Retirement- Day One

Retirement...Day One

So, I retired from IDOC on 1/31/19, so today isn't actually day ONE-, Thursday, the 31st was my last day in that SHIT HOLE. But my actual first full day of retirement, Friday 2/1/19, I had to go to court to testify for one of them turd inmates about his calc, which is what gives them their release date when they are sentenced for committing a crime. This guy was trying to manipulate a sentence (like in grammar- a lot of meanings here to the word sentence) in his court transcript and get more time taken off his sentence (how long he has to stay in prison). Needless to say, this guy is an idiot, and my testimony all but sealed that fact up. So, my actual first day of retirement was spent shoring up some DOC stuff- um yeah- I know- right?!!. Then- its Super Bowl and Eagle Days weekend, so I was busy...

"Hey what are you gonna do?" "Hey, when ya moving?" "Hey- how are you gong fill your time now that you don't have to come in this dump anymore?" The usual questions one gets when retirement is imminent- right? My answer? Anything I fucking want for now; but then I wondered about doing just this, letting all these inquiring minds know exactly, well not exactly EVERYTHING I'm doing- but maybe just some highlights of my retired life now. Exciting stuff, yes? I even ran into a friend of mine, R, at the grocery store yesterday, who should've retired a couple of years ago from her job, and she asked me, "So you're done-done now right?" Me- "Yep! - DONE!" R- "Well, when you figure out what to do with all that free time, let me know so I can retire...I won't until I know how to do that, so figure it out and let me know." Uhhhh....OK. WTF?! Honey, there's all kinds of things out in this big bad world you can find to fill your time, especially if it means you don't have to go to work and do a job you hate, dislike, rather not do, or even love, whatever. Shit, a lot of people have told me, "you'll be so busy, you'll wonder when you had time to work." So, I give you my first official day of "filling my time."

So, Illinois sucks in more than one way, but let me just focus on the weather this year. We are just on the other side of what was touted as the "Polar Vortex." We had temps well below zero last week with wind chills of negative 45 to 50 plus! FUCK-ING FREEZ-ING! Not to mention piles of snow everywhere from the couple weeks prior. I hate the cold!! This past weekend, temps finally broke. Temps were in the damn 50's yesterday! Crazy ass weather!! Today? Well, it's a damn sloppy mess outside with snow melting, ground thawing, a little bit anyway, and mud EVERYWHERE! One of my "hobbies" is landscaping, OK, fine, I take some pride in my yard, and like it to look nice. Plus, we have a neighbor, J, who is mid 70ish who does the same, and runs circles around me doing it! Nothing wrong with a little competition, and my yard looks better than yours, right? We have an Oak tree in our front yard that J hates because oaks drop their leaves all winter, so she's always got oak leaves blowing into her yard. NO JOKE, New Year's Day, she was mulching "our" oak tree leaves that had blown into her yard with her lawn mower....New Year's Day!! And like 25 degrees out! (no snow yet). My partner, Angie, feeling bad about the leaves, raked some more of ours up and put along the road in our side yard, and J said she was gonna mulch those too, to keep them from blowing over. Go for it! Well, no raking for me today, that's not where I wanted to go with this. I might rake tomorrow if the ground solidifies again with some colder temps, MAYBE. I did want to pick up all the damn sticks and branches that came down out of that tree with the winds and weight of the snow, you know...to make our yard "look nice" for all the Lewistownians that like to drive by to look at our yard. No one wants to see a bunch of sticks strewn about.

So, on day ONE, that's what I spent the first "free" hour or so of my time doing. It was like a giant game of pixie sticks! So fun. And what you may ask, did I do with all these sticks? Well, I easily doubled the size of my stick pile that sits at the base of that old oak tree. Quite impressive really...no really- it's a big ole pile! I should inform you- I am a bird nerd, and birds like piles of sticks. They use it as shelter and protection from the wind, our cat Freddy, and other lurking predators. Playing pixie sticks as a kid was fun, boring, but kind of fun. The adult version, especially for a perfectionist like myself, even more fun! I got every last stick and twig, meaning, even the tiniest ones that my old lawn mower would have no issue grinding up this spring, were thrown on that immense bird protecting pile. Take that J, no stick left behind in our yard! And I will count all this stick picking-upping as my first official work out too, gotta get back into shape to run circles around J. It was like doing at least 500 sit ups, all that bending over. 500?! Yes really! There were A LOT of sticks!! And as I picked up all these sticks and twigs, I thought to myself, I wonder how old this ole oak tree actually is? Well... I Googled it, because, hey you should learn something new every day right? So let me help you in that department today. According to Google, [note to self- probably better brush up on your APA citing- its been awhile since you wrote Angie's papers- we can let this little cite slide today though] if I measure the circumference of the tree approximately 54 inches from the bottom, then divide that by Pi (first time ever using Pi for me besides that math class I learned it in- who knew I'd actually ever use it?!), you get the circumference of the tree(wait- wasn't that the first measurement? Math is so confusing!), then- depending on what type of oak it is, there is another number you use, known as the growth factor. Multiply your Pi equation result by the growth factor number, and voila, you have the estimated age of your oak tree. You're welcome! So, for you math geeks out there, here's what my equation looks like (double check my math while you're at it!)- 114in. divided by 3.14= 36.31 x 4 (oak growth factor=4 is when you're not sure what type of oak it is- I think it's a white oak- but my Plantsnap app can't identify from the dead leaves...figures! I really wanted this to be REAL accurate for you guys since it's a learning exercise! Oh well... ) = 145.22 (age of my oak tree). J's been dealing with them leaves a looooong time, half that tree's life!!
On a side note- we have 2 dogs and well, they shit a lot! As I said, I take some pride in my yard, and well, since I was picking up sticks, why not poop scoop all those piles sitting on top of the snow in the back yard, because, hey, no one wants to see all that brown stuff on that pristine white stuff when they drive by our house. So to the back I go, armed with my trusty little person, poop-scoopin' shovel and a BIG trash bag. I usually use a small plastic grocery variety bag, but it had been awhile since the last scooping. So, each little pile I scooped had a little bit of snow go with it into the bag, couldn't be helped. I am hoping the temp does actually drop like those weather men say because the garbage person doesn't come until Wednesday.... hate for all that snow to melt in that bag o shit...SHIT SOUP!! Pretty sure there were no holes in that bag though. But if there are, they probably won't like that either. Probably dislike it just as much as when I throw in my grocery bag full of dog shit in the black plastic trash can when it's a sweltering 90 degrees in the summer. Imagine what that smells like when that lid gets lifted! Woooo-weeee stinky poo! as we like to say. And I'm pretty sure the garbage people don't get paid enough for that!
Speaking of SHIT!-- would ya look at the time! Sorry, gotta run! If I have any further "adventures" today, I will edit this so you can know how I spent the rest of day ONE of retirement, don't worry! No really... like where did half my fucking day go??

**DISCLAIMER- initials were used to protect the identity of those who I talk about... but, they are real people- just ask them!**