My Blog Reflection
A mind is like a parachute. It doesn't work if it is not open.
Frank Zappa
March 31, 2026:
Celina drove us to the Tampa Airport. We arrived three hours early due to uncertainty about the TSA workers not being paid and a good chance we would have a long delay getting through security. As it worked out it only took us 28 minutes to get through. As a result we had a long wait, no big deal.
We flew Southwest because they do not charge for a carry-on. We each had one. Allegiant flies out of the St. Petersburg airport, which is closer, but they now charge for each carry-on. This policy made flying Southwest cheaper. Another advantage to flying Southwest was they fly into the St. Louis airport, which is closer to my sister Renee's house. Renee and Jim were picking us up and we were spending the night there.
When I asked for water on the flight this is what I was given, along with a bag of about six pretzels. It was not a bottle of water like we received in the past. When flying now you better not be too thirsty.
Renee made a great Lasagna for us for supper. It was compliments by a nice salad Jim made. We spent the night at their house and borrowed Renee's car to drive down to BJC for my bone and CT scans. After the scans we went back to their house and visited until Alexa arrived from Perryville to drive us home.
When we got home I could not believe how tall the grass was. It had to be foot tall. I am not exaggerating. I found the lawnmower battery completely dead. I've had trouble with this happening in the past so I am going to install a kill switch on the battery. Once the battery was charged I mowed on a high setting just to knock it down. It still left clumps of grass everywhere. It will need to be mowed again before the rain comes this weekend.
April 2, 2026:
After the long day yesterday I slept in rather going walking at 5:00 a.m. We unpacked the bags and went through the pile of mail which accumulated over two months. I then gathered all the documentation I needed to have our taxes done and took it to our accountant. On the way home I stopped at Alexa's and helped her get the lawn mower started after sitting all winter.
Later in the afternoon I rode the scooter to several auto parts stores in Perryville looking for a new fitting for the positive cable on the lawn mower battery. I found one, fixed the cable, and reinstalled it.
April 3, 2026:
I rode the scooter to the park at 5:00 a.m. and walked a lap and a half with Gary and Wayne. This was enough for me after not walking for months. They walked another lap and I headed home.
I got on the scooter and after a two second "grunt" it was clear that the battery was dead. I sat and waited for Gary and Wayne to finish their last lap. I needed a ride home to get a charger. When they arrived I told them what happened. The battery is under a plate that is screwed down under the seat. Gary had a phillips head screwdriver in his truck so he opened the battery compartment. He checked the battery with his meter and it was dead.
Wayne had a portable jump charger is in his van so we hooked it up and the scooter started right up. I decided to get the scooter home. Gary would follow me. Even with the jump charger connected to the scooter battery the scooter lunged and would only go about fifteen miles per hour. Once I got home we checked and apparently part of the problem was that Wayne's jump charger needed to be charged as well.
At the house Gary agrain tested the battery and it was only 10.2 volts. Time for a new battery. I surmised that if the battery is not fully charged the fuel injection system doesn't work properly, thus the slow and lurching speed. Here is the battery I took out. I found a better battery on eBay with free shipping and ordered it. It will be here next week. This battery only had tabs on top for connections, rather than lugs. I made sure the new one had lugs.
I then cut the grass again trying to further chop up the grass clippings. It worked somewhat.
April 4, 2026:
We had lightning and thunder from 2:00 a.m until 5:00 a.m. with quite a bit of rain. By 10:00 a.m. we had three inches. The rain is supposed to stop today but it will be a while before I can cut the grass again.
Alexa came over for an Easter brunch since she is working tomorrow, Easter Sunday.
April 5, 2026:
Bob has been a little under the weather recently and he and Ronnie weren't going anywhere for Easter so we invited them over for dinner. Kelly cooked a ham, and made potato salad and candied carrots. It was served with a nice bread. Bob and Ronnie brought a walnut pie for dessert. Everything was delicious.
After dinner we had a nice long visit and got a nice selfie.
April 7, 2026:
I purchased grass seed and peat moss to fix a number of bare areas in the lawn where weeds had killed out the grass. In the afternoon Alexa and Aaron came over and helped get the areas scratched up, seed down, and peat moss spread over the top. Actually they did all the hard work. I just threw down the grass seed. Even that wore me out. The project took about three hours. I so appreciated their help. If I would have tried to do it by myself it would have taken me a week.
Here are some pictures of the spots of new grass seed and peat moss. I hope this effort will produce results.
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Now I have to consistently water these areas, which are spread throughout the yard, so it will be a bit of a challenge. A sprinkler just won't do it.
April 8, 2026:
Kelly and I were out and about and decided to drive down to the river to see the progress on the new Chester Bridge. Driving toward it I could not take a picture but here is a picture of the old bridge and new one from the Missouri Department of Transportation. This was taken just before the last piece of road bed was installed recently. The bridge is projected to be completed in July. It will be a major improvement.
On the way home we took a detour through the river bottom farm land. My mom was from the town of Belgique in the bottom. The town is entirely gone due to many floods over the decades but the church cemetary remains and is well-cared for. We stopped and looked around, something I had never done before. I found a replacement headstone for my Great Grandfather. He came over from Belgium and opened "A. E. Staelens Undertaking and General Repair Shop" in Belgique. I have a picture of his building.
Mary was his second wife. My grandmother's mother either died on the trip over or shortly after arriving. We cannot find her name or anything about her. Kelly thinks they may not have been married since we can't find any record. My grandmother had no great love for Mary telling me she was mean to her.
April 10, 2026:
Today we worked on tearing out the the built-in cutting board in Alexa's kitchen cabinet and converting it into another drawer. In the old days a cutting board was built in on which to knead bread, thus it was built to be quite sturdy. Gettin all of the framework out was not easy. I modified a drawer that we took out when installing the dishwasher to fit this space.
April 11, 2026:
We loaded the lawnmower on the trailer and went out to the lake to cut the grass. We are going to be putting the lot up for sale soon. We just don't use it anymore. Actually we never did use it much. In twenty years of ownership we probably only camped on it twenty times. It needs to go.
For dinner I grilled a rib eye steak and some asparagus Bob grew in his garden. Yum!
April 13, 2026:
First thing in the morning I went to my accountant's office and picked up our taxes and signed for them to be electronically filed. Of course we had the privilege of paying Uncle Sam some more money but we will get a little back from the State of Missouri.
The new battery for the scooter arrived by mail. I am happy with it because it has much better lugs to connect to the scooter. For the last battery I had to make push-on adapters. This is the second battery I have had to put in the scooter. That is not bad for owning it for twelve years. She runs like a top now.
April 14, 2026:
Today was blood work, office visit, and injections at the Siteman Center in St. Louis. Afterwards we made an obligatory trip to Costco to spend our customary $200.00. LOL
April 15, 2026:
We installed the "revamped" kitchen drawer at Alexa's, nailed moulding around the dishwasher, and fired up the chain saw so Alexa could cut up the remaining log from the dead tree we pushed over last fall in her back yard.
I then went home and finished cutting the grass just before we received a half of inch of much needed rain. I couldn't believe how much the grass had grown in less than a week. I was delighted to see that some of the seed we sowed about a week ago was coming up nicely.
April 16, 2026:
The truck goes in for repairs and maintenance tomorrow. After that we head back up to St. Louis to visit with the radiology oncologist about radiation for bone pain I am having. I didn't know they did radiation for pain. We will learn what it is all about.
And that's the news from Lake Wobegon.
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