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adventures

Enter the band

Visited the local college bookstores today so The Yankee could make sure her texts were on the shelves. Found seven at one store, found four at the second store and met the very nice manager. Found a few at the third store. At the university bookstore we found a big stash. They are all expensive, but textbooks always have been.

I pointed out the prices. It always aggravated me when a professor was shocked to hear how much the text he or she demanded was costing the students. It is a simple enough thing, stop by the store and empathize, for just a minute. So that’s what I do.

The bookstores here let students rent books for the term. Oh you can still buy a $90 text and sell it back for $12. You can rent it for half that price and return it at the end of the term. Wish we’d had that option during undergrad.

My favorite book, Strunk and White’s Elements of Style has stayed the same low price these last 15 years. I appreciate that.

On the way back to the car we listened to the marching band. Is it football season yet? Apparently we’ll have a tribute to Frank Sinatra this year. They sound good, but the director insists you’ll hear more trumpet in this number when they are on the field.

I’m not faux-marching, I promise. Apparently I’ll need to work on hand steadying techniques before pulling out the iPhone. After this take they had a break and were then going to spend 45 minutes on Luck Be a Lady Tonight.

We put a lot of pictures on the walls this evening. Just a few more rooms to go on that project. We had a delicious dinner:

Delicious

Just add the veggies, shrimp, cooking wine, butter, salt and pepper to taste, stir over a respectable heat and serve.

We stood outside and watched the first of the Perseids (Thursday night is the big show), hung out with Jupiter to the east and tried to pick out unfamiliar constellations thanks to my new app, Planets. (That’s a great, free download.)

We had a great day. How was yours?

On the site: New, artsyish banners across the top and bottom of the blog. The blur across the top is the cardinal I vainly chased this afternoon. The one along the bottom is the yard in late evening repose. This is an excellent opportunity, then, to remind about the new banners page, meant more for me than for you, but nevertheless, see ’em again. Also, there’s a new picture on the home page.

And someone stop me: I’m thinking of redesign ideas.

adventures / Auburn / Friday / photo / Pie Day — Comments Off
6
Aug 10

Our first Auburn Pie Day

Our Pie Day options

I solicited recommendations for pie in Auburn. There was a tie. One of them I’ve tried before, and did not enjoy. So we went to Mike and Ed’s, which is new to me. It is owned by a lady who is named neither Mike nor Ed.

Mike and Ed’s uses the Zaxby’s model. Place your order, wait for your number, have a seat, get your drink and so on.

Tea?

Give them this, they do the drinks right.

The Yankee debated between ribs and a pork plate. I talked her into the pork, just in case she didn’t like it. This was her first experience with mustard-based barbecue sauce. She did not care for it much. I don’t blame her. I had the chicken, which was tender and reminded me of a good dry rub. And then they poured the sauce on it.

(Barbecue sauce is a regional thing. Your mileage may vary, but the Carolina sauces just don’t carry the same appeal for me. People that like the style are fans of Mike and Ed’s, we just have a different taste. We prefer the Texas and Kansas City styles.)

You saw the pie choices above. The presentation leaves something to be desired.

The pie

We tried the peanut butter because, really, how often do you run across that? It was rich and true to the name. It isn’t the sort of thing you would order too often. The restaurant itself is decent enough. It has an eat-and-go atmosphere, though, and Pie Day has always been more about the people — eating and lingering and fellowship — than anything else. So we’ll keep looking. That’s half the fun!

Give ’em this: Mike and Ed’s is displaying what they say are the hands to the clock on Old Main. It was built in 1859 and burned in 1887. I have a copy of this image and I’m not sure where the clock was, but that’s a cool piece of history if it is legitimate.

Any suggestions? Leave ’em in the comments.

In other, happy news, we’re finished with the unpacking. The boxes in the garage have been moved and emptied. So, I suppose, that means we’re settled. Now we just have to decorate.

adventures / Friday / friends — 1 Comment
30
Jul 10

We hereby resolve …

… To never move in July or August again.

The heat index was 108 at one point. We are so glad we hired movers. This company sent two young men who worked hard, sweat a lot, were courteous, extremely careful and did a terrific job. Those two guys were worth every penny.

The company did the estimate based on our self-reporting and then a phone call. The person that conducted the phone call interview erred in a big way. We did not have a big enough truck. The company couldn’t see beyond this error, and I couldn’t see allowing the company to profit from its own mistake.

Meanwhile, those two guys were doing a great job moving a lot of stuff on a ridiculously hot day.

So we scrambled for Plan B, which is hard to do on a Friday, at the end of the month just as college kids are getting ready to go to campus. There aren’t a lot of extra trucks sitting around.

Finally we found a little van which ably handled the overflow. The day started at about 7:30 and ran far, far, far too long. Even though we were well organized and fairly streamlined, even though The Yankee did an insane amount of work and I did my bit too, it still was not an uneventful day.

Moving is a nightmare, everyone knows this. But at least and at last you’ve made it to the point where the nightmare is upon you, rather than a pensive weight. Finally, you can just move stuff, move it again and then be finished with the exercise. Even if it seemed you’d never be finished during the preparation. Especially if it seems you’ll never be finished on the fateful day.

I picked up a late lunch on the way out of town. I complimented the guy at the Chick-fil-A window for doing me an extra little favor. He seemed surprised by that, but the day was such by then that I needed to compliment someone as much as he needed to hear a compliment. And the move wasn’t even bad, really. We had the help, who were indispensable. We had the heat, which was ridiculous. We had the mad scramble to solve a problem, where we lucked out. Still: it was a day of serious moving.

We’ll be ready, soon, to never speak of it again.

But we must speak of our friends. On the days when you find you need your friends the most, you are at your most grateful for whatever thankless task they are willing to endure with you.

RaDonna came by in the late morning and was able to spend a few hours with us. She was a big shot of momentum when we needed the help, in between her own big day of chores.

Brian came after he finished work for the day and did his usual Brian best. I’m hard pressed to think of anyone who’s ever been more giving to friends than Brian has always been to us. Moving someone in 100-plus temperatures — always with a smile, always with a good suggestion and always ready to work hard — has to be up there.

Oh, sure, he’d tell you it got him out of a baby shower, but he didn’t have to spend the day moving boxes to avoid that.

On the other end of the day Fin helped unload boxes. He said when and where, we told him, he showed up and he sped the second half of the process along in smooth fashion.

We still had to change a car battery and run another round of errands, and it was a long, late, bruising, lacerating, sweaty day. But we’re done with it. We’re moved.

adventures / Wednesday — Comments Off
28
Jul 10

We painted this …

We painted this!

That’s the kitchen, obviously, after yesterday’s work.

And this!

And here’s the dining room, after a second coat this morning. You know, it never occurred to me, the whole time we were there, to pull out my real camera. So, my apologies for the cell phone pictures. I’ll actually spend a few minutes with the camera function soon and learn how to use the thing properly.

We returned the ladder to Jeremy‘s grandfather. The lady of the house answered the door again. We’d talked briefly, as much as she wanted to chat with a young stranger, the other day. You can only be so charming, but then you’re still a stranger, you know? I made nice with her puppy today, so all was well. Being from a time and part of the world where your pedigree will tell you everything she needs to know about you, she asked me if I was related to Homer Smith. I assume she meant the football coach.

No ma’am, I said. But there’s just so many of us. I’m related to a Comer Smith, but that’s as close as I know how to get.

She asked where I was from. I tell her Birmingham, but my people are in northwest Alabama. She knows the place. She used to live there, too.

“Do you know the Thigpens?”

Everybody knows the Thigpens. That’s one of the big, branchiest family trees in that area.

I dated a Thigpen, once.

I may or may not have done that. My memory is foggy. Either way it sounded good. I thanked her profusely, helped get the dog back inside and we left to return to Birmingham. There is still packing to do. And so we had lunch, using a coupon for Surin West, thinking spicy hot coconut soup on a triple-digit day was a good plan.

It is always a good plan.

And then, back to the packing. There is a light at the end of this tunnel. And that light is attached to a train. And on that train is a crowd of people screaming “You’re not ready to move yet! But the time is at hand!”

And so you just accept it. Throw things in boxes. Wrap soft things around fragile things, eschew the detailed labeling system your organized wife has developed and just start doing.

The next step is to move everything that is ready in the house down to the garage. The heat index will only be over 100 degrees when I do that tomorrow.

adventures / photo / Tuesday — Comments Off
27
Jul 10

The joys of home ownership

Painting was intended for people of sturdy emotional stock. How else can you explain away the unholy tendency of a material designed solely to please the eye which is represented in one color, is applied in another color and dries in a third? This says nothing of the swirls and the splotches and the missed spots.

The Yankee, my lovely bride, is convinced she loves painting. I know exactly where I come down on this particular skill and it is somewhere around the level of “Glad I’m not a carpenter.” She says she loves to paint, but her frustration would suggest otherwise. Last night she tried to paint part of the master bedroom, but the color of blue-hued blueness that Lowe’s offered was too blue. So this morning we visited again. The paint clerk immediately realized the error, acknowledged that there was no amount of water and milk dilution that was going to lighten this shade of pigment enough to our wishes and granted our money back on non-refundable paint.

So we visited Sherwin-Williams, where the cost is a bit higher, but they are ready to cover the earth, a bit of propaganda which no doubt irritates the green customers and the Earth Day types. (There was a splinter between them in 2003, they split into two factions, look it up.)

So we bought more paint for the bedroom and the proper paint for the library and the dining room. Lowe’s did not have the equivalent, so we picked it up from the place that gave us the handy online tool. The Yankee has been playing with it for days. You upload a picture, you highlight the wall portions (thereby protecting the furniture) and click a color on the wheel. You see a preview, the page gives you the name of a color and so on.

So it is like Photoshop? I asked.

“But with paint!”

Clearly she was in her element.

So we started painting again. The bedroom, which was an experience determined to wound the psyche. A now lighter color was painted over the darker color. The lighter color exhibited peculiar tendencies while drying. We considered hiring a painter. Fortunately for the wallet everyone was booked.

She moved on to the kitchen and the library. Having by this time finished with the ceiling fans project. I picked up our termite bond. I’d risked life and limb and probably several safety codes by standing on the very top of my borrowed ladder in my brand new home to tape off molding. I’d had the idea to invent tape smart enough to not stick to itself and generally done everything else I could to avoid painting. So, I began painting around the baseboards, windows and fireplace.

The kitchen went from a Barney purple and the future library went from a pale gold to a slate green. It matches the curtains. Incredibly, it also matches the color of the font on our family fireplace crock that we received as a Christmas present last year. I wonder if she’s noticed that yet. The bedroom, meanwhile, had dried to just the shade for which we’d hoped. Painting with your fingers crossed sometimes works in your favor, though you tend to drip paint in odd places.

We had dinner, and the romance of new home life continued. What we made for dinner tonight called for a can of tomatoes. Of all of the things my thoughtful, prepared and intelligent bride brought with us this trip the one thing she did not consider was a can opener. (I don’t say this to blame her, merely to point out that she’d packed everything else we could possibly need.)

So I opened the tomatoes the old fashioned way: with a hammer and screwdriver.

Dining room paint

After dinner we painted some more. The dining room. Note the excellent tape work done way up high. I climbed up there for that. She climbed back up to paint it. We are painting in “fired brick” which makes my hands look like a bloodied violent offender who has yet to clean up the evidence. We’ll have to do another coat there tomorrow.

Even still, we painted four rooms today, I painted parts of three of them. I managed to get only one bit of it on my clothes, one tiny little speck of green slate on a bright blue, old KARN 920 shirt; no biggie.

Which, wow, provides a moment of clarity. That job was eight years ago. And this realization right after saying aloud “You know, we should be celebrating (or not) our 15th high school reunion this year.”

Time flies when you’re mixing paint.