Today we held the first Beer Can Regatta of the year, and had a great turnout – Spike, Voodoo, Dancer, Prelude, Camelot and Caribbean Hug. Monte and I each jumped on one of the Catalina 30’s. Robert finished first and took home a bottle of Buckeye Vodka. So smoooooth! After the race a party ensued. More on that later.
We had a fantastic shower put in when we remodeled the house 2 years ago. We love it. It has natural tumbled travertine stone on the outside. But on the inside, I picked a matching ceramic tile. I did this as a last minute change, on the advice of a friend, because she’s had both and said the ceramic tile would be so much easier to maintain than the travertine on the inside where the surfaces would be wet.
I am SOOO glad I did that. But I have to say, it’s no small task to keep the grout clean. I’ve fallen in love with bleach gel pens… the gel sticks to the surfaces and every now and then I just put that in the grout for a little while and scrub and rinse it away.
However, one bleach pen doesn’t go very far in this shower, holding only a couple of ounces of bleach gel. So…. I decided to try make my own. Here’s what I ended up with. I tried this in a small batch, and it seemed to work ok. I’ve heard you want to use this infrequently, though, it can be tough on the grout.
Homemade Bleach Paste
– 1 part bleach
– 5 parts baking soda
– 2 parts water
Tonight was a good night. We celebrated Laura’s birthday by going out for a girlfriends dinner @ Uchiko. The food was fantastic. Edamame, sushi, sashimi, boquerones, vino … everything was delicious.
I’ll leave you with this: “A True Friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words.”
Peace out 🙂
I had a doctor’s appointment this afternoon which took me downtown. Since I was in the neighborhood, I just had to stop by the Sno-Beach snocone stand. If you’ve never had one, you must. It will change your life. If you don’t live in Austin, fly or drive down here as soon as you can and get one. They make the absolutely, hands-down, indubitably BEST snocones on the planet. If any of you are skeptical, I’d even put money on it. And I NEVER make a bet unless I’m sure I’m right (even when i’m wrong) 😀
Even though there were about 30 people in front of me when I got there, and when I left I was in the middle of rush hour traffic on Mopac, it was worth it.
I’d like to work on ways to transform my blog into something more interesting for other people to follow. Up til now I’ve mostly been doing this for my own enjoyment. The Daily Post is hosting a Post-a-Day-2011 and Post-a-Week-2011 challenge, an online community really, for bloggers to share their posts and inspire eachother. It started at the beginning of the year, but I’m joining mid-way (or in work-speak, at the end of 2Q 🙂 ). I recently completed my own 365-project (a year of posting one photo taken of a moment from each day) but I have been and will continue to post here. So, in search of inspiration, today I signed up for the once a week version, check it out:
Oh, wait, one more thing! Here is a link to a video that my friend Teri took of us on Cupholder last weekend as we were all headed up to Cypress Creek Cove for the raftup. (we’re the little boat in the distance that Teri and Jim are catching up with quickly). It was WINDY… and we had 2 reefs in, so only a tiny bit of sail up, but we were MOVIN’! It’s good to be back…
Finally, finally, finally – we have some much needed rain in the forecast. The front arrived right before midnight. Yay!
Today is the Summer Solstice of 2011 – Summer arrived at 12:16 pm local time. Now it ought to REALLY get hot (!)
Google sez the word solstice comes from the Latin words for “sun” and “to stop,” due to the fact that the Sun appears to stop in the sky. On the solstice the sun reaches its highest point in the sky and stays above the horizon for the longest amount of time all year (14h 06m 08s for us in Austin). Shorter days are ahead. However, the earliest sunrise and latest sunset do not coincide with the summer solstice. The earliest sunrise actually occurred on June 14 in Austin, while the latest sunset is not due until June 27.
When IBM employees reach their 25 year service anniversary they enter the Quarter Century Club (QCC). One of the perks is that IBM will foot the bill for a dinner with 10 or so of your closest colleagues. Many of the people I work with are in the QCC zone. Boy, I must be getting old 🙂
One of my colleagues, Frank, from Raleigh had a QCC dinner tonight in Austin. I’ve worked with most of the folks there for over 10-20 years, and with Frank for over 15 years. IBM also has a tradition of compiling a book of letters from colleagues that is presented to the person. Each time I write one of those letters it’s always a nice trip down memory lane.
I had a good time. Lots of strories were told, and lots of laughs. Whenever these get togethers break up people always say …. let’s do this again soon. But time flies.
Oh, that reminds me… I said I would host the next happy hour the last time a bunch of the old Boca bunch got together. I better get on it….
I’ve been in a bit of a funk the last few days. I’ve taken no photos. It’s not that we haven’t been busy, or that I haven’t had my camera with me.
Maybe it’s the incredible heat that has been with us for the last month or so (as of June 18 we’ve had 14 100+ degree days in Austin!). And it’s still spring! We are back on the lake, though, thank goodness.
Maybe it’s the work thing dragging me down… there’s sooo much to juggle, struggling with how to make progress by the end of each day.
Maybe it’s all the things on my todo-list in my head that aren’t getting done. We have so few commitments outside of ourselves and work, compared to other families. But why is it I can’t seem to get all the stuff done that I want done?
Maybe it’s that my mind has been on my mom. But the good news is that she is now back at home (her home), with drains/staples from the surgery removed. And she has not needed a transfusion since the day before the surgery, which was about 6 weeks ago. Which is amazing and fantastic and the best that we could have expected.
Well, for whatever reason, I don’t have any moments captured to post here from the last few days. So I thought I’d post something to let you know I’m still here. And even though I don’t have photos to post, I can post an update of what we’ve been up to.
On Friday, Monte put the sail on, which meant he had to lace the sail onto the new mast hoops (that would have been a great picture). He took Cupholder out for a sail in strong winds and she did great.
On Saturday, we headed out for the June Full Moon Raftup, in Cypress Creek Cove – Cupholder, Marty & Sue on Caribbean Hug, Robert & Robert on Voodoo, Jim & Teri on Island Time, and Kurt, Wally, Kevin on Dancer. We got all settled in by about 7pm or so. But the motor boats and their wakeboarders were buzzing around until after sunset. So it was pretty churned up for a while. We were able to finally cook dinner at about 9 or 10, when the wake died down. We celebrated Teri’s birthday eve with a cake, Buckeye vodka, and iPod wars. (That would have been a great picture) A good time was had by all 🙂
On Sunday, the wakeboarders returned before 7AM, so we decided to head back very early. We had a great sail in strong winds back to the marina, and spent the rest of the afternoon hanging on B-dock and floating. Joe showed up. Wiz was on Allegro. We helped Lori rig her new main sheet block. (That would have been a great picture) Seems like all the other boats made it back from the raftup by 2 or so. Monte and I were very tired when we got back home and didn’t get much of anything done so we gave in to the sleepiness and turned in.
Here’s to Monday and the start of a new week. Let’s see if the funk lifts…
Today IBM celebrated its 100 year birthday. And I’ve been there for 20 of them (!). All of the IBM sites held centennial celebrations. At the Austin town hall meeting we were treated to a live performance of the original IBM rally song “Ever Onward” – from the days when companies had rally songs 🙂
Monte and 4 other IBMers performed. Nice job guys.
After work we headed out to the lake to step the mast (yay!). Hard to believe we took the rig down just about 8 months ago. Wow. We had lots of great help from Marty, Joe, Kurt, Robert and Wiz. We backed Dancer out of its slip and used the halyards from Prelude and Allegro to raise the mast up into the air over Kurt’s slip. Then we moved Cupholder under the mast and lowered it into place. It was over in no time! I do love being on B-dock, we can do anything we set our minds to 🙂 Here is a shot of the mast being hoisted:
Next, bending on the sail and then going for a SAIL!
The masts and spars have gotten their last coat of varnish. Tonight, with the help of our friend, Marty, we rigged the mast and spars with the hoops, hardware, boom, gaff and flag halyards, forestay, and topping lift. She’s ready to step!
Tomorrow we will head to the lake after work to step the mast. We’re going to do it old school, using the halyards from 2 boats next to Cupholder to raise and then lower the mast into place.
I’ve mentioned before that we have many bluejays in the trees in our yard. Every year we see babies. This one isn’t a tiny baby, but he is a new, young jay.
I have seen 3 or 4 babies around. And I definitely hear them chattering right outside my office window. We had the sprinkler on yesterday and they were playing in the spray.
Today this one hung out in this shrub for most of the afternoon. I caught several shots of him napping on the branch, but I decided to use this one because it is the only one where he stepped out into sunlight.
One of the bloggers that I follow posted several miscellaneous factoids the other day, one of which was that a tiny owl and spider could be found in the detail on a one dollar bill. I wanted to see for myself, but I didn’t have a magnifying glass. So…. I took a macro shot instead.
I wasn’t able to see the spider, but I was able to find the owl. Can you see it? If not, this should help:
We worked in the yard today, cutting down one of several trees out back that have died in the last few years of drought. Whew, that’s hot work!
We ended up at the lake, of course. This is the typical scene on any weekend, and sometimes weekday evening, on B-Dock.
We played with Marty & Sue, Joe, Kurt, Wally, Kevin, and new B-docker friend, David.
Over the weekend Monte repainted the barn doors on the shop. They look great. We made the doors ourselves, which was quite the project. The rest of the siding on the shop is hardiboard, so it doesn’t need much maintenance but the doors are wood and the weather is hard on them here.
Here’s a shot from before the shop was there. Hard to believe it’s been 2 years. And it’s nearly 5 years since we bought the house(!). Where does the time go?
I’ve taken several shots of the morning glory already this year. It sprouted about four months ago, has grown up the arbor, and has bloomed beautiful pink blooms. And, though Summer isn’t here yet for 2 more weeks, it’s getting ready to recycle all its energy into seed for next year. I should take a bunch of this seed and scatter it all along the fenceline and see what comes of it next year. 🙂
Sheila365 