I Am Not Sure Where The Little Rock Is

I went on vacation to Little Rock, Arkansas, this past week. This is the second time I have been to Little Rock, with the first time being February 2008. There is a noticeable difference to Little Rock between winter and summer. Although everyone kept telling me how fortunate I was that the weather had turned cool for our visit, it seemed hot to me. Still, with nicer weather we got to enjoy more of the river front district:

We went to a nice farmer’s market there as well as several trips to the indoor air conditioned food court for breakfast. For dinner, we went to:

It definitely is ‘A’ restaurant for beer lovers. They have a brewery on premise and several awards hanging on the walls. Laura liked the beer she ordered. We did not go to the Underground Pub that was right next door. In fact, I didn’t order any alcohol on this visit. I am still recovering from my birthday binge.

We were able to spend a lot more time with Laura’s family, including installing cable boxes (which took the combined effort of at least 3 people), shopping, playing with lots of pets (9 dogs and 6 cats – though to be fair it was at most only 8 dogs at one time), and many many meals. There was a lot of driving from one house to another as the family is well spread out across town.

While, the iPod Touch Laura gave me for my birthday kept me in contact with the digital world, I was able to avoid doing any actual work on my vacation. An effort I plan to keep up for at least another day.

Vacation

Today the office was closed and yet I was at work. I thought I might be able to get a lot done with no one else around. Update the network, complete some paperwork, etc. Instead I must have gone through some sort of time warp and did not have enough time to complete all that I wanted to. Not even most of it. At least now vacation has started. Last night there were fireworks in celebration of the day the colonies voted for independence from Great Britain. I tried to take pictures of the fireworks using the fireworks show mode on the camera:

I don’t think the camera was designed for taking pictures of fireworks, even with the fireworks show mode.

It does take okay pictures of dogs though:

Which allows me to document Oliver sleeping in a weird position.

The Day Oliver Saved the Life of a Chipmunk

Through some very weird confluence which resulted in 277 visits yesterday, this blog has now passed 10,000 visits! Thanks to everyone who stopped by to read a little or to look at a picture (mostly of a waterfall in Petit Jean State Park).

I spent that last several days at Origins, a gaming convention in Columbus Ohio. It was an interesting ride down there through hours of heavy downpour that left the streets of Ohio covered in inches of water. I played lots of games, learned some new ones, and hung out with friends I had not seen in a while. I also played a lot with my new iPod Touch. I also learned several reasons why the Drury is better than the Hyatt, including 1) free Internet access, 2) free breakfast, 3) parking garage right in the hotel, 4) nicer rooms, and 5) no karaoke.

When I returned home, I was happy to see Laura, Oliver, Julius and Lucy. Laura and I decided to have some tofu stir fry with broccoli from the garden. So we went outside with Oliver to pick some broccoli. Oliver was overly interested in a ceramic pot near the back door. Laura told me he had been interested in it earlier in the day too. It was a large empty planter I had inverted to keep it from holding water. So I decided to inspect the planter to determine why Oliver was so interested in it. I lifted it up to see what was inside and there staring back at me was a chipmunk. I had previously mentioned this chipmunk on my blog. He, like I, seemed a little startled at the situation until Oliver, realizing his renewed chance, tried to get to the chipmunk. I figure the chipmunk gave thanks for the release and ran off to his burrow with Oliver in pursuit. Oliver then spent a long time going back between the planter and the chipmunks burrow opening hoping that the chase would resume. Now how the chipmunk got in was a curiosity as the only opening was the small hole at the top. It must have been on top of the inverted planter when Oliver came around and decided to hide inside. The hiding spot would have become its final resting place had Oliver not given us the clue that something was inside.

Moving Away

My oldest niece is flying to her new home in Texas today.

While we will miss her very much, I am certain she will have great adventures in her new home town.

The cake was really good too. Melanie also cut her long hair for Locks of Love, a really nice thing to do. She looks good with her new hair style and it will be easier to deal with the hot weather down there in Texas.

Birthday Present

Look at the cool new sleek iPod Touch Laura gave me for my birthday:

I got it online and was able to browse the web and it even knew where I was on Google Maps. The whole zoom in feature and auto-rotate is as cool as I thought it would be.

I think my birthday theme song for this year is “You say it’s your birthday” by the Beatles.

Garden Journal Update

I had a request for a garden journal update as I have not had one for this year yet. The garden is doing well, here is what it looks like today:

We planted onions, broccoli, lettuce, tomatoes, beans, jalapenos, basil, chives, cilantro, and dill. Outside the garden we planted potatoes and garlic. Inside we also have a jalapeno plant, chives, and more basil. Tonight we had a salad with broccoli from our garden for the first time this season. With tomatoes starting to grow from the flowers and the beans flowering, we are looking forward to having lots of yummy vegetables soon.

The Cat Penthouse

It is the latest in cat luxury, a must have for any felinophile. Shown here we can see the first two level of the Penthouse, easily accessible from a set of steps:

On the upper left is located the 360 degree viewing room, allowing your cat to keep an eye on everything and you know that she wants to. The Penthouse gives your cat the sites and sounds of the real outdoors without fear (yours or theirs). Interested in getting a Penthouse for your cat? I know I am.

Julius’s New Job

Julius is taking his new job seriously:

Very seriously:

Oliver is still upset he didn’t get this job.

Happy Father’s Day

Happy Father’s Day to all the fathers out there. On days like this I miss my father and wish I could call him to wish him a happy father’s day.

Its Raining Its Pouring

It has basically been raining for four days now, except for a small window of sun yesterday afternoon. Thanks to good drainage in the garden, the plants are doing well. I really should have mowed last weekend, when it was nice and sunny, but I didn’t and now the grass is getting very long again. Oliver doesn’t like rain and so he has not been that active the last couple of days. Maybe Oliver and the cats know something we don’t, because they are all taking naps right now. Well actually they have been taking naps for a couple hours now. Each in a different place and all very cute. If I wasn’t so lazy I would take pictures and show you.

Given the rain, we have to come up with other activities to entertain Oliver. One such activity was to take Oliver to Petsmart to get some dog food and treats. We like to look at the cats too. Not Oliver – he doesn’t like looking at them and what he wants to do would get us thrown out and banned from Petsmart. After Petsmart, we decided to stop at the movie store. I wrapped the dog food bag in my coat to try to keep Oliver from being drawn to it. We looked at all the recent releases and picked two up. Must have taken 10-15 minutes. When we got back in the car, the bag of dog food wrapped in my coat had not been touched. Good dog. As a reward we decided to make a stop at the local pet food store to get Oliver a not-overpriced bully stick. In the couple minutes we were in the store Oliver pulled my coat off from and chewed into the dog food bag. Bad dog. I am not certain how much if any he ate. I think we may have gotten back too soon for him to eat much. Last time he had access to a bag of dog food for any length of time, he ate over 3 pounds – which was like 10% of his weight at the time.

This past week was fairly laid back at work. I needed the break from the high stress levels of previous weeks. We actually had a customer visit and his unit which was under test failed right before he got there which could have been a lot more stressful than it was. Fortunately I was in the ‘I don’t care right now’ mode of thought that makes for a much better work day. The customer had his own issues that he was more concerned with including the fact his return ticket was for the wrong month. We have a customer visit this coming week too. But this week is my birthday week and Laura bought me something nice from Amazon. I don’t know what it is. I didn’t even touch the box and I am not asking her any questions about it. I will just wait till my birthday to find out what it is. But the thought of it will keep me distracted from other work related concerns. And then I am going on vacations. Maybe by mid-July I will be able to concentrate on work again.

Well, it is still raining. Maybe I will go take a nap too …