Mockingbird Hill Cottage

I owe you responses to yesterday’s comments. Yesterday was all about voting and I needed to take a break from the blog for the rest of the day. I’ll get to them.

The hours for early voting yesterday were from 12 noon until 8 pm. And it was the one rainless day of the last few days (it’s raining again as I write this.) Let me be frank: In the time of COVID, does anyone else make decisions as to when to run an errand based on not wanting to have to use a public bathroom? We do. We both drink two big mugs of coffee every morning. Using my calculation of liquid consumed vs. my bladder, I quickly realized that Tuesday’s late start meant it would be a good day to go vote.

We got there early, around 11:20, and there was already a line of about 30 people. Everyone wore a mask, though I had to ask one woman to please cover her nose. She apologized and quickly did so. We had some nice conversations with the people around us in line. By the time we’d been in line for about 20 minutes, more and more cars had arrived and the line went all the way down to the street and beyond.

Once the doors opened at noon, things moved rather quickly. I was greatly impressed by the way it was handled. We walked in the door to the voting space, were directed to use hand sanitizer, then to don some gloves that were provided for us, then we signed in at the desk and went to another desk to get our ballot and pen – each ballot tailored for the town the voter lives in – and then we went to a desk where we filled out our ballot. (NY has ballots that are filled out by hand.) Then a quick walk to the machine that receives the ballots, where you can watch the ballot being accepted and recorded, then a final trip to dispose of gloves and another spritz of hand sanitizer. All in all, it took us about 7 or 8 minutes.

We were so happy to have voted!

By the way, I saw Grace Bonney (of Design Sponge fame) in line with her wife, Julia Turschen, as we exited the building. We are neighbors of a sort. I ran into her at our local bank last year and we had a nice chat. Our eyes met on the way out and I could tell she was thinking she knew me from somewhere –  which is pretty good, considering I was masked.

We got home, took showers, had some lunch and collapsed. We realized we were letting go, knowing we had finally voted.

The dreaded S word is on the horizon for this Friday. Temperatures are going to plummet (porch plants will be brought inside) and we might get 1 – 3 inches of the white stuff. I don’t need to tell you my feelings about that forecast, you already know.

Today is a self-care day. No doctor’s appointments, or grocery buying, or voting. Maybe some texting later in the day – though it’s hard to grab new assignments sometimes as there are 50,000 volunteers text banking for Biden and every one of them is eager to do as much for the campaign as they can.

Stay safe.

Happy Wednesday.

 

 

I’m not even going to speak about yesterday’s travesty. I get too enraged. You know how I feel. And you absolutely know that you must VOTE.

If you haven’t mailed your ballots in, mail them in today. Kavanaugh and SCOTUS are doing everything they can to block any ballots that are postmarked before the election but received after the election from being counted. Get them in the mail today and better yet, take them and drop them off in person.

We are voting today. Period. Nothing will stop us.

Vote them all out. Every last one of these enablers, these power-hungry public servants who care nothing about our lives, but sure care a lot about controlling women.

See, I’ve started to get enraged again.

Don’s news from the doctor was not good. He was hoping it was tendonitis or something that could be dealt with with some therapy. But the x-rays showed very, very bad arthritis in that finger, so much so that the top joint in his pinky finger has no cushioning between the bones. That’s why he’s in such pain. The guitar technique he has been diligently learning and practicing over the past two years or so involves the use of that finger – a lot. So all of his practice has only made it worse. And there’s nothing that can be done but to wrap the joint and take pain meds. That’s it.

He was very down when he got home. He kept saying he was too young for arthritis but he was in actuality acknowledging that he isn’t young anymore. This means he really can’t play the guitar for a while and when he does, he’ll have to learn a new way to play the pieces that involve that finger.

It’s all relative, of course. There are far worse things. But that doesn’t matter. He’s hurting and I’m hurting for him.

Time to get something to eat and prepare to go to the polls early. They don’t open until noon today. We’re going to get in line and wait. I’m so excited to cast my ballot today.

Stay safe.

Happy Tuesday.

A somewhat brief post today. We have to grocery shop this morning – soon – and then Don has to go to his doctor’s appointment. He briefly cancelled the appointment over the weekend because he needed a break from social distancing and worrying about masks and COVID, etc. But he woke up this morning with his finger very swollen and painful, so the appointment is back on.

But we have no food in the house, so an early trip to the grocery store is on the docket.

Tomorrow, we vote.

I spent much of the afternoon yesterday text banking for Biden. Then we watched 60 Minutes – frankly, because we wanted to see Trump’s childish fit of temper directed at Lesley Stahl. What a giant baby he is. He is simply incapable of telling the truth and he has to attack whoever calls him on it. Pence is a vacuum, a guy who smoothly talks all around the question and never answers it. Let’s not forget that, in addition to being a petulant brat, Trump is a sociopath – and you could see it in the looks he gave Stahl.

I won’t even talk about the travesty that is going to happen to our Supreme Court today. I can’t go there. So I’ll keep doing what I can up to and including the day of the election.

It’s raining here today and I can’t complain because we need it so much!

I finished Troubled Blood – didn’t want it to end, it was so good – and I decided to re-read Louise Penny’s very first Inspector Gamache mystery, Still Life. Comfort reading.

I hope you taking care of yourselves in this week which will seem like a year. Self-care, my friends. Take time for whatever makes you happy. Find pockets in which you can find stillness. Take walks. Find moments of laughter. (Don made me laugh so much the other night that I was crying! I realized how very much I needed that.) Pray, if you are so inclined. Find some peace.

Stay safe.

Happy Monday.