Clearing out the clutter

We've been cleaning out the clutter for two reasons: one is because we have to before it eats us and the other is that as I get close to retirement we're not sure if we'll be here all the time, part of the time or sell the joint.

So what we're doing this week is cleaning out the shelf side of the battery building including the shelves. First we had to clean out the storage container, then rearrange everything that was left in the storage shed. After that we went through the battery building and hauled everything we could to the storage container. Following that I dismantled the shelves I built 9 years ago and cleaned up the room.




Now Crystal is working on destashing all her excess fiber stuff. So she spent today sorting and setting up for that.

I spent the day in the greenhouse, pulling everything out and then putting down weed barrier and hardware cloth to stop the rodents and the weeds. With any luck I'll get the roof vents installed this next weekend.



One of my less favorite things is cutting hardware cloth. It tends to be a little bit stabby. But I got it done, so now I can move on to building some infrastructure in there. That might well be kinda fun.






Updates as conditions warrant. :D

The work world, but only for a few more months

This week has been busy at work. It always picks up in the spring. Friday and Saturday I spent the day trying to ride out the line to Summitville mine, since they were out. It's a 13 mile power line through some pretty rough country. This time of year, we go up in snowcats and snowmobiles. I snowcatted on Friday and snowmobiled on Saturday. Friday was much easier on the old body.

Friday we got turned back part way by a continual white out. The pic is from part way down when we could see again.  

Saturday dawned bright and clear, and I know 'cause I was up at 5 to head up the mountain.



It was a pretty day all day. Today we went to Hooper pool to soak out some of the soreness. Now it's TV time. Life is good.

Winnings from Diet and Exercise

We're on week 2 of the 6 Week Cure For The Middle Aged Middle. We've been dieting and working out with a goal since last June. We've both lost a good deal of weight and we've moved around a lot more body mass in the process.

I got Crys a new 1mm scuba suit to celebrate,



It'll work under her other suit if Bonaire is colder than we anticipate.

I finished up my last dietbet today. I won it, though I was doubtful that I would. Somehow this new diet we're on started working in the last few days and helped me make it.



Back to the grind. We'll start a new round of LIIFT4 next week. This week we're finishing up a hybrid calendar of it so we're on the final (week 8). It's kicking our ass, and it's all less fun with no caffeine or alcohol. :D

Updates as conditions warrant.

Mule (deer) Train

While the girl is out helping her dad get settled in after his heart surgery I'm being a good house husband. Doing the chores, cleaning up stuff here and there, trying to keep the place from turning into a pit while she's gone.



The mule deer in the pic aren't that easy to see so I tried to make them more obvious by cropping the photo. :D I'm also going out for walks in the morning and doing a workout. Trying to keep my giant ass from eating the rest of my life.

She'll be home soon. And that's a good thing.

It's time to DIE-T

We're starting a new diet today. It's the 6 Week Cure For The Middle Aged Middle. It's been out for a good while, basically a targeted keto diet designed to work on the fat in a persons middle that lies under the stomach muscles. Apparently that's a spot where fat really isn't supposed to be. That leads to things like fatty liver disease and other gut related problems.

We've done well dieting and working out and getting our mass reduced a bit. Our friend Rich suggested this diet as he has done it a couple times before this. After deciding to do it together for mutual support we all got blood work done to see what changes it might make. Turns out Rich kinda needs to do this diet right now. That works out well.

So for 6 weeks, starting today, we'll cut out caffeine and alcohol. We've already cut out sugar and most of the carbs, months ago. The diet goes in 3 sections of 2 weeks with slightly different eating patterns for each set of 2 weeks. Section one will consist of 2 isolate whey protein shakes and one low carb meal a day. The second section contains eating more actual food, still low carb and the last set are the "meat" weeks. Crys and Rich will use fish for that, I'll eat enough eggs to float a boat of chickens. :D The diet is really built for vegetarians, but we'll make it work and get through it all together.

Crys takes off late today to be there for her dads heart operation tomorrow. Looks like they'll really do it this time. We got the fellas apartment tidied up last week so it should be a nice easy visit. She hopes to return on Friday, but we shall see. Operations and doctors are seldom specific things. She's taking her shake stuff with her, and it's not like they'll be going out a lot anyway. :D

And we're off!!!!!!!

Now THAT was a drive home.

Today we drove home from Las Vegas, NV. YEs, we make a distinction because there is a Las Vegas, NM. :D They're slightly different.

We left at 2:30 AM.

There is a one hour time difference that ads an hour. We got home in 14 1/2 hours of drive time. It's normally 10 1/2 hours so we did pretty well considering. Sure.... Crys got a little nervous when I was passing trucks with snow spray in less space than we needed with no real sight lines.... but ..... hey.....

It was really a pretty good trip. We left Las Vegas and got well over an hour in before we started hitting snow. :D Apparently there was over 3 feet of snow around the Arizona continental divide. At some points we were following the twin tracks of semi trucks and it really wasn't possible to pull off the road so we had to keep going. :D It all ended up just fine. Had a good trip. Ate a good lunch. Got home at a good time.

Now we're home, chilling and relaxing and waiting to see what the next chapter holds for family and friends.

Strolling for Vegan Food

Today we took a nice long walk. We decided to just hang around our room and chill, maybe take a walk, possibly grab lunch.........



We saw some places to check out later on. Like the one above. That was after we took off in the WAY wrong direction, lost Crystals hat, backtracked, figured out we'd gone the wrong way and then found the hat and started going the right way.

Whew.



I found this place through an app on my phone (Happy Cow, it's $3) It's kinda new to Las Vegas but it's Mexican and American food and completely vegan. And they have a duo of two good things:



Dude, they have the Impossible BurgerAND Beyond Meat Burgers.

It's a Mexican/American menu and decent sized with a fair number of choices.



Yeah, I know it's sideways. :D Then we got into eating. The food arrived quickly and the folks were friendly and helpful.





We had the Super Nachos and the Tacos. Nachos had vegan chorizo and the taocs had vegan asada. :D Then we took a nice long walk back. Tonight it's raining out, and some of it might be snow by morning. We're going home Friday morning and we're hoping the weather doesn't jack with us too much.

Tomorrow will be another day of cleaning and banks and working on setting things up well.

And there will be family and good food.

Life is good.