Story 17Sept2022

Friday, I took most of the evening off, not writing the blog, and just watched the cable show Lucifer and made dinner. I made goulash for dinner. I defrosted some beef leg slices I bought on a whim at Basics grocery store. I then shopped up some garlic and salted and peppered the beef after patting it dry and frying it in oil in a pan. The garlic was unneeded as it just burned up in the heat. I added some to the goulash. I booked the beef leg slices until beginning to reach rare.

I had sliced onions, carrots in large pieces, sliced mashing potatoes, Hungarian sweet paprika, plus the rest of the spices and wine for the goulash in my low-temperature cooking pan. When the beef was starting to finish, I took it out of the pan and put it on a cutting board to cool and stop cooking. I then cut the meat off the bones and put the ones in the slow-cooking pot. The sliced beef was poured over the top, and I stirred as things started to cook at the bottom. I add more wine and later water.

The food was good, was short on salt–as is all my cooking, and could have used some hot spice to give it a slight kick, but it was good and old school. The bone marrow had gone into the goulash, and I tossed the bones. I had a few bowls and put the rest away for leftovers.

I watched some more of Lucifer–it is getting predictable. I am laughing still. I went to bed at 11ish. I got the mail which came late, and found a gift from Beaverton Police. Yes, there was a camera at that intersection. Some more to pay.

Before making dinner, I worked from home as this was Friday, and as usual, my email, texts, and Slack messages slowed after 2PM. So I started dinner at 3PM and did laundry as the pressure of work released. At 5:30, I finally closed the Nike laptop and turned it sideways–that was my drive home and the start of the weekend.

I had a complex afternoon, and I hope I managed not to have the Beaverton Police find new ways for me to pay, with stopping by Rite Aide to get my prescriptions and some lettuce to go with all the salad fixing I have, but no lettuce! I found the lettuce at the end of the produce section, which seems to be sorted by price at Basics. Eggs and milk are in the other furthest corner.

I had tried to have all my prescriptions turned to Optima mail-order 90-day supplies, but it appears that Rite Aid had filled them early, making a mess of this. I decided to move to this not cheaper (I pay the same co-pay multiplied by the extra dose) but more convenient delivery after learning that all my Rite Aid prescriptions are not filled locally but mailed from a central pharmacy in Washington state. Rite Aid thus, by filling early, prevents the move–more clever than I would expect from Rite Aid, which always seems to be behind. The POS pad was working at the store, the transaction was fast (I was used to waiting), and I was trying to keep up. I could tell that the person at the cash wrap station was proud that I was falling behind–the previous system really sucked.

We don’t want to give Rite Aide too many points, the store is still a wreck of half-done merchandising, and muddy prints on the floor show that the store is only cleaned at night. It feels like a tired old-school pharmacist trying to keep up with the new-fangled ways of the world, but I like it. I was sorry when my nearby store closed, but this one looks like it needs my business. So I will stay a bit longer.

After getting my prescriptions and lettuce, I drove towards home but first put in some gas in Air Volvo. Gas is down at the same Chevron another ten cents, and fill is about $83 now. For you folks who gasp at $4.89, remember we don’t add on sales tax, and Oregon has a high gas tax as we have NO sales tax. We are one of few states where you cannot pump your gas. So that is the full-service price. It rains a lot out here, and unlike Washington state (which is the reverse with no income tax but lots of consumption and user fees/taxes) would rather pay some to stand in the rain than do it ourselves.

The car windshield, still showing the bug hits from my trip to the coast, needed to be cleaned. So I did the now $15 car wash. It has not yet increased from inflation; it was $15 during the pandemic. Few of us were driving in 2020, but we were all happy to pay anything to have an excuse to drive in 2021 while locked in our cars!

I returned home and grabbed my passport holder with my vax card. I then jumped back into Air Volvo. I saw while coming home that Tektronix campus was doing free vax again–I bet they got the good stuff! I had spent an hour of my life trying to schedule on Rite Aid’s website, gave up, and had the next shot scheduled for 30Sept2022 at Wallgreens. But, if I could just show up and get this done, that would be a home run.

And that was what happened; the same crew that did my second booster was there from the south of the USA. So Yup, African Americans and Latinx folks filled the room, giving shots. Soon I was watching my 15-minute timer going after a friendly Latinx gal who had used my right arm for the shot, all Covid-19 goes in the right arm for all the obvious jokes, and I was done.

You can see the original shot was on April 9, 2021, and I remember how relieved I was to get it. Susie’s shot was the next day. I had split the days to learn the process and then to take Susie. (Yes, I have had the Shingles vax too). It was scary back then.

I drove home and went back to work as I described. But, I stopped at our Salt and Straw Handmade Ice Cream store, just a few minutes from the vax, and had ice cream.

The morning on Friday was a bit rushed. I was up at 7ish, dressed, and ready for a few meetings. I was meeting Rick from Physical Therapy at 10:15 at hummingbird house for a re-evaluation for Susie. So I rushed to be parked at 10:00 and then called into a meeting. Yes, I no longer touch my phone when in Beaverton while driving. The meeting at 10 was short as the issue was resolved and the meeting unnecessary. All my other meetings on Friday were also canceled (except for the first status meeting at 8:30) as folks must have been reminded of the No-Meetings Friday rule at the shoe company IT group.

Rick was there to discharge Susie. We had not reached the goal of having Susie be able to transfer. I was not happy. I offered to appeal the decision based on the fact that at least 1/3 of Susie’s visits were canceled due to her having Covid-19, and then she had to recover. I was surprised that Rick agreed with me, but he gave the usual answer that it was the Medicare decision. I then waited, and yes, he discovered that we are not using Medicare but insurance from my employer. We had three more weeks if he wanted to continue. Rick found himself back peddling and seemed relieved. That needs a song, Elton John’s big comeback song.

We set new goals, and Rick then got to work. We got out some rubber bands and discussed how to build strength in the next three weeks. We need to show progress, and he was going all-out to try. Better. Though we look the part, we are not 75+ but not even 60 yet and might be able to make this work.

Susie did stand, but she was pretty unstable. Susie was exhausted by the time we had finished. Jennifer will help with the arm exercises. Excellent.

We called Leta after all the physical and bureaucratic workouts, and Susie fell asleep talking to Leta! Yes, we had a busy morning. That means a song from the 1980s.

I was again unhappy with the ticket from Beaverton and will have to be extra-extra careful now.

Aside: While I sit in my office, a ruby-throated hummingbird visits the roses outside the window. I watch the squirrels, and the local cats patrol the backyard. It is so lovely to sit here and work.

Thanks for reading again. I will carefully drive across Beaverton this morning to see Susie, very carefully!