Month: September 2022

Well, that went by pretty darn fast. It only seemed like last week that we said “Well here we are for six more months.” Well, those six months have passed in a flash.

When I look back I realize that we did an awful lot this year. After settling in, the decision was made to remove the walls of the old sunroom. Ultimately, a great idea. This resulted in us having to do a lot of painting. Rosalie handled most of this and did an awesome job. I don’t have the patience for the fiddly bits. I hope she’s up for it next year as we still have a bit to do.

Then she read a friend’s post about hydroponics. I was all over that and enjoyed a short summer watching my plants grow and a few that I tortured to death. Next year will be better. Although the tomatoes, jalapeños and cucumbers are still doing really well.

There was our trip to Prince Rupert and all the places in between back to the Horseshoe Bay ferry. There was a new great grand-daughter to visit and tickle. She’s the cutest baby, as all babies are, but she’s ours and therefore, so much cuter than the rest.

After the trip, there was drama with the new roof which in the end turned out just great. And now there’s the new heat pump to look forward to, another project for me to get my teeth into.

It’s starting to get a bit chilly: one morning it was only 6 C. Time to pull out the electric blanket and put a heater in the bedroom. There’s really no need to do this as the furnace is very efficient. It does wake me up in the night so we don’t turn it on then. Also, we save a bit of propane that way. The days have been really nice and the campfire ban has been lifted, so after dinner, we light it up and if any of the neighbours are here we invite them over for a glass of wine.

There was a lot of socializing too. It seems to be a thing here, that you go for an innocent stroll and come back half sozzled. It’s great to have friends in the resort. It’s even better knowing that we will see many of them in Melaque.

We were trying to stock up on our supplements. Did anyone notice that the older we get and the more dependent we get on supplements the smaller the instructions get on the bottles? I just take a photo on my phone, and then enlarge it, so that I can see how badly I’ve been overdosing myself.

All in all a great season here. Now we have to get ready to fly to our other home in Melaque. We will see the friends that come to Mexico pretty soon but will miss the ones here until next April, which will come around far too quickly.

When I write a blog, I like to generate at least five hundred words. Sometimes it’s quite difficult. Any more and some people would start to fall asleep, any less and they think I’ve given up.

When I started writing ‘Senior Sex,’ I wrote two paragraphs and almost quit. The ideas started coming, as I was going to sleep one night and some of the things I came up with almost made me laugh myself to sleep. Of course, most of these are not fit for my clean living blog. In the morning I couldn’t remember a single funny thing.

I started writing anyway and kept coming back, adding a bit here and there but deleting all of the dirty parts. (I can hear you all now saying I should have kept the dirty parts in.)

I sometimes reread what I’ve written a dozen times before I get it, how I like it. Then I give it to Rosalie to read and she polishes it up and gives some constructive criticism which always makes it read a little better.

The problem with writing a blog is, what to write about that’s not too personal, not too political but still interesting. Sometimes, when it’s been a while, people start asking where my latest one is. I can see in their eyes that they want me to say that I’ve quit and the disappointment when I tell them I have another coming up soon. It’s tough coming up with ideas. I could write a lot of rants but try to save those for special occasions.

I have about eight blogs in the draft stage but usually, if I don’t finish them in one evening they are not good enough and I let them go. Sometimes they need a lot of tedious video editing so I procrastinate a lot.

When I got to this part of the blog I had 296 words and I need to nearly double that. Let’s see if I can do it.

Rosalie insists that I add a picture whenever possible. This can be a pain in the butt, especially in Mexico where the internet is slow and it takes a while to upload. So when you see some of the crazy pictures I post, blame it on Rosalie.

Rosalie’s idea, not mine

If anyone has an idea for a post, let me know. I don’t guarantee that I’ll use it as I have to feel that it’s right from my perspective so don’t be offended. I sometimes just need a nudge.

When I started doing this several years ago I would read about authors saying that their books sometimes wrote themselves. I found this strange but as I’ve written more and more I can understand what they’re meaning. Sometimes it just happens and eventually, it evolves into a full-blown blog.

I’ve almost reached 500 words so it must be time to wrap it up. If anybody’s counting, when I mentioned the 296 words, I added some before and after so I did count right.

508 words

There, I’ve said it. Now I’ll go to hell!

Seniors are not supposed to have sex, safe or otherwise; according to the younger generation that is. So let’s not tell them what we’re up to. When the subject comes up, we’ll act shocked and say, “OH! How gross!” as they do. They probably think that they’re finished at age thirty or forty. Let’s not enlighten them; they’ll get a pleasant surprise when they get there.

The time of day is important. The little guy still likes to rise in the morning, but so does the urge to pee. By the time I’m ready to climb back into bed the moment has gone and a cup of tea seems more important. During the day is fine but here is always the chance of someone dropping by, which they do a lot. So that’s mostly out. The evening seems to work best except if we’ve been working all day and are too tired. Or, if there’s something good on Neflix.

Of course, we don’t make love as much as we used to. Rosalie and I have cut it back to twice a week…Yeah right! If only my libido were that good. It’s frustrating at times though, you get in a cozy mood with your spouse after a little bit of marijuana cookie and a few glasses of wine, hop into bed, and…nothing. Even if you do manage to get going one of you is sure to get a cramp in the leg, and while you’re walking that off, your partner falls asleep.

And all those positions we used to try! My god, I ache just thinking about it. These days it’s serious planning to find a spot comfortable for both of us before we say to hell we can’t be bothered and go back to watching Netflix.

Even if you do manage the whole deed you pay the next day with back aches and probably a hangover, then swear to never do it again. The sex I mean not the hangover. At least we don’t have to worry about getting pregnant at our age.

As we grow older, men experience a loss of testosterone which diminishes our libido and we also get the dreaded PD. However, if we’re brave enough to talk to our Doctor, there are remedies for things like this. In Mexico, we can go to the market and buy little red pills called ‘Sexo Pronto’. It sounds great but as for the pronto part, I don’t think so. I waited a full five minutes and nothing happened. Of course, the doctors will tell us to drink less alcohol. I don’t know why they bother, they should know that won’t happen.

We connect more often in Mexico, perhaps because we wear fewer clothes down there and the internet is so bad we sometimes don’t get Netflix.

Writing this has left me a bit frisky so I’m off to find Rosalie and decide who gets the cramp, and who falls asleep. But first, I’ll check out Prime Video.

I wondered how I could write a blog about something as mundane as a heat pump. Always looking for a challenge I decided to try, so here it is.

We are led astray by many of our friends and it usually costs us money. Gary, whom we have known for a few years was one of the people to tell us that we had to have a roof for our old trailer. He was right of course but it still cost us. Jim and Ylda bought a new electric car and we were hooked again it’s going to cost us. And on and on. I mentioned in a previous blog that we don’t try to keep up with the Joneses. This sounds as though we’re doing that but in reality, we’re just stealing ideas from other people.

Gary and his wife Flo were by the other day and mentioned that a mutual acquaintance had installed a heat pump in their trailer. He mentioned all the benefits and I could feel Rosalie start to twitch and knew I was in for a bit of a ride.

A heat pump would be a great addition for us for many reasons. It’s quiet for a start so we could run it during the night without being woken up. Also, we go through about $120 worth of propane a month during early spring and fall so we would save that money as well as the hassle of going for a refill every week. Also, when we go to Mexico we can leave it on really low to keep the mice warm. Then, when we come back and arrive in Vancouver we can turn it up with an app on my phone and have it snug and warm for us when we get home.

We went and looked at the one our friends had and it was running while we were there. It was so quiet that you couldn’t hear it. When we got up close though we could feel the cold air coming from it…it was a warm day. It was way better than our air conditioner on the roof of the trailer and a hundred times quieter.

I worried a bit about how and where to install it. The folks who already had one paid $500 for installation which I was okay with. But when I worked out the best place to put it, I decided that I could do most of the installation myself and just get an HVAC guy to do the hookup.

After rushing home, oh, the joy of ordering yet one more thing online to be safely delivered to us in just a few days.

The down side is that if the temperature is just right as we go to bed, Rosalie may not want to snuggle up and let me steal her warmth.

Well, not just my Queen, but everybody who cares about the Royal Family’s Queen. I wrote some of my experiences in a previous blog, so this one will be short.

When I was seven years old and a snotty-nosed little kid, I remember my older brother coming home and announcing that the King had died. Little did I know that seventy years on I would learn that the Queen had died. That happened today.

I have fond memories that probably only those born in Britain would understand. We are fiercely patriotic to some things and for me, the Queen is one of them. I grew up with the old-time belief that the Queen was the head of everything. As the years went by I realized that this, of course, was not true. She was however a huge influence in many of our lives.

Whether you love or hate Royalty, you have to give credit to this amazing woman. Her whole life was dedicated to doing good for her subjects, loyal or otherwise, around the world.

Rest in peace Lizzie. I’m gonna miss you.

Oh boy, did the fall come in quickly! One day it’s summer, the next the geese are taking off and the leaves are falling. I had to put the furnace on the other morning as it’s starting to get a little bit chilly. Only five weeks to go and we’re back in the heat.

One of our sillier moments

It is starting to get a bit colder here, there aren’t many people around and more propane is needed. Because of these minor inconveniences, we have the impression that some people may feel sorry for us. Rosalie and I sat by the propane fire enjoying a glass of wine and the fresh cool air trying to figure this out. I’m sure it’s an unconscious feeling but it’s there, nonetheless. This talking thing happens a lot as we don’t watch much TV.

Rosalie initially said it might be financial; that people think we have to live this way because we are broke. I disagreed, thinking that it could be a property thing. If we lived in a house people would see it differently. It’s probably a bit of both.

There are more than adequate resources to move into a house but we choose not to, simply because we love living in the park model. Why spend money on rent when we are here all the time anyway. We may not have as much money as some people but still have taken trips to Europe and every year we like to take a tour in Mexico. And except for the park model we have no debt. This wouldn’t be possible if we were broke. I’m sure that if we were in a house or condo no one would think a thing about it.

When we decided to sell our condo and live full-time at the resort, we ended up with a chunk of cash that we have invested. I manage this with Rosalie’s input and consequently, we get a good income from it. In fact, it was so good that half of the new park model has been paid off in less than two years.

We don’t want a big house. Cruises are not for us. An expensive car isn’t on the books; although there is a new electric one on order for next year. We don’t crave status symbols as do some people, and as for keeping up with the Joneses, forget that! It’s who we are. A little bit on the odd side but that’s just us.

Sitting outside talking is what we do the most. We’re always planning and scheming and figuring out ways to make life a little more fun. It’s important that if Mexico was out of the picture for health reasons, there should be a plan in place; and we have one.

Selling the resort site to make it work was considered and rejected. Although it’s owned outright except for what’s left on the park model, we love being here too much. Even if we had to stay in Canada year round we would still use it, most of the time.

Us, with our fur coats, in case it gets too chilly

This lifestyle isn’t for everyone, but Rosalie and I love it and wouldn’t change a thing. We love it here.

There are more than adequate resources to meet our needs: Rosalie.

It was Rosalie’s birthday on 2nd September and we both had a great day.

Rosalie started in the morning by reading all the congratulations from friends and relatives. At the end of the day she had about 68 or more people who remembered her birthday. She was also on the phone most of the day with more friends and relatives.

The birthday girl

We don’t buy each other presents anymore but we have had a few coincidences. For one of her birthdays, she got a new car. On one of my birthdays, she got an iPad. This year, for her birthday I got new underpants. I also got a set of tools from AirMiles so it all worked out.

We usually go out for lunch on birthdays so we met Peter and Suzie at the Shady Rest pub in Qualicum. We, of course, started with a glass of wine and we had a lovely lunch. To top it off Suzie paid for the whole thing. Thanks again, Suzie.

When we got home, Peter and I had another glass of wine or two, while the girls went across the road where another neighbour was selling baked goods. After Peter and Suzie left, our neighbours, Bob and Marlene invited us over for another glass of wine. We had to leave earlier than we would have liked as we were invited to dinner with Jim and Ylda. By this time we were starting to flag.

Jim and Ylda had their kids and grandkids over so we had a very nice visit with them. A neighbour dropped in and after we had dinner with birthday cake, Jim disappeared and came back with half the neighbourhood to help finish up the cake. It was great as we met a whole bunch of new people.

Meanwhile , I had fun

Rosalie and I had had a very busy day so we decided to call it a day and head home. All in all, a very nice birthday. And to be able to share it with friends made it all the better. That was the real birthday present.

The so-called summer is coming to an end and we have had such a great time that I’m wondering what we’ll do next.

We have a lot to look forward to going back to our home in Mexico, our new electric car in the spring and whatever life throws at us in the meantime.

Rosalie as usual is getting ahead of me and wanting to pack already. I, on the other hand, wait until the last minute and then panic. I repeat this every year and apparently never learn. We are going to take checked luggage for the first time in several years as I have a lot of extra stuff to take and am also finding it hard to maneuver two carry-ons onto the plane. And of course, there is the extra incentive of bringing back duty-free booze in our suitcase as well as the odd gecko or scorpion.

My hobby with hydroponics has been a lot of fun as well as challenging. This summer I saw a lot of failures as well as some successes. My excellent engineering capabilities came in handy and I only had to fix a few leaks. For next year, I’ve already built my new system which holds sixty plants. I can’t wait to get back here in the spring to try it. I may do a small project in Mexico. The problem is the heat warms up the water and the plants don’t tolerate. that.

When people ask me what it is I tell them that it will take me forward to the last century. If that doesn’t confuse them nothing will.

It does keep me busy. Each day I have to check if the new seeds are growing. (They aren’t!) Then I check to see if the plants have enough nutrients. I just found out that I was giving them too much. The PH level has to be consistent and in this heat, I have to put a block of ice in the water to keep them cool. Now you know why I call them my babies.

The trailer roof is almost finished, I felt sorry for Brad the contractor, even though he admitted he was at fault for hiring idiots. There are a few minor things off a bit, but the roof is safe and will keep the rain and snow off, which is the whole purpose of the thing anyway so what the heck.

The car is still a problem. When I took it back to Fountain Tire, they put it up on the hoist again and found nothing wrong. When I drive on the highway it proves them wrong. I have no clue what to do next but I will come up with something.