Category: Family

Purging / Decompressing Happenings – We are in the process of shifting our storage unit (or more to the point, the contents therein) as well as doing a purge. This weekend was the first step in acquiring a new unit in a closer location as well as doing some shelf assembly in said unit. The new unit is closer, bigger, less expensive, and run by a local firm. The only bad news is that the units are not as well-lit as the old unit. Which, gave me a reason to pick up another Streamlight lantern. Which, since Amazon had them on sale, meant I could pick up two.

Birthday Happenings – Last weekend we celebrated MIL’s birthday and five-year cancer-free anniversary. The Wife really wanted to go all-out, so she arranged a surprise party at our favorite restaurant. Lesson one of surprise parties – the person who needs to be coordinating with other attendees should not be the one driving to the party. There was a lot of talking in code on the ride over, and a five-dollar fill up at a gas station to burn time. Was it worth it? Hell yeah. MIL was surprised and a great time was had by all.

Weight Happenings – Yeah, I did myself no favors over the holidays. Ain’t good, but I’m back on track. Current: 276; Tollgate: 250; Goal: 200

Petty Amusement Happenings – Sometimes, the simplest and most inane things amuse me. Such as figuring out how to get my laptop to rotate colors on the keyboard and alien sigil on the lid. It serves no function other than personal amusement.

Writing Happenings – I finished the first “finished” draft of my isekai story and sent it off to my alpha reader. At some point, it will show up on the blog. Honestly, I’m treating this one as pulpy serial fiction. I’m sketching out the second story, but I really need to finish up the fourth installment of the Irregulars. That one is almost done, but I suck at endings.

Battery Charging Station Happenings – Saturday, I received my kickstarter from Olight for their Ostation Pro. It also included some of their AA and AAA batteries, a headlamp, and some patches. The last item(s) resulted in the Grandniece discovering Derek’s Patch Board. I have way more charging capacity than I need, but sufficient to what I want. Plus, the plan is for when the next storm is approaching, I can cycle all the batteries through. I have noticed that the batteries Olight sent me prefer to be charged in their Pro charger.

The Wise Man Saga – Let’s go back to July of 2021. Before MIL moved in, the downstairs bedroom was planned as the guest room and we wanted a sleeper sofa in there. We found a nifty one that instead of pulling up the bed, you kind of rolled it out. MIL slept on it for a couple of years after moving in before deciding she would like some more room in her bedroom. (Rolled out, the sleeper did dominate the room). The sleeper sofa then moved to BIL’s and SIL’s house. About a week before Christmas, SIL showed up with a little figurine that looked like it was out of a nativity. She was wondering if it was ours. We don’t have any nativities at Ward Manor. At that point, the family started running down every possibility of where this little figurine could have come from to no avail. It is the mysteriously appearing Wise Man.

Tech Support Happenings – The Sunday before Christmas, The Wife and I went over to her BFF’s place so I could help set up BFF’s new computer. The whole thing went together fairly well with minimal issues. It was kind of fun introducing the BFF to the wonder of velcro straps instead of zip ties for cable management.

Christmas Eve Happenings – The day of Christmas Eve was The Wife and I making some excursions. For some reason, I got a wild hair up my butt for some mead. I don’t really drink, maybe a glass or two a year. But I felt the desire for honey wine. So, we went to liquor store to find no mead. Can’t really complain, as demand spikes up around this time of year, and I can’t see it being a high-volume item for a liquor store. Surprisingly, I found some on Doordash and picked up two varieties. There are days I love living in the future.

After dinner, we opened our advent calendars. The Wife and MIL found one of those “men’s advent calendar” that had a bunch of little survival tools. Some of them will end up in my sling bag or work bag. Most of it will end up in the hurricane kit.

Christmas Happenings – Christmas started with our normal pancakes and relaxing. Then it was doing some prep for our overnight guests, whom we had to go pick up before dinner. The Wife’s Niece and the Grandniece agreed to stay over Christmas night so we could get an early start to our Day-After Christmas adventure. The main course for dinner was a very good lasagna made by SIL. There was a lot of food, a lot of chatting, a lot of the Grandniece opening presents and playing with her new toys. And a lot of left-overs.

The Wife Is Best Wife Happenings – Earlier this week, one of my coworkers sent me a text asking if an address in Parrish was near me. My response was Yes, if I was at home, but I’m at the office right now. Seems there were a pair of bikes being offered for free at the location, but since the coworker lives in Tampa, she was hoping I was at home and could just swing by to make sure the bikes were still there. Since The Wife is off this week, I asked if she would be willing to swing by and check on them. The Wife graciously agreed and then brought the bikes home so the coworker can pick them up from Ward Manor. She is the best wife.

Zoo Happenings – The Grandniece has been asking to sleep over for a while. So, we agreed on them sleeping over Christmas night, and we would take Niece and Grandniece to ZooTampa the next day. The Wife and I wanted to go back since our excursion last summer was cut short and I missed the Florida section. When we got there, we opted for ZooTampa’s “pay-for-a-day-get-the-whole-year” special for all four of us. Heck, even if we go just once more, it’s kind of paid for itself. The neat thing is when we were driving in, the was a big panel truck with the ZooTampa logo on the back. Turns out it was a manatee being delivered to ZooTampa for rescue/rehab. This time we brought our collapsible wagon, on the idea that the Grandniece would be riding in it. She did a little, but it was nice being able to drop all of our stuff in the wagon and cart it around. It did mean there were times we had to swap off so everyone could go see the animals. It also meant that I really didn’t need to swap out my sling bag for the backpack. But lessons learned. Needless to say, by the time we dropped Niece and Grandniece back at their place and made it home, we were exhausted.

Weight Happenings – Not happening. I overindulged pretty badly over Christmas week. I’ll get back on the scale after New Years. I always hate the first week getting back on program because I have to retrain my stomach that it doesn’t need to be full all the time. Although it was well after Christmas that I realized I never had my usual chocolate orange this year.

Old Florida Christmas Happenings – Saturday we went to the Old Florida Christmas at Manatee Historic Village. There were some good vendors, but we got there early enough that it felt a little bit empty. We hit a few stalls and walked around. While The Wife and MIL were looking at somethings, I went over to the blacksmith shop. Unfortunately, the forge was having “technical difficulties,” but the curator was making the best of it. Normally we have a chain here in front to protect you from hot metal. However, since the fire isn’t working, feel free to come in and look around. Unlike other museums that say not to touch anything, feel free to touch what you want. You just might get a bit dirty.

Advent Happenings – As previously stated, instead of stocking stuffers this year, The Wife, MIL, and me decided to do advent calendars. We bought three refillable ones a few weeks back and started finding stuff to put into them. This was trickier than anticipated – particularly when we laid down the “no food” rule. For some larger items, we just ended up putting pictures in. Plus, there was the fun of coordinating with your partner to make sure all the boxes were filled. The plan is for the three of us to “open” our calendars on Christmas Eve or Morning. Still working all of this out, since it’s the first year.

End Table Happenings – I’ve been unhappy with my side table by the downstairs couch for a bit now. It’s too small for all the stuff I need to put on it. The Wife and MIL had similar complaints with theirs. Now, the good news was that The Wife’s would work well for me, and mine would work well for MIL. We just needed to get one for The Wife. Looking on Amazon and Wayfair resulted in some that would fulfill one requirement or so, but nothing that was just right. What we ended up doing was picking up a couple ones that were wide enough, but not long enough with the idea of setting them back to back. Plus, it would have more drawer space for all of her bits and bobs. This necessitated a trip to Hobby Lobby for drawer bins, or at least, that was the excuse we used.

Tree Happenings – While I was putting together furniture, The Wife was setting up her other tree. Her first tree is up in her office since we decompressed it. As she was setting it up, there were technical issues with the installed lighting. Needless to say, we now have a new tree in the main room. Unfortunately for both trees, Freya, our youngest cat, has entered into her “I want to mess with all of the ornaments” phase.

Weight Happenings – After two weeks of poor eating, I finally got back on the scale. I undid some of my progress, but not to the extent I feared. Current: 270.8 Tollgate: 250 Final: 200

So, this week’s happenings is going to be around the trip The Wife and I took up to Charlotte NC. Her boss works out of that office, so they are trying to bring her up a few times a year to meet in person and such. This time there was some big meeting of large groups of people surrounding The Wife’s work team. I tagged along because I can. I also brought my work rig so I could work from the hotel room, but I still needed to put in for leave because of the current administration’s hatred for telework.

Sunday – Travel day. The last time we went up to Charlotte, it took us ten hours to get there. This time it took us twelve. And the GPS had us doing some wild detours to avoid the mess which is holiday traffic on I-95. There were some moments where I wasn’t sure if the GPS decided to switch destinations to some place else. Anywhoo, we left Parrish around 6a and got into the hotel around 5:30p. I swear, at least a third of that was just getting out of Florida. People forget how big my home state is on a lengthwise basis.

We also decided to hit the Buccee’s in Georgia. Neither of us had been to one – and it’s been featured on both of our feeds. So, she plugged it into the GPS on her phone – which tells us to take an exit four miles south and take the backroads to get to Buccee’s. Given Waze’s penchant for wild detours to save three minutes, we decided to just take the exit on the sign. Um yeah, we figured out why Waze wanted us to go around. The exit was a fucking mess. I think it took us ten minutes to go the mile from the exit to the parking lot. As for inside? Okay. It was neat seeing it, but it was a bit on the wild and chaotic side. Like Walmart during the wild and woolly times. Not really a fan of that particular atmosphere. Still, the sliced brisket sandwiches were really good, as was the peanut butter cup thing I had for dessert.

Monday – We woke up to 36 degree weather. That is fucking cold. I set up my work rig while The Wife got dressed up for work. Or more to the point, more dressed up than her normal work-from-home attire of leggings and t-shirt. Since it was so cold, I drove her over to the office before returning to work in the hotel room. Which, since I’m technically on leave, I didn’t do much of. I did play some Civ and start on my Lego Optimus Prime. Dinner was from a burger place that did fried deviled eggs. Those were okay. The buttermilk fried bacon was similarly mid. The burgers were pretty decent.

Tuesday – The morning temperature was up to 39, but the heavens were raining down sleet. Which didn’t make it fun when taking The Wife to her office. I pretty much spent the day more bouncing between work and play. Mostly because, unlike Monday, I had meetings that I had to be on. No real work on Optimus because I didn’t want to get involved while trying to bounce around my meetings. We ordered dinner from an Italian place near to the hotel.

Wednesday – We came out to take The Wife to her office to find the Wardmobile coated in ice. Not something we have to deal with much at home. In fact, I can’t remember the last time I dealt with ice since moving from Tampa. Anywhoo, after delivering The Wife, I went back to the room to do much of what I had been doing – a little bit of work, a little bit of Civ, a little bit of Lego. Unfortunately, I also did a bunch of grazing on stuff in the room we brought. I also binged anime series that will show up in a later recommendations post. While The Wife went off to a dinner with her coworkers, I ordered in from a local barbecue place.

Thursday – The day was taken up with bouncing between a little bit of work, a little bit of Civ, and a lot of packing and getting ready for the transit back home. Also trying to clean up the room as we didn’t want to leave a mess for the housekeeping staff. For dinner, The Wife and I joined her longtime boss and friend at Rooster’s which was close to the hotel and then walked down the “walkable area”.

Friday – By Thursday night, The Wife and I were ready to get home. I looked at the weather forecast for Friday in Charlotte. Cold and rainy. So, I thought why don’t we leave extra early to miss the rain and get home sooner? We talked it over and decided to wake up at 1:00am and try to get out of the hotel by 2:00am to miss the rain. Well, we succeeded in getting out of the hotel by 2:00am, but we did not succeed in missing the rain. At least it wasn’t freezing rain, wintry mix, or sleet. Just rain. Which continued the width of South Carolina. We only escaped when we went south on I-95 and put the hammer down. As expected, the trip took us about 10 hours to get home. Then came the fun of dragging all of the stuff into the house and unpacking. Then The Wife and I crashed. On to our bed. With our cats.

Lessons Learned for the Next Trip to Charlotte – I had a garment bag / suitcase that, unfortunately, just fell apart. However, it was very useful in transporting a lot of The Wife’s office clothing. So, we’ll need to replace it. We also need to get The Wife a better “office” backpack – preferably one that can dual as a rolling bag. Personally, I’d like for her to have one that I can get “kitted out” with some of the small necessities so we’re not scrambling. Finally, it’s very hard to stay on diet in a hotel room. We probably need to do some more meal planning with some simple dinners so we don’t Doordash all the time. I also need to bring exactly what I need for breakfast/lunches so I don’t have “spare” to graze on while working. Which reminds me, I need to bring a spare cushion for the chair in the room. It’s just hard plastic. On the plus side, the travel rig worked pretty well.

Weight Happenings – Yeah, between Thanksgiving week and being on vacation/out of town the next, I didn’t even bother getting on the scale to see how much of my work I’ve undone. The Wife and I are back on diets and exercise. Maybe next week I’ll screw up my courage to get back on the scale.

More Chinese Scanning Happenings – Someone(s) in China has been hitting the blog pretty hard. Again. My guess is the blog is getting sucked up into some LLM. My hope is I’m so entertaining that some guy in China is just going through my backlog. If so, HELLO THERE! Or 你好啊!

Grandniece Happenings – Last weekend, The Wife’s niece and the grandniece showed up so they could do some shopping at the places near Ward Manor. Afterwards, I took the grandniece to the neighborhood park, because it is “awesome”. The grandniece loves running around and climbing on things, but she’s still a little cautious of the highest places. I will say anytime with the grandniece requires vigorous use of muscles and joints that normally don’t get used. And then a couple of days later, my body is very insistent on reminding me that I did such activity. It’s why I buy the large bottles of ibuprofen.

Holiday Decorations Happenings – I hate putting up outside decorations. Well, I dislike putting up decorations overall, but I really hate dealing with outside decorations. The Wife loves decorating, both inside and outside. She has been mildly frustrated with me saying no to outside decorations since we’ve been together. Well, I relented. A little. We have a small magnolia tree in the front. As long as I’m not having to do the hanging, The Wife and MIL are going to decorate it. I think the most I’ll need to do is help with setting up the smart plug so the lights will turn off and on at the right times.

Weight Happenings – I finally broke 270 on my last weigh-in. I doubt it will last with Thanksgiving tomorrow, but the trend has been downward since the Manor went on its current weight loss crusade. I’m very proud of The Wife who is down more than 30 lbs since we started in July. Current Weight – 269.2; Tollgate – 250

Blogshoot Happenings – Borepatch posted about hosting another blogshoot in January or February. I’ve enjoyed the two he’s hosted in the past. Hopefully, I will be able to attend. Got a few things going on during the first couple of months that might limit my availability. If able, I’m certainly taking the Bren, the FPC, and my new/old FEG that has yet to be fired.

There Are No Solutions, Only Trade-Offs – One of my long-standing “projects” is how to store/dispense the enormous amount of cat litter needed to deal with six cats. Copilot recommended the Kane Big Bin, which makes sense. The only issue is lack of wall space in the garage for mounting. So, I need to either figure out how to mount it to a wall rack, mount it to something free standing, or come up with another solution.

On a related note, during my searchings, I came across this Houndsy Kibble Dispenser. A bit pricey, but I will admit, there’s something intriguing about it with the handle dispensing a bowl at a time. Plus, I can see having one of those would solve some problems. Again, it’s a case of “do we want to pay that much” as well as a case of “where do we put it”.

Advent Happenings – Well, we’ve decided instead of stocking stuffers – which is what we normally get – The Wife, MIL, and me are getting three refillable advent calendars. The idea is for the other two to fill the boxes of the recipient. Then, we will all open our advents on Christmas Eve.

Weight Happenings – Well, I definitely paid for my indiscretions on Veterans Day according to the scale. On the other hand, I’m now wearing a size lower in pants. Which means I can now use some of those that I kept in storage. Current Weight: 272.6 Tollgate: 250