Friday and Saturday, well half of Saturday was a wash out due to the tropical storm that rolled through our area.  It was not a wind event but man oh man it was a rain event with 24 hours of solid precipitation.  I have not heard an official total but I’m positive we got at least a half foot of rain.  The property looked as you would anticipate, severely flooded.  The silver lining is since we are just at the start of rainy season the ground was not saturated, allowing most of the water to soak in within a day or so. Right around mid-day Saturday the skies started to clear and by mid-afternoon bright sun was again the norm.

Saturday night I made plans to go see Top Gun Maverick, a movie I have heard nothing but positive reviews about from EVERYONE that had seen it.  I invited Gladys’s sister to go with me, she hadn’t been to the movies for a long time and I would always rather go to the movies with someone than alone.  We went to the Cinebistro, the new high end theater that opened late last year.  I have been there a few times and always enjoyed myself.

The theater was full, really full.  I have not sat in a theater with this many people in probably 5 years or more.  The concierge style service this theater uses makes it extremely demanding on the staff when it’s this full.  Ironically our food came out relatively quick however the drinks did not, we both had finished our meal by the time our beverages arrived.  When I asked what the deal was they said drinks were “backed up”.  Sounds like they needed to swing some of those food prep staff to drinks.  Monique and I got the same meal, a shrimp gnochi entree which was really good.

I was glad I wore jeans and a long sleeve shirt.  Last time I was there I froze my ass off in shorts and a short sleeve shirt, utilizing the cloth napkin at one point as a “blanket”.  Once the movie started they cranked down the thermostat, but I was ok.  Like I said I had heard heaps of praise about the film with some stating it may actually be BETTER than the original which is practically never heard.  Well I can tell you, the hype is real.

The fact they can launch a sequel to a film that was made 36 YEARS later and have it feel this good is really an amazing accomplishment.  The tie ins to the original were all there and the action and suspense was as good as it gets.  Unlike the overwhelming majority of films today that rely heavily on CGI to make things happen this was live action stuff, it was refreshing to experience again.  In normal life Tom Cruise and his Scientologist life style is bizarre to say the least but when it comes to action films he has always been and will likely always be one of my favorite actors.  I thought this was the best movies I had seen in a long time, A+.  Monique liked it as well which I was happy to hear.  Hopefully we get to hang out some more in the future.

I slept really late on Sunday, almost 9AM which is extremely rare.  I was up extra late on Saturday night editing a video about my new vacuum when I got home.  I was too pumped up from the movie to go right to sleep.

I only had a few things I wanted to get done during the day.  I posted a poll on Instagram asking where people thought I should ride the OneWheel GT.  I had three options with a fourth being to ride an EUC instead, which won the poll, not surprising considering my EUC-heavy audience.  I decided to do both things, ride the GT and an EUC.

I first went to Collier North Regional Park, a place I had not visited in a very long time since the park by my house opened up.  I wanted to test all six GT ride modes, a request I got from a channel viewer.  I had only tried out three of them to that point.  Some of the other modes I hated but some I liked.  It was enjoyable to cruise the park, it has a longer and more diverse path around it’s perimeter than my new park.

I then packed up and drove to the Greenway where I pulled out my V11.  I had a good time once again, cruising all the way down to the beach and back.  The suspension on the V11 makes such a difference for my riding comfort.  I didn’t film as much as I would have liked due to camera difficulties and low battery.  I had a spare battery that I neglected to bring along, dumb me.

I got home and dug into video editing.  I bet I spent 5 hours in total editing last night, one of my longest sessions of recent memory.  I shut the computer off after 11PM.

So I was concerned about the baby birds with the storm that rolled through.  I checked on them Saturday afternoon and they seemed fine, the solar panel above the nest provided some degree of protection.  They were about two weeks old at this point with open eyes and their feathers starting to develop. So imagine my feelings when I peeked in their nest Sunday to find it, empty….

I was immediately sad and concerned about what happened to them.  It seemed impossible that they were developed enough to leave the nest this soon but then I thought back to the last time baby mockingbirds were in a nest at that exact same spot.  It was very similar, they disappeared before it seemed like they were big enough to do so.

I recently looked it up and the typical nesting period for baby mockingbirds is only around 12 days so I guess my concern was unfounded.  Hopefully the babies are safe, sound and enjoy a good life.

After not following through on my intent to weed whack Wednesday night I was steadfast in my resolve to do that AND mow after work last night.  Trying to accomplish these tasks in their entirety during a weeknight is a tall order.  I knew the only way I could do that was if I scaled back the weed whacking part of the work by just doing stuff right around the house.  I skipped the more tedious/slow parts like whacking the main property and chicken area fence line.

I hauled ass both on foot with the weed whacker and on the Husqvarna tractor, mowing most of the time at near full throttle.  I finished up via the LED headlights on the tractor a little before 9PM.  Yea it was a bit extreme but the work is now done just in time for the tropical storm that will be rolling through our area for the next 36 hours.

Yesterday I noticed my Zillow listing for my parcel of land in Lehigh Acres was no longer active.  You have to renew it every few months it seems.  When I did it this time I decided to take a look at some of the asking prices for the lots near me and I was quite surprised that it finally seems the real estate upswing of the last few years has finally touched this land as well.  The lot right next to mine was listed for 26K.  The lot I sold last year went for 13-14k and I recall feeling lucky to get that.

So based on the asking prices of other lots in the area I increased my asking price $6K, from 18K to 24K.  Do I think I’ll get that for the lot?  It’s unlikely but damn that would be lovely.  Any proceeds for the sale would go right onto the HELOC that was used to buy the lot back in 2003 which is my only remaining debt on the house.  I’m crossing my fingers that 2022 is the year I finally get to unload the last of my (bad) investment properties that I have held for nearly 20 years.

This weekend besides trying to stay dry I am going out to see Top Gun with a friend of mine.  We are going back to the Cinebistro which I have been to a couple times previously.  It’s a really enjoyable way to watch a movie.  By all accounts this sequel breaks the mold and is actually as good if not better than the original by many accounts.

Last night I arrived home with the intention of going outside and weed whacking the property.  When I pulled in the driveway there were threatening clouds all around the area with the sound of thunder rumbling off in the distance.  I had not totally written off the task as there have been many, many times I have done yard work with storms surrounding me. Hell I have done it in the middle of storms if I am in one of those moods where nothing short of a direct lightning strike will stop me. However last night I got sidetracked onto another task and by the time I got back to thinking about yard work it was too late.  I don’t like when I don’t follow through on commitments I make, even if it is just a mental one, only made to myself.  My plan is to get out there tonight and get busy.

The reason I am trying to get the major yard work out of the way is it looks like a tropical system may be rolling through our area Saturday morning which would make mowing/weed whacking problematic. Plus it is much more pleasant doing this stuff in the evening when the heat and humidity is far less oppressive.  Hell I may even catch a glimpse of a beautiful post sunset sky, like I did last night.

One of the exercises I have been working on as part of my self help/improvement stuff is writing down 50 words/things I like about myself.  These are words that describe aspects of who you are and should be positive in nature.  When I first started on the list it seemed like a herculean task.  I got to word 14 or 15 and paused, wondering how in the world I could get to 50.

I dug deeper , thinking about different aspects of who I am, what holds importance in my life, and what about me would be seen as positive.  It took awhile but eventually I had 50 words/phrases.  I was surprised I actually got there.  The point of an exercise like this is to reprogram your brain, thinking about good things in your blueprint and expand on them instead of spinning around whatever negativity that has taken hold for various reasons.  It’s hard work and there is not a magic button you press where you can say “I’m cured”.  Small steps day by day add up to real progress as time marches on.

Last night I needed to stay up till close to midnight to fire off a process for work that had to start after 11:30 pm but complete by midnight.  It was about 8:45 and I could already feel I was getting sleepy, not good.  I decided on an unconventional way to stay awake, do a live stream for a couple hours.  After all you can’t sleep if you are talking, right?  So in the span of 10 minutes I fired up a stream and started talking.  Despite the lack of notice I had 20-30 people that jumped in simultaneously. Although being on live helped me I still was feeling less than alert.  It was then that I made a big mistake, I decided I could use some coffee.

I did not feel like going through the hassle of brewing coffee so instead I grabbed the Folgers instant coffee that I typically only use in my mom’s chocolate cake recipe.  I heated up some water in a coffee cup in the microwave and then added three HUGE, heaping tablespoons of Folgers to it along with some God knows how old Coffemate powder creamer.  It was way too much coffee from a strength perspective in retrospect.

Not only was it strong, it tasted absolutely awful.  I had to dump some sugar in it just to get it down.  Despite the awful taste the caffeine definitely kicked in.  The cobwebs cleared and I once again felt awake, too awake.  I shut down the stream after a couple hours and ran the task I needed to do at about 11:45PM, it went fine.

I went back and took a shower.  When I laid in the bed I immediately noticed that despite the very late hour I was not feeling tired, at all.  It was at this moment I knew I had a problem.   I simply could not get my brain to wind down.  The end result of this was my being awake most of the night, getting a couple hours of sleep, maybe.  It was a lesson I will not forget anytime soon.

My Memorial Day was absent of any common celebrations like get togethers, cooking out on the grill, or swimming in the pool. However as I mentioned in the video I shot yesterday, that doesn’t mean I didn’t appreciate what the day off is all about, honoring those who died in service of the country.

Later yesterday I saw my uncle posted a picture of my grandfather from when he was an aircraft mechanic in World War II.  He was standing on a massive ant hill in north Africa where he was stationed during the war.  I had never seen the picture before.  I never talked much to my grandfather about his day’s in the service and in retrospect I wish I would have.  I guess I was too young to know or care about the significance of what he experienced.

Anyway I thought it was great timing by my uncle, considering the holiday.  I miss my grandfather, I have his bowed legs, his fix it mentality and often accompany a hand shake with a reassuring slap on the upper arm, just like he always did.

Looks like I have the full four day weekend to wrap up, let’s dig in.  On Friday morning I met up with Gladys for one more ride on the Greenway, her on her pedal assist beach cruiser and me on the V12 which I had not ridden in awhile.  When I almost dumped it on my ass doing a tight turn I realized I should have checked the PSI of the tire before leaving, it was dangerously low.  I kept my riding appropriately conservative the rest of the way.  It was yet another fun ride, we went on something like four or five rides during her time in the area.  This was the first one I had the video camera along for.

Friday afternoon I plugged another tire on the Tesla.  This one had a small nail in it.  I am pretty sure I have been picking these up during my drives into Babcock with Ali and Shugs since it is an active construction site.  I figured since I was driving across the state on Saturday I should fix the tire ahead of time.  The tire plugging process went smoothly and so far has not dropped a single PSI.  I videoed the process this time, just for the hell of it.

On Saturday morning I tried to get up and going early.  I offered to take Gladys back across the alley since she was flying out of Miami.  The Tesla makes drives like this stupid easy.  With the seats folded down it had plenty of room for her stuff.  With the car being long range I didn’t need to charge until the way back at the half way supercharger and only for 10 minutes.  Gladys and I had a lot of fun hanging out during her time here but she lives full time on an island off the coast of Honduras so it was bittersweet to see her go.  It’s been a good couple weeks.

I didn’t get home until almost 4:30 but I still reached out to my buddy Don to see if he wanted to hang out a bit.  He gave me the green light.  I went to his place to see his dog Lucky who I hadn’t seen in a little while.  Despite the absence Lucky remembered who I was pretty quickly.  I love the little guy.  Don suggested we go to the Yard House, a bar/restaurant I never had been to before.  The bar was massive and the food was good.  My list of bars in my rotation are growing, this definitely made the list.

Afterwards Don said we could drop in at South Street to see what was going on.  The answer was, not much. Despite it being Saturday night there was no live entertainment and not a lot of people.  We only hung long enough for me to drink half a Miller Lite and then we rolled out.

My Sunday was a mixture of small projects and tasks.  I got the four replacement LED light fixtures installed, upgrading the dull and dreary builder globes that came with the house.  It was stupid easy, by the time I got to the last one I completed it in 10 minutes.  I also opened up the air handler to replace the UV bulb, an annual task.  It went ok.  The biggest pain is the screws that hold the sides on and the holes they go into are pretty worn out, making it a bit challenging to get it zipped back up the way it should be.  It felt good to get the task out of the way.

Elsa and I drove Sadie back up to Fort Myers to Ali’s place.  We hung there for a little bit.  Elsa is just hilarious when she first gets there.  She goes into total spaz mode just running around saying hi to everyone.  It’s very cute.

Last night I watched Operation Mincemeat on Netflix.  It’s a movie based on the podcast I listened to called the World’s Greatest Con.  It’s about an incredible deception the Allies pulled off on the Germans during WWII.  The minuscule details that went into this plot is nothing short of amazing.  That being said, I enjoyed listening to the podcast more than the movie which I would give a B.

This morning I got out on my Sherman for a very high speed DD ride.  I have not been filming as much while Gladys was visiting but now that she isn’t here I expect my schedule will become more normal.  It was a good ride and I feel the video reflected exactly that.  Tomorrow it’s back to work, luckily I don’t mind work much, unlike far too many.

Oh I forgot to mention I have locked in for an early July trip to northern New York with my dad, stepmom, brother, sister and their significant others/family.  I went there many, many years ago.  It is a beautiful lake area that is very, very remote.  It is the sort of place you truly go to uplug which is something that surprisingly to some sounds pretty good to me now and then.  I plan to do a lot of reading, maybe some writing and just appreciate the good things while letting the bad fall off behind me.

For a period of over 10 years, volleyball was THE hobby for me.  I used to play several times a week and also tournaments on the weekend on a pretty regular basis.  Hell I even played some indoor night tournaments that used to get finished up around midnight or later.  I was all about it.  I made websites, videos and wrote about volleyball all the time.

Of course playing a lot of volleyball gave me a lot of physical practice at the skills used in the sport.  Through repetition comes improvement in almost anything in life, right?

My favorite part of volleyball was hitting. Nothing was more satisfying than timing the jump and swing perfectly so you could crush a hit so hard that even if your opponent got a hand on it, it didn’t matter.  I practiced hitting a lot but I also did something that I rarely have done prior or since my glory days of volleyball, visualization.

In my mind I would imagine the entire sequence of a clean approach, jump, and swing.  I would see the ball impact my hand. I would hear the sound. I would feel the satisfaction as the ball hits the ground, untouched, at a high rate of speed.  I did this mind practice most often before a tournament, when outcome mattered most to me.  It felt like it helped me.  The mental repetitions manifested into physical improvement.  I didn’t start doing this visualization because I read it somewhere, it just started happening.

I read somewhere recently that there was a study done where one group of test subjects physically practiced doing something over a period of time.  There was another group that only mentally practiced, visualizing they were doing this same skill.  At the end of the test the skill level difference between the group that practiced physically versus the group that just visualized they were doing the skill was very, very small.

So what is the point of me bringing this up you may ask?  It translates into some of the stuff I have been talking about regarding my continuing efforts to change some of the core thought processes I have been struggling with for a long time.  In a nutshell what I am trying to do is visualize a different, more positive outcome, time and time again until it imprints a lasting change on my default state of mind.  It works, I know it works from that time in my life when I unknowingly engaged my mind to help my physical performance.  I just have to get in those mental reps.  Have a great Friday.

I drank a lot of coffee yesterday to combat the extreme drowsiness I was feeling. I had two large cups in the morning and another mid-afternoon after picking up Elsa from her dental cleaning.  This was the first time she has had it done and the first time she has been under general anesthesia.  I could tell she was still a little whacked out when they brought her out.  She was this way for the rest of the afternoon but later she was more normal and ate her supper.  I felt badly but her teeth are way better.  They also gave her nails a serious clipping, much more than I feel comfortable doing at home.

Since I wound up getting home earlier than normal I decided to put the extra time to use, getting on the tractor and mowing the yard.  Unfortunately the changing of the seasons means grass will be growing at a much faster rate, soon requiring weekly mowing once again.  I wore my headphones while mowing.  It makes the outdoor tasks pass faster it seems.  The challenge is trying to wear them in conjunction with one of my oversized brim hats, they just don’t work well together.  I could opt for ear buds but historically that type of device gets very painful for my ears very quickly. I must have an odd shape in there.

I discovered the three blue mockingbird eggs had hatched on Tuesday.  I have had a nest at this same spot before.  It’s great because I can very easily watch the amazing process.  It is very surprising how quickly the babies will grow and move out of the nest.

By the time I ate dinner all of the caffeine had left my system.  As I was watching Better Call Saul on the DVR I realized my eyes were closing as I was sitting upright.  I stopped the show and figured I would just lay down for a few minutes and close my eyes.  Three hours later, I woke up, a little before 9PM. It was sort of disorienting waking up at the time where I normally start thinking about winding things down.  The end result was me staying up until midnight.

I am off work tomorrow, giving myself a four day weekend since Monday is Memorial Day.  This past month of May has been one of the busiest and significant I can recall in a very long time.  All of the medical testing and procedures followed by two weeks of memorable, meaningful and different experiences where I have a had a chance to have more appreciation for what life can be has made May 2022 one for the scrapbook.

Yes of course I read about the horrific mass shooting at an elementary school in Texas.  As is always the case, the outrage reignites the automatic weapons debate, on both sides of the issue.  I have seen this cycle recreated so many times over my life time I feel almost numb to it.  People are horrified by these tragedies, politicians swear to make changes and NRA lobbyist fueled individuals in power quietly kill it off once the fervor dies down.

Much like a lot of things in the world, I feel powerless to make significant change in things that are not directly under my control.  At this point I do no know that there is ANY level of senseless gun violence that would be able to actually move the dial towards sensible lasting change.  Those that stoke the fear in individuals saying that something as simple as mandatory background checks is akin to the government taking your gun away are just playing mind games intended to further their own agenda.

Last night on the way home I made a snap decision that I was going to play pickle ball at Veterans Park with my buddy and coworker Rich.  Doing so meant I had to fly around the house.  My dinner was fast but sort of ridiculous, two Pop Tarts and a glass of almond milk.  On the way there the weather was good, except one large gray cloud I spotted off in the distance.  You can imagine my joy when I turned into Veterans Park just as rain from this one cloud let loose.

The rain was enough to send almost everyone that was there scrambling.  Rich had gotten there earlier and had already played a few games.  He was going to bail with the rest of the people but I told him I was going to wait a bit as it seemed like after this cloud passed we should be good, well sort of.

As I hoped the rain did stop in a few minutes but the court was drenched.  However when I walked on the surface it did not feel too slippery, except for the painted lines which were like ice.  They had a big court broom so we used it to push some of the water off the court.  By the time we were done it wasn’t too bad.  I did not slip once.  A few other people resumed play as well.

So we had just started playing with a couple women when another round of rain came rolling through.  At first I conceded that we just were not going to be able to play.  Rich got back in his car and had pulled out but I stayed, looking at my Dark Sky app that showed rain was ending in 7 minutes.  The rain did stop in more like a minute.  I texted Rich and told him I didn’t leave yet and that it stopped raining.  He turned around and came back, he really loves pickle ball.

So once again we took the brush to the courts to clear the water and started playing. It was so humid, I was drenched not from rain but from sweat in no time.  There were even fewer people left this time so Rich and I played three games of “skinny singles”.  In this variation you are only playing on one half of the court at time.  It is a way to not kill yourself as much as regular singles and with the wet courts it made more sense.  This style of game is good for working on your skills but far too often I forgot that I could only use half of the court and hit out.

We then played two doubles games against a pair of very good 18 year olds.  They both are on the high school tennis team and play club level pickle ball.  The first game we were somewhat competitive, the second game they smoked us but it was still fun and a good way to improve by playing better players.  Rich and I did a couple more skinny singles matches before we wrapped it up a little before 9.  It was awesome to get some playing time in when at first it seemed those hopes would be washed away.  I don’t give up easily.

I actually got an invite to go hang with some friends on the way home at a bar.  This is something that I would have never considered on a Tuesday evening for the vast majority of my adulthood.  However I have been making conscious efforts to keep pushing beyond my norms and saw this as another opportunity to do so.  I got home very, very late and am running purely on caffeine at this point but it was worth it.  I had a really good time.

This morning I dropped off Elsa for her first ever dental cleaning.  She was not very happy that I refused to give her breakfast.  The vet gave me a couple pills to calm her down prior to the visit but she threw them up after eating grass out in the yard, which annoyed me.  When the vet assistant came out to get her it broke my heart to see Elsa’s face full of fear as she was lead into the back office.  I will pick her up this afternoon.  From here on out I will be diligent about doing dental care at home, something that has been more or less absent since Elsa joined the household.  I don’t want her to have the same sort of mouth issues as Sadie has had over the last 6-7 years.

I forgot to mention another aggravating insurance situation I am dealing with.  You may recall my frustration with the dramatic increase in my property insurance this year.  This is a statewide issue that has gotten so bad that they are doing an emergency legislative session about it.  Well maybe they should add auto insurance to the list.

Back in June of 2020 I got tired of Allstate raising my premiums every policy cycle.  I had been with Allstate for something like 20 years.  To me, as a man in his 50’s with a clean driving record my premiums should be going down over time, not up.  When I called them up to complain they just basically shoulder shrugged me so I started looking at alternatives.  My agent got me a quote from Travelers.  My AllState monthly premium had crept up to around $200 a month.  With Travelers it dropped down to $138 so I pulled the trigger and jumped ship for the 30% savings. I was pleased.  Two years later I am no longer pleased.

After the first renewal year the premium jumped dramatically from $138 to $191.  When I inquired why they said it was because of Tesla repair costs.  I told them I had a Tesla when I started the policy, they said it was an adjustment due to the cost of Tesla claims since then.  Um ok, I was annoyed but did not feel like doing a switch only a year later.

Fast forward to last week when I got my new renewal notice.  The price has now sky rocketed another $30 to $220 per month. WTF….  In the span of two years they have jacked the rate now well past what I already considered high.  I called again yesterday to the local agent office.  I told him point blank how shitty this practice was, a clear bait and switch.  He more or less agreed with me but the only remedy he could give me was to shop around again for a more competitive rate.  I really would prefer to not be an auto insurance carousel every year but I have friends of mine that have been doing exactly that for years.  Evidently the insurance industry is banking on people being too lazy to change companies when they jack rates with no just cause.  I plan to buck that trend, bastards.