March Madness

March Madness

This writing is near the end of March 2014, I am report that March madness has encroached on our lives.  Both Kathy and I have had our days with high emotions and days with crummy physical health.

High emotion brought on by stress at work, living in a model home, and the continued cleansing of our possessions. As our days are numbered on the job, the promises we've made to complete tasks at work are building up steam on our timelines.  As a school teacher, I'm entering high stake testing time and am trying to help students and teachers in need of support.  Kathy's work project is getting down to the wire with less than twenty policies and an inspection to go.  Feels like neither of us are going to complete everything at 100% but we are getting it done.  Living in a house on the market showing regularly makes daily cleaning and organization a must.  It takes at least 30 minutes extra daily to get ready to leave for work in the morning and not knowing if someone will visit or not,  and although we still are not packed, we are getting rid of objects that we are not storing or taking with us.  Kathy keeps reminding me, letting go of items is not letting go of the experiences we had with them.  This month we turned in our leased 2013 GTI.  It was hard in two ways, financially and emotionally.  This is the first time, in over twenty years, I am not a VW owner and it cost us to get out of the lease.  I feel like we did okay on the deal because I had two other offers to take back to the Volkswagen dealership before finalizing the turn-in.

Okay is generally not good enough for either of us so we really did know how selling the bike would turn out.  Vito was our 2002 Honda  VTX 1800.  When I had taken the GTI around town for offers, I had also inquired about the bike.  We wanted WAY more than anyone was offering.  Seems there are quite a few VTXs still on the road driving prices way down.  We knew that our baby was special though and needed to be marketed as such.  I came up with this crafty little craigslist ad...Don Corleone couldn't have been a prouder papa to Vito than we are!

Vito is our 2002 customized Honda VTX 1800c. With enough growl to wake up grandma with custom drag pipes and get up and go with the power commander to easily taken anything off the line, Vito is ready to move out of this childhood home.

We adopted this California bike as a toddler and have brought him up right.  Big Bend to South Padre, most of his 34,300 miles earned were in the Texas hill country.  Now he's living large in H-town.

So your interested but your bald, married, and over 50.  No problem!

The XL Ultimate custom seat has you both covered.  This comfy seat saved our marriage!  Now she says "riding bitch never felt so good!" She keeps her purse and a map in the leather bags that zip off easily for prowling nights.  If your interested in iron butting it, we'll sell you the custom bike luggage too!  You could pack for a month with all this storage.

Vito is the perfect combination of power and prowess.  Looks like a million! rides    like a dream! handles like thoroughbred! Muscle bike and cruiser comfort!

This ad interested the man and wife it was directed toward.  Even after coming back from a test ride and discovering an slight water pump leak, Kathy's genuine passion for this bike finalized the sale to a wonderful new family at a very agreeable price.

We both had our lows this month with our physical health too.  The 140 year old oak tree in our backyard has decided to run us off too.  This tree, the oldest in the neighborhood was our pride when we moved into the house.  It draped over nearly half the house and was in desperately needed  trimming but since Houston had been in a severe drought we wanted to ensure we could keep the tree alive and healthy.  We spent several thousand dollars to provide the tree with deep root watering and fertilizing as well as cutting it back away from the house to save it.  Obviously, it's doing well providing food and habitat for a varying of living things such as squirrels, doves, wood pecker, blue jays, robins, and anole lizards.   Too bad the pollen pods are now painting the neighborhood yellow and causing Kathy and I symptoms from headaches, sore throats, watery eyes, running nose, coughing, fever, and even pink eye.

Now we live off steroid sprays and shots while the tree in the back yard flourishes with a nest of baby woodpeckers.  So even though we been under physical, mental, and emotional stress this month we continue to see the roses amongst the thorns.  Less than three months to D, departure, Day.