December 10-28: Yes, There Is A Santa Claus

December 28. 2012

Cederholm Compound, Peoria, AZ

Yes, it’s the “holiday season”.  We decorated.  We ate (and wined).  We mailed and received packages.  And Geri was a good girl and got a couple of neat gifts.

I finally got around to getting the camera gear out and shooting a few pictures of the Christmas decorations for this year.  It was probably a good idea, since we did a few things differently and would probably not remember next year what goes where!

In addition to the MacBook Air she got early, Geri got a replacement iPad, as her original iPad 2 developed a “bad spot” in the touch screen.  It wasn’t fatal; it just wouldn’t always register a “touch”.  She was able to get around this by turning the screen around, but it was annoying.  And, since somebody (aka, me) didn’t spring for the Apple Care plan when we bought these iPads about 18 months ago, fixing it was going to be $250 (that’s the flat rate for anything at Apple).  So, I got her a new iPad 4, which was going to happen after the New Year anyway since we’ll be updating our phones in January and the newest “i” devices have a different cable connector.  We “needed” to upgrade the iPads to be consistent.  How’s that for twisted logic?

The other thing that we’ve been talking about is upgrading the blender we use for smoothies (and other things, of course) to a Vitamix.  Costco started carrying them, so it was a natural that there would be one of those under the tree as well.

What did George get?  Well, there was a set of brake pads and rotors for the Rover that he’s needed, and I’m happy to say that we can now stop without squeaks or that annoying grinding noise that caused us to turn the radio up louder.  Oh, and there was another iPad 4 under the tree with his name on it; we have to maintain parity on the “His & Hers” things, right?  Oh, and there were a couple of Home Depot Gift Cards that will come in very handy when we get started painting the Master Suite next year.

The pups made out well, too, with a nice blanket boasting a picture of their buddy Tanner and some interesting travel accessories from their friends in Alabama, Jackson & CJ (whose gifts will be personally delivered next spring).

Otherwise, things have been calm and quiet, and even a little chilly.  After having above-normal temperatures through mid-December or so, we’ve had a couple of weeks of below-normal days and even a few raindrops.  We’ll likely end the year with just over four inches of rain!  Now that, too, is below normal (of something near 8”), so people are still saying, “we need the rain”.  I’ll take a little rain as long as the temperatures stay in the upper-60s or better.

And, yes, we’re starting to think through the “spring projects”.  I’ve got a batch of stuff that’ll go on eBay in January, both from the house and the coach (stuff we don’t use any longer).  And, we’ll finally paint the master bedroom and bathroom.  On the coach front, I’ll be replacing the “house batteries”, the ones that power all the inside lights and devices (as opposed to the ones that start the engine).  They’re just about 7 years old and starting to fail, so they’ll get swapped out in January as well.

That should hold us for a while, at least until March, when we’ll take in a Cactus League game or two and get started thinking about a summer “on the road”…