The need for distraction

Although I’ve been playing golf for 30 years, I didn’t realize until now what it does for me psychologically. I love the game, but it turns out I need the near complete distraction golf provides in my life. It seems I have been replacing it with doomscrolling, and um, just so you know. That doesn’t work.

Somehow golf hits the sweet spot for focus, movement, being outside and just enough mental challenge to occupy my mind. I don’t think about much of anything else when I’m playing, and believe me, that’s a good thing. You really don’t want to know what else goes on in there.

I’m 13 weeks post-fracture, so I’m guessing the earliest I might be able to play is June. More likely July. Although I am going to start putting and perhaps hit a few wiffle balls into a net at home. Now that my pain is quite manageable, I don’t want to do anything to mess that up.

I really can’t think of anything that so efficiently replaces my need for complete distraction. What in your life scratches that itch?

Art occupies me in some ways, but there’s a lot of time to daydream. And let me be clear. It’s not that daydreams are bad, it’s just that my daydreams are bad. My other hobby is ruminating on all things horrible.

Reading is a nice immersion experience, but again, my mind wanders. A good hike where you watch the scenery but also your footing might be close, but I’m still a long ways off from that, too.

The next best experience might be cooking. It’s missing the outdoorsy component, although I believe that’s a topic deserving of more thought. A long, complicated dish that takes all day to cook might come close to 18 holes.

These days I have to be so careful I don’t miss ingredients, and sometimes I improvise, so I’m giving cooking a few stars for focus and mental challenge. I should be awarded an advanced degree just for figuring out how to get my sourdough starter to rise with regularity.

Cooking and golf both offer the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. Golf is particularly good at defeat.

So, I’ve probably got another few months before recreational defeat, I mean golf, becomes an option. Cooking will have to be my lifeline. I celebrated my decision by going to the store and getting everything to make moussaka tomorrow. That will take all day. I usually fry the eggplant on the cooktop, but this time I’m going to try roasting it in the oven.

Earlier this week I made spinach pie. It was not the Greek style with feta cheese in phyllo but a variation with Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese and puff pastry. This was my first time using frozen puff pastry. It was easy. I did have to roll it out a bit but it wasn’t too firm like my cookie dough and didn’t aggravate my arm.

The recipe called for frozen whole leaf spinach, but I could not find that. I ended up buying chopped, and it was fine. It has been a long time since I bought frozen spinach. I wonder where the whole leaf went?

I can definitely see an uptick in our grocery bills. The stuff for moussaka came to almost $70. That included two pounds of lamb, four eggplants, a dozen large eggs and a big hunk of Pecorino Romano cheese.

That will make at least eight servings, so it’s not all that bad if you do the math, but I’m grateful we can afford the ingredients we like to make wonderful food at home. I do not take it for granted.

Oh, well, but …

I intended to make cookies this weekend, but it proved a bridge too far. Rolling out the dough was tough on my broken arm, and then messing around with the royal icing made everything throb. Two nights of bad sleep was enough for me. Some were frosted, some weren’t. I froze them all and quit.

For me to even say that in my outside voice is shocking. I never quit anything until my knuckles are bleeding. But I am not the same person I was then. Maybe this is a good thing?

It’s not that I’m less capable because I’m older, I told myself. I’m less capable right now because I have an injury. Oh, sure, I felt better for a minute, but the reality is I’m less capable. Probably not forever, but here I am, stuck in the present again.

I used to get all spun up about plans gone awry, but aging has softened the blow of disappointment. There’s a cornucopia of sentiments the Stoics among us have shared to help frame the harsh turns life takes.

  • It is what it is
  • Shit happens
  • C’est la vie
  • Que sera sera
  • It was meant to be   

Those all seem so final to me. Like nothing good is left. My personal mantra is, “Oh, well, but…”  For me, oh, well, but … captures the fatalism of things gone wrong or things you can’t control but also leaves an opportunity for something better on the horizon. To elaborate:

Oh, well, it hurt to make cookies so I had to stop, but now I have a bunch in the freezer.

Oh, well, my arm hurts, but my legs are strong and I can walk to the freezer and get a cookie.  

Oh, well, I didn’t finish making the cookies, but I can certainly finish them off.

Recalibrating! Recalibrating!

Today marks 12 weeks since I fell and fractured my proximal humerus. That’s up there near the shoulder, so some may call it a broken arm, and some may call it a broken shoulder. I call it absolute misery.

But it’s weird that today is my accidentversary, because the pain is now minimal, I’m sleeping better and I woke up today feeling, I don’t know, brighter? On this exact day. I have not been in a good place emotionally, but something lifted. Maybe it just takes 12 weeks to feel human again after a fall like that.

Prior to my accident, and prior to my husband’s accident, which preceded mine, I seemed to be breezing through retirement. Although I like to read and cook and create art, the bulk of my time is typically spent walking, swimming and playing golf. And all those have been pretty much off the table for three months.

Although I can walk just fine, I learned the hard way the shoulder goes through some serious movement when you walk and let your arms swing naturally. For an injury like mine, that means you can’t just walk and burn off all your frustration on the footpaths.

One of my shorter routes is about two miles. I wear my sling when I start and then take it off at various junctures. I’m now doing about half of it without the sling and improving fast. I expect to walk the full two miles slingless within a couple of weeks. And this might be a pipe dream, but I’m thinking once I can do the two miles regularly without pain, I can increase my mileage and maybe even hike.

I tell you this not because it’s all about me. Think of it as a public service announcement. Nothing is permanent. Change is inevitable. Do your best to stay safe, but be prepared for hard times. We just have to keep evolving. I’m not saying I’ve been good at it, but knowing what I know now, I’ll be better at it next time. And no, I’m not planning to fall again, but there’s always a next time when it comes to bad shit raining down.

Honestly, I still feel a little lost. I’m giving a lot of thought to how I spend my time. Who I spend it with. How I present myself to the world. I’m still happy to be retired, but I feel like I need to recalibrate. You know, when you’re in the car, and you’re using the map but you take a different route, and that woman’s voice says, “Recalibrating! Recalibrating!” That’s what I’m hearing.

In one baby step forward, I FINALLY donated the last of my professional wardrobe. I had some gorgeous suits and skirts that have been sitting there for eight years.

One day I just did it, and it was liberating. Skirts be gone.

As far as how I present myself to the world, I’ve never been one to seek the male gaze, but now that I’m over 70 and invisible, it’s easier than ever to avoid that whole scene. And yes, I realize rapists and serial killers will go after anyone, but the routine sexual harassment that comes from just being young and female – well, those days are over, and I couldn’t be happier.

Throughout my life, I’ve made an effort to look the part, to fit in. Well, for the most part anyway. But with all the mysogynist rhetoric coming from the right, and so many women falling in line to look younger and sexier, I feel zero interest in living up to anyone’s ideals of what I should look like. Or how I should behave.

Fun times ahead.

Dale and I were talking the other day, and I said, you know, I feel lucky I was never sexually assaulted. There were a few times when that was a real possibility. Isn’t that something? That we have to be grateful we weren’t raped? I realize that politically speaking, women are just as vicious, and certainly some of them are sexual predators, but what is up with all these men?????

Which brings me to the Epstein files. I think I became somewhat obsessed after reading Virginia Giuffre’s book, Nobody’s Girl. Sometimes I wish I had never read it, but you can’t unsee it. If you are equally driven to torment yourself, I recommend Alisa Writes on Substack.

She is a career investigative reporter now working independently on Substack. She’s from New Mexico and mostly focuses on Epstein’s Zorro Ranch – all that happened there, how it’s connected to everything around it and why it hasn’t been investigated.

Alisa an excellent writer and powerful researcher, and the breadth of information can be hard to absorb, but damn. She connects the dots and reveals how big money runs the show. I suppose someone could come out of the woodwork and say she’s a quack conspiracy theorist, but I don’t see how that’s possible.

As best as I can tell, her ducks are lined up in very tight rows.

On the lighter side, I thoroughly enjoyed The Fourth Consort by Edward Ashton. It’s a fun science fiction novel, not the Dystopian drama that these days seems too real to be read as entertainment. Ashton also wrote Mickey7, which I have not read but plan to. There’s a relatively recent movie based on the book called Mickey17.

I almost went to the theater to see Project Hail Mary, another science fiction story that isn’t so bleak, but I said almost. I loved the book and look forward to seeing the movie when it starts streaming.  

While I still can’t play golf, there’s a tournament next week in my women’s club, so I thought I’d go out and help. They will need cookies, so I’m going to get started on those this weekend. I like to make the decorated kind with royal icing, and those can take days to fully dry. But they’re fun to make and so cute and delicious.

I might go through the cookie cutters today and see what piques my interest. I have insects. Ladybug, dragonfly, etc. That sounds like spring does it not?

Chocolate and caviar

While I am doing reasonably well with my strategy to disengage from the news, some things can’t be overlooked. For example, when the president of the United States calls for annihilating a civilization, it’s time for even drive-by citizens to speak up.

I’m calling my three legislators every day or at least until I poop out telling them Trump must be removed from office one way or the other. He is stark-raving mad.

But we all have ways of coping. Chocolate and caviar. But not together.

Dale and I had one tiny tin of really good caviar left over from New Year’s, which we didn’t celebrate due to our unfortunate turn of events. The tin was tightly sealed, but I said, you know now, it’s not getting any younger.

It was last night on the eve of destruction that I dragged it out and suggested we have one last pleasure before it all went up in smoke. Dale agreed, but then my sister called to tell me there was a two-week cease fire. So, we ate it anyway to celebrate the possibility of better times ahead.

For the record, we no longer make a pretense of eating caviar with accompaniments. We each have a mother-of-pearl spoon (nonreactive). I open the tin and we pass it back and forth until gone. Don’t worry. It’s over quick.

I have found that trying to restrict what I write about doesn’t do me any good. I think it’s better to write a little more frequently and let it roll. Hopefully, I will keep trying and find the right balance.

We are both doing well recovering from our injuries. Dale is amazing. I don’t think they thought a 76-year-old man would bounce back like he has from a fractured pelvis, but there you have it. I’m closing in on week 11 since I fell and broke my proximal humerus.

I’ve been referring to it as a broken arm, and I was surprised to find the whole thing so painful. But then I read this particular fracture is sometimes referred to as a broken shoulder, and for some reason, the pain level made more sense to me. It’s all in the branding.

The physical therapy hurts, but I am improving significantly, especially my range of motion. I have started to sleep better. Still not quite what I need for a happy snooze, but I do think it’s within sight.

For awhile there, I couldn’t keep weight on. It was scary, but I ate more, and now I have to pay attention to what I eat or the pounds creep back on. I sort of miss all that extra eating. It was fun while it lasted. But now, even being careful, I refuse to give up my evening cookie. I won’t say we eat one every single night, but most nights, yes.

I keep a stash of homemade cookies in the freezer. Two kinds of chocolate and an oatmeal. It’s the perfect treat – high in taste but not ultra-processed and built-in portion control. There’s a coconut sheet cake featured in a recent King Arthur email that looks absolutely enticing, but I feel like that’s a slippery slope. 

I’ve been using really good quality chocolate baking chips. They are expensive but worth it, in our opinion. They also make delicious fudgsicles. And as our weather warms up again, I can see putting them back on the menu. It’s fun to eat one outside after dinner. I don’t know why it feels special, but it’s a simple pleasure we both enjoy enormously.

If you’re into making popsicles or fudgsicles, I recommend hard plastic molds like these. I tried the silicone, and they were worthless. My baking chocolate is from Dick Taylor.  It’s a great place up in Eureka, where my sister lives. We toured the factory one time when I was up there for a visit. Very fun! This is their recipe for fudgsicles:

I haven’t done any of my art because I didn’t think I could sand the board. But I’m feeling pretty frisky and might try it today. My entire recovery strategy is to push hard enough to get things done and improve but not so hard as to interfere with my sleep. You might be surprised to learn that is a fine line. For me, at least, the pain always comes later.

As soon as I can predictably sleep through the night without a mountain of pillows, we are going to take some sort of a little road trip. We like Morro Bay. It’s a longish drive, so we might need a little more time before embarking on that particular journey. But we are ready to get back into life.

Baking saves lives

Manchego cheese muffins with Spanish chorizo and roasted red peppers. Oh, and sour cream.

For most of my life, I played by the rules. I served my country in uniform. I stayed informed, I worried about all things big and small and checked the boxes of what a “good citizen” is supposed to do.

I’m not saying a broken arm is a good thing, but since I fell down and went boom, I’ve had plenty of time to read a lot of wretched news and rethink pretty much everything. Whatever I thought I knew doesn’t seem to be true anymore.

This I do know — whatever it is going on out there leaves many of us feeling anxious, divided and powerless. We didn’t choose it, and we can’t control it.

While I’ve tried hard to disengage from all this noise in the past, I always felt guilty for not paying attention. It’s my duty! But it has occurred to me we can redefine what it means to be a good citizen. It does not mean we have to save the world one doomscroll at a time.

For me, it means being peaceful and kind. Mastering the art of the micro-joy. Helping my neighbors. Supporting my community. I think that does more for the world than being angry and miserable.

I mean, hell, yeah, I’m still going to vote, do what’s right, speak up, pay my bills and follow the law, but at age 70, I want to focus day-to-day on my happy retired life – the one filled with art, cooking, walking, chocolate and other simple pleasures … the life I started to write about eight years ago but got sidetracked by political drama.

This is my way of saying I’m returning to my roots. You will read less about politics and more about the experiences of a retired person observing life and just trying to be happy. The biggest news will come from my kitchen. Or maybe from my workshop in the garage.

It does feel as though the world is spinning out of control until you realize you aren’t in control anyway. I do not believe it’s a cop-out to disengage a bit. I do not believe it makes us bad citizens. Quite the opposite.

Those of us who choose happiness over hysteria are not part of the problem. Call me crazy, but I like to think we are actually part of the solution. Perhaps living simply and living well is resistance in its finest form. Proof good people can flourish, and peace is still possible.

As for the picture, I was baking yesterday. Baking saves lives. And yes, I think I’m getting my mojo back.

Have you seen my mojo?

I’ve been waiting to be inspired by something joyful before posting again, but there’s not a lot of joy in Mudville these days. We are both healing well and have forged an even stronger bond through all this personal trauma, but recovery is a slow uphill journey.

I lost my mojo. If you see it anywhere, let me know.

At first I thought, well, if I can’t say anything funny or happy just say nothing, but then I felt bad for giving you the silent treatment. I started to write a post explaining that I was not going to write for who knows how long, but it sounded so pathetic. So, here I am.

In addition to my broken arm, I got doomscroll wrist from reading the news on my phone. I had to quit doing that, and my wrist is much better. I bought a cool little tool that solves the problem. It’s also very handy for watching TV on my Kindle in bed.

It would be impossible to itemize the list of all things horrible going on out there, so I will instead share one observation. What Cesar Chavez has been accused of is vile, but I’ve been sort of surprised by how quickly he’s being erased.

Too bad that doesn’t apply to other men of ill repute.

For example, the president of the United States has actually been found guilty of sexual misconduct, and he gets a pass? Nobody is in a rush to scrub his criminal carcass off the windshield of life.

I think I’ve read one book since Dale fell, and then it was hard to hold a book after I broke my arm. I’m proud to say I just finished another Maisie Dobbs novel, and it felt great to read again. She’s a psychologist and investigator in England following the first world war.

Now that I’m back in the saddle, I will mosey on over to the library and stock up on new reading. Probably not tomorrow, though, as I am committed to making beef stew. I usually like to save that for a cold rainy day, but we seem to be experiencing early summer. I’m making it anyway. If my starter behaves, I will also bake a loaf of sourdough bread to go with.

I’m starting to call 2026 year of cheese. It’s like we can’t get enough. And at this point, I don’t care. My arm must have been a little shaky on this blurry picture, but I made turkey enchiladas from the breast we froze at Thanksgiving. I actually made two pans this size, so we got some nice freezer food.

Then, of course, El Rey de Pizza produced another spectacular monument to deliciousness. This one was topped with whole milk mozzarella, pepperoni, hot Italian sausage, pickled jalapeños and green olives.

But life is not all cheese. My neighbor gave me a huge bag of lemons from her tree. I juiced them yesterday along with fresh ginger – prepping the lemons was a little hard on the arm, but I was careful and Dale helped some. I added simple syrup and froze quite a few six-ounce bottles of tasty lemon-ginger juice.

So, even though my arm still has a ways to go, we are able to cook, and that’s a great thing. We’ve been pretty hard on the cookies, too, so there more work to be done.

Rebound

I visited the ortho yesterday for follow-up x-rays and a progress report. The bones are healing properly, and I don’t need surgery. He said to ditch the sling permanently and use my arm gently as much as possible but no lifting over five pounds. I start PT next week.

So, yay. What a relief. He even said I could putt and chip a little, but no more than that until I see him again in two months. I believe whisking, chopping, stirring, frying and sautéing count as gentle exercise! Sadly, so does cleaning the house, but I’m actually eager to take it on as I am able. Slow and gentle. I am not going to do anything stupid.

Although I am sickened by all things political, I feel optimistic here on the homefront. Next on the agenda – get back to writing about something other than broken bones. Walk more. Get back to reading, which I haven’t really done since this whole shitshow started. I’m referring to our personal shitshow not the national example of shitshows gone wild.

I’m thinking about food and what I can make. I was going through old cooking magazines looking for a specific pasta recipe we seem to have lost and stumbled onto a recipe for coconut cream pie. I definitely see that in my future.

Dale took out the last hunk of his homemade corned beef and is making corned beef hash tonight. We always top it with a fried egg. He made white bean and sausage soup the other day. I always love that with toasted French bread brushed with garlic-infused olive oil. Two batches of that went straight to the freezer.

Our freezer food is the best. It has been mostly depleted since the fiesta began with Dale’s accident in December, but we’re back on the job. We still have the whole breast from our Thanksgiving turkey, and it will probably end up as enchiladas. It’s always nice to have enchiladas in the queue.

I’ve got my starter, Gollum, cranking up for sourdough. Dale has been asking for my little homemade baguettes, so they need to go in the rotation. Yeast is so easy compared to sourdough. We make a charcuterie board with Italian cold cuts, some kind of runny cheese, nice, bitter arugula and some cornichons and just have that for dinner with the bread.

With regard to politics, I do call my senators and congressman, but both my senators are Democrats and so far don’t need prompting to do the right thing. The Republican is another story. Maybe he was dropped on his head when he was a baby.

It’s hard to find anything to say to him that might resonate, but I do call every couple of days to remind him I am opposed to him rubber stamping everything Trump says and does, and I want him to join with other members of congress to provide independent oversight.

That is, after all, what these yahoos were elected to do.

The boulevard of broken bones

Today marks five weeks since I tripped over a power cord and broke my arm. It was non-surgical, and I’ve been wearing the sling 24/7, except for showers, etc. In another 10 days I see the ortho for an assessment. If all goes well, he will say the bone is healing properly, I don’t need surgery and I can begin physical therapy.

I will not bore you with my boring itinerary here at the boulevard of broken bones, but just so you know. It’s boring. I can’t quite get into a book even though I have several in the queue. I’ve watched a little TV. I ate a box of See’s candy. I was losing weight, but I fixed that.

I’ve been able to walk a little every day. It’s awkward but manageable. I think about Lindsey Vonn and wonder how she passes the time. She’s probably good at this, too.

Dale, who fell off a ladder right before Christmas and broke his pelvis, is defying the odds. The PT is getting him stronger and stronger, and he hasn’t used the walker in a week. He’s up and down the stairs like an old pro, and I can only detect a slight limp at the end of the day when he’s tired.

It’s too early to even speculate on what we’ve learned throughout this ordeal. There will be takeaways for sure, but right now we’re just trying to get through it. I have calmed down a bunch and no longer feel like everything is an accident waiting to happen. I even opened the door to the room where I am sleeping, as I’ve sort of moved on from that existential fear of things that go bump in the night.

My goal is to move back into the master bedroom with Dale. He’s lost weight, too, so maybe he won’t snore as much. The main reason I’m not in there now is because I have a hard time finding a comfortable position, and I guess I’d rather not have an audience.

Oh, that’s right. Dale needs to sleep. That was my real reason – always thinking of others.

Everyone assumes the biggest thing I want is to get back to golf. And that’s true to some extent, but I just want to be able to do stuff around the house like I used to. I am amazed at what I can accomplish with one arm. Still, it’s not enough to chop vegetables or maintain the household.

We hired someone to come and help with stuff, but we got rid of her after one day. She drove both of us crazy. Dale agreed to step up, and it’s working well enough. Way better than having someone else in our space. If I squint, it looks OK.

Thankfully, he can cook. We’re back to pizza on Fridays. Last week’s was sausage and anchovies. I don’t know what’s on the docket for tomorrow. Yesterday we had spaghetti carbonara with a salad. Tonight is schnitzel with marinated cucumbers and home fries. I might need help cutting mine. That was the great thing about the See’s. Just pop them in, and they’re gone.

Aside from the candy, I have been eating well. Lots of protein. I actually like cottage cheese, which is high in protein, but I got tired of it pretty quickly. I prefer Greek yogurt, which is also an excellent source of protein. Tuna, sardines – both great. I cooked up a chicken breast just to make chicken salad.

I’ve squandered many an hour on the Epstein files. I want to see Trump held accountable for something in his miserable life of crime, and I thought it might be this, but who knows? The whole thing is bigger than my brain can absorb.

Although I said I don’t have any lessons to share just yet, I will say our accidents have given me an even greater appreciation for the simple things in life. And reading about all that awfulness with Epstein and his billionaire buddies only amplifies my desire to live simply, stay healthy, eat well and enjoy the time that has been given to us.

Turning the corner

Dale and I have been through some stuff in our 47 years of marriage, and I will just go out on a limb here and say breaking bones within weeks of each other and then trying to recover at home together is by far the hardest thing we have ever done.

We have different reactions to pain. Different expectations for comfort. Different ideas about what progress looks like. Different ideas about safety and risk. One of us is on team normal, and Dale is clinically insane.

Just kidding. No lie, though, it has been tough, but I believe we have turned a corner and will soon be back to our jolly selves. I had something like PTSD, and every little noise, every little thud came to haunt me. Was that just the icemaker or did Dale just fall down and die?

The chat bot helped me come up with a mantra.

“I am not the safety officer in this household. I am present, grounded and at ease.”

That helped me a lot, and I’m not nearly as fearful as I was. I saw the house as one giant booby trap waiting to kill one or both of us, and I had to let that go. I’m cautious now but not neurotic, although Dale might take issue with that assessment.

We’re slowly approaching normal or what passes for it. Dale navigates freely about the house without a walker, going up and down the stairs as needed. He uses the walker outside sometimes but not all the time. At first I tried to intervene in that but quickly realized it is his call to make.

He is sleeping upstairs again. That was another one I just had to back away from. I moved to the guest room because of the pillow fort I’ve created to support my arm. I imagined him getting up in the middle of the night to pee and taking a tumble, so I closed my door. At least I wouldn’t hear it.

We haven’t gotten rid of the adjustable bed downstairs yet because there is still a remote chance I will need surgery, and that bed might come in handy. I was so proud of myself for getting that all set up for Dale, but now I hate it. That was the cord that tried to kill me.

We’re back to showers upstairs, but we now have grab bars and a no-slip matt. We stashed the shower seat and other medical equipment out in the garage until we decide whether to keep it, donate it or whatever.

I’ve got a couple more weeks before I see the ortho again. The worst of the pain is gone, and I’m pretty comfortable most of the time. My mood has improved significantly. I don’t expect I will require surgery and am visualizing that outcome.

I’m also visualizing myself at 80, healthy, active and strong, recalling that year I broke my arm. Was it 10 years ago already? I mean, it was awful, but now it’s just a blur. Glad it didn’t stop me!

Everything is broken

That dang humerus hasn’t made me laugh yet. Fucker.

Tomorrow marks two weeks since I fell. I saw a doc today at the orthopedic practice, although he is a sports medicine doctor. I already have one of those, so I didn’t understand why I needed to go there. My regular guy finally called me and explained that even though the other dude is not an orthopedic surgeon, he’s affiliated with the ortho mothership, and it would be better for them to monitor this whole thing.

It took a lot to get that explanation, but I get it now.

The new guy said no surgery. Yay! The sling they gave me at the ER didn’t fit me properly, so I got a new one from them. He said this was not related to osteoporosis. Just a freak accident. That made me feel better. Not that freak accidents are fun and games, but it does not appear this is the beginning of long, slow decline.

In fact, he said this might have been way worse had I not been physically fit. I felt like all those exercises and weightlifting didn’t do a damn thing to save me, but he said quite the contrary.

That said, it’s not like I will be golfing anytime soon. I’m OK with it as long as this horrible phase eventually comes to an end.

So, the illustration. I am mixed-handed, meaning I write with my left hand but do everything else with my right. I now have to use my left hand for all of it, if you get my drift. That stupid little tool didn’t work. Let’s just say I solved the problem with latex gloves and Dude Wipes.

To borrow from another song, Bob Dylan this time, Everything is Broken. Since our accidents, a long-serving laundry room light went dark, the microwave stopped spinning, the oven won’t stop heating until it hits 5,000 degrees and shuts itself off before melting the planet, the battery in Dale’s car died, the DISH signal can’t connect with the hopper (meaning no TV) and we had to get a new food processor.

All of it fixed or in the process of being fixed, but damn. But then I think about my sister’s friend who tried to sooth a boo-boo with dry ice, and I’m grateful it wasn’t worse.

Dale and I have had some moments. I have two operating legs, so he thinks I am Wonder Woman. We have had some lively discussions about my current limitations. I said I’m healing from a fracture just like him, but I’m doing it backward and in high heels.

I still have to make all the calls and argue with the home health people. They have been trying to say he can only have PT once a week, and I had to use every bit of strength left to rectify that. I finally got to Oz this week, and I believe we are back to twice a week. He is doing fantastic, by the way.

He wants to cook more, but it’s still hard for both of us. After wheeling a spatchcocked chicken around the kitchen on his overbed table (the kind like you see in hospitals) I said this is too much. I cannot do this.

Now we are keeping it simple. Freezer food, homemade burritos, sandwiches. We are trying Indian takeout tonight.

All in all, we are doing OK. Now if ya’ll could do something about Trump, that would be great.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER.