During the Ford/Carter energy crisis my father would keep the thermostat set to 68 and tell us it was patriotic to freeze.  Our house was a corner one and all the wind in the neighborhood seemed to settle into it.

So began my long history of living in wind chambers.  When I moved off Fifth on 63rd Street, at 25 in 76,  I didn’t need AC as my building had a lot of marble, and I lived on the first floor.  I had the first ceiling fans anybody heard of in Manhattan.  Bought on the Bowery when the Bowery was the Bowery.

Oh yes I’m one of those New Yorkers.  I will never be ashamed of loving the city the most in the 70′s to around 85.  It was affordable.  It was fun.  I heard it was dangerous but never felt the danger no matter where I went.  I lived in that apartment until 91 and only had AC the last year as my super gave me a unit somebody was throwing out.  It just wasn’t important to me.  Neither was TV.  A good stereo with analog speakers was of primary importance.  I began collecting CD’s years before I could afford to buy an actual player.

Though my apartment was warmer than the average apartment nobody refused an invite basically because I threw great parties, always or often had food, always had liquor as I only drank with company and found out early in life that people would bring liquor we would drink then so the good stuff, mine, would be saved for special occasions.

Oh any night on East 63rd was special.  I remember when my ex best friend Shelby came back from a cruise to the former Soviet Union.  A professor famed for his film lectures invited her.  She only had to design a brochure and didn’t have to sleep with him or in the same room.

I know because she took me to his office to do the negotiating.  What do you say to a weird man who had noticed her when she walked into the auditorium for the first film, came up to her after class, and asked her if she would like to go for a drink?  He did this in full view of the hundreds of girls who were gaga over him for reasons I never understood except that he knew many film stars.

I said something brilliant like: “So Shelby’s going to design a brochure?”

“Yes.”

“And her payment’s going to be her own room on your cruise to Finland, Leningrad etc?”  Well I didn’t say “etc.,” and was dying to say “but why can’t I be Shelby’s roommate?”  I didn’t.

I remember how uncomfortable we all were in his office.  I remember thinking that I hated playing Rhoda to Shelby’s Mary.  With most other girls I was Mary.

I remember hating Shelby because she was so beautiful and bright yet was an incredible bitch without any empathy or feelings for anybody but herself.  I had met her during Viet Nam.  She never protested.

We shouldn’t have been friends.  Yet like lovers who weren’t good for each other we circled around one another for 20 years.

She hated the cruise.  Joel Gray, Colleen Dewhurst, and many incredible stars were on it.  Shelby hung out with Cindy Williams (Laverne on Laverne & Shirley)  I remember thinking well she was the only one anywhere near our age–though older of course

The night after she came back from the cruise she came to my apartment with a lot of presents, which was totally out of character for her, and a large bottle of Stoli.  We sat and drank shots.  Neither of us realized that real Russian Stoli basically tastes like water.  Well Shelby might have but she liked seeing me get drunk since I did because it was the 70′s but didn’t really enjoy.  Oh I did but hated the next day.

No she really didn’t realize as when we stood up we fell down.  We got up laughing.  I had what looked like a large stick by my front door.  It was called a police lock and weighed at least 25 pounds.  You could kill somebody with that stick.

Shelby decided to play with it.  It fell down.  The super who hated me on general principle and was always cutting off my electricity, cut off my electricity and came up to curse me out.  I had an ability to straighten myself out really quickly and threatened him with the police if he didn’t put my electricity on.  He threatened me with bodily harm but acquiesced.

Shelby couldn’t stop laughing.  We fell onto my sofa bed, passed out and went out around noon the next day for hangover food and Bloody Mary’s.  Some guys came over and we let them pay for our brunch.

I was always amazed when guys would say “you know, your friend is beautiful but there’s something about you that’s just so….”  And two thirds of the time they did

I have no idea what this has to do with living in wind chambers except that I was living in one then and my house now has the thermostat set to 68 basically because I’m cheap)

“If you don’t act now the account will be closed.”   “What do you mean?  You will close my account?”  “No I meant to say ‘the meeting will be adjourned.’ “   It’s a proxy meeting and I won’t bore you with specifics.

Explain please how a person would say the first sentence when she meant the “meeting will be adjourned.”  I have been continually harassed by a company hired by a fund company.  Continually as in three calls in the past two days all saying the sentences in the above paragraph.  There were more calls but I hung up.  Why am I the one person in America both to answer her phone and not hang up immediately?  Why?

It’s not that I thought they were going to abscond with my money.  It’s that they use the same verbiage in repeated calls.  And there is a second of fear.  I’m an idiot.  I admit it.

I’m beyond angry. I try to let anger fly away.  Unless used for a greater purpose it only serves to give people heart attacks and strokes–as my stock broker could attest to.  He had  massive heart failure a few months ago after having lost most of his money and much of his clients money.  I felt sorry for him.  I know.  I know.  But the world changed and it wasn’t his fault.

Most of us have had our lives changed in the past few years.  These calls were directly made to play on fear.  “Single woman, lives in South Carolina.  Call her until she breaks.”   Most women I have met here are very strong.  They do have that steel magnolia thing going.

I’m a  New Yorker and we yell.  And yell.  And yell.  I refuse to fall into that though maybe it would be healthy for me.

I’m going to file formal complaints with both the SEC and the FCC.  My brokerage house doesn’t want me to.  I have to ask: why?  Is there something beyond minor harassment in those calls?

Though I have made good friends and can’t complain about my life here, I’m feeling very alone.  I would probably feel that way in New York right now.  Having bag lady fears is normal, I know, though I have less to worry about in that area than many women, I do.  It isn’t a giant amount of money but it will pay my expenses for many months or a great trip.  I would like to keep it.

Those phone calls were designed to play on my fears. I had asked them not to call me.  I specifically said, “I don’t want anybody from First Widget Trust calling me anymore.”  Once you say that legally they can’t call. They ignored that.  I feel violated.  I feel as if somebody peered into my soul and decided that I’m somebody who can be screwed with.  (According to my brokerage company, nobody else who has this fund–my one fund, I hate them–has been getting more than one call from First Widget Trust, and none have had that script read to them.  It’s a script you’ll remember.)  When a man called at 8:55 last night I said “I told you not to call me anymore.”  He said “you didn’t tell me.”  “You’re right.  I said “….from First Widget…” He hung up.  The law is that specific and I respect that.

I need winter to end.  I didn’t move to the beach for endless freezing weather.  My heating broke last week.  Fortunately I can keep it on “emergency.”  Unfortunately that’s very expensive.  Unfortunately Trane is back ordered at least a month.  Fortunately it’s under warranty.

My health insurance premium went up 37.6% a month.  Nobody has ordered a moratorium on my increase, as President Obama did in California for 1.4% more.  Is California superior to South Carolina?  Are we going to be punished because South Carolina didn’t go Democrat?  (I have given up on caring about any political party in this country.  I have always liked Obama, and thought at first his conciliatory politics marked a new era.  Now I think he needs to develop some cajones.

These are all minor things but they add up.

Sometimes I need to blog things to get over the feeling.  I hate this need.

When Bone posts about Paul Krugman I will do a real post again.

I meant for this to be a vacation week.  I learned more about heating coils and emergency heat than I ever wanted to know.  One of the amphibians, (the other amphibian or TOA,) died.  I named the other Clinton, in honor of _ _Clinton.  Clinton, never Clint, seems to like being master of his domain.  I’m living in fear that the biosphere was damaged and…..This is why I can’t have a dog.  I can’t even take the death of TOA.

I have streaming netflick.  When it actually streams it’s incredible.  Pandora, where you make your own radio stations, is OK, just OK.  However YouTube on TV–you might never hear from me again.

I hope I can still write.  I fear that wisdom might come with aging (not mine) but words don’t.  Then again…I’m starting to use a tape recorder and will buy one that can be plugged into the computer, maybe.  I so hate the sound of my voice.  It sounds like preppy whispering winds.  Yuck.

This week is tax week.  It’s the first time I’m going to attempt to do it on my own.  The screaming you will hear…..I’m trying to be positive.  As I’m trying to be positive, and say I can write this book because I have other books in me but this is the one I know I can sell and the one that needs to be written.  Well I’m not sure I can sell it but….

I know ya’all tired of my complaining so….

My sister called the other night to tell me to watch this.  We grew up to music from the civil rights era; it was the only music sung at our camp.  Our parents didn’t like most music (don’t ask) but made sure we knew about Paul Robeson and Marion Robinson.  I realize now our parents gave us an incredible gift.  I can’t imagine not having grown up in a family where equal rights for everyone wasn’t a given.

watch?v=OwDhFsrpJH0

My sister’s amazed I know so much about football but I’ve watched every episode, before Season 4 which hasn’t been on cable yet, of Friday Night Lights. I thought I was learning about life but I was learning about football also.

And I have spent more than five years hearing about football from Bone. We first became friendly during Katrina so The Saints win is very appropriate.

Only two words will do:  WOW!  WOOT!!!

I recognize and accept that somethings in my life will always be impossible for me to do.  I understand I will have to spend the rest of my life explaining why I don’t drive; that hardware and learning things such as HTML might as well be advanced physics and calculus.

But damn when I pay for things I want them to work.  I don’t want to spend a year staring at an incredibly beautiful shower that cost thousands of dollars plus I bought a new water heater for more pressure when the pressure is abysmal.  I use the upstairs shower I spent nothing on.  Then the plumber caused floods after he told me I had pin hole floods.  The floods were a few days later and he didn’t return my calls for days.  Said he didn’t have my numbers.  I know I left them but maybe he didn’t get them.

I want the netflick DVD player to work–after two tech calls that did cost me money.  I don’t want the cable company to constantly tell me “it’s your TV” when I had the Geek Squad come and check it out.

Getting things done properly costs money and I’m willing to spend the money but only if everything works when finished or after the service call.

I guess it’s time to face facts.  Do the techs really work or decide that I’m a ditz and therefore…?  Does the plumber feel no responsibility for causing floods, that cost me almost a thousand to fix?  I’m not even talking about the pressure because I’m a single woman who has non verbal learning disabilities (NLD)?   It might be an invisible disability but sometimes I feel that I wear a sign around my head “ditz,” “idiot,” “don’t take her seriously.”

Not having the social problems that so many people with NLD have might make it worse because I don’t expect to be treated poorly.  And, honestly, lately I can’t tell if I’m experiencing a series of stupid problems that anybody would experience–and be bitchier than I am being, threaten to sue–maybe even go through with the law suit. Or are these problems specific to me?

I can watch the movies on my computer but why did I buy a TV and DVD player then?  Am I wrong for caring?  And damn I want that shower working properly.  It’s Eldon’s responsibility and I told him I don’t want to involve him in a law suit but he didn’t spend the money nor does he spend a half hour a day staring at a thing of beauty that just can’t get itself it together.