I hit a milestone the other week – one year at the new “job”. That means that bennies start kicking in – like accrued vacation. So, I took Saturday as a vacation day.

Initially, with my day off on Friday, a vacation day Saturday, and the store being closed on Sunday, we were looking forward to having a long weekend together, as a family, for the first time in a while. We were full of grand plans, like clearing out the detritus of living in the same place for more than ten years and having a garage sale. That fell apart on Friday, when I didn’t get any sleep Thursday night and spent the day taking care of MEG while TMBWitW was at work – normal Friday stuff, except I didn’t get the chance to go through the piles and start filling the garage with sale items. Then, Friday night, we ended up staying up way too late, doing things around the house – laundry, dishes, etc. – and figured the heck with it, we’ll just sleep in.

Saturday morning (late morning!) we met pastor’s wife and the girls for breakfast (Pastor had to work at the hamburger joint) at Denny’s. You know, where the Baconalia thing is going on? Well, I had the bacon breakfast. Two eggs, hash browns, bacon, bacon, bacon, and a side of bacon. Yummers.

MEG and I attended the birthday party of a young man from church – it was at Castles ‘N Coasters. A great day for the park. MEG was looking forward to the roller coaster. She kept begging me to take her on the roller coaster. Until the first loop, that is – then she was willing to wait a few years before she did that again. She had the height to ride, but not the upper body strength to keep her head up in the high-G sections. Other than that, she enjoyed the day, except for the waiting in line parts.

Mother’s day went well, except for the part where we, as a family, were going to pick out a couple of pretty things for TMBWitW (i try to avoid buying things for her without her knowing about it, no, there is no surprise, but the satisfaction rate is way up while the return rate is way down). That just never happened. Sunday evening we had dinner at Denny’s (i don’t know, it just worked out that way). I finished my dinner with a sundae.

A Maple Bacon Sundae.

Now, I am not one to avoid sweets very often. I love me a good sugar rush now and again.

However.

Oh, my goodness. I could not finish the sundae for all the sweet syrup and ice cream. Don’t get me wrong – I managed to find all the bits of bacon hidden in that frozen delicacy – but the syrup is just over the top.

I highly recommend the Maple Bacon Sundae for all your sugar rush needs!

Chat ya later…

Thank you for stopping by, In GOD We Trust, God bless you all, don’t buy or breed cats or dogs while homeless pets die (spay, neuter & adopt a pet, one by one, until there are none), Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

A most happy anniversary wish to my best friend – The Most Beautiful Woman in the World. It’s only been ten years, but it has flown by like ten days. It’s felt like ten days, but I feel like I’ve known you forever.

And, you are such a saint for putting up with ME!

I’ve had enough of the “me first” and the “you don’t count because you are ________” crowd. Last night was the final straw.

I am normally a pretty patient person while behind the wheel of a motor vehicle (with a couple of exceptions), and I usually give the other guy the benefit of the doubt. Not any more. I drive an SUV, and I used to do it with a small-car attitude – as in, you are in a hurry, go right ahead and speed past me and cut me off, I’ll back off and make allowances for you.

Last night, on the way home from Pastor’s house after watching a movie and enjoying pizza and fellowship, we stopped at the QT at Bethany Home and Grand. For those of you unfamiliar with Grand Avenue in Phoenix, it runs along side the ATSF Burlington tracks, at an angle, from 7th Ave and Van Buren out to northwest of town where it becomes US 60. After filling up TMBWitW‘s car, I pulled onto Grand to make the left onto Bethany and continue home. I got the green arrow, started the turn, and got honked at.

By the obliviot running the red light on Grand.

I had seen them starting across the intersection, after I made the turn, so I had made allowances to avoid a collision. I flashed my high beams at them (it was around 2100 hours and full dark) and received a few single digit salutes in return from the juvenile interior of the other car.

This really makes me wonder, just how entitled are people getting to feel? Do they really think they can disregard traffic control devices with impunity? Are they so brazen to think that they would get off scot-free if they were involved in (read: caused) a collision? What if it hadn’t been me, but some short tempered guy with a concealed weapon (legal in Arizona without a permit, BTW!) and a very low tolerance for jerks? True, this contradicts what I wrote about an armed society being a polite society – but then, it is a learning process. Maybe the kids in the car hadn’t learned about that yet. Maybe they haven’t been taught that running a red light is against the law. Maybe they haven’t learned that driving at night takes a different kind of concentration and awareness.

Maybe they are just dumb.

I can make allowances for a lot of things, but unless they have their “DUMB DRIVER ON BOARD” sticker displayed prominently, it’s tough to make an allowance for that.

My friend Greybeard just bought a motorcycle for commuting. Sure hope he doesn’t have the same kinds of drivers around him.

Ya’ll have a good day, I’m off to court to show support for my Pastor. The city of Phoenix is trying to tell him that he can’t have bible studies on his own property, and that the size of family gatherings is somehow limited. Prayers, please.

Chat ya later…

Thank you for stopping by, In GOD We Trust, God bless you all, don’t buy or breed cats or dogs while homeless pets die (spay, neuter & adopt a pet, one by one, until there are none), Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

Chiropractor. Arrange for MEG to be at a sitter. Purchase the right kind of plywood for a project. Close one account. Cut the ply for the project. Pick up MEG from the sitter. And TMBWitW put one last item on the list last night – “Buy your wife a new car (1967 Mustang convertible)”.

That last one doesn’t look like it’s going to be happening any time soon!

Happy Birthday to my little brother, BK – 44 today.

Oh, and a big ol’ (belated) Happy Birthday to that old scoundrel, Larry.

Chat ya later…

Thank you for stopping by, In GOD We Trust, God bless you all, don’t buy or breed cats or dogs while homeless pets die (spay, neuter & adopt a pet, one by one, until there are none), Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!

So – up nice and early, to put the brake pads on TMBWitW’s Camry. One wheel off, pull the old pads, compare – huh. Not quite the same. Gather up the worn out pads, the box of new pads, and head for the 24 hour Checker. No problem, they said – it appears you got the American version of pads, when the car is a Japanese version. Compare pads, bingo! Back to the house, the rest of the job goes smoothly. Too late for TMBWitW to take the Camry to work, so she had taken off in the SUV when I got back from Checker.

That means that after a leisurely morning of catching up on my blog friends, and waiting for MEG to wake up, we can wander downtown to have lunch with her! Maybe we can get into the Paper Plate so I can say hi to my former bosses – I haven’t seen them for a while, so this will be good.

In the meantime – how the heck are all of you? I know I haven’t been around to your blogs much, lately, but that is slowly changing as I get accustomed to the new schedule after being out of full time work for so long. That, and getting off of Farmville! That thing is a major timesuck. I was spending most of my time trying to get fuel – I had the minimalist approach going, where all I was doing was crops and a hen house, with enough room for the tractor, seeder, and harvester. Something like 571 plots. That’s why I needed fuel – to click that many times for harvesting, plowing, and planting was chewing up about an hour and a half unless I had the fuel for the machines. So – I quit it (again!) and blocked it this time. Last time I quit it I didn’t block it, and eventually got sucked back into it. No more! I’m FREE!

ahem. pardon me.

So – here it is, Friday, and I’ve got my favorite Friday polo on. It’s a quiet morning, and the temps are still in the low 100’s so it should be a pretty nice summer day. Ya’ll take care now!

Chat ya later…

Thank you for stopping by, In GOD We Trust, God bless you all, don’t buy or breed cats or dogs while homeless pets die (spay, neuter & adopt a pet, one by one, until there are none), Wear Red on Fridays, and support Warriors for Innocence!