Coffee heat rising

Summertime, and the Livin’ Is…

by

…annoying…

Fish are jumpin’,
’cause they’re boiling in their pond

Oh your mama’s rich,
And you’re daddy’s…uhm…good-lookin’
So hush, little baby,
Don’t you fricasee…

Summer has done come in! The heat here in lovely uptown Phoenix defies belief…but that’s normal. As a practical matter, though, it feels hotter than the 110 degrees we see on the back-porch thermometer, because it’s getting humid.

This time of year — a little later normally, as a practical matter — is our rainy season. So-called “monsoon” storms blow in from the Gulf of Mexico, usually producing thunderstorms and rain in the late afternoon and evening.

So far we haven’t seen any rain. But we have seen (or rather, felt) the usual accompanying humidity. This morning’s doggy-walk was sweltering and muggy — that was at 5:30 a.m. Now, at 6:00 p.m. and after a full day of blistering sun it’s hotter than the hubs out there.

The pool isn’t much good for keeping cool: it feels like a hot bathtub just now! Seriously: I like a fairly HOT bath…and when I got in pool this morning, the water literally was as warm as my typical bath. Wow!

Meanwhile, forests are burning down. A big fire is holding forth up near Payson, where Mr. and Mrs. Fireman moved after they sold their palace in the West Valley. State Route 87 is the road up the hill to Payson, a forested little burg habituated by retirees and ranchers.

In-Effing-Credible….

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Whatever you want, whatever you need, whatever you have to do, it HAS to be the hard way!

LOL!

This morning I wanted to run by the grocery store to pick up an extension cord for the laptop and, while I was at it, replenish the pantry a bit. Visits to two huge supermarkets yielded NO extension cord. But I did find one at the neighborhood Albertson’s, my very least favorite place to shop because of the shady adventures in the parking lot. I head for the check-out with that and a bottle of cheap white…and am told…

Nope.

No. No, I cannot buy a bottle of wine.

Why? Because it’s Sunday morning. In Arizona, it’s illegal to sell alcoholic beverages of any kind before noon on Sunday. Holy holy holeeeeee….

Shee-ut!!! I’d forgotten about that!

Furious, I walked out and left the other stuff I’d intended to buy — admittedly not much, but if I have to go to some other store or shop at some other time, why should I stand in line at a cash register twice?

Aren’t you happy, don’t you feel privileged to have sanctimonious Kris-tee-anns looking out for your morals?

It’s 11:34 now. In another 20 minutes, I’ll set out for AJ’s, where I’druther fork over my money, if fork over I must. The only reason I didn’t drive down there this morning was that I do not feel like shopping and I just wanted to get the damned errand-running over with.

In another fine snafu, apparently American Express never received this month’s payment. Got a threatening collection letter from them.

Called. They have THE best customer service people! Talked at length with a sweetie-pie who has an exotic accent. Got that straightened out. They’re forgiving the late charge; first thing tomorrow morning I will head over to the credit union and get that bill paid electronically.

I still haven’t seen the bill. Don’t see it anywhere around the Funny Farm. Probably it got delivered to the neighbor who got SDXB’s house when the City bought it and gave to them (yes: FREE!) after the new airport runway displaced them. That address has the same street number, but a one-word difference in the streets’ name — like Neighborhood Lane vs. Neighborhood Road. Stuff is misdelivered all the time. I have to mark on orders from Amazon “ROAD, please, not Lane!” Otherwise, they take stuff to her and I never see it.

Bein’ from a totally different socioeconomic world, she and her family don’t forward misdelivered packages or mail. If it’s mail, they just throw it in the trash. If it’s a package, they apparently keep it for themselves.

Interesting how customs differ, even within a given country.

Welp…in another 20 minutes, God will allow me to buy a bottle of dinner wine. So I might as well get started traipsing down to AJ’s.

Every Which Way from Sunday…

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I swear-ta-gawd, the hassles and the hustles never stop. They come in every which way from Sunday, and they come in every day AND Sunday.

Today, in comes an email purporting to be from Fidelity, where vast quantities of my father’s and DXH’s money are invested. And it is one weird email…

They want me to send them my signature.

Got that? They want to capture my signature electronically.

Uh huh.

So that ever so many Great Endeavors can be vastly simplified. And speeded up. And…

Uh huh.

Well.

To begin with, I don’t do business directly with Fidelity. I hire a guy, affectionately known in these precincts as Financial Dude, to run interference with Fidelity and just about all else financial in my life.

To end with, where the Hell did Fidelity get my personal email? BECAUSE I don’t do business with them directly, there’s no reason they should have my mac.com address.

Understand: I don’t believe Fidelity is trying to scam me. What I think is that either a)  this is a legitimate message that for some incomprehensible reason was not sent through my financial manager or b) it’s a scam by crooks who found out that I had a Fidelity account and managed to extract the account number.

Scammers, many of them overseas, routinely target elder Americans. Check out this jaw-dropping piece from a guy who’s in the business of tracking them.

What I’m finding is that even when you’re aware of this phenomenon, even when you don’t pick up a phone unless you know who’s on the other end, it’s still hard to avoid. The scammers are bold; they’re convincing; and they’re persistent.

***

Financial Dude says it’s not a scam: they just want an updated signature on some paperwork. I have no idea who to call there. And soooo… About the best I can do is tell whoever sent this request that there’s no way I’m sending my signature anywhere over the Internet, and they’ll need to send something in hard copy.

Heh. Won’t they just love that?

 

You Thought the Hubs Were Hot?

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A-n-n-d…once again: 109 degrees on the shaded back porch, where direct sunlight never intrudes. But this evening we’ve got some overcast blowing in.

That may bode well: rain will break the heat, if only for a few hours. Hmmm…but does it have meaning?

Checking with the beloved Wunderground: Tonight we’re supposed to drop to a chilly 93 degrees; cloudy with SSE winds shifting to N at 15 mpg. Brrr! Tomorrow we have 114 forecast.

Purchased some roach bait this afternoon, but haven’t roused enough ambition to put it out. Ruby the Corgi must not eat it…so…uhmm… Yeah! Gotta figure out how to lay the stuff out so our eight-legged boarders will enjoy snacking on it, while at the same time keeping it out of the pooch’s reach.

Good luck with that!

The rats are merrily ignoring the baited traps. No doubt they think those things are very funny…

Reporting from the Hubs of Hades…

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6:45 p.m. and it’s 109 on the back porch. In the shade. Under a shade structure, inside the canopy of a hefty ficus plant.

****

And now, f’rhevvinsake it’s 7:54 p.m. and…and…what have I done to make an hour and 10 minutes disappear without a trace?

* Unloaded the dishwasher
* Reloaded with the current set of dirties
* Fed the dawg
* Sprayed hose water over all the backyard plants I could reach
* Intercepted a fraudulent-looking email supposedly from a church friend
* Clued church friend that her name and email are being taken in vain
* Heard back from friend: “This was not me.  I’ve even had this one sent to me in the past.  Not sure how they got my address but passwords are changed.  What a pain.”

Wondrous.

******

Fell asleep. It’s now 11:45 p.m. Awoke with a choking fit. Dayum! Thought this effing covid horror was about over! Dunno whether this episode was actually choking, or in fact another covid coughing fit.

Don’t see how that scamming attempt could indicate that the b*stards have any of my passwords. But tomorrow I suppose I should run down to the tech guys and have them help me change the Apple ID password. That really WILL be a PITA…of the first water.

And it’s unclear to me how a fake email purportedly coming from a friend indicates that anyone has any of my passwords.

On the other hand, I assumed the perp got my email from my website, since it uses my FaM address.

Ohhhh well. At midnight, I’m not up for fussing over that fragment of madness.

Why I quit shopping at Costco…

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{sigh} This is sad…because I love shopping at Costco. It’s like visiting a Renaissance fair: vast quantities of food, jeans that actually fit, doodads, gizmos, and endless bottles of cheap wine.
 
And I do understand that Costco, for whatever reasons suit its business plan, needs to limit its customers to “members.” So no, I don’t mind carrying a Costco card around and flashing it at the door and again at check-out.
 
But the new demand that we ALSO flash our driver’s license when paying up? Uhhh nope. Sorry, Costco. That’s a yard past the edge of the pale. You already have my ID in the form of a Costco card bearing my photo. Enough’s enough.
 
I carry my driver’s license hidden in my car. This is because I have exactly ZERO desire to tote a purse around with me, and most women’s clothing does not accommodate bulky wallets and such. When I go into Costco, all I take with me is an endless shopping list, a credit card, and my Costco card. I do not carry these in a wallet; I do not tote them in a purse.That’s why jeans have pockets, after all.
 
I simply loathe having to carry a purse.
 
So, I don’t: I minimize the amount of junk I have to carry, and once you’re down to a couple of cards and your keys, you can fit all you need into your pockets. Even when you’re wearing women’s clothing.
 
But add ANOTHER nuisance card, and then I’ll have to haul the stuff around in a bag or a wallet. And ya know what, dear Costco bosses? I ain’t a-gunna. First I’m not going to risk losing my driver’s license as I tote it around your store, and second, I really don’t enjoy putting myself at risk of theft by prancing across a parking lot with a purse dangling from my shoulder.
 
Just now I’m on the way out the door to buy a bunch of Costco-esque items…dishwasher detergent, Q-tips, doggy stuff, this and that. If I were going to Costco, I would as usual succumb to Impulse Buy Mania and no doubt buy a bunch of stuff I don’t need. Instead, I’m gonna buy all that at Walmart.
 
On one level, it’s annoying. I love to shop at Costco — it’s like a medieval fair, a riot of impulse buys. On another, more practical level, though, it’s a GOOD thing. Because…
 
* Shopping at the nearby Walmart saves gas. Costco shut down the centrally located store a few minutes from my house. To get to the nearest outlet, now I have to traipse across the city, risking my life, diddling away gasoline, and feeling annoyed by the time I get to the store.
 
* It saves money. I don’t much enjoy the Walmart: it’s in a shady neighborhood, so trudging across the parking lot feels unsafe. Nor do I enjoy the Albertson’s and the Safeway in my parts: the two stores practically clone each other; they tend to be overpriced, and they’re boooooring places to shop. As a result. I tend to get in there and out as fast as I can, and not dawdle over the impulse buys. That is: I buy only what I need when I go in there, and THAT’S IT.
 
* Costco offers a wide variety of middle-class goods, which has a drawback: It’s an impulse-buy carnival! Every time I go in there, I come out with something I didn’t plan to buy. By contrast, the Sprouts in my neighborhood is all very nice, but a little too environmentally, socially, and health-wise “correct.” The goody-two-shoes tendency limits one’s choices, even though it also leads the store to offer some things you can’t get anywhere else. Albertson’s & Safeway are booooring: nothing to see there, so you tend to stick to your shopping list. And that, over time, saves a whole lot of money.
 
So I guess I should say “Thanks, Costco, for unwisely driving a customer away: it’s saving me a lot of time and money.” But I’m still gonna miss it.