It Never Fails

 Mr. Cooper and I tried to sleep in ... well at least "I" tried to sleep in.  Mr. Cooper is always raring to go get the ball for my morning yoga session.  It's not a bad thing.  There are lots of cracks, pops, moans and groans (all coming from me) as things get loosened up.

My coffee went down way too fast as time flew by.  I had a grocery store $10 off coupon with an expiration date burning a hole in my pocket.  So off I went to pick up whatever was on sale.  Pork is still reasonable here, but beef is up to $15.99 a pound.  The bad news is my grocery bill is up $80 a month.  That's a chunk for a single income house.

What I discovered was most of the things on my list were no longer available in the store.  Marsala wine for chicken marsala, lemon curd for lemon cheesecake, and the list goes on.  You know how they always ask if you found everything?  I couldn't wait.  Too bad nobody cared enough to even respond.

So why a picture of the Magic Castle?  There was one story I left out yesterday.  I'm telling you, it never fails.  Here's how it goes .... the girl sitting next to me counts the cards and tells me exactly what to punch in to the cash register.  It doesn't matter how many times the player tells me, I don't listen.  I only ring up what the girls says as she stacks them all together and hands them back to the player.

Thirty minutes later this player comes stomping up to the desk, cutting in front of everyone, demanding more cards.  She said we charged her but she didn't get them all.  This is one I've had trouble with before. She screamed at the top of her lungs "I AM NOT A LIAR" as she threw her receipt at us.  

I explained that those charges would not be on her receipt if she had not received the cards.  I finally gave in to keep the screaming to a minimum (this was all before the dog showed up) and gave her the cards, but told her in no uncertain terms that I would never do it again.  EVER.

Another thirty minutes went by and here she came again.  Oh GREAT!!  Now what?  She had found all the cards she accused us of not giving her.  Surprisingly she apologized, making my helper feel much better about the incorrect accusations, and returned the extra cards.  Yup ... that's how it goes most every week at Bingo.

Back to my kitchen, having eaten some of the best pico de gallo I've ever had at the Elks dinner, I sought to duplicate it.  It became a comedy of errors, as seems to be normal in my kitchen.

At least I got the tomato part right, chopped to perfection.  Into that I added onion, except it was the white one instead of the red.  What was I thinking?  Chopping the jalapeño was fun as I tried to be sure I didn't get too much.

I completely forgot the garlic, but chopped the cilantro and mixed it up.  My mouth was watering!!  Wasn't I surprised to find the cilantro had magically turned into parsley!!  And WOW ... that onion was STRONG!  I just stood there and shook my head.  What a letdown!!  Next time I'll just buy it pre-made.

In the afternoon, Cooper insisted on snoozing on the couch for a couple of hours.  Since I'm not allowed to get up, I watched more rodeo.  I'm surprised to see so many competitions around the country since I rarely ever hear of anything in California.  Another hour went by as I balanced my checkbooks, which is always a big surprise!  You would think an accountant would keep better control over those things.

And then there were four .... I was able to gather up the wherewithal to finish up block numero quatro.  I've decided to view this project as my diet.  Every time I think about that cake in the fridge, I sit down and sew for 30 minutes.  So far it's working pretty well ... at least as well as can be expected with my sweet tooth.

This morning I'll be out picking up the game camera once again.  I think I've found something rather interesting ... a WOW moment.  I'll post the videos tomorrow.  Today I'm hoping for a snooze before heading off to a long 3 hour meeting at the Elks Lodge, where I've actually put my accounting skills to good use.