Snow

 And just like that - a winter wonderland is here! (this is looking out my side dining room window)

There was maybe an inch on the ground when we left to go to the city. It had started coming down pretty good when we returned and then was just dumping snow for the next several hours. DH got lots of plowing in, so that made him happy and was good to get him a bit of exercise shoveling, as well.

Friday at 1pm and Costco was a zoo, as always. I have yet to go there when it is not filled with people. After this little trip we both decided we really do hate shopping at Costco! LOL. It wasn't quite as crowded as other times (by view of the parking lot) but still lots of people and it seemed nobody could move their carts - they were just either stopped or barely moving. When my membership comes up for renewal in a few months, I will think about if I want to renew. I do want those beautiful and well priced Christmas wreath's next year, but I think I will do a work around to get them. Next year dd and sil will be coming for Thanksgiving and maybe I can get them to get the wreaths from their Costco before they come. Or I will have her purchase me a Costco gift card and from what I understand you can use those in-store and not need a membership card. Before my membership expires this year, I will try to get us in there for one last "big" shopping trip and we can try to really stock up on anything we might want there and that should last us quite awhile.

I had also gotten the Gold membership and so far we have not spent enough to make that worthwhile either. Though the lady at the membership desk did say that even if I don't earn $65 in rewards, to pay for the added cost of the Gold membership, Costco will pay me the $65, but it sounds like, reading the fine print, that I'd have to downgrade to the regular membership. I'm not going to worry about it or go to the trouble of doing that, if that's what's required. As it stands right now my 2% reward is about $31 and only that much because we spent a lot of glasses and sunglasses. It also sounds like they will be issuing me the annual rewards certificate a couple of months before my membership expires, which I just checked and it expires on 3/31, so at least I can get it used one last time, before the membership expires. I did just look at my account online, because I thought I might have been on auto renewal, and I was, so I canceled that.

I got into the bank, in and out quickly to get some cash out and then we went to Walmart. It was snowing then so my job - to stand at the back of the pickup and put the cold stuff in the coolers and bags, I was getting snowed on. DH was loading at the side of the truck, into the back seat area, so he was staying dry, haha. We did decide to treat ourselves to Wendy's on the way home. DH only ordered a single burger instead of his usual double, so good for him for cutting down a bit. Plus it saved like $3 or $4 from what the usual total is. 

I've been tracking what I've been spending on groceries since October. I used to budget $600 a month for groceries (this includes paper, cleaning, and personal care since I get most of that with my Walmart order). It appears, thanks to inflation, I'm going to have to bump that monthly budget amount up by about $100 a month. That's almost a 17% increase. Boo! I've also just done the math and just realized the packages of frozen hamburger patties from Costco, while large in package size, are not saving me any money. They work out to $1.39 per patty and I can get the ones I like from Albertson's for $1.20 per patty.

While dh was outside plowing, I got started watching the first show, Shrinking, on AppleTV+. I watched it the rest of the evening, getting about halfway through the new season. I should finish that up today. 

Since we had both eaten some lunch around 11:30, before we left to go pick up groceries, and then the burger and chicken sandwich (me) around 2pm, we didn't do much for dinner, so it was nice not to have to make anything. DH just had a sandwich and then later in the evening had the last of the 2 frozen taquitos we had left in the freezer.

Our power went out sometime during the night. I had woken up a bit before it came back on at 6am and realized it was out. The snow is very wet and heavy, so I'm not surprised it went out. 

It kind of feels like a Sunday today. Being off 2 weeks from work it gets easy to lose track of what day of the week it is. No more snow is predicted, which is probably a good thing. DH needs to work his way back into shape to shovel ;)

Well, now I am excited!

We are going into the city to get groceries today and will leave around noon. Again, it's snowed a dusting but will likely be gone by the time we leave. Either way, not really a big deal - dh is more than adept at driving in it. I just don't want any next Thursday! Pretty please! 

I'm still trying to find a smoothie recipe (bananas and strawberries) that's the sweet spot. First try tasted too much like orange juice. Second too strawberry-y. Then dh said how about just bananas? So, I tried that last night. It was ok, but even after I added more bananas it still didn't seem like enough flavor. I even added a bit of honey. I might try adding some of my vanilla protein powder next try. The ninja blender does seem to work well and fast, though. 

I also want to stop at Costco to pick up a couple bags of the frozen hamburger patties, so while we are there I will see what they have in the way of bags of frozen fruit to buy. If I start making smoothies for dh most days, we're going to go through a lot. We're also going to go through more milk, which may end up having us need to run into our town grocery store more often, in between trips to the city for groceries. I drink quite a bit of milk (dh never has) and I always buy what my fridge will hold, so I can't really buy more. I can freeze, but I find that annoying, as it seems to take so long to thaw out. I'll also see if I can find the organic peanut butter. Our bank is across the street from Costco, so we'll stop in there so I can get some more cash out. We like to keep some cash on hand and we used what we had when we took it with us on the cruise and most of our trips into the city have been on the weekend, when the bank isn't open.

DD just messaged me that it's been 10 years since she and her dh started dating. I remember it so well, haha. He's 5 1/2 years older than her and I remember her (away at college) messaging me about him. I asked her if they were going to go out on a date when she was home on winter break and she said "mom - he's like 6 years older than me!) She had just turned 19. I said so?! you are like 19 going on 30, so what's the problem? haha. I always knew she'd end up with someone older than her. Now they are 29 and 34 :)  She picked a good one.

DH has gotten so bad the past few weeks of going to bed later and later and sleeping later and later. Next Thursday we have to be at the hospital at 6:30 am, so have to leave around 5:20, just to make sure we give ourselves enough time and also get parked, which is across the street from where the day surgery is. We'll have to get up like 4:30 (UGH!). I told dh at this point, you might as well not even go to bed next Wed night! Geez! He's even going to have a hard time getting himself up this "morning" to leave by noon. He typically needs at least 90 minutes of being up before he really gets moving much, due to his muscles getting stiff while sleeping. It always takes him awhile to get going.

I finished my first book yesterday and got started on the next one. I probably won't get it finished this weekend, because I know I'll be binge watching a couple of shows on AppleTV+ free weekend LOL.  I want to watch the second season's of Shrinking and Silo, or watch as much of them as I can. Then I just read that the free streaming starts today, but I just tried and nothing is streaming free yet. I'll check back in this afternoon- maybe I'll be able to get a head start with the 2 shows today.

Oh oh oh! I was just reading that the free streaming actually starts today, you just need to log in with your apple ID. I did that, but not able to watch anything yet. Then I was googling to see if I could find out what time today it started and came across a Reddit post that Target Circle members can claim an offer for THREE free months of Appletv+. I claimed it. WOOOO!!! Now I won't have to pay the subscription when Severance season 2 (finally after 3 years!) comes on. I cannot wait to watch that show again. It was soooo good!

Relaxing days off

I'm getting my grocery order added online. Geez! The price of 18 organic eggs is now over $10. We're switching back to regular eggs, for the time being, I guess. My remaining hen is not helping, with no egg laying, haha. (The powers that be really do not want us eating healthy, do they?)

I'm very much enjoying my time off work. Not looking forward to next Monday, so far. But, I'll get back into the swing of it, soon enough, I imagine. My goal is still to retire at the end of 2030. 

I've been doing lots of reading. Finally, one e-book I had on reserve came available. As soon as I got started on that, 3 more, in the last few days, have become ready to borrow. Now I'm swamped with too much to read. I will finish the first one today and get started on the next one. 

Yesterday I realized I overpaid the GI doctors office by $34. They sent me a statement dated 12/2 for that amount. Then a week later I got another statement for $108. I added the 2 up and paid online, not realizing that the $34 was included in the 2nd statement. Who sends out statements weekly? LOL. Plus, when you log in to pay, it doesn't show your balance owing, or I would have caught it, then. Well, I'll owe them more after next Thursday, so I'll fix it then. At least it wasn't a large amount.

I see my side job check is in the mail today - it was supposedly mailed on Tuesday - last month it took 8 days to get here! 

I don't really expect 2025 to have any major changes or events going on.  Well, unless we get disturbing news about dh's endoscopy/pancreas - but I have a feeling they are going to say he now has chronic pancreatitis. Not good news, of course, but could be worse. (the MRI results said nothing typical showing of cancer). He hasn't needed any of the anti nausea med in the last couple of weeks, so that's good, too.

DD and SIL will be getting started on their house build this year. That will be exciting, but much easier to just be a bystander for it :)

2025 is here

Happy New Year! I remember when the year turning 2000 was such a big deal (mostly for the computers!) and here we are now a quarter of a way into this century.

Yesterday was more relaxing and less work, since all the Christmas decorations were put away. I spent a good part of the day reading. I do need to vacuum, but wanted to give my back one more day of rest before I tackle that, so I'll probably get the downstairs vacuumed up today. I'm still finding those pesky little green pieces off the trees on the floor.

One more year done and closer to retiring, is how I'm looking at life now. 6 more years, max. I know it will go by fast. Fortunately, I love my job, so it should still be an easy 6 years to manage. 

For this coming year, I need to (again) make sure I am taking all the PTO time I earn. I almost took it all this last year - then the company decided to give everyone a couple more days off between Christmas Eve and NY and I ended up with 2 days not used, haha. I haven't even begun to get into all my accrued time on the book (over 300 hours). But between now and 6 years, it could all pretty easily get used up if I got sick or if dh got sick and I needed extra time off. I'm also fairly certain that when I retire they will pay me out a good portion of it, as a retirement "gift". I will have worked there 26 years, if I retire in 6 years. This year is my 20 year work anniversary - oh gosh - please don't give me more PTO LOL. (they added a week ever year when I hit my 15th anniversary). I need to look at the calendar and at least get most of the days requested. Tomorrow and Friday are 2 days and I now also have to take off the 9th, for dh's endoscopy next week.

I've been watching the upcoming weather predictions, since I will have to drive us home, after the procedure. I've been stressing it's going to end up a very snowy, awful roads day, but so far so good. Still no snow predicted and so far it's showing next Thursday as a 40 degree day. Whew! Keeping fingers crossed. I wish they were doing this procedure at the GI's endoscopy center (like the first one was), rather than at the hospital. It was much easier going there, but they must not have the ultrasound type of endoscopy equipment at their own surgery center. It is going to be the same doctor who did his EUS a little over 3 years ago, when they determined his gallbladder needed to come out. 

I still have to do my mom's last tax returns (state and fed), as soon as I get her tax document. It should only be the 1099-R from her retirement IRA account, where I had taken a distribution just a few days before she passed. I did an estimate and looks like she will be getting back about half of the taxes that were withheld from her distribution. Hopefully, it won't be a hassle to get that fed refund, like it was a bit last year (I still haven't received her last SS payment). I didn't have any issues getting her state refund last year. When I filed I didn't put deceased on either return, because she didn't die in the year I was reporting (2023) but this year will be marked deceased on both returns, so hopefully it will all go smoothly. I sure would like to get these returns/refunds and that SS payment off my "to-do" list.

DH can't figure out his game camera's - they work off a cellular service. The cameras come with 100 free photos each month. If you want more you can pay for the service monthly. We are just giving the 100 free a try, first. But, the cameras are not consistent for sending the pictures for him to view on his new account with the cameras. One time it will transmit a photo to his "gallery" right away. Another time a picture will show up hours, even a day later, with a time it was taken before another picture that showed up right away. It doesn't make sense. And he certainly won't take the time to try to learn/research about it.