We Contemplate on Beans in Sharing 513

[Lynx]

In local news: Remember how Chel likes to gadabout visiting friends all over the world? Another peregrinating, peripatetic friend has dropped by, a friend named Kim from another forum. She's stopping here for about a week, then visiting a friend in Virginia for about 20 days.

So far we have visited the Olde Towne Spaghetti Store, the Cheesecake Factory, McKay's bookstore, Opryland Hotel, the Mewsic City Cat Cafe, Wednesday night church service and a couple malls. Still on the itinerary is visiting a hole-in-the-wall diner, a family dinner, a tutorial on how to use screencast devices, a tutorial on how to use a Fire Stick media viewer, a tutorial on how bicycle gears work, a tutorial on how to edit pictures, church service Sunday, church Fall Festival Sunday night (and pie contest!) and a road trip to Virginia with a short layover at my mother's house in east TN.

So far she has been delighted with everything we have visited. And she's not the kind to act delighted when she's not. I think I gauged it right when I was suggesting places for her to see while she was here.

On a side note, if you ever have a chance to go to the Cheesecake Factory, go. (That one was Kim's suggestion, not mine.) Don't go very often (or you'll go broke real fast) but do go at least once. The prices are of course high, but I reserved my opinion until I tasted the product. The cheesecake I tried was good, and the baked avocado roll I tried was exceptional.

[MsJennJenn]

I have a neighborhood cat I give snacks to. I've named him Newton. He is actually a she. But I still call it a him and call him Newton. haha

I'm meh about Cheesecake Factory. It's a slow restaurant as far as service goes and it's expensive.
But I don't like cheesecake anyway so not worth it for me.

[Lynx]

The cheesecake was good. It wasn't great, but it was good. The real food... that was great.

[Roscoe]

Wound up taking the day off because Chey's eye doctor appointment was changed. She doesn't need glasses thank God. I manage to torque myself off by twisting a fitting off of the brass gas line for the fireplace, so I have to go tomorrow and get a new fitting.
I intend to sleep half the day though.

[The Purple Fuzzy]

Not much interesting here except I got to see Chel & Bobby today.

[Lynx]

Today I'm cooking pizza eggs for my breakfast, scrambled quiche for many meals to put in the freezer for Grandma, baked chocolate pudding just because, chocolate chip cookies to take on a trip Monday, and a pot of chili to take to church tomorrow.

At least I hope I get all that made.

[sunlight]

We had to save the cat. Lol. He picked him up by his neck at first. Lol.

[Roscoe]

Best way to pick up the beast. I fixed the propane fireplace today. Had to buy a flare tool- again- but it works and that's all that matters. Spent most of the day off and on talking with someone by text that wanted my jeep. He decided to offer me a thousand dollars less than I asked and seemed offended that I turned him down.
And I pulled out the stops and cooked chop steak in mushroom gravy and mashed potatoes, anticipating my wife would come home and have a nice dinner. Nope, she went to some baby shower and ate finger foods, so I wasted my time. And, I've evidentially pulled my right hip out of socket and am in mucho pain.

[Lynx]

Well yesterday was... eventful.

That friend Kim who came through to visit on her way to Virginia, remember her? Yesterday we popped out to a local hole-in-the-wall diner for a really good burger and her first taste of fried catfish.

While there... THE STORM HIT!

It didn't dump much rain, this storm, but the wind!! Every single road had a tree down across it. I don't know of any houses that did not have wind damage. In about half an hour my whole town was wrecked. I tried to get home from five different directions and couldn't get there.

Fortunately people with chainsaws were everywhere too. Lord bless them, I'm glad they can use those things because I can't and you really don't want me to try. They cut paths through all the trees and we finally got home. In one mile of back road between the highway and my house there were four trees down. You wouldn't believe how many power lines were wasted. We might not get power back up for three weeks or a month! Of course there was no cell phone signal.

We decided to retreat to a McDonald's at a neighboring town and consider our options. Sticking around was useless because there was nothing we could do. Grandma had already been picked up and taken to Aunt Diane's house. So we looked up the cost of changing a car rental reservation... huh. Not bad.

The original plan had us heading east Monday morning, picking up the rental car in Nashville, spending Monday night at my mother's house, then heading to Virginia on Tuesday. The revised plan had us driving to Nashville last night, picking up the rental car about noon today and spending two nights with Mom... which she doesn't mind at all, as she was commenting that an overnight stay didn't give a lot of time for talking.

So last night after we used McD's as an emergency fall-back base we started driving east. We hit Nashville and began looking for a hotel. This, it turns out, was a mistake. Nashville is hosting a large number of events right now and a large number of people are packing out hotels all over. We should have crashed just outside of Nashville where they actually have space. But slightly after midnight, after eight or nine hotels, we finally found one with rooms available.

Now we have a few hours of sleep and we are ready to continue to Mom's. Stay tuned to this station for late breaking reports.

[Lynx]

Pastor of my church sent out a message there is now no water or gas in my town. Anybody from the periphery who has power is asked to cook soup or something and bring it to church to feed people in need and those working to dig out.

And here I am on a road trip. There's nothing I could have done to help if I had been there, as I have no resources... but I feel like a heel anyway, running out on them. :-/

[The Purple Fuzzy]

Wow, Isaac, that's crazy.

[Roscoe]

Wow. Ya'll got hammered it sounds like. It was beautiful here today- a bit cool. Back to work tomorrow..

[Roscoe]

Man, where did everyone go? I made it through the day, came home and have burgers on the grille. I bought a cheap grill from Walmart back in the summer...really wish I had stepped up and bought my dream grille. This'n don't work none too well. LOL
I want a new Pitboss pellet grille/smoker, but I don't wanna pay the price they want for it...
Church went well last night. I will be glad when the half of the church that is sick recovers enough to come to church. When you have a small congregation, every absence is keenly felt. And even more so when the folks that are sick are your backbone...

[The Purple Fuzzy]

It's  been a busy day getting stuff done here.

[sunlight]

Man, where did everyone go? I made it through the day, came home and have burgers on the grille. I bought a cheap grill from Walmart back in the summer...really wish I had stepped up and bought my dream grille. This'n don't work none too well. LOL
I want a new Pitboss pellet grille/smoker, but I don't wanna pay the price they want for it...
Church went well last night. I will be glad when the half of the church that is sick recovers enough to come to church. When you have a small congregation, every absence is keenly felt. And even more so when the folks that are sick are your backbone...

Robbie has been mentioning those pellet grills too.

[Nelle]

Jeremy ~had~ to have one a couple of years ago. He's still in love, but it doesn't get used as much since he doesn't get home from work until really late. Usually just maybe on Sundays or a random day off. He wants me to learn to use it, but I don't want to learn to grill, because then it's my responsibility Haha.


@Work. We had a good time. It's a beautiful area, even with all of the road construction. Jeremy's game friends were all very nice. Weekend went by too quickly.

It's misted two days now. I keep asking the weather in the mornings, and this morning it had 10% rain. I figure that's as close to 0 without being zero. I walk outside and smacked with mist. LOL. I had to quickly cover my sister-in-law's birthday card so it wouldn't get wet.

[MsJennJenn]

I grill all of the time. It's easy. I have a propane one though.

[Roscoe]

I've been too tight to buy a propane grille. And the more I read about the Pitboss pellet smoker/grille, the more I want one.
Was a long day today. Mucho busy. Mucho people not doing what they are supposed to which annoyed me. Part of the job though. And it is cool here. Glad I got the fireplace fixed....it knocks the chill off without cranking up the central heat and overdoing it.

[Lynx]

I am SO ready for October to be over! This whole trip has been major stress and a significant excursion outside my comfort zone. And I wouldn't have missed it for worlds.

It started the week before I picked up the friend who came over to visit. I found out my car's tailpipe fell off. NOOO! This is the vehicle I need to make it all the way to Nashville three times in a week! I called somebody and got a new one put on fast.

Next week my friend came in. I picked her up at the airport Tuesday and went to the Cheesecake Factory.

Wednesday we went to the Olde Towne Spaghetti Store and church.

Thursday we went to Nashville and toured a cat cafe, McKay's bookstore, Opryland Hotel and Opry Mills mall. Then we went home and fell over.

Friday I taught her how to use a screencast dongle and edit pictures.

Saturday we went to a hole-in-the-wall restaurant that has good burgers, and my town got blasted by a storm. Saturday night we retreated to a McDonald's that had power and internet and quickly researched the cost of picking up the rental car a day early. Then we drove east, crashing in Nashville... at about the eighth hotel, as all previous ones we checked were booked solid. Many events in Nashville that day, they said.

Sunday we tried to pick up the rental car. They said since we used a debit card when we made the reservation, we had to wait 24 hours to pick up the car. My friend quickly ascertained what would be necessary to get the car NOW and paid for it with her credit card. Grrrr... I was driving the car so I wanted the deposit to be on me. Now if I mess the car up SHE will have to pay for it. Not happy. But we were on the road and reached my mother's home in east TN safely (after a quick stop at the Knoxville McKay's. My friend was impressed by the McKay's both in Nashville and Knoxville.)

Monday was downtime for recuperation.

Tuesday (yesterday) I drove my friend on to Virginia, then drove myself and the rental car back. That was a lot of driving.

Today I am returning the rental car in Nashville, then going home to a house that now has water but still no power.

Tomorrow is my first day back at w*rk, and it's gonna be a hectic one. All the loonies come out and get real drunk on Halloween. The longer you are there the weirder the day becomes.

Can we fast forward to November? October is wearing and stressing me out. I just wanna crawl back into my hole and hibernate for half a month or so.

[Roscoe]

Yeah October has not been the most pleasant. November may be as bad though. I'm not the happiest this time of year. I start getting my cheer back on in the spring...

[MsJennJenn]

All I got out of that was that you had a GIRL in town.....OOOOOOOO 

[Lynx]

Don't get your hopes up. My friend has a habit of going to visit people. Just like somebody else we know...

[Nelle]

Sounds like you had a LOT of people time! I don't mean to sound like Seth, but.. almost too much peopley time for me! LOL..


@Work. Just finished lunch and purchased a few gifts online for Christmas. Making plans to visit a craft bazaar on Saturday at a local UPC church with some coworkers. I like going to things like that with people. Jeremy's never off on Saturdays unless he specifically asked off for it, so this will work! Hopefully I won't find anything to buy except maybe some baked goods.

Tried to work on the church books last night, but my laptop has decided it doesn't like to work. Jeremy started trying to offload some programs we don't use to see if it would help it. That laptop has been bad news since Day 1. (It's an HP.) I just need a desktop, to be honest. It has always been much easier to do book work with those.

Anyway.. I need to get back to work since I have an estimator out of town Friday and thru next week. I need to give him all of the paperwork I need back before he leaves, so I have to get that all ready. At least I'm warm, dry, and semi-cozy (even at work) and not outside in the chilly rain.

[Lynx]

HP has been going downhill for years now. Dell is still pretty good I think. Acer has been junk for more than a decade. Even Asus is becoming unreliable these days.

But every ThinkPad I ever bought is still running...

[Roscoe]

My work computer is a Dell. Absolutely love it, but our state network- eh, not so much.
 And morning all. Had church last night. Good friend, Bro Terry Long preached. Much to Cheyenne's delight, he brought his 14 year old grandson along. (They crushing on each other). Bro Wilson called Chey up before church to talk to him, as she was sitting back in the back corner by herself. He asked her "You gonna hide in the corner, or sit with your friend and be nice?" LOL. She turned bright red- but then completely amazed me. She came over and sat in the front with her friend, who turned about as red as she did.
We all went to dinner after church too. She told me on the way home that she had "had a good evening, Dad."
Dear Lord.
Now I am back at work, where I am majorly miffed. See, our "clients" pay a $35 month supervision fee. We are required to make sure they pay and keep the balance under $105. They want you to have a 90% average if possible. We've been in friendly competition with each other to see who can get the highest average. I've been working all month on mine. I had done the impossible. Until yesterday (the next to last day of the period) I had a 100% average. Yesterday evening they released an idiot from the sanction program. Another officer had let him get behind, then sent him to the sanction program. He couldn't parole out where he came from, so he found a place here. They released him , put him on my caseload- along with his $105 fees. I was mad enough to bite nails, and I suspect the evil witch at our front desk, who assigns the cases did it on purpose.
 So instead of 100%, I will have a 99.2%. It STILL makes me mad thinking about it.