Recollections

Fall is here. Not that you would really notice it. Few leaves have left their homes upon the branches. The weather is hot to moderate and no rain in sight. Okay, a chance of rain next week. But I know how these 'chances' evaporate the closer we come to the appointed date.

Our trip to Twin Lakes is a memory now. A good one despite the poor accommodations. We all had fun and made jokes about the service or lack of it. After we came home I put up a review of Twin Lakes resort on Yelp; it was critical but fair. A few days ago I received a message from the NEW owners of the resort, apologizing for the poor experience. The new owners had taken over about 3 weeks after we had left. It was now obvious that the previous owners really didn't care about service; they were soon to be gone.

I'm still going to the gym 3 times a week for the Senior Wellness program. 30 minutes of resistance training and 1 mile on the treadmill. Then it's into the pool for 30 minutes of what I call vertical swimming. I have a flotation belt on and I wear swim gloves; with this setup I pedal and stroke back and forth the length of the pool. Water jogging.

I've lost about 22 pounds in the past 3 months and that's a good thing. My pot belly has just about disappeared. Luckily for me, the stomach muscles that I had developed over 50+ years in the construction trades had never deserted me. The fat had just accumulated on top.I still have 25 pounds to go if I want to return to my former training weight of 195...and I do. And since I can't run or walk very fast or far anymore, I must lose this weight by dieting. I would much rather run, swim or walk than give up my cookies. But I must; sob!

I'm still painting. I've entered some shows and put my name out there in the artistic community. I'm in the middle of an artistic funk right now; unable to complete anything. I must have a dozen unfinished paintings in my studio. One has wet paint on it which proves that I haven't given up yet.

This morning started off with a trip to Trader Joe's for milk and some low calorie cookies. But, seeing that it was Trader Joe's, I ended up with a few more items. Trivia fact; Trader Joe's is a German grocery chain. They operate under a different name in the EU. And they are very successful, worrying the likes of Walmart and Target.

In the past I may have (or not) talked about the fact that we are now iPhone owners and our land line is gone. In general, it has been a good move. Our phones rarely ring for political ads. Or any other ads. The perpetual commercial calls were the reason for the move to Apple; the FCC Do Not Call list is a joke. It never slowed down the calls and we registered our number at least 3 different times.

But, the move to Apple was not without its problems. I was a devoted Google fan and I had vowed to never own an Apple device. I relented only because Steve Jobs is no longer on the planet And it was time for me to see what new things Apple has to offer...you see, my first computer experience was on an Apple 2E and I liked it. But Apple changed and Jobs' position on open platform drove me to pc's very soon after. In fact it was the snooty attitude of an Apple salesman, back in 1993 that made me exit the store and go directly to an Epson dealer the very same day. (Epson made computers for awhile in the 90's. Today, I have an Epson printer on my desk.)

Back to iPhone problems; we installed the dreaded iOS 8 and then the problems grew. When one of us received a call, both of our phones would ring. We assumed that would be an easy fix; it was not. We were on the phone with Apple service for 3 days, hours at a time. I won't bore you with the details. Finally, a supervisor took over and fixed the problem in 10 minutes! Which makes you wonder why they ever hired the 4 or more techs that had 'handled' our problem up to that time.

Now that I've started this post, feel like continuing, but it is time for lunch. maybe I will post some more after lunch.