A day at the beach

Ya see Arlene's car will not pass the emissions inspection and it has a rejection sticker. The car itself is fine. She has been going back and forth to the dealership. The problem is in the electronics. A few modules have been replaced and still they can't get the readings that they are looking for. Long story short, they (the dealership), had recommended to take the car for a fairly long highway drive. Sunday turned out to be a fairly nice day. I suggested we take a drive to Gloucester. It's about 35 miles by highway from here. Maybe 40 to 45 minutes at least on a Sunday, by highway. Supposedly a long sustained drive will cause the engine computer to gather some info to produce a reading as to how clean the engine is running. Blah blah blah...

This has been going on since March. Once again the car is fine. It runs well. So last Friday Arlene asked me if I wanted to go on a drive on Sunday. "Sure." I replied. What I didn't know was that I was driving. Initially thought I could video some of the ride up, hit one of the two beaches that I know of in Gloucester and take some pictures and video.

Bulletin Bulletin Bulletin! I've just been handed a bulletin bulletin bulletin. As I am writing this I have received a call from Arlene and her car passed! The long drive worked. Now back to our program.

One beach, Good Harbor, is one I am familiar with as back in the 70's my circle of friends and I went there quite a bit. My friend Earl's family had a cottage there. His mother had inherited it and now his sister lives there. It wasn't on the beach though ($$$) but it was a 2 minute walk to the water. What I found amusing about the cottage was that the only place where you had a view of the ocean was from the toilet seat. Anyway we decided to check out another beach as I had never been there. Wingaersheek Beach. I looked up the origin of the name and it's too long and boring to explain. It's of Dutch/German origin concerning some guy who did something back in 1670. For the most part it was a nice day. The temps were in the 50's with a bit of wind and the sky was a clear blue. All in all a nice day.      

Here's an exciting shot of a bit of the parking lot.

Having nothing to do with the beach, as I write this I am listening to the Red Sox home opener. It was almost game time when they announced that at the end of the national anthem there would be a fly over Fenway Park by two fighter jets. I went to my front door guessing from what direction they would be flying towards Boston and sure enough just as the singer sang, "...land of the free..." they flew right over my street. It was pretty neat. And by the time the singer sang, "home of the brave" I could hear the jets on the radio.

Ok here's a short video from Sunday. In advance I apologize for my dirty lens. I did wipe every lens and the inside of the camera but apparently not very well.
   
                                     

A couple of local items going back into the history of my hometown.

Here's a picture of a brick house not too far from where I live. I have driven past this house for what could be a thousand times never knowing anything about it. It is one of the oldest brick houses in the country, built around 1670-1680. The Peter Tufts House. He's the one who's family donated the land that Tufts University is built on. This is not my photo.

In the "I'm moving" dept., Though I still have much to do I have the mover all set up with both moving and moving back. There's still quite a bit to do. Boy has this been an expensive month.  So that's about it for now. I know I have some blog visiting to do and some food to eat.
I'm outta here.

Snow, sun, wind, linguine and meatballs, string beans and salad...and oh yeah wine.

Another odd weather day on Sunday. It went as predicted though. It was much better than the last storm that went, back and forth between impending doom to about an inch.  They just couldn't pin it down. It snowed from early in the morning till about 10. The flakes were quite large, or as a certain ego maniacal presidential candidate would say, "They were hyuuuuuge!"

Apart from that, I packed a few more things on Sunday, then I decided to take a break and watch some television  which really means falling asleep. But that's ok. I still work 3 full days a week and it seems there is always something to do or someplace  to go when I'm not working so I'm not against doing nothing at all sometimes. I don't want to sound like I'm the ambitious type because I'm not, but there are times I just don't want to do anything.
Here are 3 pictures I took of some trees that were freshly covered with snow from a small storm the day before. There's nothing real remarkable about them, It was dawn and I just liked the way the sun played off the snow covered bare branches.

 

 



 

 



 

So at about 3p.m. Arlene tells me that she has to go to the supermarket and I suggest that we buy some hamburger, linguine, some Victoria basil tomato sauce and a few other things and have a nice home cooked meal. It was sunny but windy and chilly.

Long story short we ended up making linguine and meatballs, I had some frozen string beans and we made a salad. And oh yeah a bottle of wine. All quite                                                                   Then we come to the weather. One month ago we hit 77, today April 4, 2016 it is snowing, it's still snowing as I write this at 5:15 p.m. on Monday. It's a slushy mess outside. It's New England and that's what happens around here.

 

I have secured a storage bin and the junk people have taken away all the refuse. I'm working for the next 3 days so moving duties will be put on hold aside from taking a few boxes to my sisters. I wish I could pull a Rip Van Winkle and sleep until all this is over. But then I think about the people I see sleeping on benches while I  have a nice warm bed and food to eat and I come back to Earth and think about how lucky I am.

Ok that's about it with this disjointed post. Now it's time to do some shoveling and then enjoy a nice piece of lasagna that Arlene made while we were making our meal yesterday. Ok where are my boots?

I'm outta here 

 

  

    





 

 

 



On the move

So what have I have been doing. Packing and some more packing and then I did some more packing. As it turns out I will be coming back to this location in about 3 months, I hope. I've always had the option of moving back to this house as the apartment I have been living in is going to be gutted and completely refurbished. My landlords told me they would like me back and for the money it really is my best option. I have checked into what is available this  is still cheaper. Rents ranged from $1600 to $2000 a month. Some had washer dryer hookups none had off street parking. And then there's the fact that Arlene lives next door. I will be living with my sister who is just a 3 minute drive from here. I will be moving at the end of the month. Needless to say this has been a bit of a stressful time for me. My furniture will be in a storage facility very close by. As it turns out there are many around here locally. I've got a junk removal service coming Monday afternoon to lighten my load a bit.
Now the place I will be moving back to is much nicer than the one I am presently living in and I will be gaining a dish washers though that's not really a big deal to me.
It also looks like we will be going back to Martha's Vineyard sometime in June, probably on the 20th. I don't know if we will be able to go again in September, which is our favorite time to go but I am grateful that I can go at all. This is turning out to be a very expensive year but I have been working for 48 years and hopefully I will be able to fully retire early next year. That's a number I am having a tough time wrapping my head around but I am in good health save for my left leg that I hurt on the Vineyard (I know that sounds pretentious) three years ago. For a laugh I checked out apartments on the island. The only way you can rent an apartment is for vacation purposes. There were no residential apartments available. I can't afford a house around here so buying property there is really a joke, just not a funny one. Still if I were rich I would have no problem living there. Home prices ranged from $900,000 to $4,000,000. Ouch! Still they treat us well at the hotel. They know us, greet us warmly and there's always a bottle of wine in our room. One of our favorite things to do, right after we arrive is go to breakfast at Linda Jeans. They serve a terrific breakfast and the place is always packed. The rest of the week we eat at the hotel.

  So that's it for now. Time to have something to eat, then I will be back to catch up on my blogger reading.
I'm outta here.