Decisions, Decision

So, I've decided to continue blogging but I'm going to start reducing it from every week day to a couple of blogs a week. I think that might help with the blog burnout factor and help reduce the amount of blogs where I whine. This is not going to count as one of my blogs but I figured that since my last blog was a dither about whether or not to keep blogging, I'd update this with my decision.

So, for now, I'll make this a short and sweet blog without saying much more other than to send out huge thank you's to my parents for helping me have one of those sorely needed weekends where I felt very loved. Sometimes, you need to feel loved and I haven't felt that way lately so it's nice to have it affirmed that no matter how blue you feel, time spent with family can pull you out of it.

Thanks, mum and dad...you are wonderful. Oh, and a belated welcome back mummy-Monkeypants from the UK where she managed to have a bad enough flying experiences that I still feel justified in setting the entrance to Hell in "Emmy Goes to Hell" in an airport.

Happy Monday and thanks, as always, for reading!

A Summer Vacation in a Weekend...

This has been a really nice weekend. I tend to think almost every weekend is nice merely because it's a weekend but this was a particularly good weekend.

I headed to my parents' on Friday and got to spend a nice evening with them. The pups explored my parents garden which is significantly larger than ours while I had a great time just relaxing with my parents. After a not-so-great week at work, it's nice to relax without having to think too much about work.

Saturday, my sister, mum and I hit the local farmer's markets. I'm a bit addicted to farmers markets in the summer. I came home with a huge bag of goodies including tomatoes, eggplant, corn, swiss chard, beets and an entire bushel of tomatillos. I'm not actually sure what I plan on doing with all those tomatillos, to be honest. I didn't even want that many. However, last year, I bought some tomatillos off my favourite farmer at the market. Then, on my next visit, he ended up giving me all of the tomatatillos that he had left because he was going on vacation and needed to get rid of them. I think I got a bushel for about $4. I made a lot of salsa verde. Well, this year, the farmer remembered me and was excited to tell me he had another bushel of tomatatillos for me and I could have them for $4. He's so nice and so low-priced that I ended up taking the tomatillos off him because he really seemed to want me to have the tomatatillos.

If anyone has any idea what I can do with a giant bag of tomatatillos aside from salsa verde, please let me know.

After the farmer's market, I got to have lunch with Saz who was in town visiting her parents. We had a lovely time just catching up and hanging out with her family and friends at their annual church campout. I only stayed a couple of hours but got to play "Cash SUV" which is the same concept as the TV show "Cash Cab" only Saz's dad drove us around the State Park in an SUV while Saz and I attempted to answer the trivia questions. We determined that neither of us had science or maths as our strong suit though we did well on the literature and history stuff. It was a lot of fun.

My final activity on Saturday was dinner and a movie with my parents. My dad really wanted to see "Cowboys and Aliens". I don't know why. Well, I do...my dad loves cowboys and he loves aliens. I believe they made the movie for people like my dad. It was somewhat entertaining but I can almost hear the filmmakers saying to one another "Let's put cowboys and aliens in the same movie! Brilliant!" Unfortunately, that's pretty much as far as they got with their creativity because the reason for the aliens and cowboys being in the same movie was pretty lame. I won't spoil it but it's pretty anticlimactic. I think the movie could have been a lot funnier but then again, I said that about "Sherlock Holmes" and they're making a sequel to that so maybe I'm in the minority.

Nevertheless, not-terrible movie aside, it was a lot of fun to hang out with my parents. I like being an adult and getting to take them out to dinner and stuff. I figure for the amount of years that they paid for my food, it's nice to treat them now and it makes me feel like a grownup.

The rest of the weekend has been low key. I'm having my first yard sale next weekend so mum and I did some searching for treasures to sell. I'm bound and determined to be one of the good sellers in my neighbourhood- my sale is part of the annual Neighbourhood Garage Sale. I'm pricing stuff super low because I figure even if I make $1 on something, it's $1 more than I got by letting the stuff sit around my house. Most of what I'm selling are things that just don't fit me anymore- as I've grown up and developed more of my own style, I have a lot of things that just aren't me anymore, whether it's clothes, bags, interior decor or books.

All in all, it's been a good weekend. Sookie and Rory are pleased to be home- they don't like the car ride much from home to my parents and vice-versa but they like the destinations. They're currently passed out on the couch since they haven't slept much today- at my parents', there are far too many new smells to explore to get much rest.

Even though tomorrow's Monday, I'm going to start the week with a smile knowing that the weekend has been relaxing and for once, I managed to escape thinking about work as much as usual. I find that sometimes, when you have a real vacation of several days, you end up being more tired than if you at work. And then there are other times where you have just the couple of days of a weekend and you manage to feel like you actually had a lovely long vacation in just those two days. I feel like that tonight and I will say, it's a nice feeling. It's a good way to kick off a new week.

Happy Monday and I hope you had a good weekend too!

Money Lessons from Childhood

I’m very pleased to report that even though I should still be mourning the loss of my old refrigerator, I’m already in possession of a newer fancier one.

This seems rather cold (pun intended), I’m sure. After all, my prior fridge was a good fridge. It chilled things nicely and rarely accidentally froze anything. It was just a bit old. Also, after I had to unplug it because it wasn’t working and instead was making a rather scary death-knoll sound, it smelled. It smelled like stale…fridge. When the men from Lowes wheeled it away and replaced it with my new fridge, I wasn’t really sorry to see it go.

I’m much less harsh when it comes to living things, I promise. It’s just hard to be sad to see something go when something much shinier and newer and actually works is wheeled into its place.

I’m pleased with my new fridge. For all their failures with paint, Lowes have an excellent appliance service. I managed to get 25% off because I chose a rather high-demand fridge and the only one in the immediate radius of my Lowes was ‘damaged’. The ‘damage’ was a tiny dent in the side that would face the wall anyway. The nice Lowes’ man helped me with everything and, voila, I had a new fridge by noon the next day.

I’ll stop talking about my fridge in a minute, I promise. It’s just that a fridge is a large purchase. It’s a ‘grown up’ purchase. It reminds me that even though I should know it by now, I really am a grown up.

It’s interesting to think that my first purchase ever with my very own ‘pocket money’ (what we call an allowance in the UK) was a Woofit toy. It was when I was around age nine, I think. I didn’t think about saving my money. I saw the toy, realized I had enough money in my pocket and the toy was mine. Then when my mum reminded me that since I blew my entire pocket money for the week, I wouldn’t be able to buy any sweets or treats until I got my next pocket money, it sunk in: it’s better to save and spend when you really have to than spend for the sake of spending.

It was a valuable lesson and one I still remember. As the thought of not being able to get my penny sweets or my crisps for the week or splurging and buying a can of Coke sunk in, I realized that by buying the Woofit, I hadn’t spent wisely.

I have to thank my mum for that. I think that’s why, to this day, I’m a cautious spender. I only splurge when I know I can really afford it. I’m not one to go out and spend my money on one pair of shoes and have to eat canned food for a week. I’d rather buy a less expensive pair of shoes and have some money left over. Certainly, it means I’ll never be a trend-setter but I’m really not a trend-setter type, anyway.

I suppose my Woofit incident wasn’t really the first lesson I had with money. That came when I was either four or five. My older brother was old enough to go out and about with his friends and ride his bike places. He’d often come home with a bag of sweets and he regaled me with tales of ‘the petrol station’ where they had all kind of sweets, chewing gum and snacks galore. To a child with a sweet tooth, it sounded like heaven. It’s amazing that something as simple as a gas station can be a destination to a little kid but there you have it…it was.

So, one day, I happened to have a 5 pence piece which is about the same value in the UK as a nickel in the U.S. even though with the exchange rate, it’d come closer in value to a dime. I gave it to my brother to get me some sweets. I waited for ages for him to come home. When he did, I immediately said “where’re my sweets.” My older brother stopped and smiled. Then he reached into his mouth and pulled out the piece of chewing gum he’d been chomping on and said, “here they are.”

This is a true story and ironically, I remember it much more clearly than the things I did yesterday. It’s something I tease my brother about to this day. He, too, taught me a valuable lesson about money that day: Be careful who you trust with your money.

Oh, and I don’t think I took the chewing gum he offered me. I don’t remember that part. I’d like to think my sense of hygiene was prevalent then but I have a horrible feeling I might have taken it. Either way, let’s just pretend I didn’t.

I think those money lessons from both the used chewing gum and the Woofit have helped me in my life. It’s true that the things you learn when you’re young help define you as you grow older. I was fortunate enough to be blessed with a cautious mother. My dad is not so cautious. He tends to be more of the Woofit buying type. He’s not dangerous with money but he has a tendency to spend before he really thinks about it. It’s not all bad. My dad’s philosophy is that if you buy cheap, you get cheap. While I think there are some cases where this is a fallacy, I think in many cases, unfortunately, he’s right. It’s hard sometimes to shell out more for something when there’s a much less expensive version next to it but most of the time, there’s a reason why it is so expensive.

I like to think I’ve learned the best from both of my parents. While my mum hesitates and tends to buy the inexpensive version, I go online, research the purchase and figure out if it’s worth paying more. This came in useful with my recent lawnmower and fridge purchases. I could have got a lawnmower for less but I got the cheapest one I could find the last time and it ended up exploding. I could have got a simple, cheap fridge but my research taught me that if I did save money now, I’d be paying more for repairs later.

So, I ended up with a nice, solid fridge. It’s not top-of-the-line by any means but it’s fancier than my old fridge which had the rudimentary shelves in the door and two buckets for fruit and vegetables. My new fridge has a lot more space, a lot more compartments and drawers and, best yet, humidity controls for my vegetables. Given that I tend to centre my meals around my vegetables, this is going to be great for making them last longer. Also, the best thing is the freezer is on the bottom and is a slide out drawer. I never realized that something as simple as not having to stoop down to go into the fridge would make such a huge difference but it’s a treat to open the door and immediately see what’s in my vegetable drawers rather than having to crouch and open them up. Having the freezer below makes more sense because, well, you open the fridge WAY more than the freezer anyway, right?

The moral of the story is that while I still had to buy a fridge when I really didn’t need to be spending a lot on a new appliance is that it turned out happily-ever-after. I’m enamoured with my new fridge. My food is cold. I got a great deal.

It was a grown-up purchase, a far cry from the days of shopping for penny sweets and Woofits. I do miss those days where my toughest decision was would I have enough money for a hot dog AND a milkshake when I went out with my friends or should I save the money for something else instead. But there are days when being a grown-up has its advantages.

Like today when I go home , have a glass of chilled wine from my new fridge and reflect that another minor crisis has been averted.

That’s a nice feeling indeed.

Happy Wednesday!

Thankfulness for Near Perfect Days...

I think, as a human race, we like to complain a lot. It's pretty much second nature for most of us. I'm not excluding myself or putting myself above anyone by saying this. Just reading back over my blog posts for the past couple of months and I'd be a resounding hypocrite if I said I wasn't one of the complainers.

It's easy to complain. We go on Facebook and we complain in our status about work, about the weather, about Obama, about daycare, about food...pretty much about anything that annoys us.

There's nothing wrong with this. As it is for me, for most, it's a coping technique. If we say out loud what's bothering us, what's bugging us, we suddenly feel much better. We get it out of our system. If we tell the world of Facebook that other drivers are terrible and that we're sick of people who don't clean up after their dogs...it's out there. Our complaint is heard and even though it doesn't correct the situation, we feel better.

Yet, the thing is, I think that we get so hung up on complaining about what's wrong, we forget to remember what's right. I'm the first to blog and whine about a bad day at work. Yet, for all the bad days, there are good days too.

Today was one of them. It was about as perfect as a day can get in its own special way. Thus, instead of complaining about everything, I want to acknowledge that for all the bad Mondays in life, there are also wonderful Sundays.

For me, my day began early. The pups and I went to bed at a decent time last night so we could get up at 7:30 a.m. this morning. We awoke with the alarm and I had the luxury of having a Sookie snuggled on one side and a Rory on the other. When we did get up, it was at the same time that the sun was just beginning to shine. I let the pups out, I got dressed. Our day began. My parents were coming down and I because I'm a fanatical cook, I wanted to make sure everything was on schedule and ready. Thus, I'd made two batches of soup yesterday (clam chowder for mum, black bean for mum). I'd also made the custard for creme brulee.

All I had to do today was make the dough for the bread, let it rise, bake it and do some last minute prep for lunch. I managed to get all this done, have a cup of coffee while still enjoying a somewhat early morning walk with the pups. We watched the sun rise into the sky while enjoying the peace of a quiet Sunday morning. My parent arrived in good time. We had a nice lunch and I got to spend the day with my parents while also enjoying a trip to Jungle Jims.

The weather was about as perfect as you can get. It was balmy with a warm wind. As a result, we got to sit out in my newly redecorated Tuscan family room and enjoy the warmth of spring. My dad helped me move the heavy stove that was the only thing standing between me and redoing the floor in my Tuscan room. We had a nice dinner and, after I bid my parents farewell, I took the pups for another walk. The walk was perfect. For a spring night, it doesn't get any better.

We enjoyed the last moments of daylight. The weather was warm and windy. The tulips have started blooming in response to this unexpected beautiful spring day and their bright red colours were a lovely contrast the sunny yellow daffodils that are still in full bloom.

In short, days don't really get much better than this. It was the type of day where I didn't once stop and be sad that I'm still single. I got to spend time with my parents and my dogs and enjoy the lovely warmth of spring. Thus, as I was walking with the pups tonight, I realized that I was 100% content. I couldn't complain about anything. And I realized that this doesn't happen very often in life. There's always a Monday or a bad day at work to stand in the way.

I'm sure if I thought about it, I could find something to complain about today but the thing is, I don't want to find something to complain about. That's a rare thing. Thus, for once, I wanted to acknowledge the rare thing instead of finding something, anything to complain about. It's too nice of a feeling not to share.

I hope that, for all my readers, that you have days like this too. Because days like this make all the other days just a little bit better, no matter how bad they are. Nothing major happened. I had no major revelations. It was just a lovely, relaxing, fulfilling day.

As I always say, it's the small things in life that make it worthwhile and in my case, today was full of a million small things. For once, I don't mind that the weekend is over and that means another Monday tomorrow. I don't say it often and...maybe I should. Somedays it's just nice to anti-complain!

Happy Monday!

Generational Continuity

For all my complaining yesterday about gloom and Mondays and tornado sirens, Tuesday came along and made amends for the dour day we had yesterday.

It’s beautiful out there. We started with a cold morning and a thick frost but by lunchtime, the temperature had climbed up to 50 degrees, the sun was shining and the first crocuses were blooming in my garden.

There’s something definite about seeing the first flower of spring bloom. It’s just like the first snowfall of winter- you know it’s welcoming you into the season and there will be much more to come. The daffodils will follow the crocuses and the tulips won’t be far behind and, from then on, it’ll be flower after flower as spring unfolds and gives way to summer.

If you haven’t noticed, I’m huge on the changing of the seasons. I find it fantastic how there are four such different parts of the year. When the season change approaches, I grow impatient. The only exception to this is spring moving into summer. I’d be much more content if late spring just stuck around and went straight into autumn. I’m not a creature of summer. It’s not a season of beaches and swimming pools to me, of family cookouts and long days. To me, it’s a season of mosquitoes, humidity and searing heat.

It’s funny. When I read that, I realize that I sound just like my mother. Except her negativity is towards winter, not summer. She’d take searing heat, humidity and mosquitoes any day over snow and ice, cold and wind. I find that slightly fascinating. We’re very much alike but also different.

It’s actually funny how we grow up and become more like our parents than we ever imagined. It’s something we fight in our younger days. As teenagers when we have vicious fights with our parents, we swear we’ll NEVER be like them.

Then, as time passes, life happens and we realize that not only are we more like them than we’d like to admit but, also, we’re pretty proud of that fact.

There are times when I’m not always happy that I’m like my dad in some ways. Sometimes, it’s not necessarily a good thing. While we inherit the good qualities of my parents, we also inherit the bad. I think the trick is knowing that and being aware of when you’re channeling your mum and dad and NOT in a good way.

It’s definitely a generational thing. I can see my grandparents in both of my parents. My mum acts quite a lot like her mum some days and that’s just plain amusing. It’s funny to see her get snippy when I suggest it even though she knows I’m right. My dad acts like his mother a lot too but he doesn’t always have quite the same humour about it.

Either way, it’s refreshing to know that into each generation, a little bit of the generation before exists. I like that notion. It’s like a chance to improve on what’s already good and work on the stuff that needs to be improved. We can fight it but there will always be a little bit of our parents and ancestors in us.

It’s actually a lot like I said the other day in my blog about my dogs. They’ve been raised in suburbia and spoiled rotten and yet their instincts to hunt, disappear down rabbit holes and try to capture prey in just part of them. From the dachshunds that were bred to hunt, generations later, my girls still have that need in them even though they were never taught or even raised in an environment that cultivated that.

For me, it just means I have to block a lot of holes such as underneath the tool shed and the propane tank. I also have to deal with a lot of holes being dug in the garden. As spring moves in with full force, I intend to use those holes to plant trees in my garden. It’s nice of the girls to help even if that wasn’t their intention. I can’t change their nature just like I can’t pretend I’m not a product of both my parents.

Although neither of them is terribly fond of snow so I’m not sure where that came from.

That must be all me. Maybe that will be what gets passed to the next generation. Who knows?

Happy first day of March and Have a great Wednesday!

Odie the Interloper!

It's Monday again tomorrow. I'd complain about the weekend flying by but it wouldn't be anything I haven't blogged already. Time just simply moves faster on the weekends, that's all.

I did have a nice weekend, even if it turned out to be a little different from what I had in mine. I headed to my parents this weekend. It was the weekend for a local Herb Festival. Mum and I went last year and had a lovely time. This year we went and...it rained. It was ok when we got there, mostly just drizzle. Sadly, probably due to the rain, there wasn't as many vendors as usual. We still had fun walking.

And then it really began to rain. We tried not to mind and we continued trying to browse the stalls but, well, there comes a certain point when you're literally dripping and you can't help but be a littler miserable. We ended up giving up in search of lunch and some hot coffee with the hope that the rain would subside. It actually did end up stopping so, frizzy-haired and rumpled, we headed back to the festival. It was fun just not as fun as last year. Still, getting to spend the day with my mother while my dad puppy-sits is a lovely treat.

As for the rest of the weekend, much of it was spent in preparation for Sookie, Rory and my new house 'guest'. My parents are off to England on Tuesday so I'm dog-sitting for their elderly chihuahua, Odie.

Odie is over fourteen years old. He's very...old. He's had a couple of strokes and can't really move well. He's half-death and has no teeth. He's quite mean and horribly bad tempered.

But he's a big part of the family. He's also surprisingly able for such an elderly beast. Sometimes I joke that He's the Dog that Will Not Die but I don't wish that on him. Odie is part of our dog history. We found him at a flea market in Daytona Beach in my early days of high school. If he were a man, he would be one of those very neat and orderly men that liked fine foods, fine wine, got manicures and listen to show tunes. Odie loves show tunes. When I lived at home, I would caterwaul songs like, "The Sun Will Come out Tomorrow," and "My Favourite Things," and Odie would stare up, blissfully as if truly grateful that someone got him. He's horribly ashamed of his background. My dad used to tease him and call him "Flea Market Dog," and, as if he understood, Odie would growl and 'shout'.

In my less politically correct moments, I would shout names of Taco Bell items at Odie. This was during the days of the Taco Bell Chihuahua. Odie would get rather upset with me, again as if he understood.

Odie is a force to be reckoned with, even now. We no longer tease him because he's an old man and deserves respect. Yet he still manages to hold his ground with the young pups. He's the only one of my parents' three dogs that the puppies cower from and won't bully a little. It's interesting.

Now Odie is here to stay for two weeks. So far, he's done very little but be nosy and look around the house. He's also had his dinner because Odie is a creature that Needs to Be Fed. If you don't feed Odie on schedule, he has this rather infuriating woofing thing he does and he just goes on and on and on and on and on until you cave and feed him. Sometimes, this is at four o'clock in the afternoon. He really is an old man.

Still, he's here to make life interesting. It means the puppies routine is going to be a bit different for a while. It's hard because we have a Circle of Trust in our house and we aren't used to Interlopers. Odie is an Interloper. I'm hoping the puppies adjust. Actually, I'm hoping I adjust. So far, things haven't been too bad. I just have to keep an eye on the old dog just because he's quite sneaky. Last year when my parents went to England, my sister Odie-sat for them. Odie managed to find his way out of her fenced in yard and even with his hobbled legs, he managed to sprint off down the street and my sister had to run to catch him. He's known as "an escape artist". For an old man, when he wants to, he can certainly move.

For now, however, he's curled up by my feet, safe from the curious sniffs of Rory and Sookie. I think it's going to make life interesting for two weeks. I'll keep you posted.

Happy Monday!

Wishing Harry Potter Spells Really Worked....

It is unbelievably amazing how quickly weekends fly by. One minute, I'm getting off work on a Friday evening and the next thing, I'm groggily reaching for my alarm on Monday morning, putting it on snooze in hopes that that extra 9 minutes of sleep will refresh me enough so that getting out of bed isn't so hard.

Of course, the snooze button never helps. More than anything, it's a taunting reminder that you do have to get up for something and no matter how many times you hit it, you still eventually have to get up otherwise you wouldn't be hitting it in the first place.

I hit my snooze button just once today and I still feel like I'd rather be sleepily lying under my covers, not having to get up. That happened on Saturday morning. I forgot to turn off my alarm and it went off and for one brief, disoriented minute I began to mentally prepare for the workday before I realized with absolute delight and joy that it was, in fact, Saturday and I didn't have to get up for a while.

Now I'm up, I'm still trying to figure out what happened to the weekend. I did spend Friday night cleaning the house in preparation for my parents' visit. I had planned on mowing the grass but, alas, a big thunderstorm put the damper on that. I spent Saturday morning cleaning my apartment. By the time they arrived, both my 'residences' were as clean as they were going to get.

I'm happy to report my parents approved of the house. They poked around, checked everything out and seemed to find no massive issues which was a huge relief, I have to say. My dad even installed a new cable outlet in my office for me so that I could run the internet in there. He's good like that. It turned out to be a really fun day. Even now, in my mid-thirties, I still crave approval from my parents and having them give the nod to my first home felt really...nice.

Naturally, I spent yesterday at the house too. I ended up mowing the grass. After two mowings, I can safely say I am not a fan of mowing. For one thing, it takes too long. I put one of those grass-catchy bags on the back of my mower but had to empty it every five minutes. I finally gave up on it. Then, of course, I looked over at my neighbours' yard. Their grass is that perfect shade of green, a nice length and not a grass clipping in sight. I felt compelled to rake up my clippings but then..what do do with them? My neighbours don't have a grass pile anywhere in sight. I'm baffled. I now have a massive pile of grass clippings. My grass looks nice but I have a feeling eventually, I might have have a grass mountain in a couple of weeks.

I still want to know what my neighbours do with their clippings. That's weird, right? I mean, I saw them mowing and it looked like they were cutting the grass but where'd the grass go? Maybe it's like a Harry Potter spell...all the grass is magically 'poofed' away as its cut.

Or maybe I just have an overactive imagination. Even so, I want a Harry Potter spell to get rid of my clippings. I think "Evanesco", the vanishing spell would work nicely.

Aside from mowing the grass and raking it, I didn't get too much accomplished. I did go exploring a little to find a Kroger. On the way, I passed a little "British" pub. I say "British" in quotes because though it says its an English pub and it has an English pub-y name, I looked at the menu online and, well, it's not that British. They have lots of British/European beers but with the exception of fish and chips, there's not a nod to British cuisine at all. There are a lot of burgers and bar-food but no bangers and mash, bubble and squeak, Welsh Rarebit or British breakfast. Nevertheless, at least there is a pub of sorts fairly nearby which is pretty nice in these parts.

I eventually found the Kroger though for some reason, my GPS (aka "satan") decided to take me on the scenic route. Sometimes she does that, even though I tell her I want 'fastest time'. Sometimes, I think she leads me on wild goosechases just because she gets annoyed that I call her satan. When I drove to our conference in Indianapolis, she took us by the hotel that was our destination about three times, telling us it was on the right. Turns out it was on the left but we were so focused on listening to her, we didn't see it. I could almost hear her laughing at us. I can't help it that, on occasion, her upbeat, annoying calm voice changes to the gravely, deep overtones that I would assign to a demon or figure of the underworld. Maybe she/he's cross that I don't give him/her more respect. I suppose I should, I mean satan is still trying to give me directions but it's hard to follow them because, frankly, the shock of hearing the voice usually takes over and I stop listening to directions. Also, I think satan needs a translator because I can't often understand him. He slurs, you see.

Nevertheless, even though GPS lady did take me the long way to Kroger, at least she didn't transform into satan yesterday. In fact, for the most part, I had a very pleasant drive through the area. It's nice to go exploring and see the possibilities for things to do, places to eat, places to shop, etc. Yet, there'll be plenty of time to explore once I've moved permanently.

As long as the grass doesn't need to be mowed. Evanesco clippings!

Yeah. That never works in real life. Doesn't mean I won't keep trying though.

Happy Monday.