Lost His Mind

Yesterday was one of those days at work.  I mean, our work is largely seasonal and it's always slow this time of year anyway.  Anyone who has worked there more than a year knows that already, except apparently Inspector Gadget.  

All day, he was running around hooting and hollering that we weren't getting our numbers, but how can we if there is no work to do?  Seriously, from lunch break until the end of shift, I brazed exactly 18 headers.  No, that's not a typo.  

I had a three piece order, then about 45 minutes before the end of shift, I got 72 piece order.  After setting up and all, I had time to braze 15 of those.  That makes 18.  That was it.  I spent most of the afternoon cleaning, sweeping, dusting off the shelves, and hiding in the bathroom.  

I hate days like that, because the lack of work makes the time go by so slowly.  But finally, the day was over, and I was headed to my locker to put my tools away when Inspector Gadget ran up and asked me if I wanted to stay over an hour.  

"No", I replied without hesitation and continued to my locker and then out the door when the end of shift buzzer went off. But before that, I told one of the other brazers, "Inspector Gadget done lost his ever loving mind!"  

She gave me that look that is impossible to describe, but when you see it, you know exactly what it means, and said, "It would have been different if he hadn't waited until 5 minutes till to ask!"

"It would have been different if I hadn't been standing around all afternoon with nothing to do!" I replied.  I mean, seriously...why is he going to wait until it's time to walk out the door to suddenly get concerned about us having work to do?  

Y'all, I don't wish ill on anybody, but they really need to do something with him.  He doesn't have the people skills, management skills, or leadership skills to be a supervisor.  

But you know what they say about time  -- it waits for no man, and eventually the long, long day ended, and I decided to do my shopping yesterday instead of waiting until Saturday.  I don't want to risk getting stuck in the store during the most important football game of the year. 

Of course, I'm speaking of Army-Navy.  I like to watch the pregame and march on, too, so that would really put me crunched for time if I went Saturday morning.   All that to say, I think I got everything I need for my Christmas Eve snacks, and for the first time in a long, long time I was able to say, "Well, that didn't cost as much as I expected it to!"  

Except that I forgot to get tortilla chips for the Ro-Tel.  I'll get them next time I go, or I'll just run to the Dollar General up on the corner.  Other than that, I'm about all done.  I'm not even going to worry about a Christmas dinner, because I have no idea what Cody and Brennan will do.  Knowing them, they'll go to Brennan's parent's house, only stopping here long enough to pick up their presents. 

I guess I can't complain.  At least I get to see them that much.  

OK, moving right along...

I hadn't really planned on doing anything this weekend except watching some Christmas shows, and I started last night with Rudolph.  

I have it on DVD, but there's just something about watching it on TV knowing everyone else is watching it at the same time.  Even if you have to put up with nearly as many commercials as the show is long.  

This morning, I turned to the DVD player and watched Frosty's Winter Wonderland, T'was The Night Before Christmas, and the Grinch while finishing the hat I had OTN.  

Yarn:  Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn

Colorway:  Green/Turquoise/Red

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8  5mm

That's the last of my Hobby Lobby yarn, until I can get up to Batesville again, so I cast on the next one with some Red Heart. 

Yarn:  Red Heart Supersaver

Colorway:  Icelandic

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8  5mm

Oh, and I watched The Shepherd, too.  It's only available on the FREE Chosen app, but if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend that you do so.  It's worth the trouble of downloading the free app and creating a free account.  Then you can watch The Chosen without ads, while you're there.  Or you can watch on Prime, but you have to put up with ads.  

In spite of all that TV watching, it was too beautiful a day to spend indoors all day, and I wanted to take advantage of that before the next cold snap comes in tomorrow night.  I got out and piddled in the garden spot a bit, scraping down some high spots and raking the dirt into the low spots. 

I only did a little bit, because I didn't want to over do it.  I had to remind myself that I'm not 20 years old any more.  I know you're thinking I should hire someone to do that hard work for me, but I like doing it myself.  There is something very cathartic about working in dirt.  

I also spent some time filling the wood box and kindling box in anticipation of the impending cold, then moved some more firewood into my rack.  Again, I had to remind myself that I'm not 20, and to not push myself so hard.  

Once I was done with that for the day, I sat outside in my chair for a while, and contemplated putting a fire into the fire pit and maybe roasting some hot dogs and even a marshmallow or two.  I didn't, though.  I decided I didn't want to fool with it, so I came back inside and started watching the 1935 version of A Christmas Carol with Seymore Hicks.  If you do decide to watch that one, the version of Prime has some major scenes cut out, so I watched on YouTube.  

The annoying thing about that was every time they showed an ad, it turned the closed captions back on.  I finally gave up turning them off and just left them on.  It's also not restored, so the outdoor scenes were pretty murky, but that just adds to the charm of watching an old film. 

Before I came in, I took a quick photo of one patch of bluebonnets.  

They are doing so well this year.  I'm totally stoked about it. 

Then I played around with AI and made a few more Christmas scenes.  

Speaking of A Christmas Carol, I signed up to do a Hillsdale College course on the book last weekend.  It has six lessons and I'd planned on doing one per day, but the lessons were so fascinating to me, I did the entire course in one day.  

They have another new course on Colonial America that I want to do, also.  Maybe I'll go ahead and enroll and do a lesson or two before the ball game tomorrow.  

And finally, I'd said I wasn't going to keep pestering the vet, but I got antsy and called them today anyway.  They said the cat is doing well, and they're thinking she can come home Monday.  So, yay for that.  

I kind of miss the little demon spawn running around the place. 

That was how I spent my Friday.  Now I think I'll go take a shower, then maybe watch the musical version of Scrooge with Albert Finney.  

I might even make myself some hot chocolate to go with it.