(Old) Happy National Shrimp Scampi Day in the MMP!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
241

Moooom that’s great news about all the help that the hospice organization is giving MIL which will in turn be helping out you and FCD. ACTS also sounds like a great organization. Hubs only used the walker a handful of times. Would be nice to be able to share it with others rather than have it sit in a closet until … hopefully it’s never needed again.

so Nelson is a lover. :heart:

I’m going to give that a try. Thanks for the suggestion.

Same except Bally Sports Detroit. Hubs is very unhappy that he can’t watch the Tigers. He called and got some kind of a subscription to something, I think it was from MLB but when he tried to watch, he found out the Tigers were blacked out. He can watch every other team but not the Tigers. So, he called to cancel and the confirmation he received showed a $438/month charge. He called again and apparently the person who had taken the cancellation call didn’t cancel the MLB package but added some other packages to his account. Hopefully it is straightened out now. But now he doesn’t know what he’s going to do. I told him he’ll have to go old school and just listen on the radio. He’s ok with that for now but as the season goes on, he wants to be able to watch.
Hope that Xfinity can get their stuff together and accept what Diamond offered. They are saying that they offered Xfinity the same deal that they offered other cable distributors but Xfinity seems not to be budging. Shucks for Hubs and all the other Detroit sports fans. Well maybe it’s going to be shucks for me because Hubs wants to switch to WOW. The only thing is that I know all my tv channels by heart and don’t want to have to learn new numbers. Also, I have a number of programs to automatically dvr and I don’t want to have to set them all up again.

Daughter returned my car. I said “what is this thing in my car; a plastic female figure dressed like a super type hero holding a dagger and when you press a button in the back, her arm holding the dagger moves up and down”. Apparently her friend bought a Happy Meal and I’ve ended up with a child’s toy. She told me to put it in the yard sale.

Sorry to hear that Oven Master is flying the coop.

Went to Kroger yesterday and broke the bank. I wanted to use the $8 off coupon if I bought at least $80 of groceries. So, I was throwing everything in the store into the cart. I ended up spending more than twice that. Got 700 gas points. A whole bunch of stuff that I like was on digital coupon so I bought 5 of Great Grains Cranberry Almond Crunch and Nature’s Valley dark chocolate, peanut and almond bars, 3 Fritos.

Before I left for Kroger I told Hubs and daughter that dinner was on them because I can’t do everything. When I got home, pretty much the entire kitchen table was covered with food. Hubs ordered a ton of middle eastern food, 4 or 5 kinds of meat, rice, hummus, garlic butter, lentil soup. It was very good but soooo much was leftover. We had it again today but first I sauteed some onions, red bell peppers and green bell peppers and that helped the rice. Also cut up some cukes and avocado. There was a sweet potato pie on clearance (perhaps I should call it a used sweet potato pie) so had that for dessert.

Made blueberry pancakes and bacon for breakfast. Made a recipe and a half. One recipe calls for one egg so 1-1/2 recipes calls for 1-1/2 eggs so Bella had second breakfast of 1/2 an egg scrambled and half of a bacon. She was appreciative.

Took daughter to the storage unit so she would know where it is and how to get into it in case I kick the proverbial bucket. Took Bella for a walk so she could have a constitutional. Then daughter painted my toenails as it’s sandals weather. Hubs & daughter went to a local attraction where they walked for 2 miles on the grounds where they saw some sheep shearing amongst other things.

Right after breakfast Daughter had given Bella what she calls suspect cheese which is a hunk of cheese with a sedative in it. After I watched most of the Women’s Final in the Madrid Tennis Tournament, I took Bella for a 3+ mile walk with the intention of truly tiring her out. Then about 5pm Daughter gave Bella some suspect chicken which was a hunk of chicken with a sedative in it. The point of all this is that Daughter and Bella were taking the train back to Chicago at 6:30 and Daughter was concerned about how Bella would do on the trip. She had bought a travel bag for Bella to ride in. Right now they’re in East Chicago, Indiana so will be home soon and Daughter has reported that Bella laid down and hasn’t been heard from so the sedatives and all the walking appears to have done the trick.

I’m lectoring at 8am mass tomorrow so I best sign off and get to bed.

Night all.

242

Oh, I forgot to tell y’all … today is my Name Day!
(It’s the day Catholics observe the Feast of St. [my IRL name].) In Ye Olde Country, it’s treated almost like a 2nd birthday.

I forget every single year, until my mom reminds me.

… I just put it into my calendar, so maybe I’ll remember next year!

You absolute rebel, you.

Can you explain and/or give a link or something? Squirrels dig up my seedlings every year, so I’d love ideas for solutions to deter them.

Sparkly stickers are pretty timeless.

Oh, I forgot to mention, a special shout-out to the guy who paid for his pizza last night and didn’t come back …

We closed up, got stuck with his, plus two others. He showed up half an hour after we closed I was like, “Dude, we were literally about to throw your food away.”

Ferrealz if he’d shown up 5 minutes later, the lights would’ve been off & his pizza would’ve been in the dumpster.

Actually, he’s lucky we closed with Old Slow Grandma who takes a while to finish up her stuff, or we would’ve already been outta there!

Whelp, it’s rainin’ again. My nasturtiums finally made an appearance, and the pea seedlings are going nutz. I stuck a branch in for them to climb on, so now it looks like there’s a small, dead tree in my flower pot. :crazy_face:

Tomorrow’s agenda includes seeing if Wal-Mart still has a tank in stock - they had one single 40 gal last time, for way cheaper than PetsMart/Co.
If I get it, then I’ll order a new top for it (the screen tops commonly sold for reptiles are less than useless against rodents) plus more clips. Oh, and at least one more chew-proof water bottle; maybe two. Dang, glad I thought of that.

I also need to keep moving on getting my phone - looks like the next step is to go to the AT&T store and get a new SIM card.

The phone number I’ve had since my Other Shoe and I were happily cohabitating has been reassigned. It was an Austin number.
Funny thing is, now that I live in the Mitten State - because my parents are setting this up - imma wind up with a friggin’ Dallas number.
Not that area codes really matter anymore (does the concept of paying out the nose for a long-distance call even still exist anymore?) but it feels like I just can’t shake the Lone Star State’s dust off my boots.

Oh, and speaking of upcoming agenda items, someone mentioned the rattie bebehs. They’re gonna ramp up production as the weather warms … but both Charm and Pretzel are overdue for a good meal, so hopefully I won’t get totally overrun.
But I definitely do need to get a bigger tank.

Dammit. Apparently, someone drank more of my booze than I’d thought. Considering I live alone, the obvious culprit is
Pretzel.
Ha! You thought I was gonna blame Monkey, didn’t ya?

Problem is, I already took off my bra, and pants, post-work. Sitting in a big ol’ t-shirt style “nightgown.”

It’s just the local corner store, in the hood, on a Saturday night, so I could probably still win a Best Dressed award. But I have some standards, sheesh.

So on the one hand, would like more hooch. On the other hand, replacing both bra AND pants?

Le sigh.

It’s like the other night when we got quiet and I stepped outside for a brief smoke to hit the hell outta my vape. Didn’t know it was raining; didn’t really care.

Came back in a bit soggy, shook the rain off my kerchief like a dog, and quipped, "Weather like this makes me think, ‘Maybe my mother’s right; maybe I really should quit smoking.’ "
Then we all had a good laugh, cuz that shit ain’t happenin’.

243

I’m pretty sure Spot considers it that you stole his mint :seedling:sprig to begin with.

All mint belongs to the cat by divine right, kinda like swans in Britain belong to the reigning monarch. So it is decreed. My Siamese won’t even leave my mint tea alone-she sticks her paw in it and we all know where that paw has been recently…

244

Congratulations on another revolution!

Why isn’t there a cake by your name?

245

Not my birthday.

However, I will accept tributes of cakes, both cup- and otherwise, from my humble servants.

246

Well, I’d buy you a cupcake, but I’m saving up for a new ring…

247

So I laughed at you playing with the toy long enough to figure it out, but am distressed that stabbing toys are normal these days.

Only if you need the same thing. Titanium rings are quite the rage nowadays, almost indestructible and can be had for less than a hundred bucks.

However, my vote is that it is somewhere in your bedroom. Or somewhere in your home if your cats like to soccer shiny things around.

Anyhow…I’m done with the hard packing. Most of my dust catchers are fragile and I am packing them myself. I would rather be sad that I did a bad job than be mad at the movers for doing a bad job, plus I know how to pack boxes so they don’t collapse when stacked.

I’ve been using corrugated paper which of course has been doing not good things to my hands, but the rest of the packing will be fairly easy. Except for the wall art, I’m not going to trust the movers with the shadow box Dad made me 40 years ago, I’m packing that so well it would survive a nuclear blast.

Hubs sold his bicycles and has been out in the sheds several times. He agrees that the pop-up tent and sleeping bags should probably be pitched unopened which is good. They were falling apart when we put them in the shed 8 years ago and we haven’t gotten any younger since then.

I will be very happy when this whole move is over, I want my things back where I can see them.

248

I hear you. We have two bedrooms’s worth of furniture in a third bedroom, my office, the living room and dining room, plus a few things in the basement. We’re halfway through a month-long renovation project and I’m impatient to get it over with. Hubby just said he needs something off his desktop, which is currently not easily accessible, so that’s going to be part of today’s fun.

Hi, Coolio!

Aka, being a cat. Glad you didn’t drink any glass. Decades ago I was eating at a restaurant and found that one of the ice cubes wasn’t melting. Not good, but fortunately no blood.

And what did you do with all the dirt afterwards?

Hope it shows up again.

I like this name: suspect cheese. Sounds like it did the trick. Good to hear that hubs can walk 2 miles. :walking_man:

Aka Star Wars Day. May the fourth be with you! :moon_cake:

Just realized today is the day for Mexican food and margaritas and I don’t have any limes or lemons, just bottled lemon juice. If we end up going to town I could buy some, but maybe I’ll just drink tequila straight.

And because our home is disrupted, we’re eating out of the freezer. So homemade chicken pot pie for lunch.

The good Mexican place didn’t survive Covid. And the other place is next to work, so I don’t want to go there when it’s not a working day. And the food is not all that good.

I did buy a Smoky BBQ Fajita Kit yesterday, so maybe I’ll do that next weekend. And I’ll buy limes and lemons to make my own sweet & sour mix. Or I’ll make some sugar syrup today and add fresh-squeezed lime/lemon juice.

It’s supposed to quite raining, so then we can go for a walk. Got the first load of laundry in, the sheets are waiting for the washer, and then I’ll do a load of delicates. And I should go clean the sinks. Fun times!

Happy Sunday!

249

Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN ‘Tis 65 Amurrkin out and clear with a predicted high of 86 and mostly N.O.S. for the day. The big item on the agenda is deheathenization followed by first Sunday brunch. We are sans Priest today, so we will do sung Morning Prayer. Da bear gets to be Presider, thus I get to gussy up in an alb and cincture (for which I always have to watch a video on how to tie the dang thing cause I don’t do this often) and read a sermon which I had to go out and find on the sooper seekret Whiskypalian site for such things. Well, actually, anybody can go to the national website, click on resources and find it, but most folks don’t do such things so I like to think of it as sooper seekret. After all that, the afternoon shall be spent in sloth, nappage, and day drinkin’.

Shoe welcome back to Coolio! Hope he had a nice Winter and is all rested up and ready to work.

Rocker Happy Easter Orthodox style!

Sticky_Buns hope you’re feelin’ better today.

Nellie maybe the ones in the pot were Norman Bate’s special peanuts. Or he was just psycho.

250

I can’t speak for all little girls, but Roxy likes unicorns and monster trucks and volcanoes.

That is the accepted convention… in my world. :wink:

BTDT - I lost the first one when preggo. I had to wear it on my pinkie because swollen digits. I was working outside and literally flinging weeds away, and the ring went flying with one fling. Never could find it. Had to replace my replacement because the band was wide and water was getting trapped under it, causing my skin to get all white and weird and early arthritic knuckle size made it difficult to remove it, so I’m now wearing my 3rd ring - a plain, narrow gold band. I got it sized up a couple of years ago because aforementioned knuckle continues to grow, but I upped the size too much. It won’t just fall off, but it does slip around till it hits the arthritis. Stoopit joints.

Rain continues here - I awoke to the sound of drops on the roof. Yesterday the forecast for today was about a quarter of an inch, and that seems to be holding this morning. We may also get t-boomers. Needless to say, it’ll be an indoor day.

I’m hoping the fire I had in the basement abetted the drying of the shampooed rug. I want to put the furniture back in place and be done with that space. And I need to contact TX SIL. According to the text she sent FCD, she’s flying in on the 14th and going home on the 17th??? I need to verify the dates, but that seems an awfully short visit for flying halfway across the country. The basement and SIL are connected thoughts as she’ll be sleeping down there.

Not sure what else today holds. I may go to BJ’s just to get out of the house and away from MIL for a while. I need a break. I have yet to avail myself of my membership, so why not? I’ll check their hours and plan accordingly.

My glasses came from Zenni yesterday and I’m trying to get used to them. I ordered progressives with the wider field of view - I feel like my eyes are working overtime, reminding me of my first experience with progressives. We’ll see how it goes. Meanwhile, the glasses I should have gotten in Feb are due to arrive on Firday. Hah, we shall see.

And so it begins! Onward! Happy Cinco de Mayo!!

251

Stickers are fun! Good job!!

Do they sell those at the Love Shack?

Sorry to hear that. I have 2 wedding rings now. Depending on how swollen my hands are and what kind of activity will be going on. One ring is much fancier than the other.

:grin:

I am finally up. I did not work on the urn last night. Instead I went back to bed and slept pretty well from about 8:30 until 6 this morning. Since I was nauseous when I went to bed, I took my evening pills up with me, but never took them. I feel a little weird this morning. For now, Annie and I are just chilling and trying to figure out what will be for breakfast.

252

Up, caffeinated, and sheveled. Off tody. It’s drizzly outside. I shall do the usual cleaning, and watch some hockey later.

But when I offered him his own mint leaf later, he just batted it off the table, possibly becuse it didn’t have bourbon on it.I guess he’s a Southern gentleman?
< wanders off to Google “How to dye your cat seersucker” >

Understandable, they’re what made home home. That and the cat.

Or make a Juan Collins

Nope.

Not since the tin roof rusted.

253

Do this: put some butter in the pan and let it melt, then add orange zest to the butter and spread evenly to briefly saute. Then put the soaked bread (preferably brioche) on top of the zest/butter. Brown and flip, as normal. I also put a tsp of Penzey’s baking spice in the egg mixture along with a tsp of vanilla and a TBSP of sugar or two.

254

Afternoon, mumpers! It’s currently 17c/63f with no predicted change, and cloudy. Weather app says “It’s nice outside if you like overcast fucking nonsense. If you don’t, you’re fucked.” We are not looking at the same place then, outside it’s warm and gloriously sunny (good news since I’ve just had a 3hr drive home).

Yesterday’s shenanigans were much fun. After putting at least a week’s worth of food out for the cats (yes, we were going to be away for at least 24hrs and hadn’t asked anyone to call in on them), extra water bowls, and super clean litter trays, we left around 10am yesterday morning. The drive up to Bradford wasn’t too bad, 'im indoors (whose navigation seems to have nosedived since the Chicago fiasco) told me to take the wrong exit from the M6 so we ended up going one junction up the wrong bit of another motorway, coming back on ourselves and then joining the right bit. Not a big deal, and we arrived at our destination just as the venue was about to open.

Too early to check into our hotel so we left our stuff in the car and walked into the centre of town to the venue. On the way we met up with a couple of friends so the afternoon started with lots of hugs. Joined the queue at the venue and there was more hugging as we saw a bunch of other friends arriving. We dipped out mid-afternoon to go and check in, so missed half of one band, then opted out of another to go round the corner and get something to eat in the evening.

Mid-evening I swapped from beer to soft drinks so I’d have a clear head for the drive home today. Good job really, the venue has some very bright white lights that flash and were starting to give me a headache. Anyway, we left at the end of the night, went back to the hotel where I had some pain pills and went to sleep. Got up this morning, had a cup of tea, perused farcebook, got dressed and packed ourselves up, dumped stuff in the car and went to get some breakfast. The drive home was uneventful although it took a bit longer than the way in because of the amount of roadworks in the centre of Bradford so we got diverted all over the place.

Back home, unpacked, put some laundry on, and am now relaxing with a cuppa after making sure the ravening horde of three have all had some wet food. It’s very busy outside, there was a Sikh procession for Vaisakhi (traditionally celebrated in mid-April) which meant lots of local roads were closed all morning, and there’s a celebration in the park round the corner from us that goes on until 5pm. We knew we’d be back late enough to avoid the congestion due to road closures (and I could plan to come towards our street from the opposite direction to the park’s traffic) but there are cars parked solidly up the street. Luckily our Sikhs are far more considerate than the people who use the Afro-Caribbean Heritage Centre, and nobody was blocking my off-street parking. Got the car parked with minimal fuss, and we’re safely ensconced in the house. Not going out again until tomorrow when I have a plan to go to the gym fairly early.

255

¡Felíz cinco de mayo!

Up, caffeinating, breakfasted and fixing to do Sunday chores. Not a lot going on here today.

Stay safe and healthy y’all!

256

I had bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon for Cinco De Mayo breakfast. Spot had zoomies. He also likes bananas again(must be a spring feral thing).

Sounds like a fun time, boofae

257

To be honest, your guess is as good as mine. I got some soccer ball-like water bottles and the stickers this time because they came up on Amazon as soccer gifts for kids. They will also get to paint my beard, which I think they enjoy the most of any activity.

Flyboy, hope the ring turns up.

Cat Glove. I had WoW! before I got Direct TV, they do a pretty decent job. I got a $7 off a $70 purchase from Kroger that I used Firday and got about 700 points too. Sounds like it was a pretty active Saturday for the whole family. Happy Lectoring!

Never remembered that custom, must not be an Irish thing…

Presume you are marking them as fragile, so the movers know which ones they can toss around…

And today will be the Revenge of the Fifth, since it looks like I have to get out and mow the lawn in what looks like 80F weather…

Happy Preaching Day, Swampy

You have a unique and charming and possibly terrifying grandkid there.

Let me know what you think of BJ’s, I’ve been to mine 2-3 times and while the quantities are usually to large for little ol’ me alone, it seems like a pretty organized place.

boo fae, sounds like you had a great time, welcome home.

Nothing much to report here, have made the Sunday NY Times run, also picked up Pepsi (Kroger is having a ‘buy 2 12-pack, get 2 free’ sale) and Apples, so won’t have to do a Moanday shopping trip. Just waiting until about 10am for the grass to dry out, then will do mowage and the afternoon will either be gym time or sloth, flip a coin on that. The whole next week is varying between 30-50% chance of rain each day, so soccer practices will be unpredictable.

Have a good Sunday all.

258

Not impressed. Many prices were comparable to Food Lion or WalMart, some were higher! I got a 44# bag of dog food because per pound, it was a decent price and I needed kibbles anyway. And I got some napkins and tissues. But most of their foods and prices didn’t impress me. Like their Diet Coke - over a dollar more per 6-pack than Food Lion’s current sale. I understand deals are to be had in the electronics aisle - some day I may look there, not that I need any. I’m glad I only spent $20 on the membership and I may go back some time. Maybe.

Frankly, I don’t understand the appeal of the membership stores. I’ve never been in a Costco, tho MIL’s sister regularly worships there (2-3 time a week!!!) The nearest one to us is 25 miles away - not worth the drive to investigate. Similarly, Sam’s is something over 20 miles off and the times I’ve been there in the past were meh. MIL claims they have great meats. I have no problem with the meat I get at Aldi and Food Lion. I shan’t be renewing my BJ’s membership next year.

Anyway, home alone for a bit - FCD took his mom to church - he’s such a good son to sit thru the rantings of some right-wing fundy under the guise of a sermon. Not sure when they’ll get home, but I’m about to assume the recline position while I can.

259

Oh, GRR! The fridge removal appntmnt. is for next Friday. I can’t read, and I feel very dumb. Plus I gotta go through the whole “waiting around all afternoon” thing again.

Also, my parents are switching me from AT&T to T-Mobile.

I swear, I can’t keep anything straight anymore. I’m so mad at myself.

ETA: I just sent a reply email to the poor CSR who confirmed my appointment, apologizing for my snippy tone.

260

yes

I asked Siri when St. ______ day was and the response was sometime in August. I then checked the USCCB (US Conference of Catholic Bishops) website and it also said a day in August.