Friday, Friday

So, I bagged work Friday afternoon to head home, and what did I end up doing? Working with power tools! I finished up the dirt box, where we've decided to store the mound of dirt that used to be behind our retaining wall but has since established an ecosystem of its own. Omaha and I dug out the finished and probably contaminated wood that was in the old woodpile square, then replaced it with the dirtbox and started shoveling. "You dig sixteen tons and whaddya get... filthy!"

While we were digging around, we discovered that an entire ant colony had chosen to set up a nice little home under the tarpualin we had put down to distinguish between the original terrain and the dirt mound. Kouryou-chan was fascinated with all the passageways, although oddly enough the ants didn't seem to be in too much of a panic.

Omaha gardened, mowed, and helped me dig. Kouryou-chan played on the swings, ran around with the neighborhood children, and generally made a terrible mess of herself and her surroundings. She does that.

We went out to eat at Wallys, a midrange fish place, not too bad. When we finally got home it was so late it was actually time for bed. It felt nice to do something physical, something that would get the blood pumping. I've been working too much brain stuff recently.

Cold, Wet, and Yucky

Saturday, we rose late and Omaha decided that she wanted breakfast muffins and smoothies. This involved a lot of baking with oats and butter, and the smoothies were a combination of plain yogurt, honey, bananas, milk, and a bunch of other things that all together were just plain delicious. I think all three of us had two muffins each. We listened to Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me, went out to do yet more outdoor house maintenance, dig more dirt it's a big pile, add another board over the open face of the dirt box because the pile was bigger than I thought, clean out the assembled clutter in the car and vacuum the floor. Kouryou-chan kept her foot on the brake peddle while I figured out which brake light was broken and replaced it.

Happiness is hearing the guy at the emissions center say "Your car passed." They don't even bother hooking up my car to the old emissions test; they just take the car's word for it that its emissions are within specifications, attaching to a connector under the front dash. Weird.

Anyway, after all of the usual nonsense, we hooked up the trail-a-bike to the back of my bicycle and rode the mile or so into town, Kouryou-chan thrilled to be out in the air, enjoying every moment as we reached the second-hand store where I found one spare pare of riding trunks but no suitable riding pack. As we were leaving, it started to pour.

We took refuge in an Arby's, where we decided to have lunch. Kouryou-chan didn't eat any of her lunch; I ate mine, but oddly didn't find it filling or satisfying. Then I rode home, sort-of: Omaha pointed out that a bus was coming soon, so I rode down to the bus stop, grabbed the bus, let it carry me down four stops to the grocery store near my house, then rode through the woods. I hopped into the car and ran back to retrieve the family. So much for saving gas and getting exercise. We got back home cold, wet, and yucky. But Kouryou-chan still thought it was great fun.

When we got home, the rain had stopped, but it came in waves, cooling off the day down below 60 again. We made our monthly Costco run, picking up the massive staples that run our household. At one point I picked up seven pounds of ground beef and a woman standing next to me said, "What do you do with all that?"

"Ziplock it into half-pound packages and put it in the freezer."

"I never thought of that." Sometimes I wonder about people.

We headed home when we got a call from FallenPegasus-- were we wondering what to do with our evening? He offered to come over. We offered to cook. He came over, we cooked paella with breakfast sausage and shrimp, sat around and geeked for a while. I put Kouryou-chan in the bathtub, but she just wanted a quick wash-- no playing in the tub. It was late, so I understood. I washed her hair and she washed the rest, and then I herded her into pyjamas. For some reason she just wanted bottoms, no shirt, which was fine. I read Hop on Pop with her and then put her to bed.

Omaha and FallenPegasus were watching The Fugitive, so I went and played Half Life for a while, then headed to bed.

Oh, yeah. ( Helen gets it right. )