White Lightning Axiom: Redux

One thing that Friday bestowed upon us was the high winds. Apparently, the gales of pounding winds assailed the back yard door until it was flung open. Since it is the door that leads to the Hound's Kennel, it sometimes is not locked after letting them out. Well, the egress was breached by the unseen hand of a high pressure front at 1430 hours and all hell broke loose. The Alarm went off, the last line of defense droids were activated and the Mammoth Hounds burst forth to slay the intruders, but none were to be found. So, amid the resounding alarms and klaxons, they ran in and out of the manor searching for targets. With that activity, they ripped up a trough through the grass and turned the moist clay permeated soil into a well mixed slurry. This slurry did a nice job coating the floor of the kennel with a light brown veneer. Of course, I spent a big chunk of the evening mopping that up. I could not let it stay since I was certain that a healthy percentage of that slurry was made of dog poo.

Saturday was fairly low key. We slept in till the Hounds began getting irritated that they had not been fed yet. Very schedule conscience of them, to be insistent that the 0700 hour not pass before breakfast is served. Once they had been let out and fed, I noticed a large sluglike green deposit, about 9 inches long, in the corner of the kennel. It laid in its own puddle of au jus. Apparently, one of the Mammoths had spent some of it's outside-time the other day consuming a large quantity of unmowed grass. Yum. So my freshly mopped and polished floor had became soiled within hours of the cleaning being completed. Nice job guys.

With the floor recovered, we packed up and shipped out to Wegmans and Lowes for an early afternoon excursion. Not too stressful other than buying 5 tubs of sour cream instead of cottage cheese. Nothing like cracking open a tub of curdled cheese product at lunch and not finding any nicely formed curds. The creaminess is a bit disturbing when you are expecting something a bit more gritty in texture. No matter, I'll survive. Pick up the truckload of fruit varieties I intend on consuming for the week and off we go. Prior to this, we stopped off at Lowes and I picked up a new shower head with spray wand for the bathroom in the Tyrant's wing. The old shower head had become worn and no longer puts out a decent spray ... more like a gurgling waterfall. When we arrive at the manor, I replace it at an opportune time and tortured the Twins at bath time. They are not entirely enthused about being sprayed with a high-pressure wand. Kinda like in prison ... not that I've been in the penn or anything like that mind you. Nope, not even a Mexican Klink or a Turkish Facility of Incarceration. But I digress (They Killed Paco, man!). The rest or the day is all about chopping wood, stacking wood and picking up the logs that the Mammoth Hounds have left in the yard which were not trampled into oblivion. Oh, since we are finally getting a bit of frost in the morning, I went ahead and started the first fire in the wood burning stove with some of the split stack in the Fleet Port. Oddly, I had no difficulties. No backflow, no wildlife rushing into the manor, no fireball bursting forth from the portal of transdimensional BTUs. I did get a small plague of ash beetles though. They lasted very shortly in the eternal (5 hrs) flames of bug hell. They puffed up a bit like popcorn, but did not have that alluring odor. Something more akin to burning hair with the funk of steamed manure.

Sunday; Up with the 'Bark of Dog' and off to Sunday School. I had intended on abandoning the Twins to perform their usual 'distract and attack' maneuver on the instructor, but the usual helper was out and the teacher leaned on me to provide air support. The usual helper is the sister of the education program director. She is mentally challenged but is quite amicable so seems to fit right in. We've had some quite extensive discussions about her job and her boy-friend. None the less, I filled in instead of attending Mass so was able to issued directives at the Tyrants like: "No slaughtering your classmates Alexis" or "Stop attempting to seduce your teacher Jacob". Anyone ever see the cartoon "Billy and Mandy's Grim Adventures"? Well, Alexis is a bit like Mandy, except with two tone hair. Yeah, Alexis' hair is stark white at the last inch of her mane. The beastly amount of chlorine in the pool has taken the pigments right out. Some people pay a lot of money for this look, she is born with it.

Right after we leave a smoking heap of rubble in place of the parochial school, we stop by the Manor to grab the Mrs before we shoot off to Sesame Place. They have closed down all the water attractions due to dangers resulting from Icebergs. It is mostly a horde of sugar enraged children bouncing around between 8 candy depots and slowly driving the adults mad. Mad as a toothless hound in an unmanned slaughterhouse. I think they called it 'Spooktacular'. I called it 'Parent Death Race 2000'. We managed to go right though with only a few difficulties. Alexis, boggled by the madness drug, decided to go on one of the more aggressive rides (elmo's fish ride) and was actually PLEASED. Must be the brain chemistry being off. The visit ended with a brief hayride with Prairie Dawn where the tractor was driven by Scarecrow Jim. Jake LOVED the tractor but Prairie went over like a sack of dead cats. Speaking of dead animals, we went to Red Robin for a late lunch afterwards and I had a less than satisfactory 'Mouth Buster' burger. They used pickle relish as a condiment. Bletch. I'll eat nearly anything except pickles, whole avocados, raw Swiss cheese and olives. I guess they could have put those on the burger as well, but it was my fault for not looking closely at the menu. I was lusting after the net weight of the beef. So be it, I finished it anyways. Back at the Manor, I lapsed into a food coma for an hour or so. I was whipped ... more so than usual. Running about all day and throw an indigestible wad of carbs, fat and protein into my gut ... you have a major system crash in the making. After an IPL (Initial Program Load), my cpu addendum chip was able to recognise that I had a wife, two children and a whole load of responsibilities. Now where did all THAT come from? I also realized that Family Friend Pete had dropped off the tiller that I loaned him. He also, as directed, took a bit of the stacked wood in the Fleet Port. Barely notice the dent though ... I have about 6 face cords there and I think he took 1/12 of one of the rows. Since I was out there, admiring my stacks, I chopped a bit of wood and started a fire again. Not that I had turned on the heat yet, but I wanted to make sure that if one of the Tyrants got up in the middle of the night to use the facilities, I would not have to chip a hole in the ice formed within the bowl. That makes for a rough morning.

In spite of applying additional BTU's to the Manor, I still had a rough time sleeping. Stupid nap, messing with my REM Cycles. End up sleeping in for an hour or so and getting to work a bit later than usual. That's Monday for ya ... the bucktooth red headed step child of the Italian family Week.[+/-] show/hide the rest of this post

Labels: Weekend

# posted by mdmhvonpa @ 7:47 AM