. . . end of week did not get the memo – snow level is about 1,500 ft
Sunday, Mar 6
For Mar 5 CPAP. Reported figures, 7 hrs 51 min with AHI=1.66 . Events: 13 H, 5 CSR, 12 RERA. All events were in the last hour — weird. No major mask leaks (max=6 L/min); oximeter on entire time, with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
Found a smaller bra in my clean-up activities, so I offered it on the BNE site. Finally, the end of this week, I found a taker. She will meet me next week at the Food Bank, where I play music, and join us for song and food (nice free reward for picking up and saving me the gasoline to deliver to her home). I wouldn’t want to go to her place anyway because of her residence being 10 miles east of EBRG and I have no reason to go there (Kittitas).
Still need to reset my watch for the day — now will just wait for Daylight Saving Time change, this coming Saturday night.
Worked on music for Thursday, and managed to do my medicines for the week, and had to laugh at Annie (a hunting dog) leaving the room because of the noise of my halving large Magnesium tablets. We wonder why she does not like loud noises; maybe it is genetic. Her mom competed in field trials with blank pistols and shotguns fired, but in her old age became gun shy and hated fireworks as well. We have to close her in a crate during fireworks times, as we did her mom. Our neighbor’s target shooting bugs her too. The teen son got a new pistol for Christmas, we think, and when the school bus drops him off (about 4 pm) he fires about 4 or 5 shots within a few minutes. Mom and dad must have placed a limit on the shells per day. We usually exchange info when we have things to trade. Her eggs. Us garden produce. Haven’t been in touch during the winter.
John has been editing the blog.
Sunny now, but supposed to be raining later, and he needs to empty the full buckets and 55 gallon barrel using a siphon and garden hose to get it to near-house trees.
We had leftovers from last night’s supper for lunch today, with added hash browns. We eat too well with John’s efforts.
Sun still shining, after wind started blowing and I thought rain was coming. John’s out giving horses carrots and starting his truck. I was doing the final proofing on the blog this week after he entered all the stuff into WordPress and the computer froze.
Published the blog after a ton of problems with a locked up computer. We even had to borrow a mouse from a neighbor that did not fix the problem. Shutting down the computer worked, after we had tried it once previously. Who knows what lurks in bits and bytes lost in cyberspace.
Monday, Mar 7
For Mar 6 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 16 min with AHI=1.79. Events: 13 H, 9 CSR, 18 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=10 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
I decided to stay home and take care of matters–did dishes, clothes, showered, worked on clothing pickup for March 22, worked on getting representatives to come to the end of the day pickup from the clothing share, who all provide a service in 5 locations (churches, university and Food Bank), to distribute free clothing to the community throughout Kittitas County. Also worked on the Jobs list (through Google Groups– NW Geography Jobs) and much paperwork, plus taking the medical data off two machines that monitor some heart-things all night.
John used a store-bought frozen concoction to bake 2 dozen choc/cherry cookies. Then, he went to the neighbors with the freshly sharpened Stihl chainsaw. Along the driveway, they had several Spruce trees. Other trees blocked light from all directions except south. Our prevailing wind is from the NW. Thus, tree growth and wind had shaped the trees and they lean over the driveway. For many years they had a motor home parked there. John and one of the sons kept urging that it be moved. It hadn’t been used in 15 years. So, it got moved about 5 years ago using a tractor to pull it. Last fall, with the ground wet and a few hefty gusts of wind, the east-most tree came down. There is a 1940s era garage and in the sense of horseshoes and hand grenades – the tree just missed the garage. Limbs rested on it but unlike a big Pine, there are no big limbs on the Spruce. John cut the limbs off that were not holding the tree up. Then he cut 6 feet sections from the top and bottom directions. He left one section standing like a multi-legged Pterosaur with one wing. That needs to be pulled away from the garage with a truck and a chain.
I arranged to give away a garden rake on the Buy Nothing Ellensburg site to a young family named Roundy. That’s to go on Tuesday.
A ‘Memory from Facebook’ – Maggie Rose to Nancy B. Hultquist, March 7, 2016 at 3:10 pm. The workshop mentioned was in April of ’09 and intended to introduce young ladies to science: called Expanding Your Horizons. One of the last really fun things I did before retiring from CWU.
Maggie Rose wrote: “La Ninas, who attended your workshop, really liked it, especially Google Earth. One 5th grader mentioned that she would like to learn geography in college.”
Tuesday, Mar 8
For Mar 7 CPAP. Reported figures 6 hrs 54 min with AHI=1.30. Events: 5 H, 9 CSR, 11 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=7 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
A busy, busy day started with having to re-cut Apple Strudel because we took the wrong one out of the freezer — not the one marked Emeritus Geog Faculty. So, after John took off for pruning activities, I cut them into 20 pieces for the meeting today. Then I went in, set up the table, and made some hot chocolate / coffee mixture, for my drink. We had 8 people there to listen to Jim Armstrong (ex-CWU Alumni Director), the Executive Director of the Kittitas County Chamber of Commerce since 2011. He gave a nice presentation. We stayed around visiting after he left, for another half hour. I drove north in town to deliver the rake we were giving. It is a small light-duty one bought a couple of years ago at an Ace Hardware sale. Having used it some, John found it uncomfortable because it is short. Photos below show the old one (green) and its replacement (black & blue).
From there I went to Jack in the Box for a fast lunch so I could go to a friend’s house to help with 3 others sort clean clothes for the clothing share coming March 22. I used a coupon for a free Jumbo Jack I got at the Parkinson’s fundraiser, but it required a purchase of a large drink ($1.99 +tax). [Note that a similar drink can be had for 89¢ at the Circle K Mart.] I also had coupons for things there, and one was for a free curly fries (worth $2.29 with the purchase of a meal item). I asked if the drink I was purchasing was a meal item, and it was, so I got all that for $2.15. I brought home most of the drink, most of the fries, and half the burger. We had fries with dinner. John finished off the drink and will eat the burger for lunch tomorrow, when I’m gone to the Food Bank for music and lunch.
Meanwhile, back to earlier in the day, I left the clothing organization after almost 2 hours, to get to Line Dancing (Boot Scootin’ Boogie, was the last one we worked up to doing). It was fun and taxing. We had about 15 people participating.
Here, from the Web, is You Tube line dancing to Brooks & Dunn’s Boot Scootin’ Boogie
In the evening I went back to town to play music at Hearthstone with The Connections, and on the way, I dropped off two bags of clothes for the Career Closet. At the playing time tonight, a couple brought me two bags of clothes to put in the share. From them I heard about the death of a fellow I have gotten to known during the past 2 years. I met him, along with his wife and dog, at Royal Vista nursing home, and then when they closed, he moved to the Rehab, where I rehabbed in 2010, and our KV Fiddlers and Friends also play. Additionally, I saw him once a month when another group I play in (The Connections) is there.
Wednesday, Mar 9
For Mar 8 CPAP. Reported figures 6 hrs 38 min with AHI=0.30. Events: 2 H, 2 CSR, 11 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=6 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
Today is my neighbor Lorene’s 90th birthday. Her son was taking her to The Palace Restaurant to meet with a bunch of her similarly young friends. I went last year, but not this, and she knew I play music and eat at the food bank on Wednesdays. I did get a card fixed up for her and dropped it off once I was home today, after SAIL exercise class.
John stayed home from pruning today, because of rain. It rained here all day and still is raining tonight, but he claims it will stop tomorrow.
I was up quite early working on many chores and getting ready to leave for picking up my friend Gloria for the day. I picked her up at 11:20 and we went to the food bank. We were unable to get a close place to park.
We went inside and I had to return to the parking lot to pick up 6 bags of clothes for the share from one of our players. He and his wife donated a lot of clothes. It was pouring rain when we went for the transfer, but he pulled right next to my car, so that was convenient. I closed the back. We played (with all 7 singing, and 4 using instruments–guitar, ukulele, banjo, and violin). We started with a few Irish songs. Afterwards, we visited and ate a nice meal–pasta, salad, fruit, dessert (none for me), and pineapple/orange juice. When it was time to go it was still raining hard, and I needed to take a lot of food to my neighbors (2 dozen eggs, 2 milk jugs, large loaf of garlic bread, huge dish of pasta, and some frosted cupcakes for dessert. I went out and got the car pulled to the door, but then could not get the back hatch door to open, not with the key transponder, or from inside, or manually from outside. I was upset, but we piled the stuff into my back seat. I tried again and could not get it to work.
I need to empty it out tomorrow to pick up more clothes from people bringing them to the Thursday music playing time at Meadows Place.
From there we went to SAIL and at the end of exercising, we celebrated the 99th birthday of a woman who still is the most agile in our class, Faye Kollmeyer, whose husband, Louie, drives her in each week. (He is 101, retired from CWU Art Department). All the class was treated to a red frosted, heart-shaped frosted red velvet cake. Katrina sent a piece home to John so he was happy too.
Came home and worked on contacting more people representing the free clothing dispersal places for the clothing share, to come at the end to pick up clothes for their respective organizations. Places included must send a representative to the LDS church near the end of the day. These are the ones we have included this year:
1. CWU’s Career Clothing Closet (for any student to get professional clothing to attend a job interview).
2. Compassion Closet, newborn – size 12 clothing, near the Food Bank, behind Mercer Cr. Church, for Foster Families in the County.
3. Clothing Bank at the Church of Christ, open to anyone in the community, on Monday and Friday mornings.
4. APOYO — (food & clothing bank) located on CWU campus.
5. At United Methodist Church is the Ellensburg Community Clothing Center (ECCC), open for the community on Tuesdays and Saturdays from 9 a.m. – Noon.
I will continue contacting people in those organizations above to plan for sharing the leftovers.
Thursday, Mar 10
For Mar 9 CPAP. Reported figures 6 hrs 9 min with AHI=1.63. Events: 10 H, 11 CSR, 13 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=13 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
John walked up to the back of my car, manually tried what I had, and it opened. No clue what happened. It has worked since. John claims there are Gremlins around that like to tinker mischievously with modern gadgets. It must be true – it’s on the Web. One just needs to know how to chase them away. Apparently he does.
Then he left for grapevine pruning. I cleaned and sorted clothes, and called in the number of chairs needed for people playing today: Maury, Manord, Charlie, Gerald, Nancy, Amy, Anne, Laura, and Minerva. Later before leaving, I washed a load of dishes.
I fixed myself a chicken/egg salad for lunch today. On my way to play, I went by Kathryn’s and dropped off a box of baby clothes and 7 bags of adult clothes.
I went to Meadows Place and made a stupid mistake. I put my camera and keys in a different purse, left it and the cell phone in the car, locked it, when I took out all the stuff I was carrying into the building. I was carrying music for several people, for the audience, my own, my Irish hat, and my violin case.
I looked for my camera and keys before we started playing and realized what I had done. I was unable to contact John because he was on the road, and he does not turn on his emergency phone unless he decides to call me. I left a message at home and then my friend Anne Engels (our Tambourine player), said, “Do you have AAA?” I did, but my wallet and card was in the car. She went out to get her number for me to call on her phone. We finally got through, and they sent a person to unlock it, but they could not get there for an hour. No problem, I had to play music for the next hour.
We had a small audience, maybe 10, but a board meeting of the staff with corporate reps was going on concurrently, and they kept having breaks and coming to the back of the room, listening, and enjoying watching Haley dance and run around the room entertaining the residents and their family.
When we stopped, I carted my stuff to the door, and waited for the locksmith to come rescue me. He pulled in shortly after I had moved my stuff to the front door. I had a bag of clothes in my hand (donated by the activities director there for the share), and I carried it out with me to leave beside my car. He opened it and set off the alarm in the process, but warned me that would happen so I was supposed to fast get inside, get the keys, and push the red button. All was done in a minute. I failed to learn what was done. I thanked him, gave him a hug, and proceeded back inside with my camera and keys.
Once back inside, I was offered a piece of chocolate cake which I enjoyed with Amy, Haley, and one of the residents (John) who had his Lieutenant’s hat from his time in the Kent, WA Fire Department. He had Haley put it on her head. It was a little big, but everyone got a kick out of that.
This collage has Haley in the fireman’s hat on the left with him, in the middle one she is smiling nicely, and on the right photo is her mom, Amy, and me with her in a living room off the dining area where we perform. Note she has green polish on her toenails. She also had white socks and black patent leather shoes she removed. In the USA, the inventor was Seth Boyden of Newark, NJ in 1818. That’s from this story:
Below is another collage from pictures taken on Amy’s camera. The two side photos Amy took earlier to show her handiwork. She made that dress without a pattern from scratch for Haley, and had her model it in their backyard. Haley will be 3 in April. What a cutie. She has quite the personality, and when she realized the camera was her mother’s phone, she gave a funny face to our friend taking the picture. Her hat came from the $1 store. Mine is falling apart with disintegrating foam, having been left over from a Senior Center party two years ago. I think I deserve a new green derby for the rest of our performances in March, especially with Haley in her Leprechaun dress.
Friday, Mar 11
For Mar 10 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 59 min with AHI=0.13. Events: 1 H, 0 CSR, 14 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=5 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
I spent much of my day on different telephone and email and Facebook conversations. I managed to finalize all the pickups of leftovers from the Mar 22 clothing share by community members that run places for distributing free clothing to those in need (discussed in detail above).
I sat through and did not answer several phone calls I knew were telemarketers. Thank goodness for caller ID. I never thought I would appreciate paying the fee so much. I do believe it has gotten worse over the past few years, after the unsuccessful arrival of the DON’T CALL list. Yeah, right!
John made it home before 2:00 and we had a late lunch. He had pizza (frozen; reheated) and I had chicken/egg salad, the rest from yesterday’s lunch. We shared a half of a very large Honeycrisp apple that weighed over a pound. When John went to Safeway, he saw some nice Honeycrisps, for $4/lb. Considering he brought home over 10 lbs last week for $10/box, we feel fortunate to have access to them near Quincy on his trips over and back for pruning.
Saturday, Mar 12
For Mar 11 CPAP. Reported figures 6 hrs 44 min with AHI=0.45. Events: 3 H, 1 CSR, 11 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=10 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
I went to town to drop off two bags of clothing for the Career Closet, hand off a bag of clothes and pick up another from a different person, and on to the American Legion for a Memorial for a fellow who died at 87 from pneumonia (see the end of Tuesday’s write-up above). His name was Ken Broostrom. I just saw him two weeks before his death at the Rehab, when I showed up alone because of not receiving notification, and stayed for 50 minutes singing hymns and playing the violin for him to sing along with me and about 10 others.
I went by Hannah Rd on the way home to leave a garbage bag full of two-liter cola bottles a couple intends to use to make an exploration display for a class. I have no clue what that means, and have asked.
Once home, I rested and then returned to visit my neighbor Lorene, whose family came from around the state to celebrate her 90th birthday. She has given me a lot of clothing in the past, and she has lost weight, so I carried her some Medium tops – a light blue shirt jacket, purple frilly blouse, and a white lightweight sweater. I had a nice visit with her and with one of her grandchildren, and visited with one of her sons, Dale, and his wife, Kathy. The funniest thing we shared was Dale showing me and her some cat and cucumber videos on his smart-phone. I haven’t seen her laugh and enjoy herself so much in recent years. It was pretty cool.
Here are a couple..(but not the ones we were looking at yesterday afternoon):
Why do they do this?
Then, at the very end, why eat it?
This morning I got a link to a performance of the Junior Jammers – Katrina & Bobbie Pearce’s group in Nampa, ID. (Bobbie was my teacher for 22 years in WA Old Time Fiddlers Workshops). Her daughter Katrina is a a world champion LEFT HANDED violinist and is teaching and leading the group now. Bobbie still teaches.
Junior Jammers of Nampa, Idaho
Sunday, Mar 13
For Mar 12 CPAP. Reported figures 6 hrs 24 min with AHI=0.94. Events: 6 H, 2 CSR, 15 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=4 L/min); oximeter on entire time with high SpO2 and normal pulse.
Supposed to storm in western WA and snow in the mountains. Scheduled for 11 a.m. so John headed to town with the old truck and two 5 gallon cans for gas. He almost made it to town before the rain started. Did leave before the snow began. Townies were posting photos and complaining because the storm was going to disrupt their travel plans. We got rain but no snow. We can see it on the hill to the north at about 3,000 feet. Ellensburg is about 1,500 feet. Figure that out. A Robin visited just now – so spring just sprung. The photo below (WA-DOT) is from 16 miles north of us:
Hope your week was fine.
Nancy & John
Still on the Naneum Fan