Oh boy.  It’s a sedate, if not serene, lifestyle I’m living in retirement.  At least as far as the USA iteration goes.  Hold on to your hats, here’s how my Friday went down.

The day started with me going to bed at 1:00 a.m.  Sometime during the night a heavy rain began to fall and continued throughout the day.  I was awakened around 6:30 by a persistent chirping.  I looked at the bedside clock and it was dark, so I realized the power had gone out at some point.  I couldn’t get back to sleep because of the chirps emitting from somewhere in the house every minute or so.  After 15 minutes the cobwebs in my brain had cleared out enough for me to grasp that the incessant noise was coming from my security system.  When the power goes out it chirps out its warning for as long as the back-up battery lasts.  Duh.  Rolled out of bed and reset the alarm, and then returned to my peaceful slumber.

I re-awoke at 9:00 and turned on the coffer maker/grinder.  Damn thing sounds like a jet taking off.  Fortunately our house guest Corine, who is visiting from Maryland, was already up and preparing for her long drive home.  My only real complaint about my ATT Uverse internet service is that every time there is a power interruption my personal wireless network disappears.  And sure enough, it was gone again.  My efforts to restore it were fruitless so I called the tech support folks.  And spent an hour and fifteen minutes on the phone trying to get the network back up.  We eventually managed to get my computer back on line, but the other devices (Jee Yeun’s laptop, Corine’s Ipad, and my Roku) would not connect.  I had an appointment to get to, so the tech promised to call me back at 1:00.  He didn’t.

I needed to get Jee Yeun to her physical therapy appointment, so we said our goodbyes to Corine and headed up the highway in the pouring rain.  I snoozed in the car while Jee Yeun had her shoulder worked on.  On the way home we stopped at Walgreen’s for a carton of smokes.

Back at the house, we did a reboot of Jee Yeun’s computer and this time it connected to our wireless network.  Hooray!  I had a chef salad for lunch and did a little internet surfing.  I put out some feelers for a graphic designer to come up with an appropriate logo for the newly formed Columbia Area Darts Association.  The bids are coming in at around $250.  Since I’m paying for this work out of pocket I’m hoping to get someone for closer to $150.  I mean, I have the vision, I just need someone with the skills to implement it.  We’ll see.

One of my favorite retirement perks is the ability to take a nap anytime the mood strikes me.  It did, so I did.  I woke up refreshed an hour later and knocked out a few games of Words with Friends.  My brother in California is the only person who still wants to play me these days .  I do fairly well at the game I suppose (it’s like Scrabble, only easier), but my bro still beats me the majority of the time.  Guess that’s why he still plays me.

Jee Yeun offered to make me a smoothie and I didn’t refuse.  Not especially in keeping with my low carbohydrate regimen, but I had it in lieu of dinner.  Besides, man does not live by not eating bread alone.  To coin a phrase.

Next up was a brisk walk for an hour (3.5 miles) on the treadmill..  Then an hour and half of darts practice.  Another round of Words with Friends, some television (Orange is the New Black) on Netflix, a shower, and this blog post.

And there you have it.  Hey you, wake up!  This is my life we’re talking about here!