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September 25th, 2018 at 02:23 am

After 3 weeks of being off routine in eating and chores, etc., I'm back on plan today. Yesterday I went to a plant based seminar - no new information, but it did help renew my desire to work towards that lifestyle.

I'm wondering if I'm going to have to do the same thing I did with soda - i.e. say not even a tiny sip, in order to kick the junkfood completely. (I'm at 2 years in 1 week soda free.)

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I also attended a program where my Sabbath School class has been collecting donations for for over a year - Sole Hope. It's a charity which provides shoes for children in Urugway? so that they avoid Jiggers infestations. (Google it - but not while eating.)

We cut out the parts for 100 pairs of shoes to be made from donated jeans. I cut out two pairs. Smile

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So … we got a letter in the mail confirming that the lady DH hit was injured and had had surgery. So far the costs are at $38k. (DH has a $50k policy.)

I finally contacted the lawyer hotline via our EAP program today. Unfortunately, they won't touch anything involving a business.

And since the main thing we want a lawyer for is to make sure DHs boss/owner does what he's supposed to …

So I'm now working on finding a lawyer without the handy dandy EAP referral program.

Sigh.

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I binge watched season 7 of Call the Midwife this weekend. DH assured me a Season 8 will be coming. Squee! (I thought for sure with how the last episode ended it was it - and was so sad. So DH did a little research. Smile )

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My first class starts on the 3rd! I should have my textbook tomorrow (ordered from Amazon for $50 less than school bookstore price ..) It's one of those you have to have an online code for in order to use some of the material, otherwise I could have gotten it for even less.

Back Home!

September 18th, 2018 at 12:44 am

I got home Sunday night about 9 p.m. I'm thankful I took today off as well, because the lawn was in dire need of being mowed, plus I needed to do all my usual prep for the week things.


Overall I had a good time.


Saturday night before the cruise a good friend I hadn't seen in years stayed with us at our hotel. We stayed up WAY late talking. Smile


She has two elementary aged children and her husband has a debilitating illness which pretty much puts the whole load on her. Thankfully before the illness manifested itself, he was a border patrol agent and had all kinds of insurance on himself. Including long term disability.


I had to deal with an eBay buyer claiming I hadn't sent their item. Finally they admitted that their son's roommate had taken it. No apology of course.


The absolute best part of the trip was our excursion on Roatan, Honduras. It started out a little iffy - we were following our guide through the neighborhood streets of the city to our van. (We got there late.)


Once we were in the van with the others, we drove for about 45 minutes through the island. We really got a good look at their reality I think, versus how often tourists are given only the pretty version of a place.


Our first stop was an animal sanctuary. Outside where we waited, there were a number of cats hanging around which made me feel right at home. Smile


Inside, I got to hold a sloth!! I also held a mccaw bird and went into a monkey cage. The monkeys were hilarious. I took some videos but am not sure how to share them here.


This one guy in our group got peed on by a monkey, and then later stung by a jellyfish. His wife wanted to go horseback riding - he adamantly said no. Smile


After the animal sanctuary, we went snorkeling near a shipwreck. I've been snorkeling before and feel pretty confident about my swimming abilities. But I am SO glad I decided to use a life jacket.


The shipwreck was in a coral reef which was very near the surface. A former Corneal freaked out and so did my mom - before getting very far. I freaked out too - but mostly because I had been holding back waiting for my mom and was separated from the group. I was worried I wouldn't find a path back to the boat through the coral.


I did see some fish, but I'm glad I didn't bother with buying a camera to take pictures - I never was relaxed enough to do that.


It really was a great time overall though.


Our other two ports were Cozumel and Costa Maya Mexico. We only went ashore for a few hours at each of those places - it was SO hot and humid.


After being to a few stores you pretty much saw everything available. I bought DH a t-shirt, and a nice top for myself. Mom bought a bunch of various things.


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Most of the entertainment was top notch. One of the two comedians was quite funny. One night they had a musical version of Saturday Night Fever which was amazing. Another night they had a Cirque de so lei(sp?) style performance which was phenomenal.


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The first night mom had a raging fit and we ended up getting move to a room with a port hole …. Loved the room, but could have lived without the embarrassment. (One of her bags had the tag ripped off, so she was sent all over looking for it, everyone assuming there must be alcohol or an iron in it. Neither of us drink.)


The first three days we had some rough seas and lots of rain. It was a very weird sensation to run on a treadmill on rough seas …


I was able to find PLENTY to eat. I had salad for lunch and dinner, plus cooked veggies and fresh fruit. I did veer away from my diet a little … um … chocolate molten cake ….


I don't think I gained anything - but I did make a point to take the stairs as much as possible. Plus made use of the treadmill a few times.


Okay - I made a shared album if you want to see the videos and more pictures. I'm going to see if I can help mom figure out how to add hers to the shared album too.


https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B15G4TcsmGaazwl;F5210E44-4C91-4BF0-96E1-2F1B36A64D9A

Waiting to board ship:


Cats outside animal sanctuary



Selfie with monkey




Holding Sloth



Outside a shop in Roatan



2nd entry

September 2nd, 2018 at 08:49 pm

I have a bit of time today (ok, so I'm procrastinating on doing other stuff I should be doing ….)

So in addition to the yardwork drama of this past week, we had some additional drama. I'm not sure exactly how this is going to play out.

It may turn out to be nothing more than increased premiums, or it could be really, really bad.

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My DH got into an accident while out on a delivery this week.

He was making a right hand turn, and at the same time a bicyclist started crossing.

The bicyclist got taken away in an ambulance - but only had apparent injuries to her knee.

DH doesn't want to attempt to report this to the owner's insurance because he's afraid the owner will get angry and fire him for being a pain. Apparently no other driver has attempted to report accidents on the job for a similar reason.


When DH got in the fender bender last year, I didn't try to push it since it was minor and no injuries. This time though there are injuries.


He only keeps $50k liability limit on his cars.


I'm having nightmares of all our assets vanishing.


I called my agent about umbrella insurance, but was told they couldn't do it with an open claim (not surprising) and we'd both have to up our liability limits.


So .. all I can do now is pray that this lady is not litigious, and that $50k will cover her injuries.


I'm also hoping that DH doesn't have another claim anytime soon - because then he might lose his insurance!

Registered! $$Yardwork Drama/Pictures; Pictures; Less Than a Week!

September 2nd, 2018 at 07:24 pm

So ... I registered at our local community college this past week. It does appear that it will take me about 4 years to do an AAS degree one course at a time. That is unless of course I decide to amp it up a bit and spend some of my own money (beyond the reimbursable amounts) to get it done a bit faster. Smile

My first class will be ... drumroll please ... Advanced Keyboarding! To get an A in this class you need to type 45 WPM. Um ... I tested out of Intermediate, but couldn't test out of Advanced. So .. an easy A to start my adventure back into school.

The other option to start with was Principles of Accounting. Yeah .. I'll hold off on that til next quarter, thanks.

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There's been some major drama rama this past week or so regarding yardwork - getting someone to do it and do it for the quoted price.

First off I had a guy who was supposed to start on Wednesday of the previous week. It rained that day. Then Thursday I get home expecting to see a good bit done - Nada. I text him and find out eventually that he'd stopped by another job to finish something up that morning, and had twisted his ankle in a hole. So .. I told him, we'll see you Monday then. Ok, he said.

That same day I had some people stop by to pick up some curtains I didn't need that they wanted for their daughter. They happened to be people who did yardwork. The one man was adamant that we needed to do something about the branch of our caltulpa (sp?) tree hanging over our roof. He showed me that it had already dented our gutter.

He quoted me a price to do everything - about $75 more than the other guy, but including cutting the branch.

I told him I already had arrangements with someone else, but if it didn't work out I'd contact him.

So ... Monday comes and goes and the first guy is a no show. I text him around 5 p.m. and no answer by 7 p.m. DH agrees that that's that.

So .. I contact the other guy to find out when he can come by and start. --- The next morning!

About 8:30 I finally get a text back from first guy. He's all defensive about how he'd promised he'd get the job done and he would get it done. That he'd bought $200 of used tools just for the job, etc... After a million back and forth texts I finally told him I was sorry for our misunderstanding, but I'd made other arrangements. Then stopped responding. I felt bad, but with our experience with the fence guy, etc., and wanting to get the dang job DONE ...

Tuesday I come home from work to find that the man and his partner (curtains) HAD come and put in a good days work. So, as agreed, I paid them 1/2 of the quoted price. There still was a lot to do.

Wedendsday I come home and they'd put in another good days work. There were still some things they hadn't done which he and DH had spoken about - so I texted him a list. Part of that was saying that we were "Possibly" interested in him treating the volunteer trees (close to 100 ...) but wanted to know if that included a followup next spring.

Thursday I get home and find out that he had interperted that to mean I gave him a go ahead. I'd also given him a go ahead on getting river rock/dirt for the back/side of our house that desperately needed it.

He tried telling us that he'd put 2 tons of riverrock out, and we'd need at least another 2 tons to finish. DH wasn't convinced of the amounts, and curtains man had no written documentation.

He wanted a check right then. 3 days in a row he and his partner had worked very hard and gotten 95% of the job done. So I wrote him a check.

Friday - he doesn't show up. (And DH royally ticked me off blaming me for this. Since we didn't owe them any money now .. I SO badly wanted to remind him who found fence guy .. especially when he self-righteously exclaimed that he'd be the KING in charge of getting the fence done. -- Fine by me - won't be done in the next century if I'm not spearheading it.)

Saturday he doesn't show up. I texted Friday night asking when he would be here - he said Saturday. I texted Saturday afternoon - where are you? No response.

Today, Sunday, hasn't shown up and no response.

The 3rd check hasn't been cashed yet. If he doesn't show up by Tuesday morning I will be attempting to do a stop payment on that 3rd check.

I'm wondering if I should text this guy and inform him that is what I will be doing if he doesn't show up, or just do it?

Total paid to this guy is nearly $2k. Gulp. I told DH that he better keep up the **** yard now that it is cleaned up again, or he'll be paying for the next clean up out of his pocket.


Some before pics …





You may notice the yard is mowed. Guess who does the mowing? Yeah.

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I've been taking pictures of some of the Lost and Found items that come in where I work. I thought it may amuse you. Smile I know it does me at times.






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I booked a snorkel and island tour excursion for our cruise today. We'll get to hold a sloth, and pet monkeys and tour a shipwreck. Smile Yes - lots of pictures of course. Smile

Less than a week to go!

Not excited at all. Nope, not at all. Big Grin