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!