O. C. D.?

     At what point do little habits, preferences, if you will, qualify for obsessions?
     Is it when we are driving to the post office to drop off some bills and when we get there I go ahead and pull up to the second big mailbox because I know if I stop at the first one I will not be able to wrench the envelopes out of Dennis's hand? They MUST be deposited in the second box. Maybe he was scared by a mailbox when he was a little kid. Who knows?  All I know is he will never, ever use the first box. See, he may have an obsession.
     Or when Dennis has some pills to take. He takes a multitude of pills a day, unfortunately. He takes the pink one. He waits two minutes, at least. He takes the brown one shaped like a football. He waits the same amount of time. He takes the little brown one. He waits. Same thing with the little yellow one and the  red and white capsule. You see where this is going. I have tried to tell him it doesn't matter if he takes them all at once. He disagrees and waits some more.
     When he has an appointment I have asked our doctor, who is a professional and he has seen her at least every three months for eight years and she has never steered us wrong, if it is okay for him to take his pills all at once. She says "Sure." Dennis nods but the next time he goes to take his pills, he takes them at the same interval between each pill. Just think what he could do with that extra hour or so a day.
     I have asked our-son-the-doctor, who has had four years of medical school, five years of residency and has been in practice eight and a half years, to explain it to him. He says, "Dad, don't be ridiculous." Dennis gives him The Look that says,"What do you know?  You're a kid," and continues to take his pills the same way he has for years. This is rooted in his past, I'm sure. I remember his mother doing the same thing, but somebody might say it's a compulsion, or something.
     I, of course, never do such arbitrary things. There are perfectly sane reasons why I do the things I do. Take car keys, for instance. No matter how soon I get out of the car after putting my keys in my purse, I have to reach back into my purse and touch them before I can lock the car. I tell myself while I am doing this "You just put them in your purse. You don't have to touch them." But I know if I don't touch them they will magically jump back into the ignition and I will lock them in the car. I don't have a spare key hidden in my wallet anymore because the car manufacturers kindly killed that option unless you want to pony up another $230 for an extra key. I've only locked the keys in the car once in the last couple of years. But then I sat and waited an hour for the locksmith to come with something that looked like a whoopee cushion and a bent coat hanger and opened the car for me in about thirty seconds. (Which is pretty scary in itself .) So, it's important to be careful about the keys.
     And there's the cell phone. To overcome my fear of leaving home without it I must touch my cell phone in my pocket as I am walking out the door. Except for when I'm talking on it as I am heading for the car, reach in my pocket to see if the phone is there and then.... "Oh! My! Gosh!! Where is my phone?? I have to go back and look for it!" At which point my daughter-in-law, Jerilyn, who is usually the one I'm talking to at these times, waits patiently, thinking, "Check your hand. Are you holding it up to your ear? Is there anything in that hand?" but she's too polite to say it. I figure it out but I'm still uneasy as I get into the car because my pocket is empty.
     Okay, there is that thing where I can't sleep at night until I have decided what I am going to wear the next day. Never mind that the only person who may see me that day is Dennis and he is almost legally blind so who cares, but I need to know. I may even get up out of bed, consult the closet, and only then can I go to sleep. But have you ever had that dream where you are walking down the hall at school and not only have you not studied for the exam you are about to take but you are also naked?  Okay, I have too, but I have never yet actually gone to school or any place else naked because I am prepared by knowing what I am going to wear the next day. See, planning ahead is important.
     I think other people may have the odd obsession here and there.  I'm pretty sure I'm just being careful.

Buying in Bulk

     When I was at Sam's Club earlier today the check-out belt across the aisle from me was piled so high that I couldn't tell what all was there. I saw a double pack of gallon orange juice bottles shrink wrapped together, industrial-sized containers of mayonnaise, big pillow case-sized bags of sugar, four thousand or so paper cups (the Solo kind) in tall stacks that I planned to steer clear of if we got to the door at the same time because the stacks were so long they could put your eye out, and some double cereal boxes the size of a coffee table. And more.
     Sometimes I see people buying so much they have to load it onto big, flat dollies that look like aircraft carriers with handles and drag it through the store with all four wheels going in different directions. I think Sam's should supply something like land-based tug boats to guide those things. Anyway, I guess that if they are buying that much they must have a store or restaurant or something. Or maybe they have seventeen kids and they are just buying supplies for the week-end.  And if that's the case, I want them to talk to me and tell me the logistics of cooking and cleaning and how much laundry they do. I don't know why, but I am always curious about these things.
     My sister shops at Sam's all the time.  Someone watching her might imagine that she is buying for a crew of construction workers, but she actually lives alone these days. It's a habit she can't seem to break, though. If she needs a can of green beans she buys a case. Paper plates come by the thousand and if you want margarine at her house be prepared to dig it out of a tub the size of a kitchen trash can. Last Christmas when she was here I wanted a few pieces of peppermint candy to put in a gift.  She knew exactly what I needed and now I have a huge plastic container in my pantry that holds 290 peppermint balls, less the twenty I used. I'm prepared for many Christmases to come. If you get a gift from me that contains stale peppermints, blame it on her. One time a few years ago she had bought so much from Sam's in one year---I am not making this up!---that they gave her a special pass so she could come in the store at 6:00 a.m. to shop before anybody else was there, even most of the employees.
     I don't know what it is about Sam's, and I hear Costco is the same way, but somehow when you are there you are mesmerized and feel as though you need to buy enough to feed the Third Infantry.  And it's not really your fault. They don't carry the Family size. Their sizes come in Gigantic, Humongous, and Just-Back-Your-Truck-Up-To-The-Loading-Dock.
     The one thing I am most curious about is how much are people paying for all this stuff? (Oh, please! Don't tell me you haven't wondered the same thing yourself.) I try to look, surreptitiously, when the checker rings them up but they always turn that screen away from me. So I think someday I'd like to be one of those people who stands at the door of Sam's and checks off people's receipts when they are leaving, then I could look at the totals and examine all the stuff in their baskets, too. Of course, when I said "Holy Cow! How long does it take you to go through a hundred and fifty-six rolls of toilet paper?" or something, somebody---I don't know who, I wouldn't---might take offense, but think how much I'd find out in the meantime.
     And, just in case you are wondering what I was buying there, I only had two items: a box of Goldfish Crackers that contained three giant bags, a pound-and-a-half each,  and a five pound bag of grated cheese. There's just Dennis and me.  I didn't need to get the big ones.

Plumbing Inequities

     There was a lady on the news last night who, even though she was afraid of heights, got talked into going on a ride at Knott's Berry Farm that went three hundred feet into the air, and then it got stuck up there for four hours.  She said she had a panic attack and now she has overcome her fear of heights.
     Well, I'm glad for her but what I want to know is: how did she manage to hang three hundred feet in the air for four hours without a bathroom? I can't walk around on firm ground for four hours without a bathroom.
     Bathrooms are my friends and I know most of the good ones in the Tulsa area and much of Oklahoma City. I visit them frequently to keep up our acquaintance. Quik Trips, of course, have some of the best and they do win the prize for being on almost every corner. But libraries are good and Reasor's grocery stores. Wal-Mart and Target, for sure. And Sam's. Any McDonald's. Twice I've dashed into Jack in the Box to use their bathroom but I don't buy food there. They may have encountered this beforecause the lights seem to be on an automatic timer and both times I've been there they have gone out when I was inside. Or maybe the manager figured out I wasn't going to buy anything and turned the lights off from a remote location. FYI, you want to avoid most gas stations, especially the ones where the door to the restroom is on the outside of the building. Just keep driving.
     I know you're thinking, "Well these things happen when people age," and that would be true, but in my case it has been this way all my life. When God gave out bladders I got the small, sample size.  Some of my relatives, (and by some I mean one) however, got the Lake Erie model. It is a bit of a problem when we  travel together. I was very happy when that person was pregnant, you know how pregnant people are, and for a few blessed months she didn't feel I was slowing down the trip when I wanted to stop at every rest area on the turnpike.
   We've all seen the commercials for bladder control medicine (and in fact, I think they modeled the whole scenario after me. I should get a royalty.) but when my doctor gave me a sample of one of them the directions had a monthly diary/calendar in it  For medicine to work, you were to chart your behavior changes. And directions: "Drink less fluids, make yourself wait a little longer between times, etc." Well, duh! I don't have to take an expensive medicine to do that stuff. If I wanted to.
     Okay, I drink a lot. No, not that. I start off the morning with a glass of ice water, usually go on to a large Diet Coke by 10:30 or so and the reason I like to go out for breakfast is that I can refill my Coke a couple of times. I have decided against moving to New York City now that they have that law against selling drinks larger than sixteen ounces. The McDonald's in Broken Arrow has half price on all drinks from 2:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. right now---that's fifty cents!--- and it would be un-American not to take advantage of that! But we drive through; I don't refill it. Then water till bedtime again. I usually have a glass near me all evening. And a glass of water on my bed table.
     The most I manage to wait between bathroom breaks is when we are watching television at night and Gus, the Wonder-Yorkie, is asleep on my lap. I don't want to disturb him, so I wait. And wait.  And pray for a squirrel or something  to make a noise outside so he will jump up and run to the window. Speaking of television, one of my favorite things is the pause button on the DVR. You don't have to wait for a commercial any more if you need to make a short trip somewhere down the hall.
 I did pull off about a four hour wait one time a couple of years ago, but let me tell you it was not easy.  At the four hour point I was desperate. And at times like these, sometimes you just have to get inventive. In fact....just turn away here and go read your e-mail if you're squeamish.
     It began when I took Dennis out to Glenpool to interview with a prospective consulting client. I waited in the car. I don't usually mind waiting if I have a good book, but then it got dark. And cold.  And the fifty-four ounce Diet Coke I had consumed on the way out there was...how shall I say this?  Wanting out. Desperately.
     Now, I didn't know if Dennis had told the client I had driven him or not. I didn't want it to appear that Dennis was limited in any way until he got the job so I didn't want to announce my presence by going in and asking for a bathroom. (Turns out he had, but I didn't know that then, now did I?) I had seen signs for a Quik Trip and a McDonald's about a mile back down the road. But there was one more problem: there is a security gate on the driveway to that building and it locks at dark. If I left I couldn't get back in.
     The conference room faces the glass front door and I could see Dennis and the client from where I sat in the parking lot. They seemed to be having quite a grand deliberation. There was gesturing.  There was writing on a white board. There appeared to be deep discussion. There did not appear to be any getting up to leave. We had arrived for the appointment at 4:00. It was pushing 8:30.
     I went through all the options in my mind and there didn't seem to be any. Well, I did have that fifty-four ounce cup. Desperate times call for desperate measures, as my mother-in-law used to say, and I won't go into any more details.
     Dennis came out about 9:00.  He has been consulting with this client ever since that time, which is really kind of a long time for a consulting gig. Sometimes when I go to pick him up he is still in meetings but now I know they have a very nice bathroom in the office.

 

Archeological Dig

     I cleaned off my desk yesterday. Not this one with the computer. I'm here everyday and there's nothing here but the monitor, keyboard and a few essentials, like my Thesaurus for when my head is stuck and my Bible for good quotes for people on Facebook.
     No, the desk in question is a small roll top that is in the living room. When the pile of things on the desk is too tall for the roll top to roll over it , it is time to do something.

Here are a few things I found:
    Mazzio's coupons that expired last December. Now I'm hungry for Mazzio's pizza but I don't have any coupons. We only eat what we have coupons for.
     Old, outdated receipts from Lowes that I saved so I could take their survey and get a $5000 gift card but you only have a week to do it even though I know exactly what I would purchase with that $5000.
     Two self-addressed, stamped envelopes. I guess I never sent me anything.
     A 2011 purse calendar.  I'm trying to learn to use my phone calendar so I suppose I forgot it was in there but it is a very soft leather so I put it in my purse anyway. I love the feel of leather; I will just take it out and run my hands over it sometimes.
     A box of business cards that say "Pat Carey Designs".  t's been about a decade since I did much of that.
     A list of people who brought food and flowers when I had all those surgeries a few years ago.If I still have the list maybe I never wrote the Thank You cards I intended to, so if you didn't get a Thank You from me I guess I owe you a Sorry card. Sorry!
     Enough free return address labels with puppies, flowers and snowmen on them to last longer than I will ever be at this address.
     A box of checks that will last longer than the address labels, even. Can't remember when I last wrote a check. I'm sure you think it is because I'm so up-to-date that I do everything on-line, but no.  I stopped using checks when banks got so smart alec that you couldn't write a check and then run get money from your husband or somebody and deposit it before the check got to the bank. I just use cash. When there is no more cash in my purse I know I am done so I go home.
     A wad of deposit slips because the ones that came with the checks are long gone.  I keep getting a bunch from the bank to keep in my desk but then when I get to the bank I don't have one so I use theirs. I wish they were worth money. Then that running between banks thing never would have had to happen in the first place.
     A Valentine for "A Cute 2 Year Old Boy" with Grover on it.  Sadly, there hasn't been a cute two year old boy around here for fourteen years now. I try not to waste anything but I'm pretty sure my grandson, David, would not appreciate it any more, even though he is still pretty cute. But sixteen.
     A Bas Mitzvah card. Well, when I first found it (not so easy here in the Bible Belt, so I grabbed it while I could) my friend in California had a little girl that I knew would do a Bas Mitzvah someday.  It happens when Jewish girls are thirteen, just like Jewish boys do a Bar Mitzvah, only with more flowers and pink stuff. Anyway, Melinda is about twenty-five now and I don't know any other Jewish girls, but it seems a shame to just toss the card. If you can use it, let me know.
     School pictures of two of my grandkids. I am waiting for the ones from the other two so I can put them in the frames in front of the school pictures from last year. I keep piling each year on top of the last one. I may have to change the frames for shadow boxes by the time they graduate.
     A really cute school picture of Dennis when he was nine.  It is one of those two inch ones so I don't have a frame. He looks kind of ornery in it, as a matter of fact. Wish I knew what he was thinking.
     A Rolodex that had belonged to Dennis's mother and now I use it.  If you don't know what it is, it is like the Contacts section of your phone only on real cards. I probably only use it at Christmas now but it has lots of info in it. I can't bring myself to pull out the cards of the people who have died. The older we get the more of them there are.
     A notebook with a calculator, a tape measurer and graph paper in it so I can come into your house, measure off your rooms and tell you how to arrange your furniture. Or what furniture to buy from me.The last  furniture store that I worked for has been closed for the last few years. I don't know what that says about my salesmanship. Oh, wait. They didn't close until after I was gone. I was probably propping the place up the whole time.
     And last, an engraved name plate that says "Patty Carey" that sat on a cubicle when someone else was the  boss of me, so that people who came by could tell I was a real person. It has an awful lot of dust on it.

Things Under the Bed

I'm not sure what all is under my bed any more. Probably a little, okay, a bunch of dust, of course. There was an old, black and white Jimmy Stewart movie called "Harvey" in which Harvey was a six-foot tall rabbit. I'm kind of thinking what some people call dust bunnies under the bed has most likely grown into Harvey by now. I can't get down there to look.  Well, okay, I could get down there but then I couldn't get up and my days of sleeping on the floor are long past.

When our cats were kittens we were always losing them under the bed.  They had found a hole in the dust protector (you know: that cheesecloth looking thing that is stapled to the bottom of the box springs)   It was just big enough for them to squeeze in and whenever you tried to grab one he ran to the other side, his little feet bouncing like he was on a trampoline.  There was no way that you could get them out even if you poked them with a broom which they thought was a hilarious game.  They waited until we finally gave up, took a little cat-nap till we were sound asleep, then came out and dashed around the bedroom causing us (and by "us" I mean me) to get up and chase them.  Then they ran under the bed and up into the dust cover again.  It was quite fun. For them.

Eighteenth Century reproduction furniture was the most popular style back when I sold furniture and we sold a lot of four-poster beds, some called Rice Beds (sheaves of rice carved into the posts) and others called Tester Beds  (usually straight pencil-shaped posts.)  What those beds had in common was that they were way-way-way! off the floor, usually about sixteen to eighteen inches, and you could see straight through from one side of the room to the other if you bent down and looked. The point being that heat rises and in 1786 or so, with no central heat, it was nice to get a little closer to the ceiling.  Also, you could fit the chamber pot under there but we won't go into that today.  We even sold little sets of steps so you could climb into the high beds. I always thought they were beautiful, but even if I could have afforded one, I wouldn't have gotten it because I need to be able to hide things under the bed. (But not a chamber pot. Or kittens.)

Whenever I get something too big to fit anywhere else, I slide it under the bed. I know there's a big frying pan under there now.  My daughter-in-law was getting rid of hers and it was better than mine so I took it but I don't want to give up my old one yet. I may get the urge to fry up a lot of something. The leaf to the table is under there. (Here's a tip: if you are storing your table leaves standing up in the closet or somewhere, go get them and put them under the bed. They need to lie flat or they will warp. I know this from my furniture selling days) And a great big stainless steel bowl like they have in commercial kitchens. It is twenty-four inches across and won't fit in my kitchen cabinets.  You could wash a baby in it.  Or have a whole lot of salad to go with all that stuff you fried. I've only used it once, but you never know. They make nice containers on wheels to store things under your bed, like shoes, I guess, but I don't have any of those.

There is most likely a whole lot more. There are probably dog toys that the dog has lost, and cat toys that the dog is hiding from the cat.  And I hope there are two or three earrings and a watch that have disappeared because I've searched everywhere else.  But I might not find out till we move or something. When we got as new mattress a few years ago it was pretty scary under there.  You may be surprised, but I am not the type who moves the bed to vacuum underneath. Please! (I know there are some of  you are out there who do and I beg you: seek help!)

I read in Genesis where God says to Man something like "Dust you were and to dust you shall return."  I'm thinking there may be a man under the bed, but I don't know if he's coming or going.  He's next to Harvey.

Movers----A Cautionary Tale

It has come to my attention that we had more than one anniversary a couple of weeks ago.  The first was our forty-sixth wedding anniversary.  The second was the eighth anniversary of being in this house.  What a surprise!  Who knew, starting out, that we would be gypsies, moving in and out of houses, fifteen in all, like we were in the Witness Protection Program?  Well, we did live the longest, sixteen years, in the house our boys grew up in and that was the best, but I'm startled to realize that besides that one, we have been here longer than any others.

I just wrote, and deleted, a whole blog about being moved by professionals. It is exciting all by itself, but today, students, let's talk about what NOT to do if you are arranging for your own movers.  As I said, we have had several moves in the past, two cross-country, two inter-state, and after the turn of this century, there were four local moves in a five-year period.  I thought I was pretty proficient at this.  I thought I spoke "Mover". The downfall came the very, last time we moved, and it was only from Tulsa to Broken Arrow. How hard could that be?

For the first time in all the moves, I was in charge of engaging the movers.  Here is where I made my big mistake: I tried to do it all by phone. Here where I made my biggest mistake: I took the lowest bid. We had pared things down considerably in those last few moves and I knew exactly what we had and what would fit on the truck. For goodness sake, the stickers were still on all the boxes.

The very friendly gentleman, Dan, that I spoke to assured me his crew could do it all in a morning and it would only cost $400.  He was family-owned.  He had been in business for a number of years.  He would take personal care of us.  He knew how stressful even these short moves could be. Not to worry; he would treat me like his own mother. We set up a time for his truck to be at our duplex.  I called the utility companies and arranged for the stop date.

The morning of the move Dennis left for work.  I answered the door to the mover.  He didn't look like he was going to treat me like his own mother.  "Hey." he snarled. " I'm Jack. Dan's truck broke down and he sent me over to move you."  He began to stroll through the house, looking at the boxes already packed in the garage.  He looked me over too.  Here is where he made his big mistake:  "I can get this for you, lady, but it's gonna cost you $700."

I stood there, dumbfounded. "But, Dan told me he could do it for $400. That is the price we agreed on."

"Yeah, well, that's because he has a bigger truck.  I will have to make two trips and it's gonna cost you $700.  We need to get going here. I know you have to get out of here today."  And here is where he made his biggest mistake:  "An Elderly Person, like yourself," he said, "needs to take what help you can get.  You can't do it yourself, can ya?"

I sent him packing, and I don't mean with my furniture.  I realize now that it was a scam from the beginning, a bait and switch, and had I let him get our belongings on his truck, he probably would have kept them there and refused to unload until I had paid him even more than the $700.  My biggest regret is that I didn't call the police on the spot.

And then this Elderly Person got cracking.  I loaded every box and every piece of furniture I could fit into the back of my mini-van and moved it myself.  Bet you didn't know I can carry a wing back chair on my head, did you?  I lifted every end table, the coffee table, all the heavy oak chairs from our dining set, night stands, rocking chairs, boxes and more.  If it fit it into the back of the van, I moved it.  There may have been some adrenaline involved.

It took a whole bunch of trips and we had to stay in a dark house with no electricity that night and brush our teeth with bottled water, but the next day another local mover came and moved the big furniture and the appliances.  I did not pay them $700.

So here are some things to remember:

1. Interview movers at your house and get written bids.

2. Pack one box with toilet paper, bedding, and cleaning supplies and load it last so it can come off the truck first. 

3. If your refrigerator is going to be turned off for more than a day or two, put lumps of charcoal in an old sock and leave it in the refrigerator to absorb odors. (Don't get that charcoal embedded with starter fluid that smells like kerosene. Just sayin.')

4. Don't call me Elderly. 

Smarter and Thinner!

This week Apple came out with yet another, thinner, smarter version of the iPhone.  Everything is thinner than me so I'm not even going to think about that and, sorry, I can't do a phone smarter than I am. I'm barely smart enough to use the phone I have.  In fact, the not-so-smart phone I have has lots of stuff in there that it's keeping to itself because its owner doesn't have a clue about it.

We are not that far removed from the curly cord that stretched across the kitchen so you could stir stuff on the stove while you were talking.  Oh, wait.  I still have one of those.  Nobody calls us on it except telemarketers and people who think we are stupid enough to wait for their recorded message.

It hasn't been too many years ago that I scoffed at people who carried their cell phones with them.  The sight of people holding what looked like a brick to their ears and talking while they walked seemed ridiculous to me, not to speak of pretentious.  Dennis had the first one in our household.  After all, he was a realtor and you know how they are, but when he insisted I get one, I balked.  Okay, he wouldn't let up, so I got one but hid it in my purse and tried to be invisible when I used it.  I wanted something like, maybe, a phone booth or something to stand in. The only time it rang was when Dennis called from his cell phone to see if it was working.

That was then and this is now.  Last night I came back from running (no, not that running, I drove) up to Braum's and saw that my cell phone was here on the table instead of in my pocket. A cold chill went up my back. How could I have gone out without my phone? What if I had had a wreck? Or a flat tire? Or forgot what I was supposed to be getting at Braum's? (French onion dip this time, but it's been known to happen.)

And more importantly, what if Dennis had fallen and tried to call me and then he heard my phone ringing near him as he lay there and he reached up to the table but his fingers just....couldn't....quite....grasp it?  Or remembered that he wanted me to get chips with the dip?

If I had to categorize the kinds of calls made on our cell phones, I'm thinking seventy percent of them are of the "I'm sitting outside.  Are you ready yet?" kind and the "Okay, I'm looking at them.  What kind of batteries am I supposed to get?" kind.  Another twenty percent keep me in touch with my out-of-town daughter-in law and my sisters who only have time to talk to me when they are driving down the road.  (Oh, stop! They have hands-free.  I think.) But about ten percent are "You left the garage door up again.  Do you want me to close it?" or "Grandma, I forgot my lunch.  Can you bring it up to me?" or "I'm stuck in this meeting, can you go let the dog out?"  The kind I am so glad I can get.  How did we handle those things before cell phones?

I saw that a lot of people were saved in Haiti during the earthquake because they were able to contact help by cell phone.  This is why I don't ever want to be without my phone these days.  What if a tornado comes and we are trapped in the bathroom by the entertainment center that has fallen across the door and rescuers don't know where we are?  Or if I am mountain climbing and break my leg falling on a ledge twenty-three thousand feet above a ravine?  Or if I am sky-diving and totally miss the location where they are supposed to pick me up and I'm stuck in a tree?  And lately on the news I've seen that a lot of bears are coming into people's yards! What?? It could happen!

You never know what's out there.  I'm keeping my cell phone charged and in my pocket.....at least when I haven't dropped it in the toilet or something and it's in a bag of rice drying out. I may not be as smart as my phone but I'm smart enough to have a bag of rice waiting in the pantry just in in case.  I'm ready for any possibility.

Ice Cubes

     I just bought something that might be entirely foreign to anybody born after the Reagan administration: ice cube trays. We may be the last living people who use them. I had to go to four different stores to find them. The old ones had sprung leaks in several of the little compartments and you had to fill every other one like you were playing hopscotch with running water.
     It's not that we don't have an ice-maker. When we bought our new refrigerator a few years ago I tried to purchase one without, but apparently they don't even make ice maker-free refrigerators anymore, in spite of the fact that they take up valuable real estate in the freezer section. So when they came to deliver the new fridge I just did not have them hook it up to the water line. We have to be careful to keep the wire that trips the filling mechanism in the off position or you hear the poor fridge making a "whrrr whrrring" sound as it struggles to fill the apparatus with imaginary water.
     I don't like ice maker ice. It is wimpy. It melts too fast. I want ice in a good, solid cube. Square and sturdy and long lasting. It stays in your drink until the Diet Coke is gone instead of disappearing after your second swallow and watering down the whole thing.
     The plastic ice trays now available, the few of them that are made, are much easier to use than the old metal trays that were operated with a lever that froze shut and had to be forced open when you wanted ice, and you had to use the whole tray at once. And SOMEONE in your house never refilled them and either left them in the sink, or stuck them back in the freezer empty which you wouldn't KNOW until you needed ice and then it was just too darn late wasn't it??? Oh, sorry. Where was I?
     It was no wonder that the trays got left empty---although never by me!  I was always responsible---because  filling those metal trays was a talent unto itself.  It took nerves of steel and the grace of a ballerina to get the tray from the sink to the shoe box sized freezer compartment that had only enough room for the trays, without spilling the water all over the floor and having to start again. Or worse yet, spilling half the water out of the tray just as you got to the little freezer, thus insuring that after the ice was frozen the trays would also be frozen to the bottom of the freezer and require a machete to dislodge them.   
     The rubber ice trays I just bought don't seem to spill so easily, or maybe I have practiced filling and loading them so much that I've gotten skilled at it. And all you have to do is twist the tray and out pops the ice. I empty them into a container each evening and usually have plenty of ice, retro as it is.  (Here is a tip if there is anyone else out there still as old-fashioned as I am: To prepare for times when you might need larger quantities, empty your trays into a paper bag a few times a day and store the bag in the freezer. Don't use plastic bags.They will make the ice stick together.)
     Lest you think I just don't know what I am missing, we did have an ice maker in the past. Then our house was struck by lightening and---I am not making this up---the ice in the ice maker was burned!  It actually had singe marks across it. It may have been that God was trying to tell us something, what with the lightening strike being directly over our refrigerator and all.
      At least I'm not taking any chances with the ice.

Making the Bed. Or Not.

     I didn't make the bed again today. Or yesterday. Or, I can't remember when---probably not since the last time we had company. Like anyone ever goes in our bedroom to see the bed, but still, when you have company, you make the bed and clean out the medicine cabinet in the hall bathroom. In case.
     It's not that I'm lazy. Well, okay, I am lazy, but that's not the reason I don't make the bed. We have perfectly fine bedding. In fact, last time we moved I spent a lot of time and more money than I usually do buying fabric, and hand sewing a dust ruffle with tuxedo pleats, making pillow shams, bolster pillows, little frou-frou pillows that go on top of the comforter, and matching window treatments. The dust ruffle and the window treatments are in their places, but all the pillows, shams, bolsters and frou-frou are in the corner of the bedroom waiting to be put back on the bed. Someday.
    The comforter, itself, is folded into a neat rectangle and plopped on the foot of the bed. Gus, the Wonder-Yorkie, is the original Princess, albeit, a Prince, (well not completely a prince any more, if you know what I mean, so it is okay for him to be princess-y), from the Princess and the Pea. He likes to lie on soft things, especially down. The comforter has become Gus's "nest". It is a shame to disturb him. He sleeps there at night and the cat sleeps there most of the day. So, you see, I can't make the bed.
     The other thing about the bed is Dennis's pile of pillows.  He has them in exactly the configuration he likes them.  He says he can't sleep flat, so he has a wedge pillow, a hand-me-down anorexic down pillow passed down from the last time I got a new one, and two ancient pillows the thickness of a credit card. When I put the pillowcases on those two old pillows it doubles their thickness. ithout the cases on they are practically transparent. Did I mention they are thin? I think he has had them since third grade and heaven help me if I attempt to replace them.
     And they have to be stacked Just So on the bed. First the wedge pillow, then the two business cards masquerading as pillows, one on top of the other, then the pillow with the down of, maybe, three goslings in it. The suggestion that he could probably get the same effect with just one nice, new, plump pillow is met with The Look accompanied by The Sigh. I need to keep my mitts off his pile of pillows. It is enough that he has to rearrange this collection once a week after I wash the sheets and things. So, you see, I can't make the bed.
     Back when I used to make the bed I would sit against the headboard and pull all the sheets and covers straight before I even got out, then slither as carefully as possible out the side and the whole thing was practically done before my feet hit the floor. These days I get up before Dennis and no matter how smooth I might get things on my side, there is still that big lump---oh! that's him---on his side, and then when he does get up he wants to sit on the side of the bed to get dressed so there is simply no point in trying to straighten anything. Or make the bed.
     Besides, one of the coolest things about being retired is the possibility, the hint of a suggestion, that maybe, just maybe, I might get to go back and take a nap. Not that I have ever done it, but I could if I wanted to. I want to leave my options open. So, you see, I can't make the bed.

I'm Moving The Jalepenos Out To The Front Porch, or How Old People Cope With Life's Little Dilmmas

     The guy who cuts our grass is out front and we have put his check on a table in the entry foyer like we usually do in case he comes when we aren't home. I have a plan today, though. When he opens the storm door to pick up the check I am going to catch him and ask him to open this jar of jalapenos for me.
     Between Dennis and me, we have wonky shoulders, arthritic fingers, toes that don't bend what with the metal inside them, knees that left the building long ago, hip joints that creak and refuse to obey directions, and one leg that has decided it is not gonna do that (no matter what "that" is) no way, no how and another leg that has gone completely missing. Heaven help us if one of us gets down on the floor, or even in a low-slung chair. So, instead of being limber, we have to be crafty. We have special tools and things we've improvised.
     We have a lift-chair for Dennis to get up and down. We have a "grabber" which is kind of like a big pair of tongs so some short people in this household can reach up high to get things, (and how did they get up that high in the first place?) or down low to get things (if I fall over trying to reach this those EMT guys are going to be ticked if they have to come out again.) We have a "sock donner" that helps Dennis get his compression socks on and he has adapted a long back scratcher to help him get his prosthetic leg on and for lots of other stuff. We have magnifying glasses to read things with and extra bright lights to shine over documents. The clock in the bedroom has numbers the size of a skyscraper---okay, a three-story building. We have a round rubber disk that usually helps me get jars open.
     I try to get creative with some of the other household items, like when I take a jar that the rubber thing-y won't open out to the vise attached to the work bench. It seems like a good idea but then I get confused. I know "righty-tighty, lefty-loosey", but does turning the jar upside down make it righty-loosey, lefty-tighty? Did I tighten it instead of loosen it when I turned?
     Sometimes you kind of need a helping hand. My mom, when she lived alone, would get dressed on Sundays up to the point of getting the zipper all the way up on her dress. Then she donned a sweater, went to church and asked the first lady she encountered to finished pulling her zipper up.
     A few years----okay, decades----ago, I walked up behind an elderly friend at our church who was struggling with her jacket and helped her put it on. She said, "Oh, I love being old! Everybody always wants to help me." At the time, I thought "How sweet!" but now I'm thinking "Delusional!" (No, really. She was actually that nice. I think the term is "Filled with the Spirit.")
     I admit, people do hold doors, offer seats, ask if I need anything, quite often these days. I try to manage by myself, but sometimes things just don't come together, kind of like that time at the gas station when I was trying to put air into my tire. There were two guys watching me and finally they came over and did it for me. Apparently I was letting the air out instead of putting it in. They were very nice about it and didn't start laughing till they were several yards away.
     Usually I don't even have to ask for assistance, but when I do, I never have anybody turn me down. Who can resist a little old, gray-haired lady who looks like your grandmother asking for help?

Next It's Gonna Be Taking My Lunch Money!

Okay, I'll come right out and say it: our dishwasher is a bully.  It has a mind of its own and if you don't treat it the way it wants to be treated, so much for you!  It will return your dishes in just as bad shape as they were when you put them in, if not worse.

When I worked at a furniture store in Oklahoma City, the cleaning lady actually filled the sink with soap and water, washed the dishes by hand and then loaded the dishwasher that was in the break room.  It could be that my dishwasher is holding out for this easing of its labor but so far I have stood firm on that.  I do rinse the dishes and try to load in a way that will be comfortable for it, though.  I actually like to load a dishwasher; it's kind of like working a puzzle, with different pieces every time.  I've always heard that it should be full before you run it for Maximum Efficiency but lately my dishwasher has been saying "Efficient, Shmefficent!" and so I put a few less things in and give it more room.

I have tried taking out some of the parts that might be bothering it, like that propeller thing in the middle, and then removing the screen thing and washing it separately, hoping that would be like taking a pebble out of a shoe, or scratching its back, hoping to put it in a little better mood.  Sometimes that works, but only for a short while.

We had a very nice friendship in the beginning. I would turn it on last thing at night and listen to it run through its cycles after we had gone to bed. This was so it wouldn't have to share the water supply with everyone in the neighborhood and not have to work so hard.  Recently I saw on the news that some dishwashers have been recalled because they actually caught fire and officials advised never running the thing when you were gone or asleep.  I took this to be a thinly veiled threat from appliances everywhere, so now I am trying to be more careful.  I have stopped short of sitting in front of it and watching it go through its cycles, though.

Don't let this get out, but when we lived in a different house I actually washed dishes by hand for a whole year and just drained them in the broken dishwasher so I could save up for a Maytag, which I had heard was a very loyal, hardworking machine. We moved from that house eventually.  Perhaps the dishwasher felt it had been abandoned and the word spread.  All I know is I know Maytags; a Maytag was a friend of mine, and this, sir, is not a Maytag. 

You may think this seems like appeasement, but today I made another conciliatory move. I bought the dishwasher its own bubble bath.  You're supposed to put it in the machine with no dishes (you wouldn't want  to stress it during its spa treatment), let it run a few minutes, then bask in the bubbles for four hours before you request that it do any labor.  I hope it likes it.

I've done all I can think of.  I just want to say to it  "Can't we all just get along?" 

Still My Hero

At this point in our lives it is true that Dennis is probably not going to be able to jump up (it would take him awhile to "jump") and attack someone who might try to kidnap me, (although he does have that big, carved walking stick that our son, Josh, brought him from Guiana.  It is really heavy and I'm positive he would make an attempt to use it if the occasion arose) but he still finds ways to protect me.

He saves me from having to drive all by myself. He lets me know if I am getting too close to the car in front or changing lanes without looking.  Or he watches to see when there is a stop light coming up or I need to make a left turn in a few blocks and he warns me ahead of time.  I have to admit that I'm not always as grateful I should be.

But a few years ago when, long after dark, we left our Sunday School Christmas party and were shocked to find a sheet of ice on all the roads and I had to drive clear across Tulsa, I was terrified. Dennis kept calmly telling me I could do it, letting me know where to slow down and where to speed up for maximum traction till we made it home. I was exhausted and shaking by the time we pulled into our garage but had he not been with me, giving me the benefit of his years of driving in bad weather, I probably would have pulled over and waited till Spring.

He just saved me, once again, from having to talk to a telemarketer.  He knows that most of the time I hate to talk on the phone, and have even been known to stop in when I'm driving by the doctor's to make an appointment so I don't have to phone them.  If you call our house, Dennis will probably answer the phone first, so don't be insulted  Of course, I guess if I was planning to have an affair his questioning of callers could thwart that too, but so far it hasn't been an issue.

And I don't do confrontation. He does that for me. The nurse who chose to unload her bad day on me while I was waiting to be wheeled into the operating room for my mastectomy is now a graduate of Sensitivity Training School and I received a letter of apology from the president of the hospital.

If it has to do with math, motors, or malfeasance of any kind, Dennis does the talking. I never talk to the guy at the car repair place, or the insurance adjuster, or the people at St. Francis Hospital billing office whose employers' children I am probably keeping in very fine schools. Lately some underling will sometimes get a little snotty and insist I get on the phone to give them permission to talk to Dennis about my business.  I'm sure they feel the need to save me from being so un-liberated.  I have to get on the line and say  "I don't need you to save me.  My husband is doing it for me, thank you."

They'd better quit bugging me about it, too, because he may talk softly, but he carries that really big, stick.