Don’t forget, next Wednesday the 23rd is the 14th annual AKL Alumni luncheon.  (I’m making up the 14th…  Who really knows how many there have been.  If you include “Turkey Bowls” it could be even more than that.)  James Munkirs, Fall ’78 Pledge, will be hosting the event at the Brooksider starting at noon.  They have expanded their lunch menu considerably since last year’s gathering, prepare to be amazed by the quality of the extensive gourmet offerings.  As an added attraction this year, Mr. Munkirs will be cycling from his house to the ‘Sider wearing his riding bibs, a sight not to be missed.

That was a marginal weekend at best.  The simple act of recapping it will likely be a painful experience for me.  I was excited for the new work week, just to get the weekend over with.  It started off OK I suppose, other than my Friday night happy hours might be getting a little tedious too.  I do like a good routine, but it seems to be wearing on me a bit.  Probably for the best;  With the weather turning cold quickly I suppose my days on the patios are limited, and I don’t like going inside anyways.  Guess I’ll need to think of a new Friday hobby.

Saturday was so painfully boring I could barely stand it.  I had the specter of an all night work-a-thon staring me in the face all day, and just couldn’t get motivated.  I pretty much sat on the couch with the dog and watched old westerns.  I guess I mowed the lawn again, but honestly that didn’t do a whole lot to perk me up.  Donette, meanwhile, ran a 5k with some friends, went to dinner and a play, and various other fun activities.  I watched back-to-back-to-back Bonanza episodes.

Sunday was marginally better.  I didn’t get home from work until about the time I usually get out of bed, so that threw my day off quite a bit.  I grabbed a few hours sleep, then we went and met my Mom and sisters at the Lee’s Summit Jason’s Deli for a tasty lunch.  That place is good;  I can’t recall that I’ve ever been to one before.  Kept me from having to watch that disaster of a Chief’s game too.  After lunch we headed back home and I bummed around the rest of the day.  Between the time change and my late night I was quite out of sorts.  After watching the afternoon game, we went to the neighbor’s house for dinner and enjoyed some tasty spaghetti.  After eating we watched “Mean Bosses,” which appeared to be pretty funny but I slept through most of it.  (Sorry about the slobber stains on your couch, good neighbor.)

Once I miss Monday I’m inclined to just skip this altogether.  I had a fine Halloween though, it likely bears a recap.  My day yesterday started off nicely when I was informed my services would not be required for the day, and I was to vacate the building immediately.  After verifying this was not a permanent situation, I merrily hopped on my scooter and headed home.  The rest of the day was a fine mix of chores and entertainment.  First Donette’s folks made the drive down to our house and we all went for a tasty meal at Jalapenos.  After lunch we headed back to our house and visited a bit, then I fired up the lawnmower in a valiant attempt at cleaning up the leaves.  I made a solid dent in that little project.  Feeling like I deserved a reward for that few hours of manual labor, I headed down the the Brooksider to join the boys for the rest of the afternoon.  We hung out there for a bit, then Donette picked me up and we went over to a nearby friend’s house for a Halloween party.  The kids were out in droves in the neighborhood, so we handed out candy for a few hours and then headed home.  When we got home there were still lots of kids walking up and down our  block.  Granted, most of them had likely driven themselves over there, and costumes were few and far between;  Likely because they’d just gotten off work.  Hey, who cares, we don’t want the stupid candy.  We flipped the light on and handed out the rest of our treats, then shut it down for the night.  Our friend Susan came over and we watched good ol’ Halloween Horror movies for a while.  We got a few flicks in, then turned on the TV just in time to catch the last of the Chief’s game.  Whew, full day!

The weekend wasn’t all bad either.  Munkirs and I went on what could well have been our last bike ride of the season.  We took the “Brookside Ride” for a nice 17 miles at a rather leisurely pace.  Good way to wrap up the year.  I finished just a couple of miles short of 1,300 this year, which is a solid 400 miles more than last year.  Next year’s goal will be 1500;  We’ll see how that works out.  Saturday night Donette threw her fundraising party down at the Plaza.  It went off quite nicely;  Made some money, had some fun, good stuff.  Nobody must have been too hungry though, I swear we took home more than we came with.  If we get snowed in this winter we’ll be able to survive on cheese and crackers for at least two weeks.

This weather is suiting me just fine.  Sure, I hear we can use some rain, but I’ll take the sunny 70-degree weather any time.  Case in point, Friday I rolled down to the Brooksider to soak in a little sun.  Alas, I found they had put up the stupid tent.  Well, that was sort of a drag, but at least it was warm so I stayed down there for a few hours.  If they would have asked me, I would have recommended they wait at least two more weeks to put that behemoth up.  They did not ask me, however.

Saturday morning Donette got up early and went on an eight-mile run with her training group.  I drank coffee and watched cartoons.  When she got back we headed up to Martin’s for a day in the northlands.  This plan came about when one of the team members on this charity thing she is doing asked if we would cook some bbq for her upcoming golf tournament.  (“Upcoming” being Sunday…)  Hey, what the heck;  It was a beautiful day for doing some cooking.  So, we got there about 10:30, got the smoker rolling, then Martin and I headed even further north to join K.B. at his folk’s house for some shootin’.  I haven’t done any blasting in a while, that was a fine time.  We killed some targets for a few hours, then headed back to watch the smoker and enjoy the fine weather the rest of the day.

Sunday was effectively spent on the golf tourney.  It went well and the food was a hit.  The beef went over particularly well.  Either they just weren’t a big pulled pork crowd or I need to work on my recipe.  (I’m guessing the latter;  It was a little bland I had to admit.  At the same time, I will take brisket over pork any day, so who knows.)  She definitely got a lucky break with the weather.  Doesn’t get much nicer than that for a mid-fall golf outing.

Geez that was a long weekend.  That means I’m in for a long week.  Can’t have it all.

As we approach the end of the year, I’m getting in my annual not-so-bad situation of needing to burn some vacation days.  So, I took off Thursday and Friday and drove Donette down to St. Louis to visit her sister.  We took the pup with us, which went moderately well.  She and her little doggy cousins didn’t hit it off so well.  They did just barely OK together;  I don’t think they will be sending each other Christmas cards though.  For the most part they just ignored each other, which is better than some alternatives I suppose.  Speaking of Teagan, we got to visit a bit with the girl that picked her up off the street, which was nice.  She was glad to see her rescue getting along so well, and had some funny stories of her short time keeping her.  (No good deed goes unpunished.)  After that visit, we walked down the street to some-place-I-forget-the-name-of and had some pizza and watched the baseball game.

That was pretty much it for my St. Louis trip.  I drove home Friday morning, and Donette headed to Indianapolis to watch her sister run a marathon.  I made it home just in time to join the boys down at the Brooksider for a bit.  And that’s pretty much it for my weekend.  Kept a low profile.  Worked in the yard a bit, played a few dozen hours of catch with the dog…  Not much to relate.  Donette took the Megabus home on Sunday, in sort of an experiment to see if it was a viable transportation option for future trips.  It didn’t exactly receive glowing reviews, I think that was a “one and done” experiment.