Coralc

We've been on Grandeur a few times. We are fine with it. We've never been on the big ships. Largest was Liberty. If you are cruising mainly for ports, then it is a hotel room that takes you to interesting places. ☺️ Grandeur is less crowded than Enchantment stretched. Service is good and staff is friendly. If you want the water slides and flow riders and things, then you should probably take the Oasis or Ovation class.

I hope you have a great time! ☺️

The Boston Port looks like the old San Francisco cruise port, before they built the new one. ☺️

You have the most interesting animals! I had never heard of Frogmouths. ☺️

There is a big purple slide on the aft of Symphony. 🙄

Interesting story about mom. She passed away on a trip and vacation in a hospital that was about 5 hours from where we live. We went up to say goodbye (she was unconscious) before she passed away. Folks in the US may be familiar with the Neptune Society. I have nothing but great and wonderful things to say about their services! 😃 They took care of everything and took care of mailing mom. I told our outstanding mail carrier that we were expecting mail delivery of my mom. (She had a tracking number) And he waited until we were home from work, so that he could deliver her in person and express his personal condolences. I guess I was thinking about her, because her birthday was Oct. 24th. ☺️

Thank you, Graham. It was quite some time ago, (3 years) and she was almost 90. Her family is just me, alone. And I don't quite have the memorials that you do for your parents. I think it is lovely how you remember them. ☺️ Mom is in a box in the garage. Along with the boxes of ashes of her 8 cats. Her request was to be distributed with them. Which we will do, when Bobby finally moves on. I sincerely appreciate your condolences. ☺️

Thank you, Graham. It was originally my mom's house. She did have to go to urgent care, briefly, because of shock and her heart issues. But no one was injured. And she was fine. (She is since deceased) The neighbors said it looked like a bomb went off, because of the sound and exploding debris in the air. ☺️

Aardvark?

Dup.

Sorry. Fridges and freezers made me think of the tree thing. 😃

One last comment. It is funny on the news reports, when they show trees hitting houses from the outside. The amount of devastation inside, is what is incredible! ☺️And just to make it cruise related. We were supposed to sail on Voyager out of NOLA in 10 days for pre-Christmas. She called me up that day to cancel, because her cat was sick. 😒 I was really mad at her. But then the tree fell on her house the same day and rendered dwelling uninhabitable, so she was able to have full recovery with travel insurance. She called me and said, "A bad thing happened". I went up for a week, to take care of things and filed her claim ..with photos! ☺️

It is all fixed. ☺️

Yes. Mom was out of the house for almost year. Poor mom, she was on the other side of island counter in the kitchen when the trees came down in a windstorm. (2011) New roof, kitchen, laundry room, bathroom, living room, and new floors because it pushed the kitchen appliances down in the basement. We were fortunate, there was a company doing salvage logging after the storm, and they just plucked the tree out of the house. (No Charge) There were 9 or so trees down in her cul-de-sac. It was a huge tree, you can see that the top of the one that hit the house, went all the way out to the street. It looks fine now; I will post a photo or two. But it was a long process. Thanks. ☺️

It used to be a regular fridge, but then a big tree fell on it.

Really? Always had a top freezer, so the food is at eye level. The other house has a bottom freezer and French doors. We really haven't put much in it, but I can just imagine it being a giant pit, that I put things in... never to be seen again. LOL. 😃

Your Part B premium is based on your income from 3 years prior. So, we will take a hit on premiums after we sell this house. But it is only for one year, and we have advance notice. We may have to work with a tax advisor, to see how we can exclude capital gains, but we are still going to have high Medicare premiums for a year. (I like Kiplinger's) ☺️

So fortunately, I guess. Pensions are not "earned income". So, how much Bill withdraws from his 401K, might have an effect, but mine should not. We just had a virtual Health Fair today, and they do reimburse Part B and most of the medigap premiums, so I might wait on SS. I don't need it, but there is that uncertainty principle, so I may just take it a bit early.....☺️

We had our flu shots yesterday. And until you mentioned it, I had totally forgotten. I probably still have a bandaid on. I will have to remember to take it off tonight or tomorrow before I shower. 😋

I'm sorry we're not with you Theresa & Pam! Have a wonderful time! We spent our Allure TA refunds on having some house remodeling done. ~Patti ☺️

I am going to sign up for SS in March. (I think) so the payments can come out at the same time when I am eligible for Medicare. But I might not, because my Medicare (Part B) and some of Medigap will be reimbursed by my former employer. My pension is generous, and I haven't even started getting into the other retirement assets. We would like to get out from under two houses though. There are no mortgages, but the property taxes, insurance, wifi and utilities would be more pleasant with just one. Since the other house is unoccupied until we move there. And Bill signed up for SS at 62. Because why not? We don't have any kids and we are going to try and spend all of this money before we go. ☺️

They will be ending at the Pan Am pier. ☺️

No, we don't.

That's just weird. 🤔And No.

You are overthinking this. 😳 Tip a dollar here or there, at the bars you spend the most time in. You will find bar servers that you click with that you could perhaps tip more at the end of the week.