As Time Goes By

Got a quick start today with breakfast and Paw Patrol. They're trying to figure out a song for "The Pups' Winter Wonder Show," but there's more immediate problems on hand. They first have to help repair the Winter Wonder Show stage when a girder is accidentally knocked over, then save the dancing penguins from Mayor Humdinger, who wants them to dance for him. Meanwhile, Tracker, who normally lives in the jungle, takes his time getting used to this cold white stuff.

Called Uber after the cartoon ended and I made my grocery list. No trouble with Uber at all today, other than some long waits. I had to wait 10 minutes to get to the Westmont Acme and 11 to get back from the Thomas Sharp School. At least there was no traffic anywhere, and only the ride home from the School took longer than 5 minutes (due to the icy roads in West Collingswood). 

I'm going to continue to shop at only the Westmont Acme until it finally warms up and my knee feels better. Neither my knee nor the weather are up to stops at multiple stores. Thankfully, it wasn't insanely busy this time. There's still a few empty spots on the shelves, but they've mostly restocked after the mess last week. It doesn't sound like we're going to get anything from the next storm, either. I think it's mostly going to hit Cape May and Atlantic Counties. I restocked apples, oranges, yogurt, granola bars, granola, coconut milk, and probiotic soda. Had online coupons for free peanut butter and tissues. Got golden raisins here, since I don't know when I'm going to get back to Sprouts. Grabbed bagels for lunch later this week, and a pack with grapes, pretzel chips, and two turkey and cheese sliders on Hawaiian rolls for lunch today. Found cranberry scones on the bakery clearance rack for a treat. 

When I got home, I went straight into lunch and Remember WENN. "From the Pen of Gertrude Reece" is one of my two favorite episodes of the entire series. Gertie proudly shows Betty her first radio script...which turns out to be a parody of Casablanca, "Rendezvous In Rabat." Scott is Rick, Betty is Ilsa, Victor Comstock is Victor Lazlo, Mr. Eldridge is Carl the waiter, Maple takes the place of the bar singer and the desperate refugees, Mackie is Major Renault, Hilary as Rick's previous girlfriend, C.J as the bartender and a young Nazi officer, Jeff as the waiter/pickpocket, and Mr. Foley, of all people, as a German officer. Like the real Casablanca, Gertie doesn't have an ending to her play. She and Hilary offer up several suggestions, none of which Betty approves of. Betty starts typing which man she thinks her character ought to be with before she finally tells Gertie it's better to draw your own conclusions.

"Eugenia Bremer, Master Spy" also involves espionage. Desmond Quist, a British intelligence officer (Daniel Davis) insists that there are still codes going out over the airwaves. He has the cast paraphrase their scripts, then removes the sound effects. He effortlessly charms sweet middle-aged organist Eugenia (Mary Stout) after having overheard what sounds like conversations in German. Eugenia does have a reason for those conversations, and they're nothing like Quist thinks they are.

Got my schedule for next week at this point as well. In good news, more hours, and I don't think I'll need to call out all weekend this time. In bad news, an extra day on Friday means two days of rushing between jobs instead of one. My knee still isn't feeling right, and it's only going to be slightly warmer next week. 

(I also discovered at this point that my tax return money showed up more than two weeks early. Sweet! Most of it will probably go into my rent.) 

Called Uber at 20 after 2 for a ride to the School. I had a hard time getting a driver and was five minutes late. Once again, we didn't have that many kids. I only had six in my group today, and I think there were 19 younger ones all together. At least they were better-behaved in the bathroom today. It was the library where there were problems. One of the boys grabbed another and knocked him off his chair while they were building with magnetic tiles. Later, one of the littlest girls ran over to me in tears. Another girl wanted to look at books instead of playing with her. I led her to the bristle blocks and built with her instead, assuring her that her friend was just doing something else, and she'd play with her later or tomorrow. 

When I got home, I went straight into dinner and Match Game Syndicated. Most of the episodes finished off the 1980 season opener week. Gene dragged out the guy who was supposed to be in the Audience Match box when he forgot and didn't open the question. Charles spent his first week back dodging jokes about the flop play he'd just appeared in and complaining about sitting "with the other patients."

Finished the night with Murder She Wrote. It's a "Deadline For Murder" when Jessica goes to argue with the nasty owner of a newspaper about a libelous article he printed on her, only to be pushed away. She later witnesses the man's death at a cocktail party when he keels over after drinking liquor. Turns out, the liquor was combined with a certain drug he took for his heart. Jessica's friend who wrote the original, non-libelous interview on her before having a heart attack convinces her to follow-up on his boss' death.