Productive New Year So Far

I’v gotten quite a bit done since our Holiday company left on the 30th. I took one day to rest and then started plugging away at the things that I had been putting off.

Jan 1, 2019

We went out to dinner at The Foundry last night with Mom, Gerry, Nancy, Tom and Lori.  The meal was excellent and we all had a good time. Except for Lori. She had to work all day and was very tired so she didn’t eat most of her meal.

I got up early  (normal time of 7:00). I built a fire, surfed the web and had some coffee. About 8:30 I went down to the sugar house and put a 2^nd coat of stain on cabin floor girders.  These are the last ones needed for the floor. I’ll have to put another coat or 2 on them this weekend. I’m committing myself to complete the cabin structure and have the roof on before next winter!

By 10:30 I was back at the house ready to take down Christmas tree. I waited until Diane got up so she could see her tree for the last time while she drank her morning coffee. While she sat there I removed all the ornaments and put them on the folding table so she could vacuum them and put them into bins. Then I removed the lights and stored them. After clearing the floor of all carpeting I dragged the decaying tree with its falling needles out the back door and threw it into the yard. Then I had to spend most of the next hour cleaning up the needles using a combination of sweeping and vacuuming (plus some rags to wipe up all the water I spilled from the tree stand).

Spent the rest of the day relaxing and watching college football. The Ohio State Buckeyes were playing in the Rose Bowl and beat Washington. It was nice to see them finish strong with only one loss all year!

Jan 2, Wednesday

I got up to my normal winter routine of fire building, drinking coffee and reading the news online.  Then I went to St. Albans to run some errands. I stopped at the dentist to see when they could get me in to re-cement a crown loosened over the Holiday. They told me to come back at 3:40. (Got that out of the way!).  Then I did the grocery shopping and made a deposit for syrup sold.

After I got home and took care of things I called Energizer to initiate my pension. This (Jan 2) is the first day for a new service provider who is handling all retirement stuff for them. I thought I would call them on the first day to test them. They incorrectly told me that starting my pension at age 62 would mean a reduction. I corrected them and they looked it up. They apologized and then told me that my pension packet is on the way and I should see it in 7-10 business days. They assured me that everything should be in time for me to start receiving my pension April 1.

Then I called VT Health Connect to correct an erroneous billing problem. I waited 10 minutes and they gave me the option to continue waiting or receive a call back “sometime this week”. Since I had selected the latter option the last 2 times and never got to speak with them, I chose the first option. I put the speaker phone and waited another 30 minutes before the person got on the line. She had such a poor connection that I only caught every 3^rd word or so. The bottom line was that she could not help me and would pass me on to somebody who could. I then got a competent soul with a good audio connection who straightened things out (time will tell for sure). The problem was on their end (which I knew).  She told me to ignore the billing and continue to send in normal monthly payments and it should correct itself next billing cycle… Then…she called back to tell me that I would be receiving a form for income verification that I would have to fill out. This might require my tax returns or something like that. All because of them! Grrrr.

Jan 3, Thursday

Today I woke up to 3 inches of new snow! We had lost most of our snow and I hated it. This winter has been excellent for the most part with lots of snow. I’ve been downhill skiing twice (not once last year). I’ve been X-C skiing 7 times during Nov and Dec.

I took care of a bunch of business in the morning then tried to ski after lunch today. The conditions were too sticky so I cut it short. It was still nice to get some fresh air.

Speaking of fresh air, I took Diane out in the Rhino (with tracks on). We had a nice ride and made some trails for me to ski on as long as the snow lasts.  Things look promising for the foreseeable future.

This morning I finalized Maple business books for 2018.  I downloaded the bank business account data and also printed invoices from Amazon purchases related to the business.  Then I reconciled both of those with the business account.  I filed the old folder and created new one for 2019.

I called the propane company to schedule a delivery for the sugar house.  I asked them to see if they can do better on their rates since we are now heating the kitchen and using over 300 gallons per year.

Decided to skip NAMI support group meeting and spend evening with Diane watching Outlander series

Namaste