Well, spent yesterday making various reservations. For some foolish reason, I keyed everything off of my best deal on airline flights...and I did get a good deal first class on Alaska to Mauii. Also excellent deals on a car and hotel in PDX. Then the good deals came to a halt.
With the economy still in a funk, I did not think that Hawaii would be particularly busy. I was wrong. Mauii appears to be jammed in February. Tried all the web travel sites and was shocked at what I saw - or perhaps more accurately, what I didn't see - reasonably cheap prices for nice places. Made a half-dozen condo calls to no avail. Finally settled on the Westin resort in Kaanapali. Beautiful place. And way spendy...but what the hell...I haven't really treated myself to anything extravagant in a good long while. And I DESPERATELY need some quality relaxation.
In other news, I was at mom's yesterday and my sister gave me a gift. Actually, she gave me the gift that I had given her for Christmas - a "Flip" video camera. It's about the size of a smart phone and while it's NOT a sophisticated device I figure it might be useful to be able to add some video to my blog entries. This morning I fired it up to see how it works and to learn how to download to my computer. So...here is my first ten second video from the front deck. THIS IS JUST A TEST. I will not bore you with deck videos on a regular basis...although I reserve the right to undertake a serious video survey of the pool area from my lanai in Hawaii if the scenery is particularly compelling.
The past week was big on the medical front. I had a small growth removed on my left forearm and am sporting a few stitches. The nurse called me yesterday and informed me that contrary to expectations it was NOT malignant. That is a good thing.
Took mom to the hospital for some imaging work. Took auntie to the dentist for a new bridge.
Did I mention that I REALLY need a vacation? Hah!
Hmmm. While the video on my computer is pretty darn good; I am disappointed with the quality of the upload here. Must be some data limitation inherent to blogspot. Oh well, it may still prove useful.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Aloha
Tickets purchased. Headed to PDX on February 2nd. Headed to Maui on February 6th for ten days.
Yippee Skippee!
So...who wants supper in PDX?
Yippee Skippee!
So...who wants supper in PDX?
Sunday, January 23, 2011
We Had It All...
Well, back to wet and warm. After very cold and seriously windy - followed by a brief 24 hour snow storm. We've had it all in the past week. The eight inches or so of snow never got a chance to get established...I've never seen snow disappear so fast. My driveway is now completely bare except for some glaciation at the bottom.
The chickadees and dark eyed juncos have discovered my bird feeder. The feeder has all sorts of seeds. The tweety birds indicate their preferences by tossing what they don't like onto my deck. Not real good table manners; but they are fun to watch. If we get a half-way decent day I will attempt some bird feeder pics. The chickadees, in particular, don't seem particularly Elmo shy - but I have yet to point a camera at them.
Last week was fairly intensive on the elder medical front. Took auntie to the physical therapist a couple of times and to the dentist once. Mom had a physical and we're still waiting for blood test results. Next Tuesday I'm taking mom to the orthopod to see what, if anything, can be done to give her some relief from arthritis in her back. It has started to affect her ability to sleep at night which is a very bad thing. Don't think they've perfected back transplants yet...
Auntie's last PT appointment was on Friday and I have signed-up to try to get her to the Club for exercise a couple of times a week. Hard to say how this will work out... I cautioned her that some people at the Club like to chit-chat and some don't - lots of folks are under a strict time constraint and don't like to be diverted from their daily routine.
I don't think my cautionary advice was particularly well received. Auntie is a serious chatterbox. I am positive that she enjoys yakking more than she enjoys exercise. She loved the PT 'cause the therapist indulged her in her banter. On the other hand, Auntie has set a goal of being able to walk on the Basin Road flume next spring. And I THINK she knows that she needs to improve her endurance in order to make that a reality.
Stay tuned...
In other news I was struck by a story in last week's The Economist which discussed the recent Tuscon massacre. The point of the article was that the lesson learned should be about guns - the availability and lethality of firearms in this country- as opposed to finger pointing over "uncivil" speech.
I think the point is well taken - although I DO believe that incendiary rhetoric from the Right is a serious issue.
A quote from The Economist:
The 30,000 annual gun related death toll actually surprised me. By way of contrast, there were 33,808 motor vehicle fatalities in the U.S. in 2009. The number of vehicle deaths has been declining steadily over recent decades. The trend for gun related deaths is going in the other direction...
The chickadees and dark eyed juncos have discovered my bird feeder. The feeder has all sorts of seeds. The tweety birds indicate their preferences by tossing what they don't like onto my deck. Not real good table manners; but they are fun to watch. If we get a half-way decent day I will attempt some bird feeder pics. The chickadees, in particular, don't seem particularly Elmo shy - but I have yet to point a camera at them.
Last week was fairly intensive on the elder medical front. Took auntie to the physical therapist a couple of times and to the dentist once. Mom had a physical and we're still waiting for blood test results. Next Tuesday I'm taking mom to the orthopod to see what, if anything, can be done to give her some relief from arthritis in her back. It has started to affect her ability to sleep at night which is a very bad thing. Don't think they've perfected back transplants yet...
Auntie's last PT appointment was on Friday and I have signed-up to try to get her to the Club for exercise a couple of times a week. Hard to say how this will work out... I cautioned her that some people at the Club like to chit-chat and some don't - lots of folks are under a strict time constraint and don't like to be diverted from their daily routine.
I don't think my cautionary advice was particularly well received. Auntie is a serious chatterbox. I am positive that she enjoys yakking more than she enjoys exercise. She loved the PT 'cause the therapist indulged her in her banter. On the other hand, Auntie has set a goal of being able to walk on the Basin Road flume next spring. And I THINK she knows that she needs to improve her endurance in order to make that a reality.
Stay tuned...
In other news I was struck by a story in last week's The Economist which discussed the recent Tuscon massacre. The point of the article was that the lesson learned should be about guns - the availability and lethality of firearms in this country- as opposed to finger pointing over "uncivil" speech.
I think the point is well taken - although I DO believe that incendiary rhetoric from the Right is a serious issue.
A quote from The Economist:
Opportunists who seek to gain political advantage by blaming the shootings on words would do America better service if they focused on bullets. In no other decent country could any civilian, let alone a deranged one, legally get his hands on a Glock semi-automatic.
...
As the Brady Centre, established after the Reagan shooting to commemorate one of its victims, has noted, more Americans were killed by guns in the 18 years between 1979 and 1997 than died in all of America's foreign wars since it's independence. Around 30,000 people a year are killed by one of the almost 300m guns in America - almost one for every citizens. Those deaths are not just murders and suicides: some are accidents often involving children.
...
It is fanciful to imagine that guns will ever disappear from America; they are too deeply embedded in its founding myths and its culture. But that does not mean that more effective checks on the mentally unstable are impossible, or that restrictions on the killing power of what can be sold are doomed to failure. Neither of these will happen, though, unless the blame is directed where it belongs.
The 30,000 annual gun related death toll actually surprised me. By way of contrast, there were 33,808 motor vehicle fatalities in the U.S. in 2009. The number of vehicle deaths has been declining steadily over recent decades. The trend for gun related deaths is going in the other direction...
Monday, January 17, 2011
Happy Birthday Dougie
A premature yet eminently satisfying birthday party for Dougie last night. He was grill master in charge of a boneless leg o' lamb. Cooked hot and basted with a hoisin sauce of some sort. Crusty on the outside - moist and pink on the inside. Yum. Yum. Alison made a mushroom risotto that was very yummy too.
And good company as well! Eric, John and Shelly, Candy and Dick and yours truly. Don't hardly get no better than that....
The weather has moderated. This afternoon it was in the low 30's and the wind has stopped blowing. John and Shelly said earlier this week it blew in Douglas as hard as they have ever seen it blow. And Shelly is a life-long Douglas girl... YIKES! Broken windows everywhere. They said their house was seriously vibrating... Floats in the Douglas boat harbor were underwater due to ice accumulation. John reported that several cleats on the dock were sprung on his boat. YIKES again!
It snowed off-and-on yesterday. I spent a awhile at the airport waiting for Joan to arrive...she missed approach and her flight went down to Ketchikan where she and her fellow Juneau bound passengers were given the heave-ho and re-booked on later flights to Juneau. I have not heard from her today...but assume she got in last night while I was occupied with the Dougie bacchanalia.
We're under a winter storm warning for tonight...possible 6 inches or so by morning; but I gotta feelin' it ain't gonna happen.
And good company as well! Eric, John and Shelly, Candy and Dick and yours truly. Don't hardly get no better than that....
The weather has moderated. This afternoon it was in the low 30's and the wind has stopped blowing. John and Shelly said earlier this week it blew in Douglas as hard as they have ever seen it blow. And Shelly is a life-long Douglas girl... YIKES! Broken windows everywhere. They said their house was seriously vibrating... Floats in the Douglas boat harbor were underwater due to ice accumulation. John reported that several cleats on the dock were sprung on his boat. YIKES again!
It snowed off-and-on yesterday. I spent a awhile at the airport waiting for Joan to arrive...she missed approach and her flight went down to Ketchikan where she and her fellow Juneau bound passengers were given the heave-ho and re-booked on later flights to Juneau. I have not heard from her today...but assume she got in last night while I was occupied with the Dougie bacchanalia.
We're under a winter storm warning for tonight...possible 6 inches or so by morning; but I gotta feelin' it ain't gonna happen.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
The Wind Blew and the Shit Flew
Serious Taku winds downtown last night with a number of broken car and house windows according to the morning news. Apparently KTOO, our local public radio station, also lost a satellite dish on top of their building. Gusts to 70 mph downtown...even higher gusts expected today. And getting colder. Temps tonight below zero in the Mendenhall Valley and windchill downtown to 35 below. Brrrrrrrr.
Personally, life goes on in its normal winter manner. Daily visits to mom. Run errands as needed. Today I will change the cap on mom's chimney. We're going through firewood at a good clip. Auntie's daughter, Sandra, is in Juneau for a week so it is light duty on that front at the moment. Mom roasted a chicken for all hands last evening - it was quite tasty.
In other news, I continue to follow the turmoil in Western Alabama, aka Arizona. The whack-job right is going on the verbal offensive after a number of days of being on the defensive. The approach of Palin, Beck, Limbaugh & Co. is to defend free speech. The gist of the argument apparently is that one may not yell "fire" in a crowded theater; but it is perfectly ok to yell "open fire" in the context of a political campaign. And this morning Palin accused the media of "blood libel" for discussing the possible link between right wing hate speech and violent imagery and actual violence. "Blood libel" was a particularly interesting choice of words insofar as Congresswoman Giffords is Jewish.
The Arizona massacre is going to enliven our politics for many months to come. Guns. Mental illness. Sarah Palin. Ain't life grand in these United States?
Personally, life goes on in its normal winter manner. Daily visits to mom. Run errands as needed. Today I will change the cap on mom's chimney. We're going through firewood at a good clip. Auntie's daughter, Sandra, is in Juneau for a week so it is light duty on that front at the moment. Mom roasted a chicken for all hands last evening - it was quite tasty.
In other news, I continue to follow the turmoil in Western Alabama, aka Arizona. The whack-job right is going on the verbal offensive after a number of days of being on the defensive. The approach of Palin, Beck, Limbaugh & Co. is to defend free speech. The gist of the argument apparently is that one may not yell "fire" in a crowded theater; but it is perfectly ok to yell "open fire" in the context of a political campaign. And this morning Palin accused the media of "blood libel" for discussing the possible link between right wing hate speech and violent imagery and actual violence. "Blood libel" was a particularly interesting choice of words insofar as Congresswoman Giffords is Jewish.
The Arizona massacre is going to enliven our politics for many months to come. Guns. Mental illness. Sarah Palin. Ain't life grand in these United States?
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Change of Plans
Well, a delay of a month or so for a vacation. Did my bookkeeping yesterday. It was not pretty. Christmas turned-out a lot more expensive than I thought - plus new tires and other expenses. So...Plan B...the Northwest and somewhere warm in mid-February. Should be able to get better prices thinking out a month or so...and should be able to avoid dipping into savings.
So...my apologies to my northwest pals...but I will see you soon nonetheless.
I took down my Christmas stuff the other day and made a sizable dump run. My veteran tree of fifteen years or so is now sleeping with the angels. Actually it's buried in a landfill. But you get my drift. It was a loyal and honourable tree...
I did go in for my annual check-up yesterday and got a clean bill of health.
Otherwise not a lot to report. Gonna lay low and try to save some dough for vacation. The only pending expense of note of which I am aware is a brake job on the Jeep...but hopefully not until it's next regular check-up next spring.
Mighty quiet on the Northern Front...
So...my apologies to my northwest pals...but I will see you soon nonetheless.
I took down my Christmas stuff the other day and made a sizable dump run. My veteran tree of fifteen years or so is now sleeping with the angels. Actually it's buried in a landfill. But you get my drift. It was a loyal and honourable tree...
I did go in for my annual check-up yesterday and got a clean bill of health.
Otherwise not a lot to report. Gonna lay low and try to save some dough for vacation. The only pending expense of note of which I am aware is a brake job on the Jeep...but hopefully not until it's next regular check-up next spring.
Mighty quiet on the Northern Front...
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