vivdunstan

Last night there was a "retirement" supper at a small restaurant of my choosing. I did not want to go, but, "retirement" supper, it's expected, I'm expected and well, I like food, so off I went. The crowd was much smaller than I expected, but that might be because not only was it mid week (some people still have to be at work the next day at the ass-crack of dawn) and because it was snowing with gusto. Everyone there was from my department, including some who had quit or retired years ago (not everyone dies within two years of retiring). We ate, were eating, at least I was still eating. Two different people gave me all their french fries. I hadn't started my hamburger yet. And then, gifts. Too many gifts, like Christmas in Hell. Gifts for retirement from my former boss, gifts for 35 years of service, gifts crowdfunded by my coworkers. So much stuff. My supervisor had called me into his office in October to ask me to choose a gift for my 35 years from a selection of power tools, luggage and various stuff I really did not want. So I said let me see if I can find something online. After finishing work at 3 pm on a short day, I sat down and scoured eBay, and for good measure, Amazon (for people in a hurry). I sent my supervisor a list. Back in his office he told me the stuff on my list didn't cost enough. I told him to, then, choose two, I don't care about spending the entire gift budget. Famous last words. He bought _everything_, including one thing twice. A tagua ("ivory") nut horse (could be plastic, can't tell), a good fortune horse (prancing on money), horse USB night lights (don't look at all like the Timothy-style lamps in the pictures), an opalite (probably synthetic but nice) horse, two solar powered spinning display disks and probably something else. That was just for the 35 years. Then for retirement, my supper paid and a thick pile of gift cards to a frozen food store from my employer, and from my colleagues: more gift cards, slippers, a cushion, a coffee cup, a giant card, a candle in a jar, a big fleece cover printed with a bunch of pictures of animals from work... all in a large clothes basket, most retirement themed.



Well, I didn't eat my second serving of french fries or my hamburger. I had it boxed to take home and perched the box on top of the mountain of swag stuffed to overflowing in the basket. I made it to the car. On the way home I stopped at the nearest supermarket to buy milk, but they'd closed an hour earlier. I got back into the car to discover an angry red car battery icon lit up on the dashboard. Oh crap. I drove home and made it without dying on way. I drove without the radio, heater or windshield wipers, just in case. I lugged the basket inside and somehow managed to spill all the french fries and nearly lose the hamburger as well. I picked up the french fries (some even got stepped on!), carefully inspected them (it's my food and I'm going to eat it!) and stuffed them into the fridge to be eaten later.


Well, I had to do something about the angry red battery icon on the dash. I could tape it over, problem solved? Nah, I shoveled out the driveway again and called the garage, left a message on voice mail. By noon I had a call back asking I leave the car there overnight. So after 1:00pm I turned the key in the ignition. It still lived! The red battery lit up. I still succeeded in getting it to the garage and getting a free lift back. They're going to check out the alternator they installed just two weeks ago. So I'm running low on milk.



But I'm not running low on hay. Danny surprised me yesterday with a delivery of six fresh 30 lb bales of 2nd cut timothy hay. I still have four bales from two years ago. The llama will eat those first. With ten bales total I have all I need until summer.