2020 Coronavirus Charlie Brown Tree(tm)

I decided to get artificial trees for Mom and I this year. 

As I was writing this I started describing all of the reasons why an artificial tree was necessary. I'm not allowed to come into Mom's apartment and set up the tree. The caregivers would have to do the setup and lights themselves...that kind of thing. As I was making excuses I realized that I actually feel deeply guilty about the tree. I feel most guilty about not wanting to take the risk of going into Home Depot to buy a real one. And because it will not be easy but easier to do it this way.

I got an artificial tree that looks "normal" for the mama, and a super Charlie Brown-ish artificial tree for us. We'll try it out this year and if she likes it, I will get her a better looking one next Christmas when she's almost 95. 

The Charlie Brown tree came a few days ago and I put it together. It's hilarious -- basically wire, brown electrical tape, green sprizzles, red "berries" and lights. I had planned to decorate it with only my most precious ornaments and the box of BABBO. But then something wonderful happened: an online estate sale that had vintage ornaments that look just like the COVID-19 virus.

Here, in all of its glory, is The 2020 Coronavirus Charlie Brown Tree(tm). I'm actually in love with it.

We'll see how Mom's goes next week.

My New Slide Viewer

This week one of the local estate sale guys had an online sale. I bought two things: some Christmas ornaments and a slide viewer that also works as a projector. This purchase is primarily for work, because viewing slides is a challenge. I have one of those slide viewers where you need to press down on the slide in order to engage the light, so one hand is always occupied. This new acquisition is a *little* bit better. It came with many slides of airplanes and airplane shows, some wedding photos, some sailing photos and the photographer was really into dahlias, so photos of dahlias. I took photos of the slides I liked, while the slide viewer was in my lap, so you get a little dining room, pajama and chair action.

Mary's wedding.

And for contrast, a wedding that took place a few years later:

The man of the home:

The lady of the home:

Dahlias:

Dahlias and arm:

And some cars:

At some point I will wipe the inside and outside of this contraption with alcohol and take it to work. 

When work ever happens at work again.

Urns

From last week:

What did you do today?

Oh, a friend's widower asked the crowd for ideas of what kind of urn to get for her.

My idea: a vintage Wedgewood jasperware biscuit jar. Think about it. They often depict women in diaphanous gowns and almost funerary broken column kinds of images. It would be perfect. My own ashes? I've told mrguy that I'd like my ashes to go in here (that is until scattering):

From this week:

What did you do today?

Jury's still out on the urn. I was not a close friend of this person, but liked her so so much. And it turns out that her friends think that she would look good in an urn that looks like Japanese gold repair Kintsugi. And it still looks like an urn and not as I imagine my friend, so I suggested something else.

Don't procrastinate on that stuff, People! Mrguy knows that when I go, I want to be scattered off a boat, with jazz playing (Bill Evans?), just as we did with the big guy. My sparkles can eventually mingle with his, and with my pop's, or at least the part of my pop that ended up in the ocean, not the part that ended up at my brother's property which eventually became a pot farm. He would have HATED that.

Maybe the lesson, here, is to arrange to have yourself cremated and entrust your ashes to a service that will hide them from your family! 

Whatever you do, make a plan. Most people don't enjoy this sort of thing as much as I do, but don't leave your people to figure it out for you or you will end up in an urn that has both kintsugi and the Pink Panther.

Kill Clouseau!

Eggxuberance

 We've been saving this egg since election day. Which turned into election week.

The Foot of Cupid

I've been looking for a good gif of the Monty Python foot, because for the last few months I've been imagining the foot crushing me closer and closer to the ground. It's a comical way to look at the amazing pile-up of events we're all having during the pandemic.

In the last two months I've watched from afar the decline and death of my favorite cousin, the new partner of an old friend (he went from diagnosis of prion disease to death in a matter of weeks), and a work colleague who did chemo for most of the last year and blogged it all.

Three cats in our circle have died. Our older boy cat is hobbled and the boisterous kitten and I live in separate parts of the house to protect the elder from the younger.

Update: I totally forgot about the stress of fires. My go-bags are still packed.

I'm grinding through a more-than-decade project at work that is grinding to a stop, yet this project still occupies many meetings and emails and much planning even in its conclusion.

The election.

My family has so much conflict over my mom and her care. Covid has only made it worse. Covid will continue. The caregivers split a 7 day week between them. I don't think they can continue to work this way. My older siblings are too frail themselves to pitch in. In May I expressed to middlesis that this was a problem, and she responded that it was Spring and she couldn't think about it after a hard winter and doing so much for the family (truth. she does so much).

So we didn't talk about it, and with the holidays coming she asked me for help. I said go to mediation with me and I'll give you my answer. I've been seeing someone who specializes in gerontology to hopefully get my sister to talk to me about this stuff. Over the summer she had said she'd go to mediation with me, and now...nope. Big sis and I got a mutual email and we're on the shit list.

The election.

Big sis has a potential large health situation, in the middle of all of this.

The election.

The election.

Layoffs. Yesterday I went to four separate meetings about layoffs. Of 22 people at the factory, 4 were in my tiny department, and two others were people I work with closely. One of them is my closest work buddy, who was hired on the same day as I was, 20 years ago. I'm devastated.

I will cope. It will get better. I coined a phrase last week about finding one thing a day that you like and love the hell out of it.

But I feel the foot right now.

 

For more on the origin of the foot, check out its Wikipedia page.

Maybe I'll just love the foot today.

Election Bunker 2020

So tomorrow is Election Bunker 2020. I will start the day by putting up my venerable "Jesse Jackson Urges You to Vote Today" poster, removed from a telephone pole in my neighborhood in 1984. Makes me so happy to share it with the people.

Then I will enjoy some working hours, trying to get the election and other things out of my mind.

And I will enjoy my pizza, which mrguy will be ordering at 3pm. Can taste those little pepperonis in my mind. When tv coverage starts, I will stop working and start thinking of the election. Hope it goes my way.

The thing I'm going to try to ignore is the current guy family strife. It's ugly and it's petty. It is super frustrating and it hurts.

So let's change the subject! The first christmas cactus are blooming. The white with magenta (estate sale find) and dark red with white stripes (Home Depot). Seasons Greetings!