Jumpin' At The Woodside

Apparently, the answer to that question is “Yes.” The events that occurred this past Friday afternoon (July 28) were difficult and unexpected. This is what happened... I was in the office until around noon then I came home to be here when the cable guy arrived. Once here, I showed the cable guy around. He was going to install cable, Internet and digital phone service. He climbed up the pole and when he came down and started working around the house I kept hearing phrases like "This isn't good" and "It's worse than I thought." Apparently our house needs to be rewired for cable. Even though there are alleged cable outlets all over the house, we only had one viable connection downstairs in our living room. We have one of our extra bedrooms upstairs set up for the office. Our phone lines were pretty much non-existent even though like the cable, there were outlets all over the house. The cable guy was able to put an extra outlet in the living room for the modem....

Written Friday, July 21, 2006 Photos taken Sat., July 22, 2006. We closed on our new house on Mon., July 17 in Charlotte, drove back to Virginia, where the movers packed us and loaded the truck Wed. – Fri. Now, here it is Fri. afternoon and I’m standing in the new house. It feels like ages ago when we were here on Mon., it’s been a long week. I brought the three cats with me and Lago has the dog. Our belongings are set to arrive tomorrow, Sat., and Lago should be here tomorrow or Sun. The cats and I will be spending our first night in the house tonight. The cats were very good for the most part on the drive down. Each was in their own carrier and Lago sedated them early this morning for the drive. Not a peep was heard from Flipper and Ella, but Vita was not happy about the drive and I let her wander around the car in her delirious state in hopes she would eventually quiet down. She took naps, but never for very long. Finally, she went back in the carrier on her own and I locked her in ...

I was in New York City this week for meetings at the Time Warner Center. There’s nowhere in the world that smells like New York. It has a perfume of trash, sewage, traffic, sweat and cart vendors. I wasn’t able to take in any entertainment, but had some excellent meals at the Red-Eye Grill and Smith & Wollensky’s . I had the jumbo gulf prawns at the Red-Eye, enormous shrimp with the bodies still attached. At Smith & Wollensky’s I had the butcher style filet – momma mia, good eatin’. I also had drinks at the Stone Rose Lounge which overlooks Columbus Circle and Central Park. A very cool spot for cocktails with big, cushy leather sofas and chairs, and an amazing view. View from the 46th floor of my hotel.

We recently had some animal medical issues, but nothing too serious. Our dog Jilly (aka JP Stinker Butt ) got into a scuffle with one of the dogs while staying at Lago’s parents. Their dog CP (aka Christmas Puppy) bit Jilly in the face during the night. We didn’t find out until later that Jilly bit CP back. CP had a minor cut under her chin, but she’s fine. Lago stitched up Jilly and she was zonked out when I first brought her home, but she’s feeling better and doing fine. In other news, our oldest cat Flipper had some bad teeth removed – he’s 12 years old. Flipper doesn’t like to be closed in a cage and was not happy to spend the night at the hospital. He had eight teeth removed in all. The staff at the hospital asked me to put him in his carrier when I picked him up, but he barely let me handle him and I’ve had him since he was a kitten. Once I got him in the car, he was quiet and rubbed his head on the front of the carrier. Vita, our female grey cat who looks just like Flipper, welc...

This 4th of July holiday weekend started off with a bang, literally. A few nights ago around 1:30 a.m., Lago and I were woken from a sound sleep by a large crash. After shaking the sleep from my head, I discovered the mirror over my bedroom dresser had fallen off the wall and was lying on the floor smashed into a million pieces. From the looks of it, the weight of the mirror had loosened the nail in the drywall and simply gave way. The mirror was part of a solid cherry bedroom furniture set purchased in the 1960s by my parents and was quite heavy. After getting some gloves and a box to place the broken glass in, I soon discovered the exact age of the mirror when I saw a date on the back of a large jagged piece - February 8, 1960, the mirror was 46 years old. The mirror’s cherry frame was fine and I saved that. The box of broken glass went out for the trash yesterday. The next day I felt kind of unnerved by the event, not that I think the mirror falling had any meaning, but having a lou...

This week wrapped up my third straight week traveling down and back to Charlotte. Now I'll finally be here at the lounge for awhile. With the July 4th holiday coming up, I won't be making a trip next week so I have myself a nice four-day weekend to be six-foot kickin' it! I'll work a few days from home before my next trip, which may be to New York City for a meeting instead of Charlotte. I'll find out next week. Last night was my first home-cooked meal since I don't know when. Lago fired up some steaks on the grill along with some big gulf-coast shrimp ("skimps"), corn on the cob and a grilled veggie medley of green beans, asparagus and summer squash done in olive oil and garlic – booyah! Lago picked up some fine wines as well and we opened the Blenheim Vineyards Chardonnay, an excellent traditional "oaky" chardonnay from the vineyard partially owned by Dave Matthews in Charlottesville. Lago also picked up some mussels that are promised for t...