Today I cleaned our furnace air cleaner filters, attended an American Legion Executive Board meeting, got a haircut, had a couple of naps, and watched a fun high school soccer game, in that order. Oh, and I got my new iPad Pro, too.

First, the filters. I have to do this every month because Diane puts it on the calendar. She knows that I check my calendar every day and am pretty good about doing things listed on the calendar, especially when they are preceded by my name. Like, “Jerrie – Cleans Filters”. The first time I saw that I wasn’t sure what filters I was supposed to clean so I didn’t do it. That, of course, resulted in punishment for Failure To Comply. I quickly learned what filters were involved and have faithfully complied ever since. Now, how I clean them is up to me. Sometimes I just vacuum them off, sometimes I use my air compressor and blow all the dirt in the neighbor’s yard. Or, out into the yard. Other times, like today, I hosed them all down and left them to dry in the hot afternoon sun. Everything dried except for the two big honeycomb things that go on the bottom of the stack. So, I left them in the yard, on a chair, facing the setting sun with a soft summer breeze blowing directly into the little damp holes. That was 8 hours ago and they’re still out there. In the cold damp, dark, night. Guess I won’t be putting them in until tomorrow morning some time. I’d go out and get them, but I don’t want to. I can only hope that some weirdo filter thief doesn’t show up and take them.

Our American Legion Executive Board meeting has historically been held at 10 which is just a little late for breakfast and a little early for lunch. Today it was at 11, making lunch more likely. I had breakfast. Now, calling this the Executive Board sounds a little elegant for our small group, but that’s technically what it is. I must attend because I’m the Sgt. At Arms, keeper of the peace. Yeah, I thought it was funny, too, when they voted me into that position. I actually volunteered to do it because I knew it didn’t involve a lot of manual labor or memory recall. That, and no one else wanted to do it. That was last year. No one else wanted to do it this year either, so I still have the little thing on my hat proclaiming my position. Maybe I’ll do it again next year if things stay calm. At the EBoard meetings everyone else conducts actual business. I just eat and vote when necessary. I voted 3 times today.

After the meeting I got home in time to participate in a haircut marathon involving Diane’s Mom, Jean, Diane, Jewel, and me. We were all in line for a touch-up from the Traveling Hair Dresser which is pretty handy, let me tell you. We just do a little Rock Paper Scissors to see who goes first, then the hair cutter gets right to work and hair starts flying all over the place. Logic says we’d do this outside, on the porch, but it actually takes place on the dining room carpet. Diane likes doing it there because she has this incredible vacuum cleaner that sucks up hair like crazy. We know because we pick up tons of dog hair every week and look at them in wonder, like “I wonder why the dogs aren’t bald?” They actually lose 3 dogs worth of hair every month. I don’t know how they do that. So, picking up a little bit of gray hair from some old people once every couple of months is no big deal.

I had the next to last haircut because Diane told me to get in the chair. I didn’t lose much because it was cut pretty short the last time I had a haircut. Like a buzz cut. Really short. After that I was really tired so stretched out on the sofa and took a few naps while waiting for the next event of the day. I had more than one nap because continuity was interrupted by the UPS lady who delivered my new iPad Pro, an email from Jimbo wanting to know when we were going to go golfing again, a phone call from John to arrange a golf date, and various other noises throughout the afternoon. The result of all the interruptions is that I’m obliged to go golfing three times next week. That’s unheard of for me because nine holes a week is usually my limit. Now I’m going to do 36. Should be interesting. Wonder if I’ll get better as the week goes on. I also wonder if I’ll be able to walk by the end of the week. We’ll see.

During some of my awake time I set up my new iPad. Diane said I needed a new one because the screen on the old one is cracked a little from an injury it received from a drop that I have no memory of. Interesting. One I make the transition to the new unit I’m going to set it up for Diane’s Mom, Jean so she can use it. She doesn’t know this yet and we already know it’s going to be a hard sell because she thinks things like the iPad are too complicated for her to use. We think once she sees what it can do she’ll have a changed of heart. She’ll be connected to the world and will be able to follow Diane and me during our travels, getting all the fancy photos we include sometimes. And Facebook! That will really yank her eyes open. Diane will set up a new Facebook page for Mom. She conquered the Comcast remote control so we’re confident she can handle an iPad and all the notifications one gets on Facebook. Should be fun.

In the evening, before the sun set, we headed for the St. Helens High School soccer field to watch our Lady Lions play against the Astoria Fishermen. Now, right away I saw a problem with the Astoria team name. I mean, this is a team of young ladies and they still call them Fishermen. Shouldn’t they be Fishergirls, Fisherladies, or a more generic Fisherpeople? That would certainly be the case if the ACLU ever hears about this. That’s an opinion, of course. The ACLU might not give a hoot. What’s happened with all the PC stuff about gender specific tags? Whatever … our girls played a great game, for the most part, and won 2-0. The score should have been more like 15-0 because our girls kicked the ball over the opposing net about 13 times. In the second half Lydia, our goalie, only got to touch the ball whenever one of her team mates kicked it to her. Oh, there were a couple of close calls, but Lyd fended them off with the help of her best defender, Ceiarra. Morgan, the first half goalie did a lot of standing around, too, and made some good stops to keep Astoria scoreless.

At the game we were blessed with the presence of the lovely Georgie and her lovely Mom Jacqui. I just learned that she reads this stuff so had to name her. Georgie graduated and we miss seeing her play. She’s very good. Just saying. Rumor has it that Georgie and family will be moving to England at some undisclosed future date where she will attend college and major in soccer. We believe this is possible for her because of the uncanny life-like British accent her Mom uses. And, more probably, because  her Mom is really British and they have lots of family still in the Old Country. We look forward to their move so we will have a place to stay when we visit England one day.

It’s almost Eleventy PM now and everyone else in the house is already in bed. I’m watching a recording of the Denver Broncos Carolina Panthers game. Looks like the Jags are going to take it home so I can probably just fast forward to the end of the game to see the final score and go to bed myself. After all, the dogs will undoubtedly wake me up in about 5 hours. Yes, they’ve been edging the time back closer to 4 am lately. I can hardly ignore them since Ozzie is on the bed and he fronts for the big dogs by licking whatever isn’t under the covers until I get up. Consequently, I’m careful about what I leave exposed when I close my eyes for the night, which is just what I’m going to do now.

G’nite.