Wow! A New Post!
Aug. 26th, 2020 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captainsblogWanna see it?
That went in Sunday, after Saturday's taffy pull. The red thing on top is a level, which shows that the new post is quite nice and level. It's set over the past two days- of COURSE we got the only rain we've seen in weeks around 2 a.m. Monday night, so Eleanor ran out and put a poncho over it- and when she gets home from work today, we'll rehang the freshly spray-painted gate next to it. Here's that, with the bag of concrete mix in the garage;
----
Because Eleanor was working on the side of the house closest to the Loud and Annoying Neighbors, she got a good earful of them throughout the day on Sunday. Things then got worse after Mrs. LAN's parents left and her brother's kid (a year or two older than their own adorable eight-year-old) got taken home. Said brother came back alone after that, and got so loud and obnoxious as we tried eating dinner in our own yard, we finally resorted to a call to the town cops. I don't think anything ever came of that, but we DO know that the brother peeled out of our neighborhood at a high-for-here rate of speed within minutes after we made the call. Does he have a buddy in the PD who tipped him off? A curfew he has to be home by? Who knows? We've since learned that he has at least one criminal case on his record from an adjoining town, and several filed judgments against him for unpaid child support. I really don't give a shit about that, or about what he may choose to smoke, drop, shoot, snort, rub into his belly or whatever; we just want some peace and quiet in our own yard, thanks.
----
That peace and quiet will be much more important come October, because Eleanor will be around the house more during the day. She put in her retirement application to Social Security this week to begin sometime this fall. She's a little under a year short of Medicare eligibility, so she stays at the Wegmans job mainly to retain the very good (though only for her, not me) company health plan. THAT requires her to work an average of 30 hours a week, but that includes holiday and vacation days, and the eligibility is set each October as of the previous fiscal year's average. So as long as she's at the 30-hour average as of the end of next month- and trust me, the company has a tracker and she checks it religiously- she'll be covered until next July when Medicare begins.
(Assuming, that is, The Idiot doesn't kill it by then.)
As for the SS benefits themselves, they'll be somewhat less than if she waited until her full retirement age in a little over two years, but from all the years she was working full-time and making decent money, it's actually going to represent a modest increase over what she's taking home now- and she probably will continue working on a more limited schedule even after the Medicare kicks in. At least some of the benefits will be taxable, but she's not likely to lose any of them to the formula that reduces benefits over a certain amount if she continues to work.
Me? I'm still more than four years away from Medicare and project myself continuing to work until 70. By then, the kid's loans will be paid off and the mortgage should be way down, and my own benefits should be higher from all these years of paying in, recently well over 10K a year. It's not an "entitlement," Idiot:P
----
Speaking of the kid(s):
Emily called, somewhat sheepishly. Her one-woman show next year, um, won't be. This place typically puts on at least two or three artists at a time. Still: she gets a lot of input into who the other artist(s) will be, and since she's in charge of publicity for it, she'll also get say into how, and who, gets marketed. Obviously we'll be there no matter how many others are on the walls.
As for our four-legged brood: Pepper gave us a little scare beyond her weight gain. The vet called last Friday about her heartworm results; I missed the call and, unusual for them, they did not leave a message. The followup call was from one of the docs, not a tech. As Scooby says, Ruh roh! The heartworm results were fine, but the bloodwork also picked up evidence that she'd been exposed to Lyme disease. He told us not to be overly concerned, as she was not displaying symptoms of an active infection, but since kidneys can be affected, they recommended we bring in a pee sample.
Hmmmm.
Somehow, in almost 20 years with three dogs, we've never had to collect one, and unlike stool samples, which I collect on a daily basis, I had no real idea what to use. I turned to the Facebook hive mind and got suggestions of soup ladles, large jar lids, Cool Whip containers and pie tins (I've got one of those saved already for a virtual pie fight I've signed up for;). I feared I'd be waking the neighbors walking down the street like the village tinker with the rattling of all these gizmos and gadgets galore- but in the end (heh), I just used a shallow plastic container from the Wegmans cheese bar, and after one aborting of the task, I shot it right under her and it was PISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
The wait for the vet tech to pick it up from their parking lot took longer.
An hour or so ago, we got the good news: Pepper's kidney functions are all fine. It's likely something that will never manifest with symptoms (only 5-10 percent of dogs ever do).
Here she is, happy with the results on International Dog Day:
Last week, meanwhile, brought National Black Cat Appreciation Day. Since they believe that EVERY day is Black Cat Appreciation Day, Zoey waited until yesterday to give me this perfect "blep" face:
No pictures of Evil Cat. She's lucky we didn't throw her in with the concrete. After all, after all these years, it'd be fitting to make her a permanent cornerstone of our lives;)
That went in Sunday, after Saturday's taffy pull. The red thing on top is a level, which shows that the new post is quite nice and level. It's set over the past two days- of COURSE we got the only rain we've seen in weeks around 2 a.m. Monday night, so Eleanor ran out and put a poncho over it- and when she gets home from work today, we'll rehang the freshly spray-painted gate next to it. Here's that, with the bag of concrete mix in the garage;
----
Because Eleanor was working on the side of the house closest to the Loud and Annoying Neighbors, she got a good earful of them throughout the day on Sunday. Things then got worse after Mrs. LAN's parents left and her brother's kid (a year or two older than their own adorable eight-year-old) got taken home. Said brother came back alone after that, and got so loud and obnoxious as we tried eating dinner in our own yard, we finally resorted to a call to the town cops. I don't think anything ever came of that, but we DO know that the brother peeled out of our neighborhood at a high-for-here rate of speed within minutes after we made the call. Does he have a buddy in the PD who tipped him off? A curfew he has to be home by? Who knows? We've since learned that he has at least one criminal case on his record from an adjoining town, and several filed judgments against him for unpaid child support. I really don't give a shit about that, or about what he may choose to smoke, drop, shoot, snort, rub into his belly or whatever; we just want some peace and quiet in our own yard, thanks.
----
That peace and quiet will be much more important come October, because Eleanor will be around the house more during the day. She put in her retirement application to Social Security this week to begin sometime this fall. She's a little under a year short of Medicare eligibility, so she stays at the Wegmans job mainly to retain the very good (though only for her, not me) company health plan. THAT requires her to work an average of 30 hours a week, but that includes holiday and vacation days, and the eligibility is set each October as of the previous fiscal year's average. So as long as she's at the 30-hour average as of the end of next month- and trust me, the company has a tracker and she checks it religiously- she'll be covered until next July when Medicare begins.
(Assuming, that is, The Idiot doesn't kill it by then.)
As for the SS benefits themselves, they'll be somewhat less than if she waited until her full retirement age in a little over two years, but from all the years she was working full-time and making decent money, it's actually going to represent a modest increase over what she's taking home now- and she probably will continue working on a more limited schedule even after the Medicare kicks in. At least some of the benefits will be taxable, but she's not likely to lose any of them to the formula that reduces benefits over a certain amount if she continues to work.
Me? I'm still more than four years away from Medicare and project myself continuing to work until 70. By then, the kid's loans will be paid off and the mortgage should be way down, and my own benefits should be higher from all these years of paying in, recently well over 10K a year. It's not an "entitlement," Idiot:P
----
Speaking of the kid(s):
Emily called, somewhat sheepishly. Her one-woman show next year, um, won't be. This place typically puts on at least two or three artists at a time. Still: she gets a lot of input into who the other artist(s) will be, and since she's in charge of publicity for it, she'll also get say into how, and who, gets marketed. Obviously we'll be there no matter how many others are on the walls.
As for our four-legged brood: Pepper gave us a little scare beyond her weight gain. The vet called last Friday about her heartworm results; I missed the call and, unusual for them, they did not leave a message. The followup call was from one of the docs, not a tech. As Scooby says, Ruh roh! The heartworm results were fine, but the bloodwork also picked up evidence that she'd been exposed to Lyme disease. He told us not to be overly concerned, as she was not displaying symptoms of an active infection, but since kidneys can be affected, they recommended we bring in a pee sample.
Hmmmm.
Somehow, in almost 20 years with three dogs, we've never had to collect one, and unlike stool samples, which I collect on a daily basis, I had no real idea what to use. I turned to the Facebook hive mind and got suggestions of soup ladles, large jar lids, Cool Whip containers and pie tins (I've got one of those saved already for a virtual pie fight I've signed up for;). I feared I'd be waking the neighbors walking down the street like the village tinker with the rattling of all these gizmos and gadgets galore- but in the end (heh), I just used a shallow plastic container from the Wegmans cheese bar, and after one aborting of the task, I shot it right under her and it was PISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
The wait for the vet tech to pick it up from their parking lot took longer.
An hour or so ago, we got the good news: Pepper's kidney functions are all fine. It's likely something that will never manifest with symptoms (only 5-10 percent of dogs ever do).
Here she is, happy with the results on International Dog Day:
Last week, meanwhile, brought National Black Cat Appreciation Day. Since they believe that EVERY day is Black Cat Appreciation Day, Zoey waited until yesterday to give me this perfect "blep" face:
No pictures of Evil Cat. She's lucky we didn't throw her in with the concrete. After all, after all these years, it'd be fitting to make her a permanent cornerstone of our lives;)