Remembering Bill

 

Bill Kelly, River Drive (now called Kelly Drive after the brother of Princess Grace Kelly, John Kelly who often jogged here parallel to the Schuykill River in center city Philadelphia. He (John Kelly) died while on this drive during one of his daily jogs - so much for jogging). Bill is pictured with his Chevrolet Corvair. The year is about 1966, ab out a year after I moved in with Bill. The beginning of my life with Bill. The next fifty-nine years were a dream, which I sorely miss so much now)

The last week has been very stressful for me. 

I think I had a panic attack this morning. All this sturm an drang is resulting from my recent problems with my refrigerator and HVAC system. Two different problems. Funny thing, about a month ago I was thinking things were going too smoothly in my life. I anticipated problems ahead and sure enough these past two weeks have proven that to be true.

The refrigerator situation is still not fixed. I cannot go into the details at this time because of privacy.

The HVAC situation I can go into with a very simple statement. My longtime HVAC company has been grossly overcharging me for years. Thousands of dollars. Of course I dismissed them after the latest attempt to overcharge me and I now have a new HVAC company. Of course I feel like a sucker that I let this company overcharge me for so long. This last time I just had enough. It just didn't make sense. Now I'm embarrassed. I feel like those old people who have been duped into losing their life savings to a pyramid scheme or an Internet romance. I feel so foolish I didn't see this coming. 

Basically, the company I've been using since 2010 was an employee owned company. I had service agreements with them. Never a problem. I felt smart that I was taking a pro active approach to maintaining my system. I was paying about $260 a year for a service agreement. For years it worked. Occasionally a small part had to be replaced but mostly, they just checked my system and that was it. Then about three years ago things started to go downhill. Every time they came (twice a year, once for the heat and the other time for the air conditioning), there were always charges in the hundreds and thousands of dollars. Three years ago I had to replace my whole system for $11,000. This is my third system since I moved to this brand new house in 2005. For comparison I lived in our Pennsylvania house and never paid anything for repair of my heat pump. NADA. Nothing. Here, I'm on my third system. Then last week when the serviceman appeared, he said I needed to replace (at least) three items. One for $400 and the other $480. Another (motor) for $1,520 and the fan for $500. Nothing was itemized like it was in the past. With my service agreement I was supposed to receive a 15% discount. The first time I received one of these sticker shock bills I asked "Is my discount in there?" I was told "It's in there."

Last year I cancelled my plumbing service agreement after the service man said he could "get me a good price ($3,000) to replace three of my four toilets. This came up because they had replaced Bill's bathroom toilet (Bill fell on that toilet and broke it) with one of theirs which was better than my three other builder grade toilets. What? Why would I want to replace my other three toilets? I don't even use those bathrooms. That plumber also charged me $777 for replacing a pipe in my bathroom. I thought that was a little pricey but what do I know? I'm not a plumber.

So with this latest attempt of overcharging me for jobs that probably didn't need to be done I did some research. I found out that this company is no longer employee owned. I also found out that the repairmen work on commission. AH HA! So that's it! This reminded me of when I lived in Pennsylvania and we had to get our cars inspected TWICE a year at an authorized dealer. Of course every time we went to the dealer, there was always a charge. ALWAYS! In the hundreds of dollars and sometimes thousands. EVERY TIME.

In Delaware, they do car inspections differently. Once every TWO years and at a state owned facility. The twenty year I've lived here I only had to pay ONCE to have a left rear turn signal replaced (the light had burned out). Pennsylvania has since reverted back to annual car inspections but still at an "authorized facility", which proves that lobbying works. When I bought my 2010 Subaru at the dealership here in Delaware I initially was going to my dealer every time to get my oil changed and for inspections. You guessed it. Every time they always found something "wrong" that resulted in bills for hundreds of dollars. About six years ago I stopped going to the dealership to get my oil changed, I go to a local guy. I only get charged for the oil change. No "You need new brake pads" or other things that I had no way of checking did I really need it or not?

I probably shouldn't be this way folks, to get this upset over knowing that I've been taken advantage of by my service company for the last several years. I feel like a fool.  I should have known better. 

I'm an honest person. My integrity is one of my most important values. I don't cheat people. I don't plan how I'm going to cheat. Perhaps that why I hate Trump so much. Why I don't get along with my brother. He's a cheater. Of course he's also a Trump supporter which is no surprise. I know that's a horrible thing to say about my brother but it's the truth. My other brother, who died a few years ago, wasn't a cheater. I've always been ashamed that a blood relative of mine, my sibling, is a cheater. Much as I'm ashamed that I permitted myself to be taken advantage of by this service company. My late friend Bob McCamley said something to me many years ago that shocked me at the time but now I realize in one respect he knew me better than I knew myself. He said "Ron, you are the most naive person I've ever known." When he told me that I didn't know whether or not to be offended or take it as a sincere observation from a close friend of mine. 

I'm far from a perfect person but one thing I am not is a liar, cheat and thief. Unfortunately too many people in this world are just that. One thing I realized many years ago is that the world is made up on wolves and sheep. I'm not a wolf but I would like to think I'm not a sheep either. Life is a challenge and as I wrote in my previous blog, life is about learning. I'm still learning folks. And I'll still be learning until the day I die. But you know what folks? I spent my whole adult life with that man in the picture with the Corvair and now I will spend the rest of my life with another man (Pat) who are both honest and loving men. In that respect I am very lucky. 

I look at my pictures of Bill and talk to Pat on FaceTime during times like this when I am so disgusted with some of my fellow human beings. 

I Voted!

 

Me at the early voting site in Milton yesterday morning. I need a new hat.

Since I was I so early yesterday because I couldn't sleep, I decided to vote early. 

We have a special election down here in southern coastal Delaware, Sussex County, District 20 to fill a seat that was vacated.  The woman who won the election last November never showed up for work. Not one day! I guess I should have expected that because that was one of the few politicians who didn't stop at my door and ask for my vote. 

In yesterday's post I showed the two ladies who showed up at my front door and asked me to vote for their candidate. I appreciate that. The regular voting date is August 5th. Early voting started yesterday. 

The polls opened at 7 AM. I left Casa Tipton-Kelly at about 6:30 AM. The voting location was at the Mariner Middle School in Milton. I have driven by that school many times on my way to Milton where I do most of my grocery and garden shopping. I avoid Route One and the Lewes/Rehoboth craziness as much as I can.

Driving  up to the school I saw a couple of lonely signs pointing to the building where the voting will take place. Of course I went into the wrong road and ended up where the school buses are parked. I have a tendency to do that (actually always) when trying to navigate my 2010 red Subaru Forester with almost 100,000 miles on it. Last week when I went to renew my drivers registration at the DMV, I drove in the wrong way too. And remember last week when I drove into the Lowes parking lot? Yep, wrong way again. Just call me Wrong Way Ron. That's the story of my life but I digress.

After exiting the school bus parking lot, I entered the right way and found plenty of parking spaces. Would I be the first voter today?

I saw the "VOTE HERE" signs outside a large building with the door open. 

I saunter up to the open door and walk in past a middle aged man posting a sign on the door. In the distance I see about ten older folk (why are there never young people as poll workers?) gathered around another older gentleman obviously giving them orientation. I say to the man at the door "Orientation". He says "Yes. We're not opened yet." 

I check my watch and sure enough the time was only 6:45 AM! I'm early! Oh the embarrassment!

I apologized to him and excused myself saying "I'll wait in my car." And then I proceeded to hobble out to my car. I wish I could walk like I used to but that will never happen again in whatever remaining years I have left on this earth. I now have that Old Man Walk. Stooped over and barely able to keep my balance. I always have my cane nearby but when out in public I try not to use it. Seems whenever I do I get a lot of pity looks and I become even more invisible. Gone are the days of my foolish youth whenever I ventured out in public I often got those admiring glances and that tall good-looking guy. Not these days folks! Those days are long gone. I remember when I was young and I would see some old man struggling to walk with a pained look on his face. I especially felt sorry for the tall older men who were now bent over in arthritic pain. I'm there now. It is what it is. Another learning experience for moi.

At about two minutes after seven I reentered the school building again and was met with a phalanx of old folks (men and women) seated at folded tables. 

"Who to choose?" I chose the first table which was a mistake. The guy couldn't find me in his system! The guy next to him, who was also a vet like me, was talking to me after I told him I love to vote. I told him that when I was in the Army in 1960 I wanted to vote but couldn't because I was only eighteen years old and back in those Bad Old Days, a United States citizen had to be twenty-years old to vote. Yes, old enough to die for my country but not old enough to vote. Remember those god awful days? Actually the first time I voted was in 1964 in the Lyndon Johnson/Barry Goldwater presidential race. I voted for Barry Goldwater. Yes, I the first time I voted, I voted for a loser. Not the first time in my lifetime either folks. I've been voting for losers ever since. But again, I digress. My fellow veteran, who told me he was in the Marines, said he worked with Army Rangers and he developed a whole new respect for Army vets. Well folks, I obviously wasn't an Army Ranger. My whole three years in the Army was two weeks Basic Training, six months of school for the Army Security Agency, and then the remainder of my three year stint working a desk job at the National Security Agency in Ft. George G. Meade, Maryland. The closest I came to combat was in 1962, during the Cuban Missle Crises when I had to work midnight shift in communications intercept. I never got out of the basement of the massive National Security Agency building at Ft. Meade. Of course I didn't tell my fellow vet these facts, I'll take the hero view he might of had for me. 

When my fellow vet saw that his co-worker still couldn't find me in the voting rolls, he took a look at his computer screen. Yep, there I was matching my driver's license which he was working from. 

That befuddle poll worker keyed in some information on his computer and then turned the screen around for me to sign my signature. Yep, I bend over my arthritic body to sign a computer screen with one of those soft tipped pens. I signed but it didn't look like my regular magnificent scrawl. My signature looked like that illegible scrawl that Trump signs all those executive orders that he spews out almost daily.

After I signed the screen he gave me a long piece of paper, which was my voting receipt (?). With voting receipt in hand I turned around to see many smiling faces and another gentleman motion to me with a sweeping motion of his hand "Choose any booth you would like." They all looked alike so I chose the one closest to me. 

I do my Old Man Hobble over to that curtained booth, quite aware that most if not all of the folks at those tables behind me are looking at me with that pitiful glance I so often these days. Whatever, whatever. I'm wobbly now, what can I say?

I pull the voting booth curtain aside and slip in. I look at the screen and only two names are displayed. Both women, on white (Republican of course) and one black (Democrat). I'm voting for the Democrat, as I almost always have for the past twenty-five years ever since George W. Bush and his administration tried to take away my veteran medical care benefits. I was in between jobs then and had no medical insurance. Yes, the Republicans are always lowering taxes for their rich friends and trying to take away (often successful) medical benefits from those less connected like me. Of course Bush and the Republicans weren't successful in that attempt, they got so much blowback that they changed the legislation to grandfather in old vets like me. But younger veterans, those not yet in the system would no longer have those benefits that were promised to us,"if we needed it", when we signed up. Got to give more money to the rich, don't you know it? And I'm sure you notice that the Republicans are still at it, lowering and taking away medical benefits for the Great Unwashed, those of us who don't have the connections. Again, I digress but that is the main reason I'm no longer a Republican as I was for many years of my life. 

I looked at the screen and then touched the Democrat's name and then pulled the switch to open the curtain and leave. I felt like I was missing something. A poll worker was standing outside my booth. He said "Did you review your selection?" He could clearly see I voted for the Democrat which caused me to wonder "He's probably one of those brainwashed Trump voters and now has a completely different opinion of me, voting for a Democrat and a black woman at that!" I don't care. Then he said "If your vote is what you want then press the "Accept" button which was at the bottom right of the machine. Wow! Screwed up again! Old man here. 

I pressed the button and I heard a "chunk, chunk" and the machine spit out my long while paper voting receipt. I handed it to the gentleman, wished him a "Have a great day!" He and a couple other people happily said to me "You're the first voter today!"

Wow! I think that's the first time that's ever happened for me. Well, that was a nice feeling. 

Then I entered out of that building into the sun, heat and humidity of the day. 

Mission accomplished!

Stressed Out

The start to this morning

Not doing well this morning folks. 

First thing this morning I had a plumber stop over to check out our four (yes, FOUR) toilets.  First thing he did was get stuck trying to back out of our driveway.  Yep, he backed out in the grass and got mud stuck.  What was he thinking?  Well, things happen. No use screaming at him. Of course Bill was and is very upset.

He checked out our toilets. All went well there after an adjustment or two. Then the challenge was getting his stuck truck out of our lawn.  He even had me in the truck (Butch Ron) gunning it while he pushed his van in the back.  Me among the cigaret butts on the floor of his van. Wonder how long that Butch will stay with me. 

He called for a two truck. While waiting for the tow truck a co-worker of his came by.  They managed to get his van unstuck from our lawn with the help of one of our two by fours.

To compensate me he only charged me half price for the service call. Hopefully our irrigation system isn't damaged.

This week has been something every day.  Tomorrow at 2:00 PM, right during my nap time, Bill has a followup appointment to his cataract surgery.  Thursday is my workday.  I go to work at 3 PM.  I've already told them that I'll probably be late to work.

Thursday I have a dental appointment for my crown replacement. I have a temporary crown in down and for the last two weeks. It's a little tight, not a good fit.  I hope my permanent crown is a better fit. Especially since I'll be taking off this Sunday for my annual California two week holiday.

Yesterday I had a serviceman come by to check out that wall basement leak.  He wanted to tear down my dry wall to get his equipment into where the sewer pipe goes out the basement wall.  Uh uh, no way was he tearing down the drywall to our media room.  I sent him on his way. We'll take care of this ourselves.

This past Sunday I checked with my ride to the Philly airport.  Unfortunately he told me he wouldn't be able to take me.  He's still undergoing medical treatments (radiation) and not feeling well.  I texted my backup ride.  He couldn't take me either.  Then I texted Mike and Bob.  They can take me.  Thank you Mike and Bob!!!

Now I have to decide what to wear to California.  Ah yes folks, I am gay and "what to wear" is a major concern.  I wish I was like Pat.  He can pack his entire two week wardrobe into a shoulder pack.  And yet he still looks stylish.  Some people have that knack. I don't.

Speaking of packing for a trip, a major part of my packing is electronic equipment. Chargers, portable speaker, wires, chargers, and chargers. Did I say chargers?  

A beautiful sunny day here today folks. Yesterday the temperature reached 63 degrees.  I love it!

Have a great day every one.  I'm going to try and zone out this afternoon and take a deep nap to destress myself.

Topsoil and grass seed needed

Murphy's Law in the Supermarket

The most popular section of the frozen food aisle

This morning at my favorite supermarket (Food Lion in Milton) I went shopping for frozen broccoli, an important ingredient in my personal recipe for chicken/broccoli/stuffing casserole. 

I usually go shopping early to avoid the school mom crowds in the afternoon.  When I food shop, usually the only other people there are little old ladies.  

Last week when I went to the frozen food aisle a little old lady hovered over the area of the frozen food aisle where I wanted to get my frozen broccoli. Check out the photo above, the frozen food aisle is a long aisle.  Frozen pizzas, other frozen vegetables, frozen meals, etc but where does the little old lady hover?  Just where I want to get my frozen broccoli.  And I mean hover and linger, a good fifteen minutes. I roll my cart around the store and come back and she's STILL THERE, trying to make up her mind.  Finally, she left, albeit very slowly.  I got my frozen chopped up broccoli, made my casserole which Bill and I consumed.

Today was time for another Ron Chicken Broccoli Stuffing casserole.  I go to the store.  This time there is a different person blocking me.  A young man who is a store employee, scanning the prices. He's taking his time.  I roll my cart around the store to complete my shopping, planning on going back when he is done.  I go back and he is done, but now there is ANOTHER woman hovering in the exact area where I want to get my frozen broccoli.  Another good ten minutes to fifteen minutes, trying to make up her mind.  Well, that chopped up broccoli is good.  I put it in my casserole without precooking it, because the broccoli comes out crisp and tasty.  

She finally left.  And I got my broccoli.  

I made my chicken casserole tonight and it was delicious. 

I think next time I'll just bull my way in when I want to buy more frozen broccoli. "Excuse me ma'am, could you please get out of the way while you make up your mind?"  Probably what I should have done the first time I encountered this problem. 

Ron's Chicken Broccoli Stuffing Recipe:

Ingredients:

1 pound of thin chicken cutlets
1/2 cup white wine
salt and pepper to taste
1 can cream of chicken and mushroom soup
1/2 cup milk
2 cups chopped frozen broccoli
1 box prepared Stove Top Chicken stuffing
1 cup sharp cheddar cheese

Place raw chicken in crock pot. Sprinkle sale and pepper to taste. 

Pour in 1/2 cup white wine over chicken

Cook on low four to six hours

Remove from Crock Pot. 

Place in casserole dish. 

Cut up chicken in bite sized pieces

More salt and pepper to taste over top of cut up chicken

Sprinkle raw frozen broccoli over chicken

Pour juice remaining in Crock Pot over broccoli and chicken (this important because the liquid cooks the broccoli just enough to make it eatable but still remains crisp)

Mix milk with cream of chicken and mushroom soup

Spread soup mix over broccoli and chicken

Place prepared Stove Top Stuffing over broccoli

Sprinkle top with generous amounts of sharp cheddar cheese

Back at 400 degrees for until browned on top (approximately 30 minutes)

Remove from oven

Cool for approximately ten minutes. 

Dig in and enjoy!

Ron's Chicken Broccoli Stuffing Casserole