House of Cards and Still Alice

Recently finished watching the first season of House of Cards. Yes, it is good stuff. But it feels slightly like The Sopranos for some reason – rooting for the bad guys maybe? Or the theme music perhaps? Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright are both enjoyable to watch. Neither of them “chews the scenery” as a good friend of mine says of over acting. I will probably watch the second season. Don’t know if I will go much further than that, though…

Ok, fallen into another obsession: Fallout Shelter. This is a game app for phones that is based on the popular Fallout Video Game series. Way too fun. I have already given up on one Vault and am hard at work on my second. Hopefully this too shall pass because I am barely able to not play. That is not a good thing. What is good, besides the fun of the game, is that I learned how to take a screenshot of my phone!

Mom had a good day today – she seemed full of the desire to explore – and she ate a lot at lunch time. Good signs.

Last night, I watched Still Alice – mom sort of watched it. I thought it was ok, Julianne Moore did a good job, but it was sort of light on showing the ickiness of the disease. From diagnosis to the end of the movie, I am guessing a year or maybe two elapsed at most. It was early onset, so I don’t have any personal experience with that, but I am guessing that mom was cognitively impaired since at least 77 years old – if not longer. She is 85 now – 8 years. In the four years that I have been helping out, I have certainly seen quite a decline. But at this rate, I am guessing it will be 2 to 4 years before she loses command of language. And then maybe 4 more years before Alzheimer’s kills her. In all I am guessing she has 10 more years of life – such as it is. Sigh (for her, for me, for all the world and especially those dealing with Alzheimer’s in any way, shape or form…)!

Dating Sites

Sadly, my profile has found its way onto lots and lots of dating sites. There was one site that spawned profiles on lots of different sites. All of them are scams. Not the big ones – they do have some merits – meaning I have actually met people from them and had some good experiences. These other set of sites, not so much. Still, when I get a ridiculous note from one of their fake profiles, I do feel a little more liked in the world. Weird, right?

I have changed my profile on the three major dating sites that I sometimes check and think are real: Match.com, OK Cupid and Plenty of Fish. Hasn’t made a lick of difference. Am I surprised? Nope. Not at all. But I wanted to at least make an effort to try something different. My consistent hope is that my path will cross someone else’s in the real world sometime. Hopefully soon. Not that I could do much in the way of dating, but I could use the excitement that even a potential dating partner would generate in my life.

My Netflix DVD is currently Still Alice. We showed it at The Smith and it has gotten good reviews. I am a little afraid to watch it, since the subject matter is pretty close to home. I don’t know whether or not to watch it with my mom. Not that she would remember it in any case…

I keep forgetting to mention something – arch support. Recently, I was having a little back pain and general soreness. I didn’t remember doing anything that would have made me feel that way. Then, a realization came: I had been wearing my sandals a lot. Normally I wear shoes with a lot of arch support – I have high arches and like them that way – so I think that maybe not having that support was what had been causing the pain. I switched back to the arch supporting shoes and miraculously don’t have that pain in the back any more! Huzzuh!

It is interesting to see who I get notes from – when I do get notes from people. Sadly, very, very few of the people who write to me pique my interest romantically. I am, though, always willing (well, mostly always) to write and even meet. One never knows, does one?

PS The picture is from my sister’s visit of mom and her new shawl! (Just because you all might be tired of my Photo Booth photos…)