I had to take a detour on my way to PT yesterday, and on the way I spotted a diner I’d never seen. I love diners, so I made a mental not to check it out on my way home.
Even though it was noon, it was empty, which surprised me. After all, there’s a big DoD facility nearby. I thought, “They couldn’t have laid off that many of them already, could they?”
Anyway, I ordered iced tea, grilled Swiss cheese on rye with tomato and a cup of soup. When it arrived, I saw the waitress had forgotten the rye but oh well. I also ordered some pudding for dessert.
“Seventeen dollars for a grilled cheese?” I said to cashier when he rung me up.
So my right arm, shoulder, neck and hand are really shot. (Oh, and I have arthritis in both thumbs.) Constant pain, weakness, getting tests. (It did not help that WordPress “updated” the site again, and I now have to make three additional movements to get the things done I used to do with one movement. Why male techies are so bad with ergonomics, I have no idea. By the way, because I have been such a fanatic about that sort of thing, I have never had carpal tunnel. Most of my problems originate from herniated discs in my neck.)
Anyway, I absolutely have to minimize how much I do, and since I get paid to post at the other site, that’s got to be my priority.
What are the things you want and need from this site? What do you look for when you come here? Please, be specific. Do you want the constant doom scrolling, or nah? According to my stats, I average about 300 visitors a day. Also according to my stats, no one clicks on the story links. (The highest amount I’ve seen in weeks is eight clicks on a story.)
What about the music? Do I need to post this many? Should I seek out new music, or just stick to oldies?
I don’t know how many of you saw this because I was having trouble with WordPress last week, but I could use some help after my recent kitchen event:
Renters insurance only covers actual fire damage — as in, scorching.
Landlord’s homeowner’s insurance would cover the smoke damage, but he does not want to file a claim. In fact, he insists the smoke detectors went off and “you must have slept through it.” Reader: I did not. And the alarm repair guy said the alarm never went off.
So far, I have spent $340 in credit card charges to get smoke removal services (ozone treatment and rug shampooing).
Now I have charged an upholstery shampooing machine ($109 plus shampoo, $23.20) to get the smoke stink out of my couch and armchair, which is slightly less than what the cleaning service wanted.
Long handled tools to clean my walls of lingering smoke. $18.99
One gallon of concentrated organic degreaser and spray bottle, $20.28.
Assorted smoke eliminator sprays, $15.50. (Febreze doesn’t seem to work.) Wish me luck!
Good news: Finally, my chest has opened up and I’m coughing up stuff. This makes me happy!
If you would like to help with these unexpected costs, please do. I’d really appreciate it.
My dear friend Colleen died in hospice this weekend of a rare and particularly virulent stomach cancer. She leaves behind her husband J.P. Ringvold and their twin daughters, Nora and Katie. Colleen was a very talented and generous musician, always looking to help other musicians along.
I hadn’t talked to her in a few months — she was at the stage where she was looking for some miracle cure like ivermectin. I’d stopped trying to reason with her and instead wished her luck. What else could I say? It’s not like the regular treatments were still working.
I’m so glad you’re out of pain, Coll. I’m happy your family was there with you at the end.
As I write this Sunday morning, my eyes are swollen almost shut and I’m waiting to see if the ozone machine I ordered will actually arrive. (Update: Nope. Won’t be here until Monday, which is today.)
It all started Friday night, when I left a pot of chicken soup on the stove. I turned it off and went to bed. I woke up at 3:30 to an apartment filled with smoke. I didn’t turn the flame off all the way! (Interestingly enough, my wired smoke detectors did not go off.)
I have asthma — mild asthma, but certainly not capable of standing up to smoke inhalation. It sucks.
I wiped down everything in my kitchen, but it didn’t help. It was so bad, I drove to Jersey Saturday night just to have dinner at a local diner, where I could breathe clean air for an hour or so. (Liver and onions, which I love but never think to make for myself. Yum!)
My windows were open, HEPA filters a-humming, and fans blowing when I got back. No improvement at all, so I ordered an ozone generator in desperation. Amazon indicated I would get it overnight. I used one many years ago when I had a similar problem after buying a memory foam mattress, and couldn’t tolerate the off-gassing fumes. It worked pretty well.
This was not a good couple of weeks, not at all. My histamine intolerance is through the roof, and like the last time I had a flareup several years ago, my diet has gotten more and more restrictive. A couple of weeks ago, I had some peanut butter and crackers and holy Moses, that was scary. My throat swelled up and I was having a teensy bit of trouble breathing until the Benadryl kicked in. Same thing with some honey barbeque potato chips. Oh, also when I made some Shake and Bake chicken. I had to rinse off the spices before I could eat it. (My doctor has since ordered me an epi pen.)
Also, anything fermented. I love balsamic vinegar glaze, but right now, it feels like I’m pouring battery acid down my throat. Most cheeses bother me, too. I can eat a little bit of ice cream, but who can live on that?
Histamine is in everything, so unlike people who have plain old food allergies, I can have a surprise reaction to anything. Like tuna fish! A couple of weeks ago, I had something they call scombroid fish poisoning. The histamine levels in tuna go through the roof when it has not been kept cold enough at each step of the supply chain. I filed a complaint with the state, which kicked it back to a city agency.
“What is that? I never heard of it,” the city worker said when he called. “I never heard of it, either,” I told him.
I love tuna salad, it’s one of my favorites. (Yes, I know about the mercury. I only eat it every every ten days or so.) This experience made me very paranoid.
But wait, there’s more! I apparently now have something called “burning mouth syndrome,” also called glossodynia. Just what it sounds like. Pretty much anything I eat hurts. But I can’t see a specialist without a referral, so that goes onto the checklist.
I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me. I assume some of this was triggered by long covid, but the histamine intolerance flared up years before covid. Maybe it’s the Lyme, I dunno. Maybe I just have fucked-up DNA. (My late ex-husband used to tell me I should live in a hermetically-sealed penthouse. But he’s dead and I’m not, so joke’s on you, pal!)
My friend Nicole Belle and I always joked that blogging kills, because almost every blogger we know has some kind of weird autoimmune disease. So maybe that’s it.
Maybe Trump and the fascist takeover is a little bit stressful.
I just need to bitch. In fact, I live to bitch. It’s how I de-stress.
So yesterday was the day I was supposed to get my leaky exhaust system fixed. When I dropped off my car, I mentioned oh by the way, a whining noise when I started up the car. He said he’d check it out.
Got a text an hour later. 1) Can’t do the exhaust, it’s falling apart, I have to take it somewhere they do welding. 2) The whining noise was the power steering pump and it’s $800, give or take a few bucks. So the money from the fund drive that was supposed to fix the exhaust goes to the pump.
The exhaust system? I will go to a shop in the dead center of the Kensington drug market, where I got a muffler welded on two cars ago. They only take cash, you have to get in line and wait your turn. It’s an assembly line. (I don’t like holding cash in that neighborhood but oh well.)
The last time I needed a catalytic converter, my BIL insisted I drive all the way out in Amish country to see his cheap muffler guy. It was an adventure. I remember there was a torrential downpour and I could hardly see the narrow, winding road — which made me just a little bit tense. (When the rain would pause, I could read all the shockingly vile and hateful anti-Biden roadside signs put up by the Amish farmers. Whatever happened to “Love thy neighbor”?)
Anyway, I finally got there. The entire trip from my house was two hours. The shop was clean and there were tables with all kinds of Mennonite religious pamphlets. It took less than 20 minutes. I never want to go back, the trip was too nerve-wracking.
I don’t know what the exhaust fix will cost (I can’t put it off much longer, the fumes are getting worse), but I suspect there won’t be much left to go to the dentist. I was really looking forward to getting at least one filling.
Like my Nana used to say, “I couldn’t move that pencil from here to there without something happening.”
It just wouldn’t stop snowing. I lost my job and of course my health insurance, so I stopped taking the Adderall they’d given me for my ADD. Seemed like every day I woke up to more snow, and I’d put on my boots and trudge out to car, where I’d clean it off again. I fell into a deep depression. I found myself planning to accidentally fall from my deck in such a way that my kids wouldn’t know I did it on purpose. But that wasn’t like me at all, and it shocked me into looking for an explanation. I found it on the long sheet of Adderall side effects. “Withdrawal may lead to suicidal ideation.” Aha! I felt better, and eventually even normal again. But it was a close call. This song always reminds me of that time.
A few reasons you should donate to my winter fund drive:
It’s going to be quite a heating bill this month.
My car’s exhaust system has a leak that I can’t afford to fix just yet ($1000+) because I’m still paying off the $700 bill for the state inspection I put on my credit card last month. It’s really cold out but my mechanic says I have to drive with the window cracked, anyway.
I urgently need to see a dentist. It’s been 10 years. I assume you don’t need gruesome details.
And in the age of the Mango Mussolini, life is extremely stressful. You get to walk away; I don’t. Obviously, I need another job. I’m still looking but so far, no dice.
If you value the context I bring to these times, please send some of your hard-earned dollars my way. Your support keeps me going.
