Most of the citrus trees here at Viewpoint Golf and RV Resort have been picked clean. There are a few grapefruit trees that still have fruit, but that’s about it. The orange trees are beginning to blossom. That means my pollen alergies are kicking in. It’s become a real nuisance as my eyes are constantly watering – it was bad enough by the beginning of this week for me to start a regiment of benadryl tablets.
The weather was a little on the wild side by Friday of last week. We had some rain and gusty winds. Speaking of wind, we had an interesting thing happen the week before when we had stormy weather. A few days after the stormy weather passed, Donna noticed one of our back patio umbrella shades was missing. We looked around and it was nowhere to be found.
Donna inquired at the pro-shop to see if it might have blown onto the golf course. They didn’t know anything about it. She also posted on the Viewpoint Facebook page to see if anyone might have found it and picked it up. I was convinced that someone took it – we have three umbrella shades out back, maybe they thought we had one too many.
Donna was talking to our next door neighbor, Lois, one afternoon and mentioned the missing umbrella. Lois asked if she meant the one that was on our roof! From her back patio, she could see it on our roof. Apparently a wind gust pick it up and deposited it on top of our house. Mystery solved.
Last week, when I met up with Leendert at Red, White and Brew, he lent me a book called The Psychology of Money. It’s a collection of short stories broken down into 20 chapters that outline the author’s philosophy of financial management. It’s a worthwhile read.
I want to mention a few other books. In these trying times with rampant inflation, divisive politics and Russia invading Ukraine, it’s easy to believe we live in the worst of times. These books might bring you to understand how far we’ve really come.
Abundance – The Future is Better Than You Think
Factfulness: Ten Reasons We’re Wrong About the World – And Why Things Are Better Than You Think
I don’t want minimize the extent of destrution and human suffering taking place in Ukraine – in fact, I’ve read first-hand accounts of horror faced by the guy and his family that I bought vacuum tubes from in Melitopol, Ukraine. On the other hand, it’s nice to see the good that’s taken place in the world as well.
Closer to home, I had some bad news on Tuesday. My middle daughter, Jamie, was in a car accident near her home in Buckeye, west of Phoenix. She has a couple of spinal compression fractures and an ankle sprain along with general soreness from taking a beating in the accident. Hopefully she’ll be discharged from the hospital today, but she faces a recovery in a back brace for the next 12 weeks or so.
Last Friday as the stormy weather approached, we had some clouds and it made for a spectacular sunrise over the Superstition Mountains.
Donna came up with some nice recipes for dinners. First up. we have shrimp in purgatory – a tomato/garlic marinara with capers over spaghetti.
That was Saturday’s dinner plate. On Sunday, we had another garlicky dinner – she pan seared, then baked chicken thighs with a garlic butter sauce. I had it with rice and asparagus.
On Monday, Donna bought a hunk of fresh ahi tuna. She made a topping with sliced jalapeno peppers, cilantro, lime juice and soy sauce. She grilled bok choy while I seared the ahi.
Wednesday she tried a new recipe for a whole chicken roasted in the oven with a curry sauce. She served it with rainbow cauliflower – this is naturally colored cauliflower – and asparagus.
As always, I’m eating well even though Donna’s following her Bright Line Eating plan.
We have a busy weekend coming up. Saturday morning Donna has her final rehearsal for the Viewpoint Concert Band March performance on Sunday. Saturday afternoon we’ll join Mike and Jodi Hall for the Superstition Blues & Brews Festival. Live music and local crafted beers – it should be a fun time.
We should have a nice, sunny afternoon on Saturday with temperatures reaching the upper 70s. Long range it looks like we’ll have upper 70s to low 80s for the remainder of March.
Just so you know, if you use this link to shop on Amazon and decide to purchase anything, you pay the same price as usual and I’ll earn a few pennies for the referral. It’ll go into the beer fund. Thanks!
Prayers for your daughters recovery
Hope your daughter has a quick and full recovery! Also, I didn’t know Donna was a musician!
Thank you, Betty! And the reason you didn’t know I was a musician was because I only took up the clarinet 2 years ago! I did play when I was 12-13, but that was a lonnnnnnng time ago!