Thankfully, this has nothing to do with James' health. James had a very good day on Friday at physiotherapy, and we also saw the respiratory specialist that day. We can knock off carrying the oxygen bottles around and he no longer needs the supplemental oxygen during the day! She gave him a walking test and his pulse ox stayed at 93 while he was walking and went up to 96 when he sat down. (We had been practicing him coming up and down the stairs without the cannula for a few days now and got the same results!) We still have to keep the "fishtank," though, because she wants him to stay on oxygen at night. We can cope with that. No tripping over that damn hose anymore! He's fallen three times due to it, including into the printer, breaking the printer cable.

No, it's dealing with Christmas tree lights again. Monday I'd put up the easiest tree, the metal one that showcases all our 12 Days of Christmas Hallmark ornaments. So easy. We just bought the 12th day ornament this year, so it's complete. Tuesday I got the big tree upstairs, but by the time I fluffed it and replaced at least a dozen bulbs, I was too tired to decorate it. That I did on Wednesday, and by the time I was done I was knackered. I usually watch Christmas specials while putting up the tree, but just left NBC on and let the "Chicago" shows play out. Dear God, is this what Dick Wolf is reduced to now? Chicago Med is so overblown and stagy and soapy I kept expecting Matt and Maggie Powers, Nick Bellini, and Steve Aldrich and Carolee Simpson from NBC's classic daytime drama The Doctors to come strolling in. Poor S. Epatha Merkerson, stuck in this awful thing when Anita Van Buren was such a great character on Law & Order!

Unfortunately, all the lights on the library tree are shot, completely burned out, every single one of them. I considered removing them and just putting on another string, but the lights are fastened on there tight and it would be a lot of work to get them off. The rest of the week I looked for another four-foot real-looking tree, and the ones I saw were as ugly as sin. Even Michael's, where I got this tree, didn't have anything good, just one with mixed branches that looked horrible. So by the time my birthday arrived on Saturday, the library was still undecorated. However, I had brought a string of fifteen battery-powered seed lights. I took the table the tree usually goes on, put the tablecloth and "snowy material" on top, then set the six little village houses that I usually put under the tree around the big pine cone Christmas tree I bought for a dollar at a craft show. Then I wound the seed lights around the houses and put an extra color-changing candle at the back. It didn't look all that bad, in fact kind of sweet.

But not being about to put up the library tree is still disheartening.

Plus my Fitbit was having fits this week: one night the display dimmed and dimmed and dimmed, and finally pretty much almost disappeared. Even though it said the charge was at 85 percent, I figured maybe it never charged properly, so I plugged it in. Still dim. So I chatted with the Fitbit people and they said they would send me a return label. Still I plugged in the Fitbit that night, since it was still relaying information to my phone, and wore it to bed.

When I got up in the morning the display was fine again. [eyeroll] Electronics. Can't live with 'em.

Also sad news on the fandom front: Chris Boucher died. Among the things he wrote, my very first and still favorite episode of Blake's 7, "City at the Edge of the World."

Labels: Christmas decorations, Christmas lights, electronics, health, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:23:00 PM

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