Grab-bag

Mrs ERJ and I went to a Celebration of Life for the woman who was my mom's room-mate in the nursing home.

"J" was as sharp as a tack and was my mom's "guardian angel". Mom's hearing was impaired and she appeared to be suffering from dementia toward the end. "J" advocated for mom with the staff and alerted us to when things were amiss. With three R.N.s, one LSWM and an honest-to-goodness medical doctor in the extended family most issues could be addressed when we knew about them.

Our family members who lived close to the nursing home continued to visit "J" even after Mom passed away. They took her "Big B" coffee; strong, fresh, well-brewed coffee.

The nursing home offered coffee as one of the beverages they served with breakfast but they were short-staffed and the small cup of weak, stale, tepid brown-drink did not resemble the coffee that "J" craved.

"J" was 74 when she passed away.

I talked with the owner of the tavern where the celebration was held. He lamented that he was still suffering from the effects of the state of Michigan's Covid response. He cannot hire help and is running four-days-a-week and short-hours. Imagine, an established tavern forced to delay opening until 3:00 in the afternoon on Saturdays and closing at 11:00 because he cannot find help.

I asked him if he had been able to negotiate a reduction in his rent. He was not able to do so.

And that is in a college town where you would think there would be students looking to earn some fun-money. But...it is still easier to borrow it and the students keep hearing that they will never have to pay it back.

Tomato stakes

Mrs ERJ continues to drag artifacts out of the "study" that we are cleaning out.

If you recall, this room is (one of) the Sargasso Seas of Casa ERJ.

The uses of many of the items she has been finding are opaque to her. She piles "like" items together for me to deal with.

She kept running into thin metal rods that were about 30" long. The ends of the rods intrigued her.

After extracting the nth one from the Sargasso Sea, she approached me and asked why the tomato stakes had that funny shape on the end.

I looked down my nose and informed her "Those are not tomato stakes. Those are cleaning rods from Military Surplus rifles."

And then my heart stopped.

Mrs ERJ slowly pivoted and looked at the pile on the end of the table. I could SEE her counting them.

She asked me "How many came with each rifle?"

I was tempted to fib and tell her "Three", but I didn't. I said "Generally one per rifle although..." swallowing "...sometimes the rod gets lost and a rifle comes without a cleaning rod."

She turned back to me. "Yeah, they are too short for tomato stakes."

And that was the end of it. At least, I think that was the end of it. I may have to buy her some expensive, round artifacts with a hole in the middle of each one of them to even things up.

The mini-van needs new tires. That should count for about four cleaning rods off the end of the table.

Still mostly unplugged

I am adding in squats and starting to use a machine that mimics "pull-ups". At this point I am fiddling with form and trying to sneak up on the weight I should be using.

For a guy of my height, being able to step up to the second step on a step-stool using only one leg (standing flat-footed with the foot on the ground) is the equivalent of being able to squat my body-weight. I am not quite there, yet.

I use free-weights when I can so I have the benefit of improving my stability muscles but you cannot beat a machine for the speed with which you can make adjustments.

We are in the middle of a warm period and the snow and ice are gone from the roads. As soon as the mud firms up a little bit, I intend to add running into the mix.

Memory

One of the few times when having hand-writing that is totally illegible works in your favor.

I am at the point where I need to write things down. To be totally honest, I passed that point about five years ago but pride got in the way.

Juvenile humor

Some humor only works verbally.

Riddle: Do you know how you can tell genuine molasses from counterfeit molasses?

Answer below the break

Genuine molasses smells like worms when they fart.