And, the survey says...

It was pouring rain when I took out the garbage and it rained most of the day.

My brother Joe called me at work with great news! My Mother has a tentative discharge date of January 24th! There are still a lot of details to work out (home staffing, a ramp in the back for a wheelchair, etc.) but, in just over three weeks time, she should be home again!

I didn't sleep well Monday night. I was WAY too hot! At first I blamed it on my flannel sheets and this crazy warm weather (we missed setting a record by one degree, yesterday, BTW). Then I remembered. When the ladies were here, Sadie was cold the first night, so I changed the settings on my thermostat so it was always 72 degrees F. in the house. So, the first thing I did when I got home was to redo the thermostat so it drops back to 68 degrees at 10:30 PM and when I am at work.

I had an email from Jyl letting me know her son Joe would be calling me at 5:30 PM. He had a school project where he needed to interview a person who is over 55 years old. The questions ranged from what did I think when the astronauts walked on the moon, where was I when Kennedy got shot, what did I wear to school, what sort of discipline was there in school (he didn't believe me when I said the nuns hit you on your knuckles with a wooden ruler) and so on... The last question was: what was the most technological advance since you were born? I hesitated a bit between medical advances (some are, after all, amazing) but decided it had to be computers and the Internet.

Dinner tonight needed to be something different, but easy. So, I went with a semi-homemade dish. I sauteed two shallots and 4 cloves of garlic in olive oil and butter. Then I peeled and de-veined 1/2 pound of tiger shrimp, chopped them and cooked them until they turned pink. I added a jar of Classico four cheese Alfredo sauce and let that warm up. I boiled a box of Linguine until it was cooked al dente. I combined everything, then topped my plate with Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated on a micro plane.

By 8:00 dinner was ready and I was ready to take a break. Outside, there will be more rain tonight and a high wind advisory.