2026, books, Media, Mysteries

A Good Thing After All…

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One Good Thing.  That’s the name of my journal – short and sweet – one good thing a day.  Every now and then if I just can’t whittle it down, then two.  Doesn’t have to be earth-shaking. 

Every now and then, like yesterday, I am just not feeling it.  Gray and cold.  No good news in the world. Found out my supplement program has stopped doing the $50 of pharmacy freebies.  My checks haven’t come in yet.  The mail didn’t arrive.  I started three different books and none of them lit any kind of spark.  Just a crumby day.  What in heaven’s name was going to be my one good thing?

Back in December I went to get my hearing aids checked before my 3-year warranty was up.  It was pretty cursory but when “Opal” (name changed to protect the innocent) asked me if I had downloaded the app, I remembered when Jacque was helping Lou with his hearing aid once at a Blevin’s meeting using his phone.  Opal and I discussed it for a bit, what it could do for me and if it would fit my needs.  And then she said the magic words…. “do you ever listen to audio books?”  You all know I perked up immediately.  Turns out that even without the app, I can have audiobooks (and also my phone) stream through my hearing aids!  Who knew.

My phone does have the Libby app on it already but it hasn’t too useful.  If I had it too loud, YA would comment.  During the summer, when windows were open, traffic made it hard to hear sometimes.  If I would get up and leave the room, I’d have to remember to grab the phone.  I didn’t use this feature often.  But through my hearing aids, it’s a whole `nother world!  No irritating YA, no traffic noise, no having to remember to take the phone.  I can walk all over each floor of my house before I get out of range.  It’s amazing.

This has been life-changing for me and I’m trying not to regret that I spent three years not knowing about this.  Oh well.  Even though Opal clued me into this in December, since one of my “meh” books today was listened to via my hearing aids, I’m gonna take it!

One good thing for anybody else yesterday?

20 thoughts on “A Good Thing After All…”

  1. The one meeting I had was blessedly short.

    We had about 75 people at our weekly pro-democracy rally…
    (up from 25 the week between Christmas & New Years, when
    it was bitterly cold).

    Ya know, this is a good idea, VS – I can see this could be a valuable thing.

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  3. Husband’s hearing aids have tiny batteries that are getting harder and harder for his fingers to manage. The next set of hearing aids will be rechargeable.

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    1. I think you can probably handle the Battery exchange for him for another couple years. It’s not difficult and I’m not certain but I’d be willing to bet that it’s possible to recharge those little batteries due to my being knowledgeable about the battery charger business but not specifically about the hearing aid battery charger business I’ll bet there’s a way to do it and that they make it difficult to figure it out

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  4. Can You Hear Me, Baboons?

    Stay on your feet today. I stepped out of the front door carefully this morning with the dog so he could do his business, to find icy steps. I have to spread some sand and de-icer out there.

    Hearing Aids, like CPAP (sleep machine to counteract sleep apnea) are mixed blessings. They improve quality of life and require all kinds of maintenance. Lou has both of these gizmos and I now do that stuff to maintain them. Somedays that feels like death by a thousand cuts.

    Yesterday I got up early and got myself to 8am Water Aerobics–a major achievement on a Monday following holidays. I was very pleased to hear the Governor would not run again. Although I supported him, I thought it was time for him to move over and give someone else a chance to serve. So that was my good news. I don’t really want to talk politics here, that was just my good news of the day. Today I am scheduled for a massage, and I look forward to that.

    I also entered a polymer clay challenge. That group meets on Thursday via Zoom. Although I weary of zoom meetings and the online life, this meeting is fun and interesting to attend. It gets me working with clay by increasing my motivation. People attend from all over the world which is also interesting, and their work is creative and inspiring.

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    1. My knee therapy appointment was at 7:20, so with a stop at the post office and Dunkin Donuts, I left the house at about 6:45. Sideway and driveway were a little slippery. Roads were OK (although I did go through two flooded areas) but the drivers on the road were complete a-hats this morning.

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    2. I am so pissed that wall‘s got bogged down with this poppycock fraud scandal that the Republicans orchestrated and that Trump has called him out on. I think it is going to be shades of Newt Gingrich where they find success in being slime balls and will continue at a 3000% increase because they know that it works both on their people and that the Democrats will be too lame to do anything other than bail

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  5. One good thing. I finished another first-rate thriller by Allen Eskens yesterday: “The Shadows We Hide.” Allen’s the real deal. Up there with Krueger, Freeman, Sandford as far as MN crime writers are concerned.

    No matter what crap the world throws at us, I’m always comforted by knowing I can escape with a good book of any genre for a few hours.

    Chris in Owatonna

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    2. yesterday I started the day off clearing up the hassles. I was running into getting signed up for classes at my wife’s school. I’m supposed to be getting free tuition because of her being a teacher. that solved and salted away early enough in the morning that I was able to get to my regular daily routine only missing a little then I needed to run the car into the shop and was able to get that all handled and then I got to go to the highlight of my day, which is taking the grandson to piano lessons. I love watching him at the lessons and his teacher is incredible. It’s a teacher I found for his mom and her brother when they were both in elementary school my grandson is such a kick and we went to give him a chance to use his Half Price Books gift card, which he received for Christmas. reading is his passion and he chose to dip into cook books for kids so he could learn to cook for his parents . we made sure all ingredients were home for banana bread and he did that last night and decided to tackle garlic bread tonight with pasta on the side. he has visions of being a chef.
      fun stuff all around

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  7. I just got great news this morning. I went into a different doctor to try and figure out how to get around the fact that all the other doctors were covering for the Doctor Who did the surgery that said that there wasn’t any problem, even though my leg didn’t work properly, and today’s doctor said the sure was obvious. All I needed was a new hip and that with a hip replacement, I should be fine. Everything else is working good but that that hip rotation can’t happen so they’re gonna do an MRI plug me into the schedule and figure out how to get on with that so if something that sounds like a good idea to anybody else, but to me where I have been dealing with the fact that it didn’t work well for the last two years the news that we might have a resolution down the road is great news

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  8. I went to a meeting yesterday that only lasted 1/2 hour. And that includes starting 5 minutes late, waiting a few minutes for the administrators to get some new paperwork, and chit chat for the last 5 minutes. It was an important meeting that was needed and now it’s over for another year.

    PLUS, the new CEO held the door open for us. Pretty impressive!

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  9. Yesterday, Filled the gas tank at $1.74/gallon.
    In the last month, gasoline has fluctuated every fourth day (I’m not joking) from $2.04 to $2.89. Nothing in-between. Big drops then big rises. It is insane. Speedway has a new offering where you can lock in the base price for a week. I did that and also used my earned discounts. I hope the next costumer at the pump sees my results because base price this morning is $2.89.

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  10. It’s hard to come up with something good these days. It’s been cold, damp, and gray, with no sign of the sun for days. The news is a never-ending horror show. Although I worked between the holidays, it was nice and quiet. Monday, it was back to business as usual. But there were a few bright spots:
    No work meetings.
    I was able to help out a coworker with a technical task, and she was very appreciative.
    I started a new book and am enjoying it (A Thousand Feasts by Nigel Slater, one of my favorite food writers).

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