How's the kitchen renovation coming?

I pretend you asked.

Well...a lot of stuff happened. And now there's a lot of waiting. I would show you the new drywall, but it's mostly covered up by Our Stuff. Our Stuff is in the Future Kitchen because the project has expanded. Now we're putting new floor down in the living room too.

So here's Future Kitchen:



In the background you can see some drywall. In front of it is all of Our Stuff.

And now this is the living room:



That pile of wood at the back of the room is our floor. It is supposed to be installed two weeks from now. My thought was that the floor guys could do the living room one day, we could move Our Stuff back to the living room that night and they could do the kitchen the next day. But I'm told no no no, they have to do all the floor in one day. So where does the Stuff go? I don't know the answer to that question right now, but I hope I don't have to pile the Stuff on my head or stick it in my car. The downstairs is already full of Other Stuff and there is nowhere else in this house unviolated by the renovations. I guess we could make everywhere officially unlivable and cram everything in our bedroom and bathroom. That's probably what will happen.

And here's a little birdy who came to visit me today:





He had a few problems finding the door, but he finally figured it out.

Vacation

We like our routines so it was back to Emerald Isle this year.

Vital statistics:

Number of beers consumed: 24
Shark sightings: 1
Dolphins: 10
Times our dogs were obnoxious to innocent passersby: 1,200
Injuries: 2
Times I logged in to do work: 2
Fish caught: 1

The shark I saw was a pretty big one. I'm guessing 5 or 6 feet. It was dead and washed up on the shore. Me and the dogs found it on our morning walk. Pity I didn't have my camera. It made me think I saw dark shadows in the water for the rest of the week, but that didn't stop me from swimming because I laugh at danger.

So I was told weeks and weeks ago about this power called Pelekinesis which is the ability to fish with your mind. Frank thought of this while he was out in San Francisco. I never thought it would have an impact on my life, but now I've awakened to a world in which I can will fish out of the ocean with my brain meats. Either that or the fish was committing suicide and I just happened to witness it. I was so excited that I ran over and picked it up and then he flopped and I said "ew!" and I dropped it and then I decided I'm totally going to eat that fish. So that's what I did. Now I know that if I'm ever in a survivalist situation my Pelekinesis will save me from starvation. Phillip wouldn't even try the fish. He'll starve.



We ate at our favority restaurants, Beaufort Grocery and Blue Moon a couple of times. We didn't do any tours or activities this year because we had the dogs with us and couldn't leave them alone at the house all day. That was fine, though, because they kept us busy enough and as long as people didn't walk by to set off their maniacal barking, they were pretty content to just sit on the beach with us while we read books. I tried to get them to go in the water, but they weren't having that. They can't seem to get enough of just running up and down the beach. Even shy Charles Wallace was having a blast.





I don't plan on deviating from this routine next year either. September is a great time to go to the beach. Still warm enough to swim and get a tan, but no people! We do plan on trying out some other beaches for a weekend here or there, but unless we find something dazzling (and close enough) we will probably stick with what we know. And knowing is half the battle.

Bring it on

Today I went to a luncheon/awards ceremony because my company won one of the Best Places to Work in the Triangle awards (woohoo!). For the entertainment they had high school cheerleaders. Those girls were all so young and peppy, I couldn't help feeling old and cranky by comparison. Remember when you got taken out of class to go to pep rally's in high school? Missing class was the only reason you went to them, but now I'd rather be in the office getting my work done. Dag. And I need to go to the gym.

Why we don't often go to the movies

We saw 3:10 to Yuma yesterday. It made about as much sense as a fart in a lunchbox.

And how did Christian Bale look? Haggard.