#262 Nomad Diary. 25-31 October 2025. Week 1 of 4 at Airbnb Harvest, Alabama. Doctor Appointments. Grandkid Visits. Post Cruise "Diet" and Our Normal.

 

Found a Friend, Sondra Seay, at the Madison Walmart.

Me and Granddaughter Esther, age 2 years and 2 months

Me and Grandson Owen, Age 4 yrs and 1 month.

Our Harvest Neighborhood for One Month.

Darrell On Our Comfy Couch at Our Harvest Airbnb.

Esther Visiting Our Harvest House

Owen Visiting Our Harvest House

Best Halloween Costumes! Owen is Spiderman. Esther is a Princess. Their Uncle Chris and Beth are Oscar the Grouch and Big Bird. Their Cousin Millie is a Sesame Street Character too.

Saturday. 25. Sea Day.

Sunday. 26. Arrive Ft. Lauderdale. Time with church and friends. Flight to Huntsville, Alabama. Grocery shop for breakfast.

Monday. 27. Airbnb house in Harvest. Costco with Eric, Owen and Esther. Get membership for hearing evaluation. Some foods purchased. Our luggage is delivered and Darrell got our stored trunks from Samuel’s house. Baked 4 pork tenderloins. Pressure cooked a pot of black beans. 

Tuesday. 28. Darrell’s pancakes! Yay!. Darrell’s eye doctor appointment, current condition and treatment plan. Great improvements were seen in Darrell’s eye with one exception. The exception is that his eye pressure went way too high. The doctor manually released his eye pressure while at the office. Darrell was prescribed a new eye drop medicine 2 times a day. He has 3 weeks until he goes back to a walk-in clinic to check his eye pressure. His next eye injection is set for January! Today his eye is very sore and he’s tired after all his treatments. Online Bible Class with Kent, England group.

Wednesday. 29. Go play with Owen and Esther. Darrell calls his mom.  At night driving about an hour to Vinemont for Bible class and to meet our Texas online friend, Mark, in person. We met Mark who was preaching tonight and his wife Beth too. 

Thursday. 30. Owen and Esther came over for a couple hours before noon. At one point Owen wants to play ‘Hide-n-Seek’. He goes to hide and then Esther and I find him. Then he tells Grandpa to go and hide, which he does. Owen begins counting random numbers for about the same length of time for counting to 10. The three of us go in search of finding Grandpa. We look in the 2 rooms where I think he is, but we can’t see him in the corners, behind the doors, and in the closets. We decide to go to the other two areas of the house and look really well where we think Grandpa might be hiding. We can’t see him. Then we go back to the original room we began and I tell them to look under the bed this time. I didn’t think Darrell could get under the bed. They find him on the backside of the bed hiding under the bedspread and he’s laughing because it took us so long to find him! After lunch Darrell and I went to Costco for my free hearing test. We also did a little shopping. My test took a full hour. It turns out that I have some loss but it is so mild that my decision, to get a hearing aid or not, is completely subjective. I leave with the intention to study more on whether I’m ready for an aid or not.

Friday. 31. I spent 3 hours on the phone today doing EPT sessions. I spent time learning about my hearing test and my extremely low hearing loss that makes me less of a candidate for aids. Deciding that I will not get hearing aids at this time. The sun has come out today after several days of rain and overcast skies. We went for a walk at Swan Creek before the party. Late afternoon Halloween party at Eric and Erin’s house. Eric made soup for everyone. The kids went out trick or treating early and then again later for a longer walk back into the neighborhood. 

Nomad Notes: This week has been ‘busy’ and doable. 

Airbnb House: This house is so comfy that we are renting. It’s like new. The bed is comfortable. We have two bedrooms and two bathrooms so I can spread out into my own space for my clothes and my own bathroom. Equally, Darrell gets his own bathroom. After our first night in this house, we were ready to book it for January, but it isn’t available. I messaged the owner and she said that a family member is living here next year so it won’t be an airbnb. Awww. We are going to fully enjoy it now.

Weight fluctuation:  Going on a cruise ship for a month is a challenge to weight maintenance. There is food all day long and a full three meals with all the snacks you want anytime. To be sure, both Darrell and I gained weight. Darrell said he was up 10 pounds and I was up 5 pounds. Darrell also said he had puffy feet which happens often with airplane travel and fluid retention. By Wednesday’s weigh-in, Darrell was down 4 pounds and I was down 3 pounds. We are enjoying making our favorite foods that we have been practicing eating and lost weight with since a year ago. 

Food Thoughts: On the cruise ship the foods are likely full fat versions of everything that we make low fat. It makes guessing and tracking accurately near impossible. There are also loads of sweets, pastries, fried foods and goodies offered at every turn. I ate some treats, but not as much in my past cruising experiences. I was able to focus on making sure that I ate protein, and low fat when I could identify it– like turkey breast, etc. 

Our Forward Calendar Planning for 2026:  Since meeting and having conversations with 4 people on the ship about their summer tourism work in Alaska, Darrell and I have been talking over this idea and how we might do this. There’s a lot to consider and we don’t have complete information about it. This week is getting closer to the opening of applications for the jobs in Alaska for next summer. With Darrell’s improved eye condition, he may be able to be a CDL bus driver and tour guide which he thinks he will enjoy. For now we are learning what we can online about the jobs, the employers and the locations of the assignments. We are also looking at rental accommodations and our options for driving there with our truck or flying there and buying a car.