Monday May 18th 2026

Good morning. It looks to be a lovely, sunny day here, but only getting to 60. We will be taking MiL to her chiropractic appointment, then to the hospital. Saturday, eldest ds went mountain biking and took a bad tumble. He walked to his car, called his wife, and went to ER. He has fractures in 2 cervical vertebrae, and one in his 7th thoracic vertebrae. He was in ICU yesterday, on spinal precautions, waiting surgery, which will happen today. He has no neuro impairment, thankfully, but having lots of pain. And he hates narcotics. He was supposed to get a pacemaker upgrade Friday, in Seattle, but that looks doubtful. Gad, when it rain, it pours.

Tweety, that is frustrating about your bookcase. I've not used Wayfair, but my daughter does. I like Ikea for inexpensive furniture, but it's so far from us, we don't go much.

Joe, it sounds like you had a nice trip, I hope the weather cools off soon for you.

Dianah, that sounds like it was a lovely day for you and the hymn sing attendees.

Stars, good to see you can get some relief from the pain.

It is supposed to get up to 91 degrees today, with 67% humidity (Mom used to purposely mispronounce it 'Hum-did-it-ee') AUGH, suddenly it is the dreaded Summer weather. It's been so nice having no humidity, sunshine, and pleasant breezes. Oh well, time to switch to tee-shirts. I think today's "T" will be "YOU DON'T KNOW ME-- Federal Witness Protection Program". One of my other favorite ones is "MOOSYLVANIA UNIVERSITY -- Whattsa Matter U". with Bullwinkle in the center of the circle.

Last night I stayed up 'til 12:30 PM. I confess I did watch that Cher movie right up until she slapped Nickolas Cage's face (hard, twice!) and yelled "SNAP OUT OF IT!" Then Tink and I went up to bed. I slept really well again and had entertaining, fun dreams which made me wake up in a good mood again. Could it be that eating "well-er" and going to bed earlier (ie not 3 AM) is helping me feel better?

I have to confess I gave up smoking again (though I never mentioned to y'all that I had been smoking again in desperation because of extreme tension and depression). But with Nannie being gone over to the rehab/nsg home, it has been so refreshing! I haven't had withdrawal problems... just want to smoke after meals a little bit, out of habit, but I don't do it. And I have nicotine patches I use for late afternoon and evening if I need to. The thing that impels and compels me to keep it up is my checking acct. What with once again being out $800/mo of "Nannie pay", and adding up these eye-opening numbers, it's almost no contest: Cigts cost $10 per pack now and I was smoking one pack per day (OMG!), so saving $10/day, $70/wk, $280/mo, and well over $3,000/year..... NICE! Pretty impressive reasons to quit! I do feel better and sleep better, for sure! Plus if it nags at me to have a cigt. after meals, I walk Tinker instead. She especially enjoys it because there has been a beautiful, long-furred, black+white cat coming through the back yard, quite near-ish to the back door, where she looks out doing her watch-dog thing. OH MY, the barking! The cat runs a bee-line to get away! So Tink is always eager to investigate, ON LEASH of course! She never gets anywhere near the cat, but sniffs and sniffs along its pathway.

I just had a sliced-salmon sandwich on DAVE'S thin-sliced bread with 29,465 whole grains and seeds. Okay, so maybe that is a small exaggeration, but still....

I have to say I am actually enjoying life now, for a change, which is also a BIG relief from scowling and stewing. LONG MAY IT BE SO!

Can you even believe I am posting without grousing? WOW!

Glad all the travels seem to have gone well.

J22, sorry that your son got injured. I hope it is an uneventful recovery.

My train trips went well. It is still a long time to sit, though. I got up once or twice to walk to the cafe car for a drink or snack. My sister's final resting place is in a nice, quiet area of a large cemetery. The area is called the Garden of Hope. There is a tended flower bed right where the memorial bench is. We watched as they placed her urn and her husband's urn inside the bench. My brother and nephews and nephew's wife and I then went to dinner. My brother and I went out for a drink later and I gave him our dad's Masonic pins and Tinker AFB service pin, and my mother's class ring. He is the only one of us to have grandchildren. Twins A and B could still produce some, I suppose, and I might regret having given these things away.

Got laundry done after church yesterday and Twin A and I fixed a meal. Had a Zoom meeting at work this morning that lasted all morning. Now just catching up after being gone Thursday and Friday.

j22~ We apparently posted around the same time, so I missed reading your post until Ado mentioned it in her post. OMG, I am glad to hear your son will come out of all this okay. My first nursing job was on a spinal-cord unit for those with fresh injuries, so when I read the beginning of your post my antennae sprang straight up out of my skull! I am relieved for him and for you that he didn't have worse symptoms if the breaks!

Ado~ Thanx for mentioning j22's son's accident in your post. I'm glad I didn't miss it! And also, thanx for mentioning your laundry because I forgot I had put laundry in the dryer. Now I have to go check on it and if it is sitting there wrinkling itself, I'll have to let it run through again for a just a few hot minutes. There are 3 irons here; two are Nannie's and the one that is mine has been lost in the shed for ten years! Good thing we don't need them!

It was posta be only 92 degrees, and there is some wind. Although it doesn't dry the sweat, it's nice to see the trees wagging and fluffing around (well, I dunno, but that's what came into my mind as I was typing.) It is supposed to be 93 again tomorrow and the next day, so I bet it will actually get hotter than that.

I just ate curried chicken on lemon basmati rice. It was pretty good. When I am grocery shopping sometimes I see something new to me and I have to try it. So that was my early supper.

Are any of you familiar with the Lumi-something eye drops they are advertising on TV? Well, I thought I might get some, BUT I had the clerk check the price because of the price on the shelf below the small bottle seemed really out of place and I wasn't going to pay THAT MUCH for a small bottle of the stuff. They wanted $22.99 for all 1/2 ounce of it. Jeeeeee-hosophats! It should do something much more than "keep the red out" like those other eye drops that use that phrase in their ads! The larger bottles of the same drops were also priced $22.99. I knew I smelled as skunk! They gotta be CRAY-ZEE!

Today I got a call where this woman asked me if I was still experiencing (? some kind of) pain. I said "no." She said, "By the way, are you diabetic?" I said "NO." and she hung up! I also keep getting calls about the car-fender-bumping I experienced with another car more than a few months ago. My GOSH! Does nobody EVER read a police report, or reference how many other callers there have been, asking me the very same questions about the incident. It is totally insane to get so many calls when NOTHING HAPPENED. The other driver had called the cops because her passenger was preggers and I guess they wanted to be covered in case something went wrong with the pregnancy. So far I have told at least 23+ callers in the past month, who ask me the same thing: Was I involved in a traffic accident within the last 2-3 years. Now, I say, "WAIT A MINUTE!" and when (IF) I am successful in getting them to halt their spiel, I say, "No damage, no Injuries, no claims. GOOD-BYE!" and hang up And the blankity-blank calls I get about Medicare, with them wanting me to change to Medicare Advantage. I just yelled at a guy and said very loudly, clearly and distinctly, "I AM NOT INTERESTED!" and hung up. The sad thing about a cell phone is you can't slam it down in someone's ear!

It makes me wonder sometimes about all the pushy stupidity in the world today! WOW! It's bad enough that the phone is one of my least favorite things, but to answer call after call after call.... I have had to answer the calls because the auto dealership is going to be offering me a new warranty on my car on Thursday (the dealerships own original warranty is running out soon) so I reckon they are the ones responsible for siccing those people on me about it. I will give my opinion on it on Thursday when I have to get the car inspected ..... even though it was inspected for a new sticker just a week or two ago. The cost will probably (my service guy said when I asked how much this new super-dooper inspection will cost) be folded into the 12-month warranty cost. I mean REALLY! The car also just had everything checked and whatever needed to be replaced or 'fixed' has ALREADY been done, so this is just a ridiculous formality.

Okay, now this griping is making me want to smoke, so I have to harness and leash Tinker and take her out for a walk!

G'day!

J22, so sorry about your son's accident but thankful for no neuro deficits. Wishing him a speedy recovery.

Stars, so glad read you quit smoking. There's no excuse to smoke. Stay away from the first puff.

I worked an overtime shift today and it was of course busy and stressful. They pulled a nurse because they could because I came in. Fortunately a nurse uncover signed up to come in on call and we called her in.

We got what they call a "GLINT" survey, which apparently doesn't stand for anything but the company that does the surveys. It asks questions about how you like your job and employer. I gave the employer all excellent reviews but they had a paragraph for "what else would you like to tell us" and as always I complained about the 6:1 ratios, how it was poor customer service, not safe and bad for nurse morale. It won't do a thing but at least I'm heard.

Off tomorrow and no plans other than to go to the gym and do some meal planning.