Morning wake-up post

So far I've been awake for about an hour and a half and had three cups of coffee, but I still feel like if I crawled back into bed I'd be asleep within minutes. I did wake up a few times during the night, but was able to get back to sleep fairly quick...still woke up not feeling very rested.

Thankfully my back was less sore this morning than I anticipated. Yesterday D and I went out on a rather intense job, in the woods, where I had to tote around nearly 40 lbs. of weight for an hour in 90 degree heat. I was carrying a machete (strapped on my belt), and a bag that had 6 wooden stakes, 6 2 ft. pieces of rebar, and a 4 lb. hammer (to drive the rebar into the ground). So, while my lower back wasn't nearly as hurty this morning, my shoulders and upper back are a little tight.

On a up-side, I got to actually use the machete yesterday. The way D does his work, he needs clear line of sight between where he stands and where his instrument is set up so that means if there are branches and things in the way, they need to be cut down. D is definitely much more experienced at machete work so he did most of it, but I got to do a little. Let me just say that birch trees are one of the hardest to cut. By the time I got four branches cut that were about as thick around and two thumbs, he'd already finished the rest of the line. It was still fun, though. The only other times I've gotten to use the machete were to clear a short line where there were a few thin branches and really tall weeds and then to clear some branches and bushes out around a property corner.

In other news, the job situation is still unchanged. I had applied at a zoo near here, Food City, and Walmart. The zoo didn't have any openings that I was qualified for unfortunately. I would've really liked to work there. Walmart said they might have some openings later this month and when I called Food City to check on my application, the store manager was on vacation, but the lady I talked to was assistant store manager I guess and said when he got back she'd talk to him about any openings and they'd call me if there was something. So I'll hopefully hear from them sometime this week. *fingers crossed*

I'm really hoping things are gonna start cooling off here weather-wise. Granted it's only been hitting in the high 80s to low 90s so far, but it's been crazy humid. I'll be surprised if we don't break 100 degrees by the end of the month.

Once D and I get done with another job coming up in a few days, we'll probably end up taking the truck up the ridge at the back of his dad's property to get started on cutting wood for this winter to use in the wood-burning stove downstairs. It'll save a lot more money on the energy bill if we use it. I'd like it to be a little cooler when we do it, but the sooner it gets done the better.

Well, time to check on laundry.

Ciao

Harper's Island

The title of the post is a show D and I have been watching off and on for the past couple weeks or so. I think, considering what happens, it was more of a short story than an actual tv series.

Lemme just say...it was quite icky!

It's about a guy and girl going back to an island to get married where the guy spent summers as a kid. Murders start happening again (7 years after a previous rampage of murders).

I don't wanna give away the ending, but it's definitely trippy.

I think we spent the whole series, up until the last few episodes, saying who the killer was. You don't end up knowing until the last few episodes. And, like I said...it's icky. Not for the squeamish and not for those prone to violence. Lots of blood and gore...made me jump a few times.

There's one time (I think the second to last episode) that I yelped/sqealed and made D jump. I would've been more scared if I hadn't been so amused that he jumped. *grins*

But, also, just like a typical horror movie...the people in it are quite stupid.

"Let's go into the dark scary tunnels where the killer is...our friends are there and we can help" ... (like it worked so well last time)

"Let's split up...we can cover more ground." (Like the last time you did that and someone got killed.)

At the end, I think D and I were both glad it was over, but it was fairly entertaining.


On another note...we got two new movies on Netflix. One was League of Extraordiary Gentlemen (I think my folks had that on dvd and I've watched it a few times) and the other was The Departed with Matt Damon, Leonardo Decaprio (sp?), and Mark Whalberg (sp?). The latter was a fairly good movie. Quite long at about 2 1/2 hours, but really good. Gory and lot's of people getting shot in the head, though (mafia movie).

Anyway...as far as other things...I've put in job applications at Food City, Kroger, Walmart, Smoky Mountain Wine and Liquor, and the Knox County Zoo. Hopefully something will pan out.

*fingers crossed*

Yesterday

Well, Father's Day here went fairly well. D and I went in the house a couple hours early to help put food stuffs together. He helped cut up vegetables for salad, mash taters, and made gravy while I made hot fudge (for dessert).

We had pork chops that started seared on the grill and then finished in the oven. While they weren't as spiced up as how D and I make ours, they were very tender. We also had mashed taters, corn, green beans, potato salad, rolls, and regular salad.

By the time I got around to the regular salad I didn't have anymore space on my plate (I'm sure you peeps know what that's like) so I had intentions of getting some on the second go 'round, but was way too full.

For dessert there was hot fudge cake (two 1in. slices of chocolate cake with about an inch or so of vanilla ice cream in the middle, with hot fudge poured on top). It was made for D's birthday in April and it is oh so good, but this time was made for one of D's brother's birthdays that we were also celebrating yesterday. I decided though that no matter how good it tasted, that this time I just didn't need those extra calories. Besides, I'm sure it's not the last time it'll get made.

In other news, it has been so freakin' unbearably humid here. The overall temperature hasn't been too bad (high 80s to mid 90s), but with between 75%-85% humidity. But, it's raining pretty hard now so hopefully that's gonna cool things down soon.

p.s. message to my momma...I got the last package you sent. Thanks for the cd and the rings...and those other things. :-)

Dinner last night

This was another of those $2.50 whole chickens D and I got at the grocery store. Unfortunately, we didn't have anymore stuffing so D made a rub of various spices and smeared all over underneath the skin and then on top of the skin as well. We also cut up onions to stuff under the skin. After that, we cut up about four potatoes to put around the chicken and half a bag or so of baby carrots. The green stuff on the veggies is fresh parsley.

It was absolutely perfect. We both could've eaten it until we hurt, but we were good kids. What we didn't eat mostly got put in a container and frozen for another day, puppy got most of the skin and some other bits and pieces, and then the bones and such got put into a gallon ziploc baggie for making chicken stock (our third bag by the way). :-)

I think it's been 4 months since we started collecting bits of things for making the stock. We've been watching the Food Network and it seems a lot of the chefs make their own stock. The contents of our bags vary from chicken leavings/bones, the necks of the chickens we've used, onion leavings (skin and roots included), green onion leftovers, cabbage parts, pieces of parsley stems, and some of the chicken broth that's settled into the bottom of the dish after baking it. It'll definitely be an experiment, but I'm optimistic about it.

1st camping trip

Now that something interesting has actually happened, I feel like I've got something to blog about.

I'll get to the main topic in a second, but first let me say that I had one of the worst scares in a long while last Thursday through Sunday. My cat, Calli has been getting a little more adventurous as she's gotten older (she's about a year and a half old now.) It used to be that she'd never go outside and then it was only if D or I were outside. Finally, she started going out on her own, but would always be close to the deck.

So, Wednesday night we left the door open a crack so she could come and go. We woke up Thurs. morning...no Calli. She usually wakes us up at some point during the night and then yowls her head off for food in the morning, but she was nowhere to be found.

D and I decided that, even if she didn't show up by Friday (when we were leaving to go camping) that we'd still go and ask his sister-in-law to keep an eye out for her. Well, she didn't show up. There's been coyote sightings around here for the past month or so and I figured that if she wasn't home when we got back that most likely she'd had a run-in with them. Honestly, I was worried sick, but tried to stay positive so as to still have fun camping.

Good news was, on the way home Sunday, I got a text message saying that the sis-in-law has spotted her on Saturday, but she'd run back into the woods. By the time we got back around 3pm Sun. our little critter was waiting for us on the deck. She was a little dirtier and quite a bit terrified, but all in one piece. I think she hid under the bed for about 5 hours that day, but it wasn't too long until she was back outside. :-)

Now, on to the main event. D and I took our first camping trip of the year last weekend. It was a blast to say the least.

We got to Citico Creek (think I've posted a couple pictures from there on my Flickr site) around 2:15pm Fri. It only took us about a half hour to unload the truck and set up the tent. We kinda lounged around for a little while and went off to collect more wood. We'd brought some with, but not near enough for the whole weekend since we've got to fit wood, supplies, and the puppy in the truck.

Our first meal that night was typical camping fare (hamburgers), but we'd also brought along a little something for the next day that was going to be a total experiment. What we brought for Saturday night was a whole 5lb. chicken. Yep...that's right. And I'm still kicking myself for forgetting my camera.

Picture two long sticks tied in crosses on either side of the fire with a long stick wedged on top. Basically a homemade camping rotisserie. We brought a box of stuffing mix and made it with a little less water than called for so it would be stickier and then we stuffed (no pun intended) the stuffing under the skin of the chicken and then sliced up onions to put in there also.

We realized after that we needed to have the fire hotter because we started it at about 3:20pm and it wasn't done until a little after 11pm. But my...oh...my was it tasty!!!

The grocery store here had the chickens on sale for around $2.50 a bird so we got 6-7 of them and have cooked 2 so far.

In thinking back on it, we really didn't do a whole lot except forage for wood, eat, and do a whole LOT of relaxing. It was very nice to get away from all the everyday stress.

Oh, I did however get to learn how to use a chainsaw. I can almost see my mom cringing at that thought. Saturday afternoon D and I went on another wood gathering trip and found a felled tree that he cut in 3-4ft long sections just to be able to haul it back to the camp site. When we got back, he pulled them out so they were hanging over the tailgate and then had me hold the end inside the truck while watching him cut it. He did two of the four logs and then...*gulp*...it was my turn. It was actually easier than I thought. And yes, mom, I still have all my limbs where they're supposed to be. hehe

As fun as it was, we were naturally exhausted when we got back. It's close to a 2 hour drive each way with most of it being busy highway (what we affectionately call the Alcoa Motor Speedway).

I think I slept for 10 hours Sunday night. Thankfully, the two jobs we've got going on right now weren't going to be ready until Tuesday so we got a day of recuperation.

We've got another trip tentatively planned for sometime next month with at least one, but possibly two other couples and D and those two guys might end up taking a boys only trip at some point this year.

I guess there's not a lot else to report besides our latest camping trip.

I'm missing my folks like crazy and wanting to make a short visit, but it's just not financially feasible right now...especially with the sucky economy.

I've gotten a couple applications out...one for the Knoxville Zoo so here's hopin'. *crosses fingers*


Until something else of note happens,
Ciao