Normalize discussing health with your family

Earlier this year, I reached out to my mother asking her to document any health issues she or my father had experienced over the years. I probably should have asked for that information half a lifetime ago, when I moved out on my own, but as I age, it seems more relevant to know what I might be dealing with in the future. We already knew that my maternal grandmother had Alzheimer’s and my father had multiple strokes near the end of his life, but I wanted to know if there were other things we should watch out for (or should have, in some cases).

For example, my parents both developed different shellfish allergies as they aged, with different effects; I knew that already when I reacted badly to crayfish a couple years ago. I didn’t realize that my mother has high cholesterol, though I’m sure my doctor would have liked to know that. (Those medical office intake questionnaires need to add “not that anybody’s told me” as an answer on the family history questions.)

I didn’t learn until this year that my mother had “very heavy long periods” before having a hysterectomy when I was rather young. I did point out that it would have been useful to know that before we hit puberty, or before our girls did. Then I found out she defined “long” as a week, which prompted a discussion with some female friends as to what is considered normal, since before perimenopause, when I wasn’t on birth control, my periods ran a full seven days like clockwork.

Of greater concern is the question of whether my father had memory issues as he aged, or whether he was just not listening. Unfortunately, that doesn’t appear to have been documented or addressed with a doctor, so I’m not sure whether it’s something I have to watch out for. Or have somebody else watch out for, since I’d likely forget in that case.

A tale of Christmas Adam

Twas the day before the night before Christmas (also known as “Christmas Adam”), when all through the house, not a creature was stirring… probably because the furnace wasn’t keeping up with the sudden temperature drop, so all the cats were curled up with me on my bed. I would love to have called our HVAC company that morning, but we had tickets to see Dear Evan Hansen in downtown Chicago, and I was rapidly adjusting our plan because of the weather.

Typically, when we see a show in Chicago, we take the Metra in and walk from the train station to the theatre. It’s usually a comfortable walk of about a mile, though the last show we saw (The Twenty-Sided Tavern) was just over two. But that temperature drop had the forecasted high of 2 degrees Fahrenheit, and the wind chills were pushing it into the negative thirties.

We had already tentatively selected a sushi restaurant a couple blocks away from the theatre, and Google showed a parking option in the same block, so I decided we would drive into Chicago instead. If you’ve ever driven in downtown Chicago, you understand that this is not a decision I made lightly: the roads tend to be crowded with drivers who have no objection to darting across multiple lanes to turn at the next light or stop suddenly to let their passengers out. The Chicago taxi drivers mock the Uber drivers as poor drivers, and I suspect the reverse is also true.

Nevertheless, the roads near me looked almost clear of the snow that had fallen the previous afternoon and overnight, so we bundled up with multiple layers and ventured into the city. Between the weather and the holidays, the Chicago roads were the emptiest I have ever seen them. Though we couldn’t spot it at the time, Google’s directions to the sushi restaurant were accurate; it was buried in a food court with just a sign on the window along with several other restaurants. Unfortunately, there was nothing even vaguely resembling the entrance to a parking garage that we could see. We looped the block a couple of times, then headed towards the theatre to find their parking lot instead.

Successfully parked, we trudged through the slushy sidewalks and bitter winds to find that the sushi restaurant – and the rest of the food court – had a sign on the door saying they were closed through the weekend because of the winter storm and holidays. We huddled in their doorway briefly scoping out other nearby restaurants, deciding that the Mediterranean place we had just passed was our top choice… mainly because having walked past it already, we knew it was open.

After a tasty lunch and entrancing show, we reached home to find out that the house was still cold, and cold water was not running from our kitchen sink. After a brief panic, I realized that only the kitchen sink had an issue, and we directed a space heater towards its pipes, which sit against an exterior wall. On Christmas Eve, targeted space heater use brought the house up to a reasonable temperature until our HVAC company could come out.

All’s well that ends well.

Happy Holidays!

We’re in the midst of Chanukah, the Winter Solstice has passed, and Christmas is right around the corner. Whatever you choose to celebrate – or not, as the case may be – have a safe and enjoyable time.

Here in the Chicago area, we’re experiencing our first winter storm, topping off the bare sprinkles of snow with the potential for several inches, followed by a temperature drop that will make clearing the snow unpleasant. It’s the price we pay for wanting a white Christmas, I suppose.

What’s your favorite holiday tradition?

Advent calendars, Christmas crackers, chocolate coins for Chanukah, that delicious pork skin at the Noche Buena celebration after the whole pig has been cooking all day… there’s are so many delightful (and delicious!) traditions around the winter holidays. Last year, we learned about an Icelandic tradition of giving books on Christmas Eve, and pairing that with hot chocolate to curl up and read. In a house of bookworms, that was an easy tradition to adopt. In fact, we’ve expanded on the idea by exchanging book recommendations throughout the year, though Christmas Eve is the only one that’s expected to be acquired specifically for each person. (Book recommendations so far have either been already owned or available through the library.)

What favorite – or new – tradition are you looking forward to this year?

2022 is going out with a bang!

This year has certainly had its ups and downs. I had my first short story published in an anthology (and my second one, which I’ll tell you about soon), we returned to attending Capricon in person (though I apparently didn’t blog about it), we’ve continued attending live shows, and we even went to Florida where we stayed in neat places, did some touristy stuff, ate amazing food, and most importantly, saw friends.

We went to our first WorldCon! But caught Covid. And to DorkStock and WindyCon (sorry, didn’t blog about those either… suffice to say, they were fun). But WindyCon coincided with finding out the old fridge was dying, and the day the new fridge was delivered coincided with discovering that the slow decline of my tires was accelerated by a nail in one of them. (Oddly, this is the second nail in a tire I’ve had this year, since our rental car in Florida picked one up.) Not, fortunately, the type that causes a bang and sudden accident… the “bang” in this title is metaphorical.

With other stuff going on, we’ve been a bit busy, so I apologize… my holiday cards are going to be late.

Broadway in Chicago presents The Twenty-Sided Tavern

Occasionally, we venture into Chicago to see a live performance somewhere other than the Paramount Theatre, and The Twenty-Sided Tavern has a level of geek appeal that most stage performances don’t: it’s essentially a role-playing adventure on stage. In fact, it includes some of the randomness of your average tabletop game… specifically, dice. Oh, and audience participation. There are no real spoilers, it’s improv with reactions to the dice and audience decisions, so each show will be different.

As you enter the theatre, after scanning your tickets, you are told to scan a QR code to access an important feature of the performance: the audience interaction. Your playbill includes a sticker which links you to one of the three character classes: fighter, mage, or rogue. Keep your phone out – you’re going to need it, and please do take photos, they said.

One of the first audience actions is to pick the character for their class between three offered characters. The results are displayed as the votes are still coming in, and you’ll see this functionality at various points throughout the show. You’ll also see the dice as they’re rolled, zoomed in on each character’s dice tray.

The cast clearly enjoys what they’re doing, though the photo above may be when two of them lost the rest of their hit points due to some overzealous audience participation. To be fair, the natural 20 rolled in the fiery skeletal giraffe’s favor a couple minutes earlier set the stage for that crisis.

Twenty-Sided Tavern is playing in Chicago through January 15th, so you still have a chance to see it!

Coming soon: a functional fridge/freezer

My first clue something was wrong was the milk that started smelling sour on its purchase by date. I noted it, but sometimes that’s a fluke, a single bottle that progresses faster than normal.

My second clue was less subtle: a sticky spot by a cat food bowl and a gooey puddle nearby, on the freezer side of our old (still current) fridge/freezer. I opened the freezer and tracked the slimy substance upwards to a middle shelf, where a Ziploc bag of overripe bananas lay careless flung at an angle – apparently not properly sealed – and clearly defrosted. I bemoaned the loss of the future banana bread and composted them, then scurried to move whatever was salvageable to the garage’s full-size freezer that came with the house, wiping off banana goo as I found it.

We had plans, so I postponed shopping for a replacement to the following day, exploring several well-known companies that could potentially provide a replacement. I measured the space, multiple times. Then I measured the doors – the front door is slightly wider than the door to the garage, so we’ll plan on the fridge going in and out that way. We discussed styles and narrowed our options down before placing an order.

And now we wait, fortunately with a semi-functional fridge that looks surprisingly bare, stripped of all its magnets and decorations on the outside, and down to the bare minimum foodstuff that we haven’t finished on the inside. The new fridge/freezer (top/bottom this time), originally estimated to arrive the day before Thanksgiving, was delayed and shipped that day instead.

And we’re grateful to the helpers… the family member who offered to loan us a mini-fridge, and the neighbor who asked if we needed space in his. If the fridge had died completely, we certainly would have availed ourselves of the offered assistance.

‘Tis the season for Transanta

I’ll keep it short this week. You may be shopping for holiday gifts already, and contemplating a charity gift drive or two as well. Please consider Transanta as a possible destination for some of those gifts; they send gifts to trans youth in need, safely and anonymously. Many of the stories are tragic, children rejected by their families simply for being themselves. You can peruse the bios at this link and click on the image to reach each person’s Amazon wishlist.

Summer, is this our final fling?

In true Midwest fashion, the weather has been all over the place this past month. We’re past our first and second frost, and my maple tree stands bare, yet I was able to pick a fresh strawberry yesterday afternoon. I haven’t drained my rain barrels yet, and there are a few branches still to trim before the final brush pickup of the season.

Sunrise over the bare branches of an autumn maple tree.

Today’s high was 76 (around 24 if you think in Celsius), and I took probably the last opportunity to walk out to the mailbox barefoot for this season… tomorrow’s forecast is promising a high of 40 (4.4 Celsius), followed by comparably cold weather into the foreseeable future. We have not, however, had snow yet, and I recall that my first Thanksgiving weekend in Illinois was sweatshirt weather, so it really could go either way at this point.

Either way, we are seeing beautiful sunrises and sunsets this time of year (OK, only one of us usually sees the sunrise), and look forward to those cold days in winter when we look out at the pawprints in the snow.

United States citizens: remember to vote in the 2022 midterm election

As United States citizens, we have few obligations, particularly since military service is optional. While voting is also optional, I would suggest that it, jury duty, and paying taxes (whether income, property, or sales) are part of our obligation as citizens in this democracy.

Midterm elections – scheduled for November 8, 2022 this year – are overlooked by some voters because they don’t usually include the hype that presidential elections do. This is a flaw in our process, every election matters. Our U.S. representatives are elected every two years, our senators every six (on a rotating schedule, so one-third of the Senate is running for office in any given election), and state and local officials are almost always on the ballot.

If you’re not sure what’s on the ballot for your location, you can look up a sample ballot on Ballotpedia, and your county website may also have one available. Once you have the names of candidates or issues on the ballot, you can research them using Ballotpedia’s information, Google, and other sources to ensure you have the necessary information when voting.

Go vote!