weekend details
Sep. 20th, 2004 03:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
winterbadgerTerrifically good weekend!
Started out with dinner and a movie Friday night with the lovely and delightful![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
vatoengland. That is, we really meant to go see Vanity Fair, but by the time we'd finished dinner we were deep enough in conversation that we figured the movie could wait 'til another night. Every time we talk we find more things in common to discuss and more interests we don't share to learn about.
Saturday came way too early when the cats got me up at 7.30 to find them breakfast. I ended up staying up and tidying up some loose ends. Chris and I traded cars so I could take the Honda to the tailgate; I loaded up all of last week's leftover food, plenty of ice, beer (had to buy cases since I had forgotten to pre-order a keg and they'd sold the one they swore they'd keep on hand every Saturday). The tailgate turned out to be much busier than I thought it would be (I'd even debated cancelling it because it looked like it would rain all weekend, but decided not to when the weathe report changed and said it would only be showering during our usual tailgate time. The team played great guns, totally dominating the Chicago Fire and nearly getting a shutout. I started letting people know that I wouldn't be running the tailgates next season, and there was some regret but no surprise. No volunteers to take over the job either. :-) Was bad and had some beers. I'm going to need to go back to Phase One at this rate...
Da Grrlz apparently had quite the disappointment, driving all the way to King's Dominion for Gay Day only to discover it had been losed (for the weather, presumably) and having no recourse but to drive the 90 miles back again.
Sunday I got up and had breakfast with Da Grrlz, then we all did yard work (Chris had been feeling like the house looked entirely too much like no one lived there.) Melissa weeded the driveway and the front walk, then swept the back deck. Chris cleaned out the gutters and swept the roof. I started cutting up a huge tree limb that had dropped off one of the oaks in the front (many hundreds of pounds at least--very lucky it didn't land on the roof!) It had lodged against several saplings, and my job was to get it off them. It was resting on three branches at one end, and the broken-off end of the limb at the other end was wedged against one of the saplings. I couldn't just cut it apart randomly, because it would have just wedged harder against the small trees and bound up the saw. Had to do some simulataneous cutting and lifting. I ended up cutting off one branch so it left a shape that would let me raise the broken-off end off the sapling and drop it a few feet away. That bastard was heavy! But the saplings are all relieved of the pressure from the limb, and it's ready to be cut up the rest fo the way. Very nice dry, seasoned oak, too. Just one bit of the join where it met the tree had gotten rotted (thus causing the drop).
The Grrlz went back down Rt 95 to KD, since the park had announced it would honor the previous day's tickets all day Sunday. Doreen came by, and we chatted for a while, then I took a quick shower while she napped avec chats, and we headed down to Alexandria. We got a picnic lunch from Sutton Place Gourmet (having an amusing conversation with the deli staff in the process, seeing two very large dogs--outside--and having repeated encounters with a family of three who had a pram with a very large stuffed green monster in it :-). Then we drove down the GW Parkway until we found a stopping place that seemed relatively uncrowded and got out to eat our lunch, talk, and look at the river. We saw quite the collection of wildlife, including a huge white heron, a bald eagle, another eagle that may have been an immature bald eagle and which was carrying a fish in its talons (and came back around later, clearly looking for more lunch, causing Doreen to start speculating about a very silly stream of birds coming past carrying things--that woman is a hoot :-)
We went back to my place once the evening started showing signs of approaching; we listend to a CDredactrice had brought back from Canada and left in my car when she borrowed it to go to Kings Dominion the first time. D told me about a number of good celtic music groups I should listen for around the area and mentioned a number of fiddle players that azbound and redactrice would probably like to hear about :-)
I introduced D to Sports Night and Yes, Prime Minister, which she loved (I fear I drifted off a bit during Y,PM--my early rising finally catching up with me). She went off home to make dinner for her andmotherwell and to have her nightly chat with kevinrtaylor. I really meant to get some homework done, wash a few loads of laundry, and hang the pictures I got back from the framer last week.
Instead, I made a very odd dinner (heaps of nasi goreng and a salmon thingy with cheese and herb stuffing, with a lime ice for afters) and watched last week's season-ending ep of Six Feet Under and this week's season-beginning ep of The Wire, only then going back downstairs to find that Chris and Melissa had left a phone message for me there, sayign they'd broken down near Quanitco around 9.30 and coudl I come get them. It being 11.15, I panicked and started calling the one phone they had with them. My panic was not reasured by the fact that I kept not getting them! Eventually they called from the Honda dealership in Annnadale, and I went over and collected them. They'd hit a tire off-cast from a lorry and it did some damage to the bottom of the radiator so the car kept overheating. They stopped by the side of the road near Quantico and called Geico Emergency, who sent out a truck that took a long time to find them. In the meanwhile, a Marine from the base stopped and took a look at the car for them, opining that they might be able to make it back to DC. Chris turned the engine on, and the temperature indicator soared back into the red zone, so she figured they'd wait for the truck. At last it came and took them to the Honda shop, and they called me (I notice that the tow driver waited until I showed up and Chris made sure it was really me before he left--good for him!)
So I still have the laundry to wash, the homework to do, groceries to get, pictures to hang... but I had, all things considered, an excellent weekend.
john_arundel, azbound, sidhne, blueinva, I'd love to introduce you guys to vatoengland; any chance I could entice you over for dinner and games/conversation some evening soon?
Started out with dinner and a movie Friday night with the lovely and delightful
vatoengland. That is, we really meant to go see Vanity Fair, but by the time we'd finished dinner we were deep enough in conversation that we figured the movie could wait 'til another night. Every time we talk we find more things in common to discuss and more interests we don't share to learn about.Saturday came way too early when the cats got me up at 7.30 to find them breakfast. I ended up staying up and tidying up some loose ends. Chris and I traded cars so I could take the Honda to the tailgate; I loaded up all of last week's leftover food, plenty of ice, beer (had to buy cases since I had forgotten to pre-order a keg and they'd sold the one they swore they'd keep on hand every Saturday). The tailgate turned out to be much busier than I thought it would be (I'd even debated cancelling it because it looked like it would rain all weekend, but decided not to when the weathe report changed and said it would only be showering during our usual tailgate time. The team played great guns, totally dominating the Chicago Fire and nearly getting a shutout. I started letting people know that I wouldn't be running the tailgates next season, and there was some regret but no surprise. No volunteers to take over the job either. :-) Was bad and had some beers. I'm going to need to go back to Phase One at this rate...
Da Grrlz apparently had quite the disappointment, driving all the way to King's Dominion for Gay Day only to discover it had been losed (for the weather, presumably) and having no recourse but to drive the 90 miles back again.
Sunday I got up and had breakfast with Da Grrlz, then we all did yard work (Chris had been feeling like the house looked entirely too much like no one lived there.) Melissa weeded the driveway and the front walk, then swept the back deck. Chris cleaned out the gutters and swept the roof. I started cutting up a huge tree limb that had dropped off one of the oaks in the front (many hundreds of pounds at least--very lucky it didn't land on the roof!) It had lodged against several saplings, and my job was to get it off them. It was resting on three branches at one end, and the broken-off end of the limb at the other end was wedged against one of the saplings. I couldn't just cut it apart randomly, because it would have just wedged harder against the small trees and bound up the saw. Had to do some simulataneous cutting and lifting. I ended up cutting off one branch so it left a shape that would let me raise the broken-off end off the sapling and drop it a few feet away. That bastard was heavy! But the saplings are all relieved of the pressure from the limb, and it's ready to be cut up the rest fo the way. Very nice dry, seasoned oak, too. Just one bit of the join where it met the tree had gotten rotted (thus causing the drop).
The Grrlz went back down Rt 95 to KD, since the park had announced it would honor the previous day's tickets all day Sunday. Doreen came by, and we chatted for a while, then I took a quick shower while she napped avec chats, and we headed down to Alexandria. We got a picnic lunch from Sutton Place Gourmet (having an amusing conversation with the deli staff in the process, seeing two very large dogs--outside--and having repeated encounters with a family of three who had a pram with a very large stuffed green monster in it :-). Then we drove down the GW Parkway until we found a stopping place that seemed relatively uncrowded and got out to eat our lunch, talk, and look at the river. We saw quite the collection of wildlife, including a huge white heron, a bald eagle, another eagle that may have been an immature bald eagle and which was carrying a fish in its talons (and came back around later, clearly looking for more lunch, causing Doreen to start speculating about a very silly stream of birds coming past carrying things--that woman is a hoot :-)
We went back to my place once the evening started showing signs of approaching; we listend to a CD
redactrice had brought back from Canada and left in my car when she borrowed it to go to Kings Dominion the first time. D told me about a number of good celtic music groups I should listen for around the area and mentioned a number of fiddle players that azbound and redactrice would probably like to hear about :-) I introduced D to Sports Night and Yes, Prime Minister, which she loved (I fear I drifted off a bit during Y,PM--my early rising finally catching up with me). She went off home to make dinner for her and
motherwell and to have her nightly chat with kevinrtaylor. I really meant to get some homework done, wash a few loads of laundry, and hang the pictures I got back from the framer last week. Instead, I made a very odd dinner (heaps of nasi goreng and a salmon thingy with cheese and herb stuffing, with a lime ice for afters) and watched last week's season-ending ep of Six Feet Under and this week's season-beginning ep of The Wire, only then going back downstairs to find that Chris and Melissa had left a phone message for me there, sayign they'd broken down near Quanitco around 9.30 and coudl I come get them. It being 11.15, I panicked and started calling the one phone they had with them. My panic was not reasured by the fact that I kept not getting them! Eventually they called from the Honda dealership in Annnadale, and I went over and collected them. They'd hit a tire off-cast from a lorry and it did some damage to the bottom of the radiator so the car kept overheating. They stopped by the side of the road near Quantico and called Geico Emergency, who sent out a truck that took a long time to find them. In the meanwhile, a Marine from the base stopped and took a look at the car for them, opining that they might be able to make it back to DC. Chris turned the engine on, and the temperature indicator soared back into the red zone, so she figured they'd wait for the truck. At last it came and took them to the Honda shop, and they called me (I notice that the tow driver waited until I showed up and Chris made sure it was really me before he left--good for him!)
So I still have the laundry to wash, the homework to do, groceries to get, pictures to hang... but I had, all things considered, an excellent weekend.
john_arundel, azbound, sidhne, blueinva, I'd love to introduce you guys to vatoengland; any chance I could entice you over for dinner and games/conversation some evening soon?
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Date: 2004-09-20 11:41 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2004-09-21 01:21 am (UTC)