How to fill time in retirement

 Just about four weeks ago (on October 25), I went to a turtle release in Cocoa Beach. I mentioned in Facebook that I was on the cover of the local paper, Florida Today. The photographer was Malcolm Denemark and I happen to be in the picture on the right. I am wearing the orange shirt. The picture I took included Malcolm so I sent it to him. He sent me back this photo which was the one used in the paper. He wrote the following caption in the photo: Jess Patterson, Sea Turtle  Program Coordinator and Peg Kelly, Conservation Coordinator, carry Jackal and Pandemonium to the ocean.  The two juvenile green sea turtles were returned to the ocean at Lori Wilson Park in Cocoa Beach on Tuesday morning. The turtles were rehabilitated at the Sea Turtle Healing Center at the Brevard Zoo. Well, today, November 23, the day before Thanksgiving they were having another turtle release. Again it was at Lori Wilson Park but it was a lot more dreary. Not raining, but a mist of droplets were ...

 Wow, it has been over a month since my last post, I guess I need to write something. In that time period, there have been a few rocket launches, a hurricane hit (Nicole), visits to the Zoo, beach, wetlands and eating out a few times. I am continuing my reading list and trying to clean house and yard. While cleaning, I pulled out some of my old albums of newspaper clippings, mostly about football when I was a kid. My dad help me get started back in 1966 when I was just 9 years old. I decided to scan and share the historical documents. I am amazed that things I collected over 50 years ago have so many connections to friends I have today... My sister Patsy had graduated in 1965 and she was a football cheerleader. We went to every game, both home and away. I even had the pleasure of dressing up as the Tiger mascot for one home game, I think I was 6 or 7. The things you do for your older sister. My oldest brother John played and that is when I started the clipping of newspaper articles...

 I started a spreadsheet in 2003 to tally all the books I have read. For the first 8 years I averaged about 5-6 books per year. Then for four years it was about a book a month. Then it dropped to about 6-8 per year of the first four years of retirement. Since, in 2019,  I added my bucket list goal to read all the great books, I have read 23, 38, and 16 books. I also starting using Goodreads which allows for me to set goals. This year the goal was 30 books. I just finished #31. Here are the ten books I have read in the third quarter of 2022. Sycamore Row by John Grisham I guess I like Grisham; this was the ninth book by him I have read since 2003.  Sycamore Row is a legal thriller novel  published in 2014. I bought the paperback on sale at B&N. The novel reached the top spot in the US best-seller list. It follows the cases of lawyer Jake Brigance in fictional Ford County Mississippi. This book was preceded by A Time to Kill and followed by A Time for Mercy , bot...

Back in 2018, I created a post about how baseball has played an important role in my life, both as a player and a fan. I mentioned that I had attended 274 games in which I still had the ticket stubs, and most of those were MLB Spring Training games (251). The total number of games I have seen probably is closer to 500 games if I were to include Little League, Babe Ruth, Legion, College, High School and the Stan Musial league. I followed that post with one on Football in December 2021, Basketball in March 2022, and Golf in July 2022. Those four sports would include about 614 events, most of those with the US National anthem played. I can admit that I have spent almost two years worth of days listening while standing, with my hand over my heart or my camera lens catching the moment.  Now I want to finish the story of my lifetime with sports with other sports I have followed. Car Racing There was a period of my life where I enjoyed going to NASCAR races, all in Daytona, just 90 miles ...