Wednesday, December 19, 2018

December 17 - 23, 2018, AZ

Wednesday, December 19.  I’ve had 2 cleaning jobs this week, Karen’s on Monday - a cleanup from her move-out last week and then Jim and Shirley on Tuesday. I will be doing JoAnne and Jerry on Friday, as their next scheduled day falls on Christmas Day.

I have also been scurrying to get Christmas gifts packed and sent to Wisconsin and Minnesota before the deadline. Unfortunately, a gift for the girls that I had shipped to me did not arrive until Tuesday, so I finally got that package in the mail this morning. It should arrive in time.

Today, Tom and I both had appointments with Dr. Roland this morning.  I am amazed at how much better I feel, almost like I am getting psychological treatment rather than chiropractic.  He says that he helps to reset the circuit breakers and I am becoming a believer in his methods. An alternate focus or distraction from the hurting area somehow leads to its feeling better.  And then he gives a homework assignment that has you focus on some stressor in your life and then to let it go gets you feeling less stressed and the muscles, nerves, joints, and mind feel so much better.

We decided to go see the movie, “The Mule”, Clint Eastwood’s latest.  We miscalculated the traffic and got to the first theater too late (and it was fully booked), so went to another theater and got there in plenty of time.  The movie and the soundtrack were enjoyable.

Sunday, December 23.  Early morning coffee and the weekly presentation of activities and updates started the day off on Thursday.  I had a haircut appointment scheduled for the afternoon, but they called and changed it to Friday afternoon.  No problem.

One of our neighbors delivered a package in the afternoon, a ‘giving plate’ that started out with our managers on November 9 and has been passed from site to site since then, each person keeping a gift and replacing it with another, then passing it on. I did have to shop for something, as there is no extra space for keeping ‘in case’ things in this trailer.

We did our grocery shopping yesterday, after taking a nice, long walk around the neighborhood.  The days have been beautiful, in the low 70’s but the nights dip down to the upper 40’s - perfect for sleeping.

We ran errands on Saturday, including grocery shopping in preparation for Christmas recipes and things that we are taking for the dinners we are going to. Somehow, that activity tends to fill our day and before we know it, it is dark outside and it is dinnertime.

Sunday was the day for cooking and baking.  A week or so ago, Tom’s friend Ron gave us a bag of organic pinto beans, and I decided that today would be a good day to fix a pot of beans.  Tom chopped up veggies and ham and we got them going in the crock pot, starting out on high for a couple of hours, then switching to low.  I was so disappointed when we went to eat dinner and the beans were still hard, then i realized that instead of switching to LO, I switched the dial to OFF.  They finished cooking the next day.


I baked a pan of Lemon Bars and Fran’s Special K Bars to take with us on Christmas Eve .