We Have Nice Superbowl Sunday
Monday February 5 2007
O it is February blue. I recognize this blue sky of February from New York City and it is same February blue here. Such a pretty blue. Such a February blue. I forget about February but it really is transition month to Spring. It is special in its own right. Even in NYC they began selling the potted hyacinths in February, it is the smell of February back in NYC. Here in Tucson it is lovely shade of blue, same shade as in New York.
Both dogs have arrived in the sunshine. Lulu is on her sun couch, just looking around. Beanie is at the back fence patrolling it, he is looking for something to bark at. And he just found it. O that is not Beanie barking, it is the dog on the other side of the fence who discovered Beanie is there. Beanie has run away. He is running into the house to his Daddy. I just heard Bill’s welcome. “Hi Beanie,” and he is saying what he will cook for him later. Beanie is always busy. But he is still such a new arrival from the pound, has only been here two months, that we don’t yet know what Beanie really likes to do. As he gets more secure here he may not be so busy all the time, he will settle down more.
Bill’s friend Jim came over to watch Superbowl with him yesterday. The whole day was high drama because we have not had company of any kind for a year or two. The house had gone to pot during the two weeks of cold and rain when no one wanted to do anything. There were so many dishes in the sink I could no longer find a fresh cup for coffee or fresh spoon to stir it. All the dishes we regularly use were piled up in the sink along with a bunch of cups I had found in back of closet and had been using for coffee and glasses for apple cider. But Bill announced he was going to sweep and mop and vacuum whole house, so I went in to put up two loads of dishes, one huge load of all the plates and glasses and cups and silverware, and when that ended the pots and pans Bill had used for cooking when he was in cooking mode last week.
A big housecleaning went on. Plus Bill decided to move all the furniture he doesn’t like or doesn’t use from the big room the sun pours into, into the second living room, a huge room which was added on to the original house. That huge room looks like a storage room now, it is so cluttered. It has two couches no one uses with stuff piled up on it, and tables and worktables and chairs. Anything someone doesn’t want has gone into that room. And it used to be such a beautiful living room.
We used it a lot the first 10 years we were here because we didn’t have heat in the house and that room has huge fireplace. Bill would build fire in the fire place and keep it going all evening. We had a TV in there and a couch and we spent all our winter evenings there. But when I learned how to go on internet and email I got addicted to my computer, I didn’t want to leave it to be near the fire, instead I got a space heater and stayed in here. And Happy stayed with me. So when Bill called “the fire is up, everyone is invited to enjoy the warmth,” only Bill and Lulu went in. And eventually it was too much work when no one really wanted to go there. And when my mom paid for us to have heat put in the house, the heat only reached this part of the house, it did not reach the add-on (the add-on is the huge living room and a back bedroom). So then we all stayed in this part of the house, except I like sleeping under 4 comforters under open window in back bedroom.
Yesterday during the big clean up for company for Superbowl he did move all the stuff out of the sun room he doesn’t use for art, and moved it into the big room. The sun room is practically empty now, just an art table and a couch the dogs like to go on. It looks nice, very empty, very clean. When Bill and Jim watched Superbowl yesterday Bill wheeled the TV in from his room, set it up, Jim sat on couch, and Bill sat on one of Caren’s mother’s bridge chairs he brought in from the room of wall-to-wall clutter and furniture.
Bill finished the huge project of cleaning the house just in time for us to have nice swim at Fort Lowell pool before the game began. The original plan was that Jim and I would go to Costco before the game began and I would join up me and Jim (Helen sent the check for me to join but Bill doesn’t want it and Jim does). And we would pick up a pizza there for Superbowl, because everyone says Costco has good pizza, and pizza is what Bill and Jim wanted for Superbowl. I already had lots of soda in the refrigerator.
I called Jim and said “pick me up at the Fort Lowell Pool, it’s on the way to Costco, and I will join up you and me, and we can pick up a pizza and be back in time for kick-off.” But Jim takes care of his aged mother, he is living in her house, and said “I don’t know if I will have finished giving her her lunch and getting her into bed before then, you call me when you get back from the pool.” So I said “OK.” This is the 3rd time I have planned with Jim to go to Costco together to sign us both up, and the 3rd time the plan got aborted. So after the pool I said to Bill, “Just in case Jim and I don’t do Costco, let’s stop at Sunflower for baguettes and lunchmeat, we can have hero sandwiches and soda during the game just in case there is no pizza.”
The result is Bill and I got home at exactly the time of kick-off. I said to Jim “we're home, maybe you want to skip Costco, you can have hero sandwiches here, or we can go at half-time.” He said “let’s do it now, I’ll pick you up right now.” So I got my purse with Helen’s check to Costco. I had figured out how to do the whole thing. The man at membership said “everyone who lives under same roof can join,” and he said “the address on check has to match the address on Drivers License when you pay.” Since Jim refuses to own a debit card, he would write out a check, but I would use my debit card. So I decided we would give Jim’s address. I thought this was a good solution.
But Jim picked me up and the instant we started to drive to Costco his car acted up, and he said “I don’t think we will make it.” And at first I said “we will make it,” but then the car really acted up, so I said “OK turn around and go back to my house, we won’t have pizza, we will have hero sandwiches.” I think Jim really wanted pizza, he said “there are other pizza places closer by, or we can order in.” But I am a New Yorker, I know what good pizza tastes like, and I didn’t want any of the pizza places close to my house.
So we came home. I was starving and made myself hero sandwich right away. I had bought a nice selection of lunchmeat at Sunflower, plus their good baguettes. And I had it in backyard with a Sprite. It was the last of the sun. Bill said “bring Jim out a soda.” And Jim said he wanted Coca Cola, so I brought that out to him, and told him “everything is out on the counter, you can make yourself a sandwich.” But then I called in “Bill, you help him, show him how to make the sandwich,” because I thought ‘what if Jim is shy about making himself a sandwich.’ And I heard Bill take out the lettuce and tomatoes for him and onions. I heard Jim say he doesn’t want lettuce, just tomato and onions with it, and I heard Jim whistling while he made his sandwich. Bill whistles when he is happy and it was joy hearing Jim whistle when he made his sandwich. I think the sound I love above all is men whistling, it is the happiest loveliest sound in world.
Because Jim’s car acted like it would conk out any second all the way to Costco and behaved perfectly when he turned it around to head for home, I thought “Costco is just not meant to be and I am going to return the check to Helen.” Jim kept saying “we can do it another time.” But it seemed that Costco was not in my stars. When I said “turn the car around, let’s go home,” and he said “I don’t even know if the car will make it home,” I thought Costco isn’t going to happen for me. There had been so many aborted trips to Costco and now that we were actually on our way and going to do it, the car was threatening to plotz half the way there.
After I had my sandwich and Sprite in backyard and heard Jim whistling while making his sandwich, I relaxed. “I am going in to watch ‘Monk’” I said. Jim said “aren’t you going to watch the game, it will be a good game?” Jim and I talk football all the time, he doesn’t know I don’t watch the games. I talk football with Jim because I talk it with Bill. He watches the game, tells me everything, and then I consult my Higher Self and we have intelligent conversation about the games. That is why I have had many good football conversations with Jim about games. Between what Bill reports and what I learn from my Higher Self, I have grasp of what is going on. But of course I’d rather watch “Monk Marathon” than the game, I love “Monk.” It’s funny because I have watched so many games with Bill, baseball football and basketball, and always enjoyed them, and yet if I have first choice to watch what I want, I choose one of my own shows.
Jim is the one who told me about “Monk.” He kept pushing it in the pool. He pushed so hard that one day when it was “Monk Marathon” I thought I will have to turn it on and watch one show so I can face him. I don’t think I fell in love from that first show I watched, but it held my interest. And since it was marathon there were two more before marathon ended. And by the end of those two last shows I was hooked.
I curled up under all four of my quilts under open window in back room and watched “Monk Marathon” while Bill and Jim sat in sun room and watched the game. And when it was 8 o’clock and a show began that I had already seen before, I came in to ask the boys if they wanted me to shut the windows and doors and turn on the heat for them. Our nights are tremendously cold. But Jim said it is time to get back to his mom, he doesn’t like to leave her alone too long. And I said “I bought valentine cupcakes at Sunflower would your mom like one?” And he said “she loves cupcakes, yes she would.” So I left two pink ones and two red ones in the box, two for her, two for Jim, and kept back two for us. I wanted to send Jim off with a gift, he is such a nice guy.
And Bill said “I want to wait to make sure his car starts,” and it did. Then he moved TV back to his bedroom where Lulu was snoozing on bed so he and the dogs could all watch TV together and be warm and cozy, the way they have been doing every night of our cold winter. Altho for some reason when I leave computer to go to back bedroom to watch TV or read or sleep and snuggle under my 4 quilts, Beanie leaves Bill and Lulu and their cozy trio, and comes in with me and lies on top of the 4 quilts and the flannel sheets, like the real princess who was given port in the rain. He stretches himself out like the little prince, and is a wonderful companion for me. And only comes in to pay a visit to Bill and Lulu when I get up to fix myself a snack or help myself to a soda.
So Bill set himself up cozily with the dogs. I turned on the heat. I went to computer and posted for about an hour on my news forum, and then went back to watch rest of “Monk Marathon.” And Bill, who was too excited to eat while his friend was here and he was showing hospitality, fixed himself a nice hero sandwich, and shared it with the dogs of course.
It was a nice Superbowl Sunday all things considered.
And beautiful Monday morning to wake up to filled with lovely February blue and bright sunshine.
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