Eating breakfast, hashbrown, oatmeal and a breakfast sandwich as I can't be bothered to cook anything more complicated, reach for my coffee... Where is it? Oh yeah, forgot to make it, we really need the coffee this morn.
Not much on the docket #today , work of course, weather is supposed to rain, bleah, and I think I might have my hated sub-zone today based on money and package count that's waiting for me, yay.
Prolly go in early after eating and taking care of a few minor things. Will have to buy lunch as I forgot to thaw out a sandwich last night, oops. Do you get the impression that I was knackered last night and still haven't recovered? Yeah, me too.
You know, going on 30 years of delivery work, while i haven't seen everything, surprises are few and far between, but seeing an apartment complex screw up their numbering is a new one. Previous building was 1008, 1010, 1012, 1014, just like all the other buildings. This one? 1016, 1016A, 1018, 1020... Ummm, did someone miscount or something?
EDIT Added categories, realized I took a crappy picture, guess what I get for moving so fast, 93 stops, 95 packages, 6hrs 20min.
@Andrew Pam I was thinking the same thing, but the design doesn't look like that would be possible, plus if'n that happened, you'd expect there to be more like it. I'm thinking because of how they numbered it, evens on one side of the street, odds on the other, someone made a mistake, because they don't usually number like that.
Ugh, Ok, my weekend list is so not getting done, I did get a lot yesterday, but today is out, I'm siiiick. Well, actually not too bad at this point, but spent a 0300 - 0600 or so in and out of the bathroom, then slept for a bit, and after a couple hours, dragged m'self out of bed, ran to the store for one thing I forgot to put on the list, and picked up some breakfast. I suspect once I get some food and coffee into me, I'll be better, but definitely not getting anything done #today
So, figure since it's a new year, should take a new photo of m'self. I don't think the glasses are a new sight, I've had them for a bit now, but look, hair!
Yeah,I've been bald by choice because hair requires too much effort to maintain frankly. Goatee isn't going anywhere, but it won't be joined by anything, nothing else feels right.
Ugh, keeping bouncing from one thing to another. This weekend I need to get the usual stuff done, grocery shopping, clean kitchen, do laundry, and that's about it, but so far I've killed 3 hours online, not because I'm doom scrolling or something, but because I keep jumping to one thing to another, rather than zipping through a relatively quiet internet.
And I expect it'll be a better one, I'll prolly jinx m'self if'n I claim it can't get worse, but after a year where my husband died less than a month after my birthday, and two or so months later the room mate had to put his cat down, the cat we took care of because she didn't like him..
Yeah, its been a hell of a year. Its not that there can't be other losses, there will be at some point in the future, but with older family members, its sorta expected that you'll outlive them, that's just life, but when they're only 5 or so years older? Yeah, I was starting to rough out plans for our retirement, with an expectation of at least another decade together, hopefully two.
So what's the plan this year?
As someone wisely said, do I look like I have a plan? Ok, seriously, not much, clear this place out, fix it up (anyone know a good contractor in #stl ?) a little bit, and downsize, the latter likely resulting in me moving out of state, because Republican states suck, but not sure where I'm going, likely Illinois, but Maryland and Pennsylvania are also possibles. First step of clearing this place out was done yesterday, rented two tables at the Sunset Hills community center for the first three flea markets, March, April and May, and while I'll still be selling stuff before that, that'll be when I really get things going.
Speaking of selling, anyone need any clothing?
Any how, that's about all, other than maybe building an electric kei van, finally found an engine small enough. Yes, small enough, there's something you never here with an engine swap.
And now, onwards with #today , grocery shopping and... Pack a few more things up for shipping.
Sounds like your year was like mine. I'm struggling a bit with the cleaning out the house chore. Seems I balk when it comes to getting rid of my wife's clothes.
Its bad enough that we have very few chargers here, but the weird part is we're not getting any new. Seriously, was just checking a site showing new chargers in the area or coming, EVGo has four coming in, all on the Illinois side, on the Missouri side, the good news is we're getting three Ionna stations... The bad news is that two of them I know as replacements for current stations, a Francis energy at Wally's, and the chargers at Schnucks in Warrenton. I'd really like to know why we're not getting chargers, even companies like Circle K who has there own charging network, and is expanding here (I know of three new stations coming in), isn't installing any chargers at the new or existing stations. Ditto for WalMart who's building their own network.
So, I bought a bag of Maxwell House coffee pods at Ollie's (seriously if'n you have these and haven't visited, try it). Had no idea what I'd do with them, but was sure I'd figure something out, it certainly didn't help that they came with no info beyond 'Makes a pot of coffee' Umm, pots come in lots of sizes, but thanks to Amazon, its a 12 cup pot, and they're usually sold by the case. Cool, time for a cold brew, but how to keep the pod at the bottom of the pitcher? Butter knife to the rescue.
Not working as they cancelled my shift, but honestly I was likely to do that as the forecast became clear, the original low was 16°F, its currently 19° feels like 4°, and my normal load time is about one hour ago. Yeah, while I might do some work #today , no package route for me, no way I'm trying to work for 6+ hours in this nonsense. And to think the high yesterday was in the 60's, maybe higher, typical St Louis winter.
Not sure what I'll do with m'self, cleaned out the closet finally yesterday, most of Vik's ( @Vik-Thor / Lirleni Hankeshe ) clothes are boxed up to donate with the exception of a few things that I added to my wardrobe and a few special items to sell. Fri? Sat? Whichever, I finalized the conversion project of his 401K to an inherited IRA in my main account. Bills were paid yesterday, including county, well, property tax, for some reason they're showing me as not owing any personal property tax for some reason, I do need to sort that out.
I will be continuing to clean out my emails, we're under 1K messages and started at over 2K, mostly stuff that should've been deleted, but I was being lazy. Need to do some last comic and book pulls, and then figure out who to sell most of the collection to. Have lots of stuff to pack and send, but its cold, so that'll prolly wait until I man up and go outside. Will prolly move my car back to its usual spot in front of the gate, moved it so the room mate could get his truck out now that its running again, he blew up the transmission and had to install a new one which took 6 weeks or so, unusually fast for him, as he was doing other work at the same time, plus he's not as good as he thinks he is on repair work.
Anyone know a good charity in #STL to donate clothing too? Lots of men's clothes, but I also have a fair number of totes in the shed of women's clothing and shoes that should still be in good shape.
Well, as I've said, I read a lot over at FiM Fiction, so I figured why not talk about some of the stuff I'm currently reading, ie what's been updated recently in my tracking.
First off, I finished both Phoenix Beyond the Veil and its unfinshed cancelled sequel. I give that a B-, and that's prolly being a bit generous, the further you get into it, the worse it gets, mostly a matter of rushing and most characters other than Sunset becoming background characters. I like the story, and I like the ideas, but it really should be stretched out so the story can breathe, there's prolly two books worth of content in there. Still, I don't regret reading it.
Blooming Days, still not sure what to make of this, its an AU where Luna was never banished, Twilight is her student, Sunset is Celestia's, there's a bit of a rivalry between them. As the story has moved along, Starlight Glimmer is now a student of both, and yes her village existed in this one too. Discord recently dropped some knowledge of how the world is cyclic, it resets and strong souls return unchanged. I think I'm still reading it because I like AU's like this where you don't quite know what's coming.
The Stone Slab Witch, another Sunset/Harry Potter crossover, but this one has some unique elements, like Canterlot High used to exist as a Muggle private school, run by Celestia Austreaus a pure blood in one of the oldest if not oldest families. During the Wizarding Wars they protected wizards and witches born of Muggles, and Voldomort killed her sister Luna. When Sunset arrives, the school is in the process of being torn down, as Celestia left the wizarding world long ago with no one knowing where she went, although she did send Minerva a letter saying her daughter will be arriving on this day. Just started this, and while it has its writing problems, its looking like a very unique variation on a somewhat common theme, jury's out on this one for now.
Harry Potter and the Luna Princess, boy, what to say about this... I think his solutions in the quest for the cup are a bit too violent, but there's so many interesting author choices here. Harry meets Luna in one of his dreams where he sees Voldemort kill a muggle, and because her student. The EQG setting exists here, its a high school in California, and they weren't aware there was a wizarding world. This leads to multiple threads going on, Harry helping the house elves get recognized as a non-human magical race both helps his friend and sets the stage for Equestria introducing itself to the wizarding world, while he takes part in the trials. Training for them has mostly been handled by Luna, Tempest Shadow and Moondancer with ruling Princess Twilight Sparkle's approval. Yep, there's another unique thing, its set later in the MLP:FiM series than usual. Just what ponies Harry interacts with sets this apart of other stories of its ilk, and there's so much more going on in here, definitely one of the most interesting of these type of crossover stories.
I think I'll stop here, there's so many more that I'm reading and have been recently updated, but this is long enough, no?
There, finished a large and long breakfast, multiple courses I guess since I ate things mostly as I finished cooking them. Buckwheat cereal, followed by a hash and cheese omelet, beans, hash and a hash brown. Then a cup of yogurt and finally a half a danish. And of course coffee, three cups, or as I called the last one, a cuff of copee... Yeah, like Korben Dallas I speak too languages, English and bad English.
I will say the canned corn beef hash that I got from Menards is terrible, should've known when I saw Save-A-Lot, yes the grocery store, as the brand, but boy this stuff is bad. I'll be glad when its gone, but I'm too cheap to just throw it away, so we'll be eating a lot of meat soup, and yes, that's an accurate description of the quality.
That's done, gotta get dressed, and head out to Ollies in St Peters. Yeah, its around 20 miles away, and there's a store closer, and another one that's around the same distance, but the close one requires dealing with US 67 in Florissant, which I avoid like the plague, the other one is on SR 100, which I avoid for the same reason, way, way too much traffic, and I hate traffic. Yes, seeing as how I happily work as a delivery driver, that seems weird, but I'd rather take the long route than sit in traffic. Need to make a list of what I need, right now AA batteries and peanut butter filled pretzels, prolly more, but nothing comes to mind right now.
Wow. That's one heck of a breakfadt. 😮 Are ya sure you'll be able to waddle out to do your shopping without detouring for a bit of a sit n your comfy couch for awhile??
Didn't get to it this morn either, actually didn't surf the web at all, just wasn't feeling it, and won't be bothering tonight. Woke up a bit meh, dragged and ran errands before going to work a bit early, including hitting MickeyD's as I had a craving.
Tonight is much the same, mostly skipping the web, I'm tired, and my shoulder hurts bad. Ice and reading.
Reading is the big reason, although some of the stories I'm tracking on FiM Fiction do have updates, I'm not feeling it, so I started reading some of my Read It Later stories. Right now I'm on the 5th chapter of A Phoenix Beyond the Veil - The Philospher's Stone, and I'm rather taken with it.
Sunset Shimmer in the Harry Potter universe isn't unknown, but it isn't super common. However, those always use canon SS, a teenager who uses a portal mirror after the mirror showed her a future where she was an Alicorn, because Princes Celestia won't make her one. This one is more mature, what if anything she saw wasn't brought up, instead, she's gotten fed up with Celestia not teaching her like she used to, so she decided to go somewhere else where she can learn more. None of the desire for alicornhood, nor a plan to conquer Equestria, just a desire to learn more. Despite expecting to come out of a statue by a high school, what happened in canon, she comes out of a mirror in the Grainger household, something she blames on Philomena, her pet phoenix that came with her, because she perched on the top of the mirror where the focus is before they used it.
Any how, I'm finding the writing to be to my taste, and while SS is overpowered, the way they're handling it is quite good, she's happy to learn, experience new things, and help people. It makes it quite enjoyable to see how she interacts with the world.
What really has me engaged at the moment? I just reached the point where she tells Hermine's parents that she can give them magic, or more correctly, she can unblock their thaumic passageways. Apparently this is a known problem in Equestria, and she's been reading an advanced medical magic book, and feels capable of fixing it for them. Interesting idea, muggles, or at least muggles that have magic capable children, are capable of magic themselves but have a malady that stops them, wonder where this'll lead.
Was sitting in traffic when a car came flying up through the grass behind and to the right, flipping and throwing a part into the road. At first the first person there didn't think the driver was still in the car, so I threw on my safety vest, and got the biggest part out of the road before it causes another accident.
After realizing the driver was still in there, under the supervision of an ER nurse who'd stopped, we started working on getting her out so CPR could be done, but it was only the two of us and I can't lift much. We did get her from wedged between the front seats to the back seat face down before the cops got there, and i supported her so she didn't fall between the front and back seats, while they got her out so CPR could be performed. She did have a pulse when they got her in the ambulance, so she might survive.
I wound up taking a shower when I got home, because I'd been kneeling in vomit and even after taking off my clothes I could still smell it.
So that was how my day ended. Not sure how I feel right now, aside from sore as my upper back was already hurting, and my shoulders are now, but I already was going to chiro tomorrow, so no big deal. Besides, as I told the nurse, a little back pain is a small price to pay for saving a life.
Still, I'm kinda processing the whole thing as you can imagine.
That's way more dramatic than when I recently rescued an adolescent gallah that fell out of its nest. Sadly, it's wing was so damaged the wildlife rescue hospital had to put it down. I felt horrible.
If I had left the bird where it was, it would have died near the tree it knew with mama nearby, albeit after some suffering. My transporting it caused the bird plenty of trauma, but in the end it shortened its suffering. I kept thinking maybe I hadn't done it much of a service. But then I thought, if my efforts could save it, it would have enjoyed a longer life. Perhaps it was worth a hopeful effort.
Thank you for being the sort of person who stops and helps.
Finish yesterday's plan, its nice to have a four day weekend. Well, we did have a few things this morn, needed to hit the bank, and was going to hit breakfast at a Black Bear Diner (if you have one of these in your area and haven't tried it, do so, especially for breakfast), I have a check I forgot to deposit earlier in the week. Woke up a bit lat at 0830, but I had stayed up to around 2330, so that was mostly expectable, albeit I wasn't up much last night, so a little odd. Lets see, what's the temperature...
7°F feels like -5°... House to car, to restaurant to car to bank... Yeah, too cold for even that, I am so not leaving the house. I swear, since Vik died, the universe doesn't want me going out for breakfast like we used to, last time I tried when I had some time to kill before work, power was out in that part of Bridgeton killing both restaurant choices. I could've gone elsewhere, but that would've given me a choice of Denny's or going out of my way which would've eaten up a chunk of the time I had, so that was out.
So, I guess the check'll get deposited via app, not sure I want to run out tomorrow, but we'll see, I prefer to hand the check over to a teller.
Tomorrow will likely be estate matters, I need to call Farmers, a check arrived a week ago, some kind of refund on what I could swear was a joint account, but its only made out to Vik, so that's a problem. And have to call Fidelity to make some account changes, they gave me his 401K, but my finance planner wanted it an inherited IRA, so gotta get that done, should be relatively simple. Also gotta reach out to e*Trade, somewhere I have the instructions from a few months ago on how to take over his stock shares as I was the beneficiary. Outside of those, got a lawyer working on the stuff I'm not a beneficiary of, probate court fun of course, hence the lawyer, St Louis County requires a lawyer for all estate filings. Once all that stuff is done, I'm pulling everything out of e*Trade (owned by Morgan Stanley) and Morgan Stanley, not just for consolidation, but because they're owned by Bank of America, who I hate with a passion for various reasons. Once his Apple card is closed, that'll be the last I deal with Goldman Sachs, because they are such a dumb outdated company. Really, they required me to mail paperwork to their legal department showing he'd died, and yet two months later, I'm still get bills as well as 2+ late notices a week. Heck, the account would've been paid off back in August, but they refused, since I'm not on the account, they won't take my money, only his, at least until they accept that he died. Seriously, this is an investment company, or at least how I know the name, can you imagine this company handling your investments? At least they'll be secure, but considering how outdated they are, they're the only company I'm dealing with that doesn't have any way to handle things online, I can't imagine how good their advice could be. Oh, yesterday I got one step closer to closing the Chase account, which would be nice as technically its a joint account, so my credit is taking a hit from it, but I don't have access officially, though I do have ways to get in there.
Boy, that got long, no? Any how, things are kinda going, doing what I have to do, keeping on keeping on.
Cold today in #stl , likely to be equally as cold #tomorrow , so I decided to cancle my shift, frankly I've made enough for the week. Well, more or less, goal is $700, with a min of $500. Last week we made a bit over $200, that's it because I took off because of the weather, so making $6xx this week is a bit of a shortage, but not bad, and I don't _have_ to work as hard as I do. #today #stlouis #work
Well, another day, nothing specific on my plans for #today a bit more cleaning and straightening, clearing some snow, chipping away at this house. Need to find somewhere in #stl to donate clothing, its one of the three big clearing projects here, books and comics being the other two. Yes, I should be working, but if'n you saw our weather on the news, you can guess why I'm not.
Two weeks since my last post, and... Well, not much going on here. Little of this, little of that. Lets see, 18th I met with the lawyer to wrap up the estate, Vik hadn't planned on going so soon, somewhat surprising after losing his mom a few years, but then there are really two ways to react to that, plan for your time, or try not to think about it. Guess which one he did? Yeah, bunch of accounts don't have a beneficiary, so the lawyer is working on that including subpoenaing companies for the amounts as they're not particularly interested in giving it out to a non-account holder. Well, should be, I haven't heard from them since that meeting, and I do need to pay a retainer and such before they can do anything, so going to have to check in with them. Thanksgiving was a big nothing, his family which I don't know all that well is 150 or so miles away. I had been thinking of wandering around eastern IL along I70 near to the Indiana border as its possibly where I'll relocate to, but just didn't feel like it in the end, which was prolly good considering the storm that hit today. Instead I've been doing various things around the house, packing up the books my sister wants from Vik's collection, ditto for the comics @RS, Author, Novelist, Prosaist wants, though those will likely get repacked into smaller flat rate boxes, as you're not supposed to ship comics Media Mail. Also moved the altar to the book case the living room TV'd been on, I moved the TV, the unfinished media computer and the power station or whatever you call it into the computer room.
A little cramped compared to the table, but it'll do for now, after all, long term I expect to get rid of that book case as well as some of the others, so it'll be re-located to a semi-permanent home, permanent until I move then.
What else... Cancelled the WalMart+ membership, not out of any belief of striking back at them or anything, its just that now its me as both Vik and the roomy's cat passed, it just doesn't seem worth it, I get very use out of it, the only thing of value in there is the Parmount+ membership, and that's cheaper than the W+ membership. Sure, W+ offers an electric car charging discount, much like they do for fuel, however that's only for Walmart charging, and that's only in like half a dozen states right now, who knows when it'll get here, plus I mostly charge at home. Ordering a Boox Go7 tablet/e reader tonight, its basically an Android tablet with an e-ink screen, which should work for most of what I use my tablet for. Oddly I can order it direct cheaper than I can get it from WalMart.
Oh, did a small project on T-day, removed the shower doors as I've never been a fan of them. Oddly, I tossed them up on Marketplace for shits and giggles, a set of shower doors, tracks and hardware, dirty but complete free... And they were taken less than 6 hours later. Didn't think anyone wanted them any more, colour me shocked.
Kinda chipping away at various little projects, debating how I want to handle the books and comics, prolly contact Half-Price Books for the former, I have a CSV file with all of them, as for the comics... Not sure, have a store that's supposed to be buying them, but I'll prolly be old and grey by the time they make an offer, so I might just throw the collection on Marketplace at a flat price and see what I get, 10,500 comics with a few graphic novels for... $7K maybe? I think that's a very generous price, prolly higher than a store would give me, but still quite reasonable.
Beyond that, gotta get my insurance situation sorted out, and that's about it other than chipping away at the estate.
Oh joy, it snowed. Meh, pup doesn't like snow, thank you very much. Going to be watching Ryan Hall for a bit this morn ( youtube.com/live/Z0YWlul2v90 ), and do stuff around the house, we are so not going out in this, especially as its still coming down
Its that kind of morning, woke up around 0330 to use the bathroom, and didn't fall back to sleep until after 0600, in and out of sleep until getting up near 0900. Going to be a long day me thinks, that or there's going to be a lot of coffee and at least one nap.
Ok, that's a spicy cheese, & I suspect it'll go to waste, Schnucks Carolina Reaper cheese. I will say I had my doubts as to how spicy they could make it, but yeah, I'm impressed. Problem is what to use it for, I put a liberal amount in my chili, & its got a decent bite. Usually I use shredded cheese in my omelets, and while this might be fun to combine with a sweet egg omelet, I suspect I'd find it too hot unless I put a very small amount in, & I don't have a matching cheese... Anyone want it?
Started out with being told I was making over $200 doing 105 packages. Thankfully they reduced my work, giving part of my route to someone else, frankly I don't want to work that hard. Plus considering that I wound up getting the car about ¾ full only to realize I'd have to more or less start over because it wasn't going to all fit, it was a good thing. Interesting part is that it was supposed to be 45cu ft of packages, but a Bolt is supposed to have just over 54cu ft of space, so I think someone's calculations were off. So in the end, about 60 stops or so, and about 64 packages, nice amount of work.
But I could never leave it at that, could I?
So, we stopped at the bank to deposit the check from selling my car yesterday. I wound up getting only $4700 for my 2020 Bolt, about half what they initially offered, but it is a lemon, so the price got cut way down, but I kinda expected that since Carvana had offered $4600 and CarMax wouldn't even make an offer until I brought it in. Sure, I might've been able to get more, but considering what I paid, and the fact that this was inline with the only offer, I decided to take it. Besides, did I really lose? The car was $14,800 when I got it last year, however I got $4500 EV credit from the government, and $8200 for my trade in, so the out of pocket was only around $2200... Should've seen the chaos it caused when I pulled that out of my pocket cash. Any how, yeah, $2200 out of my pocket to buy it, and $4700 sale, so I guess I came out ahead?
Any how, since their was a branch of my credit union, First Community, a credit union I highly, highly recommend, I deposited the check, then got back to work. And then later I was passing a DMV office, one that had only one other customer and around five clerks, so in and out in about five minutes with a plate transfer. Yep, my current Bolt, formerly my husband's, is carrying the BOXEN plates now. Hopefully I'll have to visit the DMV soon to collect the new version of that plate, MIssouri Bee Keeper Association specialty plate, looking forward to that.
Oh, and I also changed my insurance around via email, removed the old Bolt from my commercial, and moved this Bolt from personal to commercial, thankfully the DMV didn't ask for any documentation as I hadn't been home to print a new insurance card yet.
So yeah, that was my #today Tomorrow morning will be spent trying to get all my gig apps updated, car change, insurance update (did I mention that it expired yesterday on all of them?), and possibly other settings, then it'll be off to work. Prolly do a speed breakfast, homemade microwavable breakfast sandwich and K-cup of coffee while I work.
Ok, yesterday was fun. Well, sorta, I mean I don't really like doing D zone, north St Louis County, there's some real sketchy neighborhoods up there.
That said, one notable thing was an apartment complex I hit, nothing special about the design in and of itself, but this is only the second one I've found in the St Louis metro, which is kinda impressive considering the size of the area, and the amount of places I've delivered to, and these aren't even close to each other. Weird.
The second thing was fun, I delivered to a very Christian house, y'all know the type, right? Well apparently there's a bit of a feud between them resulting in the neighbor putting up a Fuck Trump flag on his garage. Seeing that, there was only one thing I could do, visit... And give him almost all of the stickers I had in my car and wallet that I got from Plastic Jesus, as well as hanging out for a bit and telling him about the Fediverse. I'll be going back soon, and dropping off links to this blog and more stickers.
While yesterday wasn't a great day, that definitely made it better.
Ok, really, really tired, its bed time, but with that said, a little run down on today first.
Today I buried my husband. I mean that literally, I don't mean I outlived him, nor do I mean I attended his funeral.
Arlen who's the caretaker, grave digger and everything else at Bethlehem Cemetery in Tunnel Hill Illinois is older than me, older than my husband, heck, I think it was ten days or so he had a stent put in. Yeah, he's already up and working.
Any how, its not like the graves needed to be particularly large nor deep, cremain vaults aren't particularly large, so he dug the one for Vik's mom, and I dug the one for Vik, placed them in the graves, and covered up Vik while he took care of Betty.
So we drove 155 miles or so in an electric car, so charging stops in Mascoutah and Benton. Mascoutah didn't go well, the charge was real slow once I got it started after three or four tries, finally through the app. The one in Benton went weird, speed was good, but the dispenser's display was out, so I had to rely on the app, and its a little slow, so I was concerned I was stuck when the lock on the charge cable didn't release at first.
Then the burial, and then head back with a single stop in Mt Vernon at the WalMart where we had a little trouble with the Electrify America charger and its app, the latter glitching when it came to updating state of charger, and the dispenser being disagreeable about starting until I used the app.
There is now a GM Energy or whatever they're calling it across the street, so I'll prolly try that next time and see if'n it works well.
I picked up dinner at St Louis Bread Co (Panera to you heathens) before heading home, ate, surfed the web, and here we are, time for bed, but no sleeping in as I have chiro in the morning. And if'n it warms up enough, we'll try to get the tires on my Bolt to hold air so I can sell it.
So, today I'll be burying my husband and his mother. Paying might get a little complicated, when planning the day I hadn't realized it was a holiday, and I forgot to hit the bank yesterday... Oops. ATM and money order I guess? If'n I can find a money order.
Bit of an update to the memorial, some additional items, plus some risers to better display them. The marker was a gift from some of his friends, and I still don't get it, I guess its from a campaign his gaming group did?
I've gotten cremation vaults, and Sunday I took care of moving the cremains in, while Vik's mom was easy, he'd already spread about half her ashes, so splitting her between two spreader urns and the vault was easy, him not so much. Vik was a fairly large gentleman, and that means a lot of cremains, I'd thought that once unsealed there'd be enough room in the back to shift him around to fit in the vault, but nope, had to scoop a fair amount into a bowl in order to fit his bag in, then add the cremains back in and re-seal.
The white is his mom's cremains, and the blue is him and Panta, it felt like they should be buried together.
It seems with how much Panta meant to him, it was only right to bury them together.
Speaking of burial, that'll be Tues. I haven't told his family, I have a very, very small social battery, and doing this, I'm really not going to be up for being around people, I'm barely up to it on a good day, and that's not going to be a good day obviously. We're not doing a graveside service, this is just a basic burial, places them in the grave, and I'll likely help Arlen fill it in, I mean at his age he prolly shouldn't be digging graves, so I'm certainly going to offer to help fill it in, I've already offered to arrange for someone else to open, but he insisted on doing it himself. I won't chase his family away if'n they show up, and they have access to this blog, but I'm definitely not going to feel like being around people. Its kinda funny, he always said he was an introvert, and yet he was on a bowling team, active part of the pen club scene out here even helping with the convention, was at least part of events related to Ingress at one time even taking part in a big event here, active with WikiTree and other genealogy sites, and more, so much that I doubt I've contacted them all. Me? I'm a happy hermit, I'll just stay home, read and watch... well, more listen to TV, and that's it. I don't think he could really be counted as an introvert...
There might be a memorial in the future, a lot of people would certainly like it, but I've been leaving that up to his family, at least the organization, and I haven't heard anything on that front.
We'll also need to pick out a headstone, plan is to get a double headstone, but use it a bit non-standardly, with his mom's name top center, his name lower left, and a blank spot for me on the right for when my time comes. Well that, or put my name without a date now, but that seems a touch morbid to me.
We've also scheduled an appointment with a lawyer to get the probate matter settled, 18th we'll see about getting that rolling so it goes to court.
I don't normally have any problems with daylight savings time, well, other than that it exists, but this time....
Yeah, I never sleep the night through, but its only twice that I wake up 2ish and 4ish, but not last night, it was one of those nights where I wake up basically once an hour. And then there's the needing to sort out when it is.
Yeah, didn't need that on top of that, thanks.
Can we just get rid of it? Let's switch to two time zones, and split the difference by adjusting the clocks by a ½ hour, and call it American time.
@#SpaceHost Help is packing it in, and my instance is being migrated to @GoFedi , but that's going to require some DNS changes obviously. During that time I'll be posting on here if'n I can while it propagates, but also mirroring my posts on @Jeph in the mean time.
Ok, starting to get used to mornings like this, 51°, no longer shivering and saying damn its cold. Yesterday I turned the heat off before leaving for work, and haven't needed to turn it on. #today is boring, just work, the cursed zone A1C, which means an 8 to 10 hour day, definitely going to bed when I get home, nothing is getting accomplished if its not accomplished before work.
Life goes on though, yesterday I started inventorying the books using CLZ software, same company who's software took care of the comics (comics for sale BTW). #today ? Egg shell grinding, bill paying, need to change the tires on my Bolt (for sale), laundry, and… I feel like I'm forgetting something, I'm sure it'll hit me though, hopefully no more bruising. If nothing else, I'll prolly do some more books, but I'll have to dig my way to the remainder of the lower floor cases.
Yesterday was a bit rough, some 4+ hours dealing with the DMV and St Louis County to get the title to my husband's car, he died with neither a will nor a TOD on the car, but thankfully I'd found an estate lawyer's blog with instructions on how to claim it under Missouri's exempt property law, which might be a bit old...
Yeah, that list is fun.
Any how, fell asleep at an earlier time than normal, and slept hard, woke up a couple times like usual, but unlike usual I didn't stay up, usually I do because why not, but not this time. I did finally wake up at 5, and decide to stay up, though I needed some Tylenol because my everything hurt, especially my back. Now I'm just feeling kinda meh, but luckily I don't have much to do today, few things I want to get done today, but no pressure, just little odd things around the house, part of the clean up.
So, as y'all know, my husband passed back in July, and he had a loan on his car with no TOD (transfer on death). About a month and a half ago, I got the death certificate and reported it to the credit union.
Now, this is where being local, like headquarters is 25 or so miles from me, local is great. Obviously with no TOD, and it not being a co-loan, standard procedure is to start repo before I walk out of the branch door, right? Well, I told them that I'd keep up the payments for a month or two until I had the life insurance, and then I'd pay it off, and I assured them I was confident I had the TOD problem handled (we'll see), and they said Ok.
Yeah, really, despite standard procedure being repo and/or requiring me to qualify for a new loan, they verbally agreed to let things continue as they had been for a bit, imagine PNC or WellsFargo doing that, right?
So, I got my ducks in a row... In order... On order... Well, received them today.
These are for my participation in the Teal Pumpkin Project, something I found out about like 8 years ago, and have participated in every year since then. While I've offered a number of non-food items in the past, last year was the first year I did ducks when I found out you could buy a 30 count box of them. They were popular with the kids, we offered pick 2 ducks or get 4 pieces or so of candy, and most kids picked ducks. While 30 was enough last year, it was close, so I bought 100 this year.
Definitely not allowing them to choose, can you imagine how long that would take? But yeah, two ducks or candy once again.
It's been a week already. Yeah, I know, its only Wednesday, but Monday and Tues were a pain. We had a little fun last week, going after a couple things last week, which didn't work, but we weren't trying hard, those were...
HIs Apple card, dumb luck that I caught a phone call from them and got instructions. First on the phone call, there's kinda a security hole on iPhones I've been exploiting, without his pin, something I haven't been able to come up with, you can't check alerts or anything on the phone, but you can answer phone calls... Well, that's useful for two factor authentication into some of his accounts, and that was how I happened to catch a call from Goldman Sachs. Did you know that even though its the 21st century, then only way to send proof of death to them is to mail a death certificate to their legal department?
Also because I think it a joint account, I've been trying to take care of the Amazon card from Chase. First problem is that I can't add my bank account so that I can pay it off, for some reason the link to add an account doesn't work in either Firefox or Vivaldi. Second, they have branches here, and while they can take payments, they can't do anything else with credit cards, only bank accounts. Uhhh, ok. Finally I haven't found a number to call that doesn't require logging in with the card number. Yeah, you read that right, I'm having trouble giving them money.
This week though, now that we have a basic financial plan in place, we started on the deposit accounts, and talk about headaches. Fidelity was the easiest one with only minor problems on the 401K side, but that's done, by the end of the week we should likely be making decisions on the disposition of the 401K and his stock (vested RSUs). But, ...
Morgan Stanley, organized chaos would be an improvement over there, it seems that they're not really organized or integrated. Stocks of all sorts seem to have migrated to e*Trade, and then each type of thing you might have with them is a different desk. I'm not sure how many people I got bounced between with no real answers, but this one is going to be a headache. The first sign of trouble was that his company gave me two people as points of contact out in California for his RSUs from when they used Morgan Stanley for that. There was no answer when I called, so I got dropped into the main Morgan Stanley phone tree, and things went from there. I'll prolly have to try calling them another time, possibly next week.
Discover, they're just about as bad, and bit of a dick about things. They do have an upload portal for documents, but after doing everything, it says I need to select the document type... but doesn't give me a way to do that. Also I have to submit documents and wait to see if'n I'm a beneficiary, otherwise I'll have to go to probate court because they won't have anything to do with me, married or not. And that's on top of the fact that there's one desk for deposit accounts, another for credit accounts, a separate one for CapitolOne who owns them if'n he has accounts there (he does and they were easy to deal with). Yeah, guess I need a lawyer and court, because the CDs there are worth fighting for.
Yeah, that was my Monday, surely Tuesday was better, right?
Yes and no, I went out to the Lowery family cemetery to get a plot chosen and all that. That went well enough, and in fact I spent an hour and a half or so visiting with some of his family, and the cost isn't bad, the cemetery asks for a $300 donation for a single plot, $400 for a double. I'll prolly give them extra as I was expecting to spend more, have the money, and would like to help the cemetery, and can't be sure if'n I can donate in the future. We will need to work out the monument, but that shouldn't be too much either. Problem was the drive, 158 miles each way. And I'm in an electric car. And they're doing construction on multiple sections of I64. Lets see, left around 0840, returned around 1845. Is it any wonder that I asked work to take it easy on me today?
Yeah, I'm exhausted and the week has only begun, three more days of work, yay.
No, that's not a typo, though this one is somewhat more understandable, since rest is not an option in my life.
Get up, switch out the dishwasher, feed the cat, cook and eat breakfast. Then wash dishes, cook a batch of rice, wash counter, sweep and mop floor.
Then its try unsuccessfully to deal with Chase Bank, that's going to require a visit. Also talk to Goldman Sachs, unplanned steps towards closing Vik's Apple Card.
Got work in about 1½ hours still, no idea how big that's going to be, the current alert shows only a small route, but the last small route more than doubled in size by the time I got to the warehouse, so who knows.
Lunch'll have to be bought as I forgot to thaw out a sandwich last night, so no food for me, yay.
What a day, slept fine far as I know, not through the night, but I never do that, but wasn't up more than usual. But dreams, I rarely remember dreaming, let alone what I dreamed, but I did sorta remember these, at least in as much as they were weird, very trippy.
So for whatever reason I was dragging this morning, but I did get out of the house close to on time so I could go sit at Bread Co and wait for RoadieXD to drop jobs... And nothing today, action there's been nothing for a few weeks I think, however I haven't had the time to work for them as I've mostly transitioned back to BetterTrucks, so I was checking as frequently, but Tues is a free day, so we were looking for something today. No dice, so I'm going to have to decide what to do with my Tues in the future, maybe back to Better Trucks, or be more careful on Sunday so I can catch when Jitsu drops their Tues blocks, not sure yet. I did however while I was out make a payment on his car, once his burial and memorial is sorted, I'll have to look at what's left of his life insurance and see if'n buying out the car is an option, but with no TOD, taking ownership might be tricky, I'm going to see if'n the Credit Union can help with that by repossessing the car on paper, then selling it to me for the pay off amount and some extra fees, otherwise there's a form to fill that will transfer ownership so long as the car isn't worth too much, and of course probate court is an option, but I'd rather not deal with that if I don't have to.
Either way, came home, finished my usual web surfing, though that took longer than usual as I was still dragging. And sleepy, very sleepy. I did wind up taking a nap, but do need to figure out why I've been sleepy lately, been busy getting the comics ready for sale to the tune of 20 or so hours a week on top of 30 to 35 hours of work, sometimes more on either of those, plus chores. Oh, and the yard work, part of a much larger project that was going to involve me, Vik and our room mate, the latter is helping here and there, but I'm mostly getting the backyard sorted out, it serves as a break from everything else, but its a large project, the yard waste pile is now 6ft or so, and we have piles of pavers and concrete. It is however mostly done, just need a few cubic yards of dirt to fill in some holes, and its done. Might also be thyroid or vitamin, my mom has basically no thyroid function and my sister very little, so runs in the family, but that'll have to wait until I find some insurance (anyone want to help with that?). If its vitamin, that's going to be tricky, I did try to go back to multivitamins, Vik had about a half bottle left here, but they turn my stomach, so that's not an option.
Should've called the cemetery about the burial, but was tired, so napped, then scanned a shelf of comics, and here we are. I suspect the burial is part of my problem last night and today, Vik was often out late whether he had game, town council meeting, pen club meeting, genealogy research, and so on, so him not being here is only unusual in the fact that its for an extended period, since I haven't cleaned out much of his stuff yet, things feel mostly normal here, but planning his burial... Yeah, that kinda hammers things home.
Need to figure out dinner, surf the web and then bed.
So, today got off to an interesting start, was up late, plus up for a bit in the morn, typical for me, and finally woke up at about 0825... And my phone has a message saying that I've been assigned a work shift at 1010. I had put in for one, but assumed I wouldn't be getting one, but nope, must've been short handed again, joygasm.
So, slightly accelerated morning, cancelled my casual plans for the day, those'll prolly happen tomorrow, and got to work. Assigned to a fairly decent zone, with a reasonable package load, in fact it was all small to medium stuff, so I had all but about four things in my totes that sit on my passenger seat, making it easy to grab when I arrive. From load to done, six hours, $130, not a bad day.
Really, nothing to complain about, I could use the money, and wasn't a bad day, I could use more like that, but still, didn't really want to work.
Got home, worked on comics for a bit, I'm beating on the letter S, and I think its winning. We've got five long boxes, and two short boxes of just that letter, with the shorts and one of the longs still to be organized into the rest of the books. So far we have a long box for Star Trek & Star Wars, though that might become just Star Trek, and I'm setting one up for DC Super titles, Superman, Superwoman, Superpowers, and on and on. I'll continue on that tomorrow, and maybe I'll finally get that done. Then there's merging some previously sorted boxes with recently sorted, and some restacking, and when that is finally done, its onto the letter T and beyond. Yeah, at least another eight hours of work, prolly more.
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