random thoughts – Day 2,151 (Thursday) – activities and practice

The days, the weeks, the months are flying by at a head-spinning pace and I don’t understand it. Not sure I need to understand it, but I do wish it would slow the heck down.

The day was spent mostly at home.  There was a trip to the mailbox and then Dollar Tree to get some dinner napkins. The Dollar Tree store overachieved with the additional acquisitions of Swiss Rolls, sugar wafers, vegetable broth, and a hook for the bathroom door upon which to hang my bathrobe.

It was sunny and around 29 degrees, so pleasant (relative to recent weather). The weekend forecast is for more bitter cold, so it felt important to get out and enjoy the civilized weather while possible.

A week ago, I noted a tai chi class on the calendar at 1:00 today. It turns out I’m better a noting events on the calendar than I am at checking the calendar to attend the events. It was 1:40 when I remembered the tai chi class. Maybe next week I’ll remember in time and attend.

Costume jewelry.

There was a duet dress rehearsal tonight, in preparation for the Sunday performance. We donned our jewelry and tights with our dresses and I tried out the newest hairpiece that arrived a few days ago. The costumes look great and our rehearsal was smooth, even when I smacked myself in the forehead with a prop. We are in the final finessing stage of presentation and paying attention to the details and it feels good to feel prepared. I might want larger, bolder earrings, but right now that is the only potential change.

After practice, the avocado that had today achieved the perfect ripeness was mashed with garlic and lemon juice and a scoop of salsa. It's always a very small window of time between the stages of not ripe enough, perfectly ripe, and then gross. The magical point of avocado ripeness usually results in the immediate cancellation of any other meal plans. Tonight, it was turkey soup that got the boot. The couch was the solo dining spot for avocado with flatbread crackers. Delicious.

random thoughts – Day 2,150 (Wednesday) – jewelry and sanity

The latest episode in the ongoing search for the misplaced jewelry took place this morning. The step stool was brought to the bedroom closets to explore the shelves. In the process, a shoe box stowed on the shelf was explored. It contained a random assortment of stuff including a Longsjo Bike Race cowbell, my roller derby armbands with my player number (813), a silver charm in a box, the fitness watch I abandoned wearing, buttons from vintage clothing items, a book about tarot, and the necklace I made a few years ago from vintage brooches. I didn’t expect to find my missing dance jewelry in the shoebox, but finding the brooch necklace was a win. I thought it was misplaced in the same bag with the dance jewelry.

The contents of the storage bag with the many troupe costume veils, hip scarves, and a top was reviewed and refolded with the tiny hope that the missing necklaces had appeared in there since a few days ago when I last pawed through it. They had not.

Reunited.

The shelves in both closets were tidied and some shoes were stowed away. As the operation was wrapping up so I could check on the soup on the stove and set the table for lunch with Mom and Sis, I looked down to the floor of the closet, and there, on top of a pair of dark colored boots, was the gray three compartment travel bag which I immediately knew contained the two missing dance necklaces. My stress level was immediately reduced and my sanity improved.

How it landed there or when I cannot guess. I can say with certainty that I didn't see it there when looking for boots to wear with dress pants just over a week ago. It's possible it was on the shelf and fell when I was looking for it in recent days. File it under household mysteries. At least this one had a positive outcome. Other missing items have never been found and still haunt me. 

random thoughts – Day 2,149 (Tuesday) – search

I needed a stamp to return the city census form because I didn’t feel like driving downtown to drop it off. The last time I remember using stamps was when sending Christmas cards, so a search for the remaining cards ensued. The leftover cards from 2025 had been set in a box with the leftovers from two or three years previous in a cabinet with art supplies. Address labels were found, but not the stamps. A stamp was eventually found in a desk drawer, but it was a flower stamp from a couple years ago and not even one of the holiday stamps.

Later, while sitting at the desk tracking bills and upcoming social events, I wrote an entry in my date book intended for February, but accidentally wrote it in March. No worries, corrector tape will take it away. The search began. It wasn’t in either of the desk drawers, so I checked the box of office supplies, which ended up being staples, paper clips, assorted pens and sticky notes and the thread trimmers from Mummu’s job at the yarn factory. The trimmers were moved to the sewing desk drawer with the fabric cutting tools.

Somehow, the search for corrector tape led to finding a bag of craft supplies. Those were moved to the sheer storage drawers with the other craft supplies that lives next to the filing cabinet in the guest room closet. Trims were found in the fabric tub in the craft room and placed in the newly acquired trim storage box. A weekend travel bag in the craft room closet was discovered to hold several jigsaw puzzles I had recently wondered about. Those were moved to the shelving in the guest room. 

This sort of activity went on for nearly an hour before I returned to the desk with little recollection of what I was originally looking for or why until I spied the datebook again. It was just another day, and this is totally typical. I go looking for one thing, find several other things, get sidetracked, forget the original mission, and do some other random things. In the course of it and with luck, random tasks are advanced or even completed. With even more luck, the original goal is somehow achieved.

Tonight after dance group, I found the corrector tape. It was in the pencil drawer of the filing cabinet which lived adjacent to the desk for several years in Lowell. Now, the filing cabinet lives in the closet. The same closet I was in organizing craft supplies earlier in the day. I was so close to the original target the whole time. Next up is the resumed search for the missing dance costume jewelry. That should also be fun.

random thoughts – Day 2,148 (Monday) – lunch, taxes, dance

The day flew by. In addition to the usual routines that keep me functional and semi-sane, there was time spent in the kitchen starting a pot of stock with the rest of the turkey carcass that has been in the freezer since Christmas. After several hours, the bones were removed from the liquid and the onion skins and trimmings were removed from the freezer and added. After a couple hours, the heat was shut off and the skins were removed. Later, the pot went into the refrigerator. Tomorrow, soup making will resume with the addition of vegetables bought on Sunday. Bonus -- there is now enough room in the freezer to hold some ice cream. Finally.

Stuffed mushrooms.

Lunch was a quick heat up of the rest of the artichoke stuffed baby portabella mushrooms. They came in a package of seven, prepared and ready to heat from the produce department at Aldi and were quite tasty. The first three were had for Sunday night supper. 

As the aroma of simmering turkey broth filled the house, I sat at the desk and tortured myself. There were job applications and then work on the tax return. Ugh. The timer feature on Turbo Tax estimates how long the return should take and mine started with a laughable estimate of 54 minutes. I remembered from last year how far off the estimate was when it was simple, but this year is blowing it to shreds with the house sale, unemployment, and the moving of bank accounts and the former company’s 401k. There is no longer a module in Turbo Tax to calculate the value of non-cash donations, so dealing with the eight or nine pre-moving donations to Epilepsy Foundation, Big Brothers Big Sisters, and St. Vincent de Paul are a lot more complicated. I don’t see me building a spreadsheet, logging the handwritten sheets done at each donation, and hunting down the values. If only I were a millionaire able to make large, easy to log cash donations. Sigh.

The countdown.

So far, I’m at 4 hours and 24 minutes on the clock on the tax return and I'm only 3/4 of the way into the Federal return. Chunks of that time were spent searching for online documents and entering information from paper forms and discovering there are still some forms missing from accounts once held at the now-defunct former employer. Super fun.

The evening included dance practice and it was a good way to shake off the dust of the afternoon. Redemption was sweet and had a great soundtrack.

random thoughts – Day 2,147 (Sunday) – searching

There was no new snow event (it stayed to the south and east) and dance group was able to meet for dress rehearsal. We ran our performance number several times and began working on a new old piece. Old in that we performed it back in 2018 or 2019 and new in that one-third of the troupe didn’t learn it and the rest of us barely remember it (at least until we review the videos and the muscle memory kicks in).

In preparation for dress rehearsal, there was a one-hour long search this morning for the necklace I usually wear for troupe dances. I wore it in December. It was last seen with a new necklace I wore for the duet in December. I can’t find either one now, but I’m pretty sure they are together someplace supremely safe and logical in the padded jewelry bag with a third (missing) necklace I made from vintage brooches. I know they are not in the dance costume jewelry bag in the bedroom closet or the travel bag used for jewelry, hair accessories, and makeup for shows that lives in the bathroom closet. A quick rifling through the underbed storage boxes of dance costumes and veils came up empty and they aren’t with the Halloween stuff. I hope the location comes to me in a dream or something. And soon. There is currently no troupe dance necklace plan B. 

Potential solution to the costume jewelry issue?

I need to get to work fast on the “better system” for dance costume jewelry because this is the second time in a week I've been searching for things. It will likely involve many hours of falling down a rabbit hole of jewelry cases, armoires, cabinets, etc. Maybe I should just get a nice tackle box. Or based on the volume of trinkets, maybe a mechanics tool chest fitted with cushioned linings. Of course, then the problem would be where to put the massive chest. 

random thoughts – Day 2,146 (Saturday) – another winter day

Bathroom skylight.

The day was cold and sunny with a blue sky. There was talk earlier in the week of a storm over the weekend, which is currently slamming the Carolinas and southern Virginia but now the absence of screaming headlines makes it seem it will miss central Massachusetts. Or not. Who knows.

The snow on the skylights is melting off. This morning there was a large chunk of blue sky and the tippety-top of a tree visible over the shower, but the kitchen skylight is still about 75% snow-covered. 

When the kitchen skylight is covered, the room has a gray tone to it, but the difference in light quality is less noticeable with the bathroom skylight over the shower area. Or maybe it’s just that I spend a lot less time in there.

There was dance practice in the afternoon with the duet partner. First, we move the area rug and sofa out of the way and then we run through the dance in the still small area available as many times as we feel are necessary. Our dance is looking and feeling great. 

Almost full Snow Moon.

Before and after practice, I worked on the final steps of adding brocade trim to the back neckline of the costume which was declared done a week ago and now might really be done done. Now I can shift my attention to a full obsession over hair, makeup, and earrings.

As darkness fell, the nearly full Snow Moon shone bright in the sky. It looked large, but in cell phone pictures from the living room it looked like a little fluff ball or a moth ball nestled in the trees. 

The sky was clear and that means cold, so hooray. It's a whopping six degrees that "feels like -4". Winter is really wintery this year. The forecast is for warmer temperatures with 24 degrees on Sunday and 30 on Monday. It will feel like a tropical heat wave and I am all for it.

random thoughts – Day 2,145 (Friday) – amateur sleuth

Icicles like weapons.

The icicles out front grow more impressive each day and the morning sun shone upon them. They glistened and dripped, extending their length throughout the day. They now extend like sabers half the length of the window. Nearby houses have matching lethal-looking icicle protective devices.

This morning I called Mom’s house. Instead of the line ringing or the recording to leave a message because the line was in use, I was quickly met with a message from my cell carrier notifying that the “person being called is temporarily unavailable.” Unusual. Mysterious.

I called several times, then donned boots, coat, hat, and gloves and walked next door to see if Mom was aware her phone was weird. There were no cars in the driveway so I returned home. I checked the outages site for her provider and saw none noted.

While in the guest room to open the curtains that had been drawn against drafts the night before, I noticed Kiki’s toy was gone from where I had placed it and couldn’t find it anywhere. Mysterious. Also, the pale yellow pillow on the daybed had black hair on it that matches the hair often found on the blanket at the foot of my bed where Kiki naps all day and on the arm of the chair where she perches in the evening when I watch TV.

The pillow offered a clue to Kiki’s nighttime whereabouts after she leaves the bedroom when I go to bed. In the morning I find her sitting on the rug staring at me while I’m in bed, under the dining table, or on the arm of the chair and wondered where she spends the time in between and how long it would take for her to discover the day bed.

In the afternoon, the car was warmed up and I drove to the mail boxes. I hadn’t checked for mail all week and the day’s USPS alert indicated several pieces of mail including tax forms and a package which turned out to be the four-inch by four-inch canvas I will work on for a fundraiser.

On the way past Mom’s house I saw she was home and called her land line again. It was still the Verizon recording. On a whim, before going over in person, I called Mon’s cell phone, which is usually not even turned on when she’s home, but this time it was. I informed her of the phone issue, she called the provider, and it was fixed quickly. Situation solved, although the outage reason is still a mystery. 

Costume jewelry.

The recently ordered set of rhinestone bracelets for the dance costume arrived – five narrow bracelets and one double rowed large stone bracelet. There are still a couple details to be dealt with including earrings, but it is mostly complete with just over a week to go until the dance showcase.