The current version is usually posted at http://wlweather.net/Pcw/
I always feel great trepidation when pressing "send".
I was pinning the recall notice to the recalled box of Michelina Alfredo with Chicken and Broccoli, preparing to take it back to Kroger tomorrow, when I noticed that the recalled product is "best by" August, and the one I have is September.
So I DuckDucked "recall" and found some with September dates, so I decided to take it back anyway. [But, it turned out, not "tomorrow".]
Dave drove himself home from the emergency room, and waited in the car while I ran in for his new prescription.
While I was waiting for that prescription and two older ones to be packed, I found a bottle of the lotion I'd been intending to buy on my bike tour. I didn't check anything else off today's itinerary. I did pack my pills after supper, which was late because we didn't have lunch until two.
Dave was trepidated about going in, because the last time this happened they kept him four days and we have very important appointments tomorrow and Monday, but Leah irrigated his bladder, wrote a prescription for antibiotics, and sent him home.
The phlebotomist drew what looked like a substantial fraction of a unit of blood in little vials. I'm glazed out on what else went on.
Steve arrived to install our new grab bars just before we left. The grab bars make a marvelous difference — Dave tried out the shower stool as soon as he got home, and didn't have a bit of trouble getting up.
Nephew Dave is driving us to Fort Wayne on Monday. Tomorrow's appointment is coming to us.
Our Sunday appointment had to take her son to the hospital instead.
While making the bed, I found debris on the floor, including a cookie fortune that said "We can admire all we see, but we can pick only one."
That's particularly inane when you remember that we got it at a buffet.
I put my hand down inside the wastebasket before letting go of it. It won't turn up again.
Dave has a glass bottle of vinegar on the counter for cleaning his bags. I had a seldom-used identical glass bottle in the laundry room. I think it was Sunday night that Dave noted that his bottle was running low, so I set my glass bottle on the dryer so I could get at the gallon jug of cleaning vinegar behind it. While taking the jug down, I knocked a basket off its hook and it bounced off me onto the dryer and knocked the quart bottle to the floor, where it did what falling glass does.
And I had topped it off when I cleaned the shelves. We could sweep some of it into the lobby dust pan, and Dave took some up with the sponge mop, but we were pretty short on rags when we finally got the mess cleaned up. I was glad that I still had an old-time mop stick, so that I could towel the floor standing up.
I put the rags through a rinse-and-spin and hung them on the drying rack.
Kathy furniture washed clothes Miranda
Signed final papers with Firefly & First Care. To poohed to write.
Took taxes to bank. [I rode the flatfoot.]
Dr. King tomorrow.
Dave got out of the shower saying "That grab bar makes all the difference." Also likes Irish Spring. [New shower soap recently purchsed from Amazon] [turned out he is allergic to it, so it was added to my collection of shampoos.]
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I shouldn't have said, yesterday, that I could think of only one reason we wouldn't be home at six or seven today.
But the clog resolved itself while we were waiting for the doctor, and we were home at six.
Half past six . . .
The driveway alarm bing-bonged while I was typing that. Miranda just left off our copy of the papers Dave signed, and we are all set with home helper and case management. Home helper hasn't been scheduled yet. I must find time to go to Lowery's and look over the vacuum cleaners before one is. I'm sure we'll need an upright; Roombas don't do well when it isn't your own carpet. I think I can do that Saturday.
The meatloaf and hamburger sauce I was going to make tonight have been postponed until tomorrow. We split a half-pound hamburger patty with cheese melted on it and a flat bun for supper.
I hope I remember what I meant by the notes I meant to expand yesterday when I find time for them tomorrow. Tonight I'm going to read my funnies and go to bed.
Today ended on a high note — at noon Kathy brought us the last papers Dave needs to sign to get long-term care, and washed about two weeks of neglected dishes.
I was making hamburger soup at the time. I decided to put it all into the soup and make meatloaf some other time — that squash I want to stuff will last for weeks. After supper, I filled two can-or-freeze pint jars and put them in the freezer. The rest of the soup would have fit into the small casserole, but I used the large one.
And in the evening Nalamolu's office called to say that Dave's PET scan had been scheduled.
As for yesterday and this morning, I'll tell you the gory details if I remember them when I get time to write. We did make it to Dave's 9:45 appointment with Dr. Knight. I shouldn't have gone with him — spouses have nothing to do at eye exams — but by then I wasn't letting him out of my sight.
I just finished unscrambling the papers in my go bag, and updating the digital copy of my calendar.
And so to bed.
I washed a top sheet today — and promptly found that the other top sheet is dirty.
Then I got up the nerve to tackle the grey fitted sheet, which has been draped over a drying rack since Tuesday. By dint of marking each corner with a clothespin, I managed to get it into a rectangular wad that takes up a *lot* of space in the linen closet. I left the pins in, as they will make it less impossible to put the sheet on the bed.
At least I'll never have both fitted sheets in the closet at the same time.
I replaced the sateen top sheet with a flannel sheet that I'd discovered while cleaning the linen closet. If we like it, I'll replace it with one of the other flannel sheets; this one drapes clear to the floor. This one was the thickest while folded up, so I assume that the others are *not* king size.
I was wondering why getting the wash on the line left me dueless and dilatory when I noticed that it's time to eat lunch and take a nap.
I must start my nap soon; I'm probably still inclined to long naps from the night I haven't had time to write about.
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Woke up thinking I'd finally caught up on sleep.
I forgot to eat lunch first. Didn't miss it, but I nibbled some while preparing stuff to add to the soup and wiping the gaskets on the refrigerators and freezer.
I have some dry macaroni and chopped parsley and basil in a saucepan, and plan to add two bowls of soup to it and maybe some water and chili powder and cumin.
Note written Tuesday:
Kathy furniture washed clothes Miranda
/Tuesday note
We had the final interview with Miranda on Tuesday. She will come by for an hour every month to manage our case. Might give Dave his B-12 shot, as she is an RN.
Dave was thinking that he might buy another bamboo bench to put the TV on so that he could watch it from the futon. I suggested that he try the old bench first to see whether he liked it. On Monday, Kathy and I shifted furniture and found that the bench was just a tad too short. I've forgotten the details but I think we ended up with the TV on Evelyn's sewing machine, which we've been using for a sideboard, and the TV-lamp stand where the sewing machine was. It doesn't matter because on Tuesday we put everything back where it was, but much neater and cleaner.
And now for Wednesday night. (Checks) Yes, it was Wednesday.
Not all that many details. It was after Dave took his one-o'clock antibiotic that he found that his catheter was clogged — probably not long after, as I was still awake doing sciatica exercises. (I normally do them between twelve-thirty and time for my levothyroxin, but I'd slept until one.) I took the bottle with us, and we were still in the emergency room when he took the next dose at nine, but we must have left soon after, as we had time to go home, change clothes, and eat something before arriving on time for the 9:45 eye exam.
A nurse flushed the catheter with little effect. At some point Dr. King appeared and flushed painfully and with good effect. It took a long time before what he pumped out wasn't dark red. I didn't think to ask what he was doing up at that time of night. A nurse had mentioned earlier that she'd been talking to him about another patient. and had mentioned that Dave was there.
And that's all that I remember.
Starting while I was still napping, Abe blew all the leaves off the driveway and paved surfaces and places he couldn't mow, which took quite a while, then chopped them up with his lawn mower. It's amazing how gone they are.
When we got to the emergency room, I had keys to the church, but didn't have my key to the car. I borrowed Dave's so I could park the car. Now I've got a tag that says "CAR KEY" on my go bag.
Turned out that a flush cleared the clog and irrigation cleared up the blood.
At supper, Dave remarked that it's pretty bad when they recognize you at the emergency room.
I must have gone to Aldi the last time I wore my black turtleneck — there's a quarter in its pocket.
I carried my quarter in the watch pocket of my jeans yesterday. Linda and I enjoyed shopping together, and may do it again.
I failed to note when it was eleven o'clock.
I've learned that one can make respectable chopped liver out of left-over liver and onions with mushrooms. I was thinking of chopping it up and stirring in mayonnaise or something to stick it together, but I looked it up on the Web first and discovered that the real deal is quite easy. At least it is now that I buy pre-boiled eggs.
Just caramelize an entire onion in schmalz or duck fat — takes a while, but one can do other things with a timer set to remind one to stir it frequently, more frequently when it begins to brown. It shrinks a lot, so if you don't think you have too much onion, you haven't enough.
Dump the livers and all their seasonings and any gravy that has cooked out of them into a chopping bowl and chop and chop and chop with my new ulu (mezzaluna). At this point I began to sympathize with those who use meat grinders, food processors, and so forth. I think I still have a meat grinder in the back corner of the southmost cupboard, but for half a pound, I'd rather chop and chop than clean it.
Then dump in the still-hot onions, being sure to scrape all that expensive duck fat into the bowl. The heat of the onions helps dissolve the butter the livers were cooked in.
Chop and chop until it would stick to a cracker, then add two boiled eggs and chop and chop some more. A rubber spatula has been returning the edges to the middle all this while.
Dave and I each had chopped-liver sandwiches for lunch.
Supper was my second pass at lamb chops. For sixty years I've been eschewing lamb because it must be cooked exactly right to be edible, but with a meat thermometer, there is nothing to it.
My attention was attracted by an "Aldi find" on lamb shanks. I thought that meant a shank bone with a little meat on it, but they meant the other end of the leg. I *think* that the chops are a regular item and I can get more in a couple of weeks. We didn't mind eating lamb two days in a row.
Our home helper is making his or her first visit tomorrow at 12:35.
Another culinary discovery: A while back I noticed that my parsnips were wilting and put them into a wide-mouth quart canning jar of water. Today I drank some of the water and found it pleasantly zippy, somewhat reminiscent of frizzante. (I looked that up: it means carbonated, but not as carbonated as spumante. But it's more carbonated than the word I was looking for.) The next time I peel a parsnip, I'm going save the peelings.
I recently discovered that I like parsnips. (I think that the impression that I didn't came of finding them only in dishes that parsnips ought not to be in.) And they don't have to steam very long to be fully cooked.
I got an e-mail from the church today. The new name is Capstone Free Methodist Church. Facebook says that the first meeting in the new building will be on December the first.
We had our first session with a home helper today. We have a lot to learn about how to use one. First off, we need a list of chores that need doing and don't involve sorting and deciding.
And I need to do a lot of sorting and deciding to clear off surfaces that I want her to clean.
She's coming next week on Tuesday, at the same time. Each week we will make the next appointment to suit her other appointments and our other appointments.
After she left I told Dave that my socializing muscles must be atrophied because I was really beat. Later I remembered that the four hours she was here neatly enclosed my nap time.
We had frozen pizza for supper. I did dig some winter onions to slice onto it. I regretted chickening out and putting on only one sparse ring of slices, as it baked out quite mild. Three mini-sweet peppers was almost overdoing it even though I ate the ends of the peppers when slicing them.
When Dave turned the TV on Wednesday morning last week, The first image was a close-up of the president-elect. Dave said "He looks as though he caught the mouse."
My plan to clear off the coffee table hit a snag when I opened a box labeled "Crochet World" and discovered that I had written a book on how to care for cave men.
It's quite sensible for the most part, badly outdated, and my handwriting stinks.
It's notebook paper tied together with a loop of elastic, so it would be easy to take it apart and scan it, but I don't think I will. I'll just add "Good Cavekeeping" to the label on the box, wrap the box in a plastic bag, and put it back into the attic.
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The box is in the garage, waiting until the next time we back out the car. Our only appointment before my eye exam on the twenty-sixth is with the home helper, so that might be a while. And I can take myself to the eye exam. If the weather is fit to ride, we might not back out the car then.
My bag of large bags is much neater than it was before I wrapped up the box of magazines. I kinder wish I'd looked into Weird Tales before sealing up the box.
I just noticed my fingers twiddling over the keys without any input from the cortex. So of course I'm making typos now.
It's almost time to pop the tenderloin into the oven. Dave had a brilliant idea. It's always a problem that every baking pan that is long enough is way too huge, so I need to scroonch or bend the meat.
Dave suggested hacking off a hunk to pound and bread tomorrow.
I'm planning to buy another tenderloin the next time I go to Aldi. Unless I yield to the temptation to hitch a ride with Linda before this tenderloin is far enough into the past.
I correctly diagnosed a problem with my Linux computer, and today Dave showed me how to open it up and blow the dust out of the air filter.
I'm also washing a load of cleaning rags. Linda T., our home helper, made a dent in them on Wednesday. She's coming again on Tuesday.
So I've got until then to come up with four hours of work.
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The scab-analog fell off Dave's donor site tonight. I'd trimmed tiny flaps off the edge a couple of times. Looks clean and healthy.
When I stepped outside to comb my hair this morning, I noticed that the leaves on the lawn were oak leaves, from trees on the other side of the house. I wonder how long they were there before I noticed? I don't remember a strong wind from the east. The drainpipe hose from the southeast corner of the house was on the lawn a few days ago, but east of where it had been.
An example of "bike shedding": when I went to Lowery's to buy a skein of grey embroidery floss, I must have spent half an hour examining the display of floss. Today I went there for a vacuum cleaner. Told the mechanic what I wanted, he selected an upright with no attachments, total time to spend half a kilobuck twelve minutes, most of it filling out the paperwork.
Dave picked it up with the car ten minutes after that and I went on with my bike tour. (I had called him as soon as I knew that he'd want the car, rather than the truck.)
Next stop was the library, where I returned a book that was two weeks overdue, then the Pete Thorne Center, where I bought a half dozen cookies at the Winter Market, then Carniceria San José, where I bought cinnamon, shell peanuts, and raisins, then Zales where I bought somewhat less than half a kilobuck of Farxigia, and finally Kroger where I bought milk and eggs and didn't buy Spic and Span because I couldn't find it. I did buy Murphy's Oil Soap.
Came home tired, slept until suppertime, and we made sandwiches for supper. I had chicken salad and swiss cheese on a flatbun. Dave put chopped liver and chicken salad side-by-side on "artisan whole wheat" bread and had colby jack on the side. Apple chunks and grapes for dessert.
While making the left-over egg and milk from yesterday's tenderloin into french toast for my lunch, I found my favorite table knife, which had been missing for days. It was in the "other forks" compartment of the silverware tray.
And I remembered to re-pack my pills tonight, instead of panicking in the morning. (I habitually pack pills a week ahead of time, so it isn't *much* of a panic.)
I realized recently that I have at least three go bags: one for the car, one for walking to church (this backed up with a check list so I don't forget to take my keys), and the pockets of my cycling jersey. My wallet wanders among those.
The keys are supposed to be turned in by Friday, except for the property committee and the fellowship committee. Mine are Fellowship.
Next Sunday is a decommissioning service and Capstone Free Methodist Church will meet in Walnut Creek the Sunday after that.
Predicted rain turned into a lovely afternoon, and I rode my bike to Zales to pick up a prescription, dropping off papers at our financial advisor's office on the way out and stopping at Kroger and Jimmy-John on the way back.
Second session with our home helper was yesterday. I didn't have four hours of chores on my list; she suggested that next week she wash the painted walls. That will take a while!
We'll celebrate Thanksgiving at Linda's house next Thursday.
The weather looks glorious through the patio doors, but I saw flakes of snow falling when I first looked out, the anemometer is spinning furiously, and the wind-direction arrow is wagging like a dog's tail.
I think I'll stay in here and finish shortening my polywool pants.
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Pants done, card-case made, coin purse for Toys for Tots begun, nap time. Now snow is coming down so fast that I can't see the other side of the lake. Plenty of visibility for driving, but I never go out in a first snow. Wasn't planning to go anywhere.
It's all soggy and wet out there. And windy and cold.
While I was napping yesterday, Dave took the Taco in for an oil change. I gather that it's a new place and that he is pleased with it.
I realized, as I sat down, that the turkey-wing soup I'm making for supper is seasonal. But we won't have a turkey carcass to make soup of.
I've been intending to make bean soup for a long time, realized in the middle of the night that I should have put beans on to soak yesterday evening, got up and put the frozen smoked turkey wings in the fridge. Now they are on the stove with three quarts of water and lots of seasonings, including three Mexican dried chipotles. A dish of washed lentils and two mini-sweet peppers are standing by, and I plan to dig some winter onions after my nap.
Sorted the pile of anniversary cards we left on the hearth and found one that hadn't been opened. Also found two unopened letters from an insurance company, but both were "read and recycle".
I discovered yesterday that we haven't any polarized octopusses and pressed an extension cord into service.
So I made today's ride a trip to the Dollar General on Market Street in the hope of buying one. I'd have better luck in Sprawlmart, but I didn't feel like a trip in that direction.
I stopped at Carniceria San José on the way because I impulse-bought a small packet of large raisins on my previous trip and we liked them very much. I couldn't find them on the rack, but did get some prunes and a bag of corn tostadas.
Nothing at all at Dollar General, though we did want a few things that might have been found there. Then I rode to the Senior Center just to get an extra mile in; no signs on either door, save one about days the gym would close which I'd seen before and didn't walk back to read.
I didn't think the bait shop/bus stop would have octopusses, but stopped to see what they do sell. When I stopped a few weeks ago, there was a hand-scrawled sign on the door telling the Coke salesman that the proprietor had had to take his wife to the hospital, deliver the cases next week. That sign was still there; I greatly fear that something dreadful has happened.
Next stop Zales to pick up prescriptions, then Kroger where I bought Moose Tracks ice cream.
Also hot dogs and hot-dog buns, and we had chili dogs for supper.
Dave's new sweater arrived today. It's warmer than his hoodie and looks better.
Today the Winona Lake Church building was decommissioned, and the congregation was photographed. Steve attended the last service.
I've still got my keys, and the church office is closed for the moving tomorrow and the next day.
The steroid I'm taking for back pain has loosened up my arthritic finger; I can touch the tip to my palm when I bend all fingers together. Trying to bring it down solo still risks triggering a "click", but farther into the bend — I can touch if I bend my thumb up to meet it.
Back pain is pretty much gone. And on previous occasions, it kept getting better for a couple of weeks after I stopped the steroid.
I intend to pay more attention to getting enough exercise.
I walked to the bank to get coins and small bills this morning. On the way back I went into the church, and found the purse I mislaid yesterday lying on the kitchen counter, just as I'd given up looking for it and was leaving the church.
Is it proper to call a bag a purse when there is no money in it?
The building was deserted, but there was still a lot of stuff to move. I presume everybody was at Walnut Creek unpacking. Someone said that Grace said that anything we didn't want could be left in the building and they would take care of it. Someone else mentioned Habitat for Humanity.
Good news and bad news after my eye exam. I can now go seven weeks between shots, and odds are I'll go to eight after the next exam.
The bad news is that the latest research says that it's a bad idea to go more than eight weeks between shots, ever.
They will call tomorrow or Monday to schedule my appointments.
I've piled up the ironware on the sideboard so that Linda T. can wash the kitchen walls tomorrow. I'm planning to go to the new church and return my keys, then do a major shopping and get home after she has begun work. (Dave will be here to let her in.) I think that this time we have more chores than she can do in four hours. But I thought that last time.
It was, and we have some chores left for next week. Linda looked really tired when I got home, and she was only half-way through. I took my nap on the floor in the sewing room even though I thought that she was through in the bedroom.
I was surprisingly teary after leaving the church, and had to be extra careful while driving to Kroger.
The new building is larger than the old one! The sanctuary doesn't seat as many people, but the rest of the upper floor is a warren of classrooms and offices, and the fellowship hall is *huge*. I didn't think to look for the parsonage. (The style doesn't date back to when there were parsonages, but I won't be around to learn what the story was. It's now a rental property. The parsonage at the old building was Kiddie Kollege.)
The former congregation left the place furnished, so now there are four fridges and two freezers, plus a drink fridge in the copy room. The firehouse will get one of the freezers.
I think the basement has more ground-floor entrances than the upper floor.
It was described, when the potential move was announced, as having "no steps", but there are two staircases. There is also an elevator, which one has to learn how to use. A sign says "close the folding door", but it isn't obvious that the door must be latched. Nor yet that it *can* be latched.
I stocked up on caffienated soda at Kroger, and bought a refill bottle of Windex. I still couldn't find Spic n Span, but a Web search says that it's still being made. I'll have to stop at Martin's the next time I go to Aldi.
I bought a pound of hamburger, and fried half of it for supper, which put a thick coat of grease on my newly-cleaned stove.
Left-overs for supper today. We should have taken more cranberry bread.
I put on a black shirt to show off my pearls, started to put the necklace on, remembered that it would be better to pin up my hair first, and didn't remember them again until it was time to take them off.
It was a lovely party — and no pictures taken.
I think. Phones were passed around.
I took a Sprawlmart tour yesterday. I meant to go to Dollar Tree, but ran out of steam in Runnings.
Runnings was the first place where I found anything to buy — I went to both shoe stores, but it isn't the season for buying sandals and there were no lace-to-the-toe shoes.
At Runnings, I found Elmer's glue and Gorilla glue, there was a clearance on jute string for tying up recyclable paper, and a polarized octopus. (All our old ones are for pre-polarization plugs.) Dave doesn't remember the hysterical ads showing power cords in an alarming tangle, so he feels that "octopus" applies only to the style of outlet-splitter that is a bundle of short extension cords, and he has a point. The package says "tap".
It's a six-outlet tap instead of the three-outlet tap that I wanted. The top three plug into the outlet that is on the dimmer switch, and I thought I would need to put duct tape over them to make sure that I don't burn out anything, but it turned out that those three are defective and neither style of plug will go in. I'm not going to take it back!
I was directed to the aisle where the Spic n Span is, examined every bottle and box without finding it, looked around for a clerk, and realized that it was time to go home.
It was cold enough that I took my bottle in everywhere to be sure the valve didn't freeze, and partway home I realized that I should stop and put the glues into the insulated pannier, but thin gloves were plenty warm — until I turned around and rode *into* the wind. My fingertips were stinging a little when I got home.