Madness In My Method

I took mom, middle nephew, and his girlfriend to Lightscape at the Fort Worth Botanical Gardens Friday night despite the 20-something temps. Mom and I were bundled like snow creatures, nephew tried to brave the cold without additional bundling and was then complaining, and girlfriend being from Nebraska felt right at home. We had pasta and butter cake at Zoli's and did a quick Trader Joe's run afterwards. It was fun and freezing.

Unfortunately, we got bad news that my sister's best friend and our adopted family member is in ICU. She has had multiple seizures that we're not sure what from and is now in an induced coma. This woman spent more time in hospitals when she was in grade school and into her 20s than not, and I can only hope that she will pull through this just as she has so many other issues that she has faced down. She is a beautiful woman, a doting mother, and lightens up any room she walks into. She knows the value of life and I know she will keep fighting for it.

I'm both working and not working today and tomorrow.

I have off technically from both contracts and holiday pay coming, but I still have at least 4 hours of work remaining for one contract (I decided to go home early Wed) and a few hours to do for another contract that could technically wait until next week, but I don't really want to put it off.

Then off to the family homestead for afternoons, today to help Mom make the dessert salads, tomorrow for the actual family dinner.

I *think* I might be able to have the weekend off, but I REALLY need to tackle the atrocity that is my bedroom.

I other news, Day 2 on New Contract, during an all-accounting-staff meeting, I totally impressed the CFO and internal auditor who just met me for the first time, and I had a couple people do that thing I see in movies where they come up to me after the meeting and tell me how awesome my presentation was. It was....weird. I just told them about one of the month-end close programs we use at Old Contract, nothing special. CFO texted my supervisor afterwards about hiring me on. She's been trying to hire me on for months now, lol.

This time last year I hit Hong Kong Market with a friend and dodged kids throwing poppers on the floor in celebration of Lunar New Year - Rat. Some folks were beginning to wear face masks. We were not yet wearing masks ourselves.

A few weeks later, another friend and I went to Rockfish Grill for their Mardi Gras specials. We decided we needed to do this again next year, but with many more people in tow. It was simple fun, folks going around handing out beads to patrons, and just lots of people enjoying a great evening out.

This year, I'm expecting to see a polar bear outside my window, and given the 133 car pile-up on the nearby freeway due to only a slight layer of ice, I'm avoiding freeways like the ... well, hell. I think we determined that phrase is kind of null and void now.

Just like how Mythbusters busted the Bull in a China Shop phrase.

I'm back from my vacation in Seattle. I made sure to eat seafood (mostly salmon) at least once every day. There was a Minecraft exhibit at the Museum of Pop Culture, so I took some videos of that for the nephews. Monday there was a lot of sun, and my friend that I was visiting commented that only I could manage to visit Seattle in the middle of winter and get sunburned. My favorite spots were all in Pike Market: a wine, cheese, chocolate, and cured meat tasting room overlooking the sound (Northwest Tastings), a coffee room with a huge fireplace (Storyville), and Pike Place Chowder, which was so good I ate there twice.

Other places of note I visited:

Derby - I ate a tasty steak salad and drank a Hot Rod Toddy while looking at classic cars

Macrina Bakery and Cafe - their brunch menu is reprinted each weekend, so I'm assuming the menu options also change regularly

Robot vs Sloth - I bought two monsters books there and resisted with all my effort buying all the plushie bats

Beecher's Handmade Cheese - watched from the street corner as they made the cheese - bought some truffle cheese to introduce my friend to truffles for the first time and bought some aged cheddar to bring home - the guy there said if I like truffles....

Truffle Queen - OMG, so much truffle! She was weighing in a fresh batch of truffles when I arrived. I opted for some truffle salt instead of truffle mustard, although I may still order some online for later, since that is my favorite to go with sausage

The Crumpet Shop - I wanted to try about 5 of them

Village Sushi - Joe has been there for decades, makes the best damn sushi, has the largest hamachi kama I have eaten to-date, and has the best stereo setup you will ever find in a sushi place on which he plays a lot of classic rock and jazz

Elliott Bay Book Co. - so totally worth a visit - in the heart of the gay district

The Purple Store - not false advertising

There was a glass-blowers shop in the Occidental Square area of the International District/Chinatown.

We also stopped by The Pinball Museum, but that was actually really disappointing, so I took a couple of pics and didn't bother going in. We have some better arcade bars in Dallas that put this place to shame.

Places I didn't really have time to see: Chihuly Gardens and Glass, Living Computer Museum, Museum of Flight, any art or science museums (although we did visit an open gallery where a friend was displaying along with some others - I actually bought a couple prints from another artist and then promptly left them at the sushi place - they will be mailed to me eventually), Space Needle (I had just as good a view from my friend's 26th story Oracle lunch room, and that was free), Underground Tour (I did that ~15 years ago when I visited previously, so didn't feel the need to do it again), Seattle Aquarium and/or zoo

Despite my friend now living in Seattle for a few years, I was able to introduce her to new things: meat pies, a new dumpling house and Occidental Square in Chinatown, truffles!, Macrina brunch, Storyville coffee, and she'd never been on the harbor tour cruise, so we did that together as well.

Yoga cushions and bolsters just make me think, "Oh, look. It's a doggie bed for humans."

I promise I don't have a hate on for yoga. I sometimes feel like getting into yoga, although I think I'd be happier joining a gymnastics gym and doing calisthenics (which is essentially what my current workout entails, just in smaller measure).

I've managed to get a lunchtime routine going at work. Luckily, I'm in an office with just me and one other person for the most part, and we both are trying to monitor our eating, just in different ways. It means we've taken over the kitchen and don't have to worry about someone stealing our gadgets or food. As such, I've bought a George Foreman grill, glass bowls, cheese grater, etc., so that I can actually COOK something for lunch. My typical menu consists of a fillet of salmon cooked on the grill with a little balsamic glaze, a quart of veggies (which is a LOT of veggies) steamed in the microwave and then smothered in butter and cheddar cheese, and 2-4 cups of spinach salad with a creamy balsamic vinaigrette, 4 cheeses (a 3-cheese blend of Parmesan, Romano, and Asiago, and then some shredded smoked Gruyere or smoked provolone, depending on which one I bought), slivered almonds, and pine nuts. I've varied the tastes enough that I can eat this menu every single day and never get tired of it.

Although, I will still hit some of the food places around and just try to make better choices, like Chipotle salad with barbacoa, Olive Garden grilled salmon or salmon piccata, or Cotton Patch Cafe or Outback steak and veggies. I'll still sometimes splurge for a Dickey's brisket baked potato with all the fixings, anything Schlotsky's, or my stupidly favorite Cane's 3-finger combo, but for the most part, I'm trying to both save some money on my meals and see what I can accomplish with different food choices. I still love Mama Cuca's in south Arlington, which has hands down the best steak quesadillas I've ever had.

Man, I love food too much.

Speaking of food, I treated my mom and two youngest nephews to hibachi last night, and the OMFG!!! look on Littlest's face when the grill was set on fire was absolutely priceless. He's what I call an über-picky eater, which is typical toddler behavior, but he's 8 now and still acting like he's 3. It completely drives me up the wall with the highly limited menu he'll eat from (although he'll eat all the candy, soda, and desserts he can get his hands on). So, I was rewarded with him actually eating all the veggies, rice, beef, and chicken that was put on his plate, and not turning his nose up at it and then complaining of being hungry still, which is a much more common occurrence when we go out to eat with him. Overall, it was a great dinner.

You can watch it all, skip through to just the Stone Mountain part at 14:10, or I've set this embedded video to start at a good point to give full context without having to start at the beginning.

This has got to be the most awesome thing I've seen in a while.

The Casual Cat Cafe "offer(s) cuddle time with adoptable cats in a comfortable setting! Come visit us to unwind and de-stress.
...
All of the cats at our cafe are available and ready for adoption. We work with local rescues and shelters to provide us with adoptable cats. All cats are up to date on vaccines, spayed/neutered, microchipped, and tested negative for FIV/FELV. 100% of the adoption fee goes back to the sponsoring rescue or shelter of the cat adopted."

Here's their Facebook link if you want to share.

I mentioned that while on vacation in Atlanta I'd like to visit Center for Puppetry Arts, and I was looking at the website again this morning

They have scheduled in August The Dark Crystal Ball, which just sounds amazing.

Unfortunately, our vacation is scheduled for the second week in July, so I'm pretty jealous that I won't be able to check out the ball.

I'm working a second part-time job that really wants me to be full time. PT job encroaches, at the moment, on FT job's hours, but most of that is because it's a company that I'm coordinating getting up and running. Being the spearhead of it all means that when someone thinks of something they call, text, or email me immediately. And there's also vendors calling and emailing at all different times. This will calm down once things are set up and start falling into place.

In the meantime, I'm trying unsuccessfully to get used to a new sleeping schedule and trying carefully to hold on to my sanity while having to multitask between two jobs.

I had a wonderfully busy weekend. I worked some Saturday morning at PT job, went to an estate sale Saturday afternoon, dodged All The Pedestrians while driving through the arts district of Fort Worth on a beautiful day, described to my friend the history of the Montgomery Plaza nee Wards, found an amazing sushi cafe down Camp Bowie Blvd, bypassed frozen custard in favor of mochi ice cream, and watched Over The Garden Wall as though it was my first time, even though I'd seen it before, because I couldn't remember a damned bit about it from my first watching.

Sunday...what did I do Sunday. I swear I cannot even remember now what I did Sunday, but it was just as packed. I probably did something with the nephews. Oh yeah, I remember. I was supposed to help them put together their new trampoline that my sister got them for Christmas, but they already had that taken care of by the time I got over there. I took the boys to Chan's Mongolian for dinner and then Mom and I watched Inside Man, and by then it was time to go home and sleep.

Oh, and Mom told me my schizophrenic uncle is in the hospital in ICU. He's probably dying, needs to have a lung removed with multiple tumors in it, has infected liquids all around everywhere, his heart isn't beating right, lymph nodes hard as rocks so much so that the doctor's needle broken when trying to get tissue for a biopsy. He's most likely to die of sepsis or heart attack, and right now we're just waiting for the doctors to tell us what they plan on doing for him next.

Seriously, why do we think we're better off as a society without euthanasia?

The double job front is keeping me occupied so much that I'm not thinking about my uncle, not that it would matter because I'm otherwise pretty numb about it regardless, and probably would be even if I had no job and all the time in the world to ponder it. I still am not ready to cry over him. I'll do that when he finally does decide to depart this mortal plane, and all that other poetry jazz-sounding stuff.

Middle nephew that loves riding the big roller coaster rides with me asked if we could go to Six Flags today. He's learned from me the value of going to Six Flags on skeptical weather days, like cold, possibly rainy days in the fall, and scattered thunderstorm days like today.

We got rained on twice, once as soon as we arrived and again right after eating dinner. That second storm cell included a few park-wide notices of the weather service alert accompanying it, which the alarm sound over the intercom made Little Bit nervous for a moment. I had to pull up the radar on my phone and talk him through understanding that it wasn't a tornado warning, and that we were safer staying there than leaving and driving in the car TOWARDS the oncoming assault. We stayed in the restaurant while the bulk of the second storm passed, which had already started losing power once it reached us and was only a mid-level rain rather than the OMG pummel of doom it started out as on the other side of Fort Worth. The A/C was making us cold, so we were happy to start walking around in the light rain again once the storm subsided. There were puddles to walk through everywhere, and nephew, along with many younger kids throughout the park, were loving stomping and splashing in them. Some bigger puddles were unavoidable while walking through the wait-line corrals Luckily I wore sandals instead of socks and shoes. I know how crinkled my feet get when they're trapped in water-logged shoes all day, like they did when I was a teen and rode the soaking water rides first thing upon arrival on a hot, hot summer day.

Our drink spilled a total of three times - once on the table, once on him while we were on a ride, and once on my hoodie while it was sitting in the bin during another ride. Apparently the lid doesn't seal as well as it should. Luckily we were already thoroughly damp, so while the spillage added a level of soaking to our clothes, you couldn't tell while walking amongst the other water-drenched souls.

The park was emptying out by the time we arrived at around 4pm, so much so that I thought maybe they had decided to close due to the rain, but they stayed open the full day until 9pm. I think most people got in their fun in the morning before the rains started, but those dry folks probably also had much longer lines to stand in. There were absolutely no lines for us. The longest we waited for a single ride was The Justice League at maybe 30 minutes, which on a normal busy day is 2+ hours. I know this because the first time we rode it I got leg cramps from a 2-hr long line, and I've seen the corral be even fuller than that on some days.

We ate a churro and popcorn and carried around that Mr. Pibb in our free refill bottle. We rode the Batman ride with zero wait. We had a burger, chicken nuggets, onion rings, fries, a fruit cup, a fruit roll-up, and Pepperidge Farm Goldfish for dinner. Then we rode The Justice League and Runaway Mountain, the two inside rides we knew would for sure be open again once the storm passed over. Then we rode The Texas Giant twice, The Titan twice, and The Texas Giant another two times. Any other regular summer day, weekend or not, and ALL of those rides would have ~2 hours wait times.

In summary, 5 hours, a snack, a dinner, two water shows, and 9 rides, all for the cost of gas (since we have the season pass with meals).

At least I didn't have to worry about sunscreen.

The best parts about today were our conversations to and from the park. Little Bit definitely has a scientific mind. On the way out he asked about the myth that green skies always means tornado, and I explained super cell clouds, wall clouds, and light dispersion, especially during sunset, through such a gigantic super cell. He now knows green skies and tornadoes are correlated, but not causality - I would have shown him a Venn, but I was driving. We simultaneously debunked the rain-means-no-tornado myth. We also talked about vortexes in general, including dust devils, hurricanes, whirlpools, and even the smoke vortex you can see coming off the iron cooking slab at our favorite Mongolian grill restaurant. I discussed how the power source for some come from the heat coming off the ground/base of the vortex and some get their power from the top. Later, while riding The Texas Giant the second set of times, we enjoyed the sunset and the going-away thunderstorm clouds while the train was pulled up the main drop hill, and he commented to me that he understood the light dispersion stuff better while looking at the pretty sunset colors.

On our drive back, he asked me to clarify the magnets installed in the cars affecting stop lights concept. He was close, but not quite right. I told him about the grooves in the road and how the metal car disrupts the inductance, so we played Where's Waldo looking for the grooves at the next couple of intersections. I didn't go into as much scientific depth with that as I did the green tornado clouds stuff. Next time I hang out with him, I'll introduce him to henry.

But Wait, There's More!

He also asked about college, and if I went to college, and how degrees work. So we spent the rest of the drive home talking about undergrad Bachelor, grad Master, and post-grad PhD/MD/JD degrees.

Whew. What a day.