The Calm Before the Back-to-School Storm

Alas, we still have no photos. Our pre-startup routine is pretty boring, because we are trying to maintain as low a profile as possible.

Bubby and I did run to St. George to do a temple session on Thursday afternoon. One Dutchman down, 19 to go in this batch. After the session, we hooked up with Uncle Rol, Auntie Nell, Uncle Bill, and Aunt B at 'Nesto's. I don't think they enjoyed their dinner as much as Bubb and I enjoyed sharing our tostado grande. After some pleasant conversation, Bubby and I hooked on to the boat and hauled it to Cedar City. I was going to have my neighborhood mechanic take a look at my electrical problems.

Friday was a busy work day, but Bubb and I drove over to Tropic to attend the wedding reception of a friend's daughter in the evening. We saw John Yardley there, and had a nice visit. We even got to have our favorite club sandwich at the Bryce Pines.

Saturday was a work day. I had promised Bubby two things this summer. One was to take a look at the under-mattress support on our bed and other was to clean off the work bench in the garage. When I took the mattresses off to take a look, the steel frame had come unclamped. I also noticed that some of the plastic inserts in the six support legs had broken and slipped so that they were no longer offering resistance to the weight of the sleepers. We tried to replace them at the Home Depot, but they didn't have anything like what we needed. I figured out how to do it with lock washers and nuts, and I put the bed frame back together. I got thinking that it might be worthwhile to add four 1 x something slats to help distribute the sleeping load, particularly on my side of the bed. So back to the Depot we went and obtained the necessary materials.

After the bed, I started on the bench. Lots of accumulation, but by 2:30 PM, I had it pretty well cleaned up. My neighborhood mechanic had been in Mesquite, and he called and offered to take a look at the boat. It turned out that the battery cable ends had not been properly crimped at the factory and that was the source of most of the problems. The big motor has a circuit that allows the charging of the trolling motor battery, and that wasn't working either. It took him less than an hour to track it down. Can't wait to see if my trolling motor and electronics are working. Maybe later this week.

We celebrated the first picking of green beans in the garden on Saturday, as well. It looks like the beginning of great things. We shared some with a neighbor who had been watching the progress of the beans over the fence and started dropping off produce in exchange as he saw them approaching maturity.

On Sunday, we enjoyed a leisurely morning, entertained Daniel, Rosalyn, and the kids for lunch, and played a few games to fill in the afternoon. Bubby has been trying to clean out the fridge, and noticed she had the key ingredients for a big lasagna. I encouraged her to put a little mild Italian sausage in it, and we had enough baby eggplants to also put a layer of sauteed eggplant in the mix. It was fabulous, the eggplant being a highlight. We also had a big bowl of green beans (Drewfy ate a ton) caprese salad, an antipasta salad, bread, some roasted veggies, and an apple cobbler with ice cream (the last two items courtesy of Daniel and Rosalyn).

Today, it all begins. We have our opening meeting this morning, and Bubby's organization is having their opening meetings this afternoon. I will be keeping an eye on Drewfy and Mevelyn this evening while their Mom and Dad go to back to school night at the SUU pre-school. I will take a camera.

Buboppy