Author: searcyf@mac.com

25 February 2025

Well, the deluge promised for yesterday never occurred. Even the rain-heavy map I posted yesterday just missed my little patch of ground. At least the pool didn’t lose water yesterday and the grass got a little sip.

Since I took the day off from walking yesterday due to the expected rain, it fed over into today and I opted out. I’ll cop to laziness on my part.

I don’t feel too guilty. For so much of my life I was a workaholic. If I didn’t have enough work, I would find more. Shockingly, most of my employers were more than happy to let me find more tasks to do. Who knew?

This is my 11th year of retirement and only now am I getting to the point that I can tell myself “That will wait until tomorrow.” Some of the things are still waiting and for some things, tomorrow will never come. I’ve learned to hire things out that I (1) no longer can do or (2) no longer want to do.

There was a point in time that I would have attempted anything: electrical work, plumbing, dryer repair, etc. I may be slow on the uptake but I eventually come to the right decision. Some things are best left to the professionals.

I’m 4 months into my 76th year and I’ve decided that gives me the right to relax, to say no to some things, and to put off things until tomorrow or let them go forever. I admit, it’s a pretty good position to be in.

I think I eat pretty healthy. I eat a mostly vegetarian diet, heavy on fruit and beans. My downfall is sweets and I try to control them so the Continuous Glucose Monitor doesn’t yell at me. I seldom drink sodas any more. My one great dietary sin is liking something to snack on before bedtime.

For a while there, I needed to eat more to regain the weight I lost during chemotherapy. I’ve regained the weight but I haven’t slowed down on the eating. Even vegetables and fruit have calories so I’m having to learn moderation again.

Today turned out to be sunny with a few clouds. I’ll take it easy this morning and maybe, maybe towards the late afternoon, take my “morning” walk after all.

Stay tuned!

24 February 2025

Yesterday was a busy day. By the time I got everything done, I was too tired to blog.

It started with a mist on my morning walk which turned into sprinkles, which turned into rain which quit before I got back home after 1.5 miles.

Along the way, a house that had been completely overgrown for years and uninhabited for many of those years was now completely visible. When I say overgrown, it look like a jungle and you couldn’t see the house back from the sidewalk in front.

In essence, the house is the same as mine – 2 bedroom, 1 bath. They had to replace the entire roof, trusses and all. It’ll be interesting to see what the finished product looks like.

John made it over around 12:15 and we ordered lunch through Instacart. It seemed we had just gotten started on hanging the tv in the bedroom when the food came.

Not to bore you with the details but John and I are getting pretty good at this mounting tv’s on walls. I know of two we’ve done for John and mine is the third. It was not without some mishaps. One of the sockets on the ratchet got stuck and we couldn’t get it off to finish putting the lag bolts into the wall. In spite of starts and stops, we finally got it firmly attached. At least, it didn’t fall off the wall last night.

I think we eventually had every tool I owned out to work on it. Cleaning up was a bigger job than hanging the tv.

Afterwards, John and I talked and caught up. He left a little after six and I had two phone calls during that time I needed to return. By the time I got off the phone, it was 8:15 and I was exhausted.

I slept later than even my later times and finally got out of bed around 8:30 this morning. One look at the skies told me I may not make a morning walk. The weather map confirmed it.

We have 100% chance of rain today and 90% chance tomorrow. At least I won’t have to water the yard or add water to the pool.

The rest of the week is clear. I need to call my endocrinologist and reschedule a blood draw but other than that, there’s nothing on my calendar. For the next two days of rain, I plan to get a lot of reading done.

Stay tuned!

22 February 2025

We really are having beautiful weather this week. It’s in the 60’s at night and in the high 70’s during the day. The humidity is very low and I’ve gotten into the habit of sitting on the patio for my second breakfast of coffee and grapefruit.

On the morning walk, I managed 1.4 miles and felt pretty good while doing it. I think I’m slowly building back my stamina. When I hike in the mountains, stamina is important but equally important is the will to get to the top or to the campsite. There have been times where I had no stamina left but the will got me through. Of course, about half way to your goal you always ask the question “Why am I doing this?”

I did make bread last afternoon. I did a sweet dough and made mini-loaves.

I’ve never been real good at baking breads. The dough either rises too fast and thus collapses or it doesn’t rise enough. I have learned to proof the bread in an oven with the oven light on to provide some temperature. These mini-loaves turned out perfectly and I scarfed down two with butter, one plain and another with blackberry jam. I’ll freeze most of them and when I want one or two, simply put them in the microwave for a few seconds.

It seems my sprinkler system still doesn’t work. There’s something wrong with the timer so it looks like I’ll have to do it manually for a while.

Tomorrow you are in for a treat. I will expound about the Italian Renaissance until you can’t take it.

Stay tuned! Buongiorno!

21 February 2025

I got a late start this morning. I finally crawled out of bed around 8 am. I really didn’t want to go for a walk this morning but the weather for it was perfect so I dragged my butt out the door and managed 1.3 miles. I got stopped a few times with conversations with neighbors which was nice.

After my second breakfast, it was time to tackle the pool filter, the patio, the chemicals in the pool, watering the plants and spraying the weeds. That was pretty exhausting. My stamina is slowly coming back but not quickly enough for me.

I made reservations to fly to Mississippi in March to see my brother and sister-in-law. My cousin Jean and her husband Roger kindly offered me a place to sleep after I asked. Nothing like pushing your way in, right? I’m looking forward to it. Ashley volunteered to put me up also but I’m too old to couch surf and even though she offered me her bed and to sleep on an air mattress, I didn’t want to disrupt her routine.

I admit to purchasing first class tickets both ways. That’s a splurge but as I get older, I can less and less stand economy seating. Those seats sold as more leg room seats are not quite what they advertise. Total flight time plus wait in the Atlanta airport will be a little over 4 hours.

The next day I’ll meet with my niece Ashley and my nephew Billy to see what we can do to help Archie and Tanis.

Chris and Tucker are too good to me. She did a BOGO for some raspberry bread and blueberry bred. She split the loaves with me. I can recommend the raspberry and I’ll let you know tomorrow about the blueberry.

Most of you know I love to cook but I haven’t been up to it until lately. I’m in the mood for bread so I may make a bunch of mini-loaves this afternoon. You can freeze those and then zap them in the microwave and butter them – if I don’t eat them all before I need to freeze them.

I read that some airlines are considering charging obese passengers more for their seats in the future. I need to be careful about how much I eat and how much weight I put on.

The real questions is will March come in like a lion or lamb. I’ll be at the tail end of March in Mississippi, so I’m sure the weather will either be beautiful or dicey. March and April is tornado season in Mississippi.

Stay tuned!

20 February 2025

Last night was movie night with Tucker and Chris. We opted for Cinema Paradiso, a 1988 release and Academy Award Winner for Best Foreign Language Film. It was a collaboration between Italy and France and is a film about the love of movies.

It traces the lives of Salvatore Di Vita (Toto) and Alfredo, the projectionist at the local movie theater. Young Toto saves Alfredo from a fire in the projection booth due to the nitrocellulose film stock which was extremely flammable. Toto, who learned from Alfredo, replaces Alfredo as projectionist because Alfredo is blinded by the fire.

As Toto matures, Alfredo convinces him to leave their small town and go to Rome. Toto becomes very successful as a director of movies under his legal name Salvatore Di Vita. True to his promise, he has not returned to his home town for 30 years.

His mother reaches him and informs him of Alfredo’s passing. He returns for the funeral only to find out Cinema Paradiso is scheduled to be demolished. In the end, it’s a happy ending and you’ll have to watch the film for the story’s main points and end. Be sure to watch it until the very end.

The small town theater reminds me of my hometown theater that we called Glick’s who owned and ran it. It was pretty basic. It had a balcony where blacks had to sit (my cousin Jimmie and I both agreed we wanted to sit in the balcony). The first floor would fill in the front with kids throwing popcorn, laughing, giggling, and shouting at the film and Mr. Glick would have to come in and calm them down during the film. About once every two months he’d had to throw someone out due to bad behavior.

My favorite candy was Milk Duds. I would buy a popcorn, and orange drink, and a box of Milk Duds for every movie. I quit the orange drinks when I saw them filling the container from the water in the men’s bathroom. Both the men’s and ladies’ bathrooms were disgusting. When you walked down the aisle of the theater, your shoes would stick to the floor from all the drinks spilled over the years. That’s pretty much the same in the Cinema Paradiso film.

When I first started going to movies, I think I paid 15 cents for admission. Later, we were hit by inflation and the price was raised to 25 cents. Outrageous! I think the popcorn, drink and Milk Duds cost me 50 cents. I still like Milk Duds and popcorn but I’m leery of any place that has drink dispensers where you can see the liquid in the dispensers.

The first thing on the screen was an episode of a thirteen reeler. Either Flash Gordon or some cowboy or FBI agent who always seemed to be at death’s door when the reel would end so you would come back next week to see what happened. We called them thirteen reelers because there were 13 episodes for some. The number of episodes varied but we called them 13ers.

As a small town theater, you never got first releases. Not even second or third. I think I saw The Creature from the Black Lagoon in black and white even though color films were common. Come to think of it, most of the places I lived never showed first run movies, even in Oxford at Ole Miss. Today, some movies go directly to streaming and there’s no wait whatsoever. Homes often have their own theaters built in and even if they don’t the new tv’s are so large they are like movie screens.

I haven’t been in a theater since Covid. Nor have I been tempted. The main reason is I’m not interested in the films but I also don’t like to be in large crowds. I’ll stay at home and do movie night with Chris and Tucker.

Stay tuned!

19 February 2025

It’s a sunshiny day in the neighborhood! On my morning walk, I managed 1.4 miles along Riverland Road. I almost got wiped out by a kid on an electric scooter who blew past me before I heard him. When I do the Riverland walk in the morning, I always look out for kids on bicycles on their way to the nearby Middle School. Even though there are bike lanes in both directions on the road, the kids ride the sidewalks. I don’t blame them by the way cars blow by on the road and almost always veer over into the bike lanes.

Another unusual sight this morning was a woman jogger in a long black dress. She must have been baking in that dress. I’ve ceased to be amazed at what I see in South Florida. Joel and I were walking one morning in an old neighborhood of mine when a guy in nothing but a thong rollerbladed by us. It wasn’t a very large thong.

Another sight on the morning walk was a bougainvillea in full bloom. The drier it gets, the more it blooms.

The most outrageous one I’ve seen was in Key West that had been trained along the front of several businesses. It apparently likes the location and put on quite a show. I like bougainvillea for several reasons but probably the most unusual is that dad was in the taking of Bougainvillea Island in WWII. The island is part of Papua New Guinea in the Solomon Islands. It was pretty vicious fighting.

Speaking of shows, the installer came yesterday around 9 am. Sadly, when the person rang me up at Costco, they didn’t enter the wall mount. The installer didn’t have a mount and he suggested putting it atop the bookcase temporarily.

I checked the price on the wall mount at Costco and it was $149. A search on Amazon showed basically the same wall mount for $59. It’ll be delivered today. John will help me install the wall mount on Sunday.

I watched two movies last night. The first was Dolce Villa a cute takeoff from the expression Dolce vita. It’s about a young American woman who goes to Italy to purchase a villa for $1. The Italian government is trying to lure young people back to small towns. Her dad flies in to convince her this is not a good idea. Eventually, he sees the potential, after renovation, to open a cooking school (he’s a former chef). Of course, the widowed dad falls in love and with a few twists and turns, everyone has a happy ending. It’s not a great movie, the acting is not great, the premise is trite (see Under the Tuscan Sun for a better version).

The other movie was Heart of Champions where an Ivy League crew keeps losing to Harvard in rowing. Enter a new coach who teaches the crew to be a team and eventually they win against Harvard. Again, not great acting, not a great movie, and a trite premise (see The Boys in the Boat [several streaming services] or The Boys of ’36 [PBS American Experience] for much better versions).

Both movies were entertaining and a great way to kill 3 hours when fighting malaria with gin and tonics. Don’t laugh, I haven’t been stricken with malaria so it must work.

Stay tuned!

18 February 2025

Today is installation day for my new tv. I was sent a notice saying my installation was starting at 7 am. I know that they weren’t going to show up at 7 am but in the unlikely probability they did show a little later, I got up at 5:30 (no hardship) and made ready by making my bed, clearing the area they would be working and turning on lights so they could see in the bedroom. I’m still waiting for them to show up and it is currently 8:14.

To kill time, I decided to spread weed and feed in the yard. I’m growing a great crop of weeds right now and I’m afraid Trevor will say he doesn’t want to cut the few blades of grass in my yard. The bag covers 5,000 square feet. My spreader is old and fickle but I managed to get the front lawn covered and the east side lawn. I don’t care about the west side lawn since it’s mostly pavers.

I’m watering the weed and feed in as per instructions. I figure it’ll take a lot of water since the lawn is parched. The sprinklers are set to come on tomorrow as a matter of course (two days a week) and so I’ll know it got plenty of water between today and tomorrow.

When the installers to come, I’ll wear a mask and ask them to. The flu season is in full swing in South Florida and I think I mentioned that Broward County is rated as critical for flu. It dissuaded me from actually going to the grocery store and instead I ordered them delivered. Just what I don’t need right now is a case of the flu.

The weather here is nearly perfect with moderate temperatures and low humidity. Friday we are scheduled to start dropping temperatures into the 50’s for around a week and that’ll be a pleasant experience during my morning walks – which I didn’t get to do today waiting on the installers.

For some reason, February seems like a long month to me. January flew by and I feel like we are trudging through the shortest month of the year. It’s probably due to me waiting for the delivery of the tv and the installation.

Saturday, Joel, Barbara and I will attend a lecture at the Nova Southeastern Museum of Art on the Italian Renaissance. It starts at 4 pm and afterwards there’s the opening of the new Christo exhibit of wrapping the islands off the coast of Florida in pink. Honestly, I saw the same exhibit at the Perez Museum of Art in Miami several years ago. I’ll probably quickly move through that section.

Otherwise, it’s a lovely day in the neighborhood. Stay tuned!

17 February 2025

It’s a dreary day in the neighborhood, boys and girls. We don’t get many days like this but you would think you’re in Seattle or Portland today. However, the overcast skies make for nice walking and I managed 1.4 miles this morning.

Yesterday, I did manage to clean the pool filter and hose down the patio and spray for weeds. After I took a break, I decided the sprinklers could wait another day.

I don’t know what’s gotten into me but I’ve been movie binging of late. Last night was One Chance, a 2015 release about a very young James Corden as Paul Potts winning Britain’s Got Talent as an opera singer. Corden is shown as a working class kid who loves to sing and is bullied by the boys and men in the neighborhood. It takes place in Wales in a town with a steel mill that his father wants him to go to work in instead of singing.

In the movie, he meets his girlfriend, first online and then for real when a friend grabs his phone and texts her to come to town for a visit. Alexandra Roach plays Julz, his girlfriend and eventually his wife. He manages to go to Venice to train and the great Pavarotti tells him he may never become an opera singer.

He survives several physical disasters and, of course, manages to impress the unimpressable Simon Cowell of Britain’s Got Talent. He is passed on to the next round and eventually wins the $100k prize. The movie is based on a true story. It’s an entertaining movie with a surprise cameo by the real Pavarotti.

I’ve decided my movie tastes are totally different from the American public. I could care less about car crashes, Reacher, or any of the trillion miles of film produced today. I like a movie to have a story that is not carried by special effects. That means I usually prefer the old black and white classics and an occasional new film. That means I have to search for quite a while on Netflix and Amazon Prime to find something I like.

Oh well, it’s time to tackle the sprinkler heads.

P.S. Broward is said to be in the critical range for influenza as reported by Kinsa.

Stay tuned!

16 February 2025

I never got around to the pool filter or the sprinkler heads yesterday so I’ll try to get to them today. Instead, I had plenty of time to make a coffee cake.

I’ve never made a coffee cake before but it was relatively simple. I figure anything with sugar and cinnamon can’t be all bad. This one had sour cream in it. It doesn’t look pretty but it tastes pretty good.

The other night, I watched a movie called The Dressmaker. It’s a 2015 release set in Australia and stars Kate Winslet and Liam Hemsworth. It’s supposedly a comedy/drama and I found it interesting.

In one scene, someone died (not a spoiler alert) and they did something I’ve always heard about called washing the body. I didn’t understand the concept when I heard about it as a kid other than you wanted the body to be clean before interment.

Later, when I read Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, I understood. There’s an excerpt where the two murderers are about to be hanged and someone mentions that when they die, they lose all muscle control and that means they urinate and poop. One of the murderers therefore wanted to go to the bathroom several times before his hanging. The idea of washing the body makes more sense.

These days, all the cleaning process takes place at the undertakers but back in the day, you buried your own dead and you didn’t want a stinky body during the service or burial.

Another tradition did survive during my childhood and that was waiting up all night with the dead. It was custom to place coins over the eyelids of the deceased. There was a practical reason. Sometimes the “corpse” wasn’t a corpse and if the coins were flipped off the eyes, that meant they really shouldn’t bury the person.

I would go into the embalming process but that’s a little much. I did use to explain it to my students and got the requisite groans and moans.

As I mentioned in a previous blog, we are in our dry period in South Florida and it certainly is dry. I need to add more water to the pool and I really need to get that sprinkler system back working. Trevor, who cuts my yard, hasn’t cut it in a month because it hasn’t grown. That’s good financially but it’s bad lawn-wise. I have a lot of Mexican clover that has taken over the yard and I need to spread some weed and feed on it. However, I can’t do that until I can water the fertilizer in with the sprinklers.

Other than the tv installation on Tuesday, I don’t have anything for the next two weeks.

Stay tuned!

15 February 2025

Is today the ides of February since the month has 28 days or is it the 14th? According to Merriam-Webster, it’s the 15th of March, May, July, and October or the 13th of any other month based on the Roman calendar. It doesn’t specifically mention February and I’m not interested in wading through the Roman calendar so I’ll call any day of the month that is the 15th the ides.

I’m more energetic today than yesterday. I stripped the bed, changed linen, washed, dried and folded clothes and even cleaned a little in the house. I’m even going to break out the iron for a shirt and a pair of shorts that have a few too many wrinkles for my taste. In reality, if I didn’t iron them, they would mesh too well with my own wrinkles. I’ve heard of crepe skin all my life, now I’m a walking example of it.

Life is complicated. I ordered a night light for the bathroom (my old one died) and when it came today, because of the size differences in the plugs, I couldn’t plug it in hanging down. The light switch is in the top position so that’s out. The larger plug (neutral) is on the left of the socket and on the night light it is also on the left. If I try to hang it downward, the neutral will not fit. I ordered a couple more from Amazon that it appears there is no neutral plug.

I got my membership cards for the AARP in the mail today with a letter letting me know I had not renewed my membership. I went to the web site, logged on, and found out my membership really doesn’t expire until June 2025. That’s very sneaky of AARP. I’m sure renewing early is a benefit for them but it isn’t for me.

Later today, I need to clean the pool filter, hose off the patio, and tinker with the sprinklers. I’ll wait until it gets a bit cooler. It’s currently 82°F. We keep waiting for the next cold front. We’re still waiting.

Sprinkler heads going bad is like herpes – it’s forever.

Stay tuned!