We got up at 5 AM this morning to see Christa off for her 7 AM flight. Joe drove her to the airport and then came back here to pack his stuff for his trip to Mark's and then on to TN. I went out at 6 AM while he was gone to buy a paper at the McDonalds newspaper machine. The paper is now up to $2. Worked a little on the Dining Room wallpaper. Libbie finished the job with the rest of the wallpaper. I did a 4 mile walk in the heat although it didn't feel too hot. There was a nice breeze. Joe called in the morning from Mark's house. They rode bikes for an hour, he wanted the Lapworths phone number to let them know Christa's plane was late. After my walk I was down to 229!!! Libbie and I went to Home Depot to look at paint. We wanted a slate gray color for the walls. I think it will look elegant. Dinner was leftover pizza from the party last night. We had pesto, bbq, ricotta, and sausage pizzas. I went to Trader Joes today but they were out of Mango so I ended up with Mangolicious which is a mix of Mango of berries.

Checked my Visa account online and the $1,000 to Fred Anderson was finally credited to my account.
I weighed in this morning and I was at 130.75 which wasn't bad considering we went to First Friday last night. Hung out on the back porch this morning with Joe and Christa. Even though I already had breakfast, I had some of the blueberry pancakes that Libbie made for breakfast. They were great as usual. While Joe and Christa went shopping I did the 4 mile walk. It was supposed to be hot but I didn't think so. It felt cool to me. Came home, took a shower, weighed myself. I'm at 129 after the walk - woo hoo!!!
Took the big A/C unit out of the shed and hooked it up in the dining room for pizza making this afternoon. The Pizza's took all day, Joe was done at 5 PM which was an hour late for dinner at Josh's house. Lib and I sat down and were deciding on dinner for us.
We ordered a pizza at Cabarras, the Rustica which has eggplant and sausage. It was yummy. Price was 9.50 plus tax and tip.

Weight is still flat lined at 231. Went over to the greenhouse this morning and tightened the fan belt on house 2. Found out that the fan belt on house 4 was beyond adjusting and worn down to only about 1/4" thick. Went home and fetched a new one and replaced it with a 4L540. I also have a 4L550 but put the 4L540 in instead. This gives me future adjusting room. Did the 4 mile walk today, Christa and Joe went to Topsail to rent paddle boards. We checked their location on Latitude and saw they were on the way home around 6 when we were leaving for First Friday. We called them from the car on our way downtown. We had 8:00 dinner reservations. I stopped into Nicole's gallery first because I wanted to talk to Rocky about palette knife painting that she teaches. I signed up for her Thursday afternoon class this coming Thursday for $75. We talked about painting palm trees. I had a glass of wine and some goodies before going over to City market. Used the parking deck near Cafe Luna and walked down to Visual Arts and Artspace. Had another glass of wine in Visual Arts where they seemed to be having an exhibition of painted chickens.

Checked my Visa and the $1,000 credit still was not there. May have to call the car dealer today. Stepped on the scale and it's back to 232, not unexpected since I had a big dinner and also a BLT for lunch. Have to cut that stuff out. Worked in the garage on the breadboard for the microwave. Took it upstairs, hooked it up and it's still alive!!! Worked on the rest of the microwave testing it out. All is well so I packaged it up and with Lib's help we went to the Post Office and mailed it to Waterville for $34. Amazingly it showed up instantly on my online visa account. For dinner tonight with Christa and Joe Libbie made her barbecue sauce recipe on Barbecu chicken which we had with Bush's Grillin Beans.

In a long winded dialogue that's beginning to sound like a broken record, I lost weight when I weighed in this morning. The total is now 231 which I noted in the Fat Ass Chronicle. This included eating Eggplant Parmesan last night for dinner. The finance guy at Fred Anderson called this morning. He's finally getting around to refunding my $1,000 on the Visa card. He also said they are doing 40 clunker deals a day since the program started. So over all, everything is going great. I'm losing weight, my portfolio is earning 10%, the Hillman divvy was properly credited after a 6 month wait and the car dealer is going to refund the $1,000 dollars to our Visa account which should not have been charged in the first place. Did my 4 mile walk and met Joe on the way back when I reached Downing Place. He was just getting in from Tennessee in a rented Suzuki. I took a shower while the sky grumbled and Lib went to Etc along with Joe and Christa. They also hit the grocery store and got too much food, my opinion. Dinner was barbecue chicken with baked beans. After dinner I hooked up the A/C in the back bedroom because it was getting hot downstairs.

Happy day this morning. I dropped half a pound! I checked my Scottrade account this morning and theHillman divvy was credited. The divvy included the cumulative dividend so it was over $1700. I was concerned about buying some BAC last Friday and the account was over one thousand dollars in the red. It was re-assuring to see the dividend was finally credited wiping out the negative balance. Did the 4 mile walk in the heat and didn't snack on extra fruits. When I weighed myself I was 230 which is great!!!! Christa's plane was over an hour late so we left at 7:10 and met her at 7:40. We then had dinner at Johnny Carinos in Briar Creek which was pretty good. I had the eggplant parmesan.

This morning I went to AgriSupply for more stakes but they only had 18. Bought them all. Did a 4 mile walk this afternoon, I really want to lose this extra pound or two. No snacking or extra fruit this time!!! After the walk I worked on tying up some more of the flowers but still did not finish. Was discouraged that the divvy froom Hillman did not show up yet. Wrote Scottrade and they said they can't post it until they receive it. The Toyota dealer has not reversed my 1,000 charge either so it hasn't been a good day. The BAC I bought continues to go up as does the entire account. Dinner was Trader Joe's pasta. Finished the Clyde Edgerton book this afternoon after my walk and shower. Libbie wants to read it next.

Went into Krogers this morning to get my paper because I wanted bread and marmalade. We got up late this morning - I didn't wake until 7:05 AM. Wow, what a sleep!!! It rained this afternoon so instead of walking I worked in the flower gardens trying to tie everything up to stakes. Ran out of stakes. Libbie made another fantastic pizza this evening, after dinner I worked on assembling pictures for the AVSA slide show. Marjorie sent some substitutes and I made another collage that I don't like.

I was disappointed this morning since the Hillman divvy was not credited to my account although the ATPWF divvy was credited to my Schwab account. Downloaded LastPass and installed it on my new computer Manon2 to replace Roboform. Did a complete 4 mile walk today without getting rained on. Worked on Lifebits a little collecting some articles on clunkers and investing. Read Investor Village to get some ideas for high yield investments. Learned about some of the so called stapled securities which is a stock with a common portion and a bond such as ATPWF. The note usually pays high interest typically over 10%. Dinner was leftover eggplant parmesan. Discovered this afternoon that Fred Anderson Toyota charged me the 1,000 holding money for the car on my credit card. This should not have happened. I called the finance guy and the salesman, Ryan. Ryan returned the call at 10 PM and said he would reverse e charges Monday morning.

I organized our vacation photos this morning and also spent some time on Scottrade and Schwab studying issues. Ended up buying BAC with money I didn't have since I expect a divvy check of $1700 from Hillman today or tomorrow. I tried my walk at 3 PM but caught in a thunderstorm on the other side of the lake. Ended up running for the building in front of the pool. When it looked clear I resumed my walk but Libbie picked me up next to Krogers. She went there to get ingredients for Eggplant Parmesan. We watched the Prius DVD before dinner while the Eggplant baked. It was yummy.

This was garage cleanup day. I tried scrubbing the floor with dish detergent and cat litter but when Libbie came home we got out the pressure washer and hooked it up. Had to first get gas from the McDonald's then started blasting the grease off the floor. While I sprayed, Libbie pushed water out. We hooked up the big fan to dry the floor. Had to dash outside at 5 to gather up everything before a thunder storm hit us. We let the fan run all evening to dry the floor. Dinner was bean burger, corn and not Vidalia but a fake version of the onion which was way too strong.

I went driving around to car dealers today. Started with Mark Jacobson where I found they sold 29 Prius's in 3 days. Did not like this lot. Next stop was Fred Anderson because I saw they were getting a Gold Prius on Aug 3. They looked it up and said yes it was coming on Monday. I gave them my credit card for a $1,000 deposit to hold the car. We got a call that the car was unloaded from a truck in the PM and was available. We tried draining the gas from our old clunker but had no luck. We drove the old minivan to Fred Anderson at 7:30 and they did the deal. We paid list price plus a $500 dealer fee which was a rip off but we like the car and like the deal. The clunker program gave us $4500 for our minivan which was worth about $2500 if it was in good shape. It had an oil leak, sticking accelerator and transmission linkage, and bad ball joints causing the car to pull right and wear the tires unevenly. In addition, the power windows didn't work. Dinner was Briyani.

We got up at 6, I was too tired to get up but rallied. Packed the car, had cereal and coffee and were on the road by 7 AM. Stopped in Kissimmee McDonald's for biscuits and coffee at 8:30. Traffic was pretty light and it was a nice day for driving. Our next stop was in Brunswick for gas at 2.29. Libbie got us a turkey sub at Subway which we split. Our next stop was in Florence for gas at 2.23 which was 8 cents higher than a week ago when it was 2.15. We got home somewhere around 6. Noticed that the exit onto 1&64 was backed up for miles so we got off at the Cary Mall exit and went home via Lake Pine. The skies opened up when we got home and it poured rain. Our timing was great. Dinner this evening was a BLT.

Found out this morning that I couldn't buy ATPWF on Scottrade but would have to call a broker for a $27 fee. I bought 1000 shares of ATPWF on Schwab and tried transferring money back to cover the 8300 cost. Next I will try to transfer the Schwab stocks over to Scottrade and close the Schwab account. Will probably have to wait until next week to do this in order to allow credit for the shares in my account. Also bought 100 shares of CEG-pa to round that up to 1000 and also picked up 300 shares more of SZG, Selective Insurance, which rounded that one up to 800. Not sure if I should go for 1000. Did not walk this afternoon but went over to the pool with my book while Libbie swam. It sprinkled on and off while we were over there. This morning we went to Selby and enjoyed the gardens and the art in the Selby house. After Selby we had lunch at Marina Jacks. I had a half Cuban with a bowl of seafood chowder. All was excellent. I enjoyed the legs of the girl at the next table. She had on a miniskirt covering a bikini bottom and sat with her skirt open and legs up on a chair. Nice site! Researched Matrix and Prius when we got home. Wonder if Internet departments at some dealers are worth anything.

It was a rainy day on and off. After walking the loop around Stoneybrook I went out and got a newspaper. Still 1.75. Left around noon and did a super long walk out to the junkyard on the legacy trail. It was cool on the way out but the sun came out back. The walk took 2 hours. Later in the afternoon we went out to Panera but stopped at a car lot first to look at Toyotas and Honda's. The Matrix is pretty ugly but the Honda Fit may be a good choice followed by the Toyota Prius. At Panera I got a chipotle chicken and french onion soup. We got home dry but later it really started pouring.

Did an early morning walk before breakfast which was unusual for me. Studied stocks for some of the morning then went on my long walk for one hour and 45 minutes, this time I went the other way down the rr trail coming out at a parking lot on McIntosh. It was a different walk but I wished I had a wide brim hat. Came home and got cleaned up then played with painting before we went out for dinner. Dinner was fantastic. I had the Asahi tuna over a mitsu noodle base. The saices were fabulour with a ginger base. I had a glass of Shiraz with dinner. Libbie had the grilled salmon with 2 glasses of Shiraz. Came back and saw Big Al swimming in the condo pond. Had not seen him this trip yet. Did some more studying of financials this evening. It looks like I may be able to buy ATPWF on Scottrade which eliminates the need for the Schwab account. There was a spectacular sunset tonight.

After breakfast we got going at 8 for the East Coast. Stopped at the outlet mall in Vero for kitchen stuff. Bought mugs and silverware plus a casserole dish for home. We also stopped in Gibsonton for gas at 2.38 and Mulberry for McDonald's coffee and sausage and egg muffins for 2 for $1. Reached the Backus around noon and found they were closed for the season. Stopped into the Chamber of Commerce and couldn't figure out why they were in existence. They did guide us to a nice restaurant, Uncle Carlos down the street overlooking the river. We shared a turkey Ruben panini which was excellent. Stopped in 2 galleries in the arcade which were pretty expensive. Next went to Peppermint Patties then down the street to talk to a guy selling art under a tent. He was quite a character and a lot of fun. On the way out of town we stopped at Treasure Island antiques in a very nice air conditioned house. It was very neat and clean. Headed home and made it back to Sarasota around 7 PM. Libbie picked up a couple of crab cakes for dinner from the clubhouse.

We took a short walk to the front entrance then went to Walmart for my watermelon and also purchased a painting kit to experiment with oil paints. Later I took a long 4 mile walk out to the back of Stoneybrook by the junk yard. The walk took 1 hour and 40 minutes, it was long and I was sweating pretty bad but I enjoyed the walk. At 6 we went over to rib night. We ordered the prime rib with salad and glass of Shiraz. Very hot rolls were included with dinner. afterward I came back and basically passed out on the bed until the phone rang. I seemed to get a second wind after the nap did some financial looking online. Hillman announced they were going to pay the dividend with interest which comes to 1.49 per share, a very nice check. All other stocks seem to be doing OK. Even MWE has recovered nicely to the low 20's. The message boards seem positive toward the stock although I'm glad I unloaded half my shares at $29 almost a year ago. It may be time to buy them back, mainly to get the dividend.

Got up at 6:50 which is late for us. I slept soundly after the drive yesterday. Had the waffle for breakfast and some juice and coffee before hitting the road. Got gas at 2.41 before getting on i-295. Stopped in a place called Palm Coast for coffee at a McDonalds. It was a very nice town, well landscaped, no signs, fancy street lights. A miniature Cary! We stopped at Celebration on our way because Sue said housing is getting reasonable and Celebration allows you to walk everywhere. Houses were around 1,000,000. which we don't think is much of a deal. Made it to Sarasota around 2. Visited Yoders but they were gone. Did some looking around and finally found them in the Mall next to Penneys in a very nice modern store. They don't seem to be getting the traffic they used to but the store looks promising. Also did Publix for ice cream and laundry soap.
At 6 we went over to pub night in the grill room. We both had Salmon over Linguine with a glass of Chardonnay. They served a salad family style. Jeannie and Mike were at the next table and came over to talk with us after dinner. I thought that was Jeannie but Libbie didn't think so.

Today is Libbie's birthday!!! She had her cholesterol checked at Kroger yesterday and it was as good as mine. My weight this morning was 235. I'm afraid it won't be going down because of our upcoming trip to Florida. I need to make a card this morning.
Made the card and went over to Walgreens at 11 AM and it wasn't printed yet. We left at 12 noon without the card. Stopped for gas and Libbie's lunch in Florence then our next stop was the Florida visitors center in the late afternoon. The center closes at 5 PM and we got there a little after 5 but we used the bathrooms anyway. Hooked up the GPS and it led us to Singletons Seafood Shack in Mayport, also called Atlantic Beach or Jacksonville. It was a very eclectic place right on the water. We ate next to the windows looking out at a fising boat. We got to see the cargo ships going in and out of the channel. The food was outstanding. I had deviled crab and scallops with cole slaw and black beans. They served us chardonnay in little plastic cups. Afterwards we used the GPS to get us back to our hotel, the Comfort Suites on Commonwealth. The hotel was very nice and new. Our room was $76 with all taxes. After checking eMail we went to be around 10:30. It was a long day driving.

This is a busy day. Marjorie sent another episcia photo which I added to the mix. Now we're only missing two. Installed Breeze Browser and HJsplit on the new computer then used Breeze Browser to build html pages for the library. Uploaded it all to MAAVS. The library photos are done for another year with the exception of the missing two pictures. Turned my attention next to the watering. Had to go to Walmart to buy a new male end for the hose. Also picked up a timer. When the thing went off for testing it flooded the yard. 15 minutes is way too long but it is the minimum time for the Walmart timer which is too long. I resurrected the old Hydro Rain and tried to get it to work. Got it all set up but didn't hear the solenoid activating so I disassembled everything. I was premature since the shutoff outside was in the off position. When it's like this the valve doesn't make noise. Will try again tomorrow. Dinner was a bean burger with Vidalia. Researched palette painting on the web and downloaded some samples. Weight today was the same as yesterday - 236. Ruth wanted photos for the article so I ran half a dozen through Photoshop and sent them to her. I also was in touch with Williamsburg about menus. Had trouble getting hold of Sarah and when she finally responded she sent Kings Arm menus instead of Shields. I have a bad feeling about this hotel. As if I didn't do enough today, Libbie came with a pile of stuff to be scanned. Worse, she mixed up the stuff I already scanned with other papers not scanned. Ahhhggh! Finished this stuff late and uploaded it to the tourdocs web site.

With some luck I'll drive to Florida on Tuesday but before I go I need water hooked to the grow boxes and all the AVSA pictures completed. Weight is 236 this morning which still matches my 2.5 pounds a week loss. We went to Home Depot to get parts to build a header for the watering system for the Grow boxes. Tonight's pizza was with wheat graham flour. IT was different, had texture but was very good. We'll do this again. Libbie added some tomato pieces to the sauce and it worked out pretty good. We had a pretty good rain today, need lots more like it. Finished the AVSA pictures today and created contact sheets. Sent the sheets to Marjorie and Anne.

Earlier today I tied the zinnias and dahlias to stakes. After my 4 mile walk I tried the gasoline trick on the yellow jackets. An hour later they still were there so I mixed up some Orthene and sprayed the zinnias and roses before using the rest of the tank on the yellow jacket nest. This seemed to bring them down. Every time a few would fly I would spray the stuff over them and the nest would settle. The Orthene seemed to do them in. The highwaymen painting came today - I knew it was dark but I really really like the palette knife technique. I even watched a Youtube video on painting with a palette knife. The Highwaymen painting I have was primed with white paint first. You can see the remnants of the paint on the back of the painting. Painting is by Charles Chico Wheeler. Dinner was stuffed flounder with steamfresh vegetables.
Weight today was 236 which is super!!! I had to check the fat ass chronicle to see if this was a loss - it was a 1/2 pound loss.

Instead of walking I mowed the backyard. Got stung by a nest of yellow jackets in one of the old stumps in the backyard. This ended the mowing. I wasted a lot of time today installing XP on the Compact Flash card in the Atom CPU system. The CF is too slow to be useful as an easy to boot system for my stereo system. Dinner was chicken Briyani.

The Newegg disk drive and compact flash arrived. Spent some time trying to get an XP install image on the compact flash. I just found that the max was 2 gigs supported. I hooked the 1 TB disk up inside Manon2 and started backing up some of the files on Manon2 to the drive. I will eventually mount this into the external case I purchased and use it as backup. Dinner was a beanburger with Vidalia.