Story 19Jan2021: Wednesday

I slept in to after 8ish as I had trouble waking up. This made the morning a rushing push. I was not to leave until after 10:20. So again, I am delaying food until later and eating within 30 minutes of my pills at 10AM. I was hungry later, so I will have to try eating twice. Maybe two bagels this time.

Air Volvo and I traveled in the heavy Oregon mist without issue. Some of the flooding I see while traveling to Forest Grove is receding. It is a typical winter day here in the Pacific Northwest, gray and wet.

I reached Susie near 11ish, and she was awake, dressed, and having a good day. Her new roommate was getting dressed, so I waited until that was done. Susie was better today and happy to see me. She is still confused and says that she cannot see me when I am in front of her. I wonder if the stroke affected recognizing faces (I have heard that can happen). But, she was happy to see me.

Susie is showing no Covid-19 issues, the Forest Grove Rehab and Care Center (Susie in Room 44A) outbreak is growing worse. The facility reported now that a patient has been infected and seven staff members. The residents are tested every other day.

I head out to lunch, feeling a bit off as my meds I think expect more than a bagel for food. I promise Susie I will be back in about an hour. I travel just a mile to the Grand Lodge and get a seat at the Iron Grill.

I have soup and an appetizer of hummus with pickled veggies and pita bread. It was more than I wanted to spend on lunch, but I wanted to stay healthy while not just having soup.

I returned to Susie about 1ish. She was still awake and even more talkative. It is nearly impossible for me to understand her, but she is trying. I clean and repaint her fingernails pink. This takes some time and requires her to hold still for a while, something that is harder now. We manage to get the paint on without getting it all over the bed or furniture.

I still fell a bit off, the incision pain is back too, and so I headed out just about 3PM. I return home without incident with Air Volvo seeming to auto-drive. I will admit I was not paying attention at one moment and the auto-steer did adjust for me. Air Volvo will not let you drift out of a lane and gently nudges the wheel back to the lane (this allows you to manually correct). Yes, auto-braking, auto-steering correction, lights in mirrors to let you know if there is a car near you, and other items make Air Volvo safer and more fun to drive. It also kills the engine and restarts the car instead of idling and generating pollution at a stop. I truly love this model of XC60 and paid it off. It is all mine.

I take a nap when home. I am surprised that I have still not recovered from my surgery, but the docs warned me that six weeks is the more likely recovery time. I need to slow down a bit and do by pulling up a blanket and reading. I sleep for 90 mins or so.

I am reading a new book, Dead Dead Girl. This is a crime novel set in New York City Harlem of the 1920s and it is a good mix of crime and awareness of what it is like to be a black young girl in 1920s Harlem. This is the first book by Nekesa Afia and will likely be the start of a series.

I manage to get started again. I pull off the sheets of the bed and wash them. Next, I must move Corwin’s clothing to the dryer (growl). I also move my clean cloth to a pile of unfolded laundry. I will have to put that away soon.

I clean off my work table the dining table in the family room. This is a flat surface I have thrown things since getting back from NYC. I have the focus and strength to start finding my table under all of this mess. I throw a lot of paper away. I put a few tools away in the garage.

In the garage on the garage door is a huge, six inches, slug. I have no idea why the huge slugs enter the garage as it is dry and dusty, but huge slugs wander in. This one is huge and fast for a slug. Ick! I ignore it and hope it does not get underfoot (extra ick!).

I make dinner. I have a simple feast of a Chicken Cordon Blue from Schwann’s and a microwaved potato with the works (butter and sour cream with sea salt and lots of pepper). I had not put out any butter to get to room temperature, so no sauce this time.

Next, I read the Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Company’s entire catalog, which is massive. I daydream of having a hot house in the backyard to grow exotic herbs and peppers. I also have seeds for violets and Nasturtiums, all editable, and ponder purchasing the required equipment to start them indoors. I am just on the edge of the growing time and this year I wanted violets and nasturtiums in my front garden. Maybe. The upcoming chemotherapy makes this more complex,  but these are the easiest of easy plants. So still, maybe, and violets and nasturtiums would be nice and edible too.

On a more practical side, I find more stamps I have purchased in auctions waiting to be placed in my collection. Stamp collecting is a lonely hobby and so it takes a second to board game playing and coding, but I have done it since I was a kid and know too much to put it away and not return. I also have invested in reference books so I have expertise. I carefully place the newly acquire stamps, US and US revenue stamps most more than 100 years old, in my album in nice plastic mounts I cut to fit. I do discover one of the more expensive stamps, a revenue stamp so not part of my regular US collection, is a repeat, it happens, as one of the stamps next to it is set in the wrong place. Oddly, this is a $350 stamp and now have two (managing to acquire a copy with a small hole for 1/7 of the catalog value a few months ago). I must have acquired the expensive stamp years ago and misplaced it in the album–I once purchased two collections and wonder if it was misplaced in the original collection as it was not that expensive. A mystery that I will not resolve. I correct the mistake, now having an opening in my revenue stamp collection of a much cheaper stamp (!), and put the spare stamp on the side in the collection. It is too valuable to just add to a pile of spares.

It is relaxing to bring order to chaos. However, I have yet to place the new local carrier stamp (this includes the famous Pony Express and West Fargo carriage runs that replaced the Pony Express) additions to my album. I have no book for these so I have to manually create sheets for them or add them to a stock book I use for the local carriers. To validate these stamps I bought reference books and validate that each stamp is not a forgery (the books are hard to find at a reasonable price, mine are from an auction). I am not going to use all the extra energy that requires now, but that newly acquired Pony Express I have to validate is really cool and I hope it is a real copy.

I collect, as a sort of requirement, forgeries too. I get them unplanned and sometimes in some auctions for reasonable prices. Even the forgeries are famous for the local carrier stamps and get sold for premiums prices clearly identified as a forgery or reprint. These forgeries are from the 1800s and early 1900s and are now more than 100 years old and the criminals are famous in the stamp collecting circles.

I enjoy the new book but have trouble sleeping. I finally drop to a night of deep sleep as the clock last said 1:45 when I look at it.