Uncomfortable Hump

Late start. Did one MSF account and French lessons before showering and making a decent breakfast. Sat at the helm thinking I’d run do a few household chores while I was home but the next thing I knew it was half eleven. I thought I would be touring again today but three quick issues presented themselves immediately so I opted to get my feet back under me for the office portion of the job. There are only a couple more corn sites I want to see anyways.

I felt off from the opening bell. I don’t know if it was weird sleep or the issues that kept me off balance but it was a grinding morning. I spent several swaths of it on the phone with what were hopefully productive conservations. Things went by quickly. I can’t provide more detail outside of saying the requests and questions getting to me are getting weirder every week. By the time the dust settled it was a quarter past noon and it was time for lunch. I had the last cam of soup, a Campbell’s vegetable. The soup I ate for a large number of days throughout high school. Easy meal, just toss a can in my bag and make it at Admiral Bonesaw’s house with their dishes. Today I supplemented it with a Stouffer’s Bistro Crustini Steak and Cheese panini that I overcooked and somewhat ruined. I guess I’m back on the sandwich component for lunch.

The afternoon was dominated by two meetings and a couple phone calls. It went by quick and was less chaotic than the morning. I took a short break at half four to collect my wits. I was feeling crappy. I ran out of allergy pills on the weekend and not sure if the corn was getting to me or something. Slight headache and generally tough feeling for the afternoon. I eventually wrapped up the day at six and went to prepare my dinner. Tonight was a cardboard pizza with extra cheese and some Cholula hot sauce. This has become a Wednesday night usual for me.

Normally I’d be rushing to prepare for some D&D but we’re not playing this week due to members of the party traveling. Instead I planned to watch my once beloved Leafs open their season against the team that destroyed them emotionally last year in the play-offs. This was not smooth sailing for me. The SN Now app wouldn’t work on any device. I tried it on the big screen and eventually got it to play after many sign-ins and password submissions. I was really getting close to snapping and outright cancelling my subscription. Whatever they did to the app made it a heap of trash. Glitchy and unreliable. They also tried to strong arm me into letting them monitor my data. I was and continue to be wildly disappointed with their product. Eventually I got to watch them in the basement on the big screen. In the end they won the game and restored a modicum of faith to the faithless followers. I’m not back yet, lots of layers of anger and hatred to chip away first, they made me a skeptic. I was in bed by ten and asleep by half past.

Return to the Tour

It is always tough to get back to the grind after time away but today I was quick on my feet. There was not slew of meetings since Monday got jumped over this week. I had a fairly open schedule with just one call so I formulated a quick plot while I covered my MSF duties in the morning. I left the house before eight and with fuel and my McBreakfast to keep me going I headed North of London to cover a few locations. The plan was ambitious but I think was very achieveable. The rain would be the biggest deterrant, it wasn’t clear what was going to happen so I ensured that I was prepared for anything. The first site on my list was a corn location that had the 85RM and 90RM maturity tests. I hadn’t seen much of them in this part of the country yet so I wanted to get a look and I had been told this location was nice. It was a bit late to see it, I wouldn’t get much of an idea on staygreen or plant health but I would see enough. The sky was getting darker and darker while I pushed through the location. I got a phone call part way through and was distracted. I may have mixed up messages and will have to deal with that issue later. No time to worry, there are crops to see and soon combines will make that impossible.

After getting across that corn location I slid down the road south for a bit and landed at the first of three soybean locations that I needed to see. This was one of the special ones so it didn’t take as long. I had that one call while I was there and it fully rained for most of the time I was there. I had my rain jacket on and my umbrella up and the handle jammed down my jacket. If I pushed my head just the right way it would stay in place. That allowed me to take notes at that site. I was back on the move around noon. The next site was down the main road about forty minutes and it was a big’un. There were four tests to review, each bigger than the last. The first one put me in a bad mood. The material was way too early for the location and looked terrible. It was pretty much a waste of time to take notes at that location for that material. The other three sets weren’t much better. I’m not sure what happened there this summer but it was a touch site. It was supposed to be my backup to bring customers to and I’m very glad that never came to pass. I’ll be having conversations with the group that runs that site. It rained twice while I was there but just light showers, enough to make sure that no harvest could happen soon. Stupid weather, days like this are why I put my hand up for a desk job. After I finished the site it was nearly two and my tummy was hungry. I stopped at the dirty bird ten minutes south and I was greeted with a delightful surprise. The Double Down was back! And for a limited time, so I was urged to get it while I could. Seeing no future opportunities to do so, I made my move. It was better than I remembered. They seemed to have changed the breading to something thicker and crispier than I remember. It was a wow meal. I got popcorn chicken too because I was hungry. The Double Down was fantastic and surprisingly easy to consume. I figured it would be slopping everywhere and had reserve napkins for that eventuality but they were for not. I dipped my popcorn chicken morsels in a buttermilk ranch sauce and slurped back my Mountain Dew fuel before heading to the last location of the day with a pleasantly full gut. I was in a much better mood now.

The set at the last location was pretty small and I made the decision not to put my boots on, to try it in my Crocs. Recall that it had been drizzling on and off all afternoon. I came to regret my footwear decision. Nothing epic happened, it was just slippery and I got my Crocs muddier than I like them. I guess I haven’t shared my footwear strategy for walking plots I can drive to. I keep my Blundstone steel toes in the back seat and my steel toe rubbers in the box. I’ve only needed the big boys once this fall, in Quebec, where I mentioned they’d sprung a leak. Generally I’ll put my work boots on and if they get dirty I’ll put them in the box. I take them off before I get back in the truck, replacing them with my Crocs. So while I’m in the truck I’m generally wearing the Crocs and when I’m out of the truck I’m usually in my Blundstones. It keeps the truck clean and is more comfortable for driving. I need to replace the work boots and the rubbers I think. The blundstones barely go 5000 steps before it feels like I’m walking on plywood. I’ve wore out the sole before the boot, that’s a first for me. Anyways, I got across the last location with limited rain hitting me. I had an hour drive home which landed me there towards six. I didn’t need much of a dinner since I had a large late lunch. I had some water and some granola bars and settled in for the night. I reviewed my draft results again and set my lines for the week. I also played some Microsoft Solitaire Collection challenges to start to get caught up. I still had lessons from September to wrap up before the window of availability closes. I finished the evening with what else, MSF and YouTube, coasting into a bedtime around half ten. It felt like a most productive day for me.

Thanksgiving Monday

The day of the return journey south. Was up and at them ahead of seven and them was my parents in this case for those whom I was at. I hauled my stuff to the truck, said my goodbyes to the parents and dogs and struck off for the long journey back to the Harbour. I fueled up in town. The truck and myself with a McBreakfast, the third of the trip, yikes! The first segment of the trip was smooth and enjoyable. I made good time and got myself to the Bay by twenty to ten. I swung over to see Booj. He wasn’t feeling great so we met in his driveway and kept our distance. He was getting a seasonal cold but that’s a real issue in these COVID times. We exchanged pleasantries and gifts. I got him a nice PBR mason jar mug to pound beers out of and he got me a lovely wolf carving for my wall. I was back mobile a healthy conversation later. I was planning to urinate during that stop and keep on trucking for several hours but social distancing cost me that so I planned to make a fuel, urine and food stop an hour later, around noon. That plan crumbled when I got there. The gas station was completely rammed. All luxury vehicles from Toronto and herd of people standing around hacking darts and chatting. It was crazy and completely unexpected. I later talked to the Chef and he mentioned that he had been in that area the previous day and seen the same thing at the local hotels. I was in line for fuel so had to follow through with that but abandoned the other facets of the plan due to crowding. I got my gas and got out of there. A short distance down the road some guy in a van waiting to cross the highway flipped me the bird and my road rage and recent frustration merged into a full blown tirade. Eventually I was able to almost calm down then traffic picked up and the road rage portion of my overall anger flared back up. It got to the point that I decided to take the next road off the highway and carve my own path home. I checked ahead on the big roads and they were loaded with delays, including a few over twenty minutes. My ETA according to Google Maps had ballooned up by ninety minutes since I last stopped. Despite that it kept insisting I get back on the highway. I pointed the truck south and west and hoped Siri could keep track of me. I made some missteps but hours of scenic driving and an emergency roadside pee later, I arrived at the Harbour. I found the results of last week’s meal prep waiting for me and to continue my Monday tradition, here is how I did.

I quickly unpacked and let people know I’d made it safely. There were household chores needing doing and I got myself unpacked quickly and fired up some laundry. Mother had sent me with some leftovers to make things easy food-wise upon my return. I chugged that food while playing MSF.

I rushed upstairs to prepare myself for our fantasy hockey draft. This was why I felt I needed to hustle home. I did about thirty minutes about prep and the draft was over quickly. I work on MSC challenges while I was on the computer until it was time for bed. Unfortunately I forgot to change the laundry over and left wet clothes in the washer all night. I managed to get to bed and asleep ahead of ten.

Rain Day

It rained on and off through the night. Everything was thoroughly soggy by morning. I wasn’t in a big hurry to get out of bed. I went back to sleep for a bit and then focused on MSF for too long. Eventually I emerged just as the Big T was wrapping up the traditional Sunday morning breakfast meal. Some mildly charred perogies. He was kind enough to keep his dirty onion ones in a separate pan for my benefit. I think after thirty some years he’s gathered that I hate the things. They had bought some artisinal bread especially for me. I didn’t realize until it was almost time to leave but I did make up a nice little egg and cheese samidge to go along with the perogies and bacon. Tasty start to the day.

There would be no outside work today. I thought about inspiring the troops to take on a project like cleaning the garage or shed but that didn’t fit the vibe at all. After eating Mother settled into her book and Big T got his. They both quietly read. I was surprised but figured that it was Sunday and they are active enough all week. It didn’t sit well with me that the barn and seed mill are in a state of disarray but I followed their lead. I went back to my room and had another nap after passing out watching YouTube. I woke up and did more MSF before doing some research and reading up on some products I might be thinking of buying or adding to my Christmas list. I crawled out of my hole around half eleven and they were both still reading. Mother had gone back to bed with her audiobook this time and Big T hadn’t moved. I stirred up trouble and soon we were eating leftovers for lunch. We used the bread buns and crammed them full of awesome stuff. Some of the lemonade from August was still kicking around so I tucked into it. Very refreshing meal for the gang.

The afternoon was also very low key. At one point I went upstairs and we got talking and Mother recalled that part of my birthday cake was still in the freezer. I brought it up and we all had a piece and it was decided that I’d better figure a way to take some home with me. It is my cake afterall. It was still good months later, moist even. Hahahaha!

Around four I got myself properly cleaned up and dressed to go for dinner. We were going down the road to my cousin’s place for a proper Thankskilling meal. It was primarily their branch of the family. I felt a bit like we were interlopers on their family event and went as far as to mention that to my parents. I was shushed and we went anyways. It would have been weirder not to. It was a classic spread for our family, about three times as much food as you’d need. I was too frazzled to take a picture of my meal. There was a lot going on and I was just happy to find a spot on the couch and wolf down my meal. Even though it was family it took a while before I felt comfortable in such a crowd. It’s been so long since I’ve been around people, took time for that to come back to me. Odd the way we react to stuff sometimes. Either way, the food was amazing. I had some apple pie for dessert but apparently the pumpkin cheesecake was electric. I chatted with a couple members of our fantasy hockey pool who were there, the draft is tomorrow night so we excitedly shared some perspectives. They obviously put significantly more time, thought and effort into it than I do. But I’m the reigning champion of the league so I guess I’ll just keep to my process. Ha! We came home around seven and I put on Ted Lasso without asking. We’d made it part way through season two when I was there in the summer and I wanted to keep going. We didn’t get to the end because we were all falling asleep by ten. I also needed to get some rest, big day ahead of me tomorrow. Bed came next and sleep was quick to follow.

Scenic Saturday

The day started quite early. The plan was to meet with the Estimator and his brother for a late season morning on the water. I didn’t bring any fancy tackle or equipment. The only thing I tossed in the truck was my life jacket, just in case. You can see that it was a fairly magnificent sunrise to start the day. This was from the front porch.

I ripped into town and got myself a McBreakfast and was a few minutes early. I donned a sweater, a jacket and my life jacket. I remembered my sweat pants this trip so I’d be nice and toasty. I even had time to get a sunrise photo at the mouth of the river. Pretty majestic.

We got away nearly on time and started out into the lake but the minor breeze was creating some rolling swells and my guts hate that kind of thing at the best of times, let alone right after I mauled a sack of food into them. They had the same idea and we ended up trolling up the river. We got past most of the houses and switched motors. I went out the back of the boat and they covered the front and side. We trolled along, enjoying the serene beauty of fall on the calm, glassy surface of the brown, muddy river. Even if we didn’t catch anything we all agreed that the morning would be considered a win from that experience alone.

But we did catch some fish. We played around with a couple different setups as we smoothly sailed along. I didn’t realize but my two soft plastics in my small travel tackle kit had melted and partially fused together. That was cool and a bit funny though it ruined the action of both. They were both paddle tails and neither swam like they should anymore. I tried some worms, a chatter bait and a jig head with a minnow. The Estimator broke the ice and I decided to switch to my Mepps spoon.

I’ve always kind of hated spoons but thought I’d try a few as we trolled. I ended up catching three fish on the first one I tried. We only caught golden eyes, locally called moon eyes or even white white fish. Over the course of an hour I nabbed these. They are known for having especially bland flavour so we put them all back for the next angler. You can see from the last picture what the spinner/spoon looked like. Probably more of a spinner now that I think of it.

I emerged from the boat as awkwardly as I had boarded, low water makes a big step in and out, and I went about my next task. I had a substantial but delivery to make. A friend of the family was opening a new location for her store and I had to figure out where it was and how to deliver there. I popped in and found her. The place was quite busy so I ended up piling the fifteen cases in the back myself. Then learned I’d piled them in the wrong corner. I moved them all and went back in to give the paperwork. Money was forced upon me. I tried to deny it but it was becoming a scene and there were customers. I returned home to a pair of roast beast samidges and some water. After lunch I retreated to my room for some MSF and fell into a devastating nap. I struggled to pull myself out of it and get gussied up in time for our dinner guests. My only remaining grandparent and my aunt and uncle were coming. Essentially the local family from Mother’s side. We had a nice time visiting and eventually dug into an impressive meal. The potato wedges that the Big T favours seem to always take much longer than he anticipates. Three times running anyways. It was a tasty feast that they slaved over all afternoon.

After the meal and the dishes the old croakanole board was pulled out and we had a few games. I watched the first and then enjoyed winning the next two. By the end I was getting my touch back. It was fun. We watched an episode of Big Sky, a show my parents watch, and then I scrambled to bed around half nine. Sleep took me around ten.

Beautiful Scenery

I’m going to do this entry as another one of those “Explain that gram” entries. Have fun with it.

I left my house in good time this morning and made the call that with rain coming I would move the corn location I’d planned to see into next week and focus on getting this soybean location done before driving North in the light. I got to the location and saw some interesting things. The site was very muddy and probably should have been harvested weeks before, if not for the constant rain and mud. The pods on some varieties in a trial were cracking open and dropping the beans out as they got over-ripe. Those dropped beans germinated and started growing. This is not what we meant by double crop soybean. It looks like a mess. I took my notes, more than I should have, and got on my way, hoping for a relaxing drive.

It was a pretty chill drive. I had a few calls to field but otherwise it was smooth sailing. The weather kept getting better the closer I got to home. By the time I reached Huntsville the sun was out and the fall colours were on full display. Big scenic swaths of trees lit up the horizon. I was probably a week too late to see the ful majesty of it all but I was still very impressed with what I saw. Eventually I arrived in North Bay and went to see She at her workplace. I planned for a late lunch having eaten my last breast of jerk chicken while driving. It was wrapped in Saran wrap and I ate it like a chocolate bar. I like doing that while traveling, cuts down on the number of stops. I ordered a quesadilla and we chatted a few times during the meal when she had time to come over. We had a long embrace after the bill was settled and I carried on my wayward journey.

I’m always very impressed by the scenery near Latchford and Bay Lake. Driving along the water with beautiful trees in the distance. The day was beautiful and I made sure to drink it in. I stopped for a second and got a quick picture dangerously while in the road, it was worth it. The photo does nothing to capture the true majesty of the environment here but it will serve as a reminder for me and I can access the memory when I look back at this picture. It was absolutely stunning and I’m glad I got to experience it.

When I finally arrived I noticed that a little bug who had hitched a ride in North Bay was still hanging on. I’d noticed it up by the mirror and tried tapping the glass to get it to go live its life and it’d disappeared from my view but apparently it had hung on for the whole two hours. I guess it will have to make it’s way in this part of the world now. It looks like a spruce bug but I’m not an entomologist so I couldn’t say one way or the other. I thought it was neat that it hung on for that long and traveled all that distance. It’s neat to think about. Hopefully it doesn’t cause some kind of shift in the insect populations.

Dinner was homemade hamburgers prepared in the air fryer. These were very good. I ripped a cheese slice in half and dabbed on some mustard. The burger was the star of this show though. Very nice meal to finish off the day for me.

I did a bit of exploring after dinner. The forecast was calling for rain for most of the weekend so I wanted to get around and see stuff before that happened. Mother had several fall displays at strategic points around the property. The things that really caught my attention in her wares was the unusual pumpkin. I forget what kind she said it was but apparently it is supposed to look like that. I looks almost like it has something else growing on it. I think it looks pretty gruesome and cool. She had a few of them, hopefully she plants those again next year. My genetic knowledge made me wonder if there had been some kind of cross pollination with gourd flowers and this was the result. Apparently that was not the case, or at least allegedly it wasn’t.

The final shot of the day was to be of the lush lawns, the freshly tiled field across the road and the general beauty of the fall colours but when Coco wandered into frame I couldn’t resist. She surprised me by popping a squat at that moment. Generally she saves such activities for when she is in the trees to her left but lucky for you, she changed it up. I thought it was hilarious, which it is, so I snapped the picture. The sun set minutes later and that was basically it. It was a pretty early night which was fine with me as I’d had a long day of travelling.

Thursday

I was getting tired by this point and it showed with another late start. I frolicked in bed for way too long this morning and eventually got cleaned up and downstairs to make an interesting shortcut of a breakfast. I used some of the last egg cups with a sausage patty and cheese. I’ve learned that if I press the egg muffins with a spatula before putting them in the samidge all the water and juices associated with freezing flow out and it makes for a more pleasant eating experience. At least you don’t have to worry about slopping juice all over your chin and shirt. It was tasty meal and the sausage did yeoman’s work for flavour.

The morning was spent tinkering with things and moving projects forward. I was still feeling a bit off for most of the day and that affected my productivity. I cleared up some issues for customers and got a lot of little things that nobody ever sees done. I also got some laundry going. I was planning to get making completed tonight so that I could get away very early in the morning. I don’t recall the specifics of the morning but I know that after eating a can of soup and some paninis for lunch I spent a long time working on creating my list files for meetings coming up at the end of the month. I usually do those in November but it doesn’t hurt to have them ready to go ahead of time this year. While I was taking some time away form my desk at lunch I did a quick walk around the outside of the house and surveyed my property. Those $0.50 roses that we got in July are looking good. They’ve both got a couple of flowers now and are looking lovely.

The afternoon was spent doing what would be considered low value work. I was punching in data into a system so that it is ready to dump out reports for me at the end of the year. It’s a bit tedious but doing it now should let me go faster in November for that part of my process. This might be the last year I get to use this tried, tested, and true system before the push me into using something else that won’t work as well. It’s a shame, I just got really comfortable with this process and then they push me into another one. Somedays I wonder why we keep changing IT systems, I hope security but I fear job security. I sometime suspect that people make changes more for political reasons than practical ones. Maybe I’m just feeling a bit morose today and have listened to too much true crime this week. Who knows? My workday ended at five me, I closed the computer a bit sooner than normal. I warmed up some of the jerk chicken and the last of the ground pork from Monday. It was a high protein dinner. It was good but definitely lacked other elements. I gnawed through it like a champion nonetheless.

After dinner I grabbed the laundry from the basement and set about folding that load and then filling my bag for the weekend voyage to the Northland. This would be the shortest of my recent trips and I was able to cram all my clothes and toys into one bag for once. Even my fishing stuff was already in the truck in the form of my telescoping setup and small tackle box. I just had to remember to get my life jacket from the garage in the morning, otherwise it was all in the bag. I wasn’t feeling amazing so I layed down after packing and didn’t get up again for the rest of the night. I rolled around like a wounded bull until eventually going to sleep. It wasn’t my finest hour. Or my most productive day.

Quick Hump

For going to sleep early, I sure had a hard go of it getting out of bed. I ended up having a late start to the day. I ended up departing the house at eight with my charged phone in hand. My plan was to take down the two locations that I’d planned to tackle yesterday afternoon. I didn’t make it far before I got into some traffic. This was a typical construction site. There were about five guys standing around talking and laughing and there was one young guy cutting pavement. I’m not sure what task they are into at this time of the year but it seems to have been going on for awhile. I sat patiently and waited until I was allowed to proceed. Just watching the show and enjoying seeing my tax dollars in action. Ugh.

I was on the clock and had to make sure that I was leaving the second location at a certain time to get home for an afternoon of meetings. I was getting to the part of the touring season where I had to balance field and office, the tail end of it all. I made it home around half noon and I slugged back a can of Campbell’s Chunky Beef Vegetable soup. It was not what I thought I was getting. I’m not sure I’d be getting that flavour again, not my favourite. I paired it thankfully with my favourite kind of Stouffer’s Bistro Crustini, the Mozzarella and Meatball. I finished eating and cleaning up just in time for a trio of consecutive calls. One bled into the next. Then I had some follow up conversations with the next level down of stakeholders. It was a pretty busy afternoon, seemed to be steady. I closed things off at half five and did a bit extra for dinner. I used the last of the ground pork as an additional topping on a Great Value brand Hawaiian pizza. I also added some extra mozzerella cheese and the dregs of the Tex Mex shredded cheese supply to kick it up a notch. I finished it with some Cholula hot sauce. It was a pretty fantastic version of cardboard pizza.

I cleaned up my mess and immediately started my preparations for D&D. We hadn’t played since way back near the start of September, the biggest hiatus since I joined the game early in the year. That gave us extra time to plot and scheme but we didn’t really use it. I tried to get some discussion going in our group chat but nobody was interested. That was okay though, it seemed to work out for us. We spent the whole two hours wrapping up the loose ends of the last session. We had a lot of loot and liberated slaves to deal with. We escorted them safely to a warehouse we’d taken over in an unexpected coup months ago and set them up as our labour force to make us what we need to finish out the rest of the campaign. I hope there is enough time to reap the benefits of blowing a whole session for that, we’re actually counting on it. We ended at ten and it was close to eleven by the time I was able to get to sleep. I was pretty tired but too jacked after the game to get to sleep immediately. It was awesome to get back into it.

Derailed

Tuesday was supposed to be a day in the field but that plan got nudged off the tracks fairly early. I got a request in the night to pull some data and this particular kind of data takes a long time and is very manual to populate. I wasted several hours on that. I also had to prepare some documents and lists to sent out to customers. That consumed the remainder of the morning. I had plans to do some other things but this slowed me down. I was ready to shoot out to cover off some locations in the field in the afternoon but realized for these particular sites I didn’t have any maps. This really derailed me fully. My plan was to leave after lunch which happened right after my licensing meeting. Lunch was another can of soup, not imaginative but delicious and filling. I had to call some guys after eating to try and get the missing maps. I got them and rather than try to rush out to the field half cocked, I decided to make a proper file to take notes with for these trials. They live outside the normal workflow and need some extra special care. Around making my epic file, there were several little fires that tried to flare up and I had to beat them back down. The afternoon went by quick but I realized that I was now behind in terms of seeing sites in the field. It would require some catch-up somehow. My day ended at half five, another nine hours of work in the books. I had my big dinner to work on so I rushed to the kitchen with glee. I put a parchment paper in the air fryer to reduce mess (it didn’t) and then carefully laid my marinated jerk breasts in the basket. They came out lovely. I combined some of the on-hand rice and a handful of ground pork with some salsa as the side dish to the chicken. It wasn’t fancy but it was a symphony of flavour performed for my taste buds. I watched some YouTube during dinner, as you can ascertain.

The clean-up was less fun than you’d expect but I managed to make it fairly quick. The evening was not as productive as the previous one. I did some MSC challenges, watched YouTube, played MSF. I found myself trying to go to sleep around nine and that actually happened. It was quite a relief to get an early start to sleep. I think I need a big rest to get ready for the last big push.

Monday?

Despite having taken the entire day off yesterday from the world I really struggled to get moving this morning. I didn’t really know what day it was. I was starting to feel the burn after going full speed for a few weeks. I guess I’m not used to putting the hammer down anymore. I managed though. I got up, showered, dressed up nicer than normal and prepared myself a fantastic breakfast. The addition of some juice really set this one off. I played too much MSF between eating and cleaning and had to hustle my buns up the stairs when the clock struck eight to make it to work on time.

The morning was spent preparing for the two meetings on the calendar for the day. The first one was in the morning and took the most prep work and then a short one in the afternoon with my boss. Most of the workday for me was going to consist of catching up on the items I deemed lower priority while I was on the road. And there was a small pile of them to dig through. I took a full office day and really went for it. I got many of them wrapped up completed. Others I put the ball back in the court of the requester. It was a productive morning for me. It went by pretty quick, the next thing I knew it was lunch time. I snapped a picture of the board as it stood. Looks like I was mostly successful last week in covering off my plans. The breakfast one gotten written the day of and I didn’t put anything for Tuesday or Thursday out of uncertainty and laziness. I did well to not have anything and then you’ll recall I couldn’t not eat on Thursday. I did well to make it home. Today for lunch I had a can of soup. Nothing else.

The afternoon slid past as quickly and easily as the morning. Most of my time was spent catching up and doing some requests for people. I had a couple of long calls with colleauges toward the end of the day. I was covering some extra responsibility this week with my Quebec colleague away hunting. So I take on the overflow, same as he does when I’m away. It’s just enough to keep you pinned to the mat and busy. I closed my computer around half five and went to make breakfast for dinner. I did it as easy as possible. I fired a couple of the egg muffins that Mother made in June between some English muffins and added cheese. It was quick, easy and freed up the rest of the evening to do some food prep work. I took four thawed chicken breasts and put them in a ziploc sack with some jerk marinade that I’d got for my birthday. I decided I’d put it in now and give it nearly twenty four hours to soak clean through the meat. I also cooked up some rice and put it in the fridge, just to have on hand for quick meals or to add to things. Finally I brown a pound of ground pork, also to have it ready for action. I seasoned it perfectly. The rest of the evening was less productive, mostly spent on my screens in or near my bed. Another day in the books, this one I hardly know where it went.

Big Netflix and Chill

The plan for today was to not follow a plan. I woke up around seven and tried my best to get back to sleep. It was unsuccessful. Instead I played Marvel Strike Force on my phone until nearly nine. Then I got myself dressed and ready to face the world. I’m pretty glad the world didn’t face me though. I made some brutal choices on this day. I had some chips and a yogurt for breakfast mid morning. That was a strange combination. Then I went downstairs with plans to fold the laundry that was in the dryer and really get a productive day started. Nope. Instead of doing that I put on the new Britney Spears documentary. It was okay. It was a good continuance to the one that came out earlier in the year. She’s barreling towards regaining some freedoms and I wonder how that’s going to work out. Her fame and the way the world worked when she came up had to have messed her up. At the papparazzi would have. Non-stop barrage into your personal life. Pre-social media publications were insane. I heard over $1 million dollars for a good picture?! Yikes. Anyways, moving on from that, I put on Mortal Kombat. It was entertaining. I was able to catch on to several of the Easter eggs but there had to be many that passed over my head. I liked watching it. Next I decided to rewatch Crash Pad, cause I saw it as I scrolled. It was still funny. It’s the language and writing that make that one, the acting is solid though too. I liked it the second time as well. At this point I wanted more food so I ventured back upstairs to make a big bowl of perogies. I took that back down to the lair and ate like a snake.

I wasn’t done with my binge. Next I put on Queen’s Gambit. I’ve mentioned on here before that I’d listened to the audiobook. It was now time to tackle this story in another medium. I did it in one shot. I did stop halfway or so to get some cookies and the last dregs of the chips. I also had a few pee breaks as I was on the water hard but never paused it for those. I got close enough to the end that I wanted to make a mad dash and wrap it up completely. The last episode ended around eleven at night and so did my day. I trudged upstairs and passed out immediately. Watching TV and not doing any housework all day is apparently hard work.

Weekend Tour

When you have a winning streak, you make sacrifices to keep it intact. I’ve been working six days a week for a couple now, or at least not taking Saturday simply for myself, cause I surely wasn’t working last weekend. I was up early in the day, got cleaned up, hit the road after fueling up and getting a McBreakfast, the usual routine now. I went back to that site in the southwest. I had taken notes on some of the corn at the site but needed to do the other half now. I did try something out of the ordinary, knowing the ground would be drier this time. I wore my golf shoes. They are only size twelve but if I keep wearing them regularly I think I can keep them stretched out to fit my feet. Part of why I backed away from golf was that I kept getting painful blisters on my heels from these shoes. I don’t want that to happen anymore so I’m working on it. I figured it would take me three or four hours of walking around to do the corn so this would be a good test.

This corn was less affected by tar spot despite being next to the other stuff. It was another beautiful day so I guess I took a selfie and included it for you? I’m not sure what this is about.

I did finish things up in three or so hours and my feet and the shoes were both fine. I’d cleaned them off in the field so they were actually cleaner coming home than when I was trying them around the lawn. I trucked it home and was back shortly after three. I had a late lunch of leftovers from last night and complimented the savoury flavours with some tart orange juice served in my even more tart glass that I got from Admiral Bonesaw and Dutchie for my birthday. It was a relieving meal. I didn’t realize how hungry I’d been getting.

The rest of the day was essentially a write-off. I played MSF, watched YouTube and even went as far as to go downstairs and try out some Netflix and Crave on the big screen. I was in bed around ten. It was not a very exciting day but I was pretty glad to be done with that location. It took me three trips to take notes and one for a tour. Not to mention the other three times I was there for various other purposes during the summer.

TGIFreedom

The run of days in the field continued today. This time it was McBreakfast and back to the south. It was a good site to get some notes taken on the late day material. I was there before ten, just enough time for the plots to be dry. Well dry enough that my jeans don’t get soaked as I stumble through the plots. I’d prefer not to have to go through the trouble of donning my rain pants with temperatures being on the warm side. Pleasantly warm as it happens. I took notes alone all morning. I did get a call from Brack asking what I had for lunch, which was nothing. He was coming to this location and offered to pick up food for us. I obliged and told him anything without onions or pickles. In the picture below you can see the walkway, this represented my road to freedom. The further advanced along this trail for a given trial the closer I would get to freedom from the task. Thoughts like that are how you know it’s getting onerous at this point.

Just as I was starting to really feel hopeless Brack swung in close to one and saved the day. We made a meal of some Burger King. The spicy chicken sandwich was delightful. He got some chicken bites for us but didn’t care for them so I took them down. It was a really filling meal. We leaned on the back of his truck and had a good long chin wag, productive discussion. Then it was nearly two when we both ducked back into it. I only had two of three sets to go and he had all five. But the two latest ones were the biggest for me. They were huge, that was part of our discussion actually.

I slogged my way through. I would have been done sooner but I got a call from my Quebec teammate and we chatted for fifty minutes while I continued to take notes. I was done before four and had to get moving. I had ninety plus minutes to travel before reaching the Harbour and I wanted to do some preparations for the Family Feast. Tonight it was going to be Asian Turkey Meatballs with Hoisin sauce. I think we all selected to serve our dishes with rice. I don’t think I let me hoisin sauce reduce enough. The meatballs were tasty as all get out. I really enjoyed this dish. It seemed to go pretty quick.

Tugboat’s version of the dish.

Sudbury Sister’s presentation.

STL Sister had a darker sauce for sure.

Parents went smaller on the balls and garnish than the kids.

View fullsize

After making the meal together, eating, chatting and picking the next one I signed off. I went upstairs to the helm and started working on MSC challenges and Musings. At this point I’ve slipped dangerously behind and my only hope to catch up is a few strong pushes where I get several out at a time or to just start posting daily and forget about those missing back issues. I want to keep my streak of daily going so I’m voting to push through. Those efforts consumed the last of the evening and I got to sleep sort of early. I had plans for tomorrow.

Day of Truth and Reconciliation

Today started pretty similar to the last two. Up early, McBreakfast and heading to the field. There was a notable difference today. I found a DVD hanging from my door handle when I was leaving the house and decided that I needed to stop and acknowledge it. I took the photo below and shared it with some friends asking if they felt like this was a deadly threat. It cracked me up, hopefully you see the humour in it. I know their intention is more wholesome but my tired mind found it funny.

My note taking adventure today took me back to my old research farm. I was there yesterday but didn’t take notes, focusing more on the customer event. I went full on with the notes today. I started with corn and got through everything before noon. I was the only one at the farm so I slipped into town to go to the grocery store. It was a moment of reliving my old ways. Except with the pandemic still raging it was different enough. I didn’t get wedges and chicken tenders like I would have a few years ago. I got a parfait and a pre-made turkey samidge. It was underwhelming. The parfait was not fun to eat without a spoon. I tipped the cup and tried to minimize the mess threatened when you intentionally try to dump a cup of yogurt and fruit into your face. After lunch the guy trying to replace me in my old job showed up and I spent an hour training him on what to take notes on and why. We spent time in the corn and the soybean plots. Once that was done I focused on taking my own soybean notes. There was heavy white mould pressure at the site this year, it happens. It was great for notes though. I was done my notes by four, just in time for a meeting. After the call I spent some time talking to Brack who had shown up in the meantime to take his notes on the soybean plots. I had to exercise a lot of willpower on the drive home to sail past the many, many restaurant options. I didn’t need to be spending money on food and I’d been eating out more than my new average, which has been quite low. Instead I opted to make myself three packages of Mr Noodles. Not as delicious but much, much cheaper.

The rest of the evening was very lazy. I did some YouTube and some MSF for a bit in the evening, nothing else.

Final Tour

There isn’t much to say for this day. I was up very early and got a McBreakfast on my way back to the site where I ended yesterday. I was hosting the final customer tour of the fall for my group. We would start in the south and look at the later maturing corn and soybean trials and then about midday we’d trek to my old research farm and review the mid-maturity corn and soybean sets. They saw the mid-maturity in Quebec also and the early material in the West so this was rounding out the views they’d get for the fall. The morning went fine. One notable moment was when I got the nerve to ask the girl who runs the southern farm if she still played D&D. For you see, I’d interviewed her when she initially got hired years ago. It was a truck stop, which was a neutral and convenient point for her. I was the help on the interview, the hiring manager insisted on ordering breakfast. She showed up a half hour early to prepare and we called her over, doing the interview whilst eating. It felt unprofessional but she loved it. I recalled her mentioning D&D as a passion and hobby of hers. As it turned out, it still is. We nerded out a bit before everyone got there. Turns out she is in three games, two are with international players and she writes one shots routinely. Crazy. She’s on hiatus for the fall because she’s having to do harvest alone this year. Her assistant destroyed his knee outside of work and can’t come back. I’ve been there, it sucks to work alone in these research programs.

As it turned out, it happened to be a beautiful day for my final tour. Perfect weather. I had a lot of fruitful conversations with customers, probing to better understand their needs and wants in terms of products. I was mostly a chaperone at my old site, moving the drink cooler around and catching folks as they went between plots. I was happy though, I’d stopped on the way through town to get myself some Wendy’s and it was making my tummy feel as perfect as the sky. Some context for the above picture. They had already harvested part of the block for silage. You can watch this video I posted back a few years that gives a general overview of what is involved in that. They will spread that residue with the tractor bucket and then bury it with some tillage this fall. Apparently they spent a massive sum on a new high speed disc, something I would never had approved, as it’s unneccessary.

The day ended pretty late. The last person left around half five and I rolled out at six after chatting with my former assistant, the Gerbs. There is a serious lack of urgency around this place since I left. They have a we’ll get it done when we get it attitude which isn’t aggressive enough. I see other slips too, the shop is very messy and there lacks a general tidiness in several areas. It rips my heart out to see but it’s their show now. They’ll have to manage it how they see fit. The photo doesn’t capture the majesty of the sky on this day but I will say that it stopped me cold and forced my hand to take a picture.

Dinner was outsourced. I didn’t want to skip it two nights in a row. I ordered in from Pizza Pizza. Less of a mistake this time. I got a chicken sandwich, a salad, and chicken bites. It was pleasantly filling. The feed stopped before things crossed over into the realm of painful. You can see that I was watching YouTube from the photo. I also did some MSF and worked on Musings. It was an evening mostly spent lounging in my bed.

Terrific Tuesday

I’m going to do pretend this entry is a version of “Explain that gram” from the hit YouTube show Hot Ones by First we Feast via Complex. I’m going to rely on just a caption under the photos to mostly guide the day.

Breakfast wasn’t overly exciting but it was delightful. These ones were quite hot off the press, I’m not sure why they seemed hotter than normal. I did some reading and enjoyed a pretty relaxed start of the day.

As I was finishing up eating and about to transition to the cleaning stage I noticed a cat boldly approaching my back deck. It was a cocky little thing. I walked toward the door to fight it off and it approached expecting food. Someone is feeding it. No collar or fear, this was a stray. I banged on the glass and it came closer. Not wanting it to scratch the screen I peeled out. I guess I know who was eating all those chicken fingers last winter. After cleaning up breakfast I packed my bags and hit the road.

I went down into the southwest of the province to walk some later day corn. There was a serious outbreak of a disease called tar spot in the corn in this part of the world. This was a photo depicting the difference between a susceptible hybrid and a tolerant hybrid. Night and day isn’t it. The plot on the left was essentially dead and the one on the right was still rocking along. It’s a pretty devastating disease. I’m not sure why the end effect is going to be but you can bet your biscuits it is going to mean lighter corn and probably more lodging.

A few more ranges up and that lodging theory was proven true. What happens is that the plant is dead set on reproducing and to ensure it’s gametes survival it will start to pull resources from other parts of the plant to make sure enough starch or carbohydrate, dry matter really, gets into the seed. Because the factory of the plant, the leaves, has been destroyed now, it’s switched to desperation mode. It can’t pull from the dead leaves so it pulls from the stalk, cannabalizing it. The dead stalks break much easier which leads to the plants falling over. In nature that is fine cause the ear would end up on the ground and would eventually get close enough to the soil to start sprouting and viola, propagation. But in a field setting, it makes harvest a nightmare and some seed remains behind, to become a weed issue for the next crop. The other thing I hate about this picture is that some of the big heavy plants fell on to the neighbouring plot wrecking it. The neighbour is going to get labeled as a weak legged coward simply for associating with the bad influence next door. Turn out corn and people, not that different when you think about it.

Somewhere in the noon hour I hit the halfway point and decided to shoot up into town to grab some grub. I knew the subway was relatively close to the edge of town and would be quick and easy. Plus it has been many moons since I had had the urge to eat froosh. They were trying out crispy chicken chunks in their samidges so I obliged to their marketing crew and took it on. I stuck to basic accourement, tomato, minimal lettuce, green pepper, hot peppers and a ranch and spice sauce. Mozzerlla cheese for simplicity. It was a tasty morsel. I had them toast it, since that seems to be the guiding preference of society now. I think Quizno’s lost the toasted sub war. That was definitely their thing and Subway ripped it off. I was a Quizno’s loyalist for years, refusing to toast Subway but I’ve decided that I don’t care enough anymore. I’m finding that about things more and more. Lunch was good though, cookies and a Mountain Dew rounded out the squadron. I consumed it in my truck back at the corn.

After about six hours of rating the same trial I was starting to get mush brain. I thought it would be funny to pull a bunch of silks off and cram them in my crotch to make a joke about the pandemic being the rise of pubes. I was right, it was funny. Looking at the photo after, I’m surprised how orange these show up. Most of the hybrids were very dark brown, you can see some of that at the top of my corn silk pube mane. I sent this photo around with mixed results. I also did a re-take of an old classic with a partially cleaned off ear of corn but it’s not as PG. I sent it to a very select audience to uproarious results.

I finished the trial around five and drove the ninety plus minutes back home. I elected to drink some water in lieu of dinner and I washed up to get all the corn grossness off me. I spent the very short evening looking at personal screens and accomplishing nothing of note. It was a nice quiet, low stress Tuesday. Those don’t come along that often so I’m marking this one. I was able to take the time to be in the present and enjoy it.

Case of the Mondays

Today was an office day. I had my usual breakfast samidges to start the day. I was able to get into my office at the normal time, around eight and I started into the painful process of catching up after a week on the road. I did a decen job of staying plugged in while wandering back and forth across testing locations in parts of Quebec and Eastern Ontario but it never replaces actually sitting at the helm and making stuff happen for people in real time. I also had a fairly light schedule which helped. There was the normal weekly meeting to discuss all things corn and soybean and then I had some soybean issues to wade through. That included a couple of phone calls and a meeting. Lunch was pretty uneventful. I knocked back a can of soup with some crackers, I don’t recall what kind. The afternoon started with my one on one meeting with my boss. It was slated to run thirty minutes but we blew well past that. It had been awhile since we crossed swords so there was much to catch up on. The rest of the afternoon wasn’t exciting, just regular work stuff. Phone calls, emails, spreadsheets. Real office type stuff. I decided that I would make breakfast for dinner. I warmed up a pair of egg muffins that Mother had made months ago and I put them on English muffins with cheese slices. I’d discovered the old avocado in my fridge had finally ripened while I was away and was starting to turn so I sliced it up and included some of nature’s butter in my meal. It was very juicy. When you microwave once frozen eggs, apparently a lot of watery juice forms a lake on your plate. I’ll have to sort out something to overcome that in the future. For tonight though, this was a quick and efficient meal to feed me. The cleanup was equally quick with only a pair of plates to rinse and wash.

I did some heavy YouTubing and played MSF for large chunks of the evening. I tried doing a little MSC challenges but I found myself not being able to get into. The same was true for Musings. I got a few lined up but didn’t publish any for you, adding to my growing backlog. Before I knew what happened the evening was gone and I was finding my way into bed. The morning was going to be somewhat early and the day potentially long so I sought the sheets early to mentally prepare for that eventuality.

Day of Rest

Not much to say on this day. I didn’t get out bed for most of the morning. I revelled in the day off for hours. More MSF and YouTube kept me company. It was late morning when I went down and made some food. Next I took on some Microsoft Solitaire Collection challenges to catch up some. After a snack I descended to the basement mid-afternoon and at Admiral Bonesaw’s suggestion I started watching the Hardy Boys show on Netflix. Unbeknownst to me, it was filmed just down the highway in the Chef’s town, among other Canadian locations. Many of the cast were local actors. The show itself was decent but the appeal was all the greater knowing I was supporting a Canadian production and my own nostalgia for the Hardy Boys. I ready a big chunk of the series as a kid and I know one of the authors is from the next town over from where I grew up. Plus I love mysteries. I stayed up unreasonably late watching it, figuring I could finish it off in one sitting. I did. But I’m sure I didn’t retain a whole lot. It was a great day of doing nothing critical.

Harbour Bound

I woke up naturally and got myself packed up to depart. No shower, just cleaned up some and dressed. I didn’t leave right away, Admiral Bonesaw put on a fairly elaborate breakfast for us. I played with the girls while they cleaned up and then it was time to go. Before I did I asked them if they wanted me to take some drone shots. I hadn’t flown it all week and wanted to justify bringing it while giving them some nice photos of their palatial estate. The girls really liked the drone. There was some tense moments when a flock of big birds started going after it. I did a few photos, here are a couple.

After packing my toys up I was off. The drive was pretty uneventful. I had to stop at the first service station to replenish my fuel. I got a few snacks too, knowing I wasn’t stopping again for hours. The Big Smoke was predictably slow for no reason, otherwise it was fairly smooth sailing. I had to pee badly and was famished when I got home. I put food in the air fryer and then set about unpacking and watering all the plants. They were all in good shape. I ate a heaping bowl of perigees when I came back in.

I spent the rest of the day and evening catching up on MSF, YouTube and rotating laundry. It was nice to not have to go anywhere and to just relax for a few hours when the sun is out.

French Friday Finale

Today is the last day of the Quebec leg of my adventure. It started with the same breakfast that I forgot to photograph. Brack departed and I did some emails to start the day. That went on longer than it should have but my responses had been delayed long enough, I wanted to keep up, or at least answer in the same week. I also knew that if I delayed a bit the rains might let up some. My first stop of the day was yesterday’s last stop. I returned to the site to walk the soybean trials, having been advised that there was good differentiation. It rained on and off and was quite muddy. I learned a lot about the plots and that my left rubber boot is no longer water tight. I had been wearing them without the insulated liners and without socks so I wiped off my dirty foot and continued on my way.

I had a bit of a drive to make before I got to the next location. I had to get from the southeast side of Montreal to the southeast side of Ottawa. There was a short stop on the side of the highway to send some emails to someone needing something and a quick lunch. I also didn’t check that toll routes were off on Google Maps and ended up taking the toll bridge. It cost me a couple bucks of my own money. I was really mad at myself for that. Settings have been updated. The site was in the Nation but back into my home province, it felt good to be back. I walked the corn and soybean trials and finished my note taking for the week. I still had another hour and a quarter or so of driving before my destination for the night.

Last stop before heading home was a short visit with Admiral Bonesaw, Dutchie and their girls. I rolled up around dinner time and offered to buy them dinner from any local spot. They opted for takeout from a new place, Iron Forge, and we called it in before enjoying a beer. The Admiral knows I like it lighter and had selected this for me. It was solid.

It was the blink of an eye before we had to go pick up the food. I’d ordered an order of Give’r Stix to start and an order of farmer wrap with fries to fill me up. The appetizer was good warm, maple syrup made it. It was a heavy feed after a long day. After the girls were sent to bed we watched a Norm MacDonald special on the Netflix. I think we all drifted off at one point or another. It ended at half nine and we shut it down. I played some MSF before powering down for the night. We didn’t get to visit that much but it was really nice to spend some time with them.