UMTravels

Kansas City, home to Bar-B-Que and Paddleboats in the same block. Had lunch today at Winslow’s Slow BBQ in the City Market. $4.99 for the regular size pulled pork sandwich. Damn fine BBQ. Gots to love dem pickles on the side. My plans were to head to the Steamboat Arabia museum after lunch. I was […]

I had the most amazing flight this morning. The flight attendants were HAPPY. They were joking, they were enjoying their jobs, they were making EVERYONE feel welcome. I have not had this on a flight for YEARS. Congratulations to the flight crew of UA958 on the Seattle to Chicago run — when I get home […]

It must be eBay day since I’ve managed to get 20 items listed in the last couple of days. Here is what the back hallway looks like now: Wanna see what’s on offer (all twenty items): http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZmarksouderQQfrppZ50QQfsopZ32QQfsooZ2QQrdZ0 Now I’m out of boxes, I’m out of packing materials — in fact, I had to shred documents […]

As Jimmy said yesterday afternoon, relaxing with Scotch on the patio, looking at the garden… “You sure are travelling alot for someone who said they had a ban on travelling for economic reasons.” What can I say. He is correct. In my defense, I’m trying to use frequent flyer miles and cut corners where I […]

How odd it is… last night I’d planned to cook a steak, eat a little salad, drink a little wine, watch a little tube, and head to bed. Minutes before I’m to marinate the steak Swanda calls — want to do Chinese with Mick, Wonderful, and me? Off to the International District I go — […]

The bathroom is all painted. 75% of the lumber is out of the attic. The list of remaining items before listing is: install corner moulding on new bathroom walls install baseboards on new bathroom walls mount towel hooks in the two nooks mount second towel bar for hand towels clear out the rest of the […]

Picking up MoonSong for a quicky run to the island to finish all the shower work — like sanding the drywall, priming and painting — and making the kitchen area more presentable (for hopeful sale). Here are a couple of shots of where we are at the moment: The kitchen area with all the bindery […]

Well, it was another $500 day in South Park — more goods out of the garage and into other people’s lives. Better theirs than mine. It’s nice to have the living room and dining room look more like a living room and dining room than Uncle Markie’s Computer Hut (sort of like Akbar and Jeff’s […]

The topic of today’s blog was supposed to be the joy of selling off my life on EBay to support my bad habits of not really wanting a 40+ hour a week job… but as I was preparing material tonight, this came up: Border Patrol “spot checks” on ferries provoke outrage in San Juan Islands […]

Up and out early — at least I had the leftovers from my Reuben Rap last night to put into my stomach with the coffee. We had a 10am tour at the Toyota Georgetown factory. No Starbucks stop this morning! And, no, this isn’t our group — they don’t allow cameras into the facility — […]

A lazy day in Kentucky. I bailed on the morning trip to the Horse Park, and I bailed on the afternoon outing to Keeneland race track. I did show up for lunch and dinner. What was needed was some down time. And I got it. Lunch was back at Regatta — tenderloin medallions for me […]

Got to sleep in this morning — we didn’t have to be on the road until 8:30! First stop was Woodford Reserve since it gets busy in the afternoon. These barrels were just filled this morning. If you blow up the photo you can see the date stamp for today. Just FYI — Woodford Reserve […]

Well — today it was up and out early (7:30) for bourbon, bourbon, bourbon. You know you are on holiday when your first dram of bourbon is at 9:45 in the morning. Jim Beam was our first stop: Neither Swanda or I had been to Jim Beam before and at least I was pleasantly surprised […]

Greetings from Kentucky, land of thoroughbreds and bourbon, and I plan on both. Interesting red-eye flight from Seattle to Minneapolis — got a free upgrade to first (because I’m an Alaska MVP) and we are at cruising altitude when guy seated next to me gets up to use the bathroom. It’s busy so he’s hanging […]

Here is a lovely piece of email that I sent a few minutes ago: I can’t believe my luck — upgraded to first class — and Deal or No Deal featuring Spring Break frat boys — add the George Foreman knockoff I got at the dump today (traded it for a dead refrigerator) and I’ve […]

 So — here we go with another surprise visit, so I can’t really say anything — and there are TONS of details to work out on the cheap — flights, hotels, cars — I can tell you that it’s for a Gold Anniversary. Enough said. Off to the island after getting a bunch of work […]

Taxes are in the mail. Yea! Now all I need to do is pay the accountant (which was more than the tax bill). Lopez run to work on the bathroom walls is on tap for tomorrow. MoonSong on the 12:40 and me on the 3:30. He can do the blocking work so we can easily […]

Top-down weather is going away — it was a grey drive north with the heater blowing. No rain yet. Better get the yard mowed before it does start to rain. Next on deck was a quickie visit to Swanda’s to pick up a package from the Geeks. 2 gigs of memory for the Toshiba tablet […]

What a beautiful day in Olympia — really top down weather — again. I even swung by my old house to see if the new owner had planted anything in the back yard (not). Wine tasting slated to run from 4-8pm. It was more like 4-11pm. Many, many bottles of wine. Curt even dipped in […]

Good? Citi Smith Barney. My broker provides services that aren’t usually associated with stock brokers. Like getting me latte when I visit and notarizing my will and health care directives. Except for the slowness in figuring out where my ROTH deposit went to — all-in-all good. Besides, I don’t need that for another ten years […]