kicks on Route 66", but I didn’t get any kicks while driving down the 66 Corridor as it runs through a neighboring city while on the way to pick up a needlepoint floss color I’d run out of and was not available locally. I did, however, pass a Barnes & Noble.

Remembering the need to check Randy Rainbow’s autograph to see how it appears in other books, I pulled in.

Unfortunately, this is one loose end that cannot be so easily solved, because the bookstore only had unsigned copies.

My buddy Apache stopped by Friday afternoon, and I finally remembered to ask him about his sister’s stolen truck and how he got into his apartment that day.

If you will recall, it was Friday the 13th when his sister took him to the casino to celebrate his birthday and, while inside, sister’s truck was stolen from the casino’s parking lot.

Inside the truck were the keys to Apache's apartment. His manager did not have a duplicate set and his social worker, who did have a duplicate set, was in Mexico.

I suggested a locksmith, but Apache’s plan was to burglarize his own apartment — break in with a crowbar.

So how did he get in you ask?

He took my advice, called a locksmith.

Sister’s truck was eventually recovered, but it was totaled from having been in an accident.

It's sad how people, who obviously can’t drive, should not be driving, steal an automobile from someone else, go on a joy ride, wreck it, walk away scott free, leaving the automobile's owner high and dry.

I had that happen to me years ago, when I was still a relatively young mother raising teen daughters.

The girls were both in high school and each had an after school work experience job.

Driving a Toyota back then, I’d dropped Twin 2 off at her mall job. When it was time to pick her up, I walked outside and no Toyota — it had been stolen.

The police later spotted it, and there was a car chase that ended with the Toyota being totaled.

I never heard what happened to the guys caught with the car — probably not as much as I’d like to have had happen to them but I did get a call to come to the yard, sign off on the car.

Sad as it was to see my ride banged up/totaled out, I considered myself lucky, because the guy on the lot said the wrecked car next to mine had been stolen along with its female driver, who was later found raped and murdered.

It was a good 15 years before I could afford to buy another car/take on car payments again, or even wanted to own a car or drive. In the interim, it was buses, cabs, and you wouldn’t believe the horrible traumatic experiences I’ve had on those modes of transportation.

Karen Riles Again

Wearing my lucky (Made in 1944) shirt to bingo this afternoon brought me luck. I won the third game and selected a sunglass case from the prize table.

I went on to win game six, where I selected a hummingbird feeder so I can lure them to the patio and watch hummingbirds from my perch on the couch.

So other players won’t get their panties in a bunch, the rule is — one can only win twice so, when I later won again on Game 7 — twice, I didn’t call out bingo.

As to how I one twice on Game 7, it was synchronicity — I was working three cards and two cards hit bingo at the same time.

So in total, I’d actually won four times, and kept that knowledge to myself so I wouldn’t get jumped by a bunch of old ladies.

There were no fresh baked pastries for the folks this time around. Instead, it was popcorn and sodas, because the Baker was unavailable — she’d taken a fall.

Her second.

One fall was outside on the property — the ambulance came and took her away.

This fall happened inside her unit — her daughter drove her to the ER.

There have been some near misses, as her balance isn’t good.

I witnessed such a near miss earlier this week when she and I were chitchatting outside and all of a sudden she began losing her balance, grabbed onto a tree to stabilize herself.

She was able to stabilize but being as how the drought has not only killed the grass, it’s killing the trees, just her gently touching the side of the tree caused a whole chunk of the tree to just crumble.

The area circled in purple is where the Baker rested her hand. The piece in red is what fell off. The tree feels like one good shove and it would turn to dust.

Some of our trees are marked with X’s. I assume because they’re dead and need to be removed. The one the Baker leaned on isn’t marked for removal but, from the looks of its condition, should be.

At any rate, I’d taken a little veggie salad (carrots, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers) to nibble on during the break but, when I saw they had something I could eat — popcorn, I saved the salad for dinner.

I had an opportunity at bingo to ask Talker what she was doing around 1:30 on Monday that so irritated her Karen neighbor that Karen came outside and stared up at the Talker’s unit.

Of course she couldn’t remember that far back, but did say she was sweeping her patio one day during the week when Karen came out and began complaining about the Talker’s bed waking her up at 3:30 a.m.

Talker said she responded with "Oh no. It wasn’t my bed, because I got rid of it last time you complained about the bed. I’m sleeping on just the mattress now, and I’m not giving up the mattress, sleeping on the floor. Take it up with the office".

I said, "Wait a minute, hold on. There is no way you gave up your bed and are now sleeping on a mattress because she complained your bed made noise."

Unbelievable and ridiculous as this sounds, it’s what Trainer said she did.

Upon hearing this, one woman at my table echoed my shock and said she’d seen the bedframe at the dumpster, had wondered whose it was, why it was there, and later saw Head Maintenance Guy break it up so the pieces could fit inside the dumpster.

So, Karen is on the warpath again, but I doubt she’ll complain to management because she’s kinda on probation from when corporate got involved last time.

I remain fascinated by G’s button jar.

Getting a closer look, I see there’s a lot of kitty cats and even a little milk jar and kitty food bowl.

I had my first hummingbird visitor just a few minutes ago, while typing up this post. He moved too fast for me to get over to the window, catch a photo ... or he saw me coming and skadoodled.

I hope I did the sugar water correctly (1 part sugar  ... organic pure cane sugar is what I have in my cupboard and 4 parts water). Don't want to get it wrong and make the hummingbirds ill.

Sneaky Petes

I didn’t see them do it but, returning from this morning’s workout, I found the landscapers had painted some of the grass.

Before

After

Before

After

I love to see it because, like I’d posted a few weeks ago, tight pants high heels manager No. 9 was letting the outside areas deteriorate. Areas which, in spite of all other problems we’ve had, were always well-maintained, described as "beautiful" and now was looking bleak.

There’s plenty more areas that need makeup, so hopefully the painting will continue.

Speaking of Sneaky Petes, some very determined burglars broke through the thick glass of the Pain Cave, managed to bend the steel burglar bars, entered, must have seen the camera — because they disabled it, and spent Monday night drilling a hole though the side wall (now covered with a mirror) to get into the liquor store next door where they went shopping.

Point of Entry

Mirror Covering Hole

Took nothing from the Cave, just did extensive and expensive damage in order to get inside the liquor store, steal lot and lots and lots of alcohol and the cash register.

Insurance will cover the damage, but I hope they don’t come back, do damage again in order to get into the next-door business.

And get this … apparently police no longer come to the scene of a crime, take photos, fingerprints and a report, because Trainer was told he had to come to the station to make the report.

Asked at the station if he had a description, because he wasn't in the mood and is somewhat of a smart ass, Trainer asked why they needed a description.

"So, we can catch 'em".

He said he'd rolled his eyes at that and I myself laughed and laughed and laughed at the telling of what the officer had said because sure, they won’t even come out to check the scene and we’re supposed to think they can catch 'em.

Trainer did actually get a glimpse of two people heavily masked, wearing hoodies, before they disabled the camera, but wasn't a description that would have served a purpose anyway.

Waste Not Want Not

Senior moment alert. I got my activity days mixed up.

Activity Director’s bingo is not until next Tuesday. Today was Pizza Tuesday.

I didn’t discover my confusion until I went down to pick up mail, began walking through the office area and saw Activity Director sitting in one of the offices.

Continuing on to the Community Room, I saw it was empty, rechecked the calendar and learned this is the Tuesday tables should have been laden with pizzas — only the tables were bare.

So long story short, Bingo is not until next week, and I’ve no idea why there were no pizzas for the seniors today.

Sucks for them, but it just so happened I’d picked up supplies at the market yesterday to try a recipe for a pizza crust made from brown rice flour which, though labeled the deadly five-letter word my gut can't handle — flour, is not that kind of flour and should be safe for me (it was).

After rolling out the dough onto the pan, I had a tad bid of extra dough. Waste not want not ran through my head, so I used it to make a mini pizza.

Both are topped with cherry tomatoes, kale, jalapenos, red bell peppers and leftover BBQ chicken.

It’ll be pizza for lunch and dinner today, breakfast (with an egg), lunch, dinner tomorrow.

The Lost Weekend

That booster shot turned into a knockout pill. I ended up sleeping the entire weekend away.

After losing the weekend to hypersomnia, I woke up well rested this morning, and it was back to the regular grind.

No problem keeping up in the Pain Cave, not even when Trainer increased the incline.

While changing out of workout gear in the bedroom, I happened to see the Talker’s Karen neighbor come storming out of her unit, stop beneath Trainer’s unit, look up and stare.

Oh oh. She’s mad about something, thought I.

I’ll have to catch up with Talker, ask what she did to annoy Karen around 1:30 this afternoon. LOL.

Tomorrow is Activity Director’s turn at bringing Bingo back.

I’m not really interested, but I’ll go just to see if anyone shows up for her.

I'm hoping not any, because she's really pissed me off.

Activity Director has changed a lot over the years — and not in a good way.

Hanging onto her job through 7 of our 9-1/2 managers, she’s become somewhat of a butt hole — occasionally taking her obvious frustrations with her life out on the seniors by speaking to them in a disrespectful manner and, lately, sticking her nose in where it doesn’t belong.

She happened to see my Buddy Apache visiting last week, ran and told 9-1/2 (the temp manager from corporate) that there had been problems with Apache in the past, he’d been evicted and wasn’t allowed to be on the premises.

Now what business was that of hers?

Where in her job description is “troublemaker” listed?

At any rate, 9-1/2 took Activity Director at her word, ran outside, confronted Apache, told him to leave.

This ain’t Apache's first time at the rodeo. He said he laughed in her face, told her — legally speaking, she did not have the right to tell him to leave as, just like any other person visiting a resident, he’s allowed to be on the premises.

9-1/2 backed down, said, "You’re right" and hopefully it blew up in Activity Director’s face that she put 9-1/2 in that position of being embarrassed, schooled on what she can and cannot do.

At any rate, I’ll be checking in on Activity Director’s event just to see.

Nothing new to report on finding Bonita’s family. If there is no response to the Seth letter by end of week, I’ll move on to the other brother — Gabriel or Seth’s new wife.

Rockstar

I was a rockstar in the Pain Cave yesterday. I handled the hill training like a champ, sweated a lot but energy level was high and nothing hurt at end of session.

This morning’s booster shot has left me feeling a little lightheaded, a little slow, the arm feels heavy, so we’ll see how Monday’s training session goes.

Bingo that afternoon was pure torture, because the Baker made cake and pies for the break.

There was fresh baked Chocolate Cake, Apple Pie, Coconut Crème Pie and, my favorite ... Cherry Pie.

I didn’t have time for lunch between leaving the Pain Cave, making it down to the Community Room for Bingo, so I brought lunch with me to eat at the break.

So, while everyone was feasting on fresh baked pastries, I had to content myself with …………

Life just isn’t fair.

It was beginning to look like I’d not win a game this time around, but I got Bingo at Game 7 and opted for the Bling Nail Kit from the prize table.

One resident was using buttons to mark her cards.

Some very unique buttons in that jar of hers— it's a treasure, and I can already see Management tossing the jar in the trash when her time comes and they go in to clear her unit.

Now that high heels tight pants Manager No. 9 is gone and Corporate has sent one of their people to cover for the time being (let's call her 9-1/2), we’re getting our Monthly Activity Calendar on a timely basis.

I see Activity Director is hosting bingo this coming Tuesday.

That’s a free day for me, so I might go just to see how many show up.

Activity Director has also scheduled a "Welcome Summer Social" and a "Summer Craft" event .

So, with bingo on Friday and these other events, looks like we’re at long last getting back to somewhat normal up in here.