A new year is upon us.  Unfortunately it doesn’t seem  better than last year. For us as a family the situation appears OK. Nationally is a different matter. One month we hear of a tax surcharge, than a tax rebate. Forecasting, especially economic forecasting is difficult, particularly about the future.

Our short-term house guest, Claudia has a job, or so I heard.  I did what I could, sheltered her for a few weeks and do not want to become involved to a further degree. If others do, fine, but it is no longer an immediate concern of mine. She might benefit from some relationship counselling but I am not going to propose this, as no doubt, then I would be involved.

Marge 1978

Marge about 1982

I didn’t take any vacation at Christmas and we stayed home for the holiday.  There was a radio station in Wilmington Delaware that played Christmas music all day, uninterrupted and we used to have that as background through the home intercom.  Quite nice really. Neither did we go anywhere for New Year’s celebration.  One practical reason was that Marge was dieting again and pigging out for the holidays would be self-defeating.  Marge’s birthday was Dec. 29 and she is now 44.  I thought she still looked very appealing then, though having two children and 44 years did give her a slightly middle-aged look.  This was a personal image thing for her, so I was as supportive as I knew how, with my limited awareness. She really looked great and I was too dumb to tell her so. I regret this lack of my perception to this day.  I was a better father than a husband.

To me, the New Year celebrations have a barbaric undertone.  You know, The survival of the sun again over darkness, eating and drinking and, well… you know.  I think the Romans called this Saturnalia.  I don’t object to eating, drinking, and romancing, and I guess New Year’s Day is as good a way to enjoy all these all too human habits. Why not more often?

The weather outside is not frightful, as the song goes, but quite mild. A bit of snow lasting a day or so and then gone.  Not at all like Syracuse.

Disney World

 We made reservations to visit Disney World at Easter, travelling in our trailer.  It is up on blocks now, winterized and does seem in good shape for a trip South.  We all look forward to this.

Pottery kiln

Some years past, we acquired Marge’s mother’s pottery material and the girls were very interested for a while. I had trouble with the cord on the kiln burning out so I calculated the load and the current was 1.5 times the cord rating.  My next task on this is assembling a heavier cord and switching system.  WE do NOT want to risk a fire and the new assembly should remove the hazard from the kiln.

Marge and I are going to take lessons in folk guitar in a group training program, I think it was the YMCA, but not certain as I write.

beginners guitar

 We are going to take the same class together and we expect this as educational and pleasant, since Marge does like to sing basic church songs and I enjoy music generally.

When we bought our house the area surrounding was not developed.  Of course that would not last for too long and we had some controversy with the developer about the lot lines.  I confronted him with out plot pins and our survey of the lot.  I called our surveyor who is still in business and he told me that he personally would back me up if necessary. With this information, the developer’s engineer agreed to accept our survey and plot plan.  We are watching the work carefully, as we have had similar trouble with the developer in the past.

A good month, we said goodbye to the last year and look forward to the present.