Coffee heat rising

Aging in place

And I need a $15,000 car…WHY?

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If you read Funny about Money all the time, you know my honored son made off with my car some weeks ago. Purloined it right out of the garage, and stole the keys that go with it. 😀

Did he think this would create some lesson-building entrée into my life?

Hevvin only knows. Minds, I do not read.

But I’ll tellya, it has taught me a lesson: a very important lesson. And that is…HANG ONTO YOUR HAT!… as a resident of a major Southwestern American city, forhevvinsake I don’t need a car!

Got that? And can you believe it?

Four or six weeks ago, I wouldn’t have believed it: not on your life!

But now, today, after several marvelously car-free weeks, I’ve come to exactly that conclusion: I don’t need a car! 

And in fact, it’s very probable that any one of us who lives in a major American metropolis does not need a car! 

Can you imagine? Two or three months ago, I sure couldn’t have.

Now, it’s true: when my mother and I lived in San Francisco, we did have my father’s beloved sedan at hand. But we regarded it not as our car but as his car. It resided several stories down in an underground parking garage. My mother would get it out when she and I wanted to traipse across the Bay to our relatives’ house in Berkeley: maybe once every two or three weeks. But otherwise: it just sat in there while he was off at sea.

When his ship came into port, she would retrieve his Chrysler, fill up the gas tank, and off we would go to pick him up at whatever dock his ship came into. But otherwise? The thing just sat there.

And now, here in Lovely Uptown Phoenix, I find I need a car even less than she and I did Back in the Day. No kidding:

  • Three major grocery stores within easy walking distance
  • A hair stylist about four blocks down the road.
  • A veterinarian right next door to the stylist’s salon.
  • Two major computer stores in the cluster that houses the grocers.
  • A lawyer a few blocks to the north.
  • A doctor’s office to the south
  • Two accountants straight across the street from me.
  • An Uber driver next-door to the accountants’ place….

Seriously: it goes on and on. I don’t need a car! If, by some fluke, I should need the services of a business or professional who’s not within walking distance, all I have to do is call one of the Uber drivers who live here in the ‘Hood.

Glorioski!

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Truly: what a GLORIOUS afternoon!  

Weather:

cool but not too cool
sunny but not hot

Neighbors:

Sittin’ around their front yards with the kids out
Kids: cuter than cute, having a great time running around

Ruby the Corgi:

Snoozing in the back bathroom
NOT lost, after all!

😀  As you may have deduced: a small surge of panic. Dog disappeared. Dog declined to come to call. Human could not find Dog anywhere in the house. Human about fainted in terror.

But eventually said Dog did materialize: yea verily, from the back bathroom where she likes to loaf, and where I didn’t see her while I was banging around looking for her.

If I had a little more ambition (and if my right hip weren’t quite so spavined), Ruby and I would walk over to the park, explore a bit, and then wander home.

This is the sort of time when I most miss the ineffable SDXB. He, as you may recall, moved to staid and stodgy Sun City, where he took up with the lively and charming New Girlfriend. 😀 I’ve lived in Sun City, thank you — that was where my parents settled after my father retired, dragging me there with them.

It’s really not my style, and truth to tell I hated being stuck out there during the four years of my university sojourn. So…soon as I finished school and got a job in Phoenix, I moved into town. Never EVER to move back to Sun City.

SDXB, himself the staid and stodgy type, bought a place and decamped out there a few years ago. He tried to get me to go with him, but…been there, done that, ain’t a-doin’ it again! He loves it, though, and shortly took up with a very nice New Girlfriend…for whom, quite frankly, I wish the best.

WhatEVER. Moi, I dearly love the kids playing outside in front. Just came in from a stroll and a visit with parental set: the young people and the toddlers and the dog or two…what more could one want?

😀 Really, it is a lovely neighborhood.

Why on earth would you want to live someplace where no kids are frolicking around?????

Spavined!!

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Actually, the spavined hip is beginning to feel noticeably better. Doesn’t mean it’s healed…matter of facts it still hurts. And hurts. And hurts…hurts…hurts…hurts.  But: doesn’t hurt as much as it did.

Whatever our grand physical therapist tried to do the other day, that didn’t help.  If anything, it made it hurt WORSE.

By this evening, the pain is back to normal: hurts, hurts, hurts…. 

Maybe, with any luck, in a few days it will recede back to something in the vague vicinity of normal. Not holding my breath…but hope springs eternal, eh?

Ain’t this nice? Our fine city leaders plan to jack the garbage collection rates by nigh unto 50%. Then to keep raising them every time we turn around. Makes life on a ranch in the middle of nowhere look better and better.

Seriously: if I were 10 or 15 years younger, that’s exactly where I’d be headed: back to the Gold Bar Ranch, out on the far end of the freakin’ Mogollon Rim.

I’m coming to hate this Los-Angelized city.

Seriously: I loathed living in L.A. Was sooooo relieved, all those years ago when my father retired and dragged us to Arizona. But now: WTF. Might as well be back in Southern California.

At any rate: what else is new?  

Our honored City Parents are getting set to gouge the bejayzus out of us again: a FORTY-SIX PERCENT INCREASE in garbage pickup rates!!!!!

Bastards.

Well. It makes moving to some other city look better and better. The only reason I haven’t done so is that M’Hijito is here.

And it’s safe to assume that will continue to be the case. As long as he lives in Phoenix, I’ll be here, too.

One of my friends installed a little house in her back yard for her parent. So…thereby they each had their own place and their privacy, but all the costs for utilities and trash pickup and yard care were shared.

Can’t imagine M’Hijito would put up with that. Too bad: it’s definitely a Thought!!

Back Online! And Chariot-Free

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Hallelujah! Funny appears to be back online. Why, when, where? No idea. At any rate, we’ll soon see if this post goes up.

Meanwhile, our li’l world is toddling off to Hell on a handcart. (Can you toddle on a rolling thing?) Everybody that I know, just about, is sick as a dawg.

(Why are dogs thought to be sick, anyway?)

The purloined car is permanently gone. The Mayo/driver’s license issue is, I think (but am not sure) is still up in the proverbial air. I do have another doctor who says the Mayo doc is ridiculous and there’s no reason I can’t be driving…but truth to tell, I don’t feel much like barging into battle over the issue.

As more time passes, I find (more & more) that, given where I live and given the commerce all around here, I really don’t NEED a car to get by just fine. More than just fine, really.

Everything I need or crave, day-to-day, is available within easy walking distance. And for the stuff that’s not right around the corner, an Uber driver lives straight across the street!

Matter of fact, I’ve learned that at least half-a-dozen Uber drivers live right here in the ‘Hood. So as a practical matter, it really is true that you don’t need a car to live in this part of town, comfortably and conveniently.

That is a HUGE money suck that goes away forthwith! Riding on the lightrail, the busses, and the local Uber autos costs a tiny fraction of what owning a car costs. I’m now thinking I’m not going to bother to try to extract my license from those idiots at the Mayo or to retrieve my car from my son’s garage.

If he gives the car back or reimburses me for it, I’ll sell it and bank about 10 grand. That will buy a whole lotta Uber rides, eh?

Gosh. It’s almost like living in San Francisco. When my mother and I lived there, waaayyy back in the day, my father’s swell Oldsmobile remained parked in the apartment’s underground garage whenever he was off at work (he went to sea and was gone for weeks at a time). The only time my mother and I got that car out was to drive to Berkeley: there to visit the relatives. Most of the time, we rode the trains and busses. Or walked.

This, interestingly, changes the tenor of life in Phoenix.

Until recently, living here was more like living in Southern California than anything: hot, traffic-ridden, bourgeois, boring. But as commerce builds up and it becomes more feasible to get around on foot, it feels more like living in San Francisco, where you don’t bother with a car unless you have a long drive to make.

And y’know….since there’s a car rental place about three blocks from here, I may just get rid of the Dog Chariot altogether. Why own a hole in the pavement into which to pour money when someone else can own and maintain the thing, and you can rent one whenever you feel so inclined?

YOWCH!!!!

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Ouch, every which way from Sunday! In the hip. In the feet. In spavined fingers… Every goddamwhich way from Sunday!

Thank HEAVEN for Amazon! Honestly: I have NO idea how on earth I would cope if somehow I had to traipse to the store for everygoddamthing the dog and I need. Just walking up the hallway between the bedroom and the kitchen hurts, HURTS, and then HURTS some more!

At any rate, now we have a new bag of dawg food ordered. Yes: WITHOUT having to pay for an Uber ride, WITHOUT having to hike four blocks (+++) to the stores, WITHOUT damn near crippling my idiot self to retrieve a couple of ordinary, boring daily items.

So, now we’re set for several more days. Much is it to be hoped that by then I’ll be recovered enough from whatever ails me to negotiate the neighborhood shopping.

We can’t easily get fresh food by ordering it on Amazon. But…really, that only needs to be purchased about once a week. And we’ve discovered a fine GODSEND here in the ‘Hood: a guy directly across the street(!!!) is driving an Uber cab!!!!

Wow: what incredible luck, eh?

At any rate, now all I have to do is stumble over to his house and beg him to schlep me around, and voilà! Problem solved.

Great galloping ZOT, am I tired of hurting. 

Long as I’m laying on the bed, the body seems sorta OK — but o’course, wouldn’cha know: that’s an illusion. The instant I get off the sack...ohhhhh my gawd! The back hurts. the hip hurts, the feet hurt, the…everygoddamthing hurts.

Well…it doesn’t seem to be terminal, anyway. With any luck, in a few days Whatever This Is will settle down, and then the Dawg and I can go on about our dog-‘n’-human business in our wonted fashion.

In the meantime… Kid, don’t get old. Gettin’ old freakin HURTS!

Gorgeous Evening!

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Five-thirty…and oh! What a gorgeous, beautiful evening. 

The magical corgi and I loaf on the back porch, beneath a sky richly decorated with fluffy clouds:  High gray clouds reflecting the orange sunset, so beautiful!

Just back from the Albertson’s shopping center, down on the corner of Slum Drive and Commuter’s Way. The crummy apartments across the way are unusually quiet and even look almost tidy. The trains ramble up and down Slum Drive, bearing commuters and tired panhandlers. Cars and busses shove their way across Commuter’s. And I wish my mother were here.

Oh, my! How she would have enjoyed this evening’s ramble!

She wanted me and SDXB to move into those apartments, when we first decided to shack up together.

I’m crazy, but I’m not that crazy. Instead, we went in together to occupy one of the pleasant, middle-class block houses that make up the single-family housing here. And I’ve never regretted it.

Truly: I do love this place. You couldn’t get me out of here, not unless it’s to cart me to the mortuary.

SDXB thought Sun City was about the best thing he’d ever seen. The endless roar of F-16’s didn’t bother him: he was an Air Force boy and frankly, I think he rather liked that racket.

Once he got ensconced out there, he took up with New Girlfriend: also about the best thing ever to come along…or rather the Best Human. She is a lovely person…and truth to tell, her personality is such that she’s perfect for him. And her advent relieved me of feeling guilty about letting that damn-near-marital relationship wilt on the vine. Thank you, Lovely New Girlfriend!

He’s not so well anymore: stumbling along under the weight of the years. How much longer he’ll last is anyone’s guess. Will he outlive N.G.? Uhm…could be. But then what? Unclear to me.

I’d kinda like to cultivate a stronger friendship with her, so as to be here for her when SDXB’s end arrives. And yet…and yet…no, that doesn’t seem quite right.

Maybe, somehow, she and I will become 24k friends after he’s gone. I dunno. Unfortunately, Sun City is so damn far away from the Funny Farm that it would be hard for us to get together often enough to build such a friendship. But…well… I do wish her a future of strength and happiness.

Long may she thrive!