A Prairie View

Moving Into A New Age

David asked me what I wanted for my upcoming birthday. I actually cannot think of one material thing that I want. I have everything, and then some, that I want. I am turning 50 and that is scary for me, and yet, I also would like to tackle this new decade of my life with some goals and a new attitude. Maybe he could get me a health insurance quote for my birthday. For our anniversary, we went shopping and we spent a good chunk of change. We both contributed to it, it wasn’t just one person paying for everything. It was a tribute to the bumpy financial road we have traveled over the years. We are doing OK right now. The only black cloud that hangs over us is not having health insurance. Maybe as we slide into this new range of numbers of age, we can tackle that part of our lives as well, and get some health insurance. One way or the other. We have been extremely fortunate so far, but one day, our luck is going to run out. I would really like to have some kind of insurance in place. Its worth checking into — again — and doing more research. At this time of our lives, not having insurance is not a good thing.

An eBay Life

We have one lady in our church that pretty much makes a living selling stuff on eBay. Its amazing just what all she has sold and how much money she has made. One time, David was looking through eBay stuff and decided to see if anyone was selling overalls. Thats what he wears on an everyday basis, and he thought if he could get some cheaper through eBay, he would do that. There was some, and after bidding and emailing her, they realized who each other was. He had to kid her about charging him freight. She lives like 6 blocks from here. Its not so bad now because she can do the freight and labels at home, so its just a matter of going into the post office and giving them her boxes and that is that. But it used to be, if you saw her going into the Post Office with her shipping boxes, you might as well turn around and go home if you needed to do any counter business. She always had lots to ship. Which is good. She’s an older lady, so if she can make extra money doing this, more power to her!

Goldwing Owners

David went with his brother today and a bunch of his friends for a “motorcycle lunch”. They all rode their motorycles and met half way at this truck stop that we all like and has really good food. David and one of his brother have Honda’s, but his other brother has Goldwing. A. Nice. Goldwing. If it was a car, he would have numerous car covers, its that nice. He does cover it at night, but it is for more than just show. He has to travel alot to and from work, and this is one way he doesn’t spend a fortune in gas money (although, I would tend to think he paid a fortune for the bike . . .). David’s nephew has a Goldwing as well, and they are working on David and his brother to “upgrade” their bikes. I don’t see David OR his brother either one being Goldwing owners. David is too cheap (sorry, but he is. He won’t pay that kind of money that he won’t use that often). And David’s younger brother … he is more of a dirt bike kind of guy, so his loud Honda fits him, and I just can’t see him with a Goldwing. Just my opinion.

Getting Old Before My Time

 
I think I messed up last night. Maybe I should start having David dole out my medicines at night. I take one Metoprol and 2 Coumadine. In the mornings, I take a Furosemide, which is a duretic. I look at the labels, and I am positive I took the right medications last night. But the events since then are telling me otherwise. Not even holing up in a hotel in las vegas would make me feel better today. It started shortly after I went to bed last night. I had to get up to go to the bathroom. Ok. No big deal. I’m almost 50. It happens. But then, it happened again. And again. And again. I had taken a Forosemide at noon yesterday, and it had kicked in shortly after taking it. So, it kicking again during the middle of the night doesn’t sound right. And then today, my head has been fuzzy, and my heart has been irratic. All things that happen when I skip a dose of my Metoprol. I thought I was being really careful - esp in light of what the Furosemide does. The last thing I want to do is have to get up a dozen times during the night to go to the bathroom. But that is exactly what happen. So, I suppose that is what happened, which bothers me. I will have to be extra extra careful to not mix the two up. I am getting old before my time!
 

Running Out Of Time

The days are ticking away, and we really need to make solid plans about getting senior pictures taking. It is still beautiful outside, with the changing colors of the leaves, and this would be the perfect time to get them done. Ethan got his hair cut yesterday, so that is step one in getting ready. We need to get him some solid shirts — most of his shirts are stripped or with a pattern, or t-shirts. And, it probably wouldn’t hurt if we threw in a topical acne treatment to clear up his face some. Its not too bad, but if we could eliminate all of them, it would be nice. You only have senior pictures taken once (well… we can hope thats all). I don’t know why I’m dragging my feet about this. I guess one reason is that we need to get him to Topeka or Emporia to get him clothes. Once the outfits are in place, then all that is left is the actual taking of pictures. But, we can’t do that until we make the appointment. And I won’t make the appointment until I know we have everything in place and we are ready to go. I’m running out of time.

Breaking Tradition

Now that we are firmly into November, its only a few blinks of the eyes before December will be here. Which means, if we are smart, we will be working on that Christmas list in the very near future. There are several : personalized gifts I would like to get several members of our family. Those take a little more time and effort than the normal gift, so if that is what I am going to do, I need to working on it now. In David’s family, we used to draw names, and we’d know a couple month in advance who we were buying for. I wish we still did that — buying for someone specific is sometimes easier than just buying a generic gift within a certain price range. With my new camera, there are lots of different directions I could go. But since that isn’t doable, I will contain my ideas within my own family, and proceed accordingly. I really don’t want to wait until the week before Christmas like we normally do to start Christmas this year. Its time we break that tradition!

Anniversary Travels

We took a whole year, trying to decide what we would be doing for our 25th wedding anniversary, which we just celebrated last week. We wanted to do something special. Travel maybe. But, would we be able to work it out with our work schedules? We kicked around the idea of going to Branson. Or maybe even Las Vegas. But ultimately? We spread it out, and we ended up traveling to just 60 miles away to Topeka for a lovely night of dining at a nice steak place, and shopping to get a couple of “gifts” that we had discussed ahead of time. I had money saved back, so I could buy him a “real” gift, not something off the bargain bin.

The second leg of our celebration involved traveling. My gift from him was a new camera, and I wanted to put it to use. So. We combined work and fun, and went around to all of his trucks that he dispatched for, and checked the tires and other stuff to make sure they weren’t needing anything. And, I got lots of pictures along the way. Spending the day with him was very nice. Something we don’t do very often, esp. on the weekends.

So, no we didn’t need travel insurance for what we did, but it was just as memorable and just our own little bonding time. Worked for me.

Celebrating All Week

Its been a wonderful week, our 25th wedding anniversary coming and going, and yet, we we took on a “celebrate all week” type attitude. The actual celebration was Tuesday night, when we ate at Outback Steakhouse, and then went shopping, buying a new camera and a new TV. This weekend, we went on a couple of road trips — combining work with pleasure. The road trip took us to surrounding towns to check the various trucks that DAvid dispatches for. Yesterday we went south. Today we went north. And along the way, we probably took 300 pictures. But, that was the whole purpose of the trip. I wanted to give my new camera a workout.

Because we were on the road, I wasn’t home, so fixing any meals kinda went by the wayside. I feel like I need the best fat burner the market has to offer. We ate way too much and I am suffering for it. I do beleive its going to be light meals all through this next week to see if we can counteract the big meals we had this weekend.