The move is now over, V is up in Asheville these days, taking Ralph up there on weekends. I don't really mind that at all.. .first, because it means I get to see her on Friday evening and late Sunday afternoon while she transports Ralph.. and this week it was a help, as I'd taken my car in to get fixed.
At long last, we were sure it was the EGR valve that was the problem with my car. The mechanic took it off back in December to see if that might be the problem (after months of me telling the front desk that the valve fit the symptoms and please test it). I have not had a single issue with the car since then.
The EGR valve is a tough thing to track down apparently, but I had done a lot of research online and asked on a site about car repair what it might be, listing out all the symptoms...the master mechanic there also said test the EGR valve, and I kept asking for this to be done but apparently the message was never given to the mechanic working on my car. I guess they assume that since it came from a woman who doesn't work on cars that it could have no validity... but I spent many years helping my dad, who did know about fixing cars, with his car repair work so I do have a clue. And looking online everything I found backed up the idea that the EGR valve was the culprit in this case. Anyway, it's done now... with minimal cost to me since they could never get the car to act up when they had it and as far as they knew it had no problem, so nothing was done on it other than the mechanic driving it to and from work for a while back when V was visiting her dad in November.
In any case, the car is now fixed and so far is still running well.. better than ever actually, since it was running a little rough while the valve was disconnected and the gas mileage was not quite as good. For a 1996 Camry with 115,000 miles on it, it now sounds like new. I've never yet given up a Toyota without 200,000 miles being on it.. not yet anyway.
So, to get back to the original subject, V helped me pick up the car on Friday, and later today she will return Ralph.
This coming Friday is V's birthday. She decided that she was going to take a couple of days off, then take the train with her boyfriend and go up to Washington DC to visit with her good friend J... J was a math major who went on to get a master's in math, and now works for a government organization at some large salary as a mathematician. She and her husband live in Washington. plus friends of V's dad also live there, so V has been there several times taking Amtrak trains to get there. I will likely celebrate her birthday with her either some time during the week or the following weekend... at which time she will take Ralph up to Asheville to stay.
So how do I feel about that? Actually, not bad... With Ralph gone I will have the opportunity to get Tessa's (younger dog) leg taken care of, and not have to worry about the dogs competing with each other. It will give Tessa the rest she needs to recuperate, and she's so much more relaxed when Ralph is not around. Added to this, Tessa does not push the envelope on things when Ralph isn't here, she is much more calm and much better about following what I want her to do. It will give me some good training time with her before her operation, and give her recuperation time afterwards.
As for V.. I'm a lot better about her moving this time around, thus far. As anyone who lives on their own knows, it's not much fin cooking for one and those of us who live alone tend not to eat as well as we should. But this time I'm doing okay with that, making food on Saturday that will last me all week so I don't have to cook much but still eat well. I'm eating lots more salads (good thing!) and because V isn't around to make things, a lot less sugar. This is very positive for me.
Starting this week I am going to be going back to my sister, who's a personal trainer, and working with her to get me moving and back into better shape than I've been for a while.
So far I've not missed V all that much.. but then she's was working full time for a while anyway, so I didn't see her much in the week, and she's thus far been around on weekends, even if it's just stopping in briefly. In the meantime I have begun cleaning up the house some now that all her stuff is out of the way. Her room is the first project. I plan on repainting it since I never liked the color she chose that much (it was supposed to be a pale peach, but came out looking a lot more orange), but have not yet decided what color I should choose next. It may well become my exercise room, since there is nothing in there right now. As soon as I can afford it, I will put a hi-riser (aka day bed) in there so she can visit now and then, but that won't take up that much space. I just need her to complete cleaning out the closet in there so I can add shelves to the ends of it, then it should be good for a lot of storage.
Once her old room is repainted and fully clean again, I can start on other places in the house that need redoing. I've been here almost 12 years now and never really been able to do all that I wanted to do, now I can begin thinking about it. I need to spend a little time perusing the local fabric store, which carries a wide selection of decorating and upholstery fabrics, to see what I want to do about curtains...
All of this is a means to an end. In a few years my plan is to sell this house and look for something that will be easier for me to keep up, and with a bit of luck something that will cost less so I will have a much lower mortgage. I've been looking into other areas, and may just move over to Tennessee, which, while it has a higher sales tax, has a much lower tax burden than NC--there's no income tax in Tennessee, and the property taxes are low as well. I did some looking, and found that NC has moved up to #24 (from 40) in terms of tax burden, while TN runs #48. That adds up over time.
Since I don't need to worry about schools, I can pretty much move anywhere I want, and thus I am considering this kind of move. Once V is taken care of, and I'm pretty sure that this boyfriend is "the one" for her, then I can give thought to things like this. No matter what, I will continue to do up the house and whether I sell or not, I'll at least have the chance to enjoy my home with its updates, not update just in time to sell. I don't want to move too far from my daughters, but I also need to look out for me and what I can afford. Their lives and incomes are just getting started. While I don't see myself ever being able to retire, I also know that I won't be able to keep up with a high workload and will have to lighten up some on the amount of work I can do, and this will limit my income to some degree. Any break I can get financially will help.
Anyway, enough ruminations for a Sunday... time to get some things done.
No comments:
Post a Comment