Last Week

Well, Hi!
Last week was a busy one. Monday started out like any other day except that it was the first day of my 73'd year. Yep; I hit 72 on the 13th. Funny, I don't feel any different. If you take life one day at a time, it doesn't seem so bad. If you look too far back and remember how you were when you were, say, 50 - you start feeling old. Age sort of creeps up on you a little bit at a time. It's kind of like the shock absorbers on your car; you don't realize how bad they are until you put new ones on and feel how it used to be. So, don't spend too much time thinking back. Just keep going forward. If you drive looking in the rear-view mirror all the time, you will likely hit a tree or at least run off the road.
I think of aging this way: It is like trading a Geo Metro in for a Lincoln Navigator. The ride may be more comfortable but you run out of gas a lot sooner.
And, speaking of rides, we will be off to San Diego in June for Riley's high school graduation. Riley is our grandson. Family from all over the place will be gathering to see him off on his "train of life." He will be going to Cal. State, Chico to study electronic music production. I have a Yamaha digital piano but what he will be doing goes far beyond anything I do. He has been playing in a little band for about three years and really loves it so this will be a good direction for him to go. It puts him about 600 miles closer to us, too and that's not a bad thing. He has been in San Diego since 1999 and we have seen very little of him since. We remember being at the hospital in Fresno, California when he was born. He was about 20" long. He is now 6'3" tall!! Yikes!! He was a wonderful kid and has grown into a wonderful young man and we are so proud of him.
Well, I must away and prepare for work. Yes, I am still working but I am in the countdown mode toward retirement (again). I will be hanging up my spurs on May 30th. I have some mixed emotions about it. I love where I work and the people I work with and (most of) the customers I interact with on the phone on a daily basis. But I feel like I want to spend some time with my lady while we are still spry enough (now there's a novel thought) to do some things we have wanted to do. That's the most important item on our list.
So, you have a great day and I will be back to bore you some more later.
Ciao!!
Bill & Almie

Good Grief!!
Has it been almost three weeks since I checked in?! Yikes!!
Almie and I are well and so are our "kids." Whisper and Almie have gone to bed and Kelly is outside in the cold and wind. I am the only one with too few smarts to call it a night and hit the sack. I think I will remedy that.
Today was one of what I call "Chamber of Commerce" days. The sun came out with a vengeance and it was almost 60 this afternoon.
We had friends in from Fresno, CA last week and we spent a day with them looking at property and houses. They may move here to the peninsula. It would be Nice to have them handy. We haven't seen them in almost twenty years and we had a lot to catch up on. We still do. Boy! how time flies.
Well, as I said, I am going to remedy the nonsense of sitting in front of this computer and hit the sack. Of course, I will see if Kelly wants to come in first.
Nytol.
Bill

Good morning.
Yesterday was weird - weather-wise. In the space of one hour we had rain, light snow, sunshine, fog and more light snow. The ten minute rule was definitely in effect. It stayed cold all day and it is cold right now. However, the sun is out and it promises to be a beautiful day.
It looks like I will be retiring at the end of May. We have to go to San Diego in June for our grandson's high school graduation so it seems like a good time to pull the plug.
I have a lot to do today so will add more later.
Hope you all have a great day.
Bill

Well! - - - -

We have had some kind of week!!

Monday night/Tuesday morning we got 10" of snow here in our yard. By Friday, it was all gone. Yesterday, we got very high winds and horizontal snow - about 1/2" in the early afternoon. Then the sun came out for about an hour and melted it all. About 3:00 PM, the snow was back for about 1/2 an hour. The snow stopped but the clouds stayed and by the time I went home from work at 6:00 PM, the snow was all gone again. That was yesterday. Today at about noon, we got about 1/2 an hour of light corn snow. It was Hollywood for sure - - - snow falling with bright sunshine and deep shadows. I thought that only happened in the movies. Anyway, there are still a lot of clouds but they are broken and there is blue sky showing through. The addage is true: If you don't like the weather here, wait ten minutes and it will change. Boy, how well we know that! It is NEVER dull here. There is something to love about it every day - - several times a day.

We hope yours is as good as our is.

Bill & The Diva

Well, HI!
Nothing special tonight but I do have to gloat just a bit. If you read my blog yesterday, you will have seen that I predicted that it should get up to 47 degrees by 5:00 PM. Well, Almie and I were returning from Port Angeles last evening at 4:46 PM and the outside temperature was exactly 47 degrees. Good, ain't I?!
Bill-Bo

Good Afternoon, folks.

While the much of the rest of the country is experiencing extreme cold, we here in Sequim, WA are having a heat wave. It got up to 40 this morning on our front porch. It has shot up to 45 now at half after noon and we may hit 47 by supper time. The sun is out and it is a beautiful day. I have said many times since we moved here that when the sun comes out, it comes out with a vengeance. So do the people who live here - maybe not with a vengeance but, boy! are they out! The city population here is a bit over 4,000 but I think they are all out in our little, increasingly busy downtown. When Almie and I first came up here about ten years ago and discovered Sequim (entirely by accident), there was only one stop sign in the whole town - at the intersection of Washington Street (the main drag) and Sequim Avenue. When we moved here in 2001, they had added a bypass for US-101 which used to use Washington Street to get through town and two traffic signals - one at Sequim Avenue and another one at Fifth Avenue. The only two really large stores in town were Safeway, close to the center of town and QFC (market) at the east end. There was a "plaza" with a J.C. Penny store as an anchor and a couple of banks. The tallest building in town was a grain elevator at Fifth and Washington. That elevator is still there but is no longer used for anything but a landmark. There is now a Mexican restaurant in the lower part of that building. There was a Costco about a mile east of town and that was basically it.

But, baby, look at us now. In the seven years that we have lived here, we have added a Wal*Mart, Home Depot, Petco, Office Depot, Applebee's, a UPS store and several more businesses including new banks, restaurants, medical clinics & an extension of Olympic Medical Center of Port Angeles. Much to the consternation of many of the old folks in town, our city fathers saw fit to install (the bane of Boston) three roundabouts. Many seasoned citizens still seem to take root at the approaches to them instead of merely pausing or slowing down to check for other cars already in the loops. Come to think of it, some of those people actually seem to take root in the aisles at Wal*Mart or Safeway, etc.. I only wish they would do it a bit less suddenly when they are in front of me. Sheesh!

Well, that's enough drivel for now. It's time for my nap. I'll be back.

The picture is of Lake Crescent - about 35 miles west of us. Pretty, huh

Bill

Okay, Pat - - - the profile is up and running. Do your thing.
Have a great day.
Bill & Almie