This week Bill and I had our annual well checks. Those appointments, of course, must be scheduled months in advance, at least if you want to see the doctor and not the janitor. Both appointments were scheduled for 1:30 in the afternoon, one one day and the other the next. When I made the appointments, the office staff suggested we both come in the morning of the first appointment to have our blood drawn. That was good news, because we had to fast 12 hours before we got stuck with the needle, and I couldn’t imagine waiting until 1:30 in the afternoon to eat and drink coffee.

Aside from my, um, puzzle addiction, I really feel in control of most of my habits. However, if any one of you could have seen Bill and me yesterday morning, staring woefully at the empty coffee pot, it would have broken your hearts. Quite frankly, I was a mess. Bill was a bit better than me, but not a lot. We sat at the table with our shoulders slumped, a vacant look in our eyes. Every once in a while, one of us would look up at the clock, which seemed to be taking forever to get to 8:30 when we could finally drive over to the doctor’s office, get poked, and get caffeinated. Since the big hand had barely moved since the last glance, we would both give big uncaffeinated sighs.

When the doctor’s office finally opened, we were waiting at the door. I explained our purpose, and the receptionist asked us to take a seat. Time passed. More time passed. Still no call from a nurse to step through. Finally, my nerves had the best of me, and I went up and asked her about our status.

“Well, you keep getting bumped because the doctor wants to look at one of his patient’s blood results, and they get priority.

What? Just because someone has a rash over their entire body doesn’t mean they can come between me and my coffee. I was hangry and needed coffee.

I drink three cups of coffee a day. My first cup is the best. It’s freshly brewed, and I enjoy it in the quiet of my kitchen while I’m reading a good book. My second cup contains a fiber supplement to help keep me out of the hospital. It is virtually tasteless, but nevertheless, I don’t enjoy my second cup as much as my first. By my third cup, I am fully wound up and eager to greet Bill when he comes downstairs.

Which is why he doesn’t even have the sleep out of his eyes or his first cup poured before I start blasting him with questions. What are we doing today? Did you order that thing we talked about? The kitchen sink is leaking and needs to be fixed. What do you want for breakfast?

It was a quick five-minute drive to McDonald’s where we bought our coffee. Before even pulling out of my spot at the drive-thru, I had taken my first sip.

Ahhh.

While I don’t remember everything about my youth, I do remember going back to school following the glorious summer months. I never liked school. Never. Not from kindergarten through graduate school.

But I remember liking the brand new school supplies. We didn’t have to bring everything that kids of late have to bring. Our Catholic school provided the teachers with tissues and paper towels, and we learned how to sneeze into our elbows, so we didn’t need disinfectant wipes. Oh, plus there was no COVID. But we brought brand new crayons and markers. We had Big Chief tablets and three ring binders. We had sharpened No. 2 pencils and — when we were in the older grades — we had pens. Our textbooks were newly covered with paper from grocery bags. I don’t remember having a big backpack like our grands carry nowadays. We brought our school supplies in paper bags, and carried our books home in our arms every night. You know, when we walked five miles, rain, snow, or shine, uphill both ways.

These days, school supplies cost parents a small fortune. Not only do parents provide the basic supplies necessary for school, but they also supplement the teachers by buying tissues and disinfectant wipes and paper towels. Either the parents buy them or the teachers foot the bill, because the schools aren’t providing them to the teachers. If a teacher doesn’t want to listen to 30 children sniffle throughout the winter months, someone better buy some tissues.

This year, the “First Day of School” is considerably different for many children than usual. I don’t know what they are doing in other parts of the country, but in Colorado and Arizona, many kids aren’t going back to school in a real classroom where they can shoot spit wads at one another. Heaven forbid.

Some of my grand started school today. That, in and of itself, is startling, as we never started school before Labor Day. Even within a single family, there are different methods of “going to school” this year, at least at the beginning. Grade school in the school district that starts today has the elementary grades coming in person, and the middle school and high school grades starting half in-person and half virtual.

Some of my grandkids start school after Labor Day, and will attend school live, with lots of protective measures in place. But at least they will be able to see their friends. And shoot spit wads.

The school system that starts a week from today in which a few other of my grandkids attend is starting 100 percent virtual. There are vague promises to go “live” in a month or so. We’ll see.

Dagny, who is in the immediately aforementioned school district, sat down the other night and sighed. “I am not looking forward to going back to school, Nana,” she said.

I asked her if she would feel differently if she was going back to a real classroom. “Maybe,” she replied. “I never look forward to going back to school, but at least I usually get to see my friends.”

Boom.

Our young people are truly sacrificing much through this pandemic. While we Baby Boomers are not only used to being alone a lot, and we’re often too tired to be very social even if we didn’t have to wear masks. Our grandkids, however, are in the midst of learning social skills, and life skills, and how to handle money, and how to handle conflict and how to handle life. It’s hard to learn these skills under normal circumstances, but it’s nearly impossible when you’re sitting by yourself at a computer, trying your damndest to pay attention to a teacher who is boring the life out of you, but you can’t even giggle about it to your friends.

I wish all of my grandkids a successful school year. My thoughts and prayers are with them all.

I had a work acquaintance years back who annoyed the living daylights out of me. She started every day with a three-mile run, worked long days and yet made fabulous meals from scratch every evening for her perfect husband (who had left his lucrative job as an attorney to teach high school English because “there are things more important than making lots of money”) and her two perfect children. She would bore us with her endless stories of quilting and knitting and making her children’s clothes, taking a break only to spatchcock a chicken and harvest her home grown organic garden. Puke.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was one day when she came to work and announced that she had made s’mores for her family’s dessert the night before. “Wow, I’m sure they enjoyed that,” I said, thinking to myself that she probably built a campfire using sticks and a magnifying glass. But the reality was even worse. The s’mores were made using graham crackers and marshmallows she had made from scratch. Who does that? Marshmallows are a buck a bag at King Soopers. And if God had meant us to make our own graham crackers, he wouldn’t have invented Nabisco.

I thought about those made-from-scratch s’mores yesterday when I gave a glance at my National Holiday Calendar to see what delicious sweet treat was being honored that day. You guessed it: August 10 is National S’Mores Day. A day honoring that snack that millions of children the world over (well, maybe not France; they eat petit fours) have made by roasting a couple of marshmallows over a open fire and sticking them between two graham crackers along with a piece of Hershey’s chocolate. I wonder how much Hershey and Nabisco had to pay to make a designated day happen.

I’m not particularly a fan of s’mores. I like the act of making them — not myself, but watching my grandkids carefully build perfect layers of gooey and chocolaty goodness. The reality is that I’m not particularly a marshmallow lover, unless they are in Rice Krispie treats. Then, the gooier, the better.

There are several schools of thought when it comes to roasting a marshmallow over the grill or campfire. While I never ate a s’more until I was an adult, my siblings and I did roast marshmallows over the hot coals of the grill once Dad was finished cooking our steaks or pork chops. I favored then — and still do today — cooking a large marshmallow until it’s a golden brown, turning it constantly so that it caramelizes but doesn’t burn. Hot outside, still cool, yet gooey, on the inside.

It wasn’t until I met Bill and we had our first foray into the act of s’more making that I saw what I considered then — and still do today — a travesty of the first order. He puts the marshmallow on the stick, places it into the burning flame, and when it starts on fire, he pulls it out and blows out the flame. What’s left is a black, charred marshmallow. “Perfect,” he’ll say.

But at least he doesn’t make them from scratch.

Here is the proper method of EATING a s’more…..

If there is no marshmallow and/or chocolate on your lips, you’re doing it wrong.

Happy belated S’Mores Day.

I love summer. I have to admit, however, that when August rolls around, I’m starting to get a little bit cranky about life. I’m hot. I can’t think what to cook any more. My pest control guy told me he was afraid of wasps, so they are still buzzing around my back yard with looks of victory in their beady eyes. Japanese beetles are eating my black-eyed susans, and last night I realized they are also munching on my basil. Ugh.

What lifts me up is that five of my favorite people (all of whom I’m related to in some way) celebrate birthdays in August. My sister Bec comes in August to visit and get out of the REAL heat. While my flowering plants are starting to look leggy and tired, my vegetables are flourishing. Well, except for my basil which now has little chomps in the leaves. Anyone know how to get rid of Japanese beetles?

If you will recall, this year I went entirely to pots. I’m talking planting my veggies in pots, not what you were thinking (though I do live in Colorado). It was so successful that I will probably never plant an in-ground garden again. I have never had herbs grow as successfully as in this pot…..

You can’t really see, but there are also chives, thyme, and dill in that same pot. The parsley really took off this year. I plant parsley every year, and almost never remember to use it. The chives and thyme yes. And the dill when I make my pickles. But the parsley gets forgotten. Cream of parsley soup?

I have tomatoes, tomatoes, and more tomatoes. My early girl tomatoes are nearly done, but I have plenty picked. We are eating BLTs, sliced tomatoes, tomato salads. I plan on making up a pot of my mom’s gazpacho, a soup that Bill won’t even consider eating. More for me.

And for the first time ever, my grape tomato plant is flourishing…..

I can eat those like candy.

In this year of Hardly Anything Good Happening, I am pleased as punch that we now have a composting bin sponsored by the City and County of Denver. I had a composting bin of my own years ago, but it never really worked out for me. I was supposed to turn it regularly, but I have no pitchfork, nor any inclination to buy one. I was also supposed to buy worms to put into the compost bin to break down the garbage. Talk about not having any inclination to buy something! Maybe that would be a job for those rotten Japanese beetles.

It doesn’t matter, though, because see above: I plant in pots these days. But for a mere $100/year, the City and County lets us use a green composting bin that we can put out on the curb on every garbage collection day. So I have become a composting fool….

It is bittersweet seeing the hot days of summer heading towards a conclusion. Still, we have autumn to look forward to, plus a visit from our Vermont family.

Plus, I have chili roasting season to look forward to.

Bill, in his never ending determination to live life to the fullest and keep moving and having fun to keep his Parkinson’s at bay, has taken up golf. He started last winter when he joined our very kind Canadian neighbor at a driving range several times, and even played a round of golf on a par 3 course. Then COVID hit.

However, he recently purchased a set of golf clubs, and has spent just about every day since at a nearby driving range. Yesterday, he invited me to go along. I agreed, as long as he understood that I wasn’t going to hit balls myself. It was fun to watch him hit the ball. He has a long way to go to beat Tiger Woods (or even one of his grandchildren), but he had some good shots. More important, he is having fun.

But what made me smile is that the man who was hitting next to him — who appeared to my novice eyes to be quite a good golfer — took time to give Bill some tips. He even gave him a half of a basket of balls. Bill thanked him, and explained that he had PD. The man was duly impressed.

I too was so grateful to the man. So grateful, in fact, that I cried for the next 10 minutes while Bill finished his half-basket. It really is true that there are such good people in the world.

I’m also endlessly proud of my husband, who attacks life with gusto, no matter what…..

Have a great weekend.