Free Advice for You

Molly told me there’s a new OS for my mobile devices and that I might consider updating my phone and iPad. She’s my technology guru, so I always follow her lead. After I did it, I had to reset Siri on my iPad (by saying “Hello, Siri” five times). My iPhone, however, didn’t prompt me to do likewise, so I wondered if Siri were still functioning. To find out, I asked my phone, ”Hey Siri, are you working?” to which she replied brightly: It’s such a pleasure talking with you. I don’t consider it work.

Meanwhile, the friendly Siri woman on my laptop has apparently had a gender reassignment. All of a sudden, I’m getting mansplained when I ask a question, and sometimes the disembodied male voice pipes up out of the blue. I don’t understand why this is happening but it’s not okay. When I went to reset my preferences, I was faced with a barrage of choices. I ruled out all four American voices: that of the stoned surfer dude, the sleazy salesman, the valley girl with serious vocal fry, and one excessively cheerful gal who must be the founder of Up with People. The British man and woman were chipper but annoying. The Irish pair was bland. Likewise, I ruled out the East Indian and Australian couples, finally settling on the South African woman, whose accent doesn’t really sound South African at all, but oh well.

Now, who’s ever heard of a website with business hours: one that works during the day and shuts down in the evening?!? At 10:30 last night I tried to log on to the Social Security site to verify something about my Medicare Plan B, and was stopped in my tracks by a screen that announced that it was closed for the day. For real? What’s that about? I know government offices tend to be paragons of inefficiency and sources of intense frustration, but was unaware that even their databases require beauty rest as well. The site turned back on at 7:00 a.m. EDT today—but probably does so only on weekdays.

I have some advice for you: when brewing stovetop espresso, be sure to put water into the bottom chamber before setting it on the flame and walking away for five minutes. Now I must replace my trusty stainless steel Bialetti, which only hours ago glowed pure silver in the morning light and now resembles an ancient, just-unearthed relic.

A mélange of my dreams from last night, in brief:

• Having all my teeth pulled out with no novocaine and then learning I’d have to wear dentures henceforth
• Getting harassed, psychologically tortured and robbed by Lulu’s [fictional] sociopathic boyfriend [her real one is wonderful]
• Being forced to climb 250 feet to the top of a wobbly frame of crooked 2x4s
• Trying without success to save a dying newborn

Fun times!

Yesterday I saw one of my East Bay friends for the first time in months. Her sewing machine is in the shop so I schlepped my 45-year-old Bernina (a present from my long-gone grandfather) down into the backyard and she set to work as we chatted.

Susie is a delight: quirky, unpredictable, fun and creative. Remarkably, we overlapped at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn for a year but didn’t meet until we both lived in California. Perhaps most notably, she is the reigning queen of recycling, reducing and reusing. There may be no one on this troubled planet more adamantly dedicated to this crucial cause. It is no exaggeration to say that almost nothing goes into her trash, but rather finds a new home or purpose. While I will dutifully recycle a plastic takeout container, she goes a step further: paints it with acrylic, cuts it up and uses it for one of her amazing mosaics. And if she discovers you’re not properly channeling your waste and other unwanted materials, or are otherwise behaving in an environmentally irresponsible way, you will hear about it.

So of course I knew better than to bring her that Ziploc baggie to carry some of her small items home. Within five minutes I had 1) returned the plastic bag to its drawer and returned with a large paper grocery bag; 2) been queried about whether or not I composted; 3) explained why I didn’t; 4) learned all about why it’s extremely important; 5) gotten a lesson in materials and methods for the process; and 6) committed myself to initiating the practice, though of course I had just gotten rid of both my nice, new green buckets during my basement purge: yet more losses I regret.

Then today she generously supplied me with a loaner composting bucket and some torn-up cereal boxes to line it: my “starter kit,”she called it. Later, when I brought it into my kitchen, I realized that since it had been previously owned it was covered with schmutz. You surely know that I am a fussy little person with an aversion to other people’s grossness, though I’m often tolerant of my own. Please don’t tell her that I used bleach (yup, the evil chorine kind) and Comet to scrub the greebers out. But now I’m all set.

One more thing about Susie: Every now and again she spouts a Yiddish word and I have to interrupt her for a definition. If it’s a useful one (they usually are), I add it to my vocabulary. After all, according to an early chart from 23andMe, I’m .01 percent Ashkenazi Jew (though sadly my latest report shows nary a trace). The latest from her lexicon: schtup. Very useful.

Today’s big adventure was going inside two actual real physical stores: something I rarely do. First, the jeweler to repair my father’s watch, which you’ll recall I accidentally swam with a couple weeks ago, after doing the same in July. The technician, from behind his loupe, repeated his warning: “Don’t take this into water.” “I know,” I replied just a tad irritably.”I didn’t mean to wear it into the pool.” I hope I don’t make the mistake a third time.

The next thrill was a visit to the used kids’ clothing store, where I kept texting Eleni with photos of my selections so she could nix or approve them. I tried hard to make sure I had equal numbers of things for Jesse and Ember, but by accident she ended up with one extra: something I’d picked for Jesse that turned out to be more her style. In the end, I came home with six shirts for Em, five for Jesse, and a wee Hanna Andersson outfit for Ruby.

It’s sad times when something as mundane as trips to the jeweler and clothing store merit space on Bloggy. I blame it on the pandemic. My life is so constrained that a tiny thing like shopping becomes a Big Event. Then again, most of my blog posts deal with the prosaic.

Finally, today’s Squirrel Hatred Bulletin: my little lemon tree has been stripped of two of its eight nascent fruits, still only the size of walnuts.