Tag: Restaurants

Fall Camera Shots, Baby Showers, and an Evening OUT!

On By BackporchwriterIn Dogs, Home, Restaurants11 Comments

I was in the laundry room – you know – doing laundry and ironing and all that great stuff. I looked down and laughed. Maisy was all in the sheets and hanging out with me. When we left to go vote, she actually slept in there. So I’m thinking of making her a bed there for when we are gone. Roger seems to take over the dog beds (all of them) and so she won’t get on them unless I have a clean blanket over them. So I think I will just put a blanket there for while we are gone then Roger will go for the softer bed and leave her area alone.

Not long ago I used a credit on Audible to download Hamilton. I was shocked at what my credit was bringing me. Wow! Thirty Five hours of listening time. THIRTY FIVE HOURS!

It seems that when I go back and forth from house to car – it doesn’t sync. Maybe there is some setting I’m missing, but I have to listen to it over again usually (you can’t fiddle with things in the car while driving). So I decided I would have a dedicated laundry time book going since I spend a lot of time in there every week. So, yeah…wonder how many months it will take me to get through this one? lol

Got the kitchen clean! It wasn’t too bad but I did have a few dishes to clean up after the Friday night spaghetti dinner.

She is my special girl, following me around the house wherever I am working.

Friends asked us out to dinner last night and we had a splendid time. On the square in Lebanon, TN eating at a new to us place called “Town Square Social”. Oh my gosh. It is wonderful. An old building with modern touches and yes a very social atmosphere. I don’t think there were a lot of social distancing going on. It was crowded. And we had a great time eating off of this WIDE range of a menu. It had bar food, but it had salads, tacos, burgers, pizzas, wings, mac and cheese, grilled cheese sandwiches, Nashville Hot dishes. And the food was special, not your average. (Sorry dudes in the windows).

We had wings, chicken nachos, and pizza for the table. Then we each ordered our own meal, knowing we would likely have 2nd’s for another meal today. The pizza was from their wood fired oven and was just a piece of heaven. I want to go back for more! We are putting it on the calendar to accompany a Lebanon Christmas shopping trip one Saturday.

Lebanon, TN is about a 20 to 30 minute drive from our house. Reaching it’s outskirts in about 15 but the innards of the city is probably more like 30. It’s a small town with quite a bit of growth lately and of course we have decided to “rediscover” what it has to offer with this upcoming trip. (Yay more to video, LOL).

Here was the brick inside the building. I took a pic mainly as it is “texture” I can use as transition pieces between videos.

So I took some pics outside with the camera and some video of the fall trees and George mowing. Really just wanted to see if I could video properly. I also did some videoing inside the house. Just kindof redoing some of the video I had messed up earlier having it on the wrong settings or SOMETHING!! Everything came out ok. I guess I took both raw images and jpeg images and need to learn more about that. As I got a TWOFER (two for one surprise). I think I had it on the settings that the guy in the video told me to have it on. I’m anxious to see the differences b/w the two and to learn more about what it is doing b/w the raw and jpeg. I have no idea what I’m doing yet. But. I know more than I did and was happy with the images from yesterday. George did a great job cleaning up the yard a bit and doing a final (maybe we’ll see) mow.

Here playing around with the focus spot through the lens. Focusing here on the bench chair in the woods.

Here focusing on the closer object, the leaves. I love, love, love, being able to do this where it is blurry in the background!

LOOK! It’s a drive-by greeting!

So the leaves are starting to turn with the recent cooler temps. The day temps are still very warm 60’s to 80’s.

You can see the cemetery begin to come into view.

And there is our house from the cemetery.

And a focus in on the leaves in front of me…

The camera did a wonderful job of capturing the detail on the tombstones.

And of course this morning, I had leftovers as I watched The Wynn’s getting back to their boat in Tonga. Yeah I know, so much for diet mode. Thus drinking lots of water, not planning on eating again til dinner, and planning a lower calorie – perhaps even a cleansing day – for tomorrow!

Just kind of a cloudy day today with a bit of rain moving into the area apparently. I’ve been behind on keeping up with the weather! Some days I’m surprised. That is NOT like me.

I’m going to be working on the iMovie some today I think. But I do have some other things I need to do – like a Target order for some household supplies. A friend at work is having a baby and I need to send something to her house. That is what I had planned all along that way she doesn’t have to wag it from work to home but it’ll be delivered. We can’t have any kind of parties at work, celebrations, or birthdays now, due to COVID. No sharing of food or anything. They did set up a table for her at work with balloons and flowers. It was very pretty. But lonely with no people or love surrounding it.

Katy had a shower yesterday given by her friends. I am not sure what I can share/not share. I think she didn’t want a lot shared by video but I think she is ok with a few things in the blog. I’m pretty sure I’m safe to share these few things if I rub out some details of the location. They are not allowed to share anything with company logo, or property etc. The shower is not on the property though. Isn’t she pretty, my girl? I put a star over the ranch name. In case you wonder what that is, LOL.

This is how big the baby is!
Party kitchen, it’s just Gorgeous!
Caramel Apples

The shower was so pretty. Looks like a wonderful fall theme related to pumpkins “Little Pumpkin on its way!”. I can’t wait to see all the things she got for the shower. Looking forward to that facetime call! And that is all she wrote for today!

Good Eating and Good Authors!

On By BackporchwriterIn Food, Restaurants4 Comments

The Eating has been GOOD the last couple of days – not that it’s NOT when we are home, but you know how much I love to eat out. It was always a treat growing up and we’d go out a lot back then any time we went to church which was every time the door was open. When George and I first married we didn’t go out as much unless we met our families. It was a money thing. I had to get used to staying home a lot, no shopping and all that. But through the years, with promotions, and paying off things we began to eat out more and more especially for all the special occasions (if we didn’t have one, we’d invent one) and when meeting friends. We love to eat out and try new things and get inspirations for things to fix at home. 2020 has NOT been the year for experimental cuisine spots, but it has been a year of COMFORT FOOD. We had a $25 gift card to use up at Cracker Barrel. And I was so proud of our Cracker Barrel here. Not only was the landscaping lovely but they added a temporary outside seating area so they could accomodate more people (not lose money) during the social distancing requirements.

We had good conversation about our work and about politics and the election and the coronavirus. I mean what else would we talk about. There is one more subject I suppose, but we left that one under the table, LOL.

Well, GEEZ, what do you do when Blackberry Cobbler is in season? Ya go for it. Oh my a bowl of heaven right there. It was little. It was good. Not sorry.

The gift shop was enticing at Cracker Barrel as always. And look….it’s a Christmas SLOTH.

Of course you know this corner speaks to me with our little wildlife yard. Speaking of….I saw the SKUNK last night.

We smelled him the night before when he permeated all the way to the highway to our house. But last night I saw him out with the deer in our backyard. Neither were considering each other a threat. I’ve seen deer and skunk together before. Might have been in the cartoon Disney movie, with Bambi LOL. But I believe I saw them hanging out in a state park in the Land Between the Lakes area. Saw the deer first then the skunk. I remember thinking it was like a zoo area with a pet skunk and was running to it and my grandfather said “un uh nope nope – that’s not a pet”. Oops! It was at a visitor center and in a fenced but open area, so I had thought it must be a pet. I’m glad he saved me from my curiosity and subsequent hotel tomato bath during our travels.

So last night I met my friend Christy at Smiley Thai coming from work. They had THE BEST Halloween decor ever!! This was a lot of fun.

I ordered the noodle PHO last night with Chicken and also had ordered Sushi. I took this pic after I’d eaten most of the chicken. The noodles were a bit hard to eat with my spoon but I managed to eat a lot with my chopsticks. I still couldn’t eat all the noodles and bean sprouts. But it was good for a rainy night as the cold front began to come through.

We enjoyed chatting and vowed to go get our toes done next week. Yay! Someone to go with! I miss my Kate and our pedicure outings. And I’m happy to have a friend that will go.

We downloaded the same book to do for a Bible Study. Hers is on line. Mine is audio. It’s a Max Lucado book. Anyway, I’m half way thru between these guys:

*Fierce, Free, and Full of Fire – by Jen Hatmaker (Like I need to read this one, LOL!) In this book she is basically giving you permission to be YOU and not worry about it. I knew I liked her when she said she argued with her publicist over which curse words they would allow to remain in the chapters (she is a religious speaker/writer, lol). Not that I like cursing, but if we are all being honest here – we all know that even elder’s wives say the S word – a LOT. Even I cursed when spilling the communion in the car before taking it to a shut in. It happens. I don’t like it, but I’m honest and I’ll ocassionally say S***, H***, or D*** to make a point. But I do not want to hear the GD word. That is a no no. Unfortunately though, this author has found a lot of criticism in her industry for not only her words but some of her beliefs. She is going through a divorce and her publisher dropped her like a hot potato for embracing some new open minded thoughts. I get it, or should I say I’m used to that. I think we all have to study to show ourselves approved and create our salvation through Jesus and with God and His plan. It’s our own responsibility to work this out so I’m no judge of that. But I draw strength from her character and spirit. And as a writer of a blog and of my own words, I can relate that when you say what you feel and what you know to be true and get called on the carpet for speaking the truth as if you were a devil served up on hot pancake. My motto is fix the problems people, don’t get mad at the writer for telling the truth. If you were ugly yesterday or caused a problem and didn’t want people to know it – then don’t be ugly, irresponsible, or causing problems and don’t be mad if it gets mentioned. Work on your issues and don’t attack the writer. Anyway I could go on but I won’t. I can relate to this writer’s spirit. And I believe I read somewhere that she will say everything you were afraid to. LOL. That’s me too! Don’t test me!

*Escape from the Ordinary – by Julie Bradley (Like I need that one either). This book is a couple who retire and sail and their adventures, some of which are pretty scary.

So once I finish with one of these I’ll start the Max Lucado book.

Anyway, it’s Friday and I’m so elated. This week has been a fast one. I’m working on quarter end and stuck on the Quarterly Reconciliation Sheet. It’s off about $1700 in the social security taxes. Neither me nor my boss have been able to find the answer for where it’s off yet. So she is having me go through every employee and do some calculations to see if it can be found. This will take forever, but here we go. As for the rest of the month, now I’ll be behind. Once I get information from others I can start doing some unemployment returns for the Transport side. And then when we get this reconciliation sheet balanced and I get info from others I can do the returns. So while I was ahead, this is the part that always gets behind but a lot if it is out of my control. I guess that is what worries me a lot about January is that I could get more of it done if I got the information earlier in the month. But likely it’ll all come to me when I’m gone and I won’t even get an opportunity to do the month on time. If the opportunity is not there then it’s hard to meet the goal. The train that couldn’t. It’s Engine was missing and so was the conductor. LOL LOL LOL

I better quit before I become a “Jen” and get dropped like a hot tater for my truth telling. As someone once told me The Truth is Hard. Yeah it is. Especially when put in black and white. But again, don’t attack the writer! Please. I just do the best I can with the world I’m given! I don’t get to write all the rules. I just write what happens. Or doesn’t happen.

So off to get this Friday done and put on the headphones I guess and listen to something as I try to find the missing $1700 some odd dollars and cents.

Ya’ll have a good weekend. Not a lot planned but laundry, cleaning, early voting, and maybe take a look to see if I can throw another movie together. Might record some more footage. Might need to do some more learning! lol But here is a good message for the day!

Saturday Shopping and Eating and Starting Camera Lessons Online

On By BackporchwriterIn Food, Restaurants5 Comments

It’s been an excellent weekend so far. After doing a private blog entry yesterday morning while sipping coffee, we headed out for a late breakfast and a shopping excursion. We had a pork roll bagel at “Pork Roll” Bagle shop. It was pretty darn good. Lots of fresh bagels to choose from.

It was definitely a breakfast hot spot yesterday. Doors open to let public know to come on in!

A rainy day as the Tropical Storm/Low Pressure center was heading our way. But here we are heading to the Providence area from some Hobby Lobby shopping.

Aren’t these little pics cute? Would be great if you owned one of these types or owned a dog grooming business or to put in a vet lobby or waiting room. So cute.

Lot’s of Christmassy going on there!

I really wanted one or two of these trees to set beside snowmen, etc. But I decided they would be too fragile and wouldn’t last long. I don’t want to have to buy special storage for them and I like things that will store easily and not be impacted. Things have to be easy these days.

At Hobby Lobby I bought some additional fall decor. I will show you some of the pieces if I get a chance to take a pic. Not a lot. I bought a few Christmas items also at the Dollar Tree which was close to our Bagel shop we went to.

I know a lot of my readers do not like Trump. But I had to laugh. I know that there was “someone” there that was bored while I shopped (uhum I won’t say who) but this “someone” — well, he showed me the fruits of his bored labor as we strolled through that section of the store. He said the letters were there, so why not. LOL LOL LOL. Don’t hold it against me please. I don’t get into politics, but I did think this was funny.

It’s begging to look a lot like fall!

We shopped at Aldi yesterday for a bit as it’s been a very long time. One of the reasons we go there is to get scallops, cheap but pretty good wine, chicken cordon bleu, and several other frozen items. I bought some kind of Keto ice cream that had a low amount of sugar and a lot of protein. It was mint chocolate chip and I’ll be getting another one of those! But a coworker told me about these wafer cookies. Does anyone really need it, of course not. The Knopper wafers. A wafer with chocolate and hazlenut cream.

I had one after dinner last night and they are a treat to behold. Sugars at 8g and 140 calories. Can’t eat a bunch but one here and there during a sweet craving might not be too bad. Has 2g of protein due to the nuts. Made in Germany and dist from Chicago. Will be a regular, and perhaps a stocking stuffer for a person or two or three.

What a cool way to store the wine while shopping, as taught to us by the lady that checked us out.

More of fall around our car. Yesterday was the most fall like day I think we’ve had so far as far as “looks” go. It was warm however, due to the tropical storm air that moved in from the South.

Heading home in our neighborhood. Storm clouds and rain moving on in for several hours of “off and on” moderate and sometimes heavy rain.

Late afternoon George provided us with an appetizer. This is using carrots, butter lettuce (or a soft lettuce – not as crunchy) and imitation crab meat, and rice wrappers.

For the evening meal George fixed shrimp and grits. And we finished watching the first season of Yellowstone. The next season is on it’s way!

So yesterday afternoon I started to download videos and go through footage I have. I can’t use most of it. So I’m normally pretty good at videoing myself when I’m staying in one spot. However, I did a segment yesterday and it was wayyyyyy blurry. I’m not sure what I did. I have a LOT of footage and a lot of it is unusable. Any iphone videos are fine. But, I decided to finally just stop yesterday and do an instructional video starting at the beginning for understanding my camera. I did learn a lot by watching a 2 hour video which helped me understand the buttons and getting around on the digital screens and menus and what each does. Of course there is a LOT to it. I’m not perfect – no where near. But at least there is some progress toward the learning curve. I need to watch the vlogging ones though and learn that specifically. I need to learn how to move around with it. And I need to learn how to grab it and go as far as vlogging. I vlogged my returning home with my goodies yesterday from the store and wanted to show you all what all I got and even with the camera still – it came out blurry and unusable. So I have to figure this thing out or I will shy away from it. It costs too much to shy away from it. This is why I’ve been afraid to use my drone. lol I’m sure the camera has more settings and more to learn on it, but I’ll get there. I’ll get there because I want to!

Anyway, I’m going to have to accomplish a few things in addition to my continued learning today. I need to iron and vacuum and do an order for LTD Commodities. Need to do a few things to make sure I’m ready for the work week – vitamins, food, drinks, etc.

Anything else I get done will be icing on the cake. Oh I will say that I do have some pretty good footage of Columbia and so I’ll still try to get another video done but oh my it will be choppy as I have such little good footage from all I thought I had. Still some segments are ok. So a lot to go through. Might be a while on the next one, but if I don’t learn how to properly VLOG with the camera, it will be a LONG while before the NEXT one. lol

It’s all a learning curve though and I’ve come a long way. Still a long way to go.