November Nothings

I understand the Hallmark Christmas movies debuting at the end of October in the run-up to the holiday, but can someone explain why one of the Hallmark channels aired “A Walton Easter” on October 22? 

I find it odd that the local bagel shop sells quesadillas and downright maddening that its sign says “Quesadilla’s” with an apostrophe.

It is fall foliage season, which means the people in my photography club feel compelled to take a picture of every leaf from every tree in the area and share them with the group. I had so many images of trees in my own collection from years past that I have stopped taking them altogether. Some of the shared pictures are absolutely stunning, but others are nothing more than snapshots. We go through this same process in the spring, where some people take pictures of every blossom on every bush as if we have never seen one before. I get it, you like to take pictures, but unless the picture is really outstanding, spare the share! 

I realize that some of what I buy in the supermarket is limited to what I can reach on the shelf.

I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to chocolate with salt, but I am willing to keep trying!

I think that if the car warranty people call you 50 times and you never pick up and never call them back, your name should just be dropped from the list. Face it, guys, this warranty thing isn’t going to happen. There should be a “mercy” rule like in kids’ sports, where when the game is out of hand, it’s over. I only wish that every time someone said, “This is your LAST call,” they meant it!

I have never sneezed as much as I have this year. There must be something in the air!

You know you’re getting old when you get a bunch of birthday cards in the mail and you open the envelope from United Healthcare first.

I saw a springform pan on sale at ShopRite and thought about buying it, along with a bundt pan, until I remembered that I don’t bake.

Now that ice cream season has ended and soup season has started, I had some store-bought, packaged butternut squash soup for lunch. I have to admit that I had to restrain myself from adding salt to the low-sodium variety. I sure could have used a pinch or two!

One day I went to aqua aerobics, out to lunch, to ShopRite and then to get my hair cut. I was so tired that you would think I just plowed the north forty.

I hate when I am eating a sandwich and I take a bite and the meat starts to slide out the side or bottom of the roll. By the time you are near the end of the half of the sandwich, the bottom portion of the bread has disappeared completely and you have to eat the rest of it upside down!

There is ALWAYS laundry. Maybe because I am at aqua aerobics three times a week and there are towels and bathing suits to wash, but it is more than that. I had to get out all of the sweatshirts and winter pajamas and wash them. And then I had to gather my Rutgers gear and get those basketball shirts freshened up for the new season. The throw blankets didn’t smell quite right to put on the couch after being cooped up in my closet all summer, so they went into the wash. It seems like last year’s quarantine – when I was wearing the same thing for three days running – required a lot less laundry!

Speaking of laundry, as I was doing a lousy job folding my allegedly permanent-press sheets, I was thinking about how my mother would take an old Coke bottle, fill it with water, put a sprinkler top on it and wet the pillowcases (along with my father’s shirts), roll them up and put them in the refrigerator. I think we had more laundry than food in the fridge sometimes! When she had enough of a load, she would take everything out and iron it. Wow, times have changed. Not only don’t I have laundry in the refrigerator, but can you even buy Coke in a glass bottle?

Do you sleep on the left side, the right side, or in the middle of the bed? My answer to this question would be YES (all three).

You know how in the movie when a couple has spent the night together, the first one up takes the blanket or sheet off the bed and modestly wraps him/herself in it? That couldn’t happen here. I make the bed so tightly that you would be lucky to get into it, no less out of it!

My father always told us that you should find something positive to say about a person. So, if you can think of nothing else positive to say about me, please note that I can always get an injection or have blood drawn without even flinching. Pretty commendable, right?

I have a stash of little metal things that look like they fell off a lamp, and keys to God-knows-what and zillions of buttons that came with clothes I probably no longer own – all things that for some reason I am afraid to throw out. My collection of chargers alone is substantial, and do I know what each one is for? An old phone that no longer works – in the house or in the car? Yet I can’t part with these things. Just in case, you know…

I always wondered how you were supposed to know whether you are in the last three cars of the train that don’t “platform,” meaning you have to run like hell to move up to where you can get off when the train pulls into your station. Usually, you’re running to get on the train, and unless you know there are plenty of cars in front or behind where you hopped on, who knows whether your car is going to make it so you can get off before you have to do the 100-yard dash?

Last month I ranted about receiving multiple reminders about my dental appointment. That’s as bad as receiving an email from your doctor that informs you that you have a message in your chart, which means you have to establish an account with the practice to access that information. And then it turns out that the message is just a thank you for showing up! In that case, I’d prefer just an email, a text or a voice mail, because setting up the account means another username and password I have to remember. Why is everything so complicated?

At some point soon, I am going to need a fancy dress – and I don’t know where to go to shop for one. The Lord & Taylor at my local mall had the nerve to shutter its doors during the pandemic. I felt like we broke up and I never got to say goodbye. They got custody of all the nice clothes! I have been to the mall only once or twice since the beginning of the pandemic, but what I strange feeling it will be not to see L&T there. I guess Macy’s wins by default.

When I was growing up, there were two kinds of apples to eat – Macintosh and Delicious. Although people then used Granny Smith apples for baking, they weren’t found in my house since we were NOT the house of pies. Now there are so many varieties that it takes as long to pick out apples as it does to select a pair of shoes. Maybe I should have an apple tasting party to sample the many varieties!

I'm a football fan but I am also a creature of habit. When I turn on the TV on Sunday morning at 9, I want to see Jane Pauley and "CBS Sunday Morning," not Trevor Lawrence in London with the Jaguars. (That sounds like "Colonel Mustard in the Conservatory with the lead pipe," doesn't it?)

Here’s the thing about microwave popcorn: If you keep it in the microwave for just a few seconds too long, it will burn and stink up your kitchen for weeks to come. But if you take it out too soon, you are left with too many unpopped kernels, which seems wasteful. I rarely make popcorn, but, when I do, I try to find a happy medium for popping time.

I found a foolproof method for making the mums in front of my house always look good: When they die, I throw them out and buy new ones. At a price of three pots for $15, it costs less than eating lunch out and they always look good. Of course, watering them instead of waiting for the anticipated rain that never seems to come when you need it would also do the trick. The replacements looked great yesterday, but they must have looked especially attractive to the local deer, because this morning all of the blooms were GONE! And now, so are the mums.

Every single piece of mail delivered Saturday went immediately into the recycling pile – after a brief detour so I could block out my name and address with my nifty little CONFIDENTIAL stamp! Most of my bills are sent electronically and I pay them online, so the mail that comes to the house generally consists of advertisements and pleas for fundraising campaigns. This seems like such a waste of time, paper and ink to me.

You know you have been friends for a long time (in this case, 53 years) when the BFF sends you a beautiful birthday card with a lovely note and tucked inside is an article on the accuracy of expiration dates on food, a subject on which we have divergent views. OK, I get it – “sell by” doesn’t mean it isn’t still good, and “use by” means you can freeze it. So, this is what friendship has come to, discussions of the safety of food. I consider myself lucky to have a friend who cares that much about me that she doesn’t want to see my waste my money by tossing out food that is still good. You really are the BEST, Jo.