Firestick - again

The other day, after my firestick not working yet again, I decided to just order a new one. It was $40, but after I clicked on add to cart, it popped up with 2 Amazon promotions going on for it, one for $20 off and one for $5 off, bringing the cost down to $15. Then I also clicked on their "trade in" old device and after I send that one back in, I should get another $8 back for that, I think. Well, shoot - can't beat $7 for a Firestick! I just gotta hope now that a new one will work. We have an old one out on the tv in the shop and it seems to work fine, so I'm not really sure why this one on our house tv stopped working. I hope it's just the device and not something wrong with my tv connection for plugging it in. I really don't want to have to replace the tv....only because it would be a pain in the butt to take down and put up a new one over the fireplace, LOL. But, I guess if a new tv is needed, then of course it will be a smart tv and no firestick will be needed.

My mom actually called me on her own, no help from staff, yesterday afternoon at 4pm. She knew it was somewhat close to dinner time as she kept saying "I don't want to keep you long, you are probably making dinner". I can tell when one of the staff helps her dial because after I answer you can hear them and/or her say something and then they leave and this time it was just her. She even remembered dh's name this time....but then said it was almost Christmas, LOL. But, overall she sounded really good still and was happy.

It sounds like my boss may have found someone for the accounting assistant position we want to add. I don't think she had posted the job yet, but through networking had received an email from a colleague about a young man, in college, looking for a job. It does not sound like he'd probably be more than a year or two at our position, but she seems ok with that. He's studying to be a lawyer and will be in law school in about a year and a half. He went through a program my company is involved in to help disadvantaged high school students gain some perspective and experience working in our field. Inspire them to push on with their education, whether it be at college or trade school. I think she will be setting up an interview with him.

Gosh, March is almost over already.  We're having rain this morning, instead of snow. DH has twice lately been off on what day of the week it is. I do that sometimes, when I very first am waking up, but once I fully wake up, I know what day it is. He's going all day thinking it's a certain day. That's a bit concerning. But on the other hand, he's not doing stuff on the computer/work all day like I am, to see things with the day of the week on it. It still seems like he should be able to figure it out early in the day. Plus, with our iphones, every time you open the home screen it says the day of the week, with the date. Not to mention, if he thought all day yesterday was Thursday, then why didn't he do laundry? - he always does laundry on Thursdays (and Sundays). 

It's taking me all morning to get this post done! So, I guess I'll leave it at this for now.

Stuff getting done

I forgot to add yesterday that the hvac guy did come on Monday and got our issue fixed, finally. We now have zones again and can keep our closed bonus room down at 64, my office upstairs at 68 and the main floor downstairs we usually put at 69 all day. Since I am up first and upstairs in my office, it's nice to be able to get some heat on up here, and leave the heat downstairs low until dh gets up.

I think I'm going to like my new primary care doctor. Shes seems on the ball. Monday she sent me a message with the test result of my pap (normal) and then added a comment that she saw I had the ultrasound and will be doing the needle biopsy and she will watch for the results and to contact her if I have any questions. Then within an hour or two of getting my needle biopsy results yesterday she sent me another message saying she's sure the radiologist already went over it with me, but just wanted to confirm that the result was reassuring and no breast mass. 

Almost done with the closets. I did the last coat of poly on the shelves after work yesterday. DH should be able to put them in later today, I would think. Then he has to measure out and cut the trim, which will need the stain and poly treatment, of course, but at least those pieces should be really quick and easy, even though they will take several days to stain and poly as well, to dry. Going forward, the only staining I will have to do is on his loft lumber and that is easier, less work. We aren't putting any poly on any of that. 

I have a headache at work I'm dealing with this morning. Our accounting software has a bill pay feature. I had one of the bills paid come back with a notification the check was returned to the bill pay company as undeliverable. I verified the vendors address as correct, but the bill pay pulls the funds out of our bank account when they send the check, not when the check is actually cashed. So here I have this payment that has been taken out of our checking, but the vendor never got it to cash. It's just a big mess and I was just on chat with the bill pay support help as I realized in bill pay the address they used is old....I'm like so are you telling me I update a vendor address in my accounting program, it doesn't get used as the address to send the next payment to? Well, it's supposed to.....but it didn't! I'm not in the mood. It really shouldn't be this difficult. And then while I'm in chat screen with the support, it won't let me do anything else in the program, so I can try to look up the check date to give the support person. GRRR! Sometimes I wish for the old days when I'd print out all the checks and set them on my boss's desk to sign, LOL.

 

 

 

Good news

All is well. The needle aspiration was what we hoped and just a fluid filled cyst, which now thanks to the needle, the cyst is also gone. Whew! So glad to have that off my mind, even though I wasn't overly worried, based on what the doctor who did the ultrasound said. The whole thing took a half hour and 29 minutes of that was preparing for it, LOL. The doctor did inject me with lidocaine, then put the needle in and the cyst was just filled with fluid which came right out in seconds and that was that. All done.

Then we stopped at Lowes to pick up some more building things we needed, plus we were out of trash can liners. Then we went to the grocery store to pick up some of the salmon we like. They only had 2 boxes left, so that was a bummer, I had wanted to get 4. Next stop was my mom's old place, to drop off that emergency call device. Then down the street to stop in and see my mom.

Finally last evening around 6:20 my phone rang and it was her # calling. Phone was back to working again. We had a nice chat. I then texted uncle that her phone is back on and she's in her room, so now would be a good time to call her (which I see from her call log he did). I got there about 9:15 this morning and when I turned the corner (the place is like an L shape) she had just come out of her room and was walking my way. She did recognize me and was really happy to see me. She was doing really well. I think being off the medicine she was mistakenly on has helped. And her dr stopping her anxiety med (she was on a low dose) doesn't seem to have affected her negatively, either. She was very happy and and said she likes this place. While she did recognize me and thought I was married, she couldn't remember for sure and couldn't remember if I had any kids. She did say "wait until I tell everyone what a great surprise visit I had this morning", which was sweet.

When I got inside the m/c unit there were quite a few of the residents still sitting in the dining room at the tables. It is common for some of them to reach out a hand as you are walking by. One gentleman did this time, so I took his hand and said hello and said "my hands are cold!" and he said "boy they sure are!" LOL. It was like 32 degrees and windy outside.

I'm back home now and going to start back to work here here in a few minutes.  Since I didn't know how long the appointment this morning was going to take I didn't anticipate being back to work for probably another hour. I did message my dd and my boss right after the procedure to let them know it was all ok. 

Thanks to everyone who wished me well with my procedure today, I appreciate it.

New day, same thing

New day, same thing, LOL. More staining. I don't think it will ever be done, haha. Saturday I got one side of the 7 shelves poly'd. The poly takes much longer to dry than the stain, so we have to wait like 24 hours to be able to flip the boards to do the other side. Yesterday I did the second coat. He worked on 2 of the big beams for the shop loft. I was able to get 2 coats of stain on those on Saturday. One about mid day and the second coat around 8pm. In between I did get the downstairs vacuumed and a nap. I don't think I've had a weekend nap it at least 2 weeks, maybe 3.

Yesterday dh also worked on the corner of the back loft and got quite bit done towards that. I helped a little here and there, but he'd just text me to come out, haha. No reason for me to stand around a half hour waiting until the next bit of help he needed. 

Still no luck getting my mom's phone to go through. I'm not going to bother the nurses station with it. It will happen all the time and they have more important things to take care of. Honestly, it's kind of been like having a week off. Probably much needed, more than I realize. I will see her tomorrow, after my needle procedure and will check her phone then.

About an inch of snow again yesterday morning. New day, same thing ;)

I've watched all the episodes of new shows I got into. Now I'm back to watching Doc Martin. It's a good one to fill in when I don't have other shows to watch. I also watched Dear Edward on AppleTV. I feel like someone recommended this show, but I don't know who. Or maybe I just decided to try it on my own. But someone mentioned Connie Britton to me recently so they must have been talking about that show. They kind of ended it where a lot was resolved but could also go on to a season 2.

When the HVAC owner called dh on Friday he said he thinks they will be out Monday, but will let him know for sure. They didn't let us know, but our neighbors did LOL. A week or so ago Mr mentioned to dh he saw the HVAC van at our house. DH told him what was wrong and that they would be coming back at some point to fix the issue. Mr said they needed something checked out with their furnace system so maybe when they are out here again for us, they could combine the visit out here and take a look at theirs. DH told him he'd let them know that when they called to let us know when they were coming, so on Friday dh did and apparently hvac guy called Mr and told him they will check their issue out when they are done with ours on Monday. So that's how we got confirmation they are coming out today, from Mr., haha. I'm sure they will be here any time. Usually it's around 8:45 when they get here. Hopefully it gets fixed. Having no zones has been annoying.

I have to process payroll today instead of my normal day would be tomorrow, since I'll be gone half the day. I just have to change a setting on the payroll system to let it let me process a day early. So far so good. For like the first time ever I don't have any questions of clarifications on time off to send to my boss. I think it really is the first time ever that our company calendar has matched up with the time of requested in our payroll system. 

Not much else going on. I'm sure I'll have more to update tomorrow, after I get my needle aspiration procedure done.

Plugging along

After almost 2 weeks, the HVAC owner (not the tech guy who came out) finally called and discussed with dh the best way to fix our issue with our zones not working. It sounds like they will be out here on Monday, but he said his office will let dh know. DH told him any day, but Tuesday.

And the delivery company that is delivering the bookcase door called, and of course they wanted to come out next Tuesday. I laughed and said I knew you were going to say Tuesday....do you know if it would be morning or afternoon? We'll be gone all morning Tuesday. No, they can't say what time, only that it will be between 9am and 4pm. Ok, then. Now it will be the following Tuesday, another week out.

We did go into the lumber store during my lunch break yesterday. I got the extra stain and a couple extra brushes and dh went out to their wood area and got the trim. Then we decided to stop in the little grocery store for bananas and a couple of donuts, if they had any. Then we filled up with gas and were back home within the hour. I quickly did the last 2 shelf boards with that needed the first coat. Then after work I spent about 90 minutes doing all the boards with the second coat. This morning I will get the first coat of poly on.

I found some wood clothes hampers I like. I guess about midway between what I wanted to spend and the prices I was finding for others I liked, so I guess I can live with that. I did some online searching for the best price. Again, that "google lens" feature sure helps make that easy. When I first saw the hamper on HSN it's $223. For one! LOL. Google lens search let me find two for less than $200 total for both. When we are done with our closets, including the dressers I want to get for each, we're going to try to estimate how much we spent in total to do them ourselves. Kind of hard since some of the lumber is for the shop lofts, but we can probably get a close estimate. Maybe a quarter of the cost of custom closets? We'll see.

Mom's phone was still off the hook/unplugged all yesterday. I did sent uncle a text letting him know, in case he was trying. And I told him I'm not sure how long a phone will work for her in her room, but we'll keep trying it awhile. 

DD may be up for another promotion at work. She's got (yet another) new boss, but she likes this guy so far. I think he was temporarily her boss during Covid, when her manager retired, but now he's back, hopefully permanent in this position at least for awhile, she's hoping.

Medical billing mistake

The first part of my morning has been spent figuring out a medical claim for dh. I just got an email from the hospital medical group that dh has a bill due. I log in and it's for $744 for lab work back 6 months ago in October. Why so long to bill? It showed the charge was $930 with a provider adjustment and patient balance due of $744. At first I could not remember what labwork dh had done, so I logged into his mychart account and oh yes, it was the prostate biopsy, so this is the lab part of the billing (how could I forget that?! it came back no cancer!). 

Something just wasn't sitting right with me. While we are on a higher deductible insurance plan, I still wanted to see the EOB. I went to log into his insurance plan (which is on my plan, but I can't see his info with my log in). I had set him up with a log in. I had it written down in my book. Nope. wouldn't work to log in. I tried resetting and it would not send any info the the email I used for his account. Finally, I tried setting up a new log in and password and that worked. Then I figured out there was a way to "share" him to my account, so I got that box checked. Now I can just log into my account and see both of our claims.

And no insurance claim for this lab work is showing. Weird! So, I log back into the hospital group account and dig around and realize that they billed his old insurance (which he hasn't had since mid 2021). I had given the doctor's office his new insurance last year, but when they sent the biopsy into the lab, the apparently didn't forward the insurance info. The odd part is how was there a "provider adjustment" of $186 when that insurance they billed wasn't even valid anymore? I sent a message to the hospital group that the wrong insurance was billed and gave the new insurance info. About an hour later I got a message back that they will resubmit the claim to the correct insurance. I'm sure we'll still owe about the same, but it needs to get processed through the right insurance plan.

We are almost done with the master closets. I have started the staining of the shelves, last night, but we ran out of stain with 2 boards left. We had planned to go to the town lumber store on Saturday but we'll run in today at lunch to get the stain and other supplies dh needs. I also need a couple more paint brushes. So, we just need to finish the shelves and install them and then add some trim (which is what dh needs from the lumber store). 

Spring just wants to sit back and wait around here. A little more snow this morning.

Well, I'm going to try giving my mom a call....I doubt I'll catch her, but at least I'm trying LOL.

Whatever day it is

I woke up (or I rather I should say the cat woke me up) around 6am and did not know what day it was. My first instinct was it's Thursday, but then I thought that can't be right. It can't be Thursday already. I don't think I worked 3 days this week....but yep, it's Thursday. 

I haven't had any luck getting a hold of my mom the past several days. She's just never in her room to answer the phone. And I just tried again and now it goes straight to the recording saying she doesn't have voicemail set up, so that means the phone is off the hook. I have a feeling we are winding down to removing the phone from her room if neither I nor uncle can ever get a hold of her and she's rarely remembering to call me to say hello (or complain, ha!).

We're still wondering what will happen to the property next door. We finally saw the guy drive in and just turn around the other day. That is the first we've seen him here since last fall. Not to say he hasn't come through, but that's the first time we've seen him. Since we are usually home and since Mr and Mrs dogs bark up a storm as soon as someone turns onto our street, it's typical one of us would look out to see if someone is coming down our street (most often delivery). Their house out of state still has not sold and the last (and only time) they reduced the price on it was last July. It's been for sale for almost a year and a half now. Now would also be the time to get started building/site prep work, if you are going to build this year. One of the first things they need to do is have a well dug and they have still not done that (why they didn't do it last summer, I have no idea). And get the building site cleared. We started our building mid March of the year we started, basically as soon as we could get started moving the dirt. I see from old pics I have that our foundations got poured on April 20th of that year....and it still took until May of the NEXT year for it to all be finished. A couple people we have talked to mentioned maybe they will just sell the property to get something where they can build that metal building. That would be best....and I keep hoping to see a for sale sign go up...but at the same time, the longer they just delay and hold on to it, the longer nothing is done there, haha. If they sell it, then it's likely someone else will start building sooner than later.

I think the couple that owns the lot on the other side of them will be moving over here this summer, working towards their plan to build. If I recall, when they were here and came over to sign the letter we sent to the other guy about his 10,000 sf steel building and covenants, they said she was working through the end of this next school year and then they were going to move over to the little cabin they built last summer on her dad's nearby 20 acres and they will live in that while they build on their property. But, if I understood correctly they don't plan on starting to build until 2024.

Another sign that spring is coming is I heard some birds chirping outside this morning.