Busy, busy, busy!

 Ok, Campers, don't have much story to tell today.  We just got back from a soiree' in Dripping Springs (Western Suburb of Austin).  The widow of my Winemaker friend (and a Winemaker herself) had invited a lot of the people we had met and toured wine regions around the world with.  It was great to see them all again.

 

One of the guests and a friend of mine showed me his woodworking skills when he was told he needed a cane.  I think it's pretty cool

 About 30 folks showed up, lots of good stories told and retold as well as the almost guaranteed "Remember when juvat..." or other guys stories of foibles were told.

Dinner was catered and the main course was chicken or beef fajitas.  Most excellent.

And....

Having sold the winery they had stashed away a decent amount of wine before inventory was counted for the sale. 

All excellent!  Whites and Rose's were available, but their best wines have always been reds.  I had a glass of cold Sauvignon Blanc first to quench my thirst then switched to Reds.

Excellent as always.  

 

 

There was a bit of music that was quite enjoyable.  The couple were long time clients at the winery, so were invited to play (and have some wine).  A very nice touch to a very nice evening. 

The party went on for quite a while, and most of the wives had the chauffeur role in getting home.  Mrs J and I had been invited to spend the night at our host's house which we took advantage of.

The following morning we had a souffle for breakfast and departed for home.

A truly excellent event all round.

Cheers! 

  

Virginia is for Lovers, Apparently ...

Morning in the Virginia Countryside, Sunrise
OAFS Photo

The Missus Herself and I did not have a traditional wedding, in fact there was no ceremony at all. Just rushing about Seoul to various offices, both Korean and American, doing what seemed to be ream upon ream of paperwork.

Our son did the same, well, he had a bit of a ceremony before a Justice of the Peace out California way. Both daughters, on the other hand, had actual wedding ceremonies, both ceremonies were held outdoors, both in the Commonwealth of Virginia, one of my favorite states. Hence the title of today's offering.

The opening photo was taken the morning after the ceremony where The Nuke and Tuttle got hitched. A lovely old farmhouse not far from Charlottesville, VA. They had the place for a long weekend, both families could be accommodated and were present in force.

Morning in the Virginia Countryside, the Backyard
OAFS Photo

The second photo is the backyard of the farmhouse, where much beer and scotch was consumed by certain members of the wedding party around that fireplace in the background. As the photo shows, nothing was damaged or burned down. Much to my everlasting surprise.

The venue for the reception was off to the left, beyond those bushes. The actual ceremony took place in the front of the house, just off the big old-fashioned porch. A lovely place, whoever thought of having this place be a wedding venue was a genius, it is perfect in nearly every way. I hope they have made, and will continue to make, tons of money from it.

The reason for my surprise concerning events around that fireplace is because after the formal reception, son-in-law Big Time and I, along with Tuttle's future brother-in-law (married Tuttle's sister a year of so after the wedding), decided it would be just the thing to build a fire in the fireplace and consume what remained of the adult beverages provided for the wedding. After all, the next day we'd all be driving back to Alexandria and points further north without much room to haul said beverages.

We made a sizeable dent in the remaining beverages all whilst stoking the fire. We did so without dying of either smoke inhalation, burns, or alcohol poisoning. A minor miracle in itself.

But survive we did, though the hangover next day was epic, I've had worse.

So The Nuke got married in the shadows of the Blue Ridge Mountains. As I mentioned before, LUSH also got married in Virginia, her wedding being more of a Navy affair as she and husband to be, Big Time, were both on active duty at the time. A number of folks from both of their squadrons were in attendance at that wedding, which was held outdoors at the Virginia Beach National Golf Club, a very nice place, though definitely not as rural as The Nuke's wedding.

A story I like to tell, tongue-in-cheek of course, is that Satan attended LUSH's wedding.

No, not the Prince of Darkness, not that guy.

Rather, the commander of Big Time's squadron at the time was a fellow whose given name was Damien. With a name like that, and certain other factors I'm sure, it seems almost inevitable that he would wind up with the call sign "Satan." Which of course, he did. (Note: Satan got a mention in a post by Lex some years back, from when he was the XO of VFA-136, you can read that here. Thanks for preserving that Bill. Note that that was the post which brought Neptunus Lex to my attention. Which ultimately led to Chant du Départ. Small world, neh?)

Both weddings were memorable and occupy cherished space in my memories. Makes me wish, almost, that we'd had a ceremony. Before you mention it, I once asked The Missus Herself if she'd like to do a ceremony. We both decided in the negative.

Ah well ...

Editor's Note: No doubt some of you are bereft and distraught at the lack of fictional story-telling going on around here lately. Others of you may be thanking the Deity for said lack. It will return, someday, but perhaps not soon. I think the Muse is still down on Cape Charles, gazing out onto the Bay and marveling at the loveliness of it all. Mentally, I'm still there as well.

Breakfast at Pazi's

Source

I need a break from being creative so let me entertain you with a tale of breakfast. It was actually a bit more adventurous than it sounds. Not a lot more, but a bit more. But I digress ...

When I retired from gainful employment, my buddy Tom suggested we get together for breakfast periodically. I like breakfast and I really enjoy hanging out with Tom. He's a fun guy and we have a lot in common. I should have thought this through a little more, he did say breakfast. Which occurs, traditionally, in the morning. For some folks, early in the morning.

Tom likes to start his day early, so breakfast, as you might guess, is also early. I mean, not before the sun comes up early but early enough that Your Humble Scribe has to set his alarm clock in order to be there. Since retiring I normally set the alarm only on Sunday, and that's not too awful as I set it for 0830. But for breakfast, at 0800 Tom hath decreed, I set my alarm for 0600.

Hey, it's once a month, so I can deal with it. Thing is though, since I retired, I go to bed usually after midnight and get up at nine-ish on most days. Now I used to get up a few minutes before the alarm went off due to force of habit and having arisen early to labor for my wages for fifty years.

These days if I have to set the alarm on any day but Sunday, I swear I wake up every hour to see what time it is. Now part of that is the joyful anticipation of seeing my dear friends Tom and Liz.

I should note that Liz was my boss for the last five or so years at the paying gig, and a damn fine one she was (and is still). We became friends as well as colleagues. She has joined the breakfast club as she and Tom also get along very well.

Now Tom worked at CVS for a long time in a managerial role, then he retired from that. As some folks (I'm not one of them) get bored in retirement, they seek a new job, one that isn't quite as stressful or demanding as the old one. So Tom became a janitor, not just any janitor mind you, he was like the Wayne Gretzky of janitors, a superstar. And he was our janitor, he has a clearance so he could get into our lab.

Now the guy before him was, eh, not as fastidious as one might want in a janitor. The floors were almost never mopped, the trash was emptied every other day or so. When Tom took over, it was like night and day.

Anyhoo ...

So Saturday morning I met up with my besties Tom and Liz for our monthly breakfast. We went to Pazi's Place in East Providence, a 50s-style diner and it was really good. The food and the company.

This is something new for me, actually socializing with people outside of work. Seeing as how I don't work anymore, the family was concerned that I might become a crabby, old recluse. Yeah, I can see that.

While I'm still crabby and old, I do go out to breakfast with my friends at least once a month. (Except March, I was down in Maryland.) It's great to catch up with the two people outside of my family I get along best with. I've never really had a wide circle of friends, lots of acquaintances and work buddies, but not a lot of friends. (Had some for a while, but they all moved away! No, not because of me.)

So Sarge, where's the sorta adventure there?

Oh yeah, Pazi's Place is about ten miles by road from Chez Sarge, getting there was something of an odyssey, the GPS took me by a very roundabout way to get there. Well, that was my fault, I'd been playing with my phone, looking at alternate routes and had saved one of those routes. Not the one I'd wanted but a different one. It was a way I'd not traveled before but it was interesting.

Now Pazi's Place sits on a one-way street. I did not realize that when departing the diner to return to the manse. (Hey it was early and I'd had maybe four hours of sleep, 'kay?)

There was something off about the road, like, why is the center line painted white, rather than yellow? A car coming from the other direction beeped their horn at me, 'twas then that I realized that I was going the wrong way!

Oh shit, oh dear!

Fortunately it was early enough so that there wasn't much traffic and the weather was gloomy (which tends to keep people at home) so I saw the opportunity to make a U-turn and now head in the correct direction. Fortunately it was in the direction I wanted to go.

Unfortunately, my wild maneuvering had upset my GPS, or something. She began adding extraneous data to her instructions.

I noted that I had to turn onto a different street in about a quarter mile, then the GPS says, "Take the second right."

Uh, what? The first right was the street I wanted, what's up with this "second right" nonsense?

Eventually the GPS and I got that sorted out but I was in the backwoods of Massachusetts and not in an area I'd driven through on my way to the diner. Oh well, I knew I was going east by southeast so it was the correct direction. If I hit the Atlantic, I could just turn right, eventually I'd circle in on my destination.

It's something I've noticed about Google Maps lately, she will get confused, especially in Boston or on Cape Cod, don't know why. Roundabouts puzzle the hell out of her. (Note I say "her" as it uses a female voice.)

I've seen the arrow on the map pointing to the left and the voice saying "turn right." (And I'm muttering, "what the hell GPS, make up your mind.") I will eventually calm down and realize that the software ain't all it's cracked up to be. (I would know, I spent years as a professional software tester, maybe Google Maps knows that and hates me for it, but that's ridiculous. Right?)

The other thing it likes to do is mispronounce the names of things here in New England, lots of old Indian names around here, which the GPS voice will butcher in sometimes humorous ways.

Anyhoo, coming home from breakfast was a bit more adventurous than I care for, but hey, to see my old friends I'd even drive through Boston.

Well, dunno if I'd go that far.

But it was a good craic, can't wait until we do it again.

Family and Friends

 Not much going on around Rancho Juvat, lately.  

 So my posting material might be getting close to Rock Bottom.

Source

However, this past weekend made up for some of that. We had a semi-Family Reunion.  Obviously, Little J, LJW and Miss B couldn't make it from Jolly Old, but MBD, The Rev, MG and Leon' made it from East Texas.   In addition, some friends of there's from College joined up with them after escaping the Houston Jungle.  They stayed in our two guest cabins, did a little out and back to a few wineries and joined us for dinner where war stories were swapped. Yes, Beans, the red BS Flag was thrown a few times.

At the start of the festivities, we met the gang on their arrival at our favorite restaurant in the 'Burg, El Milagro.  For those of you who don't speak Spanish, that would be "The Miracle".  For the first several years we lived here, our go to restaurant was "Rather Sweet".  Primarily this was because it was about 5 doorways down from our wine store.  Which was about the max distance we had energy to travel after a busy day.  The  business was actually a restaurant and a bakery and was owned by Rebecca Rather, a somewhat well known baker. The food was good, the baked goods outstanding.

But, she got a bit tired of it and sold it at a deep discount to a group of Hispanic ladies.  Ms Rather also included all her baked goods recipes in the deal.  So the new restaurant has excellent Mexican dishes, great sandwiches and fabulous pastries.  I heartily recommend it although my Cardiologist has a few comments about the relationship between it and I.

Anyhow, that's where we met the gang Friday.  Did I mention that El Milagro has a very nice patio and a band that plays on weekends.  

MBD and MG fooling around

What the heck are those two goofs doin' Gramma?

 

Just Goofin' Round

Not a lot of mind enhancing conversations, but a lot of good smiles and laughter, so well worth it.

Finally on the woodworking side, I'm working on a couple of projects for the two eldest grandchildren.  Mrs J came up with the idea.  Basically it's a book box.

 She bought 25 Christmas related books for each of them which she'll individually wrap.  She took the measurements of each to figure out the dimensions for the box and ensure the books all fit.  The grand kids will be authorized to unwrap one book for each day in Advent to have read to them.  That should keep them occupied and hopefully focused on Christmas The above model was my "Practice" one, but turned out good enough to use it.

Why Maroon, you may ask.  Well...Since both sets of parents are from a small university in College Station TX, they are encouraging them early to go there.  

Yes, Beans, Texas A&M.  I didn't go there, but I'm very happy with the way my Kids turned out and think it likely my Grand Kids will turn out well there also.

As I said, been busy and not many earth shattering events happened this week, so you get what you get.  Hope to do better next week.

Cheers and Peace Out Y'all!

 

 

Timing is everything

 A wise Captain¹ once counseled me on the importance of being in the right place at the exact time.  As one might expect when flying a fighter, being on target on time is generally critical to 1) the success of the mission, 2) protecting the folks you are there to support and 3) improving the odds that your butt doesn't get blown out of the sky. Which is a very real possibility of it being "friendly" fire in training.

So, yes, I took that message to heart. And yes, nowadays, my BP still goes up quite a few digits when it looks like I (or we) are going to be late.  Late being defined as less than 5 minutes before the event begins.  15 minutes early is my desired TOT (Time over Target, Beans).  In war, that isn't desirable at all.  IIRC TOT was +/- 10 seconds for conventional munitions and +/-30 for those mushroom shaped crowd pleasers.  

Gratuitous Pic since I ain't got nothin'

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That last I just didn't get for a while.  I mean, really, who is going to fly over a target within one minute of one of them going off? A week later maybe, but 30 seconds?  It was finally explained to my Lieutenant self, that this was a peace time constraint because range time was limited and somebody else would be coming through to drop his practice ordinance, and would you please yield the playing field?

Oh!

But the training was good, hard and close to perfection was the minimum allowed. So, hitting a TOT is still part of my psyche. 

That helped in my job at the school district as I would be in place and starting the lesson before the bell stopped ringing.  Students soon learned that being in place when the bell started ringing meant on time.  Anything else was tardy.  They may have bitched, moaned and complained, but they learned and voila' they frequently would finish the assignment early and that was basically free time to explore the internet.

Get your mind outta the gutter, Beans!

Another place that being On-Time Juvat style is important to me is Sunday Mass.  I like to be there NLT 5 minutes early, 15 is better.  Give me a chance to settle in, say hello to some friends and discuss things that are concerning to me with the Big Guy in his house.

Not that there are many of those things going on in my life right now.  No Sir!   

RRRIIIIIGGGHHHTTTT.

So, Mrs J and I go to the Early Service on Sunday.  It starts at 0730.  The next Service starts at 0900 and the one after that starts at 1130.  Now, our current Priest, well, to be charitable, likes to hear himself talk.  Even at the 0730 service, when the service is finally over, there are folks that have been waiting outside for 15 -20 minutes .  My attention span isn't that long and while nodding off is not condoned, I have had several others in my vicinity doze off with me.  

So, 0730 it is.  Our alarm goes off at 0600,  Travel time is 15 minutes from Rancho juvat to church.  Meaning in the car, engine on, transmission engaged NLT 0700.  So, having accompanied Mrs. J to mass for ~45 years now, I realize that "Thou shalt not lie" requires a bit of interpretation.  I give her the 15 minute warning ("Hey, Hon, need to leave in 15 minutes") at 0645.  With accompanying 5 minute count downs.

That also gives us a bit of cushion to drive a tad slower than the speed limit in the dawn darkness when Bambi and Family are out on the road also.

Since yesterday was the first day of Standard Time, it was daylight and I was able to see just how many Bambi's there were between us and the highway.  Good thing yesterday was also the first day of Deer Hunting Season in Texas as there sure were a lot of them.

Both hunters and deer.  Going out to the car sounded a bit like a war zone, or maybe just a normal Detroit Day.

Peace out y'all.

¹ He was my first operational Flight Lead and was also my Flight Commander.  So, had my attention both in the air and on my Officer Performance Report. His Call Sign was "Flick".  Learned a lot from him in that first year.

In Memoriam ...

Valory

I learned Thursday that one of those "best friends I've never met," as Lex called them, passed away on Wednesday.

Valory was a gem, she was ever cheerful, she never commented here but commented often over on FB.

I shall miss her a great deal.

With apologies to Gaius Valerius Catullus¹ ...

Ave Atque Vale

Through many countries and over many seas

I have come, Sister, to these melancholy rites,

to show this final honour to the dead,

and speak (to what purpose?) to your silent ashes,

since now fate takes you, even you, from me.

Oh, Sister, ripped away from me so cruelly,

now at least take these last offerings, blessed

by the tradition of our parents, gifts to the dead.

Accept, by custom, what a brother’s tears drown,

and, for eternity, Sister, ‘Hail and Farewell’.

(Source)

Farewell Dear Lady.

¹ For he spoke of the loss of a brother, I modified the poem to speak of the loss of a sister.