What are you up to today? This week?

[rodentraiser]

Hey, CJ! You know, I do almost the same thing as your dog when I have to use the bathroom at night. But it's not because of snow. It's because of an ice-cold toilet seat.

[LPCullen]

Preparing to build a Brimbles...

[CheckMouse]

We're playing Fruit Basket Upset at our house!
Our daughter and her husband are getting a divorce (about 16 years too late!) and our daughter and her two kids will be moving in with us, until they can get resettled. Our grandson is 24 years old, but still living at home. His sister is 18 and a senior in high school. So we've been shuffling things around to make room for everybody. Our little Miss Ginger (Shih Tzu) is not sure what's going on, but I was able to avoid moving her little window seat, while rearranging furniture. She sits there, or sleeps there, most of the day and I really didn't want to move it. She's our neighborhood watch captain.  As long as her stuff stays put she's okay. 
Oh, yeah, one more thrill coming our way -- A CAT! I have listened to horror stories of cats vs dollhouses for years, and was always glad we didn't have a cat anymore. So now I am digging out all the acylic sheets I had stashed away, and cutting shields for the fronts of my houses. In this big old house I've been able to put my dollhouses anywhere I wanted to. Now I have to protect them! 
The goal is to have everybody moved out of our daughter's house by March 1st. (She had taken in some renters to help pay the mortgage.)  Her husband has been NO help at all in getting things lined up for a sale. Instead he has been playing house in Thailand with a new girlfriend. So the stress load on my daughter is just about too much. It's time to come home to Momma! 

[havanaholly]

Kids really do make life interesting!  We have had our disabled son with us since a year ago August and will be closing on his new house next week.  I hope Miss Ginger weathers the extra activity OK.

[Shareb]

I always thought it would be easier having 'adult children'......I mean, maybe it is when they're older and settled.  But my almost 21yr and almost 23yr old's are harder to be around than ever!  Actually, my son is lovely, just a little awkward but my daughter....I figured because she'd been great as a teen I missed the eye-rolling stage but nope!

[CheckMouse]

My daughter is fine. For the first time in her life she is actually seeking my advice, and ACCEPTING it! 😲  She's very grateful for the offer to move in with us. My grandson, 24, is a very sweet young man but has absolutely no ambition! My daughter, a nurse, is beginning to suspect Asberger's sydrome or something on that order. He's content to stay in his room and sleep, or play video games, 24/7. He was in his 3rd year of college and doing very well when the pandemic hit, and it was as if the rug was jerked out from under him. Being cooped up in the house with his emotionally-abusive father did not help, either. My granddaughter, 18, is the go-getter. She just bought her own car, holds down a job, gets good grades in her senior year of high school, helps her mother, and is taking modeling classes. 

But we never quit caring for our kids! Love will get us through. 

[rodentraiser]

I am trying hard to get motivated to do anything. With decent weather, I finally thought I could get a dollhouse our of the shed and start working on it. Of course, first, I had to get another canopy since the old one fell down in the snow.

So, I ordered a canopy, another arbor for my garden, and an alarm clock, and bought sand and top soil for my garden. This was all after I found out I didn't have to pay taxes this year!  So for a whole day I was happy.

Then the canopy arrived. It's 10x20 and the two people I paid to help put it up couldn't do much with it. It's only halfway up and you have to walk like Quasimoto underneath it or you'll whack you head on the struts. I don't know what I'm going to do with it, but I can't work on a dollhouse underneath it right now.

The alarm clock is the wrong color and so I need to return that but I can't until Wednesday because Tuesday the car goes in again because I think the power steering pump is out. Possible $500+. The arbor went together surprisingly well, but I'm so down right now I couldn't bring myself to go out today to finish putting dirt in the flower beds and plant seeds. And I need to do that because I have the morning glory seeds soaking in a glass of water and last night when I got up to get a drink I almost drank them.

Never put your soaking morning glory seeds next to your water cup.

On the bright side, my tulips came up with a vengeance (out of 150 bulbs, there was only one other bulb that grew - an iris, out of five irises planted) and one tulip even has a bud on it. And the sunflower seeds I throw out for the birds are rooting now, too. It's been so warm at night the last two days I left my door open. Since the cat sleeps on the bed and will wake me up at night to let her out, I thought she could go in and out herself and I'd get more sleep (she goes through the hole she scratched in the screen). Instead with the door open, she goes in and out at least a dozen times at night and every time she comes in, she wakes me up for petting. The door will be shut tonight. This, of course, is not my cat.

How's your day going?

Edited May 1, 2023 by rodentraiser

[LPCullen]

We didn’t get ANY snow in my neck of the woods this past season-didn’t see not one flake which is unusual but not heard of. Of course snow here is a lot different-it’s pretty for a day or two-a week or slightly more at the most and then it’s gone. Our temperatures are simply too warm for it to stay longer. What we have had a lot of this year is rain. I have drainage issues that I need to work on-when it stops raining. I need a load or two of dirt and then a couple loads of mulch. I bought flowers a couple weeks back to plant but it hasn’t stopped raining long enough to do that. I too haven’t had time to work on dollhouses in weeks.

[rodentraiser]

Well, I'm happier. Than what, I couldn't tell you. But the power steering thing was just a belt and I have both sides of my rock garden done now and the morning glory seeds are planted. I even have dirt in the big planter and I can't decide if I should put the giant sunflowers there or plant corn in it.

Of course, with all the coming and going, nothing's been done inside and my trailer looks like a tornado hit it.

Now tomorrow I have to return that clock and then visit the hardware store for - chicken wire!, which has to go over my rock garden. I finished spreading new topsoil all over it and everyone loves it - the cats, the birds, the squirrels, and the raccoons. All of them are like little rototillers. Which is great now, but not when I plant all my seeds. Always freaking something.

 

[CheckMouse]

Sounds like you're keeping busy! 😁

[rodentraiser]

It gets worse. During this heatwave, I've been getting up 2 hours early to get things done. Things like watering my plants AND the neighbors' plants. I have yet to plant the marigolds or the daisies and my sciatica is back. Please, please don't let it be as bad as last time.

I've also had to work a doctor's appointment, laundromat, and shopping into this mix. Once it hits 11am, it's too hot to do more than just flake out.

BUT! I found these and I think I'll order a couple bundles and put them in the safe that's going in my attic.

https://www.marysminiatures.net/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=382_706&products_id=56999

 

I was going to get 6 bundles but my safe isn't that big.

Edited May 16, 2023 by rodentraiser

[Veiled]

I am also in the heat wave, and have been walking my dog extra early and hunkering down between 10-7pm as much as possible. Ran to the grocery store at 6 am today!

[chapchap73]

How is everyone doing now that fall has arrived?  I am very happy for cooler temps; summer and I are not friends.

[havanaholly]

One of the dubious joys of aging is the medical stuff.  My surgery and follow-up therapy to correct a Dupuytren's contracture was wildly successful.  My annual pacemaker checkup with my cardiologist was interesting this year because after my last two falls he has decided to wean me off of the blood thinner and install a device in my heart to trap blood clots, so I'm getting all sorts of hoops to jump (crawl) through to get ready for that.

[KathieB]

10 hours ago, havanaholly said:

install a device in my heart to trap blood clots,

Holly, you are perilously close to becoming a bionic woman! You go, girl!!  

[havanaholly]

4 hours ago, KathieB said:

Holly, you are perilously close to becoming a bionic woman! You go, girl!!  

Hahahaha!!! (rotflmbo)  Well when I went in for my annual check with the cardiologist he informed me I had six months left on my present (#2) pacemaker, so that's now being monitored monthly instead of every three months, and won't make the ten years it was supposed to (like my first one); so I guess you're right on!

[rodentraiser]

Bionic Holly. It has a certain cadence to it. I like it!

It's been so nice here that I still have the door open at night but I just took a look at the forecast. In two days the nighttime temps will be down in the 30s and in four days they'll be down below freezing. Guess I'll just have to put up with letting the cat in and out again for the rest of the year. Winter is here. GAH!

I suppose it's just as well. It's going to be raining again soon and my cat just loves to be dried off with a paper towel. So she'll come in wet, get dried off, go back outside and come back in wet, rinse, repeat. But I told her if she comes in one more time in the middle of the night and shakes herself in my face while I'm sleeping, she's a cat skin.

Meantime, my driving/long distance glasses broke and can't be repaired, so I need to have those replaced. Another $500. And I ordered pants online. They're all one size too large and need to be returned. I have to hit up the grocery store so I may do that at the same time. That will be Monday.

But today I'm just going to laze around, wash my hair, and enjoy the quiet. In fact, I think in a couple of minutes that I'll just go back to bed and dream of dollhouses...

 

[rodentraiser]

So the glasses haven't come in yet and the PO lost my check I sent to the garbage company. I also applied to two places for a loan to get a beautiful new trailer - a 2016 42ft 5th wheel with 5 slideouts. With a 12 year loan, I could keep the payments under $500 a month. Naturally, I was turned down at my credit union and I haven't heard from the other place, but I doubt they'll make the loan then, too. Surprisingly, my credit score was pretty darn good. Anyway, my credit union offered me $5000 as a personal loan to fix up my current trailer instead and I laughed and said no thank you. In 7 months, I can save $5000 dollars and not have an extra thousand in interest to pay.

So then I decided to go to the laundromat and then to the store finally. Both took me hours. Yesterday I discovered there were more live horse shows on YouTube, so I watched three of them (two with chat) and in between I went to Safeway and got the rest of my groceries Winco didn't have. I finally got dishes done today. Watching 7 hours of horse shows sure eats up a day. Who knew? LOL

Tomorrow it's sweeping and mopping the floor, and maybe weeding the neighbor's small flower bed on account I know they're having family coming up for Thanksgiving and they probably want their place to look nice. I have to figure out how to pay the garbage bill online. Monday I get to call the optometrist and find out where my glasses are, Tuesday I get to say home and sleep in, and Wednesday I will pick up said glasses, fill the propane tanks, and get my vaccinations for pneumonia, flu, and whatever Covid bug is floating around out there. The rest of the week will probably be spent recovering from that.

And I still need to open and spread soil and bark, and now plant the 40 irises I've been ignoring.

Then Imma look for cheaper trailers.

 

[MJK114]

Hi..

[MamaV]

On 12/1/2023 at 3:28 PM, MJK114 said:

Hi..

Hi! What are you up to this week? 

[havanaholly]

Well, the cardiac lint trap, aka the Watchman device, went in Wednesday and Friday AM I had more bruising than I would reasonably expect; my  post-procedure instructions instructed me to call 911 if there was a lot of sub-q bleeding, since a leak in the vein could make me bleed to death, so I called 911 and we and the EMTs waited and waited until the dispatcher said we could go, and I spent the rest of the morning in the ER getting checked out.  After the tests showed no leaks they decided it was "normal" bruising and I went back today to follow up with the ER doctor, and I go back this coming Wednesday for the procedure follow up with the cardiologist.  I'm getting too old to have this much fun!

[MamaV]

On 12/3/2023 at 5:05 PM, havanaholly said:

Well, the cardiac lint trap, aka the Watchman device, went in Wednesday and Friday AM I had more bruising than I would reasonably expect; my  post-procedure instructions instructed me to call 911 if there was a lot of sub-q bleeding, since a leak in the vein could make me bleed to death, so I called 911 and we and the EMTs waited and waited until the dispatcher said we could go, and I spent the rest of the morning in the ER getting checked out.  After the tests showed no leaks they decided it was "normal" bruising and I went back today to follow up with the ER doctor, and I go back this coming Wednesday for the procedure follow up with the cardiologist.  I'm getting too old to have this much fun!

Holy cannoli, that’s a lot to have to deal with! Thankfully, myself and my family‘s health have been pretty all right, but because we’ve been healthy, we’ve been asked to do a lot of things! Hopefully we manage to find space for it all this week, or really this month… today I’ve got a funeral, office hours for my youth ministry job, maybe visiting a friend, I’ll eat somewhere in there, youth group is tonight, and then we have a ham radio club meeting tonight as well. The fun never ends!

[havanaholly]

Oh, that was just the soup course!  Today I go in for the procedure follow up.  This coming Monday I go in for a sleep study to find out if I have sleep apnea; the pulmonologist explained that when we snore it lowers the amount of oxygen to the heart.  The follow up on the sleep study will be the day before my birthday.  Some time around the middle of next month I go in for a follow up TEE to see if my Watchman site is healing properly, and in that case I go off the blood thinner I'm taking, take a less aggressive blood thinner for a few months, and then stop blood thinners altogether.  Of course, this is all worked around regular physical exam, eye exam, getting a new pacemaker and dermatologist visit...  Getting old sure is a lot busier than I thought it would be!

[KathieB]

2 minutes ago, havanaholly said:

Getting old sure is a lot busier than I thought it would be!

Truth!! I gave up on the dreams of relaxing with a good book a long time ago. Turned out I have to schedule book time along with everything else. I don't mind, though. Pushing up daisies day after day sounds exceptionally boring!

[havanaholly]

My sentiments, exactly!  Every day on this side of the dirt is a gift to be treasured.