weekday update

Good morning.
A chilly 44 this morning, but going up to 70 this afternoon.   :-)
I just got back from the fitness center. I did 20 minutes on the elliptical machine.

  They have top quality equipment at the fitness center. The elliptical has a digital screen where you can program different trails to 'virtually' walk on , set different parameters for you workout, and even watch TV to pass the time. That's what I usually do.   :-)
And here's a pic of the morning sun I took of our Sheep mountains yesterday morning when I did the neighborhood walk.

And here's another pic of our outside Christmas lights when it wasn't so dark...

And a few pics of our indoor decorations....

Had to go to 4 different places to find decent looking 4inch poinsettias.

And our only Christmas Tree. Just 3 ft tall sitting on our Kitchen counter.  That's all the Christmas Tree we need/want.    :-)
As more neighbors are back for the winter, we've been doing a bit more socializing. Had drinks with a couple on our patio last Sunday, and was at a patio party across the street on Tuesday. But neighbors come and go out here. We have one couple currently in Jamaica  and from there they go to Germany. They'll be back later next month. Another couple is in Houston, then go to Illinois until later next month.
And there's been talk of expanding our community center. I'll be interested to see the plans for that. We have a very nice center with a kitchen, swimming pool, exercise room, class rooms and a small ballroom. It's a nice benefit to our community. And best of all, the expansion wouldn't cost me a dime. They wouldn't need to do a special assessment for it because of our large reserve we currently have. Every home in our community that's bought or sold has to pay a fee to the HOA. We paid when we bought our house. It's a fixed percent of the sale price. So the buyer and seller pay. That money is used for improvements to our community. Like the Pickleball courts they put in 3 years ago and the expanded kitchen last year. And with over 2000 homes in our community, the fees add up!
It's an added expense when you buy or sell, but it helps our community stay looking up to date without having to ask for a special assessment which no one likes.
And with that, it's time for a shower and head over to the Fiesta Casino. Yesterday during their Wed. free slot tournament, Craig made it over the threshold! Now we go back to see if he made it high enough to win any money!

getting ready for Christmas

Good morning.
Our warmer than normal temps are just about over. Yesterday we hit a record high of 78. Today we'll be around 71. Tomorrow...64. But during that beautiful weather, I did manage to get the outside decorated....

It's so nice to be out putting up lights without my fingers getting numb from the cold.    :-)
The downside of putting up lights out here is it's hard to see where I'm placing them from all the brilliant sunshine. It was easier to place strings of lights back in mostly cloudy dreary Michigan.   :-)
But, after it got dark and I lit the lights, I think I did okay.   :-)
In other news.....
I use my phone now for taking most of my pics. This phone has a good camera, and I always have the phone and not so much the old Sony Cybershot camera.  Anyway, I had noticed that when I go to download the pics to my puter, I'm getting less and less storage left on the phone. I was down under 1 GB of storage. Now, I do delete the pics off my camera when I'm down loading them into the puter, so I couldn't understand what was using so much storage. Well, I finally figured out it was the cached data! I had over 2 GB of cached data! I didn't realize I need to clear it regularly. And I don't access the internet with my phone that much! But I'll have to keep an eye on it as I just checked and in 4 days, I already have 20 MB of cached data.
So anyway, today is haircut day. I'm getting shaggy. Or as shaggy as one with thin fine hair can get.   :-)
So that's it for today.

more pics again! and my new Chromebook

Good afternoon.
Absolutely beautiful weather this week as we are running around 80 all week. Nearly 15 above normal!  Here's some more pics from this morning's walk....

The rising sun lighting up these odd looking clouds. The cloud formations here in the valley are a lot different from back in Michigan. They say it's because the valley is nearly surrounded by mountains and they affect how clouds form.

And I know I post way too many pics of our Sheep Mountains, but over a year later, I still don't get tired of looking at them as they change throughout the day.
We had a very nice Thanksgiving with Turkey and all the regular fixins. And our free Pumpkin Pie from our Realtor.
And today we bought some Pansy's and Ornamental Cabbage.

 They will do well here through the winter and add some cherry color when other bushes in the yard go dormant. They should bloom all winter through probably March or April.

Also, I shopped Black Friday!
No, I didn't actually go out to the stores.....
I went online and got a great deal!
I decided my big old 17 inch laptop was too much to take on our cruise, so I had been looking online for a larger tablet than the old 7 inch Nexus I've had for 5 years now.

Well, That's when the Black Friday previews started coming out. And, Best Buy had a great deal on a very highly rated Chromebook. This was a Black Friday Doorbuster deal only available in the store which opened at 5pm Thanksgiving, or online that day. After several online 'chats' I found out online meant 12 midnight Central time. So I stayed up until 10pm Pacific, and went online and snagged it! Lucky too, as by morning, it was sold out, and the stores didn't open until 5pm. I'm assuming they had a limited number in the store too since it was advertised in their ad. But it was nice I didn't have to wait in line to 'maybe' get one. It's a nice sized 11.6 inch screen. Has an Intel Celeron processor, 4GB Memory, and a 32 GB flash drive. All this for only $119.00 .
This will fit in my carry-on and be much more portable than my huge 17 inch laptop.  Which, I'll still take with me on road trips, but this Chromebook will be great for flying and cruising.
Well, I think that's it for now...

some community pics

Good morning.
When we go shopping, we often buy a pint container of pre-cut up fruit. I gave us a little variety of fruits at a reasonable price of $2.49.  Well, that price went up to $2.99 then this last week, $3.49. That's when I said it was to expensive for what we're getting. So, I decided to buy whole fruit and cut them up myself. I bought cantaloupe, strawberries, pineapple and grapes. Cleaned, sliced and put them in containers. I filled 6 of them. Here's 3....

The cost for the fruit was $11.00. That comes out to about $1.85 each. I knew doing it myself would be cheaper, but for $2.49 the difference wasn't bad since we don't always eat fruit every day. But these should last a week, and we'll eat them by then. And my cost will be $11 instead of $21.   :-)
And on my walk yesterday morning, I went out to the perimeter of our community for a change. Here's a few pics....

This is on the corner of Aliante Blvd and Elkhorn Rd. The main intersection in front of our community. Across the street, is the Aliante Casino Hotel.

And of course, these are the Spring Mountains just to the north of our community

And yesterday evening, while we were out front enjoying cocktails and the weather, I took this pic of the sunset.

Today, we pic up our free pie our Realtor gives out every Thanksgiving. So nice of them.    :-)
Well, that's it for now.

We got an Instant Pot

Good afternoon.
It's been nearly a week since my last post, but that's because I haven't done anything.    :-)
I've been either walking every morning or going to the fitness center. Later, after Craig gets up, we walk again. Bought our 3rd turkey today along with a ham. They had shank hams for $.98 lb. We'll have that for Christmas and save out other turkeys for January and Feb. Out Realtor is again offering pies for Thanksgiving, and we'll pick ours up on Wed.  Very nice of them to do this every year. But it does keep their business in our minds.
After that delicious beef stroganoff we had at our neighbors last Sat. we decide to get us a pressure cooker. After much research, I ordered on on Amazon.

It's an Instant Pot Duo 60 6qt 7-1 programmable cooker.  Our neighbors beef was so tender and that's what she cooked it in. We'll give it a try tomorrow. I'm thawing a beef roast as I write this. The recipe booklet that came with the cooker says it'll cook in just 40 minutes. I'm anxious to see how it turns out. What's nice with this cooker is 1, it's electric. 2, it's all digital/ programmable. 3, it's a lot safer than the old pressure cookers in that it won't start unless the top is properly secured. So it should be virtually impossible for the top to blow off.   Let's hope it works as expected.    :-)
I guess that's it for right now...

picture time

Good morning.
A cloudy fall morning here in the desert.
Here's some pics from my early morning walk......

The mountains in these pics are the Sheep Mountains just north of our community. The golf course with ponds snake through the community. Makes for a nice picturesque walk.
We had dinner at a neighbors yesterday, Beef Stroganoff. Just about the most tender beef I've eaten in a long time. She said she cooked it in a pressure cooker. It was delicious!
And our Bells of Fire bushes got a bad infestation of tiny aphids I think. I sprayed them good. I can't believe all the bugs we have out here in the desert. But then I guess putting in golf courses, parks, ponds, and landscaping has made this desert much more habitable for more than just us humans.   :-)
Bought 2 Turkeys so far. Winco has the cheapest prices in the area at $.48 lb. Will buy another one next week since they only let you buy one at a time. We have a small chest freezer and we both love turkey and leftovers and you can't get any kind of meat as cheap as turkeys this time of year.
Well, I thinks that's all I know for now....

insurance and food

Good afternoon.
A beautiful week here in the desert. Sunny with highs in the 70's and lows in the low 50's.
I finally got insurance for next year. Went on Healthcare.gov and had a choice between just 2 companies. But that's better than a lot of people around the country. Got a plan just about like the one I had last year. It's an HMO which means I have to go to in-network doctors and hospitals, and it has a $6,600.00 deductible. Fortunately, I'm currently healthy and hopefully won't need to use it. I have just one year until I can get Medicare.   :-)
But happily, the price is less than I pay for my current insurance, so the savings will be nice. Once I get approved and get official notice from the company, I'll need to find another primary care physician. It's good I have enough blood pressure meds to last until the beginning of the year.
We haven't done much the last week. Bought some new shoes and a few shirts. Been house cleaning and just enjoying retirement. A neighbor brought us over some chicken enchilada soup. It is delicious! Another neighbor has invited us over to dinner tomorrow. We have some very nice neighbors!
I forgot to post, but the episodes of Who Wants to be a Millionaire that we watched the tapping earlier this year, were broadcast on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday this week. I almost forgot they were for Veterans week. We saw one episode Tuesday, and were able to see us in the audience. It was very cool to see us on TV.   :-)
Now, we were in the right end of top row  behind the host Chris Harrison, so we looked very fuzzy and dark, but we could tell it was us! Green shirt and orange shirt.
Anyway, working on details of our winter cruise. There are a lot of things to take care of with a cruise. But I've been scouring their website and I think I've got all my I's dotted and T's crossed.
Well, that's it for now!

Oceanside CA trip

Good afternoon.
We've just returned from Oceanside CA.
 Spent 4 nites there at a Ramada hotel. It was close to the transit station, an easy walk to the beach, and a good price.   :-)
2 days we took the Coaster train down to San Diego.

One day we did a walking tour of the city which included little Italy and the Gaslamp district. The second day, we went down there to do the 2 hour harbor cruise.

I got a groupon for the cruise before we left. It's regularly $60 for 2, but they had it for $29 and they were running a special for $5 off any groupon. So we both had the 2 hour cruise for just $24.   :-)

It was really a nice tour. San Diego is the second largest Navy port in the US. We saw  a lot of ships including several in dry dock and one that they were building brand new. It was a very informative tour.

Our last day was spent in Oceanside were they have this nice long pier...

There is even a restaurant at the end. A lot of people fishing on the pier, and we watched a lot of surfers.

The last day was quite cloudy, but mild with temps in the low 70's.
It was a great trip! A long drive, as it was about a 6 hr drive from our house, and there is a lot of traffic in the greater LA basin. But we made it there and back safe, so as I always say...a good trip!   :-)