 Nostalgia, DVDs, old movies, television, OTR, fandom, good news and bad, picks, pans, cute budgie stories, cute terrier stories, and anything else I can think of. Contact me at theyoungfamily (at) earthlink (dot) net . . . . . . . . . .
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» Sunday, September 01, 2024
Breathing Rarefied Air
As the kids today say, I "did a thing." I was deathly in fear of doing this "thing" because it involved leaving James alone for the day. Make no mistake, he is much stronger and fitter than he was when he got out of the hospital at the end of June. But he still doesn't feel stable enough on his feet, mostly due to his back and knee pain, to go back to a cane or even back to where he was months ago just walking slowly and making sure he has touchpoints. He still relies on the rolling walker we got from Kaiser, but he's been using it to get around the kitchen much better—if still painfully—to the point where he can even wash a pan or two to start prepping. When I told him what I wanted to do, he said, "Go ahead, do it. I want you to do it. You need the break and you deserve it." He even went on Amazon and ordered a tray/storage compartment that fit on the top of the walker so I didn't have to help him transport the parts of his breakfast anymore (the egg plate or the burritos, the tea, the oatmeal, and the smoothie drink). He kept repeating "I will be fine." I was still paranoid, especially about what if he had a fall or had chest pains that didn't go away with nitroglycerin. To assuage that, I made sure the chair lift seat wasn't blocking the door and left a house key hidden on the porch, then told him to keep his phone on him at all times. If he had to call 911, hopefully he could tell them where the key was and they could get in without damaging the door. So I did it. From the moment that I saw Vincent D'Onofrio was going to be at DragonCon, I wanted to be there. We haven't gone since 2019, and, although I miss it, I don't miss the crowds, the constant noise, the crowds, the heat between the hotels, the crowds, the long wait for elevators since James is in the power chair, the crowds...well, you get it. I'm homesick for it, because DragonCon has been an alternate "home" for years, with a bunch of people I adore who I only see mainly there (the BritTrack people, the Trek Track folks, the sci-fi lit panel regulars, etc.). I miss them. So I bought a Sunday membership and bought a photo op (it's a very early birthday gift to myself). Alice did offer me to loan me her badge on Saturday (which would have been naughty, but...) while she watched the Georgia football game, but I decided against it (but thanked her copiously). She reminded me to get parking in advance, which I did (and it turned out I didn't need to, as there was plenty of space on Sunday at less than I paid for pre-paid, but...better safe than sorry, as everyone's mom has said at least once). We made it down to the wire with James neither having a fall or chest pains by Saturday night. Thursday night I was feeling guilty and said to him, "Maybe I should have gotten you a Sunday membership," thinking he could have wandered about while I was doing my fangirl thing. But just going for an echocardiogram, eating out at Pacific Buffet, and stopping at Barnes & Noble had wiped him out that day, and he demurred. Sunday morning, after not a lot of sleep due to anxiety, I was up at 7:30. My backpack was already kitted up with some snacks, my camera, a folder to put my reserved photo from the photo op in, my tablet, etc. I dressed, fed and walked Tucker, used the bathroom, and off Butch and I went. The bad day driving to DragonCon is always Friday, because of rush-hour traffic; on Sunday the freeway is practically empty. We freewheeled following the GPS down I-75, exited at Courtland Street, turned left on Andrew Young, and drove up to opposite the Westin. With SpotHero all I did was drive into the garage, find a parking space, and walk off (coming out was just as easy; I didn't have to scan a QR code or anything). After five years of non-attendance, you would have thought I'd fumble around trying to remember things. Nope—it's all muscle memory now, like riding a bicycle. It was cool and shady enough that I just walked down the big long hill from the Westin to the Courtland Grand (formerly the Sheraton), stopped once by a young blond woman who saw my Law & Order: Criminal Intent t-shirt (bought especially for the occasion!) and gushed "I love your shirt! I love that show," crossed Courtland Street again, and headed for registration. This was easy-peasy, just follow others through a little Disney World serpentine, show my QR code, and get my badge. Took five minutes. Then I went to Disability Services, because, while I am willing to wait in line, I cannot be outside in the sun or else Mr. Headache, Mr. Palpitations, and then Mr. Diarrhea will visit me in short order. DS decided that was justifiable and I got a seat in line and end of row designation. Now, breakfast! Again by long habit: hike the block to the Courtland Garage, use their elevator to what James and I have always called "the Luke Skywalk" and into Peachtree Center and the myriad of eating locations, some shuttered until lunch, others open for breakfast. Of course I went to Cafe Momo, which is a big buffet-by-the-pound, as I planned to have a hearty meal and then just snack later. In my styrofoam container I put oatmeal in one small compartment, roast potatoes in the other, a slice of French toast and some peeled and sliced oranges and kiwi fruit in the big compartment. Finishing off with a reduced-fat milk and a bagel and cream cheese, I went out to the tables to eat. (They have lots of other stuff—eggs—yuck!—both scrambled and fried and spicy; grits, pre-made tortilla shell meals with meat and lettuce; different fruits; coffee and tea; cereals; etc.) Oh, if you were looking for Waldo, I found him having breakfast at Peachtree Center, too! When I got done it was much too early to go to the Walk of Fame where Vincent D'Onofrio would be signing things, so I marched over the skybridges through the Marriott and into the Hilton to descend to the oh-so-wonderful coolness of the Galleria level where Trek Track and BritTrack are and walked into the Lower Decks panel. Alan Siler was on the panel and I can't remember when I'd seen him in person last. I got two hugs and we talked and he told me how he was splitting the book he was writing in three parts, and that his Kozmic Press outfit is going to be doing an anthology of essays of women talking about how they were influenced by the Beatles. You so rarely see books written about how women have been influenced by rock bands! And the panel was fun, too, talking about favorite moments in Lower Decks—has any scene been funnier than the punchline with T'Ana and the box she asks Beckett and Tendi to fetch?—and if this is really the end for the series. Now I moseyed on back to the Marriott and the Walk of Fame; there was no line at this point and I just strolled right in. The actors sit in little booths talking to the fans and selling autographs (James and I have been going long enough to remember when you bought the photos from a dealer or from the actor and the actors signed them for free!). Jodie Whittaker (Doctor #13) was signing autographs practically in front of me. Vincent D'Onofrio wasn't at his booth, so I walked around checking everyone out. Anson Mount, when I finally spied him, was wearing a baseball hat, so no glimpse of the infamous Pike hair wave, and looked tired. There was a lively crowd around "the hobbits" (Dominic Monaghan, Billy Boyd, and Elijah Wood). And I absolutely had to stop and say hi to Barry Gordon when he was free. He does animation voices now, but I remember Barry Gordon from when he was a child actor, especially in the film A Thousand Clowns with Jason Robards. It was on television in the late 60s and I cried at the end when Robards realized that, to support his abandoned nephew (Gordon) properly, he would have to give up his bohemian lifestyle and take a 9-to-5 job. When he walks off dressed in the suit carrying a briefcase just like all the other white-collar automatons in NYC I burst into tears. He seemed happy that I remembered it. Finally I went back to the line to find out that Vincent D'Onofrio was expected shortly, so I got into line. I had his two books with me, Mutha and Pigs Can't Look Up. Unfortunately, I found out in line that it was cash only. I'd been talking with various of his fans in line, including other CI fans, and the guy dressed as the Fourth Doctor said, "There's an ATM over there; I'll hold your place!" and I ran over and got the cash. Turned out I could only have one book signed with the money I had and I really couldn't afford both, so I got Mutha signed and told him I remembered going to the Monkey Jungle place in Florida that he wrote about when I was about two or three (I agree; it was a terrible place, all noise and agitated simians and smelled horrible, and why parents dragged kids there I'll never know). The line was long and I didn't want to take too much of his time, so I never asked him James' question, which was if we would ever see a DVD or at least a streaming release of Night of the Cooters, and then I was sorry a few minutes later when another woman engaged him in conversation for at least two or three minutes. (While I'd been waiting earlier he told the woman before me the story of the unusual voice he uses for the Jack Horne character in the remake of The Magnificent Seven. He was in London doing a movie (I wonder if it was the Sherlock Holmes film) and he was waiting at a restaurant when this enormous man walked in; he actually blocked the light coming in the restaurant door he was so big, and "his hands were the size of baseball mitts." So he says something to him and this huge man replies in this high-pitched voice, so he wanted to use that voice in the future.) I stood there a long time watching him interact with everyone. Honestly, he looks gorgeous. You can tell he works out and takes care of himself; the only sign that he's older is the grey hair and beard. His hands are still absolutely beautiful, long slim fingers like a pianist's might be. (Yeah, I'm gushing here...) I also ran into Rob Bowen and got a hug. I was really restricting myself on locations, so perhaps it followed, but I didn't run into nearly as many people as I do—I usually see someone from ARTC, or Mark Heffernan, or the Rays, or Roger Nichols, or even Laura Hayden...but...no. Finally I decided I needed to hit a bathroom and hie myself over to the Hyatt to get in line for the 2:30 panel. I'd been in terrible fear that I would need to pee before the panel and lose my place in line or, even worse, have to pee during the panel, so I was sucking on watermelon candies and hadn't drunk anything since the milk at breakfast (which was terrible—it was labeled "ultra-filtered milk" and tasted like milk-flavored water). So when a friendly looking woman sat next to me in the waiting area I started talking to her and we were "bathroom buddies" for the duration; she watched my backpack while I used the rest room and then I watched hers. We bonded over knee surgery, which she'd had (both knees) and I was telling her James wished he could. (BTW, I periodically texted James all day, mostly to receive the response "I'm fine; have fun!")
The panel loaded quickly, and I got a nice aisle seat where I could take a lot of photos. Vincent was on this panel with Mike Colter, who played Luke Cage in the short-lived series. They were very easy with each other and it turned out they knew each other from sometime back when Colter was in an episode of CI ("Albatross"). (They had this very funny back-and-forth about the meaning of the word "albatross"—yes, it's a really neat bird, but it also has a metaphorical meaning and so on...) Since this was a panel about Marvel, the questions were mostly about Kingpin and Luke Cage, a lot of it going over my head since I've avoided Daredevil due to the violence. He did talk about how he loved the role, but that gaining the extra weight every time they filmed was getting harder because it's hard to lose weight as you get older. For the newest series, they have a new "fat suit" which he said is still very warm, but is very light, "like a sneaker," he described it. So with that and the use of prosthetics and makeup he doesn't have to gain the weight any longer (which is fine with me because he looks so fine!). Vincent also told the story about how he got the part of Private Pyle in Full Metal Jacket; Matthew Modine, a friend of his, encouraged him to audition via a short film (he was working as a bodyguard at that time) and he rented a camera and performed some dialog from a play. Stanley Kubrick was impressed enough by the film to call him, and the first time he hung up on Kubrick because he thought it was a joke. Kubrick called right back and said immediately, "Don't hang up!" Once the panel was over, I had a short appointment in the ladies' room—"unavoidable delay" as Frank Gilbreth would put it—since it wasn't crowded, which I used it as an opportunity to decompress and cool down. It was not yet 4:30 when I headed downstairs for my 5 p.m.photo op. The area outside was crowded and hot, and I noticed from my appointment printout that I was still early, so I wandered in the rest room for a little longer and splashed cold water on myself and cleaned my face off and put a tiny bit of blush on. I'd never done one of these before so I wandered back following the signs not knowing what to expect. The basement level of the Marriott was partitioned off with a lot of dark curtains hanging from portable curtain stands. It was hard to be in this area without nostalgia because it had served DragonCon as the Dealer's Room and the Walk of Fame for so many years; it was here I got June Lockhart's autograph and talked to Dee Wallace-Stone about her being back to back with June Lockhart—two of Lassie's TV moms together! (Now the Dealer's Room takes up four levels of the Merchandise Mart!) The one thing I hate about the new Walk of Fame is they forbid you to take unauthorized photos; I used to love going in there and get candid shots of the performers interacting with the fans. I have photos of Mark Goddard and numerous other people just sitting behind a table and hanging with congoers. At first you stay in a general area where you wait for your photo op "partner" to be called. While a bunch of us waited, including a woman in a "DUN DUN" Law & Order shirt, I saw someone dressed as Vincent's Daredevil character Kingpin come in, portly, with the white dinner jacket, the cane and all. Then there were two of them, then three, and finally there were four of them altogether. They posed for pictures with the people waiting. It was funny. Then we D'Onofrio fans got called back and shuttled into lines. There were some DS seats available, but I was trying to stand and let the seats go for the people with back and leg problems. Now at this point I hadn't actually had a drink since ten a.m., and sucking on Jolly Ranchers wasn't helping any longer. I finally pointed to a chair and asked "May I sit down?" because I glanced at my Fitbit and discovered my pulse was rocking around at about 90. Sitting helped a lot. I was next to a married couple who were teasing each other, and she was in a wonderful T-shirt with Vincent's pic on top and the cityscape at the bottom and the legend "Robert Goren, Detective" at the bottom. Pretty swell! The photo op itself goes by fast because the Epic people are processing the pictures as fast as they can go. You drop your personal stuff on a table, line up, and one by one the person (or persons, because there are group shoots) gets into the picture with you, the photographer yells "Chin down!" and the picture is done and the next person is summoned. I broke protocol at this point, just quickly, because the one thing I had wanted so badly to say at the autograph table never came out. I said very quickly "Thank you for Twitter. It's helped me through some bad places in the last few years" and he bent over me a little to hear what I said and then they took the picture and I think he said "thank you" or something because I was brain fried and totally overheated at this point. Picked up my stuff and asked one of the Kingpins, "What now?" and he said come back here and get your picture, and he pointed it out when we got there, already printed out. And you got checked out to see if you got your photo—and the correct photo—and then it was over.  I really would have liked to stay...but I was tired and hungry and ohIhadtomakesure James was okay. I walked out the back of the Marriott instead of going across the bridge to Peachtree Center and taking the back door, which would have gotten me to within a block of the Westin, but I just did homing pigeon. Walked up the hill past the Hyatt and then crossed Peachtree Center and then left across Harris. By that time I was blowing like a racehorse and stopped to catch my breath at the water features in front of a building on Peachtree Street. In about a minute I was able to take in a lungful of air again to trudge on and turn at the Westin to go back to the parking garage. I will say I am glad we were not in the truck in this garage! It was tiny and if the ramps going up were steep, the ones coming down seemed like they were about at a 45 degree angle! The chair lift would have scraped the ground even without the power chair in it! But yeah, the gate just opened for me and out I went, back on the city streets, and back on the freeway, and then back home, exhausted. I was so happy I cried all the way home. James held dinner for me; it was about six, and it was a turkey burger which I smothered in the wonderful Meadowcroft Farms sweet onion relish. We split a Ritter peppermint-filled dark chocolate bar for dessert. Bliss. My day was complete when I posted my photo op on Twitter and once again thanked Vincent D'Onofrio for his posts—they have truly gotten me through many dark things in the past couple of years—and he liked my post. Well, of course I watched Law & Order: Criminal Intent later on...why do you ask? — [Fitbit stats: 13,546 steps, 5.38 miles, 12 floors, 49 active zones, and 62 active minutes. I put on 1000 steps with walking Tucker twice, but at least 12,000 of those steps were between 8:30 p.m. and 5:30 p.m. We don't call it "the DragonCon Exercise Program" for nothing.] [At least September 1 was better than August 1. I lost Oliver one month ago today. Miss you, baby bird.] Labels: dogs, DragonCon, dreams, emotions, events, exercise, family, food, friends, television  » Saturday, July 01, 2017
Big Bang Weary
 Very strange dream last night, or actually this morning; our friend Jen's parents dropped by our house to drop off some of my mother's clothes. What the hell? We have never met Jen's parents, and we did not know her when my mom was alive. Yet they had met my mother; she'd stayed at their house and left some clothes behind. I recognized them, too, especially one of her cardigans. How bizarre is that? Plus in this dream, we had just moved into another house with a small enclosed porch on the front and I was thinking "I can decorate this for Christmas!"We didn't have any plans for today except going to Petsmart to get Tucker a new harness. The old one was bought when he was younger and now is a little too small. We did this around noon. They were adopting cats today, but Tucker was too interested in the other dogs to pay much attention (face to face with two cats in a crate, he seems a bit astonished). We ended up getting a purple harness and buying a purple collar to match (like Londo Mollari in Babylon 5, he's now "stunning in purple"). Not getting him the whole kit, though; the red leash can stay. Also got some seed for Snowy, and, while James kept Tucker company in the truck, ran next door to Michaels to pick up some Command hooks. To my delight they had fall stuff out! Pumpkins, autumn flowers in different muted hues, containers referencing falling leaves and Thanksgiving, owls and foxes and squirrels made out of brushy stuff. We took Tucker home and, not wanting to veg all afternoon, decided to have our big meal at lunch and just graze at supper. Thus we drove out to Acworth and had lunch at Longhorn: six ounce Renegades with salads as sides, and bread as a chaser. When we emerged from the pleasant gloom of the restaurant the sky was still mostly cloudy, with the sun peeking around the edges. I "drove" the power chair across the parking lot to Books-a-Million while James followed in the truck, and then we swapped off. Several minutes later James was looking at the magazines, and I was looking at the books when a too-familiar sound came from overhead: the sound of rain pounding against the roof. Looked outside in disbelief to see Georgia Monsoon Season in full swing, an almost solid curtain of rain drumming on the pavement like Ringo Starr at a big concert. It faded out and came back several times, so we just browsed at leisure and shared a frozen hot chocolate as a dessert. Stopped at Kroger on the way home to pick up a few necessary things, like bread for work. It's been a quiet evening figuratively: watched part of a Wild Wild West episode, a new Father Brown, and a series about forgotten American history on the American Heroes Channel. However, outside all hell was breaking loose: we could hear fireworks from several directions and thunder was rumbling in accompaniment to lightning on the edges of the sky. Tucker's eyes got very large and, although he did come out with me, he kept stopping and staring, transfixed, in the directions of the noise. When he would do this instead of trying to run back to the house, I would praise him greatly. Not sure if the tranquilizer pills I got him yesterday are having any effect (they're not real drugs, but stuff like chamomile and melatonin). The noise, however, didn't keep him from wanting treats. Afterwards I slipped outside; someone on the other side of the development, I think on Landmark Street, always has these big fireworks. Some of them sound like mortars! And of course they had roman candles, so I enjoyed a short show. Tucker, though, just curled up in a tight ball on James' recliner and tried to ignore it all. Poor puppy. Labels: books, dreams, food, shopping, television » Saturday, March 25, 2017
Other People Meet at Bars, We Meet at Bookstores
Well, slept a little bit better, but not much; still the hip problems and had to get up at seven to use the bathroom and then hoped to get back to sleep. When I did get back to sleep, it was a Louisa May Alcott-like dream where I was someone sent to take care of a young cousin and didn't find out until I got there that I had to stay a month. I was so upset in the dream that I called out and scared the family dog. Thankfully the alarm rang.Came into the conference room to find a big table almost full of folks eating; we got our own food from the breakfast area and brought it in and helped clear a space for Lin as well. No French toast this morning, so I had extra regular toast. (I see the curse of A Discovery of Witches goes on.) During the end of breakfast, Alice and Aubrey were talking about going to a little bookstore in Cornelia that we'd never heard of. After they left, I asked James if he wanted to try to go to it, too, and John Campbell was interested, as well. So we rushed into our room to finish getting dressed and grabbing money. Because we were in the truck, John unfortunately couldn't ride with us, so he was following behind. Cornelia was about a half-hour's drive away, turning left at the big field where a big herd of Holstein cows are always grazing. It was cloudy again today, but not quite as chilly as yesterday, so we just brought our flannel shirts in case. Didn't really need them today. Unbelievably, we caught up to the Spiveys about a third of the way there, until we got to someplace where the police were escorting a long ride of motorcyclists; we and John ended up between the police cars and the motorcycle riders, so we pulled over until the latter passed. A little further on, as we approached the Walmart, for no reason John got in the turn lane and turned around and went back. We hoped there wasn't a problem back at the hotel. The GPS led us a merry chase as we got into Cornelia, which is a fairly large town with chain stores and a megachurch called the Torch, telling us the bookstore was on a street around the corner from the public library. It was, in fact, in a shopping center before the public library, a tiny little place that was also a notary public. And, sure enough, the Spiveys were there. I didn't find anything (all that I was interested in I already had; they had a pristine copy of The Little House Cookbook!), but James got a nearly untouched three-volume set of the history of 20th century sea power for only $30 and another book of interviews with fighter pilots. Then we were all feeling peckish, so we went to a place that the elderly lady running the store recommended, Fender's Diner. This had an old diner vibe and was definitely a vintage place that is well-beloved by the folks in Cornelia. It was a nice lunch, too! I had roast beef and onions au jus with onion rings (truly I will need to pay) and James had a hamburger steak with vegetables. We'd decided that when we finished at the bookstore we were going to detour to Clarkesville to go to The Art-Full Barn, which is part pottery shop and part comic shop and part art shop and part model shop, and Alice and Aubrey couldn't resist an art store. They used their GPS and we used our phone, and we made it there first, despite the phone telling me initially that we were going in the same direction. Whatever, we made it, and I had to go out and admire the animated metal pinwheels in different colors and styles that are out front. They remind me of the metal sculptures made by Aunt Meg in Twister. Really, they are not so expensive; the most expensive one was $150. Alice and Aubrey did indeed enjoy this store, and so did Ken, who stocked up on comic books. James also found a comic, and, although the model department is now very small, he got two models. I bought a set of oil paints. The Spiveys went on home, but we continued onto Cleveland and then turned back toward Helen so we could stop at the Mount Yonah book store. Surprise! Ron and Lin, their son Neil, Bill Ritch, and Charles Rutledge were already there. Some folks meet at bars, we get together at bookstores (and I do still miss those Friday nights at the Borders Books on the East-West Connector!). Bill had turned up a really neat find: there's no copyright on it, but it's a hardcover copy of Swiss Family Robinson with an inscription to a person for Christmas 1918! The pages are browning, but it's in super condition. (He let me look at it back at the hotel. I thought I had a complete version, with a different translation, but no, what I have must be still abridged, because there are some parables Father tells the boys that are not in my edition. Franz is called "Frank" in this edition, but I was delighted by the footnotes, that explained to the evidently younger reader what things like trigonometry and oil lamps are, and how when the book was written there were no trains. Plus it still has the color plates!) Anyway, James turned up a book on fighter pilots and I found the next book in Gerald Johnson's history of America trilogy for young people, the first which I bought here a few years ago, and then on the way out I found a copy of Mercedes Lackey's A Study in Sable in paperback. James bought both for me. After a short stop at Nora Mill Granary for James to get some white gravy and start on this year's Christmas surprise for Mom and Candy, we finally arrived back at the hotel. Turns out John thought we were going to the Mount Yonah store and turned around because he didn't recognize anything. As he said, a failure in communication. But I swear we said it was in Cornelia. Saturday night we usually eat at the German restaurant, but James said that this year he thought the German food would be too heavy. Well, there I was typing and the next thing I knew James was asking where we wanted to go for supper, and when I looked around almost everyone was gone. Juanita and David, though, were about to head back to Wendell's for supper and asked if we wanted to come with them. Well, we'd love to! Unfortunately, Wendell's isn't open for dinner, and another place the desk recommended was only a breakfast place. So we decided to try Cowboys & Angels, which Shari had spoken of favorably. This was downtown, close to where we had parked yesterday. Cowboys & Angels is a bar/restaurant with live music, so we kind of expected it to be loud when we got there. But when James and I walked in, the sound was deafening: live band playing not-bad music, but amplified in a small space, and with everyone talking over the music, it was awful. When David came in, we asked if he thought Juanita would mind moving outside. David thought it was too loud, too, so we went outside. The tables and chairs outside are set on dirt covered up by pine bark. James sat down in a chair and immediately started toppling backward as the thin legs of the chair sank into the dirt. David and I had to rescue him, and he found a different chair and took a different place. About then Juanita walked up from having parked the car, and we explained about the music. Of course then we had to smell cigarette smoke, but at that point it seemed the lesser of two evils. Juanita has lots of health problems, including a penicillin allergy, a cheese allergy, and a shrimp allergy. The latter is so bad that she can't even eat fish fried in the same oil that shrimp has been fried in. But the waitress told us that they did not serve shrimp. Juanita also has some other health problems and had bariatric surgery some years ago. She cannot eat dry foods (like crackers or chicken breast) because it makes her throat seize up and causes a lot of pain. So when she ordered the fish, she told the waitress the only way she could eat it was if it was moist. The waitress assured her they could cook it that way. She was also asked not to include the tartar sauce as Juanita is allergic. The place was very expensive, so James and I split a ribeye and had salads for our two sides and David had a hamburger. Well, when Juanita's fish came, it was cooked in a very thick sauce and inside the fish was dry as paper. Plus the tartar sauce had been included in a cup and had spilled over the second piece of fish. Juanita called the waitress back and said she was sorry, but the fish that she could eat was too dry, not moist as promised, and that the other piece had tartar sauce all over it. The waitress said she would get her a new batch. James had had some mushrooms as appetizers, with a very light beer-batter coating instead of the dry cornmeal coating, and Juanita asked if when they made her a new batch, could they fry it in the beer-batter instead? The waitress went off for fifteen minutes, then came back with Juanita's cold plate and said if they did her a new batch like that she would have to pay for it again! Can you beat that? We had to talk to the manager and they finally gave her a new fish dish with the fish fried in the beer batter, and it was indeed moist instead of dry and Juanita said it was good, but it was too much work to go through, especially since the food was so expensive. This place also reminded me why I don't like bars. The restaurant and the surrounding buildings are in a pretty area with paths and metal sculptures and grass and flowers. When we had been there yesterday we noticed two domestic rabbits hopping around, apparently "free range," a black-and-white one and a black one (I swear I'd seen a white one earlier, too, but didn't see it now). Well, while we were eating, the two different bunnies came out to graze; they disappeared when some little kids chased them, but returned and we were enjoying watching them. The people at the table behind us were frankly getting flat drunk. So when the bunnies came back out, a woman screeched "Oh, look at the rabbits!" and honest to God got up and tried to chase them, in a pencil skirt and high heels. She kicked off the shoes and went staggering after the black rabbit, and of course he hightailed it out of there. She then came wobbling back and was so tipsy she could hardly get back into her shoes. When someone teased her about the shoes, she shouted back than she "had blood on them from beating her husband." (Once back at the table, she admitted loudly that it wasn't true, she wasn't even married.) Mind-boggling. Why people want to get drunk and do stupid things are beyond me. So by the time we finished eating it was full dark. David and Juanita walked to get the car, and we walked as far as James could go to meet them at the street. Well, the black rabbit had come back and stood there about 10 feet from us, just eating and swiveling his ears back and forth as I talked to him. A few minutes later a guy just walked four feet past him and he didn't turn an ear. He's just put off by drunks. Me, too. So games were in full swing when we got back to the hotel. I watched them play a game called Anomia, where people who pull a card with the same symbol have to think of an answer before the other person does. That looked like fun. Then I joined in when they played something called Karma. There's a passing resemblance to Uno. And, then, of course, we played a couple of games of Uno! Always fun. I love Uno! The "kids" wanted to play Betrayal, so we cleared the table for them. James was reading on his baby laptop trying to find a certain model from a model show to show to John Campbell, and I sat next to him and worked on a cross-stitch while watching Oreta, Ron, Lin, Shannon, and Phyllis play a card game called "Once Upon a Time," which seemed to be about making up a fairy tale. Shannon was also working on a beading project. Some folks were still coloring and Bill and Damian were talking politics (Damian has served in Afghanistan, so knows the politics of the military a little better than the rest of us). The Betrayal game broke up about midnight when the gamers found a flaw in the scenario they were running, the fairy tale ended, and people wandered off to bed. We weren't the last folks out the door, but it was close. 😊 Labels: animals, books, dreams, food, friends, games, shopping, travel » Sunday, July 03, 2016
Pre-Fourth of July Frog
I have these stupid nagging dreams; I guess they are intended to remind me I am behind on something or need to be prodded to proceed on something. Last night's was a beaut: we were traveling with friends and I was always behind. At one point I had missed breakfast because I had been doing something else and now everyone was leaving and I was starving. (I woke up at this point and was actually hungry.) In another section of the dream, we were staying in a house that was an old Victorian house that our friends (no one I knew) were remodeling. The house was a mess; a warren of small rooms and peeling wallpaper and water damage, but in places some spots of real beauty, like original wallpaper that was in good shape that they were going to save, and a bedroom that had been a woman's bedroom and had a headboard made of cerise satin, like a 1930s film star might have. Another bedroom was also a woman's bedroom, and it was so big she had had a big, curved partition made at one end where she had a big washstand and bowl on one side and a reclining sofa on the other, with swinging doors to get inside. The final scene in this dream was James and I with the dog, and him warning me to keep Tucker out of the dog poop that we were standing next to. Bizarre.Not to mention that I was interrupted at least twice waking up because my nose was clogged and I'd come awake because I couldn't breathe because the inside of my mouth had dried out. At eight o'clock I heard James stirring. He'd already changed out of his night clothes, tested his sugar (he was at 59!), put the towels in the hamper...I looked at him out of glazed eyes (we'd gone to bed about 12:30) and asked him why on earth he wasn't asleep. I can't sleep, he said. I told him he wasn't trying hard enough. I felt him lay back down and then went right back off to sleep, and there we stayed until almost eleven. No way we were going to "beat the Baptists" to Kroger, so we took our time and ate breakfast before heading out. We ended up just going to Kroger. It was bad enough taking Tucker out earlier, but now it was the ninth ring of Hell, The sun feels like it could strip paint off your car—or like the heat lamps they use at the grocery store for the rotisserie chickens. You can only put your hand in for so long before you feel your skin scorching. We bought Those Damn Bananas, burritos, some soup for lunch, and a few other things and just came home. We ended up lolling in the living room watching Holmes on Homes. I had a 60% off JoAnn coupon and a 40% entire purchase coupon for Michaels (which I usually love because I buy little inexpensive thing for craft projects all at once) and I didn't even want to go out for those. About four o'clock we roused ourselves from our torpor and went downstairs and finally killed the frog. You know there's that saying that if you eat a frog first thing in the morning then nothing worse can happen all day? On the decluttering Usenet group I used to be on, we used to call any chore we didn't want to do "a frog." Well, we've had all the Christmas decoration containers and the winter decoration containers and the Easter box and the spring decoration stacked up in maze fashion in the library since after Christmas so we could reinforce the mounting of the shelves they were stored on. I haven't been able to shelve the completed books I took down there because all the holiday containers were in the way. A couple of years back I related that one of the wire shelving units in our master closet pulled away from the wall and collapsed. It was pretty overloaded with winter coats, all my jeans, and James' dress pants, plus the suitcases on the shelf on top. When we did the repair we realized the installers had just missed fastening the shelves into the studs. I checked in the downstairs storage closet and none of the shelving supports were set into studs either, and some of the boxes have ceramics in them and are heavy. For the past ten years the shelves have held the containers okay, but I've been worried since the closet incident. So we installed four supports in the studs, two for each shelving unit. We couldn't put any supports into the two studs on the longer shelf, the ones closest to the closet door because the drill kept hitting something hard. We thought it might be metal put in to guide the electrical conduits for the switch and electrical plug on the other side of the wall in the garage. So we put in those two extra supports using wall anchors. Not as good as studs, but better than nothing. Then James helped me replace the sections of the Christmas tree and the containers. The three heaviest containers are still on the floor because it hurts James' back to get them down anymore. We finished at six and had supper about seven: shrimp scampi over spaghetti. Should have thawed another package of shrimp; we only had nine each, and these were only medium sized. We scarfed all the spaghetti, and I had some of the rest of the scampi sauce on bread. Later we had some ice cream for dessert. We watched part three of Sons of Liberty, which I recorded last year not realizing I started with chapter three of five. Not sure what I think of it. It was a "dramatic presentation" based on the events leading to the American Revolution, not a documentary, and some people were not happy with the casting or the "sexing up" of the story. For instance they had Sam Adams as a young handsome athletic man (I can't think about Samuel Adams without remembering Johnny Tremain's description of him—or maybe it was Rab Silsbee's description—as "a dog fox with a fat pullet in his mouth") rather than a greying chronic debtor. I did like the way they showed Boston as a small town, a working town, not the bright set-like place Disney gave us in the film version of Tremain. It looks like a working port, and the workingmen looked particularly grimy as they should. Some people took umbrage with the portrayal of Franklin in the bathtub lusting over the pretty ladies, but I gather from my own reading on Benjamin Franklin that he indeed did love to spend long hours in the bathtub, attended by young ladies, and he was quite the roué. Tried taking Tucker out before the sunset was even gone from the sky, but even encouragement from the little boy down the street didn't help; he wouldn't pee at all. It's been popping and cracking and booming out there since way before the sun went down. Labels: chores, dogs, dreams, food, history, holidays, pets, shopping, television » Sunday, October 05, 2014
Timesink
Annnnd he's off to work again...while I was occupied by a long, complicated dream that included bad guys, a threat, and three dogs that I'd never laid eyes on before, and there was no conclusion to the mystery. Phooey.When I emerged from the bedclothes, it was quite chilly; the thermostat was standing at 64°F, which is what we keep it at during the night in the winter. Got dressed, walked the dog, and the two of us had breakfast, then I was off on errands. I needed bread for sandwiches for lunch, so I went by Publix, got some French bread, the mushrooms James had forgotten at Kroger last night, and a newspaper. The sky was a bright, bright blue; pity it's going to get warmer again. The sky looks so anemic when it's warm. I'd gotten a half-off coupon from Michael's via e-mail, so I drove to the Smyrna store and decided to get one of the big carousels to keep crafts in. My craft table is always a mess and I have to clear different containers off it if I want more room to work. This would keep all supplies corralled in one place and easily shifted. It was already half price, so I used the coupon on one of two tiny craft items. Checked out Dollar Tree at the opposite end of the strip mall looking for cheap, small dog collars, the idea being to put them on the two extendable leash handles, this way while we clean up we can dangle the leash from one wrist rather than having to hold the handle with one hand and fumble with the bag in the other. Only one big dog collar left. So I thought I'd go on to Big Lots. I took a shortcut through King Springs Road to check out the dog park at Tolleson Park, but could only find the swimming pool and the tennis courts. I either missed the internal road, or there's more of the park somewhere else, because I could see the rest of the park over the trees bordering the pool. [Later: Checked a map; the entrance for the other side of the park is on another road, which is what I figured.] Never went in Big Lots as there is a Family Dollar next door. I picked up baking soda for the fridge, a can of chicken spread for a lunch sandwich for me, and some thick elastic headbands that will do the leash job as well as a cheap dog collar. Finally it was home for a chicken spread sandwich on the last of the demi-baguette from Trader Joe's. I had a lot of things I could have done this afternoon. I did get two essentials accomplished: giving Snowy another turn in his carry box and replacing the duct tape on my splash guard. I gave Snowy his "ride" first. I put a sprig of millet in the box as an incentive, but he didn't pay attention to it, as there was too much to see for the little guy. First I just talked to him while carrying the box down the stairs, pointing out the artwork on the stairway. I hope just speaking to him calmly will help him get used to it. Then we went out to the porch. I pointed out bushes and trees and grass and houses. I know he doesn't understand, but it keeps the communication open. Then, keeping at an even gait, I walked down the porch stairway and took him to sit in the passenger seat of the car. I had to be careful to keep him out of the sun, as white birds and yellow birds can sunburn. I turned on the radio hoping it would make him feeling better; he was pretty calm, but still panting a little. The only time he freaked out during the trip was when we went out under the banner and it flapped in the wind. Finally I took him inside and walked him around the hall and the library before returning him to his cage. Five minutes later he was fluffed up and singing to his mirror. I got the purple duct tape on the splash guard of the car as well. It is fastened on (it was pretty solid when I took the old silver duct tape off), but the mechanic said some tape would help its stability since the piece the splash guard is fastened to is broken. Not sure I feel like dealing with Ed Voyles' dealership to get a new part! I ended up spending the afternoon cleaning up my craft room. First I loaded all the supplies: paintbrushes, markers, colored pens, pliers, scissors, some beads, some other jewelry-making supplies, and other bits and bobs into the new craft carousel. I am angry at myself because I knew I should have changed before I started this. One of the pens was leaking and now I have green ink spotting one of my weekend shirts. Grr. I also put up some floss, put the discount Christmas cards I bought in January up on the top of one cabinet, put the rest of the beads and charms in the new containers I bought for them, emptied some craft store bags still sitting on the floor (discovering something I bought for James God knows when), vacuumed, and finally washed off the desk. It was dry not long after and I finished a craft project on a nice cleared surface. I'd loaded the dishwasher and was starting dinner when James arrived home early, so he took Tucker outside while I got the turkey thighs in the oven. They were cooked with parsley, thyme, a little salt, and some white wine, and were quite yummy. We had Bear Creek chicken pasta as a side. Tonight: season premiere of Alaska: the Last Frontier. This was proceeded by a clip show, and I wondered if some new material was put in, or if we'd missed an episode, because I don't ever remember seeing Atz's wife Bonnie in an episode except in the background. They also had a sequence with the "bad luck calf" (he was separated from his mother on the cattle drive to the summer pasture, then a few months later was attacked by a bear) that I don't remember. Otto and Charlotte had to lance an abscess in its throat. I have to hand it to healthcare professionals and people who live off the grid; that was really gross. Labels: birds, cleaning, crafts, dogs, dreams, food, pets, shopping, television, weather » Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Not Waiting for the Waiting to Be Over...
...since I have entirely too many things I can be doing. I learned not to say "I'm bored" in front of my mother, who could always find me something to do (and it always involved housework or ironing!).Yesterday I washed and dried two loads of clothes, and worked more at web page "redecoration," manipulating photos for the various pages. This is always the toughest part; writing for the page is easy. I also went out for about an hour to take a 50 percent off coupon to Michaels. I needed a container for the different beads and charms I am using to make book thongs and other jewelry pieces. Found a nice one for only $6. I stopped off at QT on the way home because they're the only gas station in town that has free air for tires. I made the mistake of crossing over the top of my hood with the "rubber" hose, which made a half-dozen nice big scratches in the the paint. Oh, great, all I needed after that tire bounced off the freeway a couple of years ago and into my car, leaving scratches on the left side. They don't even match. We had chicken apple sausages and scalloped potatoes for supper and watched Sleepy Hollow and finally Castle. Neat little mystery there. James kept looking at the rich guy and saying "Why does he sound familiar?" That's because it was Tom Amandes, who's in one of our favorite From the Earth to the Moon episodes, "Galileo Was Right," playing astronaut Harrison Schmitt. This morning the alarm wrenched me out of a long, complicated, vividly Technicolor dream. I hate these; they go on and on, usually with no end to whatever problem I have in the dream (like correcting database pages or building a purchase order). James dreams about flying airplanes, I dream about work or cleaning the bathroom. [eyes roll] This morning I decided to tackle several unfinished "projects." The first chore was washing the floor in the hall bath where Willow now stays at night, and cleaning out her night things. Since I had the Swiffer mop out, I washed the floor in the master bath, too. Next, I was never satisfied with the total result of the to-be-read book distribution and I wanted to re-stack the Christmas books from World Book. I did this and redistributed a few books that were still in what was supposed to be a classic children's book pile into their proper piles. I also vacuumed under that pile before putting them back (I'm thinking of reading them one a day as an Advent project) and did the rest of the bedroom. Next I had to take care of the spare room. I took down the old foam "wedgies" from the closet shelf and inspected them; the foam was dark and starting to separate. I just packed them both in a trash bag. We don't really need the newer wedgies with the adjustable bed, but I kept them in case of a power failure or a guest who might need to use one. I also rearranged the "ditty bag" of snacks being assembled for vacation. Vacuumed the living and dining room. Finally put up the autumn garland on the divider. Rearranged James' magazines in a neat pile. Paid my credit card bill. Indexed the last five cross-stitch magazines I bought. Took some books downstairs to be shelved. Did my two required book reviews on Amazon Vine. Put a load of dishes through the dishwasher, emptied it, reloaded it, and am washing more dishes. Anyway, after five and a half hours of nonstop housework decided I was done for the day and have been reading "Backwoods Home" and the two British magazines I bought a couple of weeks ago, "Landscape" and "Landlove," while listening to the Christmas CDs I bought last year in Williamsburg. Have glass armonica music on right now. [Later: James made pork cacciatore with lots of onions and mushrooms...and slivered almonds, which was weird, but actually worked...and corn pasta for supper. We had pumpkin bread for dessert, and spent the evening watching a simply smashing three-part documentary on PBS about superheroes. Or, in the words of my people: wicked cool!] » Tuesday, August 04, 2009
The Tide Keeps Coming In, But Never Ebbs
Sunday night I did not sleep long (six hours at the most), but it was a sound sleep and I awoke relaxed.
Last night I didn't, and I am jittery, nauseated, and the muscles in my neck are all tense. I wish I could stop the damn nightmares. I remember when I used to work with Microslop Access I would have recurring dreams about spending hours filling in fields, only to hit save, then reopen the table and find everything blank, re-fill in the fields, hit save, reopen to find it blank, over and over and over. I would wake up exhausted because I felt as if I had actually been typing all night. Last night was a variation on this: I was given something to do that I thought was a rush, and throughout the dream I work, and work, and work on it, only to find out when I finish and have not worked on anything else that...someone gave me the wrong info and it's a Facebook game! Plus I think I forgot to take my Atenolol last night...bother. » Monday, May 11, 2009
The Sunday Night Conspiracy
It's usually about not being able to fall asleep on Sunday nights, but not always—but there always seems to be a conspiracy about us getting any more than four hours sleep on a Sunday night. Case in point: We were in bed moderately ontime and I assume both fell asleep immediately, since I can't speak for James, and sometime after four I awoke with a dry throat. I managed to rouse enough saliva to keep from getting up, steadfastly refusing to look at the clock, thinking it was probably twenty minutes of six and I had only a few sleeping minutes left.
I was just about to fall back to sleep when there was a rumble of thunder. Then a second one. No dog. Good! RUMBLE! "Bark, bark, bark, bark!" Sigh. I finally looked at the clock. It was 4:45. Oh, good. Some more time to sleep if Wil will ever be quiet. James finally "barked" back and she went silent. I hit the snooze alarm twice and darned if I didn't fall the second time right into REM sleep: two pretentious voices psychologically analyzing a song in depth was on the radio when James walked in the room and asked "What's that?" I said, "Oh, some music show—check out what they're analyzing!" and "Escape" (the "Pina Colada" song) started playing! By the time I drove to work the clouds were in tatters, although the weather report indicated it was still raining south of town and there was a drizzle downtown. The best part of the ride was passing Cumberland Mall into the little hilly area amongst which office buildings are scattered: there was mist pooled in the hollows giving the area a dreamy quality. I'm wearing my new shoes and my feet feel stiff and regimented. At least these fit so I can wiggle my toes. I always remember my first week at school every year with new shoes. They were always suede Hush Puppies made of the softest leather and back then HP still made wide widths in small sizes (size 6), so they actually fit. Still, I had to wear Band-Aids on my small toes and on my heels for at least the first week or I would come home with hellacious blisters. And people wondered why I hated buying shoes! Ah, yes, and here it is thirteen hours after dinner last night and I'm still tasting pizza... » Sunday, June 24, 2007
Strange Nightmares
I dreamt there were ants in the bathroom again, but this time enough to form a trail to lead me to their entry point. The exterminator advised me to spray them with Windex. In the dream I sprayed them with so much Windex I had an inch of liquid on the floor. :-)
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