The last time someone called me stupid was this morning when I berated myself for forgetting the Cardinal Rules for fixing all computer related boo-boos: 1) When all else failed restart your machine. 2) Restart your wi-fi. 3) Go to your bedroom, lay down a few minutes then get back up and restart your whole freaking day if you have to and by some miracle it all helps. But why does it take me a hour or two of frustration trying to get my printer to work before---Lo and Behold---the Cardinal Rules pop into my head? Someone needs to embroider those rules on throw pillow. I’ll bet they’d make a lot of money and I would be first in line to buy one.
I’ve been packing boxes and I’m up to 76 now. I have a handwritten inventory sheet that I finally typed into a word document and I wanted to print it off. Thus I was given the keys to Frustration City. Losing my printer was a frequent occurrence with my old computer and I got so I could download new drivers and get it back online in less than ten minutes. But with my new computer everything I tried including getting new drivers wasn’t working. Until I remembered to apply the freaking magic rules.
After I move I wouldn’t even need a printer if I didn’t want one. They’ll have a IT room like in hotels where you can walk in with your laptop and send your documents to one of their printers.They’ll also have an IT guy at our beck-and-call too which I was excited about until I learned he gave us bad information when he spoke at a future residence meeting and told us we could keep our Charter e-mails forever when the company says otherwise.
In case you’re wondering about how the vast right wing made me do these stupid things, it didn’t. I got that title from a title generator that I found through another blogger, The Spectacled Bean. I put ‘doing stupid things’ into the generator and laughed out loud when it came up with the title at top of this post. I’m not sure if 'Portent's Content Idea Generator' will become a part of my blogging MO but if you’ve been reading me for very long you’ll be able to tell those spoof titles from the ones my brains works so hard at churning out. It’s no secret that coming up with titles is my least favorite part about blogging. I had the same issue coming up with titles for art work back in the olden days when I needed to name paintings for exhibits. Screw the naming question. The bigger cliffhangers in my future according to the Gospel of Me is will I be able to paint again or did the years take away any talent I might have had?
My new phone got shipped and delivered in record time but I was ready for it. For some obscure reason it ported contacts from an older version that included a bunch of contacts for Levi that I had deleted when he died. No worries. I deleted them again and put the hard copy list I made in my emergency ‘Go Bag’ for a power outrage or the apocalypse, which ever comes first.
Next step was to start the porting process for transferring my landline number to the my new cell and if you read the comments section on my last post you know that is not going well. The saga continued for two mornings spent on hold and getting passed around Spectrum with different departments contradicting each other. Finally, I was given a phone number for Great Calls to call to find out why the rejection happened. Twice. Great Calls conferenced me in on the call to Spectrum and fingers crossed I'll know by Monday if the third port request works. If not, Great Calls was told by Spectrum to do the 4th request "manually" whatever that means. I'm so glad I didn't wait until closer to the move to go through this.
The house closing took place today but with hitch I wasn't expecting. Because my buyers were from out-of-state the title company couldn't issue me a check for my house until they get electronic copies of the buyer's notarized signatures. They didn't spring that twist on until the very end. Essentially, I signed my house over and had to walk out with a PROMISE the check would get hand delivered this afternoon. With so many moving parts, I feared something would go wrong. But it didn't. Got the check as promised but the bank says there's a two day hold on it which means I have to go back to get a cashier's check to make the final payment for my new place.
Since my husband’s (and my) grave marker is nearby the place where we closed I swung around to the cemetery so I could dig a hole for Levi’s ashes without getting caught. I was like Johnny Appleseed when I spread my husband’s ashes in two counties and at six places and that’s not counting the half a box of ashes buried at the cemetery, an ash locket I used to wear a lot and a four inch tall ash urn kept in a velvet box on my book shelve. Did I shed tears planting Levi's ashes into the ground? Yes, but not many and they were more about closure than the pain of loss. And for the fact that I probably won't get back up to this end of the county until my ashes are interred.
The day we interred my husband's ashes the sexton asked me if I wanted to be at the foot or head of the gravesite because Don’s ashes would be placed
at the opposite end and it struck me that these three guys---two
sextons and the funeral director---would probably judge our entire
marriage dynamics by the answer I gave. I went back and forth trying to
figure out a logical choice and finally I decided dead is dead and what
difference could it possibly make what I picked or what these strangers
thought. As hard as that decision was that day I don't remember what I decided nine years ago. Levi's ashes went as close to the stone as I could get them because I didn't want to accidentally dig up husband. That would be hard to explain.
Jeez, how did I get from vast right wing conspiracies making a person do stupid things to burying my dog’s ashes? If you can figure that out maybe you can help me step away from the computer and go find me some breakfast. My stomach is growling. ©
