random thoughts – Day 1,831 – (Saturday) – entertainment date book

Some dates have a history of fun activities, and I love how Facebook memories keeps track of them for me. In the early morning hours of March 22, 2009, after leaving Dave Attell’s show at Zanie’s in Nashville, I declared on Facebook, “Wicked funny good time.” I barely remember it now, and might not have at all if not for the memories feature. As for Dave Attell, I haven’t heard his name in ages, but an Internet search tells me he is still out there doing standup. I wonder if I would still find him as funny as I used to.

St. Urho dinner, Saima Park, 2015.

Back in 2015, I went with family to a St. Urho dinner at Saima Park in Fitchburg and we were in a decorated hat contest. I remember the dinner and contest and decorating the hats before we went, and not just because there are photos. In 2018, there was a fundraiser event at a gallery in Lowell, followed immediately by the reception for a show in another gallery in Lowell that I had photography in. Gallery back-to-back events are fun – park once, and be a social butterfly in multiple settings. 

Last year on this date, friends and I went to see Richard Thompson in Derry, New Hampshire. It was my second or third time seeing him, but my friends had seen him dozens of times.

Today, the final Saturday of broken wrist home incarceration, was spent at home. There were multiple events happening in different cities including an art reception, a photographer’s talk, some craft fairs, and this year's edition of the St. Urho dinner, but not for me. There is still no driving for me, but at least I’m in the home stretch of it. I practiced dances, then puttered around the house. Attended an online writing webinar. Did laundry and changed the sheets. The wrist that has me grounded alternates between feeling pretty ok and more mobile and frustratingly stiff.

The incision scar forced its way into my consciousness with sensitivity that amplified when I bumped it on the edge of the mattress while tucking in the clean sheets. Ow! It remained extra sensitive for the rest of the day and into the night and all I could think of was Harry Potter and his occasionally painful scar.  

The Residence, Netflix.

Unlike some previous years, tonight was not a night of live comedic or musical entertainment, but that is okay. Not every day can or should be a carnival, and there is a live entertainment event lined up for next weekend. 

Tonight, The Residence on Netflix kept me quite occupied and entertained. It stars Uzo Aduba, who I first saw as Suzanne “Crazy Eyes” in Orange is the New Black. She was great in Orange, and I love, love, love, her in the White House comedic whodunit as the brilliant and quirky detective Cordelia Cupp. There is nothing like a well-written lighthearted murder romp on a solo Saturday night.

random thoughts – Day 1,830 – (Friday) –rain, wind, cheese

Kiki, morning
meow machine.

The rain woke me up early this morning and by 5:00 I gave up trying to get back to sleep and got up. Kiki, who had been downstairs meowing her morning song, seemed puzzled when I got up. This accelerated her morning hijinks of running to the general area where I am, meowing once or twice, and scurrying away. This happens three or four times while I make the morning coffee, with another performance as I brush my teeth before bed.

The rain stopped during the morning, and in the early afternoon the wind came roaring back with intent. It blew one of my neighbor’s bins into her parked car, and the noise startled me right out of my desk chair. Later, it knocked the same bin over, spilling the contents into her back yard.

As the day transitioned from 5:00 end-of-workday to 5:01 start-of-the-weekend, I started feeling tired, chilly, and my back felt sensitive and crawly like it does when I’m sick. Again. This seems to be my recent weekend status. I will tolerate it (grudgingly) this weekend, but next weekend the doctor’s wrist-healing driving ban will be lifted, and I’ll be mighty miffed if I feel cruddy again then.

Grilled cheese comfort.

Time was spent before supper on resume refinements and looking at job postings. Ugh. This was not in the plan that was finalized just last summer. It was supposed to be two-and-a-half more years at the current job, working and saving for retirement. By then, the car would be paid off, the new furnace would be paid off, and the outstanding mortgage balance would be thousands of dollars lower. 

So much for plans.

After the resume work, it was grilled cheese for some much-needed comfort food for supper – quick, predictable, and tasty. There was the extra treat of some pepperoni slipped into the sandwich, but not enough to make an impact. Lesson learned. Use more pepperoni next time. And plans are good, but they can blow up, so be ready to pivot.

random thoughts – Day 1,829 – (Thursday) – shredded

After a supper of homemade vegetable soup enhanced with a can of diced tomatoes with green chilis and topped with shredded cheddar, I settled in for a chore involving different shredding. The kitchen trash basket was brought to the living room and the paper shredder head set over the top of it. A pile of paperwork from a decorative bin on the counter was brought over.

Shredding.

There was sorting and reviewing of the heap of papers which turned out to be mostly gas and electric bills plus various statements and inserts. Before I bought a file cabinet for the little home office, paid bills had the payment date noted on them and were tucked into the bin on the counter in case the payment ever needed to be verified quickly. Most were dated from 2019 to 2022, but some were from as early as 2017. 

The historical nature of bills is fascinating. Well, to me. I got to see how low my cable/internet, gas, electric, and cell phone charges used to be. For ages, I have had this idea that the details of rates and usage and random notes and thoughts on various sheets of paper might be helpful for a novel that I will likely never write. 

Every few years or if company is coming, whichever comes first, I sit down with the shredder and get rid of the paper piles. Yes, I know about electronic bills, but no thanks. I don't mind the act of reviewing bills, making notes on the paper bill, and paying them online. And yes, there are shred days hosted by credit unions and banks (including the one I have worked for just shy of nine years) but I am either unavailable on the designated day or I forget about it until it’s over.

The shredder box in which the apparatus lives 99% of the time, says “light use.” The instructions note ten sheets, which I initially thought meant ten sheets at a time, but it usually overheats and declares a recess after about ten passes of one or two sheets. It also has a tendency to accordion pleat some of the strips inside and jam itself up. Then there is a period of picking the compacted bits out with a toothpick. 

Shredded.

By the time I stopped, 80% of the original pile was in shreds in the trash bag and the rest was sorted and set aside to go into the file cabinet where more recent files live. There are two benefits to the seldom done task. First, a mountain of paper disappears with next to zero physical exertion. And yes, I recognize that there wouldn't be a pile if I tossed the stuff right away, but that has never gone well the few times I did so. Second, it’s meditative. Feed in a sheet or two, listen to the whir of the shredding mechanism. Repeat.  Periodically, push the collected shreds down to compact them, end when the pile is gone or the trash basket is full, whichever comes first. 

Sometimes, I think the shreds would be great for papier mâché, but I haven’t done that for decades and I really don’t need to start any more hobbies that will likely be abandoned right around the time I finally accumulate all the materials and supplies and start to get good at it.

This is turning out to be the week to shed some stuff. Wednesday had an Epilepsy Foundation pickup of a box of books, a bag of clothes, and a box of housewares. Tonight, a stack of papers was turned into shreds for the trash. I hope the momentum continues.

random thoughts – Day 1,828 – (Wednesday) –felt like old times

I got up with a fresh energy this morning. The sun was shining. The air was crisp. There was a plan. 

A colleague picked me up on her way in to the office. I hadn’t been onsite since February 12 and it was starting to feel like forever. It felt a tiny bit like one of my favorite days from age six until 22 -- the first day of school.

The day’s schedule included our team meeting, Medicare informational webinar, delivery to an art gallery, chocolate chip cookie competition in the sales suite, and an end of day social hour in finance and accounting. 

It was nice to see people. The prolonged broken wrist remote work was beginning to lose some of the luster of peace and quiet and taking on an undercurrent of solitary confinement and it was nice to get out of the house for a day. The team meeting was cancelled due to an absence of updates, but the rest of the day proceeded pursuant to the entries on my Outlook calendar.

It felt like the pre-pandemic times. All the folks hired during and after the pandemic have heard about the many food and social events we used to have and are finally getting a chance to experience some of it. Next week is the popular baked potato fundraiser. Pretty soon it will be the final gathering of all of us. That one will be bittersweet. Part food and beverage, part games and prizes, part funeral. 

The Medicare seminar was at least the third one I’ve attended and the convoluted crap of Parts A, B, C, and D all feel like a big F-you, but it’s finally starting to make sense. I still hate the whole idea of it. 

The canal, 1:14 pm.

The treat after suffering through the webinar was a walk outdoors with a couple colleagues. Two of us needed to deliver our four-by-four art pieces for the upcoming fundraiser event and three of us set forth. From The Brush Gallery, we swung by City Hall so I could drop off my city census form. We crossed the canal and proceeded down Merrimack Street and Kirk and walked a bit downtown. 

The cookie competition was amazing. There were 19 banker bakers who baked chocolate chip cookies which were lined up with numbers. Bankers from the downtown campus swarmed the suite hosting the event. We chatted, we tasted cookies, we voted. Winners for “best tasting” and “best looking cookie” were announced later in the afternoon. The team members who organized it and those who baked did a great job.

The finance and accounting social hour events have been happening for a couple weeks, but I haven’t been on site to attend. Today was a great chance to spend time with folks I haven’t seen in a long time and some I had never met before today. There were beverages, tortilla chips, salsa, and a bucket-sized bowl of cookies leftover from the competition. It was a great day to be onsite.

random thoughts – Day 1,827 – (Tuesday) – outdoors and in

The snow is gone from the backyard and the squirrels were frolicking and digging random holes. It seems they are good at burying things and less good about remembering where. It must be what I look like when I misplace something. Today was a good day in the sense that I didn’t misplace anything and didn’t have to run around like a backyard squirrel looking for it. 

Evening sky, 3-18-25, 7:09 pm.

It might have been nice weather based on the numbers of squirrels and birds in the yard. Except for trying to get a picture of the pinkish evening sky from the side deck, I didn’t really have a reason to go outside and find out, so I didn’t. 

When Moose and Winston were around, I was outside several times throughout the day and night as they stretched their little doggy legs and did their outdoor activities. Now, it feels weird to go and stand the yard by myself. I feel like a doofus just standing there not watching and talking to a dog or two and I’m not really a sit on the stoop by myself person. I need something to do. 

Later in the season, it will be easy to take a quick break and go outside to pull a few weeds, but it’s too early and chilly for that still. Based on a few articles I’ve read, it’s too early to clean up the flower beds, because the pollinators are still winter sheltering and aren’t quite ready yet. One article suggested mid- to late-April for flower bed cleanup, which works for me in terms of delaying it, but it removes a reason to be outside.

Sometimes I wonder if other people jump through 27 mental hoops first, or if they just boldly go and stand outside their homes. I don’t think I was like this in Tennessee, but in my neighborhood there, the houses were further apart and mine was set back from the road, and if I stood in the yard and pretended to be a scarecrow, nobody would see anyway.

The outside will wait and for now, the focus is indoors. There has been studying of the contents of cabinets to see what can be donated away. Do I really need so many plates and bowls? Probably not, but some of them were Mummu’s, including items she told me were wedding gifts when she married in 1941. Much of the stuff I own was handed down from family elders and there are sentimental attachments, making it nearly impossible to ever downsize.

Mummu's porcelain shoes.

Once, as I struggled with getting rid of a pair of porcelain knick-knack shoes with chipped flowers and leaves that Mummu had given to me, Mom said, “you do realize she gave those to you because she was getting rid of them, right?” Well, no, I hadn’t seen it that way. I thought it was because she saw me admire them 1,000 times when I was a kid and they sat on her dresser. Oh, and maybe she was getting rid of them. 

Decades later, the porcelain pumps are still around, and now sit on my dresser. Maybe some day I will let them go. Or maybe I can be buried with them.

random thoughts – Day 1,826 – (Monday) – five years

This date, five yeas ago, was my first day of remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic. There had been a brief stretch of part-time remote work in 2011 when I lived in Tennessee and was recuperating from the broken leg. Working half-days on a laptop from my couch, leg propped up with pillows, was a short-time situation with clear start and finish dates, and helped preserve my income and my sanity. The house was abuzz with visits from the home physical therapist and roller derby teammates who brought prepared meals and helped with laundry. I was tired from exercises and medication and working. It didn't prepare me for 2020.

The first work from home space.

The 2020 work-from-home situation was initially thought to be short-term, maybe “a couple weeks.” I left the office at the end of the workday on March 16 armed with a notepad, some printer proof sheets for the annual report, a couple highlighters, my favorite blue Bic stick pen, and the snacks from my desk. That evening, there was some clearing and rearranging to accommodate working from the dining room table.

The fully remote pandemic scenario lasted for 18 months, and mostly, I liked it. It felt like an adventure, at least initially. 

The pandemic legitimized my hermit-like tendencies. The plentiful solitude of my youth and the many long stretches between partners as an adult prepared me well for the big shutdown that my more sociable friends and family members found excruciating. The years spent with partners who failed to pull their own weight had taught me self-sufficiency. I was pretty sure I’d be okay. Not having to deal with society for a while was the icing on the already potentially glorious cake.

Five years later, life is different than it used to be. Not necessarily worse, and some things are better. There have been valuable lessons and surprises. For one thing, I never thought I wanted to work from home, but once I was doing it, I loved it. I learned how much better I function in a quiet environment, which was a huge revelation.

Dedicated office space.

Working from the dining room table was physically uncomfortable, and having work be the first thing I saw in the morning and the last thing each night became psychologically painful. The purchase of a desk and chair let the weird space off the kitchen that never quite caught on as a coffee nook be reborn as a cozy and functional office space. At the end of the day, I can step away from the office and be done with it, a big improvement. 

When the work schedule shifted to hybrid in September 2021, I got the best of both worlds – time to work in blessed peace and quiet and time to be downtown in a noisy office with colleagues.

For five years I have written every day, which has kept me disciplined and sane. I dance more, sleep more, enjoy cooking more, and drink less alcohol. It’s been interesting.

random thoughts – Day 1,825 – (Sunday) – in training

The temperatures were allegedly in the high 60s today. I was feeling chilly, tired, low-grade yucky, and sneezing, and went outside only long enough to drop the trash bag into the bin and roll it to the curb for Monday pickup. A few things were set into the recycle bin before deciding it isn’t full enough to put at the curb. The estimated total trash maintenance time was two minutes, so barely enough to register the precise weather conditions. 

The neighbor set five of the six bins for her three family house in front of my house Saturday morning and the sixth bin this morning, because apparently there is an award of some sort for being the first one to put bins out. I need to step up my game or I’m never going to win whatever the prize is.

Strength training tools.

While it was warm outside (I guess), I was inside bundled up in a hoody practicing dances for the April performance and then working on wrist mobility by drinking hot tea from a mug. The objective was to lift the mug with left hand while keeping it level and not dousing myself in hot tea. Practical daily skills are essential. Not being able to do them is frustrating. 

It was a day of frustration. The mug kept tipping, the pinky finger side of my wrist would have a twinge, and I had to use the right hand to stabilize the mug. Baby steps. Or sips.

There were also mobility attempts at prayer hands (coming along); putting my hands on the front of my hips with fingers spread, palms to torso (mediocre) and on the lower back with palms flat (not good); and stretching each finger back one at a time like we used to do in ballet school “Little finger, and the next, and the next, and the next, thumb – two times, and all the fingers together. Other hand!...” I still singsong it in my head like when I was a studio helper in high school and led barre and stretching. There are other movements specific to dance that I work on and they are improving bit by bit.

Dessert!

Food happened, because it takes a lot for me to miss a meal. A cheese and tomato sandwich kicked off lunch, and later, veggies with Kalamata olives and feta cheese for an early supper (similar to "early bird special" old people time). Dessert was an Omaha Steaks apple caramel tartlet with ice cream, and trust me, those tartlets are tasty. My belly felt full, but the rest of me still felt dull, chilly, and ready for bed. 

As soon as it gets dark, I’m “hitting the hay,” as Dad used to say, not that our mattresses were ever stuffed with hay. Or cash. Or anything other than whatever budget stuffing goes into a budget mattress.