Day Two Trip to Geneva

Got up to overcast skies. What a surprise. :) Anyway, we got out around noon after doing a lot of nothing in the house. We had errands. Bank, post office downtown. Then find a tree and do some food shopping. The bank was eventful. Mom prefers the drive-thru window for some reason. Since she doesn't drive anymore (yippee!) she doesn't get to do that to frequently anymore. We got there, only to discover that it was closed for repairs. So inside we trooped. Only to discover that there was something sticky on her check. Ick! So she had to write a new one. Something she has, sadly, forgotten how to do for the most part. Eek! But we persevered and came out loaded with cash. Ok, not loaded. Off to the post office. Mom bought three sheets of stamps, two of them love stamps. In the post office, she liked them. Later she said they were garish and wondered why she had bought them. Sigh. I mailed off a check to my designer and a thumb drive containing some 3000 images that were Saucer related. Yippee.

Next, off to the top of the hill to look for a Christmas Tree. We have a store in town called Red Jacket. It is an apple store primarily and has been in business as long as I can remember. One of the few places that hasn't gone under here in Geneva. They happened to also be selling Christmas trees. Mom and I agreed that we wanted a tree in a pot, one that we might be able to replant at some point. They had three or four - and again we agreed on one. And it was on sale! Yippee! The attendant put it in the car and it looked really, really heavy! I was not looking forward to trying to get it into the house. But that was postponed for a short trip through the store. Mom has a favorite apple, but she has forgotten the name. So we wandered around and looked at the apples and other local foods that they had. Came away with one apple, a package of cheese and a package of crystallized ginger, of which mom apparently never has enough.

When we got home, mom suggested we use a little rolling dolly thing she has to help get the tree into the living room. Great suggestion! It was really, really, really heavy. And getting it out of the car and up the three steps and onto the dolly was tough. I lifted mostly with my back, so I don't think I hurt anything. I decided that it would be easiest and best to leave the tree on the dolly for the foreseeable future. Mom concurred.

After we got the tree into the house, we went food shopping. Mom doesn't do much food shopping because the taxi process is difficult for her to get her head around and accept. Met a nice woman named Leeana in the Natural Foods aisle who helped us to find some of the ingredients I needed to make food that night. Also found an interesting beer from Southern Tier that I am looking forward to trying. Bought a little of everything in the store, as well as the makings for hot and sour soup and croque monsieur.

Headed home to unpack and to also start decorating the tree. I have put some pictures up on Facebook of the tree. It took me a few minutes to find the Christmas stuff in the attic. Three boxes were all I brought down. I think we have one or two more. But it is a small tree, and I am not going in for decorating the whole house. The tree will suffice, I think. I got some "snow" from the linen closet, tossed on some lights and a few bulbs and called a halt for the time being. Next trip, Walmart.

Our walmart has been transformed. It was an early walmart and was dingy and unhappy. Then they added a grocery section and transformed the whole place to a new, happy walmart! Yippee. If I never had to shop at walmart, I wouldn't. But they have slowly forced a lot of other stores out of business. I was shocked to find that our local shoe store had given up the ghost recently. Anyway, I wanted to get mom a couple of things to put under the tree. Nothing major or earth shattering. But mom had forgotten her glasses and so couldn't navigate by herself. And when she suggested she wait outside in the freezing cold while I shopped for her, I opted to take her home and go back another day.

Once at home, I did some more tree decorating - I still want a garland or a strand of popcorn and tinsel if I can find it. And I thought about dinner. I ended up making the hot and sour soup, which turned out ok, and the croque monsieur which was yummy, but looked weird because I used red wine rather than white. Pretty darn yummy.

Mom watched some TV and then went to bed. I played on the computer till latish and also went to dream land. Wednesday - outlet malls and other shopping. Yippee!