(Old) Mad March Hares in the MMP

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
81

Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN ‘Tis 56 Amurrkin out and rainy(ish) with a predicted high of 66 and N.O.S. The big item on today’s agenda is servin’ at two Ash Wednesday services over to the church house at noon and six p.m. If’n I am goin’ to be repentant, go big, I say. We will procure provisions tomorrow cause we don’t want to deal today. Bein’ RDOS’s, we can do that. Long John Silver’s shall provide sustenance via fish ‘n chips. Don’t judge! We like LJS.

Now I need more caffeine and to feed rumbly tummy. Then, alas, I suppose I should purtify and consider suitable attire for bein’ repentant. As I said last night glitter ashes and designer sackcloth are not considered appropriate.

Happy Hump Day Y’all! A Blessed Ash Wednesday and Lent to those who observe.

82

I do, too, but the only one in our county closed years ago, dammit. The Red Lobster in Waldorf is long gone, too, not that it was all that great, but every once in a while, I got that gnawin’ and cravin’. There are some good local seafood places with fresh local fish and crab, but they’ve become $$$. Anyway, I got the beer-battered cod at Roy Rogers yesterday, and it wasn’t bad. Not quite as good as LJS, but I enjoyed it.

Awful night - I could not fall asleep! It was close to 2 when I finally zonked out, but I was up before 7. I’m wondering if the decaf tea I made was really decaf. I shoulda just had water. Fair bit of rain expected in the next 24 hours - could be up to an inch. It’s very gray out there now. I’m going to try to rake a bit before it starts. Maybe. But the big plan is cleaning up FCD’s shop, now that he’s done with most of his manufacturing.

Possible (remote but still possible) chance that we’ll have someone living here while we’re on our cruise. Daughter’s bestest friend and her husband are moving from Missouri to Ohio - she’ll be pursuing her PhD at Kent State. Going with the assumption that the term will begin in Aug or Sept, I told her they can stay here for July so she and Daughter can hang together. I planted the idea the other day, so we shall see. The husband does some sort of IT WFH, so all he needs is internet access. Fingers crossed.

For now, tho, I’m caffeinating and doing my morning surfage. Then onward!! Happy Wednesday!

83

Yep, our LJS just closed within the last 6 months.

I’m up and ugh this morning. Getting ready to head north for my appointment. Also hoping that I’ll be able to pick up my prescription from the compounding pharmacy while I’m up there.

I just had a hearty breakfast of Ritz cheese filled crackers and a couple Keebler fudge stripe cookies. I was trying to think of something that would still be agreeing with me several hours from now and this was my best guess.

84

Good Hump day morning. Up earlier than usual, we’ll see how the days goes if nappage is in my future or not. About 52F now and not due to get any warmer for the rest of the day with copious amounts of cloud cover. Nothing on the agenda for today, so might do some house-cleaning (or not). Am eating the morning apple to break my fast and will add other calories later.

boo fae, good luck on your travels home.

swampy, trust you will have you Ash in gear for the services…

FCM, My old Alma Mater, KSU. Lived in dorms for 4 years, great growing experience. And good luck in getting some house-sitters.

A true Mumper Meal!

And onward into the day.

85

my 7:30 alarm did not go off. luckily i woke up at 7:45. tumbled out of bed and stumbled around and managed to get dressed and out in 10 minutes. good thing i had pre packed things the night before.

last night’s meeting went well. the show and tell was well received. tables for earthday were set and we will have door prizes!

the table i’m at is “green home” which will show items for the home. this table will have the door prizes. compostable bags and bin, swedish dish cloths, non plastic straws, silicon covers, etc. each item will have a container for people to put a ticket.

the big prize is the old lobby chairs. so many people wanted to know what we were doing with them; could they buy them, that sort of thing. at the b&g meeting it was suggested that we raffle them at green committee’s earthday. the board agreed that it was a good idea, but it would be better to call it a door prize as raffle suggests buying a ticket.

people who attend the event will have one ticket for the home door prizes, and one ticket for the chairs.

i’m betting that we will have a well attended earthday this year. must be present to win!

86

Morning folks! The crack of 10am here. Partly cloudy, rain off and on, and 80/27 on the way to 85/30. With palpable humidity for the first time in a few months. Which presages the beginning of the great migration northward of all Those People. I can hardly wait. The rain & clouds should be clearing and it promises to be a wonderful sunny springtime afternoon. After tonight we should have clear skies with cool-ish nights & warm-ish days for a week or so. So rewinding to our winter pattern, perhaps for the last time of the year.

BB survived her first overnight back at work last night after 3 weeks of practicing being retired. She didn’t much enjoy it.

My day started early with a blood draw then a leisurely breakfast. Now home, the last of laundry is spinning and I have no idea what the rest of the day will hold. I didn’t fiddle with my files yesterday, so that might be part of it.

Cheers all!

87

Why 76? Why not 75? or 80?

Protesting is not what I would call fun and it certainly doesn’t put me in my happy place. It’s also a big waste of time, it’s too late now. I also don’t like the parking at the university, my hips been screaming for the past couple of weeks and just getting from the parking lot to the front sidewalks is an uphill slog.

Oh, that poor lil girl! That must be so painful, I hope its just a respiratory thing.

I don’t understand. I would have thought that your feet would be happy to not be carrying as much weight? I hope you get some relief soon, I also miss the days of being able to just walk a couple of miles pain-free.

People don’t understand that staples are hated in mail-rooms world over. They just want to be sure their package doesn’t get opened accidentally. Once I learned how much staples were hated, I moved to using duct tape. I’m sure it is also a PITA but at least fingers aren’t getting poked with sharp points.

Stock up on kittah fud, Friday starts a week long amazon boycott.

I used to really like them, but didn’t have them in AZ. When I finally did get the opportunity to eat there again, my tastes had changed and I never went back.

I’m so happy that we have a Captain D’s local, they’ve always got a special or two going on.

Good luck with the house-sitter, I hope it works out.

Fingers crossed that you are right.

It sounds very exciting, you’ve put a lot of planning into this and I hope that people there appreciate all you do for them.

So it’s currently 62F and kinda breezy. The weather guessers say we might get some rain but it is bright and clear so far. I’ve put my baby lemon out again. GG still hasn’t figured out that the tree he sees me carry outside is the tree that was inside. When I bring the outside tree back inside, it is brand new, never seen before and must be tasted and spat out.

At least he’s cuddly! Hubs weighted him yesterday and it looks like he’s finally stopped growing and settled at 21.4 lbs. He sure does look so much bigger, LOL!!!

I’m not going to the capital today so I thought I’d get a swim in. Yeah, no. The power was out and had been out since they got there to open and they didn’t know when it would be restored. There were bad words being said about a contractor digging without knowing what was under his shovel, but this is still a disaster zone with all of those problems included so who knows?

I’m having a third pantry cabinet delivered today, all of my food insecurities have been triggered lately and I need more storage. I’m hoping the truck will get here in the morning so maybe I can get some gym time in this afternoon.

I’m planning on doing more stitching while I’m waiting and have a new strain of sativa to try while I’m stitching.

88

Decent bet their product was massively enshittified during the interval you were gone.

If someone eats [whatever] regularly the slow pace of cheapening goes unnoticed. But when someone else experiences 5 or 10 years of cumulative change all at once, POW! It’s a real eye-opener / mouth puckerer.

It’s been eons since I’ve had LJS, but IIRC they were good to great when I was in college, but by my age 35ish they’d fallen on hard times and the few then-surviving stores were grease-encrusted shitholes while the fish just tasted like cheap watery junk. Haven’t been back since. And that was late 1980s

89

Can you get/use a wheelchair? Properly decorated it could be an attention-getter, plus you get to sit!

That’s what I found with Chef Boy-r-dee ravioli. I loved loved loved it as a kid. Then not too terribly long ago, I decided I had to have some. Bad decision! Never again. In fact, I avoid all canned pasta - it’s just too easy to make myself. I’ll buy frozen ravioli and douse it with my homemade sauce - very yum!

I just finished about an hour of rakage of the front flower bed. I got the ends and the area along the sidewalk to about 3’ back. I opted not to fight the area between the porch and the back of the bed - I’m too tired and it’s a real pain. So, next time.

I set a timer on my phone and stuck it in my pocket. Somehow, it got changed from one hour to two, then shut itself off. I suppose I should have just set it on the porch, but the not-quite-a-blister on my thumb was a good excuse to stop. and according to the weather channel, it’ll start raining any time now, so another good excuse.

I think I’ve earned recliner time.

90

Heaving went on for a reasonable bit. I made it home before the storm hit. I need to start the sketti sauce before nap time. Also, remember those underbed storage bins I got in the Freecycle Zone? So far the only thing I’ve stored in them is Spot.

I just go to the English pub when I want fish n’ chips(and a pint).

I get it from Pet Supermarket. I only buy from Amazon when there’s no local supply.

91

We got the promised snow storm last night. The high winds kept things from getting too much out of hand, but we got a few inches, which will all be gone by the weekend.

The red beans and rice was good stuff. I think I’ll make cornbread to go with the leftovers. And I’ll make the bananas Foster today for tomorrow’s pancake topping.

Made it to exercise, although I wasn’t really in the mood for it. The wife begged off.

92

Did a load of laundry and ate lunch. And that’s about as exciting as it got this morning. Off to the gym in a little while.

rocky, nice move on the old chairs, making use of them and providing some entertainment and reason to come to your event.

Just had to pick a time and for some reason (it’s 4 years in the future) that appealed to me. Around the same time I’ll be looking to move out of my house and into a ‘retirement community’ much like other Mumpers have. At least it’s a plan.

Never been to Long John’s Silvers, not a fish eater, The local one closed down years ago.

FCM, stay dry, just looked at the weather map and looks like you’ll have rain for awhile…

OK, those laps aren’t getting backstroked by themselves. Catch y’all later today.

93

Thank you and thank you also for Lenting up St Patrick’s and serving today. You’re my kind of church person.

I’d try to make an Ash Wednesday service today but the whiteout blizzard last night is making that inadvisable for an unsteady brittle bones old geezerette like me. I’ll light a candle :candle: and meditate at home instead-that’ll do. Lots of repenting needs to be done but only minor amount by me. A ratty gray bathrobe flannel and black plaid pj pants on their last legs will have to do instead of sackcloth.

Last nights blizzard was scary. I barely made it home from dropping off Harriet at her house after school. If I had waited 10 minutes to head home I wouldn’t have made it. Complete whiteout and winds up to 65 mph by the time I parked, got in the house and took off my coat. The blizzard and howling winds spooked the meezer Moxie so I took pity on her and let her sleep on my bed with me. She’s still patrolling her window circuit and seems concerned by all the trees blowing outside her windows-windspeed is currently 27mph out of the NW (brrrrrr :dashing_away:, gusts up to 41mph). If any big limbs dropped on my property during the storm I can’t see them and I’m not about to go outside and check further. I still have power, no interruption. Probably because I located my flashlights and charged up my three power banks as soon as I got home.

It’s a read trashy novels at home and reassure the cat in my bathrobe day. Lots of coffee and hot chocolate. Bake a big fat sweet potato for lunch. Undecided whether I have the stomach to read any news. If I do, I’ll consider that my Ash Wednesday act of repentance.

94

Supposedly all day and into the night. We’re just back from some erranding and it was coming down a bit more than a drizzle but much less than a shower. Very windy, too. I don’t think we’ll be venturing out the rest of the day.

I had a minor freak-out earlier today - an email saying to check my messages on my SS account. All I could think was a certain jerkwad declared cuts in SS payments. But it was just the periodic check-to-make-sure-the-proper-beneficiaries-are-listed. So freak-out avoided.

I think I hear my recliner calling. Well, after I check something on line for FCD. Then max chillage mode till it’s time to heat up the pulled poke for supper.

95

My goodness some of you are dealing with some terrible weather! BBBoo glad you made it home safely, that would have been treacherous if you had been caught out in it.

I stopped off at home for lunch today, and I’m dragging. We had terrible winds here last night as well, and the 60 mph gusts just shook the house all night long. The cats for some reason also started trying to catch the leaves that were getting blown up against the windows, so while very entertaining for them, I did not sleep well between their shenanigans and the loud wind. They, however, are exhausted and couldn’t even be arsed to come say hello when I got home.

96

Hello! I hope you shrovers are well shriven. I guess I really don’t have anything to say today.

97

Oh, BBBoo, that sounds horrible! I’m so glad you got home safely and will keep my fingers cross for continued power.

So, I just came online briefly to brag about Hubs. I have a two inch wide piece of wood I was using for my sign and he bought me a baseball bat to use instead. Between my trusty cane and baseball bat sign, I’m all set to go to battle over Medicaid.

98

Started Typing: 3:20 PM ET
Clicked Reply: 4:46 PM ET

I slept much better last night, but no one has given me money in the past 24 hours and I wasn’t chosen for an 03/26 Supreme Court ticket…so, life is (somewhat) back to normal. :grin:

It’s currently 57°F, and we just had several hours of serious rain: now there’s just light rain, which hopefully will end around dinnertime (as forecasted) because I think I might actually go to the local monthly jazz jam session this evening for the first time in a while. There’s a chance of scattered/isolated thunderstorms tonight, but I’ll risk it. I figure I’ll get a burger and tater tots, and listen to some good live music. And maybe even sing a tune or two. The hostess from Saturday’s housewarming texted me a little while ago and is still deciding whether she wants to go, so I might be hanging out alone. That would be fine with me. It would also be good to see her and get to vent a little about work (which I didn’t mention on Saturday because it was her party), but I’m in kind of a weird headspace and being on my own would also be alright. Either way, I think the music – and getting out of the house – will be good for me.

I’ve decided to stop “hiding” the stuff I write about work. My intention was to make it easy for folks to opt out of the saga if they want to, but the situation is mainly what’s going on with me these days. I’m not (generally) a whiner and I’ll never get political here, so the topic is safe in those regards, but anyone not interested in reading about looming unemployment woes can skip my posts entirely for a while. It won’t hurt my feelings. :smiley:

I’m a little concerned about my junior employee: he hasn’t sent me an updated resume yet (I asked for one yesterday morning and he said he’d get on it) or registered for the database the company uses to match at-risk employees with open positions (I asked him to do that yesterday, too). My senior guy was quick to do both. My junior guy has only been with the company for 9 months and had just made the switch from the commercial world to federal contracting, plus he doesn’t have a 4-year-degree and most of our positions require one, so I worry he might be spinning out a little. If I haven’t gotten a resume from him by late morning, I’ll check in and ask how he’s doing.

I cannot think of a single thing that I would either staple (with a regular desktop stapler) or duct tape where those might be interchangeable! :joy:

Yikes! I’m also glad that you made it home safely!

99

Oh, I was worried about the fall out from the Amazon boycott and the lack of work it will cause.

How’s the heat holding up?

OK, that makes sense. There won’t be a retirement community for us, we will die in this home. We can pay someone to come and help with housework and showers when needed, it will be less expensive and we don’t like people enough to want to live that close to them.

I love how that works, you are so smart!

Don’t watch the news, it is all bad and there is nothing you can do about it anyhow. Canada. Our best friends forever. That’s gone forever, there is no forgiving invasion threats and trade wars. Fuck.

It has been super windy here as well. The father of our neighbor to the right came over with a ladder and told us that the soffit and gutter on the back corner of our house was flapping in the wind (thank goodness he saw it, we don’t go back there and wouldn’t have noticed until I started seeing pieces on the ground) and wanted to hammer it back up for us. Of course Hubs went out and held the ladder while thanking him.

Good neighbors are such a blessing.

Hubs: I’m home!
Fuzzbutts: Blink, blink.
Hubs: Did you miss me?
Fuzzbutts: Were you gone?

GG isn’t a fan of the wind either and having the gutters banging around didn’t help his mood. He’s mostly spending his day in his cave of solitude and pouting.

I am shocked, you have always been so much more creative than me!

I am so sorry about your unemployment woes. It wasn’t great when I got RIF’d but I was able to move from the county to the state in less than a month so my stress levels didn’t get that high. Plus, Hubs was still working so I had someone to help pick up the $ slack.

So my new pantry cabinet finally arrived an hour ago. And it was damaged so it got sent back and another one ordered. This makes me sad, I had already started sorting and separating things from the other cabinets so I was ready for the new one. Now I have piles of cans and boxes to put away again.

100

I had my failed molar implant pulled today. It took longer to drive to the periodontist than it took to do the procedure. Anaesthetising injections, wait ten minutes, poke (‘Did you feel that?’ ‘No.’), yank, insert gauze, wait ten minutes, replace the gauze.

He was done by 12:30. Almost two hours later, I’m waiting for the feeling to come back to see how much it will hurt.