Finally got around to putting this together:
Currently Reading: Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans (review).
Category: Selfie Love
Feeling High as Flying a Kite at Revere Beach
We went today to go check out the 8th Annual Revere Beach Kite Festival. It looked like it rained a little bit, but mostly it was just overcast, and though it first it sounded like it might not have been the right decision to go, that changed as time went on, and it was actually a really fun time! And of course afterwards I had to gobble down a Kelly’s Roast Beef. I even got a gift for LD’s friend who’s coming to visit next month.
A video from last night’s Trixter show that we almost attended: YouTube link. Also some of the bikes at the ride yesterday looked pretty rad to me, including this Urban Arrow Bike, which costs an amazing 8,000 dollars. Personally, for me, I think I’d rather buy a car for that money.
Currently Reading: Another coming through my Libby app, Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture. (review here) I really got to get cranking on finishing these books before I have to return them!
Lunching with Alpacas and Baby Goats
Yesterday was quite a hectic day for us. We met with a friend at LD’s office first since we needed to assemble a new office chair, which we did quickly, as well as bring back items that I’d need to take care of, such as repairing the dollhouses’ grandfather clock and getting rid of some old stuff. It was then out to the wilds of Northborough for lunch with alpacas. Now, the lunch consisted of little sandwiches and salad, but that wasn’t the point. It was actually lunchtime with alpacas.
So you eat, and then they bring down the alpacas, who you can feed, touch, hang out with, and photograph. That was really great, but then the proprietors decided to let the baby goats out to run wild, and you could feed and cuddle them as well. It was mayhem, but it was a lot of fun! Would recommend ten times out of ten! We must have taken hundreds of photos between the three of us, but I’ll leave this brief sampling for now.
Like I said, it was a pretty busy weekend all in all, but surely a fun one.
When we finally got home we arrived to see that LD’s old landlady left more containers and ingredients for us to make more lemon orzo chicken soup! It’s getting a little ridiculous that this lady likes the soup so much and wants nobody other then us to make it for her. Anyways, as tired as we were we decided to bang out two huge pots of the stuff. Amazingly we were able to get in all done under and hour and a half. We even added some kale this time, mostly because we had to use up the bag. I’ll be dropping off the various containers filled with this soup to her later today. Where does she put it all?
The wrought iron railing guy is supposed to show up this afternoon to go over some options to finish off the front stairs that was completed last month. Apparently there’s a separate guy from the mason that does that work (at least the folks that we know).
Oh! And we finally got back the workout template of all the exercises we did last Saturday. We’re supposed to these I think 2 or 3 times a week. I’m posting it here if you want to play along with us.
Circuit 1:
- Squat to Box 3 x 10
- Single Arm Bent over Row 3 x 8-10 each side
- Single Arm Overhead Press 3 x 10 each side
- Lateral Lunge 3 x 10 each side
- Bicep Curls 3 x 10
Circuit 2:
- Romanian Deadlift 3 x 10
- Tricep Kickback 3 x 10 each side
Visiting an Inner Sanctum of the Mind!
We started out the day actually going to a trainer space out in Weston to do a free weight strength training exercises with a trainer for a hour to help get a little bit in shape. We did squats, and dead lifts, curls, and all kinds of stretches. Not the worst way to spend a free hour in the morning. Then it was off to what I wanted to check out, this fine dandy of place, right in my hometown. It’s only open to the public once a year. It’s run by a couple who have transformed their house into this place. It’s quite a sight. The crown jewel of the house is surely its Grand Hall at the top of the staircases. Every inch of the walls and vaulted ceiling in the auditorium is intricately painted with bright colors featuring the artists’ interpretation of creation stories from different cultures. There are 57 murals of about 5,200 square feet in total.
(The last pic above is actually from Weston next to the town green where we worked out.)
After that we decided to try a place in the Ville that I had always heard great things about and since it was in the area we went to try it. A little place called Three Little Figs. It was good. Then we came home and bought some flowers to be planted soon as part of our gardening tasks.
Nothing But the Best. Well Wishes on a Stellar Career
We took a short jaunt into town yesterday afternoon to wish a dear colleague of LD’s well off on her leaving higher ed. It was an intimate little gathering with mostly her staff and a few invited guests (including us, I was so humbly honored!) She will definitely be missed there. I guess originally it was supposed to be a much bigger thing but with all the stuff that’s been going on there lately it didn’t seem like the right time for something like that. (I have been rather fascinated reading about everything that’s been going down there lately – crazy times). Actually I prefer the smaller gathering personally.
Some other observations that I had was that we got to park right next door (brings back memories) and then I realized it’s probably the very last time we’ll ever visit here. I’ll probably never set foot in that particular building ever again. I did get to visit the 5th floor for the first time ever though. The digs up there are pretty nice. After a lot of the stories were told and the party started to end, the guest of honor was nice enough to bequeath us a couple of her plants. The hat I’m wearing in the picture isn’t mine. It’s LD’s old landlady’s who we took to Revere last weekend and forgot to take it back. My hands were full with other stuff so I put it on my head to bring it in the house. I’ll drop it off later today back to her. It does make for a funny picture however!
As the shindig wound down we both had to use the restroom. They have gender-neutral bathrooms there so we both able to use the same one at the same time, which I will say is really weird and we probably won’t ever do that again. Just seems strange to us. Also there was what appeared to be this mini shower like thing in there that no one seemed to know what it was for. Too small to be an actual shower and I don’t think anyone would actually wash their feet with it like at the beach so what the hell is it’s meaning? Someone said a pipe drains into there to which I though, well why don’t they just get a plumber and fix the pipe? No one really knew what the heck it was for and they all work there so beat’s me! Also it was pretty dirty. I have no idea what this contraption would be used for, but it does intrigue and perplex me so!
Anyways, Congratulations and good luck on the next chapter!
Checking out the Purple Sands
We started out the day cleaning off the back deck from all the pollen that had accumulated over the last year. We didn’t plan on doing it, but once we got going we couldn’t stop and I have to say it came out looking really good. Then we had decided since it was so nice out to take a ride over to Revere Beach to check out this purple sand that we had heard about being there. It basically got all swept in by the winter storms back in February, We had to check it out and as a bonus we decided to take LD’s old landlady with us to spend the afternoon and hang, so that was nice.
LD also collected a bunch of the sand to bring back and possible put into a jar. Naturally we had to have some Kelly’s while we were there. The lady was so nice to treat us! We all ended up going with the roast beef sandwiches and a side of fries and onion rings. Have to say, it was pretty delish and the weather was great. Then after all that we headed back, I mowed the lawn out front, we did some gardening chores (more of which we need to do tomorrow) and then we had our first firepit of the season. Finally!
Currently Watching: The Bon Jovi documentary on Hulu.
Fist Pumps and Head Bumps
Well, yesterday was quite a day. It started off pretty good, having to take a trip out to Weymouth to pick up something and then since it was nice out, we decided to go by the Hingham Shipyards to get some fresh air. Ended up getting a lunch at Wahlburgers. It’s been literally years and years since we’ve been there. I think we might have went when they first opened. Guess it was a good time to go because the whole area was pretty quiet. We ended up getting chicken sandwiches. Came home, took a nap, and watched some television.
Toward late afternoon/early evening we did the cooking thing. Three meals all at once, which I don’t really like to do because I can get overwhelmed with too many things going on at once. We did the lemon chicken-orzo soup we love so much, along with another chicken dish and some blueberry/strawberry oatmeal for LD. Unfortunely while all this was going on, LD happened to bang her head on one of the open cabinet doors and since she’s on certain meds we felt it best to get checked out at the hospital, so off we went to the ER. Long story short, after all-told about four hours of mostly waiting (first in the ER lobby, and then mostly for the results of the scans to come back), her CT scans looked good, but still going to watch to make sure everything is alright. Coming back around 11 pm we had some soup and then went to bed. I guess I crashed our pretty fast since hospitals and worrying and everything that goes along with that makes me really anxious.
Never a dull moment! Although in the grand scheme of things,, everything went particularly well. However, I am instituting a new rule that no more than two meals will be made by us at a time and to maybe slow things down and not rush so much. We’ll try.
Of Solar Eclipses and Stairs
Today, the mason, the small elderly Italian guy who built the chimney cap a few weeks ago, arrived and began removing the ancient concrete and brick stairs leading to the front entry of the house. It had all started to deteriorate a while ago, so it was time to have it redone. So, that’s what’s occurring this week. Also, the prior setup was not fully to code standards, so this new one will have better measurements, such as a landing that is the proper size rather than being too little, as it is now. The new brick and limestone landings should help improve visual appeal as well. This will be going on pretty much all week I would imagine.
Earlier today I went ahead and created that solar eclipse viewer out of a shoebox. Didn’t have the time or inclination to get the glasses. To be honest, I could sort of care less about the whole thing, but everyone else is into it, so I guessed that I would try to be as well. I personally felt pretty apathetic about it, to be honest. Maybe I’m weird. But then I got invited to see it with some friends who actually had some glasses so I, at first begrudgingly, went over there and watched it, and I do have to admit, that it was kind of cool, and then my mood changed. Plus being with good friends that make you laugh, really made it enjoyable. The box sucked, it was so much better with the glasses.
I also went ahead today and finally purchased some more storage space from Google. For the longest time I held out at the free 15 gigabytes but I got tired of having to erase stuff from the cloud to backup what I really wanted to backup so now 100 gigabits should hopefully last me for quite some time. Plus it comes with some other editing perks so I suppose it was worth it.
Free Cape Weekend Getaway
We had a “free” couple of days to stay at the Cape which we obtained last summer so we finally decided to use it up this weekend. So back down to Earth-3 we went. (Earth-3 being the place down the Cape that we regularly stay at – a time share that we have). So we arrived Friday night and we ended up using a gift certificate to a local restaurant that we’ve gone to a bunch of times and got rid of that. (The gift certificate was also a “freebie” since they messed up our later last time and this was the way amends were made). So that all worked out quite well.
Some other fun things we got to do on this mini-vacation was, as usual, our multiple visits to the Chocolate Sparrow, a place we love to get our treats from. We grabbed a brunch from a place called Grumpies and they weren’t grumpy at all. In fact, I’d say the food was actually really good. I would go back there. We got much needed massages from a lady we know down there who is amazing, and those felt really good. Late Saturday night LD got me a surprise experience, my first, being in a meditative salt cave. So that was pretty cool. The weather wasn’t all that great, a bit rainy at times and quite windy which made the air very cold, but nature is nature! We used the down time to catch up on some of our reading. Speaking of which, my next read is called A Murder in Wellesley: The Inside Story of an Ivy-League Doctor’s Double Life, His Slain Wife, and the Trial That Gripped the Nation mostly because we now know a person who was directly involved. And I mean, you can’t get any closer than this person was! More details to emerge as we delve into this case much deeper over the next few days.
The Greatest Gift
In the beautiful journey of life that we’ve traveled together, every day with you feels like a cherished chapter of a fairy tale. As we celebrate another year of love and partnership, I am reminded of the countless moments that have made this adventure extraordinary. Our love has been the greatest gift, filling our days with joy, laughter, and an unwavering bond that grows stronger with each passing year. Happy anniversary, Ladydoc. Here’s to the countless tomorrows we’ll continue to write together, creating a story of enduring love that is more beautiful with every page turned.
Making My First Easter Bunny Cake!
Making my 1st bunny cake. Thanks, Ladydoc, for gifting me the joy! I’m psyched it came out looking so well!
Currently reading: Molly by Blake Butler,
Not the Greatest Message, Right?
Me and the Bunny outside Woody’s Liquors Store in Somerville a couple of years ago. Such an “Old Somerville” thing to do!
Something to keep the kids busy while the parent(s) stocked up. 
We’re on the hunt for some old vintage board games, so if you have any, let me know!
My knees have been acting up again, joy of joys.
Currently reading: Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren’t Growing Up. I find myself not agreeing with this author in the book at all for the most part, but was curious to see another perspective.
Beach Ready and Dollhouses
I’m ready for those warmer weather beach outings now! This picture I took a little while back makes me yearn for those days right now, but I know they’re coming. Just have to be a bit more patient.
Today’s brief adventure was checking out a dollhouse in Wellesley that I found for LD (it’s amazing what you can find on Facebook Marketplace, I do like to look over the listings) to perhaps buy for her new office location. This thing was quite large yet nice and not flashy, and it came with the prettiest furnishings. She fell in love with it right away, and it’s now part of the family! Then we took a little side trip to see something macabre, which I’ll tell more about later.
Later on in the afternoon I ran a couple of errands, put in a Powerball ticket (had to try, right?) ate some more lemon orzo soup that we made again last night and updated this page with this latest entry.
Currently Reading: The Battle for Your Brain: Defending the Right to Think Freely in the Age of Neurotechnology. Getting all science-y with this read!
Happiness is a Warm Puppy Part Two
Before we went on today’s adventure I wanted to see if what I saw when I dropped the food off the other day was indeed true. I saw a sign out in front of the church that said “Drive By Palms on Sunday.” So we drove over to the church and there really was a lady handing out palms. So I pulled up and asked for some and the woman was gracious enough to ask how many I wanted. I said three, mostly getting these for my mom. So we ended up getting four and I’ll be giving them to my mom when I see her again later in the week.
The main adventure today though was taking a trip up north to see our friends and their dog Mollie again for a hang out. So we spent a wonderful afternoon getting lunch, talking, telling stories, learning some new things, and laughing. Mollie’s now about twice the size I saw her last but still full of super energy.
All in all, a pretty good day.
Baby Goats and Cambridge Bikes
Hanging out with these baby goats this afternoon at a place in Northborough, Massachusetts was simply, “Baaaaaaa-mazing!” The goat from the video below we were told was only 4 days old! He has quite a set of lungs on him! Another goat also got to biting my ear, which while kind of funny, also hurt a teeny bit! And then a third goat fell asleep in my arms- she was a sweetheart.
In the morning I headed out to Cambridge for a bike ride the city was running. Got to travel thru the city, mostly through Kendell Square, and down by Lechmere and M.I.T. As you can see from my stats it wasn’t a strenuous ride in the least, but it being my first ride of the season, my legs and back were a tiny bit sore after. There was no particular theme to this ride and the route had stretches that seemed a bit odd to me, like very narrow passageways which made all the bikes bunch up and the bottle necks. I did get to pass by where M.I.T. was showing off the the S.T.E.M. women orange statues which was something I had wanted to check out in the past. I might need to go down there at a later time to get a better look.
Quite the Handfuls
Yesterday, when sorting through some old stuff, I stumbled upon this Polaroid, which seems like it was taken a lifetime ago. This is from the early Aughts, I think. This picture has quite the backstory, but I’ll let the readers try to piece it together as an exercise. I’m going to have to make some time to look over my other photos from this chapter of my life. There must be a couple more just like this one.
Some things that I want to do coming up in Spring is maybe a mini-golf outing and also a glass blowing class with another couple friends of ours. If they bag though maybe we can go with any other of our friends that may be interested. I also still want to try that axe throwing thing, that’s been on my bucket list for a while now.
This afternoon while I was walking around the flower gardens today, I noticed the daffodils starting to blossom and the tulip leaves starting to emerge. I also observed a snowdrop that I planted a few years ago is now in bloom, a lone soldier braving the cold to reach the sun. I’ll need to do some spring cleaning, get rid of some leaves, and so on, but not yet. I was thinking tonight might be a nice night to light the firepit, but I’ll wait on that as well. It’s nice to know that I won’t have to wait too long to do these things, and maybe even get the grill out a bit early.
Today also happens to be Pi Day (you know, as in 3.14159…) Normally I would celebrate by eating a pizza pie but I’ll probably save that for tomorrow as today I plan on trying my hand at making a mushroom ravioli dish.
Happy Birthday LD!
Happy Birthday to the love of my life!
Through thick and thin, you’ve been my rock, my confidante, and the greatest adventure partner anyone could ask for.
You inspire me every single day with your compassion, empathy, and wit. Your laughter always melts my heart, and I wouldn’t trade our watching-tv-while-on-heating-pads-night talks and silly inside jokes for anything.
This year, I wish you the best and all you could want. I can’t wait to celebrate with you and make more unforgettable memories together.
Here’s to many more years of laughter, love, and growing stronger together.
With all my love,
Mark
Sparkle
Got to hang out with my friend Sparkle at the Sanctuary today. We went there after visiting LD’s old landlady whose husband recently passed away, so we were providing some support. I made some killer salmon and we brought bagels too and had a nice brunch visit.
Living It Up in Lavalette
Day 1: Running Around the Beach
Day 2: Giant Hungry Hungry Hippos Experience
Day 3: Coffee and Meetups
Fun couple of days away. Got to see some family, hang out at a house by the beach, partake in the local activities, take a side jaunt through New York State to catch up with a friend (shout out to The El Dorado Diner in Elmsford!) and grateful for the good times. Didn’t get back from travelling until late last night, hence the sparse update- have to recuperate!
Currently Reading: Divine Might: Goddesses in Greek Myth by Natalie Haynes
The Valentine’s Card
I picked up this special card 8.5×11 card a little while ago and wrote things in the circles from Carson and I and then covered them up with scratch off stickers, so that when the circle is scratched the saying I wrote will be seen. Pretty neat, huh?
I also have a special unique thing planned for LD, but it isn’t quite ready yet, which is a shame, but I’m hoping it’ll come relatively soon and turns out extremely well.
The new couch got delivered this afternoon! Yay!! Great Laz-E-Boy store pickup. Just hope that Carson doesn’t take clawing to it. We’ll have to watch that.
The Case of the Cute Cuddling Capybaras
We got to partake in an amazing experience yesterday. getting to cuddle and play with a pair of capybaras! I love them! Their fur feels like straw. I never thought in a million years I’d ever be able to play with a capybara, let alone two. I remember seeing this animal in a zoo a few years ago and only learned about their existence a few scant years ago. To me, they seem to be the next up and coming “big thing.” We also go to see a wallaby which had a baby popping it’s head out of her pouch every now and again, which was cool to see, and a special cat, some yaks, alpacas and, of course, some goats, but the capybaras were the stars of the show for me! We were lucky to even get into this experience as it is currently very limited but I hit it just right and was able to get us access. The location of all this wonder was down in Mattapoisett, a town down on the southern coast. It was a bit chilly.
Planning on checking out the Puppy Bowl later today. It’s an animal filled weekend!
Carousing at the Cat Cate
It ended up being a real “cat” kind of day. In the morning I went to a pharmacy store to get a baby card for someone who just had a baby and while I was there I noticed this really cute planter in the shape of a cat with a cactus in it so I got it. Sort of an impulse buy but I thought it was pretty cute, especially since I lost on on the ones Trader Joe’s supposedly had last summer but I could never find. We took a trip out to Tiverton, RI this afternoon to check out a cat café! We didn’t know what to expect but come to find out, the place was actually very cute.
Many of the cats were sleeping when we initially came (actually, we had beverages and I had a breakfast sandwich), but by the time we were finished, a lot of them had woken up and started playing with us. A black and white cat was still nursing her kids, which were very large by this point, but she permitted it, so there was that. They had installations along the walls that allowed the cats to move about the space and perches from which they could look into the café area if they so desired. They had a ton of toys and a very cool what appeared to be handcrafted kind of a cat tree with branches in the corner. Eventually all the cats here will be up for adoption. It was fun way to spend a part of our afternoon. Afterwards we checked out a beach in the area but didn’t stay long and then headed back.
Of course, as cute as they all were none can compete with our Carson. Here he is in a shot I took that kind of reminds me of those Playboy Playmate shots in the magazines from the early 70s!
Happiness is a Warm Puppy
Braved the ice and snow and rain falling today to take a ride up to Georgetown to see out friends who finally got a new puppy. Her name is Mollie and she is just the cutest, tiny little bundle of love.
Donning the Apron for an Afternoon of Baking Goodies
We did a bunch of baking on a snowy cold Sunday afternoon! I dug out these cool aprons that we got quite a while back. Other than that it’s been an uneventful back to the grind kind of week. Nothing earth shattering as of late. Just finishing up the confessions of Gypsy Rose, plowing on through season 4 of Nip/Tuck (by this point the show is going downhill imo, nothing as great as the 1st two seasons which were the pinnacle, although I notice a lot of famous actors now as guest stars appearing on the show). When you binge watch episodes back to back, it’s interesting how you can detect narrative lines that just vanished or didn’t make sense.
I’m actually a terrible baker, don’t let the picture fool you!