Model Railway Forum banner

Retirement

2571 Views 32 Replies 12 Participants Last post by  Babz
Hi all,
On a more personal note, I have now completely retired from running my own electrical contracting business.
My wife retired at the end of February this year, so we are looking forward to spending more leisure time together, with lots of holidays planned.
We have recently returned from a nice break in Jersey, we are off to Switzerland on the 1st July for 8 days, lots of trains involved (y) , then later this year in October we are off to Japan for two weeks,
Bullitt Train journey involved, can you see a pattern forming here :)
Yesterday we booked a 24 day tour of Australia and New Zealand for the Nov/Dec 2023 (by land, rail, sea and air), which includes a 4 day trip from Perth to Adelaide, then on to Sidney on the Indian Pacific train.
In the mean time, I've just started treatment on my hands. I thought I had Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, but X-Rays revealed I had no cartilage left on both my lower thumb joints, which has been causing me increased discomfort over the last couple of years, probably due to 50 odd years of using hand and electric tools. Anyway, yesterday I had the first ultrasound guided injection into the joints, and it bloody hurt I don't mind admitting, and I think I've got a pretty good pain threshold. At the moment its still very sore, but should wear off in a day or two and I'll see if it has had the desired effect. Apparently the pain relief can last for a year or so or just weeks, if its the latter, I will consider surgery to remove the bone at the base of the thumbs, but hope it doesn't come to that as it has a long recovery period. Anyway, I'm looking forward to spending a bit more time on the layout, although her indoors has other ideas. But if I can combine trains with holidays, which seems to be going to plan at the moment, I think I will have a very happy retirement ;)
Regards to you all
Alan
See less See more
  • Like
Reactions: 4
1 - 2 of 33 Posts
In the mean time, I've just started treatment on my hands. I thought I had Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, but X-Rays revealed I had no cartilage left on both my lower thumb joints, which has been causing me increased discomfort over the last couple of years, probably due to 50 odd years of using hand and electric tools. Anyway, yesterday I had the first ultrasound guided injection into the joints, and it bloody hurt I don't mind admitting, and I think I've got a pretty good pain threshold. At the moment its still very sore, but should wear off in a day or two and I'll see if it has had the desired effect. Apparently the pain relief can last for a year or so or just weeks, if its the latter, I will consider surgery to remove the bone at the base of the thumbs, but hope it doesn't come to that as it has a long recovery period. Anyway, I'm looking forward to spending a bit more time on the layout, although her indoors has other ideas. But if I can combine trains with holidays, which seems to be going to plan at the moment, I think I will have a very happy retirement ;)
Regards to you all
Alan
Indeed, old age comes at a very inconvenient time of life.

I retired early at 58, almost 10 years ago now but since then bits of me have been falling off, breaking, wearing out, being bl00dy painful and silly easy jobs around the house I wouldn’t have thought twice about have been taking ten times as long to do if at all possible, enjoy as much as you can while you can.
  • Sad
Reactions: 3
Thanks David,
I'll be 71 at the end of this year and all things considered, I think I'm in pretty good shape 🙏 apart from the hands issue, which hopefully will be a lot better in a couple of weeks. I know plenty of work colleagues, younger than me that aren't so fortunate and a couple that are sadly no longer with us, so I intend to make the most of the time I have left (y)
Regards
Alan
It sounds like your starting off with a fantastic adventure across Europe , cannot say I am not a bit jealous ;) but I got some good news today as it appears I am now top of the list (at last) for my full left knee replacement, had the right knee done two years ago between lockdowns (it went so well, the NHS had me “done” in the Nuffield private hospital due to COVID and TBH it was like a holiday!)…….and the news today was it is back to the Nuffield again…woohoo(y)

Keepmthe news coming with the tour.
  • Like
Reactions: 3
1 - 2 of 33 Posts
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top