New Skills Continued

As explained in earlier posts, I am being Nurse Ratched to my wife who is recovering from a total hip replacement. In addition to my "nursing" duties I am am learning a whole new set of skills. Yesterday I focused on the laundry (washing. drying, and folding). Today, lets take on shopping for food and drugs. Two items that should be quite easy and not time consuming at all. Yea, right!



The shopping trip was initiated by the crime of supplying my patient with stale bread for toast. I was handed a list of things to purchase. Eight things to be exact. Bread, hamburger buns, eggs, American cheese, peanuts, washing detergent, Pepcid Complete, and ALKA-SELTZER.



Instructions included using two $4 coupons (pepcid Complete and WISK washing detergent). My wife provided me with a job aid in the form of the ad from the flyer that had a picture of the WISK that was on sale.



Going to the store is not a real easy everyday thing here. We live out in the county, and every shopping trip involves about 14 miles round trip.



First stop was Walgreens for the Pepcid Complete, and ALKA-SELTZER. No problem with the Pepcid Complete, except a mild heart attack at the price. Instant heartburn. Found the ALKA-SELTZER, but every box had been opened. Now momma didn't raise no fool. Never buy a package that has been tampered with or opened. I passed on this item, to purchase at the next store.



Second and final stop Giant Eagle. Started out great, 1 pound of American cheese. Bread is fresh bakery bread. Only two loafs left, both with a sell by date of August 31. Into the cart one goes. On to the eggs. List states one dozen large eggs. Sorted through about 100 cartons of eggs, but all had a use by date of September 3. I guess we'll have to eat these eggs in 4 days. On the list, so into the cart the eggs go. Start looking for peanuts! Found the display for the special on the WISK, but no red bottles with 36 loads as pictured in the flyer with the $4 off coupon. They had 26 load, 50+ load, and 96 load. The coupon is only good on the red bottle-36 load size. Hightailed to the customer service counter for a "raincheck". Gal tried to take advantage of my telling that they were substituting the 26 load bottle for the 36 load bottle. Here again, momma didn't raise no fool. 26 loads of wash is a wee bit less than 36 loads. No way, give me the raincheck-but make sure it lasts after the coupon expires, next week.



Continue and look for peanuts. No friggin peanuts can be found. I know they're there, but damned if I can find them. I look at my watch, and see I've been here for 45 minutes, just to purchase 7 items.



I go to the checkout with my measly 7 items. Six checkouts and only two open; each with about four customers in line. I picked the one that I thought would be the fastest. Wrong again! Lady in front of me had two screaming kids and about 10 to 15 items to purchase; one of which was a gallon of wine. She tried to pay for the stuff with food stamps or some other kind of voucher. Took the cashier and the assistant manager about 10 minutes to convince her the wine could not be purchased with the voucher. By the time it was my turn the cashier was whining to the lady behind me that she would be glad when her shift was over, that the whole day had been a day from Hell. I observed the cashier ring up my seven six item, correctly. As she kept on complaining about the rude customers to the lady behind me, she commenced to put my fresh bread into the bag and toss everything else in on top of the loaf. I said, " hey! you just crushed my loaf of bread by tossing everything in on top of it". She looked at me for the first time and snarled," do you want me to replace it?" My reply, "I really don't care, but the bread is for my wife, and she would say, REPLACE IT!"

Now I can understand why my wife does not enjoy shopping like she used to.



To be continued.......

New Skills!

In addition to my nurse Ratched routine, there is a whole new skill set having to do with the everyday activities of managing a house. Now I realize that most women will laugh at my plight with this new skill set. But you see, I have been a "kept man" for nearly 50 years. In the past ten days I have had to learn to do the following activities. Maybe I haven't learned, but I have had to do them, never the less.



a. Sort light from dark stuff to wash. Sounds easy. Sounds straight forward. Not so! There seems to be shades of gray (or any other color). If not mastered, pink underwear may result.



b. Load the washer. Simple! Well, what if you try to do more than you should. Don't ask me how I figured that one out.



c. Set the controls. Hot or Cold? Light load, normal, or heavy load. I did find out that the "heavy load" setting will not compensate for cramming all the towels and levis, and bathroom rug into the washer.



d. Add the soap. Everything is fine here, until I discover that there are at least three kinds of soap. God, I hope I picked the right one. What ever happened to the boxes of regular soap? Now it's all liquid (at least at my house).

e. Load the dryer. This proved the easiest thing. That is until after the load was dried, when I found out I should have pulled some stuff and put them on the line to dry. Something about"delicates".

f. Unload the dryer. There again, this should be simple. I did not know that you must unload the dryer as soon as it quits its cycle. Never, never let the dried clothes sit in the dryer.

g. Fold the laundry. Not so simple, when there is a right way and a wrong way to fold.

If I can get some rest, I'll go into the other skills I'm learning. Consulting on meals, shopping and the whole area of coupons, cleaning, bed changing, putting toilet paper rolls on the roller, etc, etc.

Birthday Present!

Well, among everything else that is happening I had a birthday slip in. I had honestly forgot about it. But the Flower Girls did not. Notice the Gnomes holding hands to form the "H".

In addition to bringing flowers for my wife, and some cake for me, they brought me a present. The present is a great little Gnome Home for a flower bed. I love it. Gnomes will be next.

After hugs and kisses, the girls begged to see the incision from my wife's hip replacement.

Slight Delay in Postings

Some may have noticed that there has been a delay in new postings. There is a reason. I have been distracted from the normal day to day activities that some times become the basis for my blog postings. I have assumed the role of "Nurse Ratched" here at home. My wife had total hip replacement surgery on Wednesday August 18, and is recovering here at home. As amazing as this surgery is, it still limits ones mobility for a while. It means that I have new responsibilities, and a new role as "coach". One one hand, I have available a whole new area of posting possibilities. While, on the other hand, my allotment of time has been altered. One of the "Flower Girls", has been over to visit, and the other will be here any moment now. Perhaps out of these visits I'll have something of interest to report.

Shadow Box

Seems I'm always losing some of my small carvings. The shadow box is a great way to not only display the small carvings, but a good way to keep them too. I put a small dab of that "Reusable Adhesive Putty" on the base of the pieces and that hold them in place. This shadow box measures 16" x 12".

Little Ark!

A little Noah's Ark always needs pairs of little animals. My pocket knife is there so you can better get an idea of the sizes involved. With this ark are, camels, brown bears, polar bears, elephants, horses, and rhinos.

Oh! I am also selecting some 30's fabric to start cutting for some quilt squares. That is, if I haven't forgotten how.......

Spots!

What better way to spend a Sunday afternoon, than painting spots on cheetahs. Could it be stripes on tigers? Maybe! You'd better be sure your hand is steady...