Anniversaries, Anniversaries ...

This is the month (or week anyway) of anniversaries.

Yesterday marked five years since Stephen Harper formed his first minority government.

More importantly, it marked five years since my official retirement date (since that date co-incided with the date of the election).

That's right.  I officially joined the ranks of the retired folk on the date of the 2006 election.  My last day worked had actually been several weeks earlier since I had to vacate the office I had been occupying within ten days of the writ having been dropped, but who's counting?

And, do I miss it, you might wonder?

Not one damned bit!

Don't get me wrong. I am still every bit the political junkie I've been since I was twelve years old.  And I truly loved my job.  But I am oh so glad that I have not had to be there through the years of these minority parliaments.

"Been there, done that," as the saying goes. Not interested in doing it again, thank you very much.

Of course, had the election not been called when it was back then, I would have been retiring anyway by that time. I simply couldn't continue at the pace that we were going and my limitations were catching up with me, seriously.  It just turned out that the timing was very right in my case because I had been off on so much sick leave that it was easy to roll those absences into retirement.

Today, I've been enjoying working on the computer using my new single-vision glasses which I just picked up on Friday.  Finally, I got smart and had a special pair made for use at the computer.  No more neck strain!

Tomorrow is another important anniversary in this household -- it is our 14th wedding anniversary.

We have big plans too. We're going to the big city, with a stop at my optometrist to leave my glasses (getting new ones already -- only five months since the last pair!) for replacement lenses to be installed. (I'll wear the next to last prescription in the interim.)  I have my usual Tuesday physiotherapy session, after which John has an appointment to (finally) get his hearing aids fixed (we hope).

Then we're going "out" for dinner for our anniversary.  After much consideration, we've decided we want to have pizza here in town -- best damned pizza anywhere.

We are such party animals!