I looked up weighted vests online. They do look kind of creepy, like something you'd wear to carry extra ammunition. I don't blame the kid for reporting it. In any case, it's illegal for the general public to be on school grounds during school hours (even though that's rarely enforced).
And of course in reaction to the thing in Utah, the president and his henchmen are now going crazy trying to outdo each other in clamping down more and more on free speech. If a government employee ever said anything critical about the right-wing provocateur (I'm intentionally not writing his name), they are going to try to have them fired. Of course, that will lead to a lot of lawsuits, but what will be the end result of all those lawsuits? The Supreme Court seems happy to approve anything the president does, these days.I'm trying to formulate a letter to the editor about all this, but it's not coming together clearly. I should probably just start writing and then it will work itself out. Mostly I feel this great hollow sadness inside, and trying to think about a letter seems to make it worse. What is happening to our country?
And then I think, oh well, I'll be dead soon and all this horror will be somebody else's problem. (I wish it were somebody else's problem.) But unless I get cancer or am hit by a bus, I probably won't be dead soon. I was planning to live to be 90 -- that's 25 more years. Ack. Twenty-five years is a lot more time to spend with the wreckage caused by the current administration, even if I'm kind of gaga for the last part of it.
Then there's my social security, which I could start taking. I still feel as though I should wait until I'm 67, though. "Full retirement age," ha ha, says the person who hasn't worked since she was 59.
I also read that you should expect to spend more of your retirement money when you're younger, because you have more expenses then (you're relatively healthy and you might want to run around the world having fun) (or you might want to finish raising your kids, who you had much too late in life). But what about when you're 85 and have to go into assisted living? Shouldn't you save your money for that?
This just wasn't a great week.
I had planned to make Rocket Boy a plum cake, from the Barbara Pym Cookbook. I have made it before, but this time it didn't turn out very well. The recipe says to bake it for 3-1/2 hours at 300 degrees. I did that, and it turned out WAY overdone, rock hard, in fact. I hoped it would get softer as it aged, but it's not doing that. I had a piece this morning for breakfast and it's pretty bad. I mean, it tastes good, but it's hard to eat because it's so hard.
Oh well. Maybe when we finish it I'll make an apple cake, to make up for this one.
Friday evening we also finally went back to Best Buy and returned the Dell laptop I bought for Teen B (using some of his Social Security money) back on August 24th, which overheats when he's playing Roblox. We'd been trying to do this for a while, but Teen B never wanted to actually take the time to go back to the store. He also didn't want to look at possible replacements. And to be honest, neither did I. I don't enjoy shopping for tech.
The Geek Squad guy who took our return was very nice, very understanding -- until he noticed that it had been 19 days since we'd bought the laptop. You only have 14 days to return laptops. Oops. Looks like we just bought ourselves a laptop that overheats.
But he talked to his manager and they decided that if we agreed to sign up for some sort of Best Buy membership (for $50 a year), they'd let us return it. So I did, and we did. Whew.
Then we looked at some alternatives, but Teen B was in a very bad mood and did not want to buy anything else right then. So then we went out to dinner at the Bohemian Biergarten, sort of as a birthday celebration. (Teen A wasn't with us because he went to the football game. Their high school lost, 63-0.) I had a potato pancake with apple butter, which was quite tasty. And then we went home and had the very disappointing cake. Oh well.
We were there until about 3 pm. I could have left at 1 -- I was done with my questionnaires and we'd had the lunch they ordered for us -- but I waited for the kids. I had brought a book to read, but I was so sleepy that I couldn't concentrate on it, so I just sat and flipped through my phone, like a good American. In the room where they left me, there were a bunch of postcards and a sample letter you could write to ask our elected representatives to support science (see photo). Even at CU, people are totally desperate.
They paid me with a check (for $220) so I'll deposit that tomorrow. They gave the kids cash, and Teen A immediately handed his ($276) to me and asked me to put it in his account (he isn't a cash guy). So I just transferred $276 from my checking account to his. I'll put his cash, or some of it (the four useless $50 bills), in my checking account tomorrow.
We had leftovers for dinner and I managed to stay awake until bedtime, but it was hard. Rocket Boy and I watched "Washington Week with the Atlantic" which for some reason never shows up on Passport until Saturday for us. We watch the Friday night NewsHour and at the end they encourage everyone to watch Washington Week, but we can't. Anyway, we watched it on Saturday, as usual. I find Jeffrey Goldberg, the moderator, to be very comforting. He's a smart guy and seems to really understand the world. I always feel soothed after watching him, like: as long as Jeffrey Goldberg is there, I will be OK. It makes no sense. But I need something to reassure me, in this very strange world we're in.
Oh, and the other thing I did that evening was buy Teen A a new computer (using HIS Social Security money). He's much more decisive than Teen B. When he heard that I had bought Teen B a laptop, he said he wanted a new computer (a desktop, for gaming). I said, OK, do some research and tell me what you want. So he sent me a link to some Chinese thing on Amazon. I said, no, let's buy it at Best Buy, that's safer if we need to return it (if you don't sit on it for 19 days first). So 15 minutes later he sent me a link to a Best Buy computer, half price because it was "open box." OK, fine. I ordered it. Meanwhile, Teen B is still dithering about his. But that's OK. No hurry.
Now it's Sunday. I took my Mounjaro shot on Friday night because I'm trying to get back to a Sunday night schedule, so I'm taking the shot 2 days later each week. Thus, today is Day 2 and I feel pretty crummy, but at least it's Sunday. Of course, the kids have a lot of homework to do, since they couldn't really do it yesterday. Teen A and I have so far spent about an hour on language arts and Teen B and I have done 5 statistics problems. He also has language arts, and there are a lot more stats problems to do (this is homework that was due Friday, but oh well).
A busy week ahead (hopefully with no more shootings, but I'm not counting on anything). I should get bloodwork done tomorrow morning (I'm supposed to fast, bleah), then I'm getting my hair cut on Tuesday afternoon and Teen A is getting his cut on Wednesday morning. Wednesday night the book group comes, so I've got to prepare for that, somehow, and Thursday I see my doctor. Saturday I have a Zoom call with Michigan friends. I think that's everything I know about so far. Of course, there are dinners to plan, shop for, and cook, and laundry to do, and a lot of cleaning, due to the book group.
I should note that I managed to work on my novel I think four days this past week, despite the madness, so that was great. I also pruned at least three days. I'll try to do both of those things every day again this week, although it may be hard. I keep thinking about what they say, that you should do what's most important to you first each day, not put it to the end of all your busywork. What's most important to me is reading and writing... except, is that right, really? Probably the most important thing to me is keeping my family going, even though I don't enjoy it much. But if I just sat around all day reading and writing and the family had nothing to eat and no clean clothes to wear, I wouldn't be happy. So I'll try to find a happy balance.
I hope it's a better week.
Post note
I wasn't going to write anything else about what happened in Utah, but the news that I read today is just so overwhelming. He did it for love, as far as I can see. The guy's "roommate" was actually his trans romantic partner. He's not cooperating with law enforcement, as they say, but it seems so clear. The provocateur who was killed was always saying terrible things about trans people, including right before the fatal shot was fired. The guy objected to this, because his lover was trans. He did it for love. OMG.
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