Stay away from the one and plant the other. Watch the flowers follow the sun and make intricate geometric patterns.
above the trace of an asteroid’s path
Saturday, Feb 9 Got the week’s doings completed without saying anything about today, so will review here a little. I was recovering most of yesterday. Took my last dose of codeine cough syrup about 7:00 p.m. Sad to hear last night of another friend’s brother’s death. It’s no fun to get old. I have a friend in Idaho, a few years older, who has lost 13 friends or relatives in January this year. I worked a lot on receipts, bills, and checking health charges and insurance payments. What a continued mess. Found an Aug 2012 annual physical for John was posted with the wrong code. Took me a 1/2 hr on the phone, mostly waiting to find out why the bill was wrong (in my opinion). Such has happened a lot to us over the past 3 years. I hope you all will check your medical paperwork and not just accept it as correct and pay the bill, when you may owe nothing! I was correct, but it took awhile to solve. The code was submitted incorrectly as a visit, not a routine physical, and a co-pay was charged (my first clue something was wrong). Not only that, but only a portion was credited and then most of it was counted on my deductible and we owed it (always happens at the turn of the year, when we have to pay $250 before they pay the bill). Yet with both Medicare (1st) and Group Health (2nd) coverage, we have been fully covered on annual physicals, with no co-pay. Next, I called my doctor’s office. The accountant indicated she knew it had not been coded properly, and she had resubmitted (I noticed that last year to alert her, when I figured the Medicare paperwork had not been filed). John and I always have ours the same day, and mine came through all right. Turns out, Medicare just finally reimbursed them for his IN FULL (in January). [Both Medicare and Group Health premiums have gone up for 2013 compared to last year, including the deductibles and co-pays. So we are paying a little under $6,000/year for insurance and, on top of that, co-pays and medicines that are not covered. Then there are many hours trying to keep all of these things on track. Dental coverage is entirely separate, so more cost there.] The rest of the day besides bills and sorting receipts from stacks around the room, was spent on working on the annual greetings I have been trying to get out before Valentine’s Day. (I did not make it). Today, I finished one link of the story about John’s WTA work in 2012. I have worked on it for a couple of days, mixing its time with other life’s activities. Actually, it’s not yet finished. I’m waiting for John to proof it and make additions or deletions. Almost done for my proofer outside of this house, my valuable asset. She is back east so won’t see it until tomorrow. We just finished a late dinner. Then we had one dog go out for her evening run (to potty), and she noisily encountered a skunk by the back fence and came back in smelling awful. It was an indirect or in-the-air hit, apparently, with no noticeable fluid on her. The others were out with her, but they escaped the cloud of mist.
Sunday, Feb 10 This was a not-too-much-to-do day. Mostly worked on web pages for the 2012 greetings. A little kitchen and other clean-up by us both. More tomorrow.
Monday, Feb 11 The day started early with a trip to town to drop off John’s computer to fix the missing sound problem that began with a power outage several months ago as well as to drop off my Subaru for a mileage-triggered major maintenance, oil change, and tune-up. At 4:30 p.m. came a phone call from our mechanic. My car had its 60,000 mile required maintenance and the bill totaled $914.98. Almost $550 was labor – drive belts being the big deal at 60,000. Such things have to be priced into the cost of ownership ‘cause you don’t want something to go wrong when traveling at 70 mph on the interstate. Now it is supposed to last another 60,000 miles.
Tuesday, Feb 12 Morning brought a trip to a new edition of an old local restaurant chain, Copper Kettle, for a coffee klatch with Emeritus Professors from Geography. The oldest is 86, I think. He actually led the discussion (first mentioning trips to the 3 Gorges Dam in China and the new Lock(s) at the Panama Canal, he and his wife made some time ago). We talked about lots of things but mostly about the cost of education, and a need for funding current ‘scholarships’ as our State and University seek to adjust to a new business model – meaning higher costs and less funding. This led to the old GI bill, and on and on, for almost 1.5 hrs. John and I were the only ones not filling up on coffee. There were 6 guys and one other gal joining us, the wife of the most recent retiree. We have decided to meet every second Tuesday morning of the month. Now that the weather is better, it might work for a while. We left home at 9:00 a.m. and did not return home until 4:20. From the meeting, John and I headed to Yakima, for some necessities, having lunch there. Tried making two stops at places we normally do not shop. The first we went to turn in our $8.00 coupon on a special ConAgra brand bread flour the web said was available at Wal*Mart. It was not. Did our run to Costco as well, getting meds for two neighbors and for another friend in town, and greenhouse grown tomatoes from Canada (a big industry in B.C.) for another. On the way back to Ellensburg, we stopped by the new Cabalas store to pick up two knives John ordered for in-store pick up, saving $5 on shipping. Well, they weren’t in as expected, so sadly, we will have to drive back to get them, and only have 2 weeks to pick them up. Jeez. So much for planning. Well, he wants to go to a nursery and see if they have a yellow Plum tree – maybe that should be a Ylum tree! On the return trip we detoured through EBRG for me to pick up my rejuvenated Subaru. After John did the animal chores, we carried some medicine and some cat food to our neighbor. For dinner, John made chicken, biscuits, and fried cauliflower. No work yet today on annual greetings; maybe yet tonight.
Wednesday, Feb 13 John saw two eagles this morning, in trees by the road. They visit the area when the cows give birth, using the opportunity for easy meals of placental expulsion (aka afterbirth). I’m still not feeling well yet. We did go and I played music and ate at the Noon Food Bank soup kitchen. John drove his truck to town, dropped me off for an hour, and ran errands: (1) BiMart for “generic Round-Up” at a good price, and seed starter pots and (2) gasoline station to fill gas cans for the old 1980 pickup. That’s why we drove a PU – not wanting to carry gas inside one of the cars. He also went by the grocery store and got some stuff, namely used his $8 coupon for Wesson Soybean oil rather than flour we cannot get. On by the bank and then to pick up John’s computer that has been being fixed finally after taking in early Monday morning. He will be thrilled to have his “right arm” back. I know the feeling.
The computer sound problem was only partially resolved. The output for the powered subwoofer and paired speakers seems to have died. There is still a port for a lesser set of speakers. So our 8 year old motherboard is now connected to 20 year old speakers rather than 10 year old speakers – progress? The operating system is Windows XP and Microsoft is abandoning it next spring, having tried before and gotten a lot of blowback. The company is pushing a new Windows 8 and MS-Office 2013 that cost a lot for things we don’t need. John is investigating “Open Source” systems and software. Ideas are here:
Open Source
Ubuntu
Libre Writer
We are very dependent on our computers for Web things and keeping in touch but don’t need fancy phones, high costs, monthly fees, and such for things we don’t use. I skipped exercise again today; just not up to it yet. But, I did get a fair amount of work done on the 2012 greetings.
Thursday, Feb 14 Happy Valentine’s Day. Will be going to Rehab for music, and likely drop off something at the Geog Dept. at CWU. John did not go along. He is easing back into outdoor chores as the temps come up and the footing dries out.
Friday, Feb 15 A little bird flew into the back window this morning and knocked himself out. I held the dog to keep her from leaving the house to get him, and yelled for John, who came and rescued it. It was still moving a little, so he brought it in and held it until it got its senses back and could be released. It seems to have recovered. If there is long term harm to them when that happens, we don’t know. Others we know do the same thing and we hope for the bird’s full recovery. We have been working this morning on a Blueberry soil pH story with a link from the 2012 greetings. A friend wanted to know about our Blueberries so John is working on an explanation. We are not in a good location for them so there are procedures he has to do to prepare the soil for them and then manage the water so as to not undo all the preliminary work. I am still working on other pages. We left before noon today for the Chocolate Valentine’s Day party at the Adult Activity Center. It was from noon to 1:30 but did not include lunch. There was sherbet punch, cookies, chocolate cake of two varieties, cupcakes of many types, cookies, and candy. They had a chocolate fountain with pineapple, bananas, cantaloupe, apple slices, and pretzels. Further across the room were chocolate-dipped strawberries our neighbor (around the block) made. She won one of the 3 prizes for desserts contributed by participants. All present could vote on their favorite, or the wackiest, and some other category. There were probably 50 people there. They had some games and gifts for everyone. After practicing (we found them unsatisfactory) on what we might take, we went empty handed, deciding not to enter the contest. It was a sunny, warm day today, and John took along a book titled “e: The Story of a Number.” The number starts out and just goes on and on
The number shows up in many math situations and also in nature associated with spirals. Just stick – spiral sunflower – into an ‘images’ search box on Bing or Google and have a look. So John read in the car while I exercised for 50 minutes. That was about all I could manage after laying off a couple weeks with my cold. This afternoon John did the normal chores plus cut some dead trees for corral rails and moved some of the larger rocks out of the raised soon-to-be drive to the hay barn. The bulldozer work last fall resulted in a lot of “finishing work” for his attention. I worked on more of my web pages for the annual greeting that I hope to finish and distribute this weekend. Making good progress; finally it’s coming together.
Saturday, Feb 16 Got some computer chores and postal mails completed. John’s taking the last of the small apples to the deer but at a spot 100 yards from the house. We are trying to discourage their attachment to the house area. There are 12 minutes left on my landline phone we’ll use today to call Cousin Ethel (93) in PA. I’m scheduled to go to Briarwood Commons at 2:00, to play music, on the way, picking up my friend, Lois (w/ macular degeneration that has happened to Ethel also), and then the residents will feed us afterwards. I’m back, and they had chicken noodle soup with turkey, rolls, and several desserts. My favorite was a cookie with white chocolate chips and pecans. They appreiciate us as much as we appreciate the attention. When I got home, I made the long distance call to Ethel, but ran out of minutes too quickly. Used a card and we talked another half hour. Nice to visit with her. John worked on everything up to the last couple of sentences while I was in town. Then, while I was proofing and he was outside with cat feeding duty, he alerted me to a bright pink cloud over our blue roofed pole building. The sun was just going down but still peaking over the Cascade Mountains about where Mt. Rainier is with respect to us. I grabbed my camera and ran out and almost missed the photo ‘op’ but here it is (less pink than it was).
(same week an asteroid exploded over Russia)
Hope your week was great.
Nancy and John
Still on the Naneum Fan