How I'm Doing

Oh, I'm fine! Ha ha!

Yeah, about that. 

Last Wednesday, I was two weeks out from my upcoming trip, planning all the details of the various friends and groups I want to see, and also thinking about getting things ready for my brother coming to keep mom company, while simultaneously thinking about day-to-day stuff. I had a lot of balls in the air.

Then the elevator broke.

Suddenly there are twice as many balls and there's gale-force wind and the balls are going everywhere.

Recap: We live on the sixth floor. Every grocery needs to be carried up, all trash needs to be carried down.

Initial estimate was "a month or two."

Next communication said "about 30 days."

Then on Saturday, as I was driving to meet friends for lunch, I glanced at my phone at a red light to see if anyone was running late, I saw an update email from the condo board president with the subject ELEVATOR and pulled off the road to park and read it.

10 weeks.

That is mid-July, people. Yesterday afternoon when I did the stairs, this was the weather:

Do you know how much worse it will be in two months? Yikes.

Let's think happy cat thoughts instead. It's been a while since I put up cat pictures, isn't it?

Time to Buckle Down

After the initial panic---no elevator for a month?! or more?!---I have started to settle down and work things out. Don't get me wrong, it still completely sucks. But I have to deal with it anyway.

My initial thought, honestly, was: how infrequently can I manage to have to go out? But then I had a chilling realization.

Used cat litter smells. Strongly. As does some kitchen trash, too, but the cat box scooping? I have been taking that down every other day, in happier, elevator-filled times, because it just does not smell good.

So it's not like I will be able to go out once a week and make that work. Following up on that, as long as I have to go down, I can maximize errands for those days. Or, for instance, bring home pizza for dinner. 

One of my initial thoughts was dismay about doing the condo checks. But honestly, that isn't going to be much worse than climbing the stairs would be anyway. Stopping on each floor going up? Well, it's not like I can climb five flights without a break anyway, not in these temps and with these knees.

Another 'happy' thought (such as it is) was, at least we have a garage, and can leave things downstairs. Cereal was buy-1-get-1-free, and I left a box in the garage. I'll buy some bottles of wine for Mom, but only carry up one. I'm even going to bring a gallon ziploc bag down and carry up that much cat litter at a time, because why kill myself bringing up 20 pounds at once? It's not like I need that much on a given day.

Yesterday I used a good, heavy-duty tote bag with good handles to carry things, and I also have a backpack in the garage that I can use.

Am I calm about this? Not really. I was already counting down to my vacation and how much I have to do to a) be ready to go, and b) have things ready for my brother when he comes in to keep Mom company. Removing the elevator from my tools for this planning increases the degree of difficulty by an unexpected and truly unpleasant amount. But what are you going to do? I'm not cancelling the trip. Do my best and move on.

Breathing deeply.

Oh, No. No, No, No

My building got bad news today: our elevator broke, and will be down "at least a month." (The piston broke, and my guess is that it takes that long to get the parts they need.)

For those who don't know, we live on the sixth floor, so this is not good. 

My mother finds the stairs very difficult, and will be trying to minimize trips as much as possible. 

I also hate the stairs (going down, my knees hate it, and going up, pretty much all of me hates it), and I'll have to be carrying up groceries, cat litter, suitcases ... this is going to suck, basically.

I had to go out today for an appointment, and when I dragged myself back upstairs at last, I checked the weather.

I mean, yeah, it could have been raining, that would have been worse, but ... this was bad enough.

It's been two years of good times, elevator. After this, please give us years more.

Ow, Tactical Error

My doctor recently prescribed a topical treatment for my arthritis, a cream for my hands so that I could cut down on how much ibuprofen I take. How much do I take? Too much, as I tell her when she asks; I know it's too much, but otherwise I'm in pain, and no, Tylenol doesn't work.

So I've been using the cream, and yesterday I decided to cut back on the pills and see if the cream was helping enough for that. Not stop it completely, but took 3/4 of my usual. 

The answer was, that would be a big old NO. My hands hurt! I'm back to my regular dose today, and it will probably take a few days for my hands to stop hurting. 

I'm thinking that I will keep using the cream, but not mess with cutting down on the pills until after I get back from my trip. Doing it when I'm going to be hauling luggage around isn't the best idea.

Ow....

Tune in tomorrow, when I expect to be griping about how disconcerting it is to wake up to a different alarm tone. I've used the alarm on my iPad for years, but in the last few days, it has started going off too loudly. When I go to turn it down, I see the little volume bar go down, and then right back up. The thing is too close to be for me to need it loud, and waking up flailing has not started my days off well this week.

But my phone alarm doesn't have the same tone available, so we'll see how well the change works. 

Change, hmph. Not a fan.

A Vent, and Something Fun

 Okay, let me vent first. At my annual exam on Tuesday, my PCP put in the order for my regular mammogram, although I'm not due until December, and this led to the radiology place sending me both a text and an email to call and schedule it. In fact, I got both messages on Wednesday, and then again today, and thought, fine, I'll call now and make the appointment for December, just to shut them up.

I called, I had to input my date of birth and zip code, and then the message told me to make the appointment online. (Could I have stayed on the line to make it? Possibly.)

So I went to the website, of course I have to create an account, I put in my info, click the button, and ... nothing happens. It doesn't move to the next screen, it doesn't give me an error message, nothing.

Fuck'em, I'll make the appointment in six months. Grrr, though.

~~~~~~~~~~
Meanwhile! More fun!

I'm going on a trip this month (so excited!) and I needed to buy a new suitcase, as my old one broke last time I traveled (fortunately not until the end of the return home). As I mentioned, when we went up to the outlets last week and I got the Skechers, I also bought a suitcase, and in a first for me, it's hard-sided, not fabric. 

Which means that I can't do something I've done in the past, and use fabric paint to make my suitcase stand out as obviously-even-from-a-distance mine. (I did pick a bright color, though not the taxi-cab yellow I looked at first.) However, I was talking about it with a friend, and she said: stickers.

Ah ha!

So this is the bag:

Which, by the way, has a built-in combination lock with TSA keyhole, so I don't even have to put my own locks on it. Pretty fancy. 

It has an interior cover on one side, so you can pack both sides and still close it, and it also zips to be wider if needed.

Plus of course it moves smoothly and the handle slides up and down like a dream. Ahhh, that new-suitcase feeling.

Anyway, I pulled out my stack of stickers, and while most of them were too large (given the way the suitcase has raised and lowered bits), I found enough that fit to mark all sides.

And I do mean ALL sides:

Shoutout to Ranc's!

I did take one sticker that wouldn't fit and make it work.

Now, yes, I do know that they will get scratched and scuffed when the bag is checked. That's okay. I just like it this way. As my mother reminded me, it's what I did to my car as well.

Do you mark up your suitcases in any way? Stickers, paint, bag tag or belt? Anything?

Kudos to Skechers

I’m not sure I had ever been in a Skechers store before today, but I wanted to try sneakers on, because my feet are both large (US size 10) and wide, so buying online before trying is asking for failure. We went up to the outlets, an hour away, and I started to look around. I couldn’t see anything on the boxes indicating wides, so I asked some employees how I could tell which were the wides, and they said, oh, all the wides are in that aisle over there.

Y’all. Y’ALL. I did not have to wander the entire store looking to see what styles they had in 10W, because ALL THE WIDES WERE IN ONE SPOT.

All I had to do was see what was available in 10. It was amazing. I wish every shoe store would do this.

Mind you, some of them probably wouldn’t because it would reveal how few wides they had. But anyway. I got these, and they are so comfortable. Yay, yay.

We also went into a travel store and I bought a new suitcase, then had lunch at P.F. Chang’s, went to Costco to redeem my reward certificate (that’s free money right there), and finally stopped at Norman Love to pick up some coconut macaroons.

It’s been a good day.

Naples Pride: Lots of Firsts

Mostly words first, then photo dump to finish.

I had a really good time on Saturday at Naples Pride, my first time going. I was meeting up with half a dozen people I know*, and we were in line before the gates opened (metaphorically speaking).
*I drove separately because I had a slight headache that morning, and didn't want to spoil someone else's day if I had to leave early. Didn't end up having to, though I did pop another pill during the drag show, as it was loud and had lots of flashy lights. 

Since I showed the clear bag I bought in a previous post, I want to mention that when I got to the man doing bag checks, he held it up, turned it around, and said, "I like this one, I don't even have to open it!" Which was the point of it, so yay me.

There were a lot of booths from various companies and organizations, including a couple of political candidates whose names I noted, and naturally many of the booths had not just giveaways, but rainbow ones. I picked up all sorts of stuff:

And as it was a hot day, I also bought this fan, for a whole $5, which was a life-saver; the park has a lot of trees, so the shade also helped, but the breeze was not as constant as I wanted it to be, so I made my own.

It's pretty sturdy, too, not a one-use item at all.

At one point, some of my friends and I were stopped by a reporter for the local paper, and she asked us a few questions; I didn't exactly feel prepared to articulate my thoughts, but I tried. Not sure when the last time was that I was quoted in a newspaper (if ever?), but this is a good one to have.

And it also answered a question I had had: apparently they moved it from June to April for the weather. It's true that June is mighty hot around here, but the weather on Saturday was plenty warm, too.

(The article ended by talking to "the protester" outside the event---yes, there was just one! He told the paper he felt 'threatened' by the attendees; personally, I feel threatened that he felt he had to be armed to protest. I'm glad I didn't notice that at the time, but I was pointedly looking away as I walked by him on the way out.)

So, fun! Rainbows! Happiness! Empanadas and shave ice! A few general photos:

Annnndddd the drag show! A lot of my pictures came out blurry, but oh well. There's really no conveying the experience through stills anyway.

This guy (and yes, he was introduced as "Mister" so 'guy' is right) had the most amazing light show; the part of his outfit around his waist lit and flashed, and he also had green pointer lights on his hat and wristbands, I think it was. A lot going on!

More than one performer had a costume reveal.

I believe this performer is the one who was introduced as being from Vegas, and, well...

I guess that's where she got those, then. My back hurt just looking at her move.

Just when I was wondering where the other colors of the rainbow were...

There they are!

I think this was my first time going to a drag show; at least, you would think I would remember, right? It was fun, very entertaining, and on a practical note, sitting down for an hour in the air conditioning was a very nice break! But of course the show was fun aside from that. I would go again.

And I would go to Pride again! Both for the serious, "being there as an ally to support people who are so often being treated like less-than in this country," and for the fun of going out and seeing all the rainbows and happiness. We have to find it where we can.

A Quick Ask: Baked Ziti Recipe

I went to Pride today and had a lot of fun, plenty more to come on that, but I was just reading a book that mentioned baked ziti and had a craving. Does anyone have a tried and true recipe? Not that it’s complicated, but I haven’t made it in a million years. Thanks in advance! Cat photo in payment.

Book Rec for Fantasy Book Lovers

Or maybe that should be "Book Rec for Book Lovers Who Love Fantasy"?

I recently read the last book in a fantasy series of five, and it was actually my favorite of them (though of course I enjoyed them all or I would have stopped reading before this point). I'm going to write more about book five than the others, though if you decide to try them, I highly recommend starting at the beginning.

The series is called Golden Pride, by Caitlin Ricci (AZ link), and it's about a world like our own, but with shifters, specifically lions (hence the pride part)*. Book one starts when Toby, a mild-mannered librarian, stumbles into a bar that turns out to be the hangout of a pack of lions led by Knox, and things happen from there. 
*If you think this is a ridiculous concept, well, yes, sure, but it is FAR from the most ridiculous I have read. Just ask me about that one!

Each of the books covers one member of the pride, dual POV, and the last book is about Silas, a quiet booklover, and Devin. Dev also loves books, especially fantasy books, and the title-dropping the two of them do starts at once. Book recommending is practically a long language as they get to know each other, and even when they were talking about books I haven't read, I was all in.

In this scene, Toby talks books with Devin.

This author GETS IT. She is one of us. After that exchange, Silas and Devin are alone.

The banter, the book love, it was all so pleasant to read. Assuming you like MM with a fantasy element, this is a good one to pick up. Start here: