If Our Country Crashes Can I Return this?

My youngest niece is one lucky woman. She fell down a flight of stairs and ended up at the bottom head first and on her back. The only bone she broke was her big toe and that was so messed up they had to remove the nail bed. She said that hurt worse than anything she’d ever had happen to her and that includes having two babies and a hip replacement. "Yup," I told her, "that's why the Japanese used to do it during WWII to torture American prisoners." 

 

Her hip replacement was in April but the fall—thank goodness—didn’t effect it nor did she have a concussion. I saw a photo of the back of her neck and shoulders and you couldn’t tell where one black and blue mark started and another ended. She has to see her orthopedist about her shoulder but, like I said, she is one lucky woman who I hope will never, ever again break my Cardinal Rule about walking around after you’ve taken a sleeping pill. You have 15 minutes after you take one to get in bed and stay there!

 

In other news— Well, there really isn’t any unless you count the fact that I did a little stress shopping this week. I know, at my age why am I still accumulating stuff? Sometimes I look around at all the stuff I kept after downsizing three and a half years ago to move to my continuum care campus and it makes me feel guilty that someday it will be the responsibility of my nieces to dispose of. But this time it was both my nieces and Amazon Prime’s big sale that is responsible for me buying a portable DVD player for $34. They are both super-fans of the series Mad Men and for a long time I’ve wanted to be part of their conversations about the show so my oldest niece loaned me DVD’s of the first few seasons. But I was having a lot of trouble getting my new-ish Roku TV and my DVD player to work together. Finally, I put in a maintenance request but the maintenance guy for our building couldn’t get it to work either (which made me feel good that it wasn’t just an old person problem). He was going to send the IT guy out which would have cost me $45 and when I was bemoaning this fact to my youngest niece she sent me a link to the portable DVD player that she uses. Snap decisions were made and I found myself putting the DVD player in my cart. I love the idea of not having to sit in the living room to watch movies, though. I’m not sorry for the purchase and now I can look forward to donating my old DVD player to Goodwill and checking out the movies that they have for sale dirt cheap.

 

That was an expensive phone call between my youngest niece and myself. I told her to keep her eye out for a used card table when she goes out garage shopping and I was telling her how having one will benefit my social life because I’ll be able to invite people over for impromptu Mahjong games. We were both looking at them on Amazon as I was showing her what I wanted and lo and behold one jumped in my cart along with the DVD player. The prime sale had it marked down to $50. I was a little remorseful over spending the money on that because I could live without one by asking players to meet in the public areas. But later on I recognized that this was as much about stress spending over the state of the world as it was about the bonding conversation I was having with my niece.

 

Stress spending or stress eating. I haven’t been doing the latter so I’m making up for it by spending money. My desk, for example, will soon be all decked out with a full drawer-sized mouse pad that looks like an oriental rug. I ordered one that came in the wrong size and it had to be reordered. It came from China and they don’t want that first sent back so its 24 inches are adding class to the top of my desk while waiting for the 20 inch pad to fill the computer's pull-out drawer. 

 

I also bought a keyboard skin for my new computer. I

usually eat my breakfast at my computer and cleaning my keyboard is a chore I no long have to worry about. The skin lifts off so you can run it under the faucet. Once I spilled a glass of water on my keyboard but I got lucky and was able to save it. The skin at eight bucks plus shipping is worth it. Or so I tell my credit card.

 

And to round out my stress spending the Amazon truck has been stopping often with new, tiny paint brushes as I search for the perfect one. After the fifth try I think I found it. And for anyone out there who loves to do paint-by-numbers I found a product that makes a difference when the paint in those little tubs gets stiff. It’s a slow-drying thinner for acrylics. There are lots of brands but the photo shows the one I bought. I’ve read reports that you can even bring back tubs that are all dried up with these acrylic thinners if you take your time, over several days. By the way, I live less than five miles from the Amazon's distribution center and they stop at my complex three times a day, so I'm not feeling guilty over making small purchases from time to time.

 

Anyway, when I’m not shopping online or working on another custom paint-by-number I've been scaring myself with the possibility of organizing a Mahjong tournament between six o seven CCC’s in the area. The social media guy was watching me set up tables for our weekly game and I happen to mention that was my dream is to have a tournament involving all the CCCs in the area. “But” I continued, “we don’t have enough tables for something like that.” He looks me straight in the eyes and says, “I can make that happen. This is in my wheelhouse.” He named a near-by venue that is one of the classiest places in the area for parties! I don't know if I'm up to chairing an event that large or not but I'm going to avoid the guy until I figure it out. ©

 Until next Wednesday. 

When Patriotism Feels Broken

This past Fourth of July weekend was a whirlwind of activity around my continuum care campus but in between the fun stuff I’ve been quietly grieving the loss of the country I once thought I knew and understood. So I skipped the band concert of patriotic music and a pizza party organized by a 45/47 MAGA supporter. We’re (and by we’re I mean the current administration) has been breaking presidential norms all over the place, not to mention the laws of our democracy. America, I’m tired! I’m tired of the flag waving 45/47 supporters and the greedy, spineless politicians who just voted to put the next generation into so much debt they’ll never see the light of day. And God help us if Japan, who owns a good share of our 36 trillion dollars of debt, calls in their loans. And that 36 trillion doesn’t include the 3.9 trillion the so-called Big Beautiful Bill will add over the next decade.  

I’m also tired of ICE and their cruel and illegal acts being committed against our immigrant population. I’m tired of people thinking it’s perfectly okay to snatch people off the streets, out of labor & deliver rooms, etc., without due process of the law, and put them in detention centers. I’m tired of overhearing fellow residents at the next dinner table talking with glee over Alligator Alcatraz and how fat and happy those alligators will grow while at the same time being served their dinner by the son of immigrants. Did they assume the poor kid doesn’t have ears to hear their disgusting remarks? By the way, the photo up above was posted at the official website for Homeland Security. Let that sink in.

I did go to our fourth of July picnic because it’s not often we get barbecued chicken and corn of the cob and if any of us wanted to eat that day, it was sign up for the picnic or forage for your own meal out in the community. I wasn’t born yesterday so I opted to stay off the busy roads on the third—yes, holiday parties around my CCC are usually the day before the actual holiday so that most of the staff can spent it with their families. Our picnics, band concerts and other outdoor events host all residents from all three buildings and our  townhouses in a fenced-in area between the Assisted Living and Memory Care buildings known as The Park. It’s a pretty place that keeps the inmates from walking away while still giving them access to be outside under a canape of trees with a lake view on one side and a wooded view opposite. A few people from my Independent Living building don’t like to go there because they see their futures and it scares them. I get that but as I tell them, seeing how kind and attentive the aids are with the residents from the Assisted Living and Memory Care buildings is comforting and helps diminish the fear of ending up down there. And after living here in IL for over three years, we all know people who've had to move into AL and MC. 

On the Fourth itself the temperature was supposed to get up into 90s so an outdoors pizza party that was planned by residents from our townhouses followed by watching the firework ended up getting changed. (They have their own outdoors area to gather around a fire pit.) The pizza part got canceled and we were to meet later when the sun was setting and it wouldn’t be so hot. But when one of the 45/47 supporters (who laughed over alligators getting fat) heard that he sent out a text message that he was going to take charge of ordering pizza and we could sign up with him. There were some hurt feelings between the townhouse organizers (who originally had invited everyone in Independent Living) because they didn’t get the text invitation to join in at the IL building where the second pizza party was being planned. A day later that oversight was corrected but by then the damage had been done and a boycott began. I was one of those who skipped pizza but I did hang out with the townhouse people at the fire pit. Originally they had forty people signed up but without the pizza that got whittled down to twenty-five for fireworks. But only six people got together for pizza. The whole planned and canceled then planned again was too confusing for some.

Last winter the MAGA guy who decided to organize the second pizza party caused another turf war over the Bridge Club. At one time they had three tables that played twice a week but he caused so much trouble over rotating players—he didn’t want to play with slower players—that several couples dropped out. Then he poached off the fast players and started a second bridge group. So now we have two clubs run by two different people. Sometimes it can be a regular little soap opera around here which I’m sure is true with all places where people get to know each well. Sometimes personalities clash.

The highlight of the long weekend was Saturday when I got to play four extra Mahjong games. Two of us from Independent Living and two ladies from the townhouses played at one of their homes. Let me tell you playing Mahjong where you didn’t have to be careful not to talk too load or edit which topics you bring up was different than playing in our regularly scheduled games in our pubic bistro. We had fun! I wish I had a table suitable to set up the game to I could invite people to play extra games in my apartment in addition to the weekly games where we usually have three tables. I wish I hadn’t given my card table and chairs away when I moved. I also wish I hadn’t given a folding camp chair away. To watch fireworks I had to bring the walker I used when I broke my ribs to sit on. There have been other outdoor occasions down at the fire pit when we've require we bring our own chairs. With all the planning I did before the move, I didn’t see those needs coming. ©

Until next Wednesday.  

 

 

Dinner, Drama, and a Dead Body at my Continuum Care Complex

Fancy, five course dinners planned around a Murder Mystery game where twenty of us play a character and twenty other residents dine and watch the action from the sidelines has become a tradition here at my continuum care complex. Last week was our third murder mystery dinner and once again I took a part. I actually signed up for the audience but the Life Enrichment Director asked me if I'd switch. There was a method to my madness, so to speak, because I knew she wouldn’t get enough actors to sign up and like last year, she’d ask me to switch from an audience member to a player. I said, "yes IF I can pick the part I want to play" and both this year and last year she let me. Some of the parts require fancy costumes—cocktail dresses, tailored suits—stuff I don’t own and don’t have the money to buy for a one-time event. Last year a guy even rented an outfit for $50! A lot of borrowing of props to round out our costumes goes on the week before these parties. One guy came with borrowed boxing gloves hung around his shoulders, another came wearing a borrowed tux with tails and carrying a top hat and a wand. One lady offered me to loan me a hundred dollar bill to put in my pocket. I turned it down.

If you've never been to a murder mystery dinner party, here's how they work: you are given a character before the party date with costume suggestions and you show up in costume. As you sit down for dinner you’re given a scribe to read and suddenly your dining table turns into a crime scene. For example my introduction speech was: “I’m Lucky Hart, current world poker champion. I don’t want to sound heartless but this murder has come at a really bad time. I’ve got a tournament in Paris tomorrow night and have to be ready. It wasn’t me anyway. Ever since Sterling left us, I’ve been one of the casino's bathrooms practicing my poker face in the mirror. What? You this comes naturally.” There are four times (between courses) where you have a part to read. And all night long there’s ad-lib accusations, drama, suspicious glances and cat-calling between tables going on and way too much laughter for a place where a murder supposedly happened just before you all sit down for the first course.

My suggested costume was jeans, a hoodie over a t-shirt and a baseball cap. I have lots of hoodies but it’s been really hot and I didn’t want to wear one so I bought a light weight shirt with a hood. I also figured out how to use rubber bands to put cards up my sleeves that showed when I waved during my introduction and I bought a $4.00 patch depicting a poker hand that I put on a purse with double-faced tape.

The part called for me to have poker face to stay in character. I knew it would crack up my fellow Mahjong players because they tell me all the time that I don’t have a poker face. Little do they know that sometimes when I get excited over a tile I just drew that I’m faking it and other times when I get a good tile I don’t show it in my body language. But for the most part, they are right. I get way too excited when I’m close to winning. 

For dinner the chef served five courses consisting of a Caprese Salad with burrata cheese, peaches, tomatoes, basil and microgreens. That was followed by a course of suffron-herb risotto, roasted red pepper and lobster tails. (Myself and another person who is allergic to shell fish got chicken instead of the two tails.) After that course we were given a watermelon with lime zest Sorbet to “cleanse our palate” followed by prime rib, Au-gratin potatoes and asparagus. Dessert was my all-time favorite comfort food. Bread pudding. Not just any bread pudding but bread pudding with bourbon butter sauce and vanilla ice cream that was to die for. Our chef won an Iron Chef Contest over a dozen other chefs working in places like this for a reason and at parties like this her skills really shine. At $25.00 for this meal it was worth going over my food allowance for the month. 

If you ever get invited to a mystery murder party, go. Even more fun would be to plan one. Just google Murder Mystery party games. There are several companies making the kits, for various size parties. The one we used came form a UK company. They have seventeen different themes. Ours was the Murder at the Casino and it had characters like: Buck Meister who stole the show. In real life the guy who played the part is a straight arrow, a classy dresser and very wealthy but for the part of Buck—a “red-blooded, ready to ride rodeo cowboy”—he came in jeans, a cowboy hat and boots and a white t-shirt that he’d cut down the front and held it together at the bottom with a big safe pin, his bare chest and gray chest hair hanging out of a very wide V. He’d also cut the sleeves off the t-shirt. You couldn’t help laughing every time he got up to do his speaking parts. Few of us knew he has a good sense of humor. Another standout was a guy at my table who all night long never broke out of character. He was a big, bold mob boss who dressed to kill and literally did. He was going to get me fitted for cement shoes if he ever caught me cheating at his poker table. There was also a magician, a casino floor manager, a crooner, a private detective, a TV reporter, a princess and others parts I’ve forgotten. 

What’s great about these parties is that the fun doesn’t just take place at the party itself but also before and afterward they generate a lot of conversation. For example, I was at the lunch table the next day for over two hours and when I went back to my apartment I had a sore belly from laughing so much over the rehashing of the murder mystery. ©

 Until Next Wednesday...