Stop needling me.

 

Cookie gets allergy shots because those 12 years in Baltimore really did a number on me. 

I had a great allergist in Baltimore with fantastic office assistants. After moving to Cleveland, I had a heck of a time finding an allergist who was accepting new patients.   When I found one, we needed to start the series of shots from the basement (Weekly) and build me back up to Monthly. 

If you get them, you appreciate someone who knows how to give them.  Done the right way, its a tiny needle, and the shot is subcutaneous, and the shot isn't painful, while the contents of the shot could interact with your body's immune response to the allergen. 

The idea is to slowly introduce a controlled amount, to build up the body's tolerance to the allergen, and thus keeping it from a histamine freakout that causes the watery eyes, the snot, the sneezing, and the coughing.  

To give the shot, and make sure it doesn't go into the muscle, they pinch the skin on the back of the arm, lifting from the muscle, and then give you the injection.  If it lands in the muscle, then either they used the wrong needle, or they drove it deep. 

A well-given allergy shot is practically unfelt. And while there may be a wee bit of discomfort afterward, it goes away.   But when the tech fucks it up, watch out.  Its a painful shot that will be a painful injection site.

Well, two weeks ago, I went in and got a tech that I had never seen before. Dressed in scrubs, a lab coat, and a surgical cap - all of which is a bit much - she called me in, barked an order at me for name and date of birth, which she insisted I tell her in front of stangers, and the hollared at me through the hall while she pulled shot tray.  All of which was off.  Normally, it's all done one on one, without broadcasting to everybody.

Then she comes in, swabs my arms in the wrong place for the shots, grabs my arm, pinches tightly and then drives the needle deep into my arm.  I yelped because it hurt like Hell.  Then she told me that it hurt because "you tensed up."  Then she repeats the process, only this time I can feel the needle being withdrawn.  And the back of my arm develops these massive welts.  I ask for some hydrocortisone cream to soothe everything back down, and she looks at me, rolls her eyes, and then scrubs cream into my arms. 

Now here's the thing, when they are done correctly, subcutaneously, there is minor discomfort for a couple hours.  But four days in my arms still hurt like a motherfucker, and I still had welts.  It was so bad, I called the doctor and asked if it hurt because the shots didn't go well or what. 

So I went back in week later for my last weekly shot, and damn it, I draw the exact same tech.  Only this time, and verily gunning for me.  I provided her with the information, even though she barked it from the hall, and when she came in with the shots, I asked her which one was the "cats" allergen is in.  

All she had to do was look at the sheet and tell me left or right.  Instead, she says, "Whatever arm it was in last week, it's in the opposite arm this week." 

I said, "I understand that, but I don't remember which arm it was last week because both shots were terribly painful."  

She looks at me.  I don't mean she looked at me, she looked through me, and said "Because you tensed up." 

And then she sets everything down, storms out, and I hear her tell someone else she can't work with me. 

So another tech who has been there forever comes in, gives both shots, and asks what went on.  I asked her to close the door, and we talked. 

I explained that I don't like being barked at for being a patient.  I said that the injections the week before hurt because they went too deep, and that I had called the doctor to tell him that.  But I also said that in the hundreds of these shots I have had since 2013, there have been three sets given to me by people who didn't seem to care what my experience was, and that I didn't want that tech giving me another shot again. 

She listened, and asked, "So what do you think caused this?" and I simply said that the tech and I don't seem to be able to work together, and that I think it would be best for her, and for me, if we didn't have to encounter one another.  And said she could make that happen. 

Frankly, I do not want to encounter her at all. She didn't respect me as a patient in a procedure, and I don't need that.  No one does.  I don't wish her any ill will, we just shouldn't work together. 

Anyway, I am happy to report that I had no problem with the shot sites later on Friday or over the weekend. 

So we'll see what happens in three weeks. 

Summer is Winding Down

 

1970s TV Guide ad artwork for Late Late Early Late Show
Showing of Joan Crawford's Female on the Beach. One of
the BEST summer campy movies of all time.  

Well, here it is towards the end of June, and in Cookie's book, we're on the downside summer.  Yes, I know it just began, but Cookie loves that time of year when each day is a wee bit longer than the last.  But now, each day is a wee bit shorter than the one before it, leading up to that dreaded month that Cookie can bearly function through: NOVEMBER. 

Ugh. 

And let's face it, in ten days or so, Summer merchandise will start going on sale in stores as the fall merchandise and "Back to School Sale" promotions kick into gear. And before you know it, the autumn leaves need to be raked. 

But enough about my problems. Not nearly enough, but you get the idea.

As for Shaker Heights, it is at once divine, and on the other hand damning. 

The divine is, it suits me rather well. There are no struggles here.  The trash gets picked up, the recycling gets picked up, and stores are mostly handy. One bonus is that I never realized what a traffic light Hell Cleveland Heights, University Heights, and South Euclid are. Instead of an hour, the drive to get my allergy shots is 15 minutes from Shaker to Landerwood. 

The downside of this is that if it weren't for the Husband, Cookie would be very lonely.  It's hard being a man who is this old, moving someone a new place, and meeting people, and making new friends.  Oh, you can make friends, but there are a lot of people who want to use you for what they can get out of you.  I found that out the hard way. 

The other hard thing is that so many of the people here are people I knew from grade school. They smile, they are pleasant, but I have always been neither fish nor foul to them.  So I am still not one of them because I was never one of them in the first place. 

Remember, Cookie was always a bit of an outlier.  One foot in one world, and another foot someplace else. 

So I went down to Columbus for a few days, to like my wounds, and be around people who like being around me. It was restorative. 

So here we are.  I am grateful for the experience, but I am still pining for home.

I'll get by. I always do. 

It's been a rainy, cold month, and its only May 4th!

 

Forgive my absence. 

April was such a cold, damp, and dreary month that most of us in "The Land" felt it was November. 

May, thus far, hasn't turned up anything better.  Mother Nature is certainly behaving like she has the pip and is exuding all the warmth and chariableness of brittle thin-lipped, uptight spinster at a performance of "Oh, Calcutta." So the first week of May is more like an add-on to April; we hope things will turn around at the end of this week.   

The Cookie's continue to nest in our new house, and we are finding more and more surprises.  

We have ordered new storm windows and screens. new storm doors.  When the porch door is added, we'll be able to actually walk out of the back porch into the back yard. 

A pleasant surprise was that our knarled dogwood turned into a Japanese maple.  When I saw what these were selling for, I had a moment of elation.  A tiny one is about $350.  Ours is at least medium, reaching about 10 feet in height. 

I just returned from my annual trip into the Genealogy world. The convention and annual meeting aren't the draw they used to be.  I go any more to see friends, go out to dinner, and partake in game nights. 

This year, we played a new game, Dead Grandma.  The premise is this, Grandma is dead and everyone around the table are her beloved heirs.  Cards are dealt with dollar amounts and "actions" that can be played on others.  To start, you place one card down to bid on one of Grandma's most cherished possessions (like her handbag full of melted sticky butterscotch drops), and then you play to win by stiffing the other people.  If you win the hand, you keep the card.  The first player to win three cards the same color, or one card each of three colors. 

We also played Crack List, and another game, but honestly, that name escapes me.  It was kind of like $25,000 pyramid, but with a 60-second time limit. 

A merry time was had by all. 

My sessions included Genealogical DNA, deciphering "olde tyme" scripts, how to search for women in court records when all you have is a married surname, structuring files, and indexing.  

As you can see, Cookie leads an interesting life. 

The only Angst, and I capitalize it, I have experienced all week is due to politics and the potential loss of our freedoms in our country.  I am sick with worry. 

So I have been focusing on what I can do, which is getting through each day and cheering any victories as they come. 

Messy Flowers, and Batching it.

 

Well, hello, April.  

When I was very young and I heard the old "April showers bring May flowers," I thought it was about people.  My mother knew members of the Showers family and members of the Flowers family. So I thought it was some woman named April who was bringing her friend May over. 

"Sweetie," said my mother, "No, It's an expression.  It rains in April.  And all that rain gets flowers ready to bloom in May."  OK, that made sense. 

But if we went to my grandmother's, she had a Bingo friend, Bessie Flowers, and for the longest time, I thought he name was Messy Flowers.  Of course, I never said that to her face.  Back then children referred to adults as Mr., Mrs., or Miss. 

What can I say?  Sometimes, I ain't right, then or now. 

Anyway...

The Husband has traveled back to his employer's divisional HQ to train another worker bee so he can shift to a different desk covering a different part of the country, so the boys and I have been batching it. 

Kevin is old, but our poor Rocky has aged the most in the past two years.  He gets disoriented, is hard of hearing, and sleeps 22 of 24 hours a day.  But because of his kidneys, he has to go out every hour to two hours during our waking day.  Since we haven't had the chance to get a fence in, that means I have to get them in their harnesses and take them into the back yard and on walks. 

And being pampered, they HATE being on a leash and want to roam free. 

They hate getting into their harnesses. It is a struggle. 

The first couple of days were easy because they were compliant. Now, the struggle is very real. When the husband comes home, he can fight that good fight. 

But when we go one a walk, Kevin wants to pull, Rocky is just very slow.  The neighbors see me being pulled from both directions.  And Kevin being part JRT means he's trained not to pull, but his selective memory engages and he behaves like he is a magnet and there is some attractive metal pulling him forward. 

The highlight of the morning today was "dual poopage", meaning one of them turns around and around, which sets off the other, and they both go at the same time. 

This is when I get excited because I only have to use one pick up bag.  

I so need a vacation.

And, yeah, it's time for my husband to come home. 

On, Off, Pop, P-U

 So the Cookies are in the new house, and we are getting back to this part of "moving" life that we live. 

We work.  And we work hard. And we unpack a few boxes at a time, and we get into the "wet hair, apply, rinse, repeat" cycle of life.  And laundry. Dear God the Unending Laundry.

But yesterday morning, Cookie started working on some things in the primary bath.  Put away this, move that,  install a towel bar, scrub, scrub, scrub.  That's when Cookie noticed that the four-way gang switches are greasy dirty gunk left by the former owners and full of dusty, cruddy dirt.  

So Cookie gets a screw driver, and begins to remove the eight screws that hold said plate in place.  

Now, I couldn't find an image of our wall switch plate because ours is chrome, chosen by the previous owner - and very antiseptic looking - so this will have to work:

Yes, all of the wall plate and outlet cover screws are aligned in my house, up and down.

This wall switch operates the:

1) Bathroom ceiling light,
2) The lights over the counter with the sinks,  aka Vanity Light,
3) the Stall Shower light (which is actually on the opposite wall from the vanity, and the
4) Bathroom Fan.   

I should add in that because the primary bath was originally built as a Jack-n-Jill bath, their is another single switch on the far side of the bathroom that is just inside the door to the adjoining bedroom. 

And Cookie is not going in to play with the guts of the switches, because Cookie is smart.  But I was going to dry dust the back of the plates and use a microfiber towel to Mr. and Mrs. Former owners grease and dirt off the switches. 

So, with the lights all on, and starting on the right, I unscrew the screw below the Fan (4) switch, above the Fan switch, remove the screw below the Stall Shower switch - and everything is fine.  Then I start to remove the screw above the stall shower switch - one turn, two turns, three tur...and the lights over the Vanity go out.  

Now, this shouldn't happen.  And I said what I normally say when something FUBAR happens: "That's odd."

So what does Cookie do? Well, I stopped unscrewing it and instead turned the screw a quarter turn to the right to tighten it, and the Vanity Light goes back on.

I pull back the screw driver, step back and tell The Husband what happened.  Being a man, he wants to make that happen.  So and so he does, and it does the same thing.  And he says "It shouldn't do that."

He looks at me, and I look at him and we both say, "Call the electrician."

Now, I have worked with electricity when it works the way it should, but I am smart enough to know that when you have this much wrong going on to call a licensed electrician.  

This is the type of shit that can spark and burn the house down.

So our electrician ambles over with his helper, and I explain what is happening and he gets a puzzled look on his face.  So, up we go.  And I show him and his helper.  Now, this guy is really good.  He's been doing this for a long while.  But he got this weird look on his face and said "What the Hell?"

Then he said, "Can I try that?" I handed him the insulated screw driver, and he twisted it and there go the lights.  He turns it the other way, and the lights come back on.

I explained that the lights that went off were on the opposite wall of the lights controlled by the switch.

And then I get a "Well, that's odd" from the electrician.

"Let's get that cover off and get a good look at this."  

He unscrews the remaining screws, starts to take the UL rated metal plate down, and first a bright flash, then a puff of smoke and the smell of OZONE, and the whole house trips off.  The electrician is fine, but he did say, "I didn't see that coming."

We reset the breaker, the house comes back online, and he starts taking everything apart. 

What he sees is a rat's nest of old and new wires, jumpers, and a ground attached to a neutral.  That gets a "God damn it!" 

We made the right call. 

Long story short, whoever the previous owner hired to do this electrical work when they had the bath remodeled didn't know what he was doing, and it could have fried us or caught the house on fire.   

So two hours and 200 dollars later, and a "You got the discount I give people when I see something really botched that your home inspector never would have caught," we are in good stead.  

HOWEVER, they are coming back to go over the kitchen outlets, which were also part of the remodel.                             

Looks like we made it!

 

We are exhausted as all get out, but the Husband and Cookie have made it through the move, the selling of the old house, the closing, etc., and so on. 

Simply put, the next move out of this house is to either assisted living or the mortuary. 

We are not doing this again. 

Well maybe, if we win the lottery. 

A really big lottery. 

The people who bought the former Chateau Cookie have settled in.  We were able to pass them our boxes, wrapping paper, etc., so at least the boxes were recycled. 

The old house was listed for sale at noon on a Friday.  By 3PM, it was sold. You read that right.  

This is the second fast sale that we've had.  One trip through the place and a young couple with lots of enthusiasm put in an offer on the spot. 

Once the dust settled I kept checking the paper to make sure the property here transferred and there transferred as well.  

Verily, Sweet Smoking Jesus 
Was looking out for us.

And one day, Sweet Smoking Jesus, it was in.  Officially, and for the nosey, the properties were listed in the daily paper as transferred.

We did have some bumps on our end.  Like not being able to unpack as quickly as possible because "things" came up. 

It seems that we have fallen into the trap of buying houses that are being sold by long-term residents who are elderly, and they overlook things.  Like the body oil caught up in steam that sticks to the bathroom walls, and the crusted gunk that forms in the ovens and around the range.  And then there is the water filter and charcoal air filter in the fridge that I dare not describe lest I incarnate a reunion of Kim and Aggie. 

Needless to say for the last 12 weeks we've been busy.  Very very busy. 

Now I am back. 

Snow, and lots of it.

 

Welp, it snowed here.  

A lot. 

Almost all day yesterday, in fact.  I kid you not. 

It's hard to say how much we got because then it decided to get windy.  

So all that snow started blowing. 

Well, not all of it.  But enough. 

I cleaned my car off yesterday at 11am when it was about 4" deep. By this morning it had almost a foot of free accumulation meant cleaning the car off, again. 

And I also had to dig it out because the guy who plowed our driveway plowed it in.   Why? There simply wasn't anywhere to put what came off the driveway. 

Ugh. 

The good news is, the sun is out so surfaces are at least getting some warmth.  

The bad news is, that some of the snow is melting to ice. 

But we know what we signed up for when we moved here. 

The better news is it's February 17, so March 1st is coming. 

And if March 1st is fast approaching, I need to stop writing this and start packing.