thisendoftheswamp

We had a lollapalooza of a thunderstorm last night. Tremendous winds tore down trees and branches all over Joppa. Most of the traffic lights were out when we went to church. Sunday morning is pretty sparce where traffic is concerned, and most people were treating intersections as four-way stops, which kept things moving smoothly.

One tree had fallen across the road to church, and a crew was just finishing cutting it into manageable chunks.

The power had gone out here in the complex around 7:00 last night but came on briefly for a while later. I was “doing my legs” when the power went off for the second time, so I just said “fuhgeddaboudit it” and went to bed a little after 9 PM.

When we got up this morning, we had power in some parts of the unit, but not in others. My bedroom was fine, but The Squire’s bedroom had no power at all. Both bathrooms had lights, but the sockets didn’t work, so I couldn’t do my hair. Thank heavens, the stove and fridge worked and when I pushed the button on the mixer, which is on the opposite side of the kitchen it turned on, but the dishwasher, which is next to the mixer, didn’t work. We had visions of coming home to wash a small mountain of dirty plates and pots. The A/C was also out of commission. Oddly enough, the living room and dining room were fine – lights and outlets all in working order.

We went to IKEA for breakfast, swung by Costco to get gas in his van, and then rode past the old homestead to see how things were going there. Looked pretty good from the road. No large trees were down, so we left them to it. When we got home, all systems were “go”. I turned on the dishwasher and went to bed for a couple of hours. I might have gone to bed early last night, but Boris decided 4 AM was time to get up. I didn’t agree with him, but there’s no point in arguing with a cat.

Did my legs and knitted from 4:30 to 5:30, then tried to get another hour of shut-eye, but no dice, which explains my after-church nap. It is now pushing 7, so I’m going to try this all one more time and then see about some shut eye.

For years, I have been complaining abouy my feet swelling and turning blue. Because my legs were not hot or painful, nobody got excited about it but the VietNamese woman who does my monthly pedicure. At least somebody worried about my black toenails.

Finally I convinced my GP that it really needed to be looked into, and he gave me a referral to a vascular surgeon. After two different rounds of testing, that good man determined that the problem is not with my blood, but my lymph system – a bit of medical nit-picking – but the results look the same. At any rate, it did finally shake up some action.

So, now I spend an hour, twice a day, sitting with my feet propped up, imitating the Michelin Tire Man. I slide each leg into a pneumotic “garment”, attach the hose and control box, and let the machine work its magic. I do have to stay put, but I have darned two of The Squire’s socks, sewn on a multitude of buttons, and am now trying my hand at knitting. Last time I did this, we shall simply say it wasn’t a success, and leave it at that. I got a loom at the local thrift shop, and we’re going to try doing that again. I did go to the library and grabbed some books, The author I chose isn’t very good, in my opinion.

I don’t like a lot of blood-and-guts. I’m not a Patricia Cornwell fan, but I do like a bit of action in a book, especially if it is “off-stage”. Mary Ellen Hughes writes a lot of books about Maryland, which are fun.

Laura Lippman was a reporter with the Baltimore Sun and wrote some terrific mysteries, loosely based on events in the news – changed a bit to “protect the innocent”. A Baltimorean could tell exactly where the story took place, which made them fun to read, but after a while, her writing got too “dark” for me.

Well, I only got one suggestion for cleaning my cookie sheets and decided to give it a shot.

I made a paste of baking soda and hydrogen peroxide and smeared it over the offending cookies sheets. I was supposed to let it sit for two hours but I fell asleep, so it was left overnight. This morning I rinsed off the pans, gave one or two spots a bit of a scrub with a nylon pad, and there you are. Worked like a charm.

Almost as good as new!

Other than insane amounts of elbow grease and Brill-o, is there any way to remove years of Christmas Past from cookie sheets?

I have a lot more cookies sheets than I’ll ever use again, so I want to take four of them around to the thrift store. To the untrained eye, they look pretty ratty, but all I see is years and years of love and good food. I spent an hour on one single sheet yesterday, and it really doesn’t look all that wonderful.

There has to be an easier way. Any suggestions?

As is the case wtih most women, I am constantly trying to lose weight. About ten years ago I started some medicine which caused me to gain ten pounds a month and spiked my blood pressure. I’m no longer on that med, but still have both problems. What’s really annoying is that I, of all people, should have read the PDR. To top if off, The Squire takes the same pills with no ill-effects.

(Amitriptyline, in case you are wondering. It is used for nerve pain and spasms, as well as being an antidepressant. It worked well for my Restless Leg Syndrom, but the weight gain certainly didn’t help my frustration.)

I’ve been hearing about the “Jello Trick” to drop a few pounds, but never paid much attentiooon to it, until I saw an ad on the internet claiming Dr. Gupta would Explain It All. He said the recipe as it was being pressented was useless. “Jello-O” has a lot of sugar and very little protein. What you need is plain geletin and a “few other ingredients” that most people already have in their kitchens. Tumeric, ginger, and green tea extract. I have the first two and can probably find the green tea extract at Mom’s or someplace. Lots of photos of people – including actress Kathy Bates – eating little tan cubes of gelatin.

And then, somehow, he switched to a discussion of how a Japanese lab was able to extract the oils from these products and produce a formula that worked even better than the gelatin. You just put five drops under your tongue every morning, and – voila! – you started dropping those excess pounds. There were quite a few shots of women staring down at these bottles of drops with an expression of adoration usually saved for your first born child.

And then the clincher. These miracle drop were yours for the low, low price of $69 a month! And the recommeneded plan was to use them for six months. If I spent $400 on this stuff, I’d drop weight because I couldn’t afford to buy groceries.

So this “short video” ran for almost an hour and was a big nothing burger. As I said, I have most of the ingredients, so I’m going to experiement a bit and see what I can come up with. It won’t cost me $69 and if it works, fine. If not, big deal.

. . . is not about used cars and mattresses.

When in question,

When in doubt,

Run in circles,

Scream and shout.

It’s been that sort of week. (And thanks to Shay for the image.)

. . . you can hear me scream!

A friend from church stopped by in the morning to drop off some handmade greeting cards, and remarked that she had been trying to reach me by phone for several days. “The phone goes straight to voice mail.” Hmm. So she dialed my phone while we both stood there, and it went straight to voice mail without even ringing. The Squire tried it later and not only did it go to voicemail but it told him the mailbox was full!

After supper, he called me again, sitting directly across the table, and my phone beside my plate. It rang busy. He punched some buttons, swore softly under his breath, and finally tried again. Lo! And behold! Mozart’s concerto rang out and I was actually able to answer my phone.

I called my BFF and she was able to call me back, and so was Eldest Daughter. Now if I can just solve the Great Email Dilemma, I’ll be in business. What I really, really want is to get a landline again.

Every blessed time I go to sign into my email, I am asked for a code, which is sent to The Squire’s phone. If he is not at home, I cannot get to my messages. So – I spent almost an hour yesterday afternoon in a chat with a nice young lady (I presume) at Xfinity trying to either stop this nonsense or convince them to use MY number instead of his. After all of that, she transferred me to some sort of Tech Support line, which wanted $5. Not too bad, so I entered my VISA number.

It was declined.

I entered another number, which was also declined.

And then I entered my own personal account number – and guess what?

At least I didn’t get charged for all of this, so there’s that.

This is ridiculous! If this is progress, I don’t want any part if it,