Weekend Plans Post: We Were Going To Do That Anyway
We have a bunch of windows in the house that stay open during the summer months. The one over the kitchen sink, the one over the shower in the main floor bathroom… you know. Let stuff breathe. They get closed over when it’s time.
Well, today, Maribou told me “it’s time”. We’re going to have a cold front come in, you see. Tomorrow night and Saturday night, it’s even going to hit sub-zero.
You know, we’d been talking about when we were finally going to swap out the linen sheets for the flannel ones and swap out the light and fluffy seersucker bedcover with the heavier quilt+blanket combo… and then Rumpus barfed all over the bed.
Well, I guess that decides it.
So we threw the dirty stuff in the wash, busted out the flannel sheets and got it ready to wash, put all of the clean linen sheets in the vacuum bags, got the flannel sheets out of the dryer, put them on the bed, started the other flannel sheets because you know the other cats are going to start barfing, and now we’re ready to have a talk about getting the hoodies out.
Personally, I think we should get the hoodies out. Oh, and put all of the summer clothing away for a season.
And *THAT* means that this weekend will be primarily dedicated to *LAUNDRY*. Flannel sheets are great but they take *FOREVER* to dry. Same for most of the winter clothing, now that I think about it. And the kitties get to enjoy their first nap on the flannel and tonight will be our first night sleeping in flannel since March or April.
It’s not *EXCITING* exciting, but it’s the kind of low-key exciting you sometimes get if you are very lucky.
So… what’s on your docket?
(Featured image is “Domestic Help”. Photo taken by Maribou.)
Note: Celsius.Report
Normally I spend election nights watching the coverage as the results came in, but two of my friends are getting married on election night (in fairness, they chose the date before the government did) so I’ll be attending that instead.Report
A much better way to spend an evening.Report
That sounds heavenly.
When I was a kid, I thought weddings were boring. Now they’re the highlight of any given month that I’m lucky enough to go to one. (My current favorite wedding gift is a pair of Nerf Guns. Mostly appropriate for when both participants are getting married the first time, of course.)Report
it’s my “mid fall break” (nevermind that the K-12 schools got all three days this week) so I am going up to Chickasaw National Recreation Area for some hiking (actually I could have already left; they open at 9 and it’s just over an hour there).
I may not hike as much as I planned; I had a stomach bug last weekend that I thought I had beaten but a little bit of nausea or maybe gastritis is hanging on. I’m basically OK but afraid I might not have the stamina I usually have, and I’m already trying to think about where I may be able to get lunch that won’t involve either something acidy (so the Italian place is out – tomatoes) or deep-fried (so: the fast food purveyors are out). I guess I’ll figure it out.
There are also a couple small shops in the town adjacent to the park I want to visit; it’s time to start considering Christmas gifts for my brother and his family (we exchange at Thanksgiving)Report
Sounds like a small and lovely weekend. Sorry about your tummy!Report
Today is the last day of our youngest daughter’s 7-day Driving exam; not sure if this is common elsewhere, but in Virginia instead of the usual DMV driver test I had to take as a kid, you can sign-up for a certified Instructor to drive with your child for 7-days (2-hrs per day, one driving one observing another kid driving) and on the 7th day you get a driver’s license. Very biblical.
Now, this is preceded by 40-hrs of parent/child driving plus the usual ‘rules of the road’ DMV test; so not like she’s just getting behind the wheel for the first time. But still, seems better than the way I had to do it.
I’m guessing this might also be a homeschool thing as we don’t have a semester of HS Driver’s Ed classes? I assume they still do that in HS?
We kinda messed up the timing of this since the Middle Daughter went of to college in August and she was our ‘back-up’ driver — the one who would run to target for the pint of heavy cream we forgot, or who would pick-up the others from friend’s houses, and drive themselves to dance, etc. We’ve had back-ups for almost 10-yrs, and totally forgot what *not* having a 3rd driver is like. It’s not good. So, the prospect of another driver outweighs the trepidation of another baby behind the wheel.
Slightly more scarier, as a driver, she gets her first phone. Once again I’m going to attempt to use the provider’s ‘Parental Service’ (which costs extra) to moderate its use. All the previous attempts have not survived an update or two. Maybe the tech is better now. I hope anyway. So I have to give her ‘The Talk v.3’ not about driving or sex, but about phones.Report
That sounds pretty similar to Colorado’s system, but I think the parent/child driving time is 65 hours. I remember cramming 80% of that driving time into two weeks for oldest boy, as due to his school start time we REALLY needed him to be able to drive himself.Report
At some point I think the # of hours is more of a delaying tactic that probably would be better served by just raising the driving age. But yeah, we basically put ourselves into the position of having to drive to all the homeschool stuff that ordinarily the 3rd driver would handle or smooth over.
For us, the heavy lifting is mostly in the start-up phase of learning how to control the vehicle, then how to control the vehicle and think ahead at the same time. After that the hours rack-up organically as they drive us to the things we’d normally drive them to. I’m not sure hours 25 thru 40 did much; or did anything more that saying 65 or 85 or 95 hours would be better.
My daughter insisted on learning how to drive with the pick-up truck because, well, that’s just how she is. So lot’s of things were like 1.18x harder to learn. Of course now I can have her pick-up straw, hay and feed… so while she thinks its a cooler look, I’m the ultimate beneficiary.Report
So far as I know, public schools gave up on driver’s ed many years ago because the insurance costs got so high. Certainly our kids’ school didn’t teach it.
After our kids got their licenses we put each through a local class taught by a retired race driver. His son was killed in an accident while driving and the father felt responsible because his son did exactly the wrong thing. I don’t remember what they called it, something like “basic evasive driving”. I thought of it as learning about being hard to hit. I rode a motorcycle for a few years when I was young, which definitely teaches you to be hard to hit.Report
That makes sense about the schools; now I don’t feel as bad about spending all those extra $$ on the certification.
Interesting tid-bit on our instructor, he’s ex-Marine, ex-Secret Service who used to teach the advanced driving courses … but mum’s the word on whether that also included The Beast. That’s the fun part of being in the Valley outside of DC, half the crusty old people you meet are probably former spooks telling you they used to sell Xerox copiers abroad.Report
You definitely didn’t miss out on anything or if you did it was by decades. The public high school I went to had driver’s ed but it was after normal school hours and taught by a private company that would come to the cafeteria, all paid for separately. IIRC for the actual behind the wheel stuff they sent someone to pick you up at your house, and what happened on school grounds was limited to the classroom component.
One of the funnier things I recall is that the classroom instructor gave his e-mail address which was quaintly cutting edge at the time, and it was something like oh_instructorsfirstname_oh @compuserve .com. Everyone thought it was hysterical. I can only imagine the reaction to something like that now.Report
We never really put away the Winter/Summer stuff in our house; the hoodies already live in the back of the closet and we keep flannel sheets on our bed year-round (the advantages of living at altitude and among the trees), but I walked into work this morning wearing the light jacket that’s typically “good enough” for this time of year and I was wishing I had a heavier jacket. By the time I’m walking out of work, the light jacket will be just right.Report
I hit my standard trigger for changing over from cooling to heating this week: I woke up in the middle of the night because my feet were cold. This will be the first winter I’ve been by myself in the townhouse (wife’s now in memory care). Over the summer, the electricity use topped out at about 60% of the previous summer’s peak. Have to see how the gas use goes during the cold weather.Report
There is a blanket that goes over the quilt in wintertime. It doesn’t cover the bed. It just covers our feet.
It’s particularly fluffy and so we thought it might be nice to put in the Kitten Room when the kitties were not yet allowed to wander the house at will.
Then it became one of their favorite interactive toys… drape it over a chair and it becomes a tent and a fabric wall worth fighting through.
Soon it will make it to the bedroom and they can choose to sleep on it or sleep between our pillows or risk going under the covers (as they’ve done all summer) and risk the experience of what the bald one that feeds us calls “The Dutch Oven”.Report
Giovannie and the Hired Guns have a lovely little song called “Ramon Ayala”. The song is earthy and uses salty language. Listener discretion is advised.
I think it’s a great little song, though.
The light wistfulness of that. It’s the “again” that makes it.
I can’t condone his actions wrt similarly lonely people who seek his company after the show, though.
I imagine it’s difficult to be a particular subset of good when you are lonely and away, though. Unattached, of course.
I googled “best Ramon Ayala songs” and the first one to come up was “Chaparra De Mi Amor”.
So now I’m listening to that.Report
Starting to get noticeably dimmer outside due to the eclipse…Report
Oh, yeah. Kinda creepy! It’s 10:30!Report
The power authority that provides electricity for Fort Collins and three other municipal utilities has a modest solar farm they’ve been using to gain experience. Output from the farm went from 46 MW to 10 MW to 44 MW over the course of the eclipse.Report
Oooh, that’s wonderful! Hell, they should use that as the setup to a test question at CSU/CU.Report