The grill that was

This morning David was telling me he had smoked some Mackerel on his new grill.

"What do you mean new grill?"

"Why did you get a new grill?" I asked in disbelief. After all he kept our old one... the one I found on the side of the road.

"I found it on the side of the road," he replied.

"WHAT????," I said. I couldn't believe he found a grill that way!

So I told him I wanted the old one because, after all, I was the one who found it!! Can't wait to do a steak!!

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Okay I just saw this on a website and had to post it here. I am still laughing.

The price of technology

I had this brilliant idea that I was gonna password protect my computer in order to limit Jason's use. I've been doing major head butting with Jason over the amount of time he spends playing this one game, Runescape. With password protection he would not be able to log on to the computer without me putting in the password for him... and then I could better police his use. What an awesome solution.. why didn't I think of this sooner!!

I mentioned it to David and he got the instructions up on the screen for me to read. So I proceeded to set up the password, verify the password, and type in a hint.... all the while a little voice was nagging at me in the back of my head... don't do it.

After I followed the instructions, I rebooted the computer. The password box popped up. It asked for "Name" and "Password." Name? Name?? The instructions didn't say anything about putting in a name. I don't what name it wants!!

Well the computer was originally set up under David's name so I entered "David Schuessler" and my password. Nothing. The little log in box shook from side to side to say nope that's not correct. I tried david schuessler, dschuessler, i tried my name, i tried no name... I tried EVERYTHING. David happened to over doing laundry so I screamed for him to come to me. He tried and tried and nothing would work. I couldn't get into my own computer!! Jason in the meantime lurked around snickering, "See mom, I knew you shouldn't have tried to do that!"

David said we could boot the computer with the system disks and asked where they were. "System disks? I don't have any system disks. They are at your house", I exclaimed. So I had to drive 20 miles round trip to get them.

When I got back, we booted using the system disks. It didn't just start up the computer and I had hoped it would. Instead we had to reinstall the operating system and in the process everything I had on my desktop was erased. All my iTunes were erased, all the photos in iPhoto were gone (hundreds)... everything.. my browser bookmarks were gone, my email addresses were gone. YEARS of my life had vanished.

I'm so bummed but at least I can get into my computer now... and no I don't have password protection set up and won't any time soon!

Here we go again...

Jason is back in a cast. He was still having pain in his foot and was insisting it felt like it was still broken. So after a respectable amount of parental ignoring, I made him an appointment with the orthopedic center for this morning. I dropped him off on my way to work and David dealt with the appointment process. He will be in this beautiful lime green cast for another four weeks. I truly think he's not going to stop until he gets to have every color of cast available.

I took this picture of him mainly to show off his cast but as I was viewing it, getting ready to upload it, I realized something extraordinary. This is truly him in his natural state. Look carefully... he's sitting on the couch, junk food within arm's reach, talking on the phone while at the same time playing his PSP with an ear piece that allows him to interact with a friend remotely... yes he's also talking to another friend over his PSP at the same time. The only thing out of character here is the fact that he's not sitting in front of this computer playing Runescape... and that's only because I made him get off so I could write this blog.

The grill that wasn't

I almost snagged me a free grill yesterday. I miss not having a grill but I was never the griller at home... it was always David, so I didn't even try to ask for it when I moved. I'm scared to grill anything anyway and that's why I haven't had a steak since I moved out.

I first saw the grill driving home with Jason. It had been left out on the side of the road with the trash. I was as much excited about making this treasure mine as he was mortified that his mother would actually even consider taking it! So, for his sake, I drove on past with the intention of coming back to get it later.

When I went for my walk yesterday evening, it was still there so I got a first hand look at it. It was a gas grill, some off-brand, that was missing its gassy parts but was certainly usable for charcoal, which I prefer anyway. It had the main grill plus an upper shelf for veggies I suppose. And it had two side shelves for putting utensils on, etc. It needed a good cleaning and probably some paint but hey, it was there for the taking.

I stared at it for a few minutes pondering how I was going to get it home. I didn't want to be too obvious because there was a neighbor nearby mowing his yard. It was too big to fit in the Jeep and I would have to go back home to get the Jeep anyway. So I decided to get it on the way home from walking... I would just roll it up the street behind me.

I found another grill this way about 10 years ago. I was driving home and noticed a man wheeling a grill toward the side of the road. "I bet he's throwing that away," I thought to myself as I passed by him. "I'm gonna come back and get it after I get home." But something made me change my mind so I turned around right then and went back. I'm glad I did too because the other things he left were snatched up within an hour. I asked the man if he was throwing the grill away and he said he was and told me I could have it. It was a brand new Weber charcoal grill.. only a few months old. He explained that he had purchased it thinking he would like charcoal but hated it, so he went out and bought a gas grill.

He helped me load it into the car and I scurried home with my awesome find laughing the entire way.

I was laughing because we had just moved into this house a few months earlier and had left our grill at our previous house (it was permanently attached to the deck). David had been using our smoker as a grill which, as you can imagine, made every thing taste smoked. Well I had had enough of the smokey tasting food and told him I wanted to get a grill. He said the only way I was gonna get a new grill was to find one on the side of the road!

So as I walked I thought about my good fortune at finding this grill and about all the good foods I was going to learn to cook. I made my way back up the street and readied myself for pulling the grill behind me. But as I approached its location I noticed it was gone. Someone had snagged it before me!!! I looked around as discreetly as possible and noticed it at the neighbor's house... the same neighbor who was mowing his lawn.