March 13 through 19

Another week. This one didn’t have a lot of stuff going on, but some things were time consuming, so it feels like a lot.

Andy’s birthday
The week started with my youngest and youngest son’s birthday…a magical 44. Yep, my ‘baby’ is 44. I always refer to him as ‘my youngest’ because he never really had a chance to be a baby.

Poetry Workshop
Monday night was poetry workshop night. I brought my Ekphrastic poem for critique. As often (always?) happens some people don’t understand what I’m getting at and make suggestions for changes that are absolutely not going to be made. ☺ However, some suggestions were valuable. I haven’t looked at all the comments yet. I’ve had other things on my mind.

Ekphrastic Poetry
An Ekphrastic poem is a poem about any work of art, usually a painting. I chose Mid Winter Moonlight by Regis-Francois Cignoux. This painting hangs in the New Britain Museum of Modern Art. On April 17th, over 20 poets will be at the Museum reading their Ekphrastic poems. Mark your calendars…12:30 to 4 pm. You’ll hear fantastic poetry and view beautiful paintings. It’s a 2-fer! ☺ I do believe the usual admission fee will be charged.

Meeting at nursing home
For starters I received 2 notices about this meeting for two different days and my mother’s name was spelled wrong both times. Having straightened that out, only one meeting was held. On one level it was very productive. I posed the question about the level of caring (not care…caring). I asked if it was too much to expect the aides (in particular) to treat the residents as if they were their parent. Sounds so simple doesn’t it?

More poetry
On Thursday night, I went over to the Wintonbury Branch library in Bloomfield to hear Stephanie Elliott and Susan Deer Cloud read what I thought was going to be native American poetry. There was a little of that, but the rest got very political. After the readings, one of the poets was discussing a rally coming up this weekend in New Haven to have our troops pulled out of Afghanistan and Pakistan. I had to leave. I have one grandson who gave his life in Iraq and another who has been fighting in Afghanistan preserving the right of others to disagree and protest.

I can't emphasize enough, I may not like war (who does?), but I am in full support of our troops. God Bless and Protect every one of them.

First bike ride of the season
Thursday of this week was the best for a bike ride…close to 60° and very little wind…not like today’s gusty winds. I took a short 11.5 mile ride. It felt good to be on two wheels.

I finally got around to naming my bike. It’s a Raleigh so I thought naming it after Sir Walter’s wife (if he had one) would be appropriate. I Googled and found out he married Elizabeth Throckmorton. So my bike has become Lizzie Throckmorton. What a silly name for a bike! I have to laugh every time I think of that name. And, if you’re looking for a good story read the history of Walter and Elizabeth. My kind of people (rebellious). ☺

Basketball
Of course I’m watching the NCAA basketball tournaments. It’s the men right now. The women won’t start playing until Sunday. The guys are wearing so much ink you could fill a swimming pool. Why do they need all those tattoos? Probably could take their clothes off and you wouldn’t even notice.

Is it just me or do people just not think any more?
Lets start at the nursing home. I had to request they do a throat culture because my mother has had a very sore throat for about a week and a half now. They thought that was a really good idea. Ya think?

Then they were having trouble with their suppliers and their own pharmacy getting Cepecol lozenges to ease my mom’s sore throat. They kept telling me they were readily available over the counter. Today I took the initiative and went to the drug store myself and bought some. That wasn’t such a good idea after all. They gave her a lozenge and it numbed her throat and her whole mouth to the point she no longer could feel where the lozenge was in her mouth and it slid down her throat. I yelled for nurses STAT and had two within seconds. The potential disaster was averted and I took the rest of the lozenges home with me.

They are supposed to have a throat spray delivered late Friday afternoon. I’ll go back Saturday to check…and I’ll have a bottle of spray with me just in case.

Lets talk about the temperature of the pool here at the condo complex. It’s been COLD for about a month now. Alice is the leader of the water aerobics group and she is on the Board of Directors. She has complained to the management group to no avail. So I emailed the MG and told them how uncomfortable is was to workout in cold water as well as dangerous to be stretching cold muscles.

Today they sent someone in to check it. So what did they do? They checked the thermostat in the control room. They always check the thermostat. It was reading 92°. Therefore, Alice and I are crazy. Right? Wrong. Today Alice brought a thermometer to the pool and we proved the water IN THE POOL was 76°. Oh! I think the problem will be solved and we will have warmer water. No one thought to check the water in the pool. Oy!

As I check my calendar, it looks like (outside of going to the nursing home) I have nothing going on tomorrow (Saturday). And that’s probably what I will do. ☺

Have a good week and Happy First Day of Spring!