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Covid-Smacked and Delinquent-Zapped

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Wow! This covid bug is SOME germ!

Supposedly the version I’ve got is not very severe. But I’ll tellya…it’s got me knocked into the middle of next week!  Uhm…I think… It’s hard to tell what week we’re in.

It zaps your memory. Especially short-term memory. I can. not. remember. things that I did just a few hours ago, or things that I’m supposed to do now and in the near term.

Case in point: the pool motor busted. (Wouldncha know, eh?) So now I’ve gotta get some guy out to work on that.

Pool Dude gave me a guy’s name. I know I called the guy…but…

I can…not…remember…what…we…said!

Is he going to come by? If so, when? What day? What time?

Seriously: the conversation we had is a blank. A total blank: I cannot remember one thing we said.

So now I’ve got to call that guy up and fess up to that little lapse…what an embarrassment!!!

****

Yes. Yes I did talk to him. He said he would come by whenever he can — has a pretty full plate, apparently.

Weird!!

Also weird is the apparent variability of this virus’s effects. Some people, as we’re widely told, are brought to Death’s door.

I, on the other hand, have a cough. That’s it. Well, that and so-called “brain fog.”

  • No fever — to the contrary: my temp is in the negative numbers.
  • No headache.
  • No sore throat.
  • No stuffy nose.
  • No compulsive pounding on Death’s Door.

I suspect the “brain fog” is a real thing. Even though I’m getting damn senile, I’m not THAT senile! Normally I can remember who I talked with this morning and what we said.

So I’m left worrying whether it’s safe for me to drive the car…even though I feel fine, if some marbles are missing, am I a menace to navigation?

***

The day stumbles on. Now we learn I must not have been THAT sick last night. Because….quite a commotion took place a half-block from the Funny Farm, and I slept right through it.

NEIGHBORHOOD FACEBOOK PAGE, 12:38 A.M.

Neighbor 1:
What is happening on Butler right now? Cops and helicopters everywhere

Neighbor 2
Suspicious person hiding near a car on NNth Ave & Funny Farm Road

Neighbor 3
Author
Pass-Through Street is completely blocked with first responders

Neighbor 4
The Hood…never boring

Neighbor 3
unfortunately not these days

Neighbor 5
https://www.abc15.com/…/two-teens-injured-after-stolen…
Found this article!

ABC15.COM
Two teens injured after stolen vehicle crashes into wall, fencing

Neighbor 4
3 teenagers stole a car, there was a police chase , they lost control on PassThrough and FunnyFarm Ave, one was ejected, the other they caught in my neighbors yard then the other one apparently was a few blocks north

Neighbor 6
How did you figure this out? They took out my fence and damaged property.

Neighbor 4
oh my goodness ! I’m 2 or 3 houses down i believe, the neighbor across the street spoke with the police last night and he told my husband .

Neighbor 7
If anyone has video- please let us know asap! From what I understand he took off his jacket and had a white shirt on. It was between 12-1am Saturday night. Detectives are knocking on doors looking for video. https://ring.com/share/14201c5b-5acf-434e-846d-4cebeda5a21a

RING.COM
Ring #AlwaysHome

Neighbor 7
They were hiding under our neighbors car but got away before the cops arrived on foot… :/
UGH

****

So it goes: Life in the Big City. I personally am getting bloody tired of it, and if my son weren’t dead-set against my moving, I would be soooo gone by now.

SDXB moved to Sun City because of exactly this kind of sh!t. I’ve lived in Sun City and don’t want to do that again. But there are plenty of other venues that are significantly less active than ours.

Fountain Hills is one. It’s halfway to Payson…but on the other hand, it’s close to the Mayo Clinic’s doctors’ offices, which could be convenient on occasion. On the other side of town, there’s Cave Creek and it’s affluent sister suburb, Carefree. Very pretty area, though expensive. The Arcadia district, over on the easterly side of town, has houses very similar to the ones in the ‘Hood but is a significantly better area.

Most of the neighborhoods in town, though, have this kinda sh!t going on all the time, unless they’re gated communities like the Country Club district. The nearest comparable area is probably Moon Valley, but because it’s solidly middle-class and has no adjacent slums, the cost of real estate there is way outside my budget. By and large comparable houses there cost almost twice what I could get for the Funny Farm. Most have no gas service, so you’re stuck with an electric hot plate instead of a real stove. And — not so obvious in the real estate photos — the houses are VERY cheaply built. Many or most of them have essentially zero insulation in their exterior walls. Many have flat roofs, so you can’t insulate the attic (such as it is) either. So they’re hot all summer despite astronomical power bills.

It’s Life in the Big City…i guess…

***
**** AND no, I do NOT know why WordPress refuses to double-space between paragraphs here! Yes, I HAVE tried to fix it, every which way from Sunday. No, NOTHING that I do makes it work. And so…screw it. Imagine paragraph breaks where ye please.
****

Lordie! STOP THE WORLD…

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i wanna get off!

Seriously… Don’t you feel like we’ve gone through the Looking Glass and come out on the other side?

Fires and smoke consuming Canada and the East Coast. War rages on in Eastern Europe. A living former president of the United States is indicted for a felony. A former prime minister of Great Britain stalks off the job. And Apple brings us a technology that blends reality and fantasy into one weird world.

Not that the world wasn’t already weird enough….

  • Boris Johnson, yes, quits as the UK’s prime minister — a little too much indiscretion about the partying.
  • Mark Zuckerberg brings us a fancy new headset that blends reality with fantasy. And why not? Who can tell the difference, as it is?
  • The former President of the United States is indicted for a felony that he signed into law.
  • Same Pretend President is found to have boxloads of state secrets hidden in his shower.
  • Canada is burning down.
  • The smoke from Canada is asphyxiating the northeastern U.S.
  • Chat GPT is scaring the bedoodles out of the guy who developed it.
  • A logjam of cargo ships is already piling up off the West Coast: more to come.
  • There’s such a thing as “revenge travel” these days.
  • AI is charging up the road like a demented buffalo.
  • A new prescription treatment for Alzheimer’s is coming up the pike. Let’s hope it works! 😀 It’ll be just about on time for the likes of me. Unfortunately, it appears to have a high incidence of untoward side effects. Plus to get it, you have to have a biweekly IV infusion — doesn’t that sound like fun!

***

Ahhh, the Gnus of the Day.

I refuse to pay for TV. Profoundly, indeed, did I resent our Civic Fathers taking free, off-the-air television away from us. I could see paying for cable if there were something worth watching, or if something that runs regularly were worth paying for. But, alas…unless you’re a sports fan, there really isn’t much of anything that, IMHO, is worth plunking down a monthly fee.

Seriously: if you have the Internet (which most of us do), you can import just about all the televised drivel you can stand to contemplate, right on your computer. Ad-free. I use a big iMac to follow the news and the very few PBS shows still worth watching. Why pay extra for that stuff?

***

Meanwhile, closer to home:

I’ve been too sick to pay the bills, what with this li’l covid adventure. Most of them autopay. But a couple don’t, because I don’t much trust this or that vendor. Cox, alas, is one of them. Just realized I probably didn’t pay the recent Cox bill, because I’ve been too distracted to notice which bills were what.

So tomorrow I’ll have to get on the phone and pay that by charging it up on the AMEX card.

Goodie.

****

One of covid’s interesting effects is to render your brain nonfunctional. Thus: never did hit “publish” on this post. Never did pay the phone bill.

Still seem to be online, though. First thing after dawn (it’s about 3 a.m. now), the phone predicament will have to be dealt with.

Coughing coughing coughing coughing. Every BARK BARK BARK rips into the spavined back and the sore hip.

Gotta try to get back to sleep!

Still Kickin’…

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After a fashion, anyhow…

Okay, WordPress is hijacking this post
….Abandoning…trying to save.

If it goes online prematurely, have no fear…I’l be back. Maybe.

****

Where were we?

This mini-episode is par for today’s course. Whatever I’ve touched today has gone ker-PLOOIE! And, truth to tell, that’s gettin’ a little old…

Today was a classic Day from Hell, Arizona style.

Yes. In Arizona, all you have to do to evoke a Day from Hell is to climb into your car and venture forth across the roads. WHAT a place! Crowded, unruly, batsh!t crazy. Just getting from here to there will leave you feeling a little crazed.

Wanted to go to a Walgreen’s or similar pharmacia to see if I could snare another electric steamer, the kind that boils HOT water and wafts the steam in your direction, rather than the kind that turns cold water into fog.

Good luck with that.

Along the way, I traipsed to the west side, there to visit the credit union. Argued with their rep. Could NOT make the guy grasp the concept that one of my checking accounts is co-owned with my son…for a REASON. (Dear Son uses it as a collection pail for money devoted to the mortgage on the downtown house, which we happen to co-own. This concept apparently is too arcane for the average Joe Schmoe. Oh well.)

Finally untangled the mess there (I hope), was able to get into the account (which doesn’t mean I could do so again, right this minute), and discovered I need to extract another few thou’ from Fidelity to pay this month’s AMEX bill.

NO idea how, but I seem to have hugely overcharged on the AMEX card. Not clear how or why, because I can’t get my hands on an AMEX statement. Tomorrow will have to get on the phone and ask them to send me another paper statement.

They, of course, don’t wanna do that. They want you to wrestle and bang around getting online and then spend God Only Knows how may hours trying to untangle the online data.

Guys….

Just.

Send.

Me.

A

Statement!

Right now, though, I’m in no mood to hassle with that.

Traffic in Phoenix is usually awful. Today it was horrific. Every which way you went… There seemed to be no way out of the knots of enraging traffic jams. So what should have taken two twenty-minute drives devolved into a good two hours of trudging through crazy-making traffic.

I hate this place.

Every time I get in my car, that thought wafts across my mind:

I hate this place.

If my son weren’t here, I would be SOOOO gone!

Where would I go, if my son weren’t lurking around demanding that I stay put? Ohhh…I can think of several places:

The Oro Valley, a suburb on the west side of Tucson. It’s getting a bit too suburbanized for my taste these days. But still: it’s quiet, relatively low on crime, and within easy driving distance of the urban amenities offered by Tucson.

Prescott, a large small town up on the Rim. It’s very pretty. Historic. Has a cultural life. Has a reasonably adequate regional hospital. Lots of hiking. Relatively cool weather. And its very own Costco. (What more could a person want?)

Santa Barbara (California), up the hill from the downtown area. This would require a fair amount of money…but wtf? You can’t take it with you.

Santa Fe, New Mexico. I suppose. Actually, you need rather more disposable cash than I have laying around to live comfortably and exotically in Santa Fe. But hey! Where have we heard it before? Ya can’t take it with you!

Some parts of Mexico. Ajijic, for example.

But the truth is, few venues can replace the one I have. Not for an old bat, anyway. This place is close to shopping. Close to decent doctors. Within striking distance of the Mayo Clinic. Diversely populated by people of all ages and several ethnicities. Provided with halfway decent K-8 schools. As centrally located as you can get without being in a mid-town high-rise. Lots of greenery. Served by one of the best high schools in the nation. Within walking distance (in certain seasons) of excellent grocery stores. And now we have our very own damned…uhm…coveted light-rail.

All of which is neither very much here nor every much there.

What is very much here: Bed-time!

 

And (cough!) today….

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Yes: Today is still today. The world has not collapsed into a ball of bread dough. The air conditioning (thank the heavens) is still working.

Seen from the underside:

It’s too hot to breathe, AC or no AC. My right eye continues to fuliminate and as we scribble consists of one blue-green pupil in a field of bright blood-red.

Mercifully, it doesn’t hurt.

That’s something. I guess.

The covid (or whatever it is) continues to hold forth, though I’ll say today the cough is a little milder. However, I still have a fever: 98.2, it sez here.

For normal people, that sounds OK. But it must be borne in mind that I am a spectacularly cold fish. Normal for me is about 97. 5, and even that is on the high side. So we have about one degree of fever, which ain’t that bad. But which I could surely do without.

Just tried to clean and flush the steamer, which had about stopped dead as of dawn this morning. Kinda doubt it’ll do much good. Managed to fish a few little flakes of calcium out of the thing, but not enough to interfere much with its operation. So I don’t think “clogged up” is its problem.

“Clogged up” is sure my problem, though. My head is stuffed. My chest hurts. Breathing is a chore. The cough is dramatic. And I’m real tired o’ this stuff. 😀

Having done nothing today, I’m deathly tired and would love to go to sleep. That seems not likely to happen, though.

I should get up, get dressed, trudge down to the Walgreen’s through the chilly 95-degree heat, and buy another steamer. But ohhhhhh I don’t wanna!!

First place, you just know that if I traipse down to the Walgreen’s, I’ll find they don’t carry the things anymore.

Next, you know I won’t be able to find anything like it. This thing gets hot, and of course Big Brother wouldn’t want any of us to hurt our little pea-brained selves, so probably you can’t get your sticky little hands on it it. Or on anything like it.

Hmmm… This thing looks kinda similar. Mine is not that brand, but its design is like unto it. Now waitaminit…apparently you can rev these things up by adding salt to the water.

Why not? The thing is already not working. The worst that can happen is adding salt will totally bust it. Either way, I’ll have to trudge out in search of another one, or  order this one from Amazon (which will take another two days to get here).

*******

4:20 p.m.

How can it possibly be this early? Feels like it should be about 8:00 or 8:30 p.m.

But it’s not. It’s actually late(ish) afternoon. Ugh!

The salt-in-the-water experiment: YES!!!

It WORKED!!

No kidding. To my astonishment, adding a tablespoon of ordinary table salt to the gallon or so of water in the steamer’s tank revved it right up! Within 10 or 15 minutes, it was pumping out steam.

Who’dve thunk it?

Actually, it’s revved the thing up so much that a tankful of water is unlikely to last all night. Highly unlikely. But for the nonce, it’s pumping steam into the victim’s face, and I can sorta almost breathe.

At any rate, the contraption is working for the nonce. Probably I’ll have to get up in the middle of the night and fool with it. But that will mean I’ll have managed to steal half a night’s sleep. Which would be some kinda miracle.

 

Please, Li’l AC Unit: DON’T die now!

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Argh! Sitting here on the bed, feeling damn miserable and contemplating what to write, if anything, for today’s post, and the air conditioner, which has been pounding away all this hot, hot afternoon, goes...plunk! into SILENCE.

Ohhhhhh damn. It’s 6:30 and there’s no way I’ll get a repairman over here before the middle of the day tomorrow. If that soon.

As I continue to sit here, now feeling d-o-o-o-med, it turns right back on.

Whew! Hold that pose, dear Gadget!

Let’s hope it lasts until tomorrow morning. If it craps out tonight, I’ll have to take the dog and go to a motel. Can’t take this hacking, barking fulminating disease down to my son’s house…so we’ll have to cough (heh!!) up a chunk of dough to get into a cool-ish room. Goody….

COUGH is the operative term here. Cough and cough and cough and cough and cough and…. My gawd!

Well, truth to tell, the hacking has died down a little since yesterday, even since this morning. Either that or it’s me that’s dying down…

The covid infection does, maybe, seem to be fading back a little. Temp is down to 98.8 just now. That’s fairly high for me. Being a cold fish, my normal temp is about 97.6. Or lower. So anything over 98 is a fever for me. But I figure if it’s under 99, it’s a fairly low fever.

Fished the old steamer out of the back of a closet, filled it with water, set it on a TV table next to the bed, aimed it at my face, and plugged it in. Don’t know if it makes much difference, but figure it can’t do any harm. The air in Arizona is normally dry, and at this time of year, as spring goes out and summer contemplates its attack, we’re parched.

The WonderAccountants are having a family shindig over there across the street — the whole tribe has descended on them. She brought me a hamburger, which was mighty nice!

Life “in Today’s Modren Society”

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LOL! This morning, I’m reminded of one of my students’ favorite turns of phrase: “In today’s modern society,” to be followed by a low-key rant on some clichéd topic. Invariably, the kid would spell it “modren.” 😀

Funny li’l critters, students are.

Guess I’m with them today, though. Have you noticed how many things that we old bats have taken for granted for years are now difficult, even impossible to procure?

Today’s rant is inspired by the need to replace a plush bathroom rug. The incumbent has arrived in extreme old age, much the worse for wear thanks to Ruby trying to plump it up with her claws. Whenever I can again breathe without coughing my lungs out, I need to go over to Bed, Bath, and Beyond and pick up another one…

…uhm…

wait wait… 

There is no more Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

Uh oh.

Well, surely I can get it at a Penney’s.

Uhm…

At Sears?

Argha!

Maybe the Broadway?

I’m gonna pay Broadway prices for a freaking nylon bathroom mat?????

Wait wait: the two Broadways near my part of town are closed down anyway.

No. Like everyone else, I’m gonna order it from Amazon.

And here it is! In 87 gerjillion colors. And five sizes. Mine is 25 x 39 inches. No doubt that equates to Amazon’s 24 x 40 model. Okayyy….it’ll fit. Is it cheap at $28?

I dunno. There’s nothing to compare it with. I’d have expected to pay about 15 to 18 bucks…but then, yah: it’s been awhile since I bought one.

Speaking of comparing, is it comparable to the one I have? It looks the same in Amazon’s image. But I dunno: I can’t actually see it, touch it, feel it.

With all the home stores around here shut down — except for Target, which may or may not have these little rugs — I really have little choice but to order the thing online. The Broadway, which used to carry this sort of thing, has long been shut down here, merged with Macy’s…imagine what that outfit will charge! Forgodsake: 48 to 72 bucks! FOR THE SAME PRODUCT!

How do these places even begin to compete with Amazon?

Welp…if I’m going to have to buy a new rug, I’m sure as hell not gonna pay two or three times as much as Amazon is charging. I’ll take my chances with the quality and order one up online.

And that is life in Today’s Modren Society.