Random 5 for June 14 – Face masks, more masks, jobs, diets, free stuff

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An idea! – This morning as I was trying to communicate through a face mask to my barista I had (what I thought was an original) an idea. My hearing isn’t great and I read lips to compensate. Works most of the time. In this day of face masks there are no lips to read. If only they could come up with a see-through mask so you could read lips. All plastic would be hot and yucky. I googled it and yes there are places that sell these kinds of masks. The problem is that I need other people to wear them.

Speaking of masks – When we initially had to wear them (a hundred years ago), I quickly made four for us out of what I had on hand (an old nightgown and some elastic). I thought it would be fun to get some with cute patterns. I went on-line and most had shipping dates three months out. My sincere hope is that I won’t be wearing these forever so I didn’t pursue that cute one with cats on it. Eventually I was able to buy a box of disposable ones which are more comfortable. Still, I yearn for that sweet cat mask I saw.

There are jobs – During this great economic downturn we’ve had some great news in the family. My grandniece has found a new job. It’s not a “make do” job but one in her field. Miracles do happen and opportunities are out there. Just not a lot of them.

Source: Good Housekeeping

Diet styles come and go — Someone I know from my working days way back has always been into healthy eating. Some would say obsessed but he has a reason. His family has a history of heart disease. Bad heart disease with early deaths. He’s always been on low carbs. (I can’t even imagine that!) He’s on a keto diet now with periodical fasting and cleanses. I recently read that fasting for 10 to 16 hours a day is a thing. I’ve done that most of my life. I never eat after dinner. I don’t have anything until after 8 a.m. and that’s just coffee. (Not an early breakfast eater.) That’s about 13 hours of fasting every night. I don’t do it for any reason except that I’ve never snacked in the evening even as a child. (Thank you mom for accidentally instilling good eating habits.) My snack time is 3 p.m. I am always shocked when my “normal routine” is the diet du jour! And no, I’m not curtailing carbs. For me it’s the same as chocolate – a drug used to medicate when things so wonky. You would not like me off of carbs.

Free things that don’t work – Sometimes a business will advertise “buy this and get a $50 gift card for dining out.” What they don’t tell you is that it’s only good for restaurants you don’t like. Our new health insurance gives us $50 of “free drugstore stuff” every quarter. Sounds good doesn’t it? It’s not as good as it sounds. The items are limited as are the brands. It doesn’t include things we like. At the moment we have enough cotton balls and Pepto-Bismal to last a lifetime. What would have been useful is to allow us to use it for drugstore things “we actually use!” What a novel thought. I shouldn’t complain. We have stocked up on band-aids, boo-boo cream (for cuts), and other things that we didn’t need. I have had a $50 restaurant card for two years from the last time I signed up with a warehouse store. Still waiting for a place I can use it.

So how was your week?

 

 

 

 

77 thoughts on “Random 5 for June 14 – Face masks, more masks, jobs, diets, free stuff”

  1. Cheers for the job grab. That’s wonderful!
    That’s a cute mask…winter is coming and that won’t be hot then..sigh. Even if it’s not 3 layers, you can always put it on top of a disposable one – to look cute…in very cold weather (double sigh).
    As we were sitting outside on the patio yesterday, husband had a great idea “You could silk screen dog faces on cloth – like the bikers have those skeleton bug don’t-mess-with-me masks and..” He wouldn’t believe me it was already a thing…Google is good. He’s still toying with the idea of cutting up one of those big water jugs and slipping it over to rest on shoulders…and with the heat somehow putting filtered vents in…maybe a small exhaust fan….HAHA..social isolation creates goofy!

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  2. My mom said no snacks before or after dinner – one would ruin my appetite and the other would make bad dreams if I ate too late. (Hmm – she also said if I ate bread crusts I’d have curly hair and it was a ploy to eat the whole piece of toast or sandwich.) I do the same thing now … having Pepperidge Farm Goldfish in the house is not smart for me, as I will eat them just because they are there. I saw an ad for Vistaprint flat into my screen a while back and it featured a cat print. I assumed you got one by then. I had looked at the masks as they have a removable filter which I thought was a good idea. Here is the cat mask – it’s not for kids (it may look like it is) as there is an adult male wearing one in the ad and they ship by June 19th:
    https://www.vistaprint.com/masks/all/cat/

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  3. I had to tell someone recently that I was smiling at them because how would they ever know?! Being able to see someone’s mouth would certainly help. We’ve since found an inexpensive and reliable source for quality masks, which is a good thing since the elastic my wife ordered three months ago still hasn’t arrived! Congrats to your grandniece on the job. – Marty

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  4. Good Morning, Kate! Agree with others that the mask is cute. I seem to do best with the disposable 3-ply with metal band for nose. I hope we aren’t wearing them at Christmas but my little voice says yes. Congrats to your grandniece! I never thought that I fasted but don’t eat anything from 6:30 in the pm till 8:30 in the morning when I have a bowl of bran. I do drink water though.

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    • I don’t think water counts but then again, I don’t know how these things work. I find the disposables more comfortable than the cloth ones I made. Maybe other styles are more comfortable. I haven’t seen many cute masks but I’m not out very often.

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  6. This week’s wierd. Some more shops can open today. Our local factory overstock shop is giving a free Easter egg if you spend more than £40.00. I am not sure I want one in June.

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    • I haven’t seen any freebies but then again, I haven’t seen any Easter supplies either. Shops with an outdoor entrance (not an ‘in the mall’ entrance) can open here with distancing guidelines. Some have and some haven’t. No hair salons yet though. There have been rumors that maybe June 26. We’ll see.

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      • No hair salons for us either or restaurants though some have become takeaways. One unexpecteday consequence is that I can’t get marmite for my husband as the pubs are shut and they are not brewing beer.

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  8. About those masks…I made two. You would think as much as I sew I would have made dozens. They aren’t as easy as it looks. My machine wanted to chew the fabric. And – when I went to get my haircut yesterday, I couldn’t tell if Carmel was laughing or frowning at my mess of hair! 😂 probably a bit of both.
    That cat mask is adorable!

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    • Many sewers were selling them locally. If you had elastic on hand and fabric (all the stores that carry that were closed), you could make some money. Most were going for $4-$5 which is cheaper than the cloth ones on-line. When I made ours I was hoping that this was a very temporary thing but maybe not. Anyhow I much prefer the disposable ones. They seem lighter and the elastic is better than what I had.

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      • I haven’t ventured out much but had to wear one for my eye appointment a few weeks ago. I was at the point where I couldn’t see with my contacts so I had to go! 😂 I’m going to look for some disposable ones because I don’t see this shutting down too soon.

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        • I was lucky. I bought on Amazon and received in a few days with Amazon Prime. Since then I have seen them in packs at BJ’s Warehouse. A 50 mask box should last a long time. I use them more than once since I never use for more than a half hour at a time.

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  9. Originally I tried to use bandanas with hair ties, but my ears are small and so they don’t stay hooked. Then I got ahold of some disposable KN95s, and those have worked ok, but I need the washable kind. I ordered a couple from Amazon. One came today. Not that spectacular Sure doesn’t look thick enough. Pretty sure spit will go through it. ANNOYING. Where are other people getting these cute effective looking masks?!

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  10. That is a cute mask. I made some masks in the beginning too. I had to cut up an elasti from old pajama pants because the stores near me were out of elastic. I wish I had good habits like you. I am awful with snacks at night.

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    • Even when I was a kid we didn’t snack at night. My husband doesn’t either. He doesn’t eat dessert unless we are at a friend’s house for dinner and they serve it. Mid afternoon is my time to get the munchies. Sometimes I crave salt (potato chips) and sometimes it’s chocolate.

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  11. That cat mask is so cute! I ordered a big box full of disposable masks from Amazon a couple of months ago. It took a long time to arrive, but now I’m set.

    Congratulations to your grandniece. It’s hard for young people to find a job they were trained for. My grandchildren were lucky. One graduated from college in 2019, the other two years earlier.

    I too need my carbs and my chocolate. I feel so much better after an afternoon snack. People who go on a diet like the keto diet say they feel great on it. Maybe I would, but I can’t seem to do it long enough to find out.

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    • I have IBS-D so the keto diet wouldn’t work for me. I have to limit nuts and some raw vegetables and I’m not a big meat eater. I’ve never had a weight issue but going low carb would not be my first choice. There are healthy carbs.

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  12. My week was kind of nutty, and next week will be too. But that is OK. Into each life a little nuttiness must fall 😉
    I was kind of stalling on the masks myself, but finally resigned myself that this situation wasn’t going to end anytime soon, so I ordered us some from a shop on Etsy. They took a month to get here, but it was worth it. I was debating between fancy fun ones and just plain ones. But the fancy fun ones had a delivery date a couple months out, like the one you were thinking about. So just plain ones is what I got. I’m still a little sorry I passed up the fancy ones 🙂

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  13. Those big area-specific coupon books often sold as fund raisers are usually Buy One Get One at restaurants, shows, etc Since some of us are live alone and have no problem with that, a nice alternative to BOGO or – get one meal or ticket at half price. But no, can’t do that.

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  15. That is my issue with giftcards generally. If they are given to me for someplace I go, then Yeah! But so every so often my company hands out gift cards to a Dept store I haven’t been to in 10 years or restaurant I’ve no interest in. It’s like handing me nothing. Rather what the promotional gift cards are – nothing.
    Last year I whispered into the ear of the girl who buys the cards – I said I preferred a Kroger gift card. I will ALWAYS find a use for a Kroger gift card.
    Although, I imagine anyone who knows you knows you want a Starbucks gift card. 🤣

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    • Definitely on Starbucks. When I worked we would often give out gift cards for things. I always made sure it was for a local lunch place so people could use it. One time they did gas cards. We had employees who used buses and didn’t have a car. The thought was that they could give them as gifts. Like you said, it’s like getting nothing.

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  16. I live in a small borough that has one fast food chain restaurant and some regular independent restaurants – all of which are casual places. I have to go 15 + miles to a chain restaurant, which is also casual. So those restaurant gift cards don’t attract me in any way. I agree that it would be nice if you could get what you use at a pharmacy, but…. there are homeless shelters and many are for women and children. I know they could benefit if you donated the excess of items you have and don’t need.

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  17. I also think that you should get the cute cat face mask.
    The masks that I’ve been wearing now are the ones that I had bought in 2002-3 when I lived in Beijing during SARS. No expiry date! (And I greatly appreciated not needing try to buy maks this past March).

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  18. I made my own mask, but also ordered one from a local designer. It’s a blue paisley design.
    I ordered a box of disposable masks a month ago, but still haven’t received them. I think we’ll still be wearing masks well into the fall here. I have the same problem as you, not being able to understand what some people are saying.

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  19. I won a £10 gift card at Bingo and there was only one store on it that I’d use. It was a good job I checked before I purchased, as they had ceased to ccept that card two years previously, I eventually got to use it in a DIY store towards some batten that Hubby wanted for a job. I did write to the issuing company and never got a reply, so went into the Post Office which was selling them……. or were, because they’d had so many complaints, they’d stopped.

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  20. We’ve managed to avoid most outings that require wearing masks for any length of time. I have a soft voice (apparently… I wasn’t aware of it before) that doesn’t carry well through two layers of cloth. Anyway, my husband often has to “translate” for me so the grocery checker can understand. I’ve tried to raise my voice, but I feel like I am shouting.

    I think you should order the cat mask… I have a feeling we will be wearing them for quite a while.

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  21. When it comes to masks, I wish there was a defroster (as well as a clear panel where you can read lips). Wearing glasses whenever I’m outdoors guarantees fog for most of the dog walks. I don’t need the reminder that life is in a general fog around my face.

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  22. I’m still waiting on my hummingbird mask I ordered on April 18th. The seller has my money, but has dropped off the internet. Amazon hasn’t been much help…live and learn. Congrats to your grandniece! I’m a firm believer that good can rise out of bad situations.

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    • Who thought I’d be a trendsetter with my eating habits? I have IBS so I’m careful with what I eat but the keto diet (other than it being low carb which would make me cranky) would not be good for my gut.

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  24. That mask is adorable. One of the stylists at the salon on Friday had a black one with sequins.

    I put in a fall leaves order from my friend who makes masks two months ago. She said the fabric was already sold out! But she was able to buy some winter snowflake fabric.

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  25. The masks really have made it difficult to hear cashiers and especially since most of them are behind a thick plastic barrier yet too. It does bring to ones attention how much we relied on reading or at least seeing lip movement. If it makes you feel any better, I’ve been told by many of them they are in the same boat.

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