Sunday, Feb 26. Neither John nor I slept well so rolling out in the morning was delayed until the sun was shining. But then we had a strange-weather day. Started out nice and sunny and then everything went gray. A snow squall turned everything white and now, mid-afternoon, it is brightly sunning again and dripping. We managed to keep the morning going with a late breakfast and to return to computer things. He also took a trip with the ’89 truck to give it a run to keep all things lubed, tuned, and moving. A trip around the long block and up a dead-end side road revealed a lot of new buildings, houses, and a bird hunting facility. The last one is a relocation of a place we sold a Brittany to many years ago. The son of the original owner now lives in the Clarkston area with his wife and they got one of Annie’s puppies of 2 years ago.
Monday, Feb 27 Still unable to continue with activities in town. Also canceled tomorrow’s. However, I’ve gone through all my remedies and currently am sipping hot tea, with three slices of lemon, and some honey added. Perhaps chicken soup is next; nope not till dinner with meatloaf. Instead, for lunch I had tuna with low salt potato chips and a piece of Valentine Day chocolate candy infused with crisped rice. I did walk to the end of the driveway, pick up the mail, and walk back. That’s the most I have done in over a week. I hope I’m getting better; I think a little.
Also my friend from grammar school days at Garden Hills, Ross Palmes, wrote an email today from back east and sent me a link I had seen before but not in awhile. It is called the Time Machine and has pictures taken at different times around Atlanta, of buildings, street intersections, and such things. It is quite fascinating. Here’s the link: http://www.atlantatimemachine.com/
At least my high school and grammar school buddies will enjoy following that. There are many pictures of our neighborhood (near Buckhead), and the old Buckhead Movie theatre where we spent many matinees and also went with our parents in the evening or weekends. I remember the fantastic news reels, just as if it were yesterday. For young folks reading this, that’s the way news was distributed. http://movietonews.com/the_fox_movietone_newsreel.html
John thinks he remembers evening movies costing 65¢ and the Saturday afternoon showing was 25¢. You got news and a movie. The site suggested above is supposed to have a sample titled “Featured Newsreel of the Week” that on this Saturday lists ‘Blackstone Saws a Woman in Half’ – This isn’t opening (on Google Chrome), so, sadly, we don’t know if she got split head-to-feet or across.
I managed to put in L’il Liza Jane for our music group and transposed it for Ellen’s B-flat clarinet. That song was written in the 1910s, but it has been picked up by bluegrass, folk, and rock n’ roll stars since.
Tuesday, Feb 28. I’m worn out from my trip today; not much of a trip, but I’m out of shape already, and still a little weak from the sickness. We went to town for a blood draw and on to grab some food which we ate in the car on the way to Yakima to Costco. It was an all-right trip. We needed big sized items: dog food, cat food, toilet paper (that comes in 36 roll packages). One of Costco’s strategies is to find some strange and useful (or delicious) item that isn’t normally stocked, so, one has to walk around and look to see if such a thing is there. We didn’t find anything this time, and usually only take the same route and buy the same things. Boring. Well, Nancy gets a little electric cart to putt around in, and this time got the one that stalls. John thinks a wire or connection overheats and then it stops. Turned off for a few seconds and then given a push start, it goes another 2 or 3 aisles. After a few of those, we made it to the end of the check-out line where it died. A couple of staff-types tried to explain how to turn it off and then restart it a few seconds later. She let them try, telling them she’d done it 4 times around the store. They then pushed it back to the front door.
Wednesday, Feb 29 Leap day didn’t leap, it sort of slumped. Nothing done today except computer stuff. I cancelled out my events for today again. And, I paid some bills and actually got out and walked to the mailbox again. John has come down with my cold, but thankfully it has stayed out of his chest. I expect him to recover faster than I have. Still, the day got worse. Peggy, John’s sister, reported that her friend for 50 years, Kathy, had a stroke Monday afternoon. She is paralyzed on her left side, but her mind, brain, and communication are intact.
Thursday, Mar 1 Nothing accomplished today. Woke up feeling lousy still. Canceled going to play music. Eight people showed up and pulled it off fine, without me.
Friday, Mar 2 Today was another morning I awoke early with a coughing and congestion problem, but as the morning went on, I got better. I still stayed away from town and the AAC potluck (where they had corned beef cabbage–I cannot eat because of the salt, but my friends took chicken salad, which I could have had). Origin of the term “corned”:
http://www.kitchenproject.com/history/CornedBeef.htm
Not going in for that meant I also did not go for afternoon exercise. Had a call from a sweet lady in the class who has been out with pancreas problems for several months. She is better enough now to start back in the exercise class. She is actually my neighbor a mile around the block. I should be fine by Monday and ready to restart living my life. Nothing planned this weekend. After a light lunch, I tackled the table in the middle of the room and counter next to me, with a vacuum cleaner to clean off dust that ends up on everything because of the dogs running in and out of the house with muddy feet. I worked for a couple hours plus, and would sit down every so often to file receipts for the first 3 months of 2012. Also came across some other things to sort and find a place for or discard. We have a tendency to come in with stuff, and pile it up, leaving it for another day.
The other thing I had to honcho was the schedule for our music group. We were going to have a potluck at one member’s place on Friday, 3/9/12, but she realized she had a conflict, so wants to change it to Thurs. Now I am trying to gather comments by email (so I won’t have to get on the phone to everyone), to see if we want to have it Thursday night, or if we will just cancel this one. In the afternoon I walked with John and the dogs up to the mailbox and picked up the mail. Then I called our neighbor’s cell phone because she has been gone all week and her mail was piling up. I found her in New York City for a conference that goes through Sunday. Wow. She told me she forgot to stop her mail. John claims that by going to NYC she has raised the average IQ of both places. Ouch! (Nancy here; that’s not nice!).
Later this afternoon I went along in the truck while John did all the chores for the neighbors’ horses and bulls. This involved a trip up the road 1/4 mile to feed two horses out in a pasture. John had to climb over a gate (precariously perched on two weak and falling fence posts) – backing the truck so its bumper touches the gate rails makes a sturdy combo) and carry hay out to the horses. These are friendlier than the others, but one had a big cocklebur between her eyes. I thought John was just petting her, until he got back to the truck and told me. Then we drove down the road to the bigger farm across the street. There are 2 stallions in a corral and a bull in a corral to feed. John had already carried water to the bull this morning. John fed them their nightly rations. He got out to open another gate to drive to the pasture with the 6 horses. Before that he had to close the gate behind us so the cows wouldn’t leave. John got out to open another gate to drive into the pasture. Until today the horses got out of the way and did not bolt through the gate, but today two escaped through the open gate. He drove on up and threw out a few flakes of hay, and then had to go back on foot to shoo the two horses back in the pasture. Luckily they came, wanting fed. John drove on up to the end of the pasture and spread hay (from the back of the truck) to the six horses, spaced out so they wouldn’t fight over it and have some of the lower ones on the pecking order, go hungry. While he was driving the truck around and stopping (plus when he went back for the two), a couple of horses were coming over and eating out of the back of the pickup. Finally he got them all taken care of, and we drove back through the gate, which he had to get out and close, and then across the creek and around the back of their hay barn, where he could load more hay in our pickup. Because of the rain and snow, he backs it into our 3-sided shed, where I normally park my Subaru. That way it stays nice and dry for the morning and evening hay runs. So he had to dodge cows, and open the gate to the barn, back in, and load some bales of hay for the horses, and one (fine grass, no oats) for the bull. After that, he had to close that heavy gate and open another so we could pull back onto the road for home. That whole process took almost an hour. Then home to feed our horses and the outside cats.
Supper was to be cold chicken and canned “pork & beans” – and this means: The U.S. Food and Drug Administration stated in 1996 that “It has for years been recognized by consumers generally that the designation ‘beans with pork,’ or ‘pork and beans’ is the common or usual name for an article of commerce that contains very little pork.” To spruce up the meal we added corn bread made with creamed corn (no milk). And about that “Sprucin’ Up,” see here:
http://www.word-detective.com/2008/03/24/spruce-up/
. . . and note therein the reference to “shorts” (under the name “Our Gang”) and released to movie theaters between 1922 and 1944.
I finished Friday with a good phone conversation with our broken-hip neighbor still in the nursing home (for a few more days). It began raining a little during the night and at daybreak Saturday it is wet and gray. We are to get gusts up to 30 mph so all the wet and blah stuff is to give way to a sunny Sunday. Right!
Hope your week was a good one.
Nancy and John
on the Naneum Fan