As I sit here admiring the sleet on the ground that's making our yard look like a winter wonderland, I am reminded of the wonderful fact that we no longer have to get out on this giant ice-skating rink if we don't want to. Retirement has its perks. The trouble with this 'sleet passing as snow' is it is as slick as nose excrement. I don't dare step foot outside and risk landing on my tuchus. I'm no fool. I've seen how the dogs slip and slide while trying to do their 'business' and I have no desire to spend the rest of winter and most of spring laid up with broken bones. I've gone this long with them all intact and I'd like to keep it that way. I couldn't ice skate when I was younger, and I have no intention of trying it again intentionally or accidentally.
My sister and I took our kids ice skating once at a large mall in Dallas many years ago. My kids talked me into renting skates with them. I put them on, hung onto the railing, pulled myself around the rink, stepped out, took them off and never attempted to do that again! Ice skaters must have the strongest ankles in the world. I can roll mine by stepping on a goodsized pebble.
It also happens to be our 49th wedding anniversary today (Feb. 24). Since we're housebound, David has picked up where he left off on the kitchen remodel. I have no idea what he's doing, and I have no intention of inquiring. I'm afraid if I do, he'll take that as interest in what he's doing and try to recruit me into doing something I don't want to do–like getting out of my recliner. Hey, it's my anniversary, too. Just because he chooses to fritter his day away by working is not my fault. He is already nagging me about paint colors again. Maybe in his next life he'll marry an interior decorator and I'll marry a man whose idea of remodeling is to whisk me off to the Greek isles on our private yacht while he hires professionals to have it all done when we return. A girl can dream, can't she? In the meantime, I'm counting my flatware. Why you ask? Well, I'll tell ya’ – eventually.
Right now, our tentative plans are to eat out at the country club tomorrow night. That's it. We're so exciting, aren't we?
We have got to get off our duffs and plan something besides eating out locally for our anniversary next year since it will be our big 5-0. Personally, I don't know how that could be possible since I'm nowhere near 50 myself. (If Jack Benny can be forever 39 then so can I. Ha! Ha!)
And speaking of being forever 39, I must be getting cabin fever. We've been cooped up for two whole days and I'm getting desperate! Okay, you readers from northern states that get more than two inches of snow/ice/sleet and call it a Wednesday, we in the southwest part of Oklahoma don't deal with that too often so we hit the grocery stores hard and hibernate.
But I digress.
A few months ago, I finally broke down and bought a new complete set of flatware that can serve 18 after our grandsons, over the course of several months, managed to misplace most of our spoons and forks. So, what do I do on this cold sleety morning? I count my flatware. (Told ya’ I was bored.) Okay, okay, I count it every single day. Until today, every piece has been accounted for. I washed all the dishes that hadn't fit in the dishwasher, emptied the dishwasher, and did my counting. Five, six, seven. Seven? I have the flatware divided into two stacks of eight and one stack of spoons was short.
I grabbed a trash bag, put on a pair of rubber gloves, and started digging into the trash compactor. Zero, zip, nada. I had David retrieve the trash he'd taken out the night before and started digging in that bag. BINGO! After digging out every bit of trash it was lying on the bottom of the bag, gleaming at me like it was saying HA! HA! I almost got away.
If David thinks I was paranoid before about missing flatware, wait till he sees me now. I guess I'll start roll call of the flatware twice a day from now on, or until I get bored and lose interest.
Anyway, I guess it was one way to spend a cold/rainy/sleety day. The other would be to just bundle up and hibernate. Rather than digging through the trash like a starving raccoon, I think that's a much better idea, don't you?