This photo shows that I have finally completed cutting and placing the Italian tile on all 360 square feet of my kitchen floor! YIPPIE! — that’s the floor of the pantry behind me, which along with that hallway that leads to the dining room were the last parts to be done. This took some time as I had to cut tile carefully to fit around the door frames.

With diversion-after-diversion for the past several months, this project took longer than I thought it would take, but I’m happy it’s done. Whew.

I am very happy that I got the steel toe version of the Timberland Work Boots that I’m wearing. You can tell that the toes took a lot of abuse.

Okay, now on to more finish work…grouting the remaining tile, installing quarter-round around the perimeter of the walls, some painting, and then installation of a new set of cabinets that I built in my shop.

Life is short: get work done!

Sorry, not much time to blog… I have “collected” yet another senior pal who is camping out with us. This is my other senior pal’s neighbor. First senior pal came to our home at my insistence on Thursday when I discovered that her power had not yet been restored and she was becoming ill due to the effects of high heat and humidity. She did not want to go to a public shelter, and could not afford to pay for a hotel room.

Now, her next-door neighbor has joined us. I learned by speaking with my friend that her neighbor was in the same situation as she is: no power back on yet after last week’s storm, living alone, and on a fixed income. I went to the neighbor’s house on Friday evening, and discovered at my horror that she had hardly enough energy to answer the door. She was refusing to leave her home since she did not want to leave her cats alone. But it was well over 90F (33C) inside her house.

Damn… I couldn’t just leave her there…
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The weather here in Maryland, USA, has been less than cooperative lately. Just when I thought we had the best Spring — with delightfully cool but sunny days, and crisp nights — all the way through June 22 — hell hath been wrought on the region.

The weekly rains stopped, the heat turned up, and here we are, in a full-fledged heat wave. Tomorrow (Saturday), I was going to go on a ride on my Harley, but I will heed a lesson learned on Thursday afternoon when riding in 100F (38C) heat…

…that is, ask myself, “are you nuts? You want soaked boots again?”
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Happy Independence Day in the good ol’ USA! Yes, this holiday occurs on July 4, but the greeting for the holiday is not “happy fourth.” That’s just as silly as saying “happy fifth” tomorrow, especially when the Declaration of Independence did not obtain its final signature until August 2!

Today will find me doing what I usually do on this holiday — swearing and crabbing.
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I am convinced… I live among a bunch of whiners. Really shouldn’t be a surprise, but becomes more evident as widespread power outages persist following last Friday’s severe storm. It is so hard for me not to post a retort to friends on Facebook who whine about their power not being restored by yesterday and their electronic toys not working. Gimme a break. They haven’t seen a real disaster.
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Goodness gracious, what a storm! Friday afternoon, the weather radar was looking frightening, and by 10:30pm Friday night, we got hit — hard! But this disaster dude was ready, and prepared….
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Man, back in the days of my youth, I was seriously “into” jumping out of “perfectly good airplanes.” Over 11,000 times, some of those jumps from rather extreme altitudes. The rush, the view… what thrills. I still jump from time to time, but not nearly as often as “the good old days.” Back in the day, it was common for me to jump eight to ten times a day, two or three days straight. My buddies formed a very tight group.

While I am fortunate that I did not have any major injuries, such as broken bones from a bad fall, I have had the unfortunate experience of breaking my left eardrum — not once, not twice, but three times. All due to a thermocline.
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As my family, friends, and readers of this blog know, my partner has been, and remains, ill with symptoms of a persistent infectious disease caused by a spirochete transmitted by a tick bite. It’s a disease that can happen when living in an area populated by deer.

My friends in the boot world and blogosphere have heard about this long-term difficult situation in which I am engaged.

It can be sad and depressing when one is experiencing a life event and he only hears silence. There are times when silence is deafening.

Most people have trouble dealing with these matters, because they want to show concern, but do not know how to do it. Also, they are human. Most people do not want to think about bad things. To some, ignorance is bliss. To the one affected, ignorance presents questions like, “are my friends fair-weather friends only, and disappear when it rains?”

Here are some suggestions on what to say (or do) when you don’t know what to say….
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I was reviewing the joint financial accounts that my partner and I share. We go over “the books” (which I keep on Quicken) at least once a week. He trusts me, but I insist on going over our income and expenses regularly with him so there are no questions about how we are doing, what the amounts of our regular bills are, who is due what, and so forth. One of the most frequent reasons couples (gay or straight) argue is about money. My partner and I have had our share of disagreements, but never — in all of our 19+ years — have we argued about money. Why?
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