Exchanging Unpleasantries

I was up and out of bed before 7:00am. I had a slight headache but all in all felt pretty good. I took two precautionary Advil’s as part of my morning prep process. By 7:15am I had coffee going and a full round of exercise already under my belt. Ykraps and I were off and walking minutes later.

I could see that Mindy was up and in the shower as we made our way back towards the house. I couldn’t remember for certain but figured she must have had a breakfast date planned with her friend Teri. Once back, I poured my coffee and took to the PC. Most of that time was spent catching up on Glenn’s blog and viewing many of his recently added vacation pics. Unlike me, he documented our vacation blow by blow. I read most of it.

Mindy was up, downstairs and sitting on the deck when I finished reading. I let her know that I was going to head out for a run. She advised me that she was thinking of going shopping. But before either of us did our own thing we talked through a couple of issues. Before I knew it, another hour had passed. When I left for my run Mindy still wasn’t certain whether or not she’d be going shopping even though I encouraged her to do so.

I ended up running along Trabue and Hague. Until then, I had forgotten that the annual St Margaret’s festival was going on this weekend. As I ran by my Dad’s place, I took special notice of the missing large trees and the storage he’s providing the county as they widen the road and add new storm sewers. I was back home around 10:30pm. Mindy was indeed gone.

I wasted little time getting busy. I sorely wanted to get a handful of lawn chores completed. However, before heading out, I mounted a wallplate around the bundle of wires protruding from the family room wall destine for the plasma TV. I made myself a big ol’ ham, bologna, and cheese sandwich, too. Yum-yum. Soon, I was out working on the lawn. I did it all. I trimmed, edged, cut, and blew. That took about 1.5 hours. Mindy returned home sometime during the cutting. After a short break, I drug out the fiberglass extension ladder and raised it against the brick chimney to trim back the fast growing ivy making its ascent upwards. I eventually moved the heavy ladder around front to trim the thick wall of ivy growing over our bedroom window, too.

Just as I was cutting ivy from the front windows, the kids arrived back home. I knocked on the bedroom window to make sure that Mindy was alerted to their return. She was taking a nap last I knew. And since I was in trimming mode, I used the hedge shears to give the crimson barberry bushes their mid-season trim. By the time I finished, it made sense to fetch the 9X12’ tarp to haul away all of the trimmings/clippings. It would’ve taken several trips with my 5-gallon lawn pail. I started the sprinkler just as I finished up the trimming.

Next, I got out the Miracle Grow sprayer and filled it with fertilizer and began watering all of the backyard beds, pots, and baskets. That took about 30 minutes. Next on the agenda was filling the car wash bucket with a water & bleach mixture to soak all of our sea shells. There’s a couple that still stink. The bleach, I knew, would stop that in a hurry.

In the meantime, Mindy took the kids next door to the birthday party. After doing so, Mindy set out on yet another solo shopping spree, only this time to Target. While she was away I continued moving the sprinkler every 45 minutes to an hour, and then got out the long tree pruners. I pruned some hard to reach honey suckles growing up & over the shed as well as the two red maples shading the lower tier deck. They’ve needed it for some time. By the time I was done Mindy was once again home. She helped me carry all of the tree debris back to the compost pile. There was quite a bit. By then it was time to fetch Lil’ Rocky. Mindy volunteered to go get him while I finished up and showered.

I could’ve kept going with more and more small chores, but knew that a break in the action would do me good. No sense working myself to the bone. I was showered up by the time that Mindy returned with Rocky. She quickly turned him loose on the kids who were still busy playing at the neighbor’s. We collectively started dinner, but Mindy did most of the prep. I grilled burgers while she prepared Rice-A-Roni. After enjoying our burgers we celebrated Rocky’s 5th birthday with cupcakes. He tore through his bag of gifts in a hurry. Like any five year old, he didn’t even look at the three outfits in the bag. He was concerned only with the toys. :)

During our dinner, a quick storm moved through. It rained fairly hard but moved out of the area as fast as it came. Soon the kids were back outside riding bikes and playing in the front yard. They insisted on heading back to the neighbors but Mindy and I put a kibosh on that. They deserved break from all the kids. Mindy used the time to instill bike riding skills in Bella using the same technique my dad used on Jacob. She did OK, but was fussy. The new bike helmet Mindy bought her seemed to serve as motivation. We’re planning to get her a new bike in the coming days.

As the evening wound down, we prepared to take Lil’ Rocky home. Everyone went along for the ride. We dropped him near 8pm. Kelly wasn’t home. Lindsey said that she was out walking her two big horses (dogs). Mindy held Landon who seemed very eager for her to do so. He likes Mindy quite a bit. We didn’t stay too long. Just as we were pulling away, we spotted Kelly turning the corner off of Rosedale. I wanted badly to get a picture of her walking those two dogs. In kind, I altered our route to head north. I rolled down the window to say hello and compliment her on her lovely flowers all the while snapping a picture. She spotted my camera and quickly uttered some unpleasantries my way. Sadly, the picture never took. Damn it! Of course the kids repeated a few of her unkind words.

Back at home, Mindy & I got the kids ready for bed as much as they wanted to continue playing. They were in bed sometime near 9pm and were quickly asleep. We stayed up until no later than 10pm. Mindy was especially tired, and I worked awfully hard in the yard and had to get up early Sunday for golf.