Restless

I took this on my walk home last night. That's the Alexandra and Ainsworth Estate on the right, which I've shown many times on this blog, with a couple of high-rise council blocks in the background. The building on the left is relatively new, and replaced this.

Once again, I don't have much to write about today. My days are busy but they feel very routine. Dave and I have been talking about how we feel sort of stuck. We've been living in London for 14 years, doing the same jobs, mostly in the same apartment, and I think we're considering changing things up. What that would look like I don't know. Maybe we'll move to a new flat, or maybe we'll make bigger changes.

Or maybe we just need to make some plans for our next steps so that we feel like we're going somewhere. I don't think either of us have a very clear picture of what the future should hold for us. Where do we want to retire? Do we stay in the UK? Do we move back to the states, or move elsewhere? The big question there is health insurance -- we obviously can't go back to the states unless we have jobs that include insurance, at least until we're old enough to get Medicare, assuming it still exists by then.

More immediately, we need to decide whether or not we're visiting the states anytime soon. My brother and step-sister have both had health issues in the last year, and Dave's father has been in the hospital with back problems. I think we need to go to Florida, but first we need to sort out care for Olga, which is easier said than done.

And of course Dave is still recovering from his own surgery, so we can't push anything too quickly. He's not even back at work yet. (Maybe next week.)

So, a lot to think about. I guess I'm just feeling restless.

On an international level, did any of you read Thomas Friedman's column in the Times about why Trump's seemingly offhand remarks about Greenland and Panama are so serious? People think he's just being quirky and trolling other world leaders, but I thought Friedman made a very good point. How can the United States stand for international justice, and against other regimes that are bent on forcibly expanding their own borders, when we're threatening to do the same? We are sending a dangerous message.

I got great pleasure out of hearing Steve Bannon attacking Elon Musk. Let these bastards consume each other. There's no chance that the MAGA leaders won't be relentlessly infighting for the next four years, since they all have gigantic egos and are incapable of compromise or moderation. As the Chinese allegedly say, "May you live in interesting times."

Here are some orchids in the front window, from the orchid bonanza I found a couple of years ago. One of those plants died in short order, but the rest are all still plugging away and several of them have bloomed again. In fact I have several orchids that are budding.

I have a couple more, though, that have recently bloomed and then lost all their leaves, as if they were so exhausted they couldn't even support foliage. I'm not sure what's going on there or whether they'll survive. I keep hearing that orchids can live for decades, but a few of mine (all moth orchids like the one above) have perished at about the eight-year mark. Maybe I'm just not good with geriatric orchids?