Randomness

My wife and I just passed 41 years of being married. Kinda hard to believe, but there are pictures to prove it.

New flooring in the house - living room, dining room and hallway. So happy to get rid of that nasty old carpet. Dog hates the new flooring. It's laminate and he's at least 16 years old, weak and losing muscle mass and hardly has the strength to keep his legs underneath his body if the surface is slippery.

Trying to finish pruning my fruit trees before bud-break. Learning that at 65 years old, I really shouldn't be climbing around a tree with a running chain saw. Only 6 more trees to go.

Took on another project at work as PM. Now managing two projects plus mentoring a new PM and doing corporate things as they come up.

Still have to get both personal and my corporate taxes done. Once again, need to file for extensions for both.

Gathering courage to decide when to retire for good. I retired from the USAF 19 years ago, been working in the civilian world since, but increasingly I'm finding it less and less rewarding. So, I turn 66 in October, financial wizard says that's the best time to start drawing Social Security plus our retirement funds, so sometime, within a year of that birthday, I'll retire for good. Looking forward to doing things I choose to do for reasons that are meaningful to me. Maybe some new avocations. How about making jewelry sized for trans women? Thinking rings, bracelets/bangles, necklace chains that don't look like chokers, that kind of stuff.

Liz

Going on 44 years this go round, come June 21. (5 years for the first and unsuccessful try.)

I was forced into retirement in 2012 - don't like it one bit but health keeps from the job market.

We have a new puppy (16 months) and it is tearing up our carpet so project 1 this Summer is a new wood floor in LR/DR.

I thought you retired from the USAF - you don't have retirement income from that part of your life?

As for SS, apply as soon as you reach age 66. There is no penalty after age 66 so it makes sense to start collecting as soon as possible.

I have done my taxes, just waiting for mid-April to file.

Take care, Liz.

I shop on Joom for rings. Lots of VERY nice stuff, and it comes in big finger sizes a lot. And for a dollar, well, some of it is so cheap, if the occasional purchase doesn't work out, no sweat, you lost a dollar.

Necklaces, well, you buy cheap schlock for the chain. Two pair of utility knife/multi tool pliers and you open and close a couple of links and presto the necklace is transgender sized easily.

Bracelets. Dollar store elastic rope is great for making expandable sized bracelets out of more confining ones.

Only takes a marginal amount of time and interest really. Putting on make up is harder.

Congrats on the 41. Truly incredible for anyone actually transgender or otherwise. I made it to 27 and it seemed like forever (until it wasn't of course).
I might have another 30 years in me with luck. I'm hoping my marriage to D'arcy manages a lot of good years.

@Michaela - yep, I retired from the AF in 2000 but wasn't ready to stop working or financially ready. I am ready now. Ready to have time to do things that are important to me for reasons other than income. I will probably leave myself open to short term independent consulting type work.

@Leslie - it's the making aspect that appeals to me. I've always felt a need to create. I've done a fair amount of woodworking - made a set of bangles for my wife and daughter out of some flowering pear wood from some trees that broke one winter when we lived in Illinois. Pear is incredibly brittle. Now I'd like to take a stab at metal working.

The flooring project is finished and we love it. Like a lot of people, we've accumulated more crap over the years that I'd like to admit, so as we put things back in place, we are culling the collection as aggressively as we can make ourselves tolerate.

Taxes still aren't finished, but I have collected and organized all the things we need to prepare them. Looks like an extension will be needed.

~ Liz

Elizabeth, it's really not like you would know, so don't think I'm upset with you, but please spell it LESLEY.
The other spelling is my dead name, and I hated him.