Jazz!

The new apple of the day is a Jazz! apple, which is from New Zealand, according to the little sticker. Sweet and incredibly crisp, which I love. I can't stand those soft-textured apples, or any pears, which are always like that. This was good.

Time marches on, and so do I. I feel like George Jetson yelling "Someone stop this crazy thing!" So far today, I have gotten a pedi, gone food shopping and also to CVS (where I got everything I needed except the one thing I forgot), and moved a TV down from the third floor.

Only two more steps in the great TV exchange. There are currently two fairly large TVs in my living room: the one that was K's that she just brought down, and the one that's traveled all over New Jersey in the last few weeks in the back of my car. That one has been tested with her game system and it works, so we need the Hubs to bring it upstairs when he's done with his yardwork. K's will ultimately move to the basement; I'll bring up the 12" that's down there and either the Hubs can have it for his study (as the one he has there seems to be dying), or if he wants to continue in martyr mode, we can put it in the kitchen instead of the 9" that's there that's so old it has dials that turn, with numbers around the edges. A certifiable antique.

I've also washed towels and put them all away -- yes, on the same day! and gone to recycling.

So the sad story is that I have the summer off and I always need a summer project, so I guess I'll be moving my archives, at least some of them. I need to investigate this timestamp business in blogger, otherwise I guess I can copy them into wordpress and import into blogger from there, but I still need to check it out. Thanks, everyone, for all your help!

For the moment, however, I am going to succumb to my headache and watch the rest of the Philosophy show on QVC.

Ooh, P.S. I just clicked the little "Post Options" link before I clicked the "Publish Post" button, and one of the options that opens up is where you can edit the date of the post. Score!

watching QVC :: entry #1492

Reviews, Movie and Apple

(For details on using Google Reader in place of the Buddy List, look over here.)

First, let me say how delightfully itch-free I am today, courtesy of my new favorite wonder-drug, Zyrtec. I could do a freaking commercial. I was a mess yesterday, and today, fine. The human body is so weird.

Since I started my exploration into the Wide World of Apples, I've tried

• Fuji
• Gala
• Braeburn
• American Cameo
• Pink Lady

They were all pretty good, actually, but the Pink Lady and the Braeburn didn't stand out at all. I still have left to try Royal Gala (which I think are the same as Gala, just smaller), Rome (which are baking apples?), and Granny Smith, which is what K eats so we always have them around. I haven't seen any other varieties in the stores here, although there was a sign above the apple shelf that said "Empire", but none of those in the bin.

It seems to be settled, then. I like apples. It's like when the government does one of those studies that cost millions of dollars and they come up with results that were so DUH that you can't believe they did a study, like the reason that babies cry is that they're unhappy, or something like that. Anyway, apples are good. You heard it here first.

We haven't had rain yet today, but it's coming, and the skies are darkening. There was no place to go today, really, so K and I finally watched The Queen, which had come from the blockbuster online people. As we expected, it was an excellent film, and Helen Mirren's performance was really outstanding. You almost don't think so, because she's so under-stated that you can believe that she really is Queen Elizabeth, but of course, no. Very much worth watching.

Tomorrow begins the countdown for the last three weeks of school. Can't believe it's almost over. With any luck, K will get some working days out of it.

I'm going to post and give the Sibs a call. Tomorrow.

watching Batman :: entry #1484

Apple Review

The new apple of the day today was a Gala, and it was excellent. And of course it was COLD! How -- why -- would anyone eat an apple at room temperature? Apples must be cold and crisp! That's what makes them apples, eh? Okay, okay, and I'm trying a Fuji tomorrow. I don't know if I've ever seen a Honeycrisp around here; I'll have to look in the fancier supermarket over the weekend. Maybe.

K passed her exam with a very respectable 88 -- a B+ -- which should give her a solid B for the course. And now she never has to know anything about economics ever, ever again, much like her mother.

I'm very itchy tonight; I took a benadryl about a half hour ago. Oh, my hearing is better today, too, so the magic prednisone is doing its job. I'm sure that the hearing thing is just another one of this year's allergy reactions, as the hives are; wherever I go these days, pollen is flying through the air, settling on the car, settled on my shirt before, even, when I was out.

I finally took the Sibs out for her birthday dinner, to the Cheesecake Factory, so as you can guess, I ate a very healthy dinner of grilled shrimp with no butter, steamed broccoli, and then a piece of key lime pie cheesecake. I can't even figure out how to put that into my WW food log, unless I write "... and then I ate a million points." But hey, that was hours ago, and I'm not hungry yet; haven't eaten a bite since I got home. Maybe I should eat a piece of cheesecake every night.

Then we went to the Land's End store at Sears, and I got a few little things, so now I'm going to try on the lightweight sneakery-shoes I got and see if they'll be good for Walking Away Pounds right here in the comfort of my own home. As soon as I stop scratching.

watching Friends :: entry #1481

Yes, Scarlet

Today is, indeed, another day. Let's see where the day took me.

Hey, here's a suprise. I woke up with my good ear all blocked again. Looks like this year, the lovely spring allergies have decided to attack me in the form of inner ear blockups, and hives. I'm adjusting my allergy meds tonight -- taking a benadryl instead of a zyrtec, that's for the hives -- and I started a three day course of prednisone this morning, although if I wake up this deaf tomorrow, I'm making it a four day course. This deaf thing is wearing very thin.

I didn't have to be at work today until 8.30; usually I get to school at 7.00, so that left me with time to kill. I Walked Away Some Pounds -- really -- and then reported to the Board of Ed. office for my workshop. It was as I anticipated, and yes, I will be facilitating at the all day workshop in October, the one I usually skip. Guess I'll have to skip the May in service next year. I'll be the one talking about using library resources.

I came home for lunch, by which time I had a killer headache, probably sinus, so there's that going on, too. Tell me, where can you live that allergies won't bother you? Not Alaska, I know; Alaska has its share of grass and trees and pollen. Maybe Antarctica, but of course, the ground is disappearing beneath your feet there, so that doesn't say much for property values.

Here's a quirky thing. When I was a kid, what I thought of as "apple" is what most people think of as a "Macintosh apple." I had no idea that there were other kinds, because my parents only bought Macintoshes. (They had a very limited menu, which I've described before somewhere.) Now that I am all grown up, I only eat Golden Delicious apples because I looooooove them. But today after the workshop, I was oddly motivated to go the produce market and buy a whole variety of apples, just a couple of each, to see if I like them. Now I will probably fall in love with Gala apples or something, and eat only them. I'm weird that way. I'll let you know.

Cosmic asked an interesting question: do I sign? The answer is that I do not (although it's a language I always wanted to learn), and it wouldn't help me if I did because no one else in my world signs, either. Signing -- and anybody, please, correct me if I'm wrong -- is the language of people who live in the deaf community, or who live with people who live in the deaf community. I do not, and the deaf community, I'm pretty sure, is not interested in people like me. I lost a substantial part of my hearing as an adult, but not all of it. I hear well enough to function in the hearing world the same way I did before I lost it, and even if I were to become completely deaf at some point, I would still live in the hearing world. I might learn sign at some point as a lark, or to help me along if I ever do lose a substantial part of what's left, but that's unlikely anyway. If I spoke sign, I'd have to have an interpreter with me all the time to sign to me what other people are saying, and I don't need that (and it would be really, really strange.)

The other deaf thing I don't have and don't want is a cochlear implant. For one, it's not suited to me because it's my actual acoustic nerve that's damaged, and that's what a cochlear implant implants to. There is some new thing, similar, called a "brain stem implant", which would work in my case. However, on December 17, 1991, I made an extremely serious vow that no human being was EVER to see my brain stem again while I lived (that's where my tumor was), and baby, I am sticking to that one like velcro. Like glue. Like crazy glue. I'm keeping my damn brain stem to myself from now on, thankyouverymuch.

Tomorrow is K's last day of the summer session, and she is studying like mad for her economics exam, which I think she will pass, because she exceeds expectations academically, but I think she is also genetically incapable of knowing this stuff. The Hubs, who was actually an economics major, has offered to help tonight when he gets back from his meeting. (Her mad math skilz come from me, of course.)

My headache is a bit better, and I'm having some shrimp for dinner. Maybe I'll take a quick run to the supermarket after that, since neither the Hubs nor K will be home for awhile. I didn't see R today, which is an achievement considering she doesn't live here anymore.

Okay.

watching Still Standing :: entry #1480