I’ll be holding you, Sunflower, your surgeon and your eyes in the light all day. {{{{{{ hippie}}}}].
Sadie is more interested in playing first thing in the morning than eating. It’s weird; it’s like she was never played with as a youngster. At least three times a day she makes play overtures and we do “chase the wand feathers” in the living room. Pretty active for a 14 year old cat.
Woke up to a FB video of my 12-year old grandson playing a Handel piano piece. He’s only been taking lessons for a few months, but really nailed it. This is his third instrument, although his first love is French horn. Amazing talent. I’ll be burning my guitar later today.
I finally made an appointment with the audiology people for late September. Hearing has been getting muffled in my left ear. Don’t know if it’s a wax plug or old age, but I need to find out.
I see the wife is stirring, so must get on with breakfast. We have a large shopping list to fill later today.
I was just now looking up audiologists near me. I’m thinking both FCD and I need to get checked. We do a lot of repeating.
It’s Fried Day! In the process of caffeinating while I eat fresh blueberries for breakfast. 19° Canadian out, sunny, very pleasant. Weird combination, yeah. Don’t care. Not much else going on; have to do a bit of shopping tonight before I take the Lyft the last leg home. Most of my shopping is done via delivery owing to the location of my current hat hanger and the difficulty for me of getting to proper supermarkets in person. (Sub-suburbia, no reasonable bus service on weekends.) Kinda worth it though as I can get the heavy and bulky stuff dropped at my front door rather than have to schlep it around myself.
Found you and followed back, as is the custom there. 
Ah, right. Gotcha. I don’t recall us doing not-so-secret Mumper nicknames back in The Before Times, so it kinda enfrazzled my brain for a minute, a state my neurospicy brain is growing more accustomed to the older I get.
I think I saw that one yesterday or the day before. It was a pitch perfect jab at the MAGA crowd fawning over someone’s rendition of Trump with the same musculature. If nothing else, I do quite enjoy how accurate a mirror is being held up before them and watching the cognitive dissonance fire on all cylinders.
Is there video? Tell me there’s video, because that sounds like a very good time! 
Also you sound like you’d fit right on on Bluesky. We are the Anti-Musk. The MAGAs try to get in, but ‘Sky’s block feature is very comprehensive, effectively erasing all trace of them from timeline existence, so it’s easy to find peace and quiet among like-minded individuals there.
Double bits of good news!
As for me … well, I may have implied lately that I’ve been having major appetite issues again - this is most of the cause of the insomnia.
Anyway, since I need to seriously fuel up for Long Night, I just now { sigh } put on pants, and treated myself to a Wendy’s bacon sammich. Am currently having breakfast in bed, and am hoping for one more nap before heading in to whatever shenanigans Friday night brings.
Mornin’ all - about 9am as I start drivelin’. Been up since about 7 = shortly after sunrise, and caffinatin’ inside has been good. NWS now sez 86/30 on the way to 96/36. A very few puffies and, since yesterday, smoke from a big wildfire out in the Everglades. Right now the wind is blowing it away from here, but that’ll change as the day wears on.
Last night’s music was good if more free-jazzy than unexpected: Oz Noy - YouTube. I ate reasonably healthy and avoided wretched excess. For once. Go me.
Tonight is dinner only with GF; no time for rendezvous. Last time I’ll see her for 3 full weeks. 
Other than that, today is RDOS city.
As to y’all…
JtC: Hooray for new non-thieving dentist!
I’m not skeptical about tires or other purchases until the clerk I’m working with gives me a reason to doubt their skill or honesty. Then everything gets a double check.
I had a similar email saga but it was ~10 years ago. The first time they got sold and enshittified we stuck with them. The second time that happened we bailed out for one of the big names. Precisely to avoid the sudden news that our email had been turned off without recourse.
Especially now with emails being your de-facto account name at most websites, the process of changing that when you can’t access the old one can vastly difficult. A problem best avoided.
@Johnny_L.A Congrats on slowly sanding down your mole problem. Dinner sounds spectacular.
By going in person I get real results. By calling it’s easy to get the brush-off. “No, I don’t see them, sorry.”
Besides, I know most of the people who work at these places and me seeing them and them seeing me face to face really improves the outcome. I’m a real person they know, not a random voice on the phone.
At one stop that didn’t have my glasses, three people each looked in different places within the bar / restaurant. None of them knew the other two “official” lost and found hidey holes existed. They had, collectively, about 15 sets of glasses. Most of them Walgreens sunglasses or readers, but I bet a couple were real specs. Had I called, only one of those hidey holes would have been checked by whoever answered the phone.
Also, I live urban and you don’t. Which skews the call/drive tradeoff for you. For me it was a 3-mile round trip to hit all 5 places. I could easily have walked to 4 of the 5 and in fact did on the night I lost my glasses. Besides, the first (most distant) place has breakfast & you can’t eat that over the phone. 
Sounds like you had a full household but an excellent accidental party. Yaay for family!
Yuengling is common grocery store beer here in Greater Miami. It’s an almost-national-scale "micro"brew. Has been for awhile now. They brew it in Tampa and Fort Worth in addition to PA.
Hooray for grant extension!!
You actually chew and swallow the tail shell? Sounds uncomfortably sharp. I always work to get that last segment of meat out, but it never occurred to me to try to eat the shell.
Other than that, dinner & drink sounds lovely.
My hearing isn’t quite to that point … yet. But yes, in person is better on that score. Doubly so given the very, very many ESL people here in SoFL. The kind person who actually had my glasses is a 25-ish Latin woman with a high pitched voice, a very thick accent, and rather little English beyond what it takes to handle basic waitressing. A phone convo with her would be likely to fail at my goal.
Yaay! String a couple of those together and you’ll be a newly recharged woman!
I see you have, and Monkey snuggles to boot. Yaay!!
And now eating! You are making progress!! Hooray!
In case you wonder, a lot of us worry a lot about you.
Hooray for that, and best of luck. Reaming out those drains will probably work a treat.
@Chefguy & @FairyChatMom: Speaking from bitter experience, if “What?” has become a regular feature of your convos, you’re way overdue. Best of luck to all three of you, and I’ll bet @Chefguy’s problem is mostly a wax plug. With a side order of hypernativerserus (excessive birthdays.)
On that silly note, I’ll put this on the wire.
Happy Firday to all and Cheers from here!
I mentioned to FCD that I want to make appointments for us with an audiologist. His response (as you might expect) was *Huh? (*or What? - I can’t remember exactly.) After which he said “What’s the point - it’s not like we’re getting hearing aids.”
So, does anyone want a high-mileage, retired mechanical engineer who’s wallowing in denial? I can make you a good deal… 
Some days…
I’m showered, dressed, and about to haul the dirty laundry downstairs to be sorted and laundered. Then I need to gather the household garbage so Mr. Denial can take it to the convenience center. I’ve already emptied the dishwasher, and I need to pull something out of the freezer for tonight’s feed. So exciting!!
And the windows are still open. In another hour or so, I’ll have to close them, but for now, I’ll enjoy the cool.
Fair enough. You have valid points. Tho I was also thinking in terms of, for example, finding out if something is in stock or what it costs. It’s ongoing adventures here.
It’s a good place. We generally go every other week.
Depends on how they’re cooked. Like, I wouldn’t eat them from a shrimp cocktail or if they were cooked in a sauce with the tails on; but they’re nice and crunchy if they’re grilled (as hers were) or fried.
i hope all goes well!
missred, best of luck today! i hope you and nelson will have a wonderful sleep tonight.
jtc, i never thought about dmc floss being impacted. wow!
i had 2 building meetings this week.
one regarding our shuttle. there was a recent survey on hours and usage of the shuttle. a committee was formed to go over the results and come up with recommendations. we had our first meet on weds.; went well, we meet again next month. assignments were assigned and that will be the basis for the next meeting.
next was the usual b&g. this time we had to make decisions for the new elevator cabs. it went very well. i had come up with 3 basic questions that would form the base of the choices. we were able to come up with around 6ish things that we would need samples for final decisions.
decisions were made for elevators, banquette fabric, and rug bindings all in 1.5 hours! wow! we are moving along.
For me, those are usually phone calls. Especially for smaller places.
OTOH, calling e.g. Home Depot to ask if they have [whatever] in stock is pointless. The phone answerer will say (looking at the exact same webpage I am) “The computer says we have 6”. Scream!
Draft Blatz? :d&r:
Good heavens! The last I bought was ~$1 a skein.
Just had breakfast and will get sheveled shortly. I’m getting excited!
Stay safe and healthy y’all!
Good morning.
It’s 57°F and sunny outside. It’ll remain sunny all day with an expected high temperature of 91°F. We also have a heat advisory starting at 11:00 a.m. today that runs through Tuesday. Temps creep up to the mid-90s for the weekend, and hover at around 92°F for this coming Monday or Tuesday. Bleh. I’m ready for autumn.
Shoe, I’m so happy you got a spot of rest and you’re eating a little bit.
Red, yay for getting to sleep in your own bed tonight.
Van Go, I’m glad the funding went through. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that you get to keep your job beyond December.
I use both Gmail and Xfinity for email. The Xfinity account is so old that it still has Comcast in the email address.
I spent an hour or two leveling, tamping, adding paver base, tamping, then sand and tamping the area for the storage container yesterday, and got it moved over. It’s not as level as I’d like, but it’ll do. I need three more pavers to finish the appearance, and it’ll be done. The unit itself is sitting on pavers, so that’s all good.
After that, I spent time cleaning up the area where I keep my raised planter boxes and pots. I moved all the pots out of the way and raked up all the crap that builds up under them. I waited a bit for it all to dry, then came through with the blower, finally, hosed everything down again. Then I moved all the pots back into place. After that, I deadheaded and watered any plants that needed it (the hydrangeas), and gave the birdies some fresh water in both the large and small bird baths.
Then it was playtime for the pups, and then, finally, I got to relax for a bit.
Today, I need to find a bin to stick in the storage unit so I can stack my bags of dirt in it. If I can’t find one at home, I’ll go to Home Depot. Then I’ll put all my garden tools in there, and everything will be tidy again.
That’s about it for my neck of the woods. Please take care of yourselves.
Here’s hoping it’s a quick and uneventful unloading! Then you get to figure out where your forks and your fry pans and your oregano all live! 
My mostly junk mail account is metrocast which became atlantic broadband which is now breezeline. I should probably change it to something eternal like yahoo or gmail and change all the legit accounts to that. That should stop all the morons that keep promising to get my website more views!! (no, I don’t have a website.) I guess the first step is to create a new account.
I just gathered all the household trash (oops forgot the one in the basement) and the bags are ready to be loaded into the truck. I had to hose out the cans in the garage - one had some sort of liquid in the bottom and both had maggot eggs or something stuck to the lids. They’re in the sun now to dry. FCD said he’d do the convenience center run. I should probably go along to help him…
Too many chores. I need a staff to deal with this stuff. Any takers??
I envisioned it as something of a movie caper - the evening had been long and full of shenanigans, and now in the light of day pilot needed to retrace his steps in order to remember just what spot he had rambled off to next 
It’s even made it all the way to Oklahoma! My beer drinking friends rejoiced much.
Also, good news on the grant! Fingers crossed for your job.
What brand?? I love chicken and dumplings but too much work to make from scratch, so if there’s a passable frozen option I’m all in.
Good luck, and let us know how you’re doing after!
There’s a handy list here. Otherwise, I find Metal Mouse’s posts handy because he responds to just about everyone’s posts and he uses the nicknames, so it helps me remember who’s who.
An older family member of mine was quite resistant to the idea of hearing aids until the audiologist said using hearing aids can slow down future hearing loss - something about keeping ear hairs stimulated? Hopefully someone smarter than me will be along shortly to fact check me and explain better lol
Hello! I’m back from Chicago! What’d I miss, besides you people?
I haven’t caught up on reading all the posts I missed this week and last. My problem is, I want to respond to each and every one, which would be silly. I’ll have to sit on my hands or something. Did I see that VanGogh got a puppy?
My trip was…interesting: lots of good stuff, a few great things, and some trying times. Max’s person drove me to the airport. Max refused to stay in his pet seat in the back and insisted in lying on and then sleeping on my lap, so I slipped my phone into the side pocket of my backpack. Inside the terminal, I discovered my phone was missing: apparently with a lao full of dog, I only THOUGHT I’d put it in the pocket, and it ended up on the floor. I’ll spare you my frantic attempts to reach my ride-giver and trying to communicate via email and spotty internet to 4 people I was to coordinate with when I got to O’Hare. Let’s just say I needed a rather large martini when we finally arrived at my sister’s house.
It was so great to be together with my family and both my kids! Of course we went out for Italian beef, had Chicago pizza, etc. My sister-in-law was actually reasonably calm when we arrived, which was great, even though it didn’t last. One big help was my son, who was constantly and cheerfully washing dishes and cleaning up. Sis-in-law and brother were very impressed, which is saying something.
SIL is still…difficult. My nephew, her younger son, is a truly superb cook, the best in the family, and that’s something. He made a (I HOPE I have this right) wagyu strip loin roast (?) that was tender and heavenly. She took one bite and said, “This is awful. Awful. It’s tough. I can’t even eat it.” (She was ticked that it wasn’t prime rib.) There were worse incidents, but between all of us, we managed to avert a nuclear detonation.
My son and I went for long walks, which was nice. It’s so serene there! He’s gone low contact with his dad and has had therapy to help him deal with his disability and being unable to continue his career. As I’ve said, my daughter has cut off contact with their dad completely. It haunts me that they were victims as surely as I was. I try to avoid the guilt. It’s tough to know your lack of action damaged your kids, even when you understand WHY you didn’t act. I try to focus on the fact we all survived and are doing well, considering, but it’s the great regret of my life.
My daughter and her husband left us to spend the night at a fancy hotel in the Loop and returned the next day to pick us up and drive us back to Chicagoland. He’s a trouper and the calmest driver I know, even stuck in traffic on I-294 with a bad storm brewing.
It’s sad seeing how much my siblings have aged. (I’m with myself every day and so see it more gradually in myself, of course.) One reason I’m grateful my kids could join us is that this may be the last year we sibs get together.
There’s more, but forcing you to read through it would be like showing 150 slides of My Trip to the Rutabaga Museum. I like you too much for that.
OK, off to the post office before it gets too hot, then I’ll return and read the MMP. 
And a good late morning here in N. Ali-bama. Slept in past 7:30am and then dressed and sallied forth to do the Firday shopping, 2 stops and $120 later it was done and after putting it all in it’s assigned space I have sammich’ed and hydrated so all is well with the world. Need to pick up my dry cleaning later this afternoon and soccer coaching (U12 kids this time) at 5:30pm. Otherwise should be a quiet day. Already 80F and due to get to 88F but only a 1-in-8 shot for any rain.
Busy night/morning on the ol’ MMP, so let’s be about it.
And I’m sure that flyboy’s all right and not worried about that…
One of the bonuses of working in Foreign Military sales for 30 years is that I got to visit the Boeing (Apache) and Sikorsky (Blackhawk) Helicopter plants and go out on the factory floor…made up in some respects for the 8-hour meetings…
shoe, sweet dreams. You’ve earned them. And bacon sammiches are good for you!
well why the hell not?? 
boo fae, glad you could help and hope good things come to Mom-cat and kits.
swampy, now you’ve given me a gnawin’ and a cravin’ for corn on the cob…
FCM, hope the laundry isn’t more than an upper-tight load… Will have to watch Shetland, I think I was in the same place you were (Lerwick, wasn’t it?). As for hearing aids, I’m coming up on my 1-year anniversary and wouldn’t trade them for anything, they have really made an improvement. If he won’t, you go.
Hippie, all appendages crossed for a successful lasering.
Cookie, perhaps she wasn’t played with…some humans are not as reliable caretakers as we hope. So happy Sadie found you folks (and visa versa). And nice to have a talented musician in the family. Best for the ear exam.
Kaboom, know what you mean about bus service, nothing of the sort in the area I live in, it’s cars or nothing. Frustrating at times when I visit places and see how public transit is done properly.
So say we all (I’m 73).
Pilot, enjoy dinner.
rocky, sounds like you had meetings and made progress; unheard of, I say!!
red
And you just can’t hide it…
Taters, I get tired just reading all the stuff you’re doing.
Thank you, 52 
Only way this old brain can remember them all.
nellie!! Welcome home to the MMP! And VanGo does have a new puppeh,red is about to move in to here new abode in Texas, FCM’s boat has tanks installed and we have a new Mumper, @Mindfield, aka kaboom. I see travel was an interesting time (in the old curse-way). And glad to hear the family reunion was (mostly) wonderful. And while you may have regrets, your kids still love you a lot…never forget that. Ever.
And that’s all from here folks. I’ll return sometime later in the day, now have to go provide my Cologuard ‘sample’ and get that shipped off. Take care all.
Of course! I’m embarrassed that I didn’t consider that possibility!!
My baby bro is < snerk > 69 today. He looks more and more like our dad every time I see him. The sister who’s a year younger than I am has gone mostly gray - she inherited our mother’s hair genes. Even my youngest sis who just turned 60 is looking her age, whatever that means. She was 8 when I left home and I’ve just seen her on and off since then - weird.
Yep - Lerwick. And even if you’ve never been, the series is worth watching. This is our third time thru it.
Not installed - just manufactured and waiting to be installed… soon, I hope.
Back from the convenience center, and lunch has been ingested. Second load in the dryer, third in the washer, first folded and put away. Two more to go. Whew!
Me, too! Three bucks is nutz.
That sammich did the trick, I’ve been unconscious another solid three hours.
Quite the job!
Ah, yes, the post-move scavenger hunt.
Hooo, boy, if you saw my home and my life.
Then again, not being a RDOS I have somewhat of an excuse. On the other hand, I have clean cold weather laundry still sitting around the (clean clothes) hamper cluttering up my living room, and at this point, it’ll just be more efficient to wait the coupla months and dress myself straight out of it. I’ll just be a little rumpled … so what?
Awww, Monks just curled up next to me again. Considering how hard he was gunning for gooshy-fud last night, I think the furry bastard is just sucking up.
Sasquatch came over this morning and removed the mole whose head got crushed yesterday. He reset the trap. Since there was no new activity (new hills, or cracks in the hills he stomped down), he thinks there were only two moles. We paid for a month, so we’ll see what happens over the next couple of weeks. The Spousal Unit says she’ll mow the parts of the front yard that don’t have molehills in them. The bees will not have clover for a little while (except around the molehills).
That’s quite a list that I’m going to read over and immediately forget. 
I am, quite honestly, thankful there’s bus service so close to where I live right now at all. There is service on weekends, but it’s a coach bus that runs once an hour and doesn’t necessarily take me where I want to go. I could take a Lyft or Uber but I ain’t paying that both ways just to go shopping. Besides, the mothly passes I pay for pretty much pay for themselves in transit savings, especially when I’m buying things there’s no way I could take home on the bus.
On the minus side, it means I get out less often, which my watch scolds me for.
20 years your junior here, but feel a lot older than that right now. I really need to get back to the city. I got more exercise there, weirdly.