Monday, Oct. 21

Up at 6 a.m. to get ready for water aerobics. It was cool this morning, but not intolerable. The sun glowed deep pink in cotton ball clouds, and by the time I arrived at the college, it cast a rosy glow on the chapel steeple, and the tops of autumn-tone trees.

The pool was pleasantly warm today, and twenty-two of us enjoyed the aerobics workout. While we exercised, a woman who is a neighbor of ours asked if I'd heard all the commotion around 6 p.m. last night. No, I didn't hear anything.

She said there were lots of police cars on the road behind her house (which is just beyond that wooded area next to our property). Someone had run through a pasture fence, but she thought no one was hurt. She wasn't sure what the problem was. But we think it might be the following, according to a story in our local newspaper tonight:

A man was involved in an accident, and then invaded a home, beat a woman, and abducted her, leaving her minor child in the home.

While the police were checking on that accident (the man and a passenger had fled the scene), a second accident took place near our neighbor's house, involving an SUV that ran through a pasture fence.

A naked and bleeding woman got out of the car and ran to another car to tell folks she had been taken by force, and she needed to get home to her baby. I guess these folks obliged and took her home. In the meantime, the SUV fled the scene.

Soon after, officers answered a panic alarm at a private residence, and discovered that the woman who lives there was the victim in the SUV incident. She told the officers that she had been attacked and abducted, but she was able to cause the SUV to wreck so she could escape.

The woman was able to identify her abductor, and he was arrested.

Back home after aerobics, I was surprised to see that the man who was to paint the stairwell and upstairs bathroom had not yet arrived. Hubbie said he had called earlier and said that he was having car problems, so he'd be late arriving.

I enjoyed a couple of cups of coffee, but postponed getting ready for the day until Hubbie could return from the grocery store. I didn't want to be in the bathroom when he came. Mother was here by that time, but I didn't want her trying to answer the door.

The worker still had not arrived by the time Hubbie got back home, though. I went ahead and showered and dressed, and then we had lunch.

After lunch, the guy called to say he wouldn't be coming today, since he needed to do whatever was necessary to get his car fixed. He promised to be here tomorrow.

So I set the TV for Mother to watch an episode of "The Paradise," while Hubbie and I ran errands.

First, we went to the college art gallery to see an interesting exhibit called "Failures." It was a nice afternoon for an outing, and I wanted to go see the exhibit before the weather turned considerably colder for the rest of the week.

At one end of the gallery was a display of fabric yo-yos. these are rounds of colorful fabric that are sewn and then pulled to make a gather. The yo-yos can be sewn together to make decorations on garments.

There were a variety of colors and sizes of these mounted on the wall, along with unfinished sewing projects. A shelf was installed below, with a stack of fabric rounds and needles and thread for folks to try their hand at making yo-yos. The idea is that there are lots of these made, but none is made into a useful item (therefore, a failure).

Another exhibit is a suggestion box mounted on the wall. There are sheets of paper for folks to write on and drop in the box. The only thing is, when you drop the paper in the box, it is shredded and dropped on the floor to join a pile of shredded paper. Hubbie and I laughed out loud at this exhibit. The failure is obvious here.

Another exhibit is entitled "obstacle." Here an object that resembles an obstacle over which foot racers or horses jump, except this one is about nine feet high...hardly something that can be jumped over.

One exhibit is a quilt made of sections of denim jeans with holes in them sewn together and backed with flannel that has been cut in the same places as the denim pieces. A quilt, the purpose of which is warmth, fails its purpose in this design.

There was also a series of 8x10 tin type negative photos in the display (but no accompanying positive images). I really enjoyed looking at these.

An interesting "failure" exhibit was a video playing on a wall that featured a young man trying to take flight with cardboard "wings" strapped to his arms. He never takes off, of course.

From the gallery, we went to a roadside veggie stand, where I bought purple hull peas and green beans. Then we went to our insurance company to pick up two tickets to the annual meeting and dinner next Monday.

Our last stop was a grocery store to pick up fat-free topping and the free item for the week, which is a bottle of fruit water. The only flavor available was lemon lime. I'm sure someone in the family will want it.

Back home, I noticed the TV was blaring. Before we left, I showed Mother how to turn down the sound on the remote after she'd watched the movie, because I knew it would be really loud after the DVR shut off. But she chose not to try it, fearing she would "mess up the TV." Drat. I thought she could handle this very simple thing, but I guess not.

Around 3:30, Mother and I started preparations for supper....Parmesan potatoes, and turkey cheeseburgers. She does very well if I'm standing right over her, but she can't handle much without close supervision.

After supper, Hubbie accompanied Mother to her house, and then we watched a variety of one-hour shows recorded on DVR.