Bluebeque

Yesterday was Father's Day. A customer pointed that out to me on Thursday; I hadn't noticed. My family wasn't big on societal holidays when I was growing up, but Dawn loves them, and it's fun to celebrate them. Mother's Day is a big thing for Dawn, and Father's Day is getting that way for me.

It's been a while since I last made an entry here. The BBQ saga continued apace. I bought a grill, assembled, from Home Depot. Someone helped me load it in the truck, but when I got it home I was in a hurry to catch up with Dawn & Rachel, so I took it out myself. Later that evening I was showing it to Dawn and finally realized why it has a 12' hose. Now, mind you, I had wondered why you would need a 12' hose on a gas grill since the propane tank normally sits under the grill. Well, umm, it has a 12' hose so that you can connect it to a NATURAL GAS PIPE! Dork. Can't believe I didn't notice that the label says Natural Gas on it in at least 2 places. Got my neighbor to help me load it back to Home Despot. Took it out of the truck myself again. Returned it, searched for another of the same type with LP, but they didn't have one, even unassembled. Did notice something interesting.

I mentioned on the 7th that Rachel wanted a grill that had a color, not black or stainless, though I was just humoring her by telling her we'd see what they had. Lo, and behold, while I was looking for an LP version of the Weber Silver B, I discovered a BLUE GRILL! Did some more research that night... turns out the Vermont Castings 9030 is rated higher than the Weber, costs a little less, AND IS BLUE. So that's what I finally bought yesterday. This time, Chris helped me get it, unassembled, into the back of his pickup and then from there to our back yard, where I set it up yesterday afternoon. It seems very nice so far. We're going to grill on it for the first time tonight. And we're going to keep it covered when not in use and, at least during the winter, also keep it under our deck to protect it further.

We also went to the Giants game yesterday. Decided Saturday that we should take Rachel with us since it was Father's Day, and managed to get 2 tickets on the phone even though it was supposedly sold out a long time ago. Go figure. Turns out this was NOT a good idea. Rachel was too tired and is not really ready to skip naps most days. I've never left that early except for a rain-out. We were gone by the middle of the third, I think. Had some excitement at the lot where we'd left the car. One of the lot attendants tried to back another car into the space where the 4 of us were standing. I started yelling and was about to kick the hell out of the side of the car but realized it wasn't HIS car. And couldn't bang on the back of the car with my hand because I had Rachel in my arms. He jumped out and almost started in on us. I yelled "WE'RE STANDING HERE WHATTHEFUCKDOYOUTHINKYOU'REDOING???" I swear if I hadn't had Rachel in my arms I would have smacked him one. I am not sure if I've ever been quite that pissed or quite that close to going after someone.

Anyway, got Rachel home & into bed (she was out within 2 minutes once we started driving) and I watched the rest of the game from about the middle of the 6th. It was a pretty good game. One questionable call in favor of the Giants that resulted in their scoring 4 runs on Fonzie's HR, rather than only 3, but Schmidt pitched his second 1-hit complete game shutout in a month. Would have been fun to be there for the whole thing.

And now, I should get back to work. I've got a customer (O) going live with 500 users today and she's nervous because the login performance seems to be down a little. I told her to keep an eye on it, especially when the new users actually start using it this afternoon or tomorrow. And I've got tons of work for this other customer (J); probably 3 person weeks worth so far, and they may sign for some more. And M is supposedly signing their absolutely HUGE service order any day. I think that one's enough to keep all three of us customizers busy for at least 2 months. Just the one customer. Whew.