America!!!!!! "here we come"

We have been planning this trip for 6 months and now we are down to the wire, we leave on the 31st of July and will be gone till Oct. 15  . I will try to post some pictures of our adventures while we are there , if not and get to busy will post a lot when we get back . Here is a list of the states we will be visiting with about a week or so in each , visiting friends and family , and of course having a vacation  time too.
    Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Alaska, Callifornia, Texas , Tennessee, North Carolina , South Carolina.
 Maybe some will know about our trip already and the places we will be , if possible would love to see everyone we can , .While in South Carolina we will have a mini Family and Friend reunion in Merrietta, South Carolina , at Benny Moore's homestead.  the get -together will be the first week-in in Oct.we would love to see all who can come , some we haven't seen for a long time ,will be as great time.Pray for us to have a good time and all our flight connections to go smoothly .  Malcolm and Ciejay

Maintenance in action

I have said a few times before on my blog how important  maintenance is , especially here in Thailand where we have lots of rain and then hot and humid, it takes it toll on things , and a/c units are no exceptions and  need a lot of attention, if you want to have clean fresh , cool air when you need it , nothing worse than to turn on a/c and smell a musty odour coming out of the air vent , because of dust and mildew  and who knows what. We have our A/C unit cleaned and checked twice a year.I have stayed in a few motel and hotels in Thailand and elsewhere , when the smell was worse than the heat lol. We try to put a maintenance schedule on everything and Ciejay checks it once a month to see what we need to have fixed or maintained during the month. Sorry to say that most folks here in Thailand forget that stuff needs checked for cleaning , oiling , or general maintenance  and you can see lots of things broke and laying  around the side or back of the house that would have lasted for years if only a little TLC had be included in the owning of it . We have lived in our home with all of our stuff we bought 9 years ago and have only had to replace a few light fixtures that were in the house when we bought it.The stuff we bought new , takes a licking and keeps on ticking , with a little attention and maintenance. I hope you are like us and value the stuff you have spent your hard earned cash on and have learned that you can enjoy it for a long time with a little care , and you know what ?? it's never to late to start.

RETIREMENT and MAINTENANCE

This is a repost from last year , still true and important and I am still on the maintenance program  and feeling good .

I was laying in the hammock thinking , and remembering , something I do a lot of ,while enjoying my retirement, and the blessing in mine and Ciejay's life and reaping the benefits of all the hard work ,until I retired and moved to Thailand.

The thought that popped into my head was some advice my Dad gave me while I was a kid,and young adult, and growing up, He always stressed the importance of maintenance and that if you wanted to enjoy the things that you invested you time and money into that if you maintained and took care of it (things) you would get a life time of enjoyment and use from them. I thought( then) that all he meant was ,my car , my home , my yard and things. Now as I have gotten older I realize that everything in our lives need maintenance, our friends, family , wives, kids , pets, neighbors, our spiritual lives, and also of course our cars, homes , and yards, and things.
Lately with the encouragement of my wonderful wife Ciejay and my Pastor , and my Dr. and a look in the mirror( who was I looking at ?), I have begun to do a little maintenance on a very important part of my life, MY BODY , and you know what?? it has paid off ,my blood pressure is now normal and my sugar count has gone in 6 months from 147 to between 90 and 98 which means that I have beat the diabetes 2 problem and my Dr. said next month I can quit the Pill yee haa . The maintenance is easier than I thought , getting up earlier than my usual 9 or 10 am and going to bed a little earlier, and a mile walk with Ciejay and the boys (our dogs ) at 8 am at least every other day( will increase the distance as time goes by) . . About half way thru the walk (slow first half ) I do about 15 min of senior exercises, and stretches, nothing painful (you don't need pain to get gain ) and the last half is a little faster pace , not much and WOW what a difference it has made in my life and energy level, and the way I feel about myself, and the way I can look at Ciejay's Honey Do list and not cringe.
I'm sure most of you have a maintenance program in place and if you don't I would encourage you to start one. The better I feel ,the more I love being "Retired in Thailand and Loving It."