Tic-Tacky

Past the pale: some bloggers have warned recently, and often, to check your voter registration status because the rolls are being purged. One method of selecting registrations to purge is name collection. This isn't done by reviewing voter lists for party affiliation, I hope. (In Ohio such official lists are not published, I hope.)

(Sidebar: I just went to my old county, Summit, and generated list of names and addresses of people who voted in the last primary, where a party may be declared. So I found all the names and addresses of those who voted the Democrat ticket in the last primary.)

Names are collected by collecting addresses of "adversaries". Having never participated in such collecting, and being sublimely unimaginative, I could only think of collecting addresses of political signage.  

A few days ago I read a headline in my news feed that the Portage County sheriff, (where I currently live), posted on his Facebook page that people could collect the addresses of Harris/Walz supporters by recording the addresses of their political signs. The headline was attributed to the Akron Beacon Journal, which has a paywall to read its content, and to which I do not subscribe.

I mentioned it on Allison's blog, and asked my sister to look in her paper paper for the article. I found the article this morning and just pulled up Gmail to send it to my sister, when Allison's email came in giving me the reference, too.

The collection of addresses is not for voter purge, but to direct  "the Illegal human "Locust(s)" (...who...) Need places to live...We'll already have the addresses of the their New families. 

He also had pejorative names for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. 

What a despicable human. Darrell Roland is up for re-election in November. I will make myself familiar with his Democrat opponent, and vote for her. The Republicans are building a war machine and it seems no act of suppression or intimidation or defamation is too small for them to ignore.

Make no mistake, MAGA plans to suppress the vote; intimidate the electorate. Do everything you can to encourage new voters and old to get to the polls.

In happier news, my daughter was picking figs, and found this: 

She captioned it "From Texas, no joke intended" since she had never seen a red dragonfly. My apologies to Ellen! Ours are commonly blue. Beth texted later she's found it is a Ruby Meadowhawk, common to Wisconsin. See, David, I raised my children to appreciate more than Blue Herons.

And finally, I finally was able to take a picture of our resident white cat.

We are reduced to two cats in the building, as far as I know. I know  little about this cat, whose picture is through three windows. I have it on excellent authority (Diana, who spoils Kitty to death) that this cat is a blue eyed, white, deaf cat. The first time I saw him, he was asleep in where you see him. Diana says his owner is an obtuse fellow. He put that disc in the bed hammock, and now the kitty can only sit on it.

That's it for now. No weaving news; I'm at warp's end and cannot weave until more thread arrives.

Interesting week

I feel as if I've wasted too much time this week. I have a series of pictures I wanted to make into a collage, but suddenly I cannot sign into PicMonkey to do that. So I've wasted more than a day trying other photo programs, to no avail. Since that is not working, here they are; some bird and butterfly flowers in one of the courtyards.

Our weather is changing. Day time highs are sixties and seventies; overnight into the fifties or less. Tonight is forecast to be forty. This does not auger well for winter; I'm afraid to learn how much snow is predicted.

We've also had decent amounts of rain, while much of the state is in drought emergency. In fact, one of the new units flooded because ...below grade. I believe there are twenty new units and three or four are occupied.

I've been weaving this week, and the current run will be done and posted next week. This time it's dark grey. When they are off the warp won't be enough for a full run of towels, so I'll finish with a batch of cream.

It also is my sister's birthday next week, so I made the front door curtain from the khaki and sent it off. I sent it on Tuesday and she had it on Wednesday. Granted she's only thirty miles away, but...

That's about all the news. I am rather tired; I have not slept well the last couple of nights. Tonight feels like a good sleep coming on.

Political junkie

I've watched four nights of the DNC, most of them from start to finish. Biden and I are the same age; I owed it to his excellent presidency to hear him say Goodbye. The rest of that night was OK to very good. The rest of the show, the last three nights, was stunning.

How did they put it together? It was like a show rehearsed for months. Everyone on their mark, delivering pointed, poignant, deliberate and direct addresses. The mass of delegates and spectators every night! Half way through I had to agree, the Democratic party has taken back patriotism.

The election is still a cliff hanger; it can go either way. This great ground swell of enthusiasm must be laser focused on the outcome, the goal of putting Harris and Walz in office. Only by voting big can we save our government from a fascist term; put ourselves back on the path of a moderate Supreme Court, House of Representatives and Senate.

I'm also concerned about what may happen after Harris and Walz are declared winners. I know there are militias, well drilled and organized, intent on more armed disruption and rebellion. I pray our national guard and our police are equally intent on disrupting their plans and putting more and more time between their mayhem and good government.

Meanwhile back at the ranch, I did not report that Betty left this life a couple of weeks ago. She fell and hurt herself enough to require a couple of stitches. She seemed well enough, talking, smiling. But literally overnight she gave up, quit, and died one day later. 

It's not the first time I've seen this happen. A room mate in my rehab days closed her eyes one evening, with family and children chattering about her, trying to make her eat dinner, and left. Across the room I saw it happen and rang for a nurse, who came in, looked at his patient, and explained her death to all those around.

That's enough of that subject from the last place I intend to live.

The empty place at table has been filled by a friend of Rose, who moved in a few days ago. The new section of the building has twenty apartments available, and three have been filled in the two weeks they have been available.

Back at the loom, I will be done with the khaki towels this week. 

On my shelf of thread, so many colors left to weave. Lavender, light grey, charcoal, yellow, blue, grass green. Any picks?

Oh, to be old and doddering

Some days I wish stupid errors did not get under my skin, even to the point of irritation. Here's a small one. A small sign announced Eggs Benedict, Saturday morning, for breakfast. I ordered one Egg Benedict, with my usual substitution of a piece of bacon instead of ham under the egg.

Two mornings a week we have a doddering old woman behind the counter, relaying orders to the kitchen. Like the character Joan-Margaret in Grace and Frankie, she shuffles in and out of that swinging door, bringing her breakfast offering back with a hopeful smile. She brought me a poached egg, broken and swimming on the plate, over several pieces of bacon, topped with Hollandaise. "But you asked for it over bacon!", when I refused it. Enough of the petty.

I switched my pharmacy to my prescription plan's mail order service. This began a month or so ago when I called them to compare prices, and to update my address when the comparison was quite favorable. A prescription came up for renewal, so I gave the nurse my new pharmacy. The next day I had a text to confirm the order for delivery to my address--in Peninsula.

Back on the phone, I called to confirm the order and switch the address, again. I was told the three month prescription would cost $450 and change. I was transferred to Benefits, where I learned I was again in the Donut Hole. An annual occurrence. Back to the order desk to confirm and be sure my address was correct.

Thursday I had a text that the script would ship that day. I called again to confirm it was shipping to the correct address. "Oh, yes, Ms. Noragon, the address is correct." I made him repeat it to me, to be sure.

Saturday I had a text that my package was delivered that day. Since my mailbox is downstairs, I waited until breakfast today to retrieve it. No package. I checked the tracking. Yep, delivered to my old Peninsula address, where I have not lived for four years.

I called and spoke with a well trained operator, whose only mistake was to tell me I had confirmed the old address. I informed her that every call was recorded so there were at least three recorded instances of my change of address. She is sending the replacement by expedited mail.

I certainly hope I don't have a credit problem to unscrew, too.

This whole transaction should have been as simple as some operator rising from his/her keister and verifying the address on all platforms. Perhaps not even standing up.

In better news, the pumpkin towels came off the loom yesterday and are on the computer today. A real head start on Halloween.

Another week in review

Very early in July I had a big shipping day. So many mailers of towels, they were bundled by a big rubber band about the middle. And with not a lot of further thought, off they went. USPS has been good, once they recovered from Covid.

A few days later, all had been delivered. Except one, to Florida. At first the tracking number only indicated it had arrived in Georgia. Then, in two or three giant leaps, the package was across country, to California. It made a U-turn there, and began a return journey. It came back to Georgia, early last week.

Ah, good, thought I. Next stop, Tampa. But NO. Actually, I do not know where it went from there. The recipient visited her post office for help, and help was Do not worry; it will appear when it's tired of travelling. They did institute a missing package alert.

Between July 7 and today, it was handled by nineteen different USPS facilities. I sat down at my computer today, thinking there would be more bad news about that poor package, especially now it was out there in Debby's path, too. And there was an email, telling me the package was safely in the addressee's mail box.

Now I'm looking to find everyone else has weathered the storm!

Weather here has not been spectacular, though no hurricanes are possible. We've had two weeks of severe heat, and around here that means afternoon thunder storms. We've had one of those more days than not, plus a sighted tornado. A storm was winding down as I went to supper one day last week, so I stepped out to the courtyard to take a picture.

April showers and all that. Actually, July and August rain storms have keep the grass green and flowers healthy. My not Mandevilla is beside itself with blossoms and grasping shoots.

It's trying so hard to throw a tendril around the bench and own it, too.

In weaving news, I finished the pine green towels this weekend. They are on the shelf and on the web page.

Currently on the loom, pumpkin. In anticipation of Halloween, I suppose, but also because I visited my sister recently, and noticed she'd made a valance to shield the west facing window in the front door. It's one of those silly windows no one is tall enough to see through, but she says the winter sun is brutal. 

Only problem, she made the valance from a towel. A bathroom hand towel. I can provide a length of toweling, and in a good color for her living room:

Normal has returned

Or, the current news from my turf. There is little to report, but I am capable of scraping up a bit of news. I have a standard appointment with my PCP next week and had a note on my chart that she ordered some routine bloodwork and please have it done two or three days ahead. Great, thinks I, I have a standing order for thyroid blood work that I have not bothered with; I'll do it all at once.

Visiting this clinic is not so easy as visiting the clinic I used to frequent. I think that was a Cleveland Clinic afterthought, smallish, easy handicap access, fairly quick turn around. This new clinic is intimidating. I made the first visit cold; I didn't go look around first. Consequently I learned it is big and has a lot of business. Parking is adequate, but all up the side of a hill.

All handicap parking was occupied that first time, and my walker and I made a long journey down a long hill, across two streets and a median, then the long walk to my appointment. Reverse process to get back to the car. Ever since I have bit the bullet and paid an attendant for valet parking.

So, checking in yesterday for the two sets of blood work, I learned my PCP had ordered fasting. Of course I wasn't. I get out of bed to eat breakfast.

So back this morning on an empty stomach. Surprise, the Saturday parking lot was fairly empty, a good deal since there is no valet on Saturday. My walk was reduced to crossing two streets, a median, up the sidewalk and down a hall to the labs. Job done!

Speaking of job done, my new HVAC unit was installed a week ago Friday afternoon, as promised. Some pictures:

Ain't it purty! I hope it outlasts me; I don't want to do this over again. My carpet did get dry in 24 hours, but only because of that industrial fan, open windows and low outdoor humidity.

I'm weaving again, now that the loom and all else are back in place. This time it's a green, bright, not too dark. Pine tree green. Here are both sides, and then I'm back to work.

Topsy turvy

 It seems I am grounded for awhile. I was weaving this afternoon, with my treadle foot stripped to my sock. After some time I decided that foot was wet. Actually, the sock was sodden. I looked for the source of the water for a bit. Where had I stepped in it? It was dry around the refrigerator and the kitchen sink. Same in the bathroom.

A mystery. I changed my sock(s) and took my length of fabric to the laundry room. Back in the living room, I realized the carpet might be wet. It felt wet to my hand, and did not pass the tissue test, which came back wet.

The ensuing hours have been a whirlwind. Maintenance came, removed the front of my HVAC unit and saw it was about one third iced up. The thermostat was turned off, two big men moved my loom and several other things on wet carpet. Up came the extractor, which sucks up water. Then the industrial fan, which exceeds OSHA noise limits, in my opinion. Kitty retreated to the back of my bedroom until I came back from dinner and unplugged the damn thing.

The HVAC unit is disassembled. Two windows are wide. Temps are forecast to be very low fifties tonight. Maintenance tells me they will have it all back together by tomorrow afternoon. I barely believe that. For now the giant fan is off. My ears are still reeling. I'll turn it back on in the morning. Kitty may have a nervous breakdown.

Back to the surprise birthday party! Rose was completely surprised. Completely. One hundred people did not spill one bean. She was not dismayed. The affair was organized by two people she would have suspected, a daughter and son-in-law.

But also in attendance were a son from California, two great grandchildren who also live there, and the grandmother of the grands. It was a very nice party.

So, wish me luck returning quickly to a normal life. For now, it's a very hot shower and winter jammies.

I haven't gone over the edge yet

A silly little meme has popped up several times recently. It's profound, actually, and needs shared: If the earth were flat, a cat would push everything over the edge.

Kitty does not work from that direction. In fact, since that great television disaster the first month she lived here, she's made no effort to jump up on anything.

She tried to jump onto the chest that holds the TV, but sunk her toenails into the mat under the TV and dragged everything several feet to the floor. No cat was injured, and the TV likewise survived. 

Now Kitty is content with standing on her two back legs and surveying any flat surface she can see. If something is enticing, she claims it. Chap stick and pens are most fascinating, and I am currently reduced to pencils. I guard my chap stick closely.

The warp I wound on end of May or the beginning of June is gone. I only put on fifty turns because I did not know how the current towel would be received. But all the towels left on the shelf were hemmed and put there tonight. so I should weave more towels next time.

Jan is coming to monitor the spools on Saturday, and then I'll be tying on the current warp of probably a hundred turns. That should turn into maybe fifty towels and perhaps I can get a little ahead. The rosepath towel is very nice, and there are other small weaves that will be good for towels, too. I think next I'll try a birds eye weave.

You would think in a building of a hundred residents it would be hard to keep a secret. I'm privy to one that has been kept. Tomorrow is Rose's ninety sixth birthday. Rose is adamant there will be no singing or fuss. In fact, she instructed the dining room director the staff is not to sing and there will be no cake.

Rose's daughters have outwitted her. Every Friday most of the residents gather in the Bistro for live entertainment and "Happy Hour", in the hour before dinner. Unknown to Rose, her daughters, and probably sons and daughters-in-law, will appear and lead the party.

Rose is one of my dinner partners, and it's clear no one has tumbled, and Rose is pleased as punch tomorrow will pass without a fuss. At supper tonight, she didn't even mention that tomorrow is her birthday. 

More news

First and foremost, a happy holiday to all. I hope everyone could celebrate with friends or family, or both; and there was plenty from the grill to eat, with baked beans and coleslaw and watermelon.

It is raining here, which is good for the flowers in the atrium, though there may be a damper on fireworks tonight. Just a tiny corner of the atrium:

Speaking of outdoors, an amazing amount of work went on this past week. Plenty of landscaping has improved the view from my window immeasurably. 

Temperatures last week approached or exceeded one hundred degrees. The landscaping crew consisted of Amish men and women, who planted hundreds of specimens. 

I cannot find any use for the concrete in the middle of the yard. The patios do not connect to it. The only access is from the back, utility entrance. But, the interiors are coming along. There are blinds in the lower windows and the stickers are gone from the doors and windows.

I finished weaving the light blue rosepath towels and have them on the web page. Bobbins are wound for the next set of towels. They will be lavender. 

I'm still here

The red rosepath towels are done and mostly hemmed. I put eight towels on the web page today. The loom is tied up and I think I'll weave the light blue next.

I believe I like the roses with no path best. Here is a one over one comparison:

Or perhaps deeper rows of roses before the path. We'll see.

In other news, we had an astounding presentation last weekend. A group named Matsiko performed. It is a troop of orphaned children, mostly from Liberia, singing songs in their language. The songs were accompanied by energetic dancing and footwork.

The first two photos need to be animated to convey the volume and dancing. Here is a video from earlier this year. The singers circulated in the audience during their opening number, shaking all the hands they could reach.

After the performance the children ate supper with us. There were three at out table. but the girl at the end of the table was off for more ice cream, dessert. All three ate plenty of supper, and plenty of ice cream.

The girl across from me was eighteen, the girl next to me sixteen and the one off for more ice cream was the group's youngest at fifteen. This last also had a sister in the group, as did Elizabeth, across the table. 

Among our three we had a future doctor, geologist and undecided. That and a bit about their life on the road was all we could elicit. They simply did not stop talking and had been primed with endless questions to keep us talking.

How old are you?

How many children do you have? What do they do?

Where have you lived?

What did you do?

And on and on and on. Irrepressible. And maybe high on ice cream.

Where have you been?

It's Sunday morning. I'm doing laundry. There are two machines in our laundry room, and generally I am using one and Sandy the other. But this morning EMS took Sandy to the clinic. I teased Maddie, the other machine is free this morning. Old folks humor.

I did eat breakfast with Maddie in the atrium, after she watered the plants. This is the other atrium, the one I pass every morning, going to breakfast. The Japanese dogwood is in full bloom. The other atrium is surrounded with plants that Maddie and our activities director, Joan, take care of. 

That atrium is like working in my old gardens, except I can't, anymore. I did decide this morning I can carry the watering can on my walker tray and take care of the plants in pots, so I'll do that. I asked Laura to bring me a shovel full of pinks from the old garden.

In other family news, my oldest daughter is in Ireland, on a hiking trip around the Dingle peninsula. I'm sort of jealous, but not so much. I can't do that kind of walking any more.

The first is the Dingle Bay. The second an historical library somewhere in southern Ireland, or a train ride away from their base lodging. Perhaps another time she'll head for Omagh or Armagh, where our Presbyterian ancestors originated.

And my other daughter bought a house. Not the first but hopefully the last. This house is half a mile from her sister. Isn't it amazing, how siblings can fight like cats the first twenty years and be friends ever after.

I'm weaving red rosepath. I'm weaving the paths as well as the roses. I like the look of it and can't wait to get it fulled. That will be next week, earliest.

It's been some time since an update on our two year old construction project. It has devolved into mud. In addition, I wonder how attractive apartments renting for thousands per month will be with a view either into someone's window or the street with traffic; cars, trucks, ambulances! Anyway, here are some views:

The top picture is right out my window, across the trash strewn parking area. These apartments are several feet below grade, as you can see. There is no water retention area; they are the retention area. Aurora seems to have no master water plan in effect.

The second picture is the concrete poured between these apartments and my building. Excuse me, but wtf? Just one more nail in the flood plane problem. What about those second floor balconies! They could at least have installed beige railings!

Moving along, the third picture is the sidewalk to nowhere and a view across the parking area, stacked with excess siding, so the dump trucks bringing in dirt from who knows where have an awful time getting it dumped. The sidewalk to nowhere ends just under Kitty's window. I need to get down there and figure it out.

And finally, see that chunk of red in the last picture? That's just another piece of trash they didn't bother to pick up; all that concrete is poured over any piece of siding, pipe, drink bottle or 2x4 in the way. 

Every one I explained these problems to just rolled eyes way back and said "Not in charge!" Well, my second floor apartment won't flood, come the big storm. 

I'll take pictures when the landscaping is done. Probably next summer.

On the road again

 A remarkably short trip this time. Last Tuesday I had a dental appointment, followed by a picnic supper at my sister's house. The dentist was not so good; more than one cavity and the same old hygienist turned surly. I do not like the modern method of tooth cleaning by water pick. As I've told her time and again, if you can't keep the water from blasting down my throat, please do the job the old fashioned way.

Dinner with Jan and Tom and Laura was fun. Standing in Jan's new kitchen and chatting was fun. And knowing that in my absence a box of new weaving thread was scheduled for delivery to my door was even more fun. Jan and I arranged that the very next day, Wednesday, she would come in the afternoon to be the official thread changer, putting on a new spool of thread when an old one ran out.

When it was on and we were clearing away the tools of the beam dressing trade, Jan said she was very pleased; the entire warp was beamed without a single knot. She used to put on rug warps that way, but wondered if we had ever managed another in our long career. I don't know.

It is lovely. The warp is also two inches wider than previous towels, twenty four inches, not twenty two. It's weaving at twenty two inches, a bit more than ten percent take up. That's good.

But to continue with the boring bit. I spent Thursday, Friday and Saturday threading heddles. This is the part that can put me to sleep, it's so mesmerizing. I'd realize suddenly I'd threaded 4-3-2-1 instead of 1-2-3-4, and that would be it for the day. There still was one threading error to straighten out this morning.

Today I started weaving Rosepath. It is lovely. So far I'm only weaving the roses, not including the path. I'll try a bit of that before I begin weaving towels for sale. The current batch are rose thread, to free up all the bobbins I wound. This time the long float, that is so good at soaking up wet, is horizontal, not vertical.

One more thing about this pattern, and then I'll leave off and go weave some more. When I used to devour old weaving patterns in interesting sources like Dover reprints or Foxfire or Whole Earth, I loved the weaving notation "tromp as writ." It's from the days when intelligence was shared on scraps of paper, and the sharer, having used a precious scrap of paper to transcribe the threading, condensed the remainder of the weaving by noting to treadle exactly as threaded. This pattern is a true tromp as writ.

A couple of weeks in review!

 I suppose it's to be expected in an old folk's home, but it's still taking me by surprise. There are some really old people here. Audra turned one hundred last week. A fellow named Merle will be one hundred in December.

In addition to that, we celebrated the seventieth wedding anniversary of a couple, Faye and Fred. Neither of them is ninety yet! There is only one other married couple here, but one is in this building and one is in assisted living. They are Bert and Gert.

As someone who is terrible with names, I am fascinated by all the help from the names themselves. There are three Mary's here. I only fastened on Jean's name after I realized there was a Gene and a Jean, not related. Gene has gone to another facility, but I got Jean down in time.

It seems most everyone has a name not currently popular. My particular friends are named Maddie (Madelaine), Marcia (my great grandmother's name), Rose and Betty. The last is a version of Elizabeth, my daughter's name.

I bought a couple of crooks for hanging plants in one of the outdoor atriums, and asked Maddie to buy mandevillas to hang there. She called from the nursery to tell me all the mandevillas were already trained on hoops. I hadn't considered that old problem. Laura and I always deconstructed them and repotted into my metal hanging containers.

But ever resourceful Maddie had a solution, dipladenias. Best yet, buy one, get one. She came back with two of them, red, and her son and dil helped her plant everything she brought. I didn't think to take a picture this morning, so here is one I stole from the internet.

And last, but not least, the thread I ordered is scheduled for delivery Tuesday, next. I hope to be started loading the new warp soon after. Tuesday I have a dental appointment (cleaning) and then a picnic at my sister's, with some of the grands. Hamilton, Blake and Laura. Maybe Bek.

So, I'll get serious after that. I've decided first to weave off the few spools of thread left, and then to weave with red, yellow, blue and green to start. The new pattern will be rosepath.

Mysteries

Today was cleaning day. Any day is "cleaning day" if I see something that needs done and I can do it. A while back I grabbed the Swiffer and dusted all the chair rungs. It was a mental throwback to an early job when I was at the bosses' home, having "tea" with his wife and some others. We were sitting on the floor, around a lovely low table. Suddenly she looked under the table, took her napkin and began dusting the table legs and rugs. "A place the cleaning lady never looks," she said.

Such I always thought about the cleaning staff, and what the hell. They have a lot of rooms, and people with differing habits and wants, and then the whole huge building. I can dust my chair rungs every so often. And Diana was just leaving my bedroom when I grabbed my Swiffer to clean the chair rungs. She asked what I was up to, and I told her. I blamed it on the construction dust from outside.

"Not so," she said. "It's all from your humidifier."

You probably cannot see, but against the lamp standard rising in the back is a faint cloud of steam from my little humidifier. It is a cold air unit, or as my father used to say, it flash fries water and spits it out. I bought it the winter before last, and it ended my bloody noses at once. But according to Diana, it is responsible for this:

All the white, powdery stuff that settles on everything in the apartment. I don't know. I'll keep running my humidifier and dusting the furniture rungs.

I've also emptied my loom and am ready to embark on a new project. I think it will be towels. But I need a new treadling. The Shaker towel I've woven for years is a little workhorse of weaves, dense but not heavy. It sops up water.

There are other interesting weaves that I'm sure would work. One is a pattern I first found in a Dover reprint of an nineteenth century weavers manual. I wish I could remember its name. It was a list and description of what a journeyman weaver should be able to produce. Sort of the thing Benjamin Franklin might have set and printed in his brother's shop.

The pattern is a variation of herringbone twill and was called Irish Fancy. I threaded it up more for the name than the pattern, but it turned into a staple of our weaving studio. We wove all the fabrics for our heavier garments in the twill. One popular garment was an over shirt with a Henly throat, a thick, soft cotton in that twill.

My daughter and her boyfriend way back then each had one. After a camping trip Rich told me the shirt was incredible. Dried him off after a swim and he sleep in it at night. All around versatile. I bet it will dry dishes well, too. 

The other possibility is Rosepath. It's another twill weave, but one I've never tried. In my opinion, it needs to be expanded as an overshot weave, and that is very time consuming. But I found a Rosepath treading that expands the little flowers with a bit of plain weave between the rows of flowers. Interesting.

So, I'll thread up each and see which I'll choose. Then I'll have to order more thread, fix my web site again, etcetcetc. Several price increases of thread later, I'll have to recalculate cost. I wonder if I'll be shocked.

Things happening this week

I glanced out Kitty's window this morning and saw men unloading scaffolding from their trucks. Great, I thought, they will start putting the roof on the new building.  Wrong. I left Kitty eating her breakfast and went to eat mine.

I came back from breakfast to see the scaffolding set up right outside of Kitty's window, and then for the next couple of hours the loud noise of cutting the mortor from between rows of bricks. Two hours of incredible noise. The man handling the grinder has ear protection! Here is some of the work. I wonder if it's to point up the bricks.

Laura visited a week ago, and borrowed my wheelchair. Her friend's mother needed a chair to go with them to a concert. Laura left behind a norovirus that left me incapacitated much of last week. It's awful to be out of commission.

One afternoon I decided to be a recliner vegetable and settled in to watch Netflix. I bought a Roku stick for my fairly old television about eight years ago. The Roku controller is probably that old, and has fresh batteries, I knew, because I replaced them quite recently and had to buy them first.

Nevertheless, my controller, henceforth known as The Clicker, didn't work. I could not get it past Hulu. Eventually I quit its game and asked Beth to come have a go. She did and eventually announced the Down button did not work. She could still navigate with the Up button, but nothing down.

All the replacement clickers on Amazon said for Roku television, not for Roku stick. I got on the Roku web site. No phone number, but a chat site, with a robot. It didn't know what I wanted, and offered to connect me to a technician. First it wanted credit card info to handle a one dollar charge.

My bank objected and asked me to authorize a charge for fifty five dollars (apparently refundable to one dollar). I did not, and that was the end of Roku. Back to the search. I may have found an old bit of OEM clicker. It should be delivered today. If not, I'll just click backwards. 

Odds and ends

Bear with me on this first odd. I've gained ten pounds. It could be the mocha or the ice cream or the thyroid, or all three, or one or two. I was pretty scrawny a year ago, after the pacemaker episode and the hole in my lung and the norovirus. The pacemaker doctor asked me to get back to 120, and I did all that by last April or so, and then paid no further attention.

Until this past week, when I realized it's getting warmer outside and soon I will ditch my elastic waist corduroys for jeans. I have not worn elastic waist trousers since childhood, and they may have seen the last winter! I put on a pair of jeans this week and faced zipping up like a teenager, flat on the bed and stomach sucked in. I got it done

But I see that heart doctor in a month or so, for the annual check up, and it would behoove me to present better. In short, a diet that does not include mocha and ice cream, for starters. It could also revert to my sister's lovely oatmeal muffins for lunch. Somehow we lost track of them this past year.

My sister just got a new kitchen. She and Tom bought a little house three or four years ago. It all worked for her except the kitchen, which had that crazy, post World War II housing type of little kitchen. She's pretty good at laying out kitchens, having done it twice at the old house. She knows what she wants, and she got it!

Small kitchen, lots of function. And more important, a new stove with oven to make oatmeal muffins.

One day last week Jan stopped to deliver a batch of muffins and catch up on gossip. And get her kitchen warming present.

I had some left overs to finish up for lunch, so it was today before I got to the new oatmeal muffins. And, oh dear, they were dryer than a bone. I manfully worked through the one I took, thinking "How can I tell her her new oven really needs calibrated. Or fixed!" I called her this afternoon, and tactfully, I hope, broached the subject.

And when I got done, Jan said "Well, that explains why I still have buttermilk left in the fridge! I forgot to add it." So, I need to lose ten pounds and hope I have a start on it.

I have been remiss about weaving this week. Each day was less productive than the previous, to the point of my doing exactly nothing yesterday. Nada. Zero. Zilch. I did get out of bed this morning feeling remorseful as well as guilty.

Fortunately, I encountered Betty and Margaret at breakfast. They are pleasant women. Betty is my table mate who I helped with her new hearing aids. And both are Tea Party, proving strange table mates can come to a truce and get along. The best part of seeing Betty so early was needing a scarf model and there she was, again.

We posed in front of the pool, in the atrium. Several women were in the pool, in the midst of their weekly exercise lesson. For the first time I am strongly tempted to join them. Eighty degree salt water sounds very tempting. I'd even buy a bathing suit.