Alrighty then

There's nothing that reminds you that you're getting older than spending half a day sorting out the how's and what's of Medicare and then later signing up for a retirement check. In my head I'm twenty so those things sound like they belong in the realm of the ancients. Maybe that's why I've been putting off thinking about it. I just don't feel ancient yet.

These things take some getting used to. Like for Medicare, it looks like I have to pick out a Medicare doctor? What happens if I don't? They don't cover me? Or am I OK because I'm going to keep my state retirement health plan? I'll check into that next week. At least I've found that if I keep looking the answers eventually appear on some web page. Because I often forget where I found something important, today I copied every tidbit as I went along, and copied them into a Medicare document on my desktop. Right now it feels like a bit of overkill but my experience tells me I did the right thing.

Oh, I haven't kept up on the diet progress. It's still great. Except, confession: I am starting to think about s'mores, cake, cookies, potato chips. Crap. I mean "crap" as an expletive, am not implying at all that those foods are crap. Quite the opposite.

But really, I did kind of have to go off the diet last weekend due to lack of planning and being at a party without my own food. I only lost a day, in that I gained a pound back the next day, and then it was back to dropping. It's not as dramatic as in the first week, but I don't really mind. I'm so comfortable with this way of eating that I fully expect to happily do another round of shots (which comes about 6 weeks after the first round ends, if I remember correctly.)

Lara's coming to spend the night in a couple of hours. She's bringing an easel for me. I plan to begin painting. She also is going to help me put a floor lamp together but doesn't know it yet!

Seattle trip coming up

One of my favorite things about my birthday this year was spending an extended period of time with Lara, alone! No busy schedule etc. So we're doing it again, but for even more days. I'm catching a train at 4:30 or so...getting to Seattle an hour and a half later. I get a senior discount so it's not even $12. That SO beats driving, which I don't like to do anyway. Wow. I can read on the way up, look at scenery...I hope. This is new for me but I have a feeling it's going to be nice.

Yesterday Dan and I continued to sort the stuff in the garage and my long-held dream of finding some specific items came true. A long time ago I'd put some of my favorite clothes in a box. They needed buttons sewed on. I put the box in the living room where it sat for months. The box got moved to another room...sorta got forgotten and one day someone put a bag of old cassettes on top of the clothes. That did it. They were gone forever. The box got swifted off to cassette heaven in the garage and the clothes were never to be found again. I kept thinking, "Someday I'm going to clean the garage and find those things" and sure enough, I did! Hurray for garage-cleaning.

I just found out someone's actually reading this little blog of mine so I have renewed energy to continue. Good thing because I love doing it. And, for good measure, here's a picture of a shadow of my legs. Lara's got me into shadows these days.

Cooking Aftermath

Here's a picture of the aftermath of my cooking and Lara layering her salad mess on type of my cooking messes. When Per Olav comes here, he knows I will cook lots of food for him, so buried in all this are the remains of fresh scones, hot chocolate, non-nitrate bacon & 9-layer jello. Lara's making a killer salad for the party we're all going to today. Luke is introducing his Molly to the family now that they're officially engaged. There's probably plenty of food, but we can't go empty-handed. It's a rule.

Buon appetito