another year circles the drain

 so 2021 was supposed to be the year we all got vaccinated and freed the world of COVID.. fat chance-

we all battled for slots as the vaccines became available. we signed up for five counties nearby to get on lists to receive the vax. Phil was done by early February but because I had knee replacement in late January I had to wait longer. I was done by the end of March but the country was completely crazy due to an insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021.  people were killed and our government has been under threat of the collapse of democracy since then with civil war looking like a distinct possibility.  strange to put these words down but our country is no longer OUR country it is a country that is deeply divided between those who support white supremacy and those who support equal rights.  to put it mildly - it has been a difficult year. 

COVID still rages we are now on the Omicron variant - having lived through a Delta surge in the summer. In the last few weeks thousands of flights a day have been canceled so getting anywhere is a challenge. This newest variant is much more infectious (but appears to be less deadly to those fully vaccinated) Hospitals are overwhelmed again due to the half of the population who refuse to get vaccinated (those would be the ones supporting the anti democratic faction of our politics.  

but you can read all about that in the history books 

here's what our year looked like- 

January - I got a total knee replacement in my left knee and Phil played nurse- buying ice so many times for the machine that iced my knee that he knew the 7/11 personnel even with masking. 

February - rehabbed a ton so that when March came and Steve and Suzanne visited for a week from Oregon we could all go out to outdoor restaurants - they were all fully vaxxed and I was half way there. Larry came up from Miami for part of the week.  

April we headed back north because we just couldn't look at the same walls any longer... numbers were getting better (before Delta arrived) up north and worse down south... we started dining with friends at mostly outdoor but a few indoor places but only with other vaccinated people.  We did a lot of dining on the deck - COVID brought us electric lights outdoors once it was clear we were going to be using this location for many social gatherings. We carried in and we cooked and friends did the same when we went to the homes of others. 

we did a couple of dinners indoors where our group was at the only table - one four top and one six top  and several times we were the only indoor diners for the evening- as we did some strategic planning working with inside info from the restaurants LOL 

we ate on patios - on the sidewalk - on parking lots converted for outdoor dining - we stuck with mostly places we knew - 

People we knew started traveling but we were a bit more cautious- we went to Ireland for 16 days because they would take only fully vaccinated visitors and required fully vaxxed certificates in order to dine in their restaurants - the population there was virtually all vaxxed and their numbers of infections were low- and still we dined out doors there too when we could - 

we also went to Oregon for ten days to spend time with Steve & Suzanne and do some wineries and just get away 

we had dinner with our cousin Michele in Washington on the last night of the trip-  where the very best peach ice cream in history was served! LOL

we attended two weddings - niece Lauren married in May and Nephew Kurt married in September 

in October I met up with buddy Tom for a road trip following the Mississippi river from the confluence of the Missouri north to the headwaters (near Bemidji MN) 

 above and below - the Mississippi at the headwaters where you can cross on foot...

then it was back south - where we spent Thanksgiving with brother Larry at our place and then Christmas weekend with him at his place- before heading back home for the Omicron surge lockdown- 

our saddest news was that we lost Lucy to a short but fatal illness in November - we sure do miss that gal.

a friend painted this portrait of her as a memorial for us.

LUCY JANE 

OCTOBER 22, 2005 - NOVEMBER 13, 2021

so basically 2021 was another lost year- we were lucky to see our daughter and her husband in Dublin when we were Ireland (the visited for four days from near Oxford in England) but still haven't seen son Jeremy since the first COVID lockdown in March 2020.  I am scheduled for the other knee replacement in two months unless COVID screws with the hospital schedule. At least I will feel like I did something productive during the horror of the pandemic. maybe by the time I write the next post we will have gone somewhere and done something.... who knows.