SUNDAY 123123

[OregonLuvr]

Well I guess I am ready to say goodbye to 2023 It was not a bad year and hopefully 2024 will continue to be good or great. Just popped in for a quick hello, will be back later.

[JudyJB]

Had to move sites yesterday morning and will move again tomorrow morning, then one more one-day move, and I will be in a spot for a week. Not even putting out my picnic table cover until I get in the final spot.

Motor is really, really running rough. It has occasionally been missing, but is now missing most of the time, so I have been trying to find a place to get it fixed. One is a Love's Truck stop that offers truck service, but i am not sure they will work on my gas engine. I called three Ford dealers and none will work on motorhomes!! Strangely enough, I did find a mobile mechanic, and the funny thing is that his address is in one of the houses just west of the dam--If I had a strong enough arm, I could throw a rock over there from the far end of the campground. However, I am going to wait until the 2nd to start calling around because of the holiday. I can also try CoachNet to see if they have any places in this area that will work on motorhomes.

There is a Ford dealer that works on medium-duty trucks, but it is all the way up in Tampa, which is a very long way from here.

Did a few projects, but still have not gotten into my drawer latches yet!! Oh, and i did replace a snap on from front mesh curtains but it turns out I put the snap in backwards!!

[Liz]

Checking in, I guess it’s good evening now. I have been busy getting all my ducks in a row for my upcoming surgery in one week, Jan.8th. I think I am as ready as I can be. Had my pre-op appointment with the anesthetist this week by phone. Nice they can do that as otherwise it would be a 3 hour drive for a 20 minute appointment. Next Sunday, my daughter Heather, will drive up here and take me to her house in Zephyr-hills for the night. Then Monday she will take me into Moffitt cancer Center for surgery. If all goes as planned, I will stay in the hospital one night, then she will drive me back home. My two daughters have collaborated to cover two weeks of caregiving until I go back for follow-up and drain removal. Heather will stay with me until Thursday, then my brother and sister-in-law will take over for a week, then daughterJennifer will come until time for my follow-up and drive me to that. Of course at first I was determined to spare everyone, and take care of myself other than the driving. I wanted to call it conspiring instead of collaborating, and baby-sitting instead of care-giving, but I came to my senses and decided to relax and appreciate it. I know Bob appreciates it. Going to make my brother a to do list for while he’s here. We’ll have fun.

On a lighter note, I am going on a First Day Hike tomorrow with 2 friends from the Village. The guided hike is at the SuwanneeRiver State Park, and should be interesting. I started doing a First Day Hike several years ago, and it has become a tradition. Most State and I think National Parks sponsor the activity. Find one near you…it’s a great way to start the new year.

My gardening activities keep growing. Previously I concentrated on my flower and butterfly garden in the front yard. It has done well and is mostly populated with native perennials. This year I have started focusing on growing fruits and vegetables in my back yard (now that we have mostly cleared the downed trees from Hurricane Idalia and opened up more sunshine.) This effort is mostly in containers, but have added two raised beds. So far the lettuce is the winner and providing all I need for salads.

I’ve been kayaking a few times, but that will be on hold until my recovery is complete.

Happy new year to everyone here, and I pray you will be blessed in the year to come.

[PeggyinCT]

Happy New Year Everybody,
Liz, thanks for the update. I’ve missed your presence on the Forum. Good luck and best wishes for a full recovery after your upcoming surgery. For years I was part of a little group of friends who did First Night, slept over and did a New Years hike.
Often we made a snowman when we came to a clearing. Fond memories.

I’m sitting out New Year festivities tonight. I have some sort of cold and am not fit to party… stay well everybody. Peggy

[BarbaraRose]

Good evening gals!

Well, talk about being confused on days...I went in to work this morning at 8:45 and got things set up for the day. I didn't bring lunch because I was off at 2pm. By 9am, I was wondering where my new co-worker was, but I opened up the shop. I checked the schedule to see who all I was working with today. Well, that was when I realized it is Sunday, not Saturday! So not only was I not off at 2 today, but we don't open on Sunday until 10am!! Oops!! So I was an hour early! I then closed the shop, turned off the lights and went shopping for some things in WM.
It was pretty steady today but I was in a lot of pain from my sciatica and had to sit down often and still got hit with pain in the middle of each haircut.

I stopped and picked up a pizza on the way home from work and ate half of it right away. I will be spending the evening with my cats and my heating pad!

Martha, my mom made a gravy with the juices and some flour, and then some crushed tomatoes, I think. I will have to look at the recipe for sure, but I know it wasn't white gravy. Whatever it was, it was really good!

The lake I grew up on is made up of lots of different sized lakes all connected by channels. Fisherman are always out there early. This year the lake has frozen, thawed, frozen, and thawed again so it is extremely unpredictable and unsafe, yet there are fishermen out there anyways. It can be 4 inches thick in one spot, and only a half inch just a few feet away. That can happen from large fish schooling under the ice, or a spring flowing up, or a current, or for no known reason. The channels don't freeze over until sometime in January usually. The snowmobilers will go really fast thru them even if there is open water and hope they get all the way thru without falling in.
One winter, a friend of my brothers wasn't so lucky, altho he did get out alive. He hired some divers to go down to get his sled and they came back up and asked him which one was his, because there were 6 of them down there! I guess people report them stolen instead of paying to get them out and having to repair the sled. Occasionally cars and trucks go thru the ice on that lake as well. People really take stupid chances!
The ice does get thick enough most years to hold cars and trucks and there will be small "villages" of ice houses in various places around the lake. People plow roads to the villages from the shore.

Have a nice peaceful New Years Eve! Oh! That reminds me! I bought a bottle of Baileys (Salted Caramel) this morning and it is still out in the car. I better go out and get it!

[Bethers]

Thanks for the update, Liz. I'm glad you decided to enjoy being pampered. You're worth it. And I'm sending prayers your way for everything going well and a fast recovery.

I grew up never celebrating on New Year's Eve. I did a couple times in college but it was too crazy lol. My family had a New Year's Day party. It was more about the company and food. So I will go to the pot luck tomorrow. It'll feel more like what I've always enjoyed. I did fix myself some great shrimp in my air fryer tonight. I blame my sister for texting me about the great shrimp she made the other day. Hers was more of a scampi, I think. That would be good, too. I don't think I've found a shrimp recipe that isn't good. Speaking of air frying, I've been using the new one I bought for the tt. It's spoiling me. But I think this week I'll clean it up and put it in it's new home and use my little one in here again.

Peggy, it's always good to have you chime in. Judy, I sometimes miss the day-to-day traveling. I might have to plan some more of that. I'm thinking I'll be back in Iowa a couple months and I need to renew my driver's license in South Dakota in the fall, so who knows lol

Judy, I remember there being bets every spring on some lakes in Wisconsin of the first car or truck to go in whichever lake. I never understood that stupidity.

I hope everyone is enjoying whatever they're doing tonight and here's wishing each and every one of us a wonderful 2024!

[OregonLuvr]

Good evening gals. Had a fairly quiet day, only did a few housekeeping chores. Filed a few papers in the office instead of just piling them up.
Liz sounds like you have everything in place for a quick recovery. Hope everything goes as planned and you will be home recuperating with plenty of help. I am sure that eases Bob's mind.
I went to visit my cousin in Calgary one year in early May. They told me that loren their son went out Ice fishing on some lake and his pickup was now at the bottom. I had never heard of such a thing happening until later when I was relating the story. So, yes I guess it is common.
I will turn on the tv soon to the festivites in New York and I get to watch the ball drop at 9pm....works for me. Otherwise I would totally miss it. Heard several bangs outside, hoping they were just fireworks, but this is Roseburg so could be anything. Emma has ensconced herself under my bed. It is all quiet now but I am sure it will start up again pretty soon.
Heard some news today that made me feel sad....our former manager in Talent is now in hospice care. He was such a nice fellow. Did alot of work around my house for not much money. I knew he had a form of leukemia diagnosed a couple years ago. He has acute leukemia CML. I know Judy you have CLL and they are similar but different. His wife said they didnt think it would be long so they were gathering the family together. He is home but very ill.
Will just have a nice quiet night at home. I have never been a big partier so nothing I miss much of. We used to play cards with neighbors but we stayed off the streets, safer that way. I just turned on my scanner and it is humming....YUP home is a very good place.
HOPE WE ALL HAVE A HAPPY 2024

[JudyJB]

I remember there being a community contest on Houghton Lake where you bought tickets and wrote on them your guess as to what day and hour an old car that was put on the lake would go through the ice and sink. The winner got some sort of prize, and no one cared about the car because it was an old one. Don't know if they still do that, but I would think any gas and oil would have to be removed so it did not pollute the lake. In any case, it had to increase the navigation hazards with all the other vehicles and snowmobiles sunk in the lake!

I remember one year when my kids were about 4 and 7, riding them on our snowmobiles at night around Houghton Lake carrying flares as part of a parade of several hundred or maybe a couple of thousand snowmobiles. Fun, except that the flares dropped chunks of something and burned small holes in our snowmobile suits!!

I do remember fondly the winter carnival we used to go to in the very small town of Port Austin, MI, where my parents had a nearby cottage. They used to flood one street and let it freeze, and they would play broomball on it. This was a lot like ice hockey, but with boots and shoes instead of skates and brooms instead of hockey sticks. Mostly, it was the various men's groups in town. A small town near Port Austin grew more pea beans than anywhere else in the world, so they would have a booth with free bean and ham soup served in paper cups with plastic spoons. (Pea beans are small navy beans.) Even my kids liked it when they were small. And of course, like any winter festival, they had a beer tent that was heated inside.

But Port Austin was directly on Lake Huron, and I don't remember anyone being stupid enough to go out on the ice there, unless it was very, very close to shore or inside the harbor.

[Acadianmom]

I loved Louisiana weather today, it was 75. I have been switching between Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen on CNN and a show about Egypt. Anderson and Andy get too silly to watch them all the time. When I turn the sound off on the TV I can hear some booms far away. I looked out but can't see any fireworks. I finally found some Bailey's Smores a month ago. I should open it and try it.

Liz, hope everything goes well with your surgery. Glad you will have plenty of help.

Considering how much trucks cost people are crazy to drive one on ice. My brother went ice fishing a few times but they quit doing just about everything because of Covid. After being so careful for several years they caught Covid the first time they took a trip to see family.

Barbie, I feel for you having to work with sciatica. I didn't have any pain when I got up but after I walked around a while it started up again.

Happy New Year!

Martha

[snowball]

has anyone solved the problem of saying Happy New Year and Rabbits Rabbits Rabbits at the same time????
good to hear from you Liz it sounds like you have awesome helpers... hoping that it goes as well in real time as it sounds ...cause it sounds like a great plan...
I've never been one to go out for any celebrations although do try to find a ball dropping but not sure I will even do that tonight watching a movie and even though I know how it all ends I don't know the numbers well enough to seek out a channel that will show the ball dropping... although playing games would be a fun thing to do.. I enjoy playing games like Phase 10 Dominoes and other's that it's been so long since I played that I can't remember the name of them I think I heard fire works going off but didn't go to look and see if I could find them sorta think it was city doing it not just the random fire works
good to hear from you as well Peggy. Has it been a good winter for you?
visited with my dd #1 today read scriptures and took a nap after church was going to bake a sweet potato but I slept to long so did chicken alfredo and fettuccine
you all have a great day
sheila