Whenever I hear of Boudica, I can’t help but think ‘Booty Call’.
Sorry.
{{{{MG}}}}
Could do with a lot more bsurds, too.
red and Metal Mouse, it’s been forty years since I was last in Chi. Can’t remember which museum I went to then, but I’ve been to Science & Industry a couple times and to the Field Museum and the Aquarium several times. We went down to Philly a couple times 10-12 years back, and visited the Franklin Institute both times – they have a nice, though small, section on trains.
9 miles today. Took water, so while everything aches, I’m not dizzy or anything.
I passed someone sitting on the ground with her head on her knees, a position of utter despair. I asked her if she was OK. Her face was tear-stained, and she was high. We talked for a bit. I made sure she had a place to spend the night and gave her money for food. She’ll probably spend it on drugs, and that’s OK. I hate when people use drugs as an excuse not to help out addicts. It’s not like they’ll quit because they have no money. If I saved her from having to turn a trick or steal, fine. Seeing the surprised delight on her face made it money well spent. I hope she remembers it’s in her pocket. And I hope she finds her way.
I love the Museum of Science and Industry! Mom used to take us when we were kids. My son loved it when he was a kid. My favorite place was the Adler Planetarium. I still love it. And the Art Institute, Field Museum, and the Shedd Aquarium. And a walk along the lakefront.
Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN ‘Tis 56 Amurrkin out and clear with a predicted high of 79 with rain/tstorms/apocalypse possible this afternoon. Mowage shall be accomplished today. It shall. It must. This mornin’. So mote it be! Sup shall be either majik intartoobz pizza or we shall swipe The General’s sup. This is still up for debate. I lean toward swipin’ The General’s sup.
Nettie shall we cross appropriate/inappropriate appendages for the possible new gig?
Nellie I say you did a good thing givin’ her some money. Maybe she did get sump’n to eat instead of drugs. Maybe your kindness will be the thing that gets her on the way to turnin’ her life around. You never know!
Wizard great news about Mrs. Wizard! Celebratory Krispy Kremes are always a good thing!
Now I need more caffeine and to feed rumbly tummy. Then onward into the day! Rah.
Happy Thursday Y’all!
And our are nearly done. Tulips are up, and lots of grape hyacynths. Forsythia are also nearly done blooming. And day lilies are going crazy - no blooms yet, but tons of plants. I need to move some.
I am endlessly amazed at how adept the RoxStar is with technology. I know it’s no big deal to her - it’s all she’s ever known - but I still can’t quite wrap my head around a toddler navigating a touch screen to play a game, then playing the game with its variations. What a world!
Growing up in Baltimore, we got to DC and the Smithsonian often - way back in the day when the rockets were still housed at the castle (pre-Air and Space Museum days) As kids, our favorite was the Natural History Museum. Plus there was the whole mall to run around!
Baltimore has a Museum of Industry (temporarily closed) that I enjoyed because it’s a trek to my childhood. I only went there once, but it was full of memories for me.
It’s semi-overcast but theoretically it won’t rain till tonight, maybe. Everything in the back yard got a good soaking yesterday and I’ll do my best to get my veggies planted today. I also need to figure out the chicken wire barriers.
Carpet guy will be here later this morning, then we’ll need to go to their showroom to decide what we want on the floor. We don’t necessarily have to do that today, since nothing will happen before May. But I hope we can decide and place an order before we go - assuming it’s not stupid expensive. It’s just a basement after all…
Nettie - happy thoughts for a new, better gig!
Cheers and confetti for all the assorted good news and good deeds!
Happy Thursday!
Afternoon, mumpers! It’s bright and shiny out there today, typical as I’m back at work so stuck indoors all day. I’ve made good use of my time and done the laundry though.
Weather app says “Go away, you silly weather, and I shall fucking taunt you no more” while promising me 11C/52F with partly cloudy skies. That looks fairly accurate for a change, it is cloudy but there are patches of blue and a glimmer of sun.
I have read but retained little. We visited DC a couple of years ago and were lucky enough to meet up with some Mumpers for a very enjoyable lunch. We spent the rest of the day wandering around looking at early aircraft and space stuff. That was a fun day out indeed.
In holiday mode, I’ve just booked a few days down in Kent for me and ‘im indoors. I had intended to go and visit our family graves down there and also take a small amount of my mum’s ashes to put in with my dad’s. When he died, we had his ashes interred in his parents’ grave but won’t be able to do that for mum partly because she asked for her ashes to be scattered in the Peak District where she loved to go walking, and partly because we can’t officially open the grave again (but I can sneak a bit of mum in there). Now I just have to persuade my boss that the world won’t end if I’m not around for a week.
What a pig-miserable day it is outside. At least the lawn will get watered. I did the shopping last night. The kale at Wally World was flabby and undesirable, so the rabbit is having to suffer the indignity of turnip greens. He eventually gobbled down his breakfast. I think I’ll give him one of the broccoli crowns for lunch. That’ll keep him occupied and give him something to chew on.
I’m taking Fang for his first Covid shot this afternoon. He was disappointed that it was the Pfizer shot and not the J&J “one and done” shot. The boy is seriously needle-phobic. I shudder to think of how he’ll get through Air Force Basic.
nellie - I do not envy you your conversations. One of Fang’s friends came out as trans a couple of years ago. the poor kid was practically disowned by his parents, and they would only allow him to wear dresses and female attire. We happened to have quite a lot of clothes that Fang had outgrown, but did not yet fit Spike, so we allowed Fang’s friend to take what he wanted. He’s a good kid, and I liked him right up until he came out as a Carolina fan. (I’ve got standards!)
nellie, you’re an amazing lady.
I hope Fang’s shot goes well and that the Mrs. keeps improving!
And good luck with the stump, hippie. It looks like a beast.
Today’s shaping up to be…indeterminate. I’ve been sitting here for a half hour waiting for my work laptop to finish updating itself with goodness knows what. I have another big deliverable today and I’ve been avoiding it like the plague. I drafted it a couple of weeks ago and now I’ve got to dust it off, but the skeleton I have shouldn’t take more than an hour to flesh out and then I just hit send.
Oh, well - things could be way, way, way worse. Overlygirl was off to school this morning relatively happily with no apparent large issues. Overlyboy is finally dragging his sorry butt out of bed last minute for class. Meetings are fairly fantastically sparse, but it just occurred to me that I’ll be on a zoom for a friend’s new baby’s naming ceremony and I haven’t showered. Well, poop. Guess I oughta do that at some point. I’m not shevled at all.
I scored some cheap chocolate yesterday!
Emily, yeah on the chocolate!
Wizard, I can sympathize with Fang; hated shots too when I was a young man. Got over it in my 40’s… And good on you for helping his friend.
boo fae, enjoy the holiday, even if it begins for melancholy reasons.
nellie, you’re right, it probably didn’t get used as you would have wished, but that doesn’t mean you don’t ever try. Good on you.
OK, don’t have enough milk in the house for my Instant B’fast and it’s been raining steadily since about 2am, so probably BLT’s will be the morning repast. All y’all take care now.
I was overruled.
Of course I would never tease my cow-orker about her name, which is DeDe, but I have to get it out. She should have sisters named Bebe, Ceecee, Effie, Fifi, Gigi, Kiki, and Mimi.
AWESOME CHECKBOOK HACK!
‘My world has changed forever.’ - Anna Flaxis
‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ - Attila James
‘Awesome!’ - Jenny Talia
Just kidding. It’s not a checkbook hack. It’s not even new. A couple of decades ago my credit union sent me ‘carbon copy’ checks instead of the traditional ones. Great! Since I have a copy in case I forget to record it! My old checkbook had a flap you could up under the checks so you don’t end up with layers of scrawling. About 10 years ago, my old checkbook (with a KROQ sticker on it) finally got too raggedy to use. I got a new, leather one. This one didn’t have a writing flap. So I cut a check-sized piece out of a manila folder and used that. I lost it (or rather the second one – they last for years and years) last week or so. So today at the orifice I used the paper guillotine to make some more.
Yeah, that’s how exciting my life is. 
This reminded me of a steel sailboat we saw at a marina some eons ago. Named Effie O’Two. What a great name! (For those not of a chemistry mindset, FeO2 is rust.)
Our carpet guy made a great suggestion that we’re going to go with - peel and press carpet tiles. He had some installed in their showroom office and they’re perfect - 24" X 24" in shades of gray and black. Great for hiding dirt, and he suggested we order an extra box of tiles in case we have to replace any along the way. He said he’d get back to us tomorrow or Moanday with a price, and if it’s not too obscene, we’ll set up installation for after we get back from FL.
We also went to Tequila Grill for lunch, which was OK. I like Salsa’s better, but Salsa’s was in the wrong direction from the carpet place. And we came home to pics of Roxy’s first haircut! I posted a before and after on FB - really, my daughter just had it evened all around. When poofed out, it’s a rather impressive 'fro, but she had it pulled back into a little bun - really cute.
This morning, I got some work done in the front yard, including some transplanting. Now I’m going to get back in to my grubbies and start planting veggies.
Onward!!
Nettie I HIGHLY recommend registering with your county. The county got back to me almost immediately, but the MyTurn site took weeks and then referred me to Safeway pharmacies, which had no appts.
BooFae your weather app is socially literate! I love it.
Today I may either cuddle up inside all day or do something. Who knows what. Honestly it feels more like a cuddle up day. I’ve got water dripping out of my right eye, which is usually a sign of a bad head day.
My computer keyboard is failing completely and I need to mail the computer off to Apple for repairs. I think I’ll buy the iPad because I don’t know how to manage without my electronics. 
The Big Project has been sent to the powers that be. Here I thought I just needed to plug stuff in, but I looked at it and realized that the people who matter wouldn’t understand it and redid the whole thing.
Now, I wait. And get overlygirl in a few minutes. And take overlyboy to the bank because I bribed him with money for good grades and he wants to save some. Oh, yeah - and work some more while the powers that be decide if they agree or disagree with my recommendations. I’m friends with said powers - we go way back - but like my boss, you’d better have your stuff together if you talk to her about work or so help you, you’ll get your butt handed to you on a platter. I guess immediate feedback is better than no feedback?
I got the ejection seat out of storage yesterday afternoon. Tomorrow I’ll go to the hardware store for a sheet of 1/2-inch OSB and a 2x4. The plan is to make a ‘sheath’ that goes over the inclined back, the front, and the top and bottom of the sheet. Then I’ll have to get a couple of wardrobe boxes to make into one big box to put it in, and take it to FedEx.
I went to a FedEx place at lunch to get a couple of boxes, but they didn’t have them there. They directed me to Home Despot. They didn’t have any either. I was wearing my NASA Dryden Flight Research Center (now Armstrong FRC) windbreaker, and the guy who was directing me to the boxes happened to be an aviation fan. Anyway, I’ll stop in Bellingham on the way home, and see about getting the boxes at FedEx there.
I did get a bunch of wine at CostCo, so the outing wasn’t wasted.
Lowe’s also sells packing boxes, as do most U-haul depots. U-haul charges 2-3 times more of course but it might be better than going without. The u-haul wardrobes I bought years ago had a steel rod that did a dandy job of stabilizing the assembled box.
Lowe’s.com online will tell you what box is in stock in what store in however large a mile radius you ask it to. U-haul I never trusted farther than I could throw them and I always called and spoke to a human and reserved the supplies by paying for them with a credit card.
Hell, I could spend most of a day just looking at their train layout. 
We made an early trip to Costco this morning, and then stopped at Safeway to pick up Wifey’s prescription. On the end of one of the aisles they had a display of what I call ‘emergency lunches’. Those heat and eat kinda things, for $2 a piece if you bought 4. They only had 3 of the pineapple chicken steamers, so I grabbed those and a Marie Callender’s meatless chicken pot pie to try. What a waste. I anticipated that there would be some sort of ersatz chicken-like substance in there, but I expected vegetables too. There were a few peas, and that was about it. It was mostly crust, which the pups were happy about. I am so done with Marie Callendar’s anything.
I have yet to see any cheap chocolate, but I’m a chocolate snob anyway. I only lust after dark chocolate. The mass produced stuff they sell at Easter does nothing for me.
Can I still be part of the gang?
Nothing on the Lowe’s website, so I called FedEx in B’ham and they’ll hold the only two big boxes they have for me and I’ll pick them up on the way home.