LizP1959

Hi, all; I’m about to buy a Yamaha upright “silent” piano: an acoustic piano that also has a silencing system with a pedal that slides over to silence it and make the sound go into the headphones.

Why would I give up my acoustic for this? Well, we had to move to a townhouse and will later on have to downsize further I to a CCRC independent apartment (and later on, into assisted living or nursing care if that becomes necessary as we age.).

The rules in both places are quiet 9pm to 9am. Plus my partner has started acting more and more impatient with my practicing—once pieces are finished or even kinda finished he likes listening but as you all know, practice is required to get there.

I

My pal is moving to PA from FL and she has rented a cute condo up there, but I fear she is now realizing some problems! The condo community has snow removal, good! But her heat and stove/oven are electric. I made the mistake of asking “what will you do for heat if the power goes out in a snowstorm? You have no fireplace!” She got upset with me. But then she said, I have to figure this out because I’ve never been without gas lines into the house. (Not have I—we had gas when I lived in a snowy climate.)

Can any north-dweller help me explain to her what kind of emergency gear she can buy that will prepare her to be ok in a winter power outage?

UPDATE: many many thanks to all the excellent responders here! I knew this dear group would know good places! Actually even reading the comments cheered me right up that this is possible and doable and relief is on the way. Thank you, thank you, everyone!

Original post
Hi to all the wise women here. I’m 67 and have had a rough couple of years. I want to do a retreat among women only, but not a religious retreat ( spiritual is fine) and ideally some luxury, good food, lots of rest and relaxation, some walks and maybe restorative yoga, but no intense anything. Canyon ranch seems way overpriced and all about the calorie reduction, which is not as issue (indeed I need to gain weight if anythi

Hi to all the wise women here. I’m 67 and have had a rough couple of years. I want to do a retreat among women only, but not a religious retreat ( spiritual is fine) and ideally some luxury, good food, lots of rest and relaxation, some walks and maybe restorative yoga, but no intense anything. Canyon ranch seems way overpriced and all about the calorie reduction, which is not as issue (indeed I need to gain weight if anything). Can anyone recommend a good place? I’m in Florida right now and would prefer the east but can travel west if need be.

Sunday I crouched and twisted rather quickly, trying to get into a low cabinet... and heard a terrible snapping sound and PAIN. (For context: I am strong, former athlete, exercise daily, pilates, swimming, and with weights, at 67.)

Went to an ortho urgent care, they did X-ray and then MRI and found the "labral tear, low grade tear of gluteus medius, tear of the minimus tendon." Orthopedist appt is Monday. I asked what to do between now and then and RICE was all they had for me.

It hurts to walk or pretty much do anything but lie flat. I can't lie in bed all day. Gentle stretching and moving is sometimes ok but then a sudden sharp pain will hit.

AI of course gave conflicting inf

That’s all—-just you wanted to say hi and thank you all for the great conversations this year. Hope your day today and tomorrow are good no matter what is happening!!

Hi, all; there is no SSA-44 form reason for my income dropping. I merely had a lower AGI and MAGI in 2024. It drops me down into the lowest IRMAA level.

Will they know this from my tax filing (1040)? Or do I have to call them/write them? The reasons my income dropped are not related to any of the usual 44 Form’s reasons. Is there a different form?

I phoned, but only sat on hold, and after an hour or so had to leave.

Thanks for any advice!

Dear RA community, My sister-in-law is a very youthful active 71-year old and a lovely person. Recently she was told by a rheumatologist she has RA and was put on 200mg Plaquenil plus NSAIDs. Because I have had SLE (lupus) for nearly 40 years with many ups and downs/flares and remissions, she is asking me for advice. Of course I referred her here and to reputable national medical sites.

Here is the immediate issue: her labs on which the DX was made were as follows: ANA 1:40; no RF factor; all other values normal except a very slightly low C3 and C4 ( as in one to five numbers off normal) and her typical low white blood cell counts.

She went to a rheumatologist at a very reputable hospita

Title says it all. What can I do about this, if anything?

Thanks to a recent post about tracking expenses, I was wondering what my wise women pals’ experiences here have been with software to do that.

Once a long time ago I used Quicken but dropped it in favor of a plain old paper list, added up by hand and kept in a folder. Awkward and crude, I know. (But hey, it keeps up the mental arithmetic skills!)

If you do use money software, what kind do you use, and what do you see as the pros and cons? Thanks in advance.

Hi, everyone; at an ENT visit today the ENT mentioned that he doesn’t have patients in their 80s with Ménière’s, that it seems to just fade away in the 60s.

I’m 66 and I would really love to believe this. What do you guys think? Does it just fade away as you age?

People make fun of me and get mad at me for really bad reasons and I need some support here.

AITAH? All I did was suspend civil liberties so I could arrest a bunch of people who were probably in gangs and caught in a few others who weren’t.

And all I did was ruin relations between our closest neighbors (since the 1750s) by saying I would take them over; ditto for Greenland, all I did was declare we had to have their metals and resources, and we do, and they took my promise to take them whether they liked it or not as some kind of threat. Why are people so touchy?

All I did was destroy the most important international security group since World War II that has assured peace for the past 7

Hi, everyone. I’m retired and I am lucky to be debt free and also to have a pension I can live on easily right now. But because of some major health issues I will need more income about five years from now.

Part of my money is in TIAA. I had planned to annuitize it to get this income when the time comes. On their site you can do a “retirement income illustrator” and it shows what you’ll get every month in a lifetime annuity. Every time I have done this illustrator it gives me a reasonable amount, with the same monthly payment over my lifetime.

But today I had a disturbing call with a TIAA advisor. The advisor gave me a declining-balance chart that shows my so called fixed annuity would