They're here....

Actually, we're back. Did you see my wave, Mike?
I decided hubby needed to get out of the house. So even though we didn't go to the farm, we went to Florence South Carolina. Got a room Friday night at the Best Western. Was a nice room for the price ($77 including tax). Had a jacuzzi type bath - which felt good to hubby's back.

No stress to move on this morning. Had breakfast at Cracker Barrel. They asked where we were headed and we said 'we're here'. ;-)
We went to the farmer's market and the flea market they have there. Went to Agri Supply twice. Got stuff both times. Saw a real nice iron grill there. If I remember right it had a small smoker attached. At least that's what I think it was. Hubby really liked the grill. If they still have it and we're still here next summer, I expect we'll be getting one.

And, after all the turkey advice - which I really did appreciate - hubby surprised me by deciding to fry the turkey this year. Now I've been trying, on and off, for nearly 7 years to get the hubby to do this. I'm not complaining. I think for our first time it went really well.

We got a Carolina Cooker from Agri Supply. We had a 12 1/2 pound turkey. We put some onion and bell pepper and potato chunks in it. The only real problem we had was that the cooker doesn't seem.... strong enough? for the 28 qt fryer with a turkey in it. We got it back up to 325 F, but the burner just didn't seem to want to get back to that 375 F temp they recommend. (So some of the dark meat had to be microwaved.
But we will be doing this again. Overall we were very happy. The meat was not only juicy on Thursday; it was also juicy Friday.
And I made 5 cups of nice rich broth from the carcass. :-)

All in all been a really nice weekend so far.
I have to keep reminding myself that today is only Saturday.

Have a blessed Sunday, everyone!

R.I.P. Anne McCaffery

Her books gave me hours of reading pleasure. (Not many authors I can say that about.)
I know she passed the torch to her son. I hope he carries it well.
I think it's time to revisit Pern.

It's not nice to fool Mother Nature

But sometimes she does it to herself.

Hopefully you can see the new, bright green leaves on the pecan tree, and the other leaves that know it's almost December. ;-)

Launch has been rescheduled.

Probably for Christmas week, since he has to take vacation then anyway.
And we'll take the travel trailer with us.
I was really leery about a week in a hotel.
Especially with no plumbing in the farm house.
Except of course for emergency plumbing, i.e. the manual flushing system. ;-)

I thought about it while painting the bathroom. Thought about what he was saying last night, or what I thought he was saying and decided that now was not the time to go.
And he agreed. He also assured me that if he did not agree, he would have said so.
Good thing I already have a turkey in the freezer.

We (meaning me) will slowly move everything from the cargo trailer to the travel trailer. It will be tight, but I think we will be able to do it. And maybe a little more besides.

I am relieved.

That said, does anyone have a good recipe for roasting a turkey? I will be baking it in the oven this year and it always seems to not be cooked all the way.
Any tips from those of you who do turkey in the oven?

Hope you all have a blessed weekend!

T Minus 20 hours and holding.

Houston, we have a problem.

Well, to be honest, hubby's work has a problem. One that might keep us from going at all. But he didn't get off work until 1930 (7:30PM for non-military/gov't types) and didn't want to talk about it last night. Said he didn't need one more thing to think about right then.

And he has gone to work already as I type this.

The problem, among many, is he is the only one who can fix the problem. (He is also the only technician left in his office. All the others are <i>engineers</i>. Somehow, it was decided several budget cuts ago, that engineers are cheaper than technicians.
Go figure.

So they forced out or early retired all the other technicians.
(If only there would be an early retirement right nos.)

Hubby has seniority. They couldn't touch him before, but we're ready now. Even if he only gets 2 weeks to vacate like they did last time. We're gone.

And to be honest, it scares the crap out of his boss.

Because he is the only one who can do many of the things he does.

Now to give them the benefit of doubt, they do have 4 other people working on this particular problem with him.
This time.

But we don't (and may not at all) leave until the problem is fixed.

And we might not be able to talk about it tonight either.

I can deal with delay. I do not do well with uncertainty.

Not at all.

TGIF on a cold Friday morning.

4 days to go. :)

Yup. 4 days. I always get nervous before a trip. Afraid I'll forget something. Afraid we won't have enough money (though getting stuck in Louisiana is not necessarily a bad thing).
We're leaving at O dark thirty Saturday morning. (I would guess roughly 4-4:30 AM.) So that we can get to Florence, South Carolina about 10 AM.
They have a fairly large flea market there that we like to go to. We usually try to go one way or the other when going to the farm, but our travel days haven't been on the weekend lately. Since I talked him into leaving on a Saturday, we're planning on going on the way down.
And we'll get Popeye's Chicken for lunch. Just maybe not in Florence. As I recall, their chicken isn't consistent in quality.

Oh well. Happy Tuesday to you all!

About 9 days

Until our next trip to the farm. I know it's a farm in name only right now, but it's ours. Don't know when for sure because he's trying to get a couple extra days and that hasn't been approved yet.
I do know we get to pay the property taxes when we get down there this trip. Oh boy!

Wonder what the weather will be like?

We're taking the blue trailer and not the travel trailer, so we'll have to stay in a hotel. We haven't done that since his last business trip.

Nervous as always.

I want to say Thank You to any veterans who read this. I appreciate your service. Hope you enjoy your day tomorrow. And for everyone who has a three day weekend this weekend, hope you have a safe one!

Also, Happy Birthday to the U.S. Marines! Ooh Rah!

We had frost this morning.

I think that means fall is finally here. :) Going to warm up and get rain tonight though. The weekend is almost here and we get another hour of sleep this weekend. Yay! ;-) Hope you all have a blessed day. ♥

Happy November!

Hard to believe the year is almost over. Stay safe! ♥