The Busyness - AGAIN!

Another weekend, more fun! Friday was our traditional "plan lots of stuff but collapse because it's FRIDAY and it's been a long week" day. I did have more than a little actual work to do in the day - several conference calls, some updated documentation... I'd love it if I just worked M-Th and had a true 3-day weekend every week, but it doesn't quite work that way. BUT it's hourly work, and I don't mind.

Pamela had a dinner out with her church people on Friday night, so it was Dad and the Kids having some fun... Pamela has been starting to ramp up her involvement in church again, which is great. I do think they bring a wonderful network of support, plus it's a bunch of smart people who are fun to talk with. Of course you run into the navel gazers: There was a hilarious/frustrating bit where someone decided to do a drive to collect towels for a men's shelter (so that the guys can dry off from their showers). All was going well, until someone decided to mandate that "we should only be giving hand towels - big fluffy bath towels are a luxury and cause more environmental impact because they take more water to wash."

Yeah, because those homeless guys are living in the lap of luxury with their big bath towels... Just makes you want to strangle people for missing the dang POINT. Hey, we do what we can: When I travel, I don't have the sheets changed for my 3 nights, so I'm doing my part. But if a dude wants enough towel to wrap around his waist and walk around, I think we can allow that.

Pamela handled it very well, to the point of getting people coming up to her congratulating her on her poise. Love it.

Saturday was Isaac's last day swimming at Foss in the "Tots 4" - he was swimming 6 feet from the stairs to the island without any help or floating devices... which was amazing. He's a great swimmer just like his sister. Bella finished Foss too, and won't be going back this fall - she'll be doing Synchro instead!

Had the boys over for an Avenging Saturday Night, and we had a very wild lineup of bottles that wouldn't pop to mind as "obvious" - a sherried, ancient Glenlivet, a rum casked Springbank, the last of my Birthday Bunnahabin 25, a wildly complex Rosebank (tasting notes - finish of iron filings. REALLY), the legendary sherried Talisker 20, a brilliant Caol Ila, and a new Port Askaig (tasted like a creamy Ardbeg). It had been 8 weeks since our last avenging, and it was just so wonderful to see Ant and Chicken again.

Zinsser decided that Ant and Chicken were a disruption to the very stability of our Pack, however, and spent a lot of time bark bark barking... until they bribed their way into the pack with dog treats. Then Zinsser was happy to be sitting with us in the basement, swimming in the malt smells.... The movie was 3:10 to Yuma again (Chicken hadn't seen it), and it was completely brilliant AGAIN. Bale and Crowe were wonderful...

Oh, and we decided to rent a Rug Doctor to get some cleanup from our weeks of puppy training... and that was some foul water coming out of that machine. Some rugs took 2-3 passes.... Plus the weekly mowing... Grocery shopping, fridge cleanout... Oh I got into trouble on that one. I have a fear of leftovers in general, and so when I look at a fridge full of to-go containers, I reflexively start tossing them out.

Unfortunately, I tossed out some things that were actually more fresh than I had thought (which was funny since I actually brought them home myself on Friday - 48 hours is quite acceptable), and I got a cross phone call at the airport - Pamela had been looking forward to those leftovers. ATT decided to add to the fun by dropping the call 3 times, so I called to apologize 3 times, and was made to swear a blood oath not to toss out leftovers without clearing it with the person who actually LIKES them.

I want to go on record as saying I do have a problem with leftover maintenance and I am too quick to toss. I will work on that.

I'm back on the east coast again: Flew out late tonight - it's actually much more mellow to do it this way - the airport is peaceful, the flight crews are a little loopy, and it's easy to catch some zzz's on the plane, which unfortunately leads to having energy at midnight to update blog posts, I suppose....