It's been a crazy few months since I last wrote, to say the least! As of today, we finally voted that toxic, rodent of a human t-Rump out of office and we can finally bring some honor back to the role of POTUS. The consistent lies he pushed (I've read over 21,000 or 14 a day from one source, but also "only" 4-6 per day which is closer to 7,500) have just been too much. He's done nothing positive for the country that I can recount unless you're a top 1% or mega-business owner. His tax break certainly didn't help me out (or anyone else in a highly taxed state) as it limited state and local deductions to $10k, so that cost me close to $10k. The economy outperformed under Obama by a factor of 4 vs. him according to some measure that I read, so I assume even a rock could have done better than t-Rump. Finally, and probably most devastatingly, he ignored ALL science and health warnings about the coronavirus even openly mocking doctors, mask wearers and other "losers" as well as calling it a democratic conspiracy, while the virus took a firm hold in the US and killed hundreds of thousands and hospitalizing 2 million. And these really don't deal with what a despicable human being he is, though that much lying is obviously a pathological issue. The guy is an orange ass clown who only cares about himself. January 20th can't come soon enough.
Finally, after three years from initial injury (my guess at least), I was able to have surgery to repair my torn rotator cuff and labrum in my left shoulder. That was just over 3 weeks ago and recovery has been pretty good. I'm still on the passive motion machine for several hours a day and then I ice it for 30-60 minutes, so it's taking up a good chunk of my day.
While all this is going on, I have been able to make progress on a good project: the whole home back-up generator. No more power outages for us!! Covid set us back on this front as well due to delivery issues and changing the gas meter delays, but it's going to be installed next Thursday. Yay! No more worrying about the weather.
Other projects that worked out this year: hanging pictures, getting a new sump pump and waterflow back-up system (after the flood), spray painting the front light fixtures, installing garage organizing system, bought a freezer for the garage, new downspout pipe that leads to the yard from one corner of the garage (it was clogged and backing up) and new mulch. I tried to move the gate for the fence and install a new gate in the back, but covid interrupted the fence folks supply chain so I can't get it done until the spring.
A project that's just taking off is creating a three season room off the back of the house. The overall size and materials seem to be finalized, but there are many, many details to go.
The kids are doing great, though as Covid spikes again (10,000 new cases a day in Illinois alone), there is a likelihood that they will be returning to e-learning from home.
