Have you ever seen a supermarket almost empty of goods?

 

On the way home from MWL's tonight, I had to go to the supermarket before closing to pick up lunch for the next tomorrow.  Although I knew that the Shoprite in Tallman, NY was closing, I didn't know how empty the shelves would be.  Saying that the shelves looked like this a month before the store's official closing would not be an exaggeration.  Most of the goods had already been picked over, and only those items that would perish before the store closed were still being stocked.  (Why keep a supermarket open if one can't find fresh veggies, meat, fish and dairy?)

I felt sorry for the people who work there, as they will have to drive to new locations if they want to stay employed.  (This assumes that the staff has been offered jobs in the other locations.)  In this environment, people who can't get a better job than working at a supermarket will likely have a hard time finding jobs elsewhere.

Luckily for the people who shop here, the Walmart next door sells many of the same items that are found at Shoprite, save for the items mentioned in the first paragraph.  Yet, many of these shoppers will need to drive more than a mile further away to do their shopping.  But this closure makes me wonder: Will Walmart expand its footprint on site to sell the remaining items that Shoprite used to sell?  If so, did Shoprite terminate its lease to avoid direct competition with Walmart?

All went well, although I lost something I could use.

 

How many of my readers remember John Cameron Swayze?  Although he had a career as a journalist, he is better known to my generation as a pitchman for Timex watches.  The trademarked line "Takes a licking, but keeps on ticking" immediately brings to mind his stress tests of Timex watches in extreme environments, such as having a watch strapped to the propeller of a "cigarette boat".  The watch would work flawlessly after such tests, and this made Timex a best seller among affordable mass market watches.

Recently, I decided to buy an inexpensive Timex smart watch.  The watch is not that great, but for the price, I couldn't go wrong.  Although I doubt it would pass any of Swayze's stress tests, it provides decent value for $50.  The problem - I can't find my other watch (also a Timex, a sheer coincidence) that I use on a regular basis.  Given the mess in this apartment, I can understand how it got lost.  But I am annoyed at myself, as I wanted to wear it today on a date.

My date, I'll call her DWS for now, worked in a field similar to mine, and was a little more successful at it than I was.  She seems down to earth, and may be a good partner for me if she is able to deal with the Marian side of me.  (One can only hope.)  Is it immediate chemistry?  No.  I just feel comfortable talking with her, and I have more than a friendly interest (to phrase it politely) in the relationship we could have.  It would be nice to find out she feels the same way.

But I don't have much time to write today.  I've got to get ready to go to a concert with Vicki, and I must shower and dress for the second time today.  (I got sweated up replacing the carpet mat under/near my computer desk, and I want to be fresh for tonight....)

What would you do in my shoes?

Normally, when someone says that they snagged a deal way too good to be true, it means that the person with the deal may have been scammed.  I recently snagged a deal way too good to be true, and I have yet to feel that I have been scammed.  (I'll write more about this when I return from my cruise.)  Yet, I have a very minor gripe.  The price of my mini suite has dropped $250 since I booked the cruise, and I'd like to get some kind of freebie from the line (such as a soft drink package) to say thanks for booking the cruise at this price.

If you look at the map above, there are 6 staterooms in orange and brown.  (Port: 11632-11636, Starboard: 11132-11136.)  I have one of these staterooms.  From what I read, there are only 4 mini suites on the ship - all "Aft". But I could be misreading things, and there could be another 4 "Forward" mini suites as well.  As of the time I'm writing this entry, there was at least 1 "sail away" mini suite available.  This means, that if I rebooked my cruise to get the lower price, I might get a room of a lesser perceived value.  If one assumes I'm in room 11636 (only because it stands out from the rest), should I risk getting assigned one of the other cabins?

Although I am happy with the price I paid, and that I'll be spending more than that $250 on other things, Is it worth the effort to get the lower price?  How much effort is it worth to save money?  One person I cruised with would jump at the chance to save $250, and use this for other purposes.  As for me, I'm far from rich.  But not trying to save every last dollar has value too - it allows me to focus on getting acceptable value for what I spend, and not waste my valuable time chasing after ever decreasing savings.

So what would you do????
 

If only I could read tea leaves....

Some people believe that the future can be foretold by reading tea leaves.  Too bad this isn't true, as I would be studying the subtleties of the tea leaf instead of working at a monotonous job.

- - - - -

If I had known how FL would have reacted to the discovery of my female side, I'd have eased her into this knowledge.  There are so many "If Onlys" in  life, that many of us get stuck dwelling in the past. For the most part, I regret a relatively small number of things - one of which is not to openly say "I Love You" to my wife early and often before she died.

None of us can predict the future - we muddle through it as best as possible.  Right now, I'm thinking of how to spend much of my time next year.  Do I leave my job and spend more time traveling?  Do I crack open my nest egg?  Do I spend even more time than I do now as Marian (if that's possible)?  In fairness, the best we can do is make intelligent guesses.

- - - - - -

One question I'll have to figure out on my own is how to break the news about my existence as Marian to a woman who only knows me as Mario.  One transwoman I know is now married to her second wife, someone who will accept her for who she is - unless this transwoman goes for medical transition.  Hopefully, this marriage will last.  So far, it has lasted long enough for the couple to buy a house together. 

May the two of them live long and prosper....

 

I thought an apartment was empty...

 

You'll notice how empty this parking lot seems to be.  Over the years, it has gone from being overcrowded to having enough room for visitors to find parking at any time of night.  There is an ebb and flow to life in a co-op complex, and I've seen it all - or, so I've thought....

- - - - - -

When I moved into my apartment, there was a mother and daughter living in a 2br apartment in the next doorway over from me. They were a nice family unit when I met them, and in general conversation, I found out that the daughter had health issues that kept her at home. However, things changed for the worse over the years....

Shortly after I married my wife, we applied for and got a "double spot" assigned to us.  We'd arrange our cars so that she blocked my exit from my spot each night.  This would enable her to get out in the morning and go to work without disturbing me.  The mother/daughter combination had two identical cars parked in their spots, and rarely moved them.  Even in heavy snowfalls, they would not move their cars.  This was the first sign that something was wrong.

Over the years, there were many signs that bothered me (and others).  For example, both mother and daughter would call me because they were lonely.  In one case, the mother left a 10 minute message on my answering machine saying that she had a question to ask of me.  My machine ran out of tape with her meandering  before she could ask me the question she claimed she wanted to ask.   Another time, their new car (1 new car replaced their 2 old cars) was parked with a rear window open, and it was left that way for several weeks.  Later on, the car was left in a parking spot where a storm caused a tree to fall over the car - and they did nothing.  Eventually, the car had to be towed away, as they were no longer able to drive it.  But this is not all.  Several times, the fire department had to pay a visit to their apartment because of several fire hazards detectable from the outside.  One of these times had cooking gas escaping their apartment because the pilot light went out and they couldn't smell the gas.  Another one of these times had their air conditioner overheating due to an electrical fault, and almost causing a fire in my building.  The last time I saw the mother, she seemed to be in the middle stages of dementia, and unable to take care of herself.  Yet, adult protective services could do very little, as the mother was still barely competent enough to be allowed to live on her own.  (At this time, I felt that she needed to be in assisted living, but no one would put her there.) 

Recently, I found out that the mother had died and that the daughter is still living in the apartment.  I was very surprised, as there are never any lights on in either of the two bedrooms, and that there are no shades or blinds on these windows.  My neighbor L told me that "meals on wheels" is delivering food to the daughter, and that she is nuking the food in the one appliance she is capable of using - a microwave. Luckily for L, she is too busy with work to get sucked into the daughter's problems.....

As for me, I wish the daughter was in assisted living as well.  This would mean that the apartment would be sold and that the co-op could receive a "flip tax" on its sale....

 

If I were unemployed, I'd take this cruise now.

As many of my readers know, I have a pen pal in Ontario who only knows me as Marian.  The other day, she sent me an email (in response to one of my emails) telling me that she is on this cruise this week.  While her parents may be going home at the end of the cruise (I'm not sure of this), she's booking a second cruise on the same ship and suggested that I buy a cheap  inside cabin and join her on her second trip to Bermuda.  I'm not sure if I want to tell her that I am still legally Mario if we were to meet up for a cruise, even though we'd be in separate rooms.

As much as I'd like to join her in Bermuda, I'm a bit leery of getting off the boat as Marian in a place I've never visited before.  All my ID says "Mario!" and this could get me into big trouble in some areas of the world. I figure that I might scope out this trip one day in Mario mode, then take it again as Marian if things go smoothly when getting off and back onto the ship.

This is a cruise I'd like to take some day, but not one that I'd go far out of my way to take.  The Hawaii and the Panama Canal cruises are higher on my list of trips to take.  Yet, I could see this trip as a test to find out whether a special person and I could travel well together....

Too bad that I don't feel safe in getting off the ship at many ports as Rhonda did on her cruise.  I'm not sure if she has legally transitioned or not, but she has a much easier time than I do going about the world as a woman. (I should ask her one day, as I'd like to know if she has any advice for me in getting out at the same ports as she did on her cruise.)  At least, she knows how to dress well and up on a cruise.....

 

A short post about a long line at Walmart.

 
Today, I wanted to price check a couple of things AND get home "early".  (I slept away most of the day yesterday, and I know my sleep patterns will be out of whack for a while.)  Unfortunately, this was not the case.

My first stop was at Staples to price out a chair mat to protect my carpet from the chair by my computer desk.  $70 is an uncomfortable expense for me, but one I know I'll need to spend.  Instead of me bringing this unwieldy object home in my car, I figure that I'll order it from Amazon, and have it shipped to me for free.  After this, I stopped at Target, looking for inexpensive reading glasses to replace the ones that fell out of my pocketbook.  No luck there, so it was off to Walmart.

Normally, a trip to Walmart ends up with most people spending more than planned.  But today was worse.  All of the self service checkout stations were closed, and there were lines 10 carts deep at the remaining manned stations.  Instead of being in and out in 15 minutes (I knew where the reading glasses are stocked), I was there for an hour, most of which was waiting in line.  If I ever see lines like this again outside of the Xmas rush, I'll shop elsewhere if possible.....

BTW: I bought two pairs of glasses while I was there....