ALMOST Fall

Oh man, the weather really wants to go to full-on Fall season here. Just can’t quite get over the hump. Sunday was definitely in the season, rainy all day and barely broke 60. Then this week it’s back to the upper 70’s with full sun. Hey, nothing wrong with that either. As long as it’s not snowing, it’s all good.

The weekend was unacceptably marred by work. It happens. I’ve yet to convince management that I cannot be spending nights in the datacenter instead of hitting the town in search of blog material. I don’t really understand this mindset, but seem forced to comply. Robbed of my Saturday, I did have a fairly entertaining Friday. We went to our neighborhood haunt Bones for lunch. Haven’t been there in a few weeks, so it was good to see “the crowd” again. We don’t usually eat there either, as it’s gotten so expensive. Not expensive in the “costs more than everywhere else” kind of way, just in the “everything is expensive anymore” kind of way. Apparently I whined too much about the insane cost of adding bacon to my burger and they threw some in for free though, so that was nice. ($3.50 to add a few strips of bacon?!?! C’mon man.) After that tasty meal, we finished up the workday at home and then went to an open house our realtor was throwing at nearby Saureel Vineyards. We’d never been there, and it was a fantastic property. We need to make it a point to go back there sometime and check out their wines. Had a great time though, lots of food and a guy singing who was good.

Sunday we went out to a late breakfast with some friends, then it was back to the house for a day of watching football. It didn’t feel like so much of a wasted day like usual, since it was raining and cold out anyway. Donette made some great beef stew to enjoy during the night game, which hit the spot.

I’ll throw in another random “product review” since I don’t have much else to go on. I recently broke down and bought a Vortex setup for my Weber grill. I’ve been going back and forth on if I really needed one, and as usual finally came to the inescapable conclusion that yes, there was really no way I could continue life without one. I’ve used it twice so far, both times in the “indirect-direct” setup described on their site. (Whatever that means; Doesn’t really make sense.) I made chicken legs both times, and both times they came out great. Smoky, crispy, and they get done fast. I want to do wings in the same fashion, but when legs are usually 1/5 the price of wings I’m gonna go drummies every time. The main reason I got it is to do ribs in the same setup, but I haven’t had a chance to try that yet. Supposedly you can cook a slab of ribs in about an hour; This I gotta see. I also want to sear a steak over it, as it gets crazy hot in the middle. Overall, I’ll give it a 4.5 out of 5 stars. Half star ding for the price. Yeah it works great, just like everyone says. But I can’t shake the feeling that $40 is a little exorbitant for a metal cone. A lot of people make their own, but nah. Guess I ain’t THAT put off by the price.

Welcome Back

Geez, not sure what happened there. Sabbatical? Change in weather threw me off? Pure laziness? Maybe some combo of all those, and even a few more. Plus, it’s just been quiet out here. In a good kind of way, I suppose. Can’t get in any trouble just sitting at home doing nothing. (That has actually been proven false on multiple occasions. At least the odds are a little better.)

I’ll just skip over both the notable things we’ve done in the two months since I last got around to updating this, and jump right to last week. We spent all last week out in nearby Lotus, camping in the RV. I took a few days off, and worked from the RV a few more days. Working from it works out remarkably well. Only real issue is my data plan runs out pretty quick, but then I just buy a few days on the service the campground offers and it’s all good. The dogs seem to enjoy being out there, we both enjoy being out there… It’s enjoyed by all! I wasn’t able to get a spot in November, but we have some time booked in December, weather permitting.

Other than that week o’ fun, not too much happening. I got a new “heat deflector” for my firepit, which works great. The wife has “mentioned” (read: complains constantly) that the firepit doesn’t put out enough heat, it just goes straight up. I guess that must be a common complaint because they came out with this deflector thing a while back. Works pretty well, we gave it a good test on Saturday, sitting around it watching the Missouri game. Finally using the wood I split last year, it burns great! We just had two oaks removed in the back yard so there’s more where that came from too. Lots of firepit time in my future!

It’s Raining!

Hey, it’s actually raining outside! Don’t see that very often around here. Been at least a few months. It cooled things down very nicely, at least for the time being. Supposed to get hot again soon, but we’ll enjoy the 80’s while they’re here.

One of our Major Events last week was car shopping. We’ve been kicking around the idea of selling all our vehicles and just getting one car. We were a one-car household when we moved out here, which worked fine, and then it all went bad. I don’t know what happened, but now we have 3 cars, the motorcycle, and the scooter. That’s a lot of registrations to keep track of, if nothing else. Anyway, for our single vehicle of choice, we decided on the Jeep Wrangler. Lots of reasons behind this. For one thing, you just can’t be rolling around our new neighborhood in the Benz’s. Likely to get profiled. We need to “fit in” a little better. It would also get us anywhere we needed during the occasional winter storm, which we are finding to be not-so-occasional the last few years. They’re also towable behind the motor home, which is a plus. We’d looked at them a few times already, and had become convinced we needed to wait for the 2024 models to arrive. Lots of cool new features on them. Well, they are here, with one big unexpected caveat. It seems Jeep has decided that even though the ill-thought-out gas vehicle ban in California doesn’t take effect for ten more years, they are just going to go ahead and quit shipping gas vehicles here now. I did NOT see that coming. It was a pretty short shopping trip, because I do not want an electric vehicle, and I do not want a 2023. Back to square one on the new car front.

Not much else happening. We drove out out to Sutter Creek yesterday, mostly just to enjoy the weather and eat lunch. The evenings were spent at home on the patio. Don’t want to waste these cool temps, need to take advantage of it! Oh, and I should mention, I’ve started my annual beard project. It’s a week old, and already driving me crazy. I’m just not cut out for facial hair. But again, I’m just trying to fit in around here. I am actually the only guy in a 37 mile radius without a beard of some sort. Plus, as Donette put it, I’ve been blessed with the ability to sport a sexy, handsome beard, and I should take advantage of it. OK, maybe I paraphrased her words a bit, but just a bit.

Portland ’23

Spent a fun weekend up in Portland. Great weather, OK-ish company, and a fun city; Great combo! The main focus of the trip was the Young The Giant show at McMenamins Amphitheater. We’ve already seen them a few times, but like them enough to make a short trip, plus Milky Chance was opening and we like them also. We got to Portland Thursday evening and the show wasn’t until Saturday, so we had ample time for extracurriculars. Some friends drove down from Washington Friday morning, and we kicked things off with a great breakfast at Pine State Biscuits. I won’t lie, I almost ruined the whole plan when I saw the option to order your biscuits with mushroom gravy. Sometimes you just have to make a stand for what is right and wrong. The group was able to talk me off the ledge though, under the somewhat flimsy premise that just because they offered it, I didn’t have to order it. Well… OK. I have to admit my breakfast was fantastic, but I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that somewhere in the restaurant, someone had ordered biscuits and mushroom gravy. Shudder. After breakfast our locally-based hostess took us on a nice little tour of the downtown area, and general vacation-ish fun ensued.

The place we stayed was actually a really nice short-term apartment building that our friend was able to hook us up with, so our rooms were great. They had a really nice roof-top deck with great views, so we enjoyed our coffee and donuts up there to kick off Saturday. You could see the river directly below, Mt Hood was right in front of us, and Mt St Helens was visible in the distance also. After that we kicked around a few nearby entertainment areas, then it was off to the show. Both bands put on great sets, but I do find my generally anti-amphitheater sentiment growing. This place didn’t have any seats at all, and we ended up sitting on the ground. Yeah, I’m about 20 years past those days. Every time I stood up, it got progressively more difficult. I was reasonably sure there was going to be medical personnel or heavy equipment involved in extricating me by the end of the concert, possibly a mix of both. Somewhere during the Young The Giant show though, Donette decided that if we were going to be uncomfortable, we might as well just stand down front. Key decision; It wasn’t really that crowded, and the show was way better. Our blanket-spot was so far back that the stage was barely visible, and the music marginal, but down front both were great. Made that call a little late in the show, but it paid off at the end.

Sunday, by the time we got up and around, it was time to head to the airport. We got home at a reasonable 1:00 or so, grabbed a pizza for lunch, and headed home to see the dogs. Quinny faired the absence reasonably well, but Nacho treated us to her typical over-the-top dramatics for quite a while. The volume level at the concert paled in comparison to her rather ridiculous shrieking. Nice to be missed, I suppose.