2023 Life Logs, Day 121: April Fool’s Day in May
Date: Monday, May 1, 2023
Weather in Charlotte: Partly Cloudy, Cool, Windy
Location: Back Home in the Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
This was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day in my life. I had way too much to do for my sister before I flew home tonight and at every turn, I was blocked. I felt like it was April Fool’s Day on the first day of May. Surely the things that were happening were a joke. These things do not all happen to a normal person in one day. I guess I am not normal, as they really happened. I won’t bore you with the details, but I will list the major issues. Literally everything I did today went awry.
Made a special trip to Terra Bella where my sister lives at 10 am to talk to the Director and Manager of House Maintenance about issues with my sister’s apartment–Both out sick today.
Went to pick up my niece and sister-in-law at their hotel and ran into a yellow construction tape blocking the entrance—Had to turn into a one way exit to pick them up.
Got online to order lunch for my sister, my niece, my sister-in-law, myself, and my sister’s helper—First choice closed permanently, second choice closed on Monday). Asked my niece to call and order from a third place at a set time so I could pick up on my way back from a 30 minute drive each way to get a pair of shoes for my sister in her favorite brand and known size—On my way home, my niece called and said she could not get online and that the restaurant would not take an order called in. So I stopped to get lunch when I returned to Mooresville.
The Amazon Prime delivery to Terra Bella did not arrive with the outfit I had ordered for my sister to wear to her granddaughter’s wedding in August. It is early, but I will not be back and there is no one else to buy her clothes. I paid $50 to get it delivered before I left, but that didn’t happen—So I taught her helper how to take a photo of my sister in the outfit and how to send it to me when it does arrive. Hopefully it will fit, but if not, I will deal with that later.
Took two pairs of my sister’s pants to the cleaner/alterations place I took things to in December—Closed permanently, no forwarding address. I brought them home with me and will have to get it done her and send back to her.
Thought I had done all of her dirty laundry as she will not allow the people at the assistant living facility where she lives to touch her clothes—Found another whole drawer of hidden dirty clothes, along with a treasure trove of junk mail that she has saved that needed to be thrown away. I was able to take the bag of paper out back at Terra Bella and put it in the dumpster, but I had to make a special trip to the Thompson’s to ask them to do her laundry and get it back to her.
Delivered my niece and sister-in-law to my nephew’s during rush hour so they could visit while I took off to go to a Whole Foods to drop off a box of things I had ordered for my sister to be returned that didn’t fit—All the Whole Foods employees were in the parking lot to tell people their electricity was out and no one could enter the building. Unbelievable. They did get the Amazon Coordinator to come talk to me, but nothing was resolved. I left the box with two pair of shoes and told my nephew to give them to the poor.
By this time, I was exhausted and in tears. But I had a quick dinner at my nephew’s and took off for the airport with my niece and sister-in-law who were taking the same flight to Boston. There was not one gas station on our way, so I dropped them off and went to get gas before returning the rental car. Once I returned the car, I went into the airport to check in with Jet Blue at Terminal A. That went smoothly, but it was after 6:30 pm and by this time all terminal security check-in stations were closed except Terminal E. So I had to walk the entire length of the airport to Terminal E, go through security, walk the entire of length of the airport back to Terminal B and then walk another gauntlet in a different direction to Terminal A—During this time I got an email saying our 8:40 pm flight to Boston was delayed until 12:54 am. But they were working on that. By the time I arrived at Terminal A at 7:30 pm, the flight was back to only a 30-minute delay. That seemed like nothing compared to waiting to 1 am to take off. At least the flight went smoothly.
I had not checked my bag because I didn’t want to wait at Baggage Claim in Boston. Bad mistake. I was in seat 6C and had to take my bag to 15A to find a place for it. That meant I had to wait until everyone up to that part of the plane departed before I could go back to pick it up and there was no one I could ask to help me get it down. But I was able to get it down without injury to my very fragile back. This is the first time since 2016 that I have not checked my bag to protect my back and it is the very last time ever that I will not check my bag.
Arrived at Logan and got to Central Parking where Heather had left my car. I misinterpreted her directions and could not find my car which was on the very top of the parking garage. I walked the entire perimeter and up and down the rows of cars before I finally found it. I then had to get the ticket out of the car and go back to the terminal and down to Level 4 from Level 7 to pay for the ticket. I have no idea how much it cost as I was almost catatonic by this time.
Got in the car and drove down to ground level to exit. There was an oversized truck blocking the exit and I had to wait for airport personnel to come and get the long line of cars I was in to back up while they backed the truck out.
Exited the airport to go through the Williams Tunnel to find a traffic jam at midnight! They were doing maintenance in the tunnel and the lanes went from 4 to 3 to 2 to 1 and we moved at 4 miles an hour. It took 35 minutes.
Finally, I was out of the tunnel and on the way home. That went smoothly and I got home at 1:55 pm to find my Anderson glass storm door stuck halfway open. I could not open it all the way nor close it. It had obviously blown open due to wind and had probably slammed back against the house and back to being shut enough times to totally bend the rod. I slipped in and went to bed. I’ll deal with that tomorrow.
If you read this far, thanks for reading my rant. I needed to get that off my chest. It was one hell of a day!
