Rosemary Kirstein

Nice thing #1:

I spent the last weekend of October hanging with some long-time friends at the home of one couple now living in Newport, Rhode Island. It was the annual Fall Hike gathering,  and I have to say it was just wonderful to see everyone.  Especially one couple in particular, who live much further away from me than the others, who I so rarely get to see.  And who also don’t participate in social media at all, so I have no easy way to keep up to date on their lives…

(For those of you not from the United States, Rhode Island is not actually an island.  They just call it that.  Why?  I have no idea.)

Newport is lovely, and the hosts’ house is gorgeous, and welcoming — and right near the water.

Across the street. And, on the far side of that bit of water you see there: Mansions of the rich and infamous.

I didn’t take any useful pictures of the hike along the Cliff Walk, as they call it, because I was too busy chatting to pals.

Mansion to the right. Mansion to the left. What do I take a picture of? That tree.

It was great.  Lots of good food, excellent conversation, plenty of wine.

Crappy thing #1:

I came down with a horrendous cold on Saturday night, and spent the next day dosed up on Nyquil, while everyone else had fun.

And I’ve still got it.  The entire week was all Dayquil, Nyquil and occasional excursions into MucinexD.  I was functional in a low-level sort of way, thanks to modern cold meds, but I’m ready for this to be over, now.

However:

Nice thing#2: Florida!

The sister of a friend needs a house-sitter in Florida, while she takes an extended visit with her daughter’s family in Oregon.  Sabine and I are splitting the duties.  I have six whole weeks starting just before Thanksgiving, and Sabine takes over after Christmas.  The house is lovely, on a lake with wonderful birds, plus resident cat to scritch and pet — and plenty of solitude, which I’ve been needing for a long time.   But I also have friends residing in Florida, so I can visit and socialize when I’m so inclined.  This is excellent!

Crappy thing #2: The Dreaded Chores of Officialdom.

If you have health insurance through the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare), it’s time to renew.  So, I thought I’d do that.  Through the website.  Simple, right?

I won’t give you all the grim details… suffice to say that right now I’m waiting on a call from someone at AccessHealthCT, because the customer service rep I ended up speaking to on Friday had to escalate my perplexing problem to someone higher up, who did not manage get back to me on Friday.

I’m sure it will get sorted out… but it’s nerve-wracking and time-consuming until then, as I do not know what my coverage status is right now.

I basically spent all Friday night and Sunday afternoon gathering all my materials, printing out supporting documents, making extra copies, planning my explanation of what happened, and what we need to fix –  I’m tired of the whole thing, but I can’t quite let it go (in my head) until it’s resolved.

Fortunately, nice thing #3: Genrettes meeting yesterday.

It was Delia Sherman’s turn in the hot-seat, and we all had a great time discussing her work, sorting out some technological issues, plot points, etc.  And of course, just catching up on our lives.

This took a lot of the bad taste of Officaldom out of my mouth.  I love the Genrettes.   Delia Sherman and Laurie J. Marks are amazing friends to have.  (Have you read their books?  Well, you should get right on that.)

My day so far?  Well, here I am, waiting on hold with Access Health CT, coughing every few minutes with that same cold.

This is definitely not how I want to spend my day…

The mighty Quinnipiac River, not far from my office. Note traditional festive discarded tire.