Watch night and other matters

I’m sure the sale of Tums has gone up dramatically in the last twenty-four hours. I’ve heard from more people and seen more posts on Facebook about the anxiety this election has produced. One meme said last night was like a combination of Christmas Eve and the night before a colonoscopy, and I thought that was pretty apt.

I waited too long to make watch party arrangements and then got cold feet about going out. I’m in a hermit mood, still in the pjs I’ve worn all day. In spite of a neighbor’s nice offer to take me down the street to the Wine Haus, where there is no TV, I’ve elected to stay home alone. Perhaps Jacob will come out and watch the returns with me later. But for the time being, I’m keeping the TV muted. I don’t want to hear all those early predictions. I’m waiting for solid results—and praying a lot. Two years ago, for the presidential election, I went to sleep and left a good friend and Jordan in my living room watching. When I woke in the morning, they were both there again, and when they told me trump had won, I went back to bed, like an ostrich burying its head in the sand.

Meanwhile, I spent some time shopping online today and am so proud that I really whittled down my Christmas gift list. I try to give something to each of the fifteen family members, not big but something I hope they’ll like, and then there are assorted friends I am close to. A little creative online searching, and I think I came up with some good choices. I will have to have many of my family gifts wrapped to be delivered when we’re all together for Thanksgiving, since this is an Alter “off” year when the kids all celebrate with their spouse’s families.

Sophie provided a little diversion from the election-day tension today. She had a spa day a week or so ago and came home sporting that triangular scarf around her neck. Knowing that it would just get dirty, I suggested Jordan take it off one night when she was loving on Sophie. She eased it over the dog’s head, and Sophie backed off and literally glared at her. Jordan began apologizing, saying, “Mom told me to do it.” Finally, she put the scarf back on, and Sophie seemed satisfied.

This morning, there was a repeat performance with Zenaida who cleans my cottage for me. She sweet-talked Sophie and eased the scarf over her head. Soph immediately grabbed it in her teeth and began a game of tug o’ war. When Zenaida tried to ease her mouth open to get the scarf, Sophie gave her baleful looks. Finally, we decided to just let her carry it in her teeth until she tired of it.

She didn’t tire. Scarf in her mouth, she barked demandingly at Zenaida, who restored the scarf to its proper place around Sophie’s neck. And then my spoiled dog trotted away, perfectly satisfied. She won another round with those silly humans.

An adventure—and a lesson learned

Jordan and I go grocery shopping on Fridays. She brings the transport chair that I almost never use and plops a basket in my lap, where it gets heavier and heavier. And we often run out of room. So today we turned it into an adventure—my first time to use one of those motorized grocery carts. I’ve been afraid to try, afraid I’d go careening through the store knocking down displays right and left. Well, first of all, it doesn’t go fast enough ever to careen. And second, I only nudged one display and dislodged one Bundt cake from a shelf—no damage done, though the store employee who came to right things was not cheerful about it.

I’m not quite ready to solo yet, but Jordan’s judgment was I did great for the first time. My goal is to be able to shop independently. Next lesson: get better at steering, so I can reach most things from the shelf. Seriously considering taking my grabber for things on high shelves. Lots of fun.

I know better, I really do—but I ordered clothes online from an iffy company that I thought I’d read warnings about before. New Chic offered really cute clothes at a terrific price, so I ordered through PayPal figuring I’d dispute the charge if I ran into trouble. It’s not quite that easy. The clothes take forever to arrive—probably because they are only made when you order, in China, and shipped, apparently by slow boat. Three items, each arrived separately. Two were way too small in the shoulders—I have had tops made in India with the same problem, so I sometimes think we American women are extraordinarily broad-shouldered—or at least I am from years of picking up babies.

The third item is an overall style outfit, knee-length, wide legs. Looks pretty good with a T-shirt, and I’ll keep it. But I’ll sure be careful about washing it!

I finally got a sales person who, thank goodness, spoke English. Turned out not to be a blessing. She was indifferent and inflexible about my options which were to keep the clothes and give them to someone smaller or return them to the plant in mainland China. My pleas that they’d sent the wrong size were denied. She insisted I ordered size 6. Believe me, I’m more realistic about my size than that. Again, I wonder if Chinese sizes don’t translate into English, or the other way around.

So today I had them all packaged up, address to tape on the box and tape to affix it, ready to return. Branch post office doesn’t carry forms to mail to China, and I fear it would be prohibitively expensive. I’ll bite the bullet, gives the clothes away, and pay for them. Costly lessons.

I guess life is still full of learning experiences, some good, some not so much so.