A New Year with a lot of changes to be made

I've got to clear a lot of things out of my life!

This isn't just about losing this fat ass. My office has once again made me insane. After four summers of a licensed home bakery, we're ready to pack it in - 80 man-hours a week for a $250 net is just not working. That means I've got more pans of every sort possible to banish to other bakers along with a lot of other sundry items like a tall-boy rack and packaging materials. I have craft supplies I've collected over the years just taking up space with the "oh, I'll get to that this winter!".

I will confess: I'm a book hoarder! I love to see books all around me and the pile next to my side of the bed is obscenely high. I've run out of room on all my shelves. This is after I left 5 boxes of books in the basement that I didn't have room to display upstairs when we moved in over 2 years ago. The other problem is the cookbooks. I think a safe estimate is over 500. A lot of them are magazine-type, the smaller Pillsbury series that you pick up at the checkout and I received Gramma's collection when she died.

A lot of these books have got to go. So, my first call Monday will be to the Centerburg Senior Center to see if they have room in their library. I guess another option would be Centerburg's Interchurch Social Services to see if they could sell them to buy food. Trey said that Half-Price Books pays well for hardbacks - sometimes he would get around $15 for a box. But, that involves driving to Columbus for a "maybe" shot at a few bucks plus interfering with my writer's morals about no royalties for 2nd-hand books. The cookbooks? I love to look at the pretty pictures! But, I plan to especially sort through the smaller books and magazines and open up a word program and type up anything I might be especially interested in.

I've got to start moving more often. I don't mean physically moving residences, I mean getting off my ass. I was cleaning out one of the basement refrigerators the other day so we could sell it. I hurt so bad the next day from the bending and reaching and that has got to end. Winter-time is a pretty bad time in Ohio to start to think about walking. But, there's a young lady that lives somewhere near us who runs every day she's home from college. We watch her all through the summer and I've seen her every day over the last two weeks, even when the temps were in the teens. I figure I've got a lot more insulation than she does - I should be able to do this.

There's more changes to come but wow. It seems like we can all give great common-sense advice but when it comes to following it? I've got a long way to go!