It should be no big deal but it is.  We are back and, OMG, does it feel good!  I have never liked the term, ‘go to your happy place‘ but I have, this is it and I really do not want to ever leave again.

‘Course, I will.  I have places to go, people to see, things to mess up.  

But HERE is good.  REALLY good.

We are also doing things more sanely.  We left Victoria on Thursday, came up to the nearest town and stayed overnight so as to get some needed chores done without rushing. Usually, we would just race through a gazillion chores and end up arriving home in a storm at night fully laden and exhausted.  This time, we spread the effort over two days and had a nice dinner out.  Plus we did fewer chores putting some off til next week.  Very civilized.

I mention this because, as we age, our ability to cram ‘chores’, travel, schlep and get the house up and going again is getting a bit more difficult.  Having said that, it is only made more difficult for the want of a $100 stay overnight.  Well, we always do dinner out, too, so make that $150.00.  $200 on a crazy night out.  In other words, getting old can be compensated for with money.  So, why not?

The house was ice-cold.  Took til today to get the temperature back up to comfortable but that was no biggie.  All systems ‘go’ from the start.  We still have a bit of ‘sorting’ to do but we are largely back in the rhythm of our lifestyle.  Feels good.

“Why tell us this?”

Well, I wanted to convey that living OTG has all the usual challenges of ‘leaving home’ with a few additional aspects more complicated than leaving an urban one but not that much.  Not really.  An extra day’s travel, a few extra chores to get it all done….that sort of thing…but, basically, no different than leaving the cul-de-sac for a vacation.

We’re not so weird, after all.

But just to illustrate the differences; I had hauled the boat two months ago and stored it on the other island.  The tire had gone flat as we put it up on the hard and we had no time to fix it back then so I knew one of the ‘chores’ was gonna to be a tire job.  And, of course, an outboard motor that hadn’t started in a while put a question on that, too.  Plus the weather was more than ‘iffy’ and the seas on Thursday were ugly.  But on Friday, it all fell into place.  Things worked out fine.  We were in the house on the second day, having tea before it was 3:00 pm.  Very, very civilized.

We are definitely older, tho.  Both getting Old Age pensions, discounts on BC Ferries and 10% off whenever we buy anything it seems.  Still, it hasn’t been a problem yet – except once.  The problem was Sal, of course.  We were packing up getting ready to leave Arizona and the luggage weight limit is 50 pounds.  51 pounds will incur an extra charge of US$75.00 so you want to be sure of the weight. Sal packed her bag and lifted it.  She actually ‘stiff-arm- lifted’ it and concluded it was just over 40 pounds.  I lifted it and guessed higher at 44 pounds. We figured mine was a shade lighter (we have each lifted and carried 55 pound bags of Ready Mix cement enough times to know what 55 pounds feels like so we were confident.

We were wrong.  Sal’s bag was 53 pounds.  Mine 47.  A quick juggle and we balanced them both but topped out the limit.  We were good to go. As we walked away from the Alaska Airline check-in, I remarked to Sal, “Sal, you are collecting your old age pension and yet you one-armed 53 pounds like it was a pillow.  You only weigh around 125 yourself.  How many city gals can do that? How many old-agers can do that even if they are male? You are doing something right.”

“I guess, but you carried both bags several times without hesitation.  Even up stairs. You must be doing something right, too.”

Point: this place is good for us.