AARP Membership

I was first invited to join AARP when I turned 55 - or maybe even earlier. I did, but then let the membership lapse. Every year I get a request to join again around my birthday, and this year was no exception. It was funny to get a “letter” from JoAnn Jenkins, the president of AARP. She was the chief operating officer at the Library of Congress when I started working there seventeen years ago. I had to make a presentation to the operating committee about the work I was doing in the infrastructure support services about performance measures and productivity. I found her to be very down to earth and more like the people I used to work with in health care administration - not like what you typically find in government offices. Not much was ever done with recommendations for improvement at the library. So I was not surprised when JoAnn moved to AARP because of her approach to work and her likability. The other reason I am so interested in AARP now is because our daughter in law, Kim Lankford, is their Medicare specialist and writes material for the digital magazine. Kim worked for Kiplinger - the “ask Kim” column - and has done a lot of freelance work, written books, and has appeared on a lot of finance shows. And I love to promote anything she writes on LinkedIn and Facebook. So I decided to join AARP for three years without auto renew. I’m looking forward to reading her articles and spreading the word about Kim. And, although I have no intention of going, I would get first dibs on tickets to a Rolling Stones concert since AARP is their sponsor. How funny is that?

Renew Costco Membership?

We joined Costco last November. We received a membership renewal notice and decided we better go at least one more time before the membership expires because we didn't think we would renew it. That would make three times we went to Costco since last year. We try to go in a less busy day and time of day, so we went yesterday around noon. We always start out on the housewares side, go though the clothes, over to the household products, and then to the groceries. It is simply amazing what we find along the way... Everything from HP ink, storage bins for the bathroom cupboard, electric toothbrushes, winter garb for around the house, olive oil in huge bottles, favorite cookies, frying pans, throw blankets, and fruit and cheese that we can't do without. There were both Christmas and Halloween decorations everywhere. We could easily spend more than the two hours of free parking in the place. When we left, we decided it was such a great savings to shop there, even if we go so infrequently. So we decided to renew our membership after all. It's only a short trip over the bridge to Arlington for us to travel, and well worth it. Now we just need to find more space for all this stuff in our tiny place in DC.