Cancer- a very scary word
2023 was a difficult year for us. It was a year that made me suddenly feel very old and fragile. I’m still coming to terms with a lot of what happened.
(more…)The day to day aspects of life: what is happening around the house and in our family
Spring and summer views: 2022
I had planned on posting something new about our stairway construction by now, an upgrade that was already delayed from 2021. Unfortunately that still isn’t done despite being ‘in progress’ since the beginning of May.
Instead, I’ve decided to post some pictures from around the house and a few words about how the year has gone. Most of the pictures have already made an appearance on Facebook- apologies for folks who follow me there as well. But the words are mostly ‘new’…
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The sunset of life
Things I want to do when I retire…
I’m still a few years away from retiring, but the years pass fast- and I’m definitely looking forward to it.
Retirement scares some people. What will they do, they wonder, when every day isn’t filled with the job that currently occupies their time? How will they define their value in the world? Some of these folks retire, then pass away a year or two later. Or sit in their house, watching sitcoms and gradually wasting away.
I don’t think I’m really like that. I’ve had things I want to do, things I want to learn and experiment with, for decades. Not to make money or ‘prove’ myself: that’s what a job is for in my mind, I guess. Just things that interest me, that likely produce little obvious value. I’ve even tried to work time for these into my life pre-retirement, but have never been able to balance them with my job.
So what’s on my list? Glad you asked…
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Stairs- maybe next year
There were a few things we knew we wanted to improve when we bought our home in Castlegar. Irene and I identified replacing the outdoor stairs to my office (the suite over the garage) as being the most ‘urgent’ of these.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like getting these stairs replaced is in the cards for 2021. But at least I have engineering diagrams!
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Apple Watch 7: On being Quantified
Back in 2013 I began paying attention to my health metrics a bit when I started wearing a Fitbit Flex. I found I enjoyed ‘keeping track’ of basic data and I upgraded that to a Fitbit Charge HR in 2015 to add my heart rate to what I was collecting. None of this particularly encouraged me to ‘improve’ my health, but at least I was able to keep an eye on some basics. Along the way I started looking at the Apple Watch, but the Fitbit was working well enough for my purpose so I held off.
I started to notice some hiccups with my Charge HR this year: the battery wasn’t holding its charge very well, and there were some cracks appearing in the display. Nothing serious- it was still working fine. But I decided I’d take this as an opportunity to upgrade to the ‘next’ version of the Apple Watch. Apple shipped the Apple Watch 7 on October 15, and I got mine delivered on October 22. Now I’m drowning in data: my first impressions follow.
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Castlegar Fire- 2021
Sometimes smoke really does mean fire. And in our case, it was an ‘interface wildfire’ that came within about a kilometre of our new home on July 1 of 2021.
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Small Treasures
Irene has been sorting through a collection of paper items from the past several decades. Maybe this should have been completed before we moved. But it is surprisingly time consuming, and I don’t blame Irene for deferring it.
A lot of this material is freighted with emotion. Letters from friends and family who have died or who are estranged from us for various reasons. Cards and keepsakes… it is hard to let go of those, but for the most part we must. But we also allow ourselves the luxury of preserving a few such items. Like this hand-made card my friend Chris sent us…
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Covid Thoughts
Today I received the first of what should be two vaccinations against COVID. This has caused me to give some thought to how I got here, and what the world has gone through during this first pandemic of the 21st century.
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Spooky Relics…
I have gone several days without really enjoying the area I now live in. Work and personal errands get in the way: but really, that’s an excuse.
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