Geez, these Chase offers are getting into serious money...

Of course, they want serious money, too, which won't be forthcoming.

Tempting to think about though.

I went to one of those retirement planning programs last night. They always talk about Roth conversions. Which I understand can be very helpful in reducing taxes you'll pay once RMDs begin, but I don't think they're necessary for everyone, and they didn't mention scenarios where they wouldn't make sense.

There's a John Lewis/anti-Trump rally tonight, the first one I'll be skipping. It will be a muggy 90 degrees here at 6:30 pm, when the rally starts. It's just too darn hot.

This is a Great spangled fritillary on purple coneflower.

Liatris (blazing star) with black eyed susies.

I got a new Shark vac and tried it out today. Pros: It's definitely better picking up stuff on both bare floors and rugs than what I had, and I like the easy empty feature. It automatically adjusts its setting after detecting whether I'm doing a rug or floor so I don't have to keep pressing buttons.

Cons: It acts like a self-propelled Ninja on rugs. Kind of like a dog pulling on a leash. It's pretty loud, so I'll continue using headphone thingies. It's also still fairly heavy, but I guess you can't have it all. 

I brought my Toyota in for its very first, 6-month service, which will be free (ToyotaCares) for I think the first 2 years? 10 years? I'll have to doublecheck. But at this juncture, all they did was top off fluids, rotate the tires and reinsert a small plastic cover that I accidentally dislodged that goes over one of the license plate lights in the back.

Door project done!

I'm happy to say the front entry is now finally done, both the main door and the storm door. The installer was here this morning. He has a very interesting background and I enjoyed talking to him because he's very personable. He was born in Marseilles, France,, but came to the US and was in the Army for 8 years. He's been installing mostly Andersen doors for 18 years and says he loves his work. He's very excited because he's leaving tomorrow for a 2-week vacay to St. Lucia, where his mother lives.

Anyway, I really like this storm door. As mentioned, I got this model because it has glass and screen panels that stay in the door and all you have to do is slide it up or down. The small sacrifice is that the screen is just for the top half of the door, (not the full length) but I am fine with that as it mean not having to carry or store the heavy glass insert back and forth from the basement in the spring and then in fall. It's also better if I ever get another cat again since they won't be able to scratch the screen.

This storm door and its install will be much cheaper than the main door was. The main door cost $2,000 and its install was $1100. Yup. It's shocking how expensive everything is. The storm door install will be just $140 and he said he would give me a break on the cost of the storm door, too. I'm not sure how he can do that, but if he can, great. Otherwise, the normal cost of it was almost $500.

This is the last of my major (major to me) home improvements for this year. The only thing I have to do is some painting on both inside and outside trim. I think I'll wait til cooler weather to do this, like September.

Tonight I'll be traveling to another town to meet up with another board member from my litter group to help a different group in a cleanup. I like to take lots of pix to post on social media before and after each event.

Bummer.

Today was the day Home Depot was to install the new Andersen storm door with retractible glass/screen in the door (not interchangeable, where you have to physically remove one or the other). The arrival window they gave me was 11 am to 3 pm. They got here after 5 due to some delays and they brought the door up, still packaged. Thank god we chit chatted about the door and I discovered the door they brought didn't have the retractable feature which is what really sold me on the door because it would eliminate the need to drag the heavy glass insert up from the basement each time I changed it in spring and then again in fall. I was able to show him my original order on my phone; he said the guy at Home Depot gave him the wrong door. 

So he will try to return with the right door, hopefully on Friday cus he's on vacation next week.

A young woman is supposed to come over tonight with her fiance and truck to take a Victorian couch I got from Buy Nothing a few years ago and decided I don't want. They are moving into their first apartment together and need everything. I could have posted it as a regift on Buy Nothing, but I didn't want to hurt the feelings of the person who originally gifted it to me, should she see the post, so this way, I don't have to do that.

The heat is still brutal here. Even at the gym, where it's air conditioned, I could barely do 15 minutes on the treadmill. No doubt my electric bill will spike cus I've had the central air on quite a bit. The highest I can bear is 78 degrees but it's usually set at 77. The problem is that while the downstairs usually feels ok, the upstairs always feels a good 5 degrees warmer. I always say I'm going to sleep downstairs, but I never do.

Tomorrow is dad day: physical therapy, probably the bank and then lunch, hopefully at one of our favorite cafes, which is closing this week. They have plans to redevelop part of the center of town and possibly related to that, the landlord jacked up the rent, forcing the restaurant owner to make plans to leave. It's a very cozy place where he literally knows everyone by name, just like in Cheers. He will come over to your table and lovingly recite all the ingredients in his different dishes. There's not really a menu; it's all verbal. The food is good, the portions are huge and the price is reasonable. And it's in a very picturesque area where you can sit outside on a deck that overlooks a river. And he always serves you a pair of complimentary mini cannolis for dessert. He really makes you feel taken care of there and I'll be so sad to see it go.

There is a decent chance of rain overnight so I'm going to skip watering the garden. A welcome break. 

What's growing in the garden
The garden is reaping benefits. I've been enjoying lots of green/red lettuce for a while now, and it is only now starting to bolt.  I will miss it!  

I've also been picking small zucchinis, yellow squash and cucumbers. Not sure how long the zucchini will last as it's beset by cucumber beetles that I pick off when I can, and the leaves are riddled with tiny holes, but I don't feel comfortable spraying Neem as I noticed bumblebees nesting at one of the raised bed.

I decided to underplant everything becus in the past I squeezed in too many plants in 3 4 x 4 raised beds and they grew so much i had trouble even getting in there. So I just have 1 yellow squash, 1 zucchini, 2 cucumber plants, a row of lettuce, a row of string beans just starting to flower and 4 tomato plants.

Really, the one disappointment so far is the tomatoes, which I consider my most important crop. I only planted 2 initially, but we had an unusually cold spring, so while they were alive, they appeared stunted. I bought 2 more and just added them without pulling the original 2 out in case the first 2 recovered. So of the 4 plants i currently have, only 1 appears to be the right size for this time of year.

Next Day Trip
My "one fun thing" this week will be a trip to visit Wickham Park, which seems to have a ton of stuff to see (aviary, arboretum, many different gardens, nature musuem) and yet I hadn't ever heard of this place until about a year ago. It's about an hour away but no tolls.

Kiva Loans
This week I reviewed Kiva loan profiles for borrowers in Jordan, Kenya, Phillippines, Tonga and Uganda. 

Any Cordless Vac Recommendations?
I need a new vacuum.  I have a cheap cordless stick vacuum that only does a very modest job on bare floors and is not really good at all on rugs, but that's okay since I have just a few area rugs and a backup vac. I LOVE the cordless but need something more powerful but still lightweight.

I also have a corded canister vacuum which is VERY powerful but also pretty heavy and loud so I don't like to use it.  

Based on reading a zillion reviews, I've come to the conclusion that a good cordless vac doesn't exist and will settle for a corded one as long as it's 1) lightweight and 2) powerful "enough." I don't need it to suck up everything within a 5 foot radius and sound like a fighter jet, but it should be strong enough. If you have one you really like, let me know!

I had a nice little day trip to New Paltz, NY as planned. It was a guided tour of Historic Huguenot Street, an area occupied by the Lenape Indians up until the 1600s when the Dutch and French settled there, with their slaves.  There were just 3 of us on the tour.  Here are a few pix I took.

The Lenapi Indians were widespread in the NY/NJ area, and in fact they occupied the town in New Jersey I grew up in, at Ramapo Mountain. I went to high school with so-called Jackson Whites who were said to be descendants of the Lenapi and/or fugitive slaves, and who were somewhat ostracized. Today they are a recognized tribe with about 5,000 members.

My goal is to plan at least one "fun" thing to do every week. This week I'm thinking of asking a woman I know out to lunch at one of my favorite cafes in town which is closing this week. She is someone in town who gave me some plants from her garden a few years ago, and theN we met again in the gym last week and started talking to each other without realizing we had met before. 

I had my front door installed 2 weeks ago. The door is beautiful but there were issues with its installation like a pretty prominent scratch on the front that I guess I'm stuck with. The worst thing is the way they left my storm door. I have an old Andersen storm door I thought i could keep, but it doesn't work with the new door as they could not screw in screws for the molding so they were flush. Hard to explain but you can see screws half screwed in up and down either side of the storm door molding.  It looks terrible. Installers said they warned Home Depot about this and that Home Depot "should have" warned me, but they didn't. 

So I plunked down more money, about $600 on a new storm door, which I was excited about since it solves another problem for me: instead of having interchangeable glass and screen inserts, like my current door, this one has glass and screen that stays in the door itself, so no more heavy lugging of a full size glass insert up the basement stairs twice a year.

Installer guy said he would pick up. I started getting automated reminders from Home Depot that the storm door needs to be picked up. I texted the Installer company and he said don't worry, they're just reminders. Well, yesterday i got another message from Home Depot saying your order has been cancelled because no one picked up. Installer guy hasn't responded to me message. the job was scheduled to be done this Wednesday. I'll have to call Home Depot tomorrow. Super annoyed. I already left a bad review. 

I went to another rally/protest in a neighboring small town on Saturday. Probably about 100 people.

The End

I've had a few more grocery price surprises. Today, I managed to get out, drive the 15 minutes or so it takes to get to BJs, and get home by a little after 9 am. Trying to beat the heat, which will reach 95 degrees today.

The "surprise" is discovering that Stop & Shop charges MORE than Whole Foods for organic oranges. Oranges are heavily sprayed, so I like to buy organic.  They are currently $5.99 for a 4 lb bag at Whole Foods and $6.99 for a 3 lb bag at Stop & Shop.

Here's another example: 1 lb of baby bok choy is just $2.79 (organic) at Whole Foods, but costs $6.99 for 1 lb (not organic) at Stop & Shop. That's a crazy difference!

At my BJs trip this morning, I noticed they LOWERED some prices since last time I shopped. I know this is routine as summer approaches and fresh produce becomes "in season," but it was the Wellesley Farm brand of Greek yogurt that also dropped.

The masonry crew finished the basement walls yesterday. I was SO glad when they left. Even though they were in the basement, I could clearly hear them talking (in Spanish) from my 2nd floor office, with various noises, etc. What really upset me was that in the process of cleaning up, one of them chose to use a gas-powered blower on my driveway. They did create a lot of dust with the cement mixing out there, but they cleared the whole driveway. I had 2 small parsley plants out there with baby black swallowtail caterpillars. The caterpillars were literally blown away and I'm sure died. The other thing was, they cleared a whole lot of groundcovers that were growing along the edges of the driveway, against my stone walls, plus some beautiful ground phlox that took many years to grow into a large clump. I liked the way they softened the look of the stone walls and paver driveway. All blown away. Very upsetting.

Continuing the tradition of contractors always causing some kind of damage or work for me, this crew splattered concrete on my brand new hot water heater, the oil furnace, my water tank, my kayak and even the pump for the water tank, plus copper piping. There was dust everywhere. Concrete smeared on my outdoor faucet handles, one of which is now hard to turn, I think becus concrete dust got inside the mechanism. 

I spent a lot of time wiping a lot of concrete and dust off stuff, but I'm not done.

Now that I am cat-less, I would really like to make the basement as clean and dust-free as possible, partly to protect the new hot water heater, which has a filter at the top that i clean every month, but also just to be cleaner. I need to think about how best to reduce the dust. I think a household vacuum with hepa filters would still be ruined by vacuuming up fine dust. (I learned that once and had to have the vacuum repaired.) I do have a shop vac but is that going to blow the dust around? I think it would. I guess wiping with damp rags would be best; i don't even own a mop, but maybe I'll get one at $ store. 

Remaining projects for 2025: I ran a load of wash at the "normal" spin cycle setting and it still seemed to be vibrating too much on its new stand. The clothes were still extremely wrung out of water, though, which is good. Next I want to run a load on the "low" spin cycle to see if that noticeably reduces the vibrations. If not, I'll ask the handyman to return and help me slip a half-inch foam yoga mat i no longer use under the washing machine. I may also call Samsung and ask for suggestions. I mean, I love the new stand the handymay built for me, and I want to be able to use it!

Also need to call an appliance guy about a possible leak with my dishwasher, which i haven't used for over a year.

Then there are my father's projects. I have to bring him back out to the  notary at library again to redo notarization on his letter cus bank said i left off a "0" that appeared on his statement with a space after it, so I didn't think it was part of his account number. Notary has not called me back yet. He was on vacation, but i think that was just last week.

The talking watch i got my father a year or two ago is talking very faintly now. It needs a new battery. Rather than me fiddling with it and just getting frustrated, I want to bring it to a jeweler, who will charge $15 to do it, although i have purchased the battery for it.

I made a reservation for myself next week for a guided walking tour of Historic Heugonot Street in New Paltz, over an hour's drive for me. I've passed through that area and the homes are beautiful. The area was originally founded in 1894 by descendants of the first settlers. The tour includes going inside 5 or 6 of the houses, settled by French/Dutch, I believe, and also a 1717 French church and cemetery. It should be interesting.

There are a lot of things of interest to me within a 2-hour drive that I have never gotten around to seeing, so I plan to start making "fun" daytrip stuff more of a priority. There's more to life than grocery shopping and home projects.

My mason was supposed to finish up the basement walls today, but was MIA. He said he'll be here tomorrow.

It's very easy for me to waste an entire day basically reading stuff online. So, since we're in an awful heat wave and I don't plan on going out except to the gym after lunch, I decided to do more decluttering. I really can't stand living with so much stuff around that really has no place to go (but OUT) in my small (1650 sf) home. 

It often drives me nuts. I really like the concept of "Every thing has its place." That has hardly been the case here for 10 years, really since my mother passed. I've been gradually letting go of her things for the past 10 years but I just wish I coud speed up the process. Plus just the fact that having lived in one spot for 30 years tends to encourage "accumulation."

So today I chose to tackle clothing. This one's hard for me. I look at things in my closet, some of it not worn for YEARS (like dress clothes), and I say, well, it's a little stretched out but I can layer it under something. Or, it's something I wore to the office, but maybe I'l need it. Or, I bought this in the last few years, but it was a "mistake" and now if I get rid of it I'll never "recoup" the loss. And so on and so on.

I was able to purge 15 pieces of clothing, plus a Mexican blanket and a pair of sneakers. I think I could do more, clothing-wise, but I also hate to waste money. Still untouched are 2 homemade things that don't fit me, but my grandmother made: a robe and a sweater. Also 2 or 3 items that belonged to my mother that also don't fit me but were in her favorite color: turquoise. I still get emotional contemplating getting rid of them. People say just take a picture, but that would not really make it any easier. I don't know what they're going to take.

Over the weekend I decided to offer my big chair and a half on Buy Nothing. I've had it forever and am just tired of it, and am generally trying to lighten my load before I possibly move within the next few years. It's in very good shape and has washable cushions. Right after posting it, I saw a nice oak bench with cushion that someone was offering, and I jumped on it.

Sigh. i brought it home. But only one person expressed interest in the chair (maybe the timing is bad due to the heat wave) but turns out she has no one to help her carry it, and I have a bad knee. So she passed on it, even after I offered to ask for help on our local town group, where people will occasionally ask for a ride or help of some sort, and get it.

So now I've made things worse by adding a bench I have nowhere to put. I'm my own worst enemy.

I could wait til fall and post the chair and a half again. That often works. 

I have been gifting lots of other stuff these past few weeks, mostly stuff from the attic, where I have tons of art and even just frames I probably will never use. 

Also today I was in the linen closet and gifted piles of standard sized pillowcases, which I don't need because I now use 2 longer length pillows, which I just prefer. (I kept a few of the standard size for the fold-up twin bed guests very occasionally use.) I must've gifted 25 pillowcases! So now the linen closet only looks "moderately" stuffed instead of "greatly" stuffed.

I want things to look SPACIOUS so when potential homebuyers come, it will be more inviting. I mean, I am one person, yet my clothes take up 3 closets (1 in each bedroom). Then I have 2 linen closets upstairs: one has nothing but sheets, blankets and a bulky comforter (plus my vacuum and 2 hampers) and the other holds towels mostly, plus winter scarves, hats and purses. I just have too much of everything!

I think I'll take a break for lunch.

PS I recently communicated wtih "Jon" from this site and told him about the main SA glitch I've encountered: how you will often lose your entire post upon hitting the Publish button. Long ago I got into the habit of saving all the content as a precaution, but anyway, he said he would fix that; if you have any other issues, let me know, or just send a message yourself.

Early spring was a little frustrating because I couldn't seem to get any of my planned on home maintenance jobs going.

Now, things are moving along. 

After the back stone stairs were rebuilt last week, my vinyl siding guy has arrived today and is working to replace siding where 2 small holes were made during 2 different storms. In the last storm, the Internet wires were literally ripped out of the side of my house! The 1st hole appeared the day after a bad storm years back (I've kept it sealed from weather and insects with color-matching duct tape) so I have to assume a tree branch somehow hit it at just the right angle to actually puncture it.

He said he would not bill me for doing this (!) because I've been chasing after him since April and he kept saying he would be here and then he wasn't. However, I decided I should pay him for his work and didn't really feel right about it; it was only $220 that he asked for. It involves removing siding from the bottom of the north side of my house (that people don't often look at) and using that siding to the vinyl with the holes so that the color matches more closely; otherwise, natural fading of the vinyl from sunlight would really make the new siding obvious, especially since the one hole is right above the garage door.

So I told him I would pay him and he said don't worry about it and that it would make him happier if I left a good review for him.

Another project I felt I should do to get this house ready for possible sale down the road was to recoat my concrete basement walls. This is an old house, and some of the concrete you can even scrape off as dust with your finger. I thought crumbling concrete is not a good look.

I had my old mason (Alex) do 2 walls, in 2 different years becus it was expensive. And not long after he did it, I got lots of hairline cracks in the concrete, as well as some unsightly discoloration.  When I showed that to him, he didn't really seem to have any solution for it.

Now, my new favorite mason (Jeff) who just did the stone stairs outside gave me a price to recoat the 2 remaining baement walls for a price that is actually less than half the cost of what Alex charged me for 1 wall! And he knew why the hairline cracks had appeared, and said the solution was to apply a coat of a type of primer first. The discoloration can't really be helped, but he said he/I could, after the concrete dries, apply Dry Lock to cover up the discoloration. His charge for the Dry Lock application was $800, which seemed like a lot, so I may try to do it myself. I've done it before, but it's messy becus it has a consistency of water, so drips all over the place.

He told me unexpectedly he could do that job possibly starting today. (As it is, the siding guys are here and I need time to clear areas in the basement anyway.) But I want to get it done fairly soon becus in our conversations he mentioned he is 50 and will retire in about 5 years, so I'm thinking i want to get any remaining masonry projects done before he retires, becus his prices are great.

The front door install happens next Friday. The only other remaining maintenance thing I want to do this year is have an appliance guy come over to check my dishwasher for a possible leak; I haven't used it in a while becus it smelled mildewy when I was using it.

Oh, and Tabs, if you're reading this far, you wanted to know if cayenne pepper worked to keep the chipmunks out of my raised beds. Short answer is no. They still have an entry hole at the bottom/outside of one of raised beds but I have liberally been shaking the pepper on the soil on top where I'm growing veggies. The chipmunk is still digging around here and there but the digging is not too keep and he is not treating it as an entry hole that goes all the way down. I consider it an uneasy truce; as long as he doesn't ruin my veggie plants and stays in the ground, not the raised beds. I got a large container of cayenne pepper at BJs but it cost $8 and that stuff goes fast when you're sprinkling it like I am. Each time it rains, it washes some of it away, and even just watering the plants while trying to avoid wetting the pepper is not really doable. 

My stone mason...or rather, 2 very hardworking Latino men....probably undocumented aliens that rumpty dumpety has such a problem with....finished rebuilding my stone stairs today. The stairs are at the top of my driveway and lead to the backyard and back patio. It's beautiful, and I think they did a great job. I had them put in a drain at the top to divert water rushing off my back patio into a brushy area instead of down the stairs. When I pay him the second half tomorrow, he'll show me how to lift the grill cover with a screwdriver, I think, but said I could just rinse any leaves that may get stuck in there with a hose.

There's a fairly large area to the left where they trenched the drainage pipe through an overgrown bed of lily of the valley, which I've long wanted to get rid of, so this kind of helped. I may have just assigned myself my next job. I will plant grass in the part where my mower mows, but try to find a nice native groundcover for underneath the shade of the rhododendrons here if pulling out the lily of valley that remains isn't too much.

Anyway, I observed during the past 3 days that my contractor was wholly absent from the job site except for dumping off stone, which was hand cut by his men, and gravel, for the drainpipe. I was ok with that because I could see these 2 guys knew what they were doing. So after running out this morning to help my father get a notarized letter to close a bank account (big hassle I'll explain later), on the way home, I squeezed in a gym workout and then stopped at my bank to get some money to tip both men. The contractor's price was very reasonable compared to the 2 or 3 other bids I got, so I felt fine tipping his men, something I don't normally do.

However, when I got back home, they had finished the job, cleaned up the whole job site and had left already, so I texted the contractor, told him they did a great job and asked if his men were still in the area as I wanted to personally thank them. No, they were not in the area, but he said if I was thinking of tipping them, I could put the tips in an envelope and he told me their first names, and he would take them tomorrow when I pay him.

OK, so...This is the first time I've hired this guy. I imagine that giving him envelopes for his men that he knows are tips might be a temptation to open the envelopes and pocket it himself? He's done nothing to make me question him, but I just don't know and I want to be sure my $$ goes to the intended recipients. So I decided to type a short thank you note, in Spanish, along with a brief request for them to text me at my cell # to let me know they received it. I figure if the boss man opens it up, he'll see the note and realize he has to give it to them or I'll know he took it. I hate for him to find out I don't fully trust him, but if he DOES open the envelopes, then I'll have good reason to not trust him (!), and if he DOESNT open the envelopes, then he'll never know, they will get their tips, hopefully they'll confirm that and all will be well.

Am I too mistrusting?

Now that this has been done, I immediately texted my vinyl siding guy to let him know he could come to do the repair of 2 small holes whenever he could. He was all set to start this past Monday, and then out of the blue the stone mason contacted me and said he was ready to begin work the next day at 7 am. He had been totally incognito since I had first met with him back in April. So I had to ask the siding guy to stand by. Which I HATED to do becus the siding guy, after failing to do the job after promising to do so 2 or 3 times, finally volunteered that he would do it for free and seemed to be truly on the verge of actually doing it. In return, I said I would sing his praises on social media.

But having to ask him to wait was not a great move since now there's not much incentive for him to follow through. I may have to offer to pay him anyway, just to get him to do it.

Meanwhile, the door installation is still waiting in the wings but has been scheduled for the week after next week. I will be so happy to get that done.

The issue with my father closing his bank account related to a Santander checking account he opened when he was still living in another state. They have a lot of offices there, but the one closest to where he lives now with my sister is a good 45-minute highway drive. Since he doesn't drive, it falls on me to ferry him around whenever he has a need, and it was getting old having to schlep up there, so the last time I was there with him maybe 2 years ago, I suggested he close the account and open an account in the town where he resides. He declined, and I told I would not be driving him up there again becus there was no need to maintain that account. He didn't care, but now he does, and he's got a 6-figure balance earning 0% in a redundant checking account there.

He tried to close the account on his own but could not do it because he doesn't have the right kind of personal identification. They need one "primary" ID with a photo which ususally consists of a driver's license, military ID or a 3rd option, which I think was something that was also either state of federal-government-issued. Then the "secondary" ID can be any number of things, like a utility bill, signed credit card, etc.

The problem is that my father is legally blind now so he hasn't driven a vehicle in years and his driver's license expired a long time ago. He has trouble walking and uses a walker. He lost his SS card a few years ago and we never found it; replacing it means a trip to local SS office and I really try to minimize all the trips. He has a bad habit, when going to a doctor's office, of just handing them all the cards in his wallet because he can't see which are his Medicare/Medigap cards. I'm not always right there to find them for him since I usually drop him off as close to the front entrance as possible, then go and park the car while he walks in there. I tried getting a handicap plaque for my car, but once again was stymied by state requirements and gave up.

Since he rents from my sister, he doesn't have utility bills sent to his name. What he DOES have is a VA ID card, which has his photo and an expiration date. You would think this would be acceptable, but it is not. Pulling my hair out at this point. Surely, these banks have had other elderly customers in similar situations. 

Then my father started saying he wanted to change the address on the bank statements while I had the bank on speaker phone, and I had to shush him because banks are so careful about fraud, so someone emptying out a large account and THEN saying oh, i also need to change the address, well, that would really be a big red flag.

My father has had his mail going to his son's address out of state.  I knew the bank would never want to change the address while closing out the account, and given my father's lack of identiification and sloppy, no, non-existent record-keeping, I don't see a way around it. My father has made things very difficult and has not given any of his 4 children power of attorney, which would have totally avoided all this hassle. 

I do everything for my father, from clipping his finger nails and cutting his hair/facial hair to bringing him to physical therapy (he wants to go weekly "for the rest of my life") and doctors (dentists every 3 months), lunch out every week as I am his sole provider of "recreation" or just getting out of his little studio. My sister cooks him dinner and does his grocery shopping, and that is it.  It's just too much at times. His place is a disaster but he is too cheap to hire housecleaners; he allows me to change his bedsheets and vacuum, but that's it.  My sister sees the mess every night when she brings him dinner, but walks right out the door again. 

So Santander stood firm with their policies, designed to prevent fraud but in actuality prevents valid account holders from accessing their money. The rep finally told me I could mail them a notarized letter requesting them to close the account and mail him a check. Which was nice to know; when I brought my father to PT this week, he gave me an attorney's business card and told me to make him an appointment, which I would not do until I knew why, which pissed him off to no end, but I stood firm, so he told he wanted to hire the attorney to help him get his money out of his account; I told him I thought we could do it without resorting to that, or at least I would try myself first, and so that's when I began making phone calls.

After Santander told me a notarized letter would work, I made the mistake of contacting the local bank where my father (and I) already have accounts and asking them what THEIR id requirements are for notarizing a letter. Well, their requirements are pretty much the same as Santander's, so I was getting the door shut in my face again.

So then we decided to try to get the letter notarized at my local library. Perhaps they would not be so stringent. I called ahead and asked, with trepidation, what ID requirements they had, and more specifically told them what my father, a horrible record-keeper, actually had: his VA photo ID card, a credit card, Medicare card and that's about it. The  notary said that would work. Sigh of guarded relief.

We were there this a.m. and got it done, though not without the notary hesitating when he noticed the VA ID card did not have an issue date, only an expiration date. Anyway, we got it done. Then I stopped at the PO to mail it certified so the bank couldn't claim they didn't get it. I have to wonder if they just make it hard so they can continue to make money of his balance. They could have made an exception for us given dad's condition and circumstances.

Oh happy, joy, joy.

My handyman came over last week to set up the plywood platform he had built for my front-loading washer and dryer. It's very sturdy. His buddy (with a very strong grip/handshake) came over, too, as they had to lift both up onto the platform, which is roughly 15" high. I LOVE the new height. Only problem: the washing machine vibrates QUITE a bit. Having it sit on a concrete floor vs plywood I guess makes the difference? I texted a video to my handyman, and he agreed there was too much vibration. That being said, I had it set to "high spin," which i like becus it really wrings out the water, so less drying time.

The machine is completely level. I told the handyman I'd try out a load on the normal spin and see if I could live with that. Otherwise, he's agreed to return (no charge) to help me put an old 1/2" thick yoga mat under it. (I knew I was holding onto it for a purpose.) I just ran a small load to see how it went, but then I had a different contractor come over, one I've been after since February to do some small vinyl siding repairs, and by the time I was done with him, the load was done. So I need to do another load.

Just out of curiosity, I checked the price of 2 Samsung-sold pedestals and they are still significantly more expensive than what my handyman charged me, plus if I'd bought the manufacturer's pedestal, I wouldn't have gotten the labor to set it up unless i bought them, I guess, at the time I bought the washer/dryer. I passed on them at the time because they just are very expensive for what they are, though the Samsung pedestals do include a storage drawer below, which would have been very nice.

Someone on my buy nothing group was giving away tons of brand new box cutters, each retractable as a safety feature and each with 10 blades stored inside. She encouraged people to take a lot, so I asked for 2 or 3. I figured one in the basement, one in garage, one in the main house would be convenient. She gave me 20 instead! So I gave my handyman, who I really like, 3 of them and he seemed very pleased, so perhaps that helped smooth the way toward him returning to fiddle with my dryer at no charge! Either way, I'm happy too!

Just having the door leading from garage to basement open why these guys were setting the platform in place allowed abou 5 flies in the house, which I hate. I released or killed all but one, who is currently corralled in my greenhouse window with a closed curtain. Hoping it will just die so I don't have to keep chasing after it. Two of my immediate neighbors have sheep or goats, so flies, I've noticed, are in abundance.

Oh, wow. Just heard from the mason who was going to rebuild my outdoor stone stairs.  Another one who ghosted me since April, but now he wants to start tomorrow, at 7 am. Which is actually fine, I have nothing scheduled, but my weather report says morning rain is likely. So I told him that, but he said they have demo to do first and a little rain won't affect that. He just asked me for half the cost tomorrow, so that reminded me I need a written invoice. I assume a personal check is the same as cash to him, but maybe not. May have to make a special trip to bank.

I have an old (male) friend I see every few months, so next time I see him, I'll give him a few too. They do come in handy for opening deliveries from Amazon or wherever.

I made a BJs run this morning so am well stocked with fresh food.

Back to the vinyl siding guy: he offered to do the repair FOR FREE due to the delays. Which is great, how often does that happen?  I told him I would sing his praises on social media. But WILL they show up this time after repeated fails? He told me he has new front office staff to help him keep things straight, so we shall see. He's a super nice guy, and I'd like to have him back in a few years to quote me on a roof replacement.

He told me if I have a shingle come off in a storm, to call him. He seemed to know his way around working with homeowners' insurance companies to get them to pay for an entire roof replacement when you might have just a few damaged or missing shingles, because our state, he said, is one of the few that has a "matching statute" that requires this, purportedly to protect the home property values of others in a neighborhood. This sounded like a stretch to me, but I looked it up and it is indeed true! I wouldn't think that mismatched roof shingles would affect others' property values that much.

I am still a little leery of ever taking advantage of this since we've all heard how insurers will jack up their rates after you file a claim. But isn't this what insurance is for? My rates routinely go up 15% or so every year anyway, and I have never filed a claim. What do you think?

I got brave enough to take a peek at my brokerage balances and was relieved to see my overall balance was only down $5,000 compared to the pre-tariff idyll in early March. I had to log in as I needed to restart automatic withdrawals from my settlement fund for monthly income. I had paused auto withdrawals in favor of taking some income from a taxable fund I have, mainly because the amount of taxable dividends and cap gains on the taxable mutual fund was getting to be a bigger number and I never knew what it was going to be til tax time, so it was kind of unpredictable and not very helpful when trying to calculate total income (desirable for a variety of reasons), so I had decided to shrink the balance some.

But I've since concluded that taxable mutual funds can be helpful to have on hand in case you are, for instance, near the top of your desired tax bracket but need income that is not fully taxable like traditonal IRA distributions are. Long-term dividends and capital gains from a taxable mutual fund are taxed at the lower capital gains tax rate.

So my plan is to draw income for the rest of the year (and the next 7 years actually) from my traditional IRA funds. Continuing to do this for 7 years should substantially lower my required minimum distributions when the time comes. I will stick to a fixed amount withdrawn each month, and should I have any leftover money in what I have withdrawn I would use it to do and pay taxes on small Roth IRA conversions. (I could happily use unspent funds on home improvements and or fun vacations/trips should the opportunity arise.) 

I used the very helpful AARP RMD Calculator. The last time I used it was in January 2025, which is not that long ago, but I wasn't sure I had used my latest monthly income figure at that time, so my estimated tIRA balance that's subject to RMDs could have been off.

So I redid my calculations and yes, the new RMD estimate is lower, at $12,300 starting at age 73 compared to $16,000 that i calculated in January. Which just kind of confirms my original feeling all along that doing a lot of Roth IRA conversions before age 73 may not be necessary for me. $12,000 a year is not a ton of money, and I need money to live on anyway, so that, plus roughly the same amount from my annuity, plus about $43,000 from Social Security will give me a comfortable income.

The closer I get to RMD time, the more accurate my projections will be, so since I'm still 7 years out, I'll want to run these numbers annually to see how they change. Or don't.

All that being said, Roth IRA money is the best place to be since it's tax-free, so I wouldn't mind adding to the Roth IRA portion of my assets. Right now I've got roughly 53% in traditional IRAs, 29% in Roth IRAs and 18% in taxable mutual funds. 

I've done a few Roth conversions in prior tax years but I think they were pretty small and I didn't keep track so I'd like to see if I can go through old tax returns and tally up how much I've converted in the past and to remind myself how to do it on the 1040 form. Every little bit helps.

In other news, I got through to Home Depot about the door installation. They were out here a week ago to measure the entry dimensions, but I hadn't heard a peep from them since.  Of course they required payment over the phone in full first, and it was quite a bit more than the original estimate of the "baseline" labor cost I was given due to new trim, inside and out, caulk and so on. At this point, I just want to get it done, but the earliest date she could give me was end of June. This has been one of the more trying projects I've done around here.

I'm keeping my handyman busy. He's the only reliable one who actually shows up.

He easily dispatched with 4 different tree stumps that were kind of an eyesore to look at it and made it harder for my mower. (I have a "mini" chainsaw...6"...but it's not quite enough to get these larger diameter stumps.) I care about making things easier for the mower since the more back and forth maneuvers or circles he needs to make, the more likely he will gouge out the lawn, which in turn allows weeds to grow back to cover bare earth spaces.

Anyway, after the tree stumps, we set to work assembling a "tuteur" I recently purchased after a friend of mine gave me a coral (native) honeysuckle seedling that was very much wanting to grow.  I tried putting the roughly 9 foot tuteur together myself but it was just too unwieldy for me to manage so thank goodness i had someone I could call.

He did inform me he's already raised his hourly rate (!) but only for new customers, so I believe he's charging me $65/hr. Given that many small projects don't even require that much time, I figure that's a bargain. And just to get someone to show up!  

We carried the tuteur down to where I wanted to put it and set it in place. Later, after he left, I planted and watered the honeysuckle, which has been on my plant bucket list for a while. 

So Home Depot was here 6 days ago to measure the dimensions of my front door and I'm still waiting for them to call me to just schedule the new door installation. I've called many times; at least now i have the first NAME of the person who manages door installs, but she has no direct line, and when I call the general number, sometimes it just rings and rings and rings. I've left messages, etc.

So frustrating. I guess I have to be patient, but patience is one thing I lack. Things get too complicated if you try to do more than one "project" at a time, so I want to be done with this one so I can move on to the next. Plus, that door is taking up a lot of space in my one-car garage and really in the way.

Ideally, this year's home improvement list includes:

1. Front door replacement
2. Back door replacement
3. Rebuild of stone stairs at top of driveway leading to backyard
4. Replacement of vinyl siding in 2 places where there are 2 small holes

Today is dad day so I don't usually schedule much of anything else; it's just taking him to physical therapy and then we usually do lunch somewhere afterwards. I will do my volunteer editing for kiva.org this morning before I leave, though. Last I saw, I've reviewed over 3,600 loans for that organization over the course of I think 6 years. 

I did finally check my investment balances and saw that I'm down only by about $5,000 compared to before this rumpy downturn started. I know they must've been down a lot more in the last few months. I plan to resume automated withdrawals from my settlement fund, a money market account, to at least make sure I take advantage of the 12% federal tax bracket income max of about $48,000 for single filers + the $15,000 standard deduction. Reviewing my total gross income year-to-date, I don't think there will be much unspent money through the remainder of the year, but there could be a few thousand, maybe $5,000, so I may do a small Roth conversion with it.

This am, I went to the gym to squeeze in a workout; later this am, my handyman came by and together we put together the tuteur I bought so that the coral honeysuckle a friend gave me could climb up it. Can't wait to see it grow; pollinators will love it.

He also brought his chainsaw and sawed to pretty much ground level 4 small tree stumps scattered around the yard; my mower guy will appreciate that.

After the handyman left, I decided to transplant some culver's root and mountain mint to different locations: the mountain mint was planted in a bed where a small serviceberry tree has been beset by destructive little green worms, and someone suggested that the minty smell will keep the insect that lays the eggs away. We'll see. Otherwise, I'll keep hand-picking the worms off, EARLIER in the year before they do more damage.

As for the culver's root, for 30 years it survived in the shade of a very large azaela bush I have, but as a sun-lover, it never thrived. So I've moved it to a much sunnier spot in another bed. The one clump I moved there last year is looking very good, except that it's too close to the tuteur, so I will likely have to move it again, if not this year, than next, depending on how fast the honeysuckle grows.

I'm already indoors to wait out the heat (and sun) of the day. When I go back out this afternoon, I want to:

1. Take the cover off my AC compressor thingie.

2. Cut back the many hydrangea branches rubbing against the corner of my sunroom. We don't need an ant highway there.

3. Repot a crowded haworthia (indoor succulent) that has a lot of babies.

4. Unpack and set up the new patio umbrella I bought in the table on the back patio.

5. Perhaps being overly ambitious, I'd like to put some screens back in on the upstairs windows.

6. If I have any energy left, I'd like to start my least favorite task: pulling poison ivy away from an area I cleared a year or two ago, by the mailbox. It was impossible to completely eradicate it because it was growing in and around the birch tree clumps. I suppose I could have sprayed, but I really try to reserve that for absolutely essential situations so as to avoid harm to pollinators.

7. I'd also like to clear brush and weeds away from some amsonia I forgot I'd planted on the north side so it's not swallowed up.

8. Start edging any one of a half dozen garden beds.

I am still monitoring the raised bed where the chipmunk appeared; cayenne pepper has been sprinkled heavily. I am doubtful it will work but you never know.

But first, there's lunch to think about!

This post will probably bore anyone who is not a homeowner or not interested in a myriad of details about home improvements, but I try to learn as much as a I can from each contractor who does work on this house.

I've been trying to jumpstart a few projects around here. I had a local contractor come out a mnth ago to replace my front entry door; he took measurements and gave me his price, which I agreed to, but I've been unable to get him over here to do the work.

(The old door is probably 1950s vintage, just a beat up wood door I once tried to paint with latex, which was a mistake. The new door is fiberglass (more energy-efficient with a clear stained glass panel insert in the top. It cost a lot of $$ so I hope it looks good!  I need jobs like this done should I decide to sell the house at some point. That old door is really an eyesore.)

Anyway, when the first contractor ghosted me, I tried calling a bunch of others, and their prices were substantially higher than his, and most couldn't do it anytime soon anyway. I was starting to feel a little anxious since, based on the 1st guy's assurance my chosen door would fit, I purchased the door, and there's a return window I didn't want to run up against.

The door has been sitting in my garage for weeks. Finallly, in desperation, I called Home Depot. They sent a guy out today to measure the doorway dimensions and make sure the door would fit. I started feeling anxious about this since, worst case scenario, I don't have the means of returning this door by myself and as mentioned, the local contractor is not returning my calls.

Luckily, Home Depot guy said it will fit. Now I just have to wait for their scheduler to call me to schedule the install. I won't be surprised if it will be another few weeks, but at least I'll know how long it will be and that they WILL show up.

Their price is higher than the original guy's price, but lower than all the other local contractors I called. I mean, the spread beween the lowest and the highest price was $1,000, just for labor, which seems way out of line.

In other exciting news, I had a plumber here to check the anode rod in my newish heat pump hot water heater. I had a different plumber here over a month ago to inspect and possibly replace it but they discovered they could not remove the rod due to lack of enough clearance between the top of the water heater and the basement ceiling. So I had scheduled for them to return; for over $900, their solution was to saw through the 2 copper pipes on the water heater so they could TIP the water heater to the side enough to allow removal of the rod. Then they would install "unions" on the copper pipes that would allow them to simply unscrew them next time I wanted to check the anode rod.

The junior plumber who was here at the time said if it were him, he would go back to the original plumber who installed the water heater a year-and-a-half ago to complain, becus he had never warned me that I'd be unable to remove the anode rod due to the low clearance in my basement.

I thought about that and ultimately decided to email the plumber (or his wife, who manages the business end of it) and very nicely explained the whole situation and asked if he'd be willing to cover a portion of the other plumber's bill, which I attached.

Maybe a little unusual (at least for me) but i figured the worst that would happen is he says no.

So the original plumber calls me and said the 2nd plumber was really overcharging me and that he could take out the old anode rod and replace it with a "sausage link" style rod (which is bendable becus it has joints) for less than half what the other guy was charging.

And so he did; they cut thru the original rod to remove it. And so I saved over $600 going back to the original plumber, and I thought he and his wife were very smart in the way they handled it; instead of handing over $$ to me to cover the added work that would be needed, he took the job away from the other plumber and got me back as a customer by not being so greedy.

I know that most people don't bother having the anode rod inspected and so in those cases, this wouldn't be a problem, but inspecting the anode rod can lengthen the lifespan of your heater, and since my uber-energy-efficient heater was an investment (not cheap, in other words), I wanted to protect that investment.

When the 2nd plumber took the cover off the top of it, I saw the top of the anode rod only. It looked pretty roached to me, very corroded and all. So I thought it needed replacement after just 1.5 years. Once the 1st plumber removed it last week, we could see the rest of the rod was in very good shape; so next time, he said, you don't need to inspect it for 3 years.

My handyman fixed a loose wheel on my lawn mower. I cut down a dead 8 foot high shrub myself, save for the 4 foot trunk at bottom, so he'll return with his chain saw to get rid of a total of 4 stumps I have around here. He's also buiding me a platform for my frontloading washer/dryer.

Once I get the front door done, i'll try chasing after the mason who said he'd rebuild my stone stairs leading to the back patio. Another one who ghosted me. And I have 2 small holes in my vinyl siding, another guy who ghosted me but still emailed me asking for a review!

I have a chipmunk (maybe more than one) that seems to have taken up residence in a raised bed where I'd planted lettuce! He ruined any chance I had for veggies in that box.  I bought some cayenne pepper today and hope to dissuade it, but I don't know if this will work.

Warnng: This post is only marginally related to personal finances. Proceed at your own risk.

One thing I noticed in recent years is all the different free skin cancer screenings they used to do at area hospitals are now nowhere to be found. They are usually held in May. Yes, I could make an appointment with a dermatologist, but I probably wouldn't bother unless I had a pressing concern. Still, I like to take advantage of the free clinics just as a peace of mind thing as I do have fair skin and have my share of freckles and moles.

So after wading through the many online notices of such clinics from 5 years ago (wish they'd take those things down already), I managed to find one for this year in a town about 40 minutes away, down county, and I decided to go.

I was also trying to schedule a possible walk, workout and coffee with a friend of mine after we'd already cancelled once. This is a friend who lives literally around the block from me but whom I don't see very often, just once in a while. Still, she is so appreciative as I've helped her get serious about her bone health and exercise; she's a nurse, but works these crazy hours and has a lot of demands on her time. She also is very health-conscious, as I am, so we have a lot in common. She told me yesterday that I was her inspiration and that she was so glad she met me. Which kind of melted my heart.

When I told her about the skin cancer clinic, she really wanted to go, so she joined me, and we were able to fit in some extended quality time together on the ride down there. Then we walked downtown to a local coffee shop with a lot of personality (kind of a funky vibe going on, which was surprising in such an upscale town) and ended up having a light lunch there.  I dropped her off back home and we reconnected again at the gym around dinner time, even getting one of the trainers there to show us the proper form for doing a Romanian deadlift. All in all, a fun and productive day!

Today is a day I set aside for yard work and more mowing. Tomorrow, I'm looking forward to an afternoon program on the battle at Gettsyburg. Seeing as how I just returned from a trip to Gettysburg Nat'l Park, I thought it would be interesting to see how the speaker at today's program either reinforces what I just learned about that moment in history, or adds to it.

Then on Monday a small group of us from 3 different local environmental groups are coming together (thanks to me!) to walk a section of a local high vaue river and tape knotweed, the hope being we can return after July (optimal time to treat with herbicide is July-October). 

It's in a very sensitive riparian area, so we won't do foliar spraying, which is very nontargeted, nonspecifc and harder to control.  (You can't dig this stuff out; the roots go down 10 feet.) We may use an injection method for the herbicide (depending on how much knotweed we find, it may or may not be feasible), or possibly paint it on with a small paintbrush.

I have also ordered, for my own use at home, 100 very small mesh bags with a drawstring attached (typically used for wedding party favors). I plan to use these on the cut stems of an invasive vine I have in my yard. Out of an abundance of caution, I will attach these small bags around each cut stem I treat with painted-on herbicide so that no insects are harmed by landing on the stem. So I'm going to ask the people in these other groups if they'd want to use them also. They're very inexpensive. However, we have not secured any permits from the town or state yet, and that could really delay us big time. We have the town land use director joining the walk so am hoping he agrees the need to tackle the knotweed is urgent.

I hope you all had a nice Mother's Day. I had an old friend come up for lunch and we spent a nice couple of hours. After he left, I set about to repair a kitchen cabinet where the trim that covered the gap in the middle of 2 corner cabinets had broken off. I happened to have a handy clamp that I found outside on a street sign that one of the utility companies must have left, so I used it here, along with some rubber brands to hold it in place while the gorilla glue dries.

I also was mowing the lawn until I had a recurring wheel issue occur.

But onto the focus of my post: Groceries are consistently one of my biggest expenses. In fact, last year, it was my #2 expense after property taxes, at $4,700, and I'm shopping for one.

It seems like for years now I've have a goal of lowering my grocery expenses but haven't made measurable progress. So for the past couple of months, I've been working on another Grocery Price List, where I track costs for individual items I buy regularly, at about a half dozen stores I frequent.

I thought I knew that in general, Aldi's had the best prices. HOWEVER, after analyzing the prices of 58 food items, I was surprised to see that BJs edged out Aldi's with 16 best prices while Aldi's had just 13. I've had a half-price membership at BJs for about 5 years now but only shop there once a month or so, but now I see from my spreadsheet I created that they actually have the best prices among BJs, Aldi's, Whole Foods, Stop & Shop, Trader Joes and Big Y for:

Bananas, organic raisins, mushrooms, avocado, fresh carrots, frozen berries, organic pears, prunes, gold kiwi, pink grapefruit, raisins, frozen turkey meatblls, red onions, organic celery, organic corn and kiwi.

While Aldi's had the best prices for:

Mango, yogurt, soymilk, Dave's bread, cantaloupe, organic blakberries, frozen peas, frozen broccoli, butternut squash, organi grape tomatoes, organic mini cucumbers, kefir and pineapple.

I eat a plant-based diet but supplement with eggs (2x weekly), small portions of meat or wild salmon, and I avoid processed foods, so I mostly shop the fresh produce section.

Whole Foods has the best price for organic canned, sodium-free beans, at 99 each. I also will continue to buy the 2 lb bags of wild sockeye salmon there. Stop & Shop seems to have the best price on dried split peas and their Nature's Promise organic soymilk has a great price at $2.99 a half gallon although I don't like the sugar in it, but will no longer pay inflated $5 for Silk brand, which is unsweetened.

Tracking all these prices is time-consuming, especially since prices DO fluctuate, and also, some stores are sneaky (like Trader Joe's and S&S) where they sell you an odd amount, like 12 oz instead of 16, or they sell by the piece of fruit, instead of by the pound. That's ok, then I just calculate what the "per ounce" price is instead of "per pound."

So I'm going to try to go to BJs more regularly, much as I complain about the drive (16 min) and their overly sensitive self-scanners. Their gas prices, the lowest around, is also another incentive. I also noticed that while S&S has quietly increased prices on a few items I'd recorded just a month or so ago, the other stores have not.

Also, I have to say in the past when I bought fresh bagged fruit like oranges, there could be smushed ones, but today i bought a bag of their organic Cosmic Crisp apples with a coupon and they are delicious! Super crunchy!

I am back, safe and sound, from a 4 day trip out to see Dido. It's a 3-hour trip there, so I spent Monday night, then Tuesday we left for Gettysburg, which I believe is another 2 hours.

Gettysburg National Park was really really awesome. I especially liked seeing the battlefield, which is quite spread apart and maintained by the park service as rolling hills of green, but you can definitely see how the hills were used by both sides for defensive purposes.

We signed up for the guided bus tour and I was delighted to find out that the two of us were the only ones on the tour (!) so the guide gave us his full attention. He said he'd been doing the tours for 41 years, so yes, he had an encyclopediac mind chock full of all sorts of fascinating details.

For example, there is a memorial/statue dedicated to the last documented Civil War veteran to die at the age of 106, in 1956. He was a Union Army drummer boy from Minnesota who enlisted at 14.

One of my favorite photos above.

This is part of the cyclorama, a massive, 360-degree painting done in 1883.

This is the Pennyslvania Memorial, the largest one at the park, representing the 34,000 Pennyslvania soldiers who fought in the Civil War. Each state that fought there has its own memorial.

This is Little Round Top, site of a pivotal battle and intense fighting that purportedly decided the direction of the war.

General George Meade, who President Lincoln put in command of the Army only 3 days before the battle at Gettysburg.

You can also drive around the park yourself and look at the many statues and plaques.

There are 3 battlefield observation towers, and we climbed this one.

From atop the tower you could see the small stone farmhouse that had been purchased by a newly freed slave who worked very hard to fix up his farm, only to have to run with his family for their lives when the Confederates were coming. When he returned after the battle of Gettysburg, there were shallow graves dug all over his land, the farmhouse demolished. A sad story. He got reparations, but less than he asked for.

Before leaving Gettysburg, we also stopped by the farmhouse that Eisenhauer purchased upon his retirement. It's pretty modest for a former president, but he had many famous visitors, including Winston Churchill, Nikita Khrushchev and Charles De Gaulle. This is the back of the house. We were not allowed to go inside, unfortunately.

After that, we stopped at the Hawk Mountain raptor center and walked the trails to take a break from the driving.

I have been busy as a bee since my arrival home Thursday. I mowed the lawn, planted my vegetable garden, went grocery shopping, went to the gym, etc etc. I missed the May Day demonstration in my town.

It's good to be home, but it was a really great trip. The weather was divine the whole time, there were no crowds and I hit no major traffic jams coming or going!

Mid-week I suggested to our litter board's exec director that we reschedule the litter cleanup set for Saturday to Sunday instead, on account of expected rain. She agreed.  I don't take doing that lightly because it takes quite a lot of work to reschedule anything and let people know, and since I do all the social media promotions and the PR, this has fallen on me to do.

I had to create and post new Facebook and Instagram flyers, call the first selectman's office, call the state representative's office (both are still coming), revise the date on earthday.org, contact the local paper (which luckily is online so they can publish quickly), cancel the Facebook "event" and make a new one with the correct date, revised the greeting on my landline, which I'm using so people can call the number and listen to the pre-recording as to whether we're still on or not...and on and on.

Anyway, I think we're ready for the Sunday event.

Today was a very productive day, yardwork-wise. After I got back from the gym, I had lunch, relaxed a bit, then headed outside to see if I could clear some of the wineberry and multiflora rose and bittersweet that climbs into 4 beautiful, mature evergreens I have out back. If I don't stay on top of it, you can see how the trees slowly begin getting bald spots; eventually, they will die.

This shows the edge of the lawn in the back and the "brushy" area behind it. To the left, you see a red maple beginning to leaf out, and to its right are the 4 evergreens. Two of them are very large (larger than they look here because I took this photo from a 2nd floor window) and in great shape; one is smaller, probably becus deer browsed on the bark, damaging it, but it's still hanging in there; I think I'll put some  plastic fencing around the trunk. The 4th one, which you can't see, has lawn all its needles except for the top part; not sure what's happening there.

So I worked on that for about 2 hours, to the point of exhaustion. I was afraid I may not get another chance to do this this year, because once all the foliage is completely leafed out, it just gets too overgrown out there to take a risk with ticks. (As it was, the other day I caught 3 climbing on me after working near the road front doing something different...so they are definitely out.) I dress all in white so as to see them easier. Plus the poison ivy grows a good 10 inches high before it flops over on the ground and I have to avoid that, too.

I'm feeling really good about what I accomplished. Did I clear it all out? No, no way. But I did a lot more than I thought I would.  A lot of the bittersweet I could pull out by hand (with gloves), and I was also pulling lots of small burning bush and Japanese maple seedlings. I also see I have a problem with the doublefile viburnum, which tends to be invasive.

Little by little, I'm making progress. The most important thing is to attend to doing this sort of thing REGULARLY or your work will be reversed.

Earlier in the week I dug out the final (I hope) patch of lesser celandine I hadn't noticed before. That, too, was a job. I didn't want to compost it, even at the town transfer station, so I spread it out on a tarp on my sunny driveway to bake and dry out for a few days. Since it will rain tomorrow, I threw the now dead plants into a trash bag and will take to the dump.

I took a self-paced, online safe driving test with AAA last week. It costs $20, but will entitle me to 3 years' worth of discounts on my car insurance. I forget how much of a discount it is. The test was QUITE long with a lot of different modules, so it took all told probably 4 hours or so.

My knotweed group met with the chair of a river watershed group here in town and we agreed we'd work together to begin treating the knotweed that is growing IN the river. Very bad. Trout Unlimited will join in, too. The first thing we'll do is tape the knotweed stands up and down the river. We can't treat it til late summer/early fall, so as to minimize any impact on bees; honeybees LOVE knotweed. I was actually considering buying a pair of waders so i walk through dense brush with the others to access the river, but I may not do that. Ticks, again, is my concern. We'll invite the press to come, but I would also like to be there taking pictures so I can post on our group's Facebook page. So I don't know.

Oh! I received another donation to my fundraiser today. I think it was someone from this group, but I'm not positive becus the name isn't the name that's used here. If it was you, Ceejay, THANK YOU SO MUCH.

The weeks are so chockful of stuff going on. Tonight a friend is driving over, and then we'll do about a 12-minute walk from my house up to the town flagpole (in the middle of Main St) where we'll attend an outdoor candlight vigil for those who were wrongfully deported and detained in El Salvador.

I started a fundraiser on Swing Left to raise $$ to win back just 3 Democratic seats in the House to take back the House in the mid-term elections next year, which would go a long way in impeding the orange man's Project 2025 plans. Just 3 seats is all we need! (And not to lose any.)

So I made the first contribution; I was so happy to find someone I know in town made the next contribution, but otherwise, it's been quiet.  My friend who I'm seeing tonight is chair of the town's conservation commission, and I think I can also count on her for a donation (if she remembers). My goal is to raise $1,000 by the middle of next year, so I have some time, but still, I was wondering how to drum up more contributions as up til now, I had just about 85 or so Facebook friends.

I came up with the idea of expanding my Facebook network by friending more people with similar political views. It was easy to find them. So now I have well over 400 "friends" on Facebook, but so far that hasn't led to any more contributions. I also did 2 posts about why I'm doing this. If anyone is interested, I'll send you a link!

I really hate asking people for money. Back in the day, I used to participate in a lot of MS walkathons where I looked forward to the challenge of a 20-mile walk, yet disliked raising pledge money.

Today I had a handyman come out to repair one of my raised beds. He was very reasonably priced and came out right away. I would love to have him build a platform for my front-loading washer/dryer to save my back. Today was my first time using him. He was recently retired from other work and decided to do handyman stuff and couldn't believe how many single/divorced women have a need for this kind of thing. I know I certainly do.

I've been less successful getting other home projects going. One guy gave me a price to replace vinyl siding in 2 places where there are small holes, and I said great, let's do it, but twice now he failed to show up when he said he would. Becus it's a small job.

My go-to mason gave me a ridiculously high price for rebuilding some old stone stairs here and when I called him on it, he quickly dropped the price by nearly $2,000. This bothered me, and it's still a high price, so i had someone else come out but still waiting for his estimate. The large outfit (that means high overhead) quoted me a price that was even higher than my go-to mason, so that's not going to happen.

And still waiting for a price on front door replacement. I'll wait for Easter to pass, then will start pestering certain people again.

Tomorrow I'm taking my father to a German restaurant that's new to us. It's been 10 years since my mother passed, and traditional holiday celebrations like Easter have come to a grinding halt. It's crushing to me, but it's forced me to find new ways to mark the day. Some years I do nothing and have a pity party, other years a friend invites me over and in recent years, I've taken my father on barn tours and then dinner out. I think we've done 3 barn tours locally here, so I think we're done with that.

After Thanksgiving, Easter has always been my favorite holiday because there is not the pressure of gift-giving and it concides with spring. And what's not to love about bunnies and daffodils and eggs.

I planned to spend some time working in the yard today, and while I did, the time wasn't spent on what I hoped to do. That's because I did one more walk along the road front looking for invasive lesser celandine, which I found last year and dug up as thoroughly as I could. I didn't see any more on my first 2 "inspections," but that's becus it wasn't blooming and is otherwise very inconspicuous without its bright yellow flowers, which could be mistaken for dandelion if you didn't know better.

Anyway, I did find a good size patch of it in bloom near a culvert and wet spot where the skunk cabbage is coming up. It took some time, but I got out what I saw, but walking back I saw yet another largish clump of the stuff that wasn't yet in bloom. Sigh. I'll have to do that another time, but very soon, because once it does bloom, it becomes nearly invisible.

It all came from my neighbor across the street's house, jumping the road. She also has knotweed on her property, which I pointed out to her and she was very grateful I told her about it, but I'm not sure she's sprayed it yet. (Cutting it makes it grow more vigorously.)

So after successfully recruiting someone to serve as treasurer for my litter group, I found 2 more people who expressed interest in serving on our board. One of them will join us at our next cleanup in a week or so so that we can all meet him. The other one I need to talk to on the phone first, and then i will likely invite him to the cleanup for the same reason. Getting both these 2 people on the board would be a real accomplishment, especially since someone else who is currently on the board plans to resign in June.

Update: I would say at least 300 showed up tonight. Here are some pix:

That's my street to the right of the Meeting House (looks light a church).

This is the Episcopal church at the flag pole intersection.

So far, I've participated in 2 rallies and 3 protests. The rallies were different in that they were indoors and featured a series of very inspirational speakers making testimonials. One of my favorites was from a local church pastor. I would love to see more faith leaders speak out on what's going on.

At the last demonstration on Saturday, we got about 500 people to turn out in my little town of just 28,000, so that felt pretty good. And of course, there were much larger protests going on in major cities.

Here we can see be seen walking up Main Street to the flagpole while others are already returning.

My latest online fixation is watching short video clips of young, ungroomed men with long hair be transformed in a barber shop. It seems to be a thing. And once you watch one, a whole bunch more show up in your feed. It's amazing how much better someone can look with a simple haircut.

My other favorite is watching crowds of voters booing and shouting at Republican legislators at town hall meetings as they attempt to defend what 47 is doing.

I still have not looked at my brokerage balances becus I know it will make me anxious. However next month I'll be needing to take a distribution, so seeing my balances will be unavoidable. Luckily, I have about 3 years' worth of income sitting in a Vanguard settlement money market fund, so I won't lose additional money when I take the distribution.

Here are some handmade candies direct from Ukraine. I only tried one so far and it was very good.

Spring has sprung here in the Northeast but the temp are more like March.

Work with 2 of my volunteer groups is heating up, and these days, my rallies, demonstrations, phone calls and letter writing is very much another p/t job, so I guess you could say 3 of my volunteer groups are heating up.

I am very excited to have succeeded in building consensus between my environmental group and another nonprofit here in town that seeks to protect a certain river that is a sole source aquifer and supplies drinking water to half the population.

More recently, I joined a book club and the person who heads it up is none other than the chair of the river group. We got to talking about a certain thing we observed on the river that we both recognize is a problem.  He was very excited about the possiblity of partnering with us to tackle it. I was ready to make a presentation to pitch the idea at our meeting this past week, but too many people could not make the meeting. Nonetheless, I got buy-in from 2 key people and finally got the go-ahead to invite the river man to come to our next meeting for further discussion.

In my 2nd volunteer group, I also scored a win by recruiting someone to act as our group's treasurer. We are desperate for board members; he's got a lot of good experience. Someone else may be bringing on 2 more new members whom we have yet to meet.

In the more immediate term, we have a beach litter cleanup this weekend, and then I organized another cleanup in another town for late April. I'm picking up more of the detail work that our former exec director did. I have to write a donor acknowledgement letter, and after that create a flyer to publicize the 2nd town cleanup on social media. A lot to do. I don't have a graphic design background, so that part of it has been a bit of a struggle.

Not much else new at the moment. Just trying to watch my spending and maintain my exercise and healthy diet habits.

It's impossible to ignore everything that's happening in the world around us. I've become increasingly involved in local rallies, letter-writing and so on. I went to a rally yesterday in my hometown and listened to a series of heartfelt testimonials by local people. Included among them was the mother of a child killed in a school shooting here who somehow has the strength and determination to fight gun violence. 

I did not expect that this is the turn my retirement would take. It often feels overwhelming, but I strive to do at least one small thing each day, and I'm trying to build a network with like-minded friends. Nearly every town around here has formed some sort of group that people can join. It's really heartwarming. I sometimes wonder how history will look at this period 10 years from now. I want to do my part, and be on the right side of history.

In other news...

My credit score has I believe risen a notch with my new car loan payments. It stands at 834 now, and I got the same message Dido did. He he.

I'm trying to avoid making purchases at Walmart, Amazon and Target. It hasn't been that hard. 

I attended a wonderful democracy rally last night with a few friends. I'm so proud of my little hometown. The old gymnasium was packed to standing room only, and there was a very inspiring array of speakers, including representatives of the ACLU, local politicians, the local Indivisible chapter, and multiple other organizations fighting the felon. I think my favorite speaker was the pastor of our Congregational church. I was just impressed at his impassioned speech. Impressed because so often faith leaders retreat from political upheaval and play it safe by remaining "neutral." He was not. We also heard from a young Mexican immigrant who had already witnessed ICE arrests in nearby local city, some local high school students and a 97-year-old woman.

The snow and ice have finally begun to melt with warmer temps forecast all week before turning cold again. I took advantage by going out and doing some pruning: a fairly large branch of a Japanese maple growing straight into a mountain laurel, and a hard prune of bluebeard so it doesn't outgrow its space. Soon I am looking forward to cutting pussy willow branches to bring inside.

Now that I'm pretty much recovered from my cold, I did return to the gym for 2 days last week, but decided I would make Sundays my day of rest, and pull back the workouts from 4 days to 3 days a week. Since I was also going to the gym the other days of the week to use the treadmill, the whole schedule felt kind of demanding. Hopefully having Sundays "off" will make it feel more reasonable; it's not like I'm not going to do stuff so I will get some steps in anyways....

I am beginning to think more about various home improvements I want to do. There's always more than I can handle. I guess the first priority is repairing 2 small holes that were punched into my vinyl siding after storms. The 2nd  one occurred just last week when ice on some old cable wires caused the wires to literally rip out of the side of the house. I didn't even know the wires were not needed when I upgraded to fiber last  year, but they chose to leave them there. I have since had someone from the cable company come out and remove them, but now want to repair the holes to avoid insect or moisture infiltration.

I have actually been considering replacing my roof earlier than anticipated; it was last done in 2013 so it's just 12 years old. I would like to get metal roofing for over the garage and the front entry way and I would really like to get the guy who did it last time because he was honest and gave me a great price. I also have 2 exterior doors I'd like to replace plus a bigger fridge and would love to get an induction stove. And also redoing the stone stairs leading to the back yard.  Obviously I'm not going to get all of that done this year; I tend to knock off the "easiest" projects first so who knows what will get done, and when.

Happy to say I have already gotten both state and federal tax refunds totalling about $3k.

I decided this afternoon to go get some soymilk at Target as I was running low and this is a staple in my house. I usually get 4 half-gallons at a time so I don't have to go there so often. Hopped in the car, drove out there, parked and grabbed a cart.

If you've been to Target before, you probably know they have those nifty little compartments in the top front of the cart,  perfectly sized for your cell phone.  That's where I put mine as I headed down the long aisle to the refrigerated case.

I got what I needed, checked out and left the store, came home and did some reading, both online and off. At some point, I was on the computer and to log into a certain website, I needed to get the code from my phone. Except I couldn't find it. Anywhere.

I tried to locate it in the house with the Tile thing on my key chain, but nothing was beeping back to me.

It dawned on me that it was POSSIBLE I left it in the cart at Target. Oh no. Between my keys, my Faraday pouch that securely contains my car key plus my groceries, my hands were full and I am easily distracted. I called Target to see if anyone turned in the phone. The phone rang and rang and rang, and no one ever picked up.

Feeling desperate, I grabbed my coat and jumped in the car to go to Target. It's about a 15-minute ride to a neighboring town. About an hour had lapsed since I'd been to Target.

I began mentally to recall what was in my cell phone case: multiple credit cards, my driver's license and a small amount of cash. A lot of valuable stuff. As I drove, I was thinking it was POSSIBLE the cart could still be where I'd left it, up against a small island in the parking lot further away from the store since my car is still new and I don't want it dinged. So I've been walking further to any store I go to.

I pulled in to the Target parking lot and headed to the exact spot where I'd parked before. I saw the cart and pulled up as close as I could, but there were other vehicles on either side of it. MY PHONE WAS STILL IN THE CART. And all its contents.

I felt like doing a Hail Mary right then and there. Anyone who'd pulled up to park there could have grabbed the cart and found it, and may or may not have been honest, but I'm guessing with today's bitter cold, most people don't want to walk a freezing cold cart into the store when there are usually plenty already inside. The phone is in a brown faux leather case which has a pretty low profile and apparently was not seen laying in the front of cart. I am so relieved!!!! Also glad someone collecting carts did not find it, because from there, who knows....

I guess I'll have to go back to lugging a purse around.

I'm about 95% recovered from the cold (or whatever I had), and I am running very low on certain food items, but strangely, I feel little motivation to go out now after being cooped up for 2 weeks. I did go out and knock most of the ice off my car but still have to work on the roof. I guess it's the cold weather...about 25 degree high today.

I feel like I've gotten NOTHING done, and I don't even feel like rushing back to the gym. I am usually very disciplined about doing stuff. I do plan to return to the gym sometime this week.

I did already get my IRS tax refund and am waiting for the state tax return to be  processed.

I purchased a security key that I want to start using with all my financial accounts; hopefully I can set it up without too much trouble.

I spent $8 on a dozen eggs. I don't eat many, but like to have them.

Thanks for all the well wishes on my last post. That night I was feeling a bit more energy, but waking up the following morning, I felt just as sick again. It reminded me I've always experienced this pattern of feeling sicker in the morning but better in the evening, and this worked in my favor as a child since my mother would see how I was doing in the morning before deciding whether or not to send me back to school.

But today I am definitely feeling more energy and have a load of clothes in the dryer. It was on my list of things I really want to do, along with my state tax return and shoveling my driveway. Doing the laundry is easier, so that's where I'm starting. Now I've gotten real ambitious and am laundering my bedsheets and duvet cover.

One thing I really appreciate when not feeling well....I can sign into my US Postal Service account and use Informed Delivery to see what mail will arrive/has arrived in my mailbox today to see whether I need to walk down the drive and collect it or not.  I recognize the sound of the mail truck engine coming down my street so lazy me, I can check what mail he is leaving me WHILE he is leaving it.

I'd also like to walk down into the front yard and see if there's any sign of pussy willow catkins yet. Probably too early, but last year I was too late. They are very much an early spring arrival. I'd like to cut some to bring indoors, plus cutting them back helps keep them a reasonable size.

I see so many tracks in the snow. I know I have opposums and bobcat and not sure what else is roaming around. I keep a heated water bath for all. Last night's full moon illuminated the yard.

My plumber hasn't yet gotten the "sausage" anode rod he wants to use as replacement, if needed, in my heat pump hot water heater. He was here to do some annual maintenance but inspecting the anode rod was the one thing he couldn't do because I have very low ceiling clearance in the basement. Hard to pull the rod out from the top when you have just 6" or so. The "sausage" rod apparently fits in differently.

I like this plumber because he explains everything he's doing to me in great detail and will patiently answer my questions.  I'm one of those people who tries to listen and learn as much as I can about what any contractor is doing. Knowledge is power and all that. He said most people don't care to hear it all, but I do. The more I know, the less likely some other contractor is going to rip me off, and believe me, many do, in different ways.

I also think his pricing is fair, and I like the discount they offer on furnace cleanings after the first one. He is from a local town, and his wife manages his scheduling via text. There are two plumbers in my town that have a lock on business, or so it seems. People on the town FB group recommend these two over and over again, almost to the point where you wonder if they are the only 2 plumbers in town. "Best in the business, hands down" and all that. I have hired both of them and found them lacking for different reasons.

Actually, there is another local plumber I discovered when a rusted-out pipe end cap burst in my basement last summer, whom I also liked. It's nice to have 2 plumbers in the mental Rolodex for any future plumbing issues.

Given the Felon-in-Chief's abrupt, autocratic, bull-in-a-china-shop style of decision-making about wide-ranging programs, I am feeling more nervous about my future Social Security income. My plan all along has been to wait another 3 or 4 years before collecting, but will it be there, intact? I had always reasoned in the past that if one Administration or another started making changes that I likely would be grandfathered in to existing rules given my age, but I'm feeling less certain of that now. If I felt changes were imminent, I would move to start collecting sooner, but would really rather wait.

I've been sick with what I assume is a bad cold for nearly a week now. I've gotten vaccines for Covid, the flu, RSV and pnuemonia, but still I got sick! First time in many years.

It started out with at least 2 days of just a sore throat, which then progressed to a dry, hacking cough and fatigue. Now it's congestion and sneezing. Can't wait to shake this thing.

There was a point I was so tired I didn't even have the energy to read or watch TV, and I've already lost over 3 lbs. cus not much appetite and I was just eating the simplest things like toast, fruit and cheese. But I am dethawing wild salmon now for dinner.

Thank goodness a neighbor I don't often talk to texted me, I mentioned I was sick, she offered to get me anything I needed, and so I did ask her to get me cough medicine. I am more than halfway through that bottle already. Luckily, I'd done a big grocery shop right before I started feeling sick but those weights are going to feel extra heavy once I get back to the gym.

We had about 4" of snow last night but I'm not planning on shoveling, even though 2 more storms are headed here later this week.

In other news, I joined a Nature Book Club in town (we have 3 book clubs) so I'm reading a book about beavers now. The prior book, which was hard to get through, was about the high intelligence level (on a par with dogs and porpoises) of octopi.

I'm annoyed with myself because, well, I'm not used to driving a vehicle where you press the release latch on the back door to open it, and as I was feeling around for that latch, I inadvertently pushed inward (not that hard) on one of the license plate lights and detached it from where it was securely seated. So it's loose. Now I'm wondering how much $$ the dealer will want to fix that because the door is completely sealed in as far as I can see. Unless they have some sort of special tool.

I like the Toyota dashboard for my loan repayments, and I made the first of 2 big prepayments this past week. Still a ways to go...

                                                 

The tariffs imposed by our Idiot-in-Chief go into effect Tuesday in what he foresees as "America's Golden Age."

 It could be more painful than that. Remember, rising prices won't likely be seen immediately, due to existing inventory, except for non-durable goods like food. We get an awful lot of food from Mexico. And I do worry about opportunistic and unethical price gouging by those seeking to take advantage.

I recently started thinking about stockpiling a few things like paper towels, toilet paper and the like.  If I had a spare freezer, I'd fill it up, but since I really have very limited storage here, whatever buys I do now will likely have minimal impact on my spending in the months ahead.

My oil tank is still 3/4 full and should see me through most of the winter, but if tariffs remain in place through summer, it will definitely impact my usual dead-of-summer heating oil buy, when oil prices are usually lower. If I were an optimist, I might say this would all come to an end in 6 months' time, but who really knows.  Still, I'm glad my car purchase is out of the way.

What about you?

In other news, I finished my taxes but am anxiously waiting to get the email from the IRS telling me my filing submission was accepted. In past years, I put zeroes in a few blank spaces that caused my return to be repeatedly rejected. It was a very frustrating process because the IRS does not precisely spell out what the problem was.

But anyway, despite having made about $5,000 more in income than I predicted and thus having to pay back about $500 to the Affordable Care Act, I should still wind up with a $1400 federal refund. At some point when my income becomes more consistent, I will tinker with taxes I have deducted, but right now it's still a bit of a moving target.

I'm eager to begin next on my state tax return but can't do that til the federal one is accepted.

I let my BJs membership lapse this past fall because it's hard to justify paying the $60 membership as a single person. Then I got something from them in the mail offering me an annual membership for $25, which is what I paid the last 2 years. So I went for it. Just a day or two later, I got a postcard from them offering an even sweeter deal: a $20 membership and $20 back after spendng $60.

It was too late for the better deal, but I decided to nicely ask them if they would still honor it. She gave me the $5 back for the difference in the membership cost but said she couldn't (easily) arrange it so I could get the $20 back after spending $60, but I was stil happy to get something. It never hurts to ask! Note to self: Hold out a bit longer next year before accepting the first discounted membership deal!

I bit the bullet and spent $375 on a second backup key for my Toyota and it is now safely stored with my important documents. Knowing my proclivity for misplacing stuff, the odds of me getting through the next 10 years without losing my one and only key are not good! I have, however, decided to go back to an old habit I had been happy to do without: carrying a purse around with me. It's less likely I'll leave something somewhere, like cell phone, keys or Toyota key (which is kept separate in a Farriday pouch), if I can just throw everything in my purse.

My first car payment will be early February, and that's when I plan to "turbocharge" the car loan repayments with a single additional $5,000 payment in 2025 and then continue paying about $400 a month for the year. So next month will be yet another very tight month, money-wise.  The 2nd $5,000 payment will be made early in 2026, and by doing this, I'll have the car paid off in 2 years, not 5, saving myself a lot of interest.

I very much enjoy driving the car. I like the Sirius XM alot, but don't want to pay $10 a month for it. I am getting used to dealing with blind spots with my side mirrors, though truth be told I haven't driven much on the highway where this would be most important.  But what I'm saying is that I don't think it'll be necessary that I spend $1,000 on the after-market blind spot assist installation.

I plan to at least start my taxes tomorrow. I do them myself. I am still missing tax forms from 2 entities, but I'll see if I can work up the point where I need those numbers. And I should get them any day now.

I did also recently renew my McAfee computer virus protection. If I had been lazy and just clicked on the renew button that kept popping up on my computer, I would have paid $70 for a year's coverage for my computer and smart phone. But by opening a new window and going to the McAfee site, I paid just $42 for it. I hate when companies penalize existing cutomers.

I treated myself (rarely do this) to a yummy sandwich at the general store today coming home from running an errand. I remember one thing I always told myself I would do "when I retired" was buy myself a fresh bouquet of flowers whenever I was at Trader Joe's. I haven't done that yet, partly because when I was there last week it was below freezing and I was afraid that could prematurely zap any flowers I bought in the walk from store to car. As soon as temps rise, though, I will be buying myself flowers!

Recently, my 10-year-old Canon laser jet printer finally stopped working, and I had to buy a new printer.  I paid more upfront for a laser printer, hoping to do better in the long run than spending increasingly ridiculous amounts of money (like $35) on those little ink cartridges.

I decided to just get a b/w printer. I don't use it often but do require it from time to time, for things like my upcoming tax return, which I do myself and so need to print out all the forms.

I got a Brother model that came highly recommended by a few review sites.

But oh, brother, what a hassle it was to connect it with my desktop computer. I had to call my Internet company (Frontier), and since I couldn't remember my rarely used PW for my WiFi, the rep said I'd have to change the password. That's really what started all my problems, because then my 3 Rokus no longer worked. It took a good part of yesterday afternoon to get this all sorted out. They decided to ship me a (free) Eero for the fiber, but even though we had finally fixed the problem on the phone, she said just keep it in case I have problems again.