MORE economic stimulus

I don't know what our shady governor's up to these days, but I like it. I logged in to pay my gas bill and saw this bulletin:

All residential electric customers with active accounts on 8/29/08 will receive a one-time credit of $170 on their September bill. There is no need to speak with a representative to obtain the credit. It will automatically appear on your bill. For more details, read the information below.

I don't know what's going on, but ok! That's like 3 mos of bills for me, and you know I hate paying bills.

The weekend was pretty fun, very laid back which I needed in the middle of the birth/wedding/birthday extravaganza that has been my fall.

Sat morning HN and took his niece and headed west to put her to work in the fields. She's 4, has way lots of energy and is too smart for her own good. All of these things combined make her an absolute riot on a good day, and Sat was a good day. We taught her about popping a squat if you have to pee and are in the middle of the woods. She had an interesting take on the potential for splatter, and pretty much thought completely disrobing was the way to go. We managed to keep her dress on, but shoes and scooters were neatly folded and laid out of range before she could relax and pee. Re-robing was just as interesting, as her balance is not that great so she sits down and makes a big production, all the while announcing at very high volume everything she is doing. Sorry other fruit pickers about all that information you didn't want!
Our eventual haul was 2.5 lbs of raspberries (a gorgeous mix of red and white which are really champagne colored) and 25 lbs of peaches. It sounds excessive- ok it is excessive- but we gathered that many peaches in about 10 minutes. The trees were just *throwing* peaches at you, and they were all huge and beautiful so we had issues resisting. Both HN and I use them in our smoothies though, so we just cut them up and froze them. We also sent a bunch home with the kid, as her parents are big fruity people. (ha!)

Then while walking around the neighborhood trying to discover the source of music we could hear, we found a pretty bad ass block party. There didn't seem to be any cover or invite list, so we went home, grabbed a bunch of Natty Bohs as a cover and ambled on it. It turned out to be a really good time, and there were some great bands! The Mishaps were awesome (rock keyboardist!) as were The Desert Boys. I'm not really sure how to describe them, but we were psyched we crashed and stayed. In the end, we found out that the block party was hosted by the new Pie Man. I've been wondering about the new pie store in my hood, but have not gone in yet. HN and I have tried a couple of times but keep missing their hours. After Sat, I have every intention of going to chat up the pie man. He was very cool, pretty f*cking funny, and there was a keg inside where if you knew the pie man you could go get more beer. I WILL know the pie man by the time of the next party, which hopefully will be soon. Either that or dude was just drunk talking, but he seemed ok so I think there might really be another one.

Yesterday I cooked and quilted. Just call me Martha Stewart. Sweaty Martha Stewart. It was just one of those days where you wake up and know you're going to sweat. You either spend some time in distress or just own it. I owned it, and I was not afraid. I braided my hair and let it happen. This inner peace makes spending time at the stove much easier, because it is f*cking hot over the stove and if you've already given in to the sweat, you just cook. And that's what I did. Raspberry muffins, meatballs and sauce, pasta, roasted garlic. It was deluxe.

And with that I'm off to work.