Wow - a whole month!

I've been bad. Haven't been here updating for the whole month. Sorry about that! I've got an excuse or two though. We are renovating like crazy. As my wife says, spending money like we had it. First, have I whined about buying a new heat pump on 27 December? If not, that's the first thing. (The dealer isn't having a good time though, we've had them out here three times getting the thing to work properly. Tomorrow will be their fourth service call; they are promising to send someone tomorrow who actually knows what he or she is doing. That will be nice for a change.) Then paint the house, replacing a couple of rusted exterior doors as well. And replacing all the door hardware with new. Now we've bought a new bed; the last new one was in 1981 so you can't say we don't hang on to things. Finally we are replacing the carpet in both bedrooms. There probably won't be enough left from $15,000 to go to McDonald's. Bah, humbug!

And we certainly are NOT going to Ireland. At least not right now. We got in the middle of all this renovation and just couldn't stop & go have fun. Besides, since we are paying to have others do all this work, my wife decided to rip the wallpaper off one wall of the bathroom. Of course, then we discover that the builder put the wallpaper directly over the sheetrock so it doesn't come off nicely at all. We've got it mostly sanded off so now we can start priming, adding texture, priming and painting. Doesn't it all sound like fun.

To make it a totally fun month, yesterday I went & had my eyes checked and the doctor says I have cataracts. One eye is bothering me quite a bit; the other isn't as advanced but will be ready in a year or two. Hmmm. Life in the fast lane is sounding tame compared to this retirement thing.

Have a good one - I'll try to be back before the end of February. I promise.