Vince Guaraldi, Good Grief Cell Phone Replacement, This Toe Tag

This toe and no further.

I am soaking my toe as I pull together my notes for this week's blog post. I have been suffering from an ingrown nail for way too long. I have so much else going on with my body; the pain of it has been secondary. But I have a new belief system this year. Imagine Gandalf laying down the law for the demon. It goes like this. "I don't need to deal with one more thing going wrong with my body."  This toe and no further! No matter how minor, I will get a new pain or hurt fixed in the future. This is best-practices for any age.

My Foot Doctor admonished me to soak my foot twice daily in Epson salt. A google search of the teachings says baking soda or sea salt are suitable substitutes. I will get Epson salt and baking soda this afternoon because I had to raid the fridge soda freshener box for baking soda. Another rule this year is "Never run out of the item you need nor its substitute."

Now A Warning?

Treating the ingrown nail was painless and took less than 20 minutes from numbing to a giant bandage around my toe. The nurse put a tag around the offending toe to ensure they worked on the correct toe. I had to joke that they were already toe-tagging me for the morgue. Then came the warning. Yes, now a warning. Do not get into a hot tub after toenail surgery in Las Vegas or anywhere else. Some patient, previous to me, lost their toe in that scenario. Sorry I did not think to film my procedure. I am sure it would be a significant hit on Youtube.com. #keckhospitalofusc

Out with the old and in with the used.

I outlived another cell phone. I did not want to commit to two more years for a replacement. So I found a cheaper used model sold by Amazon. I bought a used Galaxy S20 and handset insurance for about 2/3 less than a similar used S20 from Verizon. The extra hurdle I had to jump through was to pick up a new sim card from  the Verizon corporate store in Koreatown. It was free. I made an appointment in advance, and  the process took about 10 minutes in and out the door. #verizonkoreatown My phone already had software to copy my data to the new  handset. I would say that process took about 20 minutes. Notes, apps, et all are now loaded and working on the new phone. Now a bonus? Amazon gave me $35 for my old galaxy s8. I bought a wireless headset, a new case, and screen protectors with my $35 bucks. Two downsides, First, the new phone does not have a headset jack, hence the wireless headset purchase. Secondly, some of the existing apps were copied over, but I need to remember my login and passwords.

Vince Guaraldi and All that Jazz

I have been listening to a ton of soft jazz to stay loose and relaxed during the day. One station on Pandora that gets play time is Vince Guaraldi. He is famous for the music used in the Peanuts Cartoons. My husband wondered out loud what kind of man Vince was, so I wanted to know too. He was a San Francisco native and well known among the local Jazz community. I found a charming documentary about him. However, it seems to be rare. The clips make it look like a whole lot of fun. He died too young, in his forties. He exposed several generations to jazz through the Charlie Brown cartoon soundtracks. People who didn't even know they were listening to jazz learned to love the music. My dad had a reel-to-reel copy of Vince Guaraldi's music we played repeatedly.