Thursday, July 16th marked us being halfway through our fourth month in the volunteer position in White, GA.
Following the emergence of “explosive diarrhea” caused by contaminated lettuce and berries in several states recently, we purchased a salad spinner so we could properly wash/rinse produce and not get cyclosporiasis because some incompetent worm-brained poser cut funding so that food supplies could not be checked for issues or track how and where those issues come from. This administration is full of people who have no idea what they’re doing, and all of us are paying the price for that. After all, it wasn’t our government health agencies that initially identified the source, it was Taco Bell’s own rigorous supply-chain monitoring that did that. There have been more than 18,000 cases and 2 deaths reported as of this writing.
We got a nice, smaller one for less than $30 that was very highly rated, so hopefully we won’t get or suffer from severe bouts of “Hershey squirts” here. Most of the time we buy bagged, pre-washed lettuce, but it seems even that is not safe. For dinner that night Cindy made us a nice salad using the bagged, pre-washed lettuce and when she ran it through the salad spinner the water was brown with dirt, debris and who knows what else. I was shocked at how much stuff came off of it and how discolored the water was. Same the next morning when she ran blueberries through it before adding them to our cereal.
Changing Website Hosts
On Friday, July 17th, I was still handling details of moving my three websites to a new hosting service before my old host contract expires. That night we watched the first episode of season three of Silo and…whoa, she’s the MAYOR now???? I don’t remember THAT from the book, but it has been 4 years since I read it and my memory is not as good as it used to be. Or they’ve departed from the book for reasons known only to them.
Saturday was a fairly busy day at the ramp. Before my official duties that morning I posted my latest Wandering Wetheringtons blog and everything worked, so yay for that! UPDATE: Well, not quite. I discovered a few days later that the migration was not complete at that time and by the time it was that post had disappeared, so a few days later I had to re-post it. But NOW everything seems to be working, so yay again for that.
That night we watched the second episode of the new season of Silo. Yeah, I’m pretty sure this is newly created content for the show that was not in the book.
NOTE: A few days after this episode aired I read online that they did indeed add to the story in order to extend the series out to its fourth and final season.
LHOP
Sunday was a hot, hot day outside. But fortunately it was not so busy that we had to be out in the parking lot during the day and we were able to manage most of it from the shade of the screen room where the fan was blowing at jet engine speeds.
We watched the third episode of Silo that night. Then Cindy watched the first couple of episodes of the new Little House On The Prairie series from Netflix on her laptop without me, thinking I wouldn’t want to watch it. Listen, I used to watch the original network television show when it aired from 1974 to 1983 EVERY week it was on.
My wife doesn’t know me at all!
While she watched Little House On The Prairie without telling me, I watched Punisher: One Last Kill which was VERY violent and bloody, for a Disney+ show. Not complaining, just observing.
Monday, July 20th was spent relaxing as we do most Mondays. Over on my personal blog I posted about a song I like from my wayward youth, Isn’t It Time, and a cover version of it I discovered that I might like even more.
That night Cindy re-watched the first few episodes of Little House On The Prairie on Netflix with me while I watched them for the first time. I like the series so far. It has characters I don’t remember from the old TV series, but my daughter says they were in the books. So this streaming show may be truer to the books than the TV series was.
On Tuesday we did our monthly tasks around Nomad along with some cleaning inside. I wrote a blog post about how Ann and I have come full circle in our history of reading recommendations over on my reading/writing blog.
That night we watched the last three episodes of the first season of Little House On The Prairie. They only had 8 episodes, which is a pittance, but covered their first stop in Independence, Kansas and ended with them on their way to Walnut Grove, Minnesota. We enjoyed the show, as it had engaging stories and very good performances by the cast. The series has already been renewed for a second season, but now we have to wait a year to see it.
Gorgeous Grandma Day
Wednesday night we tried to watch the Masters of the Universe movie, but just couldn’t get through it. It was painful, or at least the first 25 minutes or so that we saw were painful. After shutting that off we decided to try Widows Bay on AppleTV. We had been avoiding it because Cindy does not like watching scary stuff before bed. And I don’t like being awakened by her nightmares. But I loved Matthew Rhys in The Americans, so am hopeful this will be a good show.
Thursday was National Gorgeous Grandma Day. Most of the grandkids were kind enough to send text messages to Cindy, which made her day.
After dinner we watched the first episode of the new season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. It was a pretty good story using the “Time travel that turns out you did what you were supposed to do to keep the timeline intact” trope.
Trip Planning For 2027
Friday was a “rain, rain, go away” day all day long. We sat down and did some planning for our travels next year. A visit to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland and enjoying the Lake Erie Wine Trail in Western New York are probably the two biggest things we have planned, if we don’t volunteer somewhere.
I started reading Regime Change by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan which provides an inside look at the current administration.
That night we watched Stuart Fails To Save The Universe, a spin-off of The Big Bang Theory. We were not overly impressed but we’ll give the series our usual three-episode try. Kind of holding out hope because I DO remember that I didn’t really care too much for The Big Bang Theory when it first started and then it became a show we had to see each week. And eventually bought the series DVD set.
We also watched the latest episode of Silo and they are definitely doing stuff that wasn’t in the book, but it’s still good.
Reading And Viewing
It was moderately busy at the ramp on Saturday. I finished reading Regime Change by Haberman and Swan. Somebody, I’m not saying who, but somebody is an insane, demented, egotistical, narcissist. And I know that’s redundant, but that somebody is more than guilty AND deserving of that redundancy.
After dinner we watched two more episodes of Widows Bay. One of the episodes had a killer clown in it and Cindy HATES clowns, so she had to watch one of her Hallmark movies afterward to “cleanse” her mind so she could sleep without nightmares.
Sunday was fairly busy at the ramp, but not horribly so. After dinner we watched Pompei-Out of Time with Tom Hiddleston. Here’s the description of the three-part docu-drama: Through a blend of documentary and drama, he brings to life the voices of ordinary Romans, revealing their resilience and relatable experiences. It was interesting, though I felt a bit contrived and imagined. Still, you can’t get someone much better than Hiddleston to convey, mostly through his facial expressions and eyes, the pain, mystery, and suprise of the event. He is one of the best.
Wobbly No More
Tuesday, July 28th I took an hour or so to finally replace our dinette table bases that serve as stabilizers for the legs. Back in December I broke one of the bases when I was pulling the table and legs up to make it into a bed for Abby while she was staying with us. I long ago ordered and received the replacement parts (metal this time to replace the plastic one that cracked) but with my knees in so much pain the past 7 months I had put off replacing them. Thankfully, my knees have been less and less painful so I got down there and made the replacement. No more slightly wobbly dinette table.
Speaking of my knees, that Tuesday marked 6 weeks since my third injection to help with the arthritis and joint lubrication. I was told that between the 4th and 6th weeks I would get some relief. Turns out they were right, I am doing much better and not wobbling either as much as I was. I’m glad it’s over, for now. They also told me the relief would last anywhere from 6 to 12 months before I need another set of injections. I’m really hoping for the 12 months, it at least I know what to do the next time the arthritis pain starts to return.
After dinner Wednesday we watched the penultimate episode of the first season of Widows Bay. Man, there is some crazy $h1t going on!
Thursday was our usual day of lunch out and grocery shopping. That night we watched the second episode of this season’s Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and it was an interesting horror-themed show.
Ending The Month
Friday, July 31st. We woke up to temperatures in the mid-60’s. What the hell is going on?
On my personal blog I posted about my favorite comic strips. You know, the ones that used to be in newspapers delivered to your doorstep? Except now your newspaper is online and so are the comic strips, just separate.
During the early afternoon I grilled up several entrees for the coming week. That way it’s easy to warm up the entree, add a side dish or two and making a main meal is not a huge deal.
That night we watched the season one finale of Widows Bay and the second episode of Stuart Fails To Save The Universe, which I liked quite a bit more than the first episode. We really enjoy the cameo appearances of actors from The Big Bang Theory.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day opened in theaters today. We might go see it sometime next week, but I said that about Odyssey too a couple of weeks ago and still haven’t so…
And that wraps up our 4th month in the volunteer position that is supposed to last 6 months.
Thanks for following The Wandering Wetheringtons.