The First Two Weeks of RETIREMENT and an Update

Here’s my story of the first two weeks of retirement. A chatty little vlog along with some clips of what you missed at Christmas. And a bit of humor. Hope you enjoy. Watch it HERE.

Life Update: So, I’m still getting over the stuffy nose thing. The chest has cleared quite a bit. George introduced me to Afrin nasal spray which gave my day hope and cleared me out well for 4 hours and helped me a little bit for the rest of the day. However, I began to get a urinary infection. I asked AI what causes it and mentioned I had had the flu and cold and drinking a lot of fruit juices and taking lots of meds (which I had) can cause it. Darn it. Mom said to take Alka Seltzer – and so far that has worked. I have to drink a lot of water today. But still hoping for some healing hot teas. I DID have coffee this morning because after all that is my morning engine fluid. Hopefully the urinary tract will understand and be forgiving. lol I was really worried about needing to get to emergency with these snowy roads and had to talk myself into not panicking. How many times have you heard people say “I was going into sepsis and didn’t know it”. George and I prayed together over my health last night, out loud. He said the prayer and we held hands. Well, we both had one hand on Dexter because he wanted to join in, lol. Bless Him.

So Thank you, Lord, and Momma, I feel better this morning. The nose still very stuffy but then there’s Afrin. Not to be used often so I don’t get addicted to it. But gosh something has to give.

(Of course this is AI generated. It’s fun to see what it will do. I’m laughing at the rice coming out of the container with beans on the bottom shelf.)

Yesterday we worked on the pantry – well I did. I made a lot of progress. So much was in there and you could never see what we had. I realize now that we have been living in excess. I also went and bought more stuff because of winter, ice storms, political unrest and so forth without realizing just how much we had as it was so unorganized. I bet it has been 3 to 4 years since I personally cleaned the cabinet. I blame it on YouTube, and Mom. Those two things took over my housekeeping and organizing times. So we have a lot of beans, rice, pasta, and canned goods. We DO NOT have enough green things! Not even for a week, lol. We evidently love our starches. WE also do not have much in the way of canned fruits. So need some improvement there. But it feels good to be making headway. I filmed a lot of it. I’m still not through as I have to organize the laundry room as well. It’s all kinda connected in a way.

So the pantry video will come after the “GOALS” video. It will also have snow pics for the B-rolls. I took video instead of pics so I don’t have any to share right now. I’m mainly in here to leave the VLOG link but decided to give an update.

My Mental Outlook

I’m still waiting to enjoy retirement at its fullest. But the energy levels have been low due to the flu and cold and then the infection. It really has played a very strong role in my mental outlook. I feel better and then I’m hopeful, then I take a downturn and I feel like I’m in a pitfall of never getting well and then dive into a depressed state. I want to feel good! I try to exercise thinking it will help my stamina but it’s only tired me out and I think made me worse. So I asked AI about that too and it gave me some guidelines. If I do at all it has to be 10 – 15 minutes. I am doing all kinds of walking through the house for that long so I’ll wait til I get well to start back up my walking on the treadmill.

Working on the videos has given me some sort of normalcy and hope. Feeling bad has also made me angry and asking God why. But then I remember that soooo many others have worse situations and then I feel I don’t have the right to ask why or feel depressed while my sister deals with her issues post-cancer, and people in CA have burned homes. So I will take my situation and embrace hope and trust that the Lord knows what He is doing. Maybe He wanted me to hibernate. Maybe He wanted me to rest. Maybe He wanted me to come to some kind of higher trust in Him. Maybe He is trying to break my WILL and make me further submit and trust. For whatever reason, I must trust and I will.

We have 4 or 5 inches of snow. I was unable to experience sheer joy because of my health situation. But this morning I feel better and am better. So my outlook is better. Every other day it seems is a good day or bad day, alternatively. So thankful that today is the good day and hopefully they all will be from here.

(I’m not sure why AI generates chihuahuas with three ears, lol.).

Hope your New Year is starting off in a good way. But I mean, no wonder we all long for spring because we are tired of the cold air and health issues and long for fresh air and rejuvenation of life. I’m trying to be happy in any situation but when I can’t breath thru these two nose holes of mine, any hope, patience, and joy seems to fly out the window, lol.

In Case You Wondered about my AI Generated photos

• I use ChatGPT for my AI questions. I have found it to be very helpful at times, especially in times where I need to know the facts to calm my anxieties. It’s better than sorting thru Google ads and websites for the answers as it gathers it all in one scoop. And you can ask it follow up questions if you missed something. I use the free version only.
• I use WordPress/JetPack for the AI generation of these pics I’ve asked AI to do today. I also use Canva and Facebook for AI generated photos at times.

If you made it this far, and need the video link, here it is:

Retired, the First TWO Weeks

See you soon.