Saturday's cook

I really enjoy my Saturday morning excursions over to the coffee shop with my little crew of folk that join me from one week to the next but I really also like Saturday mornings particularly when I can do a breakfast. I like to cook and I like to cook for myself. The trouble is that you make something large and you're stuck with it then for however long it takes to consume it. However, if you're cooking for your family it's not just a big deal cuz everything usually gets eaten pretty much Within 24 hour. It seems like. So today I cooked up this package of huge bacon pieces or thick bacon. The bacon I cooked this morning I purchased the number of months ago when it showed up in the meet throwaway section at my local market. It only cost me three bucks for the whole bundle. I took it out of the freezer a couple days ago but today was the first morning I had a chance to actually put it to the Heat and enjoy some crisp thick bacon. I wanted to make sure I had enough food stocked up that I can get through Sunday as well as Monday which is Christmas Day. So if I feel so inclined to have bacon and eggs on Monday morning I can do that or Sunday morning for that fact since it sounds like I'm not going out to breakfast tomorrow which is okay it's pretty much my call. Marc Anthony texted me about possibly not being able to get out to breakfast tomorrow because he had a show tonight he had to do his thing at which was all I needed to volunteer to skip tomorrow. So I could actually have bacon tomorrow with eggs since I went to the market and got a dozen jumbo eggs. I should be set now for the holiday. I will not be doing a roast or a ham or a large piece of protein like that especially since I just got my meat box in. If I really wanted to have beef I can go into my Omaha collection. I also got some more vegetables for my concoction celery, cucumbers, that kind of stuff plus another large container of orange juice and I should be pretty well set. I also got more candy bars for the candy collection for Melissa even though she won't be back until probably next Wednesday since she's taking off Christmas day which is Monday.

The temperature has dropped again, the fine spring like days are gone, it took me a while this morning in the middle afternoon to build up enough courage to crawl into my hoodie and make the trip across the street to the market. My red jacket the red jacket I love for a number of reasons is probably dead. I don't know what happened but I pulled the zippers apart from the jacket itself you know so it won't zip up and down but we tried a long time tried to fix it but couldn't get the zipper free. I suppose I could take it too Carl I'll have him come over and look at it maybe he can do. He might be able to fix it but my experience has been once these plastic zippers start malfunctioning that's the end of the road. Suppose I can get another zipper to sew into it but that's way beyond my skill set and I don't know how much I would want to pay to have somebody else do it but I don't know if I'll find another jacket that fits me as well as this does and is easy for me to get in and out of. The two other jackets I have are large are more like rain Slicker type jackets not like this the red one this has got the red outside woolly outside in the sheer slippery inside which makes it easy for me to get in and out of. I may have to do some checking around. But that's it for this year. I hardly have done anything for Christmas I want to stick one of the nut packages, salted nuts, my brother seems to like those I think I'm one of those in the Box I'll give it to him for Christmas seems weird and kind of cheap but I've been that way this year. I didn't even write about Kelly stopping me on the way to the barber yesterday Kelly bowls with my old roommate and Buddy from college he actually gave me a $50 bill for Christmas totally amazing. He didn't stop me from going to the barber so he just said hi and goodbye and that was it it's too bad I would like to have visited with him more but another Christmas miracle you can always use 50 bucks… 

Thinking of Friday

I believe I've moaned in the past about the coffee shop across the street and how it's not open on Sundays and in particular not open on holidays. I guess I could understand the holiday part everyone needs to have holidays off but there's been years I know where he's closed from Christmas Eve the entire week to New Year's it's a long time to go without your local coffee shop. Anyway because of that we decided that we would( my coffee drinking buddy and me) would meet on friday, today instead of our usual Saturday morning hook up at the coffee shop and because of that I had asked my home health person to come in as early as she could today. Because we usually meet at 9:30 for coffee and my Home Health person, Melissa wanders in here around 8:20 to 8:30 meaning I'd cut it real close for my 1 hour of service to be able to get there in time to have coffee with my friend Janet.

Melissa was early but not by very much and I was kind of worried that Janet would be there and I would not so I texted her that I might be a little late but thanks to focused concentration and maybe cutting my session a little short I was able to get out of the bathroom in time for our regular time hook up. I may be a little bit sorry for my haste now because, now my stomachs begin to gurgle a little bit and of course I begin to worry immediately that I'm going to poop my pants and start the countdown until Monday morning when my home health person will show up and this time it's not Melissa it's somebody else that I'm not too familiar with that only adds to my frustration and perhaps a little fear that things will not go well. But one thing I've learned the last couple of years is that things do work out regardless of the mess the time and who has to become involved and maybe that's possibly one of my Christmas miracles. Don't sweat the big things.

The other event of the day was the service coordinator luncheon. The service coordinators, or the folks who help us out if we have issues and problems with bureaucracy and other areas, I guess decide to go together and have a catered lunch which was today at 1:00 why so late I don't know that's another one of my constant irritations late lunches. Anyway today it was fried chicken parts actually chicken tenders, coleslaw and a cookie and bottled water of course. I wanted to be somewhat of a loner so I found the table that nobody else was at and it seemed within minutes people have picked up from their table they're sitting at and came over to sit at my table I don't know why maybe they just didn't want to poor little disabled guy to sit by himself on Christmas dinner. Anyway, the meal was not Stellar but it was okay. Had I known it was going to be as simple as it was I would have certainly passed on the whole event. But I made a good showing ate my dinner direct my water and got back to my apartment as soon as I could. I worked out on my bike and watched at least two movies. The days continue to be beautiful but that should end today tonight I mean it's a cold front comes through and drops the temperature but it's a naturally warm but quite nice to be out in.. 

Santa 2023

I'm finding it most difficult to figure out what I want to write about tonight. Do I want to write about the incredibly nice weather we're having or the fact that today was the regular/annual Christmas client party at the Independent Living Center where I did my usual Santa Claus interpretation. Or maybe I can semi-scalefully right about both. How's that?

I woke early with the expectation of an interesting day. Today I will be at the Independent Living Center and I will be Santa Claus as I usually am. The party this year seems to be pretty early starting at about 12:00 and going till about 2:30 or so. But it's Thursday and that means I don't have someone to dress me and the center is sending it driver over to pick me up around 10:30 which means I have to be semi-quick. I think I got out of bed around 6:30 a.m. and I was up and ready to meet the world by 9:00 a.m. which I forgot to include the fact that it's also coffee social today so I like to be down there to see if there's any way I can be of assistance. I was a little spooked when I got to the common room it was all dark the tables hadn't been moved together and there was no Marcia insight brewing coffee. Marsha had slept in and so we are quite behind but that was no problem there's just a few of us at the social today anyway. We had good coffee some nice treats and good conversation but I was kind of glad to get it over with and be ready to be picked up around 10:30 when the driver did show up. Let me remind you that usually I really don't have a driver and I just take public transit like earlier last week when it was so cold. I felt totally special this day however having to drive her pick me up and take me home and the fact that the weather is incredible- - but more on that later.

It seemed a bit chaotic at the Independent Living Center when I got there which is not unsurprisingly as they are trying to get ready to meet a great horde of individuals who will also be looking for lunch. The Bell Affair this year was pancakes scrambled eggs and juice of some sort and sausage. I stayed out of the way and basically enjoy the event. Usually they feed me early so I can be ready to meet the consumers after they've been fed but today that didn't happen and I was able to scarf down a little food before the event. It was a good event however humble but that's okay. We had a bit of a production line running the consumers through getting a picture with Santa and a sack of goodies. It took quite a while but it was relatively efficient it was kind of different than usual maybe it's the new director who was so nervous about the whole thing I had to feel sorry for her and just be supportive which I think she appreciated. With the pictures taken and the luncheon it was time for me to return and as I rolled out I could not believe how beautiful the day was but then that's what the second part of this posting is about.

I've now seen a couple of postings on either Facebook or Instagram or whatever about how beautiful the weather is how spring like and how perhaps concerned we should all be about the fact that we're not getting a winter the way we're supposed to and it's all because of global warming. I'm 100% sure that's the reason but as I've talked to a couple people I think we're okay at least here in Utah right now but I think our descendants are going to feel the real stress of the global warming thing unless we as a people do something about it. I look around and see all chaos going on in other parts of the country in the world major Hundred Year floods and roaring water flowing down the streets and think wow how come we aren't as the westerners and Utah specifically lucky enough to avoid all these tragedies. I always say we are not void of these tragedies are just does not come up yet and that will be a doozy when it does I think it's going to be a shift and major earthquake and that's going to be our tragedy. I know it's very selfish but I certainly hope I miss that bullet. So I'm pretty well done now till the first of the year if not longer of any major responsibilities. I don't even know if I have any more meetings except for a coffee date I have for tomorrow and that's just because our regular coffee shop is closed on Saturday he always closes between Christmas and New Years kind of drives me crazy but anyway we're moved our coffee date back or ahead one day. I'm tired tonight and I didn't even work out during the day hopefully I'll be tired enough to get all the way through the night oh and the best thing of all happy solstice for now on the days get longer and I'm happy as a clam…

Meat Teat

I'm not sure if I have mentioned a struggle I've been having for some time now in trying to decide whether or not I wanted to order that $100 deal that Omaha Steaks has been offering the past couple of months. I've coveted some time the possibility of having a freezer full of Quality Meat. Steaks, chicken, some pork but not much would all be cool I thought. And it was during this Christmas season but I thought you know what I should just order it and see. The enticed me by offering 12 burgers to go along with the regular order of a lot of meat really. But I still wasn't sold enough to drop the hammer and place an order. Then I got my annual call for my brother who sent me money every Christmas it seems like now but he has to make sure that I know that the envelopes coming the mail is coming and to be sure to watch out for it and let him know as soon as I get the envelope and open it and see the money there. This year he sent me five Chris $20 bills and that was just enough for me to justify The $99 Omaha Steak deal. Before I could chicken out I I went to the website and painfully looked over all the different options and finally chose the one that I spoke of earlier flaming youngs, pork chops, chicken breasts and lots of burgers. I wasn't even thinking about her I was going to keep something like this I just wanted to have access to this much meat. Then the first of this week I got an email from Omaha indicating that my package would be delivered on the 21st of the month which is cool I figured that but then I got another email the next day indicating the package has been delivered and I hadn't seen anything. So of course but devious mind starts thinking about porch Pirates and though it almost be impossible for them to get inside the apartment complex here but I think it could be done. However, I would still be able to see who did it because we have surveillance cameras all over the place. And naturally I began to worry about what could have happened to my order. I even spoke with the manager of the building this morning to see if somebody had reported a scene in a white styrofoam box sitting by the front door. We keep the front door locked the good part of the day or in the evenings and sometimes drivers delivering stuff can't get in the building cuz I don't know the password leaves the stuff or the Box just outside the front door. Of course this scares me to death thinking that of course that's just an invitation for somebody. Styrofoam box even if it's all taped up you know there's got to be something good inside.

I was relieved mid boarding coming back from the laundromat to find a white styrofoam box sitting outside my door! They had not forgotten me and my box had not been stolen. I finished getting my wash into the apartment then went back and finagled my styrofoam box inside again beginning to worry that where was I going to store this stuff? It's quite a bit of meat and the fact that each kind of meet like when there's like four pieces of the same thing like four flaming youngs for hamburgers patties I'll come into little box so there's a bunch of little boxes which would make it impossible to try to store it all in the refrigerator freezer but if you took everything out of the boxes you could stack it up in there pretty decently. My freezer is a bit of a chaotic mess is that redundant redundant? It took a little doing getting inside of all those boxes but I finally got them all open and got the protein out and threw it in the freezer sticking Frozen pieces of meat anywhere I could find an opening and I did pretty good I should be set for a good many months. Especially in the burger section nice to think I've got 12 Burgers to look forward to. In fact I had a Omaha Steak Burger for dinner in the form of a hamburger as I watched the Utah Jazz choke again. I don't know if I would do the meat thing again at least not from Omaha. I think there are other meat vendors that sell the same if not more amount of meat for a lot less money. For Omaha you're just buying the name and a lot of packaged meat.. 

Alone and cold

To be honest some mornings I have to force myself to get out of bed. They're not too many mornings like that but lately when I know that I have to get dressed and head out to catch a bus in the morning hours I think how nice it would be just to burrow into my covers a little bit deeper and try to get back to sleep. Well that does not happen. I've got responsibilities and so I drag myself out of bed and do the whole morning routine until 8:00 when I call the office to see if they're going to be a meeting and sure enough we're having a meeting. Actually, the temperature was a too bad when I left the apartment to race up to the bus stop. If I didn't think about how chilly the morning was I didn't have much of a problem unfortunately I didn't have long to wait until the bus did arrive. Interested Lee though once again as I was waiting for the bus off in the distance there was a shoe! A shoe laying on its side actually quite a ways from where I was on the sidewalk and it was laying in a pile of dirt that had been recently turned over so it was loose and I didn't dare get off the sidewalk for fear of sinking my wheels into the loose dirt and then it would be a real challenge to get out. But I aimed my camera at the Shoe,lying forlorn on its side crusted with morning Frost searching for its mate. I snapped a couple images hopefully one of them will turn out to be somewhat identifiable as a shoe on its side.

We really didn't have many names to evaluate this week. It was mainly a holiday get together meeting I think we did about 7 or 8 names and then ate a lot of holiday crap from the recent open house and goodies that people bring in over the holiday season. The contractors we use always bring in a lot of good holiday trays with cheeses and meats and everything nice. There was a lot of jabber around the names today it was hard for the manager to keep focused it really was becoming a Christmas office. When we had finished the last name and again the jabber started picking up I decided it was time to take my leave which I did feeling a little bit like a humbug but turn into everybody and wishing everybody a happy holiday season and happy New Year since I don't think we will be meeting again until after the 1st of the year. I cannot remember what the stimulus was but something got me into thinking of the Christmas miracle. The constant reader knows that I typically believe there is a Christmas miracle, for me, every holiday season. Some of the Miracles are more subtle than others but I still deemed the Miracles all the same. Today it may have been the fact that the day reached 50° by the time I was coming home and it felt quite comfortable but I don't think that's a Christmas miracle as much as it was the Christmas tragedy of global warming. I was just trying to put the best face on it. But now I'm looking for it I may have found a minor miracle at the office but I'd like to find something a bit larger and more miraculous lipses

Sleep time

I'm not sure I don't remember exactly when it happened but I know it was sometime yesterday, during the day. I have one of those super cheap clock radios that I purchased from the local Deseret Industries which is a giant local culture affiliated second hand store here in Utah. I think I bought three clocks one time they have a whole area of these cheap clock radios that you would never really want to listen to if you had to. The kind of clock radio you keep in a barn if you are milking cows are in a wood shop that you just want to be able to look up and see the time. They're not bad for listening to talk radio like NPR but might as well forget music really. Anyway I picked them up for a dollar a piece and I've gone through two of them already I'm on my third now. For me their best feature is that the illuminate at night so I can just always open my eyes and see what time it is. Anyway, yesterday I was goofing around with the clock and by mistake I turned it on- - so obviously I was in bed so it could have been yesterday morning early or I remember it was in the middle of the night and I did something in the radio came on and I had to turn it off so in my sleep state I hit either the snooze button or some other button and it went off but in the meantime I flailed my hands to a point hitting all the buttons on one of them was the setting button and every time you push it it adds an hour to the time showing on the front of the clock and by mistake I put an extra hour on the clock. This morning I woke up as usual looked at the clock and it said 5:00 and in actuality it was 4:00 a.m.. I felt more tired than usual but that's not a big deal. Finally, when my clock said 5:55 I looked at my cell phone for some reason and the cell phone read 4:45 a.m. so I thought it was 6:00 a.m. and it was actually just five. I had already been awake for an hour so I knew it was going to be a long day. And this was the day when I was to meet with my writers group. It was our annual Christmas dinner/restaurant lunch and I wanted to be a little more perky than I felt that I would be. Anyway,I  lollygagged around the bed for another hour before I got up at 6:00 a.m. finally. I tried to sleep but it just wouldn't come.

This hasn't been a bad day, had a great lunch with my buddies, but I have to admit being out in the cold I was a little challenged. I don't think I've ever been as affected by the cold as I've been this last season. I'm hoping I'll be able to sleep okay tonight. I'm supposed to be out in the cold again tomorrow to get to a meeting downtown. I may wear a blanket over my legs even if I don't want to. Such are the days of almost winter…

Fog

It was kind of scary going this morning over to the restaurant. Not scary like Monsters and stuff scary like not prepared to deal with what might be coming out of the Fog namely cars. It was kind of strange to wake up to a totally sucked in environment. There was a heavy fog everywhere. I could barely see cars coming even with the lights on. On the way to the restaurant there is a cutout driveway that cuts onto the street I can cut across the street directly and on to the sidewalk by the restaurant cuts off two or three minutes of my travel time. I wasn't late by any means this morning but still didn't want to go all the way down to the light to cross the street. I just like zipping across. I knew I was relatively safe because at that hour of the morning not a lot of people are traveling especially on Sundays. So I knew I'd be okay I just had to play it cool across the street. On days when there is no fog, where I cross the street, I have a good vision of traffic from the south and from the north and there are pretty long red lights on either end of the block so I know I've got quite a bit of time to cross and this morning I had to go with seeing the lights change red and it's not seeing anybody coming or hearing anybody coming and zip the street. This I did without incident and nobody honked at me or anything which is always a good day when jaywalking across the street or Jay rolling how are that would be said and particularly since it wasn't a cop or anything. A little bit of excitement for this Sunday very close to Christmas.

The inversion continues to be settled over the Salt Lake Valley trapping in all the pollutants and other things that are probably very dangerous to inhale. I should probably wear a mask of some sort to protect me from the particulate matter but it just seems like too much work. The days are cold especially with no sunshine to give the illusion of warmth. Since Mark was with me this morning we stopped at the market on the way back and I was able to pick up 10 cans of my pickled peppers sliced and a box of oranges. I know it's probably a myth but I still believe eating oranges protects against cold and other disease processes of the winter. Oranges are such a Christmas thing for me seems like when I was growing up that was the only time we got citrus fruit really. Lots of oranges it seem like at Christmas plus my grandparents who lived in Mesa Arizona often sent up literally a box of oranges and are grapefruit are both. Kind of a Christmas tradition. When I can find boxes of oranges- - even though they're not a deal- - I like to purchase some and believe I'm back in the late 50s waiting for the Box of oranges from my grandparents. You know what else was good? Where the peanuts that I get in my Christmas stock ing. They had a different flavor than peanuts in the Shell that I get today they must have had some sort of a Christmas flavor or maybe it's just they were raw peanuts or something not roasted yet. I've ordered a couple pounds of salted mixed nuts from The Nut House that I use should be here around the 21st that's still a week out well no couple days but still it's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas… 

Door Decor

 Truth be told the last couple of years I've kind of wanted to decorate my door for the holidays even before my sweet little granddaughter and her boyfriend did the job a couple years ago. I've just never got into the decoration mode as far as getting the decorations and devices needed to hang on doors and walls and things of

that nature. If I can course my granddaughter into doing more I may do so but at least I'm not the Grinch or Bob Cratchit. So I was quite surprised when the new person who has moved into the properties here and who still works at the agency that I used to work with years ago asked if she could put some decorations on my door. I said sure of course Merry Christmas. I pretty much forgot about the request until I hear a knock knock on my door this morning or mid afternoon I can't remember when and it was Jeannie wishing to start her task of hanging a wreath and a few other items on the door and on the sides of the door I don't know what's called. When she was done, the task did not take very long, I had a great wreath and a couple items on each side of the door to my apartment. It's not a big deal but it is to me. For this season I will have decorations of the season on my door. Then I plan to miserly harvest them at the end of the season put them on a Shelf and then if I'm lucky to still be alive next season apply them again to the door. The thought excites me full of Christmas feelings.

I don't know if it was a cold day all right I just may not have gotten over the long cold day of Thursday but I pretty much stayed in the apartment all day today leaving only to take couple loads of garbage out to the dumpster. I'm trying to clean up the place a little bit just because it's gotten into such a disarray mainly with winter weather gear. I have hoodies and coats and Loxley shirts laying all over the front of the apartment so I worked on that this afternoon and then this evening I tried to sweep up a little bit and try to just make the apartment look a little better. I've been running over a lot of cooked items like cookies, crackers and pretzels the kind of things that under the wheel of this chair turn to dust and crumbs that litter the floor. Really does look bad even in my sleeping area I've got stuff all over the floor which I been working on sweeping up I really need Gloria or alessi to sweep up for me. They can do in 5 minutes what takes me an hour or so to do and it looks a lot better than what I end up coming away with. It's just me I'm sure I can't blame it on the chair like I always try to do. I just have a hard time knowing when things are clean or doing that. I mean I certainly recognize cleanliness when I see it but it's hard for me to produce it and especially hard for me to do it from a wheelchair. My chair is bubbling up again somehow I know and has me listing to the right side. I'm going to have to take it in as soon as I get my other chair back from the shop hopefully soon. I believe the extra weight on my right hip isn't doing me any good…

Jolly Holly Christmas

Last night I was so cold and so exhausted from my days Adventures that I pretty much just took the day off turned on the heater and hung around my workstation by my desktop computer all day. Just taking it easy and recuperating from my yesterday activities. I cannot believe I can't do the things I used to do. In the old days yesterday's events were nothing just part of the days function now however I've got to plan things out and perhaps take a little bit better care of myself like taking a blanket with me when I go out on cold days now. I hate having to be so focused on survival. Anyway, when I did come home from my adventure yesterday there was a box at the side of my door. I didn't remember ordering anything at least not nothing this soon arriving at the door. I have an order of nuts coming in in a week or so as well as a few other items but this box looked kind of interesting. I actually didn't bring it inside the apartment till I got home from my days tripping. The box was actually there the night before and I just left it there all night and left it there during the day yesterday until I got home then finally drug it in. I threw it on the table and finally this morning I opened it up not knowing for sure if I had ordered anything and of course I had not it was a book! I guess the latest offering by Stephen King one of my favorite writers. The gift was sent anonymously I have two individuals who I think may have sent something like this who normally well enough to know that I would be most pleased to have such a gift but there was no card or address to identify where the item was sent from. There is a way to send a thank you note to the anonymous benefactor and I shall have to do that soon I do appreciate the volume. It's actually the third book in the series. To be honest with you I've read the other two but don't quite remember what this individual story was so it'll be interesting to read the take from this volume. I almost finished with the volume on Sigmund Freud by Irving Stone and hopefully I could start the volume called Holly on or by Christmas. This would be a fitting way to start my Christmas holiday of Christmas Day. The book is a big fat one which totally makes my winter season. That's such a slow reader as I am this will last me a long time.

I may have written about the new person who moved in to the apartment complex. She is older but she still working at the place I used to work for which causes some weird feelings if not friction. I don't know if she is aware of how I feel but she definitely does not like the new director who I really like. She also makes despairing comments about the director and perhaps the way that centers being run now which I totally disagree. She seems to be getting more and more interested in my apartment for reasons I don't know. Today she asked if she could help decorate my apartment for Christmas. If you'd like to place a wreath on my door and who knows what else. Who am I to stop her and I would like to have some sort of Christmas decorations I don't think my granddaughter has time this Christmas season but we'll see. She turned 20 today I'm totally proud of her she's doing great. Anyway, tomorrow my goal is to go across the street and buy a box of Christmas oranges. When I woke this morning I thought sure I was coming down with a sore throat or something but when I got up my symptoms seem to evaporate which is good. Still however the True Believer in oranges and orange juice and vitamin C in general for combating winter colds…

Cold obligations

Another incredibly long and cold day for me to be out in the elements. Of course there was the coffee group this morning at 9:30 and it was poorly attended I don't know why except for the room itself was all changed around for the building Christmas lunch function that I did attend because I ended up going to lunch with my old buddy Dwayne from the state of Utah government. Those are pretty much lightweight Adventures compared to what I had to do about 4:00 which was dress up and head down to the bus stop catch the bus then the 200 bus into Salt Lake City where I had to attend a board meeting for the private nonprofit I used to work for at the Independent Living Center it was also there company holiday function. How easy things would be if I had a vehicle and a driver's license but that's things of the past. It was chilly catching the bus inbound but pretty straightforward what was really grim was the bus ride home. But first the independent living function holiday party.

I really kind of hate these kinds of things where people are more or less suppressed into going to these functions then faking out like they are enjoying themselves playing silly games and eating silly food. Today the food was provided from a major authentic Mexican food place here in town that all the upper strata folk go to. I particularly am not fun fond of their food chicken and pork shredded for tacos and such burritos Plus other things like rice and beans but no Frijoles to speak of and a couple of tubs of some kind of Mexican roll up burrito covered in cheese. Authentic Mexican food joints never have ground beef and that's what I like best on my Mexican food plate. But they did have a good red juice drink kind of fizzy. The drink saved the dinner for me. I suffered through the dinner and then suffered through part of the games. Tell him couldn't take it any longer and then sprung for the doors quickly as I could. My best excuse was I had to catch a bus. I had to get to the bus stop. Of course by the time that I was heading out it was nearly 6:00 and the sun was down and seemed so was the temperature. Of course just as I was getting to the bus stop where the bus was sitting waiting it took off even though it saw me coming into the bus stop and I waved my arms so he knew I wanted to him but he took off anyway and it was a long cold time before the next bus showed up. Now this bus drop me off where I had to pick up another bus which had to take me to the Community College because the bus stop was counting on was closed because of Street work. So at the community college I waited for the next bus which seem to take forever. It was dark and cold and I was sitting trying to imagine myself in the warmer spot. Finally however, the 217 southbound showed up and I eagerly rolled a board and came on home. I left the heater on on purpose when I left and the apartment was relatively toasty when I got home. I'm ready to channel down in almost ready to get ready for bed but I still have some things I've got to do. A long day for me. Hopefully tomorrow I'll have a bit of a respite…

Toenail time

It's hard for me to Fathom just how much be it outside tires me out. Even though the day was not a cold day per se, very warm for this time of year. However, warm or not I was out in the cold day for a significant amount of time I think. I had to go get my toenails cut. I wasn't even planning on getting my toes cut today actually toenails cut today. I've never had so much trouble keeping an appointment in years as it has been for my Podiatry appointment. I kept double booking my appointments. Seems like there's three or four things happening in the next couple of weeks I just cannot seem to keep straight. I had rescheduled this toenail clipping at least three times. Then I realized this morning the third time that I had rescheduled for I have another appointment that I want to keep so much more than having my toenails clipped. This was supposed to be Friday. So I called once again today to see if I could cancel that appointment and in doing so speaking with the staff I found that there was a slot open for today at 2:45 p.m. I so much just wanted to keep disappointment and get my toenails done and forgot about for 9 weeks but I scheduled the appointment.

I drive my clothes a second time as I usually do and when that was finished I drugged my clothes back to the room and I didn't fold them like I usually do immediately following the retrieval for the dryers. I wanted to get in as much of a workout as I could since I didn't know for sure what I would be feel like after getting back from the toenail clipping. I wasn't sure what time that would be. So I pumped my bike for about 40 minutes. Grab the fast lunch of hot dogs which I totally enjoyed- - I had purchased some beef dogs and rolled them up in pieces of bread and enjoy them that way with lots of mustard. It was then time to catch a bus head down to the end of the line for 217. The sun was out today though filtered by a little bit of cloud cover are Smog cover or whatever it is. But I caught the bus Southbound but when I got to the end of the line when I found the bus that would take me further up to where I had to get off at 90th South, the 218 the driver told me he would leave for 40 minutes. That would make me late for my appointment so I decided I would just take off and this I did driving over sidewalks until I got to the office got my toenails done and then rather than wait for the bus to take me back to the train station and the 217 I decided I'd just roll back again in the elements which I did. But like I said being out in the elements driving my chair and holding on the chair so I don't slide out or anything really exhausts me which kind of amazes me but I'm terribly glad I can do it and I did. Now I don't have to do it again until February 14th 2024 

Tuesday's time

My day was brightened by a video call from my very old friend DD, not that insipid duck from Walt Disney, but a friend from my youth. I guess it's one of the benefits and special gifts of old men when they're contacted by friends from the past- the Deep past. My friend is very bright much so than me but he tends to slow his Jets down to take time to visit with me which I totally appreciate. We talked we gossiped made fun of historical moments from the past if not hysterical. Then we went on our way. I don't know where he went but I pumped my arm back for an hour under the guise of personal Recreation and self improvement. I don't know why I do this but it makes me feel good like I'm in some form of control over my life.m

After 1 hour of pumping on my arm bike I decided I better go to the market, first time this week, and Revitalize my vegetables needed for my daily meal of cold vegetable soup some form of gazpacho. I had to get celery and cucumbers a can of whole kernel corn and French cut green beans which I came back to the apartment and replenished my vat of vegetables Addy the can of sliced pickled jalapeno peppers it made quite a bit but will last me about 2 to 3 days then I'll start the process again. I'm totally surprised I'm ingesting this mixture on a daily basis. I truly hope it's doing me some good. I'm not sure what that good would be necessarily but still I'm pretty consistent. I have to admit however in my Zeal for slice and dice and add to the mixture I once again destroyed what little bit of order was in my kitchen. Now there's stuff all over the floor all kinds of vegetable pieces on the floor which I've dried and hardened into a disgusting looking collection of rejected vegetables. Before we go to bed I plan to sweep up a little bit and maybe soak the area where I tend to ingest a lot of the vegetables see if I can mop it up tomorrow morning or tomorrow afternoon whenever. I'm definitely losing the battle of order in my apartment. My current home health person does sweep up the apartment fairly regularly. No mopping or anything unless I specifically ask but the sweeping helps a lot. I just have to figure out where to put stuff like when I come home and not just throw everything on the table in the kitchen. I've almost come to the belief that being able to stand and move around is a key feature in keeping the apartment clean. I just can't see things from a higher position sometimes when I elevate my chair I can get a glimpse of how things could and should be. I live in continual hope that a full bona fide cleaning person one day walk into my apartment and ask for the privilege of cleaning my unit.

Emergency Meeting

 Thank goodness for volunteer boards or indeed I would be worthless. I spent a good part of the day just hanging around the apartment really not doing anything at all except occasionally staring at the computer screen / TV screen. It all starts in the morning with the news I was awake at 5:45 I didn't get up to 6:15 and the first thing I do is go into the living area and play with the remote control enough times that the computer screen whatever it is flat screen comes on it allows me to dial into the local CBS affiliate news Morning News broadcast show local as well as National. I played on the internet after I got shaved and had coffee made and kind of cleaned up the kitchen a little bit. I did this until my home health person got here spending time with me getting me on the toilet and then helping me get showered. During this time. That my brother called and the first time I was not able to contact her speak with him because I was on the toilet but the second time I was able communicate with Ross and all he wanted to be sure was that I got the Christmas card that is sent and actually it included $250 bills! I don't know what this change of person is happening to my brother at this age in life but certainly something is I was really interested the other day even visiting with him that he admitted that he was such a mean kid growing up- - and he was. I tend to try to forget all that now and I will take the hundred bucks I'm not proud. Later on I did my arm bike and got my 60 Minutes in and when I finished I was kind of just hanging around the apartment and I decided to check my email and there was a message from the executive director of the board of directors I serve on at the Independent Living Center. There is to be an emergency meeting today at 4:00. Fortunately the time was about 3:35 so I knew that I was okay time wise. My friend Kim had set up a zoom account so I was able to dial in to the meeting when they opened it up the access parameters.

Interestingly, the emergency meeting was to do with financial issues the centers going through. They're having some real problems with how they bill their government agency for funding. It seems towards the end of the last Administration they got a bookkeeper who really didn't know what he was doing and sort of really messed everything up and they're having to spend a lot of energy and time now into going back and finding out what the problems were and how to get going again. This seems very taxing to the new executive director. It was great however to see my friend Kim and friend Julie on the internet as we discussed the issues and problems. We will have other meetings soon and seems like we're going to get quite involved in the reestablishment of our financial capabilities. It's totally doable just a matter of time of sitting down and working it through. I think I'm going to like working the financial end of this. We should be doing some significant fundraising too somehow. So at the end of the meeting I felt like I had helped the something today and the day was not wasted now if I can just manage a few more of these I should have a great month….

Sunday's statement

I'm getting pretty frustrated it's 10:39 p.m. and having to rewrite this blog which I've spent the last 20 minutes trying to find after it screwed up. For some reason I had dictated probably a quarter of a page and the bottom of the screen on my tablet cut off liability to see anything more that I was dictating. I tried to save it and was going to add it to a new page to see if it still acted the same way but I lost it somewhere in the intro and rather spend any more time trying to find those few silly words I decided I would start all over again. So once again, but the most productive thing I did today at least enjoyable was having breakfast with Marc Anthony over at the restaurant. We were a little late getting started because he had a work assignment coming in just as we were getting ready to meet at the restaurant and asked if I could give her 20 minutes which is no problem. I was already I had been in my chair since about 5:45 a.m. and so even taking time to take my meds and such I was on time actually I was on time to do the 8:00 time but the other extra 20 minutes gave me the time to mess around the kitchen a little bit. The kitchen is a mess again I don't know if it's from just the production of my concoction or piling stuff up on the table. That's where I put everything yesterday once I got home from the market. Jasmine and Jackson were not with us today they are in they're in Wilmington North Carolina not far from Raleigh where there was Major tornadoes today I guess which makes me a little bit worried about the kids but I haven't heard anything so no news is good news I'm sure they'll be fine just please just punch to be back next week hopefully. Aside from the restaurant experience I pretty much stayed at home the rest of the day. It was just cold enough to defeat me from doing anything more productive like going to the movies or going up and wandering through the shops doing some window shopping just wanted to stay home in front of the heater all day.

I did email Colleen Hammond, Debra's sister, to get some service status on her. What little bit she gave me indicated that she was kind of out of the danger zone but still they're still pieces that sounded pretty serious and it's going to be a while before she gets out or maybe she'll go to a long-term care rehab type place like I did. I'm trying to figure out if I want to go visit her or not. She's at iamc which would make it easier to visit least for me. Just hard to say with people need visitations or not. Quite frankly I don't know what I would say if I did go up to visit the girl. Still she was kind of a friend as those things go. Hoping for an interesting week. I don't have to do assist this Tuesday so I've got more free time than usual. The temperatures are going to raise a little bit up into the 40s which would make being out and about a little bit easier it's a couple movies that might be good especially the timepiece called Napoleon. It's Christmas season and it begins to feel like it now… 

Savoring Saturday

 I think I'm getting acclimated to the season, at least that's what it feels like, today was one of those days for the temperature didn't get above freezing however there was Sunshine which makes a lot of difference and tolerating cold weather. But I went out twice actually today once was to have coffee with my friend Janet who lives upstairs at the coffee shop across the street and then of course over to the market for weekend recreational shopping. Today I spent $58 probably on stuff I didn't need but sure enjoy having couple more cans of peppers, a lot of tomatoes on the vine type of things that they have there in the vegetable section, candy bars for Melissa and a potato and sour cream and I'm sure there's a few other things that I have forgotten. But it was chilly there's no question about it and I didn't wear a lap blanket and then I actually spaz my shoe off at the market eventually having my buddy who is part of the vegetable crew and asks me all the time if he can do something for me so this time I said yes if I tip back where you put my shoe on and he did. That was after I rolled around for a bit looking sort of pathetic. But like I said it's cold out there. I loved looking forward to coming home to my house after my shopping trip and knowing that I'd be able to stay inside all night long watching TV eating whatever I wanted to fix or in many cases just big spoonfuls of vegetables from my container of fresh vegetables in jalapeno pickle juice. It's really good sometimes I can't stop myself from having them the Crunch and the sour and the the first this is so good. In fact I bought way too many Tomatoes I hope I can use them all before the tomatoes go bad. I chopped up three of them and added it to the batch. I also got a box of Ritz crackers and another block of sharp cheddar cheese. Like I said recreational shopping for recreational food is what I like to do on Saturdays if I have the opportunity and today I did.

Diane sent me more images today of her new place in Mesa. I think she's going to do quite well there especially now that she's gotten away from her son where she was staying for a while. They just weren't getting along which is too bad. But now she's actually into a home, a prefab home but it's very nice and came with a lot of perks, in Arizona specifically Mesa. She even has her own orange tree that is so cool and all honesty I'm kind of jealous so nice that's a nice house I think she'll be pretty happy there at least I hope so. She even got a golf cart that she can drive around the senior housing area she lives in too. Fitz are just perfect and she can start doing some saving again. She should be okay. Maybe you should fly up a couple times a year like she did the other month or we can go out to have lunch or dinner or whatever.

Open House

 

Wouldn't you know the only day of the week it snows and the only time during the day where it snows is the time that I have to leave to catch the train to go into the city for the assist open house which is this afternoon starting at 4:00 p.m. to be honest I would rather have not really gone to the open house but since I missed my meeting on Tuesday and really it's one of the only open houses in the community that are worth going to as far as alcoholic beverages served and some of the better finger foods. It just seems so late in the day after all it is December and we're fastly getting to the shortest hours of daylight during the year. But I sat around all day at the apartment building up my focus to get totally dressed up warm in transit into the meeting or open house. Today I wore as always by shorts then I wore actually a t-shirt my Iron Man t-shirt and then over that I decided to wear my red jacket which is smooth going on and keeps me fairly warm and I found a pretty nice blanket I can put over my legs. I was set to go I checked the times again when went up again got the bus inbound. I timed it pretty well and I got to the assist office the little after 4:00. It was not really crowded which I didn't think it would be but still I made my entrance and at least it was warm inside the little office.

It's a cold day there's no question about it with menacing dark clouds spitting snowflakes off and on it was only after I started my trip that the snow did start coming down with a greater frequency. The snowflakes were strange they were little round Pebbles as opposed to flakes. So technically it probably wasn't even snow it's probably some sleep former some weird Alaskan name for snow. It's pure joy when the bus pulls up and the door is opened and you roll up into the heated belly of the Beast. It's the same feeling I get when I board the train. The right over from the park to the transit center wasn't very long a little bit of worth seeped in but the ride in from Murray Central to downtown Salt Lake to the library stop was nice and warm the rocking help to keep me almost awake. As I've said before the darkness comes quickly this time of the month this time of the year. Even though it's not really late it seems late when you're talking aimlessly to folks that you see once a year at this function is you keep an eye to the outside to see if it's snowing again or how dark the darkness is for 5:30 p.m. eventually however you start putting your little pile of trash you've created from the finger foods, chip dips and salted nuts. I make the rounds one more time and ask someone to take the blanket around my legs and Tighter to make sure they don't get caught in the wheels on the way home then head out in the Darkness of the Salt Lake December night

Self-absorbed

 I think I developing a wound on my butt. It's on the right hand side and I think it's related to my power chair. I blame everything I can on my power chair just because it makes me feel so uncomfortable. That's probably my scoliosis that's getting out of control and costing me to put all my weight on my right side over my hip which basically breaks down the skin over time. If you remember, I'm doing that tattoo tape on my butt, using it as a second skin which I think has been working admirably over the last couple of years but I think now my skin it might be breaking down for just direct pressure. I don't know if there's a fix wheelchair-wise. Perhaps maybe UCAT fix my power chair my backup chair.. and I can use it and this elevator chair I can use asthma backup chair which is a shame because I like the elevator chair quite a bit it's just that it's so fragile that I think I've turned it apart which really bums me out. Anyway the right side seems to be having some issues and wet my shift all goes to my right side and that puts weight right over my hip. Hopefully, Utah Center for assistive technology we'll take little time and repairing the chair. I can't believe they would not have Motors they could just attach to the chair. We shall see. In the meantime that means more lying back in the chair as much as I can watching Netflix or some other platform which offers minimal televised entertainment.

I've been in my chair all day so my butt's hurting but it's also the second day since I had my Band-Aids changed and maybe that's what I'm feeling is just the Band-Aids wanting to be changed again I don't know we'll see tomorrow when Melissa is here. I don't really want to peel off this dressing she's got on now because I think the adhesive is still quite strong and I don't want to tear any skin off my buttocks. If it does look like it might be skin breakdown I'll have to go in to the wound clinic and see what they say. Fortunately, I really have been blessed with fast healing skin repair. If I would have to go down I think it wouldn't take long to have the wound care guys over I'm taking care of me like they did when I had the burn that was really and interesting experience.

Speaking of interesting experiences but on a totally different note. One of the new people who have moved into this property in the last couple months I actually worked and still works at my old company The Independent Living Center. It seems the boss who's been the boss there for almost 40 years and just retired a year ago seems to have taken a bad turn and has landed in the hospital with a very very poor prognosis. I don't think she'll make it through the week but she's quite a fighter and you never know. I'm surprised I have become as emotionally involved with this information as I have been. We were not particularly close. We along pretty well if it remained topical and didn't get too deep. It's so weird having folks that I know fairly close begin to die. I suppose it's natural it just feels very weird…. 

Woeful Wednesday

 It's amazing how good a decent bathroom run feels after a day like yesterday and the night like last night. I didn't lose it but I sure thought I was close to the point where I basically wrap myself up in plastic sheet or sheet Savers or whatever they're called just in case I did let go during the night but I didn't! I really feel like I was close all day long to the point where I didn't do anything, canceled my appointment/ meeting Etc. Today I just felt a bit rested and that's good. I really didn't do a whole lot except for I did have a meeting that I had a zoom meeting that took basically 2 hours of my day in the middle of the day but aside from that I finished washing my clothes and then hanging them up later on in the day after I'd worked out on the arm bike for a while I'm just went about my Wednesday scenario. I did clean up the kitchen a the kitchen really needed it. I finally got my long-term cooker clean to the point that I could put it back in its casing slide to the back of the countertop. Actually, after a few days I finally did get the rest of the kid letter sent out- - remember, I had to get to the credit union to get some cash out so I'd have enough money to stuff the envelopes with? Well I finally did all that it was good to get that done into the mail this morning that did take a weight off my mind.

I know it's kind of dull for the day and it was a beautiful day I should be shot for not going outside and doing stuff but I did get what I needed to get accomplished and that feel good aside from that I'm looking forward to a night without stress and the hopes of a civilized and social coffee social tomorrow at the weekly social and being around to speak with Robert when he comes to pick up my power chair to take in to see about getting new power motors put on so I'll have a functional backup chair aside from that it's been pretty much a woeful Wednesday.

Ps. I made the mistake of watching a couple of Utah Jazz basketball games couple weeks ago and now I'm sort of committed to watching this team lose over and over again so frustrating. I've been watching the game this evening not because I'm a supportive for that jazz guy but more because I want to see how much they can lose or how consistently they can lose. Or maybe it's me maybe I'm such a bad luck entity that just by watching the game their luck changes to bad the last couple games I've watched they've lost and I haven't watched they won I don't want to say there's a pattern there but there does seem to be a pattern there. I wish I were that powerful I know that I'm not but now I'm like the Greek character who's doomed to push the rock up the hill for eternity Sisyphus or whatever Doom the watch game after game as they lose over and over again

Tuesday's Predicament

 I lost another totally beautiful day today! I was all dressed and ready to head out it's Tuesday so I dress myself and was doing great until halfway through my morning procedure of dressing and such that I started feeling pressure on my bowel yep like I had to poop and I think it was more significant than usual like for sure if I didn't do anything soon I would be in a mess. So with great reluctance I called my person over at assist where my meeting was today and let him know that I was not going to be able to get in. The way I was feeling I knew that if I travel anywhere on my chair or with my chair as well as on the bus that I'd be having a major bowel blowout and not too long. I pretty much had this feeling all day that I was close to having to poop. I even called my home health person to put her on alert. I didn't think I heard back from her but when I checked my cell phone tonight in fact she had responded and wanted to know if she wanted to come over and assist in any way. I couldn't believe it it was like half an hour to an hour after I called her but I didn't check for like 3 or 4 hours. I don't know why my phone isn't alerting me to when I have these messages coming in. Kind of freaks me out but anyway that tag went on off and on all afternoon and now it's almost bedtime and I have a pooped but I feel like I might and I remember the last time I felt like this to a certain degree when I rolled into bed I did poop so I don't know if it's going to happen tonight or not but I'm going to cover my bed with blue sheetsavers and see if I can catch most of the stuff if it does happen on these pads bed pads. My person will be in earlier than usual tomorrow and so if there are issues we'll clean it up then I guess. But I just basically just hung out at the apartment all day watched a couple of movies and that was basically it. I was impressed that the coffee container/ pot that I ordered yesterday came in and I was able to drag it in from the outside hallway and get it on the table and open it up. I've got the little doohickeys fixed into the top now so that it will fit underneath the coffee maker. Need to rinse out the coffee maker I think that's the adult thing to do.

The kitchen is becoming a mess again dropped nuts on the floor then being rolled over by my chair as well as Ritz crackers that looks pathetic. Dripped juice on the floor from the pickled pepper concoction that I have during the day so there's pickles that have escaped and hit the floor as well as pickle juice that's escape the handle of the device I used to fish the peppers out of the brine. I also had some roast this morning I'm wondering if the roast is too rich I haven't had it for some time but sure been good but maybe it's not well for me. Other than that districts are piled up I'm still haven't got things cleaned up from when I made the roast. I might do that tonight who knows what I can do before I hit the sack hopefully the extra movement will cause me to poop. I wish I could just get back to some form of the malacy and stop missing meetings…

Brothers Help

 I must say it's kind of weird but the weather outside is delightful it's not at all frightful. It feels more like spring than winter and technically we are still in autumn but we should have much colder weather and much more snow. But putting that aside it's certainly nice to get out and about. Finally, today I jumped on the bus and went down Redwood Road till I got to my bank, Mountain America Credit Union, I could finally get some money/ cash to finish the December mail out. It's getting pretty late in the month that kind of perturbs me a little bit but it'll have to slide this month and hopefully it'll be just as well. While I was at the credit union I once again got new PIN numbers. It's really drives me crazy but I guess it's for my own good. Probably forgot the last pin numbers they gave me probably this summer so I couldn't use the cash machine nor could I get the money from the service desk at my local market. Or I could even use the cash machine at the community college just down the road MCU has an ATM at the community college. I'm surprised always how long it takes to accomplish anything doing public transit. You only probably do one or two items a day with any effectiveness so after my Mountain America Credit Union work I stopped off at my local market and picked up my baclofen which I dropped off last week and forgot to pick up when I left the market. I got a couple other things while I was there. Like I said feels good to be out and about again.

I was home again for a little bit actually I was actually working out on my arm bike when my brother called and was interested in coming back and working on some more stuff at the apartment. And soon he was back he was here we are both working at trying to fix the shower chair that has a Caster that's gone bad and it's really a puzzle for my home health person myself to get me around in and out of the shower sometimes when the cast are freezes up because the bearings are long gone. We spent a lot of time going over the shower chair trying to get any contact information possible let me finally did but by the time we got the phone number called it was way too late they had gone home for the day. Tonight I was looking at the materials and I think now I know how to go about at least sizing the Caster that I need so I don't act totally stupid if and when they should call after I left a message on their answering service. I really enjoy working with my brother again it's been a long time since I've seen him I'm glad that he's well and doing fine and healthy. Interestingly enough, my other brother called today and we spent some time visiting. He always calls when he sends me money for my birthday or for Christmas to let me know that the money is coming and to be sure that I get the money or the envelope that's coming in as soon as possible. It was good to talk with him as well. I wish the three of us get together and iron out some of our differences that would be sort of fun if not healthy

Sunday supports

I am so lucky or blessed are both. Today of course was breakfast over at the restaurant not far from my apartment complex. The place we go every Sunday morning. A darken ed moist morning not a lot of rain just a mist at least it wasn't snow I was thankful for that. My chair that I've been using, the backup chair seems to be getting worse and worse. Fortunately Sunday morning is very little traffic on Redwood Road which I have to cross to get to the restaurant. But the chair was pulling a little to the left more so than usual but I didn't think much about it until I got to the restaurant parking lot and my granddaughter's boyfriend came out to greet me. They had been watching for me. By then my chair was actually almost not going forward at all and tending to go around in circles if I let it but if I'm patient I could go a little bit in a forward motion. Follow it a good breakfast and good conversation Marc Anthony basically pushed me home and we looked at my chair a little bit but couldn't find anything that we could figure out to make it any better. At least I was home and I have Netflix and the Disney Channel so I can keep myself occupied if nothing else which I pretty much did till a little after lunch when I decided I would call my older brother who's very mechanical is good at this kind of stuff.

Fortunately he was there at his house and came right over and soon began tickering with my chair no matter what we did we couldn't resolve what I think is a bad motor. Then we looked at the other chair the one the newer one that I seem to be having problems with but at this point in the game to have anything that would let me go from point A to point B in a straight line I would totally cover it. We examined the chair very carefully or at least Carl did and he has a much better eye for this kind of stuff that I do. Essentially, he could find nothing wrong and I guess that's good enough for me. He looked at the end of carriage and the Fasteners and he looked at bolts and nuts and make sure everything was tightened up and everything looked okay. Before I left I had him sling me up and put me in the big chair and I've been using it ever since. I swear it was listed on me the other day when I thought that the seat was for sure broken. It looks like I'm back in the race and now I have to figure out a way to get my power chair, my backup chair over 

Tto you cat just see if I can put new Motors on the thing.

Today's experience sure makes me thankful for the chair that I've got. And really makes me Focus on making sure I have a backup chair. The weekend has been totally enlightening in that category. I should be playing catch up all week. I've got to get cash for the kids letters and just get cash. After all it's Christmas……

Satisfying Saturday

 You know when you have one of those extraordinary events you just leaves you almost in disbelief? Well I had one of those last night. I actually turned the light off at 11:30 p.m. after reading a couple chapters then slept till about 5:30 or so and then laid around till 6:00 a.m. and got up. It was a great night no disruptions, no gaseous events or happened to get up a pee or anything else like that. I don't have those nights very often and truly appreciated coming through last night as well as I did to the point that even though the weather seems somewhat inclement I went out and did some shopping for groceries and such. I went out shopping after I went out to coffee which is by myself by the way since my coffee partner didn't show up today which is okay no big deal but it's always nice to have someone to visit with when you're drinking coffee and trying to look cool at 9:30 in the morning. However, the big event of my day was purchasing a beef roast!

It's been quite a while since I actually cooked a roast and felt a little uncomfortable but I gritted my teeth and went for it. I purchased a $21 roast! I can't believe I spent that much money on a piece of meat basically just for me. It was a beautiful piece of meat and I was pleased when I got home to find out that I could easily put my hands on the slow cooker and all the parts. You know what now that I think about it I bought the roast last night and put it on this morning before I went to coffee across the street. I cooked it all day and it was pretty decent by the time I finally dug into it this evening. I was going to put vegetables with it but I never got to that point I lost interest after the potatoes I purchased a few weeks ago had gone around the band and decided just to go for the meet. Of course to finish product is not as picturesque as the starting piece but still it was kind of fun. I'm going to put the roast as it's cooled into a plastic bag and throw it in the refrigerator to enjoy this coming week and then Harvest the juice and use it for gravy for the coming week as well I don't know if I'll make it but we'll see either way it's going to be fun I just know it. The biggest issue however is it took a toll on the kitchen and I think once I get the roast put away and the gravy accumulated I'm just going to let it go until Monday. Sometimes  the best you can do. I'm still in the middle of doing my mail out. Those letters that did not need cash in them mainly the ones going to grown ups are pretty well mailed out now I'm not going to be able to mail anything more until I can get to the bank Monday or whenever. I thought I could sneak some money with my debit card at the market or the cash machine but for some reason I cannot remember my password or whatever that is I need to get money out when I want it. The secret number or whatever it is. Got to go set up another one on Monday when I get the cash for the Christmas letters but then I won't need the secret number change. It's all such a drag…

December already?

 It's official, we turn the page, it's December 1 2023. I could say unbelievable but I use that term way too much it just is. It's the last month of the year and it's Christmas time and fortunately for me there is a break in the clouds this afternoon which allowed me to run to the market pick up a few items before the clouds roll back in tonight and do some snowing. I don't think we're going to get much snow here on the floor but it's just the idea that storms are coming and I don't want to be in need over the storm.. I almost dropped the hammer last night or this afternoon or this morning and setting up an account for home delivery. I did this in large part because of the cold weather as well as a funky wheelchair that I don't have a whole lot of faith in but it keeps getting me to where I need to go. I've been trying for 2 days now to get the stupid guy over at the wheelchair shop to call me back to set up an appointment to pick up my chair, my main chair, that needs to repair. He must not like me as much as I dislike him. And it's not that I dislike him I don't know it just seems flaky. But anyway I figured in this inclement weather time when it does snow a lot I am housebound/ apartment bound and maybe it's time that I really consider home delivery shopping for groceries I got to the park where I was trying to pay for what I had ordered and it wouldn't take any of my information even if I tried to use another paying system through the Google Network. It was just enough frustration for me to just put on my jacket and head across the street. I still think I need to at least get registered with this organization so if I do need home delivery I can get it. Have I ever mentioned that next to my grocery store is a dollar store? I don't know if it's all a dollar or what but they have milk in sealed containers that can be put into storage. I like the milk and use it on a daily basis just because it's good and the boxes are square that can handle it very easily and I can have a pile of cartons of milk in my closet to use as I need but I'm currently almost out. Today when I went to the market I stopped by the dollar store and got me three quarts of whole milk my favorite. I was carrying a lot of stuff actually and I had plastic bags full of sliced peppers which are kind of heavy and the three quarts of milk are pretty heavy too. Anyway I got home and I only had one quart of milk and I was just too exhausted to go out and try to find out where I dropped him. I think what happened was the fat sacks for two low and rubbed against the wheel which or a hole in the bags and I dropped the milk. I should have had two bags or three bags and thickness but I didn't and I should have had a basket but I had not done that either I just wanted to run over and run back. And like a white American I figured well it's only $1.25 a box I can lose it. And I can live off the one quart of milk for some time. But I still might go over tomorrow before the storms come replace two more items of milk and maybe a couple more cans of peppers