Sunday, November 28, 2010

ON THE RUN

Autumn came. In the US it is her jumping off point since Florida has scant seasonal change. That, after all… like southern California, is that state’s main attraction. My scenic view is southeastern so even for Roswell Fall comes late for me. The trees have been brilliant but as MOST real people have a seasonal change, everyone knows the deep reds through the myriad of scarlet and oranges to chartreuses and brilliant yellows of nature’s Crayolas. A fantastic festival of ripening for our Thanksgiving.
My feast was traditional but with Native American wild rice that turned out well this year. As healthy as it is, I cheated and threw in a bit of celery (saltiest of vegetables) and a spoonful of bacon bits with the standard ‘shrooms and onions. The oyster gravy helped but oysters deserve their own blog particularly with “the troubles” of the Gulf’s seafood shut down. I was thankful for much and the USA for more.
Speaking of which, we recently sneezed (with the disaster of the real estate crash) and no one bothered to say, “God bless you” (the world hates us and I relish that Everyone knows how ungenerous and uncharitable we are!) Now THEY all seem to have come down with the flu. If they aren’t plagued by inflation it’s bankruptcy. Sorry Nobel for Literature committee but if we’re too isolated for relevance then why the waves of financial angst? Get over yourselves and do try to keep up. Washington (the prez, not the city or state) taught us to mistrust you and your performance since has only validated his advice.If my prior paragraph seems hostile, it is possibly because I’ve recently moved beyond US history to the history of Western Europe (inching eastward.) What a murky blur that is. Among other questions: is there anyone over there who knows who Louis XIV’s father REALLY was? Yes, I know: it shouldn’t matter… except the only requirement for the job was gender and genetics

O

Saturday, November 20, 2010

I QUIT MY DAY JOBS

Every writer’s dream: quit the day job. It’s really simple but unfortunately my only day jobs were housekeeping and writing. I still do both but now I do them at night. As a night owl, an insomniac, it made no sense to keep faking it. I spent my pre-retirement years meeting the clock punctually (even got a raise once for being the only one who consistently did) and fighting my nighttime energy. Somehow, the Protestant work ethic made me feel guilty that I couldn’t sleep at night. If I put in an honest day’s work, why was I sleepless? The stigma is that sleeplessness is caused by a guilty conscience. Night people in a world attuned to day productivity have it bad enough without feeling guilty about it. And that was before they put me on thyroid pills.
Now research has lifted me from that snake pit. In case you didn’t catch the article, it went something like: Morning people make better grades etc. but night people are more advanced in the evolution of our species. I don’t care if they found we were less advanced, I’ll take it. At least I no longer wonder what my obviously guilty conscience is hiding from me.
No global warming worries, nights are cooler, nor about more sun damage to already desiccated skin. I don’t choose between thousands of lousy daytime TV shows, only a few lousy night ones since I don’t care for gratuitous violence. Energy companies give big discounts if you avoid their busiest grid hours. Stores and streets are less crowded at night. Noisy leaf blowers, telemarketers, lines of consumers, traffic jams, lawn mowers, garbage collectors, neighbors, door-to-door salesman and vandals are all asleep (guiltless with their past report cards of good grades). Hmm… it’s beginning to sound like this “research” is a plot.
My lifestyle change began immediately upon release of the new research Wednesday. I slept until 2PM and went grocery shopping at 8 PM. I worked until 3 AM and then to bed but sans sleep until 6 AM. Had my morning 2 cups of coffee on my patio and listened to the birds and commuters’ singing tires on the nearby expressways (a new experience). Read the morning papers (on the net), did daily crossword and websudoku and read my Emails then gladly went back to bed and sleep. Slept soundly before waking naturally. Had a 7:30 PM dinner engagement and by TV time was POOPED! Still I did my usual late night until 2+ AM-ish. Woke up noon-ish. Obviously must work out a few kinks but when I do sleep it is because I am sleepy.

Sunday, November 07, 2010

HEALTH WEALTH WHYS

Certainly hope I’m not senile because must make two life-changing decisions with time constraints: What to do with meager income/ life savings and what to do about health insurance. Time easily matters as deposits must be made to cover expenses as you switch from one institution to another made murky by direct deposits versus automatic bill pay.
What a nightmare changing financial institutions is!! Between routing numbers, account numbers and balancing the usual monthly checkbook over possibly three months of transition I see so many numbers I can barely stand to play Websudoku. The three-month transition is because direct deposits can’t be facilitated for two months at least and the third month is in case they mess it up with or without my help.
I’ve kept with banks because of patriotism. And, oh yeah, flavored by a bit of paranoid superstition. You see, I sold my most lucrative investment, a mortgage I was holding, and about 15 minutes later the real estate market went belly up. With the resultant problems of banks, I figured if I pulled my $1.98 out things could only get worse. Such awesome power! I resolved to ride it out BUT another bank bought my already thrice bought-out bank, and the new guys want an agreement that they could unilaterally decide not to send me monthly hard copy statements. As a child of the REAL depression, that seemed unwise so I’m putting myself and my $1.98 through this ongoing torment. We’ll see if I manage it with no bounced checks.
Before you think that’s all I have on my plate, the confusion of the new Health care says Seniors have a shorter than usual time to select the annual changes we wish in our “supplemental” health insurance. I use quotes because the cost of it is four times the cost I paid for full insurance before retirement with employer provided subsidy… and at my age, the country thinks the government pays for my health care via Medicare. What a joke! Don’t get me wrong. I support the new health care law. Which gives you a clue as to how messed up US health care delivery was. The real stickler is that once I make my selection of “supplemental” insurance there is no guarantee my doctor will accept it and I’ve already been forced to change doctors once because he, make that HE, decided not to deal with people “covered” by Medicare and instead went to a “Park Avenue/Nieman-Marcus” style.Can’t wait ‘til the polls open Tuesday.