Still having it’s way with me.  But all good things come to an end.  I’ll be fine.  I was considering setting up a FIGHT Shingles charity until I realized that there must already be half a dozen.  So, mine would instead be a charity titled “SURRENDER to Shingles”. Makes more sense, really. You can’t really beat this thing, you just have to make it comfortable until it is as bored as you are and it leaves.  Fortunately, I am relatively boring and I think I see signs of it packing up to go irritate the hell out of someone else.  Still, my new charity needs money for administration and educating the public, ya know? Especially administration.

Funny how stupid we all still are in so many ways despite all the educational efforts of NGO’s and governments, eh?

Here we are on the eve of the longest day of the year and it is absolutely beautiful out. Sun, sea, wind and wildlife.  Sal and I have been courageously blazing a gourmet menu and Netflix supplemented lifestyle in the wilderness now for almost thirteen years and it still feels better than the best of vacations.  It’s great.  Gorgeous. Wouldn’t change a thing. For a guy generally considered somewhat taciturn and even occasionally grouchy, I am actually more happy and content than I ever hoped to be.  This was a really good move.

The best part?  It is not catching on.  No great exodus from the madding cities detected yet.  In fact, the opposite is true – they are still leaving the countryside and going urban.

We get a new household or two every year and we lose a household or two just as frequently. This community is a rural loose-gathering of a few families spread over hundreds if not thousands of acres existing in a form of peaceful stasis. It’s not changing. Maybe someone gets a new outboard.  A kid leaves home.  People get older.  The odd new puppy.  It’s basically the same.

Same beauty, same quiet, same lack of stress, same ol’, same ol.  I love it.

Having said that, I need to DO something now and then.  NOT a lot.  Just a little something.  If all else fails, I’ll build something.  And I can drag that on forever.  The greenhouse is currently serving that purpose for me now but even I have some limits on the duration of a project.  And, with the help of Mr. Shingles, I have managed to do nothing on anything for a new record length of time.  We are same ol’, same ol’ with cobwebs. Time to get some muscles moving.

Don’t want Sal to get all soft on me………………