Happens every year...

February 15, 2012

Peoria, AZ

Yes, every year around this time, I post something to our Blog that starts out with excuses for not posting anything for so long.  Yep, it's happened again.

Once we settle in for the winter at our southwestern location, Blog-worthy things just seem to dwindle.  It's not that there's nothing going on; not in the least.  Maybe it's that I started the Blog to focus on our travels, so stationary things aren't "good enough" to post.  Maybe (probably more likely if I'm honest) it's a lot easier to post the odd tidbit and photo to Facebook and/or Twitter than it is to sit down and actually compose a Blog post.  Well, as we all know, easy doesn't make it right, so let's do a little catching up, eh?

When last we heard from George and Geri, it was Christmas and we were wishing everyone well.  Not being particularly religious, for us "the holidays" are more of a time to acknowledge our good fortune and our enjoy family and friends.  Since we've chosen to spend our winters in the godforsaken desert where many fear to tread, that means long-distance communications.  Fortunately, we're some of the most technology-connected old farts retirees we know.  So, Facebook and FaceTime, email and SMS, and even old-fashioned phone calls and Parcel Post got us through.

I did spend a bit of time developing the “year-end message blast” posted in December, and used that as a triggering event for quite a bit of clean-up of the old address book.  No, not the musty leather-bound book of old, but the shiny new synced-from-my-Mac-to-iPad-to-Android-phone-and-don’t-forget-iCloud list of addresses.  I used our year-end missive as a trigger to get better organized in this department.  Why, you might ask?  Well, it’s all part of my grand plan for world domination moving more of our communications online.  Yep, if you get a birthday card, anniversary card, Christmas/Holiday-of-your-choice card, or even a “We-love-you-and-miss-you” card from us and I have your email address, it’s highly likely that you’ll be hearing “You’ve Got Mail” on your special day.

You might recall that I almost lost all my “Contacts” last year when the hard drive in my notebook PC failed.  Well, I was able to recover, but lots of learning about the Mac and syncing to the phone left things in a bit of a mess.  Once I had things cleaned up, I realized that there was still more organizing needed: documents!  Woo-Hoo!  Exciting stuff, right?  Well, actually, I’m quite pleased with what I’ve worked out, especially since it’s all free.

I started doing research in the Mac App Store and various technology feeds I follow on Twitter.  Great sources of information.  I found an app called Evernote that’s not quite as good as Microsoft’s OneNote but runs almost everywhere and automatically syncs my stuff.  Good start, but I’m not moving all my documents in there; I like my folders.  More reading pointed me to Dropbox and Skydrive, both with free storage options.  I signed up for both and have partitioned out various folders to each.  We have access to our medical records (us and the pets), finances, travel documents, and vehicle records wherever we are (OK, wherever we have an Internet connection - but with Smartphones and a Mi-Fi device, that’s most everywhere) across all devices, plus I have other key folders synced between the PC and Mac.  All automatic and all free.  Definitely worth the time to research and very easy to implement.  Great “winter projects” for when temperatures plummeted into the 50s and 60s for (several) days at a time!

And, speaking of projects, what winter wouldn’t be complete without a little home improvement?  We, not ours.  Armed with a trusty Home Depot Gift Card received for Christmas (Thanks!), we tackled a bathroom upgrade.  I’m never sure whether to call this the “main” bathroom or the “small” bathroom.  It’s definitely smaller than the one in the master suite (which sounds too pompous as it is), and it’s hardly “roomy”, but it’s what we have.  

Geri got some interesting advice: “start with a new shower curtain, then work the color scheme around that”.  That was all well and good until we started looking at paint.  They can “color match” anything these days, so off we went with the newly-acquired shower curtain in tow.  The “burgundy” color came out shocking pink (we were smart enough to pass on that; they don’t make you pay if you’re not happy with the color before you leave the store) and the “gold” was just crappy.  Literally.  It was “poop brown”.  

I gave Geri the “maybe it’ll look better when I do the second coat” routine.  Not so much.  All I heard was “why didn’t you do just one wall”?  Uh, because we agreed to paint all the walls the same color I misunderstood how the colors were to be applied?  No matter, it can be a do-over.  Two coats of Kilz primer then two coats of “Silver Jade”, plus two coats of the metallic glaze later and this room is starting to look good.  Oh, let’s add two more coats of a different color on the ceiling, plus a nice “copper” finish on the vanity.  It’s a good thing that the room is only 10’ x 10’.

Once the paint was (mostly) dry, we tackled the floor.  Out with the cheap linoleum and in with a nice porcelain tile.  Maybe not the first tile we picked out, but at least no do-overs.  Install border tiles to replace the baseboard, grout everything up, and put in a quick “lift kit” for the commode to account for the height difference and we’re done.  Not so fast, buster.  Let’s not forget matching towels (for the aforementioned shower curtain).  And, why not add a tile accent backsplash above the sink.  A new mirror, some shelves over the loo and a little metal fish sculpture -- now, you’re done.  And, I have to admit, it does really look nice.  And to think, it all started with a shower curtain.

Always one to press my luck, I noticed a local billboard advertising the Maricopa County Home Show down at the Fairgrounds in Phoenix and suggested we go.  “We don’t have to buy anything and we might get some ideas for the rest of the house and the yard”.  Our next major projects are to upgrade the master suite, the kitchen, and the patio, in that order and allocating roughly one project per year.  So, I signed up for the discount tickets online and off we went.  We were a little disappointed in the range of vendors; more people selling services than “stuff” (not too exciting for a DIY Guy like me) and quite a few pushing things pretty loosely connected to the “home” show theme (like 8% Return Guaranteed Investment Scams Deals).  All that aside, we did get a few ideas for the kitchen and yard (assuming I can get that pergola I want approved by the HOA and City).  And who knew that built-in home saunas were the big thing in home improvement this year (we assumed that everybody had one already, called “Summer”).  And it was nice to see all the Ginsu Knife, Vita-mix, Microfiber Towel, Waterless Cooking, and Stove-top Grill vendors we’ve missed at RV enclaves.

We actually did run into one vendor that we knew: Siding Guy.  Several houses in our neighborhood have had finished aluminum trim added to the soffit and fascia areas.  We got a quote a couple of years ago that I thought was too high, but I really learned the value of this upgrade when I painted the outside of the house last year.  Scraping and prepping the fascia and under the eaves at least doubled the project timeline, and the results were mixed.  So, I was excited (as excited as you can get about aluminum siding, I suppose) to see Siding Guy offering a Whole House, “Show Special” deal.  He came out a couple of days later and did up a new estimate.  By cutting and installing the soffit myself and having them focus on the fascia (that needs special tools to create the various bends in the metal), it was about 50% of the price quoted for the whole job a couple of years ago.  Sign me up!

A week later, we were the proud owners of two boxes of soffit and one of “J-Channel”, all in a nice neutral cream color.  The concept is pretty simple: attach the J-Channel to the side of the house at the right height then tack it with staples to the bottom of the fascia.  When they cover the fascia, it’ll cover up the edge of the soffit.  Simple, right?

Not so fast, Buster.  You have hip roofs?  Yes, around the garage and along the front of the house.  Well, then you have to cut everything at an angle.  Oh, by the way, it’s not a 45 degree angle since the builders don’t really make everything straight.  Hmmm; the stucco isn’t quite straight along the sides of the house, especially at the corners?  Well, you’d better get thee to Home Depot for the masonry disc for the angle grinder and smooth things out.  There isn’t anything to attach the J-Channel to along the peaks?  Get some furring strip and make something, Buddy.  And you put some chicken wire up under the eaves to keep the birds out after you painted the house?  Now you get to build some brackets to replace that with flashing to finish off the job.  

Needless to say, this was another of those “It’s complicated” projects.  Fortunately, I was able to work through all the issues and complete my part of the work in a little over a week.  We’ve had the fascia guys here before 7:30 AM (aka “oh-dark-thirty”) the last two days, and now the project is complete.  It really does finish off the house nicely.  By selecting a neutral color for the trim, we’ll be able to change the house color to whatever we like (or whatever we can get the HOA to approve) the next time we paint.  Hopefully, that’ll be several years down the road!

Last Friday, I took the coach over to a local shop for some work.  The dash air conditioning failed last summer, so that needed to be recharged.  Unfortunately, the compressor needed replacing, so that took an extra business day to get and install.  I also had the brakes and suspension checked.  With over 100,000 miles, I was surprised that everything was OK.  We picked it up today and it’s back in storage, patiently waiting for our next adventure. Before I took it in, I replaced the macerator, so we’ll be able to pump the tanks as needed for the next couple of years.

So, now we’re at “happy time”.  Chronologically, that would start with “Happy New Year”, since we left off at Christmas, I suppose.  Then there’s “Happy Martin Luther King Day”, which a lot of people put down.  Because we don’t want to celebrate a “lesser holiday” or, worse, because we don’t appreciate minority contributions?  To the contrary, recognizing the Civil Rights movement is incredibly important at this time, when the country is tearing itself apart, often based on rigid stereotypes.  

Now, we have “Happy Valentines Day”, when we celebrate the great loves of our lives.  Coincidentally, February 14th represents Arizona’s Centennial; the 48th State was added February 14, 1912.  Being from New England where things date from 1620-1800 and having been to various places in Europe where they’re much older, this isn’t a huge thing for us.  The local TV stations did the best they could with it, but it didn’t appear to have made much of an impact.

And, as we continue through the week, it’ll be “Happy Anniversary” for us and “Happy Birthday” for Geri, but more on that later...

So there you have it: a 2,000 word essay on life in the slow lane from here in sunny Arizona!

Merry Christmas To All!!!

As we complete 2011, we continue to be thankful for our family and friends, and our ability to both travel and spend the winters in the sunny Southwest.  This past year was a  whirlwind of activity with graduations, rallies, an exciting RV caravan, an overdue visit to Canada, and travel coast-to-coast in the USA.  We had the good fortune to have some great family visits, and we had the chance to see old friends and make new ones along the way.  

Take a look at some of our photo memories from 2011 and here's looking forward to a wonderful 2012!

PS: We're also thankful for our ability to communicate so effectively and quickly with everyone.  With Facebook and Twitter, email and text messages, Foursquare and LinkedIn, our travel Blog, Skype and Facetime and even the odd HeyTell, we're able to stay in touch like never before.  While we know it's not everyone's "thing", we hope that you'll bear with us as we convert a lot of our communications away from "snail mail" to electronic formats.  In addition to saving a tree (OK, maybe just a branch), we're hopeful that we'll be more timely and frequent with our communications in the future.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

December 10, 2011

Peoria, AZ

It's been a busy couple of weeks, and it's been feeling like winter as well.

I managed to migrate my eBay selling processes to the Mac and put a bunch of used items out there.  Roughly half off this batch sold, bringing in enough to pay for the upgrades to the "spare" bathroom.  It's more work than you might expect, since each item has to be photographed and weighed, and the proper text describing the item (especially any flaws) created.  This batch went through pretty smoothly, with a minimum of questions and post-sale issues.  While I was doing the packing and shipping, I managed to send out most of the Christmas gifts at the same time.  We only have a couple of things that need to go out next week.

We've continued to eat well and I've been whittling away at the short list of "should have drunk this last year" wines. We've made some "old favorites" (my Lamb Ragú, Geri's Pasta Sauce") and tried some new recipes as well.  Geri made a nice Spicy Shrimp with Orchiette, and I had fun with Pork Chops Roasted over Cauliflower.  We did a couple of braises, of Short Ribs and Brisket, but neither was a "keeper".

Today, I wrapped up two coats of paint on the bathroom.  When it was completed, Geri and I looked at each other and said "crap".  Yes, that's what the walls look like.  Literally.  Yuck.  As it turns out, "what we have here is a failure to communicate".  I was worried about the wall color being too dark and thought we'd do contrasting colors on opposing walls, but didn't push the issue.  Geri didn't like the color right in the store, but we both let Paint Guy do the computer color matching and off we went.  Fortunately, we're smart enough to call a halt at this point and regroup -- while everything is all taped off and changing the color isn't a huge issue.  It may take a couple of coats of Kilz before we can go lighter, but that's relatively easy right now.  Once we have the colors right, we'll finalize the tile selection and wrap this project up.  Hopefully, we'll have selected a light fixture by then.

I did take time out this morning to watch the lunar eclipse.  OK, I actually got up early, oh-dark-thirty, and was outside pre-dawn.  Chilly, but a nice show.  I was able to get at least one halfway decent picture before the whole thing set behind a the neighbor's roofline.  The eclipse was visible here just as the moon was setting and the sun was rising, diminishing some of the visual flair, but it was still worth an early morning.

Finally, we're pretty glad we decided to put up the Christmas decorations early, right after Thanksgiving.  Within a few days, it turned cold and windy, and we actually had some rain.  I think we're almost up to 4" for the year at this point!  Anyway, we've use the same decoration scheme as the past several years inside and out.  Each year, we threaten to toss the whole thing and start over, but we like what we have and know how to get things up quickly.  One person's efficiency is another's tradition, I suppose.  Geri did a great job with the tree, as always, and she arranged for some upgrades to the outside lights with a series of LED "snowflakes".  All in all, we're definitely getting in the holiday spirit!

Can you believe November’s almost over?

November 29, 2011

Peoria, AZ

Wow, time sure flies when you’re busy.  It doesn’t matter if you’re having fun.  Fortunately for us, the past couple of weeks have been mostly on the plus side.

We’ve completed all of the doctor and vet appointments for now, and everything is fine.  Merlin’s leg is healing, although it will probably be a while before he’s not running on three legs.  The anti-inflammatory medicine helped a lot and he’s able to walk on “all four” to an extent now.  We’re optimistic that he’ll be able to work this out without requiring surgery.

So, what else have we been up to?  Well, we’ve done some cleaning and started getting the house ready for the holidays.  The first holiday is Thanksgiving, of course, and we spent that with our friends Ana and Larry as we have since we settled on Arizona as our winter headquarters.  They we married on 11/23/1978 -- Thanksgiving -- and this year, their daughter got married on Thanksgiving as well.  It was a fine ceremony and a great after-party (“reception” is so last generation), and we were honored to be there for Alex and Brian.  I took a bunch of pictures with a specialized “app” on the iPad, just for effect.

And, much to Geri’s delight, I’ve started to clean out the mess I’d built in the spare bedroom.  Between things destined for Goodwill or eBay, there was just a lot of stuff in there.  Now, 90% of the Goodwill stuff (mostly older clothing items) is gone to a better place, and everything I felt was eBay-worthy is listed for sale.  In fact, one item is already shipped and five more have bids that’ll “win” once the auctions close next Sunday.  

Otherwise, I’ve been spending some time migrating my day-to-day computing over to the iMac.  I’ve found a series of free apps to handle things that I’m used to doing with Microsoft Office on the PC, and I’m getting the hang of the integration opportunities.  Having spent money I didn’t anticipate on the iMac itself, I’m trying to be cautious on the add-on expense.  My next project will be to reorganize the desktop -- the literal one -- by moving things around in the study to make the space more effective.

Once that’s done, it’s time to paint!  This year, we’re planning to paint both bathrooms and our bedroom.  Of course, painting is probably not the extent of the renovation, as we’ll likely tile the floors at the same time.  Fortunately, since we already have the right tools, that won’t be a huge challenge.

And, tomorrow is “Christmas Decoration Day”.  We’ll get out the boxes of stuff and deploy the decorations we have used for the past several years.  Geri will get the tree up and I’ll tackle the outside lights.  With temperatures in the upper-70s, this will be a piece of cake compared to what we used to face in the Northeast.

Meanwhile, we’ve continued to eat well.  We’ve had a couple of nice Porterhouse Steaks (for two), Geri’s made several of the salads she’s famous for, and we’ve restarted our “try a new recipe at least once a week” program, mixed in with “old favorites”.  I’ve started our annual reorganization of the “wine box” as well, trying to identify wines that probably coulda/shoulda been consumed by now, making room for the haul we brought back from this fall’s West Coast travels.  It’s a tough job, yada yada yada...

Back in the swing of things...

November 11, 2011

Peoria, Arizona

Well, things have been hectic since we've gotten back, but that's to be expected.  The good news is that most things are working out well, just like we'd hoped.

The biggest thing is that Geri's kidney continues to have healed well after her 2009 surgery.  We had our semi-annual follow-up at the urologist's office today, and everything is "unremarkable".  That's apparently medical-speak for "you're fine".  We got a similar report from the ophthalmologist earlier in the week; the eyes are fine.  With visits to the dentist (cleaning for both of us), primary care doctor (fine with minor prescription changes), hair and nail salons, and pet groomer complete, the list of appointments is rapidly getting cleared.  Geri goes for a mammogram next week and we're pretty much done.

Unfortunately, we're shifting our attention to the vet at this point.  Last week, we think Merlin got one paw caught in the closing door to the garage on the way our for a walk, and he came up limping.  We got him right in to the vet, and it seems like he's strained ligaments and/or tendons in his left rear knee.  Apparently, it's not uncommon in small dogs and should respond to an anti-inflammatory prescription over the course of two weeks.  If not, he may need a minor surgery to fix things up.  We're keeping our fingers crossed; at 13½, we'd like to avoid that if possible.  In the meantime, he's on "modified assignment", not allowed to go for morning and evening walks (and really not liking that), and restricted from jumping up/down on the bed and couch (not happy with that, either).

In other news, I've almost completed an assignment from last summer's motorhome caravan.  These aren't commercial caravans; they're put on by the members.  While the caravan leaders certainly have the lion's share of the work, everyone gets to participate in some small way.  I was asked to create an archive of selected pictures from the trip via DVD for all of the participants.  If you know me, this is where I say "nothing is ever as simple as it seems".

These days, burning a DVD from a notebook computer shouldn't really be a problem; most full-sized machines have DVD drives built in.  Unfortunately for me, mine (vintage 2009) has been acting up over the past year or so.  It often won't recognize a disc being inserted, blank or otherwise.  I knew this would be an issue at some point, and when I tried to burn a sample disc I couldn't do it.  "No problem; I'll just use Geri's".  Uh, not so fast, fella.  Geri's machine (vintage 2011; we got it in the spring before we hit the road) would burn the disc, but not play it.  Nor would our Blu-ray DVD player in the coach.

So, this is a timing thing more than anything.  Once back to AZ, I have another computer with a DVD burner that should work.  Worst case, I drop $50 on a USB-connected drive.  So, hardware isn't the issue.

The bigger challenges are selection and formatting.  Since I collected pictures throughout the caravan from several other participants, there are a lot of pictures.  Including my own, I have 4,969 images, to be exact.  It all adds up to over 10.2 gigabytes of data, enough for 3 DVDs.  Now, nobody wants to watch a slideshow of that size, so my first task has been to sort through all the images and try to pick the best ones.  Once I started this, I realized that I would have been well served if I'd provided the other contributors with some guidelines.  Things like use unique file names (similar models within a camera brand will use the same naming conventions, creating the potential for a duplicate - or 20).  And, who thinks to set/adjust the date/time in the camera?  Very few, until you're trying to merge multiple batches of photos together by event within day for review.  But, I enjoy this kind of challenge (at least until Geri starts reminding me of all the other to-dos I'm slipping on), so organizing and filtering was right up my alley.

Formatting?  Well, that's another story.  I've never really done a lot with photo slideshows.  "Back in the day", before digital photography took off, you got your prints back, then selected the best for reprints, and maybe even had an enlargement or two made for framing.  Fast forward to today, and most pictures live on hard drives and smartphones, delivered to photo sites like Picasa and Flickr, used in Blog posts, or sent directly to Facebook or Google+ or iCloud.  There may have been a time when digital slideshows (the term still conjures up images of Kodak carousels for me) might have been "in"; I think I was absent that day.

All that said, the caravan wants a DVD slideshow with transitions and background music and I signed up for the assignment, so a DVD slideshow  it will be.  And, leave it to me to find the most expensive and complicated way to make it happen.  After researching no- and low-costs options, I concluded that the best way to proceed was to get that iMac I've been dreaming of and use it to master the DVDs.  So, I made the purchase ("Merry Christmas, George") and have been learning many things "i" in the meantime (iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, iLife).

And, I have to admit, it's been a fun learning experience.  I was able to connect the iMac to my Windows machine, import the photos, make my selections and format day-by-day slideshows in iPhoto, import them all to iMovie for rendering, and burn a DVD using, what else, iDVD.  Geri and I watched the first cut yesterday, just over 30 minutes worth.

I've only got a few things left to work out, making final cuts to the picture sets, getting the sequence just right, verifying that the transitions (I'm using iPhoto's "Ken Burns" theme, which pans over the photos as they appear; very professional) all work and getting the music right.  There are a couple of dozen sample and theme tracks, but they're limited and I can include music from iTunes, so that opens things up.

So, in and amongst all the other projects, I'll put the wraps on the DVDs and get them in the mail by early next week.  Geri will certainly be glad when this is over!  We might even burn a couple of extra copies to share with family and friends who wonder what we're up to while we're on the road all those months at a time!

Travel Summary

November 2, 2011

Peoria, Arizona

I always find it interesting to look at our summer's travel in total when we get back in the fall.  This year, we traveled farther than anticipated, since we didn't have a full travel plan in mind when we left in April.  We knew we'd go to Alabama and Connecticut for college graduations, to Wisconsin and Michigan for RV get-togethers, and to South Dakota for my driver's license renewal.  The trip out to the West Coast was an "in-flight adjustment", and a great way to cap off the travel season.

Overall, we were on the road for 195 days, covering about 10,930 miles.  We stayed overnight at 47 different places along the way, which means we averaged a little over 4 days per stop.  We averaged just under $21 per night.  You don't want to know about the fuel.

Here's a summary map:

Back in storage

November 1, 2011

Peoria, Arizona

We must be getting better at this: we had the coach unloaded by 3:00 PM yesterday.  I was up early and started unloading before it got too warm.  Geri made a quick trip to Walmart to pick up some additional laundry baskets; we find that they're just the right size for most of the unloading.  We found that working in waves was best: I could bring in baskets of "stuff" and she could route things to the right place in the house.  This way, the dogs can stay with her and aren't running back and forth.  We've got a large pile of laundry in the queue (aka, the hallway to the spare bedroom), but most everything is back where it belongs (or at least in the right room). 

We did find another casualty, though; the standalone freezer we have in the garage will no longer cool.  It was a cheap model bought over ten years ago in New Jersey, so we probably got our money's worth from it.  One can argue that two people and two small dogs can probably get by with the freezer in the kitchen, though, so we'll hold off on a replacement for now.

Today, the "fun" began.  Every fall, we have a series of appointments for doctors, dentist, vet, grooming, etc.  We actually start making them 4-6 weeks before we get back.  Later this week, Geri has to go for her follow-up MRI to verify that her 2009 kidney procedure went well.  Since nothing is simple, she has to get a fasting blood test done before the MRI, so we were up early and off to the lab.  Then, after a quick breakfast at the local IHop, we stopped at the storage lot to sign up for our space for the coach.  Once we were set there and paid up, we moved the coach over to storage and were able to declare "done" on that phase.  Yea!