Jump to content

Type keyword(s) to search

Netfoot

Member
  • Posts

    7.2k
  • Joined

Reputation

16.1k Excellent

Recent Profile Visitors

6.1k profile views
  1. So after putting three teaspoons of fuel in the van and three minutes in the phone I paid a very little towards the water bill and another very little towards electricity. Lunch was macaroni with tuna and corn topping. I have four closets in the house that are packed with books. Well, the most easily accessible is only about ⅔ full. Anyway, I went through and pulled out all the books and piled them on the bed. Quite a few have deteriorated to the point where the covers are coming off or are very tatty. I went through and ruthlessly separated them into 1) books so deteriorated they will have to be chucked out; 2) books that I want to actually keep; 3) books I don't want and will attempt to sell; 4) books I will try to sell but want to read again first. I will try to sell around 90 of them, read and then sell about 10, and keep about 30. Of the 90 to sell, 30 or so originally came from the second hand book store who guarantee to take them back at half price. So those 30 I can definitely sell and of the remaining 60, I might get some sold, maybe not. There isn't a lot of money involved. I'd be lucky to get three to four bucks for the best of them, one dollar would be what the majority are worth. But I have three more closets full! And the books really need to be sorted out because they are just taking up space. And in the sorting, I might find Cryptonomicon and/or Snow Crash! Now, the guy at the bookstore who does the buying says he is there on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I saw him today but he says that is only by chance. But I have a handful I want to read again before selling and I don't want to delay. So unfortunately the book I am currently reading will have to go on the back-burner. I hate to do it, especially since I'm starting to get the hang of the language. But I am 700+ pages from finishing it, so back-burner it is. Dinner for Mo was scrambled egg with ham. I was going to settle for bean-mix boiled in stock and eaten with a spoon. More bean stew than bean soup. But Mo complained (rightfully) that his scrambled egg & ham was "less", so I boiled more macaroni. He had a second course of macaroni with some beans over it and I had the same but with more beans. I didn't have any issues but Mo's bowl, while devoid of macaroni had noticable deposits of beans left at the bottom. Gospel Plow by Screaming Trees. This can be found on their final album Dust, released in 1996. While not the commercial success of earlier releases, many think this to be their finest album of all. I certainly prefer it. Dylan released a track with the same name several decades before, but I don't waste a lot of time listening to Dylan. My sunburnt head and face has not seemed nasty fluid all day, nor has it been at all painful. However, the peeling will start soon and that, while painless, will be a real pain. Well, midnight is staring me in the face and I have 10 books to read. I want to have a shower because those books were dusty as hell and I look like a sweep! And while I didn't sleep much last night, I'm yawning already. I should have started this book-sorting over the weekend. I have a boxful of ratty looking books to dispose of and the binmen came early this morning so we won't be seeing them again for at least another week. Here is what I'm talking about:
  2. Four hour naps make sleep later difficult. Didn't get to sleep until after 5:00 and up again before 8:00 do only about 2½ hours. Plus the nap. Just took the van out switch some books which I sold to the second-hand book store. Made $45 which allowed mecto top up my phone by $11 (which is how much it needed) and put $19 in the van. Which died twice in the way to the station so maybe the tank was very empty or maybe that is another issue cropping up now. It didn't die on the way back... Anyway that allowed me to bank an extra $15 so now I can pay a little more towards the water and electricity bills. Unfortunately the internet banking app refused to sign me in, so... Wait! It has logged me in! And it's saying "Your account information is currently unavailable..." Great. Anyway, I will have to go through the huge collection of tatty books I have here and see what I can sell. The store has a policy of guaranteeing to buy back any book they sold you, at half price. They will also buy other books as well, if they think they can sell them on at a profit. I'll have to go through and see what I have here that has their stamp in it. Bank info still currently unavailable so I guess I'm "spinin' top in mud" as the old folks used to say. Nobody under the age of 70 knows what that means because nobody under the age of 70 knows what a top is, how you spin one, and why mud would present a problem for anyone trying to do so. I am too old. Maybe I should go home and take another nap? I have to figure out what to feed Mo for his lunch. I want to stop giving him corned beef all the time and he must be getting pretty sick of rice. So macaroni with tuna fish maybe? I could eat some of that myself! And it's not like there is a huge list of other options.....
  3. Formatting on this page is a bit messed up.... Had a long nap this afternoon. Four hours. I'm not even sure that can classify as a nap any more. Woke with my face glued to the pillowcase with sunburn seepage. Lovely. Golden Years by Bowie. Off his Station To Station album. No question, Bowie had a huge catalogue of great music and nobody can say he was unwilling to innovate! Mo and I had veggie rice for lunch, with chunk tuna over the top. I cooked a slightly larger than usual pot of the rice so there would be enough for his dinner. I took that bone I've been boiling periodically and cut off any soft tissue (gristle, meat, etc) and added it to his rice for dinner. My dinner was a patty from the freezer. Direct from the freezer because I cleverly neglected to take it out earlier to thaw. It was icy and hard. Still tasted fine. The 16 bean soup mix has been soaking for the last 48 hours so I will try it in something tomorrow. Maybe I'll make soup! The only other option is to cook it in rice. Apart from the potato flakes the only other things there are here to eat is rice and long pasta. Can't think of a dish using these with spaghetti... Watched a movie called Memento. Clever plot device. Will say no more, though it isn't a new movie and everyone has probably watched it already. (The formatting on this page is a real PITA. I'll keep this one short. Partly because being as I slept away half the day, I have little to say.) On Garden Patrol I found a tee shirt out on the wet grass. It's soaked of course. And I have to draw the conclusion that rain fell while I slept. I never noticed so either there was no breeze to blow it on on me or I was too far under to notice being rained on. Internet gone again. Twice now, since I started this post. Will attempt to reconnect and send this off. Don't want the forum to have any excuse to eat this all up and replace it with a pointless warning.
  4. I could create a special place for the phone but I use it all the time so I would need it when I'm at my desk, when I'm in the kitchen timing the rice, when I'm in the bedroom listening to music, when I'm in the bathroom watching YT,.... Besides, having a special place would demonstrate that I am organized! We simply can't have that! Me too. But it won't last long. $11 on the phone to get a few minutes, $9 (or maybe $19) in the tank so the van can be used in an emergency, and the balance split between water bill and light bill. It won't make much of a dent in those last two, but it might keep the wolves from the door for a little while longer... Meanwhile, sunburnt scalp seeping nasty, clear fluid which runs down over my face. O, joy! Had ham & eggs this for breakfast this morning. Mo got ham, no egg. He came and complained early o'clock that his water bowl was empty. I filled it up and added a full tray of ice cubes for him. (He likes crunching ice. Not as much as Buddy did, but still.) He immediately ran off to play in the yard without touching the bowl! All that ice was melted and the water back up to normal temperature again before he came back. Now I have to cook him/us some lunch. I'm thinking rice with channa, topped with tuna. Or tinned veggies instead of the channa. Dinner can be a patty or some ramen or even oatmeal for me. For him, I don't know what.
  5. A guy came to buy a motor from me today. ($150!!) His wife jokingly offered to buy Mo. I almost agreed. Earlier, I was sitting in the bedroom scratching my head. Mo came running in. He stuck his head in the basket of clean laundry. And vomited. Gimme Hope Jo'anna by Eddy Grant. Ehhh... Went over to the mall but there were no free tables in the food court. So I wandered off and found one of the few benches that offer a place to sit outside the food court. I was using the phone but the notifications were disturbing shoppers so I turned the volume right down, almost to nothing. Sent my emails, WhatsApps, etc, and noticed that the phone was down to 3% battery. Whoops! Better get home and charge this baby! Got home, unlocked and went in, with an urgent need to pee. After that I went to my desk and it was 30 minutes before I thought "Phone! Gotta put that on charge!" I couldn't find it anywhere. I searched the whole house. Multiple times. The place looks like a bomb hit it! I couldn't call the phone and make it ring because: landline disconnected. And if it was at 2% when I left the mall, it was probably powered down now, anyway! Even if I stopped a stranger in the street and asked them to call the number and the phone was still alive, the volume was set very low, maybe too low to hear. It's about then I was scratching my head in the bedroom, wondering what to do next. I searched for five hours. Every nook and cranny of the house that I'd been anywhere near today. Meanwhile I contemplate what it would be like to have no phone, internet, WhatsApp, email, camera, photo album, forums, alarm clock, kitchen timer, maps, calender, calculator, spreadsheets, internet/phone banking, bus schedule app, music player, google.... Not an attractive picture. By watching the clock on my computer I was able to take my dinner meds only 10 minutes late. And when I went for a pee. Was that the 8:00 dinner meds alarm I could hear? So quiet I wasn't sure if that was what it was? So quiet I wasn't sure what room it was coming from? I walked up and down the passage several times before I concluded it was in the bedroom somewhere. Then I was walking around with my ears peeled over here? No. Over there? No. Back over here again? Eventually, I followed the noise to a clump of fluff that had escaped Mo's Fortress of Solitude & Dust Bunnies and got lodged under the toe-kick area of a cupboard. And in that clump of fuzz was the phone. Battery at 1%, volume at near zero and alarm almost about to terminate as the 15-minute duration was almost spent.... I have to take steps to prevent this from happening again. I must ensure that if the phone is connected to the home wifi (which it will do if in range) I can send it a signal from my desktop computer and make it alarm. Mo had rice & corned beef for lunch. I had Eclipse biscuits with thin slices of fatty ham. Actually, Mo had biscuits with ham and then rice & bully. I have to sell him and get a pupper who doesn't get to eat my meals for me! My dinner was spaghetti with a sauce made from bully beef, onion and some tomato sauce. Mo had the remainder of the rice from lunch but with a liberal scoop of my sauce over it. Tell truth, I'm not in the best mood. Somehow I've managed to burn my nose and scalp to a crisp and they are painful. How I don't know because I am always careful to wear a hat if going out for any length of time and these last few days are no exception. My skin was always sensitive and after the skin grafts, etc, I have to.be five times more careful. Also feel dirty and messy. Drank so much water I've run out of ice cubes. Nine trays back in the freezer, but I want a cold drink now! And the house is absolutely infested with blue-arsed flies for some reason and of course, all three cans of bug-spray are empty. While searching for the phone I discovered a cache of books and picked out 9-10 that I want to read. (No, still no sign of Cryptonomicon or Snow Crash ☹️). So at least there is that. Now, I'm going into the shower and with the water at body temperature, I will wash the salt off my burnt face. Then I will go into the kitchen and find something cool to drink, even if I have to pour the unfrozen water out of the ice trays into a glass and drink that! Then I'm going see what I can do to stop this phone from hiding from me again.
  6. Long voicemail from Dr. K. in which she says she has been talking to the kidney people at QEH. According to them they are "incensed" over the long delay (many months) during which the hospital has not obtained any biopsy needles, especially considering the large number of people that have been waiting for months. There have been, apparently, contentious discussions between medical and administration and supposedly the confrontations are getting more frequent and louder. Anyway, the QEH doctors say they are doing everything they possibly can to get the needles ASAP. Dr. K. told them that she wants me to be one of the first to be biopsied when the needles arrive and they told her I was already "at the very top of the list." Now, I would (and have, several times) trust Dr. K. with my life. But that smooth-talking, excuse-always-ready bunch at QEH? She might trust them but I certainly don't. For all their promises to her, I still don't and won't believe a word they say until they back the talk with action.
  7. Cooked a pot of rice with the last of the lentils and a bit of corned beef. Also put that ham bone in for some extra flavour. While that was cooking I diced a little piece of ham small, and fried that up in a pan, but not too much. When the rice was ready I split it between us bachelors and topped it with some tasty ham cubes. Like maybe a tablespoon, stirred in just to make the dish a little interesting. Mo was finished before I was, but then I was using a small spoon (makes the meal last longer and seem larger) whereas Mo simply stuck his nose in his bowl and began Hoovering. With the last of the recent batch of lentils now gone, I put a bag of "Sixteen Bean Soup Mix" to soak. I don't think this will come out as good as it sounds. It's like when you are learning to paint in kindergarten. You mix the colours to make other colours. Yellow & blue give green! Blue & red gives purple! But you soon find out that if you just throw everything in together, you end up with Baby-Shit Brown. It's the same with beans. Too many different types of bean in one pot and the resulting flavour is "Sludge". Anyway, I'll do my best with them and hopefully I will be proven wrong and they will be palatable. Had to take a bathroom break at QEH. I suspect dark, red pee is not a good sign. For What It's Worth, written by Stephen Stills and recorded in 1966 by Buffalo Springfield. Inspired by riots on the LA Sunset Strip. Early counterculture stuff! Now Mo is barking his head off outside continuously, so I will have to get a stick and threaten him with lix he will never get, in hope of getting him to shut up before the neighbors pool some cash to buy strychnine. Will sleep like a rock tonight.
  8. Bus arrived at 5:06 and it's now 5:41. Just got off and heading home to get a Mozie-cuddle and a mug of tea. Knackered. It will prolly take me all weekend to recover from today's little jaunt.
  9. 4:05 and they just took my script. They gave me one of those buzzer thingies you get at coffee shops, but I doubt I'm going to get a coffee! So let's see how long before they buzz me to say they don't have any Spirolon! ETA: Time is 4:44 and just collected my meds. No coffee. Heading out to the bus stop to await a #16 but to take me home. No wifi from here until I get home.
  10. The QEH pharmacy filled Dr. Jacinto's prescription about 15 minutes ago. But they refused to fill Dr. Kristi's prescription, saying it had to go to a polyclinic. I thought the pharmacy at QEH was just another polyclinic, only with more stocks. Apparently not. So now, I am at the horrible Winston Scott polyclinic waiting to hand in my prescription. Time is now 3:41 and they made me sit in the dirt outside before letting me in because no room inside and no seating outside. 18 people in front of me - no idea how long this will take. My number is 321 but there is no display telling me what number is currently being served. Will let you know if I ever find out. When I leave here I still have to go and try to catch a #16 bus home!
  11. Reached the pharmacy. Now serving: My ticket: Dr. Jacinto was very nice and assisted me as soon as she arrived. New prescription for meds at original dosage level with instructions on how to try to reduce slowly. See her again in a month.
  12. Got to QEH - took about an hour, waiting then riding the bus. Now sitting waiting for Dr. Jacinto to arrive. She isn't expecting me so I don't know how I will be received. Been waiting here about 1:20 but she should be here in another 20 minutes. She won't necessarily talk to me any time soon, since I don't have an appointment. The goal here is to get a prescription from her. Once that is in hand I will then retire to the in-house pharmacy, where about 60 people were waiting when I came in. A guy just walked past, in leg-irons. Not kidding. At first I thought it was some sort of fashion statement. (Not impossible - I remember "Bondage Trousers") But then I noticed he was being closely followed by a chap wearing the uniform of the Prison Service. It's a good thing we don't have a Wal-Mart. The weird would be too much for me. Was to collect some ca$h this afternoon (sold something) but the delay here means I won't get it until maybe tomorrow. Which means I won't be able to pay towards my water bill today. And today is exactly one month since my last payment. And it's Friday, too!
  13. Sitting at the bus stop, on my way to QEH. Started late because I think Dr. Jacinto only comes in from 1:00 this afternoon. Expect to sit around at bus stops all day, prefer not to wait around at QEH as well. On my way out I glanced at Mo's water bowl and it was dry! Filled it yesterday but I guess that's a measure of how got it's been. Lucky I checked because I wouldn't want him to be without water all day. It looks like another hot one. I usually check his bowl every time I go past unless I know I just filled it. Hoping today won't be an endless, tiresome slog of waiting for buses. Will report back later.
  14. We had good vittles, today! Not surprisingly, I suppose... There was some of the minced beef with cabbage, onion g tomato, do I cooked pasta. Macaroni. Mo and I split it 50:50 and we both enjoyed it. Now, for dinner I cooked rice with lentils and split that 50:50 as well. I had a small pork chop that I thought might be a little iffy so I didn't want to give it to Mo in case it made him sick. I cooked that for myself. I also had a big lump of ham and when I looked at it, there was a lot of fat and skin. I paired away the skin/fat and cut this into cubes. These were fried in a pan and quite a bit of fat rendered out if them. The resulting cubes were semi-crispy on the outside and tasted good (I tried the smallest one) these were mixed in with Mo's rice. The rendered fat was what I cooked my pork chop in. In fact it was perfectly fine. When it was ready there was quite a bit of fat in the pan which I drained off and reserved to cook something tomorrow. Meanwhile I deglazed the fond from the ham fat & pork chop to make a couple tablespoons of gravy. This went over my rice and chop. It turned out rather well, although the chop was quite small. And go finish, a mug of tea after Garden Patrol. I know I'm always talking about drinking tea. It's not like I have anything against coffee! But a 100 gram jar of instant coffee is about $9.99 which will make me around 10 mugs at 16 oz. Whereas you can get 50-80 teabags for $10 or less and (theoretically, at least) use them more than once. My dad used to drink English pints of tea at 20 oz. per pint. I drink American pints of tea because I can't find an English pint mug. I ordered one once and it was grand! Then a short while later there was a kitchen mishap and it got busted. Fast Car by Tracy Chapman. I like this track but I do believe that generally she isn't as great as she is so frequently made out to be. A tolerably talented musician, no more. Mo just came in, clambered up over me, looked out the window for a minute, clambered back down, and left. All without a word. Looks like tomorrow I'll have to go out and take my chances with a #16 bus again. Gotta go back to QEH for meds and probably to the Winston Scott Polyclinic as well, in search of Spiralon. Although, Winston Scott sucks. And if I am going to QEH I suppose I might as well get my Spirolon there. I was right there yesterday, sitting for over three hours at the bus stop. But there was no way I was going to lug five bags of groceries over there. Better planning and I might have bought the meds before going to buy the groceries. But hindsight is 20:20 vision, eh? <groan!> Mozie just came in, did one of his weird, side-drops right on my nuts and while I was lying here moaning, practiced one of his double back-leg kicks dead on target again. Then to add insult to injury, he tried to steal a tee shirt. I already recovered a kitchen towel from the yard while on Garden Patrol..... A few days ago I had a painful right hand. Felt like I'd somehow bashed the base of the thumb. Wasn't too concerned because such aches & pains come and go. But this one came out if nowhere and isn't going. I don't know that it's getting worse, but it doesn't seem to be getting any better. Will give it a few more days before I start to worry about it. There is a cool, moist breeze in the window. Wouldn't be surprised if it poured with rain tonight. Just hope tomorrow isn't wet and miserable, seeing as I need to be out and about and would prefer not to get completely soaked in the process. I know myself. If I go out and the rain comes down and soaks me, well, such is life. But if I'm home, dry and comfy and the rain is pitching down bucket-a-drop, I have a hard time convincing myself to deliberately go out in it and get drenched. Anyway, I had better corral Mo and get the door locked. Otherwise, if the rain does fall, I will get a wet dog using me as a towel!
  15. When the last season aired I wondered what had happened to this season. I was told the story about it being abandoned. It seemed unlikely to me, since no matter how bad the season had been, there would be some value in the IP. But the season had clearly not been aired, and what do I know?
×
×
  • Create New...