This day actually started some time yesterday evening. During a thunderstorm in the area and a tornado close to us, 4 outlets in our house went out. I’m thinking something in the storm caused it, because to was only part of a complete circuit. Looked like I would have to replace at least on outlet. I couldn’t tell from a exterior glance as to which outlet shorted out. So I put a trip to the hardware store on my Saturday to-do list. The first thing on the list was getting my daughter to her SAT testing.
Now on to Saturday Morning… Storm damage from the previous night’s storms caused some rough driving. A normal 40 minute drive took closer to 1 hour. We just made it just in time to the SAT testing site. Hmm, day not starting off well…
I had to wait around for at least an hour for the hardware store to open, so I stopped for coffee. Those who have known me for a while, know that my favorite coffee shop closed for good a little over 2 years ago. This was the place my dear wife and I spent many happy times, just getting away from the kids, planning for future things, getting to know one another again after 4 children. Good memories in that little place. I have yet to find any coffee shop that comes close to the atmosphere, quality of the coffee, food ect. and the people who frequent the shop itself. The place I stopped in today had a very nice atmosphere (except for the big screen TV, but I went around the corner from that). The coffee was very good. The food I had ok, but nothing special.. Not many people there, so I couldn’t say anything about that. Too bad it was a 40 minute drive… Too far for a once a week type of thing.
After the coffee, I could get the things I needed to replace at least 1 outlet. I got 4 new outlets just in case. I still had at least 2 hours to wait for the SAT to finish. Stopped at another store and was able to find some water filters for our office at work. I installed an older water filter on the tap at work, but the filters have been hard to find. I try to pick up extra whenever I see them on the shelf. Filtered water makes better coffee ya know… Now only 1 1/2 hours for the test to let out…
Got a call from my daughter in FL, we talked until my Cell battery almost died. Then I got a notice that I had 3 messages… Two were from the day before!!! They weren’t there when I got up in the morning, I checked… Storm must have hit a local tower or something?? Anyway a friend wanted to get together to (in his words) “just get out of the house”. Great!! How does one decide what to do when I was already invited to oldest daughter’s place for fun and games… Hmmm. Well, I was expecting a call from the oldest earlier in the week to finalize the plans. It never happened. I let my youngest test goer decide… Friend won the toss.
So after a good lunch youngest, and I head out for some fun. We played games (all sorts), and just had a lot of fun. We played a miniature bowling game. The balls were slightly larger than a softball, no holes, and the pins were on strings/wires. If you ever see one, try it out. They are very fun. We also played indoor mini-golf (black lit area with dark black ‘greens’, and glowing colored bumpers and obstructions). This was fun to, but it did make it hard to ‘read the greens’. I ended up with a hole in one on the last hole. We also played a number of arcade games for ‘tickets’. It was a fun afternoon/evening… Good idea C…
Now I’m tired and ready for bed…. What a Day…
Wow… and I was tired from just the fun day.
There actually was a tornado? They were saying on the news that it was only a storm with rotation. If that’s the case, they need to develop an alarm system other than the siren because ppl are starting to not take the siren seriously – they hear it and go outside and gape.
From what I heard there was one sighted just west of OH/IN line. I also noticed the dirt colored sky. After all the years I’ve been living here, it is almost a sure sign of a tornado somewhere in the area. The Defiance area had massive trees down all over town, with a good portion of the county without power. (ran into Edison crews at Cosmos).
There were a couple of tornadoes somewhat north of us here as well. It’s only by God’s grace that there hasn’t been a tornado in my particular area in years. At least any that touched down- the siren has gone off many times.
Sounds like some nice bonding time for you. All too often dads don’t have that time for whatever reason.
I’ve always tried to make time for my daughters. Not always easy, but I made the effort. For the past 4+ years, I’ve been making more of an effort. Definitely the thing to do.