Yard Sale!

Our neighborhood is having a 2 day yard sale tomorrow and Friday. We have been putting things out in the garage for days so, of course, we had to work until 9 pm tonight getting last minute things done. If we can get rid of 50% of this stuff it will be fantastic. I've already emptied 4 garbage cans of trash out of the garage. We also made a trip to the hazardous waste facility with a number of items. What a thrill! We did have one thrill; we found our old Atari 400 complete with it's cassette tape drive and some game cartridges. We still talk about getting drunk one night and playing "Frogger". You try to get your frog across a busy highway. When the frog gets hit by a car it makes this noise - I can't explain it but when you are drunk it's really funny.

Naturally summer has returned for the event. It's hot & humid; don't know if we'll make it through the whole day. Setting it up we've only worked a couple of hours at a time. Fortunately we can close down whenever we want. All it means is that we'll make a few less dollars and have a larger trash bill when we get rid of the stuff.

Wish us luck. We'll be wishing to be elsewhere! And take care out there.

It's a Beautiful Morning

Ah, morning! Don't know if I'm really a morning person but there is something amazing about the fresh smell of the morning.



I was afraid to say anything yesterday, it was so nice but this morning smells like fall might finally have come to Florida. Don't get me wrong, I love all the seasons. This summer has been long and hot but it is time for a change. It might be here.

We have the car out on the driveway but it's been there for a week and I still haven't washed & waxed it so we can sell it. Hmmmm, think I have a problem selling it? Yep! I've even kept myself awake worrying about it. It's just a THING but I'm having trouble selling it. What an idiot.

Still, it's a beautiful morning in Florida. Hope it's as wonderful where ever you are.

Photos

I like taking photos. I've been doing it since college; some good, some bad. Just like every photographer! Here are a couple I made around the house the last couple of days. First is a little lizard who seems to be making a home in the bracket that holds our flag.




The next is the shadow cast by the antenna on a radio. We have one of those light bars in the bathroom that casts multiple shadows of the same object. I just liked seeing it. Seeing is not quite the same as having our eyes open.




Have a good one! (And, yes, I am using the old laptop pc to load these since Blogger won't do it via the Mac.)

Bionic Man!

Remember the old tv series, Bionic Man? Well, I'm on my way! Had the cataract surgery last Wednesday. It all went fine; was over by noon and I seem to be recovering ok. My wife is a manic about giving me my eye drops every 4 hours. I suppose that's a good thing but it is a little scary. She isn't usually that careful about things. I finally decided to go for the standard distance lens rather than a multi-focal job. Things I read kept talking about good success with a few people and far from success with others. Much as a techno - wiz like myself would like the newest thing I also want a successful experience here, so I went for the 40 year old technology. WTF, call me a chicken.

The doctor said that he was expecting to see me again for my other eye and now that I've got the right one fixed, I can see the problems in my left eye. They gave me a little eye test and my left eye has degraded since June when I was tested last. It is noticeable even at home. I was looking at tv with my 'new' eye then my old (58 years now) one. There was a substantial yellow tint through my natural eye that wasn't there with the fake one. Yep, I guess I'll be back in a few months.

On a completely different front, I ordered a new GPS today from Amazon. I spent a LOT of time checking out handheld mapping GPS from the various manufacturers and ended up ordering a Garmin 60CSx. We'll probably be ordering the maps later but thought we'd give the base model a checkout first. No other manufacturer has a lineup as complete as Garmin. Glad that we like their products! The only hassle was that Amazon doesn't carry the car power cord. Had to order that from Garmin directly. HOPEFULLY it will be the right one.

Our daughter is visiting today. She lives about 25 miles away in St. Petersburg. She is toying with the idea of buying a house since the market seems to be down. We are offering her some suggestions without directly suggesting what she should do. I always find it better to let people make their own mistakes. Then whatever happens isn't your fault! LOL Besides, who ever takes advice? In this case, the people selling the houses are poorly ranked by the Better Business Bureau. That alone is a problem for me let alone the idea of purchasing a house in this market. Then we get going about what kind of loan she is getting, additional expenses she will be incurring, etc. I sure hope she gives it a miss.

Gotta go. Have a good one.

A Friend in Washington

Saw this guy during our walk on the beach on the Olympic Peninsula.

Back in Florida

Hello world! We got back in Florida on Thursday night. It was a great trip. Sometimes the family can get a little obnoxious but this time everything and everyone was great. We ate in 4 restaurants; only 1 was totally pretentious; service was lousy in that one and 2 others. Then we came home & went out with another couple and that place had lousy food and lousy service. Boy, I am getting to be a total grouch!

Fortunately the home made food was very good. Lots of seafood, of course, since we were visiting the Pacific Northwest. Weather was excellent as well. We got rain a couple of times but it wasn't bad at all. Went up the Hurricane Ridge in the sun then came down in as close to zero visibility as I've ever seen. I doubt we could see 30 feet at times. I was driving about 15 mph! At the end, when you finally get off the mountain, you are in Port Angeles. There is a place that was still marked with emergency tape where a motorhome went through a guardrail into a little gully and killed the driver. I've seen pictures of the wreck via some of our RVing connections. The furniture in the RV that is supposed to be fastened to the walls came off the wall and crushed the driver to death. Much as I dislike governmental rules, something needs to be done. That just shouldn't happen and the RV industry had better firm up their self-regulation or Uncle Sam is going to be doing it for them.

One set of relatives have a house on "high bank" waterfront on the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It is a very nice view but it's a climb of like 130 feet down to the beach. Our Florida flatland bodies didn't care for that much! Another set is building a new house on some Puget Sound waterfront. The lot cost $500K! They are still working and need to at that rate. I think I'll stick to cheaper houses and retirement. The third set live in a trailer. They were full-time RVers for many years but finally came to a stop on the Olympic Peninsula. They do still have a van conversion that they take various places for fishing, etc.

The animals came through their stay with their "aunt and uncle" just fine. The dog was really worried that we'd leave her again though. The cat was quiet all the way home (an hour & a half's drive). I took that to mean that he was glad to be coming home even though, being a cat, he would die before admitting he missed us. Saw the daughter yesterday, she lived through our absence as well. (She's 37, you'd kind of hope she'd make it!)

So now it's back to sorting through our stuff, selling some, giving some away, wishing we could sell the house for a reasonable sum. The four or five houses on our street that were for sale are still for sale so I'm in no hurry to get on the market. Why join a crowd of losers?

Have a good one!

Tripping

Today we are off on our first flight since 2000. We found a relative to keep the dog & cat, made our reservations and we are off to Seattle. Wife has lots of relatives around there and we lived there ourselves for several years. In fact, we each lived there when we were married to other people. That's a LONG time ago! LOL

The trip is already being stressful. US Airways cancelled our flight without telling us. We signed on to their site to get boarding passes at 22:00 last night and found there was no flight. We had a car coming for us at 06:00 so we were NOT happy about the lack of notification. We got another flight (9 hours later) and should have seats. We'll see.

Packing is interesting. We went out and got all these little bottles of shampoo & stuff. Frequent travelers know the rules but we keep having to look up if we can take this or that. I'm hoping we got it mostly right. We are getting out long pants for the first time in months. It's pretty funny. Our Florida bodies are going to be shocked by the change in temperature.

Should be back in 10 days or so. Keep safe, it's dangerous out there.

An idea

If you've read my blog much you probably know I'm an atheist. Even so, here is a bumper sticker I found on the web that I like. I'm using an old laptop pc so hopefully I can embed this image. If it doesn't work, I'll probably keep trying so hang in there.

Have a good one.

Dull times

We've had a couple of pretty dull days here in Palm (less) Harbor (less). Yesterday the big thing was to mow the back yard. It's too narrow for the yard guys to get their professional equipment back there. Today the excitement was a visit to Sam's Club. Well, actually that was a step in a direction.

I talked about my unhappiness with the cataract options given me. One option was to keep on using glasses. I went back to the optometrist at Sam's for another exam. My eyes have deteriorated in the six months since she tested me last but glasses can still bring them back to something reasonable so that's where I'm going. If I can limp along getting new glasses every six months or a year; there might be something promising on the implanted lens field when I finally MUST have it. After all, if I should live to 78 ( that's when my dad died) I'll have had them for 20 years. If I make it to 93 like my mom, then it would be 35 years! That's a long time to live with someone else's mistake. Granted they will always continue to make improvements but the current version of multi-focal-length lenses just aren't that great. Internet chat rooms suggest a 40% success rate with another 20% rating them as ok. I'd like something a little better and if I can wait a couple of years and get it; why not!

Sunday is my wife's 57th birthday. Our daughter is taking her out to dinner; just the two of them. Then they come back here for dessert. It was what my wife wanted since, if we move, she won't get to spend much one-on-one time with the kid. Right now I'm thinking berries & cream; something simple. Of course the kid probably won't eat it but if I did coconut creme pie (fav of the wife) I'm pretty sure she wouldn't eat it. She's got some weird eating habits for someone who is in her mid-thirties.

Probably won't be back until after the big celebration. Have a good weekend y'all.

Im really tired of it all

Someone sent me a link to a bunch of questions proposed by a group trying to help the US Presidential election system to a better place. One of the things they would like us to consider is internet voting. Obviously it's technically possible. It would be direct and quick; the two problems I see are 1) internet access for some and 2) only one vote per person. These objections should be pretty easy to deal with; there must be a hundred ways!

The thing is that there hasn't been a candidate that's been worth a shit in years! There is so much coverage of every tiny aspect of their lives that a 'normal' person wouldn't bother! Think about all the people who've been embarrassed by having Mexican maids who were in the country illegally. Think about the guy who went on a vacation and was photographed with a blonde on his lap. Think about how Bill Clinton was almost impeached for getting a blow job from an intern.

ALL these things were wrong. Each of the people involved were doing something either illegal or, according to our mores, immoral. The problem is that NOT ONE of those things had to do with whether or not the person might be a great president. If you put my life under that microscope, with the power and resources of every newspaper in the country behind you, I would be laughed out of the race. And I'm someone who has had maybe 6 traffic tickets in my life; served as an officer in the US Army (honorably!); have had positions requiring security clearance for most of my professional life; have NEVER performed any act that would be considered a felony (as far as I know!).

It just isn't right. If we'd like "the best and the brightest" to lead us; we have to let up on the stupid stuff and pay attention to the important stuff. Any ideas? I don't care who wins the next election, I already know they'll be a greedy, crooked bastard.

On that uplifting note; have a good one please! And definitely, take care out there.

Oops, forgot!

Forgot to mention that I put off my cataract surgery for a couple of months. Reasons: 1) I don't really like the clinic. It is a cattle call kind of place. They can afford the absolute best equipment, have practice with tons of procedures but you get no more than about 30 seconds of the doctor's time. 2) I can have either a standard fixed focus lens or (for $2500 that the insurance won't re-imburse) a multi-focal lens. Unfortunately, the web chatter that I've been reading isn't terribly reassuring that the things work (like they work 40% of the time!). 3) My optometrist said she could fit me with glasses that would delay the need for surgery. If I can put it off a few years maybe things will be clearer (if you don't mind the lousy play on words!).

Went up and checked out our trailer yesterday & today. Spent this a.m. on the roof trying to find a leak that has appeared. It's a real pain in the you know what. Guess that's why I get the big bucks. Or maybe that's why I need to take the trailer to someone and pay them the big bucks to find it. You know what cheap little me will choose don't you. Will go up later in the week after it rains to see how successful I was.

Went to the library twice last week with book & video donations. We are going through our collections with a thought to storing as few as possible. My wife is lots better at it than I am. She's a ruthless critter sometimes. We are just going to store our photo albums. It would be nice to scan them into the computer but it would probably take a year and we don't have that kind of time, we hope!

I keep reading discouraging things about the housing market (discouraging since we want to sell; it might be a great time to buy). Of course there are lots of people who've gotten into trouble with Adjustable Rate Mortgages & stuff. I don't give much financial advice but here's a piece of advice that works in almost every circumstance: IF IT SOUNDS OR LOOKS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, IT PROBABLY IS.

Have a good one and just say NO to those once in a lifetime offers. Take care.

8 Things about me

Heard of this so thought I'd do it even though no one asked me! I'm supposed to tell 8 things(facts or habits) about me.

1. I had the quietest Army service of anyone I ever heard of. I was in the Infantry from 1971 to 73 (Vietnam was going strong) but I sat in Ft Bliss, TX (in El Paso) and shuffled papers. I did more than Mr Bush but only because I showed up!

2. I'm certainly addicted to Scotch. Laphroaig is my favorite but generally I drink something cheaper.

3. I always say I don't smoke but in fact I've smoked a pipe for 35 years. I buy a package of pipe tobacco and it lasts me about six months. I'll have a pipe full every 2 or 3 weeks whether I need it or not.

4. When I left high school I had math phobia. After the Army I taught my self geometry then went back to college to get a degree in Computer Science with minors in math and accounting.

5. I always get motion sick when I'm not driving. Twenty miles is about my limit unless it is twisty then it's MUCH less. The one exception is when my wife is driving. She can take me anywhere but I do fall asleep pretty quickly!

6. I was a virgin until I was 19.

7. I'm a technology addict but am only interested in things that work for me. For example, I don't care about carrying music around with me so have no need of an iPod. But just try to pry the cell phone out of my fingers and I'll have to kill you.

8. I'm a mystery freak - only old and usually British ones. They put most people to sleep but I read them again and again.

That's it for today. Have a good one.

Nothing much here...

I'm trying to do a better job at writing this thing. Depressing though when you don't have much to say!

Here's a link for Cinn who seems to think she lives in "Heaven". The title is: Murder Rate Soars In Philadelphia

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/01/eveningnews/main2635629.shtml

Of course stuff like that is reported all the time. I always like the line, attributed to Mark Twain I believe, that there are "Liars, Damn Liars and Statistics". With the advent of computers it is easier than ever to compile statistics and, therefore, screw them up. I only took one class in statistics in college but it was enough that I never believe statistics. It is SO easy to foul them up not to mention easy to slant them by asking the wrong question. I mean, how do you answer the question "Are you still beating your wife?"

We are going though our books trying to decide which to donate to the library. It's tough for either of us to part with a book, even one we haven't looked at in years. Still, it's gotta be done. Last time we moved we had 70 or 80 boxes of books; we just can't cart them all around with us any more. Not a lot by some people's standards but most are paperbacks dating from the days when they were sized for the pocket not sized to make the paper companies rich.

Have a good one.

All the news .....

Since my last post one of the MIA's came back! Cinn contacted me so now I can go back to reading of her amazing life. Cool! Thank you, Cinn. She's trying to live a more positive life & write a more positive blog. I certainly wish her luck. I've been accused of being rather negative myself; I suppose it's true. But changing a personality trait is difficult, at least for me.

On a completely different front, (depressing as it happens) we had 3 people hit by lightning in the Tampa Bay area yesterday. Two are doing fairly well, the third is still pretty bad. As it happens, I accidentally found this video of lightning hitting a tree. Gives you an idea of the power of lightning; if you decide to visit Florida, don't fool around. We get a lot of lightning.

http://www.break.com/index/lightning-strike-caught-on-tape.html

A final totally unconnected note - my wife just left for the library. They have the Harry Potter that she reserved several months ago; they open at 10:00 and by 10:10 she was leaving. Can you spell 'addict'? LOL It's cool though that so many people are so involved in the series. If only a few young people learn the love of reading it will be great.

Until next time....

MIA

It's odd how people disappear from the internet. I know some people are harassed and leave for that reason but some just seem to disappear without reason or explanation. There are two bloggers that I used to read who have just dropped out of sight.

Cinn from Dead on the Gearshift decided to change the direction of her blog and decided that only certain people would be allowed to access it. I found it odd because she was already very careful about hiding her identity. Her blog was the tale of her trials and tribulations as a single mom.

A guy named Lee wrote THREE blogs, the only one I can remember was The Curate's Egg. He was quite open about his identity but his blogs just disappeared. I enjoyed reading his blogs because the writing was so good. I even exchanged emails with him a few times. But now he's gone.

I guess some people disappear because they get tired; some lose their password (like me!); perhaps some lose computer access. It's up to them, of course, to do as they wish but it does bother me to have an electronic friend go away. Isn't it odd that we can learn to care for people who we know only as bits and bytes.

Have a good one!

The UN-cramp

Good old dumbshit Don managed the impossible, I figured out what I did to my password! ABSOLUTELY AMAZING but I lucked out finally. Please believe me when I tell you it's a bad idea to change your password after a few drinks. LOL I'm totally sober this a.m. but finally got the password typed the right-wrong way if you know what I mean. Whew, what an ordeal.

Went and got the measurements done yesterday for my cataract surgery. What a pain in the ass. I'm going to St Lukes Cataract & Laser Institute in Tarpon Springs, FL. It is probably a fine place but if you don't have to wait 30 minutes to see a nurse they think they are doing something wrong. It's a real factory setting but at least I feel that they have plenty of experience.

I'll see if I can't do this more often. Have a good one!

And remember I'm back to don34685 at Yahoo dot com. Hurray!

Not Dead Yet

Hello all. Yes, I'm getting worse about updating the blog. Well, I only started it so I could leave comments on other blogs so that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. Haven't been doing much. We keep talking about moving and doing as little as possible however I think that is changing. We sold our little bass boat last week. A nice couple who look like they will use it bought it. Next are the BMW and the spa. The BMW will be difficult. We picked in up in Munich on the European Delivery Plan on May 15, 1993. The first few years my wife commuted in it but then when we lived in New Jersey she worked from home. In Holland she had a company car and I used it around town. Now that we are retired, we mostly use the truck because it fits our needs better. As a result, we have a 14 year old car with around 83,000 original miles. What a shame. But we both LOVE driving the car. It has spoiled us for anything else. It will be tough to sell it.

Otherwise, I am having cararact surgery at the end of the month. I'm only 58 but I guess it's my time. Right eye this time but they say it won't be long before the left requires it. The sad thing is that our insurance covers the operation and a basic lense but won't do anything about the new improved lens they can implant. The new ones have three focusing areas - far, near and close rather than the one distance older lenses. It will cost us $2500 out of our pocket but I really can't see getting the single focus ones. Any advice?

ONE MORE THING! I had a brain cramp and screwed up my yahoo id. I used to be don34685 at yahoo.com - NOW I'm duhdon34685 at yahoo.com. Sorry but I'm just an idiot sometimes.

Take care of yourselves; it's tough out there.

Home Again

Got home last Thursday - a month to the day since we left. Drove 6700+ miles in that time & the truck went over 100,000 miles. About 35,000 of that has been towing our trailer. Had a great time. Learned a lot about the west. We are planning on moving to a little town west of Las Vegas, Nevada as soon as we can sell our house here in Florida. The humidity here is just killing both of us.

We had rain, snow & sleet leaving Colorado Springs; that was fun. Messy too! Then had a dust storm in Nevada. We were in a park in the middle of a valley between two mountain ranges. The valley was probably 40 miles across. We couldn't see the mountains on either side! Then it started misting and turned my nice clean truck into a muddy mess! In Amarillo we stopped at a park and turned on the tv. We saw there was a major storm about an hour away headed for us. The first course would be a tornado; the second was rain, 60mph winds and hail the size of baseballs. We hooked the rig back up & drove away. We only drove about an hour but found a park where we were next to a couple of nice sturdy concrete buildings. We got quite a bit of wind but the buildings blocked it from hitting us directly so all we got was a bunch of rain. Whew!

Kept dropping south into milder weather until we got home. 85 degrees & moderate humidity - Florida at it's best. Unfortunately the real estate market still seems rotten. Well, we'll stay here, fix the house & yard & wait a while. Our next door neighbor is retiring the first of June after 35 years with the Federal government. We should have quite a party!

Hope things are going well for everyone. Take care.

Outta Here!

Hello all. Looks like it's over a month again since I posted anything. I can't imagine how people post daily. I'd be limited to talking about my trip to the hardware store or something. Today I do have something exciting to write about. We are off on our trip starting Thursday! Hurray!

We'll leave here Thursday morning to go up to where we store the trailer in Crystal River. We'll spend the night there; go out to dinner with our relatives, then Friday morning hit the road. We are planning on making it to the Escapees park in Summerdale, Alabama the first day. It's a long drive for us but we need to get started. The first day is usually tough on everyone.

Don't know if I've mentioned it before but we travel with our dog & cat. The dog LOVES going with us; the cat would rather not but when we first got him I said he was either a member of the family and would come or he wouldn't be in our family. That was 4 years and 3 major trips ago. The dog gets the backseat of the truck and the cat gets to be under it. He howls if the road is really rough but otherwise he just hangs out. When we stop for gas he hops out & looks around then goes back under the seat when we start off again. When we stop for the night, he stretches out on the couch & acts like he owns the place. Really he's been a great traveler.

He and the dog have both gotten baths in honor of the trip. They are all fluffy now. Still losing hair like crazy but that's what they do. We cleaned the truck this evening, filled a vacuum bag that was less than half full when we started. Now I need to get the outside cleaned tomorrow. And buy some food items and buy lots of liquor and buy odds & ends and load all this stuff into the truck and take my wife out to dinner and try to keep her from flipping out with excitement. Jeez!

We hope to visit friends in Colorado Springs for a couple of days then go down to Lost Wages for a few days. We are looking for a place to live in the west and Vegas is the first possible place. We may go on to visit Reno or may decide to skip it and just go down into Arizona & New Mexico. We'll spend as much time as we can checking places out then return home. The mail will be held until April 28 so I guess we have to be back then! Maybe I'll post something from the road but..... Gee, more than one post a month would be a new record wouldn't it?

We did finally get the bathroom fixed up. Replaced the faucets too since the old ones were leaking and of a type that cannot really be repaired. It looks pretty good if I do say so. All the same you can bet that we won't be removing the wall paper from the other three walls.

We got the carpet in our bedroom replaced in February by Empire - you know the ones who will install new carpet tomorrow. We had them out here once already to glue down the edge where the carpet butts against the tile - the original guys didn't glue it. Now they are supposed to come out again tomorrow because the seam is totally visible. It just shouldn't be visible after a month but we can't get it to not show. Hopefully they can fix it. What fun.

Hope you all have a good month. I'll write more when we return if not before.

Half a month - better than last time!

Ok, it's been over 2 weeks - so sue me.

We had been expecting visitors in March; now it's looking like neither group will show. That's what I get for trying to figure out what is going to happen in my life ahead of time. Oh well, we don't like visitors all that much anyway!

My wife decided to rip the wallpaper off one wall of the bathroom. THEN we found that the builder (back in 1984!) pasted the wallpaper directly on the drywall; therefore it doesn't really come off. Tore it off, sanded a bunch, vacuumed a bunch and finally put a coat of primer (Kilz if you are interested). Today we sprayed the wall with texture stuff. It comes in a spray can & covers about 50 sq. ft. Pretty cool. You let it dry a bit then knock it down with a trowel. Gives the wall that textured effect. Tomorrow we prime again then can paint. It's been quite a while so I'm looking forward to having a bathroom again.

Got down to 40 degrees F last night. It's the coolest this winter. This will be 3 years without a freeze. Some plants are really loving it but so do pests like fleas. Hopefully this is our last winter here but who knows. Right now we don't know where we want to go. We are currently planning on leaving in mid-April for the west & the northwest. Should be fun; especially if we actually get to go!

Hope everyone is doing ok. Keep on keeping on!