Mornn’ all. 7am as I start driveling.
First things first: to dispel any concerns about my final typo-ed post last night, the fever was 100.5 = one hundred point five. So hot for me, but certainly not dangerous in and of itself. Stoopit typos.
Moving? Moi?
When late wife and I bought the lake house in 2001 so age mid 40s we figured that would do us until we became infirm and made Swampy’s move® in our turns. After all, I now had total job security at a new and much more robust airline, a big pay raise, this was a newish growing community, etc. What could go wrong? 6 months later I was unemployed and had to change careers for almost a decade. But I did have a really big mortgage. Oops.
That all eventually got resolved and then a few years later we had to move to greater Dallas or Miami to follow the reinstated flying job. So in our mid 50s we bought the condo on the water near the beach down here. Big enough to last all our years, small enough to be sensible for old folks, lots of elders living there now proves it’s doable. By then MIL was scooter-bound so I even spent time figuring out how much of daily shopping, erranding, etc., we could do on a scooter. The answer was almost everything. Yaay. This is our last move!! At least until the Grim Swampy shows up to insist on one more. Boooo!
Late wife’s advanced metastases show up next month. She’s screwed; it’s just a question of how soon. I’m gonna be old alone, or at least without her. Against all odds she lasts 7 years, not 7 months. But there I am in 2021 age 62 in our condo alone. Which complex by now is showing its age, having been built in the 1970s. Sea level rise also is more of the thing, as are other concerns about condo ownership I’d learned along the way. Time to lean towards moving again but with no particular urgency.
Then HL shows up. She’s willing to live here for a vaguely-defined “temporarily”, but once we’re together then moving is high on her list. For her own reasons she wants a rented apartment. I’d independently come to the same conclusion for an overlapping but still distinct set of reasons. Her urgency eventually overcame my sloth and a year later we happily move together to an apartment and sell the condo.
Her view since switching from owning to renting about 12 years ago is that the idea of staying in one place is vastly overrated and is just a trap. Renting, and staying possession-lite so moving is logistically easy, not hard, is much smarter. If you get bored where you are, move! Whether that’s a new street address, a new zip code, or a new state. Management or neighbors at the apartment you’re in is now pissing you off? Move two blocks away to a different building! Neighborhood declining or getting too gentrified or you’re just bored with the tired familiarity of it all? Move to a different zipcode! Weather getting too hot or cold or politics too stupid? Move to a different state!
Since she and I moved together to that apartment I’ve made two moves within this zipcode. One solo to Roomie Mike’s house temporarily, and again solo to this apartment a mile-ish from HL’s.
I could imagine being here another 10 years to age 75 or even well beyond unto my own encounter with Swampy’s move. There are a few decrepit oldies here, and since they tend to stay inside more than the average residents, there are probably a bunch more than I think there are.
I could also imagine moving again when this lease is up in Sep '25. Heck I could move next month if I wanted to.
So overall, I sorta reject the implied premise that moving is bad or to be avoided. I sure used to think that. I don’t now. And despite my recent spending spree on furniture and what not you’ve all seen the pix of, I now own barely 5% of the stuff I did at the lake McMansion we sold just a dozen years ago. I am also paying some attention to what I use and what I don’t and will start culling this stuff back in a year or so. It helps of course that except for a few friends, I have no ties to any humans here. As we used to say in the military upon a transfer elsewhere: “I’ve got a whole bunch of friends at the next place; I just don’t know their names. Yet.” What friends I do have on Earth are scattered all over it; not much concentrated in this metro area, much less this zipcode.
FWIW … The people I’ve known who remained in the big family house after their spouse died all ended up feeling really trapped there a few years later then downsized and moved. And once resettled, everyone has said they wished they’d done it much sooner than they did. Not hastily after spouse died, but in due course as a deliberate planned transition to the next phase of their life.
I suppose a bottom line to my life at least might be: Saying “this is my last move” is simply taunting Fate to prove you wrong. So don’t do that. Certain tigers should not be poked with sticks.
Switching gears:
I’m not feverish this morning but still feel stuffy and like shit. Uggh. And now I’ve had to change from sweats to a t-shirt cuz suddenly I’m flashin’.
And as to y’all …
Flyboy good luck with the painting today.
FCM and Sticky Buns: There are, of course two issues to stairs. The obvious one is “Can you negotiate them at all?” Not easy bordering on impossible with a walker, one bum leg, etc.
The other one that tends to get overlooked is “The injuries from any fall on stairs are 10x to 100x more severe than the same fall on a flat floor.” How much do you want to tempt Fate with that risk 2 or 20 or 30 times per day depending on your house layout?
So MIL is right that you’re running a risk with the laundry downstairs. And FCM is right that the risk may never mature into an actual problem. Decisions decisions.
For sure the more you trudge up and down stairs the farther into old age your stair capability will last. Finding a way to incorporate stairs into my routine is really must-do. This building’s geometry and security arrangements don’t make that easy. My last building (HL’s place) was much more conducive to voluntary stair climbing, and the condo was great for it; stairs were the path of least resistance to my 3rd floor unit so stairs are what I almost always used.
Oh yeah, and FCM congrats on the new icemaker. Some stuff is just important for us RDOS’s and the right ice for cocktails / mocktails is one of those important things 
Back to today …
Need to eventually go out and procure meds. And make some phone calls. Uug. Donwanna.
Cheers all!! Moan forth! ArrrrrGGH!!1!!
