Weekend in Tampa

We are back from a relatively short visit to Tampa.  We went to the Florida Lighthouse Association Meeting on Saturday and Tarpon Springs on Sunday and back home on Monday.  In the process I made what will likely be the last visit to my sister’s house in Tampa.  She put it up for sale and sold it within a 24-hour period. Yesterday the house inspection went fine. So my sister will be on her way to a whole new lifestyle.

We also had lunch with Christy twice – on the way down (Christian too) and on the return trip.

Here are some pictures from the weekend:

Fish’s View

It is rare to look directly up from below a heron.  Today I got that view.  Is it any wonder they see fish easily?  Their eyes are set to look directly  down in front of them.  Nature is amazing!

Sunset at Liza Jackson Park

We’ve seen a number of pictures on line taken at Liza Jackson Park at sunset - so we decided to go tonight and take some of our own.  Here are some of the pictures I took.  A lot of birds hang out there because a woman feeds them each night.  A lot of people show up, too.  It’s a regular sunset happening!

this picture of the craters on the moon is for Sophie!

Long Time No Write

I have gotten into a 2-week cycle in writing blogs.  With Facebook and Twitter we all know what is going on so the use of blogs has slackened.

It’s been uneventful the last 2 weeks but mostly busy. The weather here has been cloudy and rainy for most of this year so far.  Doing outside stuff has been at a minimum.  I’ve had the air conditioner running for 4 days now.  The temperature has been in the cloudy, damp 70’s and we are supposed to have 1 more day of this.

Yesterday morning I bent over to pick up something and noticed my back was giving me the “I’m on the edge of going out” feeling. So I acted accordingly and was careful in my actions.  It didn’t help – my back got so sore that I couldn’t do anything that required standing or walking.

So I used the time to do things on the computer I had been putting off.  First I transferred my Norton antivirus license from my dead computer to my living one.  It had a trial version of  another antivirus program on it that just happened to expire in 3 days.  Next I booked our summer vacation trip to the Maritime Provinces.

That set me on a whole different thought train.  Any time I use the word maritime I think of Paul Simon’s song lyric from his song “Duncan”.  Actually I thought of the words, “I left my home in the Maritime” but couldn’t remember the name of the song.  So I Googled the lyric and found the song.  Since I hadn’t heard that song in a long time I played it and thought to myself that there was another song on that Graceland album that I liked but could not remember the title.  Another search and I had “Boy in the Bubble”.  It only took a short time for me to discover that one verse of the song took exactly 140 characters – the maximum size of a tweet, so I tweeted it.  It brought a response from C&C and I learned that one of my favorite albums was also liked by my son-in-law.

Coincidentally with my back acting up I had a regular doctor’s appointment today.  My doctor always asks if my daughter is still working in TV.  Next he comments that I have lost weight.  My back turns out to be a muscular issue and he didn’t prescribe anything beyond the pain meds that I am currently on.  The good news is that my blood work all looks good.  My cholesterol level has dropped even more with the good cholesterol level rising.  Between the weight loss, switching to a different cholesterol med and participating in that fish oil / calcium vital study (I’m thinking I don’t have the placebo) I’ve seen the bad trends that my body was taking reversed.  My weight was also the same as my previous visit so I made it through the holidays with all its relaxation of the diet without negative effects.

Everything related to the doctors was not perfect.  When I went for my blood work it took 3 pokes to finally get the sample.  The women who stuck me was a RN and she was having the best day until I showed up.

For some reason my HD camcorder has lost the ability to charge batteries.  So I got a separate charger and charged the batteries successfully.  When I put the charged battery on the camera it still thinks the battery is dead and tells me to change the battery.  Fortunately even though the LCD shows that the battery is dead the camera still works with it.  I just can’t tell how much charge is in the battery.  That’s OK because a fully charged battery can power the camera for 300 minutes and I’ve got a 60 minute back-up battery.  If I can’t manage the batteries it’s bad on me.

Finally, I spent most of the afternoon looking at what to do in Oregon.  We are looking at going there in the spring.  I will be setting that itinerary and there are many wonderful things to do in Portland and down the Oregon coast to Northern California.  We are planning on seeing my brother when we go.

That’s it for this 2-weeks – no pictures, no kayaking, no travel.  Let’s see if I write sooner next time.

End of Year Ruminations

 

Last year at this time I had just removed the splint I wore after my 2nd thumb surgery. Somehow it seems all that happened more than just 1 year ago. My thumbs are working fine now and although they get a little sore when I use them a lot it is nothing like the agony I used to endure. I'm thankful every day that I got my thumbs back. It's been especially nice to be able to play with the grandkids without hurting all the time.

We did a lot of travelling this year, most of it to Jacksonville. We originally thought we would have taken a couple "vacation" trips but the year turned out to be one of visiting the kids for various reasons. I just counted - we made 15 trips to Jacksonville this year with 3 of those lasting 9, 10 and 11 days respectively. We usually stopped in High Springs to see C&C when we went to Jacksonville and we made a couple of special trips to spend the day with C&C. C&C and K&T also visited us. We went to 2 Florida Lighthouse Association meetings. One in Jacksonville and one in Sanibel Island. W went to Tallahassee where Penny took a 1-day quilting course. We did get the vacation trip to Canada in there. 2013 should see 2 or 3 trips; Nova Scotia, NW US (with a visit to brother Lou), National Parks Tour and Connecticut are all candidates. We are also overdo for a visit to New Orleans.

Yesterday was my Mom's birthday. I think about her a lot. I'm even looking like her more every day (weight loss was a minor setback) so every time I look in a mirror or see a picture of me I remember her.

I love the politicians today. They have had months to work out a compromise on taxes and spending. Not amazingly they didn't do it. They masterfully avoided tackling the real issues about entitlement programs and made the issue about taxing the rich and not increasing taxes on the "middle class". Then when they came up against the deadline they only addressed what had to be handled. Their logic being we should not address these important issues in these last minute negotiations. We should address them in a mature process. So we will set another deadline 2-months away and handle them properly. It's called kicking the can down the road. You know what will happen in two months. The best that can happen now is that the House not pass the bill in its current form. The president and press seem very happy that the Senate has done something and are vilifying the Republicans. I must admit the Democrats have shown how media savvy and adept at controlling public opinion they are.

We recently signed up to Amazon Prime and I've been watching their free videos. I'm currently watching the 2 seasons of a 14-year-old TV series, Sports Night. It provides an interesting reminder of where society was before 9/11. In one show they have a bomb scare. The act was instigated by a TV personality making fun of Jesus as being gay. No one on the staff had any idea what a bomb would look like. They weren't aware of bomb sniffing dogs. They didn't understand how someone could want to blow up people in the name of religion and further didn't understand why the religious leaders weren't condemning the act and the person who made the threat.

That couldn't fly as a script today. It is just not believable. We have come to know all too well that people will kill senselessly. Sometimes religion is involved, sometimes not. But each event provides the political opportunity to remove more of the freedom we have enjoyed. Never let a good crisis go to waste.

Once again this year Penny and I sleep through the arrival of the new year. I'm not optimistic about the new year. I'd like to be wrong and next year at this time find myself thinking how silly I was.

Finally, life is actually pretty good right now. My health is OK. I do need to get more exercise into my life but overall I'm in better shape than I have been in a number of years - and I'm not in constant pain. This past year I was able to travel, see the kids and grandkids, buy some toys to play with and enjoy lots of time with Penny. I've run off to the beach or bayou many times and taken more pictures of birds and sunsets than anyone in their right mind should.

That's all I've got.

Happy New Year!