Back at it

I had the booster Covid vaccine yesterday, and exactly as anticipated, it laid me low. This shot was easier than the first two; I got there and back and ate lunch before it swept me off my feet. I woke up long enough to consider supper, then fell back asleep until today.

Speaking of supper, I've located a number of sources of ready made meals. I'm currently using one just down the road, in Cuyahoga Falls. The modus operandi of all of them is to have local cooks, and the food is either delivered or picked up. I'm using CleanEatz currently, about five miles down the road. They are pick up only of preordered meals. Here is one of their meals I've enjoyed.

Pot roast. I added a slice of bread, for extra volume, and put the slice back in the bread bag. I stuffed myself on this meal, and when I had the second pot roast meal I'd ordered, I could not finish the last couple of potato chunks.

Another company I'm considering, for their large selection of meals, is CookUnity. I have no good sense of how they operate, and have not tried them yet. They are based out of New York. I believe they use local cooks, then ship. The link is to their service area map. It's quite big.

Anyway, I've solved the meal problem.

I have not resolved the back pain problem, but it is marginally under control, and I'm closing in on small hints at the problem. After all these years, I believe my office chair is letting me down. My leg can be pain free when I sit, and when I attempt to rise, wham, pain stabs.

I've ordered a new chair that supposedly is squishy soft, which is tolerable. 

In the event it's not soft enough, I added a three inch cushion.

Good news, I guess. When I got up from this afternoon's nap, I went straight to weaving, and arrived at the last bobbin before half done. Maybe I'll have this set done by the weekend, and that would be a good thing, as I'm down to three colors again.

Some history

My sister and I began weaving about the same time, in the early eighties. In a short time we had more than we could give away, and began exhibiting a local shows. At the time we lived in two different houses, in two counties, a good forty five minutes apart. One day she said if we really were to do this (weave and sell), we needed to be working from the same house.

The two houses were put up for sale and we began looking. One afternoon Jan called me and said she found a contender, and we should look at it together.

We bought the house in 1988, and wove and sold at shows until 2003. Jan was tired of weaving and had already begun quilting. That wing to the left was our studio. It held ten looms, and later on Jan's long arm quilting machine and all her sewing machines.

In 2016, more or less, the house was becoming a little more than we could physically maintain. It was sold, and I moved just a block away. L was beginning high school and I still worked for the township, and needed to stay in the township.

There were two offers on the house, identical in every way except the woman also would pay for the inspection, and the man said I must. I accepted the woman's offer. The man tried to start a bidding war, I turned him down. The house belonged to the woman and her mother, rather like Jan and I began all those years ago.

K, the new owner, was easy to befriend. She and Laura hit it off at once. I once posted a picture of the two of them on the fall MetroPark hiking spree. K has been L's go to person pretty much since they met.

Back to the house up there, K lived here with her mother and her two sons. But in the last five years, K's mother has passed, her sons have graduated high school and are in college, and worst by far, before the vaccine, K contracted Covid, and now is a long hauler. There is nothing pretty about that!

K invited me to come live in the house some time ago, and I turned her down. But thinking of the winter to come, this past summer I called and asked if the offer still stood. So now I rent the two rooms on the right, on the east end.

You can see two windows of the front room, which is my studio. The little window in the middle is the bathroom, the back room is my (old) bedroom. I also have the laundry room, which is under the front porch, and my old bay in the garage (no more snow on the car!).

I hope that catches up everyone, and you will know to whom I refer when I drop new names. At least when I mention K.

Ready for tomorrow

It's Friday, and what a week. I believe every day included a nap, thank goodness! I finished the emerald towels and they are cut and stacked to sew tomorrow.

I went for a much overdue haircut, and decided to go back to my no muss, no fuss, minimal hair. What a relief; the wind can whistle past my ears.

A woman was seated next to me. She left her little dog tethered to a chair leg, out of sight beyond the counter. The old fellow let out the smallest, saddest little yip, and with permission the owner went back and gathered him up.

It's a ten year old rescue who does not trust his person to return. How sad.

In other news, I've scheduled a booster Covid shot. At the beginning of the year, when vaccinations were somewhat of a mystery, I was all over scheduling shots and helped my sister arrange her shot and her husband's. This booster is a mystery to me, but when she announced she and Tom were done, I went to her site and scheduled mine for next Wednesday.

The other big news is discovering ready made meals, for pick up or delivery. There are so many options I believe I'll go a week at a time, checking them out. I've ordered six meals from a national company, CleanEatz, located in Cuyahoga Falls. The week's menus are posted every Thursday, for pickup Sunday. They will bring the package to my car.

The car turned out not to need a new battery.  I knew I'd replaced the battery recently; the clerk came out from the garage and showed me it was this past January. My battery merely needed an hour charge, to return it to normal. I do like the towing company that came to jump the car two days in a row, but I'd never buy a battery from them. It's just not their business.

While I waited for the mechanic last time, I took a look around at the old place. K has been so sidelined by her bout with Covid, maintenance has been furthest from her mind.

Blake offered to come help me with any jobs I wanted and I told him save his courage for spring. That garden desperately needs his and Hamilton's ministrations. 

Needs must

Been away a long time, it feels. Back now, and working up to a hundred percent. Had that long needled shot Monday afternoon; slept a lot since. Too much Novocain and dye. But I've been weaving, too, between naps. I'm about four bobbins from done.

I like to pick out the next color and put it to the end of the row of spools. Soon, I hope to use the color I picked!

I'd picked kiwi to be next, you may remember, and then the last of the "real" greens left the shelf, so I picked emerald instead. That soft melon color toward the center presented itself as a good color to go next, until the last of the blue towels left. So, it will be a blue next, probably the next to the last on the left.

Physical therapy is ahead, too. There was very minimal walking these last six weeks, and I will not be back to my cane without serious exercise. That begins a week from Friday.

Today I did put the walker in the car and headed to the post office with an order. It was not as cumbersome as I expected, and the clerks were happy to see me again, though they assured me my deputies had done well.

The car has not been started since the end of August! The door did not unlock by a push of the button. In the driver's seat, the engine had no intention of turning over. So, I sat in the warm sunshine and waited for AAA to come start it. The fellow told me I had about 45% of my three year old battery left.

There is a problem I still must solve. Food! Meals on Wheels will not cut it, at least not the food prepared for Summit County, Ohio. Portage County seems to produce better meals, but Summit is an abysmal disappointment.

Last night I had Salisbury mush steak with a layer of salt gravy, mixed veggies and cubed potatoes coated in salt and paprika. Even limiting myself to the potatoes and veggies, I had a raging headache.

Tonight I had ziti and two tray portions of veggies. Even scraping most of the meat sauce off the ziti, the salt content was overwhelming. My esophagus and stomach burn.

Last night I spent a lot of time investigating the delivery capability of local restaurants, and finally coming to the conclusion I could not afford that. I thought about it on and off today, and a phrase jumped into my mind: Ready made meals near me. Bonanza.

I found a dozen sites on the internet, and the meals look healthy. Something to investigate tomorrow, between weaving, having a car repair made and visiting with my sister.

Idle hands, etc.

These last six weeks have been long! I am a type A personality, I guess. It may be something you come with, but I also know I was raised to not be idle. I learned to pass my radio, and later TV, time with handwork. I didn't teach myself, my mother put something into my hands.

And now, this stultifying pain doesn't give a damn what I am. I defeat it in large blocks of time by sleeping. That generally follows a night of not sleeping, and then, no matter what my plan, I fall on the bed and sleep away two, three, four hours. 

I did that this morning. It put a serious crimp in my plans for the day, which were to pack an order, finish hemming the cerise towels and do the laundry, including changing the bed. In spite of three or four extra hours this morning, I got all of that done except bring the laundry back upstairs.

Dozing over my news feed this afternoon, who came in but L. After hugs and news, guess who lugged up the dry clothes and even made my bed. L, of course.

I did accomplish much of the rest, including this sort of victory lap picture:

This photo taken October 3rd, after the run of lavender was finished.

And this photo taken this afternoon, when I finished hemming the cerise and threw a few shots before leaving the studio. Two weeks. There is hope of accumulating some towels for the township's little show in early December.

I think this new color is emerald. I've had it for two or three years and can't match it well to the color chart.