Latch Key Kids

It's still hot. There is not relief in sight. The latch key kids made their own relief:

They got off the bus and headed straight for the pool. They dropped their backpacks and kicked off their shoes before jumping, fully dressed into the pool. 

That was over an hour ago. They are still there. Nobody has bothered them. Who can blame them?

Haphazard Gardening

I ordered a few rosemary plants when I first moved in. It was the dead of winter and nobody had them. When I was finally able to get a couple of plants, they died right away. It was disappointing to say the least. In early June I noticed that there were some really healthy plants in the kitchen garden at the coffee shop. I snapped off a couple of sprigs one morning while I was there. Probably not the right thing to do, but it didn't hurt the plants and nobody seemed to care. Rosemary takes a long time to root, several weeks. And when it does you have to wait until there are secondary roots before you plant them. I was finally able to plant them a few days ago. I'm hoping they will thrive. You can root rosemary, it's just not easy. 

I bought some avocados back in February. I have always been told the ones you get from the grocery store won't root, but I proved that theory wrong. I tried with four pits and all of them have produced a tree that is thriving. That really surprised me. I'm just not sure what I'm going to do with four avocado trees in a two bedroom apartment. 

I bought a bunch of green onions from the grocery store, but the ones that came in my delivery were already starting to wilt. I put them in a jar of water and they perked up. They perked up so much that they rooted within a couple of days. I've been eating from those onions since April. 

I had so much luck with the onions that when I had some leftover basil from a clamshell that I bought for a recipe, I decided to see what would happen if I put it in a jar. That was just a few weeks ago. I have even used some of what I've been growing for a salad when I friend came to visit. And it's thriving. I'm sure that I will eat a few more meals from it.

I had some ginger root that had started to put out eyes. Since I'd already had some success with the onions and basil, I wondered what would happen if I put it in a pot. To my surprise it has started to grow. Since I planted it without knowing much about it, I have asked Alexa about it. Turns out that ginger is pretty easy to grow, but I'm not doing it right. I'm going to have to replant it in a different shape pot. If I give it a few months I might not  have to buy ginger anymore. 

I have an ivy plant that I snapped off of a tree outside of the fence around a neighboring frat house. It's doing well, but I won't be eating it. And I have some mint that I've grown from seeds that I use in tea. And I have the caladium and a philodendron.  

My apartment garden is taking off. I have a tendency to collect plants. 

Hell is Burning

Another post complaining about the heat. But there is not much else going on. My air conditioner got turned up another notch to try to conserve my income while keeping my apartment livable. I am really appreciating my decision to purchase and hang thermal blackout curtains for the windows. It only takes pushing them open a hair to immediately feel the difference that they make.

The forecast had originally had a cool off starting on Friday. That has now dissipated, and we are expecting temperatures near 100 degrees with high humidity through the end of the month. I wish I could promise that I won't be bitching about the heat until then. 

I have decided that I will spring for an Uber on my birthday and  take myself somewhere that I can get out of my apartment for a few hours. I thought about going to a movie, but I can't find one that I really want to see. The only event that I'm really interested in is the Storytellers Festival in Tuskegee. But it is an outdoor event.   Maybe I will take the shuttle into Atlanta and go to the Aquarium and the Coca Cola museum. That will be a really expensive date though. Maybe I should just find a place where I can paint some pottery or something. 
 

Themes for Today: Food and Sadness...

So I went to the arts center this afternoon to see Spitfire Grill. For amateur theater, it was very good. But I was told by someone in the audience that this performance was by the amateur amateur theater. The university has another group that are the true amateur theater for the city. I really don't understand that. It was a great performance.

Afterward I came home and was feeling sorry for myself. Mostly it was because I had no one to go to the theater with me and I ended up talking to the arrogant nincompoop who decided the performance was second rate. But also because I would have liked to go downtown and enjoyed a hamburger with someone. But it was too hot to walk downtown and I had no one to join me. So I went home and made myself a cheeseburger and tater-tots and was watching Survivor when I got this text from Mollie: 

It made me cry. But I didn't want to tell her that I was feeling sorry for myself, so I just told her I was eating a cheeseburger and tater-tots while watching Survivor. She had no answer for that. 

Apparently watching people starve on television makes me hungry. The women in the group kept talking about chocolate...And of course, a lot of the focus of the show is food, or the lack thereof. So I kept thinking about the box of brownies that I have in the cupboard. I really don't need to bake them because in a few days I'm going to order myself a birthday cake, and that made me sad because I really don't have anyone here to share a pan of brownies or a birthday cake with. And being sad and hearing people talk about the chocolate they want to be eating kept me thinking about the brownies... until I made them...

I put some chocolate chips, butterscotch chips and pecans in them. They are really good. And I'm still watching Survivor...

Heatwave

It's as hot as Hell! I'm sure that everyone is sick and tired of listening to everyone else complain about the heat. It is after all the middle of August and supposed to be hot. But we are all complaining anyway because it is as hot as Hell! We have been under a heat advisory for the better part of a week, and it keeps getting extended. For now, we will be under it until Monday night. But I have no real hope that it will end then. In fact, looking at the forecast, it appears that it is only beginning then and will get worse for the better part of next week when it will be hotter than Hell. 

Heat has always made me sick. It is the one trigger for my heart condition that I am absolutely certain of. I have had cardiac events on at least four occasions that were triggered by it. So I am sitting inside my apartment hiding from it. I have had adjust the temperature on my air conditioner in order to avoid bankruptcy, I had a plan back in February to save money while the electricity bills were small to pay for the larger summer ones. But best laid plans often are often a source of divine derision. It's not really that I'm sweltering under my air conditioning, But my home is warmer than I like it to be. I would really like to see this heatwave move on out and let us start moving into the cooler weather of fall. 

I do this every year. I tire of the heat of summer long before it leaves and in February I will be searching the trees for the first signs of redbuds that will herald the beginning of spring. 

My birthday is next week. I was hoping that the temperatures would be below 90 degrees so I would feel like getting out of the apartment to celebrate. Right now, I don't think that's going to happen. 

Last year at this time I was blogging, complaining about the heat. It was hot then, it's hotter now. A month later I went to a reunion hoping to wear a white shirt and a red sweater that I bought for the event. It was nearly 90 degrees that day. I didn't wear the outfit. I thought I could wear it on Christmas. Christmas day was nearly 80 degrees in north Georgia. I wore the sweater anyway. It's the only time I have worn it. I bought a black sweater at the same time that I bought the red one. I have never worn it. I'm hoping that I will find occasions to wear them both this fall and winter. Maybe it will be a bit cooler. I can only hope.

Puzzled Again

 My friend De came to visit last week. It turns out that she likes to work puzzles. She worked the bee puzzle in a day and a half. I kind of helped a little. I'm nowhere near as good as she is at working them. But I didn't want to let it go feeling like it was an ability that I had let go to the wayside. The owl puzzle is nowhere near as difficult as the bee puzzle, and it took me twice as long to work it as it took my friend to work the bee puzzle. But I did manage to get it done. It helped me to think that maybe I'm not silently falling into dementia after all.

Today was my son's 47th birthday. It is his first with his new wife and family. I hope that he enjoyed the day. I tried calling a couple of times, but only got his voicemail. I and his siblings sent birthday messages on the family chat that he responded to. And I checked my Amazon account to find out that the gift I sent did actually arrive. 

I was going to spend the evening at the local theater for a performance of The Spitfire Grille, but it was thunder storming and I just didn't feel like getting out in it all. They will have performances tomorrow and on Sunday and I will attend one of them. So, I stayed home. I dusted and vacuumed the carpets and sprayed an anti-allergy air freshener. Not that my place was dirty, but I feel like if I stay on top of it, maybe I won't suffer from allergies so much this fall. 

I have been binge watching Survivor because Mollie said that she and Chris have been watching it. I watched the last five seasons and to be very honest, I just don't get it. I can't for the life of my understand why people agree to be placed on an island, starved and forced to perform meaningless exhausting and humiliating tasks and psychologically bullied for a chance for any sum of money. And the reality of it is that they probably won't get the money. Only one of them walks away with the prize. I have dealt with emotional and psychological abuse. The harm will outlast the money if they get it. I always judged the ancient Greeks and Romans for their love of blood sports. I looked down on the people who frequent rodeos and bull fights. But it seems that I am no better than them. The entertainment of movies and television shows seem to come at a harsh price for those who earn their living making them. 

Restricted Substances

I got a text yesterday from my son. He asked me what my mailing address is. I looked at the text and thought, umm...no. Not only did he have an apartment in this complex a few years ago, he is on the lease for my apartment. There is no way that he doesn't know the address here. So, I gave him a call to ask what was up. It turns out that he did send the text. He had just forgotten what my apartment number was and was somewhere that he couldn't look it up. He will be 47 soon. The brain fog is hitting him early. 

My grandson's medication is extraordinarily expensive and while it isn't the kind of medication that you can just order online from Canada. But it has made him learn how to game the system for other medications that he needs.  Georgia is a shitshow medically, and won't allow a lot of medications to be sent there. They don't want anyone to be able to cut Big Pharma, or the insurance industry out of the picture. But it is legal for the medications to be sent to Alabama. Like I said, he is on my lease, so it isn't like we are doing anything untoward. 

There is a big part of this situation that makes me frustrated. Why on earth do we all have to jump through hoops and play games to get the medical help that we need?  I have friends who live in Canada who are thinking about moving here and I have asked them why. In all the years that I have been alive I never thought it would come to this. But they are young and building their family. You can't get pregnant here. It is dangerous. You can't get sick here. It doesn't even have to be a major illness to bankrupt you. A bout of strep throat will cost you hundreds of dollars before your insurance company will even begin to pay for it. And here we are, the country that exports medications all over the world, and we have to devise schemes to be able to afford the ones that we need to take. It's all a bunch of crap. And sadly, nothing will ever be done about it. 

The only upside of this situation that I can see is that my son will have to come regularly to pick up his meds. And that is a plus for me. But Damn it! This shouldn't be this way.

Cleaning Woes

My friend De is coming to visit again today. My home is mostly clean. It always is, but I scrubbed the bathroom and kitchen floor anyway. Generally, if someone walked into my home, I wouldn't be ashamed about how it's kept. It isn't hard with just me cleaning up after myself. This apartment is set up in a way that doesn't frustrate my efforts. 

I have a pile of laundry that needs to be done, but the laundry room has been out of order since the weekend. I should have taken care of it before then, but who knew. I hope they get it fixed soon. I really don't want to have to put my clothes in my wagon and walk them into one of the laundries near the university, but that may be what needs to be done. I wonder if I could get an Uber to take me. 

Another Month Down

The end of July is here and my mood has gotten better thinking that soon summer will be over and the cooler weather of autumn will be with us. But of course, my mind still has PNW expectations. I am sure to be disappointed as summer in the south drags her heels into the dog days in September and refuses to leave until well into October. 

Now that I am an old lady and summer vacation from school no longer applies to me, I like fall much better than summer. I'm already looking forward to the leaves changing colors and the fall festivals. I might even buy myself a pumpkin or two to decorate my area of the porch.

I braced myself for a bout of depression after the wedding that has not materialized. I'm not counting that out quite yet. My kids have been active on our family chat, sending pictures of dogs and gardens and even pictures from the wedding. That has done a lot to buoy my mood. 

I'm not really impressed with the wedding pictures so far, but they aren't the ones from the photographer. Mainly from people standing behind her taking phone photos of  the poses she set up. I'm sure her pictures will be better. To be honest, I was quite shocked that people were doing that. I thought that it was quite rude as she is paid to take the pictures. They were pretty bold about it, not even trying to disguise the fact that they were doing it.  Maybe wedding etiquette has changed and I didn't get the memo. Anyway, here is one of the pictures that I have worked on a bit with an editor. 

Puzzled

Do you work puzzles? I used to always have one going somewhere in my house. I used to always have one going in my house when my kids were young. But over the years since they have left the nest, I have fallen out of the habit. I have a few that I bought and never worked. I finally opened one and got it started. I think that over those same years I lost the brain cells that had me successful in working them too. This one is a thousand pieces and is already a challenge for me.