Retirement: 4 weeks in

Retirement: 4 weeks in.

Everybody asks what I've been doing since I retired.  The best answer is: Not working for someone else.  I didn't think adjusting to retirement would be tough.  And it's not really when you think about how tough it is to go to work everyday and deal with all that goes with that.  But ...the husband thinks that now that I'm home, that I'm available to chauffer him around whenever he decides he wants to go someplace.  

With Covid, I still have to limit where and when we go anywhere.  His memory is not as good as it used to be, so I constantly have to remind him to wear a mask or to stay away from people, but he forgets.  I'm am totally amazed that neither of us has gotten Covid.  We've been lucky so far.  

He got his vaccination, so he doesn't think he should have to worry about COVID any more, but I have yet to get my vaccine and with the new varients, we may be having to worry about it a lot longer than originally thought.  This thing is going to take a while to get under control.  But better we are inconvenienced than dead. So please, wear a mask and do the 6' social distancing thing.  Besides, most of you need to take a step back.  I'm a midwesterner, so I like people at arms length rather than in your face like they do on the east coast.  If I can smell your breath or your perfume, you are too close. 

So what have I been up to?  Working A LOT.  I've spent days in my office getting rid of paperwork that has accumulated over 38 years.  Shreading anything that has anyone's name on it.  I've spent considerable time cleaning out filing cabinets.  Do I really need to keep 30 years worth of tax records?  Or decades worth of check stubs?  I've cleaned out the health and dental insurance files.  We don't owe anything and the retirement means I've separated into a different insurance account, so old stuff can go.  I'll keep enough records so I can look up when things happened, but that's about it.  

My friend Julie, who I haven't seen in years, volunteered to come up for a day to help me do some brush clearing along the river.  I was amazed at how much we got done and how effortless it seemed, because we were enjoying ourselves while working.  No arguements, just good conversation.  We still have all our fingers and toes, so we did well.  Chainsaw worked eventually. a bit of a struggle trying to get it to start after a long winter. And since I had very little experience with using one, I was as careful as I could be.  I can see why people could quickly become injured by these things.  I think we did an awesome job.  THANK YOU JULIE, I couldn't have done it without you. 

I brought home a neglected Briard.  She is going to be a handful since she is already five years old and has no training at all.  She seems to turn her nose up at treats and doesn't think listening to humans is worth her time.  I haven't found her motivator yet.  She was dominated by an older dog and she is extremely thin. I think people just broke open a dog food bag and the older dog kept her away from the food.  She is finally standing up straight and not curling her tail up under her as tightly as when she first arrived.  Doc is doing really well around her.  I will probably have to make arrangements to have her spayed unless we want puppies.  I could handle one or two or even three, but what if they have 10!  Both Doc and Her are AKC registered, but I don't know anything about her yet.  I'm hoping to track down her pedigree to find out where she came from and her parental background. I haven't received any of her papers yet.  I did get the vaccination record from the kennel she was being boarded at until they could find her a home.  So at least I know she has the necessary vaccines for boarding. 

So retirement so far has been catching up on things I should have done long time ago.