I love a lazy weekend from time to time
Aug. 8th, 2005 11:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bjarvisNothing much of consequence happened this weekend, which is to say it was frightfully busy but in a fun & voluntary kind of way.
We were up bright & early Saturday morning (ie. before noon). I caught up on e-mail, read through some documentation, caught up on household accounting and did two loads of laundry while Kent crawled out of bed, dragged his butt to the shower, hosed down and got dressed. My life is a monument to the power of caffeine (and a short attention span). Towards 11 AM, Jeff M. arrived from the metro and we scooted over to collect Steve H.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
discord35, then headed to the Wheaton ice arena for skating.
It was Steve's first time on skates and he did remarkably well. Steve's rental skates were actually figure skates; I suspect he didn't understand the difference at the time and, for the first time out, it wouldn't really make much difference. The next time, we'll put him in hockey skates to see what happens. In any case, he went immediately onto the ice, hanging on the side rail and generally managed to stay vertical for the duration. After 30 minutes he was actually able to pick up a little speed. Within an hour, he was generally keeping pace and not requiring physical support.
Kent did very well too. It was his 3rd or 4th time on ice and his butt didn't hit the rink a single time. He actually blended in rather well with most of the other people on the ice: it appeared to me that of the 30 or so people skating, most seemed to be novices. With so few people, Jeff, myself and two arena staffers were able to skate at a fairly fast pace, only occasionally dodging slower moving skaters and/or fallen bodies.
I'd like to get our square dance club out ice skating some time... I think it would be a hoot. Kent suggested we see if there's interest with the ACDC crowd next February in trucking over to the outdoor rink at Pentagon City for skating. Think we could square dance in ice skates? Teacup chain would really be a scream!
Some day, I want to skate on the Rideau Canal. I've never skated over a long stretch before and I'm curious just how fast I can go if I don't have to worry about tight turns every 100 feet. If Kent wasn't so adverse to snowflakes, I think a long winter weekend in Ottawa would be fabulous.
Of course, no social outing would be complete without a celebratory ice cream run. Another day, another large chocolate sundae.
Ice cream makes people have funny thoughts. The four of us around the table dreamed up a murder mystery dinner party game where the victim happened to be Martha Stewart. We even designed the box cover: a chalk outline in the shape of Martha on the carpet with "it's a good thing" written by her on the floor in blood as she lay dying. In perfect calligraphy, of course.
Towards the late afternoon, we dropped the boys off, then headed to home for a brief costume change. After Dave arrived, we went out for dinner at Mi Rancho then headed directly to De Lounge for line dancing and two-stepping. Kent's back was feeling a little strained from the skating so he didn't dance, but I had nice time on the floor.
We were home by midnight, vegged in front of the TV and eventually wandered off to bed.
I was moving a lot slower this morning than the prior one. I suppose I could have cleaned up the kitchen, cleaned up the rec room & guest room and taken measurements for a new screen door for the front entrance, but I just didn't feel like it. So there.
Before 11 AM, we collected Steve H.discord35 once again, then headed down to Jeff's house in Arlington to pick him up and head to the cinemas at Potomac Yards. We had been meaning to see the "Fantastic 4" at some point; with the lines dying away and the vastly reduced crowds queued up to see movies at noon on a Sunday, this seemed like the right time.
We were very early for the movie. We padded our driving schedule to allow for traffic and inappropriately timed lights but my ongoing bout of suspiciously good traffic karma is holding. My run of luck has been so good lately that I suspect the law of averages will not only soon embed me in traffic jams reminiscent of Manhattan, but possibly require my car to explode.
Anyway, the movie wasn't as lame as I was expecting. In fact, with slightly low expectations, it was a pretty good time. We came largely to see the special effects anyway and weren't disappointed although I thought the ending was a little too abrupt. Next Sunday: Willy Wonka.
Guess where we went after the movie! Yup, out for ice cream! Fearing I was getting into a chocolate sundae rut, I ordered a large cup of the mint chocolate chip & brownie. Change is good. :-)
We were expecting a friend down from Laurel, MD, for dinner that evening but he never showed. Instead, I spent the evening doing price comparisons for new cellular phones for Kent & me.
Now that AT&T Wireless has been subsumed into Cingular, our service has gone straight to hell. Our two phones (older models to be sure, but workable) were on an AT&T Wireless family plan so the screen declared "Shared" when they were powered up. Now Kent's says "Cingular" while mine says "AT&T" and both flip into roaming mode as we move from room to room within our house. Clearly someone has monkeyed around with the local towers and our service has been come very inconsistent.
Last night, we ordered a pair of Motorola e815 phones and are transferring our numbers to Verizon Wireless, largely because most of our local wireless friends and family are also on Verizon. I'll let you know in a couple of weeks if this is actually an improvement.
We were up bright & early Saturday morning (ie. before noon). I caught up on e-mail, read through some documentation, caught up on household accounting and did two loads of laundry while Kent crawled out of bed, dragged his butt to the shower, hosed down and got dressed. My life is a monument to the power of caffeine (and a short attention span). Towards 11 AM, Jeff M. arrived from the metro and we scooted over to collect Steve H.
discord35, then headed to the Wheaton ice arena for skating.It was Steve's first time on skates and he did remarkably well. Steve's rental skates were actually figure skates; I suspect he didn't understand the difference at the time and, for the first time out, it wouldn't really make much difference. The next time, we'll put him in hockey skates to see what happens. In any case, he went immediately onto the ice, hanging on the side rail and generally managed to stay vertical for the duration. After 30 minutes he was actually able to pick up a little speed. Within an hour, he was generally keeping pace and not requiring physical support.
Kent did very well too. It was his 3rd or 4th time on ice and his butt didn't hit the rink a single time. He actually blended in rather well with most of the other people on the ice: it appeared to me that of the 30 or so people skating, most seemed to be novices. With so few people, Jeff, myself and two arena staffers were able to skate at a fairly fast pace, only occasionally dodging slower moving skaters and/or fallen bodies.
I'd like to get our square dance club out ice skating some time... I think it would be a hoot. Kent suggested we see if there's interest with the ACDC crowd next February in trucking over to the outdoor rink at Pentagon City for skating. Think we could square dance in ice skates? Teacup chain would really be a scream!
Some day, I want to skate on the Rideau Canal. I've never skated over a long stretch before and I'm curious just how fast I can go if I don't have to worry about tight turns every 100 feet. If Kent wasn't so adverse to snowflakes, I think a long winter weekend in Ottawa would be fabulous.
Of course, no social outing would be complete without a celebratory ice cream run. Another day, another large chocolate sundae.
Ice cream makes people have funny thoughts. The four of us around the table dreamed up a murder mystery dinner party game where the victim happened to be Martha Stewart. We even designed the box cover: a chalk outline in the shape of Martha on the carpet with "it's a good thing" written by her on the floor in blood as she lay dying. In perfect calligraphy, of course.
Towards the late afternoon, we dropped the boys off, then headed to home for a brief costume change. After Dave arrived, we went out for dinner at Mi Rancho then headed directly to De Lounge for line dancing and two-stepping. Kent's back was feeling a little strained from the skating so he didn't dance, but I had nice time on the floor.
We were home by midnight, vegged in front of the TV and eventually wandered off to bed.
I was moving a lot slower this morning than the prior one. I suppose I could have cleaned up the kitchen, cleaned up the rec room & guest room and taken measurements for a new screen door for the front entrance, but I just didn't feel like it. So there.
Before 11 AM, we collected Steve H.
discord35 once again, then headed down to Jeff's house in Arlington to pick him up and head to the cinemas at Potomac Yards. We had been meaning to see the "Fantastic 4" at some point; with the lines dying away and the vastly reduced crowds queued up to see movies at noon on a Sunday, this seemed like the right time.We were very early for the movie. We padded our driving schedule to allow for traffic and inappropriately timed lights but my ongoing bout of suspiciously good traffic karma is holding. My run of luck has been so good lately that I suspect the law of averages will not only soon embed me in traffic jams reminiscent of Manhattan, but possibly require my car to explode.
Anyway, the movie wasn't as lame as I was expecting. In fact, with slightly low expectations, it was a pretty good time. We came largely to see the special effects anyway and weren't disappointed although I thought the ending was a little too abrupt. Next Sunday: Willy Wonka.
Guess where we went after the movie! Yup, out for ice cream! Fearing I was getting into a chocolate sundae rut, I ordered a large cup of the mint chocolate chip & brownie. Change is good. :-)
We were expecting a friend down from Laurel, MD, for dinner that evening but he never showed. Instead, I spent the evening doing price comparisons for new cellular phones for Kent & me.
Now that AT&T Wireless has been subsumed into Cingular, our service has gone straight to hell. Our two phones (older models to be sure, but workable) were on an AT&T Wireless family plan so the screen declared "Shared" when they were powered up. Now Kent's says "Cingular" while mine says "AT&T" and both flip into roaming mode as we move from room to room within our house. Clearly someone has monkeyed around with the local towers and our service has been come very inconsistent.
Last night, we ordered a pair of Motorola e815 phones and are transferring our numbers to Verizon Wireless, largely because most of our local wireless friends and family are also on Verizon. I'll let you know in a couple of weeks if this is actually an improvement.
