Harley and I are headed for Melbourne again. I have medical mess there today and tomorrow then again on January something at 8am. I am not a morning person. I get up, I move around, I make coffee, but that in no way means I am actually awake and functioning. Lately my brain has been slow to get in gear. This makes for a comical life at times.
Last night I was sorting through the mountain of paperwork that is threatening to make my motor home exceed her maximum weight limit. Right when I thought I was about to get some of it under control, I found a huge bag of unopened mail, that has been forwarded from four past addresses. I keep telling the powers to be that I want to do everything electronically, but some just insist it has to be done by mail and not email or internet or phone. Good grief.
I kept making excuses not to tackle the paperwork. This is so funny to me! I used to be a wizard at forms, paperwork, filing and so on. But yesterday, I would wash dishes, do laundry, pet the dog, haul the garbage, anything to seemingly put off the paperwork. I even spent an inordinate amount of time making up the bed, so I could then use it as a sorting table for the mountain of papers.
I did find my new vehicle tags, so I installed them. I found my insurance bill exactly one day before it was due. Funny, I signed up for electronic billing with them too, but they never sent me an email or anything. The forwarded bill finally found me, in the nick of time.
My bedroom wall is in progress, I still need to put it back together. I took it apart for another project I am about half way done with. More on that later. I seem to live in a construction zone.
This morning I planned to sleep late, since I have so much to do when I do get up. But the hunters were lining up outside at 4:30am. I could hear the roar of their engines. The station opens at 5am. By 5:15am, it appeared that no one showed up to open up the hunters station at all and it wasn't set up for self-service. I could see the line of hunters waiting had grown longer. I reluctantly got up, threw on a dress, because it was the closest thing at hand, grabbed a flashlight then ran over in the rain and opened up. I felt bad the hunters had been waiting so long. I handed out their paperwork, then set everything up for self-service. I came back to the motorhome. Harley didn't even get up to greet me. Tsk tsk tsk. He did poke his head around from the passenger seat where he has been sleeping lately in his doggy bed. He saw I was OK, then promptly curled back up to sleep. Even he knew it wasn't our scheduled day to work.
I snapped his sleepy picture when I came back home this morning.
I am super shy today. I don't feel like going over to wake up the folks that are supposed to work, because I have no idea why they didn't show up. Maybe there was a schedule change and no one told me. So what if I woke up the wrong people? They might wake up really grouchy and yell at me. Anything to avoid stress... I have a stressful day ahead anyhow, so I am trying to remain calm.
Anyhow, it's taken care of now, so no worries! I would have just stayed and worked, but I really need to get organized to go to Melbourne. If I miss these appointments, bad things will happen. So I must press forward, rain and all. The unmanned hunters station will have to remain a mystery for now.
As a bonus, it coordinates so nicely with the upholstery, that I will never put it away. It will get loads of use, to ward off the chills that plague me at the strangest times.
It is so big, so luxurious, that I am using it as a lap blanket as I type this morning, trying to redo my schedule. Sleeping late (until 8am) isn't going to happen now that I am up since 5am anyhow.
This velvety alpaca is my new "fuffy". When I was a mere babe, I was an avid thumb sucker with a security blanket which I called my "fuffy". It was a super soft baby blanket that I came home from the hospital in. As I grew old enough to talk, my mother said I couldn't pronounce fluffy, so "fuffy" it became. I thought I was the only child in the whole wide world who required a fuffy and thumb sucking to be happy. Then around Christmas, in 1965, "A Charlie Brown Christmas" aired. I was enthralled to meet Linus, the thumb-sucking, blanket-toting character. I felt so empowered. I was not alone! There was someone else who was like me. It was like being from another planet, and finally meeting someone who knew where I came from.
Linus, you rock my world!
Although I gave up the thumb sucking to attend first grade without ridicule, my fuffy stayed with me until my home burned down just before midnight, on leap year day in 1976. Even though I wasn't carrying fuffy around 24/7 anymore, I was cuddling with it every night as I slept. After my home burned down, I seriously suffered from insomnia. It had slept me with me every night of my life. I was bereft. Nothing in this world has ever come close to replacing my fuffy, until now.
Am I regressing? Could be! Can't remember...
An odd note about "A Charlie Brown Christmas" is that the network execs hated it! It was criticized as being too religious—Linus quotes straight from the King James Bible (Luke 2:8-14). It was criticized for featuring contemporary jazz, an offbeat choice for a cartoon. It was criticized for not having a laugh track. It was criticized for using the voices of real children (except for Snoopy).
Luke 2:8-14
King James Version
And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.
And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.
And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.
And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,
Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
Yet, "A Charlie Brown Christmas" was an instant hit. It is now the longest running cartoon special in history, airing every year since its debut. Just goes to show that then, like now, the network execs are often clueless as to what the people want, enjoy and cherish. For me, it also introduced me to a life long love of jazz.
I even watched it this year! I was trying to find wholesome Christmas specials to watch. My old boyfriend often claims my taste in movies and TV is about equal to that of a 10 year old.
Most of my life I have happily lived without a TV. I've set foot in a movie theater so few times, I can count them all on both hands and even name off those few movies I saw in a theater. This lack of TV and movies, has probably contributed to my voracious consumption of a zillion books. When it comes to books, I read anything, the naughty, the nice, the gruesome, the adventurous, the true, the novel, the sad, the happy. But with TV or movies, the pendulum swings the other way, I pretty much have a G-rated interest.
After two years of no TV in the motorhome, I have recently become a main stream American who now owns a TV. I am not sure whether to be ashamed or excited. It turns out my wheel estate has a built-in roof top TV antenna, that can be cranked up vertically. Amazingly, I get a lot of channels, since I am parked in the middle of nowhere on flat land. I pick up signals that are 50 miles away.
My favorite buttons on the remote are MUTE and OFF. When the commercials come on, I mute them. When my G-rated show is over, I turn it off. I avoid the news, but I sneak peeks at the weather channel since I wrote informal Caribbean weather reports for 15 years. That is how I became "Dear Miss Mermaid". Another story, for another day.
For now, I am curling up with my new fuffy, sucking at my coffee cup, rather than my thumb.
A big thank you to a certain angel, for such a wonderful surprise on Christmas! My new fuffy! This has been the best Christmas ever. WOW, I must be spoiled rotten.
As long as the coffee's made and noone speaks to me I like mornings.
ReplyDeleteWhat a gorgeous fluffy.