Thursday, November 30, 2017

Another doctor another day, a good day!

In reality I did have a good day, but hearing your neurologist confirm that you are in Secondary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis can cause a knee jerk reaction, yup get those too, ha, Although, many with MS do go into this form; so I am not alone!
And oh sure, I knew for the last couple of years and was told that it most likely could be.

The only real problem is my ckd, chronic kidney disease and hypothyroid disease that prevent me from trying experimental medications. So what I am on already Copaxone,  Gabapentin and Baclofen will be my continuance indefinitely until they really show no help at all, and then...what?

NAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Not going to go there.

Oops this IS A GOOD DAY a very GOOD DAY!
Snap out of it gal!
Good day, good day, good day!
Mantra.
Good day, good day, good day!

Moving on...

And so we went to Tuesday Morning's  to look for a set of everyday microwave safe sandwich, snack plates. Our adorable colorful set with seashells on it is no longer made and I did search the Internet.
Odd how just the small set of snack, dessert plates all broke except for one, the rest of the set that is a service for eight is still fine thirteen years later. A gift from a friend.

If any of you know where I might find these dishes that would be wonderful!





See cute! Last snack plate...!
Hold out dear one.

Any-who, allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you also to kindly count all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!


Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Amazing news!

And so a bit of a celebration! So we had our usual's at the Thai Cafe, crispy duck for Hubby and curry duck for me, and of course our beverages of choice water with lemon.
 Hubby taking a PIC of me unbeknownst to me, the rest are the ones I took of this small hole in the wall strip mall restaurant that has been there for decades  with a delicious international cuisine. A cup of clear both with with different veggies each time comes with your main entree, lunch is about ten bucks each according to whatever you have, dinner is much higher, and they are closed Sundays.
                                            I love these garish elephants below, the picture doesn't show the sparkling  glittery of their costumes, quite lovely for this appropriate decor.

                                          Hubby's is in front of him, duh, and mine is in the forefront of the photo, duh again, as you see the portions are way too much! So more than half came home, and I just tried eating it, the other half and half of that was again refrigerated! So well worth the price I think.

Oh the celebration was due to the hematologist telling me that I must have had a false positive of the Lupus Anticoagulant, my third test a year after the last two twelve weeks apart for them said, although part of the test indicated a small possibility that it has waxed or waned, but my only need would be to continue my aspirin that I have been on since 2006 due to a TIA then and it's a coated 81 mg. aspirin that many take anyway. And as a young woman it may have been there too during my miss-carriages, most likely. Only reason to see her again is if I do get a blood clot! And I should be on anticoagulant injections when having any other surgeries.

On that note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

Tuesday, November 28, 2017

Errands day.

Errand definition: task, job, assignment, collection, delivery, mission, undertaking.
For more info goto: http://www.dictionary.com/browse/errand

I know you knew, but nothing like being certain we are all on the same page.
After all this is an international blog that ten countries read weekly, and thank you for that!

Hubby and I left the mini manse about eleven A.M. and we were on a mission, see above, you see our three year old vehicle's battery died in our garage!
And all hubby was doing was trying to set up the Bluetooth with the new phones!
It turns out it was just a three year battery anyway, our van that is mini too was purchased 11-15-14, so the three years were up! Logically!
Good thing it happened in our home's garage!
Although, we do have towing on our insurance policies, yep even for our boat!

Instead of buying a second battery for our new boat we bought a jump box that works to start a dead battery anywhere!
So Hubby used that and our ole battery started right up, and we drove directly to Sam's Club, a big box store we belong to, membership is $45.00 a year, and you get bargain prices on large sizes or quantities of things.

Any-who, we buy mostly gas, petrol, coffee and extra virgin olive oil there, and sometimes paper goods.
The battery thing was not originally on the agenda for today, but we have learned to go with the flow.

Our insurance check was deposited after the bank signed too, first estimate people will be here Friday.
Then we went directly, never shutting off the car to our Sam's Club destination and took care of the new battery immediately at their facility for that. Hubby went inside for our coffee while they first tested the old battery for life, and no it was really dead and could not be revived sadly, and then they quickly installed the new one that is guaranteed for up to three years for a total replacement if it fails.

 Lunch was at Steak and Shake, been around since 1934, we had not been there for years, and we got their fancy burgers with fries, mine with portabella mushrooms and Swiss cheese, Hubby's Wisconsin's buttery steak burger and beverages of iced water with lemon on the side. Half of mine came home, and Hubby ate it for dinner!I ate other leftovers. Reasonable lunch for two only, ten plus bucks!

Next stop was for Hubby to return a pair of sunglasses he got at Wally World that the style, and sun protection were not very good, they were only fifteen bucks, he had saved his receipt thankfully, but they are very good on returns... no problem there!

Lastly, we stopped at the upper Publix on Cochran, not our usual at Charlotte Harbor.
We picked up odds and ends like vitamins, club soda, Dawn refill, oh and Hubby's Foster Grants for twenty bucks, yep real decent aviator style ones with Polarized tint protection, so worth the extra five bucks, absolutely!

When we arrived home we had a call from my MS. Multiple Sclerosis, neuro's, neurologist, office on the voice mail confirming my this weeks appointment, and I also see the hematologist for the Lupus Anticoagulant this week. I had gone for my yearly blood work last Monday and they did receive it already, thankfully.

Next month the nephrologist for the CKD, chronic kidney disease, and also more blood work a week before that, both eye docs, regular and neuro, in January as well as our new internist for us both yearly for Hubby: me just to establish.
Oh well.
Such is my life; so fun is my distraction.
What do you do to help yourself stay sane?
Come on... spill the beans, ha!

On that challenge of a note allow me to be the very first to wish you all a very happy good night and ask you all to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!



Monday, November 27, 2017

Nottin...

...as in doing: "not-a-thing", nottin.
Hubby had his follow-up eye surgeries' appointment today, his cataract implants have given him the 20/20 vision he was told he would get!
YAY!
He has his young again eyes!

This time I stayed home.
We were expecting some deliveries today.

Moving on...

I was able to catch up on General Hospital or GH, as it is fondly called.
A Soap Opera for the ages; it has been on for over fifty years!
I began watching it forty-five years ago when on my first maternity leave.
And on and off ever since.
More since becoming a retired bum.
Well, not really a bum, a woman of leisure!
Doing whatever I want whenever I want to do it, yeah that is an oldie but a goodie!
Some say you earn when you get older, like you did hard labor, well one baby yes 29 and half hours... yup I do know they don't mean that, ha! Although...
Yes, I guess I did worked long hours in many chosen professions.
But most I enjoyed.
Diversity... be my many careers.
And it was.
I worked as a child of seven as a store model, at twelve-seventeen as a babysitter that afforded me the ability to buy my own clothes, a fast order cook at the age of fifteen, and a model, saleswoman and floor manager at eighteen-nineteen, a credit manager, and still modeled by twenty, telemarketer, a co-owner of a retail store, service business and a restaurant where I was a chef and server, a hostess at a restaurant, an entertainment manager for a promotion agency, also a spokes model there too that they also had me casting commercials and applying makeup for the participants and as an MC at a beauty competition and a district sales manager for an international company! 
A volunteer board member, fundraiser of many fashion show luncheons and one golf tournament, certified aquatics instructor, and I had been trained to write grants and teach classes for self help, from my journalism back in college, a newspaper journalist, a novella author, and these last going on ten years a blogger!   
Whew it was all pretty much fun!
Who knows what will come next?

Life, we all live it... and I think that with all my travels too, seeing most all of the contiguous United States, and eight countries that I have no regrets and there is little more that I can wish for!

Taking inventory on my quiet days... you too?

On this note, allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

Sunday, November 26, 2017

Numbers like...7!

Yesterday, I showed you a picture of the shells I collected, it looks like only 6, but in reality I did collect 7, the bottom two were stuck together, Ta DA! Hang on for a bit please while I explain... there is a rhyme to my reasoning... and today when we were out shelling again Hubby helped me collect a few more...54! Now we can all add that 54+7= 61, and 6+1=7, interesting? Are you following me here? That number seven is very, very lucky in numerology: https://mysticalnumbers.com/number-7/ as well as the bible: http://www.biblestudy.org/bibleref/meaning-of-numbers-in-bible/7.html, how about that? Now what it means having to do with the collection of seashells I have no idea, do you? Yesterday and today we did not count while enjoying the experience we just did it, I know... crazy! Coincidences often are, well hopefully it will mean GOOD LUCK, because who doesn't need some, all of the time we all do, hmm? 
Any-who...
Oh and we did go fishing too, and Hubby and I both caught lady fish, that's the one I caught on the deck. Hubby's fish spit out its lure, yep we caught both on lures, but we let mine go too. There is no meat on them they are very bony, but the reason there were so many of them all around our boat is that dolphin were chasing them!                                               

 Hubby letting mine go, above.
Below is an effort to photograph the dolphin waiting for Hubby to throw the fish back in, yep that was weird, really weird!( The shadow in the upper right of the pic.)
 The below picture is of the Boca Grande lighthouse and park across the channel from where we were around the corner from Cayo Costa State Park for our shelling, and nearby where many dolphin appear to fish!
To the Gulf of Mexico from the harbor!

Again a lovely day! 

All we can do is wish the same for you!

PS (Just under five hours, we try not to leave Gus for any longer than that. And yes, we have tried to get him to come out on the boat, so far no luck. We have no ideas on how to do it without scaring him anymore than he already is, he puts the breaks on when Hubby calls him aboard and shakes, treats haven't worked either, you name it; we have tried. Sincerely we have no idea what to do, since all our other four legged little loves loved the boat and all other water activities. So we have not forced Gus and consequently he stays home.)



Saturday, November 25, 2017

So we decided to take another...

...cruise, and this is what we did...Hubby released us from the dock and we rode off into the sunshine...



 We saw people paddling...


Birds fishing and flying!


People sailing...

And shelling...
Oh WOW!That was me I was able to deboard our yacht/vessel.
Hubby took my walker off and I sat down and slithered off onto the beach that I hadn't been on for too long!
Oh what a feeling! My first shells above for the first time in years and years!
My today's happy ending!
Hope yours was as good too!

Friday, November 24, 2017

Ours... I am showing you...so you show me yours?

HA! Sorry Joan W., I did read what you wrote.
My ole school chum was tired of seeing all the food pics from the holiday! So...one more couldn't hurt really, nah... this pic shows the sliced turkey, corn, French green beans with roasted almonds casserole, along with the mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, peas and carrots, stuffing, herbal gravy and whole cranberry sauce... what's missing the peaches in their own juices as well as the rolls I forgot to serve! Oh yeah all the people...!
 Oh and dessert was the pumpkin pie with whipped cream! And here is the end result of that....look below.
Aaaah family, gotta love them! Those legs are Hubbies in the foreground. We are side by side as Number One Son is with his Number One gal and Gus is on one of his two beds this one as you can see is under the coffee table, ha! We were listening and watching old time videos from Simon and Garfunkel to We are the world with everyone, to Ebony and Ivory, the original and a few others, and yes prior to that we did watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and the National dog show. It was raining here most of the day... but after all our food had time to digest, sort of... we did go for a boat cruise, the rain had stopped but the harbor was a bit choppy, and we did have some swells. The sun had set so no pictures were had of that, and we were a bit early for all the Christmas lights. All in all I do think we and our kids had a good time.
Thus no significant blog last night, hope you had a very good too!
I did see a few posted pics and from what I saw I believe everyone did!
Yay!
 Good news!

Happy good night to all and to share those blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

New phones take great pics!


Wednesday, November 22, 2017

What a day!

Getting food pre-prepared for tomorrow so we can spend more time visiting with the kids than running getting everything ready!
Made, for the first time an herbal gravy: by trial and error although no errors really made, just tweaking the taste with adding things, we used, yep Hubby helped towards the end process, any and all dried poultry seasoning herbs were used: sage, rosemary, parsley, thyme, garlic and lotsa salt and pepper, Kosher salt and sea salt, ground pepper and black cracked pepper. Had bought for the first time a container of salt free chicken broth that I ended up adding three of my packets of salt free chicken bouillon, and of course half and half butter/olive oil roux with flour for thickening. Tomorrow I will probably add some turkey drippings too.

My French cut green beans with toasted almonds, butter and lemon, salt and pepper also pre-made by me, but Hubby and I discussed adding some of my delish gravy to it that is without the allergic issue of onions or mushrooms and so we will tomorrow, both items are already in containers in the fridge, along with our sweet potato and mashed potato casseroles, all veggie  platter veggies have been cleaned with lemon juice in the spinner and bagged up ready to be put out tomorrow with their ranch dressing also chilling in the fridge. we also are cheating with Stove Top stuffing, a no for Number One's gal due to onions , but he can eat it and Hubby likes it too. Cheese board that happens to be our wedding gift is a marble lazy Suzanne dual purpose that came with a matching cheese knife, all cleaned and ready to go as well as our other cheese knives, all dishes and serving pieces have been washed too, as well as glass ware!

Hubby vacuumed and washed all floors and even our outside windows!
I dusted indoors and cleaned mirrors etc. and bathrooms.
I decided since I am so pooped now so I will just be heating up our very naturally sweet frozen corn instead of creaming it.

Whole cranberry sauce has to be chilled too, I used to make that from scratch, oh well.
Oh the cocktail sauce I made too, so easy with ketchup, the good kind without that fake sugar, and horseradish, and the already steamed pound of shrimp for Number One's gal and me is defrosting in the fridge, they are the extra large variety!
Pumpkin pies are both small ones though from the bakery at Publix known for their quality and the whip cream is chilling too, again store bought but the real thing.

My hands are swelling and ankles too, so I guess that means I am all done for the day, ha!
Still after all these years I am working on that pacing thingy, guess I need to tweak it a bit, ya know?

Happy good night to all and to all be safe and have a wonderful THANKSGIVING, and we will too!
Share all those blessings, as one of my friends does daily, gotta love the gal!
Such a wonderful positive attitude; great job on that Andrea!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear! 

Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Sex, sex, sex, and more sex!

Men are pigs!
And who gets blamed for that?
Their mothers!
Not in this household! And we, Hubby and I raised two; men that is.
Women stop making your sons PIGS!
No, not funny at all.
I see as the main honest benefit for all of the women telling on their seducers, pedophiles, rapist and every other vile not asking at all or ever for touchy feely bad demonized behavior from any man is that all of the male perpetrators will be fired and put into jail if it all ends the way it should, leaving all their career positions to be filled by decent caring non-sexist people called WOMEN! If only!
 
Gosh, this is a horrid topic to discuss, but I say it's about time too.
The timing is right for all of us to get this horrific secret out into the open!
And I applaud all the women, children, and men who have told with so much strength their individual mistreatment's, and hope that these discussions helps them deal with their nightmarish horrors in their life's histories and gets the animals responsible dealt with appropriately! (Sorry to all animals, I do not mean to defame you, for lack of a better noun, forgive.)

For I too was, or should I say, "me too"! I was a victim from my male family members when I was a child, but thank God I said no to them and it worked, they held me down, two males that shall remain nameless here. I yelled and ran, and another time, earlier, one of them asked me if he could put his you know what into my you know what, but he said it using the right anatomical words, again I said NO,... and I went for decades never telling anyone until I was an adult in my thirties. Not as severe as most, but to me it was bad, real bad.
So I get it.
Scary, confusing, especially when you are prepubescent... and I even get it for the adult women too.
It's difficult to tell due to why or how you feel you, "let", yourself get into that precarious situation so we blame ourselves and then horrifically out of fear tell no one, not good, yup I do get it!

 When I was a high school student a boy I knew snuck up behind me at my locker innocently tickling me and I made a fist as I turned and swung, missing him though! I was that way whenever anyone snuck up on me. He was fine, but he never did that again.

Hard to get over some things.
Maybe that is why I went to an all girls college, although Hubby and I were dating then.
I was not into public displaying of affection either, I was marred; still am somewhat... I guess.

On this note allow me to be the very first to wish you all a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!



Monday, November 20, 2017

Getting ready for the holiday!




Hubby has mowed and trimmed the lawn, and today we went grocery shopping for Thanksgiving celebrated this Thursday. (For my international friends.)
Our menu is turkey breast with ribs in, we had taken a vote on whether we should get a whole turkey or just the part we all like by asking our Number One Son last week when he was here.
He and his gal prefer what we all seem to, thus the turkey breast.
After all it is only for the four of us.
We had considered getting the combo dinner with a whole turkey that the grocery store Publix has, but it serves two to four times our guest list for the smallest one, plus a few of the items were not to our liking and we would have thrown it out; that one with the marshmallows, ya know?

Any-who, we are serving mashed sweet potatoes with butter and cinnamon, and stuffing, French cut string beans with almonds, peas and carrots, creamed corn, whole cranberries sauce, rolls and Hubby wants mashed potatoes too, oh and then gravy for both that and the turkey! Number One Son and his gal either dislike onions and mushrooms or are allergic to them so I have to be careful.
Dessert is pumpkin pie this time; with whip cream.
Since the kids don't drink alcoholic beverages when they have to drive a few hours to go home, yep sadly they cannot stay over.
Beverages are iced tea, ginger ale, coffee and club soda.

Prior to the main meal we have cheddar, Gouda, Brie and crackers, vegetables with dip
(crudités), and shrimp with cocktail sauce for Number One's gal and me.
Number One found out as an adult that he is allergic to shellfish, and Hubby is not that enthralled with shrimp these days.
Dinner will be around two due to time constraints.
And after perhaps, weather permitting, a cruise? A chance of rain is in the day's forecast; 40%.
Then dessert when we arrive back.

The TV is always on in the background Thanksgiving Day, from the morning's  Macy's parade in NYC to the National Dog Show in Philly. Used to be the football games for my Dad and other men in the house, had been a tradition and still is, but my guys do not watch football that much the other two programming things... thanks for that guys i.e. no football (American)! Although, I do miss my Dad always explaining each move to me. My Dad loved and watched all sports on the TV.
Even when I was a cheerleader that was the one sport, football, that for some reason I could not comprehend.

On that note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night, and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!



Sunday, November 19, 2017

Cruising along...

Our day was pleasant out on our yacht, translation our 20' Bennington pontoon boat and again sadly without photographic remembrances for us or my blog. We had cruised in and out of canals and into  lakes called Spring Lakes. I just enjoy the atmosphere and looking at the exterior landscape architecture of the fancier than ours home; such as lighting, hardscapes, pool surrounds, docks, etc.
Although, they are etched in my brain, but you can't see that...oh well.

You see, my phone has a virus and next week we should be receiving our new phones, all our memories in the phones that is were full anyway.
Our phones have lived past their expiration dates, I think, technologically anyway.
The new phones will have better phone memory and picture taken ability.
And no they are not "I" phones, we get droids, so that means they are "we" phones, ha.
The price for two of ours are about one quarter of one of the new, "I" phones, ours are Motorola's MOTO E4 plus, droids.
We were hoping to wait till next year to get them... but...sometimes stuff happens.




The red A is close to where we live but not it, we are this side the west side of route 41 the Tamiami Trail, about a half inch south of the red "A".
Interesting factoid...The Tamiami Trail: got its name due to it being the original route from Tampa to Miami.

Moving on...

RED, speaking about red... I did something... for the holidays I have become a true redhead!
Oh what fun!
Those ladies in the Walgreen's commercials finally got to me, gotta love them, they have gumption!

On that note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!


Saturday, November 18, 2017

Boating day

We had visited around our neighborhood via our vessel a cruise of our local canals to see how they were doing post Hurricane Irma.
You see, we do have a whole lot of snowbirds in the area.
Definition of snowbird: northerner who has second home to travel to when the snow or cold weather begins where they live the other half or quarter of the year!

We were never snowbirds when we moved here the deal was final, back on August 19, 1986.
 Although we did vacation here in Florida for short term visits on and off for ten years as a family; once as long as three weeks before then.
But I personally had first come to Florida the winter of 1957-58, and then again the summer of '67.
So we really knew our way around.

Charlotte County has significant mileage of man-made canals, yep fifty-five miles!
All the blue stuff is water and waterways! So we decided to do some touring nearby our own waterway B-7 and the rest of the alphabet area!



We found that many people had more damage than what we had thought.
And many of those who had not had repairs done yet might be of the snowbird variety.
As many lovely yards were there, destroyed looking unkempt were there too... waterfront properties that famously are of the more expensive nature, ya know?

Many hurricanes can do that.

So these people will have a lot to do when they arrive.
And I had mistakenly thought that we did not suffer that badly in our county.
We are on the front lines for most all storms, although no storm surge was incurred apparently we all suffered different amounts of wind damage.
Wind can be nasty!
Leveling homes from the top down.
That is the reason we cover windows to prevent the wind from entering and imploding our homes, not just fear of broken glass!
So tape is just ridiculous!
And portions of pieces of wood of coverage is the same, just plain stupid!

You must logically have the entire window shuttered with fasteners or in recessed windows 3/4" plywood covering with Plylox: http://plylox.com/wp/, creating a suction seal!
Garage doors should be reinforced on the interior with two by fours nailed inside the metal brackets, and/or roll your vehicle against it.
Garages are notorious for allowing the air/wind in to destroy your home!
Lanais now have pop out screening. 

There are so many ways to minimize damage, but if you are not here... you can call a neighbor to do it!
Many folks when they leave to go home up north for the summer they close up their homes with all hurricane protection, sounds like a good idea, hmm?

Not necessarily, fires are harder to put out when no entry is available causing house loss, robberies occur due to looking empty, and on and on...so it's damn if you do and damned if you don't...call the friend idea is the best or hire someone.

After Hurricane Charley I wrote an item for the paper about ghost pools, homes were gone but those in-ground pools stayed without anyone to enjoy them, and became hazards for children and health.
The law went into affect to fence them around that time.

So much weirdness after the disasters, a truck was thrown into a tree, a very high tree... but, ya know something, no matter how many times nature misbehaves we pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and start all over again!

On that note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here, ya hear!




Friday, November 17, 2017

Happy Birthday Hubby!

His celebration began Wednesday with...
Number One Son purchasing his birthday cake!

I on the other hand extended it through Friday, his actual birthday!
And he is the one with the recent removal of his cataracts! Mine were removed in 2010 and 2014!
Sorry, he threw me off with his entire height thing, he should have been sitting, really, ha; it's my excuse and I am sticking to it!
So actually I should have NO excuse.

Imagine the rest of his handsome head, heaven knows that you have all seen it before enough.
Although, just minus the cataracts, now, hee hee!

So what did Tobi buy for Hubby for his birthday?
A great card and a fishing shirt, sunglasses with so-called cheaters in the bottom (reading glasses), and lunch at his choice of restaurants!
Oddly enough he chose Ruby Tuesday's since they also have a healthy choice section with calories stated, he did it for me... what a guy! On HIS BIRTHDAY!
I protested and wanted him to go to his favorite Mexican restaurant, but lately I have been saying how unhealthy their menu was... he remembered.
Oops!
Better for both of us; brainwashing does work with love!

We did try wine a few weeks back, and oddly enough to me it tasted like straight rubbing alcohol, could be our cheapness in choices, and no I have never ever tried rubbing alcohol internally, i.e.
Hubby too lost his taste for the stuff.
You see, with my bariatric sleeve surgery I had to sign an agreement to not drink any alcohol for one year, but Hubby and I chose about a year before that to discontinue it, ha joke on them!
So abstaining for two years and so we thought why not try it?
And we decided nah.
Any-who, with Hubby now joining me in quitting smoking for nearly a year for him now!
We are goodie, goodie two shoes with more money to spend elsewhere! Aha!

We are only on drugs, physicians prescribed ones that is... with lotsa of vitamins too!

On that note of now knowing Hubby is once again a year my senior, hip, hip, hooray!
Allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night, and HUBBY A HAPPY BIRTHDAY another oldie but goodie, and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!


Thursday, November 16, 2017

It's not like my ...


...head was moved to another location, ya know?
Then how come I cannot remember where it is when I bend down to get something?
Again I hit my noggin, this time on the inside of the fridge!
No hard surfaces too hard for heads to make contact with that is one that has been injured due to my stupid moves!

Same side as the other head banging, but lower in the temple area south of my farhead where the other lump resides, but both on my left side.
Ice pack is being applied as I write tonight, but I also have been applying it to my farhead bump too! Not as easy to do as one might think while trying to tap on these keys to do this!

In the old days I would have smacked myself for this ignorant self harming maneuver, even by accident it is ridiculous, but as we all know now that would just be foolishly redundant to do and probably just cause the need for a third ice pack and I do not have enough hands for that, hmm really?

Actually, if I lean back just right in my bed where I am currently lying the one on my farhead and the one on my temple just lie nicely flat in their locations with their ice packs doing their thing, and allowing my both hands to be freed up to write, Ta DA!

By George I think I got it!

Moving on...

Any-who, Hubby now has had both of his cataracts removed and his eyesight so far is doing what it should be doing... working just fine!
No glasses already!
With lefty just done yesterday pretty great!
Righty was done just over a week ago!

I do believe he is very happy with his outcome.

On this note allow me to wish all of you a very happy good night, and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!




Wednesday, November 15, 2017

You know how you know you should feel something?

                                                               
           

Feelings are sad when any family member passes, no doubt about that!
Rocky roads of decades to have fixes or failures and friends and foes, family or estranged family, trying and giving up, realizing that sometimes you have no other choice.
Although, you cannot change the fact that you are related, whether by marriage or blood... FAMILY can make you joyful, overwhelmed or incensed, such is life of decades of how it could/might be?

My parents both passed away way long ago in 1982 and 1986, Mom first a week before her seventy-first birthday, and with her no matter how angry we made each other within hours we would make up and we were so very close and spoke daily on the phone, I miss her still.
Dad too was a forgiving doll and never ever let anything fester for long even if it was way crazy, as a teen as I could be, but I always knew that he too loved me, he died at seventy-nine, back in 1986.
I truly had their unconditional love, and so did Hubby from them.

Hubby on the other hand did not have it as easy.
And his parents came with conditions to their love, and so in many ways this meant there would be highs and lows to his and therefore my relationships with them.
Foolishly, in the beginning I tried to be miss fix it, and tried to encourage overlooking harsh realities of how they were.
Condemning us for not doing things religious wise as they would have preferred.

Hubby and I were raised in two different, very different religions, and though my parents never interfered in how or in what religion we should raise our sons, at first Hubby's Mom had.
Though, after a while she respected our feelings and we chose to raises them as heathens, ha! 
Yes, without formal religious training but knowledge of their roots of their families heritages.
As adults they found their own ways and are happy with that freedom of nothing being shoved down their throats; thank you very much!

Over the years my MIL, Mother-in-law who showed me much love and compassion even calling me more like a daughter than a daughter- in- law!
We showed her a wonderful time whenever she visited us, and for that she did seem very happy!
Even when she started to lose herself from dementia she seemed to reach out to her middle child, my Hubby with moments of rational thinking.
She even cut from the newspaper something that she had difficulty verbalizing... a picture that spoke volumes of what she herself was unable to enunciate. What it says is, "From the Heart, I love you." Written in the sand.

This woman who gave Hubby, his sister and his brother their lives as well as sadness and strife and perhaps many times over also much joy, passed away yesterday peacefully in her sleep somewhere in a Pennsylvania nursing home or a hospital after having unsuccessful surgery for a blood clot at the very good age of ninety-six, not far from her ninety-seventh birthday this coming January 17th.

Mom farewell, knowing you for me has been if nothing else interesting, heart-stopping, infuriating, loving, and at times rewarding and you allowed your middle child and myself to say good-bye to the most of the old you before you were totally lost to us forever, and for that I thank you.

A church going woman who volunteered with the church and never said no to helping elderly friends when a younger woman.

Mom leaves in her life's wake, three adult married children, eight grandchildren, six or more great grandchildren, (sorry lost count) so in a way she will always live on...as all families do!

Adelaide Kruegel 1/17/21-11/14/17, may she rest in peace, she will be sorely missed by many.
Me included.
To be factual, Mom hasn't been Mom since before 2010, due to dementia, sadly then we had to say good-bye.

Odd notification from an unusual family, sister in PA calls eldest brother in WA, eldest brother notifies middle son/child in FL via email.
One grandson, son of middle son, visiting is told in person, youngest son somewhere in Fl also told via email, that he hates for this sort of thing, but again no choice no other way.
And the sad legacy continues...!

Tuesday, November 14, 2017

Going to be a quickie tonight.

Number One Son visiting earlier today!
Went out shopping and to dinner... relaxing now.

TTYL?

Monday, November 13, 2017

Good news!

We left the homestead late this afternoon 3:50 P.M. for Hubby's check of his right eye and according to the doc he is doing just fine!
That news allows for his left one to be done this week, YAY!

From there we thought we were going to pick up something hot for dinner from Winn Dixie's prepared foods, but we did not see anything we liked, so... we actually picked up two big Macs and one medium fries and one chocolate shake to share right in their parking lot at the local McDonald's.
I ate less than half of the big Mac and handed back some of the fries I took to Hubby, he also finished my big Mac; I had taken less than half the chocolate shake and added skim milk to it and it was fine.

I had a bad night last night and a mediocre day today too, rest wise.
Yesterday, I did something stupid, as usual.
I bent down in our shared shower room seeing something on the floor, and hit my head, basically clunking it on the porcelain toilet edge.
I saw stars and felt a bit dizzy, but got into the shower anyway.
After, I rubbed the sore spot and was somewhat relieved that there was no bump.
The bump came later, much later.



So I put one of my many ice packs on it that night switching out with cold ones all night long, and I was apparently afraid to sleep.
You see, over the years I have had three medically diagnosed concussions, so you remember what to do for them.
I even had a cracked skull once that showed up on one of my MRIs.
My head seems to get in my way a lot, and for some reason with balance issues I have a chronic problem of hitting my head first on my way down in falling.

Thus so many headaches, besides from my allergies.
Caffeine helps headaches as well as Vicks Vapor Rub under the nose after using Simply Saline for sinus related causes I have found.
Thus what makes me, me are a culmination of those noggin knocks?
Not unlike football players I suspect, and with Multiple Sclerosis lesions I am screwed brain wise!
Legal/legit excuses I suspect?

Oh darn.
And lack of sleep, since fear of blood clots or hemorrhages... makes sense to me...

Night, night, sleep tight or loose, or not at all, whatever is better for you personally, ha!

Take care and be aware of those wayward toilets jumping out in your way! Shelves, counters, desks, tables, walls, doors etc, you get the idea...

Allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and share all those blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!




Sunday, November 12, 2017

Sorry folks.




Nothing earth shattering in our inner world, re: to our home that has occurred.
Although, the news on the other hand was flourishing with many fake and true newsworthy information for our souls to see and hear and learn from with access from many modes.

Hubby and I for some odd reason sat in the same room and watched a Stephen King novella based movie, 1922. Mixed reviews.
We were not that frightened, some of King's stories are scary as any of your worst nightmares!
When I was a child I read all of Poe, i.e. Edgar Allan Poe.
To me Stephen King was/is a modern day macabre stylized Poe, so I read him.
In the 1970's he could not write fast enough for me!
My favorite to this day, is his, The Stand, that I must have read four times, yes several hundred pages and newer versions with additional pages!
As a child and into adulthood I read all of Agatha Christie, Erle Stanley Gardner, Arthur Conan Doyle, etc. those sorts of oldies, but goodies!
To be fair I also read Anne of Green Gables, Bobbsey Twins, and Nancy Drew series.
So many authors since then from Robin Cook to James W. Hall to Randy Wayne White and on and on ... many women authors too.
Reading does help with writing as any English teacher will tell you.
But forget about helping with grammar due to dialects, mannerisms of how real people speak in dialogue in most stories...see I do have an excuse, ha!

But really folks if you can give your children one gift, a cheapo one, it should be the joy of reading and the enjoyment of BOOKS!
Besides helping with mandatory studies in all levels of school, it is downright fun, and the original bargain basement escapism! 


On that note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

Saturday, November 11, 2017

Tonight's tale...



...is sadly true.
The quiet has been and still is deafening all day long.
We chilled in the truest sense of the word... oh, wait... no, not like our northern friends who did actually chill, meaning brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, the cold air type of chill! Tis their season though.
Ours was of the relaxing type; never that cold here in Florida! Well not never, almost never, maybe a few days in the year, but that's all, really!
Nearly the do nothing type of chillin'.
Needing hard to think what to write type.
Oh, here is something... I made lentil soup!
And I did a load of wash, but I think I forgot to put it in the dryer, oops!
Hubby mostly napped that is when not taking Gus out.
I've been streaming Netflix's Luther series, after watching a few PBS how-to shows.
I have streamed so many one season shows lately that I have lost count as well as the names of many of them.
This latest one, Luther, is mesmerizing and you really are hooked to watch the next one.
Good stuff, if you enjoy that sort of thing.
And I do.

Tonight's dinner menu is leftover chicken and salads from last night, too easy peasy, help yourself whenever you care to meal, hmm.
The best kind for a lazy day.

That could be why we still make too much, leftovers, although we did share one chicken breast last night and the leftovers are from that, wow we have been eating less!
Healthier?
"They" say so.
Yup, "they" those obscure insolent speaking in the deepest darkest background, "they" persons of faceless non-identities.
Never betraying who or whom, "they", are?
Sneaky little or big men or women, ya think?
Always taking censuses and filling out questionnaires?
"They" seem to have the say.
"They" might even betray what we have to say!
Something to think about, wouldn't you say, that is if  "they" wouldn't contradict you?
 Never mind.

Odd.
Crazy.

On that weird note...

Happy good night to all, share those blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

Friday, November 10, 2017

Venturing out...




... when does a venture out turn into an ad-venture?
Kidding.
No, really?
I will leave you with that thought for a while.

Any-who, we did go out to the outer world, not staying in our immediate inner one, and we did attain needed items today. Hubby's reading glasses at Walgreen's for one that he calls his, "cheaters", at least I hope that is the only thing he cheats on, bud dump bum. They were a twofer, and he got his flu shot, mine was gotten in September. Somehow we ended up months apart; how that happened is beyond me when we had originally started off together.

Next we tried to deposit the insurance check at our bank, but we had forgotten that when you have a mortgage, as we do, actually now a much smaller one, though we do have one, with our bank the one we went to...the insurance check has to be sent to the lender first, their mortgage department and signed by them with the break down of what it is to be used for that we also sent to them as requested and then it comes back to us to get everything taken care of, it was mailed out today, so all is in their ballpark now.

It had been thirteen years since Hurricane Charley and when we last had to do that, though so much larger checks due to much more damage and the rebuild, but we had forgotten all that; maybe due to the traumatic affect?

Well, all that money was unexpected so waiting on getting it back is no big deal, since the end of hurricane season is this month on the thirtieth and nothing is out in the Atlantic nor the Gulf coming towards us or expected to either! That'll teach you to have a professional check your home for damage after a hurricane or any other major weather devastation, ya never know!
And there is much less severe damage this time that can wait to be repaired.

After Walgreen's and the bank we picked up groceries at Publix, and came home and ate here.

Nothing horrific was happening on the lunch time news for once, how refreshing.

It was beginning to seem that whenever we would go out when we came home and I read either the headlines off my welcome page on the laptop or saw the TV news something awful had happened!

Makes you think about the correlation of going out and coming home that we had made it back safe and sound was perhaps a small miracle!

The world today is a much scarier place.

On that given note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you kindly to share all you blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!



Thursday, November 9, 2017

Oddities in life, can be quite unexpectedly surprising...



...and here's what I mean...
You know that I had wanted to be reimbursed for our $97 worth of gasoline for our generators due to being without power after we returned home after we had left due to us having been mandatory evacuated? And that was because we have a waterfront home with only a nine foot elevation, and Hurricane Irma was supposed give us a fifteen foot surge?
Well, it didn't, thank heavens.
But when I was told to contact FEMA for the gasoline possible reimbursement they said they no longer pay for that, but they pay for the hotel that you had to evacuate to, they said that although even though you feel your damage to your home does not meet your deductible you still must notify your homeowners' insurance in order for them to even consider the reimbursement; okay.
So I applied to both, FEMA and Tower Hill.

And last week although I had sent the receipt from the hotel to FEMA they denied giving us anything due to not receiving anything from us from Tower Hill our homeowners insurance that I was certain would deny us due to not meeting our 2K deductible, but they didn't and they sent us a check instead.

The adjuster who had been here on October 28, 2017, and he carefully examined our home and even climbed up on our roof. He told Hubby that he felt we did have some wind damage up there and he looked at our fence, and gutters and garage door and felt they had proven they too had some, but minimal.
He told Hubby he did not know if the roof would need just some repair or replacement.
And Brian Robertson from Alabama our adjuster came he saw and said he would get back to us in a week.

Today was well beyond that week, and so I called to find out what was happening and left a message to see why we had not heard back. While waiting for the call back...
Hubby went out to get the mail, and there was a check, but not for the three night's stay at the hotel for the price of $251 plus bucks, but for $XX,XXX.XX! ( I almost wrote the amount, but had second thoughts. I redacted it to be safe.)
With a breakdown on all that it was for, we were flabbergasted!
Good grief!
And if I had let it go?
Meanwhile, Hubby and I know it is not enough to replace the roof, but a very nice repair with that special white coating that our neighbors are getting is possible, no metal roof yet.

They all flew through the hurricane without any seen damage, but who knows we felt that we hadn't any either or I should say minimal.   
The garage door should be replaced, and maybe some of those new composite white fence sections in the front would be nice to replace the wooden ones.

We will have to price everything out; but Gee Whiz, I suppose that fortune cookie from last week, ya know the one about our finances, this is maybe what it was referring to?
What an interestingly nice surprise.

So now I am left with the dilemma on whether or not to go back to FEMA for the hotel monies; what would you do?
When they had sent me the forms it did not indicate the time they needed the info from the homeowners but now since now they denied us due to the lack of that information it is a more complicated process to resubmit.

Oh well.
Thinking.

On this note allow me to wish all of you a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!

This is up there with ya never really know, ya know?

Wednesday, November 8, 2017

The eye has it!





Hubby's that is; one cataract eye down, righty, one to go, lefty; yep odd the one that is left, is lefty, ha!
That is why Number One Son was here to help with transporting his Dad to the surgery.
Hubby said he was awake for the whole procedure and talked fishing with the doc, ophthalmologist/surgeon M.D. Eric R. Schaible at Community Eye Center. My eye surgeon, Dr. David M. Klein that did my miracle surgery back in 2014, doesn't do surgery anymore, sadly, but only due to partial retirement; after all he is our age!

Hubby's whole process took about an hour and a half.
Hubby said that he doesn't recall actually how long, as he quoted, he said that he was in," LA-LA LAND." The very same descriptive use of that expression for Hollywood California, sleeping, and dreamland! I recall my dearly departed, since 1986, i.e. Dad had passed away at a mere 79 years old, he too had called it that, and the expression is so much older: "

Definition of la-la land


:a euphoric dreamlike mental state detached from the harsher realities of life"
Thanks to: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/la-la%20land
Next week we will start the whole thing again one more time!

Number One Son had to leave to go home for tomorrow he has to be at work.

Bummer!

But he will be back next week, YAY!

Life is so much better with family in it, most family that is, ha!

Moving on...

So due to surgery no cruising tonight.

My steak and potato and veggie slow cooker dinner last night was a big hit as well the pizza lunch and blueberry pancakes breakfast today.

In fact there is a mere one serving of the slow cooked dinner for Hubby, meanwhile I still have one more serving, believe it or not of my lobster lo mein! And that is what I will be having, yum!

After that for the next few days I will be creative with our meals.
Our freezer is well stocked as well as the pantry.
There are a few more blueberry pancakes, I had made too many, but Number One Son had doubles, and Hubby has had many too, and still more!
Number One Son also had doubles on dinner too!
I so love to see them eat, it makes me feel good to know they enjoyed the meals.

I had also made peanut butter oatmeal and raisin cookies, about two dozen, just a few of those left.
So much fun cooking for family, even when there is only one more of them visiting!

On that note, allow me to be the very first to wish you all a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!







Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Last night...

...for some no good reason I had difficulty sleeping and finally fell asleep around three A.M., and awoke around seven A.M. not a lot of sleep by anyone's standards.

By rights I should have been able to drop right off to lala land, (not just Hollywood California, also meaning a sleeping place) due to being a pedestrian in the truest sense of what that means.
WALKING, although with my walker, but even down to the boat.
I had asked Hubby to remove BIG BLUE to the van, since I was doing more bumper cars than maneuverability with him indoors, outside I am good even in not so wide open doctors offices, but in our tiny realm here not really having that drive-ability that one should have to be able to get from point A to point B, so I left a few marks, if you know what I mean?

Any-who, in my minimalist prep time for the holidays I had asked Hubby to provide me with our wall and door white semi-gloss latex interior paint that we use for touch ups, to take care of my motorized causal blemishes in our interior of our home so I could fix them.
And that I did do a few days ago.
As I sat admiring my handy-work it made me consider the plausibility of trying harder to manage with only my walker, even to go down to the boat, and so yesterday I did!

Only with my walker I made it all the way down to our boat and no longer needed my plantar fasciitis boot on either. I managed to make it there and back with about an hour rest in between due to again going on our cruise for the sunset, but because of the time change of daylight savings' time the sun set by the time we got out there!   
So we came home and I made it up the short hill to our back door!

Since I was not going to fall back to sleep this morning so I decided to start the crock-pot for tonight's dinner, steak, veggies and potatoes all go in nicely, and ready when we are tonight, or this early evening for regular folks.

Number One Son should be here soon and we are either going for a cruise before or after dinner.

Hubby knows that it will be a few days till we can go out again after his surgery, and the same with his other eye too, next week.

We cannot even go out together shopping due to my manual ramp for the motorized wheelchair, no lifting, it weighs about forty five pounds.

So we wait, just a few days each time.

His third eyes' surgery for his lids will be after the first of the year we decided, since he will be having better coverage by then.

Number One Son called around two thirty that he was already on his way so... he should be here soon!

On that note allow me to be the very first to wish you all a very happy good night and ask you to kindly share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!
 



Monday, November 6, 2017

Saturday night.


Fisherman's Village at night from the harbor and photographed by Hubby from our boat. All pics by Hubby I again was driving.


                                                          Sunset 11-4-17
                                         
                                    
                                    Full moon rising, 11-4-17, and yes, we did get our half priced pizza at Bocca Lupo, two actually; due to Number One Son Visiting! (One we have frozen.)

                                        Our new lights doing their thing very well down at the dock.

Yesterday, we went fishing thus our nice day that I had referred to last night, and we did not catch anything. We did see dolphin who are hard to photograph unless in large pods and doing acrobatics, but on occasion we have been fast enough and have snapped a few, plus in our old days with our young water skiing sons behind our boat on movie super 8 film.

Consequently, live bait had been caught too, I suppose dolphin come back for that too, ha!

Last night we were pooped and so when Hubby suggested Chinese food from China City, and I agreed whole heartedly.
And so without further ado here are the three fortunes from the cookies given to us with our dinner.
He ordered roasted pork egg foo young and I ordered lobster lo mein, and we shared egg drop soup, and of course we still have plenty more.

"You soon will have the opportunity in improve your finances." Improper grammar I do believe it should be "improving", I think, but I am no grammar specialist as all of you know. And I have no idea of how that could be, except the increase of 2% in social security income this coming January, hardly a large improvement in "FINANCES". Although, the first time in years, but not that much really, who knows.I would give that back if you know who would step down.

"A person of words and not of deeds is like a garden full of weeds." HEY!
I used to be both, i.e. words and deeds, now only one, words, so weeds have grown, yup, but real ones outside, Hubby hates gardening, ya know, ha! And sadly I no longer can do.

"A beautiful person is with you, confide your problems." This one must have been Hubby's, ha,ha, ha; oddly enough I think it really was.

On that lighter note allow me to be the very first to wish all of you a very happy good night, and ask you to share all your blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!


Sunday, November 5, 2017

Exasperation.

And we call ourselves human beings?
Today, again, another mass murder this time in Sutherland Springs Texas at a Baptist church at 11:15 A.M. CST this morning, at least twenty-six murdered and two dozen injured, the shooter is dead.
Information is still coming in, so not everything is known at this time.
Monsters are among us, horrifying animals who seem to exist only to lay in wait to commit these evil deeds.
Another reasoning for Texans to rethink their feelings about the NRA and all gun laws, we need tighter legislation on background checks having to do with psychological testing, and previous histories, and NO ONE NEEDS AUTOMATIC WEAPONS FOR HUNTING! They should be outlawed and the gadget that turns tamer weapons into killing machines!

People, not taking any of you rights away, just using common sense????????????
Please think people, and learn by these reoccurring incidents with major murdering capacities.
No one can consider these things hunting equipment unless they expect their meat to be chopped when they capture it?

I am baffled at the illogical dragging of feet on all the real deadly incidents that keep happening and nothing changes?

Let us all do something, get after your local legislatures and tell them you want action now!

Stop being whishy washy on this too important issue!

I had a very nice safe day... and feel so sorry that twenty-six plus people did not!

Saturday, November 4, 2017

You know how sometimes nature makes you go WOW!



This was one of those many times...Last night's sunset and moon rise.





Ya know how small we all are in importance in the universe when you see such enormously amazingly extraordinary complex beautiful things that make us realize in the realm of existence we and all we have in the way of problems are minutia in comparison to everything else and we are so very tiny, ya think?
So calm down, this too will pass.
Love and peace to all.
And the next time things appear too overwhelming, literally look up!
It helps to put life into perspective, ya know?
Happy good night to all and share those blessings and we will too!

And next time please be here or be square, ya hear!  

Speaking My Mind: Which way will the war go?

Speaking My Mind: Which way will the war go? :   My eyesight is going again... in case you missed it... Netanyahu snaps back against growing...