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The loneliness of the long-distance commuter

What is a symbol of what became central in our lives sits almost alone in a hotel parking lot. Our trusty Land Rover Defender served its purpose magnificently. Three return trips between Florida and Colorado reinforced how versatile this SUV truly is. It left Florida empty and returned from Colorado packed to the gunnels. Even though we had successfully professionally moved the bulk of our remaining possessions stashed within the confines of our Colorado condo, it still required those three separate return trips to move the personal effects we simply didn’t trust to movers. Nothing says finality as much as hanging inside the condo our last sets of keys and then closing the front door one last time. The click of the latch, a hollow reminder that for two plus years, this was our abode whenever we visited the children and the grandkids. Being able to literally hop around the corner to where they lived but the upside of this soon lost its tarnish as we put mile after mile on our vehicles...
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Feelin’ Hot! Hot! Hot!

What can I say about the month of June? Well, best to admit, it was special. During our time in Munich when Margo and I were attending a conference at which I was speaking, the idea came to us that perhaps we were doing too much. There was a shared sense of being overwhelmed where the first thoughts about how best to simplify our lives were discussed. Central to these thoughts was what could we do with the Colorado condo we had acquired two years earlier? Was having a second residence, one that was very close to our grandkids, really meeting all of our expectations in this regard. At this time of year, the heat has been turned up in Florida. When daytime temperatures touch 90F with humidity hovering around 50% there’s no missing the news that pool temps are already at 90F without any outside interference. Don’t need to have the pool heater fired up although, for the spa, there will be a need to run the spa heater for a short time – we like the spa temp set to 102F. With this in mind,...

Food and Festivities – the road delivers, and more!

  Whereas Margo never really likes to mix business with pleasure, this past month such a mix was unavoidable. Business required us to participate in a HPE Nonstop community gathering in Dallas (Hurst), Texas. Pleasure, if it is fair to call it that, required us to return to Longmont, Colorado. The serious side of selling our condo to our daughter Anna and our son-in-law Erich was to begin and we had a desire to get this moving so we could make plans for the rest of the year.  We readily recall having stepped off a Princess cruise ship during the early months of 2026 and, here it is, almost half-way through the year, and another journey beckoned. It’s safe to say that in our honest opinion the years seem to be passing by rather quickly. In so doing it seems we are just wrapping up a future plan when the future arrives. We do like to travel, as this blog ceaselessly reminds us all, but it’s getting a bit old of late, not so much the travel but as our peers will attest, it’s th...

A Princess by any other name is still a Princess who remains dear to us!

“But I have a suspicion that in the age of AI, real writing, and particularly creative writing made by humans and read by humans, as an act of human connection, is going to become more important, not less.” Anna Founder, Incoming Professor of Practice in Creative Writing, Sydney University “So I saw that there is nothing better for a person to enjoy their work, because that is their lot” Ecclesiastes 3:22 Fresh from a January Caribbean cruise on Princess aboard their latest vessel, Sun Princes of the new Sphere-class cruise ships, we headed back to sea on yet another Princess cruise ship. This time, it was the Enchanted Princess, sister ship to Majestic Princess of the Royal-class cruise ships, a ship we liked very much when, a few years back, we sailed the Pacific from Los Angeles to Sydney. Sailing west to east was a first, having done an east to west crossing on a Windstar sailboat back in 2003. I have sailed on 15 Princess cruises, accumulating 108 days at sea, dating ...

Oh, very young; the distance in between!

  Oh very young, what will you leave us this time You're only dancin' on this earth for a short while And though your dreams may toss and turn you now They will vanish away like your dad’s best jeans. Cat Stevens What designated the month of this March, for me, was how it marked the passage of another major milestone. I’m not telling, mind you, but it was a significant milestone. It represented a time for introspection. A time to think long and hard about whereto, now? The watches represent a mild indulgence on my part but each one tells a story about which, more will follow later in this post. As for the opening lyrics, it was way back in June1974, sitting in the old Hordern Pavilion within what was then the Sydney Showground that I attended my first concert; Cat Stevens. Not too rebellious for the times and safe to say, well before the times when anthem concerts would prevail. Oh, very young was more than appropriate for those times as I had little inclination as to wh...

Aging like a fine wine!

There are snobs and then there are wine snobs. Fortunately, neither Margo or myself falls into either category but throwing up a photo like this to capture an important time for us both seemed to be the right thing to do. It’s a season that includes our wedding anniversary, Margo’s birthday and then my own. Enjoying a Penfolds Grange that had lost a little of its “body,” slightly watered down through the years, accompanying Margo’s cooked chicken – with the wine, there was no need for sides – a 1996 vintage bottled in 1997, mind you, and the year 1997 was the year we became engaged.  Around this time of year, we like to plan an escape from the chilly temperatures of the Florida panhandle. When we witnessed the thermometer dropping below temperatures being registered at our old address in Colorado, it was cause for considerable head-scratching. What were we thinking? Familiar as we were with Florida’s Keys, we thought these would be what we would encounter in the panhandle but no, n...