{"id":1388,"date":"2011-12-22T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-12-22T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/?p=1388"},"modified":"2019-04-10T07:24:38","modified_gmt":"2019-04-10T11:24:38","slug":"tidbits-updates-and-pause","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/?p=1388","title":{"rendered":"Tidbits, Updates, and Pause"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a onblur=\"try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}\" href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/_yytsDp42pSs\/SzFpAmGqrKI\/AAAAAAAAB7A\/MHSl8x2XGaQ\/s1600-h\/Xmas08.jpg\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 212px; height: 240px;\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/_yytsDp42pSs\/SzFpAmGqrKI\/AAAAAAAAB7A\/MHSl8x2XGaQ\/s320\/Xmas08.jpg?w=584\" alt=\"\" id=\"BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5418227285652843682\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><span style=\"font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;\">Best wishes to visitors of my blog, returning or new. Things have been kinda topsy-turvy at the ol&#8217; BHD household, so this post will hold until after Christmas.<\/p>\n<p>Whassup?<br \/><a name='more'><\/a><br \/>Man, I *dislike* that expression.  It&#8217;s so sloppy&#8230; I am such an English snob. But I digress.  <\/p>\n<p>My partner and I are hosting his mother in our home.  She has been with us since 18 December. Let&#8217;s just say&#8230; this year &#8230; we will be delighted to take her back home right after Christmas.  <\/p>\n<p>While this blog has been on a temporary off-topic off-schedule, I have received a few questions or suggestions that will become great blog articles, which I intend to write and to post in the near future.  <\/p>\n<p>Some questions have included:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>If you don&#8217;t like the white stitching on boots like Chippewa harness boots, what alternatives are there?  (Hint: just dye the white stitching black &#8212; don&#8217;t get a different, lower-quality brand like Chinese-made Frye boots just because their stitching is black).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>What kind of leather jacket do you recommend that is masculine in appearance yet doesn&#8217;t have too much bling&#8211;chrome zippers, snaps, etc.?  (Hint: a motorcycle cop jacket).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>What do you do when boots are finally broken in and you discover that the support for your arches is no longer there?  (Hint:  Dr. Scholl&#8217;s gel insoles.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>I received a pair of boots won on an eBay auction, but the seller sprayed them with something that has left behind a strong smell of fragrance. Should I try to get the seller to accept a return of the boots and refund my money, or what?  (Hint:  gel odor remover from your local building supplies retailer will do the trick).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These are some examples of legitimate questions that I have received and would serve as good posts for this blog.  I just need to find some time to write them.<\/p>\n<p>My last day of work-work for this year is today, Thursday, December 22.  I hope to spend time with my family on Friday, visiting the youngest members, twin Great Nephews.  Friday afternoon will find me in my chef&#8217;s kitchen, preparing The Feast of the Seven Fishes for my mother-in-law, who requested the meal.  It&#8217;s a rather large production.  Thankfully, one of my senior pals who is a retired <i>pescadore<\/i> (fish monger) brought me 13 varieties of &#8220;fishes&#8221; to prepare for M-I-L to enjoy with her usual (noisy) gusto. I just hope she eats eel &#8212; yuck!<\/p>\n<p>Friday evening, spirits and my partner&#8217;s condition willing, we will enjoy a Christmas concert by a national celebrity at our county&#8217;s community college that my partner has wanted to hear for months. I just hope his mother enjoys the concert; regardless, the concert is for my partner&#8217;s enjoyment.  Perhaps the heavy meal of many fishes will put M-I-L to sleep (LOL!).  <\/p>\n<p>Christmas Eve, my family is switching its Friday Night Family Dinner to Saturday, when we will enjoy <i>festa dei sette pesci<\/i> (again!) with about 70 siblings, nieces, nephews, the &#8220;greats,&#8221; in-laws, and probably some out-laws, too.  My partner and his mother will remain at home because my family overwhelms them with the noise, loud conversations, camaraderie, and fun.  But Christmas wouldn&#8217;t be Christmas without the fam&#8230; and they know it. We all feel it. So I&#8217;ll feed M-I-L and my partner early, then take off.<\/p>\n<p>Christmas Day will be quiet.  Tell you the truth, it will be rather dull with no surprises.  My partner and I gave each other a gift this year by buying a treadmill, which I have been using now for about a month.  I&#8217;m getting better at it, and anticipate it will help with weight maintenance (or better yet, help me shed a few more pounds.)  <\/p>\n<p>I will visit a few senior pals on Christmas Day, and weather permitting, I hope to ride my Harley to visit a few kiddos in my family.  However, I&#8217;ll be home in the early afternoon to begin preparing our Christmas dinner for three.  M-I-L will enjoy it &#8212; she always does &#8212; with mannerless, loud gusto &#8212; and we&#8217;ll once again retire into the basement and watch &#8212; more sappy Christmas movies!  Aaaak!<\/p>\n<p>Well, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, or whatever you celebrate &#8212; have a good time, be safe, be well, be-lieve in the spirit that brings us together at this time of year.  <\/p>\n<p>See you around the bend&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Life is short:  believe in what you do, in who you are, and in what the future will bring brightly to those who believe.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Best wishes to visitors of my blog, returning or new. Things have been kinda topsy-turvy at the ol&#8217; BHD household, so this post will hold until after Christmas. Whassup?Man, I *dislike* that expression. It&#8217;s so sloppy&#8230; I am such an &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/?p=1388\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-home-life"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bootedmanblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}