April 8, 2013
Cederholm Compound, Peoria, AZ
Well, we’re getting ready to wrap up another winter here in
Arizona and hit the road for the “summer season”. It’s gotten hot already,
although we haven’t hit the magical 100°F mark yet.
Life has thrown some unexpected curves our way this spring, which will
unfortunately impact both our travel schedule and budget. But, we’ve learned to
roll with the punches and we’ll persevere as always. No whining!
The weather has turned warmer –
much warmer! We’ve had several spells with temperatures well up into the
90s. The highest I’ve seen so far on our
little home weather station is 97°F.
We’ve continued to eat and drink
well, using a combination of newly discovered recipes and old favorites. I won’t
bore you with the food porn pictures; there are enough on our Facebook pages!
Our new neighbors, Robert and
Christine, have returned from their home near Ottawa (brrrr…), and the pups
have been having fun with their Bichon, Shakira.
On the medical front, Maya continues
to tolerate the chemotherapy for her small tumor well, but the tumor itself may
not be responding as initially expected. We’re scheduled for a return visit to
the oncologist next week, and there may be a change of medications in the
cards.
On the other hand, the dental
community is definitely feeling our support this year. That’s driving much of
the budgetary overage and keeping us here a little longer than originally
contemplated. In prior posts, I’d mentioned that I had a 4-tooth bridge replaced
early in the year and that Geri had survived “pocket reduction surgery” in
February.
Unfortunately, her follow-up
perio-cleaning identified a tooth with decay. As an “anchor tooth” for a
4-tooth bridge, this was not good. We asked for a miracle (“Sure, I can inject
some medicated bonding in there and it’ll be as good as new”) or a reprieve
(“OK, I can make it hold until you get back in the fall”) and got neither.
Instead, it’s the “We can expedite a root canal and a new 5-tooth bridge and
get it done by the end of the month” plan. We can’t complain too much since we
both feel like we have top-notch dental professionals (prosthodontist and
periodontist), but there went this year’s budget for diesel fuel and RV parks. Selling
the old bridgework at the Cash-For-Gold place probably won’t help much. C’est la vie; that’s life on a retiree’s
income. It’s amazing how your perspective on investments changes after
retirement. Sure, we have a tidy nest egg and will never hurt for money, but
knowing it has to last you the rest of your life makes things different…
Anyway, none of this compares to
the real excitement on the medical front in mid-March. Fortunately (or
unfortunately; you get to choose) for you, Dear Reader, I can’t/won’t go into a
lot of detail because Geri would kill me and, frankly, it’s icky. Suffice it to
say that she had complications after a routine screening procedure that
everyone is supposed to have once they’re over 50 and ended up with a trip to
the ER that turned into a 3-day hospital stay when a blood vessel burst. Scariest
thing I’ve seen outside the movies. But, all’s well that ends well, and she’s
almost back to normal. The funniest part was the look on Geri’s face when the
gastroenterologist recommended a repeat in one year. “Yeah, right”!
So, now our attention turns to wrapping things up and
getting ready to hit the road. The house is pretty well set, as we have the
shutdown activities well cataloged at this point. I have a couple of things to
do with the coach but they are either regular maintenance (like wash it inside
and out and check all the fluids) or small projects (an improved locking
mechanism to help the new freezer not open during a left turn, upgrading some
of the storage spaces to fit more junk stuff).
The key things on the to-do list have been addressed. The
batteries that feed all the inside functions were replaced back in January, and
the isolator that keeps both banks of batteries charged has been replaced after
it failed. The small air leak in the
leveling system has been fixed (knock on wood) and the bad brake caliper that
has been bothering me for the past several years was replaced. Although I’m
still a do-it-yourself kind of guy, it really helped to have a local shop with
a lift for the air leak rather than having to try to find and fix it lying on
the ground with the suspension sinking toward me.
Our travel plans are still pretty fluid at this point. We
expect that Geri’s new choppers will be delivered on April 30th and
that we’ll essentially be ready to go at that point, so an early start on May 1st
looks likely. We’ll head east, doing a drive-by with friends and family in
Alabama before turning north to Connecticut to watch Britt graduate from UCONN
(“Go, Lady Huskies”) on Mother’s Day. After that, it’s all undefined other than
“be back in Arizona in November”. We’ll connect with family and friends by
Memorial Day and have a plan that gets us home!
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