Sunday all around the village: PWYC

[Twins' Mom]

Yoo Hoo! What's happening in your corner of our little village today? Sweeping sidewalks, shoveling snow, getting healthy, keepin' up with the house and dishes and duds?

All the happenings of the village, here as we PWYC today.

[CathyS]

Hi Twins' Mom! Thank you for starting us off today.

I am heading out the door to pick up meds at the pharmacy for dh and then on to the highway and heading to Costco for something else for dh. He will be watching the pregame shows for football and then the games are on. He has been staying up later and sleeping in later and later these days.

We are having a chicken and rice casserole for supper.

Have a great day!!

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

I'm up. Went to bed late and do not feel at all bright and cheery. In fact, quite the opposite.

Wasted almost every minute of yesterday. Accomplishments were that I washed my hair,, put on nail polish, tidied the bedroom (but not dusted), inserting my SIM into my new phone and signing int to almost all the apps.

Before bed, I went to put it on a charger (it has QI charging, my first phone with that built in) and couldn't find one. I used to use an attachment that converted a phone to QI charging and dh's phone had it so there were chargers at both our bedsides, beside where we sit in the living room (which is within reach of my desk), then during Covid I bought 3 more, and put one on dh's desk, one in the dining room (because I was working from the table a lot on video calls) and one extra. Last night, I found only one and it was in use (by dh's bed.) So I plugged in to charge instead.

Dh informs me that 3 chargers died, and one is in the spare bedroom. That leaves 3 missing. Dh said one is in his computer bag, so today I'll go looking for the other two. I still haven't tested whether my phone will charge through its waterproof case but it is advertised as doing so. Because of the case, there is a plug closing off the charging port and it is awkward to pull out. Hence me hoping to use the Qi charging.

My phone isn't waterproof itself, nor does it have Gorilla Glass, and I drop my phone a lot, so I do need to protect it well. I refuse to spend more on my phone than my laptop so I don't get all the features. Dh spent more on his phone than 4 of my laptops. I just can't force myself to do it.

So far today all I've done is spend 45 minutes going through the phone settings to make sure they are all set to the level of privacy and non-disruption that I want.

I will go get dressed now.

LadyM: Have you ever tried bone induction headphones on your dh? They leave the ears unblocked so won't irritate them as much as either over the ear or in-the-ear headphones. But some people are irritated by them. Thankfully dh isn't so uses them on his exercise bike each day. We use Aftershokz https://shokz.com/collections/wireless. I broke one of mine by sitting on it, but it still works patched with electrical tape to hold the induction bit against my skull. I replaced that one with another pair, and dh tested the broken one and bought himself a pair. Both of ours are the around the head kind, but I see they have an offer the ear set now too. <edit> I have the OpenMove model. When I looked at the link I was shocked at how much more expensive they are now but I suspect they may be better geared to music fidelity than they used to. I use mine for listening to podcasts so didn't need that. They work well when I get a phone call, so while I didn't buy them for that, they work. That doesn't apply in your use-case, though.

[Twins' Mom]

I had a good day yesterday. I used my laptop downstairs and rewrote and did footnotes for first page of the Lewis family narrative. Given my goal of publishing this year, I just need to polish it and update some footnotes and will submit for publication. Went down a few rabbit holes and did some some footnotes for things I hadn't done before. So that was fun.

I made chicken noodle soup yesterday from chicken breasts. Dh went to grocery to get either a small chicken for soup, or chicken thighs to add some flavor, but came home with a rotisserie chicken. He did not understand the process! I thought soup was bland, will add a little more salt and pepper when I reheat. Wish I had some parsley or dill to throw into it too. We had it last night with grilled cheese, and dh did the grilled cheese and did most of clean up.

I think he's amazed that I don't get cabin fever. I suspect we'll go out somewhere later just because. He bowls tonight. Not a chance that gets cancelled!

[blessedw2]

good morning!!!

[Twins' Mom]

Looks like we are going over to see A and V. She's been cooking so we'll be there for a lunch. I am just eating breakfast, however. So we'll hang out.

[Lady Maverick]

Home from church service. I took a page of notes during the sermon because I wanted to capture his message. I will be going back over my notes to dig deeper. I thanked our pastor after the service for such a great message.

I need to find a recipe for chicken parmesan. Cathy recommended Allrecipes so that is where I will look first. I want to make it for Tuesday Elderberry luncheon. Once I find the recipe, I will scale it up to feed 24. I will need to go buy ingredients today or tomorrow.

TV sound management. Thanks for the recommendations. I will look further for Plan D and maybe Plan E. This is a big deal for my mental peace, so I am willing to spend the time, effort and money to find the best solution. DH is very accommodating and will voluntarily watch TV with no sound if he has the slightest idea that the sound is bothering me.
Hum....I remember using AI glasses that DGS18 showed us when he visited here over the holiday. The AI glasses were much more than sound, but I would love to find something similar in having a personal sound space. You couldn't hear them a foot away but the clarity of sound while wearing the AI glasses was amazing.
I prefer the solution to be wired because I don't need another thing to take care of (keeping them charged & Bluetooth connection).

Today is the final day of two weeks effort in raising money to support VDFriend who just found out she has stage 4 cancer in liver, bones, and all through her body. Our small community (less than 2k people) is going all out to surround her with caring and financial support as she and family go through this. When one hurts, we all hurt.
GoFundme is over $24k
Online auction can only support 100 items and it has been maxed out.
In person auction happens at noon today.
Meal happens at noon today. They expect such a large turnout that they are having the meal in two places. The meal is all donations. Just pay what you want and can afford.
Sidetracking alert.....this FB group gives an overview of these activities.
ANYway - I have won a couple auction items so will be going to pick them up and get some food.

[CathyS]

I'm back from doing the 2 errands. The line up at Costco was crazy. I ended up going to the regular one instead of the business one. We live exactly 20 minutes from each one. The temperature here is around 34 F. It's sunny with a few clouds. A lot of the snow from yesterday is already gone.

LadyM now they have an option to make 1x the recipe or 2x or 3x. Just click on the button.

[Harriet]

Hi, all.

LadyM, I must rush to get some method of taking notes before a sermon, if not already prepared. Don't have wise methods for keeping track later, though. Spiral bound chronologically is contained, thank goodness, but not necessarily according to any other topic organization, etc. So, I'm sure I lose compelling ideas and thoughts.

Last night, at HRH's insistent request, I took the tougher nausea med. Nearly scared to do it, but I did get more deep sleep. And felt more relaxed and calmer (well, the thing drugs you, doesn't it - not a mystery). Only lasts 6 hours, opposed to 8 with the other, so that's inconvenient. It was ddil who suggested it at night only. On the evening after my dmil fell ... .. a lot to consider about getting up in the night and dizziness. Sigh.

So far so good this morning will small breakfast and meds done.

I've started in watering/feeding all the violets. Two soaking their little feetsies now.

Tobias caught a mouse, who cleverly played dead. While HRH was carrying cat and mouse out in their usual parade, Tobias dropped the mouse on the porch and HRH shooed predator back into the house rather than allow any more "attention" to the prey. Well, eventually, HRH watched long enough and proved to himself the mouse was just playing possum. So, until the weather warms tomorrow, we have a little boxed visitor in our mud room, complete with a furnished apartment/box, a bit of cheese, a jarlid of water, and a blackberry. And there you have it, my husband in a nutshell. Faced with mortality of one particular wee Mousie, this guy who probably took a rabbit a day back with his dogs and gun as a teen, seriously questioned last evening whether the mouse would eat some of his chocolate pudding. Seriously. These are the qualities you look for, right? - who's going to be a good provider/Daddy .. .. or something.

All I said was, watch the weather and if it warms enough today, set the box outside and let him decide. 36 hours is a long time when you're little.

[blessedw2]

Re-write of the issue this morning:
my reacting to her meanness and her lack of logic/cleanliness on my part is unhealthy for her and for me. There aren't many people I react to--I have worked very very hard to be kind bc I know that when people get frustrated that there is something underneath causing it.
My struggles have been with the lack of logic with dh/mom and I am the one who has to figure it out.

the place where she is at does not have a person for day time but mom could live in assisted living but mom isn't quite there. mom is great at hours at a time. she gets stuck in cycles where she washing things etc. over and over. (at least she stays busy in these cycles).

the top thing is that dd's suggested I have to stop worrying that her hospital stuff will happen again. they are right.

-We are going to fix our shower as mom is a shower first thing in the morning person.
-we are going to work with her natural routines.
-I am going to talk to a alzheimers consultant - I also want mom's mental abilities tested every so often
-simplify her cloths where there is only one outfit she pulls at night for the next day - dd's suggestion - she gets confused by options.
and so many more things.
-I will start going to senior things - fitness - she doesn't have to join but she will come with me and hopefully she will socialize.
-be better at creative things and house fixing things as she thrived on that.

her yelling at me means I step away - no response but that "I am sorry, I can't allow you to talk to me meanly" - I did that after I saw her doing dishes after our separate meeting - I said thanks for helping- she was as nasty as can be - "what do you think I am doing" - dd's and dh are also saying she can talk to me nicely. dd younger gets this behavior from mom. My mom could always be a nasty thing if she didn't get what she wants - a good guilt trip - she wouldn't do that to my dad or my brother bc they wouldn't allow it. She always did that with me. in her old age it got better and she thought of me better - but every so often the nastiness returns.

so we will adapt until we can't -