The only reason I got dressed was to shovel out my car (a short post)

 

It is the last weekend of the year, and several inches of snow fell last night.  There was only one reason for me to get dressed - to move my car, so that the plow could clear the spot.  Luckily, I had parked my car in a visitor's spot the night before, so I only had to brush off the car, scrape the windshield a little, and move the car back to my already plowed packing space.

When I came back inside, RQS wondered whether I had even started the process of cleaning off the car.  And I was getting ready to get undressed to be able to relax for the rest of the day.  And rest we did, watching several movies and videos on the TV, making excuses not to do some laundry. Yet, we finally took care of that task around 3:30 pm.

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Snow days are common at this time of year, and I cherished the forced relaxation time we get on these days.  Yes, we will do laundry on these days when at my home.  But I can often stay in my jammies for much of the day.

One thing I've noticed is that I am slowing down.  Getting older is a drag, but the alternative would be far worse right now. For everything, there is a time and a season.  Right now it's winter outside, and I see that stage coming in my life.  And I'm comfortable with that.

Twas the day after Christmas, and all through the house....

 

Twas the day after Christmas, and all through the house....

Well, the stores were all stirring with people returning gifts, and those shopping for food in advance of the oncoming snowstorm.

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RQS and I knew we had to go out to get some food before the snow started, and we didn't get out early enough to get a lot of things done.  I decided to go out as Mario today, as there was no sense in presenting as Marian on a day where I might need to present my legal ID.

Our first place to stop was the local BJ's.  However, the parking lot was too crowded for us to risk spending time there to return an item I bought before Christmas.  (I can return the item as soon as I shovel out my car after the snowstorm ends.)  And then, it was off to Trader Joe's - a place much more crowded than usual, noted by both the numbers of shopping carts in use and by the lines of people waiting on line to pay for the food in their carts.

Next, was a stop at the drug store.  I was supposed to pick up a prescription for a GLP-1 drug.  However, when I saw the price of the drug ($510 for a low dose), I decided NOT to buy it.  I'll discuss this with my doctor when I see him in January.  There is no way that I'm going to spend that much of my after tax money on a drug which may aggravate other problems I have with my body - and I'm referring to my GI Tract.

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When I got home, I checked the prices for GLP-1 drugs on my plan, and they are insane.  Unless the price drops significantly, I will not bother with these drugs,  RQS wanted to suggest a few things, but I knew that having her try to help when I'm not ready for help would make things worse.  Thankfully, she knows how to read me well enough to let me process things if I cut her off.  Our communication style and skills may not be perfect, but we are lucky to be able to air things out before they fester and make things worse.

A nice dinner out. (Not much to say, as I'm recovering from a cold.)

 As I'm writing this, it's Christmas Eve, and I'm still recovering from a cold.  So I won't say too much about today.  

RQS came up from the city, and I picked her up around 1:30.  Both of us were a bit hungry, so we went to the local pizza parlor before taking a rest at home.  A couple of hours later, we went to Cold Spring for dinner.  If I hadn't made Xmas Eve reservations, I'd rather have stayed in for the night.

We got to Cold Spring early, and were seated in an almost empty section of the restaurant.  Both the food and service were top notch, and I had enough taste buds working to enjoy the meal.  But my cold was draining me, and we decided to skip going to church as we planned.

I don't have much energy today - I'll write more soon.

I'm amazed at how little I watch network TV these days.

 

I am amazed at how out of touch I am with most pop culture programs.  Have I watched Survivor or Big Brother? No.  Have I watched the Voice? Never.  Have I watched Yellowstone?  Nope.  I'm so out of touch with what passes for modern "culture", that most of the people involved in these shows would get no recognition from me.

Most evenings, you'll find me going to sleep with Perry Mason playing in the background.  Am I living in the past?  No.  I just find that old TV shows had a better production quality than the shows we make now.  However, that doesn't mean all were good.  There were way too many copycat shows on the air way back when, and most of the copycat shows were crap.  I tend to filter out the crap and look for good shows.

Before getting addicted to YouTube videos, I watched the Western Channel constantly until I got bored by their limited selection of movies.  I feasted on shows like Have Gun Will Travel, Wanted Dead or Alive, and Bat Masterson. All of these had good writing and good performances.  This doesn't mean that I limited myself to these shows.  It was that the channel had predictable entertainment.

Sadly, with media consolidation, we're seeing fewer good shows being produced - especially news shows.  Recently, we've seen CBS (now controlled by a billionaire's son) delete negative coverage of El Salvador's CECOT prison, as it would make our president look bad.  But then, our corporate overlords don't care about law and order.  They only care about control.  

Fascism comes by first anesthetizing the public so that ignorance of important daily events takes place.  Eventually, people ignore what happens when their neighbors are scooped up in a regime's pogroms.  I am lucky NOT to be interested in pop culture, as I am not blind to what's going on in the USA.  And that means I will be to leave the country I love for a safe haven if needed.  Hopefully, this won't happen.  But if it does, I will keep up writing from my unique point of view.

A visit to the doctor - something I never like.

 

This is not a photo of my doctor.  Only when I started living full time as Marian and moving towards a medical transition, would I switch to a female doctor.  (As long as I  have my original equipment, I'd feel a little uncomfortable with a doctor who doesn't have my "plumbing configuration."  With that being said, this is not a discussion about doctors for transgender people.  We need to choose doctors with whom we are comfortable, and advocate for the best treatment we can get in our healthcare system.

Today, I visited my doctor.  I knew that he was going to be upset that I gained a couple more pounds since I last saw him.  But he was surprised to find out that the pharmacy was going to charge me $500/month for a Mounjaro (GLP-1) prescription.  There was no way I was going to pay that much for a drug, when there are others that Medicare has approved and is covered by my prescription insurance plan.  

What I forgot as well as my doctor did was that I was supposed to get my yearly physical.  So, after my visit was "done", I was asked to stay a while to get my blood drawn and for an EKG to be taken.  I again mentioned the problem with the GLP-1 drug that was prescribed, and he said that his assistant would look into this for me.  Guess what?  I got a text from his service that an Ozempic prescription was now on file, and also got a text from the pharmacy that the prescription was ready for pickup.  I'll have to call up the pharmacy to ask how much this prescription costs before I start with it.

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Unfortunately, there was 2 inches of snow on my car when I left for the doctor.  When I returned, I found that my parking space hadn't yet been plowed.  So, when I heard the plow a hour later, I was out of the house again to kill some time for the plow to do its job.  With the expected slop to be on the ground for tomorrow, I'll have to give up on the idea of wearing a fancy dress to Christmas Eve dinner and  to church, and simply wear a sweater dress over leggings for practicality.

This is the kind of problem many of us have to deal with during winter in New York.  It could be much worse.  But I'd rather have the problems I have in a TG accepting state, than to live in Florida where we are treated like dirt.  And some people wonder why I stay in my high tax state....

A weekend with RQS, getting ready for Xmas

 

As I write this, we're all getting ready for Xmas, and Amazon boxes are going here and there.  RQS has has some of her boxes shipped here, And I've had to make sure that boxes containing small Xmas gifts for her don't arrive when she's here.  This is not a big thing.  But it is something I have to stay aware of before the holiday.

Sunday came, and Amazon delivered the SIM card for her new phone.  It was a little bit of an effort to get her new phone plan set up, in part because the SIM Card ID was not easily legible without assistance, and that the setup would be more easily done on a laptop, and not the cell phone itself.

At that point, RQS started a little bit of cleanup around the place, while I edited my co-op's website to include some government contacts as part of the "useful contact" page.  And then I joined in the cleaning effort for a little while.  After getting some room freed up on the dining room table, RQS started to work on some of her art on a "clean" surface.

Later that day, we put a spatchcocked chicken in the oven and feasted on the bird when it was fully cooked.  We took out some stuffing I had prepared the day before, and, with a salad, we had a filling dinner.  This wasn't much to talk about.  But the day wasn't that eventful either.  In short, this was a Jammie day that went well.

A new restaurant and a new phone.

 

As I write this, Christmas and New Year have yet to come.  Yet, I'm rushing to get a co-op newsletter out before the end of the year, so that shareholders see that we are trying to communicate with them on a regular time frame. 

RQS is unable to reach me today, as she left her phone here last weekend.  So we made arrangements for me to pick her up at the train station at 4:30.  Once I picked her up, we decided to go to the new Thai restaurant in town.  Before I say too much about the restaurant, the owners used to have a place in Thornwood, and after 20 (?) years, decided to move to Croton to open a new place.  Their website still lists the Thornwood address, even though they have been located in Croton since Halloween weekend.  

We walked into the restaurant without reservations, and were shown to a table next to the bar.  We were told that since the place hadn't yet been given a liquor license, they were giving away a glass of wine with each meal.  Looking at the menu, we both saw that prices were a little bit more than we expected.  I could easily manage this unplanned cost, so I ordered the Tamarind duck while RQS had chicken in a spicy red curry sauce.  Both were excellent!  We'll be going back when the budget allows for it.

Our next stop was Best Buy, where RQS bought a backup cell phone, just to have a cheap phone for use in an emergency (or, when she leaves her phone at my place).  It took a stop at 2 stores, as the first one didn't have the budget Motorola phone in stock.  When we got home, RQS was about to buy a SIM card directly from a service provider.  I told her NOT to complete the transaction, and explained why she should buy the SIM card through Amazon.  If the card were shipped by the cell phone company, it wouldn't get here until sometime after Xmas.  But, if the card came from Amazon, it would be here before the end of the weekend.  So, RQS ordered the card, then started to set the phone up for backup use.

Hopefully, RQS will be able to use her new phone for phone calls by the end of the weekend.