1 Second Everyday for May 2020.
Archive for May 2020
1SE for May 2020
May 31, 2020Yogi
May 30, 2020
Time for a book report. As many of you know, I’ve been reading a lot. The book that I just finished last night was “Yogi” by Jon Pessah.
Click here for the Wikipedia entry. And, click here for the Baseball Reference site.
This is one of the biographies of Yogi Berra, Hall of Fame catcher for the New York Yankees.
I am certainly not a Yankees fan but I thought it would be worth reading. It helped fill my baseball void during the pandemic. I even read it for free. I downloaded it from the Los Angeles Library’s ebook library.
Yogi’s life was certainly interesting. He played almost his entire career for the the NY Yankees (he actually played 4 games for the NT Mets in 1965). He managed both the NY Mets and Yankees. And, he coached for the Houston Astros.
Yogi was born in 1925 in St Louis MO and died in 2015. He broke into the bigs in 1946 for the NY Yankees. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1972.
It seems that he is most famous for his “Yogi-isms” (quotes). Here are a few of his most popular quotes.
The most famous is his insight about discipline: It ain’t over ’til it’s over. Some are observant, if a bit fractured: If people don’t want to come out to the ballpark, nobody’s going to stop them. Or It’s déjà vu all over again. Others are goofy: Never answer an anonymous letter. And this one: You better cut the pizza in four pieces; I’m not hungry enough to eat six. One is simply spot-on: I really didn’t say everything I said. Few are as sweet as his tribute to his wife: We have a good time together, even when we’re not together. And none more apropos at this moment: You should always go to other people’s funerals. Otherwise, they won’t come to yours.
Bottom Line: I really enjoyed reading about Yogi.
Tuesday
May 19, 2020We seem to have managed to get into a groove in that we are doing our grocery shopping on Tuesdays. So Tuesday is our day to get out of the house.
The Governor of CA has loosened the stay at home restrictions a bit so that folks can get to the beach or other such foolishness. So Alberton’s seemed to be a good bit more crowded today.
The way we could tell other than the feeling of there being more people milling about was the check out line (see above). The check out line started at dairy section in the rear of the store, along the paper goods aisle to the check out lanes. Though, the line was moving fairly quickly. I got in line while Paula looked for a few more items.
I figure that we will be done with this pandemic thing when the paper goods aisle is fully stocked like it used to be in February. Only stuff available today was single rolls of TP and store brand kleenex boxes. No paper towels, no napkins, etc.
Meat, chicken and fish are fully stocked, as are produce. Perhaps people can’t figure out how to horde ground beef or fresh green beans.
We said hello to Dan in the dairy department (who we call “Dairy Dan”). Dan apologized profusely for not having any 1% milk. I asked if the 1% cows were on strike? So he gave us the fancy brand with a 1/2 price sticker.
We are continuing our practice of getting take-out at the Pacific Diner after we are done watching the online version of church. We had our tasty brunch at the overlook on Gaffey St and 36th.
Friday
May 15, 2020Not going anywhere today. Yesterday, we picked up a few things for Mary that the caregivers said she needed. Needed shampoo, body wash and diapers. Picked the stuff up at Ralph’s and headed over to Long Beach.
We can’t go in to visit. We just put her name on the bag and left in a tent outside the door. Called the caregiver that stuff was there and should be picked up.
Then we headed back to San Pedro to get takeout at Pacific Diner. Paula had a BLT and I had a club sandwich. I had wanted a tuna melt but they were out of tuna. Who runs out of tuna fish?
We picked up our food and headed up the hill to stop at the overlook on Gaffey with great view of LA Harbor.
I started a new book today that I got from the LA Public Library titled “Yogi” by John Pessah. Interesting.
So we’re just hanging out today. Doing laundry. Empty trash and recycling. Reading, crossword puzzles, etc.
BTW, did you know that public libraries allow you to download books for free? The app for the LA public library is called “Libby”. For my east coast friends, there is an app for the Boston Public Library. Click the link for the pointer to the App Store. Did I mention that it is free?
Mother’s Day
May 10, 2020We started our Mother’s Day celebration early on Saturday. The staff at Regency Palms had arranged to have Mary down stairs where we could greet her through the glass so as to avoid spreading any virus to her or anyone also at the home.
Regency Palms has done a great job making sure that no one gets infected. Many other skilled nursing facilities have not done as well.
So Mike’s family joined us at 1:30 pm. Jonathan and Sarah worked on a greeting card for Mary. Unfortunately, we couldn’t leave it with her. But it is displayed on our refrigerator for all to see.
This is the first time that we have seen Mary for a few weeks. She is looking more frail and wobbly. We are not sure she understands all of the social distancing ideas that we are doing.
After we were done at Regency Palms, we headed home for a late lunch. Mike stopped at In’n’Out for burgers. We stopped at Starbuck’s for some iced coffees. It was really nice to see the grand-kids. We hadn’t seen them since the beginning of the pandemic. It was a nice day.
That’s all for now. Stay safe.
Joe
Friday
May 9, 2020So we had to the grocery store to get a few things today. We had to wait in line to get in to the store. Ugh. Took us about 10-15 minutes to get inside. They’ve been sanitizing all of the grocery carts.
The paper good aisle is still pretty much empty.
So they have special hours for seniors, 6 AM to 7 AM. Are you kidding me. UGH! What retired person, 70 something wants to get up at 0 dark-thirty to do some shopping.
So once we got in we headed for the liquor section to get a box of white wine. We also went to the flower section to get a “Mother’s Day” balloon.
We will be going over to Mom’s place to wave to her. Each resident is given a time slot when we can come by and wave from the outside. Mike & Theresa will be coming with the grandkids.
So there doesn’t seem to be any shortage of beef and/or poultry,
Check out lines were about the same. About a 10-15 minute wait.
Last stop was to get ice cream cake for tomorrow night. Yummm.
Finally, we will get together with everyone for dinner tomorrow night.
Thursday – Books
May 7, 2020
What has everyone been reading? I just finished a book titled “Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything” by Lydia Kang MD. It’s an amazing story of the ways that people thought would cure their many ills. Scary stuff indeed. But for now, I’m going to switch over to fiction. Some of the non-fiction is getting too scary for me.
So I started reading a Michael Connelly book. Michael Connelly has written a ton of crime novels about the LAPD. One of his main characters he has written about is one Hieronymus (Harry) Bosch. Harry is a veteran homicide detective for the LAPD. The book that I am currently reading is titled “Two Kinds of Truth” . Harry has been fired from the LAPD and is working on cold cases for the San Fernando PD with his office in the basement jail of the police station. This is a lot less scary than the non-fiction.
So I’ve been telling Paula for a zillion years that I have to stop watching late night TV. I keep finding out about new books that I want to read. Stephen Colbert had Stephen King on his show a couple of nights ago. He was pitching his new book. The book is titled “If It Bleeds” Here is another case of non-fiction being scarier than fiction. Well maybe with Stephen King, the fiction is just as scary
So then we had a discussion about our favorite Stephen King books. For me, a toss up between “The Stand” and “Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption”. Of course, Shawshank was made into an excellent film starring Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins.
“The Stand” was written in 1978. Scary stuff about a pandemic. Eventually, I will get around to rereading both titles again. I will write more about “The Stand” after I reread it.
That’s all for now. Stay safe.
Joe
Sunday
May 3, 2020Today is May 2. Where did April go? Getting a bit stir crazy here. So people are heading to the beach in spite of orders from the governor to stay home they are heading out.
We’re not beach persons so much, but the surfers don’t seem to care if they might get sick and die. Whatever.
So here’s what we did today. First, we watched Pastor Jacques at Oceanview Baptist do his sermon on the iPad. He was finishing up his work on the book of Nehemiah.
In normal times we would go out for brunch after church on Sunday at the Pacific Diner down on Pacific Ave in San Pedro. So today, I suggested to Paula that we call and order take-out. The diner is open for take-out. I ordered my usual bacon and eggs, Paula ordered an omelet. It was good to see the folks who work there.
Once we had our food we headed up the hill to stop at the overlook on Gaffey and 36th Street. On a clear day, one can see Catalina Island, LA Harbor or the mountains east of Los Angeles.
Apparently, we weren’t the only people that had that idea. The park across the street at the Korean Friendship Bell was closed and locked. Not the best view, but good enough. We got out our food and ate our meal.
Not sure what we’re going to do next week. Grocery shop on Tuesday. Zoom OES get together on Monday. Zoom Bible study on Wednesday.
Stay safe everyone. This too shall pass.
Joe
calherewecome 