A Favor Before I Move

Moving starts out as a great idea. Then you try to do, in one month, what you’ve put off for nine years, and reality slaps you silly, which is why I haven’t posted for a month! I’m packing, getting all my medical tests, meeting friends, and got some writing published — yay! More info is below, along with the favor.

I thought I’d made great progress just taking the art off the walls, then I dug in and realized how much stuff I’ve accumulated in nine years. Some is mine, some my kids, and some I’ve picked up along the way.

You’ll now find one third of my belongings in the Goodwill Store on Brand Blvd. in Glendale. And I’m still not done. I’ve learned a valuable lesson over the years. Just because someone gives you something doesn’t mean you have to keep it. The clincher for me was, do I want to pay seven dollars a cubic foot to send something across the country I was never crazy about to begin with? The answer was often, no.

My living room was overrun with boxes which I carted up the stairs in an espresso-fueled energy burst. Now my second bedroom is overrun with boxes. I’ve been watching episodes of NCIS to get me through packing. I’m on season six and still packing, but my eyes are wide open to the many ways someone could do me in. This knowledge will come in handy while driving across the country in a car with 186,000 miles on it.

I’ve had wonderful dinners with friends I haven’t seen in ages, which makes it so hard to leave. I make a lifetime of friendships, then decide to pull up stakes and go. But at least you all know I love yinz, as they say in Pittsburgh, and you have a place to stay wherever I am. So, visit!

One of the many medical tests I just completed in preparation for my departure was a colonoscopy, which must be medical code for inhuman torture. In a country with so many brilliant minds, how can we not come up with a beverage that will clean your insides that doesn’t make you retch?

Since the colonoscopy I learned I can actually survive on broth and Jello for two days without dying. I’m now very interested in trying the broth and Jello diet to see if I can lose a few pounds.

I also refuse to accept that there’s no better way to examine a woman’s breasts than to squeeze them flat until the breathless woman screams in pain. I love how they say, “OK, don’t breathe” As if you could if you really wanted to. Can’t some brilliant mind out there devise something conical that can expand or contract to fit said breast into? Is this too much to ask? Dammit, if only I’d been an engineer. I can see it in my head, I just need a genius engineer to help me create it. If you’re a genius engineer, please contact me.

I also occasionally write for an online group called Read650 and I’m so proud and excited to be one of the Read650 writers partnering with Carnegie Hall for its first-ever online festival, ‘Voices of Hope.’ Woo Hoo!

You can hear my story by subscribing to the Read650 Podcast ( https://utm.io/udhmA ), or visit the https://Read650.org website at 6:50 pm EDT starting this Friday through April 30 to hear true 5-minute stories of resilience and recovery. My story, Grateful for Covid? Yes, will be featured on Monday, April 19, 2021 at 6:50 p.m.

Meanwhile, you can buy the anthology with the collected ‘Voices of Hope’ essays at https://utm.io/udhmM

While you’re online, go to the Carnegie Hall Voices of Hope website to see the list of streamed performances that range from orchestral and chamber works to folk and jazz ( https://utm.io/udhmP ). There’s also a great article about Read650 in the Albany Times Union.

This is a truly wonderful perk in the midst of my moving craziness.

I also discovered a great recipe for my health conscious friends — lentil patties. This is what happens when your friends go vegan on you then ply you with their extra cooked lentils. (Thanks Mandy.) I couldn’t waste them, so I tried lentil patties and was pleasantly surprised. Some healthy woman named Sylvia Fountaine had them on her website called FeastingAtHome.com. Here is a link to her lentil patties. I added a little more mushroom to mine and really liked them.

They’re a bit time intensive, but they’re really tasty and no guilt afterward leaves you feeling refreshingly perky. I served mine on a bed of sauteed spinach, then chopped some fresh dill into plain yogurt, added a little salt, spread it on top and it was delicious. You could add cucumber to the yogurt and make it a salad.

Now here’s the favor. If you haven’t taken a moment to follow me on this blog, please do so by putting your email address in the box on the right side. I promise you will not be contacted by Nigerian millionaires who swear they’ll share their riches with you. I ask because I need to look WAY more popular than I am so I can get a literary agent, so feel free to tell your friends, or even total strangers to follow me. I’ll take anyone. Thank you! Now here’s the recipe.

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