Just need to talk to my friends (207)

BethL · June 24

That coffee pot looks like a percolator you heat up on the stove. That's how my parents used to make coffee. ☕️ We have an electric percolator at our home.

The chicken and dumplings look amazing!

jfkoc · June 24

Hope you all got to watch part of. our parade in OKC

JeriLynn66 · June 24

Iris, that is indeed a percolator pot. We use it sometimes outside. I have a collection of them. The device on the right is an old-fashioned coffee grinder. It's mostly decorative but I have used it to grind enough coffee just for me. Otherwise, I use the electric grinder. It's faster.

Zetta, I hope your Doctor can provide some relief for your hips. Mine ache at night if I stay in one position too long - One of my shoulders is lower (it's noticeable in pictures and if you look at me long enough) so that makes my hip get jacked up. But being post-menopausal also contributes.

Carl, that is certainly an apt description of our house. We're blessed to have space to grow some of our food. And it makes me feel productive.

We've just cut 3 acres of grass so now it's time to make some pickles!

eaglemom · June 24

Ok, that Chicken and Dumpling looks fantastic. Can anyone guess what I'm hungry for now? Not tonight or tomorrow night, but probably the next night. Yum.

I miss not having a garden. But frankly I just didn't need one more thing on my daily "to do's" list. DH would be great about planting and watering for two days, then he'd lose interest and its another job for me.

In the mail DH received very formal papers from social security. They were inquiring about his "work" since 08/2013. I read it multiple times, 2013, when he went on disability. He's been off disability several years now. Sigh. I called and the wait time on the phone was 4 1/2 hrs or you could leave your phone number for a return call. Of course I did that. Much to my surprise I did receive a return call, it was around 5 1/2 hrs later. I explained to the agent what we'd received. She was stumped! She found out two yrs ago Social Security did a random 'review' of his file and they never closed it. So somehow now all of this paperwork was resent like it was 2013. Thankfully she said simply write no work history since 2013 and send it back. When I said there are 18 sheets of paper here and questions - she said just write that on the last page, don't do anything else. When we get that, it will trigger another 'review' and they will see your not on disability. Geeze.

Time to get the pup her dinner, she's got the dinner dance going on beside me! Let's be careful everyone.

Lorita · June 24

Hi, this has not been a good day for me, with some exceptions: I was able to get out of bed and walk, the cats and GPs are okay, and I think the little barn swallow who lost her babies is setting again. Before I opened the door this morning I heard chirping, looked and saw what I think were tail feathers sticking out of the side of the nest. Walked past it and didn't see anything, then didn't see the tail feathers again until I closed and reopened the door. Fingers crossed. That is the good part of my day.

Took my car in and they said something had been nesting under the hood and had chewed something off that makes the dash lights work. They will order the part and then iT will take most of a day to take everything off and install it. They don't have courtesy cars but said someone would take me home so I won't have to stay there. One of the mechanics said to keep the hood open so it won't be dark for something to nest. Another told me about scent pkgs. You can put under the hood and they will repel mice. I bought eight, for car and PU. I imagine the same thing will apply for the PU. It really is embarrassing for all that to be under the hood. We had a 1949 Dodge Wayfarer and had to have all the wiring redone because of rodents.

I called Sears to have a service call because my icemaker isn't working and the refrigerator part isn't cooling enough. Now get this -'they said last January they approved a replacement refrigerator. I was never notified. The repairman said I would be notified if approved. It worked so figured I wasn't aporoved. That coupon has expired so... The repairman has to come out, check it and get approval again. Then either I can order a new one or they will and will bring it out and install it. A couple of years ago they replaced an AC., brought it out and said they didn't install and I would have to get someone else do that. This time they assured me they would install. See why I feel like I could bite nails?

Carl, I was going to do the same thing you did but the refrigerator quit cooling enough. I should have stood in bed, as they say but all of this would have had to be dealt with anyway.

Zetta,, my left hip hurts if I sleep on that side.

JeriLynn, I can Identify with the canning stuff. My family canned everything for the winter, except meat.

Carl, I love that saying and so used to be true. I told Carol what you said and she agreed.

I took a nap and am in a better mood. The barn swallow is in her nest but flies away when I open the door. Guess we will need to go out the back door.

I watched part of that giant parade in OKC for the Thunder. They estimated over half a million people were there.

Time for the news.

Lorita · 1:59AM

Good night, sleep tight. Tomorrow will be better.

GothicGremlin · 3:12AM

JeriLynn - it was such a wonderful tribute to Jo C - and yes, her photos and her online persona are a match. She was almost exactly how I pictured her in my head - she was more sparkly than I imagined. I'll never forget her.

I zeroed in on your coffee pot too - my grandparents had one like it and so did my parents. I never liked the taste of coffee, but I loved the smell (still do), and that photo brings it all back.

And now I want to go to your house with all those veggies!

I have a question about your chicken and dumplings (which look yummy). How do you eat it? Is it like a soup? Do you pour it over mashed potatoes or rice? Obviously I've never had it, it looks really good and I'm curious.

Carl - thanks (about the weather). We live for these summer days. It's cold and rainy for much of the year, but July and August, sometimes September and October, are beautiful. I'll just add that I don't mind the cold, rain, and dark, but I do love the sun.

Lorita - I'm sorry this has been such a rough day. All of that bureaucracy would put me in a state as well.

Today was a "getting things done" kind of day for me. I told my s.o. that sometimes I'd like a break from being an adult and be a carefree kid for a week. He didn't disagree. 🙂

Iris L. · 4:33AM

JeriLynn you do have a vintage home. It's very nice! When I was very young, the grocery stores used to provide a coffee grinder so customers could grind their own coffee beans. This was in the 1950s. Does anyone remember that?

Lorita, you might think about using a rubber snake or two beneath your truck to keep mice away.

Do you still have a couple of cats? At my condo complex, a decision was made to keep some feral cats to chase away rats and it has worked. But now, people don't want the cats around.

I thoroughly enjoyed the classic movie this afternoon. It was "Shall We Dance" with Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. A good story and of course great dancing.

Iris

JeriLynn66 · 9:27AM

Morning.

Lorita, I'm so sorry about your car and PU. Are your vehicles in a car port or where? Our RV is in a covered shed (like one you might see hay or farm equipment stored in). It is just off the driveway but right next to the cotton field. I had my pest control service bring me one of those black box traps to set outside the RV as prevention. Mice/rats nesting in your vehicle can certainly wreak havoc, we saw that many times when DH had his repair shop. When he gets up, I'm going to ask him for recommendations to help.

Thank you, Iris. I love my home. I learned how to drive a tractor, make a garden, cook, almost everything right here on this property. It felt good to build this house and fill it with things from my childhood, my grandparents. I enjoy the utility of old things. And making a meal to serve on a pretty table. And YES !!! to the coffee grinders in the grocery stores! Our small local grocery still has a grinder as do some of the Publix market chains.

GG, yes chicken and dumplings is considered a soup. You can serve it over rice or potatoes, but I don't. I make my broth very thick and creamy. In fact, I don't usually serve it the first day it is cooked. I will bring it to a boil today and add more thickening with some corn off the cob and make a roux with that to add to the current pot. This evening the senior in college Grandson is coming for dinner. We'll have a green salad, the dumplings, and then fresh fruit/cinnamon rolls for dessert. I'll use my Gail Pitman dishes. I have also been meaning to tell you that GG the Goat's baby is almost as tall as she! The baby is weaned but still stays pretty close to her Mama when she's not playing with the other babies. She will eat cookies from my hand.

Eagle! The Social Security Admin must be going thru an Audit or something. Yesterday I got a notice regarding my late FIL about who should get any benefits due. I filled out that form a year ago. Just weird. I guess I'll just send it in again and let them figure out they already processed all this stuff. Talk about government waste. I'm still waiting to hear from Arlington so that I can get his ashes there to be interred. He's in the guest room closet in my rolling briefcase. That sounds terrible but I just cannot have that urn staring at me. I'm so ready to get him to his final resting place with my late husband's mother. My job won't really be complete until that task is accomplished.

DH got his pickles done, so that one countertop is bare until we go out to the garden today. DH has a doctor's appointment at 8 am in Huntland. After that, Roy the Goat Man from our church is coming to see which goats DH has decided to sell. I didn't even look at who was in which pasture or ask any questions. I'll stay in the house. I don't like these days. It's a reality and it's sensible and it's a necessary part of the business cycle of farming but I don't like it.

Got my table set for dinner. Will go out to cut fresh flowers when daylight comes. The tablecloth is vintage, having belonged to my Grandmother. I know it's not a "correct" table setting, but it will work. DH hates it when I do this, lol. You can see Pink Floyd the Flamingo trying to peek out from his spot next to the armoire. He came with one of my Florida houses and I just can't let him go.

I guess I should get up and get something done besides the table. It's hard to be quiet in these early mornings while DH sleeps. Wish I could be sleeping too but it is what it is, so I just try to be quietly productive. Y'all have a good day and I'll TTYL.

JeriLynn66 · 9:37AM

I forgot to tell y’all I chopped off all that hair! So much cooler and much less trouble to fool with!!

ronald71111 · 9:39AM

Morning

Carl46 · 9:54AM

Good morning!

Fred and Ginger were great. Someone asked Ginger what it was like to dance with a great dancer like Fred Astaire, and she replied that she did every step he did, walking backward in high heels.

Cats will get into cars and damage them too. A cat crawled into the engine compartment of a neighbor's car one cold night to sleep on the warm engine. When she started the car in the morning, the fan belt caught the sleeping cat and broke. She drove to town without realizing what that noise had been, ignoring the temperature and alternator gauges, and ruined the engine by overheating.

I'm getting new radiator hoses on my car. What I really need is a new car, and I plan to buy one when things settle down a little more.

Some stores still sell coffee beans and provide grinders, but the grinders are electric now. The store we shopped in the 1950s didn't have anything like that. They didn't have chocolate candy in summer either, because the store wasn't air conditioned and the candy would melt. You could get a Fudgesickle from the freezer case, but that was it.

Mint · 12:22PM

good morning

i do like chicken and dumplings

hope your day is better Lorita

Iris L. · 12:47PM

JeriLynn your table setting is so lovely! Is your tablecloth from your grandmother? My grandmother had one like that when I was younger. I had never heard of Gail Pittman dishware so I googled it. Very nice!

Your new hairdo looks good on you.

Carl, in that movie they both had a long dance on roller skates. I took tap dance lessons for a while. I loved it.

One of my cats was caught by a fan belt. I didn't realize that he was injured right away, until he almost died. Emergency surgery saved him. After that I never let him outside.

I want to post some photos of my trip to Kenya. I didn't have the energy to post before.

Feeding orphaned baby elephants at the Sheldrake Sanctuary. Baby elephants nurse for four years and if the mother elephants is killed, the baby will die. This sanctuary has nineteen baby elephants and feeds them human milk formula with added supplements. I have adopted one of the baby elephants.

Iris

Iris L. · 12:54PM

Adult elephant

Giraffe

Impala

Thompson's gazelles

BethL · 1:04PM

https://alzconnected.org/discussion/comment/246622#Comment_246622

JeriLynn, you are looking great! I also have red glasses - 2 pairs. I only wear glasses to read, and my insurance pays for most of one pair every year, and of course I need glasses in multiple locations, so I have glasses in the kitchen, living room, bedroom, bathroom, family room and purse.

I adore your table scape. I used to blog, and I would do table scapes weekly and link to a blog party at betweennapsontheporch.net. To participate, I bought lots and lots of dishes at thrift stores. Then I would later donate them and get more. I no longer blog, but I do have 9 sets of dishes - not all are complete sets. My favorite set: Old Country Roses (below).

Iris L. · 1:05PM

Zebras

Rhinoceros and baby

Jackal

Cape buffalo

Chimpanzee at a sanctuary—they are not native to this area, but are saved from being pets. They are strong and dangerous as adults.

Iris L. · 1:13PM

Elephants

Zebras and buffalo at the water hole outside our dining room

Three Hippopotamus

Cheetah

Ostriches

Leopard

Iris L. · 1:21PM

Hyena

Lions

Crocodile

Lions

Teenage lion just beginning to develop his mane

jfkoc · 3:06PM

Thank you Iris for the Safari this morning…a real treat to start the day.

Chicken and dumplings…hmm…maybe need a trip to the store.

Trader Joe's sells whole beans and they have a grinder with a variety of sizes to mill. Nothing beats a percalator (sp) for smell and taste. When my current Nespresso breaks I am going to invest in one…electric not stovetop. We had a Corning one when we were growing up .Dadsat all morning with his Barron's and drank coffee….sigh.

I have a 20 person tour tomorrow at the museum. I will start with Ansel Adams broken nose to warm thing up. It was broken when he hit a brick wall in an after quake in 1906.

Jeril…love you new hair and would "hurt you for that necklace" (old western compliment).

Carl46 · 3:18PM

Barron's and coffee remind me of a bakery near my home in Kansas City that made really good apple fritters. They had a poster on the wall of a mug of coffee, a fritter, and a Sunday newspaper. The caption read: "Fritter your morning away."

Lorita · 5:19PM

Morning ,( for five more minutes). Today is better, so far, but haven't called Sears yet.

Iris, than you so much for posting those beautiful pictures. Did you actually take them? The baby elephants are so cute. Lots of you tube videos of them p!aying. You had a trip of a lifetime.

Nice haircut, JeriLynn. I used to wear my hair really short and it was so easy to care for. It's long now so I twist it on top of my head and put in a ciIp, but not when I go somewhere.

Another hot day with some wind. I saw the barn swallow on the nest this morning - saw her head because she was turned the other way from yesterday. I read it takes 13-17 days to incubate the eggs so she has days to go. I feel sorry for her because of the heat but she does get southerly winds.

Took out the litter box to change litter this morning and cut some mulberry sprouts around where a rose bush had been. There's a rose of Sharon growing there, about 6" tall.- wore me out. I have one really pretty white rose of Sharon blooming. Thought it had died but half of it lived. Will soon be time for crepe myrtles to.bloom. I think I have two that survived.

Chicken and dumplings look scrumptuous. The chef at the VA.Hospital canteen used to make delicious ones and twice baked potatoes. So very good. Weather is on, already 90 - hest index will be 102. The Arkansas River is brimmin: full.I have seen it when there were only puddles. Back.later.

Carl46 · 5:44PM

I found an egg next to my birdbath yesterday. Apparently, there is a nest hidden in the rose bushes and the egg fell out somehow. 88 degrees here, which is not unusual for this time of year.

Those are some great vacation pictures, Iris. Do you use a telephoto lens or were you as close as the pictures appear?

harshedbuzz · 6:27PM

Good afternoon. I am late to the porch.

Jerilynn— the table setting and chix'n'slix look delicious. DH is very jealous. I swear my mom might have that exact tablecloth. Hers is square and meant to fit a card table. She used to pick up a lot of vintage linens in FL when she lived there. One time she was buying some vintage stoneware and the adult son holding the sale wrapped the pieces in beautiful napkins and tea towels and lined the box with that tablecloth. She was beside herself with glee at her luck.

With your new do and glasses you're channeling Sally Jesse Raphael. It's a cute look.

Carl— When I learned to drive, dad taught me to walk around the back of the car and bang on the hood before pulling out. I still do in cold weather.

Eagle— I'm sorry about then glitch with the SSA. On one hand I like when you have the option to get a call-back, but on the other it seems those return calls tend to come at inopportune times. For me anyway.

Lorita— What a bummer you didn't get the replacement you were supposed to get. That's terrible.

Iris— Those are some real Nat Geo level photographs. Don't tell my friend, but your safari pictures are way better.

Beth— I do like a nice tablescape and will make an effort for holidays or the rare nice dinner for just DH and myself at home.

Judith— Costco had grinders until recently. They removed them because people were running random stuff through them. "The public?" This is why we can't have nice things.

I love that "compliment".

________________________________________________________

The perfunctory cardiology appointment wasn't. We went over the 3 hospitalizations since we saw him and then he gave her the lecture on the importance of compliance with her Keflex to protect her artificial valve. I understand why he did it, but it just makes her perseverate on it more. He was really happy with how she was doing all things considered until he asked her if she had any concerns. This is where things went sideways.

Mom mentioned that her hands sometimes tingle or are numb, her feet, too sometimes. I have attributed the hands to her defiant noncompliance with splinting overnight. She doesn't wanna. Doc's ears perked up and he added bloodwork, an echo (she had one in April) and a nuclear amyloid scan (downtown) for next week. He mentioned cardiac amyloidosis, specifically ATTR-wt. Fortunately this went over her head. Not mine. DH has been worked up for amyloidosis because of a skin lesion biopsied that was full of it. The original biopsy was in 2003 (the day before my niece got married— his forehead is bandaged in all the pictures) The new derm got excited about it and redid the biopsy which was positive a second time and had him do the testing, so I am familiar.

I feel like this is a stretch, but when I read the list of symptoms associated, she pretty much ticks all the boxes except a swollen tongue. The echo was unchanged but we're still waiting on bloodwork.

Meantime, I'm catching up on laundry. The weather here isn't as dreadful as it was yesterday; we're mid-90s instead of 100F. I took mom to the library and introduced her to large-print books. She's excited. After, I dropped her home and stopped by Old Navy to see if they had any elastic waist linen pants. For some reason, their version of style is the only brand that don't make my rearend look sort of square— looking at you Lands End and Talbots. I don't usually shop there, but they did have the pants in an olive and flax color as well as a couple of cute tops and a linen dress that isn't so short my butt's out. Dresses are so short this year, tops too. I'll need to tack the necklines closed about an inch higher on the dress and Johnny collar top but that's not a big deal.

Enjoy what's left of your day.

HB