Day 95, in Vegas

Thursday 3/7/2019

Slept badly as I always do before a flight. I know the alarm will go off at 5 (in this case) but I can’t help but keep waking up to check. No, it’s only 1:30, 3, 3:45, 4:10… Anyway up before 5 to dress, brush teeth, put two lights on timers, and re-check the contents of my bag. Yup, got everything. Get in the Lyft and as it gets a block away I suddenly realize that I did not in fact put the computer into the bag. It’s still beside my chair. Cue hilarious sequence as the Lyft driver makes U-turns to get back with me mis-directing him. Get computer, get back in car, carry on. A real senile moment, there. Seriously. Carefully checked that I had packed the power supply for the computer but omitted to go and fetch the actual computer and put it in the bag.

Anyway. No harm done. At the airport I greet and chat with three other long-time SWBB fans who are on the same flight.

The games are held in the MGM Grand Arena. To save a bit I opted to stay in the Excalibur, which is the silliest-looking of the casinos, with its faux-medieval towers. This economy is also getting me exercise. To get from my room to the arena, I have to cross the full width of Excalibur diagonally, take the bridge to New York New York, go through one corner of that casino, take the bridge to MGM Grand, and walk the full diagonal width of that huge casino to its furthest corner.

I just checked the Health app on the phone. It was 1,900 steps from my room to the arena. More than a quarter-mile. I went to the first session, at noon. Colorado against ASU. Colorado trailed most of the way. They had a flurry of hits and almost caught up in the third quarter but the magic went away and they lost.

Second game, Arizona against USC, I expected to be a runaway for USC, but it was quite the opposite, with UA ahead early and pulling away. At the half I decided to bail. I had left the ticket for the second, 6pm, session in the room so I had to go back anyway, and with this game decided I might as well get a head start. It was on this walk that I measured the 1,900 steps for the trip. Now for a bit of a nap, then return to the Grand to find some supper before 6pm.

Later: Cal won their game over WSU, although the Cougs did not go down easily, which is good because it means Cal will be tired when they play Stanford at 6pm tomorrow. I had dinner with fans Nancy and Rita, during which I confidently predicted that in the final game Utah (20-9) would easily beat UW (9-20). And of course the Huskies took a lead early and kept it to the end, so I was wrong on all my predictions.

According to the iPhone app, with two round-trips between my room and the arena, plus a long, long walk through the Vegas airport, I walked 14,005 steps today, or 5.3 miles.

Day 93, forms, desk cleanout

Sunday 3/3/2019

Sunday morning. Up and out to the coffee shop by 7. Pleasant sit reading the paper and doing the puzzle. I’ve only patronized this place for 30 years or so, usually coming in wearing a hat, and they never seem to recognize me.

Home theater dreams

I walked home and then drove up to Fry’s to shop TV sound bars. I designed my present TV setup years ago. Every audio and video source (TV, Blu-Ray, VHS deck, laptop) feeds into a receiver by HDMI cables; the receiver drives five speakers around the room and a woofer. It worked, but it is over-complex. Looking ahead at an ILF unit, I figure to dump the receiver, connect the Blu-ray and computer into the TV itself, and generate audio with a nice subtle sound bar in front of the TV. I’d already confused myself mightily by looking for “best tv sound bars” online and thought I’d get some clarity looking at actual hardware at Fry’s. But no, they only had a couple of brands and no real info.

Paperwork

Last night I realized that I forgot to go by the PAMF office in Los Altos and pick up the medical forms that the doctor was going to prepare for me. She was to have them ready for pickup Friday and, I thought, was going to message me when I could pick them up. In which case I’d have had an email. But I should have checked Saturday. The office isn’t open Sunday.

OK then, so let’s get the rest of the Channing House (C.H.) questionnaire ready. I sat down at the desk and spent an hour carefully filling out about 10 pages of questions. I was pleased to find, checking my Schwab online accounts, that Marian’s IRA has finally been combined into my IRA. For a while there was a little matter of $360K that I couldn’t access, but it’s back now. I was pleased to see that I have more than enough assets to pass the C.H. requirements. So all the paperwork is done, except for adding the doctor’s statements. Tomorrow I will pick those up, put the whole thing in an envelope, and drop it off at C.H.

Office supplies

Since I was at the desk I started cleaning out its drawers. If we hoarded anything, it was pens. We each had our favorite type of pen, and to avoid the annoyance of one running dry or not being to hand, we tended to order them in boxes of 12 from Amazon. Plus years’ accumulation of paper clips and post-its and… It took a good 90 minutes to inventory all office supplies and neatly bag up the excess by category.

I emptied the shallow desk drawers, wiped them out with Pledge, and restocked them with a small selection of tools (stapler, staple remover, eraser…) and a modest supply of paperclips, rubber bands, and post-its. Put a lot of stuff in the trash. Set aside a box of neatly sorted surplus items for the eventual estate sale. Anyone want a bag containing 39 roller-ball pens in assorted colors? Or a bag containing about 15 Sharpies of various sizes and colors? Or one with a dozen highlighters?

So now the desk drawers are organized, and ten of the eleven drawers of the tall cabinet beside the desk are empty. One has a tidy assortment of other office stuff: mailing labels, a small paper cutter, scissors, rulers, etc.

Basketball

Stanford is at UW at 2pm. I streamed the audio as I edited this post. Stanford had another easy win by 20+ points. That ends the regular season. I will be attending the PAC-12 tournament next week in Las Vegas.

Day 86, flat tire and a game

Sunday, 2/24/2019

I tried something new for my Sunday morning coffee. Going to a coffee shop on Sunday morning to read the paper was a ritual for Marian and me for decades. I’ve written earlier in this series about the experiences, both positive and negative, around doing it without her.

A constant so far has been that I would do the NYT crossword at home, before going out for coffee and to read the rest of the paper. But that sequence was a consequence of the fact that Marian liked to sleep in, and I didn’t. So I would get up and spend an hour doing the crossword and futzing with the internet; then when she got up we’d go out.

So, um… I’ve no reason to wait now. So today I got up, dressed, and walked to the coffee shop at 7am, where I read the paper and did the puzzle in comfort, with a scone and a cappuccino. Not exactly an earth-shaking revolution, but still, one more break with the past.

At noon I went out to go to the final SWBB game of the year, and found that the car’s left rear tire was flat. I had noticed a low-tire-pressure warning yesterday, but I looked at the tires before I went in to the movie yesterday afternoon, and they looked alright. I’m glad it held up for the return trip from San Jose, 75mph up I-280 last night.

But, what to do now? The plug-in hybrid has no spare (no room because of the large battery in the trunk) and anyway I wanted to get going. So I called a Lyft. At the game I met with Harriet and her visitor, Bridget, who were using my pair of tickets while I sat in her single seat. She agreed to give me a lift home.

The game was against ASU, and the Sun Devils are usually a tougher opponent that the UA Wildcats who came so close to beating us Friday night. But this game went Stanford’s way early. They had a modest lead at the half, and in the third quarter blew it up to 20+ points and cruised to the end.

This was Senior Day, the last home game of the season (ignoring the fact that Stanford is almost certain to host the first two games of the NCAAs) and I had a bit of trouble controlling my emotions. I kept remembering how Marian had hoped to last out this season, and how pleased she’d have been to reach Senior Day and applaud Marta, Shannon and Alanna who she’d watched grow up for four years. So I couldn’t have talked coherently for a while, but fortunately had no reason to talk.

After the game Harriet wanted to show Bridget the outside of the Cantor Museum and the Rodin sculpture garden, so I walked along with them to that. Then she drove me home where I made an appointment for a mobile tire repair outfit to come tomorrow afternoon, then had a pleasant evening watching TV.

Day 84, slides and a game

Friday, 2/22/2019

Started the day with a run but had some foot pain so cut the distance short. Finished reviewing all the slide groups. I have selected perhaps 150 total out of… I am not going to try to estimate accurately, but several thousands. Today I looked at some I am sure have not been seen since they were filed in the box, shortly after they were taken in the 80s or 90s. One group, from the Oughts, is a series that Marian took of me, before and after the operation to replace my aortic valve. I don’t think I had ever seen them.

In the afternoon I spent a couple of hours actually scanning and processing slides. Over several years and hundreds of scans I have polished that work flow down to a smooth pattern. I won’t go into it now. But it appears I can finalize 10 slides an hour, so the whole pile that’s beside my desk now should take about 15-20 hours total. Two weeks max. And then, I expect, I will dump about a bushel basket of slides representing 46 years of photography (the earliest slide in the collection is from 1973) into the garbage.

While I was eating an early supper, Dennis called and suggested we see a movie Saturday evening, so we made that date. Then I was off to a SWBB game against the Arizona Wildcats.

The game was a whole lot closer than any Stanford fan would like. They trailed by four with two minutes to play. With 29 seconds left, Alanna hit a three to give Stanford a 2-point lead. On defense, Stanford committed a foul, but the Arizona player missed both free throws and Stanford controlled the rebound. All Stanford had to do was hang onto the ball and let Arizona foul them, but with 10 seconds to go, they turned it over. Now the Wildcats had the ball. With one second to go, their best player put up a three-point shot. It hit the inside of the rim, rolled around three-quarters of the inner circumference of the basket — and popped out. Buzzer; game over; Stanford wins.

Day 79, game and geek stuff

Sunday, 2/17/2019

Yesterday I was so busy describing my busy Saturday that I forgot to mention, I also did three loads of laundry in between all the other stuff. Go, me. Today in domesticity, I changed the bed linens and washed them.

After reading the paper at the coffee shop, I completed scanning some old pictures that I promised to do for Jean. I like doing this; I use Photoshop to optimize and restore these faded old prints and it is a satisfying activity. I copied all the scans onto a thumb drive to take to her this afternoon.

Then I reviewed a few more groups of slides. The end of that activity is in sight. Then there’ll be maybe 200 cherry-picked slides to scan. That’ll be my background task for the next couple of weeks, I suppose.

At noon I sat down to listen to a SWBB game, streamed from USC. It was an agonizing game. Stanford trailed for 38 of the 40 minutes, turning the ball over a bunch of times, barely staying in the game thanks to offensive rebounds. They took their first lead with three or four minutes to play, were tied with a few seconds left, and won the game with a layup with three seconds left.

A week ago Diane, a long-time friend of Jean, emailed asking if I could help her get the data off the hard drive in a very old Mac, a 2002-era Power Mac G4. The old machine couldn’t be booted any more because she had no external monitor or keyboard for it. I said we could take the drive out of the old chassis and maybe mount it in an external drive enclosure, and plug that into something current. So this afternoon we tried that. I brought an external drive enclosure I had around, and Jean brought an old one from her late husband’s collection of hardware.

It was easy to remove the drive from the old chassis. Unfortunately it turned out to be an IDE drive, and both the enclosures, although old, were for SATA connectors. hdd-sata-ide I’m not sure what she can do. She’s going to ask the guys as We Fix Macs. I’m not sure they’ll be able to do anything.

Jean copied the scanned pics, and the three of us, at Jean’s suggestion, walked to a nearby pizza place for supper. Jean, Marian’s 90-year-old sister, leading the way.

Day 77, lunch and a game with friends

Friday, 2/15/2019

Spent the morning going through more groups of slides, still averaging about 1 in 50 to scan for permanent storage. I can understand why we took most of them: to document a moment or a place, or to try to capture something striking or beautiful, scenery or a flower or such. I can understand why we took the trouble to cull the slides and arrange them as a show, and project that once or twice for relatives or friends.

It is harder, now, to understand how we thought there was any point to cataloging and filing them for an indefinite future. It was just the spirit of the collector, I guess. OK, take Pioneer Day. In the 80s we bought a house for my parents to live in, in Paso Robles, near my sister. We often visited Paso Robles, and in particular in ’92 and ’93 we attended the Pioneer Day parade, when Paso Roblians parade their horses, cars, marching bands and old farm equipment down main street. OK, we shot 10 or 20 pics of the parade and us and our relatives each time. But when did we imagine we’d ever go back and look at them again, ten or twenty years along? I certainly don’t care now about some antique farm tractor, or some high school marching band, in Paso Robles 25 years ago.

Went to lunch with Scott and Bob Johansen (sp?). I didn’t known Bob well at IBM, and he I think didn’t remember me at all, but we had a pleasant lunch anyway.

At 5 I went around to basketball fan friend Harriet’s house where I watched Stanford vs. UCLA along with her and two friends of hers, and had a very nice dinner.

Day 72, game and crafty stuff

Sunday, 2/10/2019

Sunday breakfast at the PA Cafe as usual. Home to plan out a craft project. At the museum the Education group has their own collection of artifacts. Items in the “real” collection are handled sparingly, with gloves, then packed away in archival-quality materials never to be touched again unless brought out for someone doing research. Items in the EDU collection are kept on shelves in a closet and are available to be handled (pawed, mauled) by school kids during various classes. I know about this because sometimes I help another volunteer who’s been building a catalog of the EDU collection.

Two weeks ago we cataloged a couple of real core planes, which are insanely delicate. I recalled that in the 1401 lab, they hand around a core plane during their demo, but it has been sandwiched in clear plastic — a good idea, given how easy it would be to poke a finger right through it. Toni and I thought it would be a good idea to put plastic on these also. We drew a plan for the pieces. She went to TAP Plastics last week and had the pieces cut. I picked them up when I was at the Museum Saturday and today was the day to assemble them.

I started with a trip to ACE Hardware to get the needed bolts nuts washers. Then it turned out that TAP had misread my drawing, or something, and some holes didn’t line up and two pieces were too long. Fortunately I still have tools. I used a carpenter’s square, two C-clamps, a box cutter, and my nifty little Bosch drill that Marian gave me Christmas 2017. (This helped clarify how much of my tool collection I should retain in The Transition. Quite a bit of it.) By the time I had the plastic pieces cut and drilled it was time for

Basketball

On Saturday I was so into getting down my thoughts about photography and slides that I forgot to report the result of the Friday night game, which against OSU. It started badly when the Beavers were ahead by 6 after 1 minute. Then Stanford’s defense woke up and they shut OSU down. After five minutes the game was never in doubt and Stanford won by 25.

Today was not so much fun. The Oregon Ducks are ranked #3 in the country — Stanford is #11 but likely to go down after today — and they played like it. Oregon dominated at both ends of the floor, were up by 24 at the half, and finished up by 35.

After the game I made one more stop at the hardware store and then did

more crafty stuff

producing two nicely encased core planes. Here’s one.

This is a 1960-era plane, perhaps from a 1401 or some other IBM machine of the very early 60s. The other plane has amazingly tiny “donuts”, a quarter the size of these, and probably comes from a minicomputer of the late 60s. Anyway, no grubby-fingered student is going to be poking at this one, but they can still see the toroids and the wiring.

I made a bit of supper and sat down to watch TV.

Day 70, old pics and a game

Friday, 2/8/2019

When I went out to pick up the paper at 6:30 the sky was clear, and the TV news said the rain wouldn’t come until the afternoon. I assumed I could do a run, but it started to rain just as I was ready to leave at 8:30, so instead I drove to the Y and ran on the treadmill.

Then I set out to tackle those boxes of slides that I mentioned on Day 67. The slides are exquisitely organized and cataloged into “groups” where a group is usually one trip, but sometimes a category. There is an index file that lists each group by number and topic and shows which box it is stored in, as well as a catalog that lists each slide by its group and serial number and its subject.

Over the past decade I’ve spent many hours scanning slides from various groups. I would inspect a group, and scan the slides that were either emotionally significant, or pictorially fine. For some groups that was most of them; other groups just a scattering. Those scans are now on my main computer as well as in the cloud. But now I need to get serious about finishing this job: looking through each unscanned group and deciding which, if any, slides in it deserve to be retained.

I made a copy of the index, and emboldened the entry for each group that hadn’t been scanned, and printed it out. There are 20 or so, for example group 102, “New England Fall 1972”. Sitting in a chair that faced a window, I popped each slide into a hand-held viewer and made fast editorial decisions. No; no; no; don’t care; why’d we keep that; no; hm that’s nice; no;… I set aside a few to scan. On to the next group.

I’d gone through quite a few when Marian’s sister Jean arrived at 1pm. I’d asked her over to go through the memorabilia I had that was purely Lacrampe family stuff. Jean’s attitude toward old stuff is very pragmatic (the Lacrampe women are all unsentimental). Anything she wants to keep, she scans into her computer, “then I toss it.” For this exercise we went through several piles of stuff, mostly pictures. She recognized most of them. “I’ve got that. I have that. Huh, I’m not sure I have that, I’ll take it and scan it.” I set aside a few pictures of Marian that I didn’t have already. Jean built up a pile of 25 or 30 things to add to her collection. The great bulk went into the “recycle” pile.

The mound of pictures for the recycle bin.

The only part of this that had much emotional impact on me was going through a fat envelope of memorabilia from Marian’s trip around Europe. She toured Denmark, Italy and England for a month in 1960. In the folder were all the letters she’d exchanged with her mother and brother, and about 40 postcards which she’d bought along the way and used for notes on each day’s activities. Of course, I felt guilty consigning all this to the recycle bin. It crossed my mind that I could read all these letters, transcribe them into a text file, and have a complete journal of that trip. But then I thought about how the envelope had sat in a drawer in the closet for forty-plus years and, as far as I can recall, she never got it out to look at it. And, as far as transcribing it — there was nobody in the world better qualified to transcribe that material into a computer file than she! And she didn’t. And who now who would want to read it?

There’s a SWBB game at 6pm. Just time for a nap before that. Results tomorrow.

Day 65, laundry, mulling, and Superb Owl

Azalea Grief

I was so busy involved in getting my notes on Webster House straight that I forgot to mention a major grief spasm, the first after several days of calm. As I left the house to head for my meeting, my eye was caught by the azalea under the front window, which is covered in pink blossoms. This was Marian’s favorite plant, selected by her and carefully nurtured for many years, and its blooming — which always seems to come unexpectedly, one day bare and the next day blazing with pink — delighted her every year. I was just swept with a wave of pity and regret that she couldn’t enjoy its blooming now. I tried to talk it out to my steering wheel as I drove to my meeting, and couldn’t keep my voice from breaking. Still feel it, as I write.

Home Court

At the game, Stanford rolled over Cal, winning by 25. This seemed to me like a great demonstration of the power of the home court advantage. Based on the record this season up until this week, Stanford should be about a 10-point winner over Cal every time. Cal has lost to several teams Stanford has beaten. However, playing at Cal, the teams played virtually even, were tied several times, with Cal finally winning by a single point on a buzzer-beater. Cal shouldn’t be that good, nor Stanford that bad! Then, at Stanford, Cal conceded a 10-point lead to Stanford in the first two minutes and lost by 25. Cal shouldn’t look that bad, nor Stanford that good! Location and crowd support would appear to provide a 10-15 point swing in favor of the home team.

That said, following the game Tara talked to the crowd and, asked about the difference, said approximately this: “We watched a lot of film of the last two games [both were losses] with the team, and pointed out all the places where a little more effort would have made a difference, and I think everybody stepped up today.” So, you know, maybe coaching has something to do with it…

Sunday, 2/3/2019

Stripped the bed and sorted and started the laundry before heading out to coffee. Tried a new coffee shop, Mademoiselle Collette, which had been pointed out to me by Joan, as a feature of living at Webster House. Meh, not impressed. Well, impressed to this extent: they actually know what a macchiato is, and a cappuccino. Pastries ok. But the place is too small. All the four(?) small tables were in use when I arrived at 8:15. I had to sit at a narrow counter in the window, not very comfortable for reading the Sunday paper.

Back home I did a lot of inconclusive thinking and shopping. This will be boring for anybody but me.

Thinking about TV

First shopped for a TV. Looking ahead at The Transition (see yesterday), how much of my aging home theater setup should I carry over? Practically none. I’ll be dropping DirecTV for whatever the chosen ILF has (probably Comcast), so, different DVR. I’ll probably drop the receiver at the center of the system because, (A), I only use it to switch between the DVR, the Blu-Ray player, and the laptop; and new TVs all have at least three HDMI inputs, so can do that. And (B), its other purpose is 4-channel sound from various devices, which I don’t really need; a modern sound-bar unit driven by the TV will do just fine. So a new TV can do all the useful functions of the receiver. Good, one less box. The TV itself? It’s ok but there is better new tech. However, the really good new TV tech, OLED, is only available in sizes 49in and up, about 5in wider and 2in higher than the present TV.

Suddenly I realize that very likely, I want to take the TV stand/room divider piece along to the new location.

Thinking about a laptop

Second, shopped for a replacement laptop. My 2013-era Macbook Pro (MBP) is aging; there’s an annoying little split in the cover of the screen and the keyboard is acting wonky, and so on. The house is full of macs, two iMacs and two Airs and this laptop to which I often seem to be joined at the hip. (How many of them go to new location? Just one iMac, the “big” (27in) one, and one laptop. The others can go back to Apple for credit.)

Anyway, in 2017 Apple screwed up the design of the MBP with a redesigned keyboard that is pretty universally reviled; by replacing the row of function keys with an illuminated “touch bar” that nobody likes; by dropping the USB, HDMI, and SD-card ports; and by dropping the “magsafe” magnetic power connector. New ones have only USB-C, aka “Thunderbolt” ports for power and connectivity, which means you need a “dongle” to connect to an HDMI cable, another for your old USB devices, another to plug in an SD card to get photos off your camera.

But wait: I have adequate USB and SD card connectivity on the big iMac. All I really need from the laptop is to connect via HDMI to the TV screen, which I used to do fairly often. But wait, I only did that so Marian and I could both watch a streamed basketball game. If I am not sharing the experience with anyone else, I can watch a video stream on my personal lap. The laptop screen, on my lap, is the same size as the TV at eight feet. Doh, maybe I don’t even need one dongle!

Still, I hate the touch bar and am suspicious of the latest keyboard. So option one is to buy a refurbished 2015/16 MBP off eBay; ones in “mint” condition are about $900. Or, two, to buy a new Macbook Air, the latest redesign of that model; it doesn’t have the touchbar. $1400 for a new one. It comes down to the latest keyboard; can I tolerate its feel? If so, I think I’d rather have the newest machine. I need to go and put my hands on one at the Apple store.

Well, the laundry is finishing up. I’ll wrap that up then drive to the Apple store; then it will be time to watch the superb owl.

Later: bought a MBP

Went to the Apple store, tried the current Air, didn’t like it. I could use one if I had to, but the keyboard has very little travel, half the travel of the one I’m typing on. The trackpad also has extremely small travel on a click. In both cases the machine provides a “haptic” click or tap feeling to reinforce the feeling you’ve typed or tapped. But the impression is of being very stiff, yet highly sensitive. There’s no play in the keys; the tiniest random pressure from a fingertip and you’ve typed a letter. So I came home and ordered a refurb 2015 era model.

Day 64, Webster House and a game

Saturday 2/2/2019

At 10am I met with (basketball fan buddy) Harriet outside Webster House, an ILF on the symmetrically opposite side of downtown Palo Alto from Channing House, which I toured on Day 50. Just in the door we were met by Harriet’s friend Joan, who recently moved in to Webster House. She showed us all the public spaces and her own very charming 1BR unit on the fifth, topmost, floor. Afterward we sat down in a meeting room with Kirt Pruyn, the marketing manager, to learn more; then he showed us two more 1BR units. Here I will summarize what I learned.

Webster House ILF

Webster House is fairly small as ILFs go, with 37 units and about 45 people in residence. It is a fairly modern building, put up in the 1980s as luxury condos, then later converted to a senior residence. The top floor has a small glassed-in penthouse for functions and a roof deck with a view over Palo Alto (Channing House’s top floor is similar but larger). Joan said she enjoyed exercise classes held here.

The facility owner is Covia, a non-profit that started as Episcopal Residences, set up by the Episcopalian church, or some part of it. I’m not clear as to whether it was an effort of the entire church, or perhaps only the California wing of it; because Covia now owns six properties, all located in the Bay Area. Governance is by a board, which has some kind of representation from the residents of each of the six facilities (Kirt wasn’t sure about the details, but almost certainly non-voting, as with Channing House). There is also a Webster House residents’ organization that meets quarterly and has input to the staff, as well as a food committee that interacts with the food service.

Speaking of food service, it is dinner-only. The dining room is rather small, with perhaps 10 small tables; so one would be sharing a table with others. That’s not to my taste. Joan mentioned that one reason she moved to an ILF was that she “was tired of eating dinner alone.” Fair enough, but I have no problem with eating dinner alone. I’ve been doing it for many of these 64 days, and in fact I think I prefer it. Well, be that as it may.

Weekends, dinner is served as a buffet; weekdays it is full-service, restaurant style. (Recall Channing House offers all three meals, but all are served buffet-style, in a large dining room.) Breakfast and lunch are up to each resident, either to prepare in one’s own small kitchen, or by going out. Or one can order ala-carte from the house kitchen for a fee.

Next door to the ILF building is a “health center” containing a skilled nursing facility (SNF) as well as long-term and memory-impaired care. I was assured that one can go into the SNF, e.g. after an operation, and return to one’s ILF unit. One’s monthly fee does not change in this event; however the SNF has its own separate fees. Kirt made the interesting point that typically skilled nursing fees after an operation are picked up by Medicare, in which case, time in the SNF is effectively no-charge to the resident; but he cautioned that Medicare only does so provided you are admitted to hospital for at least 72 hours. Spend less time, or don’t be admitted, and Medicare won’t help with SN fees.

Webster House’s approach to Assisted Living is “assist in place”, that is, for those who need help with meds, bathing, dressing, etc, they will arrange a caregiver to assist you to live in your unit. Such care is provided at $40/hour, I see by the rate sheet I was given. (I think such charges are at least partly covered by Medicare. By the time Marian needed such aid she was in hospice and it was included in that service, so the issue never arose for us.)

There is parking in an underground garage; it costs an additional $45/month. Every unit has its own washer/dryer (at Channing House, there is a shared laundry room on each floor). There is a small “fitness room” which I didn’t see.

Financials

For all this, the monthly cost is $5300 for a 1BR unit. But there is a buy-in fee, for which they give two options.

Option 1, you pay $500K-$700K up front (it is not clear to me why the wide range; perhaps it depends on the unit, as some are larger or have better views?). If you leave within 50 months, you get your entry fee back, prorated at 2% per month. Stay only two years and you get half back.

Option 2, you pay a higher entry of $800K-$1300K (again, don’t know the basis of the range), but now you are assured that 75% of that money will come back to you, on moving, or to your estate on your death.

One final important item. I asked Kirt about how people handle the financial gap, from when they decide to move in and need to pay circa $1M, and the time their house sells. I pointed out that I’d have to sell a bunch of assets on which I’d pay capital gains tax, just to front the money that would shortly be recovered from sale of the house. He had an answer: they will let you sign a promissory note for the entry fee. It’s a no-interest loan for 90 days, which normally covers the gap to a home sale. That’s nifty; I will ask about this when I talk to the Channing House marketing rep, which I mean to do shortly.

Joan’s apartment was very nicely furnished and decorated with things she’d brought from her former home. Which brought to my mind the issue of

Transitioning

which I hadn’t given much thought to, but now suddenly looms as a major issue. All ILF units come unfurnished. You need to move in with furniture from your former home, or new furniture, in some combination. That opens a whole new set of decisions: which of my current furnishings do I want to carry forward to a new, 1BR home? O.M.G. the decisions! Which pieces are suitable? Which are useful? How hard would it be to buy new, and where, and the shopping!

The only thought I’d given to any of this was that I want a new bed, a single or at any rate not the big old king-sized mattress that I now sleep on the right one-half of. I’d keep my comfy Ekornes recliner. The desk (“Marian’s desk” that she bought in Hawaii in the 60s, I think). At least one of the dressers in the bedroom.

But what about the green leather living room set I’ve been putting leather conditioner on. Do I really want to keep it? I had sort of lumped it and many other items into the ISMISEP/giant-garage-sale category. But if I don’t keep it, what do I do? Probably go to IKEA and buy something tasteless? Oh, wurra wurra.

Game

Anyway, off to cheer Stanford WBB on against Cal.