Taste Like Chicken-Karen’s Birthday Weekend-5/8&9

Happy Birthday weekend Karen.

Thanks for the start, Chele. Hard to believe it's my birthday weekend already. Congrats on the new glasses and that they are Iggy-approved. Sorry YS was devoid of marigolds, but like you said, there's time. What did they have in YS today that followed you home? I don't remember divisions being this bad during Vietnam either. I've said to Dale many times that I'm glad I'm as old as I am because if the idiots flush democracy down the drain, at least I won't have to live as long under autocratic rule. I've gotten some things done this morning, but I wouldn't describe myself as particularly peppy. We have had cloudy skies all morning, so I think that's part of it. With all those people moving into a trendier downtown there, a larger grocery store is certain to follow. Would it be closer than your current choices, should you decide to switch? You're probably right about the current absence of masks among the younger crowd who either think they are immune or are willing to take their chances.

Linda, "fraudit" is a perfect term. And, you're right that they won't stop at AZ when there is so much $$ to be had continuing the Big Lie. I was naive enough to think when January 20th rolled around, things would get calmer in the world. Not even close. Every day it seems to get more bizarre and I'm just tired of the idiocy. How are the allergies doing today? I hope you feel better and have a bit more energy.

Shorter hair has to feel good with summer already there, Becky. I have already had to transplant my cucumbers. They grow so fast that you'll have those seeds sprouted and leafing out in no time. I get the burpless ones as well. I think I have 2 varieties I am growing this year. Do you remember what varieties of cherry tomatoes you got? They are always popular at our plant sales and I think we grew about half a dozen different ones this year. I imagine it's difficult raising cattle. Has Kenneth always had them? Does he have enough to keep him busy without them? I didn't hear about Sam Ehlinger's brother. How awful! Wasn't he a player for UT? They don't seem to have much in the press other than the police are saying it wasn't suspicious. I know this has to be difficult for Sam because they were close. Enjoy your new jewelry. I need to get rid of a bunch of mine. Especially with over a year of mask-wearing, I haven't been able to wear any of my favorite earrings. Congrats to your nephew's wife on her academic achievements. It takes a lot of dedication to get to where she has gotten. Does she work for UT?

Kathy, good luck to DN on starting his new job. Great that a lot of it will be virtual from a safety standpoint right now, but it's a shame he won't have much in-person contact. It's difficult to develop mentorships working distantly. So The Villages had MTG and Matt together😕? I used to think that it would be nice to live in a place like that when we get older, but the more I see of their far right politics, I don't think we would fit in. I used to wear contacts and I don't miss them. I had a pair of glasses for backup but didn't change them as often as Chele used to. Do you get the ones you leave in for a couple of weeks?

How was your week, Liz? Did you recover from the mystery virus that you were dealing with last week?

Denise, do I remember you have a birthday coming up in a couple of weeks? Any plans? I hope you won't have to work. I always used to take my birthday off when it fell on a work day. I said that was my personal holiday.

I've just been puttering around the house for the most part. Gardening shows were on this morning so I caught them. I did some laundry and baked Arya a batch of sweet potatoes. Dale left early to go run and we are expecting to hear from him shortly to let us know he is back at the car and I need to place the Thai order for him to pick up on his way home. I plan to get the usual Sunday load of workout clothes done when he gets home so I won't have to do that tomorrow. The weather guessers keep changing their minds on the rain chances for tomorrow. Monday is supposed to be a washout. Hope everyone is having a good weekend.

Thanks for the start Chele. Things might be easier but yes Kenneth and I would both be bored without the cattle here. I haven't been helping as long as he has had cattle but I really enjoy our little team work. Walmart was a zoo. It didn't look like there were that many shoppers and after I got everything I needed I headed to the garden center. Most of their plants looked almost dead so I told Kenneth to meet me at self checkout. OMG I have never seen such long lines and of course it's all self checkout lanes even though associates will help you. One helped us the other day. I didn't have anything cold in my basket so I just left it there and we went to the local nursery. By time I thought there was something I might be interested in their line was long. Everyone puts their pots in a wagon and they come out and figure out the price and you go inside to pay. I told Kenneth I just wanted to go home. It would have been too hot and windy to plant anything anyway. I found a yellow looking worm under one of the cuke plants so I was able to step on him and kill him. We had some Sevin Dust left but not enough I don't think. They are getting blooms though. My nephew's wife seems to be really smart. 

Karen Are you doing anything special tomorrow for your birthday? I have seeds put out and one regular cucumber plant. The plant is the one that is burpless. I am not sure about the name of the cherry tomatoes. A friend who lives about a mile from us suggested it. Something like brilliant red or bright brilliant red if that is even a type. Kenneth bought Big Boy tomatoes and a different kind since he likes the big tomatoes. Kenneth and his dad both worked cattle out here. When he was still alive they had a lot more but one reason he is thinking of selling is because they will all get old about the same time and then they don't bring as much money. Sam's brother was on the team but he hadn't played in 2 years. That is the only thing they say about the death here also. Sam came back from rookie camp to be with his family. Yes my nephew's wife works for UT and she has gotten her masters and doctorate while being married to my nephew and 2 kids. 

Linda, I haven’t used fabric softener in years. Iggy hates it. Glad the clothes came out okay.

Becky, I don’t blame you for walking out of Walmart and the nursery. I would have done the same.

It is a rainy, thundering day here with cool temps, high of 53°. This IS spring. And I have the headache tk match. 😂

Have a good Sunday.

Linda, it's good that you are so handy around the house. Is there a way to keep that waxy stuff from building up so you won't have to go through that again? We got one of those high efficiency washers when we moved here and got an ozone cleaning system to go with it, so no detergent or fabric softener needed. We do use a set of wool dryer balls to cut down on static. Don't blame you for waiting on the Micki walk. Did you tell him he really didn't want to go out in that heat? I hope things are a little cooler for you today. The zebra was all over the news here. It is where Dale did his undergrad, so he was really familiar with te area.

Thanks for the virtual cake, Chele. Just the right number of calories. So sorry about the headache. We are in the 70s with clouds and lots of wind. We may have to take in the bird feeder this afternoon, which will anger a lot of our customers. We are expecting rain overnight, but it's probably not the same system you are currently getting.

Becky, the plant section at WM sounds a bit of a mess. Even I wouldn't need plants badly enough to mess with that. Maybe you can try again the next time you're there to see if they still have plants but it will be less crazy. It sounds like you have several plants that should produce well for you. If you can keep the tomatoes from blighting, they will probably do quite well with your heat.

I hope DN does get to go in to the office more this summer, Kathy. There are most likely a lot of things he would get to do there if he was onsite. I used to do pretty well with the Acuvue contact lenses, unless my allergies were really in high gear. I got used to them pretty quickly. Are you back in the 90s today, as predicted? I know you enjoyed the cooler temps yesterday.

Dinner didn't exactly work out as planned yesterday. I tried to place our order on their website and every time I tried to check out, I got a weird message about items timing out. So I figured I would just call them and nobody ever answered the phone (called twice). I hope they aren't out of business and maybe just took vacation. But it posed a quandry because Dale was planning to bring home dinner. I found another restaurant that is a local chain and he had to come right by it, so I ordered there instead. But I had planned to eat Thai for tonight's dinner as well and the portions are smaller where we ended up getting food. So I guess I'll have a veggie burger instead. He found Hilary's World's Best Veggie Burger, so we'll see if it really is (at least IMO). Dale got me the HR monitor that goes with my swim watch, so I'll be able to track info in the lake now. I also got a couple of really nice tops that are really breathable. And, he got me a set of kitchen gloves because I'm notorious with knives. I just have to remember to wear them🙃. I've got a lot of texts, FB posts, messages, emails, etc. so far. I asked Arya to let us sleep late this morning, but she ignored me.