Category Archives: knoxville

How Pattie Got Her Snooze Back

Song Lyric of the Day:

Goes from zero to 60 in three point five / Baby you got the keys / Now shut up and drive / (Drive, drive, drive)

Rihanna / “Shut Up and Drive

10:56PM.
Well, somehow I made it through last week. Mostly because I mainlined gallons of delicious, caffeine-laded soda (“pop” to my extended family in Iowa and South Dakota). But, really, driving 2,328 miles round-trip through five states and back takes a while to recover from. And that time estimate of 15 hours? Wayyyyy off. By a few hours. So what was last week like?

First Meal of the Day: Dinner
Since Rich and I didn’t get home until 3AM Monday morning (thank God Papa Doug rode home with us and helped with some of the driving), we took Monday as our fifth and last day of bereavement leave to sleep in. And did we ever sleep in — we woke up for the day at 2:30PM. My awesome parents, sister, and brother-in-law were gracious enough to keep Snoops and Caleb one night longer than we’d anticipated, and for that we can’t thank them enough. Not having to worry about waking up early to feed and walk them allowed us to get the sleep we desperately needed. As it is, it was all we could do to muster the energy to go and pick our kids up. Both dogs pretty much crapped out as soon as we got them home. Snoops spent the previous six days chasing cats around my parents’ house, while Caleb exhausted himself playing with his cousins, particularly his horse collar-wearing Mastiff cousin, Moose, his new BFF.


A Phantom Menace

I had an ENT appointment to try and get to the bottom of the aggravating, ever-present, seemingly phantom congestion I still feel in
my left nostril. Hard to believe, but after my painful sinus surgery last year, I honestly believed I’d be breathing easy. Silly me. The good news is that, as my doctor put it, everything is fine mechanically. So that day I accidentally smacked my still-recuperating nose and that extra-hard nose bump Caleb gave me not long after didn’t undo or break anything. The bad news? Seems some of my allergies might be back. I’m now using a new nasal spray to see if it finally clears up the congestion. It’s only the thirtieth or so nasal spray I’ve used in my life, so surely this will be the magic one, right? Fingers crossed!

Workin’ for a Livin’
I got through the work week. Somehow.

Superdragin’ the Day After
Rich and I caught the Friday night Superdrag show at Barley’s Taproom & Pizzeria. I, of course, felt like the proverbial old woman since the show started at 10PM, also known as The Time Pattie Gets Into Her Jammies. As it is, the opening act, Mic Harrison and the High Score (pretty cool band), didn’t take the stage until about 10:30PM. By the time Superdrag hit the stage, it was almost 11:45PM. Rich and I were energetic enough throughout most of the show, but by the time it ended at about 1:40AM, we were both so pooped we could barely clap. Sure, we got hom
e at 2AM, but it was totally worth it. Not only did we enjoy a great show (although I wished they’d performed “Baby Goes to 11”), but we got to say hi to John Davis, the group’s lead singer and a friend of ours from high school.

Another Weekend Down the Drain
After sufficiently recuperating from the Superdrag concert, Rich and I tackled myriad home improvement and organizational tasks. It was tiring, but it felt good to restore a bit of order to the house after having been away. Our new entertainment center (in black-brown) is assembled and full of DVDs and our guest bathroom now has a new toilet, giving us a grand total of four brand-new toilets throughout the house. Now we just need new tubs and show
ers. And a couple thousand dollars with which to buy them.

Booking It
I managed to work on my book a bit more. Yay me. Third chapter, here I come.

***

That’s about all I can think of tonight. Hopefully I can continue catching up on my TV shows this week so I can write a bit about the fall season so far. Although I did manage to (barely) watch most of Viva Laughlin‘s (already gone from CBS.com) premiere the other night. I couldn’t stop watching. It was one of those “I know something horrible is going to happen so I absolutely cannot dare to look away now and should make popcorn to munch on while I watch” compulsions. Which is why I wasn’t remotely surprised to read it got canceled today, making it the season’s first major casualty. Here’s hoping producer and guest star Hugh Jackman takes some consolation in the fact that he’s the hottest mutant to ever grace the big screen. Be strong, Hugh. Be strong.

Before I go, let me say thanks to those of you who’ve left comments, emailed, and passed your condolences along in person. The support really means a lot.

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MacPattie

Song Lyric of the Day:

I’m retracing every step in my head / What did I miss back then? / I was so, so misled

Rooney / “When Did Your Heart Go Missing?

10:35PM.
I killed two birds with one stone today. I’ve been wanting to take some of the Mac tutorials at West Town Mall’s Apple store and I’m indulging in the 33 Days of Pattie. So what to do? Attend the .Mac tutorial over lunch. My only classmate was a 70-year-old Frenchman. (“You can log in from anywhere? Tres bien!“) Now I feel much more confident about what .Mac can do and, more importantly, that I can get the most bang for my buck out of it. Which makes the hubby very, very happy. Now to back everything up on iDisk.

After a year, I’m pretty confident and comfortable with my MacBook, but I can certainly stand to develop a better appreciation for how to use its programs for maximum benefit. When it comes to technology, I have the patience of Dick Cheney on a quail hunt, which is something I really need to work on. Of course, I also seem to have some crazy gift for making technology turn on me. I’ve actually gotten the blue screen of death on my MacBook a few times, and that’s supposed to be a physical impossiblity; the husband is less than amused by my technological prowess. So if you see me heading your way while you’re working on a computer, be sure to save your work, and do it quickly. Because chances are, when I end up standing right next to you, your computer’s gonna go keyboard-up.

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Too Hot to Blog

Song Lyric of the Day:

We don’t have to take our clothes off / To have a good time / Oh no / We could dance & party all night / And drink some cherry wine / Uh huh

Jermaine Stewart / “We Don’t Have to Take Our Clothes Off

9:43PM.
This heat wave is killing me. That, combined with what this week’s episode of The Closer has now convinced me is early onset menopause (hi, paranoia!), have me so overheated I think if we harnessed my body’s heat output somehow I’d be able to serve as an alternative energy source for at least half of Knoxville. (Hmmm, maybe that’d get me free pizza at Mellow Mushroom.) To wit, it’s almost 10PM and it’s still 91 degrees outside.

The heat wave actually got us out of work early today. Our office’s power went out a little after 4:30 and still hadn’t come back on when I left 10 minutes later. Turns out it was an “official brownout.” Perhaps a heads up for the affected area would’ve been nice, don’t you think? It’s not like they didn’t know when it was going to happen, what with it being “official” and all, right? Bah.

So my apologies to the 12 of you (see what I did — I added one) who regularly stop by looking for updates. I just couldn’t manage yesterday since this heat done fried my brain.

10:51PM.
Okay, I’m done reading some of my usual blogs when I end up back on Yahoo and see this headline: “‘Girly men’ best for love.” Clicking on the link, the headline then becomes: “Feminine guys better for long-term love: study.” Okay. I read the article, which basically seems only to say: The majority of women picked men they’re pretty sure no other woman would want. Riiiiight.

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