Somehow I managed to make it through the last week at work, though every night seemed longer than the one before it. Especially the second to last night, when it was busy, day shift left a big mess for me to clean up, and we were short staffed.  My asthma was also acting up from the extreme heat and humidity, up to when the storms came through and broke the weather a couple of days ago.

Have been spending the morning sorting socks and packing. We will be leaving in a couple of hours. This camping trip we have decided to leave the cats at home, and just take the dog.

Cannot wait to spend the next few days camping on the beach up at Harrisville State Park! YAY!!  And the weather is supposed to be perfect -- in the 70's and sunny!

Last day of the weekend. It's sunny and hot. I hope it will also be this way next Saturday, when we will be camping on the beach at Harrisville on Lake Huron.  Though it could definately be cooler two Saturdays from now, when we'll be running around Manhattan with friends.

The Jeep is home now, and behaving just fine. There was something wrong with something called a crankshaft. All fixed now, and it was covered by warranty.

The drier is also finally fixed, after several attempts. I am in the middle of a laundry party today.  I just opened up the huge duffle bag Bill brought back from wrestling camp. Man, did that stink!!!  Not only from clothes he had worked out hard in, but he had thrown two sopping wet towels in there, too!  Gross!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, they do not yet know what is wrong with the Jeep, which is making me nervous.  Luckily, Bill's tiny truck is behaving perfectly. You would never know how trashed it was just a month ago.

Only eight work shifts to go now, and I will be free for more than two blessed weeks!   

Harry Potter 6 was the best Potter book yet, IMHO. The author tightened up her writing and stuck to the main story very well, and it made for a fast paced book I couldn't put down. Very dark, it was, and very pleasing.

I wonder how many years until the next one?

It's been an interesting weekend with vehicles. On Friday we got my son's little Chevy S10 back. It's the one he turned over on the side of the freeway because he was messing with his radio instead of paying attention to the road and hit a sign.  I have to commend the Chevy dealer in Ann Arbor. You literally wouldn't know it had ever been in an accident!! The bill was nearly $7000. They pretty much had to completely replace/rebuild the left half of the truck. My son payed the insurance deductable with his part time earnings. So that went well and all was good.

On Friday night, on our way back from Toledo, we blew out a tire on the freeway in the middle of nowhere. It was after midnight, very dark, and drizzling rain. Dan wanted to change the tire, but there was no way I was letting anyone out with all of the traffic wizzing by at 80MPH. So we called AAA and it took over an hour for a truck to get out to us. It turned out that we couldn't have changed the tire ourselves anyway -- the Jeep has locking lugnuts, and there was no key. So the guy with the tow truck patched the tire and we limped the 30 miles home.

Fast forward to today (Sunday). Dan thought it should be OK for me to drive to work on surface roads, as the tire patch was holding fine. I got about five miles from home, and the Jeep started driving really oddly. I thought it was the tire again. I pulled into the parking lot of one of those huge hardware stores, and called home. Dan promised to come get me in the little Chevy. In the meantime, I called work to let them know I would be late, and called a friend for a chat. There was this weird light on my dashboard that had lit up when the Jeep started driving funny, and I thought it must have something to do with the tire. I looked it up in the owner's manual when I got done talking to my friend -- and it was an engine malfunction light!!   And it was blinking frantically!

Long and short, the Jeep is at the dealer, and I am now driving my son's tiny truck. Since he is at wrestling camp down in Ohio for the next few days he will not need it himself to get to work. I am really glad that the Chevy dealer got done with it when they did!

We are now trying to figure out alternatives for our vacations if the Jeep is not useable for whatever reason (worse case scenario). We can use the huge Dodge Ram to pull the camper for our camping trip here in state. But the Ram has nearly 200,000 miles on it and we can't take that hoopty thing to New York. It would not survive the mountains in Pennsylvania. And the Chevy S10 only holds two adults, and there are four of us. So we might end up getting last minute train tickets or something, if we have to.

I need ice cream.

I also need to read some more Harry Potter.

 

Yesterday was exhausting. Ran errands all day. Got the info to replace Bill's ipod again (this will be the seond time since last fall. The first time it just died for no reason. This time we think it was shaken to death in his checked in luggage on the flight home, as there was a lot of turbulance). Got Steven's trumpet back from the repair place. Took the kids out to lunch at Tios. Got Bill's truck back. That bill was nearly $7000. Thank God with insurance Bill only had to pay $580.06. And he did pay it out of the earnings from his part time job.

After Dan got home we went out to dinner at a good steak place he's been wanting to go down in Dundee. Then we headed down to the Pink Floyd Laser Light Spectactular down at the Toledo Zoo Amphitheater (of all the odd places). The amphitheater is right next to the cheetah enclosure. We were wondering what the poor cats thought of all of the noise and crowd! It was pretty good. The first half was mainly songs from Dark Side of the Moon and the second half mostly songs from The Wall. Some of the effects were great, the best ones were to the song Learning to Fly. About half the crowd loved the 3-D glasses, including Dan and Steven -- about half didn't wear them, couldn't deal with the added intensity of the lights (like me and Bill).

Coming home we got a flat tire on the Jeep in the middle of nowhere (US12 northbound, near exit 5 -- we ran over a nail). It was after midnight, the freeway was very dark, and it was drizzling. The cars and trucks were whizzing past at 80MPH, so I didn't want Dan or the kids getting out to change the tire, even though they offered. So I called AAA, and it took something like an hour and a half for the repair truck to get out to us (did I mention we were in the middle of nowhere?). It turned out that the Jeep's tires have locking lugnuts, and there was no key. So the tow truck guy did his best to patch the tire, and did a good enough job that we were able to get home, around 2:30AM.

Today the dryer is broken again. It is raining, or I would go to the hardware store on my patched tire and get some clothesline and clothespins and string it between two trees and attempt to dry the clothes that are in the washing machine before theneighbors all have fits about me committing the great crime of hanging laundry out to dry. <rolls eyes> Actually, it really is a crime in many area municipalities and/or neighborhoods with homeowners' associations to dry clothes outside, as it considered unsightly, as is having a television antenna on your roof. <rolls eyes again>

Towards evening the Harry Potter books finally arrived in the mail.  My kids can ride for 12-14 hours in the car and not complain once -- but today they were asking whether or not the mail had been delivered yet every five minutes in these heartbroken tones of voice. Hilarious!!  I am overlooking the closet lights burning late at night in their rooms tonight.

Oh, I am glad this work week is over. I have a million errands to run tomorrow, but at least I don't have to go to work.  Steven's trumpet is done being cleaned and serviced, and Bill's truck is finally repaired, and I have to run get cat litter (I forgot it at the store the other day).  And then there's the bank, and the post office, and contacting the newspaper to put a vacation hold on...

Dan fixed both the dryer and the dishwasher today. The dishwasher was especially vexing. It died with a full load of very nasty dirty pots and pans and dishes. A couple of days ago it started making the whole kitchen small of farts. I am very glad it is fixed! And that the bad smell is gone!

My friend in Albuquerque was sort of mugged today when he was putting the baby in his car. He wasn't robbed, but he was punched in the head and knocked out for a brief time. This happened in a hospital parking lot after the baby had an appointment. What kind of a freak punches someone in the head when they are taking care of a tiny baby? The police are hoping the security cameras caught it so they can try to track down the guy who did it. I will be calling my friend tomorrow to check on him and make sure he is OK.

Steven will be home from wrestling camp sometime tonight. I ran to the store a few minutes ago and got some ice cream and some other stuff to fill up the cupboards and freezer again. Man, can 12 year old boys eat!

The hurricaine Dennis remnants still have not arrived, though we had normal rain last night (I drove all the way home in it, though it must have missed Detroit and the baseball All-Star Game). I guess it went a bit further west and is hanging out in Illinois. As long as it lets us go to the Pink Floyd thing on Friday night!!!

A friend gave me some bearded iris roots yesterday -- lovely peach colored ones! YAY!!

Work this week has been bad - high patient census and very busy. Am glad that there are only two nights to go (and only 12 more before my vacation!!! ). I need the vacation. I am getting so burned out, I don't even want to read books or watch movies!!!

Well, no movie this morning. I woke up all groggy with a very bad headache, like I get before a big storm front moves in. Bleerily asked Bill if there were any storms coming into the area, and he told me that the remains of Hurricaine Dennis will be here by tonight. Ah well. Hopefully it will move through quickly so I can feel better!

Bill did go out and pick raspberries and strawberries for breakfast, and that was awfully nice. The birds got every single blueberry, though, just before they got ripe enough to pick! Darned birds!

Only 13 more work shifts to go before my vacation! YAY!!!

Well, I watched Sideways this morning, and that's two hours of my life I wish I could get back.

The acting was very good, the setting, the editing, all very good. Very well made and produced movie.

But I absolutely hated the story, about a middle aged, self-absorbed, shallow, and selfish man, who casually and cruelly uses other people for his own entertainment. And his buddy, a depressed drunk who knows his friend is being bad, but enables him anyway.

While I did get a guilty chuckle out of a few scenes, I actually felt bad about laughing, given the subject material.

I guess I just prefer silly comedies like Bowfinger, where you laugh with the characters rather than at them.

And only fourteen more work shifts to go before my vacation!!