Family Costumes

Our costumes are set.

I will be a Monk
Mrs. N will be the Cat In The Hat
TLO will be a "Goth Vampire" as she puts it (prettiest vampire I've ever seen).
And TLO II will be a scarecrow.

Bring on the candy!!

Raining Leaves

I work all week and get excited when the weekend arrives. Sure I got 18 holes in Saturday morning. Then the rest of the weekend was followed by:

1. Attempt to start lawn tractor;
2. Attempt to jump lawn tractor;'
3. Diagnose lawn tractor problem;
4. Drive to tractor supply store for new solenoid;
5. Replace solenoid on tractor;
6. Suck up leaves, drive to curb, dump them;
7-42. Repeat;
43. Quick soak in the hot-tub with a beer (possibly my favorite point of the weekend;
44. Birthday party for my nephew;
45. Sleep;
46. Wake;
47. Drink coffee;
48. Clean/organize garage;
49 Start lawn tractor (yay!);
50. Rake out gardens;
51. Suck up leaves, drive to curb, dump them;
52-63. Repeat;
64. Drive to in-laws;
65. Blow leaves out of gardens;
66. Rake up leaves;
67. Load leaves in trailer to take to dump.
68. Notice its raining (YES!);
69. Eat dinner;
70. Drive home;
71. Watch football until I fall asleep.

Seems weekends should be more fulfilling.

My son rolled over for the first time. So that's cool.

Lost in Geno's Head

I knew where west was and I'm an excellent map reader. And we (three adults and a 5-month old) only got off course in the corn maze once or twice. Yet my 7-year-old, her 8-year-old friend and the 8's younger brother managed to beat us through it. Without the aid of a map or discernable plan. Simple trial and error and a LOT of running. I thought for sure I was going to have to do a "sweep" through the maze to find them. Boy did they delight in beating us!

By the way, that's UConn basketball's ladies' coach Geno Auriemma head and the team mascot Jonathan.

McLovin' McRib

The McRib is back! As of November 2nd that delectable pseudo-meat breaded concoction will make is long-awaited return. I guess I'm a big fan of any food that's shaped exactly as it came from the cadaver of its origin. I mean, what other sandwich has "meat" in it with fake ribs built in? None!

IRT

Like many-a-redblooded American male I'm into the show Ice Road Truckers on the History Channel (although not into Deadliest Catch - go figure). But this past Sunday night caught IRT - Deadliest Roads. The truckers from Alaska were doing their thing in the Himalayas. And, holy shit!

Combine trucking, which is inheritantly dangerous with Third World roads and absolutley insane drivers and, well, you have a good watch! Insane, I tell you! Some of the drop-offs on the other side of little, or no, guardrails looked to be thousands of feet. And the bridges? Puh-lease! Not every bolt needs to be tightened, does it?

I related to it, however. On my honeymoon, exactly 14 years ago, in Jamaica we stared death square in the eyes and snickered. Our resort was 90 minutes or so from the airport and they were nice enough to shuttle us in but they didn't exactly have terrible respect for human safety down there. Their idea of caution was to use the horn as they pass, uphill, at a high rate of speed around a steep bend. Good thing I bought those Red Stripes from a kid at the airport selling them out of a duffel bag.

During the trip we also encountered Carribean Department of Transportation's way of warning of impending doom. It seems the sea had washed out 1/2 the two-lane road. The D.O.T. was thoughtful enough to put up a sawhorse with a faded blinking yellow light as warning. That's it. On a road where speeds regularly exceeded 60 m.p.h. we had a sawhorse as a safety net.

Ice Road Truckers, I can relate! Sort of.

And although we may complain about our infrastructure around these parts, thank God its what it is!