Living the life most people just dream about~

Left off yesterday heading out to the West end of the island to secure spots for Little Sis and her friend to try out SCUBA diving. Good friends out there own a nice dive shop and have excellent Instructors – so I am having them do the Discover SCUBA course for Sis and Jamie (Sis’ friend) Got all of that out of the way, we moseyed down the block to where another friend works. We hadn’t seen them in a while and wanted to check in. As it happened, we caught her getting ready to leave the shop and head down the road to a fun little bar called Rhythms. We have been there many times – so we offered her a ride, which meant we got to spend a little time chatting [and drinking] and catching up. Her husband showed up shortly afterwards and joined us and we spent a wonderful hour or so sitting and drinking and chatting. A friendly couple (Cynthia and Shawn) we like a lot (even though he is a Jar head) 😉 They run the ATV tours available here on the island – a fun adventure for anybody that happens to make it to our little piece of paradise here. Tour takes you up through a small section of rain forest and then high upon a mountain to an old Sugar Mill and some crazy fabulous views. Gecko Island Adventure ATV Tours. (https://www.geckosislandadventures.com/ ) I highly recommend them~! We finally left them and headed back to the middle of the island and what was hopefully to be our last night in a hot stuffy condo.

Another fairly fitful night sleep in due mostly to a stuffy room… we got up, had a small breakfast and got the call we were waiting for — the A/C dude was on his way with our new A/C unit~!! Yay~!! He showed up shortly afterward and set right into work. I got involved a couple of times, when trying to save him some steps, he would ping or call me and ask me to flip breaker switches, or turn the unit on or off. In between – me and my Bride watched 24 and the legend that is Jack Bauer (Chuck Norris ain’t got squat on this guy) Just as the A/C dude was finishing up – I got a call from the guy that was supposed to deliver and set up our new cinema sized TV. He had an emergency come up and would not be able to do it today. Dammit Emmit~! Not a heckva lot I could say except ok, we’ll see you tomorrow. Dang….. we were really looking forward to watching the last couple episodes of Season 7 of 24 on the big screen~! Whadda ya gonna do ?? We finished it up on our little TV and will hopefully get to start Season 8 off on the big screen. Angie made another killer size batch of Spaghetti and I almost OD’d trying to wipe it out……

Belly [overly] full I anxiously await bed time – so we will have a nice cool room to sleep in. Plan tomorrow is to go up to Blues and get some painting done – before heading off to the store and then coming home to wait for the TV. Woo-hoo…. big day huh ? 😉

Good night Ya’ll ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ Thankx for stopping in~!

My Queen and I rolled out after sleeping in a skosh… (that’s a little bit for those of you not used to the vernacular)….. Breakfast was not an option as once again we had to set out to get a blood work up for my Queen. After the allotted coff of cuppee – we headed out for the Island Medical Center. I sat in the truck while my Bride waited for her turn to have blood drawn. I managed to get into a bit of a ‘situation’ even though I sat in the truck minding my own business. An older ‘local’ woman pulled up (after I had been sitting there for WELL over an hour) and told me [not very politely I might add] that I was sitting in a handicap spot. After showing me her handicap card and exchange of some not-so-nice-pleasantries… I finally pulled out and moved to a different spot. I was NOT in a handicap spot, but she called reinforcements from other ‘locals’ walking by and I was not in the mood for an altercation…. so I finally moved. Tired old bat – I should have stood have stood my ground – but to me, it just wasn’t worth it. It pissed me off primarily because I’m pretty sure, if I was a ‘local’ – she wouldn’t have said a word…… but guess I’ll never know for sure….. it still pissed me off none-the-less~!!! 2 hours later, my bride finally emerged (keep in mind this was for a simple blood draw) and away we went.

We went to the local electronics store (that was closed yesterday) and after discussing, a dozen or so questions, running back to the condo for some measurements and then back to the store – we now have a ‘dandy’ new TV being delivered tomorrow, so we can watch out shows almost Cinema style. The debate was between a 55″ and a 65″ TV. (We currently have a 32″. Measurements dictated we should get the 55″ because the 65″ would require moving furniture and rearranging stuff. We went back to the store and promptly bought the 65″. Yes, you read that right. Everything in sound mind and logic said we should get the 55″….. but my bride, in her infinite wisdom, knew, (especially after a 8 drink lunch at Blues) that I would not be happy with anything less than the 65″~!! The Store had an 86″ model for sale, but even my booze induced feel good state, knew that would be a huge mistake ( I think) 😉 So now we can watch all of our shows on the ‘BIG SCREEN’~!! Woo-Hooo~!! Wasteful ? Yes. Completely unnecessary? Yes. Gonna get it anyway? YES~!! 😉 What the hell, we are spending our kids inheritance… we had to work for it – so can they~!! 😉 Finally got everything in place – I wanted to head to the West end of the island to secure a slot for my little Sister and her Bestie ( another cool, hip, up to date term, that you old farts probably don’t know, for best friend) 😉 to make a SCUBA dive with me……

Well crap….. just getting good and started and already at my limit….. so tune in tomorrow, same bat time, same bat channel………

Good Night Ya’ll …………….. Thankx for stopping in~!

Rolled out this morning to clouds and a fabulous breeze…. fans are just barely making sleep possible and coming out to a very warm stuffy living space. Opened the doors up for some of that magnificently wonderful cool morning breeze to cool the place off a bit. A early morning doctors appointment, even though it is officially a holiday, meant no breakfast here. We got dressed and headed for the Doc’s office…. arriving a little bit early in anticipation of hopefully good news. They got the vitals out of the way (weight, BP, etc.) and we were soon called into the office. Doc was all smiles as she sat us down and started reading through the report. We didn’t understand some of it – but Doc was smiling and said she could not be happier with what she was seeing~!! The biggest concern was the spot on the lung, and the CT Scan confirmed the same diagnosis from years ago when the first time we saw it. It was a harden benign dark lump (about 5cm) that posed no threat. Exactly what it is cannot be determined without surgery, but tests confirms there is zero danger to it. Woo-Hoo…. happy to hear that, to say the least~!! Doc said, that everything considered, my Queen was actually in pretty good shape….. and while I am elated to hear that, I am not going to stop pushing, until she completes her physical and a ‘woman’ check up. I even brought up a couple of things to Doc that I wanted her to make note of so they get checked out during the physicals. Nothing serious, but things that I want checked on her. Doc smiled, put in the notes and agreed to look at. That done, we had to head out to start blood work for my Queen. Drove across island to where that was to happen – just to find out apparently, those folks, do celebrate Presidents Day. With nothing better to do – we decided to check out a local place called CHOPS, to get some breakfast. I guess this place is the closest thing the island has to an Ihop….. or Ihob depending on how ‘up’ you are on the news. Small, dingy looking place. Not dirty, but not what I call clean. One of the things about a lot of the places on the island that I am still struggling with. If you are a clean freak or maybe a bit of a germaphobe….. you probably won’t want to live on an island. I could go into a ton of details, but because I’m about at my limit….. let’s leave it at that for now. If you have questions… reply to this and I’ll be happy to answer them. I got me a meat lovers omelet with hash browns and my Bride got a short stack. My omelet was unremarkable and my hash browns (when I got them half way through the omelet) was good, but amazingly cold. Angie said her short stack was acceptable.

We stopped by an electronics store (Since we’re going to be here at least another 14 months, I want a bigger TV) but it was closed (more on that later) – back at the condo, we opened up doors long enough to cool the place off a little bit and settled in, secure in the knowledge, there is nothing [physically] wrong with my Queen, 😉 for an afternoon of the amazing Jack Bauer and the drama fest that is 24~! Trying for blood work again tomorrow morning…. we’ll let you know how that goes….

Good Night Ya’ll = = = = = = Thankx for stopping in~!

Too hot and stuffy to write much of anything tonight. Today was as slow and quiet as you could ever asked for. Condo got unbearable stuffy that a couple of times we opened doors for some kind of breeze just to try and cool it down a little bit. If everything goes according to plan, we will only have to deal with it another 3 days…….

Doctors appointment tomorrow for Angie – supposed to have CT Scan results back. Keeping fingers crossed. She also has some follow up appointments, blood work, schedule physical and other stuff. Gots to get her healed up~!

Stopping here…. no pictures tonight.

Good night Ya’ll – – – – – – Thankx for stopping in~!

After a fitful nights sleep ( I think maybe I was ‘too’ tired) I rolled out around 06:30 to clouds and finally a little bit of a breeze — fitful night sleep may have also been in part because of a very stuffy room….. who knows~~ I made it up to Blues promptly at 09:00 and loaded up and hauled off 17 bags of garbage generated from the day before…… little bitty ole truck was plumb full~! Came back to the condo and had a [little bit too big] of a breakfast that Angie had made. Sure tasted good though. Before breakfast could get good and settled – we headed back up to Blues – stopping for another load of ice before we got there. We were there plenty early, so we took our time and set the bar up for what hopefully was going to be another action packed night. The band Hudson and the Hoo Doo Cats showed up, got set up and were playing by 15:00 ( 3:00 – 6:00) Blues shuts down early on Saturday’s because they don’t want to have to put up with a bunch of rowdy drunks 😉 The band sounded decent and there were a fair amount of folks showed up to hear them – but nothing like Blues was expecting – which translated into a really quiet afternoon for me and Angie…… By most standards the afternoon was a success, just not what they had planned for though~ Hey – you win some, you lose some — and move on~!

We got the place cleaned up and closed down, had a couple of drinks with Jim, Deb and the staff and headed out. We thought we were hungry and Mickey D’s sounded good, so we swung out past our local golden arches and a mere 32 minutes later was pulling out of the drive through. (actually a little bit quicker than most trips) Back at our stuffy condo – and still no usable breeze – some fries and fish sandwich consumed and here we be. I am looking forward to our ‘day off’ tomorrow. Sleeping without worrying about not getting up in time for something – and not have to worry about being somewhere at any given time…. one of the things I really like about being retired…… it’s just that here lately, I haven’t got to do a lot of that…… it’s all good….. I’m bringing most of it on myself – so can’t/won’t/not complaining…… 😉

Tired, a bit of headache and ready for a shower…. I’m gonna leave it with you….. couple of pix from today and some random shots…….

Good night Ya’ll – – – – – – Thankx for stopping on~~~!

JUST back from Blues….. Wow what a night. In the year plus we have been here, tonight was absolutely hands down the busiest I have ever seen our little place. There was probably at one time 175 – 200 people there…… We showed up at 15:00 with ice to get all the beer iced down and ready for quick turn over…. it stayed pretty calm until about 17:00 – when all hell broke loose…… and stayed that way until last call at 20:30. I got my cardio in for the year….. My Queen spent the bulk of the evening hawking Jell-O shots and did her usual outstanding job of selling every single one of them – so probably 120 or so…… she finally made it back to the bar to relieve me a little bit. The band playing tonight was a state side band called Mama’s Black Sheep. Not my particular brand of music but they did a presentable job and have a hellva a following. The place was hopping for a solid 5 hours…… Not going into a lot of detail, primarily because I’m so tired I don’t know how to act. We came back to a very hot stuffy condo…… opened up both sets of doors for that nice cool breeze, only to find there ain’t one……. well butter my butt and call me a biscuit~! So here we sit – sweaty, hot and tired….. I’m goin to put up the handful of pictures I took tonight and then head for a MUCH needed shower and some sleep, as I need to be back up at Blues by 09:00 to haul off a small mountain of trash that we accumulated tonight, before we show back up at noon for another ‘big draw’ band – Hudson and the Hoo-Doo Cats….. or some kind of nonsense like that. I’m curious to see if the draw is as big as tonight was. One of the things that made tonight more impressive, was the fact there was what is supposed to be a pretty sweet Jazz festival going on out on the West end of the island as well….. so Blues held their own for the night. Either way – 3 days in a row, working like we weren’t retired….. bound to make for a good nights sleep for a night or two~~~~~ 😉

Good night Ya’ll * * * * * * * * * Thankx for stopping in~!

Woke up this a.m. after a less than stellar nights sleep. I didn’t even make into the bathroom before it hit me, that our humble little abode was warm and stuffy…… that can’t be right…..A/C was just fixed~! Or so I thought…….a well placed phone call help me understand that ‘they weren’t sure it if the fix would hold’…… I told them I was not happy about spending $ 275.00 for 30 minutes work with nothing to show for it. It took a bit, but I am supposedly getting “some” of my money back…… Yea- right~! I’m not holding my breath. I had to take off for my symposium in town, but before I left, I called ‘my’ guy and he said he could take a look at it that afternoon. I went back into my meeting and during a break he called me to say he would be there about 2:00 or so. Perfect~! Just enough time to finish my meeting and get back to the condo. I stopped and picked up some flowers for my Bride for Valentines Day. We stopped doing the cards thing after we retired, but wanted her to have at least a little bit something since I was not able to take her out for a nice dinner. My AC guy showed up a little bit before 3:00. After 20 minutes or so of looking into it – he told me he was not going to waste his time or my money doing a system check. He said it was obvious a new charge would not do any good. I asked him for a quote on a new compressor and he said I’d have it by this afternoon.

We took off shortly afterward and headed up to Blues to help out as bar backs. Blues had a Valentines Day special of Prime Rib and fixin’s, Champagne or Wine and a nice dessert. My original plan was to take my Queen up there for it…… technically I did…… just not exactly how I had planned. 😉 They had a nice turn out for it and while there was a couple of times it got really busy, over all, it wasn’t to bad keeping things in order. Angie took care of the folks having the special while I backed the bar and helped occasionally clearing dishes. Finally finished, we came back to our stuffy warm condo….. My estimate was in my email when I got here. I little bit higher than I thought, but not what I call out of hand. A previous conversation with the owner said, he was fine with me going with ‘my’ guy and making whatever call I felt necessary. So – I have accepted the estimate and if the AC dude is good to his word – we should have AC a week from today…… guess we’ll just have to improvise to stay cool until then…… AHHhhh Island Life~~ I have got me some hot dogs boiling on the stove…. I’m gonna inhale a couple of them and get me a much needed cool shower….. hopefully some sleep and get ready for what should be a long kick a$$ day tomorrow. If tomorrow goes like I expect – probably won’t be a post….. we’ll see.

Good night Ya’ll – – – – – – Thankx for stopping in~!

Crawled into the sack pretty quick last night….. almost as soon as I got my FB post up – I thought I was going to pass out….. but in a tired kind of way. I couldn’t keep my eyes open. If I didn’t know better, I think maybe my Queen roofied my a$$….. but I wasn’t kidnapped or taken advantage of [dammit] – so I guess maybe the Vodka from starting drinking at 2:00 in the afternoon kicked in and had something to do with it. Any-who, I crashed and considering we had no A/C, didn’t do too bad sleeping. Got up once to whizzz around zero-dark-thirty and stumbled back into bed and wound up sleeping until almost 07:00. Yay me~ After I got good and woke up – I let Jim know we would not be up for painting, because I had to call and harass people trying to get our A/C fixed. I never got a return call from ‘my’ guy – so I called the outfit the owner likes……. they answered and I told them my problem and they said no worries, they would be there about 2:00p.m. They started to hang up and I said “Uhhhh….ummm…. excuse me… would you like my name or address ?” OH YEAH~!! That would be a good idea~! Yessir – I got a real good feeling about this outfit. Name and address given – I went back to updating my spreadsheet from the meeting last night.

My Queen whupped up a dandy breakfast of eggs and some left over ham from the other night. A little bit dry and chewy, but still had a good taste and went well with the eggs and hash browns. Spent the rest of the day on spreadsheets. It got to be 3:00 and no word yet from the stellar A/C company I had called, so I rang them back up. “We’re on our way right now~! We will be there in less than 10 minutes….. 101 Granada Del Mar, correct” Yes – I’ll be waiting. They did show and set into work… 30 minutes later… they were asking who is going to pay the bill….. That would be me. They said the compressor on the roof needs replaced, but for now, we tightened and adjusted the system and added a shot of Freon – so you should be good to go for a while“. Yay…. I think. While I paid for today’s repair ($275.00) – I told the dude – compressor replacement was going to be an owner thing – and he needed to talk directly to the owner. Happy with payment in hand…. they left. A little less money in the pocket, but at least we were comfortable in our abode again~~ 🙂 Can’t hardly wait to hear from the owner….. that should be a fun conversation. Rest of the day was pretty uneventful. My Bride made an awesome batch of Spaghetti and I in true fashion ate about 3 times more than I should have – but damn it was good~!

I have a symposium to attend tomorrow for 3 hours for Fish With a Vet USVI – then me and Angie are heading up to Blues to work as Bar Backs for their Valentines day Event (romantic huh). We will be helping Blues out the next 3 days in a row as bar backs for expected big crowds because of the entertainment scheduled – so not sure if I’ll be up for posting every night or not…. so keep checking~!

Happy Birthday Joe~!

Good night Ya’ll < < < < < < < Thankx for checking in~!

Rolled out this a.m. a skosh earlier than I would have liked…. but I had to pee so bad I could taste it…….. as I scurried toward my bathroom a glance at the clock told me it was quarter till 06:00….. a fact negated by the fact that, at this time of the year – it is still blacker than old Coles a$$ outside…….. I never really understood the depth of that statement – but it was a favorite of my Dad’s, and like many other of his ‘insights’ – I use it a lot. I have discovered, ironically, there is one huge similarity between living in the desert and living on an island…… The sun comes up AND disappears…like that [[snapping fingers]]….. this time of year – at 05:45, there is NO sunlight….. by 06:15 – you can drive without headlights~! That flat horizon out there is like a light switch. Kinda cool actually, but it sure does mess with an internal clock~! We both got up and moving and was out the door by 08:15 to be up at Blues for more fence painting. I spent an hour or so working on a project to light up a small Weber grill mounted up on the roof at Blues. It is a solar powered set up I am working with and lots of quirks don’t let me know if I’m doing any good until after dark or not. I have the grill about 1/2 way wired, but will have to wait for dark fall before I can do much else. I finally finished as much of that as I dared and set in painting. My Queen and I both spent the last couple of hours painting, wrapping up shortly before 11:00 and the place opened to the public. Afterwards, we sat and had 2 or 5 drinks and a bite to eat before heading back to the comfort of our condo. Sat down to enjoy the adventures of Jack Bauer on 24, before we had to pack up and head for the CRABBS meeting (local dive club). We arrived early enough to get the new PA system set up and take our place at he sign in table. Nice turn out – probably 60 people…. lots of new members, which is always a good thing. Tonight was a [dive] Trivia contest and it appeared everybody thoroughly enjoyed it. Evening finally over, we came back to discover that our air conditioner decided to not work so well any more…. I swear – even in paradise… it’s always something…… so instead of going back up to paint in the morning, we will hang out and try to get our A/C fixed. Kinda sad actually….. there is a wonderfully cool breeze of about 72° blowing out there, and we will have to try and get some sleep in a 79° apartment. We literally cannot open the windows for the breeze, as the salt in the air will reek havoc, with anything in the condo…… Ahhh – Island life. So no painting tomorrow while we try and get the A/C fixed…. Damn shame for the middle of Winter Huh ? 😉

Good night Ya’ll – – – – – – Thankx for stopping in~!

Rolled out this morning to the pinging of my phone…. I forgot to mute the ringer and the dive club I belong to (who was up this morning entirely too friggin’ early) was having an Instant Message meeting and my phone sounded like the bell at a prize fight…… I swear, I don’t remember what people did before that infernal phone….. guess they had to wait to actually talk to each other……. It looks like our dive club is making huge leaps and bounds to move the club forward – but I am officially sick to death of all the instant messages…… oh well, guess I’m stuck with it for the rest of the year…… that or try and get on board with instant messaging….. LOL, that was funny – even for me~~ 😉

Took my Bride for her CT Scan early this afternoon…… and in typical island fashion, it will be another week, before she gets to talk to Doc about the results….. kinda like the military…. hurry up and wait~! So for those of you that are curious, please be patient as it will be another week before we get to talk to Doc about the scan. Some good news, today was one of the better days my Bride has had in the past several weeks, so maybe she has turned that corner. I don’t want to say anything too loud in hopes I do not jinx it…… but it sure was nice to see her with most of her color back and not sounding like she is trying to cough up a lung~! She was even up for stopping by the grocery store on the way back to pick up a couple of things. We came home and relaxed with some more 24, before she made us a tasty slice of ham, some carrots and smashed taters……. Back now to enjoying the waves crashing in on the beach and a nice ‘cool’ sea breeze blowing in on us (73°)

Plans for working out West got side tracked by illness and now cancelled all together…… I was trying to feel bad about it, but the person wanting the work done insists it’s a “good thing” the work didn’t happen and she will have some more work for me in about a month – so we have shifted focus and are heading back up to Blues in the morning to resume painting on the fence. I’m gonna do some lighting work Miss Deb wants done….. then back to the fence line painting.

We have a CRABBS club meeting tomorrow night, which from recent intel says is gonna be a whopper – supposedly SRO for the event. It’s nice to see the club changing direction like that. I just hope this old timer can keep up with the ‘kids’ running it now~~ 😉 No new pictures… so for now….. some you may have not seen yet…..

Good Night Ya’ll > > > > > Thankx for stopping in~!