A Nice Summer Day (for Florida)

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

It was 78 degrees this morning, not too wet, and the sun was shining so we had a good start to the day. I actually turned the irrigation system back on, given the weatherman's prediction in the paper.

The BW set off for Dog World, was gone three hours, and came back with one receipt from Walmart. She stopped at a vacuum cleaner store that she had been curious about, and it thinking of buying another vacuum. We have plenty of money in the furnishings sinking fund, but she is worried about getting some place comfortable for Jerzy (Annie's boyfriend) to sleep next Christmas and New Years. He was sleeping on the love seat in the front room, and refused to use the air mattresses we had. Yesterday the BW took the air mattresses and other stuff to the Sheriff's Ranch Thrift Shop and turned them in - maybe some one else can use them.

I told her that there is plenty of money in the emergency fund, and that she could always borrow some out of it, but she is still thinking it over. My best guess is that she could buy a leather couch, have it delivered, buy the vacuum too, and still have money left over but she has to think about it. I did tell her that it's OK to buy one more (which will make three for a little house) but I would get really frustrated if she wanted a fourth. It doesn't seem like very long since I took an old vacuum to the Sherrif's Ranch. We have the standard problem of NOT ENOUGH STORAGE. We are shedding stuff all the time, as if we were still living in an RV, and there's still just enough room.

Other than that, I just went over to our neighborhood Publix and brought home two gallons of frozen yogurt - Butter Pecan, Moose Tracks (two half gallons), and Roadrunner Raspberry. I'm not hungry, but after three meals and a tremendous snack (six cups of popcorn and two Busch NA's) I'm still at 1530 calories for the day, and I'm going to have a nice ice cream cone before I go to bed. The yogurt is all light, but the chocolate pushed the calories up some anyhow. If I had gone to the Kiwanis meeting tonight at the Tarpon Lake Resort, it would have been a disaster.

Tomorrow I get my stitches out, dress up to make a speech and eat a free meal at Jerry and Millie's going away party, and weigh in at TOPS. I had two real eggs, fried potatoes, and toast at Tiffany's yesterday morning (which totaled 853 calories with butter and jelly) and I was almost 1900 calories by bedtime. We'll see how I do on the TOPS scale.

  

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

MS.ELENI 7/21/2010 9:34PM

We also have too much stuff and no where to store it. We have no where for anyone to sleep here. I got rid of all extra beds. We do have an air mattress that we use for Brianna but nothing for adults. It was a nice day today.The frozen yogurt sounds good. Good luck at TOPS tomorrow Report Inappropriate Comment

S3XYDIVASMOM 7/21/2010 9:26PM

And I thought that living in an RV would cure you of excessive accumulation. Or maybe living in an RV taught you the comfort of "stuff." Maybe it's incurable. We're going to work on de-accumulating this weekend. Not fun. Eggs are about the only thing I miss on my low cholesterol diet. Your breakfast sounds delicious. Report Inappropriate Comment

LAVENDERLILY 7/21/2010 9:09PM

We can't have breakfasts like that too often, but isn't it fun once in a while! Report Inappropriate Comment

Whose Fault Is It?

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Sunday it rained 1.3 inches here, and yesterday we got another 0.2 inches. Today started out like the other two days - with a beautiful sunrise into a nearly clear sky, and then the clouds started to form Later the cumulonimbus clouts filled the sky and made a really scenic day, and in the afternoon it got dark most of the time, with a little sun once in a while.

I woke before six this morning, got started for the day and fed the dogs, then went to our weekly Kiwanis meeting at 7:00. I got both a bill and a check this morning, so I came home to do paperwork, then went to the post office and bank, did some more paperwork, tried to stay awake, and finally had a little lunch. Then, about 1:00, I went out for the mail and found that the sky was completely gray and decided to take the dogs for their walk.

By the time I changed my clothes and emptied my pockets of all the paper and stuff that shouldn't get wet, the sun was shining, so I put on a straw hat and took off. The sun was only out a couple of times for a short while, and the temperature was about 90, so it wasn't too hot. We did make it to Midland Cemetery, but I was wondering about it for a while. My legs didn't want to go, especially on the hills. I was slow today, but did make it out there and back, and the dogs were hot, but not as bad as they have been.

After we were back in air conditioned comfort for a while, the BW commented that I needed a day of rest. That reminded me of my days as a branch manager, when I would have teams working on hot jobs. I would always be there with the earliest ones, and stay until the latest ones left. By letting them set their own hours I made mine longer. I also would not approve overtime on Sunday for anyone, because working 12 hour days for six days makes you completely tired - shot. You couldn't work 7 days a week like that for six months to a year, and the only way we could keep up the tempo was to have one day a week to recover. The Sabbath tradition was a sound rule.

Anyhow, when you're just an old retired guy, no one cares what you do, and I realized that those Spark Points were driving me to get time every day possible, and most Tuesdays I had off until I got started with them - thus it's the SparkPeople's fault that I'm completely shot today. That psychiatrist from Rose Hullman was right - just a list on a piece of paper can be the most powerful motivator.

  

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

MS.ELENI 7/20/2010 10:21PM

I agree you need to take one day off. You never seem to just rest. All the time you spend outside is hard on anyones body.This heat is terrible. So remember you are not 20 anymore. Report Inappropriate Comment

S3XYDIVASMOM 7/20/2010 7:56PM

Spark People doesn't seem so much work as an obsession with me. I've decided to limit my time so that I'm not simply replacing one addiction with another. But it still seems like I spend an awful lot of time here and a lot of the rest of my time thinking about it. Report Inappropriate Comment

LAUGHINGRRRL 7/20/2010 4:14PM

I think taking Tuesdays off is a great idea... from everything. I've started skipping one day a week of nutrition tracking just so I can keep going the other six days. It wears me down to do it every single day. I can do that for a few months, but then I really start resenting the effort required.... it's a lot healthier to take a break from anything periodically. "Moderation in everything... including moderation." Here's an O'Doul's for you. :) Report Inappropriate Comment

Day by Day

Monday, July 19, 2010

This morning was clear and beautiful when the sun came up. We had 1.3 inches of rain yesterday evening, and it was humid, so the grass was covered with dew. I spent the day shopping - at Sam's Club, Costco, and Publix. I also did a bunch of paperwork for the Kiwanis and visited the Post Office and Suntrust Bank.

There were a few other errands, and the BW wanted to watch one of the movies I recorded last night, called "On Borrowed Time," so we did. We had leftover linguine for supper, and I brought home a 12 pack of O'Douls for her because she was cleaning out the garage and needed a particular cold drink.

  

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S3XYDIVASMOM 7/19/2010 11:32PM

It's hot here, as well. No rain in sight. We're supposed to take the kids on a walking field trip on Thursday with the temperature in the mid-nineties. I'm really looking forward to that. NOT. Report Inappropriate Comment

MS.ELENI 7/19/2010 10:57PM

On Borrowed Time," sounds like a sad movie. I watch the mystery theater movie you mentioned last night.Did you watch it? I stayed in house all day.It looked hot out there. Bill likes a cold Odouls on hot days. Report Inappropriate Comment

Pretty Lazy Sunday

Sunday, July 18, 2010

This morning I cut the grass, then read the Sunday front page and comics. The BW took my cell phone with her on a bike ride, which prompted me to go get a new sim card for her phone and buy a year's worth of service. We now have two active phones again, one for each car. They're very low cost. You buy $100 worth of time (400 minutes) and it lasts for a year, and if you renew at the end of the year the leftover minutes roll over. I'm up to $380 on my phone, but she decided it was too expensive and just had a phone with no service for a year. That means she could call 911, but not home, which she has wanted to do a few times.

While we were full-timing I paid $100 for 600 minutes every month and was grateful for the low cost. We never used the 600 minutes, but the service was to call anywhere from anywhere, and if you're moving all the time that's what you need. The little GO phones also let you call from anywhere to anywhere, for 25 cents a minute, so they're very convenient when you travel.

I wrote a couple of checks, to Consumer Digest and Reader's Digest, and now I run to the store for some linguine and washed spinach. The Spanish Rice with Chicken I made yesterday we had for lunch so that's no good. I have today's recipe from Spark People that sounds good (Skillet white beans, spinach & tomatoes over Linguine) and the BW decided it was as good as the turkey burgers she was thinking we would have because she didn't want to go to the store.

So that's it., and we'll be done for the day except for the new Poirot on Masterpiece Theater (or maybe it's Mystery) tonight. They're all new this year, and all in HD, so it' worth watching a little TV.

It was a pretty lazy Sunday.

  

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

S3XYDIVASMOM 7/18/2010 10:07PM

You sure get a lot done for a pretty lazy Sunday. Report Inappropriate Comment

MS.ELENI 7/18/2010 5:58PM

Bill and I were talking the other day about how much we depend on our cell phones. It does make life easier for us. We never come close to our minutes either as we have the fave 5 and we call each other the most. We use ours when we go to grocery store or Walmarts. I am thinking about going out to Fred Howards and see if I can get pics of sunset. I don't know why as Bill is right when he said I already have some.They won't look much different. We had our grass mowed yesterday by a guy that bags it which makes Bill happy. Enjoy TV tonight. Report Inappropriate Comment

Dead Paper Shredder

Saturday, July 17, 2010

Yesterday I spent an hour and a half using a dental pick and a pair of tweezers, picking away at the cutters in the jammed shredder. After I thought I had it clean, I put it together and it still wouldn't eat paper, but some more shreds showed up, so I picked some more. Then I tried again, and it still wouldn't work.

Then I finally got a little smarter, because things looked a lot the same, so I tried three times, and the cutters stopped at the same place (I looked at the bottom where they showed) every single time. Then I measured the depth the paper went in, and tried sticking a strip in a clear, pristine space, and still nothing.

THEN I finally realized what the two pieces of warped spring washer were - the clutch was broken. I had thought from time to time that the BW had jammed this thing, but I'm not dumb enough to blame her, so I kept complaining about myself. The paper wasn't jammed, the machine was broken. So I decided to see if I could disassemble the drive and fix up a jury-rigged friction connection.

Six of the seven screws came out just fine, but I could not get the seventh one out. I considered just taking the two pieces in my hands and doing a Godzilla imitation while I ripped them apart, breaking a corner off of one of the plastic housings. Instead I decided that the shredder had reached the end of it's useful live, dropped everything in the shred bin, carried it out to the 95 gallon trash can, and dropped it in. Then I felt that I had done something useful.

We had that shredder before we moved in here, in February of 2004, so I know it's more than six years old, and probably seven or eight. It was useful for a long time, and I would just buy another. I though it cost 40 or 50 dollars, and we have plenty of money in the furnishings fund.

Today I thought of all the places that sell shredders and decided that it would be a good idea to check out the prices online before I drove around all over town, so I looked. The least expensive one at Staples was $50, plus tax, and Amazon had a tiny one (desktop) for $20, but with $12.03 for shipping. Most other places had prices starting at more than $50, but one had a $20 shredder with free shipping. It only takes six sheets of paper or a credit card, and it didn't promise to eat a paper clip, but for the price I decided to save my afternoon and just buy it, which is what I did. It has a 3.5 gallon basket and looks as if it's the same size as the one I threw away, and we never put a paper clip through the old one. It was just overtaken by old age.

  

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MS.ELENI 7/17/2010 10:14PM

I think I will drag mine out and start using it. Report Inappropriate Comment

S3XYDIVASMOM 7/17/2010 3:24PM

Our new shredder appears to be just fine. Yeah! We decided to treat this shredder gently and not even try to put in the 12 sheets the manufacturer claims that it can handle. Our old shredder which does strips only is still going and I have this thought of running them simultaneously and really taking care of all the paper work around here. Report Inappropriate Comment