Another annoying week at work. I do not know how a business does business without not knowing specific things about itself! And everything runs out on Monday. So it was better I enjoyed the weekend while I could—if I can get over being depressed about the whole situation.

Traffic was utterly mad Friday night, even if I leave an hour earlier on that day. I just went surface streets to avoid the whole red mess in either direction on the freeway. I got home so late James still ended up taking Willow out.

We went to SteviB's for dinner because it was cheap and we knew we would splurge on Saturday night at Juanita's birthday dinner. Afterward, despite having no coupons, we went to Barnes & Noble. Now, on the way to dinner, we had listened to a "Travel With Rick Steves" podcast I had saved because Jane and Michael Stern (Roadfood) were on; we love listening to them on "The Splendid Table." They were talking about their at-the-time (this was a 2010 show, I think) latest book, 500 Things You Must Eat Before They're Gone. Minutes after we entered the bookstore, I heard James looking for the book at the information desk. :-) I figured. The Town Center store didn't have it, so we drove down to Cumberland to fetch one there. I found a few good things in the remainder bins at 75 percent off: To End All Wars (first World War, about war dissenters), The Eighty-Dollar Champion (I had this already, as a free ARC, but this copy was only $1.25, with better photos and properly paginated), and the big, beautiful coffee-table size The Life of Charles Dickens. This was written after Dickens' death by John Forster, his best friend, and was republished for his bicentennial in a lavishly illustrated version containing novel illustrations, playbills, period engravings, etc. The dust cover on this was a bit damaged (nothing that couldn't be fixed with tape), and all for only $10.

We were in bed early Friday because James was off to work on Saturday. I didn't sleep well, but got up nevertheless to go to the Farmer's Market. It was a weekend for the Artists' Market, too, and I was lucky enough to find someone just pulling out; otherwise it was SRO. Still had cucumbers, so got cherry tomatoes and also chicken salad, dog biscuits, and goat cheese. Capra Gia not only had a sleepy little goat with them, but two chickens, a couple of fat and fluffy hens. I held out my hand like I had some grain and greatly perked their interest, until the reddish one realized my hand was empty—then I was soundly pecked!

Came home by Bernhard's Bakery to get a couple of desserts for the week, too.

I spent the afternoon doing some clean up in the dining room. The dog's area against the wall was starting to be a little funky, so I bundled all her towels and blankets in the washer and then the dryer, and while those were scrubbing, washed out her crate with Swiffer cloths as well as the plastic mat her dishes go on. I thoroughly cleaned both dishes, and then cleared the area and scattered baking soda on the carpet and left it for over an hour. Then I vacuumed thoroughly, and sprayed the area with Lysol.

I was watching Atta Girl, Kelly! in between all this. This was a three-part story that first aired on Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color in the 1960s, the story of a German Shepherd destined for the Seeing Eye. I loved this as a kid, but watched it with a little sadness thinking that most kids wouldn't be interested in the slow-moving story today. Kelly, bred at the Morristown kennels, is first given to a farm boy named Danny (Billy Corcoran) to raise. His father expects him to be interested in cows and sheep instead and is a bit confounded by this being a 4H project. This is Danny's first puppy and he is very reluctant to part with her, and she with him. In the next part of the story, it is shown how Kelly finally bonds with her trainer Matt Howell (played by Beau Bridges; she and a Labrador named Robin are his first projects, and he is closely watched by his supervisor, played by J.D. Cannon) and learns to be a guide dog; not just to work and be obedient, but sometimes to be disobedient to protect her handler. The final part has Kelly learning to adjust to her new, blind master, Evan Clayton, an attorney who was very attached to his previous dog, Jennie—so attached, in fact, that he isn't giving the dog the support she needs. In a parallel plot, the attorney's roommate, a newly-blind football coach named Chuck Wilson, gets along famously with his dog Robin and learns to love her, only for her to prove undependable after they had bonded and him having to receive another dog.

(I was amused after buying this film after all these years that here, four years before they did one of my favorite movies of all time, The Andromeda Strain, together, the two men training with Kelly and Robin are Arthur Hill and James Olson.)

I managed to get Willow's corner cleaned up and Juanita's gift wrapped (as well as Ken's belated gift) by the time James arrived home and we had to leave for Longhorn. Dinner was great fun; we sat at a long table and ate and chatted and watched Juanita open her gifts. From there we just went home; it was almost eight o'clock anyway. Watched a new production of The Mystery of Edwin Drood on PBS after As Time Goes By. In this one, John Jasper turned out to be Edwin Drood's illegitimate older brother, who was ignored by their father in favor of golden boy Edwin. He didn't kill Edwin, but he did kill their father, in an opium fog and embittered by having been so long ignored.

We were so tired we went to bed early (read: at midnight, which is early for us on Saturday) and thus were up at nine today. After breakfast, did the grocery shopping, and then had a more fun errand: going to Books-a-Million with a 30 percent off coupon. We were mainly looking for gifts to put away, and came away with a bumper crop: two Christmas gifts and a birthday gift and a bunch of stocking stuffers. James bought himself a couple of books, and I finally bought electronic Scrabble Flash for myself since it was only $10 before the discount. We listened to "The Splendid Table" there and back, and came home to read the paper.

Some goodies on television tonight: Cosplay: Crafting a Secret Identity, about science-fiction costumers, a lot of it filmed at DragonCon (I had to give Alice a fast call when I saw it, since she's designing a costume for DC this year; she's going to be a Minion!), and featuring Grant Imehara from Mythbusters. Lots of shots at the Atlanta Marriott; I'd know those carpets anywhere! Later we had three parts of Pioneers in Aviation, with lots of wonderful old photographs and vintage film footage.

Labels: books, dogs, DragonCon, friends, podcasts, television, work

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