dianec42

Yesterday I texted with Mr Diane a bunch and did a workout.

Forgot to call my mom this week.

Today so far I tried to sleep in. The cats let me get an extra half hour in, although that did include dresser gymnastics and a certain amount of duvet acupuncture.

I've awakened to surprise snow. Must... get... into... town... If nothing else I still owe Claudio's kid a postcard.

Edit: Cleared driveway and my car. Made it to open knit at the yarn shop and showed off the Wizard of Oz/Wicked crochet book I got. Bought, wrote, and sent the postcard. Holy kamoly it's too cold to be doing any of this.

Edit edit: Called Mom.

Borrowing a page from a local introvert friend: Without some outside impetus, it honestly does not occur to me to leave the house.

Luckily, yesterday I was planning on going to the 2:00 open knit/craft session at the local yarn shop, and the aforementioned friend texted to say she was going to the 5:30 session. My brain defaulted to "go out, come back, go out again" when Mr Diane sensibly pointed out I could just go out and stay out.

So in no particular order, yesterday I:
socialized
had tea
got a TON done on my out-and-about stitching project
went to the library
chatted with my friend who works at the library
am now on HER list for a Friday museum outing Real Soon Now (tm)
told several people about the upcoming Paul Simon concert & am assembling a MASSIVE posse for same
went to the quilting store, chatted with the owner about hand quilting, bought supplies for same
browsed at Goodwill (did not buy anything)
shopped at Ocean State Job Lot (bought a purple sweatshirt and some almonds which I ate in the car)
accidentally happened on a not-normally-scheduled movie night at the yarn shop
petted the shop dog (Winston) lots
had cake
had random potluck foods brought by folks who DID know about movie night
sang along to Wicked For Good

and somehow utterly failed to send a postcard to a work friend for his kid's school (they're trying to get a postcard from every state)

Why am I sitting inside playing WoW again?

Last Friday was a very busy day. We dropped in on our remodeling place, then spent like an hour at the local tile & flooring store picking stuff out, and - more importantly - pointing and laughing at things that looked like Q*bert.

Then, heaven help us all, we went to Costco. Right before the big snowstorm. Inside was only normal levels of Costco crazy, but the parking lot (West Springfield, MA) was Mad Max levels of insane. That parking lot needs at LEAST one traffic light and probably at least one rotary. Luckily Mr Diane volunteered to drive at that point, otherwise we might still be there trying to turn left.

Bonus: I saw all "8"s out of the corner of my eye and thought the register had tilted. No, that was our total. Ouch. And that was WITHOUT booze or chocolate. Weirdly, wine now costs less than mixed nuts.

Over the last few days: the bathroom contractor came out and measured for tile; I phoned the schmancy fixtures store and placed our order; we changed our minds on the cabinet colour yet again, and ordered the cabinets and countertop; faffed around on the tile a little more, finalized the tile order, and put down the deposit on that. Oh and we picked out a paint colour. IT'S HAPPENING!

Meanwhile it's still colder than a very cold thing. I've learned things about taking the trash bins to the street after a big snow that I really could have gone my whole life without knowing. Oh well, all part of the Vermont experience.

It's been a bit over a month, and retirement is finally (maybe) starting to feel bigger than a massive extra-long weekend. There are still days where we do basically nothing but play World of Warcraft and snooze on the couch; but we're moving forward on the bathroom remodel, we're planning trips, and we're getting out of the house on a fairly regular basis.

Sigh, the bathroom.... it seems like the fixtures know their days are numbered. I never got around to regrouting around the shower; so of course that's now leaking water into the basement. The toilet has gone from "you have to flush it right" to running constantly. Who knows what mayhem the sink will come up with.

The cats are healthy as little horses. The yard is presumably still there; it's under a foot of snow at the moment, with more to come. The EV is cute and zippy and somewhat less efficient when it's f---ing cold.

I still need to set up the craft room for actual sewing. Cross stitch projects and library books continue apace. Here, have some work-in-progress pics.

We had a bunch of friends over for Boxing Day snacks and socializing. This gave Mr Diane an excuse to bake ONE BILLION SNACKS, with the added bonus of leftovers for the rest of the year. It was great to see people and hang out. What with holiday baking and the attendant cleanup, plus some lousy weather, I was going a bit stir crazy. Snacks and socializing were a hit; I think this will become a tradition.

The up side of all that cleaning and tidying is that the house is now somewhat more pleasant to do stuff in (especially the kitchen). The down side is that I managed to put a few things in "safe places" and I'm not sure I've found everything yet.

The first rule of Retirement Club is there are no rules don't talk about Retirement Club I need to have some structure or I will never leave the house.

Some rough ideas for structure:
1. (With Mr Diane) Go out hiking once a week (snowshoeing counts as hiking);
2. Try at least one new location, food, or activity every week;
3. Every day, do something I didn't do yesterday;
4. Every day, SKIP DOING at least one thing I did yesterday;
5. DO NOT VOLUNTEER FOR ANYTHING FOR AT LEAST A MONTH! Seriously. I've met me. I WILL overcommit and burn myself out if I don't watch it;
6. Have some long-term goals as well as short-term activities;
7. Do stuff with Mr Diane;
8. Do stuff WITHOUT Mr Diane.

Activities so far have included yoga class and Open Knit (yes, cross stitch is also allowed). I still need to check out the senior center, the sports center, the Y, activities at the library and the museum, and actually GO to the library and the museum. Yes, I have a spreadsheet.

Speaking of structure, for 2026 I'm going to try a premade planner and skip doing a bullet journal. I've mainly been using the bullet journal in its capacity of "it's a free-form planner for people who don't like any of the planners sold in the shops". I've been doing some habit trackers but that's tailed off in the last few months. I just can't be arsed doing all the setup any more. I got a cute Pusheen weekly/monthly planner off my wish list this Christmas, which includes space for notes and 2 pages for 2027 planning, so I'm going to give that a go.

I should write up a 2025 "year in review" thingy, but honestly 2025 kind of stunk in a lot of ways so I might not bother.

Tuesday I went to yoga. Wednesday I went to the "open knit" at the yarn store in town & started a new cross stitch(*). Thursday I did NOT go to free yoga at the library, because it was insanely nice out, so Mr Diane and I went hiking. Today I had a Zoom call with an old work friend.

Next week things in the big world will slow down due to the holiday. Next Friday we're having some friends over for Boxing Day, so there will be a great deal of snack prep and the concomitant cleaning-up.

I suspect my "doing nothing" is not the same as everyone else's "doing nothing", but why be normal?

(*) This is my "out and about" cross stitch project. It involves only whole stitches, is very high contrast, and as such does not require a ton of brainpower or super-good light. Most of all, it does not have any "difficult bits" so the odds that I will actually finish it are extremely high.

I'm doing the Autumn installment of an art nouveau set from about 2003. Unfortunately it was originally designed using Anchor threads and the DMC conversion is not very good. Two of the shades of yellow are basically identical, so I've been working on a substitution and may yet redo Spring. If I start redoing things I have a similar complaint about 2 of the shades of green in Summer... and should probably also use higher-quality fabric (I'm using a piece of Charles Craft aida which is shockingly badly off-grain).

Come to think of it I did also buy some stuff at the quilt shop on Wednesday (Q-snap extenders and a skein of DMC 973 which turns out the be ENTIRELY unsuited for the hoped-for purpose). I also tried but failed to score a smaller embroidery hoop (haven't seen my 8" q-snaps WHICH ARE PERFECT FOR THIS PROJECT since I moved). So the new project is living in an 11" q-snap square for the moment which is not ideal.

We had our first real snow last week. It actually stuck around & is still looking nice.

Saturday we went to a "cut-your-own" Xmas tree farm and brought back a lovely tree. I've never had a tree so fresh it still had snow on it, so that was fun. It's also the first time we've had a full-sized tree here.

Next, what started out as a quick dash to Home Despot for appropriately-sized lights, rapidly turned into an epic trek for brunch in town, British foods 45 minutes up the road, and finally Home Despot. We decorated the tree - we do NOT have too many ornaments, we still have hooks left! - and settled in for a nice quiet Choresday on Sunday. The cats are interested in the tree, but haven't climbed it or broken anything that we know of.

Today, the snow is melting a little, and we can see loads of animal tracks across the back yard.

This is also my last Monday on earth of working. In a little over 4 days' time I will be a free human being!

When the cats are quiescent, I get to work on cross stitchI made some progress on Upon A Star, including a couple of actual stars. Most importantly, now I can count from the top down instead of bottom up, which is a relief.

We hit a rich vein of '80s and '90s acts at the Palace Theater in Albany. In no particular order:

* KT Tunstall & Toad the Wet Sprocket
* ZZ Top
* The Beat(*) & UB40
* Gary Numan and the Psychedelic Furs

KT Tunstall was really damn good. Luckily there was an opening opening act (Vertical Horizon playing a medley of their hit) so despite delays at dinner we did not miss anything important.

Toad the Wet Sprocket was kind of meh.

ZZ Top was a lot of fun. I knew most of the songs. Boy howdy is that music a product of its time though.

The Beat & UB40 - Loads of fun, good energy. I did not know most of the songs and had a blast anyway.

Psychedelic Furs - MASSIVE disappointment. Richard Butler(**) was like somebody's creepy drunk grandpa getting out the dance moves. It was embarrassing to watch. I bought a t-shirt before the show & am having some regrets.

and finally, GO SEE GARY NUMAN IF YOU CAN, OH MY **** ***. I had no idea what to expect. It was loud, it was industrial, the lighting was like something out of Blade Runner. He played "Cars" about 30 minutes in - normally that's the point where we all think, welp, that's the end of the set then - and then he KEPT GOING for another half hour. Absolutely incredible. Super intense, amazing performance. I can't believe he's 67. He still has his voice, his moves, and his precision. GO SEE HIM. Do consider buying the $2 earplugs from his merch booth.

I should have stuck around & bought a Gary Numan t-shirt; but if there is one thing I have learned, it is that if I buy a black crewneck t-shirt I will NEVER wear it.



(*) known in the US as "The English Beat" but they are the One True Beat to me

(**) it still weirds me out that he has the same full name as a friend-of-a-friend who passed away much too young

I made a tiny bit more progress on Upon A Star. I’ve been super burnt out lately, but there is a weekly Reddit thread where people show off their WIPs so I was moved to spend some time on this today.