morrowlife

Here are Shannon and Mark at one of the many scenic spots in Worlds End State Park in Pennsylvania. That was a really memorable camping trip. The park was nothing short of spectacular, from its endless forests to its huge rock formations. Highly recommended. Great Art courtesy of my old Minolta camera and part of my famous Shannon, Vacation, and Camping series.

Well, the cruise is over. I really had a nice time and met some very pleasant folks. Let’s see if I can remember what happened on Friday. First, it cooled off quite a bit. I wasn’t able to spend time either on the promenade deck or on my balcony. It was cold and the water got just a bit rough. The ship rolled a bit – still nothing like the worst we saw on previous cruises, fortunately – and the wind was pretty strong. So I stayed indoors. I happened to pass the gay ladies I went to the beach with at Cabo and they invited me to sit with them and a couple other friends and play some of the trivia games. Passed an enjoyable hour or so with them. When we were going our separate ways, they made me promise to come to a cocktail party they were having a couple hours before dinner. I said I’d be delighted to attend. It turns out the party was for a couple of guys who got married at the beginning of the cruise. Juanita, one of the ladies, is the travel agent who made all the arrangements for the wedding and other events on the cruise. I felt just a little out of place at the party, since I didn’t know any of the family members there – just their travel agent – but they were very kind to me and I had a nice time meeting them and spending an hour together.

Retired to my cabin pretty much immediately after dinner to pack and relax, which I did. The ship rolled possibly a little more overnight than it had during the day, but my gift of sleep served me well and I had a very good night’s sleep indeed.

I awoke early on Saturday and watched through my window as the ship came into port and docked by the Queen Mary. Then I got up, got cleaned up and dressed, and went to breakfast, never to return to my lovely cabin. I found a comfortable sofa to read and wait for my turn to get off the ship. My turn came after a while and I disembarked, made my way through the Customs line, got in my beloved pickup, and drove home. Uneventful and easy, just like I like it.

Mark and I spent the weekend quietly at home and enjoyed being together again. The house was in excellent shape when I got home and everything that needed to be done had been done. No worries, no troubles.

Mark’s looking into starting back up in college in the fall. He’s leaning towards UNLV and has started the application process. I’m really excited for him and am sure it will be a worthwhile endeavor. He’s not sure whether to major in Computer Science or IT. I don’t think he can go wrong with either.

The health insurance people from Lockheed Martin had called me while I was gone, so I returned their call today. They told me I can change insurance plans and who is covered, so I did that. I went to the higher-deductible plan and dropped coverage for Mark and Andy. Andy’s covered by his new employer and it was so expensive to keep Mark on that we’re going to try to get him enrolled in an Obamacare plan. We have until the end of this month to make that happen. It’ll save a lot of money and hopefully be good insurance as well.

With the adjustment to my retirement pay due to Shannon’s death and the change in my health insurance, I’ve gotten a large increase in my take-home pay. In fact, it’s pretty much doubled. That’s good. I can use more money. Money is good.

Feeling lonesome today.  There are lots of reminders of my old life and I’m still tending to indulge myself in them. It’s so comforting, but it also makes me feel such a loss. Things are getting better, though. Slowly but surely.

And I’ll leave my Loyal Readers with this exciting Morrowlife Employment Agency job opportunity: traffic-jam-creating beaver!

See you tomorrow.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 11th, 2014 at 1:13 am and is filed under camping, shannon, vacation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.