Raincharm’s Weblog

We started the day dealing with a mostly dead car. It had been mostly dead for a few days. Mostly dead means the idiot lights would turn on when the key was turned, but only clicking after that, no engine start.

Apparently the mostly dead had been preceded by a few starts when it clicked, but eventually started. This almost dead situation was noted, but not acted upon, and the car parked nose down at the bottom of our sloped driveway. What this means is that our jumper cables are not long enough to reach. On the positive side, it was in the bottom spot, not blocking our other car.

It needed some help, so we made an appointment for this morning. But still needed to get the car to the shop, either by starting it or towing it. Cue AAA. They came by and did a quick diagnostic and jump. According to the nice AAA person, it was the battery. And the battery was original to the 2017 car. As they are expected to last about 5 years, I guess it was time. Moral of the story, pay attention to almost dead signals, and don’t park in the least accessible location.

And don’t forget the smaller variety. I think we’re out of 9 volt, AAA, and possibly low on AA too.

We like jigsaw puzzles, and got 3 new ones for Christmas. In addition I got one at my retirement from work.

Two from Christmas have been completed,  and the retirement puzzle is currently under construction.

We’ve been fitting in work on the puzzles around other chores. My other chores today included our first big pharmacy order under Medicare, and summarizing expenses from 2025. I actually enjoy this bit of spreadsheet play. We started really tracking expenses in the current format in 2011, so we can see the trends and changes over the years.

Before we listed payments and reciepts, but not categotized. This really started when we were trying to look ahead to figure  how much we should be saving for retirement. Our finance person asked the simple question, “How much do you spend on food each month?” We didn’t have an answer, so we started tracking. I guess now we get to see if that planning works out.

Today’s primary task was to take down the Christmas decorations. Our yard waste pickup is Monday, so we wanted to get the tree to the curb.

The picture captures a good percentage of the decorations from this year. There was a creche and some other bits and pieces around elsewhere.

Carl is showing off one of his presents, originally gifted by Mariner Mike Blowers to the craftsman who built a staircase for him. It was handed on by a fellow blogger. It’s a heavy bat.

The Christmas decorations all survived our basement flood because they had been brought upstairs. We did lose some Halloween stuff, but that was all much less important.

Most importantly, Carl’s mother’s ornaments were not harmed. That would have been hard to accept.

And we did get through the decision phase on our collection of cassette tapes. One or two have been retained, with the rest destined for a recycling firm, and potentially a few to a used record store in our neighborhood.

A term I heard at a meeting this morning. It perfectly describes our cleaning up, and sometimes out, situation.

I’m trying to slow down, but not stop, take smaller bites when I should ask for input. My first area of stuff planned to go through is old cassette tapes and some homemade CDs. It’s only 4 medium boxes, and I know some will be easy to say it can leave the house.

One fun bit from today was taking the 2025 Filthy Lucre Funds to the winner. We allow each person in a household to enter a guess, and their house had 4 guesses. She described the different methods behind the guesses.

• Used AI with the 2 pictures of the money provided as input. $81.00
• Trying to estimate a value per inch based on what they could see, and then expanding to the whole jar. $48.15
• 6-7 twice from a teenager. $67.67
• Used the 2024 actual total. $75.69

As it turned out 2024 = $75.69 and 2025 = $75.40 were very close, but this is not the norm, so it might not work in 2026.

On the outdoor front, a mix of hard rain and partly sunny. So we went out for a medium walk. There are several lawns, including our parking strip, that are being torn apart by crows.

According to the article in the Seattle Times today, they are eating European Chafer grubs, who would kill the lawn themselves if left alone.

I’m not sure what we’re going to do. Maybe find a ground cover that will fare better.

Baby steps on recovering the basement.

I’m just trying to clean the floor before putting things “away.” This entails moving things out and off of an area so the floor is accessible. Then sweeping, vacuuming, and mopping. And each thing I pick up begs the question of should it be retained, moved on, or thrown out. I can’t answer most of the keep or not questions on my own. And the partner in these questions isn’t in the same head space as I am. I think  I am more able to focus on this task because I have a time void that work used to fill. He, on the other hand, has well established routines and things he does.

Plus, final destination questions aside, where does it sit while moved. It’s rather exhausting. And it’s generally dusty and full of cobwebs in the corners.

Essentially it’s taking quite a bit longer to accomplish than I thought it would. I completed about 30 square feet today. But I have time, right?

We welcomed in the new year in bed, but hardly asleep. I could here the downtown fireworks, about 3-4 miles away, going off with a soft, bass sound. The neighborhood explosives were much louder. Like in the backyard loud. And they went off until about 1 AM. Needless to say, we slept in a bit this morning.

Our “work” today consisted of identifying the winner of our Found Filthy Lucre contest, the 2025 version. On walks Carl looks for money that has been lost, and is now found. At the end of the year the found funds are totaled and pictures taken. Then we invite the neighbors to guess the total, and the closest to the actual amount wins the money. This year we had 33 entrants, and the winner was only 29 cents from the total of $75.40. We will deliver their winnings tomorrow.

Other than that we were treated to a good luck black-eyed peas gumbo gathering at a neighbor’s house. Really good eats and conversation.

Generally speaking a quiet start to the year. We didn’t do any work on recovering the basement from the minor flood. But no worries, since I’m no longer working I should have plenty of time to work on that in the coming weeks. Yes, a few things have happened since I last posted….

The bad news is the Mariners are still the only team not to have ever played in the World Series.

The only slightly good news is they were very, very close.

The good news is we were able to share our disappointment with friends over good food.

And now, back to our regular life for 2 weeks.

To set the stage:

Game 5 of a 7 game series. Mariners and Blue Jays each have 2 games, won in the other teams ballpark. After today they return to Toronto. If it goes poorly, this is our last home game. If it goes well,the Mariners will no longer be the only team to have never made it to the World Series.

This morning, I had a moment of peace and thought that, regardless, it’s been a pretty good and fun season.

But now that I’m at the park, it’s all about being the loudest fans. Not about the fun of the game, even the situation.

And it’s a beautiful sunny fall day in Seattle, and the roof is closed. My cynical self says it’s to increase the din. It rained in the morning, but none is predicted this afternoon/evening.

I’m mad, not sure why. My focus is the roof, but I think it’s stress. Not about the game, although I really, really want to win. I left our seats to walk around and try to get in a better head space and figure this out. Which is why I am writing as the game swirls around me.

The rest of the story is work. I have two more weeks and two more weekends to finish what I want to get done. So here I am on a workday afternoon, not working.

GRAND SLAM- GENO SUAREZ , MARINERS UP 6-2, 1 OUT IN THE 8TH

I need to be stable next week. Lunch for me at work on Monday, last statements to the Board of Commisioners Monday afternoon. Possible game 7 at 5 PM (away game).

I know what I want to say, but I don’t want it to be emotional. 38 years is a long time. Maybe that’s what today is about.

And I really want to get the work done, but it’s not quite under control.

Listening to the fans around me in standing room only is helping. They’re excited to be here at all. And just a great play from our 2nd baseman to snag a line drive.

For now, LET’S GO MARINERS. No time like the present.

⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️⚾️

Warming up

And while it started well, the game ended as a loss. No one said it was going to be easy.

Still up 2 games to 1. Hope for a better result tomorrow.

I want my hands to hurt like they did in 1995.

I want to be hoarse like I was in 1995.

Tonight feels more like 1995 than any playoff game I’ve been to since 1995, albeit it’s only been a few games.

I had forgotten how tiring it is to care so much.

About a silly game

And you can’t win if you don’t hit. And sometimes you do.

For those who don’t know, this is about the Seattle Mariners. The only major league team to never get to the World Series.

But Humpy won the Salmon race. First win in 2 years.

And now, back to our other, regular life.

Until Sunday, because we WON.