Nance and Rick are gone, left here Saturday about mid-day to drive partway home, stop for the night, then finish the drive on Sunday.
We sure did have a lot of fun while they were here. Fred took Friday off so he and Rick made a bridge to go over the ditch that separates the back yard from the back forty (I hate having to slog through the water to get out to the back forty when it’s as wet as it’s been recently – and the fact that there are holes in my boots makes it that much more miserable) while I made breakfast (bacon, eggs, biscuits, YUM). Nance alternately loved on the cats (Miz Poo is a huge love slut) and mocked me for being Suzy Homemaker in my apron.
I dropped Lucille, Lindsay and Maeby off at Petsmart. They’re so cute and personable that I expect quick adoptions. (Maeby was adopted on Saturday; I haven’t been to the pet store yet, so I don’t know if either of the other two have been adopted yet). The entire drive to the pet store, the kittens would take turns howling mournfully, and then at the pet store while I was setting up their cage, they howled sadly, and then I put them in the cage and it was like I was taking them out of the carrier and putting them in the cage and they were all “Wah wah wahhhhh, why must we be in this carrier, why do you hate us so, why do – oh! Is that a new toy?” When I left the cat room, they were all sniffing interestedly around their cage like “Hey, this place is cool!”
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From the pet store we went over to Target, then stopped by the fabric store (Nance bought some fabric and I picked up a flyer. I’m thinking of taking a beginning sewing class, since it’s been more than 20 years since I touched a sewing machine) and then Fred called and was all “When are you coming home? We want to watch I Am Legend, do we have to wait?”, so we headed home.
Nance went off to read while Fred and Rick and I watched I Am Legend. About half an hour into the movie my sister called and we talked for a minute and after I hung up the phone the three of us decided to pause the movie so we could take naps.
Yes, we are the lamest.
I dozed off for about ten minutes and then couldn’t sleep any more, so I went out and filled the bird feeders and then Fred and I walked out to the back forty to see the pigs.
Here’s where a conversation took place that later came back to bite me in the ass. I was wearing sneakers on my feet and I bitched about having to walk through the mud, and Fred said “You should wear Nance’s boots!”, because Nance has these cool yellow boots.
I said “Oh, they won’t fit me. She wears, like, a men’s size 14.” Exaggerating for effect, you see? Because she’s like a foot taller than I am, so she has proportionately larger feet?
“Does she really?” Fred said, fascinated. “A men’s size 14?!”
“Well, no. But Rick can wear them, so they’re probably far too big for me.”
And then we went out and visited the pigs, then went back inside and finished watching the movie. Once the movie was over, it was about dinnertime, so Fred and Rick went out to start the grill and Nance and I went into town to return the movie and go to the grocery store.
We had Fred-grilled steak for dinner and baked potatoes and salad. The steak (according to Fred) was salty (because he was at the bottom of a bottle of Dale’s steak sauce), and the salad was sadly lacking. Unlike the salad they served me in Pennsylvania that was the best! salad! ever! (I’m going to start calling it Shirley salad), the bagged stuff I added tomatoes and cucumbers to was just not all that. The pigs ended up with the bulk of the salad later that night, and they loved the hell out of it.
Rick took Nance up into town to Starbucks, and I did a quick vacuum of the house while they were gone, then Nance and I sat in front of our computers and Fred and Rick played with the Wii (Trey’s Wii, which he kindly allowed us to bring to Alabama with us) until Fred could barely stand it anymore, and we adjourned to the living room to play Pictionary.
Pictionary is a fun freakin’ game, helped out by the big whiteboard Nance had bought during our trip to Target. We played two games, and Fred and I started out strong with both of them, but about halfway through each game got ourselves tripped up so Nance and Rick would just mosey on by us to win the damn game. It was KILLING Fred to lose those games, but you can’t win ’em all, right?
(Admire my mad drawing skills hither. And hither. Also, hither.)
During the game, Fred would walk over to the whiteboard to take his turn and then he’d stomp back over to the couch, and he’d walk so fucking close to my drink – which was sitting on the floor in front of me – that I was convinced he was going to kick it and knock it over. So I’d be “Watch out, watch your feet, don’t kick over my drink!” and he’d say, all annoyed, “I’m nowhere near your drink!” and finally I got so annoyed with him that I got up and clomped about in imitation of the way he walks with his big goofy feet, and I thought Nance was going to pass out, she was laughing so hard.
Which is when Fred said “Yeah, well, she was making fun of YOUR feet not very long ago!”
Aghast at the lie, I said “I was NOT!”, and then he recounted the “Men’s size 14” conversation from earlier, and I about choked to death, I was laughing so hard. I had COMPLETELY forgotten I’d said that. And then they tried to say that I was calling Rick’s feet “dainty”, so in one short day I managed to insult everyone in the house. Score!
We turned in pretty early, ’cause we were all tired. That sitting around all day with a nap thrown in halfway through the day is a killer, ain’t it?
Saturday morning we left the house earlyish (not as early as Fred would have liked to leave, because I’m sure he wanted to leave at like 5 am) and we went into Nearville to eat breakfast at a restaurant Fred knew about (a restaurant I do not recommend in the slightest, because my omelet had NO flavor whatsoever) and then we headed to Lacon Trade Days, which is just a big, crappy flea market type place where they also sell some livestock. It’s where we got McLovin, actually.
(pic) If we hadn’t just eaten breakfast, I would have insisted on eating at this place. It smelled really damn good. Alas, we were all still full from breakfast.
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(pic) I tried to convince Nance that she needed to invest in this as a statement piece. Somehow, she disagreed. Isn’t it creepy?
We walked around there for a few hours, eyeballing everything they had for sale, and believe me – there was a LOT of crap. Fred ended up buying some goose eggs just ’cause he wanted to try them (he scrambled one yesterday and tried eating egg sandwiches, but then declared the egg to be – any guesses? – too eggy, so gave the others to the pigs).
It’s so sad at that place to see all the puppies they have for sale. It wouldn’t be so bad except that some of the people have these little bitty puppies all crammed into one small cage, and the puppies are scared and have no food or water. And you can adopt some of them and bring them home, right? Except that you cannot possibly save them all, there’s no piece of land on earth that will hold all the puppies places like these sell.
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(pic) I think this is a Silver-Laced Wyandotte. They’re gorgeous birds, I wouldn’t mind having a couple.
(pic) Fred’s still pushing for goats. I’m still pushing back.
We left there after a few hours and ran over to Stuckey’s so Fred could use the bathroom and Nance and I could nose around. Nance and I are copycats, because we both bought “genuine hand-made Mexican blankets” for $6.99 each, and then I bought some ground pecans to make pecan-crusted chicken, and we headed home.
We stopped on the way home to visit the bakery thrift store. We poked around looking for sweet stuff for the pigs (we’ve found that they’ll eat their pig chow a lot more readily if there’s a little something sweet mixed in with it) and Fred ended up buying about 100 packs of mini powdered donuts for $10. That’ll last for a month or more, so that’s a pretty good score.
(pic) You cannot come and visit Crooked Acres without leaving with a load of canned stuff. It’s the law!
Once home, Nance and Rick loaded up their car, we stood around and talked for a few minutes, and then they were on their way and Fred and I were like “What the hell do we do NOW?”
(The answer: Eat lunch, putter around, then settle down and spend the afternoon watching The Office and Enchanted and Survivor.)
Yesterday was very low-key for us. I slept in ’til almost 7, started laundry, wandered around in my nightgown, stripped and remade the guest bed (when we have no guests, we keep some old sheets and a crappy comforter on the bed so that the cats can hang out on it and I don’t have to worry about getting cat hair all over the mattress or cat vomit all over the good comforter), cleaned the litter boxes, then read for a while and showered and did more puttering.
Fred’s mother and stepfather stopped by, late morning, to drop off leftover food for the pigs. I don’t know what it was – rice and carrots and cabbage and there was some kind of teriyaki sauce on it, it smelled really good – but the pigs dove in and didn’t stop eating ’til every bit of it was gone. We hung out and talked to them for about an hour, then Fred pawned some tomato plants off on them (he’s planted 120, woot!) and they left.
The rest of the day was laundry, puttering around, hanging out with the cats. The usual.
(pic) My new sweatshirt, thank you to reader Lyndell who posted the link in my comments. Fred’s got the t-shirt. He’s promising to wear it while he does the slaughtering.
We had steak for dinner, with black-eyed peas and green beans. I’d thought about doing a mini-Easter dinner with the ham and mashed potatoes and deviled eggs, but that was more work than I wanted to do, and we ended up with a damn fine meal anyway.
Now it’s back to life as usual. I’m off to the pet store. See you tomorrow!
There are a ton of pictures uploaded over at Flickr.
I love the way Tommy goes a little crazy-eyed when you rub his stomach. Check out those claws!
Previously
2007: No entry.
2006: No entry.
2005: I. Am. PISSED.
2004: “I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t believe I quite understand. Could you explain this “spoonful” word to me via pantomime again?”
2003: That, or she’s a stalker-reader.
2002: No entry.
2001: No entry.
2000: Some people just have a smack-me face, don’t they?