Saturday 9

Welcome to Saturday 9. What we've committed to our readers is that we will post 9 questions every Saturday. Sometimes the post will have a theme, and at other times the questions will be totally unrelated. Those weeks we do "random questions," so-to-speak. We encourage you to visit other participants posts and leave a comment. Because we don't have any rules, it is your choice. We hate rules. We love memes, however, and here is today's meme!

Saturday 9: Love on Top (2011)

Unfamiliar with this week's song? Hear it here. 

1) Beyonce sings that she and her lover have worked through a tough time and now they are happier than before. Do you agree with the lyrics that relationships take effort? Or do you think that if a couple is well-matched and their love is real, happiness will naturally follow?
I think any relationship, whether romantic or simply friendship, takes effort.

2) She tells us that he's the one she can always call. But that was in 2011. If someone needed to get in touch with you today, would you recommend they call, send an instant message, or text?
Probably text.

3) Beyonce goes through many costume changes in this video and in her concert performances. What are you wearing right now as you answer these questions, and will you change clothes throughout the day?
I am wearing pajama bottoms and a t-shirt and will get changed later in the day.

4) The choreography in this video was inspired by Janet Jackson's videos in the 1990s. The Jackson family -- Janet, her brothers as solo artists and as The Jackson 5 -- have sold a staggering 750 million records. Can you think of another successful musical family?
The Von Trapp family, The Osmonds

5) Beyonce and husband Jay-Z have an impressive classic car collection, including a restored and customized 1959 Rolls Royce Silver Cloud II, reportedly worth $1,000,000. If you suddenly received a million, what would you splurge on? We want to hear about a gift you'd give yourself. (It doesn't have to take the whole $1,000,000.)
I would splurge on having a dressmaker create a wardrobe for me that actually fit and looked good on me.

6) Beyonce "loves to lather" and enjoys shampooing her hair. What's a simple, everyday thing that relaxes you?
Sitting in my recliner watching the squirrels outside and the TV inside.

7) In 2011, when "Love on Top" was popular, so were movie franchises. Sequels to Harry Potter, Transformers, Twilight, Kung Foo Panda, and Disney's Cars and Pirates of the Caribbean all topped the box office. What's your favorite movie series?
Does Outlander count?  What constitutes a "series."  I loved the Bing Crosby Father Chuck O'Malley movies, but there were only two of them.  I think there were also 2 or three Lassie movie series.

8) Speaking of sequels, Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and two of its sequels (The Girl Who Played with Fire and the The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest) were on the NY Times list of fiction bestsellers for 2011. Have you read any of them?
Yes, I read all three.

9) Random question -- Which of these items do you misplace most often: your cellphone, your keys or the TV remote? 
Actually, I don't seriously misplace any of them, but if I had to choose, it would be my cellphone.

Ina Garten

 I have been a fan of Ina Garten, the Barefoot Contessa, pretty much since she started her TV show on The Food Network.  I love watching her make food, so simple and easy and, apparently, delicious.

Now she has written a memoir and it's delightful.  I got it as soon as it was released and read it pretty much non stop until I finished it.

My goodness, what a life she has led!  Coming from a family with a rate-a-holic father who would pull her around the floor by her hair when he was angry with her, and a mother who was incapable of showing any affection whatsoever, from a childhood where she was told she was worthless, that nobody would like her, that she would never find anyone who wanted to marry her, she has accomplished such an amazing number of things and has the marriage that everyone would dream of.

After working at many jobs in many fields, she was working at a boring bureaucratic job in Washington, DC and hating it, when she saw a tiny ad for the sale of a specialty food store in the Hamptons and decided to buy it, with zero experience in running a business, working in a food store or anything, but she managed to make a success of it. 

Her story of her love with Jeffrey and their relationship is wonderful, especially their months in driving around France and experiencing all the foods and wines (on a budget of less than $5 a day)

The explanation of how she creates her recipes is fascinating.

Heck, the whole book is fascinating.  

Kaiser

 My father joined Kaiser when I was 10 and I have been a member of Kaiser for over 70 years.  Basically, I have had very little problem with Kaiser, except that whenever I see the commercial on TV for an Alzheimers medication and how it helps the mother be better it reminds me that none of her doctors gave my mother any medication for her Alzheimers and I wonder if she might have been better if they had.

One thing I loved about Kaiser was when they created their web page.  You could go to KP.org and check your prescriptions, get messages from your health care team, or correspond with your doctor.  I've used the web site for years and my doctor and I solved a lot of simple problems via the web page,  But recently they took away the ability to email your doctor.  Now if I want to say something to her, I have to write her a letter and hope she responds (which she does, by telephone in a week or so ... I can't call her.)  Now if I have a minor question, I have to go through the telephone line and  they contact some doctor to get the answer, a doctor I've never heard of.  I hate that.

Yesterday, I had problems with the pharmacy.  You can still, supposedly, order refills of your medications through the web site, and I did about two weeks ago.  After I ordered, I got an email asking for my date of birth so they could confirm that it was really me making the refill requests.  I sent them that information.

But it's 2 weeks later and no medications have shown up.  I finally contacted the chat line and talked to someone named Kerry, who says they have NO order from me for refills.  Swell...and I'm running out of the medications.  She asked if I wanted to pick them up at the pharmacy, which I didn't, but I said that yes, I would.  Now, I'm talking to her on Tuesday and she says I can pick up the medications on Friday. But we are leaving for Santa Barbara on Friday, which means I can't get the meds until Monday.

She finally said that if I registered at the pharmacy, they could find her order and fill it, but I can't do that until Wednesday.  So I'm supposed to go to the pharmacy this afternoon and it will be interesting to see if I actually get my medications...and she can't give me a refill for the vitamin my doctor has prescribed because she says it's an over the counter order.

This is presumably an "improvement" on what has been working so well for years.

World Postcard Day

 Today is World Postcard Day and I had arrangements to meet someone in the parking lot of the CoOp and we would both write postcards.  She was going to be there at 9 and I slept until 8:30, so I rushed around to get things together and get down to the CoOp.  At first it was just the two of us.

Later a third person showed up.  She's getting ready to leave for 3 weeks in Chile tomorrow, so she was kind of rushed, but she had several postcards to send.

It was a beautiful day, with the birds singing, people playing a piano that is set up on the patio for people to play, and all the shoppers going into the CoOp.  Lord...more people I saw today than I have seen all year, I believe!

It was fun talking to both of the other women about our experience with Postcrossing.  All three of us get a lot of mail going to and coming from Germany, but two of us got messages going to Latvia this week, which was unusual.

I was there about an hour and a half, by which time it was starting to get hot and the sun was shining on me.  All three of us were ready to go home, so we mailed our postcards and said goodbye to each other. 

A nice change from sitting at home all day!