Last night, Hubbie had a severe bowel problem that nothing cured. This morning, he was completely miserable, and it became apparent that he needed to go to the ER.
We arrived there around 8 a.m. He was so miserable that I had to use Mother's wheelchair to get him into the hospital. There was no delay at the reception area, and he was taken to an exam room promptly. Things bogged down from then on. Nurses came and went, and the doctor finally arrived and ordered an x-ray.
Time dragged, and dragged, and dragged, and Hubbie was getting more and more miserable, to the point of sobbing. Finally, when I could stand his suffering no longer, I made it plenty clear that something needed to be done for his pain. The doctor ordered a small dose of morphine. When it was administered, and Hubbie was in bed, the pain subsided pretty quickly.
But we waited another eternity before the doctor decided what course of action to take. At 11 a.m., he finally decided Hubbie should be sent upstairs to be irrigated. A nurse escorted us to a room, where we were told a nurse would come by presently. It was noon before she came. When she'd gotten all the information she needed, she disappeared for another eternity, and finally around 1 p.m., she and another nurse came prepared for the procedure.
This was a very unpleasant experience for Hubbie, not helped by the fact that he was exposed to three women. But he took it stoically, and it wasn't long before he finally got relief.
In the course of all this, I called Mother a couple of times to report what was going on, and to make sure she had something on hand at her house for lunch. She did.
It was around 2 p.m. before we finally left the hospital and returned home. Hubbie was tired, and I was stressed, but otherwise everything was fine.
I accompanied Mother to our house, and we made a couple of pots of soup...chicken noodle, and Dragon soup. We indulged in the chicken noodle for supper, since I thought it would be easier on Hubbie's stomach. Hubbie accompanied Mother home afterward, and then he settled in for an evening of TV, while I went back to the downtown church for a documentary screening.
Tonight, there was a couple of short films, and one longer one. The short ones included one about an elderly couple at the end of their lives, who try to rekindle the romance of their first date by going to a movie theater that is on the verge of closing down. It's a very touching and sad film. Fifteen minutes long.
The second short film was about a teenage girl with a negative attitude who meets someone in a more dire situation than her own. Eleven minutes long.
The main feature is a think piece featuring four men...a naturalist, a scientist, a historian, and a poet, who explore "where did we come from, why are we here, and where are we going afterward." It sort of addresses our primal scream upon entrance into the world, our various activities in an attempt to transend what we know is coming, and our primal scream at our exit from the world. Lots of food for thought in this one.
By the time I got home, I was plenty ready for bed.
Friday, April 5, 2013
Wednesday, April 3
Really cold day today...wondering where spring is.
We were up at 6:30, so I could get ready for water aerobics. Suited up as for winter for the walk to the gym. Thankfully, the pool was very warm. Twenty-four of us enjoyed it. This was the largest number to attend since last fall.
Back home, while I got ready for the day, Mother packed a lunch for the two of us to take to the museum for a brown bag FilmFest event. Hubbie opted out of going, because he wanted to attend a Master Gardener training program this afternoon. He missed the morning session, because he wanted to be here when the stove repairman arrived to replace the element in the oven. He also wanted to administer medicine and Pedialyte to the cat to help him get better after spending two nights in a tree.
Mother and I left home shortly after 11 a.m., even though the film at the museum didn't start until noon. I wanted to be sure to snag one of the two handicapped spaces in front of the building. We were willing to wait a while after we arrived for the convenience of that space.
We went inside around 11:30, and enjoyed our lunches of chicken salad sandwiches, chips, a dessert bar, and water, before the film started. Today's features included one about a New Deal colony in our state, which was Roosevelt's attempt to provide refuge for displaced farmers, with the promise that the land and the house built there would eventually become theirs. The community where the colony was located was home to a famous country-western star.
The second short feature was about a boy's grandfather who teaches him a little about cattle farming. The boy is straight from the city, clad in new boots and overalls, and what his grandfather asks him to do is hilarious. The feature is only eight minutes long, but it's eight minutes of laugh-out-loud hilarity.
We were back home shortly after 1 p.m., and it wasn't long before Hubbie arrived, too. He decided he wasn't really interested in the subject matter of the MG training session.
We didn't accomplish much for the rest of the afternoon. Around 4 p.m., Hubbie put potatoes in the oven to bake, and we had those with lefotver beans and ham around 5 p.m.
Later, the three of us went to what used to be a movie theater, since renovated to a church, to attend a screening of the 1937 black and white film, "Topper," starring Cary Grant. For this showing, FilmFest volunteers, and several members of the audience, dressed in clothes appropriate to the era.
The movie was preceded by a cartoon of "Popeye the Sailor Meets Sinbad the Sailor." The color of this cartoon is extraordinary...almost like art.
"Topper," of course, is about an elegant couple who are killed in an automobile accident, and then become ghosts. To go to their eternal reward, they must first perform a good deed...and the comedy begins. Mother was particularly interested in this film, since it's from her era.
It might seem strange that FilmFest events would be held at a church, but this church has a huge screen mounted up high enough so the view of those seated is unobstructed. And the facility seats over 200 people in padded chairs rather than pews. The church is quite willing to lend the venue for screenings of family friendly films.
We were up at 6:30, so I could get ready for water aerobics. Suited up as for winter for the walk to the gym. Thankfully, the pool was very warm. Twenty-four of us enjoyed it. This was the largest number to attend since last fall.
Back home, while I got ready for the day, Mother packed a lunch for the two of us to take to the museum for a brown bag FilmFest event. Hubbie opted out of going, because he wanted to attend a Master Gardener training program this afternoon. He missed the morning session, because he wanted to be here when the stove repairman arrived to replace the element in the oven. He also wanted to administer medicine and Pedialyte to the cat to help him get better after spending two nights in a tree.
Mother and I left home shortly after 11 a.m., even though the film at the museum didn't start until noon. I wanted to be sure to snag one of the two handicapped spaces in front of the building. We were willing to wait a while after we arrived for the convenience of that space.
We went inside around 11:30, and enjoyed our lunches of chicken salad sandwiches, chips, a dessert bar, and water, before the film started. Today's features included one about a New Deal colony in our state, which was Roosevelt's attempt to provide refuge for displaced farmers, with the promise that the land and the house built there would eventually become theirs. The community where the colony was located was home to a famous country-western star.
The second short feature was about a boy's grandfather who teaches him a little about cattle farming. The boy is straight from the city, clad in new boots and overalls, and what his grandfather asks him to do is hilarious. The feature is only eight minutes long, but it's eight minutes of laugh-out-loud hilarity.
We were back home shortly after 1 p.m., and it wasn't long before Hubbie arrived, too. He decided he wasn't really interested in the subject matter of the MG training session.
We didn't accomplish much for the rest of the afternoon. Around 4 p.m., Hubbie put potatoes in the oven to bake, and we had those with lefotver beans and ham around 5 p.m.
Later, the three of us went to what used to be a movie theater, since renovated to a church, to attend a screening of the 1937 black and white film, "Topper," starring Cary Grant. For this showing, FilmFest volunteers, and several members of the audience, dressed in clothes appropriate to the era.
The movie was preceded by a cartoon of "Popeye the Sailor Meets Sinbad the Sailor." The color of this cartoon is extraordinary...almost like art.
"Topper," of course, is about an elegant couple who are killed in an automobile accident, and then become ghosts. To go to their eternal reward, they must first perform a good deed...and the comedy begins. Mother was particularly interested in this film, since it's from her era.
It might seem strange that FilmFest events would be held at a church, but this church has a huge screen mounted up high enough so the view of those seated is unobstructed. And the facility seats over 200 people in padded chairs rather than pews. The church is quite willing to lend the venue for screenings of family friendly films.
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
Tuesday, April 2
It was after 3 a.m. before I fell asleep last night. I couldn't keep from worrying about our cat that was up in a tree. Though it wasn't freezing last night, it was uncomfortably cool, and I hated that the little guy had to spend the night up there. At least one time during the night, Hubbie got up to go check on him, but there was just no coaxing him down, so there was nothing we could do but wait til morning and try to enlist someone's help in rescuing him.
Hubbie had set the clock for 6:30, so he could go out and maybe coax the cat down in daylight, in case he was just afraid to climb down in the dark. But no dice, the cat was glued to that tree. So Hubbie began calling around to see if there was anyone with climbing equipment who could come help get the cat down.
The first person he called touched base with our electric company, where a supervisor said one of their trucks was nearby, and the worker could stop by and get the cat down. Well, time drug on to noon, and no one showed up. So Hubbie called a neighbor to get information about the location of a tree service business in our neighborhood, and then he went to the buisness to ask for help. The owner of the business, who also has cats, and who has had to extricate his own animals from trees, was very willing to come get our cat down.
He arrived within a few minutes, and presently, he'd climbed up and brought the very exhausted, frightened cat down. I whisked him into the house, where I thought he'd make a beeline to his water and food dish. Instead, he spent time wobbling around trying to stretch his atrophied muscles after spending about 36 hours clinging to a small tree limb. Soon, he nestled in Hubbie's chair, where he slept through the afternoon and into the evening.
It was awfully hard for me to get up at 6:30 this morning, after not falling asleep until 3 a.m., but I rolled out, because I needed to get ready for an 8:45 doctor appointment. I was due for a fasting lab test, so water was my breakfast this morning.
At the clinic, I sat in the waiting room while nearly a dozen people came and were immediately called back. Finally, I was escorted to the exam room. I didn't like my weigh-in, and my BP was a bit higher this morning, due to several things...lack of sleep, worry, forgetting to take my water pill yesterday, and eating a meal a bit higher in salt (ham) Easter Sunday and Monday night.
Since it was around 10 a.m. by the time I got back home, I was plenty ready for breakfast. So I fixed myself scrambled egg substitute, which I had with the remaining hot cross bun that Sis brought when she came to visit, along with a glass of orange juice, and a couple of cups of coffee.
Hubbie accompanied Mother to our house around that time. Shortly afterward, the kitchen stove repairman came and determined that the trouble with the oven was the bottom element, which was broken in half. He'll bring a new element tomorrow. Hubbie felt a little foolish that he didn't notice that the element was broken...when he checked it, he was unable to see that anything was wrong with it. Maybe, although it wasn't working, it split apart after he checked it.
The bottom element quit some time ago, splitting apart that time, too, but Hubbie saw the problem, bought a new element, and changed it himself. He would have done the same thing this time, if he'd spotted the problem.
Before lunch, Mother and I put a pot of beans on to simmer. Mother diced the veggies...onions, carrots, and banana peppers...and cubed leftover ham, and I seasoned the beans with no-salt seasoning, pepper, and paprika, and added a can of chicken broth, and a can of beef broth.
I let the beans simmer until time for Mother and me to meet a 3 p.m. haircut appointment. In the meantime, Mother worked on her jigsaw puzzle, and I uploaded snapshots of the cat rescue to my social network page, completed a monthly report for the Literacy Council (the last one, unless I choose to tutor another student), answered e-mail correspondence, and read the local newspaper.
Around 2:30, Mother and I went to the beauty shop. Br-r-r, it had turned sharply cooler outside, and it was dizzling rain. I was so very glad our cat was safe and sound indoors. It made me teary-eyed to think he might have still been stuck in that tree.
Back home, it was time to think about supper. The beans had cooked before we left for our appointment, so they only needed to be heated a bit. Mother mixed a box of cornbread mix, which Hubbie took to Mother's house to bake in her oven. I put a dish of the remaining scalloped potatoes in the microwave, and searched out a package of boiled cabbage from the freezer to be heated.
While everyhing heated, we watched "It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown," that I'd recorded on DVR. Supper was very good. Afterward, Hubbie accompanied Mother to her house, and then we watched a 2006 movie we borrowed from the public library..."Invincible," a sports film based on the story of Vince Papale, a 30-year-old bartender from Philadelphia, who beat the odds to play with NFL's Philadelphia Eagles in 1976.
Hubbie had set the clock for 6:30, so he could go out and maybe coax the cat down in daylight, in case he was just afraid to climb down in the dark. But no dice, the cat was glued to that tree. So Hubbie began calling around to see if there was anyone with climbing equipment who could come help get the cat down.
The first person he called touched base with our electric company, where a supervisor said one of their trucks was nearby, and the worker could stop by and get the cat down. Well, time drug on to noon, and no one showed up. So Hubbie called a neighbor to get information about the location of a tree service business in our neighborhood, and then he went to the buisness to ask for help. The owner of the business, who also has cats, and who has had to extricate his own animals from trees, was very willing to come get our cat down.
He arrived within a few minutes, and presently, he'd climbed up and brought the very exhausted, frightened cat down. I whisked him into the house, where I thought he'd make a beeline to his water and food dish. Instead, he spent time wobbling around trying to stretch his atrophied muscles after spending about 36 hours clinging to a small tree limb. Soon, he nestled in Hubbie's chair, where he slept through the afternoon and into the evening.
It was awfully hard for me to get up at 6:30 this morning, after not falling asleep until 3 a.m., but I rolled out, because I needed to get ready for an 8:45 doctor appointment. I was due for a fasting lab test, so water was my breakfast this morning.
At the clinic, I sat in the waiting room while nearly a dozen people came and were immediately called back. Finally, I was escorted to the exam room. I didn't like my weigh-in, and my BP was a bit higher this morning, due to several things...lack of sleep, worry, forgetting to take my water pill yesterday, and eating a meal a bit higher in salt (ham) Easter Sunday and Monday night.
Since it was around 10 a.m. by the time I got back home, I was plenty ready for breakfast. So I fixed myself scrambled egg substitute, which I had with the remaining hot cross bun that Sis brought when she came to visit, along with a glass of orange juice, and a couple of cups of coffee.
Hubbie accompanied Mother to our house around that time. Shortly afterward, the kitchen stove repairman came and determined that the trouble with the oven was the bottom element, which was broken in half. He'll bring a new element tomorrow. Hubbie felt a little foolish that he didn't notice that the element was broken...when he checked it, he was unable to see that anything was wrong with it. Maybe, although it wasn't working, it split apart after he checked it.
The bottom element quit some time ago, splitting apart that time, too, but Hubbie saw the problem, bought a new element, and changed it himself. He would have done the same thing this time, if he'd spotted the problem.
Before lunch, Mother and I put a pot of beans on to simmer. Mother diced the veggies...onions, carrots, and banana peppers...and cubed leftover ham, and I seasoned the beans with no-salt seasoning, pepper, and paprika, and added a can of chicken broth, and a can of beef broth.
I let the beans simmer until time for Mother and me to meet a 3 p.m. haircut appointment. In the meantime, Mother worked on her jigsaw puzzle, and I uploaded snapshots of the cat rescue to my social network page, completed a monthly report for the Literacy Council (the last one, unless I choose to tutor another student), answered e-mail correspondence, and read the local newspaper.
Around 2:30, Mother and I went to the beauty shop. Br-r-r, it had turned sharply cooler outside, and it was dizzling rain. I was so very glad our cat was safe and sound indoors. It made me teary-eyed to think he might have still been stuck in that tree.
Back home, it was time to think about supper. The beans had cooked before we left for our appointment, so they only needed to be heated a bit. Mother mixed a box of cornbread mix, which Hubbie took to Mother's house to bake in her oven. I put a dish of the remaining scalloped potatoes in the microwave, and searched out a package of boiled cabbage from the freezer to be heated.
While everyhing heated, we watched "It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown," that I'd recorded on DVR. Supper was very good. Afterward, Hubbie accompanied Mother to her house, and then we watched a 2006 movie we borrowed from the public library..."Invincible," a sports film based on the story of Vince Papale, a 30-year-old bartender from Philadelphia, who beat the odds to play with NFL's Philadelphia Eagles in 1976.
Monday, April 1, 2013
Monday, April 1
Today is April Fool's Day, though I didn't try to fool anyone, and no one tried to fool me.
We were up at 6:30, so that I could get ready to go to water aerobics. It was a cool morning, but not unpleasant, for the walk to the gym. Today is Easter break for the college, so the parking lot was empty.
The pool was really warm, so much so that the regular lap swimmers were angry and refused to swim in it. I suppose it was a tad too warm, since we could see steam rising from the water. I'm sure the temperature will moderate considerably by Wednesday, though.
About 20 of us showed up today...way more than usual, probably because it was such a nice day. We were a bit crowded since one lap swimmer, who is training for a triathalon, didn't let the warm water deter him, so he occupied two lanes on one side of the pool, which meant our group had to squeeze up to make room for him.
Funny: one of the ladies who swims in the deep end commented that a younger woman she had been talking to for the past several days chose to stay in the shallow end and talk with a couple of other ladies. The lady said she feared the young woman would never get away from those talkative older ladies.
Usually, this woman is one of those talkative women at the shallow end. Today, though, she declared that she just wasn't in a chatty mood in the mornings. Could have fooled me, since I've rarely seen her when she wasn't talking. When I mentioned this to one of the other ladies, we both agreed that we are obviously not able to see ourselves as others see us, which is probably a good thing.
Back home, I enjoyed a cup of hot coffee, and then Hubbie put color in my hair in anticipation of a haircut appointment tomorrow. Before he did that, he accompanied Mother to our house, where she worked on her jigsaw puzzle. Once I was ready for the day, I didn't accomplish much for the rest of the morning, what little was left of it.
After lunch, Hubbie called a repairman to come check the oven on our stove and was told it would be a few days before he could come. So I'll need to plan meals that don't require the oven until it can be fixed, or until we're forced to buy a new stove.
Usually on Mondays, I spend time reviewing lessons for my ESL student, but since she is leaving in a week or so to go live in another state, I decided that for our last meeting at the college library, we would just visit. So I met her at 2:30, and we talked until 4 p.m., when I gave her an early birthday gift of a quart jar of local honey, and a farewell card. She was excited to get the honey, since it was on her list to buy a jar before they left. She and her husband have been enjoying honey for breakfast each morning as a preventative measure against allergies.
It was a tearful goodbye, since we'd grown to be friends as much as tutor and student, while she learned to speak and read English over the past year or so. She is not fluent in the language yet, but she can speak and understand English well enough that she was able to interview for and be hired as an assistant to a woman who owns a real estate agency in the state where she will now live. Her boss does not speak Spanish, so the student will be forced to converse with her in English, which is very good.
Also, I gave her the level 4 workbooks she began working in, so that in her spare time, she can work on her own. The Literacy Council director is also referring her to a Literacy Council in her new state, so she can get another tutor.
I'm very pleased to have been able to work with this special lady, who made me proud by being named our state's Literacy Council Student of the Year. If I decide to tutor another student, I hope I'll be assigned to one as hard-working as this one.
Back home, I heated leftovers from yesterday's Easter dinner for supper...in the microwave, of course. Afterward, Mother sorted pinto beans, which I rinsed and put into water to soak overnight. Then Hubbie accompanied her to her house.
Before we relaxed in front of TV, Hubbie and I rode around the neighborhood and beyond looking for our black cat. We had hoped he would be on the porch this morning, but he was not, and he is nowhere to be found. We suppose he is lost and may never return. If he has tried to come back, the other male cat in the yard probably ran him off. I hate that he is missing, especially since he was a favorite of Hubbie's. Tonight, one of our female cats meowed as though asking for him, since they spent a lot of time grooming each other.
A missing cat, a broken oven, and my student leaving made for a less than joyful day. But the weather was nice...though predictions are for cold, rain, and a smidgen of wintry stuff during the next few days. After that, warm weather is supposed to finally arrive and stay for a few months.
We were up at 6:30, so that I could get ready to go to water aerobics. It was a cool morning, but not unpleasant, for the walk to the gym. Today is Easter break for the college, so the parking lot was empty.
The pool was really warm, so much so that the regular lap swimmers were angry and refused to swim in it. I suppose it was a tad too warm, since we could see steam rising from the water. I'm sure the temperature will moderate considerably by Wednesday, though.
About 20 of us showed up today...way more than usual, probably because it was such a nice day. We were a bit crowded since one lap swimmer, who is training for a triathalon, didn't let the warm water deter him, so he occupied two lanes on one side of the pool, which meant our group had to squeeze up to make room for him.
Funny: one of the ladies who swims in the deep end commented that a younger woman she had been talking to for the past several days chose to stay in the shallow end and talk with a couple of other ladies. The lady said she feared the young woman would never get away from those talkative older ladies.
Usually, this woman is one of those talkative women at the shallow end. Today, though, she declared that she just wasn't in a chatty mood in the mornings. Could have fooled me, since I've rarely seen her when she wasn't talking. When I mentioned this to one of the other ladies, we both agreed that we are obviously not able to see ourselves as others see us, which is probably a good thing.
Back home, I enjoyed a cup of hot coffee, and then Hubbie put color in my hair in anticipation of a haircut appointment tomorrow. Before he did that, he accompanied Mother to our house, where she worked on her jigsaw puzzle. Once I was ready for the day, I didn't accomplish much for the rest of the morning, what little was left of it.
After lunch, Hubbie called a repairman to come check the oven on our stove and was told it would be a few days before he could come. So I'll need to plan meals that don't require the oven until it can be fixed, or until we're forced to buy a new stove.
Usually on Mondays, I spend time reviewing lessons for my ESL student, but since she is leaving in a week or so to go live in another state, I decided that for our last meeting at the college library, we would just visit. So I met her at 2:30, and we talked until 4 p.m., when I gave her an early birthday gift of a quart jar of local honey, and a farewell card. She was excited to get the honey, since it was on her list to buy a jar before they left. She and her husband have been enjoying honey for breakfast each morning as a preventative measure against allergies.
It was a tearful goodbye, since we'd grown to be friends as much as tutor and student, while she learned to speak and read English over the past year or so. She is not fluent in the language yet, but she can speak and understand English well enough that she was able to interview for and be hired as an assistant to a woman who owns a real estate agency in the state where she will now live. Her boss does not speak Spanish, so the student will be forced to converse with her in English, which is very good.
Also, I gave her the level 4 workbooks she began working in, so that in her spare time, she can work on her own. The Literacy Council director is also referring her to a Literacy Council in her new state, so she can get another tutor.
I'm very pleased to have been able to work with this special lady, who made me proud by being named our state's Literacy Council Student of the Year. If I decide to tutor another student, I hope I'll be assigned to one as hard-working as this one.
Back home, I heated leftovers from yesterday's Easter dinner for supper...in the microwave, of course. Afterward, Mother sorted pinto beans, which I rinsed and put into water to soak overnight. Then Hubbie accompanied her to her house.
Before we relaxed in front of TV, Hubbie and I rode around the neighborhood and beyond looking for our black cat. We had hoped he would be on the porch this morning, but he was not, and he is nowhere to be found. We suppose he is lost and may never return. If he has tried to come back, the other male cat in the yard probably ran him off. I hate that he is missing, especially since he was a favorite of Hubbie's. Tonight, one of our female cats meowed as though asking for him, since they spent a lot of time grooming each other.
A missing cat, a broken oven, and my student leaving made for a less than joyful day. But the weather was nice...though predictions are for cold, rain, and a smidgen of wintry stuff during the next few days. After that, warm weather is supposed to finally arrive and stay for a few months.
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Sunday, March 31
Today is Easter Sunday. Hope everyone had a wonderful day. Today is also the last day of March. April coming up, along with the promise of warmer weather once we get past a few really cold days...and maybe even wintry weather for our part of the state.
We were up at 6:30 this morning, and of course, I skipped my exercises again, because I needed to get busy preparing for a noon Easter dinner. Mother and Sis came over relatively early, and they put together two large baking dishes of scalloped potatoes. There wasn't room in my oven for both dishes, so Sis put one in Mother's oven. Hubbie had peeled and then sliced the potatoes in the food processor earlier.
While the potatoes cooked, we did other things, like make deviled eggs, put asparagus, whole kernel corn, and ham, in dishes to be heated later, slice bread, fix an olive/pickle tray, set the table, and set up a buffet table.
About an hour later, I checked the potatoes. They were barely warm and had made no progress cooking. Hubbie put the thermometer in again, and it registered only 250 degrees, when it should have been 350 degrees. Drat. This meant that Hubbie and Sis had to take the dish to Mother's to be put in her oven as soon as the other one cooked. And it meant everything else had to be heated in the microwave.
Looks like we'll be calling a repairman for the stove, or opt to buy another unit. It's always something.
Daughter, and Niece and Nephew, arrived before noon, and we soon sat down to the meal. Everything turned out great, and we thoroughly enjoyed it. Spent the afternoon visiting and working the jigsaw puzzle. Everyone tried their hand at it, with Nephew having the best luck. He seemed to be able to look at a space, judge exactly the pattern that belonged there, look through the hundreds of pieces, pick up exactly the right one, and plunk it right into place. Yet, he declared that he is not fond of jigsaw puzzles.
Around 3:30, Sis and Niece and Nephew were ready to leave. Daughter stayed for a ham sandwich supper later, and then left around 6:30. Before she left, she accompanied Mother to her house. Hubbie and I spent part of the evening watching TV, and part of it looking for our male cat that seems to have slipped out of the house again. We have no idea where he is. Maybe we'll find him in the morning, if our other male cat hasn't run him off by then.
We were up at 6:30 this morning, and of course, I skipped my exercises again, because I needed to get busy preparing for a noon Easter dinner. Mother and Sis came over relatively early, and they put together two large baking dishes of scalloped potatoes. There wasn't room in my oven for both dishes, so Sis put one in Mother's oven. Hubbie had peeled and then sliced the potatoes in the food processor earlier.
While the potatoes cooked, we did other things, like make deviled eggs, put asparagus, whole kernel corn, and ham, in dishes to be heated later, slice bread, fix an olive/pickle tray, set the table, and set up a buffet table.
About an hour later, I checked the potatoes. They were barely warm and had made no progress cooking. Hubbie put the thermometer in again, and it registered only 250 degrees, when it should have been 350 degrees. Drat. This meant that Hubbie and Sis had to take the dish to Mother's to be put in her oven as soon as the other one cooked. And it meant everything else had to be heated in the microwave.
Looks like we'll be calling a repairman for the stove, or opt to buy another unit. It's always something.
Daughter, and Niece and Nephew, arrived before noon, and we soon sat down to the meal. Everything turned out great, and we thoroughly enjoyed it. Spent the afternoon visiting and working the jigsaw puzzle. Everyone tried their hand at it, with Nephew having the best luck. He seemed to be able to look at a space, judge exactly the pattern that belonged there, look through the hundreds of pieces, pick up exactly the right one, and plunk it right into place. Yet, he declared that he is not fond of jigsaw puzzles.
Around 3:30, Sis and Niece and Nephew were ready to leave. Daughter stayed for a ham sandwich supper later, and then left around 6:30. Before she left, she accompanied Mother to her house. Hubbie and I spent part of the evening watching TV, and part of it looking for our male cat that seems to have slipped out of the house again. We have no idea where he is. Maybe we'll find him in the morning, if our other male cat hasn't run him off by then.
Saturday, March 31
Up around 7:30, but skipped my exercises, so I could begin preparations for Easter Sunday. Sis and Mother came over mid-morning, and we set to work. The first thing I did was put a ham in the oven, and get a dozen eggs started boiling. Hubbie used the food processor to grate carrots, and then Mother made a recipe of carrot salad, using golden raisins, Craisins, pineapple, and salad dressing. Before any of that could be done, though, Hubbie had to run to the grocery store for carrots, raisins, and other items.
Shortly after Hubbie got home from the store, he cut daffodils, so I could make an arrangement in a white teapot for the dining room table.
I ironed tableclothes, gathered China, stemware, and serving dishes, then spent part of the morning doing a few things to spruce the house, though I didn't do any real cleaning. Hubbie took care of vacuuming and cleaning the downstairs bathroom. We hoped family would overlook any cleanliness inadequacies they might notice.
Checked the ham with a meat thermometer a couple of times after I thought it should be cooked, but it was still not done by noon. So I began to suspect that the oven was not heating properly. Hubbie was not convinced there was anything wrong with it, though, so he went to the store to pick up an oven thermometer. When he checked the oven with it, the temp showed 350 degrees, which is what it was set for.
So I let the ham cook until 1 p.m., at which time the meat thermometer showed it was done. Since it appeared the oven was okay, I went ahead and made a pineapple upside down cake. It seemed to bake just fine. But when I turned it out onto a cake keeper, it was very juicy...so much so that I very nearly lost it onto the floor. Luckily, none of the liquid splashed on me. I figured I might have put too much tub margarine in the bottom of the pan, and it didn't absorb during baking. I decided I should have used stick margarine instead of the tub variety, which tends to be watery when melted. The cake was fine, though...very edible.
Sis had a lot more luck making a bucket cake...an angel food cake drizzled with hot strawberry Jell-o...than I did with the ham and the pineapple upside down cake.
After lunch, I spent part of the afternoon working a very difficult jigsaw puzzle with Mother and Sis. It's a display of colorful flat woven baskets that are extremely challenging.
Later, we had leftovers for supper. Then Hubbie watched NCAA tournament basketball games, while Mother, Sis, and I continued with the puzzle. Around 8 p.m., we sampled slices of the bucket cake with dollops of fat-free topping. Afterward, Sis accompanied Mother to her house, and Hubbie and I watched TV until bedtime. Before we went to bed, I fixed Easter baskets for Mother, Sis, Daughter, and Niece, using little metal containers painted with springtime motifs, in which I put Easter grass, chocolate bunnies, and assorted little chocolates. Mother's also contained a pound bag of Jelly Belly jelly beans. She also received a new jigsaw puzzle.
Shortly after Hubbie got home from the store, he cut daffodils, so I could make an arrangement in a white teapot for the dining room table.
I ironed tableclothes, gathered China, stemware, and serving dishes, then spent part of the morning doing a few things to spruce the house, though I didn't do any real cleaning. Hubbie took care of vacuuming and cleaning the downstairs bathroom. We hoped family would overlook any cleanliness inadequacies they might notice.
Checked the ham with a meat thermometer a couple of times after I thought it should be cooked, but it was still not done by noon. So I began to suspect that the oven was not heating properly. Hubbie was not convinced there was anything wrong with it, though, so he went to the store to pick up an oven thermometer. When he checked the oven with it, the temp showed 350 degrees, which is what it was set for.
So I let the ham cook until 1 p.m., at which time the meat thermometer showed it was done. Since it appeared the oven was okay, I went ahead and made a pineapple upside down cake. It seemed to bake just fine. But when I turned it out onto a cake keeper, it was very juicy...so much so that I very nearly lost it onto the floor. Luckily, none of the liquid splashed on me. I figured I might have put too much tub margarine in the bottom of the pan, and it didn't absorb during baking. I decided I should have used stick margarine instead of the tub variety, which tends to be watery when melted. The cake was fine, though...very edible.
Sis had a lot more luck making a bucket cake...an angel food cake drizzled with hot strawberry Jell-o...than I did with the ham and the pineapple upside down cake.
After lunch, I spent part of the afternoon working a very difficult jigsaw puzzle with Mother and Sis. It's a display of colorful flat woven baskets that are extremely challenging.
Later, we had leftovers for supper. Then Hubbie watched NCAA tournament basketball games, while Mother, Sis, and I continued with the puzzle. Around 8 p.m., we sampled slices of the bucket cake with dollops of fat-free topping. Afterward, Sis accompanied Mother to her house, and Hubbie and I watched TV until bedtime. Before we went to bed, I fixed Easter baskets for Mother, Sis, Daughter, and Niece, using little metal containers painted with springtime motifs, in which I put Easter grass, chocolate bunnies, and assorted little chocolates. Mother's also contained a pound bag of Jelly Belly jelly beans. She also received a new jigsaw puzzle.
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