Eye to Eye

Yesterday was my annual appointment with my ophthalmologist...oh goody. The good news is that both eyes seem to be healthy although the vision in my right eye continues to deteriorate. The doctor keeps referring to the problem as a "cataract" but it's not the usual cloudy problems associated with a typical one. Basically, the lens is a sac of protein and apparently my sac is changing and not for the better.

Anyway, it's still up to me to decide when to have the intraocular lens replacement surgery and I'm not ready. As long as I can see to drive, read, watch TV, blog and all the other necessities, my quality of life in terms of vision is just fine so why mess with things?

Now I've made appointments for the two of us to see our optometrist who usually takes care of the glasses/contact lens end of vision. Because of the problems with my right eye, I gave up wearing contacts a few years ago. Now I want to see if there is a way to somehow get myself back into them. Part of it is vanity but part of it is also the fact that wearing contacts offers a much better peripheral view. Stay tuned...

The Blather Continues

Can it possibly be true that this is my 300th post? And remarkably, I will celebrate my 3rd blogoversary in a few short weeks on November 13th.

I've loved blogging...even when I've taken blog vacations to let my mind rejuvenate. And "yes" sometimes it seems like a chore to come up with something to write about. Still..I continue to love making new friends and getting to know everyone here in BlogLand so onward to post 400.

On another note...

Rick and I went to a semi-annual golf show yesterday. Rick goes to look at new products while I go to shop. One of the local golf stores has a section of the building where they sell much of their discounted merchandise...golf clubs, bags, balls, accessories, clothing, shoes. Oh, oh...shoes. Yep, what can I say...I now have two new pair of golf shoes in our golf gear closet. And "yes" I just had to buy them. After all, they were my size in a narrow width and they were my favorite golf colors...black and white. And here they are:


Pretty nifty, don't you think?

The Great Halloween Debate

Ack! It's only 9 days until Halloween and we still haven't bought our bags of candy. Of course, it's been only a week or so since I threw out the 2 unopened bags left over from last year.

Every year Rick and I argue over the number of bags to buy. He insists on buying at least 4 big variety bags from the our favorite BBW (Big Box Warehouse) which is, quite frankly, ridiculous since we don't get scads of trick-or-treaters. Of course, Rick insists on giving out handfuls of candy bars to each and every child which then makes him a hero in their eyes. Me? I think 2 or 3 tiny candy bars per child is perfectly fine but will he listen to me? Hah!

So I'm thinking maybe a little input from my fellow bloggers might settle our Halloween dispute.

Question of the Day

How much candy do you hand out to each trick-or-treater who comes to your door on Halloween night?

Another Busy Week

It seems I'm always thinking about posting something new when things just divert my attention. What can I say...focus is not one of my strengths.

The week started out with two wildfires which were within our view. Thanks to the amazing efforts of firefighters from across California, both were finally contained mid-week and now we are just holding our breaths hoping the hot, dry weather we are having will not stir up any embers causing a restart.

Then yesterday I took Mom to the doctor's for what I thought would be just a normal uneventful checkup. Wrong! It turns out she's having some cardiac issues which required us to hike on over to the Cardiology Department for an EKG. Thankfully the problems are not life-threatening and so they have adjusted her medication in hopes it will help return things to an acceptable level. Days like this remind me that, at 87 years old, every day we have with Mom is a gift and we need to enjoy them while we can.

Hopefully, the rest of the week and weekend will be less stressful and allow me some time to get my thoughts together for a little blogging and a little commenting. Stay tuned.

If It Ain't Broke...

So here's the prologue to my story. I was raised by very frugal parents. What can I say...I'm frugal too. I was taught that one does not discard household items and appliances until they no longer work. Yep...they have to be "dead," most sincerely "dead." Trust me, we were the last family on the block to buy a color TV because our old B&W just wouldn't die.

Anyway, Rick and I went off to C*stco yesterday to look at new digital TVs. Mind you, we have 2 perfectly good, older 27" TVs (one in the living room, one in our bedroom) plus one fairly new digital 20" TV in our den. For some time now, Rick has been lusting after a 56" TV for our little tiny living room. Why he thinks we need such a big flat-screen television is beyond me but I'm guessing it's a "boy thing." Anyway, I've humored him these past several months allowing him to drag me to numerous audio/video specialty stores while at the same time reminding him that our current TVs work just fine.

So, off we went yesterday to what I commonly refer to as the "$199 Dollar Store" just to look. I knew I was safe because Rick's been talking about a new generation of 55"-56" TVs which aren't supposed to be released for sale until later this year. I should have known better.

Remember I said we also had a perfectly good, reliable 27" bedroom TV. Well, you can forget that now. Before I knew it, we had a brand-new 32"digital TV (ostensibly for the bedroom) on a flat-bed cart being wheeled to the cash register and I was writing the check.

The TV is still in the box 24 hours later. I think I've finally convinced Rick to temporarily set-up this new TV in the living room where he can enjoy his new toy since we hardly ever watch TV in the bedroom except for the 10:00PM local news. There's this little part of me that hopes he'll get so accustomed to watching this 32" television in the living room that he'll forget about that 56" monstrosity he's lusting after. Sure...

Power of Four Meme

I was tagged by Lynne at Lynne's Little Corner of the World for this little meme today and I thought I'd give it a whirl.

What you are supposed to do is copy/paste my post, remove my answers and type in yours and then tag four people in your lists! Don't forget to change my answers to the questions with those of your own.

Four places I go over and over

* Starbucks

* T.J. Maxx

* YMCA

* Costco (AKA the $199 store in our house)

Four people who e-mail me regularly
* My sister Lynn
* My cousin Ina

* My friend Judy

* My friend Sherry

Four of my favorite places to eat
* Our local Argentine restaurant
* Our local Mexican restaurant
* Any one of several really good Italian restaurants

* StoneFire Grill which has the best salads

Four places you'd rather be
* The British Isles

* Vancouver (never been, can't wait to go)

* Anywhere there's a beautiful waterfall

* On a cruise ship sailing just about anywhere

Four TV shows I could watch over and over
* Law & Order

* Law & Order Criminal Intent

* Law & Order Special Victims Unit (notice a theme here)

* The Closer (I just love Kyra Sedgwick's character)

Four people I'm tagging
* Patti @ Late Bloomer Boomer
* Rosemary @ Rosemary's Attic

* Linda @ Are We There Yet?

* Renee @ fefyfomanna

Have fun!

Slow Cooker Conundrum

Okay...so remember that slow cooker I bought months and months ago? Well, except for a trip to our friends' home with turkey chili (which Rick made) for the Super Bowl, it has remained lonely and unused shoved to the back of a kitchen cabinet.

With the weather supposedly turning cooler this weekend, my desire to start cooking using the crockpot has suddenly resurrected itself. So this week I managed to find not one, not two but three (count 'em) slow cooker cookbooks while I was out and about. Two of the three were actually on sale at 70% off so, of course, they just had to come home with me.

And, of course, Rick had a word or two to say about these new cookbooks. "Yes"...I do have a bookshelf filled with cookbooks that have spines still unbroken. And "Yes" I've made several promises to use the slow cooker only to bail out at the last moment so I can hardly fault him for his snide comments. Still...a little show of confidence from him would have been nice.

So I stood up and declared that I would cook Friday's dinner using the crockpot. And here it is Friday and the slow cooker is still sitting silently in the cupboard. I am making progress, however. I've opened all three books and have searched through the numerous chicken recipes looking for the perfect healthy dish. I've found a few that look interesting and now I need to have Rick pick the one that sounds the best to him. Then I will go to the market, buy all the ingredients and finally drag the crockpot out, wash it thoroughly and then set to work.

When? Stay tuned...

Random Wednesday Thoughts

* Here it is October 1st and it was a sweltering 104 degrees. By Saturday the temperature is supposed to reach a "high" of 72 degrees with the possibility of showers. Welcome to the wacky world of Southern California weather!

* Yesterday my friend Sherry and I went to our monthly lunch with several of the ladies we once worked with at the library. A few of them still work there and it's always so much fun to listen to their library horror stories and realize that those of us who are retired no longer have to put up with all the craziness and agony.

* I took Mom to the YMCA Arthritis Aquatics class this morning. It's been three months since we went last and there were lots of hugs as everyone was glad and relieved to see us. When you have participants who are in their eighties (that would be Mom...not me), you get nervous when one of them doesn't show up.

* I'm sitting here watching cable news listening to pundits talk about the Senate vote on the re-vamped economic bailout package (oops, I mean "rescue" package.) To be honest...I'm not sure why all this fascinates me but it does. I've forbidden myself from looking at our retirement investments knowing that it will probably freak me out. I keep telling myself that, as long as we don't need to dip into these funds, we will be just fine because everything is cyclical and things will eventually turn around. OK...call my Pollyanna.

* Tomorrow Judy and I are going shopping...or should I say "returning." During our last shopping spree, we both overdid it big time and now our buyer's remorse has kicked in and we have items we need to take back. What can I say...we seem to have this problem whenever we get together.

Stay tuned...