Category Archives: miscellaneous

books, home improvements, memories, miscellaneous

So Sick Of Books

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The legacy books on the built-in shelves in the living room.

No, not sick of reading. I’m in the midst of reading two different books, one print book and one e-books. Actually, it’s 3 books. There’s one other one out in the sunroom that I’ve almost given up on. Maybe I’ll read a little more in that. And, when I’m done with these two, or three, I’ll transition into two more. Wait, it’s four. There’s also the book I read in the mornings for devotions.

The books on the left are waiting for the buyer to pick them up. The books on the right are waiting for reshelving.

No, not sick of writing books. This last week I finished the first chapter in my next Bible study. I enjoyed doing it, though after almost two months of writing nothing due to my health problems. And the two months before that I was writing at reduced capacity due to the two freak injuries I had in mid-July. So I’m having to get re-used to taking a portion of my day for writing. And working through my fine motor skills for typing. Yes, re-learning the elements of being an author.

Keepers to go back on a shelf, or possibly to be revaluated, but right now adding to the decor in the dining room.

No, what I’m sick of about books is selling them. You see, in the interest of a future downsizing, which after this year of health problems is much closer than we though, we decided to make a big dent in the 2 or 3 thousand books in our house.

That includes what I’ve been calling my legacy books, or more properly termed heirloom books. These include a large number of books published in the 1800s. This has been a lot of work. Looking up the books at on-line sales sites, deciding on a price, placing an ad on Facebook Marketplace, fielding queries, scheduling buyers in, dealing with no-shows, etc. It’s a lot of work.

Books on the dining room table.

I could also say gathering books from various places in the house. We had many boxes of books on shelves in the basement storeroom. Lynda was the one to identify the boxes and carry them upstairs (since I wasn’t allowed to go on stairs after my operation). Our daughter, Sara, also helped carry books upstairs while she was here. The basement is now much cleared of books. Yet, the bookshelves in the basement living room still have lots of books. We have no shortage of building material.

Books on the garage worktable.

The garage worktable is covered by boxes of Christian novels, mainly for women. The dining room table is covered with boxes of misc. books, a cross between legacy and modern books. All those are for sale. Then we have boxes of books in the living room and dining room that Lynda hasn’t yet made the keep/get rid of decision. We also have a pile of books on the hearth, waiting for the buyer to pick up, and another, smaller pile near of books we have decided to keep but haven’t yet looked where to reshelve them.

Why not just give the books away, you ask? It may come to that, especially with the modern ones. But for the legacy books, it seems a shame to not first try to get something for them. Some of them have been in the family for 130 years—first on bookshelves of some kind in the houses David Sexton rented, later in boxes in the boxes in the basement of the house I grew up in in Cranston, Rhode Island, then finally on the bookshelves or in boxes in our house. All that storage and transporting deserves compensation, don’t you think?

At some point, the inventory will be small enough that donation will be more likely. Or the few that are left will be manageable to keep. We’ve already done that with children’s books, 400 of them donated to our church for a special event.

But at some point, I’ll be glad for the dining room table to be clear, the living room clear, and the garage clear of book boxes and loose books to be gone, either sold, donated, or re-shelved.

books, miscellaneous, reading

Reading In the Woods

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Dateline Friday, 5 July 2024

The view from my woodland reading chair. Our house is to the left. Well in the distance is where the sound of the limb falling came from.

A few years back, we bought the unbuilt lot next to us, on the uphill side of our house. We got it for a good price and, based on current prices for lots in Bella Vista, it’s perhaps the most profitable investment we’ve ever made.

I’ve done some improvements on this lot, cutting down dead trees, cutting underbrush, clearing leaves from the edges to allow some grass to get a start. We have our compost pile on the lot (actually had it there before we bought it) and a well-worn path from the garage to the pile.

The woods directly in front of me. I’m keeping this are free of new trees and brush, though there are enough mature trees around it that the shade canopy is complete.

Along that path is my reading place. I don’t go out there to read often. Usually, I take my noon reading break in our sunroom. But it isn’t airconditioned, and this time of year it’s really too hot to read in. So on these days, I either read in the basement or out in the woods. I think I’ve gone to the woods most days this week (see the dateline), usually right around noon.

Isn’t it hot then, you ask? Yes, probably around 92°. But it’s shady. The oaks cover the path. I have a chair out at a level spot. A cut log set on end serves as a small table, leveled up with a wedge piece from a tree felling, to set my phone and cup of coffee on. By 1:00 p.m., the sun will have moved around further south and higher, and gaps in the canopy caused by the death of a couple of oaks due to a blight maybe three years ago. At that point I’ll have to move my chair or go inside.

Another view from my reading chair, looking more to the south and past our lot. Sunshine occasionally finds its way to the ground here.

Today I followed this procedure, but the temperature was a little cooler than recently due to rain yesterday evening. It was 92° with a nice breeze. In the shade of the oaks, I felt quite cool. I had a book and a magazine (an old one) with me. I decided to read the mag and try to get through it. Since it was from 2009, many of the articles were dated and not worth reading. Despite the distractions of woodland reading, I was able to read all I wanted in the hour and put it in the recycling bin afterwards.

What distractions, you ask? Just the sights and sounds of the woodland. And yes, even though our house is well within sight, when I’m sitting on our lot I’m in the woodlands. But most of the sounds are of human civilization. Take today. At first it seemed dead quiet, except for the sound the wind was making with the leaves. Then I heard a car door close, then another. Soon, I heard a lawnmower start and start to move. It sounded like it was coming from down the street at one of the two new houses. Then I could faintly hear a voice; probably one of the mowers.

Before the mower sound came, I watched a small lizard play near the edge of the driveway. A butterfly came by but didn’t stay. A fly somehow got in my coffee, but I fished it out and went right on drinking. I heard a mosquito near ear and swept it away. A vehicle made its way up the steep road across the hollow, somewhat faintly, around a thousand feet away or a little more. In winter, when the oaks are devoid of leaves, we can hear vehicle much clearer.

As the mowing continued, a vehicle came up the hill and passed by me, most likely without seeing me in the shadows. The view from the road into the woods is partly obscured by the first row of trees, some underbrush, and my blackberry vines. I looked back down the hill, into the woods. A bird flew silently across the lot thirty feet away from me.

Then I heard a crashing sound. Shifting my gaze to the north, I saw leaves and branches moving in the direction of the crash. It seems a branch fell from a tree behind our backyard. Maybe tomorrow I’ll go down there and see if I have new deadfall just off the property.

I continued reading in this distracted state. The magazine, the monthly publication of our Rural Electrical Cooperative, had a good article on one woman’s historic preservation work in Arkansas. That was quite interesting. Another article covered things that the State Legislature would be dealing with in the session about to start. But I kept looking up from the mag to see what was going on around me. I heard the sound of a squirrel but didn’t see it.

I looked around for WTBD—work to be done. Some underbrush needed more cutting. Leaves need to be pushed back a few feet more from the house, to widen the grass strip that’s coming up naturally there. Three trees, 6 to 8 inches diameter, fell near the south border of the lot. Someday, perhaps, I’ll saw them up and put them on one of my brush piles.

The sun was moving around to the point where I would soon lose my shade, then thin clouds partly obscured the sun. I decided I’d read all in the mag that was important, laid it on my log table, and took up my coffee. Perhaps you think it strange to take hot coffee out to woods to drink on a hot day, but I like the taste, and in the woods it’s not too hot to drink.

But my time was soon up. I:00 p.m. neared, and lunch beckoned me. The sights and sounds of the woods faded as I traversed the rocky path the 50 feet to the garage. Possibly I’ll return to my reading spot tomorrow for another hour with another mag or a book, and once again read distractedly but enjoyably. Cooler weather and the sunroom are not far away. Any place to read is a good place.

miscellaneous

Things Proposed on Facebook, Part 5: I Forgave People

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Demonstrating absurdity by being absurd. Meh.

Every now and then I’ll find another meme on Facebook that I think is worth adding to my series. If you read any of the prior posts in this series, you’ll see I’m critical of the memes. This one is, perhaps, a little different.

I saw this on Tuesday. It’s in the picture. In case the picture doesn’t come through, here’s the meme:

I forgave people I should’ve beat up.

Ignoring the grammar, this is obviously a horrible meme. No matter how badly you think of people, no one should be subject to your desire to inflict physical violence. No, this is not an acceptable behavior.

Except, this is obviously not meant to be a serious statement. Someone’s just trying have some fun, to demonstrate absurdity by being absurd. The person posting this meme is venting frustration at the behavior of people she (or he) encounters. The statement is harsh, but it not meant to be taken seriously.

Forgiveness is a good thing, a virtue. Multiple times for the same or different offense. Physical violence is never an acceptable solution.

So I give this meme a grudging pass. I wouldn’t post it, but the absurdity of it makes obviously sarcasm, not a true statement of intended behavior.

Christianity, miscellaneous

Things Proposed on Facebook, Pt 4: How Stupid Can You Be?

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Is this an appropriate meme to be sharing? Somehow I think not. It certainly doesn’t comply with the law of love that Jesus spoke about on several occasions.

Here’s one more in my series of social media posts. This one is a little longer than the other ones. I’ve seen it worded two or three ways. It’s based on the premise that people act stupidly. Now, I know that the word “stupid” is out of favor at present. You ought not call anyone stupid, which is usually meant to demean their intelligence.

The meme I see fairly regularly on Facebook, and I suspect it would also be on other social media platforms, is something like this.

I have got to stop saying “How stupid can you be?” I’m beginning to think people are taking it as a challenge.

In other words, people in general are really, really stupid. And just when you think they can’t be any stupider than they have been so far, they go and do something even more stupid.

This grates on me. Behind this meme is the thought by the one posting it that everyone he/she knows is stupider than he/she. The person has an expectation that everyone he encounters in life is below him on the intelligence scale. Or on the behavioral scale.

I look at Jesus’s command to love one another, love your neighbor, and love God. Somehow this meme doesn’t fit that command. You might say, “I’m just telling it like it is.” You might think so. You might even be way high on the behavioral and intelligence scales. But saying this meme is not loving others.

It’s your choice. Post the meme if you want to appear arrogant. I’m going to do my best to live out the law of love.

Engineering, miscellaneous, Personal Growth

Things Proposed On Facebook, Pt 3: Surround Yourself

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I find truth in this saying, but when do you get to the place where you give rather than get?

Continuing with my mini-series of mini-posts about advice found on Facebook, here is the third one. On Facebook, you have heard it said:

If you are the smartest person in the room, you are in the wrong room.

Said another way:

Surround yourself with people who are better than you are.

Admirable sentiments, don’t you think? How can anybody object to that? In order to improve yourself, choose your friends wisely; make sure they are smarter than you, better than you. Let their wisdom, experience, and common sense rub off on you. You will soon find yourself a better person.

But…but…if you really, rigorously do that, you might help yourself, but can you ever help someone else to be better? You can’t. You will always be taking, never giving.

So it seems like this is the height of selfishness. Yes, sometimes surround yourself with good, smart, better people, and grow from your association with them. But at other times, be the smartest, most experienced person in the room and help others to grow.

I remember back to college. I think it was fall semester sophomore year. Several of us in the engineering program were in the same calculus class. This was level three calculus. We’d already been through calculus both semesters freshman year. Third level was what was supposed to weed out those who would make it or not as an engineer. I was working a lot of hours at the Burger Chef that semester, riding my 5-speed bicycle the 5 miles each way, along with 18 credit hours, leaving little time for study. Leading up to a critical test, I thought I knew the material fairly well but still wanted to study more.

But two other guys in the same class with me were struggling big time. They asked me for help. So between classes and work, rather than study on my own to improve my knowledge, I met with them and went over the material. The test came without me doing my normal intensive study for a math test. I felt fairly good, but thought I could have done better if I had found the time to study.

The day the grades were supposed to be posted, I went to the professor’s office. He walked in about the time I got there. He said the tests were graded but not yet entered in his book. Would I help him do that? I took the pile of tests and read off the names and grades while he entered them in his book. Yes, this was a primitive time, long before computer databases and grading systems. Page by page I read, over 60 students in his three classes of this course. Finally I came to my test. I got a 100. My best grade of the year. It paid to help my friends study what they needed to know, perhaps more than studying on my own.

I want to be careful here. Making sure others in the room are smarter than you may be a form of selfishness, but making sure you’re the smartest in the room could easily lead to arrogance. Some balance is required.

But I think it’s easy to reject this Facebook advice. Be in the position with others that makes sense for you. Look for smart people when you need help and needy people when you need to minister.

Christianity, miscellaneous

Things Proposed on Facebook, Pt 1: How To Treat Others

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You all have probably seen something like this on social media.

Yes, Facebook, like all social media, is full of advice. Is any of it worth listening to? Or actually modifying your behavior to emulate it? I’m thinking of doing a series of short posts—not necessarily consecutively—discussing some of them. Or, perhaps I’ll do one or two and find it a waste of time. But here’s the first.

If you treat me right, I’ll treat you right. But if you cross me, I’ll hurt you right back.

I have seen this over and over on Facebook. It’s probably on other social media platforms as well. I’ve seen it said by men and women, though more often by men. The people who say this seem to span many ages, though I think they come more often from those considered middle aged.

Is this good advice, something worth making one of you life behaviors? When I think of wise maxims people have grown to accept as useful guides to behavior, I think of the Golden Rule.

Do unto others as you would have them do to you.

But that’s just the opposite of the Facebook advice, which can be rephrased as

Do to others as they have done to you.

That’s just the opposite of the Golden Rule. Let your behavior be governed by others—not just by others, but by behavior that you dislike or even find reprehensible. You wind up behaving just like them.

I also see in this Facebook phrase a touch of passive aggressiveness. That may not be the right use of that psychology phrase, which I’m not sure I ever fully understood. But you are saying something aggressive that you will enact in a passive way—your behavior totally depending on how others behave toward you.

How much better to treat others, not how they have treated you, but in love. To return insult with blessing; evil with good; hate with love.

So, when you see this advice on Facebook or other social media, counter it with the Golden Rule. Don’t let your behavior be dictated by that of others.

Bible study, letters, miscellaneous

Writing Again

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Vol 1 is published, Vols. 4, 5, 6, and 7 are written and edited. Vol. 8 is written and edited one time. Vol. 2 is now underway.

I finished writing my latest book, A Walk Through Holy Week, Vol 8, on April 1. I set the book aside for a time of seasoning—not of the book, but of my brain. For two weeks, almost three, I concentrated on my two special projects: transcribing letters from our years in Saudi Arabia, and scanning/saving of the hundreds of pages of poetry critiques I posted at on-line poetry boards years ago.

On Friday April 19, with the two special projects making good progress, I decided to pick Volume 8 again and do a round of edits. I did one chapter that day. That felt good. I did this using Microsoft Word’s text-to-speech feature, which I am liking more and more. So on Monday April 22, I edited two chapters, then did two each day and finished up one chapter on Saturday April 27. The main problem I found with the book is what seems to be too much repetition.

I then made the decision to put the book on the shelf and let it rest until I’m ready to publish Volumes 2 through 7. That will allow me to publish them in order.

But that got me to the point where I figured it was time to get to work on Volume 2 (Volumes 4, 5, 6, and 7 are already written and simmering, waiting their turn to find the book pages of Amazon). On Saturday, April 27, I took about an hour to begin the outline of the book. I finished that on Monday April 29. That brought me to Tuesday, April 30. Time to begin writing.

And that’s what I did on Tuesday April 30. I sat down at my computer, outline in hand, and got started on Chapter 1. Each chapter has seven sections, and I decided to write just one this day.  I was able to do that in less than an hour, a little over 750 words. I also did some formatting of the Bible verses already loaded into each chapter.

One section a day is less than my normal production, which is two sections a day. But for the first day writing after a layoff of almost a month, that wasn’t bad. Then, on Wednesday and Thursday, I was able to write two sections a day. The target for today is two sections, which will complete Chapter 1.

If I could equal the production I had when writing Vol. 8, I would finish he book sometime in June, possibly even early June. But I have lots of interruptions ahead: medical appointments, home maintenance need, and traveling. I will be happy if I can finish the book around the end of June or even into early July.

If I put my special projects aside, I think I could finish this well before July 1, but I don’t want to totally abandon the projects for the sake of writing. The trick will be to write the book while still working on the letters and critiques. Tuesday was a trial run of that. After writing, I transcribed two letters and scanned and saved several critiques. What I’ve found about the critiques is that each file created needs careful proofreading to check for scanner errors, as well as formatting to make sure everything is in a printable format. The goal is to someday put these in a nice concise volume, or probably two, as a record of a large part of my writing life.

I thought I was done with transcribing the Saudi years letters. I searched for letters that might have been missing to match a dozen or so empty envelopes. In the process I found a batch of letters written to us in Saudi Arabia. These were mainly from our last two grandmothers, with a handful from others. I found 43 of these letters, then another eight. So far I’ve transcribed sixteen of these. Only 27 to go. And I don’t have many more places to look for what should have been in those envelopes.

But that won’t be the end of the transcribing project. That year I kept a detailed travel journal for our trip through Asia, especially China. That will take a fair amount of transcribing. After that will be proofreading the transcriptions, then putting them in book form for the family. I don’t think I’ll finish this project in 2024. The transcription—yes; the proofreading—maybe; but assembling them into a book? Not a chance—not unless I drop everything else.

So, busy times.

letters, miscellaneous

Forgot What Day It Was

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No, I didn’t forget that today was Friday.

I forgot that today was blogging day.

It’s been a busy day—my wife’s birthday. We went to lunch, spent some time together.

But I usually plan my blog posts a few days ahead and write them the day before. So I need to look back a day or two to figure out why I didn’t plan and prepare a post for today.

All I can say in my own defense is I have no excuse. Yes, I was busy with medical appointments. Tuesday I had a Pulmonary Function Test, preparatory to my heart valve replacement surgery coming up in a couple of months. Also on Tuesday I made a presentation to a club I’m a member of, the Northwest Arkansas Letter Writers Society. Preparing for that presentation took time on Monday and Tuesday.

Wednesday was a haircut. That shouldn’t have taken too much time, energy, or concentration. Between all of this, I haven’t been writing. I’ve been working on the two special projects: transcribing letters from our years in Saudi Arabia, and scanning/e-filing poetry critiques from twenty years ago. I’ve worked on that every day. And I had a few letters to write over the last couple of days.

Yardwork has also started in earnest, and that has taken an hour a day. Tomorrow will be longer than that.

So this blog post is late. Hopefully, over the next couple of days, I’ll spend a little more time planning and writing my next couple of posts.

Health, miscellaneous

Using Scissors

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Perhaps harder than cutting with scissors right-handed is taking a picture of cutting with scissors right-handed.

Tuesday night, after a quiet afternoon and evening, while the TV was running, more for background noise than anything, I had a need to cut something and grabbed scissors from the drawer in the end table between my wife’s and my reading chairs. Except only my wife’s chair is there at present. I was sitting in it. My chair hasn’t yet been returned to its normal spot after it was moved for two months while water damage remediation was going on in our house. I don’t know if the chair would know how to act if it was moved back now.

The chair doesn’t actually enter into the story. I just thought of it. Anyhow, I took the scissors out of the drawer and prepared to do some snipping. But I remembered the problem with scissors. Ninety-five percent of you won’t know what the problem is. Not that they are sharp and moderately dangerous, but that they are made for a right-handed person.

Two features of the scissors make them righthanded. One is the holes the fingers go in. Most scissors have holes that fit fingers on the right hand but not on the left. A right-handed person doesn’t know this, but a lefthander does from years of having the fingers of the left hand in those uncomfortable scissor holes. Cut long enough and the fingers hurt.

Some scissors have “neutral” holes that are the same left-handed or right-handed, but they are rarer. But even with neutral holes, you still have the problem that the sharp edges are made for a right-handed person. The left-hander, after putting his fingers in the backwards holes, learns that you have to squeeze the two part of the scissors in a way that is unnatural in order for them to cut.

Yet you learn to do it. All through grade school you cut things with the handicap of backwards scissors. At some point you learn that they make left-handed scissors. Maybe you find a pair somewhere and try them. While the holes may feel more natural, you find you can’t cut with them even though the sharp edges are, in theory, just right for you. So you keep using the right-handed scissors uncomfortably and somehow get the job done.

But what happens if you ever have to cut something using your right hand? What would make you do this? Maybe if you’re wearing a jacket with buttoned sleeves and see a thread hanging on the left sleeve. You grab the scissors on your desk, snag the errant thread, and cut. Except you can’t cut with your right hand. Though the scissors are made for that hand, you’re too used to squeezing them the other way. You can’t cut even a simple little thread without taking the jacket off and cutting with your left hand.

I suppose that is all incidental to the main story. On Tuesday, the day I reached for the scissors, I intended to use them right-handed. Why? Not for a hanging thread, but to cut three bands off my left wrist. Why did I have them there? Because Tuesday morning, I had a heart catheterization as an outpatient. You see, I have a genetically abnormal aortic valve. I’ve lived with it just fine for 72 years. But now my cardiologist believes it’s time to replace it. So last month I had a trans-esophageal-echocardiogram, and Tuesday the heart cath. The purpose of the tests was to see if everything needed is present to do the valve swap-out in the least invasive way, through the groin.

The way things are these days, I had the results almost immediately through the patient portal. While they are not in English (but rather in medicalese), they are supplemented by what the cardiologist told Lynda. He feels that it’s not very clear that they can go through the groin and I will need open heart surgery. But I must undergo more appointments and see other doctors before we make that decision. And however it’s done, it likely won’t happen until July.

But back to the scissors. I could not get the bands cut with my right hand. I tried and tried, but those scissors sharp sides just wouldn’t cut the bands. I twisted them first one way then the other. No dice, no cut. Should I call my wife and have her do it? I decided to keep trying it. On about the tenth try, I was able to stretch the band to the right place and squeeze the scissors just right, and the first band snapped.

The other two bands cut a little easier. For maybe the first time in my life I successfully used scissors in my right hand. A small life triumph.

Now, as to the heart surgery, I don’t expect it to be easier than cutting three flimsy bands right-handed. But if it must be open-heart, then so be it. I just hope the heart surgeon has the right scissors for whatever handed he/she is.

Now, I have a thread hanging from my left sleeve that needs to be separated from its source.

Bible study, critique group, goals, miscellaneous

Busy Days

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Rocky and me, our for our early morning walk.

I usually try to have the posts for the blog go live around 7:30 a.m. on Mondays and Fridays. Usually I try to write these a day ahead so that I don’t have to rush them on posting day. But here it is, nearly 8:00 a.m. on Friday, and I’m just writing today’s post.

This week has been very busy as we are dog-sitting again. Our neighbor’s dog, Rocky, has been with us since Saturday. He’s a good dog, but he gets homesick a lot. At his house he goes outside without a leash to do his business. At our house, if we let him out without a leash he will hand around a few minutes, then run home. We then have to go uphill, pass the three wooded lots between our houses, and find and fetch him.

Still, it’s been good to have him here. He’s older now, and I figured out this morning that we may be walking him more than we need, for he didn’t come right out of his nighttime kennel and run to the door. I think I will walk him less today. When we came back from a long walk a couple of days ago, we passed some neighbors out on their porch and stopped to chat for a while. I told them one of us was worn out. The other was a dog.

It’s been good to get my steps in every day. My weight is down (helped by a little sickness on Tuesday) and I’m very close to reaching a major milestone on weight loss. Look for an announcement soon.

On the second walk today, three deer were grazing. Caught two of them in this shot.

Rocky goes home tonight and, despite the work involved with his care, we will miss him. Because of the early morning walks, twice I encountered a herd of around eight deer grazing in the lot north of us. Never would have seen them under normal circumstances. Alas, I didn’t get my camera out in time to snap a picture before they scattered.

Meanwhile, in other news, the water/mold remediation work inside the house is finally done. Two men were here yesterday to re-install the built-in bookcase. All water damaged areas have been removed and replaced. Corrective actions have been made in three areas to keep it from happening again. The painting is not yet done, for we will have Rocky’s owner, who is a professional painter, to do that, hopefully soon. But today I will start putting books back on the shelves. We’ve already put some stuff back in the master bathroom.

I’ve also been able to mostly keep up my writing schedule. Monday through Wednesday, I completed one chapter in the Bible study I’m writing. Yesterday I planned out the next chapter and edited the gospel harmony it’s based on. Today I will try to write one section in it. By the time my writing is done tomorrow I hope to have two more sections done, which is actually a little ahead of the weekly schedule I’ve set for myself.

As far as my special projects are concerned, I’ve fallen a bit behind on them. I’m transcribing letters from our years in Saudi Arabia, intending to put them in a book. But I found a folder with eight items in it from our Kuwait years. The last few days I worked on them, typing and formatting them. They will have to go into the book on the Kuwait years and I’ll have to republish it. All for family, of course. The project of scanning genealogy papers and e-filing them has fallen on hard times. Perhaps I can get back to that in a few days.

No, the taxes! I forgot I still have our taxes to do. Got the business taxes done and in before the March 15 deadline, but still have to do our personal income taxes. I suppose I will have to start on that tomorrow. Alas.