Thursday, June 25, 2009

 
 
 
 
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Transition

We moved Meredith (Lori's Mom) to an assisted living home this week. Meredith had been diligently downsizing for quite some time in anticipation. An apartment had become available a week or so ago...perhaps not the one she wanted, but she deemed it satisfactory 'temporarily'.

Monday Lori's brother Ivan, Lori's friend Mary, Meredith and I started the big move. Lori and her Mom attended to downsizing details. Ivan and I loaded the furniture making the move. All in all things went very well. Some of the furniture was heavy, but not so heavy we could not move it. Meredith moved to the new apartment with the first trip. First and most important item in was her Couch...her nest is how she refers to it. The last item of furniture to be loaded was the sewing cabinet Lori's Dad had built. This went to Sister Joyce Wednesday afternoon. We loaded up the roll top desk into Ivan's van along with most of the things related to genealogy. The huge (analog) TV went to Mary for her kindergarten classroom. We were tired, but everyone seemed happy with the move.

Tuesday Lori and I went back to the old apartment to do the finishing touches. We sold the bedroom suite to an antique dealer. Then we started the final cleaning touches. I made several trips to Goodwill with unneeded items, while Lori sorted things...we filled the trash bins available to us (two smallish bins) and hauled some more to the dumpster at the Middle School. Lori and I both worked harder Tuesday than we did Monday, surprisingly.

Wednesday we did the Final final cleaning and carting. We had a nice visit with Joyce when we delivered the sewing cabinet to her. It looks good in it's new home.

Setting up DSL for Meredith took some extra time. First I had to learn how to get to the right people answering questions to a computer. I more or less got that handled. Then a tech lady led me through the procedure, and after about an hour of trying this and that we had success!

Until I hung up the phone. The DSL disconnected as well! So back to talking to the computer...answered something wrong and went a long way the wrong way to a dead end. So I tried one more time! I carefully answered the questions and finally reached another tech lady...who promptly told me she could not help! But who also directed me to someone who could.

He and I went through the whole procedure again...but first he had to act like a jerk. He asked me what color the lights on the DSL modem were...and when I started to tell him, he shouted at me I NEED YOU TO ACTUALLY GO OVER AND LOOK AT THE MODEM! (I was!) With some difficulty I did Not react to his disrespect. I decided not to make his problem my problem... Finally we discovered the problem. I had plugged the DSL into the filter but not the phone! I thought the DSL was what needed filtering, but no, it is the phone that needs filtering. I believe we could have saved a half hour (and a whole bunch of shouting) if he would have listened to what I was trying to tell him. I guess the only way to do things is to go through the Whole procedure everytime...obviously the customer doesn't have any important information!

But DSL is up and running and as I type this Meredith's new cell phone is charging so maybe tomorrow I can deal with another AT&T helper....

Meredith is enjoying her new surroundings and getting acquainted with the other residents.

I believe this will prove to be a beneficial transition.

Saturday, June 6, 2009

TN

We arrived here in Arrington TN Wednesday evening about 5 minutes longer than 12 hours after we left home. I drove all the way...and was decidedly tired of driving. We had an almost uneventful drive down. We passed a couple of accidents involving semis and weathered two deluges. I am here to tell you that it is a Long way from the North side of Nashville to Franklin TN. We had the feeling 'almost there' when we started through Nashville...and we were only an hour or so away actually.

Thursday featured MI weather...cold and damp, high about 50 with a stiff Northerly breeze. We had been promised 80...So we were somewhat disappointed. We have noticed that TN people run there air conditioners when the high is about 50 degrees! We don't even have air in our house, and we didn't run it in our car at all last summer. Different strokes for different folks. I was looking forward to getting some of the ice melted out of my bones from that Long MI winter..but I had to wait a couple of days for that.

We are having a really good time with Don and Diane...Lori's sister. This household is different than ours... lots going on all the time. It sure makes us look like a sedate couple. It has been fun!

We are sure enjoying this Southern Hospitality...And I am very happy that we made the trip