Missed the mark

Randall and Lily weren’t supposed to arrive until early afternoon on Saturday.  That meant that I felt the need to get everything done chore-wise during the morning.  From the first step into the early morning dripping wet humid air, I knew I did not have a fun few hours ahead of me.  The heavy summer rain has kicked weed growth into overdrive, it took me close to the double the time it normally does to just get the weeding done.    I was already dripping with sweat.

The next task was weed whacking.  After starting the whacker it ran for like 2-3 minutes before shutting off.  Despite countless, hot, sweaty yanks on the starter cord, with each pull being more aggravated than the last, the damn thing would not start.  The last thing I felt like doing was screwing with weed whacker in the heat.  I first popped off the air filter to see if unrestricted air flow would help, nope.  Next I got my can of starter fluid/carb cleaner and sprayed it inside the intake and the exterior of the carb.  The whacker spun to life for a few moments as it combusted the starter fluid but then once again was dead.  Damn it.

I was about ready to say f it, and let the weeds win until I had time to do a more thorough analysis in more pleasant weather conditions.  I tried one more thing before giving up.  I pulled both of the fuel lines that run into the carb and then shot a bunch of carb cleaner into the inlets.  I assumed there was some sort of fuel blockage from the behavior I was seeing.  I didn’t expect what I did to be sufficient to correct the problem, thankfully it was.  After putting it back together the whacker started and kept running.  My reward for the effort was to sweat through both my shirt and my shorts as well as coating my shins with a heavy layer of grass clippings.

While Cindy and I were outside we had the chickens outside free ranging.  Cindy was giving the coop a thorough cleaning.  The chickens as always loved the unrestricted access to the backyard.  It’s very funny how they now will often follow Cindy or I around the yard, hoping that at any instant one of us will drop some cracked corn.

When Randall and Lily showed up Cindy and I were half asleep on the couch after eating lunch, we were both pooped.  The two of them showed up with a bunch of Trader Joe’s grocery bags, where they stopped on the way to the house.  The groceries were both for Randall’s pantry at home and some to be utilized Saturday evening as Randall had offered to prepare a shrimp dish for dinner.  Randall had prepared meals a couple times in the past for me, he is actually a good cook.

It didn’t take long until we took Randall and Lily out back to meet the latest additions to the family, the three chickens.  We had some left over pasta to feed them which rivals cracked corn as their favorite treat.  Both Randall and Lily got a kick out of how “friendly” the chickens were, even if most of their affection is tied into whatever food you had in hand.  One of the chickens, Betty has actually started allowing us to pet her freely.  When you reach out to pet her she will sit and let you rub her back and neck without much fuss.  Wilma and Pebbles do not share this trait and will only allow you to touch them briefly if they are in the middle of actively eating.

I pulled out my portable ping pong set and transformed the dining room into a sports arena.  Despite the table being more narrow than regulation it still was good enough for a bunch of good quality, highly contest matches where all four of us played each other.  Both Cindy and Lily have real good hand/eye coordination and were tough players.  Lily was funny to listen to as she played.  She was as vocal as a pro tennis player when she lost a point.  Every match we played was tight, but of course the only person to emerge undefeated was me.  I used a boring but consistent play style to rack up the wins.

The plan was to eat at home and then head out to catch the 7:55 showing of Lucy at Coconut Point.  Randall’s shrimp pesto pasta dish seemed quite involved to prepare.  The end result was really, really good.  All three of us greatly appreciated Randall’s efforts.

So after cleaning up we had to hustle to get out the door to the movie.  We walked into the theater about one minute before the official start time, luckily, as is almost always the case, late arrival has no seating choice penalty.  The theater had less than 50 people in it.

Cindy and I had been looking forward to Lucy based on the previews we had seen.  The movie started out well, it was exciting and cool.  Unfortunately the last two thirds of it pretty much fell apart.  Randall, Cindy and myself all struggled to keep our eyelids open during parts of the film.  The story was just weak and predictable.  It’s nothing more than an average B to B- movie, suitable for a Netflix rental but certainly not the effort/expense to see in a theater.  My opinion of it was shared by everyone else. By the time we got home we were all pretty damn exhausted, we retired to bed without much further delay.

On Sunday morning originally Cindy and I were targeting to go on an Ave Maria bike ride with Randall and Lily.  Unfortunately Cindy has been diagnosed with a probable hair line fracture in her left foot, meaning torquing the foot on a road bike was on the not allowed list of activities.  So while Lily and Randall did the ride Cindy and I went to go pick up the dogs for a day trip at the house.

When they returned from the ride the dogs were quite excited to see Uncle Randall again.  Nicki fussed for a couple minutes because she never saw Liliy before but soon mellowed out.  Old age has made her not be so fussy about who is in the house anymore.

Cindy made a nice omelet breakfast for Randall and Lily to help them refuel from their very warm and calorie consuming bike ride.

I unwrapped the reusable hanging rubber bottle shooting target I bought at Rural King a few weeks before.  I figured BB gun target shooting would be a different type of activity for us.

I was out by myself at first.  I set up the target maybe 30 feet away.  I discovered that the rather hard rubber the “bottle” is made of has a bad trait of making bb’s bounce off of it instead of absorbing the impact.  When one of my shots hit the target and then bounced off the metal picnic table I was leaning on I knew it needed to be further away.

I moved the target all the way out next to the small shed, figuring that was well out of rebound range.  Unfortunately having it that far away made hitting the bottle much more difficult.  You see the sight on the $30 air rifle I bought for myself two Xmas’s ago is not accurate.  To hit what you want you need to aim right of your intended target and even when doing so, it’s still a crapshoot.  When the others came out to join me they were surprised to learn you had to pump up the air rifle after every single shot which is a physically demanding task.  The pump on the Daisy gun requires significant amounts of power to get it going.

Hitting the bottle at long range was too hard.  I had Cindy bring out some additional things to shoot that would not rebound bb’s and were bigger like an empty Bud Light box, a tissue box and an empty one gallon water container.  These items were placed closer.  I liked hitting the water bottle the most.  It gives no doubt about it feedback when you hit it.  The cardboard boxes did not flinch a millimeter when the bb’s sailed cleanly through them.  Cindy was actually the only one to hit all four targets, including the rubber bottle.  She was deservedly proud of her accomplishment.

All of us were pretty warm after hitting the backyard shooting range so we decided a little pool time would be appropriate.  Sadie was quite pleased with our decision as Randall and I took turns splashing her.  She was totally soaked and very tired by the time we got out.  Even Nicki participated in her normal, not too close, way.

Sunday afternoon was filled with various things.  One of them was me working through (with a little help from Randall) episode 4 of the Walking Dead game.  I finished the episode, leaving only one more left to complete the series.  It really is like being a first person participant in the show.

We also took in about 2/3 of Interns which was playing on HBO.  I wonder how much money Google laid out to have a movie that was like one big commercial about their business.  I just have a hard time enjoying anything with Owen Wilson in it.  Despite not seeing the entire movie I feel qualified to rate it, giving it a Lucy-like B- rating.  It has a few laughs and a story structure you have seen 1000 times before.

Randall and Lily stuck around for dinner.  Cindy made a combo meal of black bean burgers and crab cakes.  She did an experimental desert, something she never tried before, lemon meringue pie.  Unfortunately the healthy ingredient substitutions she made did not work out great.  It seems that baked goods are less forgiving than cooked meals when it comes to tweaking the recipes.

We left the house last night the same time Lily and Randall did as we had to drop the girls back off at Ali’s place.  They thanked us for the hospitality and pushed off for the other side of the state.  It was nice seeing Troy and Randall on consecutive weekends, something I don’t think has ever occurred before. The stretch of time leading up until the road trip looks to be more conventional, allowing me to keep plugging away at the endless must/should do’s at the homestead.

Over the weekend a good exercise themed video was suggested.  I plan to try to “pull” it off although it is going require large amounts of both physical and editing effort to complete.