We had an unusually hot week last week. Highs were in the 90s Monday through Friday. Some schools in Baltimore and Baltimore County that aren’t air conditioned either didn’t open or closed early. Tuesday, during the hottest part of the day, a small shower came through. I happened to be sitting at my desk and looked at the deck. I saw snow. There were very large, widely dispersed drops of very wet snow. By the time I got downstairs to take a closer look, the snow had melted.

From Friday afternoon to Saturday, the temperature slowly dropped to 60 and stayed there. This is usually the hottest part of the day, but the temperature is still below 65. We’ve had continuous rain, and it promises to continue to rain continuously through the rest of the week. My joke is that I’m not riding to get ready for France. Its a perverse kind of anti-training.

Other than that, there’s not a lot to report. We started planning for a new phase in our financial lives. I will start Social Security in January, and have to start taking distributions from my 401(K) next year. Danita starts her retirement pension next August. There are significant changes to the tax laws for 2018. (Significant to us.) We are collecting facts and asking questions. There are QCDs, DAFs, survivor/spousal benefits .. the list appears endless. We could go to a financial planner, but it’s more fun to do some research and figure it out for ourselves.

I hope this finds everybody doing well.