The Wandering Minstrel

The Better Half and I decided to drain the spa for the winter season. Even though we are likely to get 70° + days during the winter months, we figured that keeping the spa heated up would be a losing proposition.

Clickable image - ice chunks coming out of the hose

I hooked up the hose to the drain on the spa after running the other end down to the wash west of the house. I was mildly surprised by the chunks of ice coming out of the hose as the water started draining. I should have expected that since there was a layer of ice floating on the water in the bucket under the RV drive hose bib.

After we got the spa drained, I went to the spa manual and read the section about winterizing. I have to get out the shop vac and remove the water standing in the spa’s internal plumbing pipes to avoid freezing damage.

I saw a bumper sticker in town the other day that said “RETIREMENT IS A FULL-TIME JOB.” I’m beginning to believe that very thing.

Yesterday, I went to the clinic where I had the minor surgery performed two weeks ago. The surgeon removed the stitches from the incision he made to remove suspicious tissue that may have contained additional carcinoma. The lab report was good. They found no more basal cell tissue.

The surgeon brought a student in the treatment room to observe the suture removal and to discuss the technique used for the procedure. He referred to the process as subcutaneous suturing. The Better Half was in the room and told me that he clipped off a knot at the bottom of the incision and then pulled the knot at the top to remove the remaining suture.

You can view the incision with the sutures at this post. You can view the “after” result by clicking in the rectangle above right. Voila! the subcutaneous technique left very little scarring. It is nothing like the spiderweb scar that a former surgeon left on my back a few years ago.

I downloaded the Google Earth® plug-in for Firefox a few days ago. I don’t have the Google Earth program on my computer (I don’t need all the bells and whistles). You can get pretty good results in your browser with just the plug-in. There is a red arrow in the (clickable) image above showing the approximate location of our little house. The Bradshaw Mountains are in the distance and you can see the Hassayampa River flowing down from upper center to the right.

Last June, the landscape crew planted two citrus trees in our little “orchard” on the west side of the house. We had them plant one orange and one lemon tree.

The one in the (clickable) image to the right is what’s left of our lemon tree. Luckily, we harvested the lemons last month. As you can see, most of the leaves have been eaten by javelinas.

How do we know it’s javelinas and not something else? Exhibit A - javelina hoof prints (inset in photo) in the sandy soil next to the tree. Exhibit B - leaves at the top seem to be out of the goddamn little beasties reach. The orange tree didn’t fare as well since it is still under four feet tall. There is one orange on the tree which is still getting ripe in spite of all the missing foliage. Click here to view the naked orange tree.

Oh well, we like living in our semi-rural little house. We would rather have javelinas as neighbors than some of the unsavory types we left in the LA area.

Our Turbo Tax 2011 CD arrived in the mail this week. We decided to get the tax early so that we can adjust the withholding for 2012 when the new year starts. We also want to know whether we need to make some adjustments to the 2011 year since there is still a month left to do charity and to pay property tax (yes, bummer - we still pay tax on our property in LA County).

I still have not loaded the Turbo Tax program on the computer but it will be in place this week. Meanwhile, I used the widget below to get a quick and dirty estimate. The usual caveats and disclaimers apply, so take the results with a grain of salt.

Well, I assume since this 1972 Mustang Convertible has Minnesota tags, that this classic belongs to a “snowbird.” The term applies to people that retreat their northern homes for the milder climate of Arizona (among other warmer places).

We saw this nice ride in Surprise, AZ. on our way back from a shopping excursion to the valley metroplex. TBH took this (clickable) image as we passed the Mustang in traffic. Speaking of traffic, the density of traffic in our little town has doubled (or more) since the snowbirds have flocked here for the winter. C’mon spring!

Actually, this was yesterday’s dinner. We got tired of Thanksgiving leftovers, so The Better Half whipped up a batch of marinara meat sauce with Andouille (Cajun) sausage instead of the usual ground meat (pork, beef, turkey, etc.).

Served with a Sam Adams Oktoberfest brew and garlic toast, this meal was just out of this world.

There is too much entertainment and food to blog this weekend. Enjoy yours!