This week went by quickly. Went by? As in walked past me? Anyway, it seemed like a short week. Maybe because I had a little time off the other morning. I still didn't make it to the dump, no matter how many times I vowed to. One dump takes metal for recycling, the other takes clothes. Just what one needs, two dumps to keep track of. I know the hours of both dumps, you know, the sort of information we need to commit to memory.
I visited my doctor yesterday--he has my blood tested and it reveals all sorts of things. Like, my cholesterol (bad) level is down. I'm pre-diabetic (just barely). I have sinusitis (YES--an explanation for my daily headaches, and even better, a cure). I LOST WEIGHT. Seven pounds, add that to the 5 I lost before that. It's such a slow process, weight loss. I'm counting points (pretty much--at least I know how many points I'm supposed to eat every day). WW is a great program and I'm really pleased with my ability to stick to it. Especially now that my food and alcohol-obsessed summer friends have left.
I started weaving baskets again, tentatively. There is one kind that everyone likes, woven with round reed, which I'm not very familiar with. I lost the pattern for this design and I've been trying to re-create it. Without much success, until the other night when I finally figured out what I was doing wrong. So I have 5 that are not good and one that is perfect. Strive for perfection, always. Anyway, they don't take much time to weave and I can get plenty done this weekend. Merry Christmas, everyone.
I'm gearing up for my Thanksgiving trek to RI. I like T-giving, one of my favorite holidays because it's simple and straight-forward. Food, it's all about food. Oh yeah, we're supposed to give thanks. For the food I guess. I'll be with my mother, my niece, maybe a good friend from the past who keeps in touch with and helps out my mother. I haven't seen Meredith in many years so I'm hoping she comes. She lives in D.C. If she comes, I'll probably sleep on the font porch, a favored place of my sister's and mine. It's chilly, for sure, this time of year, but it's nearly sleeping outdoors, with big windows facing the garden and woods. Like the "back room," where we sleep in the off-season. Both are wonderful places to sleep and I'm lucky my mother lives in such a pretty spot with has nice places where one can enjoy the woods.
My mother is old, 84, and now seems like an old person. She's always been youthful and ageless. It's odd to think that I can remember when my mother was as old as I am now. And even younger. When she was my age her husband had recently died and she had to figure out how to make enough money to live on. He took his Social Security earnings with him, so she was stuck and frantic. That's an awful thing, I think, to have a loss like that and not have enough money as well. I guess many Americans face that these days. I'm a lucky ducky, a good job I really like, good benefits, secure employment, maybe near retirement with a good income. maybe. As one friend says (too much) "time will tell."
My father was 12 years older than my mother (he was a teacher, she a student at Mt Holyoke College when they met) so people often thought he was her father. He looked old, bald with gray hair early in life. She looked young, always young. When my siblings and I went out with my father sometimes people said "Isn't it nice of Grandfather to take his grandchildren shopping." I was irritated to hear that--my grandfathers were very different from my father, plus I could sense the disappointment my father felt when people took away his pride in his children. Wow, talk about projecting! Who knows if he cared. But he was a bit indignant.
My father was an interesting person. Many fascinating details of his life, most centering around his impressive intellect. Genius? I think that's a good term. He did some amazing things and my mother is now chronicling his life and achievements. He developed a method for teaching military personnel Morse Code that was used for decades. What I knew about his ability to train was his work with our dogs--he taught one to roll over clockwise, counterclockwise, to sneeze when he wanted to go out, to sit up (well, every dachshund knows how to sit up, it comes with that body shape), speak softly--just about everything but drive a car. He was a Skinnerian, so I was well aware of the effectiveness of positive reinforcement as a young child. Sometitmes the dogs outsmarted him, though, the same way my dogs try to do with me. Give them a treat for pottying outside and they soon learn to go outside, turn around and come in for a treat. Then go to the basement and poop. At least my dogs can't go to a basement. They stare at me when they come in, though, and I don't know when I developed the practice of rewarding them for coming in the door.
I keep thinking of a good dog name for my next dog. Tempting fate? I don't know, and it's probably a disloyal thing to do. Chances is 11 and in great shape, no reason to think she'll die soon. Except that I've had 2 Labs die of cancer at 11. C. has better breeding, though, so maybe she'll live to 15 the way another of my dogs did. Tess is 7 and the only thing I worry about with her is her getting hit by a car. She chases the few cars we come across in the neighborhood (as opposed to Chances, who walks toward them blindly--literally blindly, her eyesight is getting worse). Plus she accompanies strangers through the bog whenever she can. It's been suggested that I have a tag made that says "I'm Tess the Bog Dog and I know my way home." She's so great--sweet and pretty--that I worry someone will take her home. She has a tag that tells everything about her except her birth date and weight. That works pretty much to convince people that she has a home, though many worry about her ability to find her way to the house next door to the bog.
Oh how I do go on about my dogs. I never think of them as substitutes for children, nor do I consider them to be part of my family. They're my beloved pets and they're loyal and loving, enjoying my life along with me.
And now it's off to see a new dentist. He says I have beautiful teeth. Probably from a dentist's point of view that's true.
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