Fri 21 Mar

Spring is here (figuratively speaking) and we are back home. Certainly doesn't feel like Friday. Missed waking up to sunshine and warmth, but paradise can't last forever. Real life intrudes. We meet with the accountant in Wausau at 11 am today to discuss how/if Grandma's leftover money affects our tax obligations. We will also try to gather some of our statements to ask his opinion on preparations for my eventual retirement. Would be nice to have the advice of a financial professional who is not trying to sell us a product on how the money we have set aside is likely to last. One thing I am looking forward to on returning is to get back to a normal eating schedule. When you are surrounded by bountiful food options, free for the taking, and alcohol in abundance, it is difficult to find your own comfortable level of consumption. Since we have paid for the package and it will not be available in a few days, I feel compelled to sample many things. After a couple of days, my system is saying "Enough!" but my mind says "You only have a couple more days and this will all be gone". At least we usually made good choices with grilled fish, lots of fruits and veggies and lean protein, but all the extras (desserts, pastries, Nutella crepes, alcohol) don't help. We also got lots of steps every day, often approaching 20,000 with our long beach walks. It wasn't real active cardio, but it was good. I decided not to try the spinning or step aerobics classes because I didn't want to be closed inside a gym room with the beautiful sunshine, sand, and ocean breezes outside. It seemed better use of our time to take a couple of long walks on the beach every day. Saw the accountant and we will contract with them for some financial planning advice to consolidate all our assets and make sure we are handling things optimally. This will also help you two to know what we have and how to access it should something happen to us. We had lunch at the Great Dane. Hoping to see more of that place as we can hopefully resume our evening hikes before too long. Spent over half an hour on the phone with a rep from Grandma's annuity trying (unsuccessfully so far) to determine why the monthly payments I am supposed to receive for the next 2.5 years have not yet begun. I had received a letter that they had received all the necessary information from me, but no money yet. The nice woman also could not see anything in the record to indicate why the payments were not happening, and of course everyone in the specific department that might have known the answer was gone for the weekend already. She promised to check into it and get back to me no later than Monday. We'll see. My mosquito bites itch. So I went downstairs to do walking videos to get some exercise today. After the first one, I wanted to check how many steps I had gotten, knowing I was at 3000 to that point of the day. Of course, I had left the Fitbit on the regular bra when I changed to my sports bra. I did the same Latin Spicy Walk again as it was fun, and it was worth about 3850 steps so I know I'm now over 10,000 on the day although my Fitbit only gives me credit for 6850. I'll probably try to push the official count over 10,000 by the end of the day and just know my body is getting an extra boost. Food: 8:30 am 1 c Trader Joe's multigrain flaxseed cereal, 1/2 c light original soy milk, 1/2 grapefruit, coffee 12:45 pm 4 oz vanilla stout, deep fried perch sandwich w/lettuce, tomato, onion, cheddar cheese on sourdough, sweet potato tater tots 7:00 pm Roundy's Light lemon nonfat yogurt, 190 g strawberries, 1/4 med cantaloupe Exercise: 4:45-5:15 Jessica Smith Latin Spicy Walk YouTube 5:15-5:45 " "