I haven’t been getting quite enough sleep. I looked forward to sleeping until seven Saturday. Mr. Bladder decided to wake me up at 0525. When I awoke I thought, ‘Why is the fan off?’ I turned to see what time it was, and the display on the clock was dark. Power outage. I got up and urinated. I knew I couldn’t go back to sleep wondering about the power, so I called the power company. They knew the power was out. Of course no power means no coffee (unless I pull out a camp stove). I threw on some shorts, a T-shirt, and zoriis and drove two miles to the gas station. The drive seemed longer than usual. Got two 20-ounce coffees. Mrs. L.A. snost, so I drank them both. I saw a guy from PSE driving around, and he said ‘a wire burned out’ on the beach road. The power came back on at seven. Went out again around 2:30.
I have a thread about the new deck. I’d hoped the contractor would finish the planking Saturday. It rained all day. Pretty dark, too. Basically, nothing got done around here on Saturday, except that I made the traditional Saturday hashbrowns, eggs, and bacon. There’s still today, right? I wanted to go out to breakfast since we were going into town. Mrs. L.A. din’t wanna. We went to Sears (which I’ve just discovered we have one here) to pick up the new washer and dryer. Mrs. L.A. said we could stop at Denny’s on the way home. (‘It’s not Arlis’s, but I’m getting hungry,’ she says.) Too crowded. The contractor and his helper showed up not long after we got home. I’d already removed the old dryer, and I let them do the rest. On to the deck! Or not. Apparently it’s Father’s Day and these guys have families. Beautiful day for working, too. So the decking part of the deck won’t be finished until tomorrow, and the roof won’t be finished until after that. I went to a Mexican restaurant to get ‘breakfast’ (at four in the afternoon). Now we’re just waiting for Game Of Thrones to start.
Knew it was coming, so we spent yesterday shopping and laying in supplies. Beer, hard lemonade, water, snacks. Hit World Market for chips, the local German deli for knackwurst, kraut, potato salad, cheese, bread, pickles and such. Watched the Dodgers shellac the Brewers.
Today I got up early, watered all the plants and the neighborhood strays, turned the cooler on early and have spent the day in front of one sort of screen or another, noshing and trying not to think that tomorrow will be even hotter. I’m planning on doing sweet fuck all for the next 10 days or so. Why? Because I’M ON VACATION!!
I’m on call this weekend, so that sucks. Can’t really get too involved with anything 'cause I might have to go in. But no calls yet, so that’s good. Been watching DVDs with the commentaries turned on all weekend–John Carpenter’s The Thing, Tropic Thunder, The Crazies (2010), The Matador, Sideways, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and The Mist.
Very good. Washed 5,000 miles of road grit off the RV, and vacuumed it out. On our walk yesterday, we discovered that the Cajun food cart has finally opened. We gave the jambalaya a try and it was great. Went back for some gumbo today, and it was also terrific. My wife made me breakfast this morning of blue corn pancakes and bacon. Now watching game seven of the NBA finals. Life is good and so is the weather.
My wife and daughters bought me a small refrigerator for the garage. I spent the morning building a shelf for it under my workbench. The beer is cooling now. They took me to my favorite steakhouse for dinner tonight. I am drinking a nice glass of red wine and watching Game of Thrones.
As per usual, I’ll look forward to sleeping in tomorrow when I get up & go to irk…
Lesse, Friday was a late evening due to the obligatory hotel room pillow fight. (which ended sometime after midnight). That was followed by a 5:45 am wakeup call, a screwed up Mickey D’s breakfast order & a chipped tooth. Then it was off to play with the new dragon; my part was to wear/carry the heavy gear. However, I was then allowed some free time to get to walk around, including cockpit time in a DC-3, a VIP V-5, & a 767. Also got to see a bunch of other flying things both outside & inside, including a SR-71 & a shuttle.
Once we finished & packed up, it was off to a late lunch/early dinner at Red Robin for 17 of us. Bad traffic around DC (surprise, surprise!) & a couple of more hours behind the wheel we got home. By the time the car was unloaded, the pix/video downloaded & the batteries put on charge (for this morning), SNL (rerun) was coming on TV.
Overslept this morning’s 3:50 wakeup call but ½ hour later my phone rang. Flight cxl’d - gnarly winds aloft so, luckily I plodded back up to bed for a bit.
Today was only car museum, then hot, sunny baseball game & grocery shopping before coming home to some other activities & finally burgers for dinner. Never did get a run in.
Maybe instead of sleeping until a normal get up & go to work time, I’ll go for a bike ride in the morning, before it gets too hot (forecast of 92° tomorrow). First day of summer; will I finally break down & turn the AC on?
Sat on the lawn tractor, revving it, waiting for the clock to tick over to 9 (earliest my gf feels I should mow) on Saturday, so that we could get an early start on a pontooning with the dogs adventure. On the river we spotted a pontoon boat with a “for sale” sign. We’ve been wanting to upgrade, and ended up buying the boat.
Now I need to find a [del]sucker[/del] entry level boater interested in a good deal on a cheap used boat.
Spent Sunday pontooning as well, burning up the $50 worth of gas I put in on Saturday. Seems silly to sell a boat with a full tank.
We went to Virginia to visit my sister and nieces, one of which is going to Saudi Arabia in July to teach music at the Aramco compound so we won’t see her for a while and the other one is going back to Hong Kong to pack up to move to Scotland with her husband and 6 month old. So we really won’t see her for a while…
On Saturday we met my nephew and his kids at a park and hung out and fished a little. I overheard the music teacher niece complaining to my nephew about how they don’t have a drummer for their Christian band for Sunday’s service, so for the first time in 15 years I played drums in a band and went to church.
After a delightful lunch we spent the rest of the day driving back to NYC.
My daughter bought her first house last week. So I spent the weekend mowing her (hilly) lawn, replacing the rotten deck steps, installing three sets of miniblinds, patching some drywall, helping move furniture, and installing a new dishwasher. Oh, it was Father’s Day too - she did say “Thanks!” but I still had to cook supper.
