There is nothing on the calendar for me to do today. So can I sleep in? Of course not! It's been a busy several days and I went to bed early. Naturally enough I woke up early. And of course I thought of you guys and decided to blog.
Coffee. (duh!)
Quick browse for news.
No Facebook so far, maybe not at all today.
Mostly junk email.
Except.
An email from my brother and I'm jealous AF. Really. Totally.
He's in New Zealand just now, having dodged cyclones and atmospheric rivers and flight cancellations, and who knows what else. He's sent us several photos, and today was a lovely beach, complete with nice sand, reflective water, a nice looking cliff. Typically beautiful NZ. Sigh. It's probably 20 C with a cloudless sky. Taken with an iphone, which means he's probably still ACTUALLY ON THE BEACH! Lots of NZ beaches have good cell service. At least one has WIFI.
His wife's family is from New Zealand and they're visiting her parents, or so they say. Apparently via the beaches, which is totally fine, and I'd do the same. We'd thought about NZ again this year, but we probably would have been caught in that cyclone, since that's the part of the island we haven't been to, and that's about when we would have gone. Just as well. I do not aspire to be star of a news story titled, 'Canadian tourists rescued.'
As I was telling someone last night, this retirement gig is busier than I thought it would be. Especially since (and there's some major caveats here) COVID has receded somewhat from public consciousness. Don't get me started. One of my friends tested positive and advised me since we'd gone to places together. Since I was volunteering at a casino for my community association I tested myself, just in case. Negative. The staff said the casino was long since back to normal.
I've never tested positive, but I'm pretty sure I've probably had it in my system. Being vaccinated and generally healthy I've been able to fight it off.
Traffic is back to pre-COVID insanity. Even when the roads are shite or in the many construction zones, some people are still driving like idiots. The upside down car off in the the snow covered weeds doesn't seem like a cautionary tale to them. The emergency vehicles on the road nearby are an inconvenience to be dodged. I saw a flag person have to jump off the road.
I'm not in many stores besides the local Co-op grocery store and the Farmer's Market we like, though I was in an actual mall yesterday. That's where my eye doctor is. You'll all be pleased to know my eyeballs are in tip top condition. She says the photos of the back of my eye could go in the textbooks as an example of what they should look like. Pity about the astigmatism and being really short sighted. No even a hint of cataracts yet, though she says when (not if) they come along they'll be able to correct a lot of my vision. I'll probably still need to wear glasses, but the prescription will be much simpler and (surprise) probably cheaper. My next appointment is only a year out now.
When you turn 65 they want to see you more often. I'm not there yet, but later this year. It also means we have to look at heath insurance stuff, and Good Lord is that complicated! Trying to figure out the various options, while thinking about what we've actually used in the past and what might be used in the future, and wondering what's already covered by the basic plan you get because you're 65 and an Albertan.
Then again, this might be a dementia test. If you can't figure it out then you're likely to die from some other less expensive condition, as opposed to slowly dwindling away in a care facility. There's an assisted living facility beside an art gallery I went to a little while ago. They promise a concierge experience, and it appears to start at $50K a year for a tiny suite, and I don't know what all isn included in that price. We all know it only gets more expensive from there.
Although I'm minded of paying car insurance when I was young and and full of teenage stupidity hormones. I got told my insurance would get cheaper as I got older, but that wasn't true. I don't think I've ever paid less than that. The actual rate might have gone down, but I started driving newer and more expensive cars. The insurance companies started getting even more mercenary about their profits. Don't get me started.
But back to the point. There weren't a lot of people in the mall, but then again, it was a Friday just after lunch, at the end of a branch corridor. I don't know what the baseline is. I didn't get as far as the food court.
Photography is getting busier. I'm delivering a print tomorrow, first time since before COVID. I'm in the middle of a photo gig for a paying client, and I've got tentative proposals for a couple more. I'm not hustling for photo work because I don't want it to become something I do only because someone is paying me. I want to do it because it's fun, or interesting. Even if I ended up working a lot, and getting paid for it, the rate is only a fraction of my oil and gas rate, so it wouldn't affect my life much.
Now, where was I? There were some blog thoughts before I opened that email. Gone, digressed away.
So let's give you some Vancouver Island green. Much of this was on a walk to or from a beach, and that was as nice as being on the beach, in a different way.
1. Linda on the way to a beach.
Of the Day
Driftwood (NZ)
Driftwood (BC)
Peony
Film (new)
Film (old)
Linda, Nefertitti, and Amelia, with 2 of the three ignoring the camera.
And a serendipity.
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