There are 6 "getting large" swallowtail caterpillars up and about. There are now 2 chrysalises. I've marked my calendar so I can keep a close eye on things when they might emerge as butterflies, so I can catch it all with my camera, though honestly, now that I'm not working, I check the aquarium several times daily because I love watching them.

In addition to the 8 caterpillars, there were two more very small caterpillars but I'm afraid I may have tossed them when I snipped off a few small pieces of parsley plant so I could more easily sop up rainwater that collected in the bottom of the aquarium without disturbing or jostling other caterpillars on parsley branches. I looked for and found the parsley branches I tossed, but no caterpillars. It's possible they're still in the aquarium.


Can you see the chrysalis here? There are 2 branches in the aquarium. Look at the one on the right. See how it's v-shaped. Look at the branch on top and you'll see a weird oval-shaped thing hanging underneath it. That's one of the chrysalises.

I got a little yard work done after 5 yesterday. I wanted to cut back some shrub foliage that was touching the front of my house. It was getting overgrown. Well, in doing so I discovered an underground burrow, which I'm pretty sure is where one of the 2 rabbits hanging around here made its home. As with the woodchuck burrow a few years ago, it's a little too close to my home for comfort. Literally, one foot from the foundation. And to prove my point, it looks like the little rabbit did some digging in another spot right at the foundation. I live in an old house and I don't need bunnies in the basement!

So I cut back the overgrown shrub to just a nub. It will grow back; it's impossible to kill. The bunny will have time enough to find another home before winter sets in. Critters around here sure do seem to like living in close proximity to humans. I guess the walls of the house feel "safe."

Not much happening on the job search front. I've applied for only 10 jobs since my last day of work nearly 3 weeks ago. It feels like ages since I've been gone! I feel I should be applying for more jobs, since it's a numbers game, and in fact I haven't heard back from anyone. But I've seen very few jobs I could do.

I've attended a few webinars at the outplacement consulting group and will continue with weekly meetings with my assigned counselor there. I guess it's helpful but I don't really feel motivated, that's the real problem.

I am also somewhat distracted by other competing things I want or need to do: wrap up probate (totally out of my hands now), get back into researching family tree stuff and continue disposing of mom's art, which I am doing...in the next 2 weeks I'll be meeting with and donating up to a dozen pieces at the new local farm sanctuary (construction starts next year on their building) and meeting with a new shop to sell art.

I continue to be amazed by a single cucumber plant in my driveway that has gifted me with 15 cucumbers so far and is still going strong. Those soft, store-bought cucumbers have nothing on these. My lone eggplant is also going full guns with no less than FOUR small eggplants growing now and numerous other blossoms. I've already harvested 2 eggplants. Let's pray the voles don't destroy the plant.

I harvested what I could of my onions which had pretty small bulbs. I'll cook them all up in one batch with rice or something.

My one potted tomato plant petered out and is done. I have one cherry tomato plant doing pretty well. I'm tracking produce of all and will summarize everything in a few weeks. Late-planted stringbeans are now loaded with blossoms. Everything's in pots because of voles, which no fence can deter since they go underground and pop up wherever they like. To try to exterminate them would be a massive job since i have an acre and a half.

My 401k rollover check should be on its way to me now; I wish it could have gone directly to Vanguard but it hasn't.

I sent in my check for my 1st month of COBRA. It's going to be $513 a month as I decided to drop the dental insurance.

I heard the scary news that Aetna has pulled out of most states' ACA offerings. I'm afraid this will raise rates this November for those who remain, at open enrollment time. I can save a lot of money in 2017 by switching to a lower cost plan for $300-something instead of $513/mth at ACA, but I'm very worried about security and stability of my plan and having it work as seamlessly as my current plan.

To top things off, my longtime GP decided to turn his practice into a thing where you have to pay an annual lump sum figure in order to get his undivided attention and top notch care. I knew he'd wanted to do this years ago becus I responded to some telephone surveys he did and I said in no uncertain terms I thought this was a terrible thing for patient care because it turns quality healthcare into something only wealthier people can afford.

I called in to see what the fee was and while I don't remember it exactly, it was well over $1,000. I assume that would be in addition to the usual co-pays.

HOWEVER, i almost always see the nurse practitioner in his practice, and the office said she would NOT be a part of that plan. I see her for my physicals and minor ailments like a bad cold or poison ivy, etc. But I really should be seeing a doctor, and should have a GP to turn to if I need one for something more serious. Although I'd wind up seeing a specialist if that were the case. I really like the nurse practitioner. So I don't know. I'll be skipping next spring's physical if I'm still unemployed.

I'm not quite halfway toward meeting my $500 charge goal on my Bank of America bonus credit card. I'd like to wrap this up fairly soon so I have time to get another bonus credit card, maybe one with a higher charge required as my homeowners and car insurance come due in October. I could meet a big chunk of any big charge goal in one fell swoop. Otherwise, I'm mostly limited to groceries and gas while I'm unemployed.

I've been thrown off the normal exercise schedule I'd been building by the extremely hot weather of the last 2 weeks. It's still muggy, but in the 80s, not the 90s, so I did squeeze in a small walk last night, and want to go for a longer walk this morning, while the day is still young.

Dad invited me to join him on another trip to Rutherford, NJ, where my half-brother lives, so dad could collect his mail. In the eyes of the state of NJ, he is still a New Jersey resident. There was something he was waiting to see, and although it would be far simpler to have my brother mail dad his mail every week or so, dad prefers to drive 2 hours to get it. I think it gives him something to do.

So I joined him. It was more quality time with dad, that's why I went. But first before leaving we shopped at an exorbitantly priced organic grocery store where my sister, the health nut, has encouraged dad to shop. We bumped into someone who noted that the medium-sized zucchini she was buying was costing her $6 and from there we had a conversation where she told us her recipe for eggplant parmesan. She was younger than dad, but older than me. Turns out she's had a lot of auto immune health problems and thus she's shopping at this grocery store. Dad eventually went on to shop while I continued chit chatting with this incredibly nice woman, who gave me a hug. It was just one of those random encounters where you feel perfectly at ease with a total stranger and can tell them anything.

We dropped the food off at dad's apartment and then continued toward the Tappan Zee Bridge. I really prefer to drive when I'm traveling with dad and take every opportunity to do so, but he was behind the wheel and said I could drive on the way back. For the most part, he seemed to do ok except that while I anticipate things by looking ahead at people braking, I don't think dad could see that far in the distance and so he often didn't slow down til rather late, but that could just be me, back seat driver.

We arrived at Rutherford; my bro and his family were on vacation on the Jersey shore but B. knew dad would be coming for the mail, which he leaves in a basket inside their screened porch. Well, the porch door was locked. The window was open and dad could SEE his mail in the basket but could not get to it.

Sigh. I suggested to dad he might do well to get a spare key to B.'s house so this kind of thing doesn't happen. I doubt he'll follow up on doing that.

After that, we had lunch at the diner on Rt. 46 and then took a drive up to the "Paterson Mts." which was frequently scrawled on the back of many old b/w phots my mother had saved all these years filled with friends and boyfriends who seemed to have a real fondness for this place. My dad bluntly told me it was where everyone went to "make out."

Today, it's known as the Garret Mountain Reserve. We actually found an old stone tower featured in my mother's childhood photos(!) and I would have liked to explore it and get out of the car but it was a one-way road, I knew dad has trouble walking and so I let it go.

After that we pulled up to the lookout which dad was also familiar with. You get a bird's eye view of the city of Paterson, NJ.

Not quite Manhattan, but still impressive. At night it must be something to look at.

After that, we just headed home and dad continued to drive, much to my chagrin.

It was kind of a wasted effort as far as his getting his mail, but I consider it priceless, like other trips I've taken with him now. We talked A LOT and I have a deeper understanding of my parents' marriage, and why it came apart. It's very sad it all had to happen the way it did. My life could have been very different.

Unlike my sister, who dad agrees is a very black-and-white person who forms an opinion quickly and never deviates from it, I believe in gathering as much information as possible when forming any opinion, and even though the truth hurts, I would rather illuminate my understanding of life events with The Truth.


How many caterpillars do you see in this photo? There are four.


A view from the top of Garret Mt. Reserve of the very urban Paterson, New Jersey, pop. 149,000 and the state's 3rd largest city.


Driving home with dad on the Tappan Zee Bridge, which they are rebuilding.


My elephant ears are doing great in this heat, but they were SUPPOSED to be a dark purple color and I was very disappointed to get solid green!


My gazania daisies are looking very lush and healthy becus I am being more conscientious about daily waterings.


Not sure how best to pull off the baby plants but i guess i should before winter.


Last night's early evening sunset, when I was surprised to see the moon out so early.

4 accomplishments today and it's only 10 a.m.

1. Clarified some confusing directions from the people who will manage my COBRA health insurance and was able to get the check and enrollment form ready for mailing.

2. Was able to direct the company handling my 401k rollover to prepare to send me 2 checks (1 for traditional 401k money and 1 for Roth IRA money) made out to Vanguard, where the money will go, but mailed to me. I guess I then have to forward it to Vanguard myself.

3. My much loved and used "Pocket Hose" sprung a leak after a month-and-a-half of use. I became alarmed after seeing a lot of criticism of this company and how poor their customer service is. However, I was able to get a live person on my first try and she said while they don't now have any 100 foot hoses like the one i bought, they will replace with 2 50-foot hoses which I can connect together. I think I will just use them unconnected to prolong their life as I have a feeling the fabric exterior will become scratched again on my driveway and eventually fail again. I don't think they will refund the money.

I've used the hose daily to water all my potted plants on the paver driveway and have dragged it around to this spot or that spot. But it did cost me $50 and should last longer than it did!

4. I also got a full refund of $49 from another product, an online subscription that I tried to undo 2 days after purchasing for 3 months instead of 1. I had already gotten my credit card issuer involved but I see just now the company issued a credit. I hadn't expected they would on their own after finding they had no customer service telephone anywhere on their site, which made me suspicious of their legitimacy. No customer service number and they make you hunt all over to find a way to contact them via a little pop up box.

In other news....

I called and left a message to be a paid volunteer in a U Conn study on health behaviors and employment. They're looking for people who are looking for work. It requires a number of interviews and meetings over a period of 3 months but they have locations throughout CT, so hopefully there'd be something nearby. The pay is $672 so worth it to try.

Went out to dinner with dad last night and this morning he dropped off a small bucket of queen anne's lace for my butterfly caterpillars. I may have to pick more once i find it growing alongside the road somewhere. The smallest ones are now much bigger. There are 7, not 6.

Last night we had thunderstorms. It brought temps down a few degrees but today's forecast calls for another day of it feeling like 110 degrees.

Early this morning I went outside to check on the caterpillars. There was less than a quarter inch of water in the bottom of the aquarium, but I imagine it could be enough to drown a young caterpillar. I took a dry paper towel to soak up water and then wrung it out about 15 times.

All 6 caterpillars were accounted for.




One of the smaller ones.


As seen through the glass.


The aquarium I scored for $8 on Craig's List and the flimsy cover I made by staple gunning screening (roll, $6.49 at hardware store) to 2 wood yardsticks ($1.40 each) I cut up. It all should have worked just fine but inexplicably, the staples only went into the wood of the yardsticks about halfway, making the whole thing very flimsy. I hadn't thought yardstick wood would be that hard, but it is. I covered the cover with the black duct tape so I wouldn't cut myself on all the half inserted staples. Luckily I don't need this long term so I'll just be careful handling the cover, although I could see myself enjoying the whole butterfly thing enough to get lots more parsley next spring to attract more butterflies to raise. I might end up getting the cover at some point down the road at Pet Choice on Federal Road ($15). Normally wouldn't think twice about buying it but harder to justify discretionary expenses like this when I'm not working.

I got my severance money deposited in my checking account. How disappointing to see $12,000-something gross whittled down to just $7,700 net after taxes.

With this insane heat and humidity, I haven't done ANYTHING the last few days except create my butterfly home and read my Steve Jobs biography. I cancelled a get-together tomorrow to put mom's art in another shop simply becus when I'm dripping sweat I just don't have the energy to clean and gather together and list the art I'm bringing over there. I haven't heard back from her but I'm sure it will be ok to defer my visit for another week when more moderate weather comes.

I think I'll brave the outdoors to cut some queen anne's lace for the caterpillars. An excellent online resource for raising caterpillars, "Berkeley swallowtails," said even organic store-bought can kill caterpillars if traces of pesticides were carried over to the plant by wind. They also said an empty toilet paper roll is appealing as a place to form the chrysalis because it sort of mimics the underside of a leaf.

Another interesting factoid: the caterpillar purges (ie, throws up) a lot of liquid right before it forms the chrysalis. It's part of the process of preparing for its metamorphosis.

And after it becomes a butterfly, it will only live for 2 to 4 weeks.

I'm so excited.

Last night I watered all my potted plants, as I do every evening, and this is what I saw:





Black swallowtail butterfly caterpillars!

And then I noticed these:



Earlier "instars," I think, of the same black swallowtail butterfly caterpillar.

So I have 2 of the larger caterpillars (funny I never saw them even though I water the parsley daily) and I think 4 of the smaller caterpillars.

I was going to just let them be and take pix of their development, but after reading online about the very high mortality rate of caterpillars due to predators like birds and those disgusting parasitic wasps, I decided to do better.

I went online looking for small glass aquariums I could put the caterpillars in with a screened top to protect them and yet be able to see what's going on. Petco has these ridiculous prices of hundreds of dollars on fancy aquarium "kits." The cheapest I could find was about $60, but I don't need all the bells and whistles and I really can't be spending much being out of work right now. Surely I could find a plain glass rectangular aquarium.

I tried Pet Choice and the woman who answered IMMEDIATELY suggested I try Petco becus she thought they were having their "$1 per gallon" aquarium sale. (They weren't.) I mean, she went on and on about how I should go to Petco. I actually had to prod her to tell me their lowest price anyway. It was $15 for the aquarium and another $15 if I wanted to buy a screened cover. But anyway,that woman is hurting sales at Pet Choice.

I tried a few other local pet stores but didn't do much better. Then I decided to try Craig's List and lo and behold, I actually found someone about 35 minutes away who was selling both a small and large sized aquarium. I called him up and asked for the small one, for just $8, which should do just fine. He's supposed to call me this afternoon as he's heading for an adjacent town to me and can meet me at the library parking lot then. Hooray on saving money!

For the time being, until I get the aquarium later in the day, i don't want to take any chances with natural preduators. I was thinking about it when I went to bed last night and woke up with a viable solution. (Yes, I tend to get a little obssessive once I'm interested in something.) At around 7 am i walked out back to my tool shed and retrieved one of my smaller tomato plant hoops. I put that over the small pot of parsley with the caterpillars and then draped the bird netting over the hoop to encase and protect the caterpillars until I get the aquarium set up later today.

Next I'll need to figure out the top. I am not at all "handy." Again, don't want to spend anything if I can avoid it. I do have a small piece of bird netting but I'm not sure if wasps could get through that. Screening would be better and I may end up at hardware store to see if they'd sell me just a small piece.If I could find the right size wood to cut for the border, even on just the 2 ends, I could staple gun the screen to the wood edges. I was thinking of buying a wood yardstick and the cutting it with my bow saw for just the 2 ends.

After that I'll need to call around for ORGANIC parsley, as the small plant I have won't be nearly enough. It must be organic or they could die. I'll try Caraluzzi's grocery store first and they're right around the corner.

One thing I'm concerned about is whether or not if I'm seeing caterpillars now whether they'll pupate and become butterflies this late in the season or want to overwinter. I read one person's account online that some will "hatch" in late August while others won't.

I'd rather not be responsible for keeping the chrysalises alive over winter, as they could dry out or alternatively, have mold issues if it's too damp, so it's a bit iffy. And of course I would love to see them emerge this summer.

Anyway, it's kind of exciting. I've always been an amateur naturalist.

I had actually purchased the parsley back in May with the hopes of attracting butterfly caterpillars. I don't really use the parsley in cooking but am much more interested in watching the caterpillars develop.

Today was another blistering hot and very humid day. It reached 85 inside my house. I could have gone out somewhere air-conditioned, but I didn’t want to leave my cats to fend for themselves. So I retreated to the basement, where it is much cooler, and looked around for something to occupy my time.

I pulled out a box of mom’s memorabilia from some plastic shelves. I knew it contained school stuff, but I hadn’t really examined it. I don’t really like to collect a lot of “stuff,” so I was hoping I could maybe winnow the contents down to a more manageable size.

The box was filled with black and white photos, some yellowing and on the verge of disappearing forever, from about junior high through to the early years of my mother’s marriage. I did throw away countless photos of friends, but sorted through everything and kept photos that had either mom, dad or family in it.
But I had a hard time just tossing the friends’ photos out, sometimes their wedding photos. I had to keep telling myself, I never knew these people. They never knew me, and most are probably dead.

Still, it was hard to do, because I knew these people were very important to my mother at one time. And now she is gone, so to what purpose would I hold onto these?

There were pictures taken on the Jersey shore, hiking and picnicking at “Paterson (NJ) Mountains,” which I looked up online and found no mention of, so I’m sure what used to be a frequent getaway is now developed into residential homes or something. There were lots of photos taken of everyone all dressed up before a prom, at what I recognized as my grandparents’ house, the one I discovered was torn down when dad and I did a road trip there a month ago.

There were a lot of girlfriends! They even called themselves the “Kleen Teens,” whatever that was all about. And I discovered mom had some pretty special beaus before dad. One handsome boy named Eddie showed up a lot in the pictures, and there was even a fake wedding certificate for them. It made me wonder why it didn’t work out between them, and if my mother would have still gotten divorced if she had married him instead of my father.

There were a few others, too, who showed up frequently in the photos, which doesn’t surprise me since my mother was very pretty.

There were a few newly discovered photos of mom and dad that I had never seen before, some very special, so I will be scanning those for posterity. Pictures of both the outside and inside of their first home in Lincoln Park, a simple brick ranch on about 2 acres, just below the hill from my dad’s parents’ home.
Also in the box was a giant embroidered letter “B,” for the Garfield (NJ) Boilermakers. The name is still used for the sports teams there today. Not sure what it means but I do know Garfield was an industrial town.


This was my grandparents' house in Saddle Brook, where mom grew up and so filled with happy memories for me. Grandma was Czech, Grandpa was Austrian. The house was torn down and a new one built in its place, alas. This photo, faint as it is, clearly shows that what dad told me recently was right: that grandpa hadn't built the house with the large patio I knew so well. It was added on later.


My handsome dad. I will have to ask what year and model car this was!


Here's a sweet one of mom and dad. Notice the cigarette in dad's hand. So many of these old photos have people holding a cigarette! It was really the norm.

The trees don't seem to have any leaves on them yet they're not dressed that warmly. It must have been early fall.


Dad at the beach! Somewhere in Jersey!


My much loved grandmother, mom's mom. Don't know who the man sitting next to her was.


My dad's parents. He was German, she was Irish. Always thought grandpa was so handsome too.


Wow. That's quite the fashion statement, mom. Before you laugh, please know that MANY of my mother's girlfriends dressed the exact same way! jeans rolled up to below the knee with a kerchief and the socks. Funny...


Mom on the beach...somewhere on the Jersey shore.


And yours truly, looking mischievous.

55 minutes. Sweaty. Lightly raining.


I found a new venue to show and sell mom's work. It's a small high end shop that features the work of local craftspeople. It's located in a nearby town that is a bit more affluent than my town. I sent her jpgs, she indicated which she liked the most and I'm meeting her Monday morning with the work.

I will bring about 8 pieces. It's a bit of work becus mom used some artists' tape on the back of most pieces to cover the seam where the little nails stick out. The problem is, while this apparently worked in mom's climate-controlled condo, the tape on a lot of pieces is curling around the edges in my humid home. Luckily I have plenty of the tape mom used so I have been carefully pulling off the old and putting new tape on as neatly as possible.

I also have to type up a list of each piece, size and price. I'll also have to clean the ones with glass fronts becus they've gotten dusty/dirty sitting around here. But anyway, the more stuff I get out on exhibit the better the chance SOMETHING will sell. And now that I'm not working, I have plenty of time to do this and it is sort of an adventure. While I helped my mom install many shows in the past, I didn't really handle the talks with gallery owners and so on. This one gets a 40% commission.

So with this one I will have mom's work for sale in 5 places. I'd say about 30 smaller pieces.

I met friend R. at a Starbucks between us so I could give him 2 old VCR tapes of family movies he converted from Super 8 many years ago for me. Now he's offered to convert the VCR tapes to CDs, and he wants to take the little TV I have with built-in VCR player which I really have no use for becus it has only a cable plug and I never plan to get cable again. I had thought it would at least have plugs so I could use my Roku with it, but it was made pre-Roku and I guess they figured since the VCR is built in, there was no need for any other plug-ins.

Yesterday I went to Macy's and used up a gift card, getting 2 fall tops. I also used a $5 birthday gift card at Kohls on a 6 pak of those low-cut socks so out of pocket was just a few dollars. I also went to trader joe's (with a small cooler to keep frozen/refrigerated items cool on the ride home) and stocked up on 5 Amy's veggie pizzas, which are $4.25 at TJs but close to $8 elsewhere!

No pix today becus i forgot the camera! But I DID walk for an hour. And I can tell you that it's still blazing hot between 5 and 6 pm in August. I hadn't realized it was 87 degrees and I went somewhere different today, a dirt and grassy path through woods and meadow that was very sunny. I did not enjoy it, it was just too hot.

This morning I returned the bamboo shade for my sun room door, which I inadvertently ordered in a different pattern from my sun room windows. Both patterns had the word "Dali" in them.

You would think the company would recognize this could cause confusion or ordering problems when they only have about a dozen different patterns. It would be easy enough to change one of them.

But anyway, they did agree to refund me 70% of the cost for that reason, or about $61 of an $87 order. When I reordered the correct pattern shade today, I was able to make use of a $15 e-gift card they sent me in exchange for me posting a photo on their website of the shade installed in the sun room. So I saved some money there, although postage to return the shade was $16. So I guess I'll have spent $22 more than I needed to, but considering these are custom blinds that they don't usually give refunds for, I'm happy. At least now all the shades in the room will match. I wish I hadn't been so careless when ordering but I do think they share some of the blame for that.

This morning I did my grocery shopping at Shop Rite. Instead of using a gift card I got from a previous credit card bonus, I charged the purchase to my latest credit card with BOA where I'm working on charging $500 to earn a $200 statement credit. Easy peasy.

I don't remember how, but somehow I got out of the habit of shopping at Shop Rite. I think becus Stop & Shop was on my way home from work and other grocery stores were just more conveniently located as well. Anyway, now that I'm unemployed, I have the time and motivation to shop more carefully.

Shop Rite does have the best prices, if not selection. I bought two albeit small cantaloupes for .99 each, broccoli crowns were .99/lb and a large whole watermelon was $3.88 (I think I paid $over $5 at BJs)

When I go to Trader Joe's, I will DEFINITELY stock up on Amy's vegan pizzas, which i have grown fond of. (DO you know how hard it is to find a vegan pizza that tastes decent?) TJs sells Amy's vegan pizza for $4.29 vs $7.80 and $8 at Stop & Shop and Big Y, respectively. I had never noticed this when I was making the big bucks at the bank, but this is a BIG difference on just one item! I will buy 4 or 5 at TJs since it's furthest from home.

I spent all day yesterday working on building my Coroflot portfolio pages. I found another site, this one 100% free, where you can convert an unlimited number of PDFs into jpgs. It was still a time-consuming, multi-step process to be sure, but I loaded a bunch more writing samples onto my page broken down by format categories (PR, sales brochures, customer communications, magazine articles, web content, bios and anything else I've written).

It looks much more professional now. I still need to spend time writing descriptions to go with each category and possibly improve on what I've already written.

I've applied for 8 jobs to date. A few I wouldn't take unless i could telecommute part of the week. It could be a waste of time, but you never know until you talk to them, and at least they'd get to see how much experience I have.

Tomorrow I also want to call the voter registrar to sign up to work the polls on Election Day in November. It's a very long day, starting at about 5 a.m. and ending around 7 pm, but they pay you, not a lot, but it's cash. (Many of my extreme money-earning techniques from the 2008 recession are coming back to me now. ) I'd like to also work the Republican primary this month, which would be great, as there are only so many times a year when there's an election. This one's for probate court Republican primary. But I'm not sure they'd allow me to work if I'm not Republican.

The probate court called me today. I shuddered mentally because there have been so many issues with them. Forms must be filled out perfectly, even though there are no real instructions for doing so. The clerk questioned me about the inventory of assets and apparently I filled it in incorrectly again, but this time, she asked if she could just cross something out and I said YES. Instead of making me resubmit the whole thing. She said she would now "put this on the calendar," which I think means the calendar for the judge to look at it before they give me the okay to disburse funds. I should have asked how long that would take, but i was just to relieved I wouldn't have to refile the form that I let it go.

Hallelujah I think we're near the end of this thing. I only have one blank check left for the checking account and so when the time comes when I cam disburse funds (to me and my sister), I'll have to go to bank and ask for one more check. This was a special estate account I had to set up, and it was only used to pay bills incurred after my mother's death. I don't think they'll make me pay for a box of checks.

I can't wait to cross this off my list of things to do. I am also waiting for my ex-employer to inform 401k company of my termination so I can do a rollover of about $56K into a Roth IRA. And am also waiting for my $12K severance check. So I will have a LOT of money coming into my accounts in the next few weeks.

With the 401k money, I just decided to more or less evenly divide the money into 2 of my existing 3 roth IRA accounts. I really didn't want to have to open yet another mutual fund account. I have so many as it is. The severance check, since I intend to use it to live on, combined with my unemployment checks, for the next year or more, I think I will just put in my Barclay "Dream" money market, which right now gets only 1.05%. However, you can get a little more by doing this, which I do religiously:

1. Deposit up to $1,000 a month in your Dream Account
2. Every time you make consecutive deposits for six months, we’ll give you a 2.5% bonus on the past six months of interest earned
3. Make no withdrawals for six consecutive months and earn another 2.5% bonus on the past six months of interest earned

To make sure I still get the #3 bonus, I could make one withdrawal that I think will last me for 6 months. That could be tricky, but i will have ongoing income from unemployment checks too.

Yesterday I wound up not walking. Lazy. Since I am letting myself have ONE non-exercise day each week, the pressure's now on for the rest of this week. Oh boy.

Did people really believe that I could build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico and get the Mexicans to pay for it?” Trump asked, “and that we could deport 11 million illegal aliens? That’s ridiculous. How could we possibly do that?”

Trump said he wanted to show just how gullible the far-right wing was and how weak-kneed Republican leaders were.

“Even after I made racist statements about that judge and attacked a Gold Star family, the Republican leadership continued to endorse me,” Trump said. “Man, what does it take to get tossed out of the Republican Party?”

He also pointed out that he had offered no real solutions to any of the country’s problems and nobody, even the news media, took much notice that “there was no there there in my campaign,” he said.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, while expressing shock at Trump’s announcement, said, “After I thought about it a bit, I realized this made a lot more sense then the campaign he was running. The joke’s on us.”

Fifty-one Republicans immediately announced their candidacy to replace Trump on the ballot.

Asked if he felt any remorse about fooling so many people, Trump answered in typical Trumpian style: “No. They’re all losers.”

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article94019107.html#storylink=cpy

OK, guess it's not real after I could not confirm this anywhere else, but it sure had me excited for a while.

Today's walk was 65 minutes long. This is the last day of the week, so I can tell you I exercised 313 minutes this week, or 6.2 hours. That's a lot for me. All of it was walking (6 out of the 7 days) plus for 1 hour of yoga today.

It's positively tropical like, inside and out, and despite a brief rain shower, it's still muggy.

Out of habit i went to walk the grounds of the old state mental hospital.


This area is known as the High Meadow.


They've begun tearing down one of the old buildings on the campus. I don't think they have any special plans for the ground it stands on. I do know they are saving the cupolas of each building they tear down. I saw three of them all sitting together like so many giant chess pieces. They could do something very creative with them. I am sure they will rehab them.

For Dido or anyone who wants to know how to post pictures, here are some brief instructions:

Write your post as you normally would. Then click on "Save and Add Images" below.

Click on the "Browse" button, find the photo you want to post in your computer files, and hit attach. You'll see the photo pop up below. Click "Save as Draft" and then wait for it to show up with a code that looks something like this: [img]a number here[img].

You need to copy that code and paste it in your post.

Then you can click Publish.

I'm going to try to post a photo of each day's walk here, to make myself more accountable and more likely to follow through on my plan to walk 6 days a week.

Somehow, the weight has crept up on me. It's 146, making me heavier than I've ever been. I was in my 120s in my 20s and 30s. At age 50, I weighed 131 lbs. And now, 7 years later, I'm 15 lbs heavier. HOW DID THIS HAPPEN? I'm still not wholly vegan, maybe 75%, and it's usually eating out fairly often with dad that is when I go off vegan fare.

Aside from that, I still must be doing something wrong to be gaining, instead of losing. I must admit that while I rarely eat meat or dairy or white flour products, I do consume a fair amount of olive olive oil. This may be the culprit. For instance, one of my favorite things in summer is to pick the basil from my garden and make some pesto over whole grain pasta. The other way I consume oil is through salad dressings, and I do eat a lot of salads. I do have an oil-free salad dressing recipe I tried, which is pretty good, but I haven't made any lately.

I also have an oil-free pesto recipe but haven't tried it yet. Maybe it's time.


Today's walk was 45 minutes. I had to make a detour as the park I was planning on going through was filled with throngs of excited little children on some sort of summer school outing. I could hear their delighted shrieks and screams as they played a game clear across the meadow. Maybe they know they have only one more month of summer left and so many more games to play.


This is Ram Pasture in the center of town and about a mile from where I live. The local farmers used to communally graze their sheep here pre-Revolutionary War...hence the name.


This is the trail that leads to a park set up to attract the kiddies, with a pavilion that can be used for various activities, tennis courts and a little kids' playground, plus a skateboard park.

About a week before I was laid off, I spent $80 at Payless Decor on a bamboo shade for the door in my sun room. It gets VERY hot and sunny in there and I actually can't use the sun room becus it gets so hot. About a year or two ago I had gotten bamboo shades for all 6 windows in the sun room from Payless Decor.

I had a sample of the shade pattern/color I wanted called "Dali Tuscan." When I went on the site, I did not see Dali Tuscan but I did see Dali Natural. I guess becus they shared the same Dali name, I assumed it was the same shade.

It was not. I have the shade up and it fits perfectly, but it's noticeably darker and also a different pattern than the others shades on the windows. I guess I could live with it but I wanted it to blend in with everything else in there and instead, it kind of stands out.

So I called the company to see if there was anything they could do. The shades are non-returnable since they are custom cut and measured, but I'm sort of hoping they could give me, say, a 50% discount if I order the shade again, although the Dali Tuscan is now out of stock and I don't even know if they'll get it back. And I don't know if they would be that generous. Kind of a bummer.

It was a careless mistake, and I should have called before ordering, but I also think it was not very smart of them to have more than one shade called "Dali."

In other news...

I got my newest bonus credit card in the mail, the Bank Americard Mastercard with my choice of baseball team logo (the Yankees) printed on it. This one is as easy as can be: just charge up $500 worth of stuff in 3 months and get a $200 statement credit back.

I went with dad to pick up his AC at Best Buy and then we went to lunch, but he would not let me come and help him move the AC up the stairs into his place. Men can be very stubborn. He has a dolly, but is very unsteady on his feet and walks with a cane.

My library has a program where they want to encourage summer reading so for each book you read and write a brief review about, you get a shot at winning one of a half dozen prizes, gift certificates from local merchants.

An old boyfriend of mine, with whom I still stay in touch, lost his mother around the same time as I did. Like my mother, his father was a professional artist, a painter of horses. I would say his father achieved more success than my mother did. His mother managed a catalog business of prints of his oil paintings, and he also illustrated many children's horse books.

He is faced with the task of emptying out his mother's home, which contains a lifetime of stuff and his dad's art; he has a sister in California who hasn't been able to assist that much. This is what I went through with mom's condo, albeit on a smaller scale. He called me last night for my birthday, and he was also donating and selling art but still had so many prints left, he said he would just give them away. I immediately said I would love to have one. Not that I have the room for it, but it would remind me of my friend and his dad was a very nice man, and very talented. I am sure his art is worth quite a bit. It just can be very difficult to find the right market, especially when you're working f/t.

If so, be sure to click link below (or copy and paste in your browser) to become a claimant in this class action settlement over pricing labels.

It still feels weird to be home all day with all this unstructured time. I am still adjusting.

Today, for instance, was doubly weird. It was the first time my mother didn't call to wish me happy birthday. I've been kind of mopey and sad ad teary-eyed since yesterday. My dad wished me happy birthday yesterday, but was planning on driving down to Jersey today to pay his property taxes. My sister and I don't speak anymore (my choice). A few friends called me, but that was about it. It was kind of a business-as-usual day.

The day's biggest accomplishments were driving down to probate court to return more forms to them (they returned another form) and going for a long (75-minute) walk on the very back roads of my town, past the horse farm, down gravel roads, past Cherry Hill Farm, through the woods and on and on. I love the old country road names, names like Ox Hill and Beaver Dam Road and Mt. Nebo Road. It was very nice to take a LONG walk, something that challenged me physically more than my usual 30-, 40- or 50-minute walks.

I am not religious, but I consider the woods my church, and the tall trees that form a canopy overhead, my steeple. At times, walking along a country road, it is a religious experience when I hear nothing but the sounds of summer: the breeze, the birds, the crickets. If anything will pull me out of my slump, it will be spending time outside in nature. I have to push myself to venture further to other spots I used to visit. It is easy to forget what you've given up.

Otherwise, I spent most of the day at the computer, mostly working on the Coroflot site to build my portfolio pages. I think this is largely a waste of time. A commenter here did very kindly send me a link where you can easily convert PDFs to jpgs, but the many steps involved in scanning items, creating PDfs, converting to jpgs and then uploading the jpgs to the coroflot site is crazy time-consuming. The jpgs do look much better than the photos I attempted to take of printed writing samples outside. I may wind up redoing those. Eventually, if I ever get to finish uploading what I feel are an adequate representation of my different writing styles, I will put my Coroflot address on my resume. Although many places let you send attached documents with your resume anyway.

Hopefully Best Buy will have dad's AC in tomorrow so we can go pick it up. I did also finally succeed So in getting the new DVD player I bought working with my TV so we can watch a special movie I purchased, a spy movie dad said he remembers watching decades ago that featured the German-American Bund camp he went to as a child. I wanted us to view it together as part of my family tree research. So now we can do that; I hadn't realized that I had to completely unplug the 3 Roku plugs before the DVD player would work.

Today I saw a job posting in search of someone who was "relentlessly creative." Big eye roll. Another one specified that I "must love data." Who writes these things?

Yesterday I vacuumed but spent most of the day working on building my page on coroflot.com. Because I'm posting examples of my writing, which are not jpgs, it required me to keep running outside to photography my documents in daylight. One little jiggle of the camera messed it up, as I needed to get as close as possible for legibility purposes, but I didn't want to cut off any corners. If they had just made it possible to download MS Word docs, all this wouldn't be necessary. Sign.

I don't think I'll spend a whole lot more time on it. I've loaded a bunch of case study writing samples, a sales brochure and some web writing. But not all of it is readable so anyone interested would need to request a URL from me, which I could much more easily provide. So despite what the recruiter said, I don't think this is the be all and end all. I doubt I'll ever use it. Easier to email URL links or bring actual hard copies with me on an interview.

I now have connected with a 2nd worthy nonprofit in town who has expressed their desire to take some of mom's art. I sent them a detailed email with links to some online stories about mom with photos of her work about a week ago and explained what my intent was.

You may not know this if you live outside CT, but a number of the families of the 12/14 children have started various organizations or foundations that in some way honor their children's interests. The one I am donating to had a little girl who was very fond of animals. They are building a farm sanctuary for neglected or abused farm animals. Actually, they are well on their way to renovating an old barn where the animals will be housed, and construction will start next year on the offices of the organization. I believe the wooded land was donated by the state of Connecticut.

I am very happy they have graciously accepted and now I need to schedule a time they can visit me at my home and see the art, either picking and choosing what they want from a certain selection I'll put together, or taking it all. I have at least another dozen pieces for them in a variety of sizes and mediums.

Mom would be very touched, I think. She loved children, and she loved animals of every sort.

I am also dropping off 3 pieces at a local frame shop today for an upcoming exhibit (theme, "Landscapes").

And if Best Buy gets my dad's AC in, I'll be taking him there to pick it up and get it up the stairs into his apartment and in the window. More warm days ahead, I am sure.

We took another road trip, me, R. and dad. R. did all the driving and kept up a running commentary of the areas we were driving through, offering a pretty good summary of historical highlights and so on. Well, he knows the area very well.

After meeting in the commuter parking lot, we headed down to Bridgeport, where I used to work, and stopped in at the new Bass Pro Shop. It's pretty impressive, with 3D dioramas and a large aquarium filled with what I'm guessing were bass.

Here's some pix:






That's dad at the right.

After that we took a long and leisurely route hugging the Connecticut shoreline through Stratford, Milford and West Haven. We saw some lovely beaches, oceanfront and homes.

Our final destination was a bierfest at one of the few remaining German-American clubs in the area. We enjoyed our bratwurst sandwiches with heaping sauerkraut and mayo-less potato salad. Yum, even tho i'm vegan.

They had a band playing polkas and some people were using the dance floor. There were probably 150 people there, a great turnout of mostly older people in the era of video games and Pokemon.

Tomorrow it's back to reality and I need to give myself a big shove to get going with the job search. There are various things I need to do. And hopefully will get a callback from the unemployment office so I can file my initial claim.

I also need to update my profile at left but I'm been a little bummed about having to do that as my fast track retirement savings will come to another grinding halt. Now the goals will be not to dig into savings, something I'm confident I can do for at least the first 2 months no problem since I've got the severance. Actually with careful attention I should be able to get by on unemployment for 6 months.

I took a walk tonight and am aiming to walk 6 days a week, at least a half hour.

I only really got one big thing accomplished today, and that was going out looking at ACs with dad and his ending up ordering a window air conditioner to supplement the one he's got.

It'll arrive at Best Buy Monday or Tuesday and I'll help him get it and then bring it to his place. He's going to need help getting it up the stairs.

We looked at a few at Lowes as well but they were mostly sold out of portable ACs and in the end dad seemed more comfortable with a window unit. So be it; I just wanted to make sure he's cooler than he is now.

I got some printer ink cartridges at Staples on the way back, and a jug of almond milk.

I did my end of month expense and investment report and am pleased my portfolio is up $22,000 this month, bringing my investment value up to $798,000. I'm almost into the eights!

I also blew the leaves off the patio, watered my container plants and picked another cucumber, bringing my total to 14 cucumbers from just 2 container plants. I also picked a small bowl of wineberries, which are winding down, and blackberries.

I made myself a fruit smoothie. I changed the sheets on my bed. I made another pitcher of ice tea and would like to make another batch of granola tonight, as I'm out. I also have a job to apply for online.

It's super muggy out. Very sticky. Ugh.

Today was my last day. All I did was attend an outplacement webinar I registered for (the company will pay for 3 months) and then I turned in my laptop, keys, badges and password fob. I left the office at 11:30 a.m. and hugged my old boss goodbye and told other laid off person I'd be in touch with her in late August, when we agreed to get together.

I was planning to say goodbye to the parking garage gate attendant (I am friendly with all) but she wasn't there. Instead a young woman who hardly spoke English was sitting in the booth. I told her I didn't have my badge, to wave in front of the scanner to raise the gate, becus it was my last day and I had to surrender my badge. She didn't understand, and i envisioned myself being stuck behind that gate forever. I repeated the same thing 3 times and then I think she still didn't understand, but just gave up and raised the gate for me. Why would they hire someone for a job who can't speak English?>>

I decided to go to Trader Joe's but even though I was on my way back by 2:15 pm, the traffic was already pretty bad headed eastbound. I had to take back roads home.

Note to self: NEVER venture out on Friday afternoon again. Not worth it.

So my spirits were lifted tonight because while I saw very little in the way of jobs I could apply for today (there is one, a temporary job), a Chicago area recruiter contacted me via Linked In about a Director of Marketing Communications position that sounded like a very good fit. Writing a wide variety of stuff, working closely with senior management, managing the PR agency relationship. I don't know the industry. I have never worked at the director level before but as we know titles vary from one company to another quite a bit.

There's just one big problem: location. This job is in Stamford, where I vowed never to even look for jobs, due to horrendous traffic and distance. As I remember from when I had a 3-month contract job down there in 2013, the commute was over an hour. I hated it. There ARE no good routes. Every road is clogged by 5 pm.

So I will learn about the position, anyway, but at some point early on I'll need to tell the recruiter I can't commute down there, at least not on a daily basis. I'd hate commuting down there period, but I suppose I could be open to a few days a week. Like maybe two.

I would LOVE to be able to tell the people at the bank, you numbskulls! You should never have let me go.

It felt weird to have the afternoon free during a time I should be at work.

I got my final paycheck today and was happy to see they included the one week of PTO (paid time off) I hadn't used.

I dropped my signed severance agreement in the mail at office so at some point in the ensuing weeks I'll get another check for $12,000, which will be a big help with day to day expenses in the months to come.

I had a phone conversation with a local insurance agent in town becus I wanted confirmation that my decision to stick with COBRA, rather than an ACA plan, was the right way to go. He agreed that since I've already earned too much money to qualify for any subsidy and based on the higher pricing of the ACA plans in general, that it made sense to stick with COBRA, at least for 2016. In November when open enrollment comes around, I could revisit that decision and, assuming my salary could be under $45K for all of 2017 if I find no new job, I could switch to an ACA plan with subsidies that would reduce my monthly premium payments to the $300-something range, saving me over $200 a month.

I TRIED to sign up for unemployment benefits but the online system wasn't recognizing my old password from 2013 and when i requested it send me a new password, it never did. When i tried to enroll via phone, it took forever to get thru the automated system, only to be told that due to high call volume, wait times could exceed 2 hours. I would have held, but it didn't give me that choice, saying "try back later" and then disconnecting me. I did try back later and this time got the option of getting a callback on Monday, which I set up.

We had some more rain tonight, which was good.

I have a ton of different things to do yet am feeling so scattered and disorganized. I have my daily planner but still, I need to get a handle on things.

Ugh....feeling a little sad as I continue to prepare for my last day at work tomorrow. Had my last phone meeting with new boss, who said I don't have to stay the whole day tomorrow.

She offered to serve as a reference, but I don't think I'll use her. I have my old boss and 2 coworkers who have agreed and who will sing my praises.

I have a 10 am orientation (by phone) for the work outplacement service tomorrow which is free for 3 months and I figure I'll leave around mid-day. I just have to return, to old boss, my laptop, briefcase, password key fob, desk keys and badges.

The other woman laid off in my dept has agreed we should get together for lunch or coffee in late August.

I've said goodbye to all the people who matter, about 15 people.

I completed the "final accounting" form for probate. I had to pay a $900 fee to probate, not $600 as I thought. Before mailing it to the court, though, I mailed a copy to my sister with an additional form which, if she signs, will waive the need for a hearing to review the final accounting and will just speed things up by at least a few weeks.

Then I have to wait to get "approval" from the court to disburse the estate, splitting it with my sister.

So my long held hope that i can finish this whole thing by September may be pretty well on the mark.

We'll each receive $44,000. Combined with the mutual funds I disbursed earlier this year, which bypassed probate, we'll each have received $92,376 from mom's estate. It's an unexpected gift since, as mentioned before, I thought I would spend down all mom's money for assisted living, and then the nursing home, but she died before that happened.

I still think about her...a lot...each and every day. She is never far from my mind and I often find myself predicting how she would react to Donald Trump or my layoff or any number of things.

I don't plan to do anything with the money besides invest it, especially now that I don't have a job.

So despite the loss of the employment income I expected for the 2nd half of this year, I will still easily hit my retirement savings target as detailed at left.

I connected with the Atlanta headhunting firm that got me my bank job 3 years ago, but they have nothing for me now. They do have my resume.

Dad came by to drop off the plastic window insert on which he shaved a few inches off so it would fit in my window when i use my portable AC.

I also dropped off a window screen at hardware store for repair, which will take 1 week to get back, and I mailed the final accounting to my sister, for her to sign the hearing waiver.

The other day I made myself a berry smoothie.



I have so much to do after my job ends tomorrow, and the next chapter of my life begins at 5 pm Friday.

...my layoff, that is.

Today, five of us went out for a little farewell lunch at Captain's Cove. We all ordered seafood and sat one of the many wood picnic tables on the boardwalk area there. It was beautiful, all the boats were in the marina, and I didn't feel I was "at work" at all.

I've spent the last week-and-a-half saying my goodbyes to people I care about or, enjoy chatting with. Probably 15 or so people. It's starting to feel emotional and a little sad when so many people are saying so many nice things to me.

The other woman in my group who's also leaving said she's only planning on spending a half day here on Friday, our last day. Meaning, what's the point?

I'm going to ask my new boss is I can do the same.

I got the bill from probate court. Mind you, I'm not paying taxes on the estate or anything, this is just "a fee" for keeping me from accessing my inheritance for 7 months now and counting. I had calculated based on their rate schedule the bill would be about $600. Wrong. It's about $900. I will have to call them tomorrow to see why. Did I tell you I hate the probate court?

I have one window in my house that I can't open in this hot weather because the screen for it at some point years ago fell out a 2nd floor window and dented up the frame, so bugs could come in if I used it. I'm finally getting around to bringing it to a local hardware shop. The guy said they'll probably have to replace the screen if they have to fix the frame, so all told, not really cheap, about $40 but it would be great to get a cross breeze in my office. It makes a big difference in keeping it cool in here. I'll drop it off tomorrow at lunchtime.

The 2016 wineberry season is just about spent. I can usually pick for about 2 weeks in July. This year's berry bounty seemed a bit low, no doubt due to a very dry June. I've enjoyed them daily on my morning breakfast cereal and right now I'm enjoying a yummy peach/wineberry crisp, a modified version (much less sugar and no butter) of my grandmother's recipe.

The sign language classes will have to be deferred. So will the redo of my badly deteriorating brick patio in the backyard, with pavers to match the driveway and front entry, which I'd been toying with for next spring. Oh well. Three steps forward, one step backward. Layoffs have been the norm of my career, not the exception.

I don't feel highly motivated about the job search and I'm kind of resigned to the belief I'll have to bide my time, that beating the bushes will not uncover the perfect job and that I have no real control over when something good for me comes along. I just have to make sure I don't miss it completely due to not paying attention.

The 1939 movie Wuthering Heights is playing at our town hall theater. Should I go see it, anyone?

I am on the lookout for another juicy rewards credit card with upfront bonus. It's just such easy, no-brainer money, I can't not do something like this for a quick $200 or so, especially now.

I think I've finally found a sunscreen (SPF 45) that doesn't make my face break out. It's Neutrogena Dry Touch something or other.

Am going to TRY getting on a regular schedule of walking 6 days a week. Probably aim to do it first thing in the morning, while it's still cool, and before my day really begins. I'm sure it won't last, but we can dream.

Fridays are always pretty quiet at the office, but I think I'll bring bagels in for those in my group on this, my last day.

My old boss said that in order for me to become an "approved vendor" who can do freelance work for whoever at the bank, that I would need to become an LLC corporation. I need to verify that with new boss tomorrow and I am not really crazy about doing it becus i think once i registered with the state they would inform my town and then the town would start sending me annual tax bills for my tiny business. Which I would hate doing. They did that to me before and I promptly told them the business was over.

I'm a true blue liberal but I'm beginning to hate taxes and probate court.

I think on Monday I'll go grocery shopping at trader joe's. It's stupid, but i keep thinking about how great it will be to go grocery shopping on an uncrowded weekday. Around here, TJ's is absolutely mobbed on the weekends and it stresses me out. I may take dad with me becus i know he's never been to one and he may like it. It being a smaller store, he could get around it more easily. Dad's walking with a cane now. Actually, I'm just now remembering that day is the day of his doc appt with new primary care doc. I'll have to find out what time it is.

Today was another work-at-home day. Rather than seeing my work dwindling down, I keep getting new assignments from people who express how utterly appreciative they are, knowing that since Friday is my last day I could easily blow them off. If they're that appreciative, I feel like saying, why don't you go tell head honcho so-and-so she's making a big mistake!

Although I've known about my imminent layoff for a full week now, I've been a little slow out of the gate in terms of a job search. Quite frankly, the whole thought of the dog and pony show where I pretend to be enthusiastic about "working under pressure in a fast-paced environment" is getting old.

I've managed to update my resume and apply for all of 2 jobs; now my recruiter friend insists I have to build my own website to showcase my portfolio. It's what all the "creatives" are doing these days. He gave me 3 site options, all of which are free, which is good, but they all seem geared toward artists and graphic designers, not writers. Because when it comes to downloading your work samples, they have to be jpgs, and my copy probably won't even be fully readable as a jpg. So I don't know. I'll have to play with it next week.

Dad came over toward the tail end of the day to check out my portable AC, to see if he wants to get one for his place. He has one window AC unit which isn't quite doing the job. He needs a 2nd one.

He actually helped me with my AC because I could never get the hose to fit securely where it connects to the back of the ac and the other end that goes out the window. He fixed that pretty well and also took one of the horizontal pieces of plastic to cut it a few inches so I can actually use it to completely block the open window when the hose is attached.

It was always something that never worked very well even to the ac unit itself seems very heavy duty, at 12,000 BTUs. So maybe now I'll use it more. I prefer it on casters where I can roll it around rather than ding up my window sills everytime I have to haul the heavy window unit down from the attic.

My dad has sacrificed SO MUCH to live at my sister's. His central air, for one, a very spacious and renovated ranch with NO STAIRS for another. He's afraid to ask her if he could put in a small wood stove and so last winter with his diabetic neuropathy his legs and feet were always freezing. Now he just wants to water his plants but my sister won't let him use the hose there becus her well is in danger of running dry, so dad went to the river and filled up a heavy rain barrel with water. Geez. My dad should not be doing this kind of stuff at 83 years old, yet he never complains about anything except the pain in his legs. He is seeing his new PCP next week. I often feel like THROTTLING my sister for being so completely selfish while she collects dad's monthly rent.

My friend Ron and I are taking Dad out for a 2nd mini road trip on Sunday along the coastline, and then to a German-American festival. We're German, so Ron thought he would like the wienerschnitzel and bratwurst and all. I'm a little worried becus it seems the extreme heat will still be with us and I don't want dad to overheat.

I want dad to get the 2nd AC as quickly as possible, so I think I will go out with dad Saturday to look at the portable ACs at Best Buy and/or Lowes. I have to drop off a few pieces of art at a local frame shop for another exhibit, but that shouldn't take more than 30 minutes. I guess I will skip my yoga class again (for like the 4th time in a row) to make sure I have enough time for dad.

There is a special academic program for older adults here that's part of University of CT satellite campus in Waterbury, about a half hour away. There are a bunch of courses offered, taught by older people for older people, and while there's a fee, it's very affordable, like $50 for a 10 week course. This was something I wanted to check out but never could since I was working and most of the classes are held during the day. I think they assume you're retired. I was toying with the idea of asking dad if he'd want to go to their upcoming open house. There's a course on European History during WWI and WWII that interests me, along with a few others. My dad has always had an interest in politics and current events, too.

I'd be tempted to sign up for something though if I got a job I'd have to give it up.

Wow, 9:15 pm already. Time to take a shower and catch an episode of The Good Wife. She's thinking of running for state's attorney. You go girl.

...and some much needed rain.

We had an earlier round of storms while I was still at the office and I was afraid I'd come home to some soaked window sills, etc. as I had left a lot of windows open for the cats' relief.

Only a few windows got wet and I cleaned it up pretty quickly. It is still so muggy here though the temps have dropped somewhat.

Work was noneventful. Worked on version 2 of the medical practice transitions white paper. I only have 2 more days in the office (and 2 at home) and then I'm done.

I hope to have another noneventful day working at home tomorrow. Though I do want to run down to probate court to deliver the next form. This one is pretty simple/straightforward so hopefully it won't be returned.

I need to get back into family tree research. I sort of reached a point where I didn't know what else to do or was wandering aimlessly on the site. But since I'm going to let the subscription lapse in a few months due to my pending unemployment, I want to try to get as much out of it as possible, and find a way to copy all the info I did collect, which could prove to be very, very cumbersome.

I had some time at dinner Saturday night to ask Dad more questions about his time serving in the US Navy during the Korean War. He never left the US becus his boat was stationed in Bayonne NJ and in fact he went home every weekend!

One time, there was a pilot who committed suicide by aiming his plane down toward the Hudson River. My dad's crew went diving at the site to recover body parts, etc.

Dad enlisted for 4 years but only got to serve 2, much to his disappointment, after my grandmother went to an American Red Cross office and made an appeal to have her only son discharged because my grandfather had a heart attack and couldn't work. My grandmother needed my dad at home to keep the family business going (a gas station) becus grandpa, a mechanic, couldn't do anything. My dad really enjoyed the Navy but he was discharged.

In those days, the treatment for a heart attack was a year of bedrest, believe it or not. Imagine how much weaker you would feel after that!

I believe dad said that was grandpa's 2nd heart attack. And it was the 3rd one that killed him. So sad. He was a lot of fun.

When I was growing up, he used to take a forkful of food and slowly bring it around in a circle toward me and I would open my mouth up for the food, whereupon he would complete the circular motion with his hand and put it in his own mouth. I would always fall for it, and he would always laugh.

When i got home the inside temp was 82, which i believe is about the hottest it ever gets in here. I ran my portable AC for about an hour in the family room, which was even warmer than the main house (I closed it and the sun room off becus they have more windows and heat up more) and it managed to cool things down from 88 to 82.

I will have to take a cold shower tonight for sure. My upstairs is uninhabitable. I will sleep on the twin bed tonight in the downstairs family room.

It's awful.

My team is taking me and the other person who is being laid off out to lunch next Wednesday. I've never worked anywhere where those who are laid off get treated to lunch. Usually, you're out the same day they tell you about the layoff.

I have one more week to go and just 3 more days in office.I've emailed as many writing samples to my personal email address as I could. They could be helpful during a job interview. I also asked a friend in our Boston area office to inter office mail me some finished samples of brochures I've written, and I got them today.

I've emailed a few people who like my work invitations to hire me on a contract basis should they need a copywriter after next week. You never know if this could pan out.

I've emptied out my desk and deleted favorited websites and personal emails no one needs to see.

Not too much going on this weekend. Seeing dad for dinner tomorrow night. It's gotten to be a regular thing. I like to meet him at his place rather than have him come here becus by the time we're done with dinner, it's getting pretty dark and it makes me nervous knowing he has to drive home in the dark with his macular degeneration. My sister's town has a lot of very dark roads.

After a lot of back and forth due to scheduling conflicts, about 8 of us in my group at work are taking me and the other person laid off in my group to a farewell lunch at Captain's Cove, on the water in the city where I work. It will be boiling that day and 90 but what the heck....

My goal today was to make more progress on the job search, either by reaching out to recruiters or applying for a job.

That didn't really happen as I was sidetracked by probate issues. I got a call from the court telling me that after having the latest form rejected by them twice (over the course of several weeks, with me hand delivering each time just becus i don't trust the mail) she told me I'd forgotten to sign the return.

Blah!

I ran down there to sign the return and she told me they would then "accept" it for filing and that I'm now free to file the next form, Form 237, which reports on outstanding bills paid to creditors for expenses incurred during the decedent's lifetime. Luckily there are just 4 items on the list since when your loved one is at a nursing home, it's mostly all-inclusive. Bills incurred AFTER death, like the funeral/burial, tax returns, etc., are to be reported on the final accounting form, which comes after Form 237..

Because the court is exceedingly picky about everything being perfect, I spent at least an hour this afternoon just adding up expenses reported on both Form 237 and the final accounting, just to make sure it balanced out to what I have in the checkbook balance. It does.

I also had to call them to ask whether one particular bill, reimbursement of $7,000 to the state of CT related to a Medicare Savings Plan my mother was in for years (which lowered her Medicare monthly premiums and thus increased her Social Security checks) should be listed on Form 237. They didn't know and said I should consult a lawyer. I'm not going to incur more stupid bills, but in rereading their booklet's definition of what goes in Form 237, I decided that was the right place.

The court wants complete addresses for each creditor that was paid. There was a $90 bill for my mother's last teeth cleaning last December, done at the nursing home but billed separately to me. I remember seeing the bill and paying it but could not remember the name of the dentist. I rummaged around in the attic and could not find it; finally, i remembered I a handwritten note I'd jotted down following a talk I had with the hygienist, in 1 of 2 notebooks I kept during this awful time just to stay on top of everything.

Just having to go thru the notebook to find it made me all teary and emotional. It brought back the memories in full force of a 4-month period of time from September thru December 2015 I consider nightmarish, filled with fear, anxiety, worry and an all-round out-of-control feeling as I dealt with numerous parties at the nursing home to deal with her care.I had only a few friends to lean on for support, my dad, and my cousin Margherite.

Anyway, I found the address online after getting the dentist's name and the name of the practice, which was very generic sounding.

So I have everything I need to fill out the form but at this point I'm going to wait until my next work at home day, Tuesday, to fill it out and again hand-deliver it to the probate court. That will make probably my 6th trip there. I could mail it, but I prefer knowing it arrived intact.

The probate clerk also gave me a heads up I would receive the court's bill in the mail. I estimate it will be around $650.

This has been hanging over my head for so long and I really just want it to be over so I can truly move on.

I am going to treat myself to a good walk right after work to de-stress and calm down.

I feel like I have piles of stuff to do and so I've only applied for one job thus far and reached out to 2 former My Bank employees who moved on to other area banks to see about possible job openings. I've also played phone tag with a job recruiter friend of mine who's asked me to send updated writing samples.

So today I hope to apply to a few more jobs, touch base with 2 recruiters I know and scan website of Creative Group headhunters.

So I definitely have tons to do on the job front. In the back of my mind I am still casting about for another local non-profit I could donate more art to and I would really like to sell locally somewhere a bunch of my mother's cameras and associated equipment. I also have a diamond engagement ring which is of no use to me.

I decided to enter 3 small pieces of art in the next show (theme: landscapes) at local frame shop; I can drop them off when I pick up the one piece entered in the previous show, which evidently didn't sell. Note to self: Take pictures of the 3 pieces before you drop them off so you can blog about them on mom's blog. There's a $20 entry fee.

I still fight moments of dwelling in an unhealthy way on my mother. The last 6 months are what I always think about and dwarf the other 80 years, but to be honest, she wasn't nearly as big a part of my life when she was doing her own thing and unaffected by Alzheimers. I often struggle not to be swallowed up by depressing circular thoughts that never seem to lead anywhere. This is why I have long believed it's best to stay busy doing other things.

I sent off my DNA sample (in saliva) to Ancestry DNA and should have results back in a month or so. Dad wants to do it too but agreed we'd wait to see whether we think it's worth the $79 price based on the results I get. Ancestry encourages more than one family member to do it because genes can skip a generation and his results could look pretty different than mind.

I'm still reading Steve Jobs' biography, which is pretty good even though computers are a snooze to me. As a teen he was into drugs, Zen/enlightenment and dropped out of college but he seemed to have a gifted mind from the start. I hadn't known he was adopted. His interest in the arts equaled his interest in technology. So it's a pretty good read.

Something...I'm guessing either a chipmunk or a vole...mowed down most of my stringbeans that I was growing near my front entry. I should have fenced it but hadn't gotten around to it. These were seedlings that had been chomped much earlier but actually recovered and were just starting to form small stringbeans that would have been ready to pick in 4 or 5 days. I'm feeling disgusted. Something did the same in the fenced veggie garden and since I could see the vole hole right near the beans there, I'm assuming it was voles. That's why I was trying to grow them near my front door so I could keep an eye on them.

So gardenwise, I've had a bounty of cucumbers from just 2 potted plants. I have a fair amount of green tomatoes and now I'm picking wineberries from my yard that I eat daily over my breakfast cereal. I had one smallish eggplant from my one eggplant plant. The other plant collapsed; I suspect voles ate through the roots. The remaining plant is looking very healthy but no further eggplants.

My onions are hanging in there, though some appear to have been dug up by voles. That's all I've grown this year except for basil and mint. It's a little frustrtating. With the voles, I may give up the fenced garden entirely. I did recently sow more beans in pots in my driveway and I see some of them starting to emerge from the ground. I will HAVE to rig up some sort of protective fence around them using plastic fencing. Otherwise, they're doomed.

Six of us went out for drinks after work. We mostly dished about all the other layoffs happening at the bank. Yes, there are more. I thought at first just 10 of us were laid off, but they're doing them in 8 "waves." So am guessing they're laying off about 100 people across our 11-state footprint.

Of course now that I have just 2 weeks left to go, I'm getting inundated with work. Including writing 2 white papers which I'm going to have to tell them I'm not sure I can deliver anymore since I assumed when I accepted the assignment I would have my job into August. The woman was supposed to get me her notes over a week ago before she went on vacay, but only delivered them today.

Another thought on my health insurance choices...it doesn't have to be an "either/or" choice between COBRA and ACA options.

It makes sense to stick with my employer's COBRA plan through the end of 2016, since I have already earned enough YTD to disqualify me from getting any subsidies. But it may make sense in 2017 to switch to a much lower cost plan in the $250 a month range that comes with full subsidies.

However, this is a gamble and a guessing game. If I don't have substantial income below $45,000 in 2017, then yes, I could enjoy the lower cost ACA options. But if I later wind up with a job offer or even a well paying, ongoing contract gig and exceed the $45,000 cap, I could end up having to pay back several thousand dollars worth of subsidies to the federal government at tax time. Which is exactly what happened in 2013 before I knew I'd get the bank job. I'd rather not have to pay the subsidies back if I don't have to, but I guess it's still worth it to grab them on the chance my income will be low. Otherwise, I'll miss out on this substantial savings either way.

The Tappan Zee Bridge Authority nabbed me with a $5 bridge toll bill from back in June when dad and I road tripped to his ancestral hometown in Jersey. I vaguely remember not having to pay the toll due to the reconstruction of the bridge.

I was over my father's yesterday after our lunch and a trip to KMart where we bought him a new microwave. I made sure to carry it up the stairs for him as he's so unsteady on his feet. Spending more time in his little apartment I could see it really needs a good cleaning, especially the kitchen area. With is failing eyesight, he can't really see it. He wanted to clean his kitchen floor and we went looking at KMart for a scrub brush with a hole in it where you can attach a pole, but we couldn't find one.

I told him i would wash the floor but as usual, he wouldn't let me. This is the problem I have with dad; he doesn't allow me to help him and i very much want to help him and he very much needs my help.

I called him tonight after realizing I could position my offer of help in a way that would make it seem it was benefitting me. I told him he could pay me and it would be a big help once I'm not working anymore and could use the cash. He said ok, when your job ends, we can talk about it. I really don't care about the money as much as I care about helping him. He still has boxes he hasn't unpacked since a year ago and I know he doesn't have the energy.

It's been hot as hell here. May catch some relief tomorrow. Been sleeping downstairs in the family room.

OK, what a dummy..I miscalculated something big time.

For some reason when projecting my income for 2016, I didn't count what I've earned YTD at the bank. I just was figuring out my income from my last day of work forward through year's end. This would include severance and the unemployment benefits and whatever freelance/contract work I may find.

But that all was incorrect since for purposes of seeing if you're eligible for a subsidy on the healthcare exchange, you have to figure total income for the year, because that's what will be showing up on my tax return when I file and that's what will be used to determine whether or not I'm eligible for any subsidy.

So I already earned a gross of $43,215 and I have 2 more paychecks to go in July. Add in the 8 weeks severance totally $12,723 plus unemployment benefits for October through December and I'm already up to $60,000, which clearly means I get no subsidy.

So now looking at the healthcare exchange is much scarier. Most of the silver plans are in the $700 to $800 a month range, and the only one that has a $500 deductible like my current plan costs $745 a month. All the other plans have annual deductibles of $2900 or more.

I may as well stick with my employer's plan at $513 a month. Now it seems like a no-brainer.

I do only routine and preventive office visits except for my MS meds and thru the drug maker's financial assistance program the copays are 100% covered up to a max of $12,000 a year, so I don't have to worry about that.

And sticking with my current plan would be SO much easier and a lot less red tape than switching to a state-managed program.

Bottom Line: My severance will carry me through August and September. I'll try to save as much as I possibly can during that time.

I also plan to do the Safeco Insurance gadget on my car that measures how safe a driver I am (fast starts, sudden stops, and time of day) and this could save me up to 25% of my car insurance.

Unemployment benefits will kick in October and continue through March 2017 (if needed). While health insurance costs will eat up 25% of my unemployment income, I will still have about $1400 a month left over (based on a gross of $1800 a month) so sticking to my austerity budget, I should only be a few hundred in the red each month.

Imagine how much harder this would be if I had a mortgage or rent to pay!

Ideally, I will find some kind of work within the 6 months, because after the unemployment runs out, my healthcare and other expenses will be a big pinch.

It occurred to me this is pretty much the scenario I'd be facing if I chose to do an early retirement in 3 years. I'd forgotten how expensive health insurance is without the good fortune of being on an employer's plan.

The only difference would be that I'd be 3 years closer to getting Medicare and have 3 years less living expenses to fund before getting on Social Security later in my 60s.

My friend R. never fails to point out the sliver linings whenever there is bad news, like my layoff. He said to think of it as an opportunity to spend more quality time with my dad, who is getting on in years and who knows how much time he has left?

This is very true; for long stretches of my life, he was not in the picture, but now that he's moved up to my sister's barn/loft apt nearby, I see a lot more of him than I ever did.

The other thing R. pointed out is that I'm in a better financial position now than during any other time I've faced a layoff. I can see from my records that my total savings/investments at the time of my last layoff in October 2009 was just $418,000. Now I'm at $776,000. So that's comforting, but I don't exactly want to spend any of that money down now.

So the bad news is...health insurance. Right now I pay just $143/ mth with my employer plan, and that includes dental. Super cheap, and a good Cigna plan. I know my employer picks up part of my premiums for me now, but i figured even if that figure doubled once i leave company, it still would be relatively cheap. Wrong. As a single person, if I keep this plan, without the dental, i would have to cough up $513 a month. This would easily become my single biggest expenses during unemployment. This is what would put me in the red each month while collecting unemployment benefits. So I will definitely have to look into prices of plans under the Affordable Care Act. Don't even want to think of the mess that could ensure if Trump is elected and the Republicans continue on their mission to dismantle the ACA for something else. Not a good time to be dependent on the system for health insurance. Sigh.

A few friends, here and elsewhere, have asked whether I might be able to retire right now. I've considered that, but I don't think that would be a good idea, at all.

While I'm mortgage-free, I still have day to day expenses, including health insurance, homeowners and car insurance, food, taxes, heating bills, etc.

I also very much want to bump up my 35-year average earnings for purposes of increasing the monthly Social Security benefit I'm eligible for. Right now, when I look at my lifetime SS statement which anyone can look at online, I see there are still several years of earnings when I was in high school or college where I made around $1,000, more or less. Those small numbers are dragging down my 35-year average, which SSA looks at to determine your benefits. So by working a few more years, I can bump up my average.

I will know more details about what I have to work with when I get the exit package overnighted to me by HR, but a few preliminary thoughts:

1. Expense cutting: This is my 2nd summer hiring someone to mow for me; it comes to about $1,000 a summer. I can't bear the thought of having to haul that heavy mower around myself again, but I think I will email him to see if he could start mowing every other week, so it would cut my bill in half.

UPDATE: My mower has responded yes, no problem to pull back to cutting the grass every other week. This is good. If I was mowing myself, this would be problematic as I'd have trouble cutting long grass with my own mower, but with those big mowers they ride on, it's no problem, they could mow a woodland.

No more pricey organic foods.

No more framing of mom's matted art; luckily, I got most of the ones I wanted to frame, framed. I know I spent over $700 doing this.

It's back to careful assessment of road trips and errand running around.

I skipped the last 3 weekly yoga classes becus i was doing other things, but I might like to continue going on occasion. It's good for my health and it's only $5 a class and it's 2 minutes away.

2. Health insurance: I will definitely want to keep my current plan with my employer via COBRA; I pay just $143 a month now for Cigna health and dental. Even paying double that would likely be cheaper than getting health insurance through Affordable Care Act.

Also, I know if I stay with my current plan my copay for the MS meds remains $0; if I go thru ACA, I'll have a $50 monthly co-pay. So the COBRA is good for 18 months, and hopefully before then I'll have found a new job.

3. Income: With my 7/29 end date and 8 weeks of severance after that, I won't feel the effects of the layoff until October, by which time, unemployment will start, hopefully. I forget what the max is or what I was getting last time, especially since I was always juggling some combination of part-time work, freelance contract works or one-off stuff.

I just heard this morning from an old freelance client who will have 2 jobs for me in the coming weeks. It's not a lot of money, but every little bit helps.

I don't think I'll spend much time looking for new freelance clients as I'll be focusing on full-time employment, or at least a steady p/t job. However, I may revisit that as I remind myself I'll be looking for employment at soon-to-be age 57. A scary age to be job-hunting.

I hope to wind up the probate process by the fall, and I anticipate another $40,000 or so to come my way from mom's estate. I'm in great financial shape but I don't want to undo any of the great progress I've made in saving for an early retirement. Nor do I want to give up on the goal of retiring in 3 years time.

My biggest concern right now is I don't have any psychic energy to get into the whole job search mode again. I know I have to, and I know I should just allow myself the day, for gosh sakes, to let things sink in and get some perspective on what's happening.

Just by talking to some friends I can tell there were at least 6 others laid off, and most likely more. I may learn more at this afternoon's tele-meeting. I just attended a quarterly meeting with a head honcho who painted a very positive picture of how the company's been doing. Makes me wonder how truthful that was if they find they need to do a round of layoffs a week later.

No matter, don't want to spend much of my own time focusing on that.

A few people have already offered help however I need it. I suppose I could ask a few of them to write glowing references for me on my Linked In page, which I've done before.