Congratulations, Grantie Consuela!

Sending the ~ma to Tim, Erica's mom, Matt's mom, and all our loved ones with health challenges.

Laura one day I want to visit your Otter Lake place. It looks so peaceful.

I can't wait for the construction crew to finish and having true peace and a great spot for guests. Summer and Autumn are such wonderful times here. They promise me I will have a functional bathroom today! The areas they have finished are beautiful.

Monday! Yeah, why be it?

Sending an abundance of ~ma in your direction, Trudy. Thank you for being an awesome daughter and taking charge!

Trudy, I’m SO GLAD you got your mom to NY for this second opinion!!! What a change!! All best wishes your and your mom’s way!

And new baby grand nephew, congrats Suela! And knowing his mom, I’m not surprised at all by her heroism. That kid is so lucky in the parents department!

All positive vibes for your mom and her new team of doctors. Good for hanging in there about MSK and being her rock and new roomie through it

Trudy, so glad your mom got to MSK! Bring on the restaging!

Tim’s surgery has been pushed back by 90 minutes, so we’re just killing time.

That's an excellent change of venue, Trudy. Good job! Wishing you the -ma.

so we’re just killing time.

I wonder if that Lou Reed's line about buying drugs ran through his head at the end of his life as he received cancer care: "First thing you learn is you always gotta wait."

Congratulations, Grantie!

That reminds me, I'm about to be a great-great aunt. I was a great-aunt before I was a mom, since my oldest niece, who's only six years younger than me, had her firstborn about 8 months ahead of Alex. And so my oldest grand-niece, who just turned 20, has hastily married her high school sweetheart and just had a baby shower. I'm currently viewing all this through Facebook, though I'm visiting that part of the family in October, so I'll get to meet my great-great-grandniece then. (I should bring a cane for the trip--unfortunately it's too late to grow out my gray hair for the occasion.)

Sorry Lisah-- I didn't mean to mis read it, I was kind of ...feeling grumbly and worried maybe I'm being too picky and I should just find something , anything, to get back to work.

I am definitely looking at jobs that pay more...which is why the field is so limited. Even branching into administrative aide /reception type jobs the pay is often on the low side.

I've been trying to focus on places that have $15 and up as a salary range because with my experience I know I could get at least what I was making previously if not more. Surprisingly to me grocery stores seem to have the better pay range when it comes to associate jobs. I've seen some retail jobs advertising assistant manager positions for less than $14/hr. I saw one that was $10.50/hr.

And then I was just randomly looking around and saw a position for a FedEx driver for $14-$19/hr and have the whole UPS almost strike I was curious about the difference--which is UPS is union.

Hourly wages of that level make it really next to impossible to be independent. Sad state of affairs. This is much of the reason that my son is doing delivery for Walmart, even though wages are higher in NY.

Also sad, Paul Reubens has died. He brought smiles to many.