. . . put your hands up, turn around slowly . . .\u201d<\/p>\n
We ended the blog last week with Friday, so will start this on Saturday, January 01, 2011 with a low temperature at the airport of -1.\u00a0 It\u2019s interesting when you abbreviate the date as 1-1-11.\u00a0 We have cooked, cleaned a little, fed the horses, dog and cat, but mostly done emails all day.\u00a0 I manage to write a few letters to people who don\u2019t have a computer, and to pay a few start-of-the-new-year bills.\u00a0 John is making a big pot of his famous salt-free Chili for dinner and the rest of the week as needed for lunches or dinners.\u00a0 Also there is a big container of rice steaming.\u00a0 Yesterday we made some long distance calls but didn\u2019t do any today.\u00a0 It never got above 16 here, but was colder at the airport about 5 miles south of us.\u00a0\u00a0 We had lots of deer and birds hanging around today looking for handouts.<\/p>\n
Sunday \u2013 The Taize\u2019 music program has been cancelled until next week.\u00a0 Suits me.\u00a0 I will be happy to stay home all day and work on projects.\u00a0 We have no other pressing plans.\u00a0 By the time I drive to town and back and spend a couple hours in town, it is a time sink, not to mention the gasoline expense.\u00a0 My car gets worse gas mileage in the very cold.\u00a0 I spent two hours sorting and cleaning stacks of receipts off the counter between the den and kitchen.\u00a0 It has accumulated amazingly over the past year plus.<\/p>\n
Monday \u2013 I went in for a blood draw and then to the SAIL (Stay Active & Independent for Life) exercise class at the Adult Activity Center.\u00a0 They have a new policy to help pay the bills and are charging a yearly fee for all AAC activities of $20.00.\u00a0 I don\u2019t mind paying that at all for the whole year.\u00a0 My class is only $3.00 \/quarter, so a lot less expensive than going to Physical Therapy and paying an insurance co-pay of $25 for 45 minutes.\u00a0 The SAIL class meets MWF for an hour.\u00a0 Turns out the yearly fee will cover those quarterly costs and allow us to participate in other activities, such as the first Friday of each month\u2019s potluck with \u201csomething-main dish\u201d provided by the center.\u00a0 This week it will be baked potatoes with all the toppings.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m pretty worn out from all the exercise today.\u00a0 We plan to make cookies tomorrow – chocolate chip & pecans; known by some as Toll House* cookies.<\/p>\n
*While the \u00a0NESTL\u00c9\u00ae company still brands their chocolate chip related products as TOLL HOUSE\u00ae, the \u201ctoll house\u201d legal \u201ctrademark\u201d seems to have been lost in 1983.\u00a0 The name does relate to an original stage line toll house built in 1709, near Whitman, Massachusetts.\u00a0 Story here:<\/p>\n
http:\/\/whatscookingamerica.net\/History\/CookieHistory.htm<\/a><\/p>\n and here:\u00a0\u00a0 http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Toll_House_Inn<\/a><\/p>\n Once each year we take cookies and repay favors owed, including always to the people at Complete Computer Services when we pay our connection (email) bill for the year for the old account we have had since 1995, ( nancy@ellensburg.com<\/a> ).\u00a0 They only charge us $5.00\/month and that includes the occasional silly computer-tech question that John doesn\u2019t solve on his own.\u00a0 They set up this \u201cblog\u201d for John to provide \u201cNancy updates\u201d and (for a reasonable fee) they also fix our serious computer problems.\u00a0 They are a nice bunch (3) who love our homemade cookies.<\/p>\n It was cold today and tonight.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t get my feet warm even with down booties and heavy cotton socks.\u00a0 So, I found my garage sale wool socks from Eddie Bauer to put on inside my garage sale down booties from Eddie Bauer, and my feet are finally warm.\u00a0\u00a0 Only problem is the wool socks have dangling green balls on the laces, and the cat thinks they are meant for him to bat around.<\/p>\n Tuesday is John\u2019s birthday.\u00a0 We\u2019ve nothing special planned, other than sorting receipts, except I have to call my doctor in Yakima for a report on the blood tests from yesterday.\u00a0 It beats driving all the way there to hear them.\u00a0 Turns out I wrote an email to his nurse and she got back to me that all the tests went well, and sent me the report, with my \u201cnumber\u201d and range expected.<\/p>\n Yesterday, I got a $40 savings from a pharmaceutical company on my $62 monthly prescription (Micardis).\u00a0 It doesn’t apply to people with state or federal help with drugs, such as Medicare D, which I do not have, but is allowed for those with insurance co-pays. Night was spent on the phone with various people who called; one, the longest, was from John\u2019s sister Peggy wishing him a happy birthday.\u00a0 Then after dinner we both spent a lot of time on the computer.\u00a0 The kitty spent his time running back and forth between us.<\/p>\n Here we are already Wednesday, and we are back from town and still making cookies.\u00a0 We didn\u2019t start till this morning and made enough to take a couple of dozen by where we had planned.\u00a0 John did that and went to get my meds reduction, buy some groceries, and then come back and pick me up from my exercise class.\u00a0 It went a little better today than Monday, but I\u2019m still sore after the long \u201clay-off\u201d.\u00a0 We stopped by our neighbors on the way home to pick up a nice chocolate frosted cake she made for John\u2019s birthday.\u00a0 Also stopped by the hospital for a blood draw (INR) to check on my dosage of Coumadin.\u00a0 We missed doing it Monday this week, and it was due.\u00a0 I\u2019m only on a monthly check now, after it has been stabilized.\u00a0 So that\u2019s nice.\u00a0\u00a0 While baking the last couple of batches of cookies (we still have half the big bowl left), we are making spaghetti sauce with some ground beef John bought this afternoon.\u00a0 That will last us a couple of meals.\u00a0 John gave me the choice of a hamburger with cheese, and I declined, asking for this instead.\u00a0 He is so accommodating, and finally happy that I\u2019m again eating what he fixes.<\/p>\n Sunny kitty is now eating on top of a dog crate on the end of the table in the den.\u00a0 It\u2019s a great place for him with room to eat and lie down from his perch on high to watch the dogs below him.\u00a0 He is \u201cking of the mountain\u201d, and now John was able to move his food from out of the window in the computer room, next to the filing cabinet.\u00a0 Yesterday, he pulled his little bowl down into the cabinet, but thankfully, John had put a newspaper below so it didn\u2019t all fall down into the file drawer.\u00a0 He now has a bigger square bowl that is more stable.\u00a0 He will come down the hall from his room, even in the middle of the night, to get his food when he\u2019s hungry.\u00a0 His water bowl and litter box are still in the back computer (bedroom), where he usually sleeps in the chair or under the bunk beds.<\/p>\n We got some more sad news of people we know losing dogs.\u00a0 We\u2019ve had dogs, cats, and horses and the average life time is in that order, about 10, 20, 30.\u00a0 Folks we know got a baby African Grey parrot (now 19) and they average about 55 years. \u00a0I wonder if anyone knows why life spans vary like this?<\/p>\n Our kitty is cavorting and mingling with the dogs now.\u00a0 He\u2019ll get on \u201ctheir\u201d couch and walk among them on the floor.\u00a0\u00a0 He\u2019s also growing and climbing up on more things.\u00a0 He was eyeing the kitchen counters today and I told him no.\u00a0\u00a0 Wonder how long that will last.\u00a0\u00a0 He gets a little braver each day.\u00a0 Still very playful with everything that moves, or moves when batted.\u00a0 If it makes noise, all the better.\u00a0 One of his toys is a medicine container with hard dog food it in to make it rattle.\u00a0 Another is tied to a long shoe lace and hangs from the table.\u00a0 He will play for many minutes batting it around.\u00a0 We\u2019ve heard companies are going to market toilet paper without the cardboard centers, but those are another favorite toy.\u00a0 We need to start a web-campaign to prevent the demise of cardboard tubes.<\/p>\n Thursday was a trip to town for me to play music and John to go shopping and buy stamps at the P.O.\u00a0 We had a nice afternoon.\u00a0 Rained on us going in, but nothing serious, and there was sun in town.\u00a0 We had some fog out here, but had had early morning sun.\u00a0 John is working on the KVTR newsletter (Trail riding club), and I\u2019m doing emails and need to transpose some music when he wants to take a break from the computer.<\/p>\n John took a break to come fix dinner.\u00a0 What a guy!\u00a0 So, I transposed the last two pages I wanted to do.\u00a0 Then we ate, and now John\u2019s back at the computer again to work on his newsletter.\u00a0 It has to be finished, printed, and sent out Saturday afternoon for early delivery next week.\u00a0 It has to be in the pickup box in EBRG by 4 PM Saturday or it doesn\u2019t go until Monday evening. Mail we send to local folks bypasses EBRG and goes to a processing facility in Yakima, then returned to EBRG from whence it came, and hopefully delivered in a timely manner. \u00a0\u00a0So if we wait until Monday it likely won\u2019t be delivered locally until Wednesday and the meeting is Thursday.<\/p>\n Friday was a food fare day.\u00a0 I had two potlucks to attend:\u00a0 one at 11:30 and another in the evening with my music group.\u00a0 John will be making a baked ham for the latter, and I\u2019m taking cookies to the one mid-day.\u00a0\u00a0 Then I have my SAIL exercise class after.\u00a0 I also played the violin and sang old songs at noon with an accordionist and the group there for the potluck.\u00a0 They have words to the songs to sing along.<\/p>\n Friday we had an early morning call from a charity fund raiser in Manila, Philippines for the Spirit Lake South Dakota Native American tribe elders and children for help with heating costs.\u00a0 I am always skeptical of those kinds of calls and ask lots of questions.\u00a0 I got on the web to check their website and will write someone there about the authenticity of the call I received.\u00a0 They started with wanting a $100 donation.\u00a0 I asked where they got my number and address and they said it was from a list of charities we had given to.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t pursue that.\u00a0 I know I just should have hung up at the start.\u00a0 We had had a call last week from an organization saying they were calling for funds only in the state of WA for Viet Nam vets.\u00a0 We checked that out and found it is a real scam and that the \u201ccharity\u201d organizer pockets most of the funds.\u00a0 I assume that is also the case with the recent call.\u00a0 When I asked, however, how much of the money would go to the reservation, the caller claimed if I wrote RESTRICTED on my check, that 100% would have to go there and they could keep nothing for administration.\u00a0 So, who sees to that?\u00a0 And I wonder if the Spirit Lake Dakotas don\u2019t have telephones?\u00a0 I\u2019ll take up a collection to get them some.\u00a0 Send money, please.\u00a0 Unmarked one-hundred dollar bills will do.<\/p>\n Great potluck tonight and good jam session following too.\u00a0 John\u2019s ham was appreciated, and there was chili and potatoes and salad, deviled eggs, bran muffins, and brownies, cookies, and angel food cake, and we took John\u2019s chocolate frosted chocolate birthday cake our neighbor made for him.\u00a0 There was plenty of food and we all ate a lot. <\/span><\/p>\n Today, I take off for a play date at Briarwood at 2:00 p.m. and they serve us a meal afterward.\u00a0 It will be vegetarian chili.\u00a0 I debated about taking some leftover ham to throw into the mix, but I won\u2019t.\u00a0 It\u2019s probably already got more salt in it than I need on my \u201clow salt\u201d diet.<\/p>\n We wish you a good week, and we will chat with you next week.<\/p>\n Nancy and John<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" . . . put your hands up, turn around slowly . . .\u201d We ended the blog last week with Friday, so will start this on Saturday, January 01, 2011 with a low temperature at the airport of -1.\u00a0 It\u2019s interesting when you abbreviate the date as 1-1-11.\u00a0 We have cooked, cleaned a little, fed … Continue reading “SATURDAY — \u201cBack away from the food, . . .”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-random-issues"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p72iNf-bv","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=713"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":716,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713\/revisions\/716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rocknponderosa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nToday starts the winter quarter at CWU.\u00a0 Thankfully, I do not have to worry about being there and ready to go with 3 new classes.\u00a0 Phew.\u00a0 Retirement has its benefits.
\nWe just had lunch: the foundation was a Marie Callender\u2019s plastic dinner of rice, sweet & sour chicken \u2013 with added carrots, a couple of costly panko shrimp (flaky bread crumbs) \u00a0and several Idaho fries.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t low in salt \u00a0but \u201creduced\u201d by the carrots and the fact that we split it.\u00a0 John fixed his own birthday lunch and breakfast and fed the horses, and entertained the cat.\u00a0 We emptied the dishwasher and I am loading it, so we can clean a large Pyrex bowl to mix cookie dough in.\u00a0 We double (perhaps quadruple) the recipe.\u00a0 Turns out we multiplied all the items 6 times one year when we finally figured out how many we had to make to give away and still have a few left. \u00a0\u00a0I always forget that until I open the cook book and find those notes from years ago.<\/p>\n