{"id":14241,"date":"2018-05-15T19:16:31","date_gmt":"2018-05-16T01:16:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/?p=14241"},"modified":"2018-05-15T19:16:31","modified_gmt":"2018-05-16T01:16:31","slug":"may-15-2018-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/?p=14241","title":{"rendered":"May 15, 2018 Update"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Wednesday morning May 2 I got in my explorer and hauled a load of yard sale items up to see my mom who lives 670 miles away. That required 3 gas fill-ups in order to get there. But I hadn\u2019t seen mom in a couple of years so I was overdue for a trip up there. I made a whole $1.25 during the yard sale, but mom bought a book I\u2019d hauled up, so that was another $1 to go toward my addiction to Mountain Dew.<\/p>\n<p>Her health is not the best, so it did her good to have me come up there. She is a smoker and I am not, so the odor of stale smoke in her house was hard on me and my throat. But I was able to sleep in her bedroom as it was pretty decent in there, and I was glad I could be on the premises with her. Normally I get a motel room, but I was able to handle sleeping the night there. It meant a lot to the both of us for me to be able to stay there.<\/p>\n<p>I drove the 670 miles up in one day, and I drove the same distance back a few days later. So I know what it\u2019s like being on the road for long distances, especially for any of you who drive truck for a living. Thankfully it didn\u2019t seem to bother my back too much. It was good to get away and see the sights and sounds, and I did get in a little sight-seeing. I even saw a deer along the side of the road. And mom\u2019s got a rabbit hanging around her place, and I got to see him (or her) as well.<\/p>\n<p>This month I had to pay my CPA. I had taxes this year (for selling stories) and I needed the CPA to make sure all my ducks were in a row with other investments I have that are steadily dwindling. So that bill came due. April and May are always tough months for extra expenses. But I\u2019m preaching to the choir as you all had a lot of bills come due these last couple of months, right?<\/p>\n<p>This month is the one year anniversary of the passing of my ex-wife. That has been on my mind a little. And with getting ready to haul stuff up to see mom, you can imagine the last few weeks have been more than a little stressful. That is why I appreciate you being here. You give me an outlet to share my stories so I can keep on writing.<\/p>\n<p>So thanks again for stopping by. It really does mean a lot to me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wednesday morning May 2 I got in my explorer and hauled a load of yard sale items up to see my mom who lives 670 miles away. That required 3 gas fill-ups in order to get there. But I hadn\u2019t &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/?p=14241\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14241"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14241\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14242,"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14241\/revisions\/14242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riwaslibrary.com\/story\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}