Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Mr. Droughtfire


I allowed myself to fall back asleep after waking an hour or so ahead of schedule. In the end, I didn’t wake for good until 5:35am. Right then, I leaped to my feet, brushed my teeth, and gathered my running clothes from the closet. I was downstairs by 5:37am beginning my many times repeated morning routine.

It was after 5:50am by the time I finally headed out the door with Ykraps. And for whatever reason, he was dragging tail wasting many valuable minutes. It was after 6:00am when we made it back to the house. I wasn’t comfortably in front of the PC with coffee until 6:05am. I felt a little hurried to get through the rest of my pre-run prep. And being hurried causes me great angst. I still took the time to deliver coffee & meditate.

I was late heading out for my run. I didn’t put one foot in front of the other until 6:42am. It was much colder than I anticipated. For some reason, I expected mid 20’s at the worst. Instead, it was only 6 degrees. I was comfortable, however, and enjoyed my run immensely.

By the time I was back and had shed my outer shell it was already 7:20am. Mindy needed to be out the door. I noticed a card propped up on the island, almost certainly a card recognizing our 11 month wedding anniversary. I had remembered and planned to stop for flowers on my way home. Jacob asked if he could play Wii while I showered. I saw no good reason why not.

I returned from the grooming experience refreshed. We had 5 minutes to kill before we had to bolt. I calmly went about loading the Trooper and allowing it to warm. We walked to the bus stop. There we greeted Pat & Alanna. Bus #10, I noticed, was back in service – Jacob’s original bus, but also the one that breaks down often. They were gone by 8:05am. Pat & I chatted only briefly before moving on. I was heading into work by 8:10am.

I arrived slightly ahead of time. I had temporarily forgotten about the interview I had scheduled for 9:30am. I had to prep for that, but still had plenty of time. After the interview we had our regular staff meeting, which lasted beyond 12:30pm. Like most Wednesday’s, I chose to work straight through. I did sneak in some personal time, however. I searched for alternative vendors for the black entertainment cabinet I found yesterday online. Originally, I found it at some off the beaten path e-vendor with free shipping. Today I found the same exact item at Target.com (online only). The difference was that I would have to pay sales tax and shipping. That raised the price by almost $80. Later, I decided to check Walmart.com only to find it there as well. And not only was the retail price a bit less, they have free “ship-to-store” service. Cool! I needed to share this news with Mindy.

The afternoon wore on. I left for home at 5:10pm. I headed directly to Kroger to get Mindy some flowers and to pick-up some Diet-Coke with Splenda. I found some beautiful pink roses, but they were out of D.C. w/Splenda. I called Mindy on my drive home. She was grading papers. This was a Mindy Wednesday – the first in a couple of weeks. The kids were with their daddy. We briefly discussed dinner plans and ultimately decided on Barley’s. Go figure!

After arriving home, I presented Mindy with her flowers then immediately leashed up Ykraps for his evening walk. While we walked Mindy finished up the last of her paper grading. We left for Barley’s sometime just after 6pm.

We arrived to a surprisingly busy Barley’s. We found the last two stools at the bar. But to our dismay, no regulars at least within eyeshot. We each ordered a beer – Mindy a St. Joan’s Revenge and me a Droughtfire IPA. Moments later we placed our food orders. Mindy ordered the mini-burger special, and I ordered Gates of Hell wings. We engaged in conversation with Katy, the bartender and Matt, a patron, who we see there often but didn’t previously know. He works for the local document shredding company – a service I sorely need to use! We stayed until 7:25pm. We had to be home to intercept the children by 7:30pm. Jim & the kids called just as we exited the freeway. We were home a minute or two latter. I gave Jim our garage combo for future reference.

Mindy ushered the kids upstairs while I began updating my blog. Jacob asked me to play PS2 football. I stopped what I was doing and joined him. We played even past the time that Mindy allotted. I won – again! I helped get the kids fully into their PJ’s and tucked into bed. Mindy returned downstairs to watch American Idol while I finished updating my blog.

Mindy was ready for bed. She headed to bed at 9:40pm. I stayed up. I wanted to play some Wii golf. I headed to the family room and played two rounds. 2 over then a round of even par. I secured the home then headed up to bed at 10:10pm. Mindy was already out like a light.

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