How The Sausage Is Made

Today I will take you behind the scenes to show all my faithful followers where my blogging emanates from. My home office!

I finally have a tripod on which I can place my iPhone camera without breaking all my fingernails. I also have a remote control where I can position myself before I turn on the camera. No more scenes of me rushing to my position for videoing after turning on my iPhone. However, this morning's video is a little jerky because I'm still not smooth at this thing. Give me time. 

The last several weeks I've been in a depressed mood. Can't exactly explain why other than I still miss Bill terribly which I know now I will the rest of my life. I just have to deal with it. Thank God I have Pat in my life. Week after next he will be here for a couple of weeks. Always a treat when Pat is here. 

Fall has finally arrived here in southern coastal Delaware where I have been living for the past twenty years. Just on time to as the Winter Solstice began a few days ago. I am so tired of the heat and humidity of this past summer. It was suffocating. Most days I had to spend in my house. Lately with the cooler weather I can get out and take my daily walk in the Oyster Rocks development (they have better roads) behind my development. I couldn't take these walks in the summer heat and humidity. It would probably kill me. I can't breathe in that heat and humidity. Since I've been walking my legs feel so much better. They tend to swell up if I don't walk. Especially if I spend too much time at my computer as I am doing now. 

I noticed lately my sleep pattern has changed. I wonder what this means? I usually have a later dinner from 7:30 PM on at night. About an hour after I become seriously tired. I try to stay up until at least 10 o'clock but lately I haven't been able to manage it. So I go to bed around 9:30 PM. The thing is I get up around 4:30 AM in the morning. I'm ready to go. But then around 9:30 AM I'm tired again and I take a short nap. In the afternoon I take a long nap. That's my Serious Nap. Usually about an hour to an hour and a half. Pat always calls me at 6 PM to make sure I'm awake. I think I'm entering into serious Old Man Territory folks. 

I think a lot of my current funky mood has to do with the political situation in America now. I won't go into all that mess but you all know what I'm talking about. I will say this though, I'm confident the Dems will win big time the midterm elections but I'm not sure if the current criminal administration of Trump and his thugs will accept that outcome. Fasten your seatbelts folks, more chaos will be coming this November and especially January 3rd when the House is expected to verify the new members of Congress, which I'm sure the current criminals in charge of the United States government will to accept. We live in perilous times folks. To tell you the truth, I'm glad in a way that I'm at the end of my life and I won't have to endure this worry anymore. I have enough to deal with my current physical state where I can hardly walk.

Speaking of which, I think I'll try and take my daily walk now. 

Thoughts On A September Sunday Evening

 

Pat was surprised that I have this original Duane Eddy album from the early Sixties

Well folks, I've been in the dumps lately. 

I don't know exactly but perhaps a lot of it has to do with the current political climate in the country that I live in. I'm trying to avoid going on a political rant but with the prices of everything going up, and the threat everything going to hell in this country, it's hard not to get depressed. So I'm going to think of good things. Pat is coming down again in a couple of weeks!

He'll be here October 4th and stay until October 17th. I already have a rather long To Do List for him. Pat is more of a handyman than I'll ever be. 

I am still in the process of cleaning out my garage and basement of items no longer needed. Mostly items Bill had like old paint, thinner, insect sprays, garden poisons, etc and et al. I'm not getting rid of his tools. Nor his other items. However, I am selling all of our old jeans on eBay. I sold some of my old jeans (I've never thrown away old raggedy jeans) on eBay before Bill's strokes. Pat and I are also going to sell all my old LP albums and original 45's that are still in the original store bags with receipts. At one time I was collecting those 45's. All from the Sixties and Seventies. 

It will be good to have someone in the house. While I enjoy living alone, being alone all the time isn't good. I think that was also contributing to my recent depression. Pat has his own bedroom on the other side of the house. When I go to bed at night I often hear strange nosies. I always feel more comfortable knowing that there is someone else in the house when I hear these strange noises in the night. Bill used to sleep downstairs in his basement bedroom. Even though I've slept apart from both of my husbands, it's nice knowing that they're in the house.

Fall is coming which is helping with my mood. Way too many hot and humid days this past summer. I was often trapped in my air conditioned house for most of the summer. I'm looking forward to working outside now that the cooler, less humid fall weather is making life outside more bearable. 

Have a great week everyone! 

Random Thought On A Rainy September Sunday

 

This morning I woke up to the usual rain and humidity we've been having here at Casa Tipton-Kelly for the last few months of summer. No dry summer this year. 

I recently began a regular walking routine in the morning back in my neighboring development of Oyster Rocks. They recently had their roads repaved (at a cost of $300,000) and it is pleasure to walk on that nice flat road. Here in my development, Covington Chase), the roads are on an incline and uneven. Not pleasant for my arthritic legs. I need my exercise but these days it's painful for me to walk. Not only with my stooped over posture but my legs ache. That was always the one thing I had, I could walk and walk until I got bored. These days I have to listen to my body. When my body says "Enough!" I go home and take a nap. Yes, that's about my life now. 

I mostly stay home these days. I don't like to go out in the heavy summertime traffic. When I do I go out early in the morning to at least avoid some of the traffic. Just last week there was another serious accident just a bit down the road from where I enter the dreaded Route One, also known as Coastal Highway. Route One is a speedway. Entering it one takes one's life into one's own hands. 

When Bill was alive I used to take him out at least once a day for a ride, sometimes twice a day. These days I only venture out once a week or maybe twice. I only go out for grocery shopping and doctor's appointments. There is no other reason for me to go out. I would like to go down to the Rehoboth Beach boardwalk and take a walk with the sea air breeze wafting through my clogged up nostrils. But fighting that traffic and paying $4 to park for half an hour just isn't worth it to me. There is nothing else for me to do in Rehoboth Beach anyway. No interesting stores which only sells overpriced tourist junk imported from China. Restaurants? Way overprice and I don't like to eat alone. So that's out. And I have no interest in hooking up with friends. What friends I had have either died or drifted away into their own lives. I enjoy my own company.

Pat will be down next month. I enjoy being with Pat. We'll go out to a couple of my favorite Mexican restaurants that aren't located in the high rent area of Rehoboth Beach. We'll also go to our favorite Italian restaurant for their off season specials. Oh, an update on Pat's green card status. Nothing. I have heard nothing. I read where those applications could take from eighteen months to two years. I doubt if I'll even be here then. Whatever, whatever. Given the current state of the U.S. government these days, I hold out little hope. If we get his green card, then we can proceed with Pat moving down here. If he doesn't, well, there isn't anything I can do about it. I've pushed worrying about this event way into the background of my everyday concerns. I just don't care that much anymore. 

In the meantime I continue to mark time here until one day I am no longer here and reunited with Bill. That's what I look forward to these days my friends. 

Labor Day Weekend

 

Photo of the back of my home here in southern Delaware taken at 1:26 PM today -  I may not have access to the boardwalk or a view of the ocean but I am perfectly happy here.

Another Labor Day Weekend rolls by this weekend. I didn't go out today at all. And I won't all weekend. Like the rest of the summer, I gave up even attempting to take the ten mile ride down the road to Rehoboth Beach. Why would I? Fight all that traffic to find an expensive parking place in Rehoboth Beach to do what? The only thing I used to enjoy was walking on the boardwalk and I can't even do that now because of my physical infirmities. No problem though, I have a beautiful home right here on my Almost One Acre oasis in the midst of all the summertime chaos. I hear the constant roar of traffic going north and south on Route One just beyond my planted tree barrier while I'm fussing around my fish pond. That's just the way I like it. 

Counting the days folks. 

September In The Rain

 

Ah yes, here we are in September and as the album cover states "September In The Rain."

Dinah Washington is one of my favorite vocalists. 

I have this album of hers. 

I started to collect her albums after I got out of the Army in 1963. I lived alone (before met and moved in with Bill) for about two years. Dinah's music kept me company.

Over the years I drifted away from her music. However I still kept all of her albums. 

After Bill died two and a half years ago I started to listen to her music again. This time I stream her music from my Pandora subscription on my Bose radio. Listening her Dinah sing brings back fond memories of my early days while I was looking for love in all the wrong places. 

Yesterday during one of my several daily conversations with Pat on FaceTime (we're still waiting for his green card), the subject of all my albums came up. I'm at the point in my life which I'll never play another LP again. I have decided to sell online all of my albums, including my Dinah Washington collection. I think I have about two hundred LP albums. 

LP albums have come back into favor again. Pat buys them at about $30 a clip. I bought mine (in the day) for $4.99. Pat and I were checking the value of selling some of my collection and were pleasantly surprised that most if not all of my albums are valuable, some selling for as much as $300. Of course all of my albums are in excellent condition. I even have mint 45 RPM that I've never even taken out of the bags that I brought them home in. They are also of value. This makes me feel good that I can pass on these treasures to others for a new life. A few years before Bill got sick, I was selling items on eBay including my old leather jacket and vest. I was also selling my vintage jeans. I made about $500. I still have about twenty pairs of jeans left to sell. I plan to sell them now that it is fall and I don't have to concern myself with the summertime tourist traffic down here in coastal Delaware. Selling anything on eBay and keeping a good reputation requires a fast and efficient delivery system.

That's it for now folks. And oh, yes it did rain last night.