Well, my friends 2024 is now starting to come to an end. What surprises will 2025 bring us, Will we be safe?, No matter what we feel at this time in a way, I can consider myself very lucky to be able to reach 2025. This will be my last posting for this year and hopefully I will start the new year with a new posting and as I tell myself each year, I want to add one posting per month, We will see how that works out. Our daughter Lisa bought me a book, That I find quite interesting. It’s to be able to look back over my years and write down important facts that I can still remember for different questions and I’m going to try to work on this book and share those experiences with you. That apparently is my New Year’s resolution. As in the past New Year’s resolutions last for about 3 to 4 weeks hopefully this one goes a lot longer. At least it’s something for me to do something for me to Contemplate.
I can tell you now that the biggest surprise that we have had this Christmas was opening the door on Christmas Eve to welcome the family together for the usual Christmas Eve celebration, and lo and behold. There was our daughter who had flown in from Alabama to be able to celebrate Christmas Eve with the family as we have done for years and years. Unfortunately, her husband had to stay back in Alabama and was not able to enjoy these festivities with us. The Christmas Eve celebration began as it has For many years with Margot‘s fantastic dinner, including lasagna, baked ham, Caesar salad, and the flow of Wine. After dinner, we head into the living room, gather around the Christmas tree and begin our game of white elephant giftgiving which is always hysterical. We have a limit of $25 per person that is spent on gifts.
Christmas Day produce the other side of the coin where I was taken into the emergency room for some complications, but I survive the ordeal. My children were with me. My wife was with me. For a period of seven hours, I was tested for just about everything that I guess can happen to an old man and the results were passed on to my primary care doctor. I will meet this coming week with a specialist to find out what the results were and what to do about it. Anyway, life goes on and hopefully I’m part of that. Like I previously said, I’m planning big things for 2025. Thanks to my kids for sitting it out through this ordeal.
I found this article and I thought I would include it in this posting as I found it fairly interesting. You can just click on the navigation links and look at it and see what your ideas are
As I have said in the past, My Republican friends have voted party over reality and whatever happens in 2025 will happen to all regardless of Political consciousness. I’ll be waiting to hear from them about the happenings that they are enduring, By the way, I feel that prices of product will go up rather than down, but that’s only my opinion. Inflation will occur, but that’s only my opinion. Will let it rest at that. But don’t come crying about the situation just remember you help create it. Enough said.
Well, my friends it’s now time to say Margot and I send our sincere wishes to all of you to enjoy a happy healthy new year and I hope you continue to follow my blog in the coming year.
Hospital visits? What a terrible subject to be discussing, I sincerely hope that whoever has spent any time in the hospital found it was nothing serious, and couldn’t be fixed. I For one really do not like hospital visits, But while watching a movie with Margot last night, one of the scenes of the movie brought back memories of a hospital visit that I had to make. In this movie, the medics that were brought in, stopped the bleeding simply by Using a woman’s Tampax to contain the bleeding apparently it’s very Absorbent. It brought back a funny moment that I had sometime ago with a nosebleed. I tried everything that I could think of to stop the bleeding. Including holding the bridge of the nose, for 20 seconds, leaning my head backwards, all of the old witch craft ideas and nothing stopped the bleeding. Margot got me into the car and we went to the local hospital emergency room. Well, it turns out that they were unable to slap the bleeding also so they sent me to the emergency room where I guess what they were going to do was to cauterize the inside of the nose, However, the doctor decided that he was simply gonna give something a try before he went to that extent. He stuck a tampon Up my nose and sent me out into the waiting room for a little bit of time. Low and behold, The bleeding stopped, but all of that time that I had this tampon Up my nose, the little string that hangs out one end of it was able to wiggle around my lips tickling My lips. That was driving me crazy so Margot decided to get some tape and tape the little string to the upper lip, But just the appearance was demoralizing as people now knew and could see for themselves that I had a tampon sticking up my nose with the string tape to my upper lip. The doctor suggested that I keep this in for the next two or three days and then pay another visit to him and he would make a decision on whether and what he was gonna do. What an embarrassment this was until my visit back after three days and the conclusion that he came up with was simply to remove the tamponAnd call it a day.
I guess the moral to the story is to always have a tampon or tampax Available for emergencies, Even if you have to carry a box in your emergency kit that you have in your car. Now in editing this little story, I use the word Tampax End tampon, But I’m a man what do I know? It was just one of those little short things round in shape.
WTF JUST HAPPENED
Well, November 5th has now come and gone. As far as I am concerned, it arrived with hope but at the end of the day, it left with hopefulness. I still have a pit in my stomach and am still wondering if I have confidence in my fellow man, regardless of their political position. It’s like feeling something is wrong with my health and on the way to the clinic thinking that it might be herpes, than at the clinic finding out it is HERPES, AND it’s going to last at least for the next four years.
It’s hard for me to understand how a person twice impeached, guilty of molestation on not one but several women, convicted of 47 felonies and has lead an insurrection by trying to overturn a legal election. A person that speaks like a 7 year old, is a confirmed racist, and the person of lies and misinformation, become president of our country, I guess that’s where my confidence in my fellow man drops flat on its face. Could it be that those voters in favor of 45 are of the same making? Let’s hope not.
I guess the bottom line is that I just have to go with the flow and hope that it lasts only for four years. Someone has told me that they heard that Trump’s doctor feels Trump will only medically mentally last about 2 1/2 years but then we have JD vans who is worse than Trump. I don’t really believe in that rumor but just thought I would pass it on to you.
I know that there are gonna be a lot of changes, And feel that these changes will not necessarily be for the better. I don’t really know if they will really affect people in my age group I sincerely hope not, But realizing what a person 45 is you just can’t tell where it’s going to stop. May not even affect my children who are both reaching the age of 60, but I know definitely that it will affect my grandchildren. I’m closely watching who is picking for his so-called cabinet and so far all the names mentioned are all in my danger outlook. Many of you probably will not agree with me and maybe I’m just a pessimist, But if any of this comes true, look back over this posting of the blog and see that I told you so.
Well, That’s all I’ve got to say about that hopefully in future post I won’t have to bring up his name and hopefully we will now end up under the rule of a dictator.
A new dawn is upon us, and we, the people can control if it becomes sunshine or a tornado. November 5th is the day we can make it happen.
I was going to make this blog, a little political giving you facts that you should be aware of. I have decided not to do that, simply because I believe that anybody that reads this blog is intelligent enough to make their own decision. Having said that, You simply have to feel that the decision that you do make at the voting booth will stay with you for at least the next four years, If not longer if you permit it. You simply have to sit down and ask yourself were you better off than you were four years ago? Are you that able, To think back to the past and come up with a realistic reply? This country seems to be a two-party system country even though there are 10 different people representing 10 different political thoughts running for president. Most people simply vote ideology, but this time there seems to be only one party with a platform that fits all people in the nation compared to the other party, which has a platform that fits only one person, That to me personally means dictatorship. One party seems to feel that all people should have the opportunity to succeed in what they do, The other party is led by a person with a mental disorder called Narcissistic personality disorder. For those of you that do not know the meaning of that, spend a little time looking it up to find out exactly what it means. One side spent a lifetime working for the law, abiding citizens. The other side spent a lifetime working for himself, a Three time impeached person and a felon of 34 convictions. Just a show that an apple doesn’t fall very far from the tree in 1927 Fred, the father was convicted in New York City for marching with the KKK and was also known as a racist, keeping certain people from renting apartments in any of his buildings. Enough about this, Just remember how you vote you have to just swallow it and live with it. Don’t try to blame it on someone else. It’s hysterically, funny to me just to listen to one person, unable to speak the English language as it was meant to be spoken. Totally unable to put together two sentences without having to speak of themselves or something that just doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Whenever he says something, it’s either about him, a total lie or some misinformation. There’s actually no evidence of fact. If that is what you want to lead then don’t complain when you learn something different.
GETTING OLD IS NOT FUN
I remember when I was five years old I wanted so much to be able to be seven. When I came to seven I wanted so much to be 12. At 12 years old, I wanted to be 18 and this goes on throughout my whole life always looking forward to becoming something else now that I’m 88 years old I say to myself I wonder if I will become 90. Does this happen to all people or just to me? At 90 years old, would I want to make 95, Good question I just feel very good waking up every morning and seeing the ceiling on my bedroom rather than angels flying overhead. I roll over and I asked Alexa, Alexa, what’s on my schedule and she gives me an update for the next four days. I love it when I go to the doctor and the doctor says OK Vito see you next year, Makes me feel awfully good right there, even though I may have pain all over my body. As soon as I see the ceiling, I immediately throw back the covers and do several of my exercises just to be able to get the feeling back into my legs. I have to sit at the edge of the bed for a couple of moments just to get the dizziness out of my head and then I make a start of my day Brush my teeth, Wash my face comb, what hair I have left, And The day is now ready to begin. I noticed for the past three or four years that I have to begin the ritual of getting up and starting the day identically to the day before just so I don’t forget to do things, turn off the alarm open front door to check to see if the sun is shining Open the Blinds in the living room and start the Coffee. After the coffee is made the next important thing to do is to turn the TV on just to check what’s happening in the world. This type of schedule eliminates me from having to write it down and then looking for the paper that I wrote it on. Also, Alexa is quite a big help and reminding me to do certain things. I guess it’s nice to have a woman in the house that remembers things As good as she does. It’s now getting to the point where I can sit in the kitchen and talk to Alexa and Margot wants to know who I’m talking to, So maybe at this age it’s good to have two women in the house. Wonder if I should go for a threesome. Now, in order to remember what day I’m working in I have a seven day pillbox after I take my pills. I keep that small compartment left open so that I know which day has passed and which day is coming. I then double check this just by peeking over at the calendar and marking off the day on the calendar. What a genius I have become. I build my shopping list for the week simply by giving the information to Alexa and then transferring it to my phone so Wala there’s my shopping list. This system may not work for everyone, but it sure does for me so each, and every person has to build their own system to meet their needs. It my particular case growing old, isn’t that really as bad as it may sound, It just gives me another day of something to talk about when I meet with my buddy for coffee once a week. He happens to be a very good cook and very knowledgeable in world concerns, So as we sit here, sipping our coffee and eating the latest creation that one of us have baked, we have now added Waze to correct the world situation, If they would follow our ideas, it would be a better place in the world. Thanks, Don for all these great conversations.
I’m guessing, that it was about 10 years ago perhaps even a little bit longer that I suddenly became bored with not doing something, So I collected a whole bunch of photographs that I had put them all together in a little movie put music to it and Walla, I had my first movie. Since then, I made several others and you can always go to youtube.com search for Vitoonfilm , And see some of the other movies that I’ve made. Just to give you a small taste of what they may look like, Here’s one about a visit made to a small town in Washington called Leavenworth. Take a look at it and you can send me an email telling me what you think about it.
I don’t know about anybody else, But going through our house we are loaded with pictures. Could be that at one point of my wife’s life she had a camera automatically attached to her finger. Every time one of our kids did something there was a picture of it, and it was set up into a package of three, One set for my parents, One set for Margot‘s parents and one set for us. Pictures of our kids growing up, places that were visited and just crazy things happening at the time. These pictures alone, tell the story of our life.
Now it has become a full-time job going through these pictures and trying to figure out what to do with them. If I was certain that I could finish it, I would probably put them all together put them to music and develop a 15 hour documentary of my life, Wow, what a stupid idea, at my age, it would probably go as an untold story. Finishing it, will never become reality so, I have decided not to begin it. What I need is a hobby that when it ends, It will leave no one in suspense.
LIVING ALONE TOGETHER
sounds stupid? You may think so however this is the life that Margot And I have been living for perhaps the last 12 to 15 Years. We have quite a large home consisting of three levels and about 3500 sq. ft. Up until about two years ago, I had the total daylight basement area designated as my man’s cave. That gave me about 1500 ft.² all for myself. Now that area belongs to our daughter Lisa and her husband where they have redesigned and made it into an apartment which will become their hub while they are in their retirement travel days. That leaves the balance of 2000 ft.² give or take, Available for Margot and I to share, Thus living alone together. We can literally go 8 to 10 hours without bumping into each other, every twist and turn or having to carry on a conversation that eventually bores both of us. I’ve turned one of the four bedrooms into my office, This was previously an area that Margot used as her office when she was working from home. We use our dining room table to work on puzzles, And of course, the family room is to watch TV. Both of these rooms are on Opposite side of the kitchen, this means we can both go to the kitchen make something to eat or just go to the refrigerator without having to have a conversation on what to eat when to eat and where to eat. Since completing puzzles is Basically concentration, we can both work on the same puzzle without necessarily speaking to each other. On the other side of the kitchen since the TV is on, we can both sit in the family room watch TV without the necessary chatting, However, making comments about certain things being discussed on TV has become necessary, small talk is permitted. Now, I don’t want you to get the idea that we never talk. We do talk quite a bit about many different things, Conversation does take place, but not on a basis of a whole day spending talking to each other or feeling that we have to talk to each other, Living alone together, simply means we can enjoy our own space when we want it for as long as we want it, Ideal situation. Having said all this, I do have to admit that there are times I feel a little bit lonely, and I would feel that if something happened to Margaret, I would feel terribly lonely just because I don’t have the possibility of talking to someone. I’m fairly certain that Margot feels the same way. We both get little bits of these pieces now. When I end up going up to bed at 11:15 PM, Margot will End up watching TV for perhaps another hour before coming up to bed. When I get up in the morning two hours before Margot I get a little lonely. Taking everything into consideration, apparently has proven to be quite good for us since we are quickly approaching 60 years together. I think the reason for that is primarily because we simply do not have the possibility of talking with each other, even if we wanted to. It’s even gotten to the situation where I have thought about asking women in our age group, if they would consider moving in with me, no strings attached. They would have their own bedroom and their own bathroom. It would be companionship. Not officially speaking For Margot, I think she would prefer prefer to just be alone, but always with the possibility to having our kids nearby somewhere, especially the grandkids.
Well, my friends, That’s all I have for you on this posting, The next one will be probably at the time of the 2024 election and I will give you my take on what I think about that. I don’t intend to tell you how to vote or what I think of those that don’t vote the way that I vote, But just little tidbits on how I have come to my decision.
We have now been informed that Mr. DJ T has been convicted of 34 felony crimes. Now the question is, what should his punishment be or should he be punished? If it was me or you, we certainly would be punished and more than likely put in jail however, what the punishment will be for DJ T will be long contested by many people in this country.
Even though I consider myself bias and this situation, I do not want to see Mr. DJT put behind the golden bars he so deserves. Instead, if I was the judge, I would place him on the house arrest for a minimum period of five years along with having him sentenced to community duty for that same time consisting of all seven days in each week. The only people I would really feel sorry for in this situation. Are the Secret Service people that he will still enjoy during this period of time. His community service will include cleaning the toilets of the subway bathrooms in New York sweeping the streets of debris in New York and caring for those that need the help in New York especially in the Harlem area. If he is unable to complete any of these chores, the judge should have the power to find him $10,000 per day.
THINGS TO PONDER
Given the age bracket Im presently living in, I find that I now have the time to look back and ponder questions that are still unanswered. Some years ago it became difficult to bend over to cut my own toe nails. It was at this time that I decided to do the unmanly thing and get a pedicure. Much to my surprise, when I arrivered, I found other men enjoying the experience. Margot and I sat next to each other in very comfortable smooth vibrating chairs and was offerered a cold juice drink. As the ladies filled the tub area with water, I found myself wondering what nationality this beautiful woman could be. We each had our own, so as they began the pedicure process , we decided that they were most likely Vietnamese. As they clipped, filed, oiled, scraped, rubbed and massaged the two of them spoke, giggled, laught. I could only imagine what they were saying and laughing about. Probably something like ” look at the claws on this gorilla, I think my clippers are broken, l need a chainsaw, and he’s tickelish so I will continue to scape the bottom of his feet ” ” His legs are so skinny, like massaging sticks ”. ” I will use extra oil on his feet so he will slip and slide in his sandels ” ”hahahahaha” ” these are the ugliest feet I have ever seen. If his toes were any longer they would be fingers ”
Simple truth is, I really don’t care what they say, I enjoy the experience and keep going back for More, but it will always be something to ponder.
DAYS GONE BY WILL ALWAYS BE
No one knows what the future will bring, but we will always know what the past has brought. Growing up my parents told me to always look forward never Look back, However there comes a time of your life when you should look back with the hope the future will be bright. For me, that time began when I was in my fifties. This was the time when I first started to write my blog. I wanted my grandkids to have an idea of just how their grandpa grew up, What I did during that time of my life how I did it during that time of my life and understanding that I did those things as being an only child, but not necessarily a spoiled child.
As a matter of fact, I remember quite clearly how my mother cured me of being a spoiled child, and it began at the age of perhaps five years old. My grandfather smoked a pipe and I wanted so much to be able to smoke a pipe. I remember going shopping with my mother one time and there were pipes that I spotted. I asked my mother if I could have that pipe and she of course said no Vito you’re much too small for a pipe so I figured the best way for me to be able to get that pipe was to simply lie down on the ground kick my legs bang my fist and start to cry and my mother, in order to keep me quiet would simply buy me the pipe. That wasn’t the way It worked. As the other adults in the area could very easily hear my tantrum and my screams my mother would gently pick me up off the floor, take me by the hand and squeeze the hell out of that hand, which made me cry even more. All of those onlooking adults simply felt sorry for my mother not for me. My mother would speak very tenderly to me and say no Vito you can’t have the pipe today, While , she’s so tenderly squeezed the hell out of that hand. Me, Being so intelligent, quickly learned that in order for me not to get my hands, squeezed that it was not a good idea to start crying, banging my fists while , making a complete fool of myself. Thanks, mom you certainly knew your stuff.
A hardy thank you goes out to all the people that reads this blog and I promise there would be more to come
Today, I participated in a zoom meeting with classmates of the 1955 graduating class from Woodmere High School. What a wonderful time it was as so many of you were all reminiscing about the past but also updating people about what you have been doing from those days to the present. Richard Rubenstein was a fantastic host and gave everyone the opportunity to brag. All the ladies looked well and fit along with the guys. Even though all are in their eighties they spoke about still playing tennis, pickleball and such. What a great class that was and those still around remain diligent in what they like doing to this day. Some had minor problems connecting including oui, but were able to get into the conversation somehow. Modern technology!!! Should have paid more attention when my grandsons were trying to teach me how to do those things. I still remember them, trying to tell me how to get into the Internet. They told me that I had to start by opening windows, My reply to them was if I open my windows will that get me better reception because it was kind of cold with the windows open. It wasn’t long after that, though that I finally found out that they meant me opening the program windows on my computer and there I was finally into the Internet and just browsing away. That made me so enthusiastically competent. Listening to my classmates today brought back so many fun memories of growing up and a time when even though we are just finished World War II, it was so peaceful and exciting. Now when I start to look forward, It seems that everything will be so complicated and involved with things I have never heard of or done before. To all my classmates that shared this remarkable feet of zoom in the visit we had today I hope that some of you still keep in touch it sounds as if you do, And continue to reminisce about all those great days that we had.
Mr. President or may I call you Richard thank you for being the host and I hope you will be there to be the host of many more. let me know when you book is out, And I will do the same for when my book comes out.
As I have said, High school at times was a little challenging for me, Primarily, because I thought I knew everything there was to know and here I had teachers that were trying to teach me things that I thought I would never have any use for, Therefore, my study habits were quite different from what they should have been. Having said that perhaps it was just that I was having too much fun doing other things. Luckily, just before the final test in my final year, Several friends came to my rescue and forced tutored me so that I would graduate when I was supposed to. It was only after I was working for Scandinavian airlines that I realized that some college would become necessary for me to advance, Lucky for me, Scandinavian airlines had a program where they would pay for my college education. It was at that time they sent me off toMalmo, Sweden Where I was enrolled into the university of Lund To study the Swedish language. That paid off big time since I was newly married to a Swedish lady. After an intense course of five weeks, I returned back to the United States and enrolled in Night classes, studying business procedures and worked daytime for Scandinavian airlines. The best education came from the 40 years of working for Scandinavian airlines and getting the opportunity to travel around the world and experience the different cultures that exist throughout this world. That to me was worth more than having to spend days of my life in classrooms.
Once again, let me thank Richard Rubinstein for arranging this zoom with the former classmates of the 1955 class of Woodmere high school. I hope we can do it again soon
This is something that I sincerely believe everyone should be aware of.
I recently saw on TV a program from Steve Reeves, touring Europe, learning about the effects of the start of fascism in the countries of Europe. I found this to be extremely informative, and believe that everyone should be made aware of what fascism is, and how it could affect our lives. I then found this video from Robert Reich, With practically the same situation. Now, I’m not saying that this will happen, but is something that should be in the minds of all of us. What we want our country to look like?
I’m just asking for you to read this and think about the total package. We agree that some of 45’s ideas have merit but you must look at and understand the total package. In my opinion, he is totally unexceptable for the office of president, and is a danger to democracy.
