We had one of our typical Saturdays today.  First we went to Franks Diner, a very old diner with great greasy food, a sassy staff and always a line and a crowd.  It's a fun place to go, apparently it's the oldest continuously run dining car in America, though I'm not sure who exactly was keeping track.  There's always a line to get in, so it's not one of those grab and go quickly stops, but the waiting in line if half the fun.  We all celebrated Saturday with a diner-wide free tequila shot, which is I think rather unique in itself.  I don't know of any other diner that does something like that, though I'm no diner expert by any means.

After Franks we walked to the Farmer's Market.  We've got a pretty good sized farmers market and it's got so much good stuff, we love making it a regular stop.  Things are starting to look a little scare there though, since the weather is starting to get chilly and vendors and shoppers alike are not quite so apt to sit around in the cold.  There's only 2 more weeks of the outdoor market, then it moves inside.  We stopped at the fudge place and they had $5 flop bags available.  Those are bags of misshapen and corner pieces of fudge.  You don't know what you're going to get, you just grab a bag and hope for the best.  One of our offerings today was root beer fudge.  It sounds wrong, and after tasting it, I assured myself that it IS wrong.  gross, just gross.  That's hard to believe of any kind of fudge, I know, but it's true.  Take my word for it, don't try and see for yourself.  There's my life advice for the day.

Settling back into normal.

It's been a pretty quiet week around here.  Now that the school rush is over, work is pretty relaxed.  I wouldn't like it like this all the time, because it would be a little boring, but after a month of craziness it's nice for us all to catch our breath a bit and get the store cleaned and up to snuff.  We literally didn't have time to restock, straighten shelves or even sweep the floor, but today all those things got done.  Plus, we're getting rid of textbooks that we didn't sell, and clearing off shelves and condensing them is a very satisfying feeling.  We'll start stocking graduation stuff next month, check in return textbook in December, then  start all over again in January with a new semester.  The circle of university life.

It's starting to feel a bit like fall now.  It was cold and rainy today and our main sales at work were rain ponchos, umbrellas, windbreakers and cold medicine.  It's all downhill from here.

Hubs was working in Hawaii the beginning of the week and brought a gecko home in his suitcase.  They run around wild down there and are as common in a house as a housefly.  So, now we've got a gecko of our own running around in the kitchen.  It's been hiding under the stove but comes out occasionally to see what's going on in the rest of the house.  Oh well, at least it's not a dog.

Houston, we have a problem

I've been in Houston for the last 4 or 5 days.  Not a good travel choice, as my good friend Tropical Storm Imelda reminded me, once I got there.

The airline did try to warn me, sending me emails telling me I may want to change my plans at no charge because of the storm, but the DOWNTON ABBEY MOVIE WAS OPENING ON THURSDAY!!  Yes, I flew across the country in a tropical storm so I could go to the movies with my daughters.  Stop judging me, it was a good movie and we've been looking forward to it for ages.

My flight on Thursday was only an hour delayed, so I thought things were going my way.  We had a relatively smooth landing in Houston, I got off the plane the went to the passenger pick-up area to wait for my girls to come get me.  That's when things went bad.  My first clue things weren't right is when I went to the pick-up area and there were only about 8 cars sitting there, 2 of the police cars, and none of them were moving or even turned on.  As a matter of fact, only 2 of them had people in them.  If you've ever spent time in a post 9/11 airport, you know that this is NOT a thing.  Turns out that after much texting and calling with the girls, that all the roads and from the airport were under water and the airport sent out a tweet telling people to not come pick up their passengers, that they had food and electricity and they'd be fine.  They never actually told any of this to those of us sitting in the airport waiting for our rides, we had to find out through comparing notes with fellow stranded passengers and calls to our Houston contacts.

After waiting at a complete stand-still for an hour on the road to the airport, the girls gave up and managed to find a place to turn around and went back home to wait for further updates.  4 hours later there was a break in the storm and they found out through someone on Twitter (NOT the airport) that there was one lane open, so they jumped in the car and got their momma.  YAY!!  So 5 hours after I landed, I finally walked into the door and I was officially there.  The drive back was apocalyptic.  There were abandoned cars sitting all over the place, some tire deep in water.  People were driving through ditches in an attempt to get out of parking lots and jumping the curbs to avoic roads that were under water.  And, worst of all, all the theaters were closed, so we had to postpone the movie until Saturday night.  😲

Friday it was still raining, so I spent the day juicing limes.  What?  Doesn't everyone juice limes when they're on vacation visiting their kids?  Someone had given the girls a huge case of limes and they were making the whole house smell funky.  Since the girls were busy, I just juiced away, made a pitcher of limeade and a lime pie.  So the citrus portion of our program was definitely covered.

Saturday we ran errands and did random stuff until it was movie time.  But right before we left to go, the girls discovered an injured baby squirrel, wrapped him up, brought him in the house and named him Alfred.  *sigh*  It's like these critters know then they've got a couple of suckers around. 

We went to the movie (AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME!!!) and it was AWESOME.  It was fun being in a theater with a bunch of people who also knew and loved all these characters and laughed at the inside jokes and snarky comments together. 

Sunday we brought Alfred to the SPCA, then spent a ridiculous amount of time there so Angel #4 could pet all the cats.  I had an uneventful flight home, got in about 10pm last night and here I am now.  So, we're all caught up for the moment.

Haunted tee shirts and lucky dreams

I've gotta say, I love Asian moms.  One of the kids I work with is Hmong and every once in awhile shares a morsel of wisdom passed down from her mother.  When I was talking about my favorite thrift store the other day she informed me that she'd never shopped at one because her mother didn't like them.  I asked if it was because she didn't like the idea of wearing other people's clothes and she said it had more to do with dead people.  "She's afraid dead people wore the clothes and now they've got dead people cooties??"  Nope, she's afraid that the former owners of the clothes are still with them in spirit and will haunt the clothes.  So, yeah, she won't buy used stuff because she's afraid of haunted mini skirts.  She also said her mom called yesterday to tell them to buy lottery tickets because she dreamed of poop.  Apparently, that means luck is coming your way.  And all this time I just thought it meant you should probably wake up and go to the bathroom before something really bad happened.

So, yeah, already not writing every day

Yesterday was catch-up day.  We had a branch fall down in the yard on Friday, so that needed cleaning up.  I also refuse to use the dryer in the summer time, which limits my laundry time to the weekend, so I did that.  Also got the lawn mowed and hubs and I got a start on my raised bed gardens for next summer.  He got his hands on one of those big square plastic tubs they use to haul liquids in, cut it in half and put it up on some posts.  So essentially, they're like a giant version of those little sandbox tubs they had in your kindergarten classroom.  We filled the bottom half with wood chips from the stump we had removed, then filled the rest with dirt.  Next spring they'll be all ready to plant and I'll be a happy gardener.

As I see from my comments, my friend Stacey is going to be a grandma next month!  Wow, I'm SO not ready for that yet (well, maybe a little).  But since I prefer my kids married first, then babies, my only option is little WE's running around and I'm not sure if the world is ready for that yet.  I guess I'll just enjoy grandkids vicariously through Stacey for the time being.

okay, yeah, it's been awhile

In order to get my mind back in writing mode, I'm resurrecting this baby.  It's been almost 4 years since I abruptly quit writing in here.  I'm not sure why I quit, I guess I just figured that after over 10 years of blogging, I just ran out of things to say.  Of course, if you know me, you know that's utter BS because I NEVER run out of things to say.  I guess I figured people just got sick of hearing it, which is probably true.  So I'm writing in here for myself and if you want to listen in, go to it, baby.

Quick recap of the last four years for those of you still playing:  The last angel graduated high school and moved to Texas to live with her sister.  We sold our house, moved to Hawaii for a little while.  Then moved to Texas, then back up to Wisconsin for the summer, then back down to Texas.  Then hubs got a good job offer and we moved back up to Wisconsin.  Got it?

So, currently, here we are, just hubs and I, living in a 3 bedroom ranch in a town situated on the shores of Lake Michigan.  Our house is about a mile walk to the lake and we like to walk down there and watch the waves, enjoy the free concerts they put on at the park there and just enjoy life in general.  Hubs got a job teaching at a technical college, so for the first time in our married life, he gets a regular paycheck and has regular hours.  I work at a university book store with a bunch of people who understand my bizarre humor and love me for it.  So, life is good.

The angels are all adulting very well, thank you.  All four are going to college full-time (with Angels #1 & 2 also working full time).  WE is out of the military, going to college full time and he GOT MARRIED!!  Who woulda think that the craziest of my kids would be the first to settle down and tie the knot?  The two of them have been together since before their junior year of high school (2012?) and Mrs WE is like a daughter to us, so life is wonderful.

I will do my best to write in here at least 3 times a week, but I'll try to be here daily.  I really need to get my writing groove back into play.