Welcome to fall, North Dakota style. We had a delightful weekend with temps in the upper 60s/low 70s and it was paradise. A paradise we knew would end. By Tuesday, the median temp dropped 15-20 degrees and the wind picked up a mite. Currently we have sunny skies and a wind that gusts up to 65 mph. The cats HATE it. So do I.
I’ve been writing a lot lately. For months I’ve been toying with the theme and plot lines of the beginning of my never ending fantasy novel/hobby. A new shape has been starting to solidify. I gave my lead characters more agency, made the technology available to them a little more advanced and more diesel punk than before, and made their entire world weirder and wider. It’s fun to write even if it will never see the light of day.
I have been picking up the guitar every day now as the tendinitis is bearable. I went 20 minutes the day before and about ten yesterday. I’ll try to pick it up this afternoon and bang away on some rudimentary chord progressions that I had regressed on while I was unable to play. Yesterday I was horsing around with the chords in “Horse with No Name” and Carjo thought it actually sounded like music. Note, she never says that when I am playing electric guitar. But it does inspire me to continue to bang away.
A little over two weeks ago we got our super-duper senior influenza shots along with the Omicron booster shot. I know at least four people in our immediate circle that are just coming out of COVID right now. We’d rather not be them. We are determined to maintain a semi-quarantine protocol until spring now. We’ll make a giant COSTCO run in a few weeks. I’ll get some basic maintenance done on the Family Truckster. And then we will lock down. I think we’ll make a few road trips in November but none of them involve getting out among the general populace and when we do, we will be overly cautious. We have a plethora of TV/movies to watch, I have a boatload of music to play, books to read, and hobbies to pursue. Oh, and the Swedish Death Cleaning will continue.
If you are not familiar with the concept, Swedish Death Cleaning is the act of cleaning up the things that would be a burden to others if you died. Most senior citizens should do this but few do. But we’ve been doing a lot of paring down of late and this long dark season it will continue.
One of my summer projects was clearing a lot of detritus out of the garage. I have a small mountain of cardboard left and that will go into recycling soon. We now have the luxury of two city garbage cans and I’ve been using the second for Death Cleaning items. There’s just a lot of furniture, boxes, old books/records, tools, clothes, and just mess downstairs (aka The Flood Zone). At some point a plumber will be installing sump pumps down there and when they do, I plan on having a basement that is free of everything that brings me less than ridiculous joy. Which means I am dumping everything. The city will have a cleanup in May, with dumpsters set out to take the large items people want to purge. I will hit that like the proverbial Hammer of the Gods. Not a stick of furniture will remain downstairs and hopefully, even that damn heavy treadmill.
So that’s the plan. We’ve found that we handle the hermit life with ease. Our circle in this small town has decreased over the years and many good friends/family are far away in Minnesota. We’re not very social animals, especially my wife. When we get out of the confines of rural North Dakota we can be gregarious and social, but there’s a joy in sitting down with a book or a good movie, a cat in your lap, and a lovely beverage while the wind howls and the walls creak. Bring it on, Old Man Winter. We’re ready.
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jeroljohnson 