Conduct Unbecoming To A Granny...

Exploring the world outside my pigeon hole, one stumble at a time....

[francesweyr]

Okay, if you cold call me about roof inspections and I hang up on you, that is not being rude. At least not being any more rude than a cold call.

[francesweyr]

My daughter’s two best friends are a gay couple. They like to do things on their birthdays. The only problem my daughter has with this is her birthday is at the end of June, so there is inevitably a scheduling conflict with the Chicago Pride Parade. Watching a parade and hanging out with an increasingly inebriated bunch of strangers is not her idea of a good time on her birthday. It’s not that she doesn’t support Pride, it’s just that after you reach a certain age, sunburned and hungover isn’t all that appealing.

Every year I hear this. Every year I nod sympathetically. Every year I bite my tongue to keep from saying, “Well, you know, if you hadn’t decided to hang around for five weeks after your due date, you could have had a birthday in May.”

[francesweyr]

My car is in the shop. It’s going to be a hit to savings, but I need to get that freaking engine light off so I can pass emissions and renew my plates. Sometimes I get very annoyed that Brother has two dead cars cluttering the driveway and an expired license because it would be extremely helpful to have someone who can get me to appointments if I can’t drive.

Home Depot canceled and refunded the order for the water filter, deciding it was lost in transit. I’ll order it again. Hopefully work on the kitchen will commence soon. I’m looking forward to putting it behind me.

[francesweyr]

Well, this is not an auspicious sign.

For background, I’ve been keeping my sourdough starter in the fridge when not actively using it lately because the warmth in my kitchen makes it too active. Consequently on Wednesday evening I take it out of the fridge and feed it. This gives me a nice, enthusiastic starter to mix bread on Thursday morning that will be baked Friday.

Last night, after finishing the dishes, I pulled the jar out of the fridge and fed the starter. It wasn’t until after I turned off the lights and laid down that I remembered it was only Tuesday.

Wow. I mixed up the bread this morning, the world won’t end if I bake on Thursday. Not sure how I feel about losing track of what day it is, but it’s not a smiley happy thought.

[francesweyr]

Introduced grandson to burrito bowls today. He asked for a burrito for lunch and although there were burrito innards leftover in the fridge, his great uncle considers my flour tortillas made with butter to be prime snacking, so there was nothing to wrap around the leftovers.

Hence burrito bowls. He ate two.

[francesweyr]

I had to go out for some follow up boob pics today. (I had my mammogram last week and they wanted a better look). They decided there wasn’t a problem after all, so I went on my merry way. This left me close to GFS, which is a rare occurrence, so I went to see if they had any eyes of round. Some folks are dismissive of the cut, but round steak was the steak of choice in our house when we were growing up, probably because it was cheap. We actually like it. We also have little crank machine to make cube steaks and Brother learned a lot when he worked in the meat market. A whole eye of round is 6 pounds or so and can be turned into steaks, cube steaks, roast, stew meat, or strips for stir fry.

Anywho, I grabbed a nice eye of round for Brother to subdivide and then grabbed a 10 pound chub of 80/20 ground beef and put it on the credit card. It was cheaper than the ground beef at Walmart and we have a vacuum sealer and a freezer.

So I brought home two ridiculous packages of beef today that will probably last us for the rest of the summer. I do not regret it.

The sink was delivered a few hours ago, so now we’re just waiting for the water filter.

[skygenders]

College should be free and you should be able to study “useless” degrees just for the love of learning

[francesweyr]

And there should be pillories on campus for staff advisers who counsel that you should give up studying what you love for something “practical” so you can throw overripe vegetables at them.

[francesweyr]

Weather app predicts we’re going to get .01 inches of rain. Really? That’s barely enough to spoil a freshly washed car. It’s not worth the effort to cloud up.

I guess I’ll be dragging the hose out to the tomato plants again

[francesweyr]

The four cabinets and a pantry ordered last week have all arrived. They are currently sitting in the garage waiting to be finished. The sink and water filter should be here Monday. I realize I’ll be making multiple trips for odd bits, but that’s a future problem.

I have pretty much done nothing all day because I felt like it. Just kind of blah and tired.

[francesweyr]

Daughter was here yesterday when I got a muscle spasm in my hand. I honestly thought I was past those because I hadn’t had one in a month. It was somewhat aggravating to try to deal with it calmly while she was peppering me with questions and advice. Not because it felt like a particularly calm event, but one learns that there are very few experiences of that type where screaming, sobbing, and/or cursing improves the outcome.

An example:

Daughter, on seeing me curl my fingers, “You should straighten your fingers if you have a cramp.”

Me, who has done this before, “if I straighten them, they’ll try to bends backwards.”

Daughter, dismissively, “But your fingers don’t bend that way.”

Me, exasperated, “That’s probably why it hurts so damned much when they do it.”

And this is the person I’m supposed to give my power of attorney to.

I realize this is only a very minor incident, but it did give me some infinitesimal glimmer of how folks with disabilities must feel to get “advice” from people who know Jack shit about what they’re talking about. It sucks bowling balls through a bendy straw.

I apologize to the Universe if I was ever that stupid

[francesweyr]

Just read an installment of a fanfiction series which included a discussion with multiple detailed examples, spanning several chapters about vaccination. While I am in agreement the thoughts expressed, there was a point where the conversation became ponderous and really started to really weigh the story down.

I think I’m a little worried about the author. Honey, who hurt you?

[francesweyr]

About three weeks ago, I hung up the hummingbird feeder again. I take it down, clean it, and store it every winter after the first frost. So far Brother and I have each seen only one hummingbird this year, although the nectar is disappearing at a steady pace. Part of me is disappointed to miss the fluttering jewels at the feeder. Part of me is pleased to support the hummingbirds. The final part of me wonders if something else could be helping to empty out the feeder.

[francesweyr]

My brother Michael would have been 68 years old today.

[francesweyr]

They backed a big orange Home Depot truck up my driveway this afternoon, beeping all the way, and unloaded a pallet of cabinets and a ten foot chunk of countertop. Brother put it in the garage to await the rest of the order. He will have to assemble a couple of the cabinets. I bought them unfinished, so they will have also to be stained and urethaned.

Grandson sat on the couch with that damned tablet and didn’t even ask what was going on. When we were 11, we would have been right in the middle of that making nuisances of ourselves, or at least watching the whole thing and checking out the contents of the pallet.

It’s a little bit concerning that he shuts out the real world so completely.

[francesweyr]

Anybody ever hear of “cubical tunnel syndrome”?

I wanted to ask the doctor if he was making this nonsense up, but apparently that’s why the two smallest fingers on my left hand are going numb and tingly. He compared it to carpal tunnel, but your elbow. I’m supposed to do OT for it, and PT for my knee, which got a steroid shot today.

Because I don’t already have enough to do with babysitting, preparing to rip the kitchen cabinets out, and getting the car fixed.

[francesweyr]

Is it sad that I’m excited about a sink? It’s got a drop down faucet, a waterfall faucet, a glass rinser, and a faucet for the water filter. There is a rack, a wash basin, and a cutting board that slide on a little rim. Not to mention it’s one bowl instead of two so it will be easier to wash big stuff like roasting pans and barbecue grills. There’s a soap dispenser.

Yes, it’s a little sad, isn’t it?

[francesweyr]

I have ordered all new base cabinets for the kitchen, a new pantry cupboard, and countertop. I have a snazzy workstation sink and an under sink water filter in my shopping cart. They are going to be delivering the unfinished cabinets next week. Brother says he has enough stain for them, but it probably froze in the garage last winter so I’m including that in my mental tally. There will obviously be what I refer to as “Oh shit!” expenditures. This is not my first home improvement rodeo.

Add in the fact that my car needs work to pass inspection before renewing the plates, and the savings is going to have a really nasty dent in it. Can’t be helped.