Megan was here for two days, which was delightful although she had to endure all sorts of delays, cancellations, etc. Travel with Covid and storms is pretty stressful. We opened all of our Christmas presents finally. We went out to three meals and all the restaurants were packed. Mask-wearing is on the decline in Michigan again, which was shocking to Megan. Also shocking to her that we didn't have to present vaccination cards. I took her to a used bookstore where she was delighted to find some James Cain and Jim Thompson books with vintage covers. Actually my friend Kathy took us. I am so lucky to have a friend that is willing to cart us around for an afternoon.
Reading DEER SEASON, by Erin Flanagan, which is great. Also Laura Lippman's short stories, SEASONAL WORK.
Enjoying the new HBO series SOMEBODY, SOMEWHERE with Bridget Everett, ABBOTT'S ELEMENTARY SCHOOL and assorted British series on BRITBOX. Watched a bit of the Disney series on the Beatles, which is good.
How about you?
28 comments:
Glad you could hang with Megan for a few days. Just where is that bookstore?
Realized I hadn't seen season 5 of Billions so I binged that. The new season has just started.
Tried Vienna Blood. Dull.
Read Fadeout by Joseph Hanse. A Thousand Steps by T. Jefferson Parker which I enjoyed. Now reading Bitter Flowers by Gunnar Staalesen.
Mask wearing must be different with the restaurant group because I notice when shopping most people wearing masks. Moreso than 3 or 4 months ago.
It's called TOADVINE and is on Coolidge between 11 and 12 on the west side of the street. Really nice little collection of books. Mostly used but also some new.
Stores are better, yes. Being smashed in a lobby waiting for a table with people without masks is worrisome.
So glad you got the chance to spend time with Megan! Travel has become so fraught these days that I'm avoiding it completely!
Glad you had a good time with Megan.
Anti-mask people are in full bloom here in Florida but they can't be faulted because they did the research, or some politician or right-wing weirdo or some Russian disinformation expert did the research for them. **sigh**
My biopsy was scheduled for Wednesday at 5:30 am. After an hour and a half filled with blood draws, IVs, EKGs, etc., I was told that some new scheduler had booked the wrong operating room. It seems that there was only one operating room that could take the specific equipment needed for the biopsy and that was being used for another, much longer, operation and it may be available some (unspecified) time in the afternoon -- or not at all. So I was sent home and told to re-schedule the biopsy, which may be scheduled for a month or so. The surgeon and the OR head nurse were both very apologetic but this is one of the problems of hospitals being short-staffed and new personnel not familiar with the specific ins and outs of the hospital.
In the meantime we had to postpone Kitty's appointment with her podiatrist until this afternoon. She'll be getting a very painful shot of steroids -- something she is not looking forward to.
Walt changed jobs again but is still doing the same work only he spends half his time on-site or travelling and the other half working from home. Each time he changes jobs it means more money, more responsibility, and a heftier promotion. The down side is that his insurance changes. This new insurance wants to pay for Jack's basic medical equipment he needs but not for the (very) expensive medicine itself. It's a variation of a theme that happens whenever Walt changes insurance companies and Christina has been spending the last week straightening it out.
Jack had a basketball game last night but because of the cold, the late hour, and the distance we couldn't attend. Waiting to hear the results now. His team won their last game. Upcoming games are scheduled earlier in the day so we will be ale to catch them.
Because of the cold snap, we've been staying inside as often as possible. Various streaming services help. Watching FOLLOW THE MONEY, a Danish show about a police fraud squad. Very good. Just finished Season One (of three) last night and will begin Season Two later today. Started to watch a number of other shows and movies but turned them off with a resounding "meh."
Caught up (just about) with THE ARKHAM SAMPLER, a quarterly magazine edited by August Derleth in 1948 and 1949. I had read the first issue last month and zipped through the remining seven issues this week all, that is, except for a two-part serialization of Ludvig Holberg's 1741 novel JOURNEY TO THE WORLD UNDERGROUND -- I'm saving that one for this week. I also finish Richard Osman's second Thursday Murder Club novel THE MAN WHO DIED TWICE (even better than the first). Also read Bill Pronzini's THE PARADISE AFFAIR, a Carpenter and Quincannon mystery, and Max Allan Collins' SKIM DEEP, his first Nolan novel in thirty years. For graphic novels, I read the first two volumes of Charlaine Harris and Christopher Golden's CEMETARY GIRL and a collection of Neil Gaiman's work for DC comics. I have a couple more by Collins and one by Ken Bruen waiting for me at the library. In the meantime I starting Colsen Whitehead's HARLEM SHUFFLE today.
All in all things are going pretty well here. Wait...except the cat just threw up on the living room coffee table. While I clean that up, let me wish you a fantastic week ahead, Patti. Stay safe.
Glad Megan was able to visit you! No inside restaurant dining for us--just Take Out. The Western NY Covid-19 infection rate is 15%...but many people are self-testing at home and they don't notify the Health Department if they're positive. So the Real Number is likely to be much higher. Than, there's the new Omicron Variant: BA2. Scary!
We've endured two weeks of freezing weather. We woke up to single digits this morning. But, our weather-guessers claim we will hit 40 degrees tomorrow. But, another snow storm is on its way so we'll see snow on Thursday.
Diane is in Marie Kondo mode and continues to "declutter" a lot of stuff. I hide out in the basement reading and listening to music.
Stay safe!
Megan would be even more shocked in Florida, then. There are definitely places where masks are in evidence, but way too many where they're not. We've been to three restaurants (out of about 20) where the staff didn't wear masks. Forget about the patrons. In all the cases we were either outside or in a wide open place with few other people, but still. And we have cut out a couple of favorite places from past years because they are what we would consider unsafe - tables right on top of each other, no protections, etc. We went for a walk on Atlantic Avenue in Delray Beach with my cousins on Saturday at 5:00 and all I could think was, "Superspreader Event" when we passed a bar with live music, with dozens of unmasked people packed together. No wonder the positivity rate in Palm Beach County is still over 25% while Brooklyn is down to 4.46%.
Otherwise, we're fine, but Jackie is complaining about the cold. It is the coldest winter down here in 12 years and this weekend was 20 degrees colder than normal. Still, compared to a foot of snow in New York, I'll take it.
Besides the day with my cousins (from Long Island, but they own an apartment down here too), it's been mostly television, restaurants, reading and shopping, basically what we do at home, only with better weather.
Television - basically watching the same shows I mentioned last time, with a few more additions. BELOW THE SURFACE is a tense Danish thriller series (first of two series), where three masked terrorists who pull 15 people off a Copenhagen subway train and demand a 4 million Euros ransom. Is "Alpha," the leader of the terrorists, really the guy who kidnapped and tortured Phlip Norgaard, head of the Terror Task Force, as he believes? It's fast moving and tense.
THE CLIFF is the first Iselandic show we've seen that has no snow. They are going to blow up a cliff for a controversial hydroelectric project. An outside cop is brought in from Reykjavik to help the less experienced local woman, and they have to deal with seemingly supernatural elements. It's short (only 4 episodes) and worth watching.
Also watched VERA (series 11 #5), THE GULF (New Zealand), SPIRAL (France), various others.
Jerry, I can't believe they put you through all that and then just told you to come back in a month! You are a lot more forbearing than I would be. Good luck. I checked FOLLOW THE MONEY on Prime, but after today it is being switched to yet another new streaming service, so no go.
I get what George says about dining inside vs. outside, but you can be careful and still eat inside...at least in certain restaurants. When we went out with my cousins on Saturday, we went at 2:30 and the place was nearly empty. We were seated basically alone. Yesterday we went to Carrabba's, which was more crowded, but Jackie asked to sit in a booth in the corner away from other people, so that was not a problem.
I just tossed dozens of placemats and cloth napkins. Phil was always buying placemats. Funny how he was the bigger shopper of us.
That happened to Megan with her first colonscopy, Jerry. She was prepped and on her way into Manhattan on the subway, of course, when she got a text saying there was a mixup. Imagine doing that again! Ugh! Our positivity rate is still in the thirties. Not sure we have ever gotten much lower because Michigan is really more like Florida than New York despite a governor who's a Dem.
I am happy that my mother sold off her old Toyota sedan which was a second-car and seldom used. One more thing off the plate and the sale seems to have been clean and easy.
Boy #1 made the Dean's List for his 1st semester in MN. Boy #2 is trying out for the state Honors Orchestra. You'd think he'd not need to have his mother reminding him to practice for such a tryout. Nope.
I was finally able to fix the bathroom sink last weekend and now await replacement parts for the Kohler toilet. Neither Home Depot or ACE had any Kohler parts for toilet tanks. Up next is repairing the grout - possibly having to re-do all of it so the color matches - and replacing a water supply valve that does not fully close.
I started reading PILLS AND SOAP by DDC Morgan. Morgan wrote BLOOD AND CINDERS set in late'40s London at a motorcycle race track. I really enjoyed BLOOD and the first pages of PILLS is good,.
Also reading TIM AND TOM: AN AMERICAN COMEDY IN BLACK AND WHITE about Tim Reid and Tom Dreesen who formed a comedy duo after meeting in the Jaycees in a Chicago suburb. Both went on to a lot of success. I'd never heard of Dreesen but he was Sinatra's opener for years.
Just ran across Tim and Tom's promo visit on Letterman. https://youtu.be/gKT9jzfZZ70
Boy, the money I would have saved over the years if either of us could fix anything. Not familiar with either of them. I read ROSS AND TOM though
https://www.amazon.com/Ross-Tom-Two-American-Tragedies/dp/0306809923/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2STRVUH1J12DS&keywords=ross+and+tom&qid=1643650397&sprefix=ross+and+tom%2Caps%2C122&sr=8-1
Glad you're liking SOMEBODY, SOMEWHERE; given it and THE RIGHTEOUS GEMSTONES are about the only things on HBO right now, I suspect my mention of it wasn't the major push toward giving it a chance. I'm starting to wonder if I like any drama that isn't depressing at some level.
Having watched the two episodes offered of A&E's Hefner ugly-side documentary series last week, I was primed for the debut episode of Showtime's Cosby ugly-side documentary series. Such selfish pricks, to be kind, these stunted cases be. Perhaps not oddly, the "Spanish Fly" album of Cosby's wasn't one of those I found in libraries in my youth, while most of those leading up to it were.
Been reading spottily, doing what I can to unclog toilet and bathroom sink (the former of which I did replace a few parts of...it's not too tough, once, as with Gerard's experience, you find the right parts, not as easy at times as one would think) (happily? the sink in the Other bathroom) and try to get the dishwasher to stop malfunctioning. Finally catching up on the latter seasons of THE GOOD FIGHT after renting Paramount+ in a discount offer.
OH, yes. Tom Dreesen is a pretty good comedian on his own, and he had a memorable guest role on WRKP IN CINCINATTI, where his old partner was a regular. Which reminds me of the sad news yesterday of reports of the deaths of both comedian/actors Jo Kendall (largely in the PYTHON-related orbit in UK comedy) and Howard Hesseman (leading to every social-media halfwit in the world seemingly thinking the best way to recall him was in quoting his character's joyous announcement of "Boooger!" on WKRP, admittedly a decent-enough joke in context on the series premiere).
Yes, I got rid of Showtime too soon.
By mechanical abilities are zero. I still have to fumble in emptying out my vacuum every time. Or putting it back together.
What a great visit with Megan! I haven't been to a used book store that had old books with vintage covers in years. We do have one used bookstore but it never had that type of book. A few do show up at the book sale each year. Otherwise I have to search online, but nowadays I struggle with reading the small print so I buy them less.
Not much going on here except working on Glen's recovery from the eye surgery. Which is the same way I started my comment last week. We did not realize how long the gas bubble in his eye would take to go away and his vision in the right eye will be blurry to the point of useless as long as it is there. At least 4 weeks.
We are still watching The Good Place -- for the 2nd time. Just started the last season last night so we will be done with it soon.
My fiction reading has picked up a bit and I am continuing with NEMESIS by Jo Nesbo. Alternating reading that and CARRY ME HOME: BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA, which is now getting more interesting.
Watched two football games with disappointing outcomes yesterday. Watched latest episode of All Creatures Great and Small, which I guess I’m the only one here watching. Since two major subplots are not in the book, it’s all up to the writers of the series now, I guess.
Weather here has been great, clear, low to mid 40s, really beautiful. I finished THE WHOLE ART OF DETECTION by Lyndsay Faye, which I enjoyed. Also read WINTER SOLSTICE by Rosamunde Pilcher, which, though not my usual kind of thing, I also enjoyed. I read her THE SHELL SEEKERS many, many years ago, my Mother’s copy. Now reading WYCLIFFE AND THE GUILT EDGED ALIBI by W. J. Burley, the third in the series, and enjoying Wycliffe’s acerbic outlook on policing. I have a couple more of them on the shelf, I think. I have books coming from the library, not ready, but close to it, so I’ll read those when I finish Wycliffe.
Glad you had time with Megan! What does she think about your apt. move? Have a great week!
Rick, I have several books in the Wycliffe series on my shelves and they are nice short books. I need to get to reading them. I will be interested in how you like this one when you are done.
I am watching ALL CREATURES, Rick. I guess they didn't want to copy the earlier series. I loved Pilcher back in the day. Took Megan to see the model apartment and she thought it fine.
I have never managed to read Nesbo. Megan did a talk with him once in Melbourne and said he was a really dish and nice to boot.
"real dish"
Further speedier recoveries and better coping by medical staffs to all of us dealing with long-term matters.
Patti, our Miele vacuum-cleaner certainly goes back together again easier than does the Miele dishwasher (even when we have to take apart the rotor head because Alice's long, strong strands of hair have built up around the brush roll again--her hair is fierce). But there is some magic I'm not catching onto to allow the vacuum-cleaner bags to fully inflate once installed...
Rick, we're watching ALL CREATURES too, but didn't watch last night because of a two-part streaming show we watched. We'll watch it on PBS Masterpiece tonight. I still prefer the original version, but it has grown on me this series, partly because Tristan is less annoying to me. I have read and much enjoyed all the books. We spent some time in that part of the world and it is beautiful.
My mother watched ALL CREATURES in the '70s. My interest at the time was that if my mother is watching it then it must be neat. I used to hang around at the top of the stairs when banished from adult television programs.
She watched the new version when visiting over Christmas and I enjoyed the episodes I saw.
I used to sit at the top of the stairs too. Not sure if I was listening to the TV or to my parents bicker.
I used to stand in the hall outside my parents' bedroom to catch the winners of the Academy Awards in the late '50s.
Glad you got to spend time with Megan. Glad she got back home safe.
Covid and Stomach Flu are ripping through here so we do not eat out and are staying at home as much as possible. When we do go out, we now rarely see anyone wearing a mask besides us. The library staff do, for the most part, but none of the patrons. This despite the fact that the hospitals are completely overwhelmed here.
My cardiologist granted approval so in the morning I go to the Dentist and get two temporary crowns. So not looking forward to this. Am supposed to be home by shortly after noon as the rain moves in.
We, and much of the surrounding area across the state, are in for an ice storm starting sometime tomorrow afternoon according to the kids that read the weather on TV. It will go all night and then change over to snow for much of the day Thursday. Not looking forward to this either.
KRT
Staff at my library have been adamant about masks. But, mask wearing by the public is encouraged and advised, not required. Other City departments rarely wear masks. They've had staff out sick with COVID, and we have not.
We had some library customers get very angry when the mask mandates were place. A couple were lecturing and arguing with me for a half-hour one summer.
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