Coffee heat rising

Angst

THIS Is Life in the 21st Century?

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Holeeee shee-ut! I have been left SO FAR BEHIND in our fine 21st-century culture that I can’t even speak to today’s fine moderns.

Today, I sat in a Mayo Clinic doctor’s office while she explained to me, in words of one syllable, how to use a paper calendar!

No joke. Apparently their clients have become so accustomed to using electronic devices to track time and appointments that they no longer know HOW to use hard copy!

Understand: I’m an old lady. I’ve used paper calendars for the past SEVENTY YEARS. I do not need to be instructed in the use of a hard-copy calendar formatted as a booklet that you can carry in your purse.

So…I was just astonished when she launched into an explanation of how to use a paper pocket calendar to keep track of the current ailment. Incredibly, she assumed that I would not know how to use it.

It was a tiny sliver in the woodwork of a nightmare day. By the time we left, my son (who drove me out there) was not speaking to me. We made the entire hour-plus trip home in silence. That was jolly.

Clearly, I’ve outstayed my time on this planet. When the time finally comes to exit, stage left, I will not regret it. Of that, you may be sure.

Don’t get all panicked, please. I’m not ready to jump off the North Rim. Yet…

But consider: it’s true, we are living in a dystopic culture. It makes Brave New World look tame. All you’ve gotta do is look at the news of the day to know that. But…just passing day by day on the ground in America also will go a long way toward convincing you of it.

Soggy Doggy Day

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Just back from a morning doggy-walk, waiting for the water to heat up enough to make coffee. Wunderground says it’s 93 degrees out there; 15% humidity; expected high: 113.

Wouldn’tcha know it: M’hijito and I have to traipse to the FAR SIDE of north Scottsdale to go to another brain-numbing, BOOOORING get-together of the mentally challenged. Since everyone but me has decided that I’m now non compos mentis, I have to drag out there and listen to these people go on about how they forgot to pull up their underwear or forgot to eat their breakfast…on and on and endlessly on.

What an agonizing waste of time. Two hours trudging back and forth, and then a good three hours listening to old buzzards tell us what they forgot. Forgodsake. I know, already, that I forget things!

  • I know, already, that it’s normal for old people to forget stuff that they never would have spaced ten years ago.
  • I know, already, that there’s precious little anyone can do about it.
  • I know, already, to keep lists of upcoming appointments and to-do’s.
  • I know, already, to make notes on important tasks and meetings and events.
  • I KNOW, ALREADY, GODDAMMIT!!!!!!!

And I do NOT need to kill five hours traipsing back and forth to listen to a bunch of old folks complain about being old. That’s five hours of time I need to spend on a client’s current book project.

Well, speaking of killing time: I’d better quit bellyaching and fix some food and coffee, so as to be fortified before the kid gets here. Ugh!

This is gonna be a bi!ch of a day!

112 degrees and…and…

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FOGGY?????

Great Galloping Gods! No kidding: it’s 112 in the shade of the back porch, and lurking to north of us is a low cloud bank that looks for all the world like fog.

W?

T?

F?

Just got back from galloping around town in the heat. Dropped by the mechanic’s to describe the car’s latest eccentricity. She (yep: she ) wasn’t unduly concerned. She described what to watch for. Explained if and when to come back.

Over to Sprouts. Of COURSE they didn’t have what I wanted.

Through the heat to the Albertson’s. If the air is 112, what is the temperature of a parking lot’s asphalt?

Wunderground says the ambient air is 114º; predicted low tonight: 92º. Balmy.

This would not be an out-of-the-ordinary summer temperature…except…the real problem is, it’s humid out there. Hence: the fog-like stuff. It feels like effing Saudi Arabia.

How on earth my harbor-pilot father managed to work 8-hour shifts on those docks just mystifies me. How did ANY of those guys survive?

Frazzling up some chicken and some French fries on the grill. Hope the damn thing cools off enough to throw the plastic cover over it before that storm comes rolling in.

Must feed dog, so she’ll be wrung out (with any luck) before said storm comes rolling in.

 

July 4 Kaput

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Gosh. A whole post was almost done here, dated July 4. And…egad! Apparently I never published it.

Out it goes.

Far as I recall, it wasn’t a truly horrible evening. Often July 4 is truly horrible here, with idiots setting off their bang-bangs way-y-y into the night.

The reason for this: Our honored civic leaders, in their Passionate Patriotism, legalized fireworks in Arizona, undoing a years-long ban on sales of the damn things. Of course, people used to smuggle them in across the Mexican border and over from neighboring states…but not every numbskull and his mentally retarded brother, sister and cat glommed the damn things every Fourth of July. Now, everybody can get them —  any kind of them — and so nitwits blast them off all over the city and the state. So we get BAM BAM BAM BAM WEEEEEEEUUUUUUUU  BAM BAM all. night. long.

Understand. It’s not that I hate fireworks. We had a friend — now a late friend — who used to get a license to shoot the things off. He would throw an annual party, and he had professionals who knew what they were doing fill the air over his neighborhood with lights and noise. That was fun. And it was OK, because the fireworks were overseen safely, and because his Paradise Valley home was not surrounded by flammable trees and grasses.

The people who put on that show DID know what they were doing. They weren’t putting people’s homes and yards and pets at risk.

What I hate is fireworks in the hands of flaming morons.

And that’s what we have now.

Last night I ended up standing on the street all evening, keeping an eye on the doings in the alley. To my amazement, two young gentlemen who have taken up residence across the street came out and kept me company!

Can you imagine?

I sure can’t. At any rate, we ended up socializing for the better part of an hour. After the loony toons settled down, we went back into our respective palaces, and that was that.

LOL! Truth to tell, I seriously did consider putting the dog in the car and heading out to the desert, there to camp until dawn. That was NOT the way I wanted to spend the night, but it sounded a lot better than dodging nitwits all evening.

But for a change, not too much nitwittery went on, at least not in the immediate vicinity. Probably, I think, because those two guys were standing out there.

Well, not too much nitwittery except for the drunk driving. Lushes killed one person and injured two on the accursed freeway up the road. Honestly.

It makes Sun City look good…if only that place weren’t such a mausoleum.

At any rate, today we’re back to normal: Hotter than the hubs of Hades. Just now we’re down to a chilly 111 degrees, according to Wunderground. And yea verily: that’s exactly what the thermometer on the back porch reads.

Pool Dude — the guy I hired to come around and take care of the Hole in the Ground Into Which to Pour Money — has about paid for himself in sheer labor savings. The damned pool is sparkling clean: not a sheet of green to be seen anywhere. He’s expensive, but IMHO paying for his service beats leaving the thing empty.

Because, after all, there is no “empty” with a swimming pool. It doesn’t have a drain that you leave open, like a bathtub. If you don’t actively keep it drained, it hosts a puddle in which to grow algae and breed mosquitoes. My next-door neighbor does that.

Other Daughter, who lives in the next house down from that neighbor, leaves her windows open at night. (Don’t ask!!) Result: the mosquitoes got into her house, chewed her up, and gave her a raving case of encephalitis. She almost died. For a while, the doctors thought that even if she survived, she would never walk again.

She’s one tough lady, though. Not only did she live through it, but yea verily, she’s trotting all over the ‘Hood again.

At any rate, this particular stupidity means, for me: keep the doors and windows closed. Keep screens on all the doors and windows. Do not leave a door open for the dog to come and go at will.

Isn’t having to make allowances for neighbors’ idiocy fun?

To my mind, this was the beauty of the ranch: living out in the boondocks, two or three miles from the nearest neighbor, meant you were pretty much out of reach of the idiot neighbors’ frolics.

Balmy Summer Day(s) in Arizona

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Tuesday: A hot, damp day in June

Sooo…yeah. Come late afternoon, I go to throw a little chow on the grill.

DayUM, but it seems kinda warm out there.

Check the back porch thermometer. Ayup: 115 degrees.

In. The. Shade.

Well…really, I didn’t need to toss the shrimp on the grill, did I? All that was necessary was to set them on a plate out in the sun for a few minutes.

LOL!

Stumble outside. Retrieve shrimp.

Incredibly, the damn things are done unto perfection. They’ve been on the grill for…ohhh…about two minutes on each side.

It worked. That’s all that matters. I guess.

***

Vast banks of white clouds are piling up to the north.

Cool OFF, little grill, so we can close you and toss your cover over you, because pretty quick now we can be sure it’s gonna rain like Hell.

Why, in the name o’ God, would anyone want to live in this place?

The nerve — the NERVE, I say — of my parents to drag me here when my father saw a chance to quit his hated job and “retire” to this gawdawful venue!

***

Friday…Another Day: Absolutely Positively NOT Another Dollar…

Lost track of time…probably because the brain fried.

One o’clock in the afternoon:

108 in the shade of the back porch

Rented a PO box for all the sh!t that comes in (and goes out)

Contemplating my mother’s “career” as a real estate agent; thinking holeee sheee-ut

Contemplating my mother’s “career” as a Wife and Mother: Thank you, God for delaying my birth into the mid-20th century

Sitting in the air-conditioned living room, sweating like a pig.

Do pigs sweat? Why? Dogs don’t sweat. Cats don’t. On the other hand…horses do.

Cruised around North Central Phoenix this morning & early afternoon, ogling real estate.

Do I want to become a Realtor?

My mother tried that. Flopped.

Unholy flop. You have to be a lot more dedicated, a lot more hard-working, and a lot smarter than I am to succeed in that game.

Especially when it is as GAWDAWFUL HOT as it is today.

Pushing 110 in the generously ventilated shade of the back porch.

The nerve — the NERVE, I say — of my parents to drag me here when my father saw a chance to quit his hated job and “retire” to this gawdawful venue!

Damn! Whatever possessed the man?

*****

Tempus Fidgets
and
Now it’s 6:20 p.m.

HOTTER THAN THE HUBS in the backyard! It’s 111 degrees in the shade. Five percent chance of rain.

(Does boiling water qualify as “rain”?)

A couple of peakèd-looking cumulus clouds lurk to the north — way north of the Valley, it appears. So the alleged chance looks mighty remote.

Ruby is conkered out on the bed. Good thing we managed to get in our DoggyWalk along about dawn this morning. No chance we’d be able to go out this evening. The sidewalks are too hot for her to walk on now, but even after dark, when the concrete will cool some, the asphalt roadways will be WAYYY to hot for her dainty paws.

***

Saturday
5:00 a.m.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Annoyances of the 21st Century: Beeping goddamn phones.

The land line — which remains much easier for me to use than an accursed cell phone — has to be kept charged up. This is because its handsets are battery-operated, just to add another hassle to daily life.

To accomplish this, you have to set the handset on a base unit, which has a charger. When you do that,it “reminds” you…by going BEEP! about every five minutes after it’s fully charged.

Profoundly annoying!

*******

Sunday
Mid-afternoon

Almost got a nap in...til the damned phone rang. Friend/erstwhile client on his way over. He wants to hire(?) me to help with his latest book.

ohhhhkaaayyyy…

Outta the sack. Throw on some rags. Go out front to find irrigation hasn’t come on. Plants are frying. Neighbor across the street is out puttering in the 110-degree heat.

This is the spouse of the formerly beloved neighbor who for reasons unknown has cut me off. Flat.

Yes: She will not speak to me! If I call, she hangs up. If I go to the door, she won’t answer.

Why?

I. Have.NO. idea.

Ohhhh well. We already knew I’m not a nice lady. Apparently I’m even MORE not-nice than we thought.

Hotter than the hubs of Hades out there.

*******

Client/Friend in. Client/Friend out the door. He left several chapters of his new manuscript, a rumination on the way political and social power has shifted over the past century. I’m looking forward to reading it.

Evening rolls in. Put the BBQ away: cover it to repel the coming rain.

Ten after 7 at night: 103° and overcast.

Should go swimming. Why, after all, do I have this swimming pool???

But nay: it’s just too, too HOT. A hundred and three degrees with gray skies — thickened by wet-looking clouds. Ugh! What a place!

{sob!) Bye-bye, Amazon!

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For several years, I’ve loved Amazon deliveries. A bit pricey, but the convenience of having this excellent retailer drop everything at your door can NOT be beat.

But today undid all those years of superb service. Not through any fault of Amazon, but because the ‘Hood is…well…a ‘Hood. Once or twice in the past packages that supposedly were delivered haven’t shown up. But I haven’t thought much about it: they’re cheap and I’m busy.

But today, for cryin’ out loud!

I ordered a stupid little metal sprinkler. Not expensive — yea, verily, pretty cheap. But for that very reason, it was NOT something I wanted to traipse across the city to get from Home Depot or Lowe’s.

Off to dinner with M’Hijito this evening. When I get back, here’s an email from Amazon with a photo showing exactly where their delivery person placed the package. Exactly where she or he should have placed it: good job.

Problem is: no such package appeared out there.

Translation: one of the local porch pirates must have stolen it.

One of our techie neighbors set up some cameras with which he actually recorded a thief FOLLOWING an Amazon truck, stopping where each delivery was made, jumping out, running up to the door, grabbing the package, and running back to her car with it.

I should have known better, then, than to pay Amazon to send something I could’ve picked up at the local Home Depot. But ohhhhh no! I just had to save a half-hour or 45 minutes of driving time and stand-in-line time.

Dumb, huh?

Welp. It’s not Amazon’s fault. But I can’t afford to pay for things I never receive (supposedly they’re crediting my account with a refund…we’ll see!). And when I need something, I need it NOW, not after it’s been delivered and stolen and then I’ve had to drive to a store to get it. Might as well go direct to the store: hold the time to order it; hold the theft aggravation; hold the time to report the theft to Amazon.

Too bad: Amazon has been an enormous convenience. But when convenience turns to frustration…what’re ya gonna do?

Lancaster, PA, USA – December 15, 2017: Two Amazon Prime brown boxes package delivered at a residential home front door.