HEY!

I'M GOING TO DISNEY WORLD!!!

You might say that it has just sunk in. I finally picked up all the paperwork from the travel agent, who didn't have it until last night, and then I came home and packed. Yessiree bob, I packed for a trip that I'm leaving on in ... let me check ... 18 days. (I have a countdown on the phone.) And my carryon in packed too, more or less. I have a short list of what's left to be packed, and then they just have to point me in the right direction.

I have not been as excited about this trip, I think, because, let's face it, I have no money. The trip is already paid for, but I could certainly have used that money for other things (not to mention the other trip to Florida I have to take in September, which is also paid for, and which money I could really have used for other things.) But I'm not letting anything get in the way of just going and having a good time. I'm not going to be bothered if I don't go on some rides that I want to go on, because, as I said last time, I'll certainly be going again. (And here I am.) I am bringing two, count'em two, bathing suits, not that I want to be seen in either one, but I'm okay with that, too.

Remember the tote bags I was going to make for the four of us as mementos of the trip? I wasn't sure how I liked that picture for a tote bag,


but I did realize a couple of hours ago with a resounding DUH that I didn't have to get the bags made at the mall kiosk (which is where I got the idea), all I have to do is get cheap bags at the craft store and print the transfers and do it myself! And when I checked in my desk cabinet for the transfer paper, I found ...

desk-jet printable Shrinky Dink material!

When did I get this? Anyway, I tried the picture and made a sample, and it looks FANTASTIC! I made a few adjustments and then I ran out of black ink, so I'll get ink tomorrow and then make the four shrinky dink keytags or whatever anyone wants to use them for, and all I need to get at the craft store is a can of Krylon to seal them with and something for keychains (although I actually have something at the library I can use that we don't use for anything anymore.)

In other news, I got my hearing aids adjusted -- again -- and they seem to be slightly better. I have not heard from the ob/gyn, which is disappointing, even though I know it's not serious; I should have had a call by now.

No news yet either on the possible excellent job possibility for K, but then this morning, yet another possible excellent job came up, and she sent in her application immediately. She says she has 100 cover letters on her computer, so she applied for at least 100 jobs. (Some of them she applied to directly online, no cover letter needed.) Can you believe it? But either of these would be just incredible, both very good districts with fairly big schools, and good Social Studies departments.

I'm finally reading that book I was trying to get my hands on for weeks, and it's a challenge, although an amusing one.




watching THE GOLDEN GIRLS :: ENTRY #2093
READING: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

Catching Up

I'm all out of books for the moment, since I'm saving what I have for the trip. I really liked Finding Oz, about how L. Frank Baum came to write The Wizard of ... It's got a lot of historical and philosophical background, and was set in a time period I like, the late 1800s.

I did not like the next one I brought home from the summer reading list, Me Times Three, and I gave it up early on. I seriously don't understand how some of these books are chosen for kids to read. This was another Sex in the City-type thing. Why are we giving this to kids to read? What are we going to teach them using this crap?

I have another book coming from B & N tomorrow, which I hope I'll like. I'll let you know.

Pictures. I promised you a picture of the map the girls gave us for our anniversary:


I know it's hard to see what this is. The map is from the 1880s, when New Jersey was made up of several large townships, each divided into school districts. About ten years later, legislation was passed so that school districts could incorporate as boroughs, each one a distinct municipality in control of its own schools; the borough movement went on for about 30 years. This map shows the township and its school districts that was later broken up into many boroughs, including Bizarro Town, which incorporated in 1924. We were then part of Saddle River Township, but we are nowhere near the town now known as Saddle River (a very, very upscale community; Richard Nixon lived there in retirement.) We are also not close to Passaic, a city, although the map shows something called East Passaic, which no longer exists. Anyway. We like maps.

I haven't heard from the doctor yet -- I'm expecting her call this afternoon or tomorrow -- but I know that the scan showed "lots" of fibroids. Swell. I hope I can live and die with them and not have to do anything about it. We shall see.

Lacking a book to read today, I thought I'd do a little *shudder* work. I have a procedures manual that I wrote in the spring of 2008, pretty much a guide for anyone who came after I retired. Well, I'm not going anywhere, but I need to update it anyway, a little time-consuming, but not difficult. And then, CRISIS: I could not find the file anywhere. Not on my home computer, not on my flash drive, and not on the school computer, which I logged into remotely. At last, I found it tucked into the wrong folder on the flash drive, but CRISIS: the file is corrupted. I tried a lot of tricks to get it to open, but it just ain't happenin'.

So now I have to type it all over again. It's about 27 pages long; it'll be longer once I put in the revisions. Oy. And then make an abbreviated edition for the teachers who'll be on library duty; they won't need all of it, but they'll sure need some of it. And then save it in a million places. And put the printed out versions in binders, which I guess I'll need to go buy.

So now, it seems, I do have something to keep me busy. Funny how that works out.




watching L/O :: ENTRY #2092
READING: --- by ---

Book Reviews

I finished the Fat-O-Sphere book, and it really was quite interesting. I also talked to R about it. She reads several "fat-acceptance" blogs, which is what this book is about, and although I thought I agreed with it from the beginning, she pointed out to me that my actions say otherwise. Which, I realized, they did. So I've got a whole new avenue of thought opening up for me here. A lot to (pardon the expression) chew on.

Next, I picked up A Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Banks. I had just grabbed this off a cart in the library Wednesday morning when the book I was looking for wasn't there. This book has been on my school's summer reading list for a few years (I'm not sure for what grade level) and it's always on the table for summer reading and Barnes and Noble, so it must be a common assignment, which is why I wanted to read it.

Wha ...?

First, let me say, if you're a grown woman looking for a book to read, this is okay, not a bad read. If you are a kid, especially a boy kid, I can't imagine what possible relevance this book has for you. (It's not a YA book.) Ethan Frome has more relevance, and that, as everyone knows, sucks. This book is a little oddly written; the style and voice changes by the chapter, but not in any consistent way. It's a chick book, with sex. I think it's okay for kids to read books with sex, but only if it's valid within the context of the book, and not gratuitous, or trendy. I didn't get the point of this book at all, not for kids. I can't imagine what aspect of it they teach.

Today I read The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie. This is a YA book, and a National Book Award winner. Better written than the other, more boy-oriented, a good story, good characters, but again, I don't see the need for some of what's in it. But it was a popular book with the kids, so I wanted to read it. (It's not on the reading list.) I don't know, it must be me.

My next book is the story of how L. Frank Baum came to write The Wizard of Oz, a book the Hubs gave me for Christmas. Time to read some non-fiction/bio for now.

Oh, I got the results of the thyroid ultrasound; I'm fine. I guess I'll hear from the ob/gyn on Monday. She'll tell me I have a fibroid, which I know. Here's hoping I don't have to do anything about it.




watching THE JETSONS :: ENTRY #2091
READING: Finding Oz by Evan Schwartz

Ohai

I wish I could tell you that I haven't written in days because I've been leading such an exciting life, but that would certainly be untrue. I've done some reading, some shopping, some returning, some doctor stuff, and some marathon TV watching. That's about it.

Last first: I think it's probably not a good idea to watch too many Law and Order marathons of any kind. It makes me a little afraid to go into the outside world.

Reading. I started and gave up on a book called A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. It's a Pulitzer Prize winner, and on the summer reading list for one of the new English electives at school. It was ... well, interesting, but too densely written for my tastes, and too crude for school, I think, although it is an elective for seniors. I gave up after a hundred pages. I'm currently reading, and on the verge of giving up on, a book about dieting and body-image and having healthy attitudes towards both, which R gave me to read. I'm down with all that it says, but it's saying it over and over and over. Even so, I'll stick with it for tonight and move on tomorrow, especially if I get the chance to go into school and drop off the book?s I'm done with and get another one that I want.

Oh, K and I did at last see the Harry Potter movie yesterday. What can I say? It wasn't a bad movie, but it was one of the worst adaptations of a book I've ever seen. It was as if all the heart of the book was gone. Less the halfway through the movie, I wanted to kill Dumbledore myself.

Doctor stuff, and I'm going to talk about the lady doctor and lady parts, so, you've been warned. Two doctors have pronounced me post-menopausal, so, yes! It's about time. Even so, there's some minor thing going on that needs investigation; the internist told me Friday to make an appointment with the ob/gyn and tell her I need a "hysteroscopy." I didn't know what that was, so I called, and they were all like "uh, no" and made me an appointment to talk to the doctor yesterday. Turns out that a hysteroscopy is a D & C, which I can tell myself that I don't need, and I certainly don't want, and the ob/gyn agrees, but now I have to have that all ultrasounded as well. So I'm doing that tomorrow when I get my thyroid ultrasounded. I already know that neither of these things is really any kind of concern, but I'll go and get scanned anyway.

Here's the crazy thing on my mind about all this. You know, when we are children, we explore our bodies and are familiar with what we've got and where everything is. (I don't mean just that; we also know every freckle on our hands and knees and feet, and all that stuff.) And as girls get a little older, we are warned of the changes that are about to befall us. (As are boys, I assume.) And the change comes, and it's more or less what we've been expecting. I don't remember being told ahead of time that I would get cramps each month that would double me over in pain, but I had an older sister, so that wasn't much of a surprise.

We are prepared for the change that comes at this end, too, but not nearly as well. For example, once you start piling on the pounds and can't get rid of them, only then does someone say, "Oh, yeah, that's menopause." WTF? I knew about the hot flashes, the mood swings, and some other stuff -- I had watched my mother for those clues -- but some of this other crap, really, I had no warning. Part of that is gravity taking hold, but just in general, it's like I'm trapped in a stranger's body. Not only are there new freckles and the like popping up daily, it's as if nothing is in the same place anymore. I don't know if I can be more clear than that, even if I were talking to you in person. It's just very, very strange. Makes me wonder what else is going to be relocating over the next 20 or 30 years.

No job yet for K, but a new opportunity may have opened up today, a really, really good one, so cross those fingers and toes, folks. Maybe this is the one that was meant to be after all.

Oh, and the girls gave us a really excellent anniversary gift over the weekend. It's in the living room, but it's a very rainy day today, so I don't have enough light to take a good picture to show. I'll try to get one tomorrow.




watching THE GOLDEN GIRLS :: ENTRY #2090
READING: Lessons from the Fat-O-Sphere by Kate Harding and Marianne Kirby

Books and Stuff

I had my annual physical this morning. Nothing to report, some tests to have, that's about it. The only thing of any significance is that the doctor says all my aches and pains are indeed related to the Crohn's arthritis, so at least I know what it all is. And Resnick gave me something on Monday that should be starting to help soon, and today's doctor had me add a supplement that she says will help. Time will tell.

Yesterday's book, The Housekeeper and the Professor, was just wonderful. It's a Japanese novel, but well-translated, short, and different.

Today's book was So B. It, a YA novel I brought home from the library. Not brilliant, but well written for what it is, a good YA read. I seem to be in short-book mode now. My next choice is Luna, another YA novel; one of the kids at school told me it was good when she was returning it, so I'll give it a shot. I have another few in this vein, and then some long ones to tackle, including an old David McCullogh, this one about the building of the Panama Canal, and Mary Stewart's Merlin trilogy.

It also occurred to me that I would want some ebooks along for the Disney trip, and I was low on those, so I checked Amazon for Kindle book sales, and picked up a few.

Did I mention that I'm also starting to save coupons again? I was into this bigtime in the early years of our marriage -- so, 32 years ago -- but then it just became too much of a hassle to deal with. Now that I'm not going to the supermarket with two little kids, I guess I can handle it again. I'm checking websites, printing stuff out, and so on. In fact, it is a pain to do, and I don't know how much it'll really save, but again, time will tell.




watching THE GOLDEN GIRLS :: ENTRY #2089
READING: Luna by Julie Anne Peters

Thinking Back ...

It's July 16, 2009.

48 years ago -- hard to believe it's that long -- my Grandma Sadie died. I was eight years old. I loved and adored her, and had been sad that she didn't choose to live with us after we moved into our house just months earlier. In fact, she had told my parents that she was going to live with us so that they would take the money she offered to help them buy the house, and she did move with us, and stayed a little less than a month, and then basically said "Ha ha just kidding" and moved back in with my aunt, to the town in Massachusetts she had lived in for over forty years.

I didn't go to the funeral with my parents and sister, and I was angry at them for years for leaving me behind, but when I was older, they told me that I had been afraid to go, and they reluctantly left me with family friends. It was probably a good choice, if I was scared. Not ready to deal with it, I guess. I remember that one morning (they were gone for several days), the mom in the family I stayed with let us sit on the floor and eat our breakfast off of trays, still in our pajamas, because there was a rocket launch on TV. (It was a Mercury flight, the Liberty Bell 7, commanded by Gus Grissom.) It was very exciting, as I remember now. I don't regret not going with my family, because I don't have that memory of Grandma like that (not that the casket would have been open; that's not a Jewish thing.) I remember her smile and her holding me on her lap and her voice and the magic things that came out of her kitchen.

In 1969 -- forty years ago on this day -- they launched the first rocket to carry men to the moon. We watched on TV days later as they prepared to step out of the lunar module and onto the surface. If you didn't live before then, and men on the moon has always been a given to you, you can't imagine what it was like. The TV picture was poor, although now they always show it enhanced and clear, not the way we saw it that night. It was a hot summer night, and everybody everywhere was inside in front of a TV. We had just started using the air conditioner that summer, and it was a big one, so we all sat and froze, in the dark living room with the glowing TV on its portable stand in front of us. We didn't have a color TV then, but the moon pictures were in black and white anyway. (How would I know?) We watched, and we grinned, and couldn't believe it, and took tremendous pride that night not in being Americans, I think, but in being human beings.

And ... 32 years ago today, the Hubs and I said "Live long and prosper," among other things, and poof, married. 32 years. It's a long time, man.




watching THE FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #2088
READING: The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa

This and That

I am still not at all sure what to do with the whole Facebook thing, but I was just friended by my childhood next door neighbor/playmate. I would certainly have passed her on the street and not recognized her -- she doesn't even look like her mother -- but once I looked more at her pictures, I saw her there.

It made me consider putting my own picture on my page, but I haven't been happy with a picture of myself in years and years, and I don't expect to get a good one now because I am fat, or, as the Wii Fit tells me every morning in its soft voice, "oh ... that's obese." The pounds are not moving, although I'm eating well and lo-cal, and I'm doing about a half hour of aerobic exercise in the morning. What the hell, I'll see if I can get a decent picture taken in Disney World. My two cousins, as it happens, are incredibly photogenic, and always have been; I've never seen a bad picture of either of them. My sister and I tend to get caught blinking or talking or something.

Speaking of pictures, I scanned a bunch yesterday that I recently found and which had never been scanned before, so I'll share one or two with you. These are oldies, as you'll see.


This is the last time I sat on daddy's lap. I think I was about 17. Someone said something about him missing his little girls who would sit on his lap, so I sat.


This would be the winter of 1981, a month or two before R was born. And yes, I weigh more than this now. (My mother must have taken this picture; that's her purse on the table.)


I'm guessing about 1980 on this one, although it could be later in the eighties. In my head, this is kind of what I think I look like; that is, this is pretty much what my self-image tells me I look like. Mirrors, however, disagree. (But I still have that cowlick in the front.)

(BTW, I don't so much mind what I look like when I look in a mirror, because my face is moving. It's photographs that capture my face still that I don't like. It has to do with my eye and my facial paralysis. I look weird in pictures, but I look fine in person.)

No idea how this turned into the self-image/old photographs entry. I'm going tomorrow to do a market research thing (for $90!) on using technology at home. I think I can manage to answer their questions, eh?




watching THE FAMILY GUY :: ENTRY #2087
READING: The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa

TMI

If I shared all of today's medical information with you -- not all of it mine -- it would be waaaaaay TMI. Nobody's got anything life-threatening or even painful, just a lot of relatively indelicate ailments. Enough said.

I had to go into school this morning for a few things, and ended up making the trek from the library to the central office twice because I either forgot or didn't know what I was looking for. But I think I got my purchase orders all straightened out, and said hello to the principal and took care of a little business with him.

Otherwise, I straightened up my desk so now I don't feel like throwing up when I look at it, which is all the time, and I may (or may not) have solved another problem.

Did I mention that I wanted to have something made for the four of us cousins to commemorate our Disney trip, and that my sister vetoed hats and t-shirts? I settled on a tote bag, but I still haven't been able to find pictures of the four of us as children to have printed on them. Wonderful Niece has all of my mother's pictures, including some I never scanned, and I've been trying to get in touch with her. In the meantime, I found a completely different picture and played with it a little, and here it is:


This is, of course, my Uncle Sol (father of my two cousins going on the trip), my mother Shirl, and their parents Ida and Sam, so, our common grandparents. Is the caption too weird? Is the whole thing too sad, or in K's words, bittersweet? Too depressing a tote bag, or more like a memory, bringing them with us? What do you think?



watching THE GOLDEN GIRLS :: ENTRY #2086
READING: Blue Diary by Alice Hoffman

Clean!

The alternate title of this entry could be "You don't know what you got til it's gone."

We woke up Friday morning at 6:15 to a robo-call from Bizarro Town's office of emergency management. A water main burst on the other side of town and they were issuing a "boil water" alert. They said it was safe to wash clothes and shower, but not to do dishes, and to boil water for three minutes before drinking it.

Hmm. Well.

So is this bullshit, and they just tell us this to cover their asses? Isn't the water that's already in our water heater safe? And if it's not bullshit, how can it be safe to shower? You can be sure a man came up with that one.

I made do by boiling water and filling the bathroom sink with it to wash from. I already had a UTI and didn't want to develop anything else. K, however, had an interview, and so, no choice.

The sink filled up with dishes. (We use bottled water for cooking and drinking, so no problem there.) We started to run out of cups and forks, though, and I broke down and bought disposable (which I not so secretly love.)

We got the robo-called all-clear a little after ten pm on Saturday. I have never done dishes so joyfully, and leaped into the shower immediately thereafter. Ahhh.

In other news, I got a Facebook lesson last night and am contemplating more Twitter. Soon.

I slept like an actual human being last night and had pleasant and amusing dreams. It was so nice.

A couple of medical things tomorrow and a brief stop-in at school. And for now, just trying to keep my feet warm.

A Visit From Grandma

I'm feeling pretty good today, btw, and thanks to those who commented yesterday. I mean, I could still use a vacation at the Mayo Clinic, but that's pretty much every day. I had a wonderful therapeutic mini-massage this morning, and the basement sink is clogged, but generally okay.

On the way home from the massage, I had a little visit with my Grandma Ida. Okay, let's say I enjoyed a little fantasy visit from Grandma. Because a real one would be scary, since she'd be about 117 years old and a zombie and all that. But the fantasy visit went like this:

The doorbell rings and I answer, and Grandma Ida is standing on my front porch. She looks pretty much like this:



except not fancy. (This was their 50th anniversary photo.) Grandma Ida was basically good peasant stock, never wore make-up that I can remember, styled her hair with a man's pocket comb. She was very pretty, as I have mentioned, but generally wore simple dresses with sturdy shoes. Which is how she would be dressed on my front porch. She would also be carrying a black purse draped over her arm -- the kind that snaps closed with a clasp at the top -- and would be carrying two shopping bags, one in each hand.

"Grandma!" hug hug hug "Come in! Let me show you my house!" She puts down her shopping bags in the living room, but holds onto her purse as I show her around. She is nodding and smiling. My house is small, which suits her fine. All she ever wanted was to live in a nice small house.

(Come to think of it, Grandma liked small things, as I do. I think she was so used to moving from one place to another at the drop of a hat that it made more sense to her to have small things. Why have an 8 x 10 of your grandchildren when a 5 x 7 will do? Who needs a hairbrush when you can have a pocket comb?)

We sit at my kitchen table and have some tea. She has hers in a tall glass, with the sugar in cubes and a lot of milk. (Skim milk? Never heard of it.) She does dissolve the sugar in the tea, though; she doesn't hold the cube between her teeth and drink the tea through it, although it wasn't uncommon among her generation. She'll have a nice little piece cake with it, too. When we're done, she'll take the dishes to the sink and wash them, despite my protest of "Grandma, I'll wash the dishes!" And then she looks at the sink. She leans down, opens the cabinet door underneath and peers in at my cleaning supplies and says "Where is the Ajax?" (I wish I could convey her inflection to you.) Hmm.

Next thing I know, Grandma is scrubbing my sink and countertop, and then my stove, inside and out, and then the refrigerator. And then she says "Is there a pail someplace, maybe, and a brush?"

Ahhh. She'll tell me to do the laundry, maybe, or vacuum, while she scrubs the kitchen and bathroom floors on her hands and knees, because how else would you clean a floor? I don't think she dusts or sweeps, her thing is to have her hands in soapy water and scrub. And when she's done ...

She folds the laundry out of the dryer. No one folds laundry like Grandma. She uses her water-worn hands to fold, and smooth out every crease. When she's done, your underwear and socks look like they've been ironed.

She'll stay for dinner, but I put my foot down when she wants to help cook because you never really wanted to eat her cooking. (Although I alone loved her lamb stew.) She'll do the dishes when we're finished eating, and dry them, and put everything away where she thinks it should go so that I'll be calling her for the next three weeks every day to ask where missing stuff is.

She'll smile and thank me for letting her do all that scrubbing today -- and she'll mean it -- and then she'll loop her purse over her arm and pick up her shopping bags -- I have no idea what was ever in the shopping bags that she needed to carry around with her -- and kiss me goodbye at the door and walk down to the corner to wait for the bus. I'll watch from my front porch until I see that she's gotten on.

*sigh* Where's a holodeck when you really need one?




watching HOME IMPROVEMENT :: ENTRY #2084
READING: ----- by -----

Average Bear

Yogi has it better than a millionaire.
That's because he's smarter than the average bear.

I'm not so much calling myself an average bear, or smart or not smart. However, in very many ways, I probably do have it better than than a lot of millionaires, except, of course, in the having money department. I shall backtrack.

This has been not so much a good day, although it's mostly okay now. Once again, I fell asleep after four, and after a couple of hours of disturbing dreams, I woke up about 6:15, shortly after which it became apparent to me that I must have a UTI.* Ick. I slept for another couple of hours, woke up feeling pretty crappy, decided not to go out, and left it at that. At nine, I called the doctor's office and they called in a prescription for me.

The Hubs had a business appointment and K went out for a long walk, so I was here alone, which rarely happens these days. I thought this would be my golden opportunity to start a little packing -- it's only five and a half weeks until the Disney trip, so I'm getting a late start for me -- but I found there really wasn't much I could do at this point except put a few things inside the suitcase that I had had sitting on top of it. Oh well, I had some bills to pay, so I fired up Quicken. That's when the fun started.

Let's just say the family Chai is having its own little economic crisis and it all hit the fan today. It's always been a bad subject for me, but with the help of therapy and other stuff, I've managed the stress very well for awhile, but it fell on me hard today. The old familiar knot reappeared in its traditional place in my gut, and I was stressed out, more than I've been in ... well, a year, really; I started taking the anti-depressants a year ago this week. I was still holding on, though, I was managing. I just knew I'd need to have a talk with the Hubs when he got home.

K came home, we had lunch and such, and then, I guess it was around 3:00? Maybe? we had an odd bit of an altercation, this because she commented about something she saw in the backyard and I didn't hear her and said "What?" and she repeated it and I still didn't get it and must have said "What?" again, and she lost it. And I felt like shit, mostly because it makes me angry when she does this; I mean, I didn't ask to become hearing impaired and I don't personally enjoy it, and I was close to being a mess already. She quickly gathered up her things and retreated up to her room.

The Hubs came home moments later, and we talked. I told him that other than the obvious need for more money, it needs to be not my problem anymore because the stress is not good for me. And he took it, I think, and told me that the meeting he was at all day was in setting up a kind of new business plan and stuff, so, YAY! I felt soooo much better after I talked to him and got the weight taken off of me. And while I was adjusting to the knot getting smaller ...

K came downstairs, took the remote off my desk and switched my TV from Law and Order to a new channel we're getting called Boomerang. Why? Because there was a Quick Draw McGraw cartoon on -- she had been watching it upstairs -- and she knows that Quick Draw is my most favorite of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters. (They show the Yogi Bear and Huckleberry Hound hour every day at three.) It was an apology that worked for me, and after grinning like an idiot at the cartoon for a few minutes, I gave her a hug. (We also watched a very early Snagglepuss cartoon together.) Oh, and K had offered to make dinner (chicken parm) if I don't feel up to it.

(I mentioned to the Hubs that I have never gone so begrudgingly to Disney World; I wouldn't have spent a dime on a trip now, but I didn't have much choice, it being the wish of a dying aunt. The second Florida trip, in September, is something I could also pass on, but unfortunately, we didn't go to my cousin's first son's Bar Mitzvah two years ago because of a threatened hurricane, and not going to this one would cause a breach in the family that no one wants. I'm pretty much taking both trips against my will, which is not to say that I don't want to enjoy them when I go. I just wish someone else had paid for them.)

So, it's been quite the day for me here. Not so much ups and downs, but a long down followed by a nice little sequence of ups.

*For those that need an explanation, a UTI is a urinary tract infection.




no wait ... it's

no. more like


okay. I'll go with
and maybe one more
watching L/O :: ENTRY #2083
READING: ----- by -----

Am I Still Here?

Oh, look, I am still here. I don't know. The lack of sleep gets to me later in the day. Once again, I saw four on the clock before I fell asleep last night.

It turns out we did not go to the airport to get R. It would have been a half hour to the airport, a half hour to where she lives, and then an hour home, all between two and four in the morning. Not that I wasn't up, but I gave her the choice -- we texted before she boarded the plane in London -- and she felt it made more sense to call the GF's father, who was only too happy to do it. Literally. One of the reasons she had wanted us to come is that he is happy to fulfill their every need (the GF is an only child, and his parents are used to doing things for him), but as she said to me, "What am I, an orphan?" She doesn't want her future in-laws to think of her as all theirs, so to speak; she wants to make it clear that her family/parents are part of the picture, too. For which I am most happy. But the GF's parents live 15-20 minutes from them, and in the same direction from the airport, so I think I can concede airport duties to them for the time being.

However, if I win the lottery, I'm buying them a house near me. I'm just saying.

My biggie for the day was getting my nails done and trying to take only a short nap. If I don't sleep tonight, then no nap tomorrow for me. We'll see how that goes.

I need to get my glasses adjusted tomorrow because they're too tight. How is that they've only become too tight in the last few months? I can only assume that my head has gotten fatter. Is there another explanation?

That's my day. I'll let you know if I'm still here tomorrow. (Or whenever.)



watching THE GOLDEN GIRLS :: ENTRY #2082
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HelpMe

So it's about 2:30 Tuesday afternoon, and we're "watching" -- I use the term loosely -- the Michael Jackson Memorial, which I had vowed not to watch. I forgot that K would be home and would want to watch it, for the performances, she says. Probably. Anyway, I have to be quiet, because any remark I've made so far -- something about Stevie Wonder's song, I think -- she says "Well, you don't have to watch it, you know! I can go upstairs! You can change the channel!" Oy. So it's on. As I type, Al Sharpton is speaking. And I finally figured out who he reminds me of, but you've got to be old to get it:


This is the main cast of a TV show I loved when I was very young. It's called Amos 'n' Andy; it was based on a very successful radio show. Amos, on the left, was a hard-working, sensible cab driver who reminded me for some reason of my grandfather. Andy, on the right, was the slightly dumb buddy that you see on every TV show. The man in the middle was Kingfish, a demagogue in their little community, full of scam and bluster, and always trying to get Andy to buy into his doomed get-rich-quick schemes. The way he talked was bigger than life; every simple sentence was a performance, and almost nothing was ever sincere.

Guess who Al Sharpton reminds me of? Nothing like living up (or down) to the qualities of the worst kind of stereotype.

Anyway, Michael Jackson. I'm not that interested, but I'll say my piece. He was very talented, although I never understood the worldwide adulation. I don't think he was a pedophile. I think he was a damaged man who never grew up, and whose family exploited him from the minute they saw he had talent, and they still are, and they will continue to do so. His life, no matter how grandiose, was a sad one. If his children brought him joy, he and brought joy to them, so much the better. And now their lives will be sad because there is no way they can continue to live the sheltered lives they did, and everything will change for them. They've been put in the care of a 79 year old grandmother whose husband is certainly the man who made Michael what he was (not in the good way.) When the grandmother's time is done, they will pass to Diana Ross, who is 65, and has already raised her children. And then? Something needed to be more well thought out.

I wonder if this memorial is what he wanted, or if it's just what his father wanted so he could make a buck off the whole thing.

++++++++++++++++++++++++

I felt pretty rotten yesterday after the colonoscopy, which is unusual. Fine for the first few hours, but then I had a low grade fever and could not get warm for hours, or eat. I felt better by nine or nine-thirty, and all through the night, though. I saw four on the clock before I fell asleep. This sucks. But will come in handy tonight, because R's flight, scheduled to arrive around 7:30, has been delayed (hello, Newark Airport!) and is now coming in around 1:45. That's in the a.m. But I'll be awake anyway, so what's the diff?



watching the travesty :: ENTRY #2081
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Lost Weekend

I didn't lose the whole weekend, just yesterday and today (which I know is Monday, but it's all running together for me.) It's about 11:30; I'm having a colonoscopy in two hours. At this point, I'm mostly bored, and HUNGRY. I thought I'd post now rather than think of the food I'm going to eat the second I come home later on.

It seems like a long time without writing for me, for no real reason. I thought a log about July 4, but couldn't decide where to go with it. It used to be a family holiday, a barbecue in our backyard, but the kids are all dispersed now, and my parents are gone. Maybe we'll restore it someday. It was a lot of work for me, but also a lot of fun. And truth be told, we did it as simply as we could. The vegan Hubs even cooked all the meat for everyone, but I don't know if we even have a grill anymore. Ah, I'll put it on the list for future consideration.

I couldn't eat solid food yesterday, so I pretty much slept as much as I could. I should have had a morning appointment; I did, for last week, but had to postpone it because the Father's Day barbecue at my sister-in-law's got postponed a week, so I couldn't have done the preparation.

Anyway, the worst of it is over, and I do like the feeling of going under the anesthesia. All I want to do now is eat. The good news is that this time, I actually did lose a couple of pounds. So altogether, I'm down a little over six pounds in about ten days. Not a rate I expect to continue, but if I can get two more by the end of the week, I'll be back to where I was before I started gaining the weight back. And maybe then the Wii Fit won't tell me that I'm obese. :(

So that's my story.




watching WILL AND GRACE :: ENTRY #2080
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