respublica

Puzzle two

Since New Year's I've gotten into the jigsaw puzzle habit. I have to confess, I feel guilty doing something which seems like a total time waster and live with Dale who does not see the point in this at all. Well, we're even then, I see no point in his constantly tearing down walls in the basement to construct more bookshelves. But it is what it is. I find doing these puzzles good for my mind and it fills the time spent staying at home. And it stops me from constantly finding something to clean.

Anyhow, here is the second one by Jane Wooster Scott. Today I'll receive a third from Amazon and I'm looking forward to this because it is a Charles Wysocki puzzle. His puzzles are great and they sell out pretty fast, I haven't found one around here lately.

A shot in the arm!

We made it yesterday. Received our first Covid Vaccine and we are very thankful to Memorial Hospital and BJC who are doing a yeoman's job. They are so organized from the moment you drive into the parking lot to the send off. The parking lot has signs all over with the word Vaccination and arrows pointing in the right direction. The shots are not done in the hospital itself but in the big office/research building behind it. Inside the lobby really nice people were manning the elevator to take us to the third floor and immediately walking out to a huge room with workers everywhere. Tables were set up all around, some with sign in, others doing the shots and a middle area we were to wait for 15 minutes after the shot. Each area had guides taking us to the next place.

Amazing. Each person was cheerful and kind and helpful. I mentioned to several how unexpected it was to see such kindness while they dealt with people constantly all day.

In any event we now have our second shot scheduled for March 15 at the same place. After the shot the medical lady told us to take tylenol when we got home in case the shot area started to hurt. Dale did this right away but I waited until I went to bed.

We both woke up with a sore arm muscle where the shot went in, but no big deal. One more Tylenol and it's gone.

I can't  recommend Memorial and BJC enough. The best thing is you can go to that website and see available times for the vaccine. Sometimes you have to scroll down the page, but as of last night there were still openings for this week. And next week will show up probably over the weekend.

Another cleaning tip

This must have been around for a while, but its the first time I've heard of it. Dishwasher tablets have amazing cleaning power in many things beyond your dishwasher. The tablet needs to be the pressed powder type, not the gels. Drop a tablet in some water just to moisten it and rub it on the oven window. Grime comes off. One example.

But, they clean oven windows, racks, burned pots and pans, even the washing machine. Who knew we had to clean a washing machine. It seems dropping a dishwasher pod into the machine and running a cycle on hot will really clean it out. The water drain water will be dirty if the machine needed cleaning.

I plan to give this a try.

One good idea for opening those clamshell packages

Honestly this sounds like one of the best ideas yet. We've all fought to open something that came tucked into the hardest plastic ever and not for nothing named a clamshell. I've had to pry open these things for something worth 2 bucks. Like it was the hope diamond. But lots of things are now sold in the clamshell and lots of us have cut our hands trying to get the product out.

So when I ran across this advice today I was amazed and almost giddy. Take your every day can opener, the kind that has the turn knob that you place on top of a can and turn until the whole thing comes off. With a clamshell, place the opener on the end of one side, any side, and turn like you normally would until you get to the other end and voila! Open sesame.

I just ordered one more thing

Since the Covid thing began and we have been pretty much tucked into our house, I've noticed a lot of things that our house needed and many it didn't. The ease of getting something has had me living the "immediate gratification" life.

Most have been things we did find useful, one of which was the air purifier. It worked so well in our bedroom I got a second for the TV/kitchen area. They seriously cut down on dust which we had constantly from Dale taking down walls in the basement and sawing other things down there. I do not regret this purchase. I dusted for the first time in a couple weeks and almost no dust on the rag.

Today I woke up once again with a really dry nose. It is obviously from the heat in the house drying the air and the frigid cold dry air outside. We'd talked about a humidifier but quite honestly didn't want to bother with the constant refilling. But today I bit the bullet and ordered a small one just for the bedroom. My feeling is anything will should help this dry air while sleeping.

This is what being home all the time does to a person.

I've also bought a lot of bird seed lately at the Wild Birds Unlimited store. Do not regret this at all.

What's missing on the roads lately?

The St. Louis area has had a lot of crashes due to the snow and other weather. But for some reason there has not been any mattresses or ladders falling onto the highways lately.

A good thing.

For the love of salt brine

With the big snowfall and single digit temperatures we've suffered through this week, one thing has helped us get around if we absolutely had to. That is the salt brine street departments and highway workers put on the roads. This chemical certainly helps to melt this stuff and coupled with plowing, the streets are in good shape.

The salt makes a mess though. And this means anyone who works at or owns a car wash will be very busy in the coming days as all the snow and ice disappears. I know we will be in this line at some point.

The Vaccine hunt finally ends Monday

I've lost a lot of sleep recently worrying about the difficulty in getting the Covid Vaccine. I've tried so many places with no result and have had to listen to news reports of counties adding more and more people to the eligibility lists. I read posts from people who got their shots at one place or another, but by the time I'd heard it was too late.

This morning, or last night, I got up at 3 a.m. and began searching. I stumbled upon a site which listed places by state (Illinois) and found Memorial Hospital in Belleville with quite a few open slots for next week. At least on Monday and Tuesday. I grabbed Dale as soon as he got up a little before 4 and we both signed up and by golly, we were successful. We have our ticket!

It still bothers me that Madison County is not doing as much as other areas. But I'll surrender that irritation for the time being.

Conserve and protect

With this arctic freeze and snow we've had this week, it goes without saying the local news stations will be all over it with information we need. There are stories about how to keep your pipes from freezing or how to deal with pipes which froze. How to stay warm by being slightly cold to conserve energy. If you have one of those furnaces that exhausts out an outside wall, watch for condensation causing freezing and then carbon monoxide. Then there are the stories on the safest way to drive on covered roads-stay home if possible.

Lots of information. But. Have you ever gone to their websites as they ask us to for more complete information? Whether it's a story link on Facebook or a link on the actual web page they are 100 percent impossible to read due to constantly moving, flickering, jumping around, ads. Start reading a story such as "How long will we have to conserve energy this week?" KSDK. Good grief it's not just annoying to try and read, but impossible. There are moving ads on the sides, ads which start up one paragraph in, ads all over and all moving.

Often an ad covers up the story which is advertising themselves. Like, hey, I'm already here, just stop this.

It's all of them. FOX2 Now, KMOV, KSDK, and channels from every city and national news outlet. They have become unreadable.

Fiery scene

Late Sunday afternoon we were driving home after spending a bit of time with Connor on his birthday. When we got to the intersection of Arsenal and some cross street, we saw a lot of action ahead.

Something on fire. We had to go straight ahead because the on ramp to 44 East was a couple blocks up.

This car was totally blazing. I'd never been this close to a car fire before and it is horrifying.

There were people standing around and police beginning to show up and wait for a fire truck which was why we could still pass by and not be detoured. Unreal.

Hot Pepper Bird Seed

I discovered this around Christmas at the Edwardsville Wild Birds Unlimited. I've also been to the Swansea Wild Birds Unlimited. There is at least one in St. Louis. I was skeptical about this seed keeping squirrels away, but boy does it. The birds love it, squirrels hate it. It comes in bags of mixed seed as well as in shaped form to hang outside. They have cylinder shapes and bells. They have so many options for feeding birds.  The cylinder ones last a long time even when birds are on it constantly. Here is the bag I have right now.

Winter

We are really getting a bout of frigid winter temperatures and to top it off, we're in for a lot of snow on top of it. I mean to say, it is seriously cold and the snow just keeps on coming along with wind.

So, there is nothing much to do about it right now, the forecast is for this snow to keep up a good part of the day. However, I have a plan!

Since it is so cold, the snow will be fluffy-ish and not soggy and heavy to move. I decided to try and clear it off (tomorrow) with the leaf blower. I got it out of the garage yesterday and put it in the basement to get warm. I hope this makes moving the snow easier and faster than using a shovel.

It should at least help get the snow off the cars, we aren't lucky enough to have a nice big garage. We have a one car garage, but Dale has been using this as a workshop.

Life narrows down when weather hits.

I slid down to fill the bird feeders this morning and they were waiting. It's fascinating to watch how fast birds know when food is ready and how fast they eat. Also, the bigger birds are the greediest and really cheat the smaller ones out of the best seed. Here are some this morning in our back yard.

These guys in the tree are waiting their turn, at least that is my guess.

I can't say enough about the hot pepper bird seed, we have no squirrels at all.

For love of a dog

We laughed at this because it rings so true. Thankfully when we had a dog, we did not need to do this.

Meanwhile we wait

We've been watching the vaccine issuance for some time now and we can't make heads or tails out of how this is being done in Madison County. It just seems like surrounding counties and areas are way ahead of us. We heard to today from someone who is sort of involved that Madison was just overwhelmed and is trying to keep up.

What I read is St. Clair County has vaccine times at several places. Part of St. Louis will be adding vaccines at Walmarts and Sam's Club. Around here? no.   Walgreen's and possibly CVS is doing the shots, but when I check I get the notice that nothing remotely near us is doing this.

So, my question is, was Madison slow on the uptake with this? I have friends in the Chicago area, a major population place, and they have had both shots. Same for others in places other than here. It's very frustrating to read news reports that Illinois and even Madison will be extending the list of those who can now get the shots including kids. I mean, come on, those of us who qualified in group 1B have heard nothing except they were overwhelmed and now they will add even more numbers to this list.

We are doing our best to stay safe, staying home except for grocery runs and wearing two masks. But it's getting exhausting not letting our guard down especially when reading the cheers from so many others posting they got their shots.

I do recommend double masks, though. The paper type under a cloth mask feels much more secure. And, oddly, easier to breath.

And one more update I just read from the Post Dispatch. Missouri said it will double the doses to the St. Louis region after local officials complained. Now there's an idea for Madison County.

 

Things to help around the house

I confess I've often been a sucker for ads promoting an easier way to clean things around the house and since we've moved back I've been rather obsessive about this sort of thing. Yesterday I received my latest device (or gimmick if you think this is the case). It's an electric (battery powered) scrubber made for many things, but especially tubs and showers. I'm hoping this works because being stooped over a tub or shower floor is rather painful these days. It has a long handle and 4 different shaped scrubber heads.

This got me to thinking of the other items I've purchased sine July. My favorite so far is a 5 dollar drain opener from Home Depot which clears out the slow draining bathroom sink amazingly. Our main floor bathroom sink gets the most use and with all the hand washing these days, soap builds up and slows down the draining. This is quick and easy.

Then came a hand held steamer which works nicely and I have used it mostly for freshening up heavy comforters which don't fit in the washer. I have also used it to loosen up dried drips on the stove top. Lots of uses for this thing.

I did see an ad today for an interesting item. This is a battery powered, hand held seeder like you use in spring on the lawn. But this also works for spreading ice melt onto snowy, icy sidewalks. Actually I could probably just use one of the non battery powered spreaders we already have.  I just may do this if we keep waking up to snow and slick spots.

 

Ok, I have to say this once again

We woke up to very cold temperatures and snow. The snow was maybe 2 inches or less, but miserable to clear off in the cold. However one thing never changes in this area and that is traffic reports of one accident after another during the morning commute.

But, since Dale had to drive into Clayton to teach a class today, I was paying more attention to the traffic reports. Almost every report from local news stations mentioned how much better the roads on the Illinois side were than on the Missouri side. Every year it's like this. For some reason MODOT cannot get this winter weather clearing right. Each year I get on here on beg the MODOT people to come over to IDOT headquarters in Collinsville and take a lesson on how to do winter weather clearing.

But they don't it seems and drivers over there pay the price of accidents and sitting in long jams. This is not to say the Metro East has no snow/ice accidents but they are far fewer. It makes no sense.

It's a small world

On Saturday Concordia Seminary announced the name of the person who will be its next President, Dr. Thomas Egger. We've known him a long while and he's a great guy. He has a son (Andrew) who works in Washington DC as a media writer. I told our daughter about him later that day and she contacted him as one child of a seminary president to another working in DC. As they talked she learned his sister went to college with a woman who works with Katie.

In Lutheran circles connections like this happen all the time.

One crazy "how to" advice

It seems someone I have never heard of, Lil Uzi Vert, had a diamond inserted in his forehead. I have no idea why this guy is famous and I'm not curious enough to look him up, but he got a story written in GQ about how this is possible. His piercer, Sean Dowdell, used "what's called a surface piercing to get the diamond onto his face. A surface piercing, which can also be done just about anywhere on the body, looks a little like an upside-down staple: the needle pierces the skin, makes a 90-degree turn, and emerges an inch or so from where it entered." 

Normally for gem piercings a microdermal or transdermal implant is used (depending on the size of the anchor foot), exposes a threaded post that jewelry can be screwed onto." But this diamond was too big for this and Dowdell warned if that technique had been used, there was a chance of infection and "If he got hit in the face, it would rip half his forehead off."

Another piercer, this time a celebrity piercer, Keith Thompson weighed in: "he isn't optimistic about the healing process for Uzi's diamond. A fitful night of sleep or even a kiss at the wrong angle can cause the body to reject a surface piercing, which could take over a year to heal."

It's Saturday so why not read about nutty piercings.

 

Finding things to keep busy

This stay at home unless absolutely necessary was ok for a while. We had the advantage of moving back to Collinsville and all the work that entailed. We've done a lot of things around the house, but for me at least after all these months, my list is pretty much down to dusting and laundry. Dale is still crashing around in the basement taking down walls and creating bookshelves everywhere. So with cold winter weather and no outside things to do, I'm bored.

Which has put me into jigsaw puzzled working. It passes the time quite nicely even though I have to deal with Dale who does not understand the point of it.

Two things constantly on my mind

Every day I either obsess over or give hourly thought too food and health. The first is what I'd guess is on everyone's mind and that is when or if we will ever get the Covid Vaccine. This is totally out of my control and we are at the mercy of whenever our names come up on the registration list. But it's hard to stop thinking about.

The second is what will we have for dinner. This past 11 months of being stuck at home meant eating in every single day. We aren't prone to going out to eat although we miss this a lot. We also don't do pick up very often, maybe 5 times during the shutdown. All this means is that I have run through our meal rotation many times. We've tried meals seen in magazines. I've run out of ideas and have been tempted to start buying cooking appliances I know in my head I'd only use a few times. Such as the air fryer, instapot, etc.

We do eat more vegetables with dinner and I buy a lot of the frozen type since they are just as nutritious and last longer than fresh. We've done chicken, ground beef, roasts, pork in many forms, fish. We've had umpteen pasta meals, rice meals. We've made Mexican, Asian, and American meals. We've had breakfast for dinner and dinner for lunch.  I tired of my cooking.