Upon inspection Saturday morning I found that a green tomato had been eaten; so much for vine ripening. Not satisfied with my tomato selection, the critter(s) moseyed over to the field peas and green beans and munched away on those too. I’m not upset about the peas and beans as those were planted mostly for ground cover. From the size of the poop I found in WLF I assume that the culprit was larger than a rat, perhaps raccoon or opossum? Though I am not sure the cheap tomato cages could support the weight of either…
Saturday I drove up and met Barb, Allan, and Davey for a hike around Kennesaw. After eating lunch with the I split off and tried the new brewery in Austell, Frog Creek Brewery. The beer was good, but the place was unfortunately overrun with families with young, loud children, that day.
I considered volunteering at Patchwork City Farms yesterday. I thought it may be cool to see how a real city farm operates. However, I wanted to do some cleaning/decluttering instead, so I didn’t sign up to volunteer.
Where has this summer gone? When I think back to summer 2022 I had done so many cool things — day trips, hikes, bike rides, camping weekends — by this time of the year, but I’ve done none of those this year. This bums me out. Oh yeah, I have been spending more of my time dealing with Florida (and that situation has deteriorated quickly…)
I had a partial zucchini bread failure yesterday. At first I intended to bake the loaf in an 8″x8″ pan in the air fryer, but the batter came to the top of the pan and I feared that it would overflow the pan upon rising, so I baked it in the oven instead because there is more headroom and I could bake it on a lager cookie sheet to catch any overflow. My recipe said to bake the loaf for 45 minutes, but at that time it was still liquid in the center, so I gave it another twelve minutes. I thought the skewer came out fairly clean, but after letting the loaf cool for fifteen minutes I went to take it out of the pan and it fell apart, revealing an uncooked middle. Dangen!
Yesterday I started to watch the second event of the NCL Racing Cup from Denver, with anticipation of going next Sunday to the event here in Atlanta. That was until I saw that the racing will be held at Porsche and will be a VIP-only, $150/person ticketed event. Hard pass.
I solved today’s Wordle in five attempts; my starter today was PLACE.
First!
🙂
Wordle in 6 with a little help from the Google. Typically, one of my normal starting words would have been a slam dunk, but I was out of character this morning.
The fence guys come next weekend to add some 2fence to control roaming hounds (ours) and I needed to close off possible exits from under the back deck. I put in some lattice and it looks pretty good. Hopefully the hounds won’t put it to the test.
I also watched the Denver NCL race, as I’m chief judge on Sunday. They changed up a few rules since Miami and it seemed to work more as they anticipated originally. Teams swapping riders out of the pit for recovery. I think the $150 entry is over the top, but it might be required as I doubt Porsche is giving them the venue for free. I like the overall concept, but I’m not seeing anything that makes me think there will be a second season.
-FP
Unfortunately “Florida” got in the way yesterday so I didn’t get to see the entire race. I forgot you were officiating, I’ll just show up and tell them that I know you. 😀 I am not saying they shouldn’t sell tickets, especially since they may have only one more year behind this effort, but I wouldn’t pay $150 even if I were still employed. I doubt that there will be a large crowd.
I don’t see an issue with an entry fee, especially with a closed venue like the Porsche Center, but a single option (i.e. no options) is a mistake. There was never a good crowd shot from Denver, but it didn’t appear to be well attended and it was “general admission”. Shame.
HAH! I didn’t know what series Paulie was talking about and when he said it would be at Porsche (otherwise known as The Porsche Experience (TM)) I assumed it was car racing and thought, “Yeah $150 for a car race at Porsche sounds about right.” Now that I see it’s bikes — no way.
I had so many ambitious plans for yesterday that fell apart for one reason or another. Try again today…
Already did two loads of laundry, a Walmart trip and a trip to Cobb County Water to exchange my test kit. Ran a 5k on Saturday, slower than last year but still managed a 1st AG win. Fun hash yesterday with a pool ending. Might do the Monday night hash as it is on my way home from work. Wordle in 4 starting with water.
Why am I not surprised you are an OVERACHIEVER!
^this^ 🙂
Kudos, Sally! It’s all the more impressive that you accomplished that in August heat!
Saturday we went to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie at the Midtown Arts Cinema. We were the only people in the theater, which was great. The movie was fine, I’ve seen worse. The music was excellent, though. Afterwards I saw Trent Reznor did the music and I was all, “THAT makes sense.” And yes Paulie, we went to Mellow Mushroom beforehand and it was amazing as usual. My new favorite there is a pesto sauce (instead of red) with ground hamburger. Soooo good.
Yesterday Finn had his early morning swim lesson and then we went to Majestic for breakfast. When we got home I unpacked or stored away about 10 boxes of things that I had taken from my parents house before it sold. So it wasn’t exactly getting rid of anything, but definitely tidying up some annoying boxes that have been in the home office for a while.
Well done you.
I’ve been experimenting more with tomato-free pizza and not regretting that.
$150 to watch a bike race is just dumb, they have priced themselves out of any sort of attendance. Drop it to $50 and you may get some but still not much. They will probably keep the price high and have very few show up and will have lost the chance to recoup any of their money.
Batchelor party weekend for my friend Ryan which consisted of a ton of riding since he doesn’t party. Saturday we went to Jarrod’s Place in Summerville for a day of shuttled bike park party laps all day. Full day of downhill madness, so much fun!
Yesterday was the Tour de Snax in town. Took Marta down to midtown to ramble around. Rode the beltline to Victory for whiskey and coke slushies (yum!) then to Biggerstaff brewing for coffee scones or beers, went through the cemetery before heading to grant park then through EAV on the way to Fox Brothers BBQ. I had to bail after the park to meet family but super fun day on the bike.
That sounds like a great day of rambling in town.
And I agree- $150 is just nutz. I was thinking with a closed venue like Porsche, you don’t have a road closure permit ($) or rent much barricades ($) or pay cops to direct traffic ($$$), but still the same staging and tents. We shall see.
That does sound like a fun day of over imbibing.
I know $150 get you more than just entry, but it’s far too high for my participation.
hey – if you get free food & drinks – and a chance to driver a Porche on the track – $150 sounds good!
Hopefully the driving occurs prior to the drinking. 😉
Wordle in 4, coulda been in 3 but for one letter.
Saturday I finally broke through some serious writer’s block, so much so that I wrote until 3:30 AM out of necessity. 1 and 1/3 chapters to go on this manuscript that was due in full 2 weeks ago. No surprise considering that I’m coming off of the busiest summer of my life. What did the trick was sitting on the front porch and playing all sorts of loud music while writing. I can’t explain. ¯\_(?)_/¯
My decluttering block has lifted as well. Over the weekend I discarded a couple of pairs underwear that were beyond their useful life. This morning I discarded a mattress pad that should have been ditched long ago instead of store.
On Saturday afternoon my son Lucas and I drove 4 bikes to Chez Grove to get various repairs and tune-ups made. Allan truly has every tool imaginable, and a crazy array of bike parts. It’s quite impressive. We left the bikes for Allan to get to when he can.
Since he is my mechanic I consider him to be the #1 mechanic of the Grove family. For those who don’t know, Allan’s brother works for a World Tour Team as a mechanic, and his father has been a cycling muckity muck for years.
Ah, that explains why he’s so extremely gifted in that arena. Thank you for the background.
I forgot to mention earlier that Grand Funk Railroad is playing a free show in Sandy Springs this Friday night. Yes, please, I am totally going to be there. I like this trend, or at least mini trend of local cities sponsoring free concerts. The Drivin’ n’ Cryin’ show in Chamblee was excellent the week before last.
busy morning here –
yes – all the Grove males know way too much about bikes. We joke that Kevin is #3 – as he only knows how to work on brand new super special bikes. 😉
Allan will get to work on the 4 bikes probably this evening – he’s at some class today. Has to figure out what parts he needs to get.
Good to meet Lucas, though he only said maybe 4 words the whole time.
Lucas does not need the “who’s the daddy” test, he is my child through and through. He did talk to Allan about what his bike needs. He is extremely introverted, but I’m working on it. I truly do not want him to struggle socially the way that I did for so much of my life.
Trust me, he has said much less in social situations, so he was doing pretty well with you guys. He was absolutely absorbing the advice Allan was giving me about the bikes. You’ll get to meet Rachel when we pick up the bikes. She’s the yang to Lucas’ yin. 😉
Weekend was pretty boring, except Saturday
Good hike, David dropped off bikes, went to eat ramen with Kevin on Buford Hwy, then had some time to kill (as the ramen place has no liquor license) so went down the strip mall to KPOP BBQ & Bar – a Korean place. They had some tasty cocktails. We need to go back, its $35 for the all you can eat bbq – cooking at your table of course.
Then we went to an 80th birthday party for Lost Cause. a few of the older hashers we know were there – it was fun – I’ve been friends with them (Thar She Blows is the wife ) it seems like forever.
Sunday I decided to do NOTHING – I watched the entire 4th season of YOU. the earlier seasons were better.
Saturday was a good, sweaty hike. I have admit that I had little clue where we were hiking until well into the hike.
it’s so much easier parking where we did than going down Whitlock to the other end (the Cheatham Hill parking lot).
Besides saving the $5 parking fee, we don’t need to worry about not getting a parking spot. (and – interesting restaurants right there is the 2nd perk)
Its the least hilly part of the Kennesaw Mtn battlefield, so nice to not do tons of climbing on such a hot humid day.
But next time we can park where the GUTS people park on the north end of the park -and go up to the top of Kennesaw.