The Sort-Of-Do-It-Myself-Dreadful Affair

Wow, what a crazy two months it has been! Big changes, lots of activity, some stress and dithering. Here’s what got accomplished toward the end of the year.

11. Start taking RMD in 2025
Took my first Required Minimum Distribution from my retirement accounts in late November. I had to take them by December 31st, so I did. It made a nice bump in my bank account and will certainly help with all the moving expenses, but I won’t be happy come tax time.

16. Increase principal payment on HELOC loan
Well, since the HELOC loan was paid off in full in November, this was no longer necessary

20. After selling house pay off all debt and hopefully have enough left over to buy a house without a mortgage
This was accomplished!! The house sale closed on November 24, 2025. It was a bittersweet event for me, but both the mortgage and HELOC were paid off in full and I have already contracted to buy another, smaller home for cash. I do still have a small amount of credit card debt for moving expenses, but not a huge amount, thank goodness. For a very brief time there, I was completely free from debt of any kind. Hoping to repeat that circumstance before 2026 is over and keep that status going forward.

53. Replace exterior spotlights on house
I failed to do so by the day I moved out but did leave the replacement fixture and light bulbs for the new owner

79. Finish decluttering basement
The basement was finally entirely emptied and swept out in December

88. Organize and backup digital files
Although this will ultimately be an ongoing project forever, I did manage to get all files backed up and organized on an external drive before my old tablet went belly-up. So I’m calling it done. For now.

98. Decide what household goods to keep for the move
This was a decision that was happening up until the day the pod was loaded and basically, the only thing I wanted to take but ended up being left behind was the old desk. I was sad to see it get broken up for disposal but am sure I’ll find something just as good once I’m settled in a new home.

99. Dispose of unnecessary/unwanted items
The last few weeks were quite the frenzy of getting rid of things, like the patio furniture and lots of small household items. After the pod was loaded, another company came and picked up all the furniture pieces designated for charity donation AND took literally everything else that remained in the house (except for a single folding chair for me to sit on) for either recycling or trash.

100. Pack up everything for moving
I did a lot of packing during Thanksgiving week. I ended up with a total of something like 47 or 48 boxes and Rubbermaid containers, and I packed all but two of those myself. So I guess I have no one to blame but me if anything is broken upon unpacking.

106. Hire painting and/or cleaning crew
This goal was deleted. After the summer renovations and a bit of touch up paint in a few spots, no big painting project was needed. The sale happened so fast, before the house was even marketed, that there was no time to hire a cleaning crew. And with the tight schedule with the pod, the discards, and us needing to leave, all I could manage was to leave the house in broom-clean status.

Wow, look at that – all goals under the house and moving categories have been crossed off. That was pretty inevitable since they all dealt with getting the house ready to sell and moving across country.

In addition I managed to transplant myself and Kayden from Tennessee to Washington state. That was a heck of a trip, experiencing sunny warmth, freezing temperatures and whiteout snow, high winds, torrential rainfall and a mechanical failure on the car – all in the space of four long days. Thank goodness for my son, with his mechanical knowhow and outstanding driving skill.

I am not doing any of my regular end-of-year financial tasks this year due to the fact that I am currently in temporary quarters and do not know how my annual budget will need to be adjusted. I’ll do that after I’m more settled.
My weight loss and other health goals have also been put on the back burner during these frenetic last few months. Am looking forward to getting back on track in 2026. I’m kind of scared to step on the scales (once they’re unpacked) again, lol!

So at the end of 20 months, I have managed to closeout 68 goals out of the 116 total leaving a mere 48 to finish up over the next 18 or 19 months. Go me! I’m way ahead of schedule here.

However, once I get settled in my new home I am hoping to focus more on relaxing, spending time with the kids and exploring my new home state. I’m not sure how much effort I will put into completing my Mission 116 in 2026, tbh. Just taking it easy sounds so good to me moving forward. Let’s hope that evil politics allows all of us to live our lives in peace, semi-comfort and semi-security.

Good grief, 16 months in on this project already and two-thirds of 2025 already gone. 2025 has been a crazy and stressful year for me, but I am happy to remind myself that we are on the downside now. My word of the year for 2025 was Momentum and I think that was the perfect word for what I needed to do this year. I made the decision at the end of 2024 that I would be moving in 2025 instead of 2027 as originally planned. And so far, I am on track to be moved by the end of the year. I underestimated just how much needed to be done, not just to the house to prep it to sell, but in other ways as well. Yes, moving is right up there with stressful, disruptive activities like getting a divorce.

OK, onward with the month’s accomplishments.

25. Do an elimination diet for 60 to 90 days
Effective today, September 1, I am starting an elimination diet in the hopes of identifying any foods that may be affecting me negatively. The diet will be very restrictive for the first 30 days and then I will slowly begin adding other foods back in, one at a time.

28. Weight monitoring
A slight increase in weight in August, I am hoping to see weight loss in September with the strict elimination diet.

29. BMI monitoring
Weight goes up, BMI goes up. Nothing surprising there.

45. Repair the front porch
This one is being deleted, because it has been determined that it is not reparable. Instead I will focus on getting quotes to replace the porch so that I will have a basis for figuring out a concession for porch replacement to potential buyers.

46. Pave driveway
It will be far too expensive to actually pave the driveway before moving so I am altering the goal to ‘repairing’ the driveway and turnaround area with new gravel and replacing the rotted railroad ties lining the driveway.

Annoyingly enough, the Habitat for Humanity fellow did come out last week and said that I do qualify for both the HVAC replacement and fixing the driveway. BUT it would be paid out of a grant they do not yet have, which would mean it would be at least next spring before they could do the work. And since my goal is to move this year, they aren’t going to be able to help me at all. Phooey. Would’ve been nice but I wasn’t counting on it anyway.

53. Fix exterior spotlights
Still working on this one. I have a lead on a couple of reasonably priced electricians.

91. Curate CD collection
Completed!. I went through my CDs twice and ended up donating 98 to my local library. Still have a decent sized collection of CDs and they are all ones I listen to on a rotating basis. I am a big believer in having physical media to enjoy at a moment’s notice.

96. Create a list and schedule of essential tasks for selling house and moving
The list is getting whittled down quite a bit by now, with mostly only small tasks left, some easily accomplished, some dependent on others’ assistance.

97. Gather all home improvement receipts
Been working on this a bit at a time, but now that my desktop computer and scanner are back up and running, I hope to make a lot more progress on this in September. This will be my evening task on a regular basis instead of watching TV. Will probably also involve doing research during the day to contact places to get receipts.

98. Make decisions on things to keep, things to get rid of
This has been an ongoing process over the past six months, but I have continued to whittle the list down a lot as the move nears.

99. Dispose of unwanted items
I am getting rid of things on a weekly basis – some for donation, some to trash. It is usually quite small things at this point – drawer contents, etc. but there will be a few larger items going in September for sure. It’s a fine line on the decision process because I do not want to have to buy things after moving if I can help it (because those evil tariffs make everything far more expensive), but I don’t want to have to move a lot of excess things either.

100. Pack up smaller items in boxes/totes
This is currently stalled but should ramp up soon. My problem is that I don’t want a ton of packed boxes/totes sitting around the house while it is for sale. It’s just not a good look, y’know?

101. Settle on date to get house listed for sale
I have tentatively given myself a goal of October 1 to list the house. That will depend, of course, on how much progress I make on the other tasks needed in order to do so. But that is the date I am aiming for. And then hopefully being able to move before Thanksgiving.

All of my travel goals have been shelved for the foreseeable future. Moving across country kind of pushed everything else to the side. I truly did not realize just how much prep work goes into preparing for such a major life change, especially at my age! Silly me.

More big activity this month as the renovation continues. A very busy and stressful month!

5. Read Vorkosigan series
Thanks to friends, I was able to find an ereader app that works on my tablet and then sent the books I am missing to me, so I could read again, yay! Thank you, spiffikins and mrlnpndrgn!

Read Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance and Flowers of Vashnoi. Ivan and Ekaterin get their own books!!

28. Weight monitoring
This was depressing, although not unexpected. Still stress eating, still gaining weight. Must find the discipline again. I don’t feel anywhere near as good as I did before gaining, although stress is likely a big part of that.

29. BMI monitoring
We all know what happens when you gain weight. The BMI goes up. *sigh*

33. Semi-annual checkup with PCP
Not nearly as bad as I’d feared, despite the weight gain. The visit was cordial and he was kind and sympathetic about all my stress issues and didn’t lecture me on the weight gain. Most of the labs were way better than expected.

35. Tracking A1c to keep under 7
Honestly, I was shocked that my A1c came in at 6.6. It’s a far cry from the previous 5.7 but I’ll take it, and at least it remains under 7.

67. Replace damaged closet door in middle bedroom.
I had thought to replace two doors in that room but the entry door was salvageable. The closet door was purchased, painted and installed. I have a new handle but someone needs to drill a hole in the door so it can be installed.

69. Replace damaged subflooring at stairway landing
Done! Also ended up replacing a few pieces of subflooring in the upstairs family room – most likely pet damage from previous years.

71. Renovate upstairs bathroom
This part of the job was seriously noisy but the room was gutted at long last. All the tiling is done as well – the shower and the flooring, with plumbing rough-ins. The old hanging fluorescent light in the bathroom has been removed and a nice clean can light installed. Still waiting on a few things to be done, but the main bones are there now.

73. Repair damaged wall areas in upstairs rooms
Lots of remudding work involved on the ceilings and walls. Quite the lengthy process – mudding, sanding, remudding, more sanding. So much dust! The A/C got so clogged it stopped working. I’m changing filters every couple days at this point to get rid of lingering dust.

74. Paint ceiling, walls and trim upstairs
The upstairs painting has been completed, and as I said elsewhere, the white on white effect is underwhelming to me, but at least it is done and is fresh, clean and the rooms upstairs are now flooded with light.

This wasn’t a separate item in my list, but the electrical work is also completed upstairs. Those horrid old fluorescent lights in the ceiling have been replaced by snazzy new can lights, 6 in the family room, 1 in each closet and 4 in the bedroom. Oh, and one in the bathroom. Let there be light!!

92. Curate book collection
Done and done! I did go through my final selections and decided to keep all of them. I’ve kept around 50 books, just those I tend to read over and over.

First week is over and I was surprised that they worked yesterday as well. I figured they would have a normal weekend 'off', which would give Kayden and me a comfortable decompress time, but alas, no. Still, a six day work week suggests the job may be done sooner than anticipated, which is not a problem at all! :-)

My bedroom is almost completely finished now. It only needs the electrical work done, which is quite minor. Just replacing those dingy plugs and outlet covers with new ones and installing the new ceiling fan. The big work has been done - the flooring is installed (there was a little flap with how the doorway into the bath looked, but that was resolved quickly and easily. The ceiling, trim and walls have all been painted, including the interior of the closet. I was SO happy to get rid of that vivid pink closet - the entire primary suite had been done in shades of pink when purchased back in 1988 and I'd repainted the walls and trim years ago but never bothered with the closet. But now it is fresh and clean. As for colors, I maintained the neutral gray (Morning Fog is the shade) throughout with bright white trim. Been lectured that gray is no longer a desirable color but eh, it's what most of the downstairs is, so I'm just choosing to stay consistent. Not interested in painting the entire interior of the house, yanno? My brass bed was reassembled but remains unusable right now because I'm waiting for the closet trim paint to dry fully before putting things back in. For now the bed is piled with all the closet contents.

Work has started on the second (smallest) bedroom. The flooring is actually pretty decent so they only had to fix a couple of problem areas. The trim has been painted and the walls patched and sanded, waiting for paint tomorrow. I will be interested to see if both remaining bedrooms will be done by the end of this coming week.

Probably not surprising to anyone on my reading list, but having workers in the house all day every day has proven more stressful than I'd anticipated. It leaves me feeling quite tired much of the time. Guess I'd forgotten how it felt years ago when the other work was done. And of course Kayden has never been exposed to such activity as far as I know. At any rate, work is proceeding on schedule and I am pleased with the results.

While all that is going on I continue to quietly declutter. The upstairs is completely empty now, except for a few pieces of furniture I hope to sell. At this point I have 14 full totes/boxes packed and have taken multiple trips to the dump, donation site and library. Right now I have three more bags of books to go to the library again (good grief, so many books!!) and two medium size filled boxes to donate. I keep thinking, though, that 14 totes is a LOT of stuff to be keeping and will very likely go through each tote again and see if there is more I can part with. Those totes are just personal stuff, doesn't include any kitchen items or any of my artwork. Or clothes.

I'm investigating a less major way to fix the porch issue as well and hope that bears some results soon. My handyman, sadly, has pretty much disappeared again after that single hopeful visit two weeks ago. He wants to come and help out, but just can't seem to fit it into his schedule, so I'm thinking I may ask the guys who are here every day if they could squeeze a bit more work into their days. We'll see.

Our weather has definitely warmed up and the humidity is also quite high. We had a storm Friday night which really cleared the air. Yesterday was gloriously beautiful and not much humidity, but today it is overcast and creeping back up. I hear there are bad storms predicted for later in the week.

As far as my brother is concerned, I am still working on putting it all in perspective. Looks like all of the younger generation has opted out of attending the anniversary party for various reasons, so it boils down to my sister, my brother and me. And my sister's two children. It's going to be a difficult visit but for my sister's sake, I will attend and make nice as best I can.

That's really about all I have to report. This coming week will be much of the same, I expect.

20 minute video from The Lincoln Project. Please watch and take the message to heart. Let it spur you to action.

It's time to downsize everything in preparation for a move, and that includes my fanzine collection. I am happy to mail zines to other fans for reimbursement of postage costs. Good condition.

This batch contains GEN Man from UNCLE zines. I have a lot more of the slashy stuff and that list will follow in a few days.

Del Floria’s Press #1
Del Floria’s Press #2
Del Floria’s Press #3
Dossier One
Dossier Two
Eyes Only #9 (adult het)
Kuryakin Files #23
Kuryakin Files #28
Paladin’s Affair (2 mildly slashy stories, rest are gen)
Quelle Belle Vie Affair by Vicki Loebel – 2002 novel
Sleeping Beauty Affair by C.W. Walker – 1994 novel
Small Sacrifices Affair by N.L. Hayes & C.W. Walker – 2003 novel
Through Innocent Eyes – collected works of Linda Cornett
Tiger Cage Affair by Patti Ellis – 1996 novel
UNCLE Chronicles 1 – Cousins, Friends & Brothers – stories by Pat Foley (copy of zine, not bound)
Waverly Papers, 1983
Double volume containing two novellas (copy of the zine, not bound)
Wolves and Lambs Affair by J. Hunter Holly - 1977 novella
Final Affair by Paula Block – novella

There are also two novels that hover between slashy (nothing explicit) and gen, with some het (nothing explicit) thrown in for good measure. There are also some indirectly referenced torture scenes, nothing explicit. LOTS of IK hurt in this one.
Beloved Traitor by R. Dean Becker – 1993 novel
Traitor Redeemed by R. Dean Becker – sequel to Beloved Traitor

Politics, ahoy! You have been warned.

Subject line is not original to me, it is something an EU citizen said on a political post that really resonated with me. And what this person meant was that other countries cannot help in this internal situation so it is up to the US citizens only, each and every one of us, to save ourselves and our country, and in doing so, we can help pull the entire world back from the brink of war and more oppressive authoritarian takeovers.

This one sentence inspired me to get up off my despairing, overwhelmed, terrified ass. Somehow I found my courage. Yesterday I participated in my first public protest in more than 50 years.

Let me tell you, it was empowering. Being in my 70’s does not make me immune to fear or inertia. One thing I discovered is that educating myself by consuming podcasts, news shows and learned articles only made me feel more overwhelmed and hopeless. It contributed massively to my inertia on actually doing something productive. It was easy to come up with excuses on not taking action while feeling helpless and victimized.

So, I was terrified driving over to the location – what if I get arrested, what if there is violence, what if I am injured, what if my face is identified and I end up on an FBI watch list? What if, what if….

You know what, I don’t know about an FBI watch list, but I do know that there was no violence, I was not injured and I did not get arrested. But what did happen is that I joined with some 200 like-minded people who still believe in democracy and rule of law and are mad as hell that our rights and benefits are being stolen, that our tax dollars are no longer going to services that help people but instead are being illegally directed into the pockets of the already unbelievably rich.

I met people who have reached out to me since to welcome me, to offer friendship, collaboration and purpose. I felt about 1,000% better after having taken physical action, even if it was just putting my body out there and carrying a sign for an hour. I also learned that even in this ruby red bigoted state of Tennessee, my voice and my presence does make a difference.

The power is in We the People. Never forget that.

Link to a local news video about the protest. They definitely underestimated the size of the crowd, more like 200. And yes, I can be seen in the video, but I won’t tell you where I am! Also super interesting to me was that more than half of the protestors were in my age group! I hope hope hope that we can gather many more active protestors in ALL age groups soon.

WKRN News

For anyone interested in learning more about taking action yourself (it doesn’t have to be protesting in person, there are lots of ways to help), check these two websites out.

50501
Indivisible.org

Wow, it seems astonishing to me that I have already completed ten months on this project. And despite the current awful political climate it felt like overall a positive month on a personal level. That’s because I made some huge decisions and then took action to followup on the decisions. Plus now we are getting more sunshine, fewer frigid temperatures and more daylight, all of which boost my mood and energy levels.

The coming three or four months should see a huge number of goals crossed off the list in a crazy flurry of activity. Most of which will be done by the hired contractor, of course, but I must keep my own sights focused on the smaller goals that are within my power to accomplish. The health goals, for instance, and the financial goals.

19. Find a creative way to pay for needed upstairs renovations
I can’t really say my solution was particularly creative, but between the census work, my upcoming RMD from my 401k and the open HELOC, this will handily cover the costs. I’m not sure how to cover any other repairs right now, but today I am filled with energy and hope that I will find another ‘creative’ solution for them as well.

22. Auto-deposit stock dividends
I really don’t know why I dragged my heels on this one, as it was absurdly simple to set up.

28. Weight Monitoring
As predicted, my weight bounced up again after that historic low last week, so my overall loss for February was only 1.2 pounds. But I’m happy that it was a loss! And my interim goal keeps getting closer all the time.

29. BMI Monitoring
It continues to stay at 29, on the upper edge of the ‘overweight’ category. This continues to be a win.

That’s it! Progress on only four goals is still way better than no progress at all. And there is much to look forward soon.

It's a beautiful day here, bright and sunny and quite warm at about 65F/20C and my mood is cheerful and sunny as well. Things are looking better both for my sister and my friend.

My sister's treatment, it appears, is a proactive every-six-month infusion to improve the strength of her bones in order to prevent cancer from moving into the bones. She has terrible osteoporosis and spine degeneration apparently and now I am told that that sometimes provides an easier path for breast cancer to metastasize rather than going into other organs. Interesting, if terrifying, but she is getting the needed treatment as a prophylactic measure. The infusion can be difficult for some patients and apparently she is one of them. The good news is that these effects are short-lived and she only needs a treatment every six months for a couple of years. So, fingers crossed that this works as expected and she improves quickly.

My friend is also improving rapidly after some initial testing and treatments yesterday. She is hopeful to be back home later this week. May it be so. And I hope she will be able to take better care of herself in the future, to prevent more acute episodes.

The contractor got back with me and it looks like we'll be starting the reno project around the first of May. So that gives me two months to get going on the decluttering ahead of time. Yay!

Today I've run a few errands and taken a ton of trash/recyclables to the dump. And then I came home to start sorting through the kitchen one more time (about the fourth or fifth time in two years) and have accumulated a list of roughly 16 items that can go away (i.e., items I will not be moving with me). It's actually a lot more than that because some of the items are group items, like my current dishes and stainless flatware, sets of glassware, placemats and table linens, etc. Some of them will remain here until the day I leave, probably, like the dishes and flatware and then I'll just put them out at the curb for anyone who wants. But I've got my list to checkoff as time grows shorter. Of course I won't be moving foods either, so I'm looking hard at those items to use them up as much as possible over the next few months. The move really represents a fresh start for me in every way.

Now I'm going to go for my walk - I did walk yesterday and my body really appreciates the effort. Just down to the school and back, I think that's only around maybe 3/4 mile to one mile all told. It's a perfect day for a pleasant walk.

My next decluttering run will be in the laundry, the coat closet and the shelves that line the stairs going down to the basement.

Tomorrow the day starts off with a followup visit to the podiatrist to make sure the toenail that she removed is healing properly.

This morning's weigh-in was a jaw dropper for me. I hit 178.6 pounds, the first time I have been under 180 in probably 40 years. I've been hovering around 180 -183 for a couple of weeks now and expect I will probably bounce up again once more before settling under the 180 level. This is huge for me, as that is 70 pounds lost over the last few years. As I said, I lose very slowly, but I do lose! I would like to get down to my ultimate goal of 150 some day, but for right now my current interim goal is 175, and I am seriously within reach of that one soon.

Yesterday I did indeed meet with the contractor and signed the contract and handed him a 25% deposit on the project. I'm just glad it wasn't a 50% deposit like the contractor who did my back porch/deck requested. Big deposits are pretty standard these days on large projects. It is terrifying to be undertaking a big and expensive reno during these perilous times and I'm just closing my eyes and crossing my fingers that it pays off with a big sale price too. But at least I am doing something to move this goal of relocating to Washington state forward. My son is ecstatic with this step and can't wait for me to arrive.

Speaking of the kids, they have decided they will not be doing any more traveling. Mainly fear of flying these days, but also a recognition that they need to go hard on reducing their debt load faster. None of us knows what the future holds with Trusk (or should that be Mump?) gleefully dismantling the entire country. I think they are trying to beat Hitler's record of doing so. By the end of March I expect we will be living in a full blown fascist dictatorship. I don't even want to think about what might be happening in Europe in another month. I know everybody here is valiantly sticking their heads in the sand and trying to ignore the news and preserve their mental health, so I won't list all the political atrocities of the week. Just know I am keeping track of it all, and I am scared shitless.

OK, enough said. My plans for the immediate future are to declutter, organize and start packing. Hah, that seems like a joke to a lot of people, given how much decluttering I've already done. But I'd like to get the upstairs and the bedrooms cleared out of all unnecessary items that I won't be moving so that the reno work can be done efficiently and quickly. I am also taking very hard looks at my spending habits. Already pretty frugal to begin with, but there is always room to economize somewhere. This is to help with both the reno costs and moving costs. Did finally get some figures from the realtor, at least as far as sale pricing, but she was worthless on ballpark closing expenses. No patience with her lackadaisical attitude.

Bit the bullet yesterday and called my brother for the first time since our awful phone conversation back in July or August. The reason was because a cousin of ours passed on Thursday and he knew how to get hold of that family. I wasn't close to anyone on that side of the family, but sending a condolence is the least I can do. The conversation went okay, probably because I told him up front that if he made any kind of a political comment it would be the last time we ever spoke. Turns out that only one of his three daughters is still speaking to him - two of them have cut ties entirely. Well, y'know, he is now reaping what he sowed. And I guess he didn't want to completely lose his baby sister as well.

We are still freezing here. I think we may have gotten up to the freezing mark today, although the promised sunshine didn't come through thus it's colder than our forecast. Fingers crossed that the temps start to rise soon, as promised.