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Monday, September 26, 2016

Quotes from This Evening's Debate

Names withheld to protect the... whatevers. And don't even try to guess, because you'd be surprised at who said what.

Pre-Debate Visitors

As you all know, we will be watching this evening's cage match, er, presidential debate. In preparation, I picked up some special brain food on my way home so we would both be in top form.

As we were out on the deck, grilling walleye (attention Colorado Springs Midwesterners... King Soopers on Unitah has fresh, wild caught walleye at the fish counter), I looked out and said...

Sunday, September 25, 2016

Fall into Winter in the Park

One of my favorite places on earth, well, at least the parts of the earth I know, is Rocky Mountain National Park. And we got to go there this weekend with some of our favorite people. There were some hiccup to our weekend, like trying to camping in a windstorm of massive and freezing proportions, and an SUV that decided it no longer wanted to work, inciting a trip to Boulder to pick up a part, and ultimately, a tow. But it was a good weekend in a great place.

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Fight Night at the Kelly House

Ladies and gentlemen!

You've wondered about it for years...

You've asked about witnessing the events...

You've threatened to buy tickets...

FINALLY!!! Your chance is here!

<<Cue the music... you know, something out of the Rocky soundtrack or 80's WWF>>


Announcing...

Fight Night at the Kelly's!

Friday, September 16, 2016

Potato Salad, Mason Jars, Pallet Wood, and Monkeys

This past weekend, I was putting together potato salad in preparation for having some folks over. I had boiled the potatoes and the eggs, chopped up the celery and onion. As I was stirring in the mayo and mustard, I looked at the plastic bowl I was using. "Ok," I thought, "This is good for mixing, but what do I have that I can actually SERVE this in?"

And then I thought, "Are you fricking kidding? This is an outdoor event, just refrigerate this bowl and then carry it outside at the appropriate time."

Then the other part of my brain went, "But this bowl isn't cute enough!"

The rational side of my brain then took that woman who lives in my head and wants everything "just so," shook her by the shoulders, slapped her across the face, and yelled in her ear "knock this crap off! This should be easy. EASY. Make good food. Feed it to people. Enjoy having people to your house."

And that, was my mantra for the weekend.

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Capitol Reef National Park, or How My Husband Gets to Go to a Bowl Game This Year

We arrived at the campsite late-afternoon on Friday. We set up camp, which took slightly longer than usual given the short space we had for the pop-up (we were the only trailer in the primitive campsite, which was best designed for tent-camping), and we never got exactly "right," sleeping with our heads downhill. We debated going the miles up to the visitor center to get water, but ultimately decided to stick around camp for the evening and just use the six liters or so that we had brought with us. We made dinner (that gorgeous salmon), and relaxed, reading by the campfire, enjoying the light breeze, and going to bed at an hour amenable to my 93 year-old grandmother.

Monday, September 12, 2016

Leveraging What You Can To Stretch What You Have

I like travel. In fact, some recent study said (according to Eric, who was likely reading me a headline off Facebook, so I don't know about the scientific reality of this statement but I believe it) that travel makes you happier than just having stuff. This is most certainly true of me, and especially so if the travel involves being outside. Bonus points for sleeping in the outdoors.

Thursday, September 8, 2016

De-Southwesting, Session 1

As it happens, this last year of moving from one quirky place to another has increased my tolerance for just living in a space. While I haven't by any stretch, turned a blind eye to the outdatedness of any given abode, nor have I refrained from commenting on the garishness of décor. However, I have learned to just live with it.

Eric on the other hand, has spent the last year waiting for the time when he could engage in house projects once again. In some ways, this has, by contrast to me, diminished his tolerance. In this house, the object of his first angst was the tile.