Good morning all. Randy, glad you went to dinner with your friend, sadly this is a big club, not a little one. Which is why when I hear you guys say you've been married forty and fifty years, I admit to some melancholy. The simple fact we don't know how things turn out is that wonderful reason to kiss and hug your wife every day.
This appears to be another trip of me losing things. Luckily not my mind...first I left my microwaveable heat wrap in my Delaware friend's microwave; we all forgot to take it out, though my fault, and boy do I miss that. Shows me how much I have been depending upon that wrap to take away neck pain because last night was not fun. Then I left my nice LL Bean fleece in the restaurant booth, having grabbed my light jacket but the fleece stayed on the seat. Grrrr. I called them and they put it away and my friend will come get it. So yesterday I had to go find some kind of liner and the only clothing store in town was a sports shop. I bought the cheapest thing they had with the least amount of lettering on it, and the owner nicely discounted it for me. Which considering all the stuff was about to go on half off sale she sure should have. List price on clothing is nuts and no one believes it.
45 degrees in Princeton NJ after the rain went through last night, the high of the day and temps going down from here on out. 62 degrees at home in NC in rain, same system, and hopefully it will rain there for days.
After finding a drug store where I can buy another heat wrap, I'm off to my step brother's farm in New Hope PA for a long visit. I have to put on my old insurance and financial planning hat on; my stepbrother was a client who purchased long term care insurance and now his wife is having issues and he wants to talk to me about it. I have a policy from Mass Mutual for myself that over the years has now climbed to $6k a month coverage due to the 3 percent inflation factor built in, which would cover most of a nice ccc. Have to be pretty disabled though to claim and who wants that, you hope you never have a claim but our bodies and minds fall apart and we have to be prepared.
Mass Mutual, being a true mutual insurance company, has never raised their rates on existing policyholders. Most of you have heard the horror stories of huge rate increases on LTCI; the companies simply did not charge enough, actuaries had insufficient info, and we all know the cost of medical care has gone through the roof. Plus my policy has a unlimited benefit, cannot run out. Not sure they even write that anymore. $1300 a year. Today if I went to buy that for myself I bet it would be closer to $6-8k a year, utterly unaffordable. With my degenerative spine condition, having that coverage is a real comfort for me. Not going to be a burden on family.
On a lighter note...went over my garden plans with my sister and had great fun. We have all decided that none of the planned new mega veggie garden will succeed unless I totally fence it. Carrot greens, beet greens, yum to a deer.
