Orlando, FL

Okay, here is the weekend recap:

Friday was very busy and hectic. We were furiously locating a demo SP-5 rotisserie oven to fill an order for Budget Restaurant Equipment. The factory ran out of 240-volt elements. We located one in Charlotte, NC at Duke Energy and that was good because the customer was 60 miles west of there.

Debbie is still causing heartache. She insists that Fay must be free to go to Ikea to "browse" for kitchen cabinets. Honestly, neither one of us have time for that shit. She said, "Going to Ikea is about gathering ideas." Well, she needs to gather ideas on her own time.

Gabe Puerto phoned to discuss enrolling in the FER IRA plan administered by UBS. He then sent in my email a short story about the Ant and the Grasshoppper. I forwarded the message to Craig, Neil and Nancy saying only, "...then the grasshopper got a job as Marketing Director for FER. THE END." I know Nancy is going to pee her Depends when she reads that! Neil wrote back this morning "It is amazing how much free time she has." Fay said he talked to her about it on the phone today too.

We finished the week with $576k in new orders! A good week indeed. Since Fay was out two of those days, you know I was extremely busy.

After work I went home, packed my bag, packed Buddy's bag, and went to Bob's house for the weekend. I told Bob that I did not want to paint walls, install shelves, or anything else. I just wanted to relax.

We had Polynesian Pork Chops for dinner with steamed broccoli and cauliflower and the cucumber/onion/pepper/nectarine salad with a nice red wine.

After dinner we chased the dog around the house to make him tired. He discovered that he could wiggle up under Bob's bed and crawl across to the other side! It was so funny watching him crawl like that as fast as he could!

Unfortunately he got carpet burn on his chest from crawling under the bed so many times.

Once the dog was tired out and laying down we had a quiet evening of reading. I continued reading Catch-22 and Bob read his Entreprenuership book for school.

On Saturday morning Buddy woke us up with his baying and crying to go outside. We both got up. I started the coffee and then got Buddy harnessed up for his walk. We walked around the lake and stopped at Panera Bread. Here I got two pecan buns, two spinach bacon souffles, and a loaf of asiago foccacia bread.

We had the rolls and souffle for breakfast with our coffee and a cup of yogurt for each of us. Then we layed around for awhile. I read while Bob balanced his checkbook and paid bills online.

For lunch we walked over to Dexter's and ordered sandwiches. It was very noisy inside the restaurant - a live jazz band was playing and as the crowd grew noisier they played louder!

Around 1:00 PM we went down to the pool. We are working on teaching Bob to swim. Last time we were at the pool I was trying to get Bob to dive to the bottom for a rock, but he could not see under the water. Last week at Wal*Mart we got some goggles for him to swim with. He could see very well under the water now. He is getting better at retrieving things from the bottom of the pool! Next week we will drop the rock into the deep end!

After 3:00 the sky began to darken and thunder could be heard. Since we were already sunburned we gathered up our cooler, our books, our foam Fun Noodles, goggles, and towels and headed back upstairs.

For dinner we made salmon patties with a molasses syrup sauce. We had mushroom-flavored cous cous, left over salad, and the focaccia bread with dipping oil. We had another bottle of red wine with this meal.

After dinner we watched a movie on DVD and then went to bed. We moved Buddy's bedding over in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows because he seems to like it there enjoying the views.

Sunday morning we got up, started the coffee and went for our walk. When we returned to the house I made scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast.

It was a relaxing morning at home. We did not turn the TV on all day - not until the evening when the strong storms came through!

For lunch we went out. We drove to Sweet Tomatoes on East Colonial Drive and ate there. We gorged ourselves, actually. On the way back we stopped at Publix and got a loaf of bread, some Coke Zero, cheese slices, bananas, and a cheesecake.

Bob had his air conditioning in the car worked on this week. It worked perfectly the whole time we were out. That is a good thing too - it was hot!

We took Buddy out for his walk a little early. It was very hot and he was dragging as we walked back to the house. He layed down and panted for awhile after we got home.

When dinner time rolled around we were still full from lunch so we did not make dinner. We just ate the cheesecake!

Later we were sitting in the living room. I was reading my book and Bob was checking on his financial aid or something for school on his computer and I heard thunder. I looked out and saw clouds moving in from the south.

It began to rain, and then lightning, and storm very hard. It rained so hard for a few minutes I could not see more than two blocks away! I even saw pea-sized hail coming down! We turned on the TV for the weather reports. Golf-ball sized hail was reported near Orlando Regional Medical Center!

During the storm I started to run the vacuum cleaner. Then I gathered Buddy's toys up so that we would be ready to go in the morning.

This morning we got up at 5:30 AM when the alarm went off. I got my bag packed up, put Buddy's feed bowl and water bowl into his bag, harnessed Buddy, put on my socks and shoes and loaded the truck up. We were back home shortly after 6:00 AM. I quickly put the bags into the house and then took Buddy for his morning walk.

After the walk I checked Navy Federal Credit Union to see if payroll had been deposited. It hadn't, but there was a notice that it would drop tonite. Something else in there confused me. Last month, for some reason, $300 was missing from checking. Now, I saw $300 extra there that I did not spend.

Work today was very busy. More confusion about that damned rotisserie oven ordered for that dealer that is not set up with Enodis as a favor. The factory completed an oven and shipped it this weekend after they told us it could not ship until July 7. Now the customer was going to have two ovens! Damn. Lincoln, Merco/Savory, Redco, Wear-Ever is the most dysfunctional factory we deal with.

Debbie was in the office for about an hour. Fay and I were both on the line when a third call came in. Debbie took a message. It was someone calling Craig back from Concrete Alternatives, Inc!! Hahaha!! Debbie became pissed and left right after that!

Fay said the only reason she came in this morning is because they were without electric service in her neighborhood. Soon she was back home with electric because another inane email showed up from her.

I didn't feel good during the morning. I felt hot and tired. I think part of it was from being sunburned. I am not sure. But being harried all morning with numerous requests from Darden, the problem rotisserie order, and other service calls, all bearing down on me did not help.

Fay is taking next Monday and Tuesday off. I do not know if anyone will be in to help with the phones or not. Hell, I don't even care. It's not like Debbie is any help.

The fax machine became very busy in the afternoon and I had to stay until 6:00 PM getting orders entered. We finished the day with $150k in orders - not bad!

It clouded up this evening, rained briefly, lightninged and thundered, and the wind blew a little, but we were able to go for our evening walk without the storm molesting us. I am glad Monday is out of the way and that this is a short week.

Orlando, FL

I turned off the alarm just before it went off and I kept sleeping until around 6:15 AM. I was still exhausted, but I got up because Buddy needed his walk and I needed to start my day sometime.

On my way to the office I stopped at 7-Eleven. When I stepped inside I picked up a bag of the 7-Eleven Cracked Pepper Kettle-Cooked Chips and I heard Erma go, "Uh huh, you like dem chips! Dem chips and the Coke Zero!" I retorted, "Yeah, well, you just make sure you keep the things I like out on the shelf where I can buy them. Yesterday all they had was the Cherry Coke Zero and you weren't even here for me to complain to about it!"

Man, what a day. Fay came back to work. We were both very busy all day. I had to process new orders, get confirmations on all of the Darden orders from yesterday, fax those confirmations, and then work on unfinished quote requests.

Debbie was in briefly this morning. Her "emergency du jour" was the fact that her cable went out yesterday during the thunderstorms and she was the only one in her neighborhood to lose Internet, so she was taking her modem to BrightHouse to exchange it. Nevermind that she was already late for her demo at Avalon School. She is never prepared for her demos and she does not know the equipment.

She phoned me from the jobsite, "I need a favor. I need you to go on the Cleveland Range website and see if there is a video for the Steamcub steamer. DF&E has to provide it to the school it is part of their contract." "Debbie, everything Cleveland puts out is on the shelf in the Test Kitchen. If you did not find it there, they do not make it. I have ordered everything they have." The main reason I had to order everything was because SHE was bitching about something not being there!

Nancy Baranet phoned in this morning and Fay took the call. Nancy asked where Debbie was because Buddy McKernan called her to report that Debbie was not at the demo. Nancy said, "I told Craig that Debbie needs to be in the office everyday from 7:55 AM to 5:05 PM with one hour for lunch and if she can't do that, FIRE HER!" Nancy wouldn't fuck around with her! I guess at 72 years, Nancy hasn't got the time for it.

She sent some inane short story today in her email to everyone in FER about some boy with one arm who won a judo championship saying that your weakness can be your greatest strength. She obviously has time for stupid shit like that, but can't get out there and bring in new business.

We phoned an order in to the office park cafe and I stepped over and got it paying for it with petty cash.

During the afternoon the shit hit the fan with Debbie's activities. She complained to Craig that Fay was not available tomorrow to go to Ikea to shop for cabinets for the Test Kitchen (how can we? we are both swamped with work!) and Craig told her that all of that shit was On Hold. He said, "I am getting advice on how to remodel the office from the three people who use this office everyday - Craig, Vince, and Fay." She was not happy about that! Woowee!

Well, there was a phone call next. Craig phoned Hollywood and got Tom Dickie on the phone and Craig was raising his voice with Tom about Debbie going behind his back and saying that those people coming to our office would be like him and Fay going to Hollywood and telling them how they should remodel their office.

Craig had a quick talk with Fay and me about Debbie and her shenanigans with the other partners. I said, "Debbie does not have enough self-discipline to manage her own time efficiently. She needs more direction and more structure in her days." Craig and Fay whole-heartedly agreed with me.

Craig said he suggested to Tom that Debbie quote all of the Edward Don quote requests (because they complained that it is taking too long to get their quotes back), and Tom immediately shot it down saying "No, you can't undermine her like that! She needs your support working on this Marketing thing." Fay said, "Boy, she really has all of them snowed! They have no idea how she wastes her time everyday!"

I am glad Craig finally got pissed about it and started to speak out against it. It is overdue.

He also confided that Debbie is going to find a surprise when she gets her July paycheck.

Fay said that she was dismayed that Craig talked to Tom about her. She said the last time this happened was when she and Didi complained about Debbie having her nails done during work hours and running all manner of other personal errands. They complained and Tom called Debbie and said, "Be careful what you say in the Orlando office. You don't have any friends in the office!" Well, Debbie came in and confronted Fay about that.

I HOPE Debbie confronts me. She will leave the office very unhappy that day!

We ended the day with over $450k in new orders. A very robust week indeed! You can see how busy I was with Fay out of the office. I had to quote the onesy-twosies, answer almost ALL of the phone calls (neither Debbie nor Nancy could help the callers), and coordinate the delivery and testing of the Merrychef oven at Disney, as well as get all of the orders processed. I am beat.

Orlando, FL

Another extremely busy day for me. Craig can attest to how busy it was. He was with me from about 9:00 AM until lunch time. There were several periods where all four incoming phone lines were busy!

I did not see Debbie Owings until 2:00 PM. She was at Whole Foods Market grand opening on Sand Lake Road taking pictures of the line of people waiting to get inside. I guess she must have been waiting in that line too. Trust me, Craig noticed that she was taking pictures of this spectacle and not winning sales.

Craig returned to the office shortly after Debbie came in.

She was in the office until 3:45. Then she suddenly disappeared.


It steadily clouded up after lunch and then became very dark. I went outside to put my car windows up for the coming rain. Around 2:30 it began to storm very hard. Lots of lightning, winds, and some heavy rain. A couple of bolts struck so close the thunder rattled the front door!

Chef Ryan met with the Disney cast members at Port Orleans to demo the Merrychef 402s oven. I understand that testing went very well. Every menu item tested turned out better in our oven than they ever did in the TurboChef oven. This will end up being a coup for FER and Merrychef USA.

The installation that Chuhak was so pissed about yesterday turns out it was a needed repair and repair parts were not available at the service agency. The factory found out that one of the agencies had been called and they followed up on it. Turns out Chuhak did call Tony Wilcox, but fortunately Tony was up-to-speed on the whole thing and was able to tell Bob that it was being handled.

They F'ed something else up too - on 10 purchase orders they incorrectly ordered 21CET16 steamers at 240 volts when they should have been 208 volts. Some of them had already shipped too! Fortunately they can be field-converted to 208 volts. Cleveland agreed to pay for the parts, but Darden will have to pay for the labor. Steamers in production will have their shipping dates pushed back as they have to be changed over on the assembly line. I put all of this into an email message and did not hear a peep back from anyone over there about it.

I am exhausted (again) from my continuously busy day at work. The good thing is that sales have been steadily flowing in this week. We closed the day at $386k in new sales for the week. We still have two more business days to go!

Smoked Pork Baked in Beer Rye Bread

Bread and Pork

1 3/4 cups warm stout beer
1 tbsp. dry active yeast
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups rye flour
1 cup oatmeal
1 tsp. salt
1/2 cup caramelized onions
1 tbsp. caraway seeds
1 cup sauerkraut
1 cup sun-dried apples
1 lb. smoked pork loin
sea salt, for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 375 F

Pour warm stout beer into a small warmed bowl. Sprinkle dry yeast over the surface. Put in a warm place for about 5 minutes and allow to activate. The yeast should be foamy.

In a large mixing bowl, combine flours, oatmeal, salt, onion, caraway seeds, sauerkraut, and apples. Stir in foaming beer-yeast mixture.

Cover the bowl with a clean cloth, place in a warm place away from any drafts, and let rise until doubled in size. This should take approximately one-hour.

When dough has risen, pound it down and place on a floured surface. Press out to a rectangle large enough to wrap around the pork loin.

Place the pork loin in the center of the dough, wrap it up, and press edges of dough to seal. Place seam-side down on a greased cookie sheet, cover with the clean cloth, and place in a warm place until dough has doubled in size.

Sprinkle top of the loaf with sea salt and bake for 45 minutes. As the loaf bakes, spray surface with cold water at least twice so a firm crust forms.

Remove loaf from the oven, and allow to rest for at least one hour.

Beer Mustard

1 tbsp. oil
1 cup white onion, finely diced
1 cup mustard seeds
1/2 cup dry mustard powder
2 cups wheat beer
1/4 cup white vinegar
3 cups Dijon mustard

In a medium pot over medium heat, heat the oil and saute onion until translucent. Add the mustard seeds, mustard powder, wheat beer, and white vinegar. Reduce liquid by 50%. Remove from heat and whisk in the Dijon mustard.

---

Tip: The trick to yeast is warm liquid that is not too hot. The yeast must completely dissolve in the liquid, and a light froth should form on top.

Orlando, FL

I would have written a recap of the weekend yesterday, but Blogger was getting a massage, or had some other technical difficulty.

Briefly, on Saturday we took Buddy to the vet for his shots. He weighed in a 46 pounds and the doctor said his ears were very clean, his eyes looked good, teeth good, coat good, overall that dog is in excellent health. He got the shots and we got six months of Heartguard. Total bill = $193.00

Next we went to Staples and I got some new speakers for the computer. After making a Dell tech support call to India we realized that I had the speakers plugged into the wrong port on the back of the computer! Well... it was dark back there!

We installed a trial version of DVDCloner and made a copy of "The Devil Wears Prada" for Fay. Then Bob continued working at my computer writing a paper for his Economics class.

On Sunday we drove to Daytona Beach to take his parents out for dinner at Olive Garden. This was a combined trip for Father's Day and his Mom's 83rd birthday. When the wait staff brought the cake and sang Happy Birthday in Italian the Birthday Girl began to cry.

It was a long drive back to Orlando - the AC in Bob's car would not cooperate and work.

In the evening we began transferring files from the computer Bob let me borrow to my new computer via CD's. It was only the next morning that I realized that I could ferry files (and even whole directories) to the new computer via my wireless home network.

Yesterday was an okay day at work. A few orders started to come in. For some reason, Fay decided that she needed to take Tuesday and Wednesday off work. So I knew that it would be a little stressful this week.

Today we passed $198k for orders - it is only Tuesday. Nancy Baranet came in to help, but I swear, she makes more work for me. The first thing she wanted was for me to make a pot of coffee for her. Then she had additional requests. She sat at the guest desk, ate crackers all day, played Solitaire on that computer, and helped answer the phones.

Nancy said something about "poor Fay and the life changes her body is giving her" - whatever THAT means. Then Nancy wanted to spend more than a few minutes gossipping about Debbie Owings. This delayed my lunch by about 30 minutes.

Unfortunately she isn't able to answer a single question, so you know who got all of the phone calls. It was an extremely busy day for me.

Debbie Owings is supposed to come and help with the phones tomorrow. We will see if the "talk" Greg Olsen had with her has any effect.

Craig told me today that on all future Cleveland Range orders if the gas type is not specified, that I am to assume it is Natural Gas. He said, "you do not understand the stress over there right now". I am like, "Great. So the first time we ship something of the wrong type to a restaurant they will be bitching that I did not do my diligence and question it." Whatever. I will do what he wants, but I will notify Laurie at Cleveland Range that he has us flying blind on these now.

Something else I love... Chuhak called up this afternoon imperiously demanding my help on an ice machine installation at a LongHorn Steakhouse in Tennessee that neither my office, nor Scotsman factory had any part in processing. Hell, I don't even know if an installation was paid for, or who the service agency was who is supposed to respond. Well, Bob didn't know either and retorted, "I can see that I will have to spend more of my time on this. Don't worry about this. I will deal with Scotsman directly!" Well, for good measure I notified the factory and Tony Wilcox. By dealing with Scotsman directly, that must be what he means - calling Tony.

All I know is this - they need to chill the fuck out over there. I am spending 80% of my day on their orders and their issues.

The Merrychef 402s oven was delivered to Port Orleans today. Chef Ryan made contact with Chef Fern at PO and he is going over there at 11:00 AM to make the oven ready for his demo after 1:30 PM. Evidently Craig is giving me all of the credit for getting the Merrychef successfully placed at Disney.

Hopefully tomorrow will be better than today was.

Orlando, FL

We went out to walk at 5:20 AM and we were back home by 5:45. I read the news, ate two cans of yogurt, and then had to shower. I dressed casually for work because it was Friday and because I knew there wouldn't be visitors.

Again, I was kept very busy with processing orders, but it was not extreme. I had to make up a bunch of LongHorn Steakhouse and Capital Grille folders for the file too.

For lunch we dug a chicken pot pie casserole out of the bottom of the freezer and heated up the combi to cook it. It was supposed to bake at 450F for 55 to 60 minutes, but I inadvertently put the oven in convection mode and left it. I came back in 25 minutes to check on it and found the crust dark brown - starting to blacken and the gravy was boiling!

I took it out and let it sit for 15 minutes before we ate it. Fay and I had the pot pie while her baby grandson watched us.

Oh yeah, I didn't mention that, did I? Tyree came to work today so that Evelyn could visit with him. I just don't like it that I have to be so quiet when he is sleeping - he's a light sleeper.

On the way home I stopped at Publix and got a frozen casserole, some sourdough bread, a small carton of Hagen Daas Butter Pecan ice cream, a cherry cream cheese Danish, and a bottle of red wine.

Bob was waiting on the stairs when I got home. It was starting to rain when I got home too. We had some rain here, but Volusia County was really getting socked with rain, lightning, hail, and winds!

The solstice was at 7:59 PM. It is now officially Summer. Tomorrow is the first full day of Summer and the longest day of the year.

Tomorrow morning we are taking Buddy to the vet for shots. Then I need to go to Circuit City, Best Buy, etc to get a power transformer for the speakers Bob gave me, and a copy of Nero Burning ROM 8.

Orlando, FL

Today was a very busy day for us!

When I woke up at 5:00 AM I turned the alarm off and continued sleeping until 6:00 AM. Then I took Buddy for his morning walk. I felt much better! I told you I would beat that cold back!

When getting dressed I decided to wear my yellow FER shirt with black slacks to look nice because I knew that Rick Cutler, President of Cleveland Range and Joe Nicholson, Key Accounts Manager, were going to be going to Darden today with Craig to present a pricing increase.

I arrived at the office early. I think it was 7:40 when I got there. I turned on the computer, took the new orders off of the fax, turned on the lights, warmed up the copier, began stamping today's date on the received orders, and then reading my email.

Because today is Thursday I have to make the UPS label for our weekly package to Hollywood (this goes out on Monday), and I brought in my USB hard drive back-up because we do our weekly back-up on Thursday.

Evelyn made an appointment to come in tomorrow and work with Fay and Craig.

Craig phoned in around 9 AM to ask me how many kettles, how many steamers, and how many skillets Darden Restaurants has ordered from Cleveland Range since June 1. I said, "Hell, I don't know Craig, but I can tell you it came to $147,555 since June 1". He wanted to know if I could tell him how many of each item. I told him that it was on 22 different orders and I would have pull all of those orders and count to find that out.

Fay came running down the hall. "I will stop what I am doing and help you with that!! If Craig needs that information, we will have to find it for him!" So, I printed out the list of orders and we began pulling orders from the filing cabinets and counting how many of each model was ordered. That took both of us 30 minutes.

I continued to remain busy. At 11:30 AM my fax machine began to eject a big pile of Darden purchase orders that were dated from last week! They were not duplicates. Monica Marcotte phoned and said, "Hey, I just faxed1o purchase orders to you that reported 'Fax Failure' on our system." So, I was going to be busy processing those late orders.

Just as I was preparing to leave for lunch, Craig returned to the office. He came in and said, "They're coming in." We went back to the Test Kitchen to clean off the big conference table and Craig said the pricing increase request did not go very well at Darden. He said that one of the managers was so mad he was shaking and screaming at them!

They were giving a Powerpoint presentation that had nothing to do with the increase and that pissed the Darden personnel off even more! This slide show had big mistakes in it and Fay tried to warn them about it, but they either disregarded her or they were unable to make the needed changes.

Because Cleveland Range email service was down all day - until 3:00 PM, I am sure that no one at the factory was able to update the slide show for them.

Well, now I definitely couldn't leave for lunch with Craig and the factory guys in the Test Kitchen. I needed to be at hand in case something was needed. Fay had me order Dominoe's Pizza and we had lunch in the office.

While those guys were in the Kitchen, Nass Parts and Service came to the door to pick up my Delfield VersaDrawer and Merrychef oven for transport to a food show tomorrow. I said, "You guys could not have come at a worse time!" They had another delivery to make over on I-Drive so they agreed to come back in 45 minutes.

When the came back they delivered a 4460N-24M salad top refrigerator from Red Lobster and they took the VersaDrawer and Merrychef. Hopefully the Merrychef will not be coming back - Betsy requested a Merrychef for immediate testing at Port Orleans. Hopefully we can place that next week over there.

My afternoon remained busy with quotes, phone calls, and order processing. I did not get everything done that needed to be done when 5:00 PM arrived.

When I came home watered my plants, unloaded the dishwasher, and took Buddy for his walk. While we were out walking it began to thunderstorm and we had to wait in an apartment building breezeway until the rain let up.

Back home I cleaned the kitchen and bathroom floors with Pine Sol, then I vacuumed the carpet. With my housework done I went to the garage to finish my new aluminum Fibonnaci Gauge and flattening the sole of my bench plane.

I am glad tomorrow is Friday! Bob is coming over tomorrow evening, but I have no idea what we will be eating. Nothing in the crock pot yet. Maybe I will just get a frozen Stouffer's lasagna or something. We are supposed to take Bob's parents to Olive Garden on Sunday.

Orlando, FL

I rolled over at 1:00 AM to a face full of moonshine - the full moon was blasting through my window into my face. I rolled back over and pulled the covers up.

My head cold seems to be subsiding now. To be sure I loaded up on vitamins this morning and grabbed another bottle of Day Quil on my way to work. I will have this cold licked before the weekend.

Work today was continuously busy. Craig returned from NC and he was full of stories from his adventure at Camp Lejuene. He said he learned a new term this weekend - "Shit, shower, and shave" from his Marine son.

Also I overheard him telling Fay that Debbie will be meeting with Greg Olsen next week and Greg is going to tell her that her numbers are way down and that she has 90 days to turn them around or else she will be canned - FER cannot afford to carry her any longer. Craig said it is always the "crisis du jour" with her.

Fay is afraid that Debbie will come into the office and accuse us of backstabbing her or something after her talk with Greg.

Craig also said that I did something to help one of the Facilities girls last week and she told Bob Chuhak what I did and that they are all very happy with me. If they are happy then Craig is happy.

Evidently the fact that Navy Federal Credit Union's website was down all day yesterday made the national news - Fay told me she saw it on CNN. I was able to log-on this morning and verify that my Stimulus Check was deposited. I made an appointment for Buddy at the vet on Saturday at 9:00 AM.

Tomorrow is sure to be a very busy day... I have a lot of scheduled (and un-scheduled) tasks waiting for me. Tomorrow Debbie and Chef Ryan have a demo at Whole Foods Market and Craig will be at Darden all day with Rick Cutler and Joe Nicholson of Cleveland Range trying to get Darden to agree to a pricing increase.

Fay wanted to take tomorrow off because Tyree is having a CAT scan or something on his head, but I told her, "No! Thursday will be a RED LETTER DAY!" She said that since the results won't be back for a week, that I was probably right.

Orlando, FL

No new entry yesterday because I was too beat after bringing the weekend up to date. My head cold worsened and I was tired. I went to bed early.

Orders have started off very soft this week.

When I got home last night I changed the AC air filter and I poured a cup of bleach into the condensate tray. Now the house smells faintly of bleach. Maybe I will burn some incense to cover up the smell.

Craig, Sally, and Catherine are in North Carolina on Monday and Tuesday for CJ's graduation from Combat Training for Non-Combatants at Camp Geiger. They are flying back this evening.

Craig has definitely wisened up to what Debbie has been up to. This morning she sent an email to everyone saying that she was taking vacation Aug 4 - 9. Craig said to Fay that he had to use all of his self-control to refrain from sending a note to the other partners saying, "Will any of us notice?"

Stumbled onto an interesting website this morning called Hotpads.com. Using this website you can find all of the real estate for sale in an area, sort it by sale, foreclosure, or auction, you can find rental property and even a roommate with it! I like that it scatters the properties over a map of the area.

My headcold was still dragging me down this morning. I took some Day Quil tablets and Flonase. On the way to the office I stopped at 7-Eleven and got a bottle of Day Quil and drank half of it when I got to the office. I started to feel better in the afternoon.

Despite a 50% chance of precipitation today it did not rain.

When I got home I took Buddy for his evening walk. Then I went to the garage to work on projects. It was very warm in the garage and all I have out there for cooling is a fan.

The new cutoff wheels I bought for my Dremel tool were advertised as 2x better than the regular wheels. Well, my testimonial is that they are 5x better! I am serious. They hold up that much better. Of course, the trade-off is that they are about 3x as expensive.

The cutoff wheels and Dremel are being used to shape aluminum for my new and improved Fibonacci gauge.

I also continued working on flattening the sole of my bench plane. I did not finish this evening, infact I did not get out of 100 grit, but I think I can have it done tomorrow. Doing that is a dirty and hot job. Flattening and grinding the old-fashioned way.

Following behind the plane on each grit of sand paper with the aluminum gauge legs, I will polish the scratches off of the faces and smooth the sides.

Navy Federal Credit Union website confirms that my Stimulus Payment has been deposited. Now I need to make an appointment for Buddy at Hiawassee Veterinary Clinic for his shots.

Weekend

On Friday morning I did exactly what I said I would do and told Craig, "Next time those guys from down South decide to have a meeting like that, make sure I am NOT invited. That was the biggest waste of my time. They would not listen to a single thing Fay and I said and they had already decided what they were going to do before they came up here."

Before I could even finish Fay came down the hall and she started in with her part. No stopping her either! I sensed Craig was annoyed at first. Then he went to call on a dealer. When he returned after lunch he went to Fay's office and sat down to discuss it more. I guess he thought about it and realized that Debbie was not pulling her weight and that she had used the other three partners to gang up on Craig. Craig is not happy about the whole thing now either. He wrote a carefully worded email to the other partners and let Fay proof it before he sent it out.

By the end of the day I felt like we had accomplished alot in the Test Kitchen Remodelling Department.

My Stimulus Payment went out in today's mail to NFCU for deposit. With that money in checking I need to make an appointment at the vet for Buddy and pay BOA for my new computer.

In the back of my nose/throat I felt the beginning of a summer cold.

I remembered that my Father's Day gift for Dad was being delivered that afternoon, but because Dad was out-of-town, I hoped someone would bring it inside instead of letting it sit outside in the rain!

Right after work I came home and got Buddy and went to Bob's house. We had Chicken Provençal and Watermelon Salad for dinner with a 2005 Blackstone Riesling. After dinner I began masking off the little wall around the door to the balcony to prepare for painting.

We watched The Devil Wears Prada again in the evening. We were up past midnight watching the out-takes and scenes that were cut from the movie.

On Saturday morning Buddy woke us up with his crying and baying. I got up and took him down to the street for a walk. When I returned I got Bob up, he got a shower and we went to Brian's restaurant on North Orange Avenue for breakfast. Then we went to his office to drop off some keys.

Back at the condo I rolled more of the crimson Red Dahlia paint onto the wall, then left it to dry while we went down to the pool. We took drinks, a book, some suncreen, and our foam Fun Noodles with us. We spent over two hours at the pool.

Bob could not see very well under water. I dropped a stone to the bottom of the pool, but Bob could not see it or retrieve it. I decided that he needed goggles to help him see better under the water.

Back in the house I rolled another coat of paint onto the wall. We had leftover chicken for lunch with frozen peach yogurt for dessert.

Bob found some old PC speakers that we decided we would try with my new computer. Unfortunately he did not have the 12-volts, 1 amp wall wart needed to make them work. I guess that will be found on a future Radio Shack trip.

I accidentally brushed red paint onto the ceiling, so I would have to mask off the red wall and dab white Kilz on the ceiling like I did the other walls painted red. We decided that we would have to go to my house to get my tall ladder and the Kilz for this.

After painting the wall, Bob had me cut the vertical blinds in his living room down to about 6" past the bottom of his window sill. For some reason they were installed all the way to the floor! That took us about 30 minutes.

Sunday turned into a very very busy day! After walking Buddy I made egg patties with sausage patties and French toast with coffee for breakfast. Then I took Buddy to the tub and gave him a good bath. Bob had to help with this because Buddy would easily hop out of the tub!

We put Buddy's bedding into the laundry along with his bath towel.

With the dog dried off and ourselves showered we went out and drove west on the 408 to Ocoee where we went to the Lowe's store to get a new mailbox for Bob's Dad, some coarse grit sandpaper, aluminum rivets, and Dremel cut-off wheels for me. Then we went to Arby's for lunch.

Driving in the heat was making me very tired and I could feel some sinus pressure.

We went to my house to put the stuff away and try the speakers. Yes, as I suspected, I would need to get a power supply at Radio Shack. The house smelled stuffy and mildewy. I knew the AC filter needed to be changed.

I picked up the Frontline flea and tick treatment, the Zodiac flea spray, and my scrub brush to take back to Bob's house.

We went to Wal*Mart next. Here we got a bucket for Bob, some sour dough bread, some Just For Men hair coloring (for Bob, not me), some swimming goggles, some DVD-R recordable discs, and some foamy paint brushes for trimming in walls.

When we got back to his apartment I set up the ladder, taped off the wall, and dabbed the white Kilz onto the ceiling. After this I layed down on the loveseat to take a nap. When I got up we started to scrub patio furniture on Bob's balcony. It was sooo dusty and dirty! We needed about 12 or 13 buckets of water to rinse all the filth away!

I put the flea treatment on Buddy and then sprayed the areas he had been laying.

We took Buddy for a long walk in the neighborhood. When we came back we started preparing our dinner of fried chicken breast strips with fried polenta and cheesy chicken sauce. We had leftovers that Bob was able to take for lunch today.

After dinner I ran the vacuum cleaner to get all of Buddy's hair and treat crumbs up while Bob loaded the dishwasher. We got to bed around 10 PM.

It feels like a sinus infection. I asked Bob if Florida Hospital Centra Care accepts Aetna (they do) because I want to go to a clinic instead of back to my primary care provider who will run me through a stress test before anything else.

Reading A Box-and-Whisker Plot

Let's say we ask 2,852 people (and they miraculously all respond) how many hamburgers they've consumed in the past week. We'll sort those responses from least to greatest and then graph them with our box-and-whisker.

Take the top 50% of the group (1,426) who ate more hamburgers; they are represented by everything above the median (the white line). Those in the top 25% of hamburger eating (713) are shown by the top "whisker" and dots. Dots represent those who ate a lot more than normal or a lot less than normal (outliers). If more than one outlier ate the same number of hamburgers, dots are placed side by side.

Vince's Weblog is so educational!

Orlando, FL

When Fay came in this morning we immediately began talking about the "Marketing" meeting yesterday. Fay was so pissed about it that she even said, "Damn!" I told her, "and you're gonna hear me tell him, 'Next time they get the idea to do something like that, DO NOT invite me!' and I want you to hear me tell Craig that!"

Unfortunately Craig was only in the office two minutes the entire day - and I was stuck on a phone call when he came in and when he walked back out!

Fay said that she is going to speak to Craig about the whole thing too. She is certain that Craig is not behind this entire thing.

As my part of "supporting Debbie" I am making a Google SketchUp model of our Test Kitchen so that we can rapidly install cabinets, tables, even paint and floor surfaces and evaluate them. This will be a better process than just guessing.

This afternoon we had a brief thunderstorm at the office. It looks like our usual summer pattern of afternoon thundershowers has started again.

When I got home the first thing I did was change into shorts and take Buddy for his walk. Then I started laundry, watered my plants, and ran the vacuum cleaner. I want to have my housework finished so that we can go to Bob's house tomorrow evening.

Orlando, FL

I wore my new olive color slacks with my green long-sleeved, button-down FER shirt, and black dress shoes to work this morning.

Fay was about 15 minutes late. When she arrived she was carrying two big paper bags from Publix. She stopped at the grocery store on the way in to get cookies and candies for the partners and our meeting.

Greg was the first one to show up. Gabe and Tom were 30 minutes late. Craig was the last one to come in and join the meeting.

Basically they talked about how sales have slowed down and FER needs to work with end-users to promote repeat business. One way they want to do this is with post card mailings. Another way they want to do this is with a newsletter. They also want to drop some money into our Test Kitchen and here is where the controversy begins...

None of the people present aside from Craig, Fay, and myself work in that office - no, not even Debbie, but they want to rearrange everything in the office and change the way it works. Of course they are counting on Vince and Fay to support Debbie on this new initiative. They don't realize it, but because of the way they have gone about it, they have already doomed it.

Fay and I support resurfacing the kitchen floor and painting. Even adding cabinets and other aids for the kitchen. One big problem we have is that we have 7 bakers racks full of marketing literature in the Test Kitchen and they want to move all of it to the File Room - a room that is 14 x 16 feet and full of file cabinets. They are full of reasons why it can be done - as a way to support Debbie - it was obvious that everything they wanted to do was previously discussed and they were only going through these motions to get Fay and me on board.

Unfortunately, I don't think Craig is with it 100% either. They just need to get rid of Debbie. She isn't doing her job - marketing our products to her dealers. She just wants to change everything in the office so that she can have "networking parties" in the kitchen.

I told Fay that I don't want those parties in there on the weekend or when we are not there. Before you know it stuff will come up missing from our desks, the supply cabinet (or worst of all - from our confidential files). I think Craig will have to put his foot down on that one.

Everyone broke up and left thinking that it was all settled. Fay confessed to me that she was angry during the meeting and she caught Craig's eye during the meeting. He could see that she was pissed too.

I told Fay that Debbie's battles are only just beginning and that we needed to figure out how to

influence the changes that are coming down the path. Without Craig, Fay, or me backing her up, she won't get very far with her plans.

What is so purplexing is why FER has waited until the economy turned south and orders have slowed down to decide to invest money and time in this project. This project should have been started years ago.

Anyway, the rest of the day went by fairly quickly. It didn't storm until after I had been home for an hour. Buddy had already taken his walk and I was in the garage working on flattening a plane sole when it began to storm. It rained hard for about 30 minutes.

Today feels as though it should have been Thursday. I wish it were too - because Friday will end up being the 13th!

Orlando, FL

During the night it stormed. I woke up around 1:00 AM to thunder and flashes of lightning. Soon I heard rain beating on my window. I rolled over and continued to doze. The thunder trailed off, but soon another storm approached and the thunder got closer and closer. I heard Buddy's metal tags rattle, but he stayed in his bed.

By the time we got up at 5:00 AM to make our morning walk the storms had stopped, but it was extremely muggy outside. The sun came out as I went to work and temps reached the 90's. In the afternoon it began to cloud up again and around 3:00 PM we had a raging thunderstorm going again! The retention pond at the office filled up! The weather is forecast to be severe tonight and tomorrow is supposed to be a repeat of today.

Online today I found something interesting. Anyone reading this who had an Apple in the 1980's will be familiar with the easy-to-use programming language called "Hypercard". Apple discontinued Hypercard and support for it in 2004, and many people were left high and dry with alot of work invested in Hypercard. Well, a website has come up that uses Hypercard programming and displays the working programs in browser applets. I am going to investigate this one further because the idea of Hypercard with it's card metaphor and almost-English-like programming language has fascinated me for several years.

Orders are very weak so far this week. We haven't even processed $100k yet. Here comes the deflating economy!

We have our meeting with the four partners tomorrow. Fay ordered chicken and turkey wraps for lunch with either potato salad, pasta salad, or potato chips. I will apply Just For Men hair color to my graying goatee tonight and cut my hair short so I can look my best.

Orlando, FL

The alarm went off right on-time at 5:00 AM, but we kept snoozing until about 5:45 AM. Then I got up to walk Buddy and Bob got up to shower and get ready for work.

We had some leftover lasagna for breakfast and I packed a big square of it for Bob to take for lunch.

The office was quiet when I arrived. Fay called at 7:45 AM and left a voice message saying she would be late because she had to take her daughter to the doctor. She finally showed up at 11:00 AM - at the same time Craig pulled up. So she really couldn't hide how late she was. She showed up with the baby too.

I showed Craig the article in Orlando Style magazine about Chef Cliff Pleau, executive chef for Seasons 52. Craig liked the article because it was so short. Also, I took him to the test kitchen to show him the plate I made from a grill plate to cover up the drain trench in the floor. He liked that.

After lunch I brought my jewelry box back to the office to show Fay and Craig the finished project. They both gushed about it. Craig said I could get hundreds of dollars for it. "Ha! Yeah, I would have to because I have hundreds in it!"

Also in the afternoon it thunderstormed really hard. Lightning, thunder, and some nice cool rain. Temps dropped from 92° F down to 73° F during the storm, but it was rising up into the 80's again when I left.

Fay left early too.

My 2008 Stimulus Payment Check was in the mail this evening! Most of it will go to Bank Of America, but I need to make an appointment at the vet for Buddy too - it's time for his shots.

This evening I walked Buddy, made my bed, loaded the dishwasher, and worked in the garage some with the jaw pads of my new wood vice, and I layed out another Fibonacci gauge - this one in aluminum.

Weekend

I got up at 7:00 AM on Saturday morning and took Buddy for his walk. When I returned I put the coffee maker on and started a breakfast of strawberry pancakes made with muffin mix found in the cupboard.

After breakfast I worked on writing my book about our trip to Peru. Bob read his Economics text. After a while I took Buddy to the bathroom and gave him a bath using the new flea and tick shampoo I bought for him. He hates baths.

In the afternoon we went to Lowe's to get another quart of "Red Dahlia" mixed for the opposite wall in Bob's dining room. He got a small roller and pan for the painting job too. I got a wood working bench vice and a Stanley bench smoothing plane.

Next we went to downtown Ocoee (yes, that place exists) we went to a used book store called The Book Rack. I found a book about surveying fundamentals and Thomas Friedman's book called The Earth Is Flat. Bob got a couple of books too.

When we came home we had the pot roast and carrots that had been cooking in the slow cooker since 8:00 PM the night before. It was very tender and tasty!

After dinner we watched "The Devil Wears Prada" starring Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway. It was very funny! My cheap-ass Chinese DVD player in the living room (the newer one) refused to open it's drawer so we had to watch it in the bedroom in bed. I caught Bob dozing off a couple of times!

This morning I got up around 7:00 AM and took Buddy for his walk. We saw the two foxes in their field during our walk.

When I returned I asked Bob to go to the store get me a half gallon of 1% milk. I made oatmeal with raisins, cinnamon, sugar, and diced pears. After breakfast we went to Bob's house to hang the bars we bought at Ikea last weekend. I will post a picture soon, but the bars are mounted behind a column in his kitchen and using hooks we have hung his pots, pans, and some of his utensils up in an inconspicuous spot.

Then we went to Barnes & Noble to pick up the book, The Money Game, ordered for Bob last week. I vowed not to buy anything, but while browsing the magazine rack I noticed an article about Chef Cliff Pleau of Seasons 52. I bought that magazine so that I could leave the article on Craig's chair in the morning.

Next we went to Daytona to see Tom and Louise. Louise had her hair done and it is shorter and dyed strawberry blonde. Tom walked outside and back inside to the dining room (it was very hot outside), but then he was not able to make it back to his bed - we had to go get his wheelchair. We have decided to take them to The Olive Garden for Louise's birthday (June 20) and Father's Day.

After that we went by Lowe's to get a 6-foot-long 4x4, two sacks of Quickcrete, some 6" nails, and a furring strip to brace the 4x4 once we have it planted. We are going to return to Tom & Louise's house soon to replace their mailbox.

When we returned home I immediately set the oven for 400° F and put a Stouffer's lasagna in. Then we walked Buddy. While dinner was baking I worked in the garage mounting my new wood vice and grinding handles off of an aluminum grilling plate for use at work covering the floor drain.

Dinner was very tasty (although late). We had Ray's Station 2003 Merlot with lasagna and Asiago focaccia bread. Yum!

Here comes another hectic week.

Orlando, FL

I arrived at the office at 7:30 am hoping to get my orders entered and email read before Fay and Ryan showed up. Ten minutes later Fay showed up. She wanted to vacuum the floors before the demo. Then she kept bothering me to move shit in the test kitchen. Soon Ryan was there and wanted to move ovens around. Everyone just expects me to drop what I am doing to help them as soon as they are ready.

There were 6 to 8 people from Hilton Hotels attending the demo today. I think it went very well. Having a trained chef on hand is definitely a plus for FER. I think we are going to be using the test kitchen alot more in the future.

At noon I went home. It was blazing hot outside. I made a ham and cheese sandwich. Buddy got a very short walk outside. I had to get right back to the office because Greg Olsen was supposed to be in at 1 pm.

Sure enough, when I got back there Greg was already inside. He just wanted to hear Fay's ideas about improving the kitchen compared to what Debbie is proposing. He said that Wednesday's meeting is supposed to be a brainstorming session for marketing ideas and ways to improve the Orlando test kitchen.

Ryan had lots of left over food from his demo. We put some of it into zip bags to take home. I took two big steaks and Fay took chicken and rice.

FER-Orlando processed $326k in new orders this week. Hollywood handled $121k. Not a bad week at all.

This evening I phoned in an order of Lobster Mac and Cheese from The Capital Grille on I-Drive then Bob and I drove down to get it. He let me off on the street corner and drove around the block while I went inside to get it.

Monica Marcotte at Darden Restaurant Support Center said the Lobster Mac and Cheese was "to die for". She said the side was a serving big enough for two people. It was too. It cost $12.50. We brought it home, heated up the steaks, spooned out the mac and cheese on to the plates and dug it. Yum! It was good!

Orlando, FL

This morning on our walk I saw two (2) foxes. I don't think Buddy saw them at all. We stood on the sidewalk and I started whistling. Soon, two foxes came running across the field toward the biggest mound. The female immediately ran down into the den and the male stood on top watching us.

I stopped at the cafe in our office park to get a breakfast burrito before heading over to the office. Fay was just getting out of her car when I drove up. Even on days when I am running late I still beat her.

As soon as I pulled my chair out from my desk I noticed a $20 bill on my chair! Craig must have left lunch money for us since he is travelling out of town.

The phones were not heavy today... not a good sign for business. We are hosting an accelerated cooking demo tomorrow in our test kitchen. Chef Ryan is asking me to help move equipment into position for this demo. In the afternoon Greg Olsen is coming over to talk with Fay and me about our Marketing Plans Meeting next Wednesday.

Today was the last day for little Tyree in the office. His Mom even came to pick him up early. I am glad. It was getting on my nerves how much he would scream like someone was killing him when he did not get his food immediately!

During lunch I put the brass hinges onto the jewelry box project and used the brass screws this time. The screws went in easily. After work this evening I cut and layed adhesive-backed brown felt in the drawers and on the bottoms of the legs. I am happy with the way it has turned out. See the pictures posted here.

This weekend I want to spend some time working on my Peru trip book in the Blurb Booksmart software that I downloaded. I have over 200 pictures to use and I have other memorabilia to scan and put into the book too. When I printed out the blog entries for that trip it ran for just over 20 pages! I imagine my book will be even longer.

Orlando, FL

Work today went by quickly enough - I stayed continuously busy. The first call I took lasted 90 minutes! Red Lobster #6298 in Times Square, New York City believes they are having trouble with their salad top refrigerator and I had to set up a conference call with Delfield Service Department to discuss his perceived problem. Matt Todd at Delfield was cursing me for that one!

We have processed over $280k in orders so far this week - so much for a faltering economy! Craig was gone almost all day calling on dealers and Darden Restaurants in particular.

During lunch I stopped at Wal*Mart to get Just For Men beard and moustache coloring, a small jar of minced garlic, and a sandwich for lunch. I came home and took Buddy for a quick walk. It was blazing hot outside.

In the afternoon a big surprise for us was Frymaster writing to us to report that the pasta cooker returned by Disney (my quoting error) arrived with holes drilled in the sides and grease running down the side of the unit. Disney told us the unit was new and un-used, but it obviously is not in new condition. I think Disney won't be getting full credit for this return, but it is mostly up to Craig.

This evening after walking Buddy I worked in the garage piecing together my very first Fibonacci Guage. I took my jewelry box project out of the cardboard box and set it up on my newly re-topped table and decided that I would not finish it with polyurethane and risk ruining it - it looks great as it is.

Tomorrow I will reattach the hinges and cut out the felt to line the drawers and feet with. Then I will rub the outside with a rag dampened with Pledge. I will take it to the office to show off on Friday.

Orlando, FL

I reached down at 4:50 am and turned off the alarm on my clock and then rolled over and kept sleeping. It was 6:10 am when I turned back over and looked at the clock again! Yikes! Time to get moving!

First thing to do was take Buddy out for his walk. When I came back it was immediately time to shower and start dressing for work. I had to shave and dress up a little since I was supposed to have lunch with Betsy today.

I left with Craig around 11 am and we drove to DC-2 to get Betsy. After we picked Betsy up we headed over to The Magic Kingdom and parked in a guarded area backstage - right behind Tony's Town Square where we were having lunch. Super convenient park space!

Tony's Town Square is an Italian restaurant on Main Street USA right inside the front gate. We had a 2 minute wait and then we were ushered inside and seated. Betsy wanted to hear all about my March Peru Vacation. Most of the talk was about how poor the economy is faring and business is suffering lately. I had baked ziti with iced tea.

After lunch Betsy wanted to take us over to Crystal Palace to have us look at a recently-installed Cleveland steamer that is not working properly. It wasn't even a busy day or weekend (although Gay Dayz are this weekend!), but that kitchen was a busy mad house! We looked, asked the chef questions, and I got the serial number off of it.

Boy was it a hot day! My desktop computer Weather Bug thermometer said 96F and I believe it too!

After dropping Betsy off Craig had to take me over to show me the new Waldorf-Astoria hotel being built in Lake Buena Vista. It will be the only one outside of New York City, and it is a big building! Lots of construction still going on around Disney World.

Back in the office I had to get everything caught back up, but that was not hard. I also had to spend about two hours compiling some numbers that show how the Frymaster Protector fryer saves energy and oil, which means it saves money. After sending that to Betsy, I sent it to everyone in FER. Two of the partners wrote back thanking me for it.

Greg Olsen phoned to say that he will be in the office on Friday to discuss with Fay and me some things that we will discuss next Wednesday with the other partners. I told Fay that there is more going on with this "Marketing" thing, Debbie, and The Partners, than just advertising. She agrees with me.

This evening it continued to be hot. I hear loud thunder and see some clouds, but it has not rained here yet. Buddy is playing with his "squirrel" rubber toy very aggressively, but the thunder seems to bother him.

The week seems to be moving by quickly - Wednesday tomorrow, already. I have processed $153k in orders so far.

Discovery Liftoff

Orlando, FL

My day started at 5:30 am at Bob's house. I had to hurry and gather all of my stuff and Buddy's stuff up so that we could return home, walk Buddy, eat breakfast, shower, dress for work, and go to work.


We saw the fox again this morning on our walk. It made sure it watched us as we made our walk.


When I undressed for my shower I noticed that I got some sun yesterday at the pool. My shoulders and upper arms are lightly burned.


Work today was steady. A couple of large orders quickly brought our total to $128k. A great start to the week!


Fay announced that Thursday will be the last day her grandson spends with us in the office. Her daughter is going to take the summer off to stay home and this fall she will enroll him in day care. Fay seemed sad, but at the same time it has to be a relief.


Craig phoned in to tell me that my lunch with Betsy was moved up to tomorrow. I will have to shave and dress nicely for my lunch.


It thundered and rained for about an hour this evening when I got off work. That was the product of our local seabreeze pheonomenon. There was an envelope in the mailbox this evening marked "Stimulus Payment" and I was sure it was my check. No, it was a letter informing me that I will receive the check by Friday. They sure find lots of ways to waste tax money.


After walking Buddy I went to the garage to work on putting a new top surface on my folding table. Here you can see the Before and After pictures.


As you can see, the 14-year-old paper table top was peeling and unsightly, but otherwise the board was sound. I sanded this surface to rough it up for adhesive. I cut a formica laminate board to near net size with my jig saw and slathered contact cement on the back of this board and all over the tabletop. Then I lifted the laminate up and layed it down on the table. I vigorously hammered all over the top with my rubber hammer starting in the center working outward.


Using a long, clamped down, straight edge, I trimmed the laminate even closer to the table with the jig saw. Then I put a flush-cutting bit with ballbearing follower into the router, adjusted the depth to follow the side of the table, and trimmed the laminate flush all the way around. Finally I put the black plastic molding back on all the way around. I am happy with how it turned out.

Weekend

FER-Orlando finished the week with $205k and Hollywood did about the same. Not a bad week.

After work I went home and packed a bag of food, toys, and bedding for Buddy, packed a bag for myself, and went to Bob's house for the weekend. Bob made a zucchini meatloaf and a salad for dinner.

We took Buddy for his walk while the meatloaf baked.

In the evening after dinner I read about sightseeing in the Titusville, FL area and the Processing computer language. Bob worked on his Economics homework and reading.

Strange dream Friday night - I dreamt I was baking pretzels, but these were not knots, these were supposed to be fish-shaped and other shapes!

Saturday morning started with Buddy whimpering and crying. It wasn't even 7 o'clock yet! I had to get up and take him down for his walk. Meanwhile Bob started coffee. When I returned we had breakfast. I had cold cereal with milk and Bob had oatmeal.

Our first task of the day was grocery shopping. We left in my truck and went to Petco to get doggie duty bags, treats, and flea and tick shampoo. We browsed Pier 1 Imports next because Bob wanted to replace his dining table placemats. Then we went to BJ's Warehouse.

Here I spent over $200 on bottled water, sliced lunch meat, onions, sliced cheese, yogurt, and canned goods. We picked up a few things for Bob and his parents too. He agreed to pay me back later.

Next we went to Super Target for the rest of the groceries. I spent another $160 there. We took it all back to my apartment to put away and then I sat down to balance the checkbook. Without a bonus check this month I quickly ran through my paycheck!

Our original plan was for Bob to work on paramedic Internet training courses while I worked on giving my folding table a new tabletop out in the garage, but it was sofa king hot and time was getting away from us. I wrote a check for the rent, gathered up the trash, and we headed out again.

We stopped in the front to put trash in the dumpster, drop off the rent check, and get a free furnace filter. Then we went to Bob's house to put the things away that we bought for him, and for dinner on Sunday.

With groceries out of the way we headed east on SR 408 toward Titusville to watch space shuttle Discovery liftoff on a 14-day mission to the International Space Station. We stopped at Subway to get sandwiches and bottled drinks for the cooler. Traffic was heavy on SR 50 going east. Finally we got to US Highway 1 and huge crowds of people waiting for the liftoff.

We parked the truck about two blocks back and walked up to the Indian River. Where we found a spot to sit down and eat while waiting for the big event. From where we were the Vehicle Assembly Building and the launch pads looked very tiny! They were probably more than three miles away.

Around 5:02 pm the space shuttle fired and lifted off. The sound didn't reach us until the rocket was about two hands up in the sky! I made a two-minute-long movie of the liftoff and will post it here soon.

Traffic was horrible going back west out of Titusville. It was more miserable because my truck

does not have air conditioning. Finally the traffic let up as we got past I-95 and speeds increased on SR 50. The next problem would be finding gasoline for the truck! We were in the last quarter tankful and I did not want to buy gas in Titusville at more than $4 per gallon.

We made it back to Orlando, but could not find an Exxon or Mobil station and I had to get $5 at a Chevron station so we would not run out.

Those footlong subs kept us pretty full, so we skipped dinner. We went back out to browse the books at Barne's & Noble. I did not buy anything, but Bob was interested in finding The Money Game by Adam Smith to read for his Economics class. This book was not in stock, but the store ordered it for him.

On Sunday morning I made Buddy go back to bed until around 7 am. Then I took him down for his walk. We walked over to the Panera bread where I got a loaf of focaccia bread and two pecan rolls to bring back for breakfast.

Bob made coffee and we heated up egg patties and sausage patties to put on English muffins for breakfast sandwiches along with our pecan rolls.

Next we started getting our lunch ready. We bought stew meat, tomatoes, onion, bell peppers, and pineapple to make shish kabobs with. We got the kabobs ready and Bob made his cucumber, pepper, onion salad that he also added diced peach to.

We put the assembled kabobs into a foil pan and took everything down to the pool where the gas grill was. I spread aluminum foil on the grill because it was so dirty and then attempted to light it. As soon as I turned the gas on I heard the grill clicking - the igniter striking. Then I turned a second burner on and "WHOOOSH!" a big ball of flame blew the foil up off the top of the grill and rose up infront of us! We were both tripping over each other trying to back away from that grill!

I guess the first burner was not putting out much gas - not enough for the spark ignition to light, then I cut in the second burner and lots of gas came out. It all piled up like a bubble under the foil until it finally caught fire and then ALL of it wanted to burn!

We kept the gas turned down low and took about 40 minutes to cook the kabobs. Then we ate them ate them at a table there while they were hot.

We spent the next couple of hours in the pool. We bought Fun Noodles (extruded foam) at Target and brought those down to the pool. Bob does not swim, so he needs something to support him in the water. We worked on his swimming lessons a little too.

Around 1 pm we climbed out to dry. I think we both got some sun while drying off. It was very warm - over 90F and you could feel the sun beating down.

We carried everything back upstairs and got ready to go out. Bob wanted to shop for placemats and other things for his house and I wanted to go to Woodcraft for those sale items.

We drove up 17-92 to Casselberry to the Woodcraft store to get a dovetail saw, dividers and gauges, and precision machinists squares. Bob likes to look at the book section and thumb through the do-it-yourself books on home improvements and built-ins.

Next we went to Bed Bath & Beyond to search for placemats. We decided that if we did not find them there we would buy a roll of colored shelf liner and cut new placemats out of it. We found some mats that fit the bill for his table though.

After this we got on I-4 and drove down to Millenia to the Ikea store. Our goal here was to get wall-mounted bars with hooks so that pots and pans could be hung up and stored on the wall. We did not intend to, but we spent over two hours in that enormous store looking for the item and then looking for the hooks which were stored in a seperate location! Plus the store was very busy... very busy.

Back at Bob's house we decided to have leftovers for dinner. We took Buddy for his evening walk and we hurried because it looked like it was going to thunderstorm.

I had the leftover meatloaf and Bob had leftover shish kabobs. We had salad and the focaccia I bought in the morning. After dinner I ran the vacuum cleaner. We were up until after 10 pm reading - me on the Internet, Bob in his Economics textbook.