Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

'Snail' Mask

I was looking at some items Amazon suggested for Gary and saw this:

"Ooh, good call, Amazon. Gary does need that," I thought. "It is his birthday month."

I looked at a few reviews. Some troubling reviews said it smelled. More troubling were the reviews that said, "This mask helped me be the snail I was always meant to be" and "This is a slug mask, not a snail mask!!!"

I bought it so thoughtlessly that I forgot it until Monday afternoon when I was working and I heard Gary open a box, and then laugh.

I'm glad it's a slug. Gary often describes his retired life as "Slug Life."

Smells: the Second

For the past few days Gary has been very dismayed by the smells that have been coming out of him. 

I have encountered Gary's smells in the past, and it is true, sometimes he goes through episodes of gas that are bad. Regrettably bad. Labrador-level bad. Called on the carpet before HR bad. Bad. 

However, this time, I can smell nothing. I see him shriek and wave his arms and apologize, but there is nothing. No smell. He tells me there is something wrong with me, and then of course I must prove I don't have Covid by smelling other things, and then he concludes as always I don't have the refined nose he does. I would buy that, only I have been getting running over and dropping my nose down to ass level to try to see if he is really making these smells, or if he is hallucinating.

The jury is in: I think he's hallucinating, mainly because here are no pains or sensations that accompany these smells. It might be the same meds that once made him think snakes and bugs are crawling on him. Or, it could be his epilepsy; when I looked up things that can cause olfactory hallucinations, temporal lobe epilepsy was at the top of the list, and that's the very kind he has. 

I'm going to keep an eye on it. Or my nose on it. It might just go away.

Dentist

I'm quite happy with my decision to delay my dental visit. Omicron is trending down now. Here's the graph for my county:

(No one I know died this week, but a vaccinated coworker went out sans mask and lived to regret it.)

Gary kept his appointment, but he had a little debate with the dentist about his level of concern. They were talking about how Gary elected to sit in his car and not the waiting room for fear of catching the virus. He quotes the dentist as having said, "You should be worried about us."

Gary interpreted that as, "You should be worried about me and the rest of the staff catching it, not about your selfish paranoia," and I say it the dentist meant, "You should be worried about me and the rest of the dental staff spreading it." 

Will I remember to ask the dentist to clarify when I see him tomorrow? We shall see.

 

Tongue: 60s Edition

I was going to bed. "Please don't come into my room at kiss me at midnight," I complained, "I never got back to sleep." 

Gary said, "Well, you better give me a terrific good-night kiss now. Tongue."

I can't remember the last time our tongues made contact. But we tried it. And of course we laughed.

"That's insane."

"Really, we liked that once?"

Dog Ears

A recent conversation with Gary.

[Stage direction: Gary has been coming in and out of the room to re-enact recent football plays and demand attention.]

Gary: "And then the quarterback - HEY STOP READING YOUR BOOK AND PAY ATTENTION!"

[Ellen dog-ears book to keep her place, and puts the book down and clasps her hands so she doesn't flip her husband off.]

Gary: "That's a big book. How are you going to keep your place?"

Ellen: "You just saw me dog-ear it."

Gary: "YOU DOG-EAR YOUR BOOKS THAT IS AWFUL HERE LET ME GET YOU A BOOKMARK."

I may have asked before, but is this true? Does one not dog-ear books?

Reclaiming My Kitchen

There was a brief time a few years back when Gary was in charge of the food. He took over the kitchen, added an entirely superfluous knife block, bought a "palette" of all the spices, reorganized the drawers and banished my cunning shiny tools to the back of a drawer, then put our ugliest spatulas and big spoons out in the counter in a controversial Spinny Thing.

He hasn't touched any of those tools and spices for a year. I bided my time, and advised him that I would be reclaiming my kitchen. (I did look for a tea towel that said ELLEN'S KITCHEN in big block letters, but I backed off. Too pointed.)

Last weekend, the big basket of herbs were sorted and consolidated, and the ones I use moved out of the basket and organized in the pantry. Knife block was demoted to basement, as were the bulky baskets and milk frother and especially the Spinny Thing. 

The contents of the Spinny Thing were prioritized and the useful ones are on the outside of the fridge, instead of tangled in the farthest corner of the Spinny Thing.

This sparks joy.

Gary was gracious enough to say it looks like a good system.

Gary Has a Stunning Revelation

Gary waved me over to where he had been comparing his can of Dr. Pepper and a protein shake.

"Look at these numbers! For just ten more calories I get all these nutrients. Calcium and stuff. The Doctor Pepper has just ... nothing."

Garyoke 2

Back in the day, Gary and I had Karaoke software on our old IBM PC, and we called it Garyoke. That PC died, and none of the replacement software had the Doris Day / Dean Martin songs we liked. 

Gary bought himself a Christmas present: one of those Alexa devices that has a video screen. It might have a dozen uses, but we're going to use it to sing the Garyoke again.

You can sing along with a video with scrolling lyrics, but you will still have the original singer at full volume, so it's not true karaoke. Still, he's talking about setting up a mixing board with microphones again.

We sang the Garyoke again last night. Lots of fun.

Christmas Ornaments

On the right is my ornament, the Hot Wheels car to commemorate the purchase of the new car.

On the left  is Gary's ornament, to commemorate ... well, to commemorate a side effect of the pain medicine he took for his recent root canal and tooth extraction. I got to see a new ... side of Gary. And I got to find out where the all-night pharmacy is. 

I don't know if Santa has Gary's physique, but he does have Gary's smile.

Thanksgiving

Gary spent the week claiming that he was unable to chew because of his recently extracted tooth. "DO NOT MAKE ANY FOOD FOR ME FOR THANKSGIVING I CANT EAT ANYTHING NOT EVEN YAMS.'

Unfortunately I had already stocked up early on the Turkey Day supplies, and when I say supplies I mean items fully prepared by the grocery store. Pint of dressing. Pint of cranberry relish. The only cooking I intended to do was the turkey and reconstituting a packet of powdered gravy. I cooked everything from scratch last year and set off the smoke alarm -- not worth it.

I suppose I could freeze everything for twelve weeks from now when Gary's mouth is healed. I anticipate I will spend Thanksgiving day, Black Friday, and the weekend nibbling on Thanksgiving, while Gary spoons mashed potatoes on his tongue and swallows without chewing, poor guy. 

 

Beloved

Gary recently saw this post on Facebook. The headline is:

Three 'beloved' snow leopards died of Covid complications at Nebraska zoo.

"So they weren't really beloved?" I asked Gary. "Are those, like, air quotes?'

"People use quotation marks to set things off now."

"I've seen that, but it's wrong."

"They do it online, because you can't use an underline on the web, because people will try to click it."

People, what do you think? I think those people need to learn about italics. Is this acceptable now?

 

 

Car Alexa

Gary was listening to this commercial:

"LOOK AT THAT!" he said. "THAT'S A BMW! THAT'S WHAT WE SHOULD HAVE BOUGHT. WE COULD HAVE THE ALEXA IN THE CAR!"

"Gary. That is what we bought. BMW owns Mini. We do have the Alexa in the car."

"NO! YOU NEVER TOLD ME THAT!"

"Well on the one day you drove the new car, I tried to show you, but you shouted that you needed absolute silence."

(And, to be fair, I respect that. The car is a little intimidating. Each week when I walk out to the garage and open the car door I immediately backtrack to the bathroom, because driving it upsets my stomach a bit. Or else leaving the house upsets my stomach a bit.)

Also, that couple doesn't have Siri always listening for commands at the same time. If they did Siri would but in and respond to the Alexa command with "I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

You'd think he'd want to go out play with the car immediately, but no. They just really haven't bonded.

Groceries

I submit the grocery shopping order once a week. I don't add things directly to the shopping application, I still add them to the Alexa shopping list and then shop form the on the grocery store application.

It's an unnecessary extra step because I am too crotchety to change my ways, but at least I'm not as crotchety as Gary. He writes a list.

A list in ink, on paper.

And on the top of the sheet of paper he writes:

1. His name, first and last
2. The date he made the list.

I don't know why. Perhaps he doesn't want his groceries confused with the groceries from all the other husbands and households I maintain. And perhaps he thinks I am filing his old orders in a special filing cabinet, which is why he needs the date. 

"Gary S______ 9/9/2021

Cottage cheese" 

It's just so weird.

Coricidin

Months ago:

Gary: “My nose is stuffed up. I need some Co-RICE-uh-din.”

Me: “You need what?”

Gary: (louder) “CO-RICE-UH-DIN.”

Me: “Well then buy some?”

Last Week:

Gary: “We need to buy more Co-RICE-uh-din. We are almost out.”

Me: “Show me.”

Even after I showed him numerous commercials in which it is pronounced “co-ruh-CEE-din,” he will not budge.

Admittedly, my family bought many containers of “par-MEE-zhun” cheese, but I eventually got it straightened out.

Gary and Football

I don’t understand why, but Gary is watching football again.

He played football in high school (and takes medication daily for the resulting brain injury). Still liked football.

He followed the football Cardinals, of course, until they were cruelly traded to Arizona. Still liked football.

He followed the LA Rams during the time they slummed it in Saint Louis before going back to LA, the bastards. Like many Saint Louisans, that soured him on football for years. 

I have no idea why, but this season he is watching every football game of every team he can get his hands on. I can only guess it’s because he feels justice shall be served in the lawsuit St. Louis filed against the LA Rams and he’s searching for a team he can pin his loyalties on.

 

Color Download

I was walking through the great room, looking for a snack between meetings.

“Ellen, look at the TV!” 

“It’s a commercial.”

“No, look at the picture.”

“What do you mean?”

“Can’t you see? They downloaded more more colors.”

Evidently, according to Gary, they have downloaded new colors to the television and the picture is significantly more glorious.

Here are my theories:

• He has suffered a contact high somehow, or gotten some bad lettuce. 
• Delayed side effect from his medicine.

However, the color increase only happens when he looks at the television, so I suppose Sony was holding back and now, threatened by a class-action lawsuit, they have released the colors  they were stockpiling in the Big Sony Color Warehouse in the sky.

Commentaries

Since the first days of DVDs, Gary has stoutly refused to watch the commentary track. If I try to watch the commentary he leaves the room in protest.

I can’t tell you why.

• Is it because an expert is telling him things he doesn’t know, and therefore he cannot be the expert?
• Is it because someone is talking over a movie and it’s sensory overload?
• Is it because it spoils the magic? 

No, it can’t be that last one — he gobbles up all those “Making of” documentaries. In fact, he has rediscovered his set of discs for Blade Runner with every damn version of Blade Runner ever made, and I finally convinced him to watch the “work print” with the commentary turned on. 

I watched him for the twenty minutes that he could tolerate of the commentary and I’m fairly certain it’s the first reason. Not being the expert makes him very cranky. (See all posts in which he has to listen to doctors or use repairmen.) He already gets a little cranky when I go to IMDB and share details he doesn’t know. 

I suppose when he’s watching a movie his imagination is stimulated and he makes up his own reasons and motivations (such as the “suicide” at the end of The Heiress). Then he’s confronted with what the director actually meant and it enrages him and he becomes Gary Godzilla, squashing  directors and smashing movie sets and rearranging them.

As it turns out, half of IMDB is transcribed director commentaries, so l’m good never seeing another. I’ll need to take some time to manipulate Gary into an expert position soon so he can get his expert fix in some constructive way.

Frog

For the last few weeks there has been a frog on the glass on our back door. We thought he just liked watching us.

I was admiring the frog when I noticed he would move - just a bit - just a little twitch every so often.

Turned out there were an apocalyptic number of winged bugs coming up from the patio, climbing skyward on the glass, and passing right by the mouth of the frog. He just had to sit there on the shoulder of the bug highway and flick out his tongue. 

I pulled Gary over and we started high-fiving each other for every bug that the frog consumed. 

Gary has abandoned his idea that the bugs are taking the air vent superhighway and recognizes them as outdoor animals. Now he has bought an outdoor bug zapper. I even said the zaps will frighten the raccoons and THE FOXES yet he is heartless. 

I am certain that after little baby raccoons are videotaped being startled by the sound his heart will melt and we will be left with a nearly-new outdoor bug zapper in the basement.

Gary and the Flies

Gary’s bathroom, the master bathroom, is plagued every summer with tiny little flies. Last week Gary came out of his bathroom, found me in the kitchen, and said he’d had a revelation.

He saw a moth in the bathroom, and squished it, then wondered what in earth a moth was doing in there. There is a bug zapper inside by the back door, the moth should have gone into the light, figuratively and literally.  

(I HATE the inside bug zapper. I also hate bugs, but I hate the zapper more. Picture an outside bug zapper in the floor inside your peaceful house. ZAP. (Random time passes.) ZAP.

Gary wondered why the moth wasn’t zapped. I will turn the story over to him and his exact words.

“I wondered about the moth, and then I saw a fly inside the air conditioning vent. As I watched, it squeezed through the grate, expanded its wings and fluttered them delicately to dry them out. It then buzzed up into the bathroom.

There is a matching AC grate on the floor near to the bug-zapper in the dining room. Flying insects are getting stunned to the ground, crawl into the AC grate to safety and simply walk to the end of the house where the AC grate comes out in the Master bathroom. Mystery Solved.”

Great, hon. Or the bugs crawl in, see the piles of bug bodies inside the zapper, then opt for the AC detour instead.

Door needs to be fixed. Gary has not felt the door needs to be fixed up to this point. Perhaps the March of the bugs into his bedroom will change his mind.

Spatchcocked Chicken

I have a copy of Salt Fat Acid Heat, and all I have ever made from it is the Spatchcocked Chicken.

So, foodie friends, when you spatchcock a chicken, does your spouse or partner do an impression of a spatchcocked chicken? Gary’s impression has him holding out his arms (ala crucified spatchcocked chicken) and doing an impersonation of a screaming chicken.

I can just imagine how he’d scream if he knew the chicken has no arms post spatchcock. Or if he knew the uncovered chicken spends the night fully exposed overnight in the garage refrigerator. I don’t know if I’ll ever get tired of spatchcocked chicken.

Overbought

I personally don’t like to eat the same thing two days in a row, but Gary delights in it. Given that Mr. S___ will eat no meat, and his wife will eat no carbs, we share no meals. I’m back to cooking home meals for myself on the weekends while he assembles ornate salads for himself. Each salad is a science experiment: he begins with the standing hypothesis (X% lettuce, X% feta, 1/4 cup salad dressing), eats that for two days, and tweaks it slightly on the next round. He has lost sixteen pounds doing this.

So this means Gary’s grocery list is only tomatoes, lettuce, croutons, cheeses, and two sides: cottage cheese and yogurt. Every week he tells me how much of each he needs, and for some reason last week I didn’t notice that he ordered two week’s worth of food, when he already had one week of food. 

I spent last weekend moving my food into the garage fridge, and sorting his 21 yogurts by date so nothing spoiled.

I also did this:

Note how certain bags are marked “OLD” in Sharpie. The font I used was Sarcasm Sans Serif.

Gary countered by not eating the old first, and then yesterday he went through the OLD bags and selected the one green leaf that was not rotted and incorporated it into a special Heirloom Lettuce salad.

Today he says he is off bag salads entirely. He wants to eat his cheese and tomatoes and dressing on a bed of something else. Spinach? Yeccch. Corn? Yeccch. Green Pepper? Yeecch. I suggested he augment his salad dressing with a purée of cheese and tomatoes and eat soup every day.

I think he’ll do a base of artichoke hearts and hearts of palm. He’ll be back to step one of the salad experiment but I think he likes that.

Apologies Robert Browning

Grow old along with me?

The worst is yet to be

The aches and pains from which the quarrels are made;

Our bile grows worse each year

We pass the pain to those held dear,

Once wife, now nurse, with thinning sympathy.

====

Gary doesn’t deal well with illness. Sympathy doesn’t make him feel better, what I think makes him feel better is expelling the venom. I’m always going to be younger, and therefore healthier, and therefore always the nurse and always the target.

That works fine if I’m not filled with bile myself. How do two sickly people stay married? Do they? 

====

P. S. I have a particular hatred today for Rabbi Abraham ben Meir Ibn Ezra and the poem that bears his because my left foot, the best foot of all my feet, is still jacked up by its encounter with the Grow Old Along With Me sundial.

Salad

Gary speaks well when you get him going. Bring up Trump, he can rattle on in pentameter for an hour without pausing for breath.

In fact, he did that last night, not quite for an hour but for at least twenty minutes, when I interrupted him to ask, “Did you eat anything today?”

Indignant. “You interrupted me! Let me finish my thought!”

”Sorry, but you weren’t winding down, and I was thinking about dinner.”

He said, ”I had …” (waving hand at refrigerator) “one of those round bowl-y things.” 

“What?”

Gary got more annoyed, threw his hands up in the air. “Bowl! White round bowl-y thingy!”

All he’s eaten of late, in a white bowl or not, are salads made of 25% dressing, feta cheese, and croutons, and chicken, and scraps of lettuce. 

I said, “A saaaa … llaaaad?”  I am afraid I pronounced it just that way, slowly, two distinct syllables.

”Yes! A saaaaaaaa … lllaaaaad,” he hissed, and then I laughed for a good long time. He laughed too. Eventually. 

Gary Drives

Gary had not yet embraced the Mini, so Friday afternoon I took him down quiet country roads and busy city streets to a spot ten miles away so he could drive back, only, per Gary, “I am not taking the Mini on this dusty podunk two-lane country road” and “I am not taking the Mini on this busy stop-and-go two-lane city street.”

I threatened him with driving in an abandoned parking lot like a teenager and he agreed to switch places with me and drive home. He was as tense as a cat going into a bath when he pulled out into the city traffic, but then he accelerated and you could see him unwind a little bit. The stop-and-go traffic gave him plenty of chances to accelerate and unwind until he was neutered drunk cat in a sunspot level of relaxed and called the 10 and 2 position on the steering wheel, “where the steering boobies are.”

He didn’t want to floor it on the country road back home, and he doesn’t like the extra power you get in Sport mode, but he was talking about the car when he woke up the next day so I am encouraged.

Review: The Heiress

I campaigned enthusiastically to watch this movie with Gary as part of his effort to find a movie his mom will like. I had fond yet vague memories of loving it, particularly the ending when - well - I didn’t quite remember. 

[spoilers, with additional spoilers for scenes that exist only in Gary’s imagination]

So, two men are awful to Olivia de Havilland, and she has tremendous scenes in which she destroys them. Was your father mean to you? Watch the scene when she confronts her father. Do you have abandonment issues? Watch the last scene. Is your self-esteem based on knowing that other people were wrong about you? Watch the whole movie.

Gary watched the movie and the said, “Well we can’t show that to Mom, because of the suicide.”

”What suicide?”

”Well they make it obvious she’s going to kill herself. She said she’s never going to embroider anything ever again.”

”Yes, she’s abandoning introspection and is going to live life to the fullest.”

”Oh no, can’t you see, she’s going upstairs to kill herself.”

I mean, she does look determined, I’ll give him that … but … a whole coda in which she kills herself because she’s off embroidery?

How many hobbies have I turned on? Has Gary thought I was going to kill myself each time?

Glad We Have the Pet Model of Roomba

Evidently I only clean on national holidays.

This is Gary’s hair loss since Memorial Day:

The bin was completely jammed full.
I have no idea why I didn’t get the “Please remove and clean Roomba’s brushes” message. Perhaps it sensed that my Pet paid for the Roomba.

Gary Needs to Have his Facebook Card Revoked

So this happened Saturday June 26th. 

The stubbornness. The dogged insistence. But, maybe he could claim he was late because Texas was late? I don’t know. I also don’t know if he will delete the post, or if he will wish us all a happy belated Juneteenth. 

====================

Update: he claims that the northern areas of St. Louis county celebrate on the 19th, yet St. Charles County, being further south, didn’t get the word until the 26th.

Spam

The new Caller ID announced, “SPAM RISK.”

Gary said, “Spam spam spam spam, spam spam spam spam,” and then we sang the whole Monty Python song perfectly with the crescendo and all.

Only, not. Prepare to have your mind blown.

In response to his call of “spam,” etc., I sang, “spammity spam, spammity spam,” and

NO

 … those are not the words.

The words are “lovely spam, wonderful spam.” I feel like this is one of those Yano/Laurel/brainstorm/green needle tricks.

Sticks and Stones

I was on Facebook and posted a fun fact about sloths: they are constipated. 

Gary commented: “Babe, you are my sweet sloth.” Awww. 

I responded with, “No, you’re MY sweet sloth.”

Facebook complained, “Your Comment May Go Against Our Community Standards.”

Facebook? I can only guess “sweet sloth” must be some kind of far-right code word, like “cuck?” Or is there an algorithm that picks out phrases like, “I know I am but what are you” and “I’m rubber but you’re glue.”

Gary’s Dr. Squatch Soap Review

Well, just last Monday on our anniversary I heard about some special manly soap the Young People at Work love: a Dr. Squatch soap, and as it was our anniversary that very day I bought a sample of Manly Man-scented soap for Gary.

Here is his review of the scents, as verbatim as possible.

Pine Tar - athletic

Alpine Sage - old fashioned 

Cedar Citrus - he likes, citrusy

Deep Sea Goat’s Milk - he likes most , interesting 

Bay Rum - masculine

Gold Moss - old fashioned, he likes

I also liked Goat’s Milk, Gold Moss, and Cedar Citrus, in that order.

One thing I forgot is that neither Gary nor I are on what you could call a “frequent” shower routine, so the soaps will likely stay in the shower, and the Tar, Sage, and Rum will likely be donated to the next Boy Scouts drive. Someday, somewhere, I will sniff the air and there will be a little homeless child smelling of rum. 

Anniversary Gifts!

Late in the day on our anniversary I asked Gary if he had truly forgotten, or if he was just waiting to see if I had forgotten. He was so immediately so wracked with guilt he bought me three pairs of gardening gloves.

These come with claws on the left or right hand, so he bought me two pair so I should have one plain pair and one fully-clawed pair. 

I don’t know how far those claws will go in our clay, but it’s a nice thought.

These rose suede garden gloves with rose embroidery on each gauntlet were perplexing at first. How am I to scrabble in the clay with suede gloves? He then explained they were specifically for when I go out to the rose garden and I want to protect my arms as I clip the individual long-stemmed roses.

It’s a lovely thought. I mean, we don’t have roses, anywhere, at all, but it is nice that he sees me as both the gardener clawing at the dirt and the duchess gathering the roses.

Limited Review of the Billy Wilder Classic: Sabrina

I was under the impression that I had seen Sabrina starring Humphrey Bogart, Audrey Hepburn, and an oddly blonde William Holden. 

I thought I had seen enough scenes piecemeal to put together the plot, and Gary thought he had as well, and evidently we had never seen a bit of this movie. I mean, what we did actually know, “Love triangle with men too old to be in a love triangle with Audrey Hepburn” still held up, but the comedy element was a surprise. Also the plodding in the second half was a surprise. 

The final surprise? Audrey Hepburn had huge feet.

Gary has a nice quality in that he sees a beautiful model or actress and checks out any supplemental body part he might criticize. The more lovely the woman, the more criticism he gives her earlobes or elbows or lower teeth. 

So every time Hepburn looked particularly head to toe luminous, Gary would shriek “MY GOD LOOK AT HER FEET THEY ARE BOATS GOOD LORD.”

(Car shown for scale.)

I think of her as petite - imagine being petite with giant feet. WikiFeet puts her at 10 and a half shoe size. 

Only giant in proportion to how tiny she is - but yes, not International Toe Porn Superstar quality feet. Poor thing.

Flag Day

Flag day was yesterday. And, it was also our 35th wedding anniversary. The coral anniversary.

Gary entirely forgot, which delights me. He had Facebook to remind him, and Alexa told him the exact date, but he never caught on.

I don’t know why I love it when he forgets. It’s not just that I feel superior (which I do). It’s more that I am glad he doesn’t feel our 35 years of marriage is an “accomplishment.” Accomplishments are hard. 

Another nice thing happened on our anniversary. Last Friday Gary asked me to find our marriage certificate and it is nowhere in this house. Thankfully, today the state emailed me that they do have proof of our marriage, and they will be sending it here in 3-5 days, so I will not be starring in my own personal remake of some Doris Day movie where a couple realizes they aren’t really married.

Gary’s Hair

When most vaccinated men are breaking their bubble to get a haircut, Gary is keeping his long hair.

He does accept that it’s untidy, though, so he found two solutions on Amazon.

One solution is an innovative little bead lasso marketed for women, so, a bold move:

The other is a manly-man’s hair band that is marketed for men, because men want hair bands that can hold up to 80 pounds.

If he is anything like me he will purchase a dozen solutions before he finds the irreplaceable one that works. He will use that one exclusively until it vanishes and destroys his world.

Gary and the Car

Gary has not embraced the car. Well, he has not embraced driving the car. He did drive it last Monday, but he was hesitant. He claims it’s because he knows every mile he drives takes up one percent of the battery. 

I see his point - I drive to Florissant and back and discover that I’m at 50%, which is fine - but plugging it in at home takes over a day to top it off again. He hasn’t seen how easy it is to charge up on the road, so he feels like he’d be stranded.

To ease that anxiety we visited a level 3 road charger Monday night, and everything went wrong.

1. EVGo charging card had not been activated.
2. Another car pulled in right after we did so she was waiting, adding to the stress.
3. Gary is familiar with how it feels to breathe in sulphuric gas, because batteries in his  mainframe computer room leaked once, and he said this battery was leaking sulphuric acid, and he choked and coughed violently.

So, we left with the same level of stress, if not more.

To alleviate his fuel stress we decided to accelerate our plan to put a level 2 charging station in our garage. I did notice that there is one application you can use that will tell you where the nearest charger is - and it is a house two miles away. Does this mean that people will arrive and ask to charge up? Awkward.

Responds How?

So I saw this commercial for a “smart bed” that responds to snoring.

At first I thought, so how does the bed respond to the snoring? Does it rattle you awake? Toss you off the side? Then I saw the head tilt graphic. So if someone snores because he has, let us say, sleep apnea, it will raise his head so that his airway isn’t as obstructed? Wouldn’t that wake him up? 

I’d mention it to Gary, but he snores so consistently that the thing would keep elevating until he was folded in half like a toddler’s PB&J. 

Wires

Maybe I have a little Joan Crawford in me, but I find this unacceptable:

This mess is behind the monitor on Gary’s computer desk. Usually I steer clear of his little hoarder haven, but I needed a big monitor for a work task. I was finally able to find the monitor cable after I gave up and left the room twice.

(He’s not really a hoarder. He’s just more disorganized than I am. I keep following mom’s advice: men don’t need a mother, they need autonomy.)

It Went as Expected

The new all-electric Minis:

• are four inches bigger than the old ones. (We went without our trade-in, and they suggested we donate it to a good cause instead.)
  
• are an odd color of blue/black (they still make red, but of course Gary couldn’t wait)
• look non-plussed now
• drive exactly like the Moon cars at Six Flags - when you lay off the accelerator they just stop
• have white leather seats, which scare me, because I think we all know I will pee on them or worse.

 

 

Mini Update

One nice thing about the pandemic is that we really don’t need two cars. It’s entirely possible we just take the sick Mini off the insurance and leave it in the garage ... well, forever.

But, Gary’s Honda Fit has as many miles as the Mini, and if it goes out then we have zero cars, and then I think, you can buy a lot of taxi rides for what a new car costs. 

But thinking ahead, in a year or so, there will be concerts and museums and visits to other cities, and potentially there won’t be the $7,500 tax credit for the electric Mini. 

I think we just need one more thing to tip us into car buying mode. A discount, which Mini evidently doesn’t do. A good price on our trade-in.

“OR, WOULDN’T IT BE COOL IF THEY DELIVERED IT RIGHT TO OUR DOOR?” Gary said. “WE LOVE GETTING THINGS DELIVERED.”

True. That would do it.

Signs

One thing about Gary: he doesn’t like to be told what to do. I know, no one likes to be told what to do, but Gary hates it so much he even resents road signs.

We were in the car together for the first time in months, and he encountered two road signs he felt were trying to oppress him. 

The first sign that stepped outside its station and dared to tell him what to do was a “NO OUTLET’ sign. 

“I HATE THAT SIGN. NO OUTLET. STUPID SIGN TRYING TO KEEP ME OFF THAT STREET.”

”I think it’s to keep you from getting stuck  — “

”NO THOSE PEOPLE DON’T WANT ANYONE TURNING AROUND IN THEIR PRECIOUS STREET.”

The next sign was worse: it didn’t just boss him, it tried to play mind games. 

It was a digital sign that said our exit was going to be closed for construction starting at 9 that night. 

”I DON’T READ THOSE ELECTRONIC SIGNS. WHO KNOWS IF THEY’RE EVEN RIGHT.”

I thought, “Of all signs, the electronic up-to-the minute signs would be the most accurate: no one has to come out and unscrew the sign,” but I didn’t want to be seen as defending the double-plus-ungood signage mind control plot.