Rando Blast

As always, there's a lot that happens, and I haven't been doing great at keeping up here. I'll catch a little up today.

A couple weeks ago I put in a new ceiling fan in the front room. The old one was one of the early home improvements I had done, and it was a bit more involved, as there was nothing there before!!! I added a junction box and a cross joist, and ran wiring inside a flexible conduit. The wiring was left as installed when the clowns re wired the place. Anyway, the old fan, in addition to looking a bit old, was getting noisy, and after I installed the one in the bedroom, I missed having a remote. I'm pleased with the results.

A month or so ago Menace from The Woody Show was doing an opening at a new Raising Cane's, so I took off work a couple hour early, and we headed down. The older boy was a fan of Cane's, but I'd never had it fresh, and it loses something when it's re heated. They were doing giveaways, and I got a sticker and key chain, and the younger got a new Woody Show T-shirt, which he accidentally grabbed two of them, so we both got one!!!

Bort was there, too, along with Heavy T, the King of Whittier. Speaking of shirts, Bort (real name Brett, but he got some critical email years ago where they called him Bort, and it's pretty much his name now!!!) liked my “Large Marge Sent Me” shirt I'd picked up at the Cabazon Dinosaurs gift shop.

Last week we were coming out to the car on a rainy afternoon, and my wife missed the last step and landed on her head. She also scraped her nose, and it was bleeding, and it looked like a gallon in the rain.

Got her back upstairs (after getting her up) and out of the rain, and she had the most huge cartoon lump you ever saw on her head!!! Nope, we're going to the emergency room to get that checked out!!! On the way, I pulled up my camera and told her to smile, and she totally did!!!

They X-rayed her and gave her a CAT scan, but (ha ha) they found nothing. One of the nurses had a bunch of tattoos on his arms, one of which was an asthma inhaler with a smiley sticker on it. The doctor told her to ice the lump, and she'd probably have a black eye, maybe two, the next day. He called it!!!

The younger had his birthday. Last year he never got to have the get-together with his friends that he wanted, but it worked out this year. One of his friends gave him the Baja Blast can-looking drink bottle, it's actually a double wall unit, really nice, but doesn't hold much. We got wings and one of those giant pizzas (it's been a long time since we've gotten on of those, I think a bunch of Caeser's would have been a better way to go, but oh well). The giant pizza place was always a pain to park at, but they just recently opened a Wing Stop just a little ways up, so I was able to park there and walk over. They played Binding of Isaac: 4 Souls. Several had to leave early, but four of them played until one had 9 souls!!!

I had repainted under the kitchen sink last year one time the drain had backed up. It was in bad shape under there. I added a couple motion detector LED light strips. Just recently I added some sub floor, and tiled under there. Looks better, but I question my tiling ability and am re thinking if I want to tile the bathroom myself. I had some large tiles, and was almost able to do it with just 4, but of course my OCD had me add the little strips on either side and center everything!!!

I've been kind of hoarding stardust in Pokemon GO, just recently got to over 10 million!!!

Fun fact, the gift shop for the Cabazon Dinosaurs is in the belly of a dinosaur!!!

About a month ago, we were in the neighborhood of this place, Charley's Philly Steaks. I'd never heard of the place, but I generally like Philly cheese steaks, except for I can't do bell peppers. Some places, they're part of the mix and you can't get it without them, but you're able to get it your way here!!!

The younger had a teriyaki chicken sandwich, and the wife and I had cheese steaks. They have wings, but we had enough stuff. They were quite good sandwiches, but the prices were a bit on the high side.

For Christmas both last year and the year before, I bought a multi pack of Chicago deep dish pizzas. This year was Nancy's, where it's a stuffed pizza. Pretty good, but could have been bigger.

The year before I bought Lou Malnati's, which were bigger. Spent the same amount, roughly, but got only 4 instead of 6, but they were bigger. Photos thought they were cake!!!

When I went to install the ceiling fan, I turned the light on the old one off and went out and switched the breaker I thought went to it. Came back in, and the light was still on, so I had they younger come out and observe while I went through the other breakers. None of them shut it off, either, but when I did the first one again, he said the light flickered. Forgot, years ago I picked up a set of LED light bulbs with a self-contained battery back up!!!

The younger watched a few cooking videos, and wanted to try his hand making Monte Cristo sandwiches, and fried cheese curds. The cheese curds had a beer batter, and as always when cooking with beer, I wanted something with flavor. We headed off to BevMo! for the first time in a while. After locating a suitable base, we checked out the other stuff, as we do. I liked the Rat Bastard, but we didn't get any. They had Baja Blast in cans there, and since it's been hard to find, we picked up a 12. A couple weeks later, I was ordering some stuff to pick up from WalMart, and they had it there, too, for a much better price.

While we were doing the curds, we had plenty of batter, so cut up some onions for rings. Check 'em out cooking, it looks like The Riddler's cooking corner!!!

While I was on the ragtop quest, one of the candidates on my list was the PT Cruiser. As I've said, we've always been on the plus side of the polarizing styling. Now that I have the Sky, I haven't been really looking, but there's this one that I drive by pretty often. Well, a few weeks ago, a for sale sign shows up in it's window!!! Naturally, there's no price on the sign, just the number. I took this picture that shows the bulk of the damage below the taillight and the number. Eventually remembered and called the number, and the guy speaks nothing but Spanish. Had a friend call for me and get some of the details. It has 140,000 miles, current smog, and he's only asking $1,800!!! Like I need a hole in my head, but I'm considering it...

Baja Blast from the fountain at Taco Bell just hits different.

We all got our new glasses recently. The younger has had his for 4 or 5 years, and he thinks his new ones are like everything is in HD now!!! In the same center as the glasses place (I didn't have my exam with my favorite, Dr. Hu) there's a Jamba Juice, and we got some. In a scenario reminiscent of the Big Mac, after we were out enjoying our juicy treats, one of the workers came out and said they'd made an extra of one if we wanted it!!!

Big Mac Birthday

McDonald's has recently been engaging in some revisionist history. For years, Grimace has been something of an oddball background character. I've heard he's supposed to be a giant, anthropomorphic taste bud, and when he was introduced, he was somewhat analogous to the Hamburglar, where he'd steal people's shakes.

This year, for whatever reason, McDonald's has come up with the story that Grimace is huge on birthdays, and June 12th was declared his birthday. In celebration, they came up with Grimace Birthday Meals, featuring either a Big Mac or 10 nuggs, medium fries, and the special signature item, the Grimace Birthday Shake.

Don't know if I've made mention here, but a couple years back they built a Wingstop not far from our home. On Mondays and Tuesdays, they started off with $.50 wing night, sold in either 10 or 15 packs, with 2 flavor choices. We like their flavors, and it's a pretty good deal, so we've made Tuesday Wing Night. The price has gone up, first to $.60, then to it's current $.70, but it's still a pretty good deal. A couple weeks ago, I was out, first to the store for a couple items, then to Wingstop to pick up our order. In the same lot as the store, there's a McDonald's, so, being curious about the Grimace Birthday Shake, I stopped in to pick up some for the family to try. Got there, and there's a guy waiting at the counter, but no one helping him. I step up to kiosk to try and order one there, but it's either not there, or it's impossible to find, so I get in line, now grown to two, and now with a worker. As I'm waiting, the guy at the head of the line attempts to order a shake, and it met with the classic McDonald's reply, “Our ice cream machine isn't working”. Made my wait shorther.

The next weekend, we decide to again head to McDonald's for a second attempt. McDonald's is one of those where we rarely go there. I like the sausage biscuit with egg, but almost never make it out for any breakfast, and my son is a fan of the Shamrock Shake, so that's the one thing we end up going there for a couple time a year for. There's one it the area we're in that we've never been to, so we head there. We're able to order the whole Grimace Birthday Meal from the kiosk. The place it pretty nice, and for a change, it has restrooms where you don't need a key or code to use it!!! The workers bring out our chow, and they're friendly and on the ball with ketchup for the fry dippin'. Big Mac is a classic, and I ordered mine with the right extras.

The shake is... interesting. You can tell it's based on the vanilla shake, but with some berry flavoring. I'd read a review where they likened it to a cereal flavoring, along the lines of crunch berry or Fruity Pebbles.

Around the time I was almost done with the Big Mac, the worker came out again. Apparently, they'd made up a second Big Mac to my specifications, and since they couldn't give it to an unsuspecting customer, they gave it to me!!! Bonus Big Mac!!!

Happy Thanksgiving

A couple of food and beverage related pictures of my wife for Thanksgiving!!!

The first is from our anniversary, at a very nice Italian restaurant: "It's the best steak I've ever had!!!"

The second is from a very authentic Mexican restaurant on the Big Island (where we ended up after we couldn't find the barbecue place)

She does not approve of your Mountain Dew Baja Blast.

2018: The Year in Food

Welcome to the end of the year!!! It's been a pretty good one, and at this time, there's always a bunch of lists and retrospectives, so here's another!!! A look back at some of the stuff I ate!!!

To start off, I'm always looking for a good Chicago deep dish pizza. There's a few places that are purported to to serve it up, but the only new to me one I tried was a place called Dough Box. It's pretty decent, but not quite as good as the one I had in Chicago.

Next up is a creation of my own. The Woody Show had a segment on the ultimate stoner foods, and one was a grilled bacon cheese peanut butter & jelly sandwich. I think Menace may have cooked some up. Probably on 4-20. I love me a grilled PB&J, it's a meal and dessert in one, so I tried out the embellishments, and it was pretty good. Added in some grilled onions, and if I remember, I had some fancy kind of cheese. When I went to make it, though, there was only one slice each of two different kinds of bread, so it was a real mash up.

I've been going to the Aldi by my work for some time now. they have some of the best prices on most stuffs. One time while I was there, they had Jeno's East Chicago deep dish pizzas for around $6. Had to get one, and while, once again, not as good as Chicago, it was still quite plausible, for a fraction of the price. I think I got one more before they sold out, and they came back later and I got 2 or 3 more.

Next up, Oinkster had their Burger Week again. I skipped last year, but this year they were bringing back a few of my favorites, so I made it a quest again. I think the winner for my favorite was the Thrilla from Manilla. Pork patty with shrimp & mushrooms in a lumpia wrapper, green papaya relish, pork belly, and sweet sweet Thai sauce.

I was looking most forward to the Pantera burger, with grilled mac & cheese, pulled pork, bacon and garlic aioli. Sounded awesome, but for some reason I was underwhelmed.

One of my favorites from my first time was the Bet it All on Black Garlic burger, with a lot of garlic stuff on it, too. When we got there for this one, they told us they were out of the black buns, so it'd be on just a regular bun, but when I got it home, it was black!!! Didn't seem as garlicy as the first one I'd had.

They also had several of their "tribute" burgers, starting with the Big Max, then the Sourdough Josh, and the week ended with the McRibster, which makes the original seem like the ribwich from the gas station!!!

Habit Burger never disappoints, and I made it by for the limited time guacamole crunch burger, and it was well worth it. Later on in the year they had a French Onion burger that was also quite good!!!

Here's one I happened on. For National Donut Day, Burger King came up with the Whopper Donut!!! Only five locations in the country were going to have them, and one was close to where I was going to be, so I was able to get in on it!!!

Really nothing that special, just a Whopper with the middle punched out. Comes with a "mini Whopper slider", which is just the punched out center. Whopper is a pretty good mass-production burger, so I enjoyed it.

As briefly mentioned, we went to the Orange County Fair this year. Always fair food to be had, and here's a few!!! We got some of the Australian Battered Potatoes, which were quite good.

Of course, deep fried stuff had to be consumed. I got some deep fried cheesecake, the younger boy got some deep fried Oreos.

Mom got the deep fried Nutella. Looked bad, tastes good. She also got some pizza on a stick later on.

Of course, they had the Christmas party for my work this year. Seemed like a lot of people weren't going when you'd talk to them, but once we got there, every place you look you see someone. I'm always tempted to get the fish, but I got the filet mignon, and it was good!!! Mine was kind of thin, but that made it nicely cooked throughout. Dessert was these little cakes.

Just the other day I went to Taco Bell and had them try and make a re-creation of Woody's deep dish Mexican pizza!!! He'd gone to their test kitchen and stacked it to where it'd just barely fit in their oven. I basically just had 'em double up everything, and it looks like it could have gone taller, but it was honestly more than enough!!!

Finally, back at the end of August, noted crackpot California Democratic Party Chairman Eric Bauman was calling for a boycott of In-N-Out Burger. All that made me do is want an In-N-Out Burger. The next night, I went by and got one. The boycott doesn't seem to have done them any harm. It occurred to me just the other day, I can't recall the last time I've had an In-N-Out Burger that wasn't prepared animal style!!!

I took this picture and posted it on Twitter. I think it may have been the most liked and retweeted post I've ever done. For the text, I just did three words.

God bless America.

The Month of Not Working Very Much

Happy September!!! Thought I'd do a recap of my last month...

I had the first week of the month off... starting on the Monday on the end of July (actually the Sunday, but that's a normal day off for me anyway) through to the Saturday shift I normally work. That is the week that we had normally gone to family camp, but that has been in flux the last couple of years. Last year we'd ended up going to the San Diego area with the extended family, and this year, it was moved up a week earlier. The youngest got to go, but since I'd scheduled the wrong week at the beginning of the year, I didn't.

Anyway, since I had the time off, thought I'd get some stuff done around the house, as well as try and get some leisure stuff in. Something that's been a burr under my saddle since it was done was the half-assed tiling job that was done a few years back by the most incompetent and crooked contractors shysters I've ever done business with, YYB Construction.

As you can see, they'd done a lame transition from the original yellow tile on 45° angles to white 90°.

Not only that, but the switch for the overhead light on that end of the kitchen, they moved from by the door entering the room where God intended it to be, to over by the sink!!! I opened up the old junction box, and put it back where it belongs.

Next thing, clean up that door jamb and get some fresh paint on it...

Oh, and since I'd moved that light, I was able to put a super bright LED strip over the sink, where they'd taken out a light that used to be up there (and not even bothered to fix the hole it left!!!) I'm quite pleased with the results.

Prior to this week, my wife had been seeing a specialist about some pains she's been having, and he said he was going to do a disc replacement surgery on her. An outpatient deal, in by 10, out by 2, no muss, no fuss. I had a feeling they'd want someone to take her home and such, so I told her to see if she could get in the week I was off. Ended up being a couple of pre-op appointments on Wednesday and Thursday, with the procedure on Friday. Cool!!!

Show up on Friday, and the doctor says he's going to do a fusion between a few of the vertebrae on the inside to keep the discs from collapsing. Huh. OK. He also says, "Later on, we're going to do another surgery and add some reinforcement to the outside, too." Well, that sounds like more!!!

So they wheel her off to surgery, wait over here, we'll call and let you know what's what... hours go by, well past the out by 2 I was told. Finally, they give me the room they're going to bring her to post-op, and I head up there. She arrives a bit later, and after a while it becomes apparent she's not going home that day. That day... which was the last day of my vacation, and I'm supposed to be back at work on Saturday early on. It's a bit late to call in, so I clear with the crew at the hospital that she can be there until I'm off, and I head there straight after. I don't know what they gave her for pain medicine, but it tweaked her melon!!! She had it in her head that they had moved her somewhere else, and she didn't have any of her clothes or effects there. I'd left her phone with her, and she'd sent a few not very coherent texts, and she called my parents and told them of the move, and the mean nurse at night. After getting up early that morning (barely on time to make it with no shave or shower) and working all day, I was burnt. I went straight to the hospital until late and then headed home that night again, as they weren't letting her go home just yet. When I get there the next day, she told me how the mean nurse had come back again, and wanted to put her hand in some fluid or something, then cut it into a shape... They had a sitter with her from that point on. The doctor came and saw her, and asked why she was still there!!! I told him I think she's still quite out of it, and he tells them nothing but Tylenol. BUT!!! They'd just given her something, and she ended up sleeping several hours more, until late that afternoon

So far, we're up to almost the first week in August!!! The doctor wanted to see her on Monday for a follow up appointment, see how she's doing. First thing on Monday, I call into work and tell them I'm going to need to drive her to an appointment, and help her with food and cleaning and getting around for a few days, probably. No problem, they say, keep us posted. We go to the follow up, and everything is good, and hey, you know that other procedure for the outside??? We're doing that on Wednesday!!! Outpatient surgery, in by 10, out by 2. Cool. Plays out just about like the last time they said that!!! I don't believe that doctor when he says that kinda thing anymore!!! She was in the hospital until Saturday morning. At least I was prepared this time. They had the pain medication dialed in a lot better, and must have gotten Nurse Ratchet back down to the Psych ward. This time, I'm able to call out before my Saturday shift.

One day they had a therapy dog come make a visit. He was so chill!!!

All the rest of the weekend I kept asking her how she was doing, are you going to be OK if I go back to work on Monday??? Yea, I'll be OK. That, and the younger is still out of school, so he can help out. Before I go in, I let her know if she needs me there, just call in and I'll be there. At work they tell me pretty much the same thing, just let us know if you need to go home. They're good about that kind of thing.

So, I go in that week, but this is my Birthday week. Another of the vacation days I'd signed up for was my Birthday, so there's a day off in the midst of that week.

I had heard about on the Woody Show Jack in the Box has some new items, the Munchie Mash Ups, hash browns with white cheese sauce... Jack'd Jalapeno Hash with jalapenos and bacon, Wakey Bakey Hash with fried egg and bacon, or my favorite Hangry Hash with chicken nuggets and buffalo sauce. That was breakfast for my birthday, and then we went to see The Dark Tower movie. Remember how that first week I'd wanted to do some sort of leisure activity??? Mostly the only thing in that vein I got some in of was breaking out the last book of the Dark Tower series and starting in on it again. The last 3 (and book 4.5, if you will) I've only read through once, and for a while I've been meaning to hit 'em again, but when I attempted to do so, I could only find book 7. I'm most of the way through, and have located the other three. ANyway, the movie was pretty good, but when they say "Based on the book series", I think they should have been required to make it "Based LOOSELY on the book series". The younger was going into it completely cold, and my wife apparently hadn't retained much of it, and they both enjoyed it quite a bit. I went in expecting as much, and kind of went in with the mindset that it was on another, heretofore unvisited, level of the Tower, so to speak.

The week after that, my wife had another follow up appointment, so I took the day off to take her to that, too. So, if you're counting, that's one day of the first couple of weeks I worked, and 4 of 5 for the next couple.

I picked up a couple of phone holders for the cars that came up on one of the merchants that E-mails me daily. It looked like they would be able to mount in the blank area of the dash above the vents to the right of the instrument cluster. There was almost no explanation on the site, and it turns out it was supposed to be a vent-mount unit. I find those, and the CD slot mount phone holders to be about the stupidest things!!! I really don't want to sacrifice the functionality of either of those for a phone holder, or pretty much anything else!!!

With only a little modification, however, I was able to modify them to mount right in the area I was thinking of!!! Ran a couple of 6-32 screws through the legs, with rubber bumpers on the ends, and hooked the vent clip on the top of the dash plastic just under the dash cap!!! I'm pleased with how they came out.

The last weekday of the month that I would have worked, I checked the available days, and was able to take it. Took the boy down to Go-Cart World for good times!!! It was the least crowded I've ever seen there, we mostly had the place to ourselves!!!

23 days is how many I would have worked if I had not taken any time. 12 is what I ended up doing.