Grandspawn have been returned to their maternal unit and I just finished riding mowage. The ditches look like crap, but it’s too hot to mess with that. Maybe Firday morning, since I won’t have the kids then.
Supper will be forage. Chillage shall abound! Except for the jumper cables I need to finish.
It’s been a weird day, full of questions that the people asking should have already known the answers to. But I got a lot of small personal tasks done, my work day will be over in less than an hour, and after I get the laundry out of the dryer and make some dinner I’ll have no plans this evening other than chillin’ on the couch with the doggy. Ahhhh.
My therapist has been on vacation, and tomorrow I’ll see her for the first time in two weeks. I might bring up the idea of stopping our sessions. It’s only been 9 months, and I think she’s been helpful, but I’m starting to stress a little about how much I’m spending every month and I feel that the gym membership and personal training are more helpful. Plus, now that I’m leaving work “early” every Thursday (to meet with the trainer) I’m feeling self-conscious about the idea of also being out of the office for 2 hours every Thursday morning. She does offer video sessions, which we’ve done a few times in a pinch, but I’m not a fan and would never want video to be my primary therapy method. I guess I’ll see what she says/thinks.
Taters mentioning zoos and red wolves reminds me of something I recently learned in another thread: there’s a Lakota Wolf Preserve about an hour from where my cousins live in NJ! I love wolves. I have for as long as I can remember. There’s wolf stuff all around my house, and the tattoo I’m in the process of having removed is of a howling wolf (the subject matter isn’t why I’m having it removed). I’ll be going up to NJ again in a month for my cousin’s daughter’s wedding: I won’t have time to fit in a visit to the preserve then, but I will definitely try to do some advance planning for my next trip and see about booking a tour.
Ahhh, gotcha! But I still plan to appropriate “ambition-killing administrivia.” 
Very true…but so many people omit them that I no longer assume omissions are deliberate. 
Oh man, I learned young to never speed on base. Not even 1 mph over the limit. Ever.
HA!
Same here!
Same here!
Same here!
Happily, today I’m not nearly as sore/crippled as I expected to be. I definitely feel it all, but am mostly just a little more tired than usual.
Howdy Y’all! We procured provisions and whilst there I got a text from Sonny’s remindin’ me of their Hump Day ribs and pulled or sliced poke special, so we did that. Matter of fact got back from Sonny’s about twenty minutes ago. Quality cee-mint pond time, nappage, and day drinkin’ have also been achieved.
Pilot I make what I call a Bloody Bubba, which is twelve or sixteen ounces of beer poured in a Solo cup, a sploosh of V8 and a dash of one’s favorite hot sauce. I’ve heard it called red beer, but I think Bloody Bubba is a much better name.
Your Bloody Bubba isn’t too different from the Mexican Michelada. Here’s a somewhat frou-frou (How do you say frou-frou in Spanish 
) version thereof. They can be done pretty rustically too:
Irk was good and I got to play instructor for a new guy who’d never been here. Here being San Jose Costa Rica again. And we arrived via an unusual route landing opposite to normal which was really a grand tour of the entire city / county, the nearby mountains and forests, etc. Very pretty while we had time to look and weren’t in and out of clouds.
Got to the hotel, then off to the groc store where I stocked up on 5# of good coffee & a wonderful little hard sourdough bun as a snack. walked back in light sprinkling rain while I could see that farther down-valley was underneath a real downpour.
We hope to go for fancy dinner in a bit but the rain has moved in so that may have to postpone a half hour, or we’ll uber the few blocks: Aqui Es! - Restaurante y Parrilla Argentinta en Costa Rica (restauranteaquies.com).
That’s similar to a couple of commutes when my irkplace released us early, once for a snow storm (4 hours to go the 23 miles home) and once for the big tornado (4.5 hours for the 10 mile commute).
Some extra cuddles and due diligence to make sure Rocky was on this side of the door this afternoon. 
Your trip to the zoo sounds interesting taters. Enjoy the rest of your vacation.
Irked, came home, walked Nelson, et and now have an armful of little reddish dog. <3
Stay safe and healthy y’all!
It was a local burger joint. I got a burger, fries, and a malt. All were good.
Speaking of food…
I marinaded swordfish steaks in lemon juice (freshly-squeezed), olive oil, oregano, kosher salt, and a little coriander, then grilled them on the barbie with corn onna cob. Good dinner. Two nice portions of swordfish from Trader Joe’s were under $11, and the corn fromTJ’s was 69¢ per ear.
Too late to edit: Lemon juice (freshly-squeezed), olive oil, minced garlic, oregano, kosher salt, and a little coriander
Good thing you clarified that; without the garlic that’d have totally sucked. 
Seriously, with or without garlic that sounded like a perfect marinade. Swordfish & corn is a match made in heaven. And one made in the PNW. You can be rightly proud of your efforts.
Just “home” from dinner. It turned out to be as fine an experience as it portended. Excellent company with my coworker. The 60-something owners are Italian ethnicity but were born and has lived most of their lives in Argentina. Now in CR. So it’s Argentine cuisine as the Italian expat community practices it.
We had a hot focaccia w cold caprese-style toppings w fresh rosemary & basil to start. So thick slices of a good mozzarella and some very flavorful tomatoes. With a bottle of Malbec from an Italian-owned small Argentine winery. Tres bien. Entrees were marinated tenderloins of beef with pasta w pesto & a vinaigrette mixed salad as sides. Along with au poivre sauce, home made chimichurri, and a similar veg-in-oil sauce but made from pickled and non-pickled hot peppers. Quite hot but even more flavorful. The overall effect is a total taste explosion. Big too, as the tenderloins came to about a whole pound with no bone or wastage. Then came dessert: a flan with dulce de leche & whipped cream and a very dark brownie with vanilla ice cream and a Nutella-based sauce. Accompanied by digestifs of sambuca and Frangelico.
Then a half-mile walk home in the light sprinkles. Life is good.
Time to read, write, and digest for a bit then fall asleep.
Evening all. Figured out my digital coupons (just clip them from the Kroger website to my Kroger card and run the card at checkout and Bob’s you Uncle). Also got swimming and sauna in, so decided to overeat and had my planned Sunday Dinner on Wednesday, topped off with a Bruster’s 3-scoop Butter Pecan Waffle cone. So I’ll be paying for that at the gym tomorrow, but damn it was good.
Oopsie, you know yourself pretty well, and hopefully you are able to do some self-evaluation, so if you want to try things without the therapist, go for it but make a list to yourself of things to watch for that might indicate a need to return to her (amateur advice giver).
Pilot, nice trip and dinner and good work on the stockup. We get nearer Thanksgiving somebody remind me to tell the story of the Colombian Air Force and the Turkeys.
OK, AMTRAK Southwest Chief is arriving in LaPlata, Missouri. Off I go, take care all.
GodBody, you’ve got that right! The calls/requests I’ve been receiving at work have been seemingly over the top. I work for a pet boarding service. One of the calls I received was requesting a quote for boarding snakes while a guy had his storm-damaged roof replaced. We mainly deal with dogs, cats, bunnies, birds but this poor guy had 250 snakes. Of course, we couldn’t handle such a number of snakes (he breeds them; they aren’t venomous) but his doggone insurance company is claiming he should be able to find someplace to do it cheap. Yah. Sure. Absolutely no boarding service is set up for that. Poor guy. He was so frustrated. Arsehole insurance company.
Other calls were people wanting us to take their pets at the last minute for a “vacation opportunity” and why won’t we make an exception for them? Spoiled brats. Mind you, for real emergencies, we do make exceptions because my boss is a good soul (an angry soul but a good one) and she does help known customers with placements due to medical emergencies, funeral guests, etc.
Do not pick up the phone. Real people will leave messages. When you pick up the phone, they share your number out with other scammers. That is all.
I heartily agree. Applause.
A friend claims that I just don’t have a filter for appropriateness of my observations but of course I just don’t have a filter for him. Or for other Dopers. Because I take my fun where I find it. And you do too. Also because I find it ridiculous to get squeamish about body fluids when you walk around with the every day. Mind you, some days I can even laugh at my fish phobia, because I do know it is ridiculous. But there it is.
Ah geez, how frustrating. In the long run, will the lack of cars be hard on your mom?
Sari, fingers crossed for you on the house.
Nothing new to report for me. Still at my friend’s house; with luck, I’ll be in the apartment Sunday night. This work/apartment/house bit is wearing on me. I’ll be happy to be down to two locations. But of course, the apartment will be a huge money drain so once there, I need to be job hunting. I’ll probably not be seen much around here then, but I gotta do it. So be it.
New job is going well so far. It worries me slightly just how impressed my sup is with skills I consider pretty basic (such as my typing and reading speeds, plus computer usage), but she’s really nice. Only problem is killer backaches. I hope it’s just that my back is expressing upset about the sudden jump in activity level, such as doing a fair amount of filing and desk drawer sort-out (whoever had my desk before me wasn’t much on organized, apparently).
I am in Ely and it is cold and raining. Ely isn’t big city like Boise so the wifi isn’t great. It is pretty and green.
My plan for tomorrow was a nice easy 6 hour drive home. Instead the York fire is messing up the Los Vegas route and making it a 10 1/2 hour drive home and motel rooms around Vegas are super expensive, so I’m going down through Page and stopping at the WESTERN place again. It was clean and quiet and safe, plus the entertainment value was high. Total driving time will be about the same if the fire in that area doesn’t cause problems, but my room will be about half the price and it will be a prettier drive.
Tonight I am staying at the Rustic Inn and got the fisherman room. “Business hours subject to change during fishing season” sign over the small desk and “Old fishermen never die, they just smell like it” on the wall. There is a fisherman themed wallpaper border and assorted fisherman related wall decorations.
I totally crack up at the “I did that on purpose” attitude cats get when they do that sort of thing.
I used to get sucked into it and would be mad at myself because I know better. Ain’t nobody knows better how to push buttons than family and she is really good.
She is much fatter than me (her fat looks like lard and ripples like jello, my fat is at least semi-toned) and her hair is all gray and unkempt and her bad dentures are tobacco stained. She looked 10 years older than me last time I saw her and she hasn’t aged better since then.
So, yeah, I can be a bitch, LOL!
Thank you, we did have a good time. Mom is still there, when I mentioned wanting to take her to the eclipse next year, her eyes lit up just like old times. If she is able to do it, I will make it happen.
Darn it Polar, don’t you know that you are worrying folks all over the world. No pukey dog, ya hear!!!
I am going to encourage this choice. My hip first started acting up 15 or so years ago. I spent years going to doctors and getting tests done that basically said that I am old and need a hip replacement, but then the world ended and it just didn’t happen.
I started taking Tai-chi to support the instructor. Now, almost a year later, my cane lives in the back seat of my car and I can get up off the floor without help or furniture. Focused exercise has been a life changer for me, I hope it works as well for you.
I LOVE swordfish, I haven’t been able to get it in AZ. I like to broil them and then serve them with a nice mustard sauce.
I think I meant ‘marinated’.
I avoided swordfish since at least the '90s because of sustainability concerns. But I just couldn’t resist any longer.
Play that backache to show how dedicated and efficient you are. Make yourself indispensable!!!
Up, caffeinated, and sheveled. Off to heave.
Neat. I’ve never come in the opposite way when I come back to RDU.
Yay!
Morning, mumpers! It’s currently 15c/59f with a predicted high of 18c/64f, and mostly cloudy. Weather app says “Cloudy, fucking bullshit.” I’d agree with that, there’s some fluffy clouds out there and some stringy ones, and a lot of sun instead. It’s cool, the window’s open and I’m comfortable in the office. Only three of us in today so it’ll be a quiet day too.
JtC I’m sure you’ve more than earned the right to bitch about your sister, she sounds awful and the mental picture I’m painting is not exactly flattering!
Oopsie are you following me round the gym, lady?! Today is upper body so it promises lat pulldowns, cable rows, flat dumbbell bench, lateral raises, cable rope pushdowns and dumbbell hammer curls. Oh, joy!
Seanette your supervisor obviously knows quality when she sees it! I’m glad the new gig is going well too.
Taters your day out sounds perfect. We looked at that area for one of our trips and had seen that particular zoo, sadly the trip didn’t work out and we went in a different direction. I have mixed feelings about zoos too, I know the design of enclosures has come a long way since I first remember going to a zoo, and the breeding programmes are invaluable for endangered species. Being able to reintroduce animals to their natural environment is just inspiring. My local zoo does great work too, I did a “waking up with the animals” experience there and got to feed giraffes!
Busy evening yesterday - got home and dealt with litter trays, then made today’s breakfast (overnight oats), today’s lunch (mediterranean veg and sardines), and last night’s dinner (chorizo, bulgar wheat and veg stirfry) with some leftover from last night for another day’s lunch. Then I went to the pub with a couple of friends and was proper saintly as I didn’t have anything stronger than council pop
Now it’s time to see what delights await in the irk inboxes…
Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN ‘Tis 74 Amurrkin out and clear with a predicted high of 93 and N.O.S. for the day. No big plans at all for the day. High sloth and general overall uselessness shall rule, to include quality cee-mint pond time, nappage, and day drinkin’. Sup shall be fried salmon patties, peas, smashed N.O.T. and bizkits due to a gnawin’ and a cravin’ on both our parts.
JtC safe travels back home. Sounds like some what of an adventure due to the fires, but you do get a return visit to cowboyland motel, so there’s that.
BooFae I had to look up “council pop.” HEE! That gave me an early mornin’ giggle.
Nettie glad you’re likin’ the new gig. Hope the back gets less achy. Your boss obviously appreciates someone who is competent and can get stuff done.
Pilot your sup sounds yummy! I can picture myself bein’ absolutely stuffed and miserable, but happy and sayin’ it was worth it.
MetalMouse is the story of the Colombian Air Force and the Turkeys anything like this?
Now I need more caffeine and to feed rumbly tummy. Then, onward into the day! Rah.
Happy Thursday Y’all!
Another cool night with the windows open. It’s funny how noisy it is outside when I open them, but come morning, it’s sooo still! Unless it’s trash day - then all bets are off.
Not sure what I’ll do with the kids today. Thankfully, it’s just 3 more weeks till Roxy goes to school - it’s easier to entertain one at a time - especially Tobias. It’s supposed to be a pretty nice day today - I may actually take them to a playground again. We shall see.
It’s Giant Rubber Duck weekend in Leonardtown - tho rain is threatened tomorrow. FCD doesn’t want to go - it’s difficult for him to do much walking these days. I want to see the duck, so I may just go myself to take a few pics, then come home. Dunno.
He wants to go out in the boat on Saturday - we’ll see how that plays out. And, of course, we’ll be working at the school, trying to get the network and PA systems done. Same old, same old.
Oh well - Happy Thursday!
I totally forgot till I saw the calendar - 50 years ago today, I reported to the Recruit Training Command (Women) in Orlando - Navy boot camp. I’d enlisted on a whim and it turned out to be a life-long association with the Navy - even now, I live less than 20 miles from a Naval Air Station. FIFTY YEARS!! That’s HALF A CENTURY!!! 