Think Fast

Didn’t make it to the Farmer’s Market on Saturday after all. Experiencing some trauma from the last two workouts, I ran what errands needed to be run, returned to the complex and lathered the sore areas with an ointment that would get me arrested at Disneyland, then chilled until the pain lessened.

I’m assuming you heard about the great grandma who was arrested at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida, ordered to strip naked, bend over for a body cavity search, banned from returning to Disneyland, because she carried on her person an ointment her doctor had suggested she use to treat her osteoarthritic pain.

Since she obviously was using the ointment for pain relief, was not the Heisenberg she'd been profiled to be, she’s suing for $18 million.

Hope she wins, but don’t think she has a beggar’s chance of coming out on top against the mouse organization.

At any rate, the incident cautioned me about carrying pain relief with me or going anywhere after lathering it on my body, so I decided to stay inside reminder of the weekend.

Today, Sunday, I decided to give myself a Skittle Nails mani/pedi in colors to fit this week coming up on Easter.

I’m happy with the outcome, but think it looks — and correct me if you see differently, more like pre-Pride Week than pre-Easter.

Either way is fine by me because the mani/pedi is bright, cheery, pleases me.

Returning my nail kit to the bedroom closet, I looked over and who did I see out and about through the bedroom window but our Karen character.

Telling myself to Think Fast, I jumped into the closet, hid behind the closet door, peered out to observe without being seen.

Didn’t see her pick up any tree droppings — she might have already done so by the time I saw her. She just followed her cat around, looked up this way a time or two — seeing nothing, I’m certain, but that lamp and the sun bouncing off the window — because I was in the closet so to speak.

After a while, she grabbed the cat without luring it with tree droppings and went back inside.

Tomorrow it’s back to the start of another week and dueling Bingo Games.

Red Light tells me the Bingo Game indicated on the Activity Calendar is being run by Activity Director, 12-12:45 Tuesday the 19th. The one she and Talker are hosting is 1:00 April 14 and, mysteriously, is not included in the calendar of events, but is mentioned as a blurb on a back page.

Consequently, she and the talker are walking around, alerting us to Thursday’s event.

Sabotage?

Is Activity Director jealous?

Does she feel her position is being threatened?

I think Activity Director has been here too long.

She joined us during the tenure of Community Manager No. 2, has been here since and a couple times said or done something that made me think she’d become too comfortable, too sure of herself and her position.

Like that time she was so rude to the residents that did her job for her when she was late arriving on pizza distribution day. Upon arriving, instead of thanking the Baker, the Helpful Little Lady and one or two others who'd stepped up to the plate, did her job for her, she yelled at them saying, "No pizzas are to be distributed until I get here!"

Then, as I recall, still mad, she instructed those same residents to take over an event that immediately followed pizza distribution, while she spent the afternoon in the computer room.

I can't stand a bully so I'd suggested to the ladies that unless and until she apologized that they walk away, don't continue to help her.

Of course, they were nicer and more forgiving than I. Allowed Activity Director to get away with her bad behavior.

Just two/three days ago, I ran into D, the sex assault victim. She looked quite pretty, having dyed purple streaks into her hair.

I complimented her on the look, telling her it was flattering, very hip, very now.

She thanked me saying that Activity Director had made her feel bad about it saying, "Who are you trying to be".

Sounded like a bitchy put down to me and D took it that way.

Activity Director is early 30’s, dumpy, so I said "How would she know what’s a good look. You look great. Do you".

At any rate, I've nothing else to do on Thursday. So, even though Bingo is not my thing, I’ll be going just to stick it to Activity Director, support Red Light and the Talker. Hope they get a larger crowd than she.

I’m not worried about the event turning into a super spreader because I’m so tired of Covid, variants, vaccinations, being careful, and life in general, that I no longer even care.

Off the Clock

Last workout of the week, enough groceries that I don’t have to leave the unit to go grocery shopping, I am off the clock until Monday.

I don’t even know if I’ll go walking tomorrow, Saturday. Depends on whether the walking bug hits me when I awaken tomorrow.

Trainer is a young man with an old soul. Consequently, we have deep philosophical talks. He shares things with me he can’t share with his younger clients — has to maintain that invincible tough guy image with them. As for me, he knows things about me that my own family doesn’t know ... so do you, my readers.

Trainer and I laugh a lot, kid around a lot and, one day this week, he and I even turned the session into a quasi Zumba class.

At any rate, he and I have been following and discussing the Gabby Petito/Brian Laundrie case.

All along, Trainer said Brian would be found deceased by his own hands. My theory was Brian had escaped to another country.

Having myself escaped from an abusive situation, one thing I discussed with Trainer is that I didn’t understand why, when the cops originally arrived on the scene after receiving reports of Brian slapping Gabby, and separated the two — sending Brian to spend a night in a hotel to cool down, while Gabby spent that night in the van, was why she didn’t just drive away. Leave his arse behind.

"Love" said Trainer.

Perhaps he’s right. She just wasn’t ready to give up on him.

Too bad she didn’t get another opportunity to save herself.

For new readers who don’t know my history, I was Gabby once — young, stupid in love, not giving up on the relationship with my ex-husband in spite of being verbally and physically abused, my every movement controlled.

Fortunately for me, the day came when the abuse caused me to fall completely out of love. All that was left was contempt and fear.

Yet and still I gave him a chance. Told him he needed to get some help, that I’d give him six months to get that help or I was gone.

I didn’t know then, what I know now … that when these abusers lose control is the most dangerous time for a woman.

His response to the ultimatum was to go postal. He kept me and the new-born twins locked in the apartment with him. I slept on the couch in the living room, so I could be near the door to escape, while he slept in the bedroom.

Another thing I learned is these abusers can read your mind. He figured I was planning to sneak away while he slept, so he kept one of the twins with him at night, knowing I’d not leave without both my babies.

When he began drinking, trying to work himself up to killing me to stop me from leaving, I managed to trick him into believing I still loved him and wanted to give it another try. When he felt he was back in control, and could leave the apartment for the ten minutes it took to drive a few blocks to the cleaners, pick up his cop uniform, so he could return to work, as soon as I heard his car exit the driveway, I grabbed my six-month old twins and fled with the clothes we had on our backs.

That was my moment, and had I hesitated to take it, as Gabby hesitated to drive away, I’d have been her.

At any rate, now that Brian’s bones have been found and identified, I told Trainer that I actually felt sorry for Brian. Sorry because he thinks taking himself out of this life frees him from experiencing the consequences of his actions. While, in actuality, the only thing he’s succeeded in doing is establishing the direction in which his next life will go, and it won’t be pretty.

So, I am now off the clock and already not looking forward to Monday. Not just because Monday is back to the same ol same ol, but because it will be the day after Halloween and I’ll have to put the decorations away.

The decorations will go back into storage, but I’m going to keep my current vampire bloody nail art until it’s time to switch to Christmas.

Shenanigans

Having received a notice to be out by the 31st, because she’s been deemed over-income, I was surprised to run into the Talker this morning, looking like she had all the time in the world.

"Did you find a place?" asked I.

"I did, but now I don’t have to move. I was prepared to sign the lease tomorrow, but he (the Tyrant) just told me I didn’t have to move. There was a mistake in the paperwork. I can stay as long as I like".

What the heck is going on here?

I, who thought for sure I’d be kicked to the curb for being over-income, was told I don’t have to worry, it doesn’t apply to me. Now, after the Talker was put to the trouble of preparing for a move, she’s been told she can stay as long as she likes.

The reason she was given for this turnabout was that a mistake, in the paperwork, occurred at the Corporate level.

I doubt that.

The mistake … if there was a mistake, is more likely to have been made closer to home — in our own front office.

So anyway, I’m glad for the Talker, I’m relieved for myself, but there are some kind of shenanigans going on.

Logging into Candy Crush this afternoon, I see they’d changed one of their candies into jack-o-lanterns.

Cute, but doesn’t make passing the level any easier.

Not so cute, but scary fun if one does a lot of inside decorating for Halloween, is the peel and stick grate wall decal that popped up in my feed.

What would be hilarious, but wrong, is for someone to stick the decal to the side of a random building. Hide, then watch as passersby's freak out.

On another note, responding to JanF’s comment that she was amazed I could get three striped candy corn colors on my smaller toe nails … Jan, it’s accomplished by using wedge shaped nail sponges.

First, I paint my nails white. Once that’s dried, I paint tiny stripes on the sponge for the smaller nails, press and swipe the sponge across the nail; larger stripes for larger nails, press and swipe.

Easy peasy.

Okay Monday, Let’s Do This!

I’m finding that, just as Monday was my least favorite day of the week when I was in the workforce (for obvious reasons), now that I’m retired, Monday is STILL my least favorite day of the week.

Why?

Because Monday brings with it the grind of starting all over — things I must do, places I must go; while weekends, when I do get time to myself, are so carefree/unscripted.

I did have Sunday to myself — took a nice long bubble bath, caught up with a few recorded television programs, gave myself a fresh manicure/pedicure.

Then I checked out an app that Mistress Maddie did a post on a while back — Reface, where one can swap their face with faces on magazine covers, in movie scenes, shows, gifs, etc.

After investigating the app, to make sure it was safe, I downloaded and chose to insert myself into the highly popular Netflix series The Squid Game.

Based on the children’s game Red Light/Green Light — which game I remember rushing home from elementary school in time to catch Engineer Bill on television, calling out “Red Light/Green Light” as I tried to keep up while drinking milk or water, the Squid Game takes that harmless game to another level.

Hundreds of contestants who have a financially challenging past, all looking to test their skills and their strength in the hopes of winning a large sum of money, enter a contest — at the helm of which is a terrifying doll that recites the name of the game over and over.

Standing next to a tree, the doll turns its back, whereupon the players can move towards the doll (green light). HOWEVER, when the doll spins around to face the players, the contestants must freeze immediately (red light), or risk getting fatally shot.

I played around with the app and this what I came up with ….

Me as the horrifying doll

Me as a player who (supposedly) did not fare well

Later, seeing a friend had posted that, after viewing Squid Game, she'd never play red light/green light ever again, I'd commented with my doll photo "Don't worry. I'll let you cheat".

That garnered a lot of LOL's, questions as to how I did this, and a request to make myself a player described as “The Crazy Girl”.

There’s not a lot of Squid Game on Reface, but there was that.

So, that's how Sunday ended ... on a high note.

Waking up this morning, I find this .....

Two other friends had joined in on the fun.

So at least this Monday started off with a ROFLMAO!!!

I can't help but wonder how Engineer Bill would react to Squid Game, seeing how his wholesome red light/green light has been turned into terror and horror; but thanks Mistress, for turning me onto this fun app.

Revenge With a Side of Rocks

While in the Laundry Room on Saturday, talking to a resident I’ve never seen before — even though she tells me she’s lived here for three years, I asked if she’d gone to movie night.

Her response was to laugh — long and hard.

Once she stopped laughing, she said — with a smirk on her face, “No one did …. except my neighbor and his wife”.

From this resident’s obvious enjoyment of the Tyrant’s failure, I’m deducing that his carrying on with movie night, rather than telling the couple the event was cancelled due to lack of interest, has residents laughing behind his back. He’s become a joke.

When people in power lord it over others who, for one reason or another, feel they can’t speak up/fight back, those powerless ones find other less hazardous to themselves ways to exact revenge. Silence and non-participation is one such effective measure.

However, the Tyrant may have found a way to break down some of the wall that’s between himself and residents. The Baker tells me he’s bringing bingo back.

These old people love them some bingo. So, they will undoubtedly put aside their dislike and participate.

Even the Baker, who opted out of everything some time ago, long before the pandemic shut activities down, said she planned to participate.

And get this … not only is the Tyrant bringing bingo back, he’s planning on being the Caller.

I too enjoy bingo, but I’m not desperate enough to lock myself into the community room, with a group of residents when the pandemic is nowhere near over, plus have to look at the Tyrant’s deceitful face, listen to words coming out of his lying liar’s mouth.

Besides … doesn’t he have more important work to do?

I’ve not run into Jan — the painted rock maker, in some time; however, I have seen her latest work in and around my area, which consists of smooth oval rocks with bible verses.

I captured photos of three. 

Matthew 11:26

Joshua 1:9

Proverbs 14:30

You will note there is not the usual polish on my nails in those photos. I'm such a girlie girl that I  actually feel naked when not wearing polish but, in the process of giving my nails a breather, I didn’t want to take a chance on the rocks being taken as souvenirs before I got polish on and could get a photo fully dressed.

I'm impressed at how neatly Jan managed to script on these rocks.

At any rate, I didn’t have to worry about someone removing the rocks before I could polish my nails and take a proper photo, because I confiscated two of the three to add to my collection right after I captured those photos.

I'll have to let Jan know, so she'll know they're in appreciative hands, not tossed.

The two I confiscated go well with my nails — now freshly skittle polished, don’t you think?

Nothing

Other than my normal schedule of workouts, needlepoint, trying to catch up on recorded television programs, I’ve got nothing other than sitting on my couch perch watching maintenance guys getting Sue’s (whose lifestyle took such a toll that she became unable to care for self and was moved in with family) across the quad, upstairs corner unit ready for the next tenant, and landscapers uprooting ALL the plants on the property.

I also squeezed in time to watch a movie I’d been anxious to see ever since I’d first heard about it months ago.

Of course, I don’t go to the movies and though I have a smart tv and can load a streaming service, the mechanics of switching from TV to all the other options the smart tv offers is too confusing for me, so I patiently waited for the DVD to release.

It’s up for Best Picture and Best Screenplay.

I don’t know about either, but I enjoyed it and particularly enjoyed that, instead of the usual spoiling of a movie for myself by knowing what was going to happen before it happened, this one was full of unanticipated surprises.

The main character’s skittle nails motivated me to go back to what was last year’s style.

Promising Young Woman

Retired Senior Citizen

Sue’s family must have left a terrible mess inside, when they moved Sue out, because the guys brought in a dumpster and spent two days loading it with miscellaneous junk.

Good luck getting a cleaning deposit back.

As for the landscapers, here we are, same week as Earth Day, and first they pruned the trees to death, then came back and stripped the entire complex of, what looked to me, to be healthy striving plants, leaving a few hedges and patches of dirt.

I’m assuming management has a plan, a before and after. Can’t wait to see the after, because the before was already lush and pleasant looking.

Oh, and by the way, the news reported at least six people fatally shot by officers (with varying circumstances) in the 24 hours after jurors reached a verdict in the murder case against Chauvin.

Just sayin’

Stream of Consciousness

Also known as, this and that on this Labor Day ─ not looking much like a holiday around here, except for the absence of staff.

I made it through the weekend without the smoke detector going off again.

This may be because I didn’t move the stepstool.

When I’d pulled out the stepstool to disconnect the beeping mechanism on Friday, the beeping stopped. This made me superstitious that, if I put the stepstool away, the smoke detector would start beeping again. Not wanting to take the chance, I left the stool as was.

With staff back tomorrow, I can then take the chance to put the stool back in storage.

If there is no beeping during the day but, if after hours, when staff has left for the day, the beeping restarts, I’ll know for sure the smoke detector is possessed.

A spiritual practitioner I’ve worked with for years, now basically retired from the practice, living in Hawaii, celebrated her 100^th birthday over the weekend.

She said it was a goal to live to 100.

It surprised me that she, or anyone, would actually set 100 as a goal.

To each their own, I guess.

It also got me to thinking that, even though this practitioner looks to be in good condition for her age, living to 100 would not be something I’d want for myself.

As it is, I continue to be surprised that I’m still here, when I’d always felt I’d be gone by 35 ─ one way or another.

Here I am 40 years past that, with no end in sight.

That’s the reason why I signed up to workout at the Pain Cave.

Inasmuch as it never entered my mind to live this long, I’d not paid a whole lot of attention to maintaining my physicality, other than normal upkeep.

I’ve got a few things that, had I been more concerned with my physicality, would not be a challenge now. But, as has been said, “If I knew I was going to live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself”.

At any rate, it is what it is and, looking around at how some of my neighbors have fared in this aging game, what is could have been a whole lot worse.

Sitting on my couch perch, people watching through the patio window, it was scary to see residents previously observed bouncing along the path, had deteriorated to the point of shuffling along, looking like one of AMC’s Walking Dead, or now dependent on a cane or walker.

Realizing the deteriorating atmosphere was rubbing off ─ that I myself was getting slower, weaker, felt tired all the time, I decided that, since I don’t know when my expiration date will be, I didn’t want to go out the way the other residents are going and had better make the best of it, get myself in as good a shape as I can at this stage.

But though I feel, had I known I was to live this long, I’d have taken better care of myself, Trainer tells me I’m in better shape than some of his clients in their 20’s and 30’s.

“How is that possible?” asked I.

“Too much partying, overindulgences”, said he. “By the time they get to me, it’s a complete rebuild, rather than a restore”.

Trainer says it’s not unusual for the younger clients to find the work so hard that they throw up during a session.

He says, one young lady stopped in the middle of a workout, said, “It’s too hard. I can’t do this anymore” and walked out, never to return.

Other clients have complained so much about it being hard, and whine about not wanting to do this routine, not wanting to struggle with that equipment, yada yada yada, that Trainers says it brings him down. He’s told them, “I can’t work with you” and sent them on their way.

LOL.

So, though I still occasionally wish I’d known I was going to live this long, so I could have done some things differently, it is what it is and I’m grateful the is isn’t worse.

Still, I’m hoping so not to 100.

All day Sunday was prep work for the new stitch piece.

I had to zigzag stitch the edges of the aida cloth, so it would not fray. And it took hours and hours and hours to set up 65 different floss colors.

I’m so anxious to start the new project that, though I’ve not yet finished the current piece, I’ve decided to work on both, but on alternating days.

This should be interesting.

Later in the evening, while watching Big Brother, I decided to give myself a mani/pedi.

When I’d been at Michael’s the day before yesterday, I’d gotten into a discussion with the nicely manicured cashier about her nail art and how I was thinking about, but was reluctant to try, the new social media sensation ─ Skittle Nails.

As seen on the internet

I told the cashier that though I liked the way it looked on other people, I was afraid I myself would look like a clown.

“Sometimes, we’ve got to step outside our comfort zone”, said she.

That statement struck my somewhat conservative basic one-color or french manicure self, and I thought … why not.

I’m liking it.

Think it will be my thing for a while.

It’s a great way to use up a stash of leftover colors.