Well, been busy with life in general and haven't been around much online, including here (said Capt. Obvious).

A year ago I decided to go out on my own and leave the company I had worked for 25 years off and on. It had gotten out of control to say the least. Good thing is I had a couple other companies lined up that wanted to use me on a contract bases. They came thru and even the company I left has used me from time to time (go figure). Been working enough to just pay the bills but some months have been lean, but we are getting by.

At the same time, we decided we didn't need the big house we were living in (or the mortgage) as we had plans to downsize eventually anyway. Timing looked right with the rising house prices so we put it on the market and sold in a few months. Been renting since while looking for a smaller house to purchase with the proceeds. The price range we can afford puts us in a very busy price window so pickings have been slim to none. We have a pretty definitive criteria of what we want so that affects our searches as well.

Because we are renting, the garden has been limited to small areas around the house, 1 above ground I built and containers. Still we've been able to keep our hands dirty. Plus, a friend had a garden that we had helped with so they allowed us to expand it and use a portion for ourselves. They have since sold that house and will be moving on.

The wife has another 5 years till she can retire, (I'll be 62 this Sept) and at that time we'll decide where we want to end up. We just went on our first vacation in about 5 years to visit like-minded friends in western Montana and loved it. We plan on going back in the winter months to see if these Florida crackers could handle the colder weather. If so, you never know...

Anyway, just wanted to touch base with ya'll and let you know I'm still kicking for now.