Electric Syllables

Shake your shamrocks—it’s March, dear.

On my first commute in March, I listened to Pati Jinich’s Mexican Jewish Table with The Kitchen Sisters on NPR. They mentioned walking through Oaxaca’s Enthnobotanical Garden. It sounds lovely! This is an interesting episode with cross-cultural influences.

Speaking of culture, I went to an Irish elementary school and celebrated St. Patrick’s Day “religiously” by marching in the annual parade as a member of the school, Girl Scouts, and even a baton twirler. Fun fact: I faked twirling the baton because I didn’t “get” it, but I learned how to twirl legitimately almost immediately after the parade. This year, the mantel was adorned with splendid St. Paddy’s decorations, but no marching was had.

I didn’t do much outside of work this month. Most of my time was spent on work, taxes, accident-related business, and being sick. I had a weird spell where I was very sick with an electrolyte-imbalance for about a week. Then, finally, this past weekend, I got out with my mom for some shopping and errands.

What else has been going on?

Car Accident Update

In car accident news, I finally took my car to the repair shop on March 18. And, after a comedy of errors with the rental-car agency and the repair shop itself, I, finally, got my car back on March 26.

What else can I say? Accidents happen, but when you’re the one they happen to, they cost a lot. These are the items not covered by the insurance:

• Time off work for estimate, drop-off/pick-up, phone calls, emails, car rentals, mistakes; transportation time, pick-up, and drop-off of rental car.
• Time wasted when the the at-fault party wanted to pay for the accident instead of going through the insurance company and stopped replying to messages.
• Cost associated with not using SiriusXM service in car
• Stress, anxiety, anger
• Gas for rental car

I thought I would have to pay for the cost for the rental car above partial payment (which was miniscule on my policy). I was surprised to learn I would be reimbursed for the full amount—and had even been delighted to convince the car rental agency to apply discounts.

Sadly, I am out a lot of extra money—not including the repairs I wanted made while the car was there—because someone else hit my car when I wasn’t even in the car. Insurance doesn’t cover these items. And, I realized that I am very angry about this, but I will forget about it in time.

Home and Garden Expo

I attended the local Home and Garden Expo to research vendors for new home siding. The house has an old aluminum siding that is a distressed white that I call “dirty white.” My mother sees more of an iced blue that she calls shark skin. I think we will look at colors that are more in the iced blue family. So far, we have not been shown many colors and most of the vendors were unhelpful. We made a goal to talk to at least three vendors and talked to five and were impressed by one siding vendor and one handyman service. We’ll see who of the others will call this week to make an appointment for an estimate.

Samples and Scents

I received the tiniest sample of Valaya Exclusif by Parfums de Marly and a couple of random things to review: a very, very soft cozy plush throw, Suave Strawberry Delight Uplifting Body Wash, and a Korean cream that had ingredients that I don’t usually use.

Is it just me or do the most expensive fragrances both anyone else? I hear everyone raving about this or that pricey perfume, and I inevitably hate it and go back to my less expensive essential oils, tropical white florals, and vanillas. I’ll continue on my quest to find my signature scent, but it’s not looking promising.

Mostly I’m just trying to get caught up on the previous list of review to do. And, hopefully, next month will be better.