Rita's Bits of Life

I always mean to write, but you know… I had grand plans to work on my latest quilt today. Had all day with nothing happening. And with a great night of uninterrupted sleep, no restless leg syndrome. Thought I’d get lots done today. Woke up at 8 ish, listened to the radio for about an hour – grabbed a little extra beauty rest – then got up. Ate a carrot muffin from Patty Cake, a vegan bakery, but it was not good. A little blah and the cream cheese wannabe frosting was grainy and sugary.

Checked out google news, and played a game of gin rummy and pinochle. My eyes started feeling very heavy and I figured a little nap wouldn’t hurt. I woke up 3 hours later. So much for quilting all day!! Decided I needed a venti vanilla sweet cream cold brew while I watched the Genesis Open golf tournament on Peacock TV which has the best coverage. I’ve gotten really lazy about changing clothes to go through the drive-thru at Starbucks. Wore my at-home/pj’s. Who will notice?

So I guess I’ll crochet and watch golf today.

On the surface, it seems like a daunting task, but i realize if I take it one set of folders at a time then I can accomplish this.

Today I combined all the Seattle photos. I’m making a page of my favorites that I’ll attatch to thos page.

Seattle

It had been 6 months since my last shot of cortisone in my wrist but my hand and fingers were hurting terribly. This episode came on quickly. Usually I feel a tingle in my fingers, however, this time it was full blown pain. I’m letting my hand rest from my usual handwork, such as sewing and crocheting, and organizing photos from my Nurnberg HS years. I’ve scanned most of them but I’m going through each picture to make sure I do have it in my files. I know, maybe a little OCD, but these memories are precious to me. It’s clearing out my stack of photos though and leaving empty spaces on the shelves. Off the albums go to a thrift store. It’s exhausting work when I discover that I have multiple sets of photos in file explorer. Each one has to be named so I can see how many of the same photo I have. Should have labeled them in the beginning. Life lesson learned.

Went to bed last night to the sounds and sights of nature’s fireworks. Rock’em sock’em thunder careening off the buildings and brilliant lightning illuminating the tree canopies.

Woke in the middle of the night to intense darkness and quiet. Trees had whipped into the power lines leaving me without light. It was at first unsettling. I’m used to going to sleep to the drone of a frequently listened-to video keeping the thoughts of days past, present, and future at bay. Wasn’t sure I could fall back asleep without sound of some kind.

When I awakened at 8 to the piercing sound of my phone, I still had no electricity. AEP workers were laboring to fix the effects of nature at work.

Headed to Home Depot for GrassBGone, pruning shears, and decals for my trash can. As I pulled into my parking spot, a man with a truck stopped behind me and told me he noticed I had some dents in my car and he could fix them right there in the parking lot while I shopped. His truck was labeled with advertisements that stated he did indeed fix dents. He quoted me $100 and I thought it a fair price so I went shopping and let him do his dent thing.

When I came out, he wanted payment in cash. Now I barely carry $10 with me let alone a hundred. So I went back in the store to buy birdseed which I wanted anyway and thought I could get $100 cash back. Turned out I could only get $50, so I bought a candy bar and got the rest of the cash. He was waiting for me and I gave him his money that he said he needed for his son’s birthday gift. Truth or not, but the dents are fixed and as I left he was roaming the parking lot looking for more dents.

On my way home I noticed a hillside near the high school that has always been covered with milkweed and other wildflowers, is now skimmed like a burr haircut. I was so disgusted, I wrote on the HS’s facebook page. Seems it’s the quickest way to attract notice and to get a response.

Earlier this week, I spied a deer lounging near my apt. I took its picture and realized it had a rope around its neck. The end of the rope is frayed so I assumed it managed to get away from whomever had it captive. The more I looked at it, I am not sure it is a deer. I sent the picture to the Columbus Zoo to verify its unusual markings. I had reported it to the Worthington Deer control and they will be on the lookout for it.

So an eventful week.

Three day adventure to Connecticut to pick up hatch cover. Drove 9 hours to Danbury CT to spend the night then about 10 miles to Bethel, CT to meet Brian. When I got there, it was not as expected – a warehouse really and Brian was not there. Thankfully a woman who was driving off, asked me who I was looking for. I told her I came from Ohio and Brian said he’d be there all day. She called and said he was only 10 minutes away. Really very sketchy place, but he arrived and put the two pieces in the car. They weren’t as big as they said, for I was sweating that they wouldn’t fit.

I drove about 6 hours through I-80 and it truly was a beautiful drive- hills and trees as far as one could see. Must be beautiful in the fall. No construction on Saturday and Sunday though there were many places where there will be on Monday. Slept in this morning and drove about 3 hours home. Will deliver hatch cover to Logan on Monday for him to begin the transformation.

Discovered I have multiple sets of photos in different places on my computer. AUGH!! No wonder my computer is running out of storage space. Also, my couch won’t be delivered till June 6 which creates another complication. I’m not planning to be here! AUGH! Getting this couch is turning into a nightmare. I had been waiting to schedule a time after my little couch was gone. If I had known, I would have rescheduled long ago considering I’m mostly sitting here. But getting bored with deleting photos. I may go over to Franklin Park. I need to get out.

Surviving the Pandemic in numerous ways, but today I’m clearing out duplicate pictures on my computer – I have so many. When I am ejecting duplicates from one of our Nurnberg HS reunions in Denver, I view a few of my dear, dear friends who have passed away in the last year or two and my stomach gets so sick. I have to stop and go on to something cheerier like making a birthday card for a niece I was searching for a picture of her and somehow the NHS folder got mixed up in her family folder. So back to her card and hopefully I’ll be able to withstand these memories of my dear dear friends. But this will only keep happening. What a sad prospect that afflicts us all. Guess I’ll find something really cheery such as an episode of Endeavour – people die there and Endeavrour figures it out, but at least I don’t know them.

Nice lunch with the gals at Goat in Hilliard.  They had a great salad with mahi mahi.

But everything aches.  I’m always reminded of John Denver’s song – ‘There’s a Storm across the Valley” cause I can feel it’s a-coming!!  The arthritis pain index for Columbus says I shouldn’t be feeling anything – tell my throbbing knuckles that!!

Making a Matagorda Bay photo book for Craig and Loretta.  Great pictures if I have to say so myself!!

Think I;ll crochet a few rounds on Anna’s skirt tonight until my shoulder hurts worse.  Watched Finding Nemo and I think I’ll watch Finding Dory tomorrow.  I believe I like it more.  There are crazier characters if that’s possible – the octopus and the truck leaping  off the road into the water is crazy!!

Long time – playing lots of gin rummy online with a computer and I’m really beginning to hate it.  Is there a point to this game?  You can’t make any plans, cards just come at you willy nilly – but I am playing it for distraction.

Waited in a long line to get a Covid test that was required before I had a colonoscopy which was postponed anyway but decided I’d get the test anyway.  It was negative, YEA!!

Updating my Nurnberg memories page and sometimes I get a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach when I begin to enumerate how many of my classmates have died.  It feels like when Mom died.  I feel like throwing up, so I have to quit for awhile.  Like now and do something else to take my mind off things.