On Sunday when I went to pull the shades it was snowing lightly. It continued like that all day. I worked on the Christmas present in the morning and kept stoves going. I was sitting most of the day, only 2908 steps for the day.
On Monday I had 3 appointments, leaving for the first at 8AM. It was bitter cold outside and windy. I had gotten the snowflakes up in the laundry room on Sunday afternoon and swept the steps and walkways. That’s probably where all my steps came from.
The ride to the first appointment in the hilltowns is 40 minutes and we always leave early because, you know, hilltowns. So I had to wait for 20 minutes for the appointment time. But the provider was running late and I never got in until well after time.
Out of that one and back on the bus for a 40 minute ride back. I thought my next appointment was 11:20AM and waited and waited. Apparently it was a 11:40AM phone visit.
While I waited for the 3rd appointment, I finished the Christmas present, after waiting for all the materials to come in.
The birds didn’t wait this year to find the feeders, nor the squirrels. I have to take photos through the windows, sorry about photo quality. My husband’s old camera doesn’t zoom as well as the previous 2.
The van came and took me to the last appointment. It’s a very short drive and I was taken right into the room. Where I sat and waited and waited. After a half hour I flagged a nurse to ask if I had been forgotten, again. (This is the place that forgot me in October.) No, just the provider running late. Sigh….
So I was finally seen and got out and called the van but got the answering machine. That was weird but I waited 15 minutes. No van. So I called again and waited 15 more minutes after getting the machine again. Well it was getting onto 5PM, so I called the Senior center, but they were gone.
Hmmm, I didn’t have phone numbers on me, nor could remember any. But my friend runs the Lyme Disease Resource Center and so the receptionist looked up the number and called. My friend answered and said she’d be over in 10 minutes and get me.
So I went out to sit and wait for her and the van pulls in. The receptionist called my friend back to let her know I had a ride and I went to the van. It turns out he’d given me the wrong card/phone number. It was for another driver not on duty. Sigh… He’d wondered why he hadn’t gotten a call and came anyway.
But my son had turned on my Christmas lights and was working on the stoves when I got home, so it was nice to see the lights.
On Tuesday morning, I realized I could start the chicken stock on Tuesday, it would finish on Wednesday and cool overnight, and my helper friend would be here on Thursday afternoon to package it and clean up.
So I set about getting ready to do that and at 9:20AM I realized I hadn’t thawed the 10 lb carcass block. Sigh… But a cool thing I found is my old gas stove heats at 140F in the oven, so I put the block in and by noon it had thawed enough to get it in the crockpots.
My helper friend had helped chopping vegs and he ran an errand and we had the roasters loaded by noon. We cleaned up and he left. I sat down as I was pretty tired even though my #1 intern was to arrive at 12:30PM. She got here around 12:45PM, but I never got up and got ready until after 1PM.
We headed out up north and picked up an order, then went looking for clothes at Salvation Army. I only found 2 shirts, that was all. Then we headed to the co-op and I got boots at 20% off even though I had missed the sale last week!
Next we headed south and on the way I got too tired. I decided to do 3 small errands and then go home. Salvation Army shopping in the south store would have to be another day. We got home at 3:45PM and she got the cooler of food into the cellar for me and headed out.
I got everything put away, then checked the roasters. One was just simmering the other, not yet. I went and sat down for a while. I got up at 5:30PM to get stoves going and check the roasters and feed the cat.
That roaster still wasn’t simmering, so I stuck a finger in, stone cold. Sigh. I changed the outlet it was plugged into, nothing.
So I dragged out the big crockpot and the biggest stockpot and it just fit in the two. My brother took the roaster apart and it was badly rusted inside. I had never gotten it into water since I bought it at a tag sale 4 years ago. But over the years the element connections had corroded and then broken. It was well and truly dead.
I went online and found a new one, to be delivered on Wednesday, but too late for this batch. Then I asked my son to keep an eye on the various pots during the night when he’s tending stoves.
I was in bed at 8:15PM hoping to sleep through. I have exercise class on Wednesday morning. I’ll be turning off the remaining roaster at noon and move the crockpot into the kitchen as I have to close off the porch to cool the roaster.
Both pots will be cooking until 6PM and will be moved to the porch to cool then. Hopefully everything will be cold by noon on Thursday so I can skim fat off.
I also MUST do laundry on Wednesday. And I have another project I should start, if I have the energy. It’s to be a cloudy day, but not so cold.