Another rainy and cool morning in lovely Michiana. Thought it would be a good day to sit at the keyboard and 'bang out' another of my 'highly anticipated' BLOGS. I base this comment on a statistical analysis I've done that shows 2.5% of you do 'highly anticipate' this blog. I realize 2.5% isn't statistically valid enough for me to extrapolate and use 'highly anticipated' in my advertising, but I don't advertise much, and who is going to bother turning me in? Now that I've clarified this, I'll move on.
We'll be parking the travel trailer at Spaulding Lake in Niles for a month starting June 10th. This is a "poor man's" version of having a summer home on the lake. So, from June 10th till July 10th we'll be spending some time in Niles, MI. When we leave on the 10th of July we'll head to Champaign, IL for the REUNION with our Florida gang. The ten of us are gathering for a few nights to solve many of the world's problems. That's not to say we didn't solve most of them during our winter gathering in Florida, but for some reason a few more problems have developed since then.
Government's spending of OUR money is totally out of control as most of you have probably noticed. It's incredible what the D.C. dingbats can come up with. Whose the imbecile that decided we need signs in every school zone that state, "This is a Drug Free School Zone"? Really? How nice! I've been driving around looking for a school zone that advertises drugs. Damn, they are all DRUG FREE. Wouldn't you love to know what it cost to produce and install these ridiculous signs. One small example of the people we've elected going out of their way to screw us. Don't you love it?
Speaking of spending, I bought myself a new phone. Not just any phone. I bought an iPhone!! This is the most amazing gadget I have ever encountered. I'm sure some of you also have the iPhone from Apple, so I won't detail all of the fantastic features of the iPhone 4. I love it. I hate to admit it, but it virtually eliminates the need for my MacBook and my Nook. In fact it virtually eliminates the need for anything other than Mary Ellen. Yes, I do love her more than my iPhone, but it was close!! I actually bought the book, iPhone for Dummies. This book takes an in depth look at all the features with shortcuts and tips that make navigating the many apps much easier.
We are 90% settled into our new home. It's actually looking like we've lived here forever. Of course we have numerous boxes packed onto the many shelves in the garage. Some of this stuff will eventually go to Goodwill or some other worthy cause. There is plenty of room for Mary Ellen's PT Cruiser. There are still a few things that we haven't located yet. The biggest headache is changing our address with the numerous magazines and accounts. I didn't realize we had to apply for new driver's licenses in order to give the BMV our new address. You have to bring a couple bills with our new address on them. What we didn't realize, and what makes no sense to me, is that these bills must also have Mary Ellen's name on them. We took bills from our electric company and newspaper. Both of these had my name on them with our new address. I could apply for a new drivers license, but
Mary Ellen couldn't. We failed to take anything with her name on it. Even though we are married and both living at our new address, she was unable to apply for a new license. Our State government in action. Mary Ellen will need to make another visit to the BMV when we can find something with her name and our new address on it. She's really looking forward to her return trip!
We'll be heading to Indy at the end of this month for the Indy 500 weekend. Mary Ellen and I won't be going to the race this year, but we'll spend time with sons Dan and Mark and Dan's family. Erin has a soccer game and Ally is graduating from Kindergarten. I think she had a 4.0 cumulative!! Elementary school scholarships are pouring in!
JIM
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Saturday, May 7, 2011
BOXES!!!
The past two weeks have been draining. Mary Ellen and I end each day physically exhausted. I know what your thinking, "get over it. It can't be that bad". Three of our sons did a tremendous job on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. On Monday afternoon Two Men and a Truck moved the heavy stuff. One might think with all that help it would pretty much take care of it. If you thought that, you'd be wrong. Its all the little stuff, not to mention all our clothes. It has taken us the last five days to totally clear everything out of the house. We got it as far as the garage. Tomorrow we'll get it into my truck and haul it over to our new home. The good news is we both love our apartment! Thank god we have a garage. We thought we had gotten rid of most of the excess baggage. We've made numerous trips to Goodwill, Women's Shelter, Faith Mission, and of course "the dump". Even after all that plus Craig's List, we've managed to have way more stuff than we have apartment! The lesson learned is NEVER stay in the same house for 36 years.
So, for those of you planning to send us a 'house warming' gift, and I'm sure many of you were thinking just that, DON'T. In fact Mary Ellen and I have a plan. It's called a 'reverse house warming'. So, all of you can plan to receive a surprise package in the next few weeks. Nothing elaborate mind you. Most of what we'll be sending you are items we were too embarrassed to drop off at St. Vincent De Paul. So you've got that to look forward to.
For those of you who have moved in the past 36 years, have you noticed how things that you truly valued seem to disappear during the moving process? What makes this even worse is we're finding ourselves saying stupid things like "I know I saw it in a box". My God, that's all we've seen in the past three weeks. Just yesterday I asked my wife, "have you seen my knife"? This is a knife that I always carry in my pocket. It's my favorite knife. My Son, Tim, bought me this knife. It's a really good knife. It has simply disappeared. That same day I took some pictures of the apartment complex. I had my camera bag in the truck with, of course, my camera and the USB cable with a little gizmo that goes into the camera. With this simple little cable I'm actually able to send pictures from my camera to my Mac Book. Truly amazing. Well, I'm no longer able to do this. My cable has vanished. This is why none of you are able to see the lovely place where we now live along with 567 boxes!
Speaking of boxes, most of what we moved now resides in our lovely attached garage. The plan was to have all of this stuff that we weren't mentally capable of trashing to reside on the right side of our garage, leaving plenty of room for Mary Ellen's PT Cruiser. My truck of course would reside in the parking area. At this moment both vehicles reside in the parking area. I'm betting on 2013 for PT Cruiser indoor parking!
We moved one of those lightweight plastic shelves we had in our former garage. I honestly thought this five tiered shelving would handle most of the stuff. The rest would hang from some cleverly positioned hooks attached to the walls and ceiling. Last Wednesday I purchased two more five tiered shelves. But the boxes kept coming. Last night we returned to Menard's. I now have five of the five tiered shelving. I do not plan to purchase more shelves. However, I've purchased 280 more hooks to be cleverly positioned on the walls and from the ceiling.
Mary Ellen has two mis-matched shoes. She's upset. You would think with 175 pairs of shoes, something like two shoes that don't match wouldn't be a big deal. But don't tell that to Immelda!
Still no knife nor camera cable. The quest continues.
JIM
So, for those of you planning to send us a 'house warming' gift, and I'm sure many of you were thinking just that, DON'T. In fact Mary Ellen and I have a plan. It's called a 'reverse house warming'. So, all of you can plan to receive a surprise package in the next few weeks. Nothing elaborate mind you. Most of what we'll be sending you are items we were too embarrassed to drop off at St. Vincent De Paul. So you've got that to look forward to.
For those of you who have moved in the past 36 years, have you noticed how things that you truly valued seem to disappear during the moving process? What makes this even worse is we're finding ourselves saying stupid things like "I know I saw it in a box". My God, that's all we've seen in the past three weeks. Just yesterday I asked my wife, "have you seen my knife"? This is a knife that I always carry in my pocket. It's my favorite knife. My Son, Tim, bought me this knife. It's a really good knife. It has simply disappeared. That same day I took some pictures of the apartment complex. I had my camera bag in the truck with, of course, my camera and the USB cable with a little gizmo that goes into the camera. With this simple little cable I'm actually able to send pictures from my camera to my Mac Book. Truly amazing. Well, I'm no longer able to do this. My cable has vanished. This is why none of you are able to see the lovely place where we now live along with 567 boxes!
Speaking of boxes, most of what we moved now resides in our lovely attached garage. The plan was to have all of this stuff that we weren't mentally capable of trashing to reside on the right side of our garage, leaving plenty of room for Mary Ellen's PT Cruiser. My truck of course would reside in the parking area. At this moment both vehicles reside in the parking area. I'm betting on 2013 for PT Cruiser indoor parking!
We moved one of those lightweight plastic shelves we had in our former garage. I honestly thought this five tiered shelving would handle most of the stuff. The rest would hang from some cleverly positioned hooks attached to the walls and ceiling. Last Wednesday I purchased two more five tiered shelves. But the boxes kept coming. Last night we returned to Menard's. I now have five of the five tiered shelving. I do not plan to purchase more shelves. However, I've purchased 280 more hooks to be cleverly positioned on the walls and from the ceiling.
Mary Ellen has two mis-matched shoes. She's upset. You would think with 175 pairs of shoes, something like two shoes that don't match wouldn't be a big deal. But don't tell that to Immelda!
Still no knife nor camera cable. The quest continues.
JIM
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