Saturday, July 11, 2009
Saw 4 different fireworks shows, flying home. Willimantic's and Hartford's were the best. We flew right next to the big cloud of smoke hovering over the river when we landed... the Hartford show ended about five minutes before we got there. We could see them about 25 miles out. As soon as we put Tango away in the hangar, it started to pour!! It sounds really cool with the metal roof. Now it's thundering like a GIANT bowling ball. It's really reverberating! Wow! I bet all those dudes walking back to their cars from the 'works are getting drenched. We could also see a whole bunch of boats in the river, right below us coming in. It was cool!
Posted at 10:01:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Went in the Labyrinth and Hodge Preserve. They were both nice. Excellent Froozie's (I forgot HOW good!) and Harry's. Bweel's was slackishly closed for a post Harry coffee at 8 o'clock. Windy at Pots. My scuba beater and arm warmers (new mauve ones) were great. I am perfecting my summer playlist. Love LOVE hounding on Block. And l.l. Jim's organic coffee (iced). Tons of hydrangeas in full bloom. New FBO is premium! Baby hydrangea landscaping at airport. :-)
Cat Stats: Total Distance - 12.38; Average Speed - 8.8; Max Speed - 27.6; Total Time - 1:23'47.
Friday, July 10, 2009
The only coffee shop where I tip big is the Borders Cafe. With good reason.
Posted at 5:38:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
One of the baristas even knows my name now! (And I only go there once a week at the most... usually once every other week.) I am easily impressed when people know my name, since I can't remember anyone's name, and forget what people look like about two seconds after I turn away from them. (I am not exaggerating.)
It's NICE out today. Sun! 80°! (!!!!!)
I bought two more things of Suder blueberries.
Thursday, July 09, 2009
Aaaaahh!! Must buy daily Suderberries!!!! I forgot how superior (TART) they are!!
Posted at 9:56:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Went to Suder's for the first time this season! I don't usually go this early, but I took a chance and it was great! I got 1) tomatoes (hothouse ones, so they're not as good as the later 100% in season tomatoes, but they were still good!), 2) fantastic happy basil, 3) blueberries! Suder waved at me when he saw me. :-) Then when I was paying he asked me how I'd been and I said, "Great!" and I asked him how he'd been and he said "Pretty good." Good old Suder.
Posted at 6:30:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
To go with the basil and tomatoes (it's too early, really, but I WANT SUMMER!!!!) (it was sweater weather again today, aaagh!), I went to Stew Leonard's and got Stew's handmade mozzarella. The mozzarella guy was making it right then (kneading and stretching this big white mass with his hands... it was cool!) and he offered to make me a special size one if I wanted, so I got a fresh mozz formed just for me because I wanted one smaller than any of the already packaged up pieces. He squeezed it with his hands and a smooth bulbous lump formed; then he twisted it off and wrapped it up in plastic. When he handed it to me, it was WARM, almost hot! I was surprised... I didn't know it started off warm! It felt really strange to be holding warm cheese.
[Edit: We ate the WHOLE THING tonight. It was delicious! Squeaky and tasty and fresh fresh fresh. Aaaah!]
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
I celebrated 04:05:06 07-08-09 this morning.
Posted at 4:47:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Dean: How did you celebrate it?
Laura: By acknowledging its existence when my alarm went off.
Dean: That's silly.
No it isn't! And yeah, I set an alarm on my Treo for 4:05 AM. I was still awake when it rang, since I stayed up re-watching the first two episodes of John From Cincinnati on my NetBook. Heh. JFC is like Deadwood, where you get a lot more out of it if you watch each episode twice.
Aaagh, I liked the second episode, too. Only 8 left = :-( !!!
Posted at 1:19:00 AM by Laura W. Petix.
Monday, July 06, 2009
That was weird. But I liked it.
Posted at 11:40:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Oh, I got an interesting new yogurt to try, from Whole Foods (even though I am still addicted to True Yogurt): Better Whey. It's (obviously) made out of whey, and therefore has tons of protein. I just tried it, and was initially a little startled by how tart it is (I got the plain flavor), but then decided it's quite good. According to this review, even the fruity flavors are fairly sour, so it's possible I'd like them too. I'll have to try another variety next time and see. They should redesign the packaging, though. It's rather boring and unattractive.
Posted at 8:39:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Three types of local berries from Berruti's Harvest House in South Glastonbury: rasp, blue, and straw! Wowowow.
Posted at 5:54:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Today Uptown Consignment had a brand-new looking instance of my many-years-old favorite skirt of all time (black and white polka dot silk), which I don't wear anymore because it's very long in the tooth and I don't want it to become completely worn out. The only thing is, the brand-new instance is size 8 and my original one is size 2. I bought it anyway, since it's a once-in-a-lifetime thing, but I really don't know if I have the skills to properly resize it without messing it up (it has a side zipper and a lining, so I can't just stitch up the sides). The original one was always a little big on me, so if I do manage to resize it I might end up with an even better version of my fav skirt ever, but eeeek. It's too scary to contemplate. Still, wow. Just looking at it almost gives me shivers. I recognized it on sight from about six feet away, and my heart leapt.
My nose and eyes seem to be fully recovered today, but I'm still in paaaaaaain, especially my fin muscles and back. Heh.
Posted at 2:25:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Sunday, July 05, 2009
I wish I could play badminton every day! Every muscle in my body hurts. Clearly it's good exercise. Also, I keep sniffing and sneezing and my eyes are all itchy and my whole brain feels woozy. What the heck? What am I allergic to? Being around two dogs (and their people) for not that long in a non-enclosed area?? Good grief. But what else could it be?
Posted at 10:45:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
I feel like sleeping for another 11 hours. It's pretty nice, in a lie-in-the-floor-and-moan kind of way. Honestly, I'm so relaxed. Badminton is especially good for your upper back muscles (I don't have any) and forearm muscles (ditto). And legs, but I do have those.
At China Pan, I was admiring the eagerly running dragon on the menu (by far the cutest Chinese Zodiac creature pictured), and I counted animal classes represented in the C.Z.: nine mammals, two reptiles, and one bird. But Dean argued that a dragon is not a reptile (he thinks they're in a category of their own), so I texted June to settle the debate, since she's clearly an authority on the subject. She responded almost immediately with a "No." Reason: dragons are not cold-blooded. I don't know, I'm still skeptical, but I did agree to honor her judgement.
Posted at 6:26:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
[Edit: Hmmmmmmm.]
Ahh! I was so tired. I slept until 3PM, and only dragged myself out then because I thought I'd better. I had a dream about finding cool moa-ish remains in the banks of our pond (our Puddin Lane pond) (also there were LOTS of Northern Water Snakes, but I didn't freak out too much), and another one with Jack McGee in it! In that one, there was a huge cataclysm on the highway and we all had to abandon our cars and walk about four miles (and I was barefooted, for some reason) on the road (hmmmm, now that I think of it, I know what that was inspired by) and meanwhile as a subplot McGee was involved in the same situation (but didn't meet up with me) and stumbled across an abandoned convenience store at the same time as two shady guys, so he was pretending to be a shady guy too. He found a huge jar of marijuana behind the counter, disguised as a glass orange juice container (it was orange juice colored so you couldn't see what was actually inside) and was dumping it out into a plastic bag as collateral. It was really great because there were lots of McGee closeups where I could see all the craggy lines around his eyes and his fantastic McGee mouth talking, etc. I got up, so I didn't get to see how it turned out, though. Bummer.
Posted at 3:16:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.
Wow, we've never landed when the tower's closed for the night before. :-)
Posted at 3:07:00 AM by Laura W. Petix.
Posted at 1:29:00 AM by Laura W. Petix.
My hair smells like the campfire. :-)
EXCELLENT 4th of July at David's. His place is a superb gathering place. I'm writing this in Tango as we fly home in the night. Atlantic City's in the distance out the window. Dean couldn't take it anymore last night after the pounding music continued 'til 2 AM-ish, despite many phone calls to the front desk, and he flew home (got back to Brainard just as the sun was beginning to rise, two seconds after Tower opened for the morning).
There's a huge dark space in front of Atlantic City, split in two by a single bright line of cars. It looks like the highway is packed. Anyway, I stayed in the hotel, David and Hunter came over and picked me up for the festivities, and Dean flew back to join me this afternoon and got to David's around 7:40, perfect timing for a piece of cherry pie a la mode and to join us for our walk to the Greenbelt fireworks. (At first I couldn't get through to David--his phone just rang and rang, so I called June on her cell phone. Later she swung by the hotel to check out the giant colorful convention [still going on, albeit without the musical element] for herself, and to make sure I wasn't pathetically stranded, needing to be rescued. :-)
I had a fun time with the fam in the afternoon, eating delicious food, imbibing blueberry beer and beet beer (Wacko, which I bought because of the name/label... it didn't taste like beets, though), watching Hunter perform circus tricks, and playing badminton. ♥ = the badminton! I think I am actually better at badminton than I used to be, even though I haven't played in years. (Or maybe it's easier to play vs. David and Hunter with Jan as my teammate rather than with June as a participant... heh, sorry June, but badminton was not your forte, even though the classic JMT&L games will still always be the greatest). It was super fun. My fav part was the brother-sister volleys between me and David. There was a respectable amount of falling on the ground performed by the Jan and Laura team, which is why our team ruled. (I think badminton is the only sport I'm okay at because long skinny arms with no muscles are not a handicap.) I gave my camera to Joe to take pictures while we played; later, he joined in and passed it over to Sam. Both did a giant WangPaul, so I have tons of photos--thanks immensely!!! [Edit: Here are two of my favs: 1) me setting up for an overhead shot as Jan and Hunter look on, and B) action shot of Jan looking awesome as she reaches for the birdie.]
My legs are tired now. Not sure if it's from the badminton or from walking to the fireworks. Heh. The fireworks were GREAT. Jan and June kept text-messaging me on the way in order to meet back up with us at Greenbelt Lake (they both went home to feed their dogs). It was super-cool, because no one has ever txt'ed me except Dean. Ha. Yeah, I'm a goof. June slacked out and went to the peninsula instead of braving the throng to find our spot, so I sent her mean tongue massage txts about how we were eating sour tongues without her. :-) We ate them ALL (not intentionally; it just worked out that way) so there were none left for her when we rendezvoused at David's afterwards, but I gave her the dregs from the bottom of the bag (non-tongue sour blob candies). We also had MASS QUANTITIES of watermelon afterwards, and made SkyFlakes s'mores! I ate one and made one for Dean. My marshmallow-toasting skills were admired by multiple people, and I told them it's because I learned from the best (my dad). The weather was PERFECT. Not hot, not cold, still and calm and no mosquitoes, only fireflies. I took some photos of the 'works using fireworks mode on my camera and they are COOL. Very good 'works (and very enthusiastic crowd!), even though there were no whistley spinny ones. 
It's 1:53 now, and we're already almost to NYC. It was such a great 4th. I feel so relaxed with those guys. :-) I'm a little sleepy now. I got lots of good hugs goodbye! Jan, June, Hunter and David = thumbs up on the hugs! I like mmmuurrrrrrrrrrrr-ing along at night under the sky. Too bad I can't get Internet up here!
