Christmas Day was quite pleasant; we had a leisurely breakfast. We had no gifts to open--James hadn't wrapped mine (the Law & Order monopoly game) and his hadn't arrived from Amazon yet (a new food processor), so we watched The Little Drummer Boy and The House Without a Christmas Tree until it was time to go to the Butlers for dinner, conversation, fuzzy Christmas feelings, and a gift exchange.

The food certainly beat Bay Breeze all hollow: perfectly cooked turkey, ham, and Clair's pot roast, over half a dozen veggie sides, desserts from pie to the little Favorina florentines, and of course Lin's cinnamon-and-sugar piecrust folds. She always makes them and I always hug her for it. I remember when I was a kid and would only eat the pie crusts; the filling didn't interest me at all. One of my aunts used to make the little pastries out of piecrust. too.

Later we had a mad gift opening—I opened everything so fast I'm not sure I know who gave me what—but everything was nice, from cross-stitch kits to dessert treats. We checked out Christmas lights on the way home, but weren't able to go on to check out the lights in Smyrna because we both needed to "hit the head" by the time we got to the house. Ah, the pleasures of being old!

Tuesday was a funny day: usually it's me who has post-holiday gastric distress, but today it was James. He remained close to home while I ran errands: went to Barnes & Noble, only to find this year their post-Christmas hardback sale is only 33 percent off, and there was nothing I wanted that bad for only 33 percent off. Instead I went to Hobby Lobby and got Oliver a new cage cover, as the one I bought at JoAnn was too small (I ordered a yard and they gave me only 30 inches—not cool, JoAnn). Then I got Butch gassed up at Costco and finished up by picking up something at Kaiser for James and then went to Publix. (I was actually heading for Big Lots, but traffic was stopped dead for a big accident; I ran past three accidents in the two hours I was out, and in two cases one car had hit the other car so hard that the wheel was bent. In fact, one of the cars had its left rear wheel broken off with the axle sticking out of it! After seeing the third accident, I just wanted to get home unscathed.)

James was better by Wednesday, so we went to physiotherapy; this is his last until Kaiser gets off their duff and re-ups his referral. On the way home we stopped at Lidl.

Thursday it was James' turn to get gasoline at Costco. This time we went inside to get the rest of the things for our Twelfth Night party. I also did a search-and-destroy through the garage and tossed away a garbage bag full of stuff, plus a bunch of old magazines. And to make it a medical trifecta, James had an iron infusion on Friday. Made the mistake of eating at Whattaburger afterwards. I am so not impressed by this place. The burger tastes of that fake "grillmark" shit and James clearly asked them for my burger as "a bun, the burger, and ketchup only," and they gave me the whole darn salad (thank goodness they remembered to omit the mustard). I burped the crappy thing up the rest of the afternoon.

Yesterday we went to a nice little gathering at the Spiveys home to celebrate Alice's birthday and watch the UGA vs. Florida State game. The company was great, but Florida State did a crash and burn. Later we learned the final score was 63 to 3!

Today I washed towels and cleaned the bathroom so I didn't have to do it on New Year's Day. Still have to sort meds for the week, but that's a twenty minute thing. For supper James made something he calls "egg roll in a bowl," ground pork cooked up and then blended with diced coleslaw, carrots, and celery. It was yummy. We watched a few Law & Order: Criminal Intent episodes, then Rudolph's Shiny New Year, the Ellery Queen episode "The Adventure of Auld Lang Syne," and finally the M*A*S*H episode "A War for All Seasons."

I put on the live feed from Times Square at 11:30, but the music was dreadful, so I found an old Guy Lombardo special from New Year's Eve 1976 to watch until it was almost time for the real Happy New Year. So we saw 1977 in about 11:55, then switched back to Times Square for the final countdown.

HAPPY 2024, EVERYONE!
Linda
James
Tucker
&
Oliver

Labels: birthday, Christmas, errands, food, gifts, health, illness, New Year, restaurants, videos

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:59:00 PM

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It was an unremarkable week leading up to Christmas. Tucker did finally get his bath. The gifts were wrapped and the spare room finally looks decent again. Wednesday was James' physiotherapy and "Doughnut Day," plus we made it to Hallmark to spend our coupons. Grocery shopping was done on Wednesday, and on Thursday I finally got my birthday dinner.

It was terrible. Some friends recommended Bay Breeze a few years ago, and we have enjoyed going there. They have baked stuffed shrimp that is actually affordable, and, even if it's not the "jumbo shrimp" they describe, it's usually good. Well, apparently it's gone way downhill according to other friends. We didn't get our appetizer until after our entree and it was overcooked, the shrimp were overcooked and tough and salty as the dickens, as was the appetizer (potato skins). After we finished eating, we went to downtown Marietta to walk around. We found gingerbread boys at the Australian bakery, went into The Corner Shop (the British store) and the candy store (found a dark chocolate Toblerone for dessert), and I checked out the new bookstore on the square, Elephant Books. (It's pretty much just starting out, so not a lot of books, and it strikes me as a "boutique type" place.)

We never did get to the antique store to see the vintage decorations among the vintage items because Mr. Lower GI was acting up again and we had to come home.

Friday I finished prepping my 2024 journal, and then Sunday it was back to the chores again, so Christmas Day would be free.

Labels: birthday, books, dogs, food, gifts, illness, pets, shopping

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:31:00 PM

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A better photo of Oliver.

Labels: budgies

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:51:00 PM

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 He's twelve weeks old, so I've set his birthday on September 13. Easy date for a Space: 1999 fan to remember.

This store has all sorts of birds, including big macaws and parrots. A Fischer's conure (a beautiful turquoise bird) seemed to be fascinated by me. I was trying to teach him not to bite. There was also an adorable canary, almost pale white with lemon yellow markings. We seemed to connect; he kept running to the bars to check me out. His other passion was shed feathers; every time I saw him, he picked one up and played with it. But $130! Goodness!

Labels: budgies

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:59:00 PM

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On Monday evening at 11:30 p.m., I officially turned 68 years old. How the Dickens did that happen? In my head I'm still the six year old who fell in love with Lassie, the ten year old who learned to play the organ in the fifth grade classroom at Stadium School, the fifteen year old who adored Mr. Abosamra's English classes, the eighteen year old who missed almost the entire final quarter of twelfth grade due to surgery, the twenty-something who cried when the Paperback Books store in Providence closed...ten budgies, eight cars, two states, and James...so many years!

Monday we were off for a birthday dinner. Alas, we forgot Bay Breeze was closed on Mondays. We made a short stop at Ollie's Discount Store, then ate at Okinawa instead. Bulgogi beef, yum!

I spent the rest of my birthday replacing light bulbs on the bottom of the Christmas tree.

And when I did, that part of the bottom of the tree still didn't light up. I wanted to cry. Instead I just threw a spare string of lights at the bottom and replaced the lights in the middle of the tree where they had gone out last year. Those came back on.

I gave up and put the decorations and the tinsel the next day and it exhausted me fully. The best part of the night was listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's annual Christmas concert. The guest was David Suchet, who told the story of Englishman Nicholas Winton and the Czech Kindertransport, so I spent time tinseling in tears.

By the way, I want you to see the smallest Christmas miracle. I bought this star at the Woolco at North DeKalb Mall, Market Square as it was then, and now demolished, in 1991 for our first Christmas tree together. Every year "Little Blaze" still lights...every year I know it might be the last, any day this year might be, too, but I always see her light anyway. Inspiration from a small Christmas star. She makes me cry.

I had a bunch of Hallmark coupons, so on Friday we went to Gretchen's at the Avenue at West Cobb. Unfortunately Mr. Lower GI decided to go spare at this point; James got a Battlestar Galactica ornament and I had to hotfoot it to Barnes & Noble to use the bathroom. The result was that I spent no coupons, but did buy four discount books, including two Christmas books.

It took us a long time to get over Snowy's death, then we had the whole summer with James falling or hurting himself in some way. In the last few months he's been asking me if we were going to get another bird. For a long time I couldn't think about it. Snowy's death itself had been so painful—I couldn't forget how his little body struggled as his legs stopped responding to his body, but he still attempted to crawl into a corner to die, and he didn't want me to hold him or comfort him in my hands—that I cried almost constantly about him at least once a week, most recently a week ago on his adoption day. James said I needed a bird; I was thinking more that he needed a bird; after all Snowy had been his working companion.

But this weekend he talked me into it. He'd found a bird store out in Norcross called Fancy Feathers.

But that's a story for another post. I did vacuum before we left. The last thing I wanted to do was frighten a baby bird with "the bizippy thing."

Sunday I got disgusted at my laziness and went downstairs to at least put up the airplane tree. It took me what seemed like forever because I dropped something like every fifth ornament. I broke the wing off one of the glass airplanes, and one ornament I dropped even knocked two more off the tree. I was fit to be tied by the time I was finished because I felt old and useless. There's nothing to decorating the airplane tree. You hang the ornaments, swag the garland, put on the star, and you're done. And it took so long. Sigh.

Labels: birthday, books, budgies, Christmas, Christmas decorations, food, illness, music, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:27:00 PM

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I was so conflicted. I wanted to write. Wanted to put up Christmas decorations. Wanted to do something fun.

Well, I did do some decorating almost every day this week, but was way behind due to procrastination and just plain depression. Monday I did kick myself into action. I had gifts I had not mailed out last year that I definitely wanted to get out this year, and early so I could use media mail. So I wrapped all four gifts and went to the post office. The line wasn't too awful because there were actually (faint!) four cashiers at the Smyrna post office, and the one I got was very jolly. I also mailed all the Christmas cards and went to the Smyrna fire station to drop off Toys for Tots.

(Amazingly, every single person I mailed to—media mail—got their gift before the end of the week! Emma got hers in two days.)

James had to take care of another annoying health problem this week: he has had a dermatitis problem on the tip of his nose for several years now. It bleeds and crusts over and then heals. The last time the dermatologist biopsied it, it wasn't cancerous, but some type of skin irritation. But in the last couple of weeks (ironically since he had the new drug for arthritis—which he quit taking) it has bled and formed a huge scab about a centimeter in diameter. So Tuesday we had to go to Kaiser to get it biopsied again. (The dermatologist said James was clearly reacting to the new drug with all his other symptoms, and he'd heard of those side effects for that drug before.) I did get the laundry done, too.

Wednesday was the usual physiotherapy and Doughnut Day. James also had to get a blood test. That awful methotrexine has really bollixed up his system—his readings were all awful and his iron levels worse than ever, so that he has to have iron infusions scheduled.

Thursdays I inventoried all my gift boxes and prepped for gift wrapping.

Labels: Christmas, conflicts, decorating, errands, health, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:24:00 PM

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The week had a good start—since I'd done all my Monday chores on Sunday, we took the time on Monday to go up to Books-a-Million—bought a couple of remainder books—and while we didn't have lunch at Uncle Maddio's as usual, we did stop at BJ's to get maple syrup and other goodies.

This week I started putting up Christmas decorations, but because Advent is so late this year, I got complacent—not to mention that this year I am still not feeling much "Christmas spirit." I got so dispirited last year, and really haven't come out of it, although I managed to keep James out of the hospital this year (so far). The falls and the hell he went through during those ertapenem shots ground me down to nothing.

We couldn't even go to physiotherapy this week because I got sick just before it was time for us to leave. When I wasn't in the bathroom, I was asleep—until we had to go to Kaiser for James to get a blood test. Ended up stopping at Publix on the way home.

Recovered a bit on Thursday, enough to do some shopping and get James his biweekly Procrit shot, and we stopped by Big Lots, where I was lucky enough to find a set of blue lights for the Christmas tree on the front porch, since the previous set had blown out when I put up the lights earlier this week. Unfortunately, Thursday night was a flat nightmare.

Tuesday James ran out of Ambien, which he needs to sleep. So when we were at Kaiser on Wednesday, we picked up a new supply (Kaiser will only give him a thirty-day supply at the time; we are required to pick it up in person) and I had to finish filling in the Ambien for the rest of the week in his day-and-night pill dispenser.

Apparently I filled it once...and then filled it a second time. So James had two on Thursday night and I didn't realize. So I thought he was having some sort of stroke after I had tended the raw spot on his leg and I couldn't get him to sit up. I kept telling him to wake up and he kept insisting he was awake and then closing his eyes and going back to sleep. At one point he was lying crosswise on the bed with a pillow under his head and I was in the bathroom in tears.

That brief sleep seemed to rouse him a little, and I was able to finally get him straight in the bed and his CPAP mask on and send him properly off to bed. This is when I was finally able to go into the bathroom and check the pill compartments and take out that extra Ambien from the other five compartments. Sigh. I spent most of the night checking James' breathing. On Friday morning, he didn't remember most of what happened—I told him he was asleep!

Friday we went to the Apple Annie craft show as usual. Saw many nice things, but so much of the show is jewelry now, or beautiful woodwork that I don't grudge the artists the money, but we can't afford. Instead we bought stuff from the bake sale, which should last us as desserts for several weeks!

When we finally went into the sanctuary before leaving as I always do, to pray, I burst into tears instead and just knelt there and cried and cried.

On Saturday morning, James had his hair cut, and then we spent the next five hours at Urgent Care getting a problem checked out. Since Monday, probably another side effect of James' new meds—I sent Dr. Salazar a note telling him I was not giving him the third dose on Sunday—James has had a raw wound on the inside of his right thigh. Monday it was a little spot; by Wednesday it was a big raw sore. I dipped into the expertise given to me by Greta at the wound clinic (who doesn't appear to be there anymore) and have been treating it with Xeroform sheets and surgical bandages. It was bleeding on Friday night and looked ugly, like raw hamburger, and looked just the same when the nurse and later the doctor examined it at Urgent Care. (BTW, Urgent Care was slammed. I'm surprised it only took us five hours.)

They gave us more of the prescription antibiotic mupriocin ointment which Greta had once prescribed, and told me to just keep doing what I was doing with it (putting a barrier between the wound and other flesh so there would be no friction)! Also that we were smart in deciding not to take any more of the medication, since all these side effects had boiled up the moment he'd begun to take it.

(They told me not to put anymore Xeroform on it, but I did anyway, as an extra barrier. By Sunday it had quit bleeding copiously and was just leaving small patches of blood when I cleaned it three times a day. The mupriocin is truly a wonder drug.)

I suffered the same fate as James, and never received a reminder from the county to renew my car registration. I got the car inspected last month and just got online Sunday morning to renew it. Still find it funny neither of us got a reminder, but Alice, who lives up the street, got hers fine.

Labels: books, Christmas, crafts, decorating, excursions, health, medication, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:09:00 PM

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We ended up not going to Thanksgiving dinner after all.

James began taking a new drug on Sunday (once a week) to help with his arthritis. Immediately he developed an odd line of rash-looking bumps in a straight line on his right hip. By Thursday he had a sore throat and stuffy nose so bad (the sore throat was so bad it didn't go away when he drank and he had some sores in his mouth) we were fearful of spreading something. Luckily we had bought "emergency turkey" at Publix last week, we had potatoes, and had carrots. So we stayed home and watched the Macy's parade and the National Dog Show. Only later in the day did he feel better, and we realized it wasn't really a cold coming on.

Friday he was better. We went to Town Center, where James bought me my Christmas gift (the Law & Order Monopoly game) at Hobbytown, and we went to Target to look for a new microwave. Well, we found a microwave/convection oven again! A nice woman helped me get it into the cart, and we bought it and left, only to discover someone had put a plain old microwave in the pile with the microwave/convection ovens. So we had to get them to help us bring it back in and do a return—and then go back and get another one (found another nice person, a guy this time, to help me get it into the cart)—all the time hungry and thirsty.

Stopped briefly at Barnes & Noble to see if they had any Black Friday specials—they didn't, which was annoying since they told me on Wednesday they wouldn't tell me about the Friday specials, and which I thought was damn rude—and then picked up supper at Cracker Barrel (chicken and dumplings, of course). Alas, this batch was really salty.

Happily, after missing "First Thanksgiving," there was still "Second Thanksgiving" to look forward to at Alice and Ken's house. Turkey and veg and fun and friendship. All good. Juanita gave us the turkey carcass, but we decided last year it was just too much work anymore making the soup and there was no room in the freezer for the containers. So instead we stripped the carcass and got another two meals for us. Juanita makes great turkeys, so this was a fine gift. Add gravy and it's all good.

Besides the side effects James seems to be having from the new meds, our Hot Shot broke. We use this to make tea, hot chocolate, and instant soup, and the loss is keen. We went to order a new one, and Sunbeam doesn't make them anymore. All we can find is coffee makers. So I brought my old one from downstairs to use that.

I can't imagine why they quit making useful things.

Labels: chores, food, friends, health, holidays, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:09:00 PM

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It was an ultra-typical week. Thank the Lord nothing bad happened. In fact, I finally "ate a frog." Our garage door openers——we have six, but one is missing——are from 2006, when we bought the house. Two quit working, we figured, because the batteries were dead. The holder on my keyring one finally broke, so I swapped it out for the opener that was inside next to the garage. Now the working two, one each on our keyrings, were getting cranky. I kept saying "We need to bring them to Batteries Plus."

Naw, didn't need to do that at all. Looked 'em up, they take a standard 2032 round battery that we keep in stock because our scale and James' diabetes meter use the same battery. Pried them all open, put in new batteries. Now they all work. Win.

This was the silly part: I said at the beginning of the month that, "Hey, Conjuration should be coming up soon. Let me see if a schedule is up." It wasn't. Then I totally forgot about it, and only remembered when I saw a friend's Facebook post.

We couldn't do anything about it on Friday anyway, since James had a doctor's appointment, and then it turned out the doctor put in a new scrip for his arthritis that we had to go pick up. The convention was in a new location (Gwinnett County) rather than down near the airport, which suited us fine, but by the time we got there in rush hour traffic after going to Kaiser, we'd have to turn around and come home.

So Saturday morning we got up and went.

The new hotel is very nice. The old was a nice venue, but the food there was insanely expensive (a plate of spaghetti with one meatball for nearly $30???; even the sports bar was pricy, and you had to pay for parking), so we always had to bring our own sandwiches (although this helped keep the sodium down for James). It mainly catered to business travelers on expense accounts. The Sonesta had free parking, and during the weekend they put out a "floating" meal stand that had breakfast things in the morning and then lunch things until 3 p.m. I had chicken soup both times and it was flavorful, not overly salted, and had lots of noodles in it (and it wasn't Progresso; yeah, I'm looking at you, Panera Bread!). James had sliders both days. There was also a restaurant where, while the main meals were expensive, you could get a big burger for a reasonable $15, and they had these Philly cheese steak egg rolls that were to die for. We had them Saturday night, and should have ordered two each instead of one. Oh, and did I mention it was pet friendly? We met some really sweet dogs during the weekend.

Anyway, enough with that. Conjuration basically has a Harry Potter theme with the names filed off; one of the co-founders told a very funny story about how, after they started the call, they got a very polite call from the Warner Brothers people about "your little Harry Potter convention" and he was quick to say that it was a convention about magical media of all kinds, and they had to do a couple of tweaks, but WB was cool about it.

Saturday I did the following panels (lots of writing panels, as usual). James went to a few of his own things.

• "Fandom Funerals and Repass" (half) (fictional deaths that got to you...yes, Old Yeller was mentioned!...mostly they mentioned fandoms we're not into, like Game of Thrones)
  
• "Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Screenwriters" (about the movie and all the D&D "Easter eggs" and how fun it was)
  
• "Editing Feng Shui" (this panel had some positive qualities about getting rid of verbal clutter but I don't think the presenter was as prepared as she could have been)
  
• "Positive Mental Health Methods for the Creative" (basically coping with stress from real life)
  
• "Dragons, Wizards & Pens" (a fun panel: given a subject prompt, four writers had to come up with the best opening line for a book--we went to this last year and it's always fun)
  
• "People Who Live in Your Book" (designing characters for your stories)
  

Sunday, alas, we didn't get up early enough for me to get to the Harry Dresden panel, but:

• "Sort This--Identifying and Sorting Plots and Characters" (using "sorting methods" like the Hogwarts houses to give your characters personality--also things like horoscopes, Myers-Briggs; I even suggested Gretchen Rubin's Four Tendencies)
  
• "Learning from Luna Lovegood" (panel about neurodivergencies, mostly autism, which I found interesting because I'm thinking about introducing an autistic character in my fanfic)
  
• "Fanfiction 101" (not that I needed the 101, but there were several people here who really wanted to know the basics, like "where do you find it?" and "is this legal"?)
  
• "It Ain't Easy Being Geek" (how nerds/geeks are perceived by media—Big Bang Theory anyone?—and acceptance)
  
• "To Tell the Truth--Or Not" (one of our favorites from last year, too: four writers get together and, given a prompt ["the most way out thing you've ever seen at a convention," for example], they have to tell a story and the audience guesses if it's true or not—heard some great true stories this way!)
  

Talked with Alice for a while afterwards. James pre-paid for next year. Sadly, the restaurant was closed today and we couldn't get more egg rolls for supper.

Dear folks: next year, please keep the singalongs way away from the panel rooms, please? On some panels we could barely hear the panelists speaking.

Labels: chores, conventions, health

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:03:00 PM

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You've heard of 1001 Nights? This week was 1/3 dozen doctors. (And, to be honest, 1/4 dozen doctors, since physiotherapy doesn't really count.)

The tally:
Last visit with vascular doctor.
Podiatry.
Pre-sleep study consultation (in Decatur, no less).
Also, physiotherapy.

So doing housework on Monday was actually sort of relaxing. 😉

So James' fistula appears to be healed properly. Not sure if it's ripe yet. The doctor keeps asking "When are you going on dialysis?" Well, not yet, I hope. It's not like anyone's told us. James has no symptoms: he's still urinating fine, the urine looks normal, he has no loss of appetite, edema, nausea or vomiting, or shortness of breath. (Dr. Kongara keeps asking.) On the steroids Dr. Salazar gave him, he lost five pounds.

Since we were at Glenlake anyway, we went to Merchant's Walk and checked out the new Barnes & Noble in the shopping center where the Borders used to be (the B&N is in the old Bed, Bath & Beyond). The new store is...quite trendy. The bookshelves curve and "float" around the store so you are led in a certain path around it; James didn't like it, said they didn't have enough stock. I thought it was kinda cool (but, yeah, all the bookstores can use more books!) In fact, I found a cool book about Josephine Baker's spy work there, and bought James Travis Baldree's new book. I also had to get Victoria Finlay's new book, Fabric. "But, Linda, you hate to sew." Why yes, I do, and I can't tell one type of cotton fabric from another (except flannel). But I love Victoria Finlay's writing, and this book is no different. It starts out with barkcloth and tapa, both made out of the inner bark of palm trees, and she travels to New Guinea and other South Pacific islands to meet the few Polynesian craftswomen who still practice doing the fabric the old way. She also uses the book as a way of assuaging her grief after the deaths of her parents.

We also went to Trader Joe's, where most of the Christmas stuff is out. Where are the Candy-Cane Joe-Joe's? All they had were the chocolate-covered ones.

Wednesday was Doughnut Day Physiotherapy. It was a warm day, like the previous one, and James was still in minimal pain due to the steroid treatment, so we took the rollator instead of the chair so we could use Butch and take him by the cheap ($15) inspection place. Everything was okay, and then we went on to what was a very extensive workout, and yes, the doughnut. On the way home we stopped at Publix to do the weekly shopping.

Thursday we took a box to Goodwill, dropped off our good duds at the cleaners after their appearance at Neil and Emilee's wedding, then James got his feet inspected and a good pedicure at Kaiser before we went on to Lidl and two different Publix stores, since the Scufflegrit store on Wednesday had none of my favorite yogurt flavor (chocolate hazelnut). (They had plenty of that nasty coconut almond, though!)

Friday was our 33rd wedding anniversary. (Rodney pointed out that in March we would now be an LP!) We celebrated by having to get up at a hellacious seven a.m. to drive out to Decatur, as James has not had his C-PAP vetted in a long time. The only way to get this done is have a new sleep study, and when you're on Medicare you have to have a neurological exam before the sleep study. So this was the exam part, at 10:30. At the Emory sleep center. Off North Decatur Road. (What I call the "old neighborhood" since if you drive a few miles and a couple of turns and you're at Clifton Road and CDC headquarters.)

It was cloudy and rained most of the afternoon, which made it a PITA with the power chair, but we managed to have a good time. We found the building in one shot (thanks, Waze) and the exam itself was anticlimactic (James' opinion was "I had to drive all the way out here for that?"). I'd seen there was a Whole Foods across the street, and the last time we ate at the Whole Foods in Kennesaw they had a killer salad bar, so I said, "Let's go there for lunch."

Mistake. It is (or at least at that Whole Foods) no longer killer (no more of the delicious cucumber/tomato salad!) and there wasn't a darn thing on the hot bar I could eat without risk of (1) eating something spicy or (2) eating something that didn't give me massive indigestion even with a Protonix. They had clam chowder, but it was watery. I just had a salad while James found meatloaf, tikka masala, lasagna, and something else. He brought half of it home and the darn lunch cost $34! We could have gone to Tin Drum for less and gotten better food.

We did get some nice chocolate tarts for an anniversary dessert and two chocolate bars for other desserts.

There was a Half-Price Books across the street with a JoAnn next to it, so we took refuge out of the rain there. I got lucky in HPB and found another John Douglas book; also a hardback of Stephen King's On Writing and a "Bottom Line" book for $2 (we already had it, but I wanted to make sure!). James got some cool Lego Christmas sets (polar bears, a snowman, and a train) in JoAnn. I just bought a yard of good flannel...in case we get another bird. I cut off part of Snowy's cage cover for a shroud.

Anyway, James has become addicted to his new air fryer. We went from a 2.5 quart to a 5.something quart, so he's been making everything in it: warming up burritos in it if he has frozen burritos, making egg/cheese/ham/etc. egg dishes, cooking drumsticks and thighs, etc. So instead of putting it back on the dog's crate after using it, he's just left it smack in the middle of the kitchen counter, pre-empting prep space. We have very little kitchen counter as it is.

So Saturday I did a little cleaning in the kitchen pantry closet and cleared a space wide enough to put the two clear containers we have for English muffins and for Toufeyan wraps. If I then moved the tea machine next to the toaster, there was enough room to put the balsamic vinegars, the air fryer, the Magic Bullet, and the two-level lazy susan against the back wall next to the refrigerator. This means the entire counter got clean, and also the other counter. It was a long afternoon's work, but it worked out.

Finally on Sunday we went to Costco, as we were running out of probiotics. We've been taking them for three months and it has really helped my lower GI problems, and I think they've made James more "regular." Bought toilet tissue, almond flour crackers, and a few other things, too, then dumped all the stuff at home and went to IKEA.

I remember when you could get a decent lunch at IKEA; now all they have are the meatballs, veg meatballs, or chicken strips. I had a salad that there was no dressing for, and a kids' meatball dish (four with mashed potatoes). I was famished when I got home. Found a cool light to plug into my desktop that will throw light on anything I'm copying from, a clip-on light for my side of the bed, and a cheap squirt bottle to use when I iron creases in anything. Also got some ginger cookies. IKEA's new self-checkout screens are terrible. They're not sensitive to the touch at all and take you forever.

I'll tell you, though, that I'm so glad we moved into the current house when we did. IKEA has gone back to their "roots," which means plastic bucket chairs, ugly square sofas, lots of blond and white woods, and other junky 60s-looking crap. I'm glad we got all the Leksvik furniture when we did, as there's very little I would buy there now, except for the Billy bookcases. It didn't help that they are remodeling the entire bed/bedding department.

Labels: anniversary, books, cooking, crafts, errands, exercise, food, health, shopping, sickness, weather

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 12:47:00 PM

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Well, finally! Tuesday was Hallowe'en, so now that all the Fright Night/Spooky Season stuff is over, there will be better stuff in the stores. Watched It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, of course, and the Hallowe'en episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent, "Masquerade," with a very troubled Liza Minelli playing the mother of a little girl who was murdered years earlier, but whose attacker, a spaced-out child molester, was just recently escorted by Goren and Eames back to the United States; they soon begin to believe he was not the murderer. Would have watched other things, but James just discovered there were new episodes of Forged in Fire, so we got on Philo and he watched those instead.

The other "event" of the week was the weather: it was cold enough on November 1 to wear my Vermont sweatshirt. In my world, this is exciting!

Otherwise it was nicely routine, with no falls, the usual physiotherapy for James on Wednesday followed by our weekly doughnut treat. Also tried a new breakfast/lunch place with Alice and Ken, Eggs Up, in the shopping center at Brookwood near Hobby Lobby. There was also a trip to Barnes & Noble (finally the November/December "Yankee"!), and I put up the Thanksgiving decorations while James was at his club meeting on Saturday.

The fly in the ointment: it got hot over the weekend, into the 80s. It was disgusting. At least there was a nice breeze so that things didn't sizzle. How ridiculous to have beautiful leaves on the trees and the scent of autumn when the air smells like a heating pad.

And we are happily back to Standard Time, where the clocks need to stay.

Labels: decorations, friends, Hallowe'en, seasons, standard time, television, weather

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:53:00 PM

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Everything was going so well this week. I even ran out on my own on laundry day to get more Smart Balance and stop at Sprouts for Litehouse salad blend. Except the Publix on the East-West and the Sprouts across the street didn't have either of those products. I did find the Smart Balance at the Smyrna Publix; we always stock up when they're on BOGO.

Then on Wednesday James had an appointment with his rhematologist. He spoke frankly this time about all the pain he has been in and asked if there was some way it could be relieved without using opioids. Dr. Salazar decided to put him on a short course (two weeks) of Prednisone to see if relieving the inflammation helps. Then we went to the Sprouts at Heritage Pointe and they had the Litehouse we needed, too.

On the way back from taking his blood sugar, James stumbled on his slippers—he tends to roll on his right foot and he stepped wrong—and fell. He didn't hit his head, but he pulled something, and the usual way he gets up, by scooting to the stairs and then standing, he couldn't do. So we had to call the nice firemen at Station 30 again. He had no bruises we could see, but he was awake during most of the night with pain from the muscles he strained.

Ironically, after all that, he felt better in the morning, but I did the shopping on my own on Thursday.

On Friday, we made a decision: James needed some type of shoe to wear around the house; the slippers are just too soft. I tried to get him a soft shoe at Walmart, but for once a marked size 12 didn't fit him. He also wanted to look into those "step in" Skechers they advertise. So Friday afternoon we went to the Kennesaw store. We did find a pair of the step-in shoes, but also got a different kind, too, very light, but with a very firm sole. (The step ins, alas, don't work for James; his ankle joints are too deteriorated for him to point his toe like you need to do to step in.)

The surprising thing was that I bought shoes. Voluntarily. I not only bought shoes, but I bought women's shoes, which, except for the wedgies I bought for Sabra's wedding, are the first women's shoes I've bought in years; I've been buying boys' Reeboks, which have always been the same style as women's Reeboks (and $20 cheaper) and wide enough for my feet. I got two pairs of the same grey ombre shoes. I have not bought women's shoes that fit properly the moment I put them on since my Hush Puppies. The soles on my Reeboks were worn down anyway.

Sigh...except, getting used to the shoes, James fell walking into the kitchen. Mostly what was hurt was his pride, and he was able to scrunch to the door.

Saturday night, however, was fabulous. On Saturday, October 28, Neil Butler, the son of our good friends Ron and Lin, and his girlfriend Emilee Cox, joined hands in matrimony at a ceremony at Ivy Hall (formerly an old cotton mill which was in use until 1975). We had a blast. The music was old, from 40s swing all the way to modern rock (James and I even sorta danced; I got up and moved and we held hands and he rocked back and forth in the power chair), we stuffed ourselves on delicious food, and the company was outstanding: we were seated with Daniel and Clair Kiernan, Bill Ritch and Caran Wilbanks, Charles Rutledge, and Marilyn Teague. The latter, especially, we hadn't seen in ages, since she had some medical problems and had to have part of a leg amputated. We were happy to see her walking very well with a walker and prosthetic leg!

The only fly in the ointment was that the handicapped access for Ivy Hall was terrible. The venue is two levels, and the big open deck and the cocktail area (and the only bathrooms!) are on one level and the ballroom on the top level. The only way to get between these levels is a 45-degree angle road and a narrow "ramp." James got down there with the power chair set on "1" and moving very slow. When the ceremony and the appetizer course ended, we had to go back up to the top level via that steep road. James had power and made it up the hill with me spotting behind him, bent double in the chair. Poor Marilyn had to have both Charles and Robbie Hilliard help her up the hill. We were still having fun at nine o'clock, but had to leave early because James needed to urinate (the doctor said he should never "hold it") and there was no way he was going up and down that hill in the dark!

I can't believe this gorgeous venue can't afford to install a little lift (I've seen ones that look like a capsule and work like the lift on the Jupiter 2) for handicapped or temporarily incapacitated people in a corner somewhere. Either that or they need to rent a handicapped Porta Potty every time they have an event.

Labels: food, friends, health, injuries, shopping, sickness, weddings

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:37:00 PM

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Thank goodness, the week was pretty harmless. The one problem was Thursday; by the time we went grocery shopping and finished it, if we went home to drop off the food, we would be late for James' Procrit shot! So we stuffed all the perishable items into the cold bag and dashed to Kaiser. They were quite understanding about the need to hurry with the shot!

Saturday was Hair Day, but we didn't stay long because James' club meeting was this weekend and it was the annual Swap Meet. He went off to the VFW Hall and I stayed home, finally swept out the garage, and vacuumed. In between I did some writing.

Sunday turned out to be fun: we went to Ellijay for the second weekend of the Georgia Apple Festival. It's gotten quite expensive, $10 each to get in plus $5 to park. Of course all the proceeds go to the Elks Club and the Boy Scouts.

We got the second of our two fudge purchases for the year, and also bought some Asian sesame dressing that was very good. We figure we can use it for a finishing sauce. James and I also bought anniversary gifts for each other: I bought him a new leather wallet, and he bought me a Christmas sweater (since most of mine are worn out). We each had an ear of corn, which was so yummy; we stopped having them at the Yellow Daisy Festival because they were always so dry, but these two were juicy and wonderful. Afterwards, as always, we went to Panorama Orchards and bought all our favorite things: James' herbal teas in the little wooden boxes and sugar-free taffy and also some salsa, goats' milk lotion and blackberry spread and peanut brittle for me (their peanut brittle is wonderful), and a bag of Granny Smith apples and an apple pie for both of us. The day was sunny, but not hot, and we had a very good day.

I wish they could be all good days. I don't ask for perfect days, I just want good days.

Labels: chores, events, food, friends, fun, health

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 9:14:00 PM

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Well, we had some Big Events this week (and none of them involved goddamn Urgent Care).

The Friends of the Library book sale was on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and it was the first time that I've gone that I did not go first thing on Friday morning. I still fret about James and I didn't feel like getting up early to boot, plus I know I'm not going to find the stuff on my want list at the sale (it has happened, but not often enough to be a pattern, like when I found Time Out for Happiness). I ended up going on Saturday instead, to kill a little over an hour before Jessie's birthday party at Mellow Mushroom. And, yes, I still did manage to find books, including Michener's Chesapeake and Alaska, a compendium of Agatha Christie's books, a book of British mystery short stories that includes one by the late Christopher Fowler, My American Revolution about the war in the Middle Colonies, and Ronald Kessler's The FBI. Also grabbed four books for James including a P.J. O'Rourke and a first edition Book of the Month club version of Victory Through Air Power (from 1942).

Ironically, James was going to go to his club meeting and only I was attending the birthday party, but he discovered the meeting was next week, so I followed him over there only to find out Jessie had a problem and could not attend her own party. There was a nice crowd anyway and we enjoyed ourselves.

Instead of the book sale on Friday James and I went to Home Depot, which was absolutely filled with Christmas trees! Doesn't anyone make a decent-looking tree under 7 1/2 feet tall? I simply cannot decorate one that big without getting on a stool! The small ones have mixed branches which are absolutely repulsive.

Anyway, we were at HD to get light bulbs. I've discovered I like their "bright white" bulbs (3000K), since they are brighter, but don't mess with my eyes. I got a box of four clear 60-watt equivalents and one of 100-watt equivalents. For the living room I bought two bulbs which you can adjust from "warm white" to "daylight." I have left them on "true white" for now and am crossing fingers they don't irritate my eyes.

We also went to Lowes just for the heck of it, and...more Christmas trees. Same heights, too.

Had lunch at Hibachi Grill—oh, God, are they now in this oversalted hell, too?—then finally returned the pair of slip-on shoes I got for James at Walmart and bought up sugar-free candy, and picked up some things we hadn't gotten at Lidl during the big shopping trip on Thursday.

On the way up the stairs with the groceries, I whacked my right elbow good on the woodwork of the stair rail. Oh, my God! I bang one of my elbows at least once a week and it's horrible and painful, but goes away in a minute. Today I had to run to the fridge and put ice on it for twenty minutes and it raised a big purple bruise and dear Lord it hurt! I was afraid I'd broken or chipped something. After the ice I wrapped it in an Ace bandage for the rest of the night, and by shower time it was fine.

All I could think of was: if my arm is broken, how will I cath James????

Something nice happened to a friend of mine on Saturday that I was very happy about. Rupert Holmes was signing his book Murder Your Employer at the Deptford, NJ, Barnes & Noble store. Our friend Emma goes there all the time! I was practically jumping up and down in the truck seat as we went to James' physiotherapy I was so excited as I texted Emma the news. She was able to go and have MYE and also her copy of his novel Swing autographed by Rupert, and he told me how nice it was to meet another "friend of WENN" (Remember WENN, that is).

We didn't go to the Apple Festival on Sunday because both of us got too little sleep and it's a 75 minute drive. I did manage to format a new piece of fanfic for upload on Thursday, though.

Something sad did happen on Sunday that was of little consequence, but was still a bummer. I signed up for Twitter a couple of years ago so I could read posts from a few people I liked, including Susan Branch, Sam Neill, J. Michael Straczynski, and Vincent D'Onofrio. The latter, especially, would post neat views from his apartment of the NYC skyline, or his unusual little "poems" which are by turns funny, inspirational, and sometimes downright melancholy. After Elon took over Twitter, D'Onofrio mentioned he might quit, and Sunday afternoon he just pulled the plug. It will be sad not waking up to a funny video (like the one he posted a couple of weeks ago of him and his daughter cleaning the carpet in his apartment!) or a pretty view or a poem).

Labels: books, Christmas, errands, food, friends, injuries, shopping, social media, writing

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:20:00 PM

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James had a really good surgery followup on Wednesday; I guess the fistula is "maturing" okay. It will take several months to be completely functioning, and then it will be ready when James needs it.

Am I just being desperate hoping that he won't need it for a long, long time?

Afterwards we went to Barnes & Noble. I bought two "buy one, get half off on the second" books, and also a nonfiction book called The Murder Room, about detectives and forensics experts who get together to solve cold cases.

We have found something interesting to watch on Apple+, For All Mankind, which is an alternate universe story (you see, it's not just for fanfiction!). The Soviets landed on the moon before Apollo 11, so the Space Race is still going on. Things are the same—Neil and Buzz still land on the moon—but there are fictional astronauts, and now some of them are women because on their second moonflight the Russians sent up a female cosmonaut, so of course the United States had to have female astronauts, too. The ERA gets passed in this universe and Teddy Kennedy doesn't go to the party on Chappaquiddick—but once in office he is having an affair with Mary Jo Kopechne. Some of the social advances still seem kind of quick, but it mostly jibes.

Friday we got things done: took our clothes to the cleaners to be ready for Neil and Emilee's wedding, brought the boxes for donations to Goodwill; after physical therapy we grabbed some quick food at Krystal to go on to Kaiser for James' Procrit shot, bought gas at Costco, then finally picked up some craft supplies before going home.

Saturday I did a lot of tidying, and also finally put all the fall decorations up. In March, I had just left the winter decorations I had taken down in a box because I wanted to go through the rest of the winter decorations to get rid of some of them, the ones I didn't put up last year. So I went through the winter box and gathered a dozen or so things that "didn't spark joy" anymore and put them in a donation box. Then I finally put the rest of the winter decorations away.

I guess the truth is that I have been in kind of a funk most of the year from James' different falls and the wretchedness of summer. This makes it hard to be enthusiastic about decorating or crafts; I just want to brood. When it gets at its worst I can escape into my stories, but it doesn't do a lot for my wanting to do anything else. It got so cool over the weekend we could ride in the truck with the windows down and I felt like taking a longer walk with the dog. It's such a relief not to sweat because the moment I do my rash flares up again.

Maybe once it gets cooler permanently—but that's always such a fluctuating thing in a Georgia fall and winter—I will be in better spirits. At least I hope so.

Labels: books, chores, decorations, donations, food, health, mood, television, weather

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:58:00 PM

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We have discovered the best day to go to Costco: Tuesday. Oh, there's still a crowd, but it's a smaller crowd, and parking spaces are more available. In fact, we ran into a friend there: Alex Lucyshyn was there on his lunch hour. We bought toilet paper, which was a relief, because we were down to three rolls. James has been hankering for a new air fryer because ours was so small, so we bought one today. Alas, he made wings in it the first time and burnt the sauce. I ended up throwing up by bedtime. (But the wings themselves were cooked perfectly.)

I am determined to get more junk out of the house, so I made up two boxes of items we don't use (the old rice cooker, a sander I never used and now I don't make furniture any longer, etc.) to go to Goodwill. The box didn't go anywhere this week, though.

On Saturday, we took a few things to electronics recycling—the notice for it popped up unexpectedly on Twitter a few days ago—then went to an event in Acworth called the "Time Traveling Book Sale that had popped up on Facebook Events. This took place at the Acworth Community Center, and while there were a few booksellers, most of the dealers sold other book-related items. James bought a couple of dice from a vendor, and we saw the neatest keyboard at one vendor's table. It really does click like a typewriter keyboard!

We also went to the Crazy Book Lady bookstore. I found a neat book about numbers in literature and science, a book called Indian Time to read next month, and, finally, James Michener's Creatures of the Kingdom, which is all the collected nature and animal shorts from the beginnings of his books like Centennial, Hawaii, etc.

We ate in a spot off state route 41, Capo's Pizza/Ristorante. The service was very good and the "garlic knots" were to die for, but the spaghetti sauce was much too sweet. We didn't need dessert afterward.

Anyway, James has been wanting to see the film Greyhound for ages, but it's only on Apple+. Best Buy had this special offer for new subscribers: three months' free membership, so I got it. We watched Greyhound on Sunday and we both really enjoyed it. Laughed at some of the reviews, which complained there was "no character development." This was basically an action film, a war action film, about American destroyers escorting supply convoys across the Atlantic and being trailed by U-boat wolfpacks. Except for the first five minutes in the hotel, it is nonstop shooting and battle, and it's so well done I enjoyed it immensely. I didn't care if there was "no character development"--it was perfect as it was.

Labels: books, decluttering, errands, events, food, friends, shopping, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:05:00 PM

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So we stayed nice and confined at home. Took another COVID test on Tuesday. The lines are lighter, but the tests say we still have it. So no physiotherapy this week. However, when we talked to someone at Kaiser, they said if we were no longer showing symptoms, we were no longer contagious. So we went to the supermarkets in masks on Thursday. Kaiser aggravated the hell out of us that day, though. We went to Kaiser first to pick up a prescription, then to Costco for gas, then to the supermarkets. On the way home from Publix, we got a call from Kaiser saying we had to go back to Cumberland where we'd already been three hours earlier because James needed a blood test before his Procruit shot on Friday. I was sick from being out in the heat and instead of getting to rest after putting the groceries away we had to go back out.

At least we got to go out and eat on Friday. We were craving bulgogi beef and went to Okinawa.

Alas, one of us was back on the sick list on Saturday. It is actually a little sensitive to talk about, so I won't, but James ended up back at Urgent Care on Saturday. It wasn't dangerous or life-threatening, but it was...annoying. Especially being at Urgent Care was annoying.

Labels: health, shopping, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:07:00 PM

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People who visit us might be amused or weirded out by the amount of extra groceries we keep downstairs in the hall and in what's supposed to be the coat closet next to the garage. We have jars of peanut butter, spaghetti sauce, and cans of soup, vegetables, and containers of olive oil and chicken broth; the freezer is also always stocked. We aren't "preppers" by any means, but we are prepared, and this week we were glad we had.

Had a great Sunday at Yellow Daisy and was quite already until bedtime, when my post-nasal drip unleashed. If that wasn't bad enough, I started to cough. And cough. And cough. Not a lot of sleep for me Sunday night or Monday for that matter. Monday I took a nap and that made me feel worse! Got the chores done anyway. James wasn't feeling as bad as I was, but he had a sore throat and general lassitude.

Since we had physical therapy this week and James' Procrit shot, I decided we'd better err on the side of caution, so out came the COVID test kits.

And we both tested positive. James' was very pale, but there, and mine was a bright thick purple! Son of a bitch. Dodged the damn thing for three years and it came at us out of nowhere.

Because of all his health problems James called Kaiser and got a video appointment with his doctor on Thursday; because of his kidney problems, he couldn't have the regular COVID med you see advertised (Paxlovid) and had to have a different kind. This led to us driving down to the Kaiser Cascade office, eleven miles away, in a driving rainstorm because the alternative was not nearby. What fun, because by this time I had a 100 degree fever and felt like sh*t. When we got home from Cascade I fell asleep for four hours! Only had the fever and the cough at night for two days, but the post-nasal drip persists.

Labels: sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:45:00 PM

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Bracketed the week with goodies.

Did the usual chores a day late this week since Monday was Labor Day. We spent that afternoon at craft stores and then went to Longhorn to celebrate James' birthday. Since we got there before three we got luncheon prices, which was fine with me.

James had the usual physiotherapy this week and later in the week he had his surgery followup. The doctor said the incision looked good and you could tell the fistula was working—if you feel just a few millimeters away from the incision, you can detect a buzzing under his skin; that is the increased flow from the fistula—but since the incision itself got a little red, he was prescribed an antibiotic. On the way home from the appointment we stopped at Trader Joe's and Penzey's Spices.

Hair Day was on Friday, but we were the only ones there for the Friday edition. We chatted for several hours with Ron, Lin, and Sheri, and then went off to Sam's Club to buy lots of inexpensive meat and more Tylenol.

On Sunday we were up early to drive across town to Stone Mountain Park for the Yellow Daisy Festival. The last two years many of the vendors had been out on the main street outside the exhibition area under the trees. In 2021 the heat nearly killed me; I was dizzy and nauseated for most of the morning. Last year was better, but I still hated the street. This year thankfully all the vendors were in the woods under the trees again—I guess they finished redoing the paths or something.

It was very strange not to see my favorite Country Pick'ns vendor there this year, but the Messengers retired last year. Many of our favorite vendors don't show up any longer, like "Smack Yo Mama" barbecue sauce (they don't do Georgia shows anymore) or 1st Sergeant Salsa or the guy who makes the doormats out of old tires. Thank goodness the maple barbecue sauce guy still shows up; we had used up his product. We bought several different maple products, the yearly fudge (but they were out of double chocolate!), different kinds of honey, a cheese slicer made of reclaimed wood, and I was quite taken with an opal ring (although I should have gone the size smaller; my fingers swell up when it's hot like it was today and now the ring is loose, and maybe I should have gone for the three small stones rather than the infinity symbol).

All in all we escaped before it got sizzlingly hot, so it was okay.

Labels: birthday, crafts, festivals, food, friends, health, shopping

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 9:19:00 PM

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Poor James—he came down with a thump late Tuesday. Monday after the supposed dose of steroids during his surgery he had no pain at all and was walking tall and easily until bedtime. He even forgot his cane several times because he really didn't need it. Tuesday he had a little pain, but was doing okay. Wednesday the pain came back with a vengeance, especially after we went to physical therapy. Karen didn't have him do any arm exercises; just leg and hip and he was pretty miserable that evening, even though he told me he was "okay" at Publix. Thankfully, this let up a little by the end of the week and we could go on to have some fun.

One other doctors' appointment this week: his Procrit shot. Apparently it's raising his iron levels well. And he got some comfort food: after doing the shopping we picked up chicken and dumplings from Cracker Barrel.

Since we weren't going to DragonCon, on Sunday we made our monthly trip to Canton. Picked up three bargain books at Books-a-Million, including a World War I-set story about nurses by Lauren Willig and a rom-com that I didn't realize until I started reading it that it was set in Rhode Island! We had lunch at Uncle Maddio's Pizza, of course, then stopped at BJs on the way home for maple syrup and mandarin orange/pineapple tidbit cups.

In the meantime I finished a piece of fanfiction and have continued watching Law & Order: SVU. Again, some spectacular guest performances, but I'm watching Richard Beltzer having less and less to do, and Ice-T getting one or two interesting performances (Ken Briscoe disappears completely) while the meat of the stories go to Benson or Stabler. One funny thing I noticed that in the first two seasons Benson is the rookie and it's Stabler who's the big victim's advocate. By the end of fifth season you can see Benson taking over the role of victim's advocate and it's firmly in place by sixth season, while Stabler is just the guy who is always angry and yelling at the perps. His character seems to just quit growing by sixth season, as if the guy had to be the one to be angry and constantly struggling for control (it doesn't help that the Stabler character is separated from his wife in this season as well). I wonder why the shift? It was rather unique to see a man so firmly in the role of victim's advocate in a squad where the primary crimes were rape and child molestation—Stabler could be quite empathic to both rape victims and children when the series began; all of a sudden we are back to the "empathic woman figure" advocating for rape victims and children. Did the powers that be decide it was "more natural" for a woman to take this role?

Labels: books, fanfiction, food, health, shopping, sickness, television, writing

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:44:00 PM

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Our day started at five a.m. 

James' surgery was scheduled for nine, but we were supposed to be there by 7:30; we were there way earlier.

They have a nifty system: you get one of those "your table is ready" things that vibrates and blinks when you check in. It notifies you to admissions, then to pre-op, and then it's given to whomever accompanied the person having outpatient surgery, to call you back to see the person before they go into surgery. Following that, they have a board with color-coded stages of the surgery (admittance, pre-op, waiting, etc. all the way to "all done"), and you also get texts on the patient's progress in surgery and then in post-op.

So James did paperwork, then we waited, then he went back to pre-op, then I went back to pre-op, where he was all kitted up for surgery. The nurses, as always, were super-nice, and we met the anesthetist and then Dr. Austin came in to go over the surgery with us. And then I went back out into the foyer to wait. I got some milk and Doritos from the cafeteria and had brought fruit with me. (I tried to get a seat next to an electrical plug; there was only one, and when I did get that seat, the plug wasn't powered. So I depended on the laptop battery, wrote what I wanted to write, then went on to reading.) The text came that he was in surgery. The doctor said surgery would be 25 minutes to an hour, depending on what they found and also how long it took them to stop the bleeding (he didn't have to go off his blood thinners). Pretty much an hour later I got a text that he was out of surgery.

Post-op was hard to get through. They said about an hour, but could be up to three hours. James' was closest to three because his blood pressure was very low when they woke him up and also because the post-op nurse wanted him to be able to blow a certain amount on the spirometer before he got to go home. It wouldn't have been so bad, but his number disappeared from the status board; I never did get the grey "all done!" message that was supposed to follow post-op! So, yeah, I was "making buttons" until they called me back, and then we had to get the discharge papers and he had to get dressed and we had to use the bathroom, and then we had to stop by Kaiser for pain pills (which he never used, but we took them anyway) and only then could we go home. They didn't even put a bandage on it; the post-op person said they didn't want to impede the circulation in any way. All they put on it was surgical glue and it was fine for him to shower with; he just couldn't immerse. The surgical cut was less than three inches long. Got the usual warnings: look for excess redness or swelling or pus.

The surprise of the day was when James came home and took his blood sugar; even after not eating, it was almost 300. So he figured they might have given him some steroids, because he also discovered that even though he was bushed from the surgery, he was standing straighter and his knee wasn't creaking like it does all the time because he had no pain in his knees, back or hips at all.

Labels: health, sickness, surgery

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:18:00 PM

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Another week of chores. The big event was eating at the new buffet on Austell Road, the Atlantic Buffet, which bills itself as a Chinese/American/Mexican buffet. It was pretty good. We went on a Friday so there was a lot of seafood (I ate lots of shrimp and paid for it the next day). They had sushi, a hibachi grill, and then various Chinese dishes. The "Mexican" was a little rectangle of space with taco shells and various fillings. The "American" appears to be cheese pizza and lasagna and mac'n'cheese. Most of what we ate was okay and not all that salty, and I enjoyed it because they had steamers as part of the seafood and also coffee ice cream in the ice cream freezer (with the desserts they also had grasshopper pie).

But this place took over the old Golden Corral which has been closed for ages, and they announced the Atlantic Buffet "coming soon" for so long that we figured they were doing a thorough cleaning out. What a surprise to pretty much find out that it looks like the old Golden Corral setup, with minor modifications, and the old ripped up vinyl sofa that was there when GC closed was still there! I did like some of the food but the "remodel" was thoroughly disappointing. However, lots of working class folks in there for a big hearty meal.

Watching the Futurama revival on Hulu. Some funny stuff, but it seems to have lost its edge.

I've also been watching Law & Order: SVU from the beginning because of how people rave about it, and also curious about the fervent Benson/Stabler shipping. It's a completely different show from what it is now, which basically seems to revolve around Olivia Benson, more of an ensemble drama the first two seasons, and then as seasons three and four go on, more stories revolve around Benson and Stabler. Everyone's always on about John Munch (Richard Beltzer's character), and yet he has less and less to do each season, and seems to hang around just to make a pithy remark or offer some kind of conspiracy theory. Once in a while he gets a chance to shine. Same thing with Fin...they sort of toss him in every so often. I guess I still haven't reached the point where you start seeing this "thing" between Benson and Stabler. They don't even seem to have the rapport Goren and Eames had reached by second season.

I'll tell you though, after four or five of these in a row, the show is very depressing! Probably why we never watched the first time around!

Labels: food, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:18:00 PM

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It's been a mixed-bag week.

The most fun thing this week was Ron Butler's birthday party at O'Charley's. There was a big crowd including a bunch of people from the other side of town who we don't usually see that often.

James got a new office chair this week. His old one had a cracked base and made the most dreadful squeaks and creaks when he sat in it. It's a nice chair, but it was hell and a half to put together. The holes that the screws went into to fasten the armrests to the seat and the back (which hold the seat and the back together) did not have screw grooves all the way through. So the screws kept getting cross-threaded. It took us a half hour to get eight screws into the holes, one of them never went in properly but is holding anyway, and James had to hold the chair back and seat in place while I pushed the screws in—one person could not have assembled this chair.

However, it's so nice now not to hear that chair screaming!

James had a good checkup with Dr. Shash (cardiologist) on Tuesday, and then we went to Trader Joe's. Pumpkin spice is already appearing on the shelves!

I also picked up my 2024 calendar for next year. Alas, no more lighthouse calendars from Jot.

Labels: chores, food, friends, health, shopping

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:51:00 PM

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The heat has been relentless, in the mid- to high 90s. We have not even been going out to do the shopping regularly, but stopping at Lidl on the way home from James' physiotherapy and then stopping at Publix erratically. It means staying inside, but it's better than not being able to breathe properly and having burning skin.

Our only respite was Saturday, when James went to his club meeting. I followed him there to make sure he made it in okay—he told me he leaves when the other guys leave, so if he does fall, there is someone there to help him and call for help if needed, and he won't be out there lying in the heat—and then I went to Book Nook, but it was closed, so I went on to Walmart and then to Sam's Club next door. Got the most delicious-looking steaks and pork chops at the latter, both under $3/pound.

For supper we went to The Tomatoes Buffet (formerly Fried Tomato Buffet) and then went to Barnes & Noble. We stayed a lot longer than usual because as soon as we got into the store the skies opened. For several minutes the rain was coming down horizontally! Talk about Georgia Monsoon Season.

Labels: books, food, shopping, weather

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:34:00 PM

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Several good things happened this week.

The big primary was that the chair lift got installed. They removed the railings on the stairs and then set it up. I don't know why, but I didn't realize it was going to be installed on the stairs; for some reason I thought it would hang from the studs in the wall. Now that I look at it, it being in the studs in the wall wouldn't make sense.

We also closed out the HOA post office box. There's no HOA anymore, so there's no use in having a post office box any longer. Thank goodness, no more trips to the post office for all that crap. Now to get the water turned off out front; in seventeen years we've never watered the lawn out there.

We also finished watching all of season one of Dark Winds. Outstanding! Waiting for season two to finish so we can watch that.

Did a bunch of chores this week, and worked on a piece of fanfiction.

Yippee. Exciting!

Labels: chores, health, television, writing

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 10:06:00 PM

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In opening news, the leg is looking better. There are still two small raw spots, one about a quarter of an inch around, another smaller. Still treating with MediHoney as it seems to work the best. You can tell the leg was swollen from the fall because of the skin now peeling off.

The weather has been terribly hot; despite this, we've had to venture out into the sun. It actually makes your skin sizzle, or at least it feels to me as if my skin is sizzling. This week we checked out the Lidl on Whitlock Road and noticed a restaurant next door called the Hoboken Cafè that I remember has been written up in Cobb Life magazine. We had lunch there on Friday with Alice and Ken, who have been juggling their own problems: Ken was at Urgent Care yesterday for high blood pressure. I had a great meatball sandwich! Afterward we tooled our way to Walmart for needed items.

James wanted a new keyboard on Saturday, so we went to MicroCenter, and got Zaxby's on the way home because they had two-for-one wings. Except I never got the discount, and I was rather pissed.

And today we made the monthly pilgrimage to Books-a-Million. Not happy with the way they've remodeled; like Barnes & Noble they have ditched a lot of books in favor of toys; you should see all the Funko Pop figures! I still bought a bunch of books, two remainders and three rom-coms and a Nathaniel Philbrick book about George Washington. Next it was lunch at Uncle Maddio's, and finally we went to BJs.

Tomorrow the chair lift(s) get installed. So here we go...

Labels: books, food, health, shopping, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:09:00 PM

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That line was supposed to be the end of the blog entry "Our Ten Days at Urgent Care." So it has been placed there. Go back, read it, and return. (I feel like Wil Wheaton on The Ready Room.)

So, anyway, on the evening of July 7, James had this terrible-looking scarlet scrape in the middle of his lower right leg, like the skin was flensed right off a big triangle, after his fall on the stairs. It looked even worse than the horrible blister he had on his foot and blisters on his leg after they couldn't put the compression sock on his left leg due to the foot infection in December 2020. I treated it with ointment/Medihoney for two days, and then sent off a message to Greta Agnew at the wound clinic. How should I treat this? I asked. Medihoney? Antibiotic ointment? Xeroform sheets? Should we come in?

God bless Greta. She responded the next day; told me to swath it in Xeroform (it's embedded with Vaseline; she told me to add Vaseline if I had to and make sure the wound was kept moist) and she had Byram Healthcare send us more Xeroform and also huge nonstick bandages 10x10 embedded with some other kind of medication, and said if it got worse shoot her a note and she'd get us an appointment. He's been on this since about maybe the 12th, and around the 20th I was seriously considering sending her another message—I also, without instruction, put Medihoney on it at least three days to draw out the excess fluid and Mupirocin ointment on it about three times because I was worried about infection—and I finally realized last night that, by God, it did actually look like it was really healing.

I'm crossing fingers that it actually completely heals.

Labels: sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:02:00 PM

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So Monday morning I find Pam next door outside raising hell.

They have been painting different color warnings all over our end of the street for over a week because Spectrum was supposed to come through to bury a cable. Now I know you can't do a damn thing about utilities digging near the curb, the "the first three feet (or whatever) belongs to the city" thing. But we've had cables buried before; they basically dig a slit into your lawn and slip the cable between it; the lawn grows and you never notice again. They buried our fiber line when we had it installed; I can't tell where anymore.

But apparently, according to Pam, they were going to dig up the actual lawn, and here basically is where my charity stopped. She kept running out there to make sure they didn't topple over her mailbox, and I spent the afternoon in the foyer writing on my laptop with the front door open and the fan on me to make sure no one invaded our lawn. They did dig up the lawn of the guy next door to Pam (the House With the Red Door) and Tony's lawn beyond that (although I have to admit they did a fairly good job of putting the sod back down, it was still a mess out there).

On Tuesday James and I finally installed a couple of hand railings I got off Amazon Vine for free on the lower staircase. They're supposed to be shower handles, but they're nice looking, chrome with black handles, and after going crazy finding the studs (we have two stud finders, both giving us different results) and avoiding the metal supports at the corners of the walls and breaking one drill bit (me), it took about three hours, but we got 'em secured. Of twelve screws, we got eleven in the studs and only one in a wall anchor, and we used deck screws instead of the ones that came with the railings. I find myself using them, so it's worked out well.

We also have a date for the stairlift installation: July 31. I told James we'll have to name it "Harry." (July 31 is Harry Potter's birthday.)

This was the first year we haven't gone to the Hallmark Ornament premiere on opening day (James was too busy getting Libertycon memberships), so we went on Wednesday. All I got was the St. Joseph ornament, and James got this year's airplane and also the little Fisher-Price mini airplane for the tree. I found a sweet gift for Juanita's birthday there, too.

And, by God, The Avenue at West Cobb Barnes & Noble did have the new "Yankee."

Thursday James had another iron shot scheduled, so we went for that, then went down to the pharmacy to pick up his prescriptions. The nurse came to shag us down because we had to go back upstairs and listen to the Kidney Counselors for an hour. Not to be rude, guys, but we've done this already. They are sure prepping us for dialysis. They also told us that to keep Dr. Kongara, we would have to drive to Kaiser's Cascade facility three days a week. If we went to DaVita (we have one five minutes down the street) or one of their other clinics, we'd have to be at the mercy of their nephrologist. Oh. Joy.

Interestingly, they also told us that now you can do hemodialysis at home; you just have to have room for the equipment and I'd have to be willing to learn how to "plug him in" and do the sterile techniques. What fun.

Friday we had Hair Day—always good to talk with friends—and then James had a video appointment with Dr. Kongara. More dialysis talk; his numbers must be terrible. But he's peeing fine. The doctor was asking if he was losing his appetite, or experiencing nausea or vomiting. Um, no. In fact, the lidocaine seems to have worn off and he's walking better (with a cane rather than the walker) despite the chronic pain when he does.

Saturday was a double treat: Juanita's birthday party at the Longhorn in Kennesaw—and it's a good thing I looked at the invitation because James led me to believe it was the Longhorn on the East-West Connector—and then we came home to watch the long-publicized Strange New Worlds/Lower Decks crossover, which was a gas and a half. I loved the end when they "cartoonized" the Strange New Worlds cast—Spock's arm! 😂😂😂

And today Tucker had a bath. It was on my to-do list for this week, but became required when I didn't pay attention to the fact the poison ivy had grown back at the front of the complex, where, of course, I walked him this morning. Yes, I'm tired. So I threw his bedding in the washer and watched Law & Order: Criminal Intent. So there.

Labels: books, Christmas, dogs, events, health, home improvement, magazines, neighbors, pets, television

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:38:00 PM

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Well, we have seen the vascular surgeon. It's actually the same vascular surgeon we saw five years ago; it's why we waited to see him and not another one. The vascular surgery is scheduled for August. And because James can't be hauling himself up the stairs via the handrail when the fistula is fresh, he has called a company and we have arranged to get a chair lift for the stairs. It will be expensive, but it has to be done since James can't have the knee replacement surgery with his bad kidneys.

We also got Apria to take away "the fishtank," as we called the oxygen concentrator he's had since October. We didn't take it with us—it weighs forty pounds—for Atomicon or for Libertycon, and he wasn't using it half the time, but when we got a note from Kaiser that they weren't paying for it any longer, we realized it meant they didn't think he needed it any longer.

Prime Day was this week. I wasn't inspired; all I bought were a couple of smart plugs. I put one in the library because the overhead light has been inoperative for years due to debris in the socket.

And we are going to LibertyCon next year; James was on the computer the moment memberships opened. They sold out in 24 minutes. [Got reservations at Staybridge a few days later, so we are in completely.]

Mostly this week we have been doing stuff at home. James has had to use a walker all week because he's still unsteady, but it seemed to be easing off by the weekend.

Labels: health, purchases, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:06:00 PM

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If you were at Libertycon 35 and at David Weber's panel on Saturday, James apologizes. He's "that guy" whose phone rang and he answered it, just in case it was Kaiser (because yeah, they actually do call you when there's something wrong, even if it's late night or weekends).

It was Kaiser. James figured he'd tell them he couldn't talk and would get back to them later. Instead the lady on the phone insisted he had to get to Urgent Care right now and have an IV infusion.

He finally had to leave the room because she simply did not understand that he not only wasn't at home, he wasn't even in the state.

Tuesday morning, promptly, though, he called Kaiser and they got him in that afternoon with someone in adult medicine. She told him he did have to go for IV antibiotics for the UTI, which was still hanging in there. But no, we didn't have an appointment at the infusion clinic. We had to go Urgent Care.

Every day.

For ten days.

And, of course, since this was Urgent Care, we had to wait--justifiably!--for the urgent cases to go first before he got his infusion. What a fripping nightmare. A half hour up there, a half hour back, and many hours in between.

The first day it wasn't bad. We only were there three hours, and that included the infusion.

The second day was a nightmare. We had breakfast, went to ACC, and were there for seven and a half hours. Three of those hours were trying to find a vein for the IV. They finally had to put it in his right hand, and they decided it could stay in for the next two sessions. It had to come out on Saturday.

The third day we were only three hours.

The fourth day was a nightmare for its own reasons. Although no rain was forecast, the skies literally opened as we approached Kaiser Town Park. I got drenched just taking the power chair down off the lift and then it got stuck. I sent him inside on foot, which was a bad idea due to his bad knee and may have contributed to his later problems. He got drenched simply limping from the truck to the overhang, a distance of not even a couple of yards. The nurses got us warm blankets, and by the time we got home just before bed, I was still wet, down to the elastic on my underpants.

Day five we got a respite. The on-call doctor at Urgent Care had called Internal Medicine and they said James could have a shot instead of an infusion! So they took out the IV, and gave him the ertapenum in combination with some lidocaine for any pain.

Yes, we had to go even on Independence Day, and there were quite a few people there, so they must have not been feeling well, because who wants to go to Urgent Care on the Fourth of July? We did manage to have our nice T-bone steaks, corn on the cob, and watermelon, watch 1776, and the Boston Pops concert on Bloomberg. It was a great show this year.

Wednesday James decided not to go to Physical Therapy because his legs were feeling so weak. We wondered if it might be the lidocaine, because he had no problems until he started the shots.

On the ninth day we had to fit the shot in between James' shoe appointment and his Procrit shot appointment, but we managed it, as well as a short visit for him to Hobbytown. He was complaining more about his legs for the last couple of days, which we attributed to his getting caught in the rainstorm and also having to walk in on his own; that he possibly twisted his bad knee. On the way up the stairs on the way home, he actually slipped on the top step and got rug burn on his right knee.

But we were so happy when we went to bed; next day would be the last.

During the night James called me. When I got up, I found him in the bathroom doorway. He was trying to get back from the toilet and all of a sudden he couldn't get his left leg to move. I got him a chair and after he sat down for a while he could hobble to bed. He hobbled up in the morning, and seemed to be better, until he started down the stairs without me to head to Urgent Care for the final shot. He seemed okay, so I ran into the kitchen to put food in Tucker's bowl, since we wouldn't be home in time for supper. Just as I was pouring food in the bowl I heard a crash downstairs.

James had somehow put a foot wrong and landed on his back in the downstairs hall. I still don't know how he managed to get the bench in the foyer down on him. He'd smacked his head on the leg of the stool outside the laundry room, raising a bump, but he was conscious and embarrassed. I had to call 911 and the paramedics came to check him out (one was 30 weeks pregnant) and the firefighters had to come to get him off the floor. One of them was the probie and they even had an apprentice (son of a firefighter).

The paramedics said that he seemed fine but since we were heading to Urgent Care anyway, he should get checked out. Yeah, don't worry about that.

He got the last shot, got a CT scan to make sure something didn't happen when he smacked his head (it was clear), the doctor checked his wounds, and then we could go home. It was hell getting back up the stairs again, but he made it.

He was still wobbly all weekend, so we stayed in since we have to go see the vascular surgeon on Monday.

However, there was one more surprise in store: when James removed his right sock that night, he had a big, ugly bright red scrape five to six inches long on the front of his leg. It didn't pain him, and didn't stain, but big patches of skin had been sliced right off. I cleaned it with saline solution, rubbed ointment into it, covered it with what I had left of foam bandage, and wrapped it in stretch gauze. Now thinking maybe we should make an appointment with the wound clinic. 

Labels: health, holidays, sickness

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:21:00 PM

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Of course, Sunday was better, but the con was almost over, too!

Another morning, another breakfast. Alas, no bacon today. Had to content myself with oatmeal, toast, milk, and a bagel and cream cheese. Walked Tucker in the green area behind the breakfast area/pool, and then it was back to the con.

I still hadn't found the art show or the dealer's room, so James escorted me there first. James bought an attractive piece of a spaceship against a starfield, and also an ironically whimsical print of an atomic cloud as part of a scoop of ice cream on top of a cone. He bought me a pretty blue-and-silver bracelet made of links. So blue. No purchases in the Dealer's Room.

LibertyCon always has a charity; this year it was Ronald McDonald House. One of the things that was auctioned for charity was a chance to play Larry Correia's roleplaying game "Gritty Cop Show," which is basically an amalgam of every cop show you've ever seen. Six people bid a total of $5000 to play, and we went to watch. The first hour was fun and I wish we'd stayed. Instead we went off to a panel that was supposed to be about care of your old books. But mostly the moderator talked about valuation and buying of rare books, which I find a bore. I don't buy books to collect, I buy them to read.

Finally we went to the tribute to Eric Flint. Yesterday was still affecting how I felt and I think I dozed through most of this. James enjoyed it, since Flint's 1632 universe is a favorite of his.

Finally we went to closing ceremonies, where they told us how much they earned for Ronald McDonald House, the guests for next year, etc., and then people complained or complimented and asked for different things for next year. It was lively and upbeat...

And then we emerged from the room and holy hell was going on outside!

It was pouring. Can't call it Georgia Monsoon Season. Let's call it Tennessee Monsoon Season. So we talked to Sue a little while and then walked the last time down the long, long hall, made it across the street without being drowned (the rain had slowed down). We waited a little while and the rain finally stopped, so we went out to go to McKay's Books (I bought a Valdemar book I didn't have and a book about a couple who sold their house and live permanently traveling in Europe) and finally get some decent food at City Café: James had a shepherd's pie (he should have sent it back; he said it was way too salty) and I had two exquisitely grilled pork chops, a baked potato, and of course City Café's outstanding chicken soup with broken-up spaghetti in it.

We brought a nice slice of Death by Chocolate cake back to the hotel. Whatever channel I found had Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episodes that were a tribute to Raul Esparza's Rafael Barba character, including the one where he left the show, so we watched those and went to bed at midnight—checkout time wasn't until noon, so why not? During commercials packed a few things up.

Monday morning we packed, made it down to breakfast just in time (have to remember ends at 9:30 on weekdays), then proceeded to walk Tucker, and pack, pack, pack. Then it was checkout time, and then getting on the road time.

We had stopped at "Buc-ee's," one of those giant rest stops, on the way up, so I could pee. Buc-ee's is a chain from Texas, with a restaurant, lots and lots of gas pumps, and a huge store that specializes in jerky. They have opened about a half-dozen of them down here, and one is on the way to Chattanooga, in Calhoun. Walking in is overwhelming: it's a big store and people everywhere, and noisy. I went in and pee'd and that was it. We talked about stopping on the way back, especially as Tucker had gone crazy when he saw the tumult, but we were tired.

So of course there was a traffic jam. We waited over a half hour in Adairsville for them to clear a fracas that appeared to have involved two tractor-trailer trucks. It was exhausting.

We got home safely, and the house was okay (the big storm we'd had in Chattanooga roared south and had hit Atlanta like a cannonball in some places; supposedly trees were down in Cobb County, but around us was safe). I shoved clothes in the washer and that was the end of LibertyCon.

We will go up on Thursday next year (if we get in) and stop at Publix or whatever, and buy food like pot pies or Hungry Man dinners. $26 for meatloaf indeed!

Labels: books, conventions, food, travel, weather, writing

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 8:49:00 PM

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Alas, there are bits of Saturday I don't remember.

As always when we go away, I don't sleep all that well. And then the stress and the heat saw me awakening to lower GI problems. James had to help me get dressed, and we did make it down to Staybridge's outstanding breakfast bar: three waffle-making machines! Two kinds of bread and bagels to toast! Three hot foods (today: eggs, bacon, and sweet potato tots)! Oatmeal! Three kinds of cereal. Cream cheese, butter, and a bunch of other seasonings. Four kinds of "juice mixes," and coffee and tea of course. I had to raid the milk-for-cereal pitcher for milk. They still have their "grill out" suppers, too, but they're during the week.

Walked Tucker, and then James went off to the convention center. I laid down for about forty-five minutes, then joined James for David Weber's panel.

We are sorry, David Weber fans, that James was that guy during the panel. His cell phone rang and it was fucking Kaiser! They wanted him to go to Urgent Care right away to get an IV antibiotic! James finally had to leave the room because the woman who called seemingly could not understand that not only weren't we in Atlanta, we weren't even in Georgia, and kept arguing with him.

Gah.

James went off to the Baen Books panel. Here's where things get fuzzy. I know I fell asleep in a chair in a deserted hallway at the center of the convention center. (I was thinking the deserted location might be great for a police chase story!) There were writers' panels I wanted to see, like "The Art of Editing" and "Writing from the Perspective of a Historian," but I never made it to them. I did walk the dog early.

At some point we had dinner at the restaurant. They had big beef brisket sandwiches and we tried those. James wasn't impressed. He said brisket is supposed to be tender and this was chewy; that it certainly wasn't Texas beef brisket anyway! The onion rings were good.

And at 9 p.m. we did get to see the Atlanta Radio Theatre Company perform Ron Butler's "Resurrection Eve," about a wealthy, self-absorbed woman of the future who wants her "darling husband" resurrected so that they can have a family together. The results are...well, let's say things don't go well. They also did an adaptation of Larry Correia's "Maple Syrup Wars," which is a humorous tale about aliens who discover that maple syrup makes them...well, very high. Several of the alien species are willing to pay for the maple syrup, but one species wants to take it by force. We fight back, of course.

Usually we stay afterwards and talk to folks, but we were both so bushed we just headed back to the hotel, and went to bed.

Labels: Atlanta Radio Theatre Company, conventions, food, friends

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:06:00 PM

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James has always wanted to go to LibertyCon.

LibertyCon has been going for 36 years now (having skipped 2020, of course), initially held in July, hence the name (there were three years it was held in May and for the last few years it has been reassigned to June). It is a small convention with a membership cap, and many of our friends have been going for years and years, until basically now it's like a fannish family reunion.

2020, James decided, was the year we were going to go. He bought tickets. And, of course, shit happened, and everyone's memberships rolled over to 2021. 2021 we were unable to go, and they rolled it over for us. Well, in 2022 we were unable to get hotel reservations in time. At this time, the convention was being held at the Marriott Hotel connected to the Chattanooga Convention Center, but the Marriott isn't pet friendly. However, the Staybridge Suites (our favorite hotel) at the other side are, and it costs more to board the critters than it does to pay the pet fee, so we wanted to bring them—Snowy has always loved "little rooms with teevee"!

But James waited too late to get reservations.

He managed to talk them into rolling us over one more time. It must be all that customer service he learned for IBM tech support.

But this year we were in and we were going to go.

I have to be truthful: I was ambivalent about it. Trips are hard on me now; since James' back and knee makes it that I have to do all the carrying, there's a lot of work for me. I have lists upon lists so we don't forget anything important, including his medical supplies which include bandages and tape in case his legs get a blister, the insulin, water for Tucker so he doesn't get diarrhea from strange water, etc. Plus, this is basically a science fiction writers con. I started out on Heinlein with some Asimov, but don't read any modern SF. There were a few writers' panels, but basically I'd be there to chat with friends, which would be the good part for me.

Let's not even go into having to travel in the summer...

So we packed a little day by day, and I had a long lead time to take stuff down to the truck; since we couldn't check in until three, we didn't need to leave until after noon.

We left at one and should have left earlier: Chattanooga used to be a nice 75-minute drive, now until you get out of the Atlanta metro area it's a morass of traffic. The freeway was backed up, so we tried the highway instead and, of course, traffic lights. Plus we hadn't covered the bed of the truck and we ran in and out of rain during the nearly two hour trip. Apparently Interstate 24, which splits west at Chattanooga and was the way we had to go, is always backed up during daytime hours. Of course Waze took us through teeny city streets, including one steep hill on which I was convinced the chair lift was going to scrape bottom.

However, we made it to Staybridge unscathed. Dropped all the stuff in the room, took Tucker for a walk—alas, Snowy never got to see another "little room with the teevee"—and then hurried to the convention center to get registered as there was a panel tonight that James really wanted to see.

Staybridge is literally across the street from the convention center; you can just enter at that end and walk the length of it—we didn't know that at first and walked the outside till we found a way in—a big long hall with meeting rooms on one side and big exhibit halls and banquet halls on the other (with more meeting rooms as well). I think at least six different exhibitions can be held here. When we got there there were two different church groups; one stayed all weekend. Also a hunting exhibition was there on Saturday. LibertyCon was all the way down the long hall at the Marriott end.

There was, alas, no food. The restaurant was horribly expensive—seriously, $26 for meatloaf?—so we ate some sandwiches from the downstairs café. I went to see a panel given by a woman who now works for child advocacy groups, but she was talking to us about serial killers. She is the daughter of a psychiatrist and a psychologist, and spent part of her childhood at the nurses station in a mental hospital. Her dad was one of the shrinks who examined Albert DeSalvo (the Boston Strangler, for those of you who didn't grow up hearing about this dude on the news).

James was at a panel about "Guns of the Future," so I went back to Staybridge to take Tucker out before dark, then came back to the hotel. The panel James was looking forward to, "No Shit, There I Was," was at nine, but I wasn't all that interested. I had my tablet with me and I found a nice little nook off the hotel lobby and sat and edited a manuscript until he was done.

The Staybridge room (James got the baby suite, with a separate bedroom) was quite nice and they have feather pillows. As always, there is a little kitchenette and dishes and pans, stove, sink, even a tiny dishwasher, and a living room together, then the bedroom, and the bath, which was handicapped accessible, had a pocket-panel door. This was good. However, I was a bit ticked at a jerry-rigged repair. The roll-in shower had a low shower head, for a person in a wheelchair, and then a higher, removable shower head on a long vertical pole which, theoretically, could be adjusted high or low. But the handle that kept the shower head up didn't tighten, so it slid down when you had a shower, and, because the hook that fastened the removable shower head to the pole was broken, they had made loops to hang it with two zip ties!!! And they didn't even clip the ends, so we both nearly poked ourselves in the eye several times.

Oh, and body wash. I hate body wash. Give me a nice bar of soap every time. I hate "pump, pump, pump," wash one arm, "pump, pump, pump," wash the other arm, "pump, pump, pump," wash your stomach, on and on and on. We had soap with us, but there was nowhere in the shower to put it down. Sigh.

Labels: conventions, travel

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:58:00 PM

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