Friday, November 18th, 2022
Friday Five
TGIF! Time to share five random things about our week:
- Wizard has finished the building portion of the garage! But man, his hands are a mess. Most of his fingers have cracks in them. Do you think that stops him??? Please a few bloody cracks in his skin are not the same thing as a Man Cold
He’s done a great job! He has more organizing to do but the bulk of it is done. - My brother-in-law is home now, and we’re hoping he continues to feel better. Fingers crossed!
- Turbo and his family have mostly recovered! They are planning to come out Sunday. Turbo wants to make chocolate rice crispy treats. Easy and fun!
- On the baking front, I found a non-dairy and gluten free chocolate cookie! They are meringue cookies, but very rich which is almost an oxymoron since meringue cookies are usually light. I froze them to see how they defrost. This cookie was just a personal challenge as I know someone who can’t have dairy or wheat, and I limit those items in my diet. Then I went to make vegan white chocolate macadamia cookies (which people seem to really like!) and realized I didn’t have any dairy free white chocolate chips. Now this is a problem since they are super hard to find in my town. Long story short, I’m hoping they ones I ordered arrive tomorrow as promised by Amazon, then I will make those. But all this is fun stuff. Eventually I’ll make cakes again. Cookies are just easier to freeze and get one or two out when we want them. I also have a half batch of regular and very good chocolate chip cookies in my freezer Unless Wizard ate them all when I was gone yesterday, LOL!
- My CT scan was yesterday and I did everything right because I sooooo want to be done with all this. I arrived an hour early, drank the contrast stuff (no idea what it was, but I was determined to get this done!). Waited an hour, got all set up in the room then drank even more mystery solution. Then the tech put my IV in. I started to get worried just because she kept cautioning me not to bend my arm so as not to pop out the IV. Okay…so they do the first two scans, then tell me the machine will put the contrast in my IV. Liquid spurted everywhere but into my vein. Two people came running, they thought I was having a reaction when actually something in the IV line spouted holes or a connector failed. I couldn’t really see from my position, but I know the needle in my arm was in fine. The next try shot contrast into my hair and the two techs were pretty flustered by them. On the the third they “think” some contrast went in, but I can barely feel it. What I should have felt was a sweep flush of warmth that makes me question my bladder control. But what I did feel was a tiny trickle of warmth a few inches up my arm then nothing. I have serious doubts about whether they were able to shoot good enough contrast scans. I so don’t want to have to redo this scan. We’ll see.
So that’s my five, now I’d love to hear yours! I hope everyone has a terrific weekend!
November 18th, 2022 at 7:22 am · Link
Yay for Wizard! Boo for ouchie hands, though. My fingers are crossed for your brother-in-law, too. Yay for Turbo and his folks getting well enough to visit again. Yay for cookies. Ack, sorry that happened to you at the CT. :hugs:
1) I made the cake. A picture of it is on my blog. It is not Holiday Baking Championship cake, but it’ll do. I hope the gal likes it.
2) I said something to one of my co-workers and he was all like ‘heh, you’re dating yourself’. Well, yah. I don’t pretend to be any age but what I am.
3) There’s a dog at the pet rescue that I fell in love with. He’s 125 pounds of awesome. But we still won’t be getting him. I won’t do that to Hubs because he would be the person doing all the work. But I still want that dog.
4) Did you know that German chocolate cake has nothing to do with nationality? Some dude with the last name of German invented the chocolate used in that type of cake.
5) I found a reasonably priced and not too huge turkey for TGD. It’s still 14 pounds, which means loads of leftovers for Hubs and I. Yay.
November 18th, 2022 at 9:12 am · Link
O’Keefe’s Working Hands hand cream for Wiz. It’ll help the cracks now and will help prevent them in future but yay for getting it done! Yay for better family health with BiL and FamTurbo! Yay for cookies! Ugh on the SNAFU at the scan. Hope they got enough so you don’t have to repeat. Crossing 🤞🏼. My five:
1. We had a forecast for snow at the beginning of the week so LG went out to “winterize” his truck–putting the windshield wipers vertical and covering his mirrors with plastic bags. He did the same thing for my Highlander–who is NOT used to being outside in the weather (🤞🏼 the door comes in by next week!). Thing is, Drover has heated mirrors. LOL I said two words: Thank you. Of course, then we only got a trace of snow. 🤣
2. I found the groove, finished polishing, formatted, and published UNDER THE ASSASSIN’S MOON. After “pulling the trigger” I found ONE FREAKING TYPO! I caught it in time for the ‘Zon but I have to wait to update on D2D. 🤦🏼♀️
3. I went on a shopping spree. I’d ordered new flannel sleep pants. They were a disaster but I couldn’t return them. Ordered new ones from a trusted brand. They come today. To get free shipping from Wallyworld, I need a few $$ more so I ordered a new bra. It arrived yesterday and came as a two-pack. SCORE! And then, I bought new slide on fuzzy slippers. My old pair had a hole worn in the metataursal pad of the left one. New ones are rubber-soled, suede, memory foam, with fake sheep fuzz. Comfy! And warm! I don’t often splurge but well worth the $70 I spent for all.
4. We only enjoyed Stormy one day this week. Weather and other afterschool things narrowed it down. He and his Big Daddy practiced his spelling words because he did his math homework coming home in the truck after school. “Just for fun,” his 4th grade reading teacher (he goes up a grade for that class) upped his AR (Advanced Reading) points to a 100 for the semester because he’s already at 77. He read and took the test on INHERITANCE (2nd book in Christopher Paoli’s dragon trilogy) and got 36 of 36 points on the test.
5. Cat news of the week: The black feral who’s been around for years and that I named Shylock/Shy Cat because he’s very standoffish and quiet, slinking away when I come out to feed but staying on the porch at night has suddenly become very vocal. He has long conversations with me while I’m feeding in the mornings. He still won’t come near but hey, progress? Smudge shows up occasionally, as does Long Tom “hissy cat” Silver. I haven’t seen Lucifer in a long time. 😟 We’re still trying to get Pete to come in. The garage isn’t freezing but it IS cold out there! Loki is still confused about that yellow thing and hides behind the door every morning to say high with a nose bump and a pawk pat.
Have a great weekend all. We’re staying down and in and warm. This whole 30 degrees for a high thing sucks! Also, it gives me no excuse not to get back to serious work on CROSSFIRE. I’d like to have that sucker released before the 1st anniversary of the war in which it’s set. I’m about halfway done and it is NaNo so there’s that. Upward and onward, right? Right!
November 18th, 2022 at 4:16 pm · Link
1. Oh no , poor fingers. If you can get it, Manuka Honey ointment works wonders. I learned about it from an Opossum rescue. https://firsthoney.com/ I have the cream too. They are amazing healing tools.
2. Excellent news on BIL.
3. Chocolate rice crispy treats sound yummy – Go Turbo!
4. Those cookies sound great. Did Wizard get the regular cookies ;)?
5. Oh my! I have my fingers crossed that enough contrast came through to get clear enough results to make an assessment.
1a. I got my hair done today. It seems dark but it may just be me.
2a. It’s been snowing but nothing like back home. My family in NY are all hunkered down. It’s not like they haven’t been through this a time or two.
3a. Silver said her one feral cat is talking up a storm. So is Spunk. I wonder if it has anything to do with the weather.
4a. I have to go shopping tomorrow for normal every day food stuff and I really don’t want to. It’s supposed to be snowy and the crowds of last minute Turkey day buyers will be out. But we need to eat, so out I will go.
5a. My neck is killing me from getting my hair done. I don’t want to make dinner. I just want to curl up and go to sleep. Unfortunately that will not be happening.
I hope everyone has a great weekend and gets as much Thanksgiving prep done ahead of time as possible.
Have fun with Turbo!
November 18th, 2022 at 7:23 pm · Link
B.E., thanks! I just hope they got good enough scans to give me the all clear
But it was a freak accident and not the end of the world.
1) I hopped over to look at your cake, and think it’s great! The important things is how did it taste? Did your co-worker love it?
2) LOL! Why pretend we’re anything but what we are?
3) Oh my gosh, I feel for you on wanting that dog! It’s so hard when you want them but not quite ready for them in your life.
4) Nope I didn’t know that! Now I do!
5) Yay for finding the right turkey! I love turkey leftovers. Plus you make soup too, which I don’t because I’m not as skilled as you
Have a great weekend!
November 18th, 2022 at 7:33 pm · Link
Silver, Thanks! I’ll look into getting that, but the battle is getting Wizard to use it. He keeps “forgetting.” I’m hoping they can see enough to rule out the need for a further scan, but I’d rather repeat that than some of the other procedures
1) Thoughtful of LG even if you do have heated mirrors! But dang, you need your garage door!
But the truth is he clearly comes from a family of readers who also help and encourage him. I did that with my kids as well. I pretty much let them read any book — I just read it too so I could talk it over with them. It worked really well.
2) Congrats!!! You did it and got the book finished and uploaded! That’s huge!
3) Awesome shopping spree with great deals! I love the two for one on the bras!
4) Wow Stormy is so advanced on reading! It’s like his grandma is an author or something
5) It’s fascinating to me that Shylock is chatting with you now. Cat brains are a thing of wonder and it’s definitely progress. Loki is, well, Loki, LOL! Pete probably believes he’s living the dream by having garage access, and he likes his freedom. I’m so glad those cats have you and LG!
Stay warn and have a good weekend!
November 18th, 2022 at 7:38 pm · Link
Viki, I’m with you and just hope the scan has enough contrast to rule out the need for a better one. Thanks on the tip, I’ll check it out!
1) Maybe see how your hair looks after you wash it? I hope you like it then!
2) I feel for everyone in NY right now! I was shocked when I read this morning about the storms there. Hope your family is warm, safe and has power.
3) Huh, that’s interesting that Spunk is talking too. Are they trying to tell us something???
4) Ugh, I hope you can get in and out of the store quickly and without too much damage to your bank account! Food shopping is shocking here right now.
5) I hope your neck feels better. The cold probably isn’t helping either.
I hope you have a good weekend!