Got Nothing' for Ya

There are nights -- not many of them -- when I sit down here to write a journal entry and come up blank.  I feel like Jeff Probst sending the losing Survivor team back to camp after completing a challenge. "Return to camp.  I got nothin'for ya."  (Probst not exactly the elegant elocutionist.)

It was a full day, though not one in which a lot of interesting things happened.  

There is always a lot to be done after going away for a few days.   Catching up on recorded TV programs alone is a big job.  I always try to delete the command to record some programs so I don't have a big back-log to return to, but our DVR sometimes has a mind of its own.  It is set to record all of The Big Bang Theory episodes, for example, old and new, because over the years I didn't always watch it and now I'd like to see the episodes that I missed.

Only The Big Bang Theory is shown here two times a night on one station and the new episodes when they are shown on another.  This meant that there would be eleven episodes of the show to record in my absence and I dutifully went through an indicated that I did not want them recorded.  However, the DVR, being obviously a Big Bang Theory fan went ahead and recorded them anyway. I came home not only to the shows I wanted to watch, but eleven episodes of Big Bang Theory and a DVR that was 99% full.

It seems the ultimate in sloth to sit here all day watching the TV backlog.  But it's a dirty job and it had to be done.  These are the pressures that the modern conveniences places on one.  It's a job that Jeri, who does not watch TV, never has to worry about and makes fun of me because I do.  

But how could I not have recorded the finale of Scandal, for example? If you miss 5 minutes of that show, let alone an entire episode, you are hopelessly behind.

I'm not all caught up yet, but I do have the DVR down to only about 50%.  (Fortunately Walt, who likes Big Bang Theory, but not that much, was gone much of the day, taking the new car to have its finishing touches put on.)

But I didn't spend the entire day in front of the TV screen.  I had brought a set of dishes home from my mother's.  They are another set that once belonged to my godmother.  Simple dishes, but they are a deep blue glass and I've always loved them, and especially the unusual shaped glasses that go with them.

I remember fondly drinking orange juice out of the little glasses on special occasion breakfasts when I was a kid.  I don't know how much I'll use the set, but I'm glad I now have it.  I got them all washed and put away, where they will probably now gather dust for as long as they gathered dust in my mother's cupboard.

The other thing I had to do was to switch purses (isn't this all riveting?).  I am not one of those women with a "purse wardrobe."  I have one bag and I carry that until it's time to change.  For literally decades the bag has been one of those ergonomic things that are supposed to be good for your back.   It looks like a large boda bag, like Basque sheepherders carry their wine in. They are never good for my back, though, since I carry so much crap in them that the purse weighs about 25 lbs (I weighed it at the doctor's).  I routinely carry my Kindle, the camera, iPod, and cell phone, as well as the normal stuff, like wallet, too many keys, coin purse, etc.  One of those bags will last me about 10 years and I replace it with another identical bag when the zipper starts to split. I think I'm on my third ergonomic bag.

This time I got brave and daring and decided to look for something new.  The one frustration with the ergonomic bag is that no matter what I put in it, it immediately gets lost.  I can stick the camera in it and 5 minutes later I can't find it because it has sunk to the bottom of the bag.  I thought I'd look for something with more places to separate things out.

I came across a "Baggallini" on Amazon and decided to try it.

It's going to be an adjustment to learn how to carry this, but it has four outside pockets, one for the cell phone, one for the iPod, one for the camera, and one for the two containers of quarters I carry for parking meters and a bag of lozenges that I take when I go to the theater to keep myself from coughing.  I think I'm going to like it, once I get used to it.

Last night, Walt and I went off to Costco and bought a 37" TV set for my mother, which we will take up to Covell Gardens today so it can be installed and ready to go when she moves in on Saturday.

All this stuff from yesterday seems so terribly petty when I think of the people in Oklahoma trying to rebuild their lives after losing everything after that terrible tornado.  "I got nothin' for ya" is literal for them, and my heart goes out to them.