11/27/21 Food Prices?

     Wow, I am starting to notice the higher cost of things in the store.  I'm a little perturbed, not exactly shocked, we have been aware of prices steadily climbing up and it is who's guess when something will make the prices turn down.  I really haven't gone for a "fill the basket, spend $300-$400 shopping spree in a couple months, since Baby A has been busy with classes and Wife gets home late, we are eating out a lot more, not that the food is any better, but it is convenient, I guess.

    This morning I figured I would go get some things to start the week, plus I really like to grill and I don't feel like we have eaten much "meat" in the past week.  Between pizzas, sandwiches, the turkey meal and corresponding leftovers, there hasn't been a real chance of just grilling some fajitas and enjoying some fat tacos.  The first shocker was Wife had asked for Q-tips, I saw them in the big baskets as you walk in the store and I said get those, although I though $4.99 was a bit much.  I wasn't planning on getting much, so I said OK and kept on going.  The next thing to get my attention was the Cheetos, I usually throw in a bag or two, Mijo loves himself some Cheetos and I do too, but the regular bag was $3.88.  That is really too much for a bag of chips.  Yes, I could afford them, but I can't buy them on principle.

    Another big shocker was the bacon.  I usually grab this big pack from Oscar Mayer, I am not saying it is the best but it gives you the most slices and we use it to make our jalapeno bombers, wrapping half a jalapeno with a slice of Mexican cheese, I hadn't noticed the price, so it didn't bother me before, maybe it was $7.  It was something like $10.86, which seems like a lot for a pack of bacon.  I am already avoiding the fancy steaks like rib-eyes and T-bones, not to mention the briskets, but it is only going to get worse.  

    I still got my fajitas, at a cost of like $23 for a pack of 2.2 pounds, which sounds excessive.  I am supplementing the meal with some sausages, chicken thighs, and some other cheap cut of beef which works on the grill.  I'm not really "crying" about the cost, we will still be able to eat even if prices get a lot crazier, but what do people on fixed incomes or low incomes do if this does last another 3-4 years, yes I blame the idiot president, even if I am wrong.  It kind of sucks, but even if these people suffer the most, they are the ones that will continue to line up and vote blue, so they are almost asking for the pain.

    What do I know though?  Oh well, I will enjoy my BBQ to the best of my ability.

11/26/21 Early Thanksgiving At My In-Law's?

     Thanksgiving has come and gone and all I am left with is a gassy reminder of some delicious food.  We got together earlier than normal so Boy could make it back to Austin before the sun went down.  He was technically "on call", although I am not sure what that meant, the few times I was "on call" I had to stay in town in case I needed to go in to work.  But anyways, we left the house around 10:45am and got there by 12:30am.  The traffic was about as light as it has been since Covid had everybody really scared and stuck at home.  We managed to drive around 80 most of the way which makes the trip go by fast.  It was nice to have the four of us together in the car, much like old times, even if the boys do both put in headphones and play their video games as soon as we take off.

    In the past, the meal has been a crowded affair with Wife's siblings all showing up along with a cousin or two, but this year, her brother and his thousand kids did not show, he was working and wouldn't be out until after 6:00pm.  The older sister and her husband and their part of the family was there, along with the younger sister, her man, and their two boys were there and then my mother and father in law.  The food was good, as it always is, my younger brother in law is a BBQ master, he is outside grilling every time we go, and this time he smoked a smaller turkey which was probably the best tasting thing I ate yesterday.  The stuffing was equally as good, and of course the desserts all kicked ass.

    Although we were all there together, it felt like a disjointed meal, the older sister and her part of the family (hubby, step daughter, her hubby, and her 2 kids) all ate in the family room, we ate at the big formal table with Wife's parents, and then the younger sister and her family (hubby, older son, his girlfriend, younger son) ate at the secondary table in the living room.  It was fine, it just wasn't hectic like it usually is with people running in and out at the last minute.

    We probably ate before 1:00pm, and were out the door by 3:30pm.  I have learned not to fight my urges, Wife is as good a driver as I am, so I let her take the wheel.  I managed to stay awake for about 20 minutes, but was out before we got on I-35.  I woke up just as we were about to get into Austin, I love that, missing the whole long boring part.  We got home as it was getting dark, Boy ran in, got his overnight bag, and left to his girlfriend's house.  I think that was his real hurry to be back in town early, but whatever.

    We were in the house before 6:00pm and all I managed to do the rest of the night was nap, fart, and watch Tiktoks.  I was even too full to snack later in the evening, even with a whole bag of leftover turkey and sides.  It was a good day.

11/25/21 Did A Reboot Yesterday?

     I think Wednesday was finally our first day of really resting, with no agendas or things to get us out the door.  I thought we were going to rest on Tuesday after we got back from visiting my folks, but Wife lined up a delivery of the small blankets she picks up once a month at 10:30am.  Although I didn't really want to go, I also did not have a good excuse not to, other than I would have preferred to just lay around.  I had gotten up at 6:00am, thinking it was a free day, and just when I was thinking "time to go nap, Wife likes to sleep until noon when she is off", she comes down the stairs dressed and ready to leave.  Once we picked up the blankets, it turned into "let's go get our pies for Thanksgiving, Central Market is on the way."  It made sense, but it also lengthened the trip.  I could not miss out on going to the store next door, they sell all sorts of cool gadgets and bags, which I like finding stocking stuffers for the boys there.

    We got our pies and then headed home, which then Baby A wanted to go looking around Best Buy, maybe he would get lucky and find one of the new X Boxes.  Best Buy did not have any, Walmart supposedly had 15, but they were being saved for Black Friday, I guess they still like a crowd on the verge of killing each other to save a buck.  We gave up on the idea and came back home. Wife managed to buy some stuff for dinner and burgers to make on Wednesday.

    Getting back to our reboot yesterday, we didn't do anything other than I did go pick up Mijo's friends and then drop them off, but around that, I mostly just napped, ate junk food, grilled the burgers and napped some more.  Wife was not much better, she was already not feeling her best (you know, that time...), so she barely even left the room, which if anybody needs some time off, it is her.  

    I hate to say it, but here we go again.  I got up at 8:00am and already feel like we are running behind schedule.  For whatever reason, Wife says we are leaving at 10:30am to San Antonio, I drank my one cup of coffee with some toasted sweet bread from Central Market and now it is already 9:30am.  I just got the annoying yell from upstairs that she is out of the shower, which is basically "get your ass in gear and come and poop and stuff so we can leave..."  goddammit, I hate always being on some mental schedule to appease others.  Rare is the day when we can just sit around and really just chill.

    Oh well, maybe tomorrow can be another lazy day.  We don't really do the whole Black Friday shopping, people get too stupid and aggressive to save a buck or two, fuck that.  That is my second warning, she just screamed to the boys so they can wake up, so I guess I will go do as I am told or I might not get any turkey.  Happy Thanksgiving Y'all.

11/24/21 Why Don't Celebrities Shut The F*ck Up?

     Mark Twain said it best "It's better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than open it and remove all doubt."  With celebrities especially, we tend to invest our emotions and side with you when we see you on the big screen, specially when you play a hero and we want to believe that yes, you are just a person, but you embody the qualities of the characters you play.  I am sorry, but in this new world we find ourselves in, I can't play ignorant and keep cheering for the men behind the heroes on screen.  The latest sci-fi hero turned dud is The Mandalorian, with Pedro Pascal coming out in support against Kyle Rittenhouse.  I could forgive him when/if he shot his load prematurely and let his emotions out before knowing the full details of the situation, that is what non-thinking reactionary people do.  There is a guy on Youtube, Donut Operator, an ex-officer, he came out initially describing the situation as Kyle belonging to a militia organization as the main stream media wanted to pain him as, but once he viewed the evidence, he changed his opinion and decided that Kyle did indeed acted in self defense.  This even happened with very left leaning Young Turks, Anna Kasparian, another Youtube show that does lean to the left, but the cohost did admit to finally seeing the evidence and agreeing with the rational side and saying it was self defense.  Pedro, is sticking to his guns, now that the trial is over, he still sends his condolences to the two heroes on the left that were "murdered" by Kyle, apparently as Kyle "hunted them down. (that is what the left seems to believe)."

    I felt this same way about Mark Ruffalo who is very left leaning, he plays Bruce Banner, the alter ego to the Hulk, in the Marvel universe and because of his ignorant shit, I can't sit and enjoy those movies, it doesn't help that Ironman was killed in the last one, which was a great point to jump off that sinking ship.  I am sorry, but you don't just represent yourself, you also speak for the worlds you help create, unfortunately, you are part of the face of whatever franchise you belong to, you can say what you want, don't be surprised when you lose half your fans in this age where we are being forced to stand on one side or the other of the line drawn in the sand.  

    It has to be ego that makes these geniuses pipe up because they could just make their millions and not take a side, then we wouldn't have anything to object to.  You play make believe for a living, none of us think you are necessarily smart, same with Lebron James who is ultra rich because he can bounce a ball, not because he is a scholar.  Stop weighing in on everything, at least wait until the facts are known, y'all are coming across like buffoons. 

11/23/21 Visiting My Parent's?

     There never seems to be enough time to just detach from our obligations, but I guess we do the best we can.  Wrestling kept us busy Friday and Saturday, honestly, it is Tuesday and I am still a little beat from that big event.  Still, we got up Sunday morning and after a bit, drove ourselves down to Crystal City to visit my parents and siblings.  I honestly love visiting with my family, I just don't like being out of my own environment.  We have three bathrooms, for example, in our house (one dedicated for Wife and my fat butt), but over there, we all have to share the one.  If that isn't bad enough, even my siblings who both live next door and behind my mom's house will also hang out and fight for time in the one bathroom.  Then of course, I sleep somewhere between the bed and my recliner, splitting time on both.  I love sleeping in bed, but my back will hurt after awhile, then I switch to the recliner and it feels better, but I do like laying down on a bed more, so I keep going back and forth.  I can't really do that over there, so I wake up with a sore back.

    Other than those little inconveniences, the trip was fine.  My brother's boy wanted to light a fire Sunday night, they got back around 6:30pm, we had arrived around 4:00pm, they had gone to San Antonio to buy a new vehicle, he got a nice loaded Tahoe.  There was a little pissing and moaning when they arrived, as it was his kid's idea to make a fire (it is a newish thing they do, to hang outside in the evenings), but my brother was still pissed that we hadn't started anything.  I have no idea where they even keep the firewood, I think my brother bought a cord of wood which he keeps in his shed, but they were also pulling firewood from all over the yard, so I wasn't sure what was happening.  They also argued over the wood not being cut small enough to light, I just joked "where do you put the pellets in this grill?"  I don't mess around like this, I rely on my pellet grill to light a fire outside.  Once they got it going, it was a pretty good time until it got late and we started feeling the cold, it got cool at night.

    I got up early Monday, around 8:00am, and we just kind of sat around most of the day drinking coffee and eating.  About the time my mom finished making the cake, Baby A started getting fidgety that he wanted to come home to study.  We then ended up leaving by 3:00pm.  We were probably home by 6:30pm, which was good considering the horrible traffic which just makes me feel bad for Wife who is stuck in that every day.

    Although it was a quick visit, my mom and dad are supposed to come up in a week or two to watch our boy in one of his wrestling matches, so we will see.  It is one thing to wrestle, but even being a spectator requires a sort of fitness or one could pull a muscle just sitting there all day.

11/22/21 Our Baby Turned 17?

     Time seems to drag forever on the day to day BS, but the years somehow seem to come on fast.  I still remember Baby A as a little Buckethead husky little hunk of ham and now he is mostly a man with his hairy chest and overly developed sense of maturity.  We are still kind of recovering from the first wrestling tournament and there amongst so much testosterone and teen energy, our boy fits in perfectly.  Last year he still felt awkward and would not wear the singlet, the little outfit wrestlers wear but he said he was ready and he looked as good as 245 pounds of mostly muscle can look in a super tight outfit, the heaviest possible wrestlers are in his category (up to 285 pounds), but he caries himself well for a beefy lineman.

    He is not all brawn as he seems to keep reminding us.  I like to make little jokes with him along with his brother that he is our knuckle dragging Muscle to which he always says "F*ck Y'all (we playfully cuss all the time, not in anger), I am also taking college classes and still have an above 3.5 GPA."  Mijo is getting it done right, I can't say I would change much about him.  He is a very serious person, has already developed a lot of personal self control and discipline.  I can't really even get him to eat Halloween candies from the snack bowl, he is always in training mode, this is not a kid I worry will go out and get drunk behind our backs.

    He has already turned into a leader at his school, which seemed to come naturally for him.  I thought for a Junior the responsibility came on a little early, but he works hard in the gym and I think the other kids notice and that makes them look up to him.  He was deemed the captain of the linemen during football and he is the leader now of the wrestling team, mostly because he is the only returner from last year's team, so he has that much more experience than most of the other boys.  It was cool to see him holding court and seeing most of the team follow him around throughout the day as he went out of his way to go and cheer for the other wrestlers on his team and consoling them after their matches.

    His birthday was a little bit of a mixed bag, we went down to my folks Sunday afternoon, his birthday was Monday, but since he got a little nervous that he had to test for one of college classes, he put a little pressure on us to come home early.  We then did not wait for the family to assemble like normal, people were busy during the day, but my mom still baked him a pineapple upside down cake and we sang him Happy Birthday.  He knows we all love him, he'll probably get another Happy Birthday sung to him on Thursday at my in-law's house before or after we eat turkey.  I think he has decided he wants a PS5, so that's something to go out and buy him, which seems like a rarity, he hardly asks for any material things.  Love you Mijo, Happy Birthday.

11/21/21 Capitol Classic (Parent's Perspective)?

     If anything, we learned that we are not in good enough shape to even watch one of these wrestling tournaments that go on for multiple days.  I think there was a lot of lack of good control and the venue was too small for the amount of kids involved.  We could have sat down but there were really two gyms (three rings in one, two in the other) being used and any kid could wrestle in any ring, so we couldn't just sit in front of one ring and wait.  The way wrestling seems to work, based on what we saw last year and so far this year is they start off with the lightest weight and work themselves up the 14 weight classes (106, 113, 120, 126, 132, 138, 145, 152, 160, 170, 182, 195, 220, 285).  I asked the coach to check and with the boys, they only allow one player per weight class for each team, so our son, for example is the team's 285 wrestler.  It kind of sucks that he is in that weight class because it is such a large range.  He weighs 245, but can easily find himself fighting someone weighing 285, 40 pounds of mass is a huge difference compared to the lighter classes that only range 7-12 pounds.  His lineman buddy also weighs above 220, so is the JV heavyweight.  The girls have a hard enough time filling their weight classes, so they don't have a JV, but will allow multiple girls for a particular weight class.

    As far as my comment on being in shape, if we wanted to actually see a match, we had to move with the team and stand around the ring or we were not going to be able to see over all the standing kids.  Because we are starting to get to know the kids better, from football and some of them coming over to the house, we are invested enough that we want to see them fight and support them, I still hate that the rest of the parents don't come and support their kids, but I get it with this sport, it is a little violent.  All this standing around and constantly moving I think is what left us so beat and sore.  We were constantly going from back to the bleachers to the other gym to watch a match, then back to sitting for twenty minutes, to down on the floor to watch a match there in front of us.  The bleachers from afar looked puffy and comfortable, but they were worse than concrete.  They were almost too narrow and the plastic had no give, and they were shallow, so my knees were up high and it was a struggle to stand every time.  We have really nice bleacher sits with backs but they need to catch under the normal metal stadium seats and with these plastic crap, that was not possible, so we couldn't even use them for help.

    We were there until 11:00pm Friday night, our son probably fought his one match about 9:30pm that first night.  We then had to deliver him to the meet at 7:15am even though they didn't start until 9:00am, which they didn't say or we might have slept in another hour.  The meet ended about 6:00pm, we picked up chicken, came home, and I must have fallen asleep in my living room sofa by 7:00pm and did not wake until 10:30pm.  I managed to pee, then walk upstairs and fall right back to sleep.  I woke at twelve thinking I had slept into the middle of the night, only to find it was about the normal time we go to bed.

    I can't imagine how Mijo is feeling, he took a beating yesterday, fighting three times in one day.  We are sleeping today until both Wife and him wake up, Wife got home Friday after putting in a full day and going directly to the meet and being there until 11:00pm then doing it again on Saturday.  Some of these kids have parents who probably don't even work and they can't show up to support?  There were a handful of parents there though, and that was nice.  It was also nice that strangers come up to us after our son wrestles and we I was told a couple of times that they have seen our son wrestle and they like what he does on the mat, that he fights with confidence.  That is what I like to hear, almost makes the beating I took worthwhile 😀.  I kid, These moments will pass by too quickly, I am just happy we can be involved and show Mijo we are there with him, the soreness is temporary.