SkyWatch Friday 07/31/26

It's been a lot longer than I thought since I linked up with everyone over at 

SkyWatch Fridays!  

July 8 was mine & the Spouse's 20th anniversary, and we went on a nice road trip to celebrate.  I have a LOT of pictures I could use for this post, but I'll use the ones I took out of the window of the plane.

Here's Part 1 in my travel misadventures.

 

A Grrrreat HodgePodge

Thanks to Joyce over at From This Side of the Pond for this week's HodgePodge. 

1. What was the last thing you celebrated?

Kind of half-heartedly - mine & the Spouse's 20th anniversary.  We were on vacation, away from home and just us together- so that's a celebration in my eyes!   We didn't even exchange gifts. 

2 July 29th is International Day of the Tiger. Besides the wild animal itself, when you hear the word tiger what's the first person-place-thing-whatever that comes to mind?

I was just telling my manager about the grandson going to baseball camp next month that's put on by the Detroit Tigers.  It's a M-F from 9am-3pm and it comes with a real Tiger's uniform and 4 tickets to a game! 

Love this action shot from last night.

The Spawn is going to start looking into getting him into actual Little League instead of just the local recreation league.  Right now, he's in the 5-7 age group which is a huge range when it comes to the kids' abilities and sizes!

I took this because it was hilarious - the mass of bodies were in his way, so he was bouncing left & right trying to figure out which way to go.  But look how big he is compared to 5/6 of the kids in green shirts! 

No idea where the ball is in this mob, either.  They were all going after it!

3. The expression 'eye of the tiger' describes someone with intense focus, determination, and the drive to succeed. What area of your life are you currently bringing that kind of energy to?

Respectfully skipping this one - I'm not feeling warm & fuzzy / successful with life right now. 

4. What was the last meal you cooked?

We've been eating out way too much lately.  But when I do cook, I have to take into consideration what the Picky Asses will eat.  So, we tend to go simple & easy when it's hot out.  The Spouse grilled boneless country ribs & I did corn on the cob & opened up a can of baked beans.  That & some Hawaiian rolls and it was good! 

Another story about the grandson - he's lost his first 2 teeth (on the bottom) so we had lots of jokes about him & the corn! 

5. Describe your July using exactly five words.

vacation / surprise / melty / dismay / Summerween

6. Insert your own random thought here.

So, I guess I can share the news we have here at the Shaque - grandbaby #3 is currently in the oven!  This is the medical drama that we had last week - she had been bleeding and had to go to the ER.  But everything is OK now. 

Quick description of the Spawn - she's 100 lbs in soaking wet winter clothes.  She's just over 12 weeks and isn't showing in the slightest.  Insane, I know.  She was in labor for about 6 hours with the grandson, approximately 3 hours for the granddaughter and both of them were over 8 lbs, closer to 9.  This kid will probably just fall out. 

Anyhooo.  That's what's up.  She's not working.  Her & the kids are taking up over half of our very small, 2-bedroom house.  Said house is a mess.  The Spouse and I have no privacy, and he works from home.  I just don't know what we're going to do.  Rent on a 2-bedroom apartment around this area averages $1500 +/- and even when she was working, I don't think that would have been possible.   Don't get me started on what daycare costs.  I only met the Donor once - he knows but I'm not sure what he's going to do to help.   I've looked up info from the state for assistance and sent her the link, hopefully she's applied.  If she has, she'll have to go talk to a caseworker, so I told her I'd go with (the best way to make sure she does something is to hold her hand).

Don't get me wrong - I'm sure we will love this baby as much as we do the other ones.  But right now - when I think about the situation too much, my stomach hurts and I feel like I need to throw up. 

Sorry this ended up being so mopey.

How about a picture of my DaisyMae?

She says NO, I can't have the shirt that she's laying on. 

The Lemon HodgePodge

When The Hodgepodge Gives You Lemons

Oh wow - I totally lost track of what day of the week it is!  It's just been crazy. 

Monday, I went to my new WW workshop - I live north of my work and the workshop is south of my work - and it's 2 hours after day workday ends.....so I don't want to hang out there for that long if I don't have anything pressing that needs to be done. Anyway, I get home and was sitting in the driveway with the Spouse while he grilled some ribs.  Here comes the Spawn running from the backyard, screaming & crying, and throws the granddaughter onto my lap, who is also screaming & crying, with blood dripping off her foot!  The grandson got into my gardening tools and left the manual trimmers out in the lawn and GD stepped on the blade and gashed the underside of her second toe.  It stopped bleeding fairly quickly and once she got all bandaged up, she was back out playing. This is on top of the lovely black eye she's currently sporting from some incident over the weekend.  That poor kid - it's a good thing she's tough and heals as quick as her mom (who had a million dance injuries in her younger days).  

Tuesday there was some medical drama that will probably be posted about soon.  Anyhoo.  Tuesdays are also baseball nights for the grandson now.  And since the oppressive heat & humidity has given us a break for a while, me & the Spouse went to watch him play.  It's amazing how much he's grown - a lot less playing in the dirt and more watching the ball in play. 

Wednesday, I had to meet up with the new Auxiliary President at my VFW post. I'm the chair for the VFW scholarship programs at the post and she wanted to know more about it.  Then I was there for the regular meeting (since I missed the last one due to it being mine & the Spouse's anniversary and being on vacation).  When I got home and finally had some dinner, I remembered it was my Mom's 92nd birthday and I hadn't called to sing HBD to her!  It wasn't terribly late, but the grandkids were already in bed so I'll call her tonight so they can sing, too.  

We missed our anniversary pedicures, so we went on the Spouse's birthday on the 18th instead! 

I really hope this evening is less eventful!

Moving on - linking up again with Joyce and a bunch of folks over that From This Side of the Pond!

1. Do your goals and dreams energize or exhaust you? Elaborate.

Meh, right now it seems both.  I have things I'd like to do, both dreams & goals, but having all the extra people in my house add a huge degree of difficulty.  At least the Spawn is collecting unemployment, but hopefully she'll get a new job soon.  Kinda hard to get an apartment when you don't have real income!  And finding out how to get assistance from the state is....waaaa too hard... <insert eye roll here>  so I am going to hold her hand and find out for her, but I haven't had time! 

2. July 23rd is national lemon day. Are you a fan of this flavor? What's a favorite dish or beverage you enjoy that calls for lemons?

Love it.   I love the taste and the smell is just so clean and refreshing.  One of my favorite dishes that I've mentioned it in a HodgePodge before is the lemon ricotta pancakes from a restaurant called First Watch.  OMG, so good! 

3. "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade"...is this something you're pretty good at managing? Have you had to do this recently? If so tell us about it.

I'm trying.   Sometimes I feel like I'm wearing too many hats and when I get home from work - I just want to fall on the bed and not move.   So am I good at managing anything?  No.  

4. Something you love that is lemon yellow in color?

When the Spouse & I bought our house, I told him I've always wanted a yellow kitchen.  So when we moved in, one of the first things we did was paint the kitchen yellow.  

Funny story - another favorite thing is the Sunshine & Lemon scent from Bath & Body Works.  (that and the Vampire Blood scent - I need to stock up since it's back in the stores now) I have hand sanitizer on my desk at work and on my purse.  At home I have the foaming soap.  My sisters also like it.  We were all out at Sis1's house one day and she had ~gasp~ refilled a BBW bottle with non-BBW lemon soap!  It was obvious.  So Sis2 called her out on it - asking where is the f*cking lemon soap?   So it's a running joke between the 3 of us, calling it f*cking lemon.   

5. How would you describe your attention to detail?

Like Joyce said, excellent with the written word.  And being part of a search & rescue team, we do a lot of training regarding attention to detail.  In 2 of the main certifications I had to earn, we had to go out into the woods for an "area search" meaning we had to completely search a sector ~for playing cards~ so many meters wide by 100 meters deep while maintaining a certain heading (picture a parallelogram)!  We had to write down which cards we saw and had to get a certain percentage of the cards in order to pass the activity.  Oh and there was a time limit.   And the parallelogram wasn't roped off or anything - we had to keep track of where our sector was, so we didn't cross into anyone else's. 

6. Insert your own random thought here.

No real thoughts - but here are some pictures from baseball Tuesday!

So the kid catches & throws left-handed but bats right....

He's at the age now where they don't use tees for batting unless needed - the coach is actually pitching to them. 

I love little kid baseball when ALL the outfielders go after the ball! 

They had him playing first base.  

I'd love to hear some of the conversations that happen out on the field! 

Adventures in Travel - part 3

Days 7-8

(part 1)        (part 2)

Here we are in St. Louis!  Our first stop was the Gateway Arch!  Neither of us had been there, so it was a neat stop.   We rode in the tram up to the top - 630'!  And talk about an optical illusion - the base is also 630' wide!  The tram cars are round and sort of like a ferris wheel, so you swing a bit to follow the curve - that was unsettling!  You could see out of the cars, too - but you were looking at the inside of the arch.  Stairs & wires & various other things you'd see inside a building.   The cars held 5 people, if you were very cozy.  Luckily, the Spouse & I got our own. 

View from the top

Blueprint with the dimensions.

This is a cross-section of the keystone at the very top - those screens are livestreaming the view so people who can't make the ride can see what's up there. 

It's very efficient how they work the whole tram thing.  We had already bought our tickets (for a specific time) and when we checked in, they gave us a pair of "boarding passes" with a car # on it.  There are 8 cars per tram, north side & south side.  Then we went into the staging area and stood on the spot on the floor corresponding with our car #.  We got the story of the Arch and safety briefing from the worker. and then filed thru the picture area by car #.   Up a flight of stairs and then waited at our respective car loading areas.  The doors opened and people got off the tram, and we loaded and took the 4-minute ride to the top.   The trams reloaded, went down, unload/reload and came back up and that's when we had to reload back onto our same car.  So, you're up there less than 10 minutes and it's not terribly crowded at any time that you go.  

There are other things to do inside the base of the Arch.  There were several museums and a gift shop, of course.   We had "Ultimate Explorer" tickets, but since we didn't get the tickets far enough in advance, we ended up missing the documentary movie.  We did experience the virtual reality theater - which I wish I'd gotten pictures as we approached - it was basically a walled off area in what reminded me of a food court and several rows of stools.  There were a handful of people sitting on the stools with the VR goggles on, all looking around like a flock of chickens.  Quite hilarious!  We also got an hour-long Riverboat Cruise on the Mississippi River.  Take note - make sure you don't wander too far away from the loading area.  We did and suddenly 8 million people were in line before us, so we didn't even get to sit out on the deck due to no seats left.  But that's OK, it was hot, so even tho we couldn't see outside very well, we enjoyed sitting in the interior part in the a/c. 

When we left St Louis, we headed toward Gas City, Indiana.  The only reason I knew of this place is it's always where the Spouse stops when he drives home from his Mom's house in Arkansas.  I didn't think there was anything special about it, but come to find out, it's part of the Garfield Trail!  

Jim Davis, the artist who draws the Garfield cartoon is from Grant County in Indiana.  So there are 14 Garfield statues throughout the county in his honor.  We drove around and saw them all!  

This is #1 stop in the brochure - however we didn't go in numerical order, more like "map order" so we didn't do a lot of driving back & forth. 

I was happy to get to this one - we were driving around on a Saturday morning and this one is in the local library so we were hoping it was open!  They also decorate the statue for the seasons. 

This one is noted that you can only get to it during daylight hours, and between April-November since it's inside the pro shop at a golf course! 

This one didn't have a plaque - he's standing outside the James Dean Museum in Fairmount.

A family was just coming out so I was chatting with the mom who said she thought they'd just moved the statue here.  Come to find out they were also from Michigan, which was pretty funny!

This was their first stop and our 5th, tho.

Once we finished the Garfield Trail, we headed on back home.  

As usual, it's nice to be able to shower and use your own bathroom, even tho we did stay at some nice places. 

Adventures in Travel - part 2

Days 4-6

(part 1)

Since it was quite late when we got to the MIL's house, I didn't see her until Monday morning.  She goes to bed early and therefore gets up crazy early.  She just had her 80th birthday in mid-June - the Spouse sent her picture in to the local news tv station so she saw herself on tv!  That made her really happy. 

So the MIL insists that a married couple should always share a bed, so she gives up her room for us when I visit. 😵  She's got a spare room with 2 perfectly fine twin beds, but we get stuck on her saggy, creaky mattress that's probably as old as me!  But the Spouse went and got a nice air mattress and set that up in the spare room for us - it was glorious!  

We did some touristy stuff.  We always drive up to the top of West Mountain and hang out at the one or both of the overlooks and just look down at Hot Springs.  We stopped to get some water at the Happy Hollow spring, which is different because the other fountains around Hot Springs are, you know, HOT!  This one is not.  Speaking of - I did NOT visit the bathhouse.  I've gone there in July before and it's just not enjoyable when it's hot out.  Then we went to have some BBQ for lunch and then just vegged in the a/c the rest of the day and planned the rest of our trip!  Luckily, we didn't have anything planned already, since the delay in me getting to Arkansas would have messed up plans. 

The Supreme Spud at Stubby's BBQ.

OMG.

an enormous baked potato, pulled pork AND brisket, baked beans & coleslaw. 

Tuesday, we got up and went to this little Mom & Pop restaurant for breakfast - those are the best kind!  Phil's is located right across the street from Oaklawn Racetrack and is in an old house.  I don't know what I was expecting, but the decor was a whole bunch of vintage kitschy collections ~everywhere~ one wall had a bunch of porcelain spice sets, another had a bunch of "wall pocket" vases in the shape of various people & animals.  Another wall was a variety of kitchen implements; mandarin blades, potato mashers, ice cream scoops, etc, etc.  There was a LOT to look at! 

Biscuits with chocolate gravy, cheesy grits & sausage patties. 

My first time having chocolate gravy. 

 It was like a room-temp runny pudding, but less sweet than Jello pudding.  Very interesting.  

The Bobby Hopper Tunnel on I49

We left MIL's around noon and headed toward Fayetteville.  The Spouse & I have been married 20 years now and I've never met his best friend & family in person!   Before we got to their house, we drove around the University of Arkansas campus, since the Spouse is alumni. 

It was pretty cool, since I never did the college thing.

After visiting & dinner with the BFF & his fam, we finished up our day in Eureka Springs. 

Home for the next 2 nights. 

Our welcoming committee

Wednesday was our 20th anniversary!  We got up and did some touristy stuff and figured out the trolley system.  When we were riding thru the "entertainment district" in downtown Eureka Springs, I saw one of these places where you can have old-timey photos taken. We had one taken on our honeymoon, where the Spouse was a cowboy and I was a saloon girl.  We needed a new one!

We is fancy now!  

I just need to point out - the Spouse can rock a top hat!  He looked awesome.

The Bigfoot store

Yes, Chuck the skeleton went along with us. 

After a late lunch at a place called Sparky's (awesome bacon cheeseburgers there!) we went back to the cottage to cool off for a while, before heading back downtown for the "Eureka Rocket Ghost Tour".  Basically, this old guy & his dog drove us & another couple around in a golf cart (it identifies as a rocket) for 2 hours, telling us stories about the town and area.  It was fun, tho.  He was a great storyteller. 

The Crescent Hotel - reportedly one of the most haunted hotels in the US.

We just popped into the lobby for a bit, but we didn't do any of the haunted tours there. 

That's on the list for next time!

What we did see was absolutely beautiful, tho.

Thursday morning, we had breakfast at a place called the Squatch.

Good stuff there, too!

No pics, but I had the "Hog Wild" - a toasted croissant with ham, bacon, cheddar, bacon aioli and bacon jam.  The Spouse had a sausage & cheese kolache and a side of biscuits & gravy. 

Our next stop was the Christ of the Ozarks statue.  

His "wingspan" is 65' and he's 67' tall on top of Magnetic Mountain.

Fun fact, per the Rocket driver - he was meant to be 68 feet tall, but that would have required placing an aircraft warning light on top of his head.  So they made him slightly shorter to avoid that.  

😂

It worked out that we only drove 4 - 4 1/2 hours a day.  

Once we left Eureka Springs, next stop was St Louis!