Happy Friday to all. Another exciting week in the Midwest. We set a new record low on Tuesday, February 16 of -23ºF. We broke the previous record and managed to stay inside and get the car started everyday. Considering that the 16 year old Subaru that Mark drives sits outside year round, it is a pretty good track record.
Valentine’s Day, Sunday, was a bit of a let down. After our annual discussion about how the “holiday” is a made for marketing set up by the candy and greeting card enterprises, Mark didn’t even bother with a card. You would think the. Old fool had learned after all these years that some protestations are not as strenuous as others. No card, no candy, no flowers - just a hug and a wish for a great day. Deb at least gave the idiot a little foil wrapped candy heart she had tucked away in her purse!
Deb also invested solid baking time in service to the holiday, baking and decorating a pair of huge heart shaped chocolate chip cookies. One was delivered to the girls, and one was delivered to Iris and Esmè, together with a loaf of banana nut bread. Monday, on President’s day, Deb also baked up a huge batch of oatmeal cookies in honor of Mark thinking he was still in charge of anything - got to humor these old guys!
Tuesday, to celebrate the record temperature, we journeyed out to the previously scheduled appointment for out 1st round COVID vaccine. This enterprise went off without a hitch. We were in and out of the clinic within 25 minutes, which included the 15 minute mandatory observation time for adverse reactions. We used the Charles Drew Clinic located in a building at the Omaha Home for Boys, in North Omaha, the use of which was recommended to us by our dear friend Ann Hosford, who found that this clinic had openings available. When we made the appointment we were concerned that perhaps we were drawing a slot from some more impacted person, but the reservationist assured us that their goal was to get the vaccine into as many arms as possible as soon as possible - they had time for us and so we took it. They also made our second appointments at the same time. We were impressed with the professionalism and efficiency of the operation. Afterwards, we took the opportunity, as we were out, to complete some of our weekly grocery shopping.
As we noted last week, we had experimented with a Shepherd’s Pie recipe utilizing some ground lamb and a number of vegetables. The seasonings made for a delicious dish, which was also great a night or two later as a leftover meal. Abigail was inspired too, so found a vegetarian recipe of Shepherd’s Pie to try, using lentil beans as a substitute for the ground lamb. She generously shared a few helpings with us for an evening meal. This, too, was delicious, and the flavor was very close to what we had made earlier. Abigail’s mashed potato topping was superior to ours and perfectly browned for a wonderful presentation.
Wednesday morning, with the temperatures rising to 14ºF in the daytime, Mark loaded his trusty new electric snowblower into the Subaru and drove over to the girls house to spend a quick 30 minutes clearing their sidewalks abutting the streets. As they live on a corner lot and have a very busy bus route thoroughfare whizzing by, it needed to be cleared before the ice set in. Normally a neighbor takes care of it for them, but for some reason it didn’t get cleared, so Dad to the rescue. Besides, he is retired and needs to feel needed.
Wednesday evening was percolating along uneventfully; we grilled some cheese sandwiches for dinner and settled in after the PBS Newshour to watch some escapist TV. We have been watching Season Two of a show called The Alienist, a crime drama set in the late 1890’s New York City with Dakota Fanning in the lead role as a detective. Not great, but an enjoyable story line. We had just turned off the TV when a loud rumbling sound began from the TV. Thinking that it was a problem with the sound bar or the TV, we were genuinely confused when it did not stop when we shut the TV down. We realized that it was instead a broken water line in the wall. Mark ran downstairs and shut the main water line off, ending the noise. We moved the bookcases located under the TV from the wall and sopped up the relatively small amount of water on the floor. We called and left a message for the plumber for the next morning.Thursday morning, the plumbers arrived around 9:00 and opened up the wall to locate the broken line. They cut out the offending portion of copper, repaired the line and then put the thawing machine on the lines.
They were in and out in under an hour and we were back in business. We ran around flushing the toilets, starting the dishwasher and running a load of laundry to make sure that we wouldn’t run out of clean dishes or clothing.
We now have another wall to repair but are taking the episode as a sign of good luck. If we had already been in bed when the line broke, we probably would never have heard it and awakened the next morning
We may have mentioned this before, but we subscribe to The Writers’ Almanac, a daily email we receive that provides a daily poem and short articles, mostly of birthdays of writers or other historic happenings in the world. It comes under the auspices of Garrison Keillor. We mention this because we also receive, about once a week, a daily column of musings from Keillor as a separate email. He currently lives in New York City with his wife and he has been writing lately of their trials and tribulations under the COVID pandemic. A lot of what he says is similar to what we write about here, but, he is such a great writer that we have no compunction of recommending his work to you. The column we received this past Wednesday was particularly good, and included a poem he wrote while waiting the requisite 15 minute observation period after his first vaccine shot. It won’t be copied here, but we recommend that you go to his website and read the column of February 16, 2021. It is titled “The old scout stands in line.” His website is Garrisonkeillor.com.
As usual, we urge you to stay safe, keep washing your hands, stay away from people, or at least socially distanced, and schedule for your vaccine at the earliest possible time. All these things could save your life and the lives of others. That is a good thing.
