What's Been Going on at Chez Sluggy Lately

I'm trying my best to get back into a blogging groove since I am back from our latest adventure/trip/vacation but it's been difficult.

Feeling like crap with what is now a head cold doesn't help matters any.
Hubs was so nice to share the virus he picked up in Maine with me....what a guy, right? ;-)
He is better but whatever he gave me I just can't seem to shake.
bleh.

I still have hundreds of photos to edit from the trip.

Interesting story about my camera though, speaking of photos.

The camera died 9 days or so before we left for Maine.
Thinking it might just be the battery that died I ordered one online but I paid for the "expedited" 2-3 day shipping which was $5 more to ensure that the battery would arrive here before we left on the trip.

Well, by Friday morning, the day before we left, said battery had still not arrived......if should have arrived Tuesday at the latest if they had truly sent it an expedited rate.

Friday morning I said screw it and went to Best Buy to buy another of my same camera and an extra Canon brand battery.
My thinking was, open and try to battery first, and if that was the camera issue, I could return the new camera when we returned and I'd only be out $50 for a battery replacement.
But if the battery wasn't the issue I'd need to open/use the new camera and be out $275+ for both the camera and an extra battery.

So I got a new camera and extra battery on Friday and came home to find.....and you know what I am going to say here.....the online ordered battery had showed up in Friday's mail.
Ack!

First off FIRST CLASS MAIL is NOT Expedited!
They sent the package the cheapest rate they could and charged me Priority mail rates.

They charged me $8.99 to mail this and actually spent $2.45 for postage.
So I shot off an email and reamed them a new one.

On Monday while checking emails in the motel room I saw that they had refunded the $5 extra I paid for expedited service.
Satisfaction but still a big old hassle to have to deal with.

I opened the online bought battery and indeed my camera sprung back to life so the battery replacement was the cheapest fix for the problem.  I did take the Canon $50 battery with us on the trip just in case this online bought generic battery crapped out, but thankfully I didn't have to open the package and use it.

So when we got back Hubs took the unused camera and extra battery back to Best Buy and that was $275+ less to pay on the August c/c statement.

I took a shot of the garden before we left........

These were the largest tomatoes we had as of 29 July.  They were slightly larger than the size of a golf ball on that date.
As of today we have some "tennis ball" sized tomatoes out in the garden.  Seems it didn't rain here while we were gone and nobody thought to water the plants.
I'd show you a shot of them today but it's currently pouring down rain thankfully.

I also baked a blueberry coffee cake with lemon buttercream frosting the day before we left for Maine.

Hubs dearly loves blueberries and Weis(PMITA)Markets had a BOGO deal on pints of berries that week so I make a cake.

Of course Hubs didn't eat any of it before we left(I snuck a small square that evening)but the kids sure enjoyed the heck out of it while we were gone.

I think the dog was more upset about us going on a trip than the kids were.......

Between hacking up a lung I am trying to get back into my blogging routine, editing photos from the trip, putting stuff away, doing laundry and keeping the dog hair in the house down to a low roar.

And I'm trying to come up with new ways to use Zucchini since we have 2 in the fridge right now that need using.
I'll tempura some and then make a zuke casserole.  That should take care of what's on hand at the moment.  I'm scared to even look under the zucchini plants in the garden and see more coming. lolz

Ok, that's about all I got for today.  Off to the grocery store to get some deals and the farm stand for some "real" tomatoes.  I have been craving a real tomato the whole time we were gone.

What have you been up to lately?

Sluggy

Chez Sluggy as a Vacation Destination-Part 1

It all began innocently enough.
An online blogger friend mentioned she had taken some time off from work, vacation time, but had no plans to go anywhere.
So I emailed her and said if she wanted to get away from where she lives for a few days, I had a spare bedroom/bed since the Daughter left home in May and she was welcomed to come stay here.
Of course, I also told her that this is the armpit of Pennsylvania and if she came to visit there wouldn't be a grand high class time to be had.....just normal every day type stuff and maybe we could go see something interesting/fun while she was here.

And the blogger friend actually took me up on my offer.
Shocking, right? lol

I love having company but nobody EVER takes me up on coming to visit....until now.
I must say I was giddy as a schoolgirl with anticipation!
My life is so boring.....I hope she wouldn't be disappointed.

Thus begins how Sluggy and Tanner met last month.

I was coming off of a Colonoscopy the Friday before and #2 Son had 3 wisdom teeth extracted the day Tanner said she would like to arrive.  So the decks were clear for her arrival on Wednesday.

Wise planning on her part......come for 3 days and not a whole week.  It's always scary meeting someone for the first time, ya know?  So going to stay at someone's house you are meeting for the first time, it's wise to only commit for 3 days and not 7, because frankly, even though you've "known" each other for months or years online, you really don't "know" each other.
Making it only a 3 day trip meant enough time to have fun together and to get to know each other better but not too much time in case we didn't "mesh" in person.
And besides, being around the awesomeness that is Sluggy for 7 whole days could just wear a person out.*
*Read the above sentence with a full load of sarcasm.*

So dependent on #2 Son having a successful extraction Wednesday morning, Tanner was slated to arrive sometime before dinner that evening and depart after lunchtime on Saturday.

And Tanner and Samantha made good time on the road(thank the lord for avoiding Philly at rush hour!)and cruised into Chez Sluggy around 3ish in the afternoon.

I guess having a strange large woman "of a certain age" grab her when she got to the front porch and hugging her to death didn't make her run screaming back to her car, because she came inside. lolz

Here's Tanner in my kitchen.  She hasn't even taken off her backpack and sat down.
Isn't she the cutest thing?!  Even after hours in a hot car she's perky and cute.
Why would anyone this cute and young want to hang out with old boring me?
I still can't answer that one.....

We spent the evening talking, making friends with the doggies, talking, eating dinner and talking some more.
Man, can that girl talk!
I have met my talking match it seems.
Pfffftt, I thought we'd have trouble finding anything in common and stuff to talk about...lolz

On Thursday, the first full day of her stay at Chez Sluggy things started slow.  We hung around the house, ate breakfast, chatted, I think we ate lunch?, and talked some more.  
Tanner really didn't want to be "doing" lots of stuff while she was here, so this was going to be a low-key kind of visit.
I like low-key. 
The major activity was just sitting around and getting to know each other.


For a change of scenery, in the afternoon I took Tanner for a ride to show her a "good time" in my town.
First we went to a cemetery.

Yes, a good time in my town when you are with Sluggy means you get to go to a cemetery.
Besides, I had 4 F.A.G.(Find A Grave)photo requests at a certain nearby cemetery I wanted to fulfill so I hauled Tanner out there with me.
And she proved to be a trooper and walked around looking for the headstones.  We never did find the folks we were looking for but I got some shots of other headstones to post on that website so the trip wasn't a total loss.

I could have sworn I had taken a shot of Tanner surreptitiously while she was walking the graveyard but I must have deleted it from my camera, so you have to just believe me when I say Tanner went walking through a cemetery.
I don't think she was feeling the love however during this activity.....

So we headed out to our next stop, the Burger's Farm Stand in St. John's PA.

                                     Not Tanner.

I needed tomatoes and some fruit so we hit the farm stand and procured said items.

They have a small enclosure with baby farm animals at the farm stand so I took Tanner's photo standing in front of it.

I tried to convince her to pet the goat but she declined.  The donkey in the background there is quite the vicious animal and had his own sign about staying away from him as he bites(and kicks too I think?).  I don't think Tanner is a farm animal lover in the "up close and personal" sense....

Here is a gratuitous shot of a chicken wandering around the farm stand area for Linda and any other chicken fans out there........

After the thrill of the farm stand, I rode Tanner around our town to show her the sights.......the grocery stores(two, count 'em two!), the banks, the post office, the gas stations, the high school, the Subway, the Laundromat, the post office, the doughnut shops(two, count 'em two!), the pizza shops(a mind numbing number of those), the Rite-Aid and the Burger King.  That about sums up the sights in my town.

While at Burger King I spend lavishly on Tanner and I for a spur-of-the-moment mid afternoon treat.


Since we are/were a couple of hot babes, we hit the drive-thru and sat in the car and ate ice cream cones so we could get unflattering silly photos of each other to share with the world.

 Tanner looking all sexy-like with ice cream shoved on her face.....

Sluggy showing off her tongue work......ewwwwww!

Thanks for the great photograph Tanner!
 *Read with much sarcasm*

Yes, I have no shame and a dragged Tanner down with me.  ;-)

The rest of the evening was spent talking and eating a smoked barbecued fest and then talking some more.
By 11pm I was plum worn out and we hit the hay.
I tell ya this Tanner gal is high maintenance...... 8-))

More of our adventures in Part 2 coming soon.



Sluggy