#419 Power Lunch

Late entry - I'm still considering this Monday.

Piper, my financial advisor, had called last week, saying he had some numbers he wanted to go over with me, and suggested we do it over lunch or dinner.  So we had lunch today. 

The original plan was to walk from his office to the Inn just down the street, but instead we drove to a restaurant just across from the Rhinebeck Fairgrounds.  It used to be the Rolling Rock (where we had dinner after the wedding, Daughter.  Remember?)  It's under new management now, has a new name with "O"s and the word "Grill" in it (or something like that).  It's really nice inside, terrific food.  I had Pad Thai noodles with oriental vegetables and shrimp in a spicy coconut sesame sauce.  Yummy.

Well, Piper actually had very few "numbers".  He and the Angel had run my projected tax returns for 2005, 2006, and 2007, to figure out what my likely capital gains exposure would be under various scenarios, selling off stock over three years.  Man, this rebalancing is going to cost me!   But it has to be done, and they are working hard to minimize the pain.  Angel is a tax genius.  But going over those numbers took all of ten minutes.

The next two hours and 50 minutes was ... lunch.

We talked about divorces and real estate reassessments and relationships and communication and compromise and school taxes and depressions and recessions and loneliness and interest rates and relearning how to flirt in your 60s after 30+ years of marriage and the weather and teapots and kings.

I was shocked to find that we had been sitting at the table almost three hours.  I hope he tipped the waitstaff well.

It's really too bad that I have no interest in him as other than an advisor and possible platonic friend.  He'd make a good friend.  He's sweet and earnest, even cherubic, but there's no chemistry.  Not on my part, anyway. 

When I got home, I had to look up some details for the Angel, then I went shopping, dropped off the camera from Rakkasah at CVS (this time I got the prints and CD back in an hour), and then I spent the next four hours putting several hundred photographs into Kodak EasyShare albums.  I'm a little angry with Kodak because the program grabbed every photo it could find on my system, and put them into random "albums", but won't tell me where, and won't allow me to delete the bad shots.  It seems like all I can do is move them (or copies of them?  Gee, I hope not!) into new better-named albums.  Razzelfrats.

Roman was supposed to call me tonight.  He didn't.  I left him a message at 10:30, saying that if he got my message before 11:30, to please call.  He didn't.  I'm a little worried.  If he's ok, and his parents are ok, I may have to kill him.

~~Silk

#418 What I Found on my Walk, and While Cleaning the Bathroom

I went to the deli this afternoon to pick up some fried chicken, and it was so nice out I decided to walk.  With all the rain we'd had lately, I hadn't been out in ages.  Walking from the deli around the mile+ circle is nice because I can visit the deli restroom and get something to eat or drink at the end.

I found several interesting things along the road - four tires, two with rims; one newly dead cat; one brown leather high-top man's shoe in brand new condition, without laces; one long dead opossum; one toppled tree, 4-feet in diameter, that looked like it had just crumpled; the same rubber snake that had startled me a few weeks ago; several huge pieces of bubble wrap; and two tanker trucks rusting into the ground - one for gasoline and one for fuel oil.  The trucks didn't look drivable, but I swear they weren't there last time I walked past that spot.

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I keep telling people how bad my house is right now, and they don't believe me.  I spent more than six hours yesterday and today clearing off the counter in the master bath.  Just the counter top.  Not the drawers, cabinet, or medicine chest.  The counter was covered with bits of jewelry, some in various stages of repair, items like hair clips and bindis, henna kits, perfumes, creams, cold remedies, hair care products.  There were also various medical supplies like surgical masks and gloves, potions and tubes, syringes and pads, things I used with Jay near the end, but which now are useful for various household tasks, but which had never found a proper nook elsewhere in the house.  Heaps of stuff, all of which had to be sorted and stored or discarded. 

Discarding is hard for me, probably because I grew up deprived, but I think I've found a way.  Instead of thinking "What is this good for, what future use might I find for it?", now I think "Would I rather keep this, or have company?"  It makes it real easy to pitch stuff.

Which reminds me - remember when I sorted shoes and discarded more than half?  I also decided then to cycle through the remainder, instead of wearing the same favorites all the time.  The past week, I had been wearing a pair of slingbacks with 1 inch wedge heels.  They were comfortable and looked nice.  As I was putting them away Friday night, I noticed what looked like mud on the heels, so I took them into the bathroom to clean them.  It wasn't mud.  The fronts of the shoes were leather, but it was fake leather on the heels.  What looked like mud was where the fake leather had dried out and cracked and was now peeling off the heels.  Told you most of those shoes were old!  So there's another pair out.  Eventually I'll get down to a core shoe collection that looks good and feels good, and is not too old to hold up to wear.

At the bottom of the pile on the bathroom counter I found five good Turkoman tribal pendants.  I bought them because they are beautiful, I got a real deal on them, and they will increase in value.  Silver with fire-gilding, and studded with carnelian and lapis.  But they are huge pieces (the two largest are 9" wide and 5" deep, with an additional 4" of dangles on the bottom) and even more outrageous than is usual for me.  So I strung the five of them on cords, and I've hung them in a grouping on the bathroom wall, next to the window.  They look stunning!

~~Silk

#417 Fourth Anniversary

It may not have been apparent from the previous entry, but I was a little depressed yesterday afternoon.  Tears were ever near the surface.  I figured it was because today is the fourth anniversary of one of the hardest days of my life, and I can't help feeling like I have ... forgotten, perhaps? over the past few months.  I have begun to move on.  And here I am having a very nice birthday, and he never got to celebrate his fiftieth. 

I thought I would be very unhappy today, so I decided not to go to the Halloween party this evening.  It's a good (annual) party.  I had been looking forward to it for weeks, even bought a special dress and cape for it.  I thought that this year I would be better able to handle the memories, not that it has been any worse than a "quiet day" in previous years, but yesterday things were building up quickly.  I really expected to crash and burn today.

Also several weeks ago I had signed up for a drumming class.  I thought it would be great fun.  I originally got the date wrong for the class, had put it on the calendar for 9/29, and was surprised to find, when the materials arrived, that it was actually scheduled for today, 10/29.  I was tempted to skip it, too, I didn't see how I could possibly enjoy it, but yesterday's companion talked me into going to it anyway.

So I dragged me off to the college, turned at the wrong intersection, went in the wrong entrance, couldn't find the right building, was actually literally told I "couldn't get there from here", finally found the building but couldn't find the room (it was in the building BEHIND the named building, accessible through a breezeway) etc. etc.  Finally found the room, five minutes late, by following the sound of hand drums. 
  
Surprise!  I had fun!   I was actually able to keep up (I have two left hands, can't seem to keep track of what they're doing), and I enjoyed it.

After the class (ended at 4 pm) I went to the Everready Diner (One "r"?  Two "r"s?) for the spinach dip and tea.  I like most of their food, but they've GOT to do something about the noise!  There's a constant roar.  Something strange about the acoustics, too.  There was a woman sitting 20 feet from me speaking to her friends, and I could clearly hear everything she said.  I could clearly hear everything everyone said!  All at once!

There are no secrets at the Everready.

But the spinach dip is good.

I don't remember it being so loud there.  Back when I was taking the EMS classes, we used to meet there to study and quiz each other the evening before tests.  I think that might be impossible now.

I drove through Rhinebeck at 6 pm, and it was pretty amazing.  It seems like every flat surface in town has a line of real carved pumpkins, most with candles, the children's home has hundreds of them lined up on the stone wall, the Beekman Arms's lawn is covered with them.  It was light dusk, and the grins flickered.  The center of town was packed with people, and there was some kind of market going on in the Foster's parking lot.   They were selling already carved pumpkins there - $3 for a small one, $5 for a large.  All different, all unique.  Wow!  That's a deal!

So, I'm feeling pretty good.  A lot better than expected, but not so good that I regret missing the party.  It would have been a very long drive alone, too much time to think.

~~Silk

#416 Birthday Done

Lots of cards and enotes, a romantic dinner and evening, lots of phone messages when I got home this ... ahem ... afternoon.  Daughter says some stinky stuff is waiting for my next visit, and I got a perfect white cotton robe from a friend (the trim on it just happens to match his.  All together now --- Awwww....)  I also treated myself to a bunch of Coldwater Creek travel knits and two gorgeous Egyptian hooded thobes.  This is fun.  Maybe I'll have another birthday next month.

I picked up some cards in the mail yesterday, on the way back from the grocery store, and I opened them at the bottom of the driveway.  One of them was a bit odd - there was a painting of a deer on the front, and inside, the sender had written "All these deer are here to wish you a Happy Birthday."  ALL these deer?  Then I drove up the driveway, and a doe ran across the lawn and right in front of the van.  A second deer ran across a little further up.  When I pulled in front of the house and turned the motor off, a third deer came out of the patch of woods between my house and the neighbor's, and peered curiously at the van as she sauntered across the lawn.

I'm gonna have to call that woman and ask her how she managed to arrange that!
  
~~Silk

#415 Why I Shouldn't Miss Entries

Just a note - a week ago I missed two days of entries in the journal.  And when I got home and was able to check my phone messages, I found this:  "Mommy?  Mommy!  Mommy mommy mommy!  Mom?  Mom? Mommy mommy?  Maaaaaa- meeeee!  Mommy mommy! ..." for several minutes.  So cute.  She missed me. Worried.

I saved the phone message.

~~Silk

#414 Birthday

Today is my 61st birthday.  (My internal age, by the way, stopped at 37.)

A friend will be taking me out tonight to celebrate.  I don't know what he has planned, but he will be picking me up at about 5.  I have to go to the bank, grocery store, and do some shopping across the river before then, so this will be short.  Just wanted to get the day's entry in while I can.  I don't expect to have time later today.

I have made commitments to have the house company-ready by Thanksgiving.  Wish me three weeks of sunshine and a strong back for my birthday present.  I'm gonna need both.

~~Silk

#413 Dinner With Mensa

Dinner last night at Dickens, in Poughkeepsie.  Odd, but ever since I have someone special there to welcome me, to smile at me, I've been enjoying the Mensa dinners and the people much more.  It's very strange.  Maybe it's because with a "protector" beside me I'm more open, or maybe that people are so amused/intrigued/pleased/surprised by seeing us together (he's well liked in the group) that ... that what?  I don't know.  I just feel a lot less guardedness somehow, both coming from me and coming toward me.  It all seems so much more relaxed.   

The Hippie was there last night.  Haven't seen him in ages.  I adore him.  He's such a gentle soul, but there's so much darkness there, too.  I wonder if he still works at the dynamite factory?  I didn't ask.  I should have.  I've lost track of him lately.  I'm losing track of a lot of people.  I should fix that.

~~Silk