Gadget day for Bette and me.

Today the mail lady bought a treat I got for Bette, a new Rockwell Versa saw.  She loves it.... thank you Amazon!!!

We also headed over to Home Depot, and got ourselves a new fancy showerhead, that we saw on one of our favorite shows, "I want that!" It a Kohler Flip something or other

That sort of got installed after some proper coaching and assistance from Bette,
here are the directions that came with it:

Well, not really, but you get the idea.......

Then, we located a Mint Vaccum, at Bed Bath and Beyond, which is a robot cleaner, which we now need since we installed all wood floors in the house...  they had lots of them, I had looked in several places in Anderson before Christmas, to no avail..

We were gifted with a Shark Steam Cleaner also for Christmas from Tina and Tony, and after much effort, we located the cleaning pads also at Bed Bath and Beyond, so now were set for that to do the tile floors at home.....

So it was a productive trip.  $400 plus, but a happy wife is a happy life. 

Finally, we went to Michaels, which anymore is a two or three time a week stop for us, and Bette found some special notecards for a friend. 

A big bucket list item yesterday..

For around five years of so, I have followed the blog of a couple from Louisville, Ky, Howard and Linda, and they have set up "RV Dreams" and do a super job of writing about the full time lifestyle, and have lots of great information about finances, workkamping, and such..  Several times over the years, we have been close to them, but never made the connection-  They pulled into St Augustine and are staying about a mile or so from us, so we snuck in yesterday and finally got to say hello-  They are as nice in person as they are on the blog!
We snagged a dinner date with them tonight downtown-  along with another couple they knew from the area- 

Would have loved to have made their rally this spring out in Rockwall, Tx, but we'll not be close then. shoot.

Moving the pin collection around

I decided to move the pin collection around a little, since we brought back a bookcase from SC this trip.  I first moved the National Park pin collection over my desk-  Its by far the largest of the collections, and represents the 167 National Parks visited so far....only 230 more to go!

I regrouped all the state pins we've done so far into 2 groups- so now it looks much more centered, I think. 

Gee, guess we've been a few places and seen a few things....  got two big trips coming up this year to add to the collections..... and now I'm doing lighthouses in a serious way, as well as different grave sites...  always something to find....

Some of this summer's baseball booty

This is 30 of the 40 or so baseballs we got this summer on the trip-  The rack was built, but hasn't been installed just yet-  The top row is a category of what I am calling specialty balls, which are generally commemorative balls from places we visited, or balls that are issued by teams that describe "the road to the show", which is a logo display of all the teams in their progression to the majors, from rookie to the Big League Club.  The first ball on the left on top is an International League AAA ball, which shows all the teams in that league, then a Negro Leagues Museum ball from Kansas City, then the gold one 3rd from the left is one Cooper and I got at Cooperstown in 2007 when Tony Gwynn and Cal Rypkin were inducted, the 4th ball is one from Alcatraz prison, the next one is one of the Presidents of the US, the next is a ball from the state of Colorado, then one from the Taft National Monument, then one from Grand Teton National Park, then a Sox ball from Wrigley Field, the day we were there it was Mayor Daley day, and the last one on the top row is a Road to the Show ball from the Greenville SC Drive, for the Red Sox Organizaton.
On the Second row, left to right, we have Boise Idaho Hawks, Cedar Rapids Kernels, Chattanooga Lookouts, Omaha Storm Chasers, Sioux City Explorers, Rockford River Hawks, Missoula Osprey, River City Bandits, A Road to the Show Ball from the Independent Atlantic League of Baseball, and lastly a Great Falls Voyagers ball.  Bottom row left to right is Beloit Snappers, River City Rascals, Lincoln Salt Dogs, Helena Brewers, a Road to the Show ball from Cedar Rapids, Kansas City T Bones, Jackson Generals, Iowa Cubs, Clinton Lumber Kings, and the Gwinnett Braves.   Whew! 

357 or so miles, lots of traffic, especially on I-95, but no accidents nor construction, we left at 0735 and got in at 2:55.  Took a different routing this time, since there was a known detour around Harlem, Ga this time. 

Brought back a small load of stuff, including a bookcase, so I spent some time rearranging the office this afternoon. 

Glad to be back in the warmth, and sunshine.  Saw a gaggle of wild turkeys at the pond just now, so we are officially back in Florida!

Or whatever you call a group of 4 Wild Turkeys......  Beautiful colors....
Back to the routine tomorrow, Bette has to go back to PT, and is SO not looking forward to that, and I have to get my classes ready for Lander, we start back up on 9 January. 

Happy birthday to granddog Beau

Yesterday was our granddog Beau's 4th birthday.  He is a sweet little pup-  and loves, loves, loves his mommy. 

Christmas 2011

Got up at 0730- which is reasonable for our older age, and headed over to the house to see the opening of presents... 

Cooper was pretty thoroughly pleased he got his jersey of his idol

Brandon and his new tablet- which they do allow in school- 

How to be Grandfather of the Year

Get a pair of special custom made Nike soccer cleats for your biggest grandson-  They even have his name on it.....

He will be the snappiest on the field....  His Uni is purple, btw.

Christmas Eve Breakfast Tradition

As is our custom, we all piled into the cars and headed up to Jackies for our Christmas Eve breakfast-  it was yummy- then we headed over to the mall, so Bette could get some total non essentials at Michaels. 

Rest of the day will be devoted to total vegging out. 

Off to Anderson today

Hung out this morning for a while while one of my brightest former students who just graduated from Lander in History dropped by and took me up on my invitation to help herself to as many books as she might like from my library.  I was happy to have her avail herself of books that will be of use to her I hope in her teaching career, and felt really good that she found lots she liked.

Tina, cooper and I headed over to Anderson today to fill out some Christmas shopping needs.  Went to the Mall, stopped at a Subway on the way over for lunch, and managed a stop at a Marble Creamery for some ice cream. 

Saw this beautifully restored or either well-kept vintage Bentley at a stop light- all right hand drive and all.  Quite an example of a wonderful auto.

Suspect we'll rest easy tomorrow-  not much to see or go do. 

Catch up stuff

Cleaning day at the pond- the day before we left, the resident anhinga bird and a big egret took advantage of the nearly 80 degree weather to preen....

One of the bigger gators we've seen so far dropped in for a visit- he was quite a large fellow... spent most of the day leisurely floating around.

This is Bette's latest stepping stone that she created for our neighbors across the street, its's their 3 cats, obviously....

This pretty fellow strolled around for an hour or so.

Today, Bette and I headed over to the dentists for a cleaning, both of us got a clean report-  then a quick McDonald's for breakfast, then Bette ran over to Newberry to see Megan and have lunch with Lina-  the boys and Tony and I went over to La Hacienda for a nice Mexican lunch.

Got a phone call from former colleague Porter who is visiting in town, so we'll grab a dinner tomorrow perhaps.  Yea! 

Tony is grilling fillet mignons tonight.... 

Up to South Carolina for Christmas

We decided to head on up to Carolina a day earlier than originally planned so we could make dentist and dog appointments... so we stuffed the car.. jeez we're only going for a week, but we brought up a table, and also a big compressor for our pals Dave and Bev to use..  374 miles and about 8 hours later, we pulled into Saddle Hill. 

According to the Fit's on board computer, we averaged 39.3 miles per gallon.  Wow!  Started out as a beautiful traveling day, desintegrated into a bit cold and rainy by the time we headed out for dinner...

We stopped for fuel at a Flying J, and then did lunch at a subway in Swainsboro.

Think it was near there, I noticed a repurposed old Coke bottle factory building, these little bottle plants used to dot the south, we had one in Newberry, that I remember seeing being used back in the middle 60's, before they consolidated all their operations, beautiful old buildings with the Coke logo..

Made it to Saddle Hill about 4, boys were glad to see us... and we them.  We all headed out to our traditional O'Charley's welcome home dinner, and had a nice family meal..  sorry for the picture quality..  and Brandon as usual didn't want his photo taken....

From there, the boys and I headed to our annual tradition of going to Lander University in town to see the High School Christmas Classic basketball game..  Saw 1.5 very good games, on the boys side...

Might go back tonight as see the championship game.. think Cooper wants to go.

This morning, the menfolk got up and went to the Little Breakfast place for breakfast, then the boys and I went out to Game Stop so Brandon could get a game he wanted, then later, Cooper and I headed over to the YMCA so he could work on his basketball shooting, then he and I went to lunch at McDonalds.

Bette has been over at Bev and Daves all morning, working on patterns and hanging out.   Buster went to get groomed this morning, as well as Beau. 

Everyone is vegging out here at the house- Tina is working today, so I imagine we'll be on our own for dinner,. then maybe the basketball game....  Still raining off and on. 

Another rare plate

Saw this plate today in the hospital parking lot when we went to visit a friend from Coquina.  Have not seen this one before- pretty plate!

24 inches of Keeper Redfish!!!

Went out with Steve on the Intercoastal, over by the Airport, and hit a pocket of redfish, caught 5, of which we could keep two.  Mine was the biggest of the day.  Fun trip!!

We're heading off to SC a day earlier than planned, leaving in the morning. 

Carpal Tunnel? no big deal

Bette pretty much sailed through her first surgery today- We'll see how good she feels when the local wears off-  2 hours in the facility, about 10 minutes or so for the actual surgery-  She has her PT tomorrow for this and her shoulder, that ought to be not fun. 

Bingo tomorrow night! 

3 Inches of Partly Cloudy today, then to the Golden Lion

Ugh- heard the pitter patter of rain starting about 3 this morning, followed by the mini deluge.  We've had 2.5 inches so far, and they are calling for more before it passes through-  Good news is that it is 60 or so outside...

Today is our monthly jaunt on down to Ormond Beach to the Golden Lion for lunch with our Coquina pals....  Guess we'll eat inside today! 

Cooper called this morning to say hello, and that he was going on a school trip to Philadelphia in the spring-  Long trip for a 6th grader!  Glad he will be getting the experience. 

Also up this week is several Doctor visits for Bette for her shoulder and her carpal tunnel stuff, and one for me for a follow up to the heart doc-  then Friday is Bingo.  We are so retired!

Now, we learn of Carpal Tunnel for Bette!

Bette went for her nerve conduction test today and was unpleasantly surprised to learn a new diagnosis of dual carpal tunnel in both hands... yikes!  She'll have to have dual surgeries on both arms, and goes back next Wednesday to see how quickly she can start-  the good news is that according to the Dr, it's "not major surgery", and recovery is "only three weeks."  One side is much worse than the other, he said. 

I worked on the ball rack project today, and we decided to modify it since we were having such a struggle to assemble our original plan- so I'll wind up with two racks, each with two rows of balls. 

We went out and did several chores this afternoon after the Docs, and met up with Dan and Kippy for a yummy dinner at Crispers.  Dan and I had the trios, love that dish! 

Big Liar's club breakfast in the morning.....

Bette joins me in frozen shoulder land

Went to the Sports Medicine Doctor today that I saw for my frozen shoulder last year and Bette was diagnosed with pretty much the same thing, good news was she doesn't seem to have any torn rotator cuff worries, and an onset case of the frozen shoulder.
Same course of treatment I had,  muscle relaxers, which don't work, she won't take pain medication, so that's out, and starting next week, she gets to go the the PT's (Physical Terrorists) upstairs. 
3 weeks of PT, and if it isn't any better, a cortisone round, and then more brutality upstairs, which should do the trick, if she will religiously do her PT- we'll see.

We had a win today, (with a $15.00 tip) and got the trash fellows to pick up all of our residue from the flooring installation, so that worked out good.  We took our overage of stuff back to Home Depot this afternoon, and were like $238 to the good there. 

Then, off to Wal Mart for fill ins, and her medication.  She goes tomorrow to see Dr Lal for her nerve conduction test for her tingly fingers, I suspect that is connected to her neck operation of last year. 

Made some progress on the ball rack today, cut the side supports and painted the whole rig that we have so far, and sanded it.  Suspect we'll work on that again tomorrow. 

Have to run a friend's daughter up to Jacksonville airport tomorrow, so that will knock out three hours or so. 

Friday morning is the big annual pancake breakfast for the liar's club coffee group, we have like 45 or so signed up for that-  that will be fun.  

Green light from the eye Doc

Got a good check up at Dr Nelligan's this morning- eye pressure was reduced 25%, so the glaucoma is in check he says.  Next visit is now 4 months out.  Bob and Carl continue to finish out the trim work and little details on the house project, predict they'll be done by today.

Started the ball rack project yesterday with Frank Schmidt, got the boards cut,and half way measured for the ball dimple cuts-  will work on that this afternoon I believe.

Got the new XM radio very cleanly installed in the Fit yesterday, very happy with that job- surely not one for a non professional-  I started to get more that worried when he began to unsnap the front dashboard, using pry bars and such, so I quit watching and went back inside- sure enough, when I came back out an hour later, it was a perfect clean neat installation, no wires visible, and set up exactly the way I wanted.  Way cool, another thing off the list- and I feel better for having a pro do it, and helping the local economy to boot. 

Bette will be off to mah-jong after lunch, and we'll enjoy the beautiful sun shiny day today. 

Floor project almost done, busy week

Bob and Carl are working today to finish up pretty much the floor project, they are doing the last bedroom, and then after lunch I suspect they will start installing baseboards. 

Today at noon, I'm going to have the new XM radio installed in the Honda, want to have it done "professionally" as opposed to just having wires hanging around..

Bette is off taking a friend to the Doctors just now, and then I have a follow up Eye Dr appt tomorrow, and then Wednesday, she has to go see about her shoulder problems.

Tomorrow, I believe I will be starting on my baseball rack project with my neighbor Frank-  if I can squeeze it in-
Friday morning is the annual pancake breakfast for our coffee club, so I'll be helping in the kitchen for that. 

Nice weather this week, although they say a cold front will hit by the midweek or so, that will be after some 80 degree temps.