Unpredictable

Gainesville

Was almost ready to head out to shop, once Gator game was underway, when Bill announced he couldn't face the craziness today, but would be glad to go tomorrow. Oooo-kay. Had TV on to monitor G-game progress, left it on-- and so got in on excitement of (1) Michigan getting their ass handed to them by... Appalachian State?! and (2) a Boston rookie making his second major league start pitching a no-hitter against (who else?) the hapless Orioles. If it weren't for bad luck (they were also on the losing end of a 30 to something loss recently), the O's would not make headlines at all.

In other news, oh yeah-- the Gators won handily. And so did Cal.

Once again, the fun of pulling a meal out of nowhere. Slim pickings, since haven't really stocked up since getting back from trip. Found some unopened tapenade and a viable 4 oz of Kasseri, so made "Aegean Chicken," a thing I've planned to try several times, then chickened out. So to speak. It was quite good, although maybe a bit on the garlicky side. Made a really weird fruit salad (tangelo, apple, over-ripe banana and canned pineapple tidbits) and miked up some frozen peas. Talk about your desperation dinner.

Thanks for the report that Thea enjoyed my letter, Mom. I was disappointed that Penny had not been there to help her read it when I called Friday. I knew she would like hearing a few details of the trip.

And congrats on doing the Morning Routine again. I'm very proud of you. Just keep doing that every day until it really is a Habit. Don't worry about anything else. The new calendar will be a good time get take a baby step back into the sticker game, too.

I still have no idea what I'll do for a holiday meal. Must resolve this puzzle of what to do about a GRILL, as so many recipes this time of year assume you have one. My old Brinkman smoker is unusable after years of neglect. I liked the look of Sandy & Charlie's set-up, and wish I'd paid more attention to how it worked while I had the chance.

I'm almost through Just Visiting -- skipped the poetry, as I tend to do. I write poems occasionally, but consider them symptoms of mental/emotional distress. I have no patience with reading them (my own included) unless they are astonishingly wonderful and I happen to be in a poetical frame of mind. But the prose pieces are remarkable, and some of them I can tell have left indelible marks on my mind. It's so annoying to realize you've made a new good friend that you'll never meet or even get to correspond with-- he's already dead. That's part of what books do, of course, but this was such a near miss.

We had a late afternoon thunderstorm with hard rain. A huge thunderclap came out of nowhere, no warning. Cat went straight up from her perch and dove beneath the coffee table (duck and cover, kitty cat!). I just went straight up, then went on reading. The satellite took a break for a couple of hours too. No worries, we were able to get caught up soon enough. And now, more thunder rumbling. I see there is now Felix, projected to follow the path of Dean. But these guys are unpredictable, ultimately, so we'll need to keep an eye out. It may be impending winter up there, but down here in the tropics, not so much.