Vinnie’s Vlog

Everyone is well rested and we are on our way to MGM

My absolute favorite comic strip in the paper is Pearls Before Swine.  My favorite is the battle the Crocs have with  their neighbors, the Zebras.

However, the other day Pig and Goat were discussing Goat’s blog and Pig pointed out…” some people think the internet is nothing more than an outlet for their immature rants”.

I know you are, but what am I?

Now, in a later strip, the ever superior Rat points out… ” (blogs) provide their frustrated creator with the delusional outlet of being a published author.  Sort of like how the prison warden that lets the psychotic inmate scribble ‘poetry’ on the cell wall so he doesn’t beat his bunk mate with a toilet seat”.

Now THAT’s why I blog.

We have arrived at our hotel, had lunch and rested. We are now on the bus making our way to the magic koingdom for dinner and the christmas party. lily and leo have both napped nicely today and are in good moods which we hope will carry them into the night.

It just figures don’t it?  Continental has a Tampa to Newark special this weekend!

Lily – only 26 days to Christmas!

Had dinner at Longhorn’s last night.  Half way through my Lafayette Chicken and Shrimp I cut into what I thought was a cooked piece of cheese.  Turns out it was a plastic lid baked into my dinner.  It was a lid off of a small plastic cup that had the sauce for the chicken in it.  Apparently it was poured onto my chicken, lid and all.  I called the manager over who recognized what it was immediately.   We weren’t charged for my dinner and they threw in dessert for everyone.   The lady got Lily’s ear and the two of them created a monster ice cream serving with Strawberry sauce and whipped cream.  You should have seen her face when that arrived.  It’s funny – the thing that would make someone not want to eat there again is the one thing that endeared her to that place forever.

Seems like it was a rought night.  Leo was up around 1am.  Lily woke up mad because her blanket had fallen off her bed around 2:30am.  And Leo was up again at 4:30am.  We have to be up at 6am on school days.

Some heavy fog this morning made for a cloudy start but it’s breaking up now.

News reporting that 72 million people bought something online yesterday.  (Maybe it was 72 million different purchases, not sure)  Either way, 68.5 million of those were done while on the job!

Hey Lily – 27 days to Christmas!

FACTS:
There is a bus with 7 children inside of it
Each child has 7 rucksacks
In each rucksack there are 7 big cats
Every big cat has 7 small cats
Everything listed above is entirely in the bus
There is no driver
Every child has 2 legs
Every cat has 4 legs

QUESTION:
How many legs are in the bus?

Wow – NFL player killed in his home in Miami… Click here for Story

I filled up the car with gas this morning…$3.319 per gallon  (I know, that .009 is real important)  Cost me $60.  Nothing like beginning your day 60 bucks in the hole.

Nice again this morning – mid 70’s, no clouds.  Should be nice all the way through the weekend.

Anyone see the Delta airline specials for this weekend coming to Tampa?

Nice quiet evening…kids asleep, a nice, muddy, rainy football game getting ready to kick off in Pittsburgh.  It’s the Golden Hour around here.  Everyone asleep by 8…maybe 8:30.  Time for some quiet time until we go to bed.  All the chores are done, everything is cleaned up and put away.   This is quickly becoming one of my favorite parts of the day.

Lily took her coconut to school today for Show and Tell and apparently did very well.  Her teachers told me she showed everyone the coconut and explained to them what was inside and how she got the thing out of the tree and where she got it.  She’s already looking around for her next Show and Tell item.  I got to her school a few minutes early and waited inside and watched her finish her lunch.  She was just finishing her water and went to the play ground where she had a very animated conversation with two older boys.  I don’t know what she was telling them, but she was quite passionate about it.

Leo is growing.  I swear, he’s getting longer and longer everyday.  Which is good considering where he was after his three month appointment!  He’s into 6-9 month old clothes and this weekend we bumped him up to size 3 Huggies.

Nighty-night!

29 days, that is if you are counting down to Christmas.   That was Lily’s first question to me when she came down this morning…”How many days until Christmas?”  Not “good morning”.

Lily is off to school with a Show and Tell this morning.  She wanted to bring the coconut she knocked out of the tree on our trip to Punta Gorda this weekend.  I sent her with a nice sized print of the picture of her and her grandfather knocking it out of the tree with a big stick.

Leo was up at 2 wanting dry drawers and something to eat and again at 5 wanting to play.

Back to work today!

I guess this marks the end of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.  Sure seems like it was a long four or five days.

We continued our work around the house this afternoon.  Cleaned upstairs, cleaned the pool, made dinner and took a walk around the block to see the lights.  There are 7 houses with lights.  Three of them on our cul de sac.

Lily’s been bathed and is off to bed.  She got to watch “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” before bed tonight.   Leo has been asleep for about a half hour already.

Everyone is back to work and school tomorrow!

Only a couple of minutes until kickoff…hope everyone is settled in to watch their favorite NFL contest.  The Bucs are at home today versus the Redskins.

We made our French Toast, vacuumed the house from top to bottom and put up shelves in Leo’s room and in Lily’s room.   We ran to Lowe’s and hit the grocery store.  I’m learning to not take Diane along to the grocery store.  I think she’s adding to my weekly bill with too many things that aren’t on my list.

Lily and Leo are both taking a nap.  When they get up, we are going to get some things done outside.  It’s a beautiful day today – nice breeze, temps around 79…maybe 80.   Looks like it’ll stay that way through the week.

Gotta go…time for kickoff!

I spent some time going up and down the ladder today.  And anytime I break out the ladder,  I usually draw a crowd for some reason.  Neighbors come and watch, the media is alerted, blood banks are put on Speed Dial.

Here are some pictures from our day of decorations.

We’ve hit the mall this morning and another round at ToysRUs. I don’t suppose we’ll hear the ToysRUs people complaining about holiday sales thanks to us.
Lily and Leo got their pictures taken with Santa and now we are going to get lunch.

Lily and I started in the garage this morning at 9:10 am.  We unloaded the Christmas decorations from the attic and played with the chalk on the driveway.  After lunch and a nap, we ran to Lowe’s to get a few things we needed for the lights and went home to get to work on the lights.  I got the outside lights up in about an hour and a half but I still need to hook timers up.  We’ve gone with colored lights this year over the white lights we’ve had for the last 10 years or more.  I guess having two kids, we decided our lives now have color.

We had spaghetti for dinner with a nice salad.   Lily’s been bathed and we’ve gone outside to survey the lights.  She’s a bit wound up with all the decorating going on.   Looks like it could be a long couple of weeks!

The Retailer’s Prayer

Our Retailer, Who art in heaven
Hallowed be Thy Sales;
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
at the mall as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily coupons,
and forgive us our frugality,
as we forgive those hardcore shoppers who get there
before us; and lead us not into debt on Black Friday,
but deliver us our online purchases before the 15th
of December. Amen.

How come when a day is bad, or has the potential to be bad (Black Friday, Black Tuesday) it is Black?

I know no one is reading this because everyone is out shopping.  Our outlet malls opened at midnight in fact.  I think Penney’s opened at 4am.

Here it is 7:30 and I’m sipping a cup of coffee while Lily and Leo are playing on the floor.  The house is quiet, the tv news is showing the scene from the mall.

I think we’ll take down the fall decorations and start putting Christmas up.  I don’t think we’ll do the tree just yet, but I’ll probably get the outside done.

I ate entirely too much yesterday so I’ve managed to convince Lily that we don’t need to do pancakes today.  You know you ate too much when you skip dinner as I did and I’m still waking up stuffed!

I really have something to be thankful for tonight.  First of all, at this point in our evening, dinner and bathtime are behind us.  Whew.  And secondly, Lily didn’t take a nap today which means she’ll probably fall asleep during story time!  Even Leo didn’t take a great nap today so he might be done early as well.   It’s one of my favorite nights for TV (I like Pushing Daisies!)  The hard part of the day is over and it’s smooth sailing from here! 

Today marks the 4th anniversary of the filling of the pool.   Lily and I celebrated by heating up the hot tub and pouring in bubbles.  The backyard is a bubbly mess, but it was worth it.  Diane wouldn’t let Leo come in.   I think she was afraid we’d lose him in the bubbles.

We hit ToysRUs this morning and knocked out probably 90% of the shopping.  Now…where to hide all of this?

I went into work for about two hours this afternoon and hit the grocery store.  The grocery store was a mad house by 2:30.  And I loved every minute of it.  I love watching the frenzy.  It’s the same way the day or two before a hurricane.  I was in and out in about a half hour, so I didn’t do too bad.

Today’s lesson:  ham bones are bad for dogs.  Real bad.  This isn’t a lesson we’ve learned around here – our dogs are just fine, curled up in my bed, I’m sure.  However, I have it on good authority that a full ham bone can mess you up!

We’ve had our breakfast and we’ve planned a morning trip to Toys R Us.  Lily and Leo are both dressed and we’ll be leaving after Leo has his breakfast.  Surprisingly, it seems the weekday mornings don’t really get started around here until after 9:15 – which, coincidentally, is right after the beginning of Regis and Kelly.  I’ve noticed no one leave the house until 9:15.  Flights are scheduled to leave and arrive from the airport so that we don’t have to leave until after 9:15.  Want to mess things up around here?  Schedule a doctor’s appointment for 8:30.  Want us to pick you up at the airport?  Better not arrive before 9:15.

Sorry – kind of busy today.  It’s a nice quiet evening around here now – both Leo and Lily are asleep.  I’ve managed to do all four of my newspaper puzzles in a record 7 minutes – crossword, word jumble, suduko and the cryptoquote.

I went to work around noon after the party at Lily’s school.  Then I went to the cell phone store and came home.  Sounds like I need to run to the office for an hour or so tomorrow and then I should be done.

Actually, Thanksgiving is still a few days away.  But the Christmas decor has been up at our Lowe’s for several weeks now and I saw them unloading the first load of Christmas trees this weekend.  Everything started early this year.

Even my neighbor had his house fully lit and decorated this weekend.  Easily the first one in the neighborhood.  Might even be the first one in Brandon.

Lily was up bright and early this morning at 5:30.  Then she ate a huge breakfast.  Guess she was hungry.

We didn’t do too much this weekend, just regular weekend errands and chores.  Lily and I decided to replant the garden.  October’s weather was killer on the garden – everything suffered.  Yesterday we replanted broccoli, corn, peppers and spinach.  Our salad is doing ok – we’ve been picking a fresh salad almost at will.  I’ve never planted new plants and seed this late in the season so I’m hoping for a mild 60 or 80 days.

We had a gorgeous weekend – tons of sunshine and mild temperatures.  We had the windows open all weekend and spent a lot of time sitting on the porch.  You gotta love November! 

Our neighbors to our left moved out over the weekend.  Lily and I raided their garbage yesterday and scored a nice birdbath.  I know – probably shouldn’t be teaching my 3 year old to pick through other peoples garbage.

Today is Lily’s only day of school for the week.  She has her Thanksgiving party at school tomorrow and we’ll all go to that.  We have to bring dessert and water.

I think Leo is figuring out the system.  I also think he knows that little toothless smile of his gets him attention!

Diane is getting her hair done so I’m in charge.  Leo took a short nap while Lily and I played Chutes and Ladders.  (she won)  We’ve checked the pool chemistry (needs a cup or two of acid) and we are moving the hose around the yard from tree to tree. 

We have a chicken boiling for our soup and we made chocolate pudding for dessert.

Next we are going to paint Lily’s fingernails.

FSU is winning 24-16 but there is only 3 minutes to go.

We’ve made it to mid-morning Saturday. The pancakes have been eaten, everyone is dressed and I”m working on the grocery list.

It’s chilly this morning – I think we hit the low 40’s overnight so it’s a perfect day to make a big pot of Chicken Noodle Soup. Not sure Lily will be happy about that. I also have a craving for some fresh cookies – so we might do some baking today.

Diane is getting her hair done at 2:30 so that kills her afternoon.

I bought new phones for the house yesterday. Hopefully that will put an end to the constant switching of the phones that has to happen during most conversations. The replacement batteries for the old phones cost Fifty bucks and I have four phones needing batteries. Or I could buy a set of new phones for $100.

I’d like to thank everyone I came in contact with this morning for NOT pointing out the giant sticker on my pant leg that had the size on it.  I might as well have left all the price tags hanging on too.  You’d never see Anderson Cooper walking around with tags and stickers left on his new clothes.

Chilly start to our weekend with temps in the low 50’s this morning.   Sure glad I didn’t have to go roller blading in this wind.  Boy, oh boy – between the wind and the cold – my ears would hurt.

I pulled a muscle in my back yesterday morning and immediately took one of the magic pill combinations my dr. prescribed.  I don’t think I had a single minute of relief yesterday and last night was down right miserable.  This morning I took a couple of Aleve and I’m feeling much better.  My finger is healing nicely.  It’s reduced to a small cut and the skin is tender and pink.  Kind of hurts to type.  Not sure I’ll ever have a normal finger print from that finger again.

I’m having lunch today in Lakeland…mmmmm, BBQ!  It just isn’t Friday without BBQ.

We don’t have too much planned for the weekend – and that’s a good feeling!

Only 40 days to Christmas!

I hope everyone managed to catch the wonderful performance by Celion Dion on the Today Show this morning.  Her air guitar was awesome.  I think I’m bleeding from my ears.

I was cut off this morning, rather rudely, by a car emblazened with University of Wisconsin Badger stickers.

Nice morning here today.  Low 60’s and sunny.  Lily and I sang Little Mermaid songs all the way to school this morning.  She had a rough morning which began at 4:20am.  Not sure what she wanted, all I ever got from her was that her bear fell off the bed.  Diane went up and got her back down.  And then this morning, we had a “discussion” about how many grapes she really needed to go with her breakfast.  She was in a better mood for the ride to school, but I expect she’ll be in need of a nap by midday. 

I know I will be.

I hear Iowa is nice this time of the year…  Click here for Story

Lunch is over, but not without having to round up the neighbor’s dog.  Needless to say, Weezy and Skeeter were a bit bothered by the strange dog we housed in the backyard for a few moments while we figured out what to do with it.

Still no news on the car.  As of 10:30 this morning, it wasn’t ready yet.

Here’s some local news… Apparently some kid thought there was money hidden in the 6 inch pipe he was drilling a hole in.  Turns out it wasn’t a money pipe but, in fact, an ammonia pipe.  This is about 5 miles away as the crow walks so we were just outside of the new’s helicopters flight path last night.    Click here for Story

Lily asked me why “glass cleaner (Windex) is blue?”  And then she asked me what the white part of our eye is called.   I don’t know Lily…good questions.    Yesterday, during lunch, I said next time it cools off we should make a pot of my famous Chicken Noodle soup.  Lily isn’t a fan of my soup and said, “tell you what.  You can make your soup again when I’m dead”.  We don’t discuss “dead” or “kill” around the house.  I self-edit when I come across those words or concepts in her stories.  Things usually just “go away”.  So she’s no doubt picking this up from school.