Day 1664: Q words

Quick! It’s time for another quirky post from the quintessential blog about non-judgmental living.

In her quest to complete my yearly review, my manager recently quizzed a quota of qualified co-workers about me, the self-described Queen of group therapy. In response to that query,  a doctor quietly quipped that I was something that begins with the letter Q.

Question to all my qualified readers:  Is that Q word already quoted in this post or is it one of these?

quality

querulous

quipster

quizzical

quarrelsome

quixotic

I have no quarrel with the Q word that was quoted about me, especially since another doctor — who is definitely not a quack —  had no qualms calling me the same Q word quite a few years ago.

Do you see Q words in this quantity of yesterday’s pictures, snapped by a queasy blogger cleaning out her old home?

I saved a small quantity of LPs yesterday, including “Walking in Space” by Quincy Jones (also known as “Q”).

Before I quit, here‘s a quality cut from that album:

 

Un-qualified thanks to everyone who helped me quietly put together this Q-word post and un-questionable thanks to you, quite the reader!

 

 

 

Day 1663: It’s okay

Several years ago, I participated in a group therapy exercise where we created a personal flag.  I hope it’s okay if I ask what you would put on your personal flag.

Here’s my okay flag:

Telling myself “it’s okay” helps me deal with a lot, every day.

A few months ago, a more-than-okay person shared a variant of “it’s okay.”

It’ll be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end.

It’s not the end yet, so here are my other okay pictures for today.

 

Here and now, I’m blogging inside that gazebo and let me tell you — IT’S OKAY!

Here‘s some okay music:

 

Thanks to all who helped make this post okay and — of course! — to you. Okay?

 

 

Day 1662: Pictures taken before disaster strikes

Have you ever been invited to go to a website of pictures taken before disaster strikes? Have you taken the bait to click and look? If so, that’s not a disaster — that’s just the human trait to focus on disaster and catastrophe.

Some of the photos in today’s post ARE pictures taken before disaster strikes.

In yesterday’s therapy group, we discussed how our expectations — including disasters — often don’t turn into reality.  Immediately after that group, I received a call about disaster striking unexpectedly.  When we had extricated our cat Harley from the crawlspace where he was hiding during the move two days before …

… somebody knocked loose an HVAC pipe, which caused significant water damage to the kitchen below.

When I talked to people about that disaster striking, the responses included:

• “OMG!”
• “That stinks”
• “Is your heart okay?”
• “We were going to remodel the kitchen anyway.”

Considering that the last response was from the person who bought our old place, I guess we’re all going to survive this latest disaster.

Here are more pictures taken immediately before disaster strikes (warning: some disturbing photos included):

 

For some musical relief from disasters, here‘s  “Pictures at an Exhibition.”

I now expect some comments. I wonder how that will turn out.

Non-disastrous thanks to all who helped me share the words, pictures, and music in today’s post and — of course! — to you, no matter what you expected.

Day 1661: 20 20

As they say, hindsight is 20/20. In hindsight, I should have gone to sleep earlier and woken up before 7:20,  so I would have more than just 20 minutes this morning to blog AND get ready for work. With traffic, my drive to work is more than 20+20 minutes. Once I leave my car near Fenway Park — where some pitchers, hitters, and catchers (but not umpires) have 20/20 vision — I have a 20 minute walk to work.

Usually, I share about 20 photos in a post, but today I have only one to show you.  All this 20 20 talk is an introduction to that picture.

I wonder if I’ll get 20 comments on this post?

20-second  but long-lasting thanks to all who helped me create this 20 20 post and — of course! —  to you.

Day 1660: Moving experiences

 Yesterday’s move entailed many moving experiences, which included:

1. The piano I’ve played since childhood dangling from a crane as it moved down to the street,
2. Our cat Harley moving with desperate panic away from the movers into the basement, where he refused to move,
3. Our cat Oscar cooly moving among the movers as if he owned everybody and everything,
4. One of the movers showing us a picture of his cat,
5. My being so moved by my piano landing in our new place that I cried,
6. Realizing that none of the refrigerators at the new place were working and my moving to call a repair place,
7. Moving back to the old home to fetch the cats,
8. Harley moving a solid door to escape into the crawl space under the roof TWICE,
9. Aaron and Michael moving around the crawl space to find Harley, who did not want to be found or to be moved, 
10. My inability to locate my heart medicine after we moved, 
11. A pharmacist movingly giving me a free dosage of Warfarin/Coumadin for the night,
12. Harley moving under the couch at the new place and then not moving anywhere else,
13. Oscar moving around the new place like he owned everything and everybody, and
14. Loving the water moving outside our new home. 

Now I have to move myself out the door for an unfamiliar commute to work, but not before I move some moving pictures here:

Here’s a moving song about going home by Sam Cooke:

Feel free to leave a moving comment about any moving experiences. 

Moving thanks to the wonderful movers from Prime Q moving company, the CVS pharmacist who was moved to give me my dosage of Warfarin, and to you — of course — for moving yourself to my blog, here and now. 

Day 1659: Everything must go

Because today is moving day, everything must go, including everything I photographed yesterday. 

Everything must go, including that important message I wrote yesterday. 

Here’s “Everything Must Go” by Steely Dan, who are everything. 

Before everything must go to our new home by the ocean, I must go to sincere thanks to all who helped me create this everything-must-go post and — of course! — to you, for going with me. 

Day 1658: Ready?

Ready for some links to other posts I’ve written about being ready? Ready or not, here, here, here, here, here, here they come.

After I wrote that first “Ready” post on Day 10 of this blog, I was ready to create this t-shirt:

I left the house before I felt ready yesterday (wearing that t-shirt) because a furniture delivery at our new home by the sea was scheduled between 7:30 and 10:30 AM. I wondered if I would be ready for my 9 AM haircut appointment, miles away, and then ready for Comcast to come to the new home in the afternoon.

The furniture delivery guys showed up at 8 and I was ready for them. However, I wasn’t ready for this exchange:

Furniture delivery guys: You ordered a white table, right?

Me: No!

Furniture delivery guys: You didn’t?  That’s all we’ve got.

Me: Arrrrgh.

Furniture delivery guys: It’s a poker table, right?

Me: Are you guys yanking my chain?

Furniture delivery guys: (silence and then laughter when I punched one of them in the arm)

Me: Do you guys usually pretend you have the wrong stuff?

Furniture delivery guys: ALL THE TIME.

Even though I wasn’t ready for those guys to be such excellent actors that I was totally fooled for a few moments, I was ready for them to deliver our dining room set and so were they.

They were definitely ready for their close-up.

On my way to MiAlisa salon, I was ready to take a picture of a car in front of me with the license plate “ANGRY,” with my iPhone set to ready, aim,  fire on the dashboard of my car.

Ready to learn that the car on the left is the Angry one? That reminded me that those ready furniture delivery guys had told me that people readily get angry when they pretend they have the wrong stuff in the truck.

Ready for my other photos from yesterday?

 

Whether or not we’re ready, we’ve moving to our new home by the ocean tomorrow, July 17.

Gotta go pack so we’re ready for the movers tomorrow at 7 AM, but first, are you ready for more thanks from me?

 

Day 1657: Cheese/Cloth

For our move on Monday, we’re packing up everything we’re holding on to, including this:

Because of my cheesy mind, I noticed cheese AND cloth for the rest of the day (as well as a few other things). Do any of these photos make you smile as wide as saying “Cheese”?

 

 

 

 

 

I do love cheese, so maybe we’ll get a pizza tonight after another arduous day of packing.

In the meantime, here‘s a cheesy song.

 

Thanks to all who helped me create another cheesy post and to you — of course! — for reading it.

Day 1656: Holding on

I’m holding on to many things as we pack up to move, including

• my sense of humor,
• things I find valuable,
• my job,
• creatures I love,
• my thoughts,
• my feelings,
• my sanity, and
• my iPhone, so I can be put on hold and also take pictures of my holdings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Before I started writing today’s blog post, I got a little ferklempt at the end of this excerpt from last night’s Jimmy Kimmel Show (which is holding on here at YouTube):

 

As always, I’m holding on to gratitude for all those who helped me create today’s post and — of course! — for you, who keep me holding on.

 

 

Day 1655: Letting go

Is everybody ready for another post about letting go?

Before I say more about letting go, I’m not letting go of my habit of sharing links to my previous posts with similar titles (here, here, and here).   I am now letting go any judgment of the fact that all those previous “Letting Go” posts occurred during the first year of this living-non-judgmentally blog.

Now that I’ve let go of that, I want to tell you that yesterday’s  therapy group focused on “Letting Go.”

I’m now letting go of my disappointment about my inability to include a blow-up of that white board, zooming in on the words “letting go” (in a different color, on the right). If you can’t find “letting go” amid all the red on that white board, let it go.

People in yesterday’s therapy group did an exercise in letting go by writing down words of things they wanted to let go. Here are some of the words I let go:

DOOM

GLOOM

DISASTER

JUDGMENT

HATE

UNWORTHY

SELFISH

FEAR

 

Since last fall, I’ve been letting go of negative reactions about

1. my open heart surgery,
2. the recall of my pacemaker/defibrillator, and
3. the U.S. election.

Letting go takes a lot of work!

Now, I’m letting go of many things as we prepare for our move close to the ocean. Sister Thrift is a great place to let go of possessions for a wonderful cause.

Now I’m letting go of all my other photos from yesterday.

While I did let go of many CDs yesterday, I’m not letting go of any of the Compact Discs shown above.

Here‘s Bonnie Raitt singing an amazing song about letting go:

Feel free to let go of any thoughts and feelings about this post in a comment, below.

I’m now letting my gratitude — for all those who helped me create this post and for all those who are reading it — go out into the universe.