Well, that escalated quickly.

Apr 27, 2026

To put it bluntly, my teeth suck. I got my first fillings at age seven and now sport twelve crowns, several fillings, and have had three root canals. I have probably had $20,000 worth of dental work over the years. My teeth have been holding their own for a while or, at least they were until I went to the dentist last week.

Last Tuesday, I went to the dentist for my six month cleaning. I was expecting to be told one of my lower crowns needed to be replaced; the dentist has been keeping an eye on one for a while. However, that is not what happened. While the hygienist was cleaning my teeth with those wonderful little pointy hooks, one of my crowns came off – and it was not the one the dentist was worried about. After cleaning up the nub of tooth under the crown, the dentist determined that it has a “poor prognosis.” In other words, that little nub of tooth will no longer support a crown and needs to be removed. This left me with two options: a bridge or an implant. A bridge would entail crowning the two teeth to either side of the bad tooth while an implant would replace it. I elected to move forward with the implant. The teeth to either side of the bad one are currently healthy and I don’t want to have them crowned unnecessarily.

The dentist referred me to a periodontist and even called and scheduled my consultation appointment for May 4th. However, the periodontist called later with a cancellation so I actually got in the next day. While the periodontist was looking at my x-rays he said, “I guess the dentist told you that you need a root canal on this other tooth.” No. No, she did not. After a call to my dentist, the periodontist’s office called the endodontist and I have an appointment with her on May 22nd.

The periodontist will remove the remains of my tooth and insert the implant the same day. However, it will require four to five months of healing before a new crown can be placed on the implant. Since the tooth being replaced is a front tooth, I will receive an Essix clear retainer that will contain a “tooth” to hide the fact that mine is missing. The day after my consultation with the periodontist I had to go back to his office for a scan that will be used to create my retainer. Once that was done, my procedure was scheduled for 9am on May 21st.

Of course, this means I have an periodontist appointment on May 21st and an endodontist appointment on May 22nd. I’ll be making a call to the endodontist this week to find out if my appointment on the 22nd is for a consultation or the actual root canal. If it’s the latter, that appointment will get rescheduled. There is no way I’m have two dental procedures back-to-back.

So, yeah. I went in for a cleaning and wound up needing an implant and a root canal. Good times. What’s new with you?

Friday Funnies

Apr 24, 2026

Several years ago the kids gave Kenn a walker as a gag gift. It has been hanging in the wall in his workshop ever since – just in case. Imagine my surprise (and confusion) when I saw it sitting at the foot of our currently non-existent front stairs.

I had forgotten that our neighbor, Matt, fell out of a deer stand a few months ago and broke his hip. Kenn loaned him the walker so he could have one for each floor of his house. Now that he no longer needs it, Matt brought the walker back and left it on the walkway. Kenn decided the presence of the walker added that little something extra to the construction zone so he left it there.

Yes, we are those neighbors.🤣

Apr 22, 2026

Wordless Wednesday

Cruise 2026: Lessons Learned

Apr 16, 2026

Kenn and I looked at our cruise as an experiment of sorts. Is this something we would like to do again? Why or why not? Periodically throughout our trip Kenn would ask, “So, what have we learned today?”

The most important lessons we learned are:

We need a room with a view. Neither of us would do well with an interior room.
Paying for the package that includes all tips is a must.
The “unlimited beverage” package would be better if it included water. Instead, we took advantage of the “special” offered the first full day aboard and purchased 12 bottles of water for the low, low price of only $20.🙄 Neither of us are big drinkers but we did make some use of our unlimited beverage plan. We spent a couple of hours every evening on deck twelve near the outdoor bar where there was plenty of seating and windows overlooking the ocean. Kenn’s favorite drink of the trip was a Mudslide, which was basically an alcoholic dessert.😂 I had never had prosecco, so I tried a peach bellini; it turns out, I am not a fan. I guess it shouldn’t come as a surprise since I’m not a fan of wine in general. I tend to prefer a drink with rum or tequila. (The rum based Bahama Mama was my favorite.)
There were several complimentary restaurants onboard, but the others required additional money. Our cruise package included a credit toward one of the non-complimentary restaurants which we put toward a meal at the Italian restaurant, La Cucina. The food was good but nothing to write home about. I did get to try panna cotta for the first time and it was delicious. (I can’t believe I didn’t take a picture of it.) It might be nice to try a cruise line where all of the restaurants are complimentary. (Such cruise lines do exist.)
The biggest, and most important, lesson we learned is that we will never be avid cruisers. No, it wasn’t bad, but for us, the destination is the most important part of the trip. Our road trips take longer, but give us longer at our chosen destinations and we can make side trips on the fly. This is not to say that we will never take another cruise, just that cruises will always be the exception, not the rule.

With the last point in mind, a cruise to Alaska is still very much on our bucket list; we think a cruise will give us the best opportunity to see the most scenery. We’ll probably take a one-way cruise from Seattle so we can disembark and spend a few days visiting friends who moved to Alaska. Of course this means that we’ll have to fly back to Seattle – and neither of us enjoy flying – but, you do what you gotta do.

Later this year we’re planning to take a train trip to see how we like traveling by rail. Have you traveled by train?

Apr 15, 2026

Wordless Wednesday

Friday Funnies

Apr 10, 2026

Bear gave it a good try, but sometimes you don’t fit not matter how hard you sit.🤣

Cruise 2026: Great Stirrup Cay, Bahamas

Apr 9, 2026

The second (and last) stop on our cruise was Great Stirrup Cay in the Bahamas. Great Stirrup Cay is a private island owned by Norwegian Cruise Lines. Normally, this sort of “destination” island wouldn’t appeal to me; my fair-skinned self isn’t made for basking in the sun or floating in the lagoon, even with sunscreen. However, there was one activity on the island that we couldn’t pass up. Well, that I couldn’t pass up: Stingray City & Swimming Pigs on Treasure Island. I was sold on this cruise as soon as I learned about the pigs. Kenn, being the sweetie that he is, agreed. Norwegian only offers this specific cruise twice a year; we were on the last one for the year.

The pier at Great Stirrup Cay is only large enough for one ship, so the Star dropped anchor away from the island and passengers were “tendered” to the island on smaller boats. Specific instructions were provided for how and when to arrive for tendering. As per normal, the actual process was… disorganized. Our excursion to Treasure Island was scheduled for 11am, and since we were supposed to allow thirty minutes for tendering, it was important for us to be among the first to tender. (There really needs to be a better term, LOL.) In spite of the confusion, we made it onto the first boat so we were in the queue for our excursion in plenty of time. Whew!

Our group had a bit of a hike to the dock where we took even smaller boats to Treasure Island. Once on the island, we were given the instructions for how to behave around the animals before being allowed to proceed to the interaction areas. Staff was on hand to work with everyone individually to limit any issues. Of course, we had to sign waivers; where animals are involved, accidents can happen. Example: I got stepped on by an adult pig. No harm was intended, the pig simply wanted some apple. Did it hurt? Yep. Swim shoes don’t provide much protection from pig hooves. But, I was fine; not even a bruise. We were not allowed to take phones into the animal areas so there were plenty of staff with cameras recording everything. Yes, that meant we had to pay extra for photos, but I was fine with that. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, braces yourselves. Photo dump incoming!

Which would you prefer: swimming with the pigs or interacting with the stingrays?

Apr 8, 2026

Wordless Wednesday

Cruise 2026: Key West

Mar 30, 2026

I guess everyone chooses a cruise because of the destinations, but our reasons for choosing these destinations were very specific.

Panoramic photo of Key West from our stateroom.

Key West has long been on our list of places to visit. Kenn also decided that if he truly hated being onboard the ship, we could disembark in Key West and rent a car to drive back to Tampa to pick up our car.

Since we only had five-ish hours in Key West, we booked a tour on the Old Town Trolley. The tour would allow us to hit the highlights of the town and hop on and off as we wanted.

The tour would have been more informative if we could have heard the tour guide over the lady behind us; she talked incessantly. At one of the stops the tour guide started his informative spiel and the lady behind us piped up, “He sure talks a lot.” You think? It was almost like talking was his job!🤦‍♀️

We got off the trolley at the famous buoy marking the southernmost point in the continental US. Usually, taking a selfie somewhere like this is an absolute free-for-all; this was incredibly organized. Everyone was in an orderly line and the people at the front of the line gave their phone to the people behind them, who took the photos, gave the phone back and then repeated the process for their own photos. I was impressed!

We walked from the buoy back to where we boarded the trolley locating the Zero mile marker along the way. Oh, and I got to see the feral chickens of Key West, so I am a happy woman!