. I hadn't realized, but it's now been 2 years and a month since I officially retired. I've been happy with how those 2 years went, though I wish I could slow down the pace of life. I always feel too busy with too many things to do; rare is the time I choose a "non-productive" activity that involves just relaxing or reading over other things that need to be done. I have a feeling this won't change unless I sell this house, because just maintaining a home like this takes a lot of time; sure, I'd still have similar responsibilities with a condo, but there would still be substantially fewer chores without the yard, for instance. Even though I pay someone to mow now, it would still be easier to write a monthly check without having to think about it. And I still choose to do things like shoveling the driveway.
That being said, I often incorporate certain activities into my day to day that are tedious and take up time. For instance, I've had a subscription to cronometer.com for years so that I can log in everything I eat during the course of a day, and I often tweak my final meal to include or disclude foods that exceed or fall short of my rough RDA for protein, vitamins, minerals, etc. I started doing this when I discovered I had osteopenia. That was also when I got a gym membership and began strength training after too many years of sitting at a desk all day. I guess that was around 2020.
Along the same vein, I keep a subscription to consumerlab.com, an independent agency that, similar to Consumer Reports, tests many different supplements, vitamins and food items for safety and efficaciousness; you can, for instance, find out which brands test positive for excessive heavy metals (unsweetened cocoa, tinned sardines, and sunflower seeds are common culprits).
Another thing I do all the time is before making a purchase, even not big expenditures, I routinely comparison-shop it online. I'm sure this saves me money but it also takes time. What I DO prioritize is socializing with friends or what I consider "new experiences," including vacations or road trips.
The tree pruning work was not done this past week. I needed to coordinate with my neighbor, whose driveway we'd be blocking, and the tree guy, and somehow the tree guy failed to completely read my text. Hoping the weather is decent for them to do it this Tuesday, because after that, well, we're into March and the sap is rising. It's better to prune during dormancy.
I wanted to try out a soup place with a cute name in neighboring town, so stopped by today since I was going to Aldi's, which is nearby. I had the beef barley, which wasn't bad but it was VERY salty, as 99% of soups I try at restauants are. After I logged in the 1 cup serving on the cronometer app, I see just that 1 cup gave me 65% of my daily sodium RDA. Which mean that even by increasing potassium, it is difficult to get the right ratio for the day. That's usually how it is with any restaurant meal. Excessive sodium can lead to stiff/hardened arteries, high blood pressure and heart disease, the #1 killer of people all over the world, so I pay attention to it.
It is snowing hard again this morning. The bluebirds are enjoying their worms, and I've begun to supplement with crushed eggshell since egg-laying season is on our doorstep.
I resubscribed to Calm in hopes of getting a better night's sleep. The first night, I listened to a 30-minute "sleep story" narrated by Matthew McConaughey, but when it ended, I found myself still awake thinking of what a nice voice Matthew has and his subtle Texan accent. The second night I was successfully lulled to sleep by Jonterri Gadson, the comedian and author.
Yesterday I had a good workout. A week or so ago I added a 3rd set of reps to my routine, so now doing 3 sets of 8 reps each. It has increased my workout time to 1 hour from a 1/2 hour. After that, I do the treadmill and am trying to step that up as well. Yesterday I did 45 minutes at 3.4 mph. So I was a little tired coming home, but after lunch, I pushed myself to do some outside yard chores: removing a cluster of bittersweet berries still on the vine, freeing a crabapple tree from grapevine growing into its branches that I never got to last fall and cutting back and treating with herbicide a black locus sapling and some multiflora rose. I was out there about 2 hours but I won't try working in the snow again. With one step I'd stay on top of the snow pack and the next step I would sink down one foot. I'm lucky I didn't twist a knee doing that.
March 1st, 2026 at 11:08 pm 1772406529
If you have certain meals that you eat frequently, you can save them as recipes in Cronometer to save time on logging. I know that I have a fairly limited repertoire of breakfast and dinner meals, with more of the variety coming at lunch (which is where I try to have my biggest meal). I haven't used Cronometer in a while, but when I was using it, that trick saved time on logging.
March 1st, 2026 at 11:09 pm 1772406548
March 2nd, 2026 at 10:18 am 1772446739
If Matthew McConaughey ever read this, I can just imagine him saying, "Alright alright alright"!