Thanks, I've been quite pleased given the effort(or lack thereof) that I've put in.
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A little Pink Floyd to cap off the evening.
And where the heck did San Tropez come from?
-jk
I’m hen music starts again, I highly recommend catching Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets next time they swing through the States. They strictly play pre-Dark Side stuff. It was an absolute blast, and damn they were having fun up there.
“Emily tries
but misunderstands,
ah ooh
She's often inclined to
borrow somebody's dreams
till tomorrow . . . .”
And — one of my favorites (the Floyd only played this some live one time btw):
https://youtu.be/YZXKgl8turY
No music this morning. Just the soun of silence.
Back on payroll duty for the next couple not weeks. Yuck.
I've done a lot of things, but not payroll.
I still critique the job done when bagging my groceries. But then I bagged during the paper bag era.
I think I’ve seen this Nuts Von Crazy a hundred times in the last week. Is that a bad sign?
Tonight’s musical interlude - Prince & The Revolution, Purple Rain
Good morning!
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6 Deer in the back yard as I head out to work, including the piebald doe, a four-point buck, and a fawn.
Plumber is here.
Yes, the joys of home ownership.
I have some unfortunate news.
I'm almost out of gin.
How Aviation Gin makes its wonderful beverage (warning, language):
https://youtu.be/NjDCH6SiMgo
No music tonight, going with a book.
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There is lots of room in my jewelry box since my severe nickel allergy makes it so that I can't wear most jewelry.
It had gotten easier for me to count the states I have never visited, Arizona is one of them.
Just visited a burger stand recently touted as “the best burger in ATL” with my brother. It was very conducive to eating carryaway sacks on our tailgates in the parking lot with his kiddos while being safely distant. Burger lived up to the hype. A lovely outing.
Complete list of states (in the US) that Bostondevil has yet to visit: Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, New Mexico, Utah.
My requirements for checking a state off, I have to have spent a night in the state. I didn't count Colorado for that reason for a long time - changing planes in the Denver airport does not count. But, it's on the list now. Crested Butte is beautiful, so are the Spanish Peaks.
Same...for me it’s 1) spend a night there, 2) eat a meal there, AND 3) engage in at least one locally meaningful activity there.
I’m down to Nebraska, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Alaska. I was supposed to be crossing off those first three this summer with a trip to Colorado and back, but canceled on account of the ‘rona and am now hoping to hit that trip next summer. That would keep me on target for my overall goal of making all 50 by age 40, which would be capped off with a trip to Alaska in summer ‘22, just before I turn 40 in August of that year.
My self-imposed Massachusetts 5k Challenge is suffering. I'm trying to run a 5k in every city and town in Massachusetts - officially. There are 351, I have run in 48. I had already registered for the 49th and 50th and had hoped to get to 60 by 1/1/2021. That's not happening.
But, I have decided that if I take "mini-vacations" where I drive to a small town that doesn't have an official 5k and take a run, I get to count it during the pandemic. Depending on how long it takes for 5ks to be a thing again, I may expand beyond towns that don't have official races.
Sounds like a version of what a friend of mine is doing... 100 miles in all fifty states.
He's a certified maniac though. He ran the Iditarod on foot. Pulling his supplies on a sled. In February. And won.
Check him out. Surprisingly down to earth fellow, great to grab a beer with.
https://www.peteripmaster.com/
My definition is a little looser, if I drive across the entire state I count that. Alaska is the only state I have left, but no plans to go there any time soon currently.
I'm somewhere in between. I'm willing to lose '1' for YmoBeThere's criteria. A few of my 47 states would fall by the wayside if I applied Wilson's criteria, like OK, KS, NH, and AL. I've driven through all those states or been staying in an adjacent state and popped over for a day visit to do some sort of meaningful activity, had a meal, etc but haven't spent the night. I've driven end-to-end Kansas on I-70 twice now so ain't nobody telling me I haven't been to Kansas! For New Hampshire, I've stayed in VT, Maine, RI, etc and popped over the border to NH so spent lots of time there but not an official overnight...
I think my disqualifie-rs are "an airport doesn't count" and "if you arrived at four corners from CO, stood on the four corners, then went back to CO, you don't get AZ, NM, and Utah!"
I only watch "West Side Story" with large crowds so I can annoy the a large group of people when I laugh while Tony is dying. (Actually, I only did that once and I didn't realize I was going to be seized by an uncontrollable fit of the giggles.. But man, oh man, do I find Tony's death scene hilariously ridiculous. I have absented myself from watching it again, because, even though I can't stand it, I don't really want to ruin it for everybody else.)
As to all the Iron Man stuff, I don't do it. My best (yes, best) time running the Boston Marathon is 6:02:41. It was my dream to break 6 hours but it's highly unlikely that I ever will. I gave myself a stress fracture running it in 2017 and I haven't gotten any younger since then. However, since I last ran, I have become good friends with a woman who lives in Hopkinton and will let me stay at her house the night before the marathon. I'm thinking I might need to give it one more go now that I can stay overnight in Hopkinton, roll out of bed, and run 26 miles. I'll walk the last .2.
For those of you who have not been following my marathon career - I do Galloway Method. Run/walk at regular intervals. It does put less wear and tear on my knees (although I still have to baby them). I have carried over the run/walk mentality to 5ks. For anything over a 10k, I run 2 minutes, walk 1 minute. For the short distances, I run 3 1/2 minutes, walk 1 1/2 minutes. It's not a winning strategy, but my goal isn't winning, it's finishing upright and smiling. Or by doing a cartwheel over the finish line.
Started taking Lipitor this week. I feel old.
X3 Hoping for the best outcome for you, your wife, your business partner and their family and your employees.
I’d probably break an arm trying to do a cartwheel.
Show off!
But has he ever sent you an email? He sent me one.
I have a couple of things signed by him too.
I have probably told this story before, but I mailed Coach K a copy of my play about a couple who find each other through an online dating site and when they meet in person it's love at first sight until they find out she went to Duke and he went to Carolina. He still wants to give it a try but she kills the attraction by telling him, "I think Coach K is sexy." A couple of weeks after I mailed it I got an email from him saying thank you and telling me that he loved the play, especially the ending.
So, I got that going for me. ;)
I read where some folks made a movie on zoom a few weeks ago, rented a theater to show it, and thereby had the largest box office film of the week. You could do that, as a series of short vignettes. I could not attend from here but would buy a virtual ticket.
Nice! If and when the Zoom version of our Romeo & Juliet becomes available, I will provide the link. I look absolutely terrible but, I'm playing a monk, so, I purposefully did not wear make-up and rather severely pulled my hair back. Not the look I will go for if I ever have the chance to meet Tom Hiddleston.
I find that far more preferable than page upon page arguing about how many minutes each player will get, or a host of other threads I don't visit. But to each their own.
It's a big community, there are lots of interests. It is nice that we each have the ability to start, join, or ignore threads as we feel.
Hah, I know, I know. I was thinking I might get a response from you! With respect to the conversation, I differentiate between "been to" and "BEEN to", you know? Can I say that I have reasonably been to Kansas as part of a 50 state quest? I think so. Can I say I have gone deep and explored Kansas? No.
I did go out of my way both times to get off the highway and find some good places to eat though! I ate my fill of sliders at Cozies in Saline on one of the trips, IIRC.
Lots of fun things to see if you get off I-70 - Largest Ball of Twine in Cawker City (sometimes it drops a place or two), Garden of Eden in Lucas, Rock City, Cathedral of the Plains in Victoria, amazing Tiffany stained glass windows in 1st Presbyterian Church of Topeka, the hot and cold water towers in Canton, world's largest prairie dog in Oakley - just to name a few. ;)
I ended up crossing off Kansas by accident last summer. My wife and I had planned on spending our anniversary in Rocky Mountain National Park, but we woke up that day and the afternoon/overnight forecast in the park was very poor, so we did a great morning in the park before things turned ugly, then packed up and headed east. We spent the night in a bed & breakfast in Hays and had a great dinner at a local brewery, then stopped off at the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve, a small pocket that preserves the prairie that attracted so many settlers to the area in the first place. It was a sort of weird pivot from what we had expected for our 6th anniversary, but we have really fond memories of our Kansas time, and I won't be sad the next time I pass through (on the way back to Colorado).
Attachment 10919
I haven't been to this particular one but prairie ecosystems are such under-visited and underappreciated places relative to a lot of the mountains, forests, shores, etc. We also have so little of our original great plains and prairies in tact that it's fun to see what the ol' American gal used to look like before the damn Europeans overran the place*!
One year, I spent Thanksgiving in Arkansas City, Kansas.
By BiL's family is from around there. Nearby Cottonwood Falls is a nice little town with a beautiful court house. His hometown of Pilsen is also the hometown of Father Emil Kapaun. He is being considered for canonization. He was the 9th chaplain to receive the Medal of Honor. They have an impressive little museum by the church - his SiL gives a great tour and talk. She went to the Medal of Honor ceremony, along with some of Father Kapaun's fellow POWs, in 2013.
Interesting story for Capt./Father Kapaun. I am humbled by his sacrifice.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Kapaun
Attachment 10922
Trip Advisor ranks it as the #6 attraction in Pratt, KS.
Attachment 10923
Here are the towers from Canton.
Cher did a version of West Side Story where she played all the parts:
https://twitter.com/jrawson/status/1...742789121?s=21
You’re welcome. (Although I can go back to the old Pink Floyd videos if you prefer. You don’t want to see the third option.)
Oh, and I’ve found my soul animal:
https://bgr.com/2020/06/19/alcoholic...y-india-kalua/
Good morning and thank you.
I posted what I was listening to last night, a Pink Floyd song, and linked to a YouTube video of it. The song was Comfortably Numb. For those that are familiar with the song it comes from the album The Wall and the video was an except from the movie of the same name. I regret the decision to post it and requested that the post be removed. They mods here have done that and for that I thank them.
Just got back from kayaking. No one on the water when I hit it at 7:30; an armada on the river by 9:45 when I got back to the boat ramp.
Leaving the kayak on the vehicle so I can hit it even earlier tomorrow. Nothing like sunrise and fog on a back river.
Bike trail was a bit busy. Hoping it isn't as busy on weekdays. We are having the family bike trip locally the week leading up to the 4th.
Yard done, may be time for another Covid haircut.
Pool vacuumed, scrubbed, salted, and shocked. Darn thing gets bigger every year it seems. Pretty sure it has a leak, losing water too fast for evaporation alone. My dog seems to like it though.
Pool installers have been busy in my neighborhood the last couple of months. Houses with them sell much faster. , but not are they expensive.
Watched some EPL on NBC earlier. Didn’t look that great to me...
Armageddon is the afternoon nap re-watchable while the t-storms rumble by. Got me thinking, if a global pandemic didn't unite us, would the threat of a meteor obliterating earth?
I don't think so.
Had a wonderful picnic lunch with a friend today - we sat a bit more than 6 feet apart under a shady tree on the Andover Commons. She's all in with my idea for "Spaced Out Shakespeare".
I will post more details if we make progress with the idea.
Meanwhile, the Andover Commons is lovely and, when actual full outdoor Shakespeare productions resume, I'm thinking it might be worth trying to stage something there.
But no T Bone and the Drewsk episodes lately...
1998 Duke at UNC, this one does not end well.
We had our regular pool people do it. They had never done one before and basically wanted the experience, so they didn't charge us very much and we didn't question when they worked it in around their usual schedule.
They are great folks - used to bring us eggs from their chickens when they would maintain our pool.
Long story short, after collapsing our pool, they decided it's way too much work and no longer offer that service. I think we got lucky.
Yup. They had to rent a backhoe thing. The broke up the pool and the concrete walk around, it all went inside the hole. Then nine loads of fill dirt. They worked it in around their other obligations and ended up taking them two weeks. I'm sure they lost money on it.
We paid them more than they quoted us, because we felt badly for them.
So, quick google on "pool removal". No surprise, but it's cheaper to get rid of an above ground pool. In ground quote from one google search gives a range of $3k to $19k.
The Quarantine Adventures of T-Bone and The Drewsk: T-Bone finds a job with a local family taking the two boys to the park and playing games with them, video games and board games. Meanwhile The Drewsk starts a remote internship at the Naval Research Lab.
Husband needs a new car. Test drove the BMW 4 hardtop convertible and the Audi A5 cabriolet. Guess who did all the talking?
My best wifely sotto voce observation was that the cat would enjoy sleeping on a new soft top over the hard top any day.
I can do sotto voce when it's warranted.:cool:
What's on tap for today?
I need to go grocery shopping.
I drive a Honda Accord. I have neither a garage nor a convertible.
My cat came home!
Mine is leased. I had a nice dark blue one for 3 1/2 years, when we went to turn them in and lease new ones, they didn't have any blue ones. My choices were white, silver, and champagne. I was very disappointed but then they told me they had one red one on the lot. Red cars are easier to find in parking lots. I'm sold on red.
My husband has decided that leasing is the way to go and I don't care enough to do the research to see if he's correct.
To me, cars are a means to an end. I understand that other people feel about cars the way I feel about yarn. I think that's great. But it's not going to make me care about cars. ;)
I hear thunder.
The show "Dear White People" set fictional Ivy League institution Winchester University has some exterior shots that are obviously Duke - the Chapel and the Clocktower. None of these exteriors also show the actors in the show and the exteriors that do show the actors are fairly obviously not shot at Duke. So, I don't think they did any filming at Duke beyond a few exterior shots.
I'm not much of a car person but I do find I get sentimental about my cars once they've been with me a while. I'm on my 3rd and a lot of good memories happened in the first two at least! And the first will forever be immortalized because 'first car' is the prompt question for so many of my password resets!
What does accusing someone of 'bovine silence' mean?
A movie that didn't so much give me nightmares but made it difficult for me to sleep for a few weeks was the original Dutch/French version of The Vanishing. The horrible Hollywood remake, no, but the original? I had to leave the theater when you find out what happened to the missing woman as I nearly threw up. And yeah, I didn't sleep well for a few weeks.
Yes, I avoid them too. Not a horror movie fan although I usually like psychological dramas. My favorite movie is Michael Clayton. So - no gore but I like tension. I also love movies about stealing stuff. You know, heist movies likes Oceans 11 or The Italian Job or Hot Rocks, that kind of thing.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen horror films out the wazoo. Psychological thrillers, etc. Add to those apocalyptic type fare also. But at some point it just gets to be too much. Give me a well done rom com every once in awhile. I did watch Ocean’s 11 this morning. Ot at least the second half of it on TNT or similar channel.
I have two friends and we want to start a podcast that reviews only romcoms and heist movies. We plan to call ourselves "Klepto Love Jockeys" (our initials are K, L, and J) but we haven't yet taken the jump into actually doing it. We did have a watch party set up for our first two movies - "When Harry Met Sally" and "How to Steal A Million" but then the pandemic got in the way. "How to Steal a Million" is one of the rare movies that fits into both categories. We have decided that "The Pink Panther" is not enough romcom to be both. If we ever actually start doing the podcast, we will record the minute details of that discussion. ;)
I licked the leftover batter off the spatula.
Wow! Life on the edge!
Still waiting on test results for my wife and myself. All other co-workers have come back clean, save the one who tested positive initially.
My potential August production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, brought to you by the unofficial group Spaced Out Shakespeare, hopefully coming to a backyard near me with a few invited audience members has, so far, a Puck/Hippolyta, a Helena/First Fairy, and a Titania/Snug the Joiner (me). Helena has also jumped on board as the choreographer of fairy magic since we are going to be practicing social distancing in this production as much as we possibly can, the reason the actors can't get near each other will be fairy magic. Rehearsals on Zoom with an element of improv when we are actually performing. Face coverings when the actors are in the wings, but we will be taking the risk of no face coverings while the actors are "on stage".
Sigh, having to think way too much lately.
That's exhausting.
Handed off the analysis dataset today for the project I've been working on. I'm done for now. Finally.
I can see why that is good news (and congratulations) but I find myself (in my circumstances since I don't own a business like you)thinking I might even be happier to find out I've got a very mild case of the virus. As they say, once you've got it, you can stop worrying about getting it (we hope).
We have good reason to believe that my wife contracted the virus in London in February, as she came down with almost all the symptoms three days after we got home...she was sick as a dog...though I had no illness myself.
We'd love to know if she has the antibodies, but the tests are so inconclusive that there's no point (which is why we couldn't get a test performed anyway).
Have to assume we haven't been infected, so The Great Staycation continues...
Just added Disney+ to the lineup.
My wife and I both had all the Covid symptoms in early February too for about a week. A rough 4-5 days.
I haven’t been tested but she has and her antibody test came back negative. Doc said there was a strong flu going around with similar symptoms as Covid and that was likely what we had.
You might already know this, but from what I understand it is quite possible to have been infected (and still be infected) with the Covid-19 virus and yet have a false negative antibody test. I’m not necessarily advising to retest; it’s just an FYI.
It’s unfortunate that the tests aren’t more reliable. Hopefully, more accurate tests will be available soon. The best case scenario is that the results were indeed accurate and your wife was not infected with Covid-19 (nor you either). Sincere best wishes to the two of you during these trying times.
I have heard these same words from so many people. The fact is, there was a lot of crap going around this winter. I would imagine (just my opinion) that the chances of your having had COVID-19 in early February are pretty slim. I think if all those people DID have it, it would have spread a lot earlier and a lot faster around the country than it did.
Blueberry muffins this morning.