And they are home.

While, over here…

Michelle set her alarm for quite early so she could start orange rolls for breakfast for Sam. John and Richard got up quite early so they could pick her up from the airport. Sam beats everybody on earliness because the only flights from Alaska in December within reach had a six-hour layover in the middle of the night in an airport and then a red-eye here.

Food and festivities and we had an absolutely wonderful day, laughing much. We all got to see Madison across the screens in all her sweetest, sleeping cuteness. (She took his mommy away for a day. Hudson is wary. Give him a day.)

Richard opened Holly and George’s gift of their hammer dulcimer and his eyes got huge. He repeated quietly, all day, I am blown away. I am blown away. I am blown away.

I was chuckling just now, typing that, and he said, reasonably enough, Well, I *am* blown away. I am!

I am, too, but I knew what was all wrapped up over there, and the stand to go with. We hope to do the gift justice, and he gave it a good start by practicing for a good hour quietly as we all chatted.

Sam fell into bed at 7 pm. John helped some more and then did likewise at eight after being on his feet working on the food with Michelle for hours and she was ready to do likewise when we left her place. We got home, Richard sat down a moment, and fell instantly asleep himself.

Well, *somebody* has to get this room ready for the carpet installers coming at 9:00 am. And I had the easiest day, certainly.

After two hours of that, I’m ready to fall into bed myself. It wasn’t just this room–I had to move everything out of the way for them to pull the piano and heavy couch into the other room.

I sat down a moment to take a break and go tell the blog our new granddaughter’s name while hoping everybody else had such a wonderful, perfect day like we did.

And that’s when it hit me. I still have to get all those tubs of yarn stash out of the closet–they’re doing that part too. Okay, a little more to go and then I call it a night.

Twenty and a quarter inches, 8 lbs 4 oz, 1:00 this afternoon and all went well.

Parker was given a big-brother package by the hospital and, finding a stuffed animal in it, he took it out and gave it to his new sister.

Holly of proseknitic.de arrived today with her husband; I finally got to meet George! Given that they live in Germany, time together is a rare and wonderful thing much less getting to see both.

Richard had to leave in the middle for a doctor appointment, and before he left from there he called: would a follow-up on this date work with my calender?

Holly said, He’s a good one, and I said, Yes he is!

And while he was gone George slipped outside a moment himself. She’s got a good one, too.

Richard made it home and so we carried on. Fresh-pressed apple cider all around. They took their leave, we had dinner chez Michelle, and then we had a little last grocery shopping to get out of the way, not wanting to go anywhere near a store on Christmas Eve. With me pleading fatigue, the menfolk dropped me off at home on their way to Costco.

Yup. They left me alone in the house for just long enough. I can just see Holly and George grinning right now reading this… I thought about it, cut up a white sheet of paper, wrote FRAGILE–twice–and added it to the bright gold paper.

And since it was a Costco-sized roll of wrapping paper, it’s on its second Christmas, just about everything’s been wrapped in the stuff (again), there’s still a lot left, and nobody has noticed a thing.

Bwahaahaaa. With a huge side of Thank You!

I had a list for the day, checked it twice, was tired enough that I only got half of it done and considered it good.

Meantime, our nephew and his wife whose wedding we flew to Atlanta for in July will be staying with us for his brother’s wedding.

The phone rang this morning, after the shop’s checking of quantities of both workers and material available: the desperately awful 20-year-old carpet in the family room will be out of here and the new one in, the day after Christmas and two days before the guests arrive. Thick and plush, good for the coming baby to crawl and walk on and lovely to see.

No. More. Formerly-and-still-trying-to-be blue carpet. At long, long last. Soon!

Michelle’s ward meets two hours earlier than ours does and John went off with her.

Which means we came home from church to find the tree up and a whole bunch of other Christmas-readying stuff done as a surprise: parental figures walking in the door and noticing in 1, 2, 3…!

One other surprise: a photo Michelle had found of my husband’s great-grandfather all dressed up as Santa  ~1885.

Looks to me like some handspinner tried to hide that last bag of merino fleece up the chimney and forgot it was up there.

My husband, son and I all got to Skype with Parker and his family for his birthday. Parker had had a long and overstimulating day (presents! And nobody gets to open these but Parker!) and he showed us his toys as he played with them. And happily shared them with his little brother. I was impressed.

Hudson, of course, then climbed into the empty box and made his own toy out of it. Choo choo!

Two more hours to midnight and then Parker still gets to share his birthday with his great-grandmother, but that one thing, his big day, he won’t have to share with his little sister. Seems fair to me.

Googlemaps showing accidents here, here, and here. Time: two hours and…

(Checking the flight) flight is delayed.

Time: one hour and…

Flight actually hasn’t left the ground yet. Oh.

Time: fifty-eight minutes… Still a red zone on 880, stop-and-go, looks like.

We could wait a little longer.

Time: fifty-one minutes…and no red zones. Still a little early. Forget it, we’d rather have us wait than him–time to go get our kid!

(Edited to add, John’s home, John’s home!)

The second errand of the afternoon (I’ll tell you about the first one tomorrow) : getting a coaxial cable to go with the thermostat he already had, then on to the hardware store for an outdoor box to keep that in–but first the cable.

And so he had an excuse to browse his favorite shop. He got his ham radio license after the Loma Prieta quake, when the phone lines were down and we had twenty-four hours of Not Knowing, only knowing that his aunt and her family had been right there by the epicenter. That sense of helplessness wasn’t going to happen again.

They were fine; their house, not so much. And that is when he started volunteering with the city, county, and Red Cross communications teams, collecting a few ham radios along the way, portable here, (s0rt of) big stationary one there.

Oh but they had some big ones.

Here, let me zoom in a little on that sign on the door. “Hey Guys! Your Wife Called! She said you can buy anything you want!”

Well, but hey, yarn, so, I totally get the enthusiasm and the need to see what’s in stock now.

Speaking of which, Purlescence finally had Malabrigo as of this week and they had it on sale and after knit night tonight they have just a little less of it. I do totally get it–I’m just lucky the individual parts to my hobby cost vastly less than his.

And then we were off to the hardware store, where they not only had the weatherproofing box he wanted, they actually had non-LED white Christmas lights. We thought those had already been taken off the market.

For $4.80 a box. (!) Marked 25% more efficient, when we don’t want efficient at all we want heat for the Alphonso mango tree, but hey, just add another strand. Sold!

Turns out the salesman who found them for us has been warming his four citrus trees that way for twenty-five years and was keen to hear about how to grow mangoes.  He had room for one more fruit tree in his yard.

I told him cold prompts them to bloom but below 40 kills the flowers and fruit–but if a guy in upstate New York could do it, I could do it.

He was clearly already figuring out how to do his own setup to make that work.

You know? This could get contagious.

He was dreaming that I’d gotten up and after 34 minutes he finally rolled over to turn that stupid alarm off himself, growling inwardly at my forgetting to–and there I still was, sound asleep. Oh oops.

Made it through the traffic and rain to that doctor appointment on time by the skin of my teeth.

Which is why I was 2/3 of the way there before I realized that in the rush and the quiet of the house I’d forgotten to grab my hearing aids. Oh goodness.

I was mortified, saying, and honestly so, “I never do that. I *never* do that!” The nurse laughed it off and was wonderful. The doctor, thankfully, had a deep voice and knowing his patient’s deafness well he pulled up a chair to face the opposite direction while being close in and I only had to ask him once to repeat himself. Blessings on the both of them.

Got home in time to do some quick sprucing up (now there’s a good Christmas-centric term for it. Douglas firs, no for some reason but spruces, yes–I guess some trees are just the fir-tunate f-yew, the rest can balsam) before some friends dropped by. They left in time for us to get out the door for our haircuts to be ready for Ryan’s wedding coming up before Gwyn of the most-perfect scissors goes out of town. Got home, grabbed a quick bite (have you had anything all day other than that sliver of birthday cake? No, me neither. Here let me grab this so we don’t shop hungry) and went to the grocery store. Got home in time to grab another quick bite and get ready to go see a friend who just lost his mom after a supposedly routine surgery last week. Yow.

While we kept an ear out for our phones to hear if our granddaughter had arrived early like her brothers had.

Life.

Fourteen hours after that alarm I’m finally actually sitting down at home for longer than ten minutes. Oh wait, hold that thought…

Theoretically, I should scrub that off. And I will, when we finally repaint that wall. But for now this little reminder of our grandsons’ visit in September with their parents just makes me smile every time I go into this bathroom.

One washes his hands, the other, copying his big brother, wipes his off where he can reach–I can just see it.

Right there.

Happy Hanukkah to those who celebrate it!

I should have been clued in when a certain someone started working on organizing and clearing his electronics projects from the kitchen table.

I should have been clued in when Michelle came over, got out a clean tablecloth, and harassed her dad gently for not having the table ready to put it on there yet, but then, I’d been encouraging the same step forward myself, so, hey.

My birthday was over and done with, a good day enjoyed much and that was that for the year.

Not to them it wasn’t. Lee called it a flash mob surprise birthday party and that’s precisely what it was. Chocolate cake from The Prolific Oven, a goofy headband-hat thing put on my head first thing, ice cream, Martinelli’s apple soda, dairy-free cookies for Michelle, the co-conspirators had thought of everything.

Phyllis (Lee’s wife) had already doorbell-ditched flowers a few days before, which was birthday surprise enough. The lilies in that arrangement were in full bloom and the heavenly scent totally covered over the stopped-up sink behind us that thankfully wasn’t too bad yet. There’s still a towel kept on the floor because the icemaker on the fridge still has that slight and random leak.

My daughter, niece, husband, and they and a lot of other friends were in on the whole thing and Christmas season busyness or not, they totally pulled it off.

When Richard got up this morning the ganached cake in the fridge was a little smaller and there was a slice waiting at his place on the beautifully clean table on top of a second fresh cloth, last night’s having been put to its appointed use. “Somebody loves me!” he crowed in delight.

Yes, honey. Someone sure does.

(Yes there are pictures. I had been outside chasing after escaping styrofoam peanuts from unpacking the mango tree before it got any worse (and STAY in that bag!)  I’m sure there was a spiderweb or five and I had not so much as brushed my hair out yet. No you can’t see.)

Last night thankfully we decided to stop by home before running one last errand for the day–because when we turned that car off it stayed off and that was that.

Today the Alphonso mango tree showed up at noon as planned, the one thing I had so wanted out of my day and there it was! We immediately planted it in the paper pot up against the house in the alcove of the patio, the most protected spot it could ask for while it recovers from its long truck drive, with walls on three sides while still being outdoors.

Then we were finally ready to call AAA. The tow truck driver determined that the main Prius battery was fine but the 12v that powered the dash and locks, not so much, and jumped it.

How often does one jump-start a Prius. I know.

Now, when you drive a hybrid, the motor turns itself off when you’re idling so as to conserve energy–not such a good idea when you’re trying to recharge a battery, so, Richard asked me, Freeway time! Where do you want to go? Nothing too close!

It was his idea to offer to go to what is my favorite bakery, the one in Burlingame, and we were off. He circled the block, car still on, while I ran in and bought what I wanted, and then off to the Costco in a different town–with me quietly hoping we would run into someone we knew. We did. Old friends. We were so out of context in that place that the guy didn’t think it was really me at first till he saw me talking to her.

The car has been running ever since, my tree is beautiful, I told Dani it was here and he was as thrilled as I was, (the friend from India who knew exactly what the most perfect variety to get was), we Skyped with our sweet grandsons and talked to all our parents and the kids and laughed that,  no, looks like the baby wasn’t going to come today after all. We’ll just have to hope that Parker, too, gets to keep his birthday all to himself next week.

And life is good. And I am aiming for 10:11 12/13/14 to hit post on this. How many birthdays get that as an option?

(Edited: Hah! Never did update that time stamp after the time change. But it really was 10:11…)

There was a box. Via Amazon, so I opened it thinking it was something I’d ordered.

No shipping slip, no name, nothing–just a hummingbird feeder inside with no way to know whom to thank. I would if I could!

I woke up this morning and grabbed my glasses. Through the clerestory windows I watched the tops of the trees duking it out with the near-hurricane winds.

We’re at 3.84″ of rain with another .5″ to go for the day, and then next week it will rain again. We just need snowpack in those Sierras, too. I’ve been watching my downspouts going crazy and wishing we had the means to capture our roofprint’s worth up there.

And so we stayed out of that and at home, grateful for power and heat, listening to it rain, rain, rain. The water came up a foot in our street. Not as bad as the happily boogie-boarding kids in ’98 and the homes across the street with water up to the electric sockets that we had then but threatening to be. The storm drains are old and long overloaded and one neighbor waded out into that water to see if he could save those homes from it and he quietly cleaned the leaves out of the way, here, here, here and if a fourth spot needed it he did that too. We would never have known except that another neighbor ratted him out online so that everybody could thank the guy.

One friend who did leave home said there was water sloshing right over the center divider on the freeway.

I’m fine with marveling over the photos rather than experiencing that sort of thing in person.

Our mail service has had issues, as I’ve occasionally mentioned, sometimes major issues, but today our guy was totally a hero: he came at about 7:30 pm despite the fact that most of the roads between the main post office and here were shut down by flooding and fallen trees, including the road it’s actually on. We heard him and I ran for a rain jacket and struggled to get it on fast enough and then called out into the night as I lifted the lid on the box, “Thank you!”

He answered from over next door, “You’re welcome!”

The CSA (community-supported agriculture) guy made it in, too, dropping off our farm-to-fridge veggies in the dark of the early morning, and in honor of his effort I had to use his greens at their peak. Fresh-picked red chard. Strip the hard thick lower parts of the stalks out of your way, saute the greens in a bit of very good *EV olive oil, that’s all it needs. A small amount of bacon bits topped it off in a perfect winter dish against the cold.

And who knew that slicing ripe Hachiya persimmons in half and roasting them at 450 for fifteen minutes would give them a texture and taste like Thanksgiving sweet potatoes with marshmallows melted in. Peel the skins off that were holding the stuff together and there you go.

It was a thought and a whim and something I will definitely do again.

They must have run out of the spinach that had been on this week’s checklist. They keep making me try out new things. Rapini greens? Looking at the bunch, I’ve never eaten…spikes…before. It’s just the smaller leaves acting all edgy like that, though, y’know, ’80’s punk style.

Not that I’ll mind breaking out that olive oil again.

———

*EV–extra virgin. By lax Federal law, an imported olive oil can be labeled as such no matter what its actual grade as long as it’s food grade, but California requires that if the olives are grown in this state, the bottle must contain what the label says it does. Buy Californian.

Got some bad guys and some good guys for you today.

Back in September, when I caught the flu with all the autoimmune flaring that went with, I was barfing nonstop from the Crohn’s. The lupus was going nuts, too, my blood pressure was tanking, and I needed IV fluids, fast, just to start. (There would be chest and abdominal x-rays too.)

There were a lot of other people around with early-season flu, too, but for whatever the reason, when we called my doctor her nurse emphatically told my husband not to take me to Urgent Care but rather straight to the ER.

This was not a decision made by us. She insisted. She said if we went to Urgent Care they would simply send us over to Stanford, and we knew what the co-pays on the ambulance they would insist on would be, not to mention it would tie up that ambulance unnecessarily.

Turns out Anthem Blue Cross requires in their fine print that you verify with each health care provider before seeing them each time that they are still in contract with Anthem. Doesn’t matter if they were in-network for all the years you’ve had a policy with them, they reserved the right to yank that at any time. Doesn’t matter if you’re in an emergency with no capability of sitting on hold on the phone for two hours. Etc.

Now, by the contract we’d signed at open enrollment, if you go out-of-network in an emergency they’re still supposed to pay such a percentage and even though it’s less, it’s still a substantial amount.

Anthem and Stanford were in a contract dispute. Anthem never notified us in any way, not so much as an email, nor by their terms do they have to, and our trip to that ER was a life-and-death emergency with my already-very-low blood pressure. As far as I’ve been able to tell since, that day we had and we still have no in-contract hospital to divert to, either; I could be wrong on that but Anthem certainly hasn’t offered us any information to the contrary.

So we are paying for insurance to cover things they will not cover despite selling us a policy on the grounds that they would. I’d call that fraud, myself.

So, out of network, painful, but I thought we’d be out about a grand. Someone on the phone at one point said three. Ouch. But we waited for a bill. And waited. And waited, while the two sides hashed it out.

We got a notice finally last week from Anthem, and a day or two later a letter from Stanford.

And this is what Anthem said:

Not.

Covered.

Except this one unclear thing here that was probably that IV and only that IV, or maybe one individual doctor they were not in dispute with. But whatever, so, one thousand paid towards the claim and that was all it was going to be. “Your responsibility”:

Twelve thousand nine hundred ninety-nine dollars.

Breathe.

Hello? Out of network percentages, at least? How can they…?!

They don’t care.

Then came a letter from Stanford Hospital.

And they said, It is not your fault that we and Anthem Blue Cross are currently out of contract, and your health is more important. We don’t want you to be afraid to get medical care when you need it.

They said they will only charge us what our co-pays would have been had everything been as we expected when we went in there, as if all prior contracts had been in full force.

Multiply that times the whatever number of patients, given that Anthem covers something like a third of all the people in California, and what their bills could be and that Anthem should legitimately be covering and refuses to… Staggering. Just staggering.

I just felt (and these words look so faint on the page compared to how I feel) that Stanford deserves my praise and my thanks as loudly and as publicly as I can offer them.