I did get out this morning before 9 to briefly water the new plantings, including the Korean Spice Viburnum, seeds and red daylilies.

We visited an exhibit of artwork by one of our Harper Center acquaintances at the Congregational Church, then picked up a book on hold at the library, then did a grocery run at Stop & Shop.

I stupidly deleted a file with a SQL Server backup script.

For reasons I don’t understand, someone quite close to me thinks he’s of Italian background. He isn’t; his wife is. He is English, German, Scottish with a tinge of Irish and he looks it: tall, fair-skinned, blue-eyed.

I saw Reshma Saujani, the founder of Girls Who Code and Moms First, on Meet the Press. She is admirable and so are her organizations. I wrote to her about the struggles that those of us who weren’t born lucky in looks have in STEM fields. Hope she writes back.

Got a call around suppertime this evening from a T-Mobile representative who has issued me/us a credit for the Internet service I’d cancelled!

It’s still May and already the Town has placed a restriction on water usage between 9 am and 5 pm.

Glad I put off watering the front garden although I’m vexed that I haven’t done it yet.

Had a good conversation with someone at T-Mobile today who finally explained my last bill in a way that I could understand. As in unaccented English.

Gigantic row with Ron over his sadistic passive aggressive game claiming that he can’t hear. He – finally – made an appointment with the audiologist for next week.

I ordered a rail planter today. Gave up trying to find one like ours, settled for something close. Seems all our online stores have sold out. Our Aubuchon doesn’t carry planters of any type in-store, “no room”. Other hand, they seem to have everything else!

Was going to order a giant pizza special from BigY but they changed the menu to chicken and bacon instead of Margherita. Ron got Mexican. I had to drive him because he couldn’t figure out where the restaurant is. We have three of them in this town and he kept getting them mixed up.

I’ve been in sleep clothes all day. Haven’t wanted to shower or cook. I guess that’s why they call it the blues, burnout, depression. I went out after dark to spray deer and rabbit repellent on the daylily bed next to the driveway. The smell is horrendous.

Ron and Jett were out doing errands, including returnables. Ron mowed the front yard yesterday. I guess this is in lieu of helping me frame the new artwork, one of which I ended up doing myself today, or cleaning and rebaiting the mouse traps, one of which I did yesterday, or reconfiguring the front hose holder. Maybe I’ll do that one tomorrow.

Sometimes I hate my life.

Picked up some gorgeous frames at Goodwill. They are perfect for the collages we bought a couple of weeks ago.

Stopped in at the Liquor Mart to check out their deli.

Jett seems to be okay after his high fat snack yesterday. Fussy about his food, though, but that might be normal.

Ron has been complaining all day that he can’t hear me. Turns out there seems to be something wrong with one of his hearing aids, the right one, which has been trouble from jump.

I finished planting the new daylilies.

They are in Bennington only about 20 minutes away and well stocked with annuals and some perennials. Like a small Mahoney’s. Beautiful nursery.

I brought home some annuals for the deck planters and two red daylilies for the driveway garden. Unfortunately, something ate the blossoms from one of the daylilies I planted last year. Electric fence?

Jett and I shopped at the Tractor Supply in North Adams this morning. He didn’t like the Kong toys or for that matter anything else that was hard plastic or rubber, thus saving me an expense. So I got him some chews. Cashier could not have been nicer, gave us a heads up when two more dogs walked in with their owners.

Guess the chews weren’t enough: Jett ate a whole stick of butter this evening. I ate half a pint of Brigham’s Mocha Almond.

Dropped off a package of Andi’s favorite coffee and backed up the database and code. Need to figure out how to automate the backup. Shop looks great!

Have been cleaning up my laptop and phone, deleting files and applications.

Did laundry. Changed sheets.

It’s been raining off and on today.

Up early but went back to bed for about an hour. Jett kept me company. Dreamed about mashed potatoes. Ron did a white wash and is doing a short grocery run.

I planted the veggies and mint from yesterday and dropped sunflower seeds in the flower garden.

I put zuke seeds in the flower bed and one of the raised beds. Planted Kentucky Wonders in between the other climbing beans in the other raised bed.

No idea what will grow but it’ll be interesting.

Invoiced MRS.

The new plantings are doing well both in the ground and in containers.

The plantings from last year have also for the most part taken root. Two clumps have buds already.

Although I got a very late start, I got to the shredding event at the library before the truck left and to the plant sale at the Pine Cobble School before they packed up.

There was very little left but I was able to buy a tomato plant and three bean plants, the latter of which were sown by the Grade 3 students. They were half price.

Later I picked up a couple of bottles of French Sauvignon Blanc and some lemon squares.

Catch as catch can for lunch and “supper”.

A man came by to check out repairs to the deck and placement of the electric box in Ron’s “study”. He’s a local person and has been working with a crew who are building luxury homes on Sweet Farm Road.

We watched “Compass Points” and “Horizons” on PBS.

I think I’m done with MRS. Uploaded changes to web pages and database today.

Had to switch Backblaze to an internal drive, have run out of room on my laptop. Uninstalling apps now.

I woke up from a horrible dream feeling that I’ve turned into a monster who stomped on a little girl who loved me but now hated me. She was bruised and sad and she was sitting on a doorstep waiting for me because no one else had let her in the house.

This is terrifying.

What can I do to fix this?

It can’t have anything to do with Jett or with Ron. I made cinnamon rolls and oatmeal with raisins for Ron and me and mixed half a hard boiled egg with two kinds of dog food for Jett this morning.

I keep thinking about and worrying about my granddaughter which scares me to death. I know my fear is not based on anything real.

We haven’t been doing much around town these days, partly because money was so tight from the first of the year to now and partly because we are old and “been there, done that” jaded.

It occurred to me the other day that while I was looking for a new place to live, I wanted a house in the woods, and we pretty much have that even though our lot is small. For one thing, we’re on a hill, which gives the illusion of more space between houses than there would be on the flat.

For another, our lot is surrounded by trees on three sides. The back of our lot abuts an undeveloped woodland and a steep hill with Henderson Brook at the bottom. We can see our neighbors’ houses but rarely see them, although Jett barks at or for their dog.

My window has a limited mountain view in the winter but from now until November, all I can and will be able to see are leaves, branches and a little sky.

We live in Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. It’s beautiful no matter the season. The number of cultural and artistic events and amenities in North Berkshire County is astonishing never mind the activities an hour or so south of us.

People are concerned for each other and support local businesses and Town government. Our neighbors wave to us, they are considerate and respectful. Business people are friendly and some of them even call us by our first names. Everyone loves our library; the new director is dynamic and imaginative and has launched a remarkable number of events. The College opens its facilities and performances to everyone; most opportunities are free.

It’s nice here and we enjoy it, so why does my stomach hurt so often and why am I frightened right now? Why have I started to hate taking showers because I dread being cold? Why do I want to stomp on my little girl inner self and make her hate me and be afraid of me? Have I become the jealous, narcissistic, manipulative, cruel Rose Cohen? God help me, I hope not!

Filed complaints regarding T-Mobile with both. Received a message that the FCC is sending a copy of my complaint to T-Mobile and that they must respond in writing within 30 days.

Made an apple cobbler from a very old box of dark brown sugar and apples from the Pantry.

Working on MRS. Weeding.

I feel sick to my stomach. Cannot believe it and am dreading it.

This is a PTSD reaction from living on Cape Cod for 23-odd years. Traffic there is bad much of the year because of road construction but Memorial Day Weekend is the start of the crush of tourists and second home owners that makes travel, shopping and everything else intolerable.

Fortunately, this is our “one more year and then you’d be happy” year. We are in a good place and grateful for it. There is so much we need not fear any more.

We had great cellphone service with T-Mobile for years. We added internet service and were pleased with that until we got a better deal from a different carrier.

I cancelled our phones and the internet service on May 13. I received an email acknowledging this with no instructions for returning the equipment. Turns out if you didn’t get the equipment from a store, you need to either return it by UPS or drop it off to what they call a “corporate store”, the nearest of which is in Rensselaer, NY, about an hour away.

To get a shipping label, you need to call their customer service. I called last night about quarter to nine and there was a half hour or so wait.

It seems that T-Mobile uses its Philippines call center for off-hours “assistance”. A more stubborn bunch of corporate toadies I have rarely encountered. The rep tried to “sell” me on keeping the service. It was after 9 pm and I was not of a mind to indulge a sales pitch from an aggressive person with a heavy Asian accent.

The rep refused to acknowledge that I cancelled my internet service before the end of their May cycle and wanted to bill me for a month that we never used! He (supposedly) needed to complete some mystery cancellation order on their end before the service could be stopped.

Evidently other customers have encountered this obduracy and, frankly, dishonesty. After arguing with me, the corporate stooge finally got his supervisor on the line. They both insisted that the confirmation email was not for cancelling the internet service even though the subject line is “We have confirmed your T-Mobile internet cancellation.” Unbelievable.

The supervisor finally apologized for the fact that the representative from my May 13 call only cancelled the phones and not the internet. He must have taken care of the mystery order because I received a slew of emails including the RMA labels shortly thereafter.

I guess my next stop is to file a complaint with the FCC, the FTC and the Mass. AG’s office.