July 2020 Message from Tina: Mid-summer Musings

I will never understand how light bulbs get loose when you don’t touch them, how double and triple knots in my shoelaces still manage to untie, and why Tom Brady left the New England Patriots.

Two more things I will NEVER understand:  Where does lint come from and how do “soft close” drawers work?

I rely on my Alexa for a lot of things – the weather forecast, my shopping list and my calendar, among others. She also helps me to relax and sleep by playing guided meditations, music and soothing sounds. The other day she offered to play ocean sounds, a rainfall, nature sounds and silence. Silence? Really? So, I asked her to play the sounds of silence just to see what happened, and there was no noise (and no Simon & Garfunkel, either). How could I tell if she was done with the silence? When I told her to stop, there was still silence, so was that the silence sounds she was playing or the sound of nothing? All I know was that the next sound was me, laughing out loud in bed. It’s a good thing I live alone.

Has anyone actually ever died of boredom? Is there any anecdotal evidence of such a demise? Not that I have nothing to do – the To Do List doesn’t get shorter on its own, after all – but there is nothing I want to do besides the things I don’t feel comfortable doing, like meeting friends for an outside the restaurant lunch or venturing into a store for some retail therapy. I don’t want to go anywhere where it is too peopley. I even rescheduled my long-overdue dentist appointment. I’m just not ready.

Sure, this would be a great time to straighten out my list of passwords, but is that what I want to do to occupy my time? I could reorganize my office, I suppose, and it would feel great if I got that done, but there’s always tomorrow for that. And the day after that.

Even with subscriptions to Netflix, Disney+, Hulu, Peacock, HBO and Apple TV+ (Prime Video comes free from Amazon), it seems hard to find something to watch. This might be the right time to binge-watch some series like Grey’s Anatomy, that has been on the air for 20 years. I have plenty of time on my hands to do it.

The damn Hallmark network has displaced my regular morning and evening dose of "The Golden Girls" with their inane Christmas movies. This had better not last until Christmas.  

I am starting let down my guard just a tiny bit lately, like letting the handyman into the house to take care of two real emergencies. First, my TV died recently after a long illness, so he had to mount the new 50” TV on the wall of the bedroom (with my help; we both wore masks). That was a necessity. I need to see my Golden Girls in the morning! And second, he had to open the new bottle of vitamins for me. No matter how hard I tried to “push down while turning,” I could NOT get the damn bottle open. I feel stronger from taking the vitamins now, but weaker from not being able to open the bottle on my own.

When I can’t find something nowadays – my computer glasses, the case for my phone – I know they can’t REALLY be lost since I rarely leave the house. They must be here somewhere!

I think half of my newsfeed on Facebook consists of ads for facemasks. They are becoming fashion items. My latest order of 5 came in and they are so attractive, I wish I had clothes to match them.

I had a bunch of knives sharpened by someone in my neighborhood who offers that service. He did a great job, but my knives are now so sharp that they are shredding my kitchen sponges. It can’t be long before they get a finger, too.

I woke up recently convinced it was Saturday. I had to ask Alexa to learn it was actually Friday. And then I realized that it just doesn’t matter anymore.

If you watch a program called “Unsolved Mysteries,” should you be disappointed when the mystery is not solved by the end of the show?  I mean, think about the name, Tina. But I wanted to know “who done it.”

Sometimes I wish Book Bub would stop recommending books for me to read and Netflix would stop suggesting movies for me to watch, or Amazon would stop showing me things I might like to buy that are similar to other things I have bought or am buying this time. I’m starting to feel like Lucy in the candy factory with all that stuff rolling my way to consider buying!

On June 16, I finally put gas in my car for the first time since March 9. It wasn’t running on fumes yet, but I figured that gas prices – which had dropped – would be going up soon, so why not get my gas while it was less expensive? Let’s see now if I can hold off refilling the tank until the fall. I’m not planning any big trips, that’s for sure.

If all the watermelons I buy have no seeds, where will the next generation of watermelons come from? Should I be worried about that?

If the weather report calls for rain and I DON’T water the flowers, it does not rain. And if I do water the flowers, regardless of the forecast, you can usually count on rain that would have done the watering for me. I realize that this should be my biggest problem in life.

People, enough with the emojis on social media! Many new ones have been introduced, so the original ones for thumbs up or using a heart to indicate love have been greatly expanded. To me, words matter, not commercially created little symbols. While they may be fun, please don’t overuse them to the point where they detract from your message. Half the time, I can’t figure out what the emoji is supposed to represent. Less is more!

I may have signed up for a few too many Zoom sessions. I watched one about the moon recently with my legs on my desk, leaning back in my chair, and the melodious voice of “Ranger Bob” lulled me to sleep. I guess if I can’t go to the movies and sleep in the theater anymore, I’ll have to find some other place to get in my naps!

I have mastered the art of filing my nails while attending a Zoom session. I just keep my hands low and you can’t tell they are moving while I am filing. Don’t tell anyone, OK?  Thanks.

No matter how late I go to bed, I am up at 4, 5 and/or 6 every morning. No wonder I have bags under my eyes. If I go to bed earlier, I’m up at 2, 3 or 4. I can’t sleep! Except when there is a movie on. Or I am someplace where I should NOT be sleeping.

I notice when I drive now, my car instinctively stays further away from the other cars. It won’t wear a mask, but it is practicing vehicular distancing.

I have succumbed to the trend of using only one space between sentences – but only for items that will appear online. Let me tell you, a 60-year habit is tough to break.

You know what is annoying? It is that burning smell from the toaster when a crumb is caught inside. I shake it, turn it upside down and try to force the culprit to leave its position, but often to no avail. It sounds like a boulder bouncing around inside. You can’t see it or get it to fall out – but you can hear it moving around, taunting you. And if it finally becomes dislodged enough to fall out, you can’t even brag about your triumph, because no one will really care.

I must confess that my addiction to the Food Network has gotten worse during the quarantine. I can have the channel on all day, just to see if somebody finally beats Bobby Flay or whether the competitors on “Guy’s Grocery Games” can make an award-winning dish using only ingredients from two aisles. But the show I cannot stop watching is Guy Fieri’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” where he drives his red Camaro around the country to uncover all of the above. He goes to the most unlikely looking places that turn out to serve plenty of scratch-made food (like their own ketchup, mayo and breadcrumbs), or use recipes from the original owners. These are gourmet-quality places, often family-owned for generations, still using grandma’s meatloaf recipe or creating “Sunday gravy.” Especially now, when restaurants are off the table (so to speak), it is fun to watch people packed into small places enjoying the house specialties. I literally can’t get enough. The show is my white noise as I do whatever around the house, pausing long enough to see the incongruity of a Jewish deli in Iowa, jambalaya in Minnesota and Italian dishes in Phoenix. It all makes me hungry, but I can’t gain weight from watching, right?

Stay safe and wear a mask -- for your sake and mine!