Christmas 2017

Anthony and I hosted a little holiday get together at our house. It's starting to become a tradition.

The guests included the two of us, Anthony's aunt JoAnn, his brother Michael and his girlfriend Serena. We ate Italian food, opened gifts, and play games including Cards Against Humanity (a gift that we gave Michael) and the Golden Girls edition of "Clue". We had a ton of fun.

Anthony cooked dinner and served it, too

Om nom nom

Michael and Serena

JoAnn, Michael, Serena

Michael a.k.a. Father Christmas drinks a little wine

while Serena digs into her stocking

Checking out goodies from their stockings

JoAnn with a kit containing everything a woman needs

when she leaves the house

I had mugs made this year with pictures

of Anthony and I on them

Muggin' with the mugs

Cards Against Humanity for Michael, electric teakettle for Serena

Photo frame for JoAnn

Anthony gets a new alarm clock

And to make sure he gets up, he gets a second alarm clock

Sugar skull, salt lamp

I received emoji underwear

Hey! That doll looks just like me

Mmmmmm. Chocolate covered apple.

Chevy Chase photobombs in "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation"

I open what may be the greatest gift ever....

A giant pen!

Feel free to be amazed because... my pen is huge.

Holiday shopping 2017

Anthony and I headed out today to do a little holiday and grocery shopping.

Justin Trudeau, My Canadian Boyfriend

This may be one of the funniest calendar ideas I have ever seen

Anthony spots this hand mixer at Target and said:

"Hey, this looks like a dildo"

This donut is made of wood.

That's a total waste of a donut.

Where's Santa?

Apparently not at Target

This package contains: POOP (The Game)

What a bunch of crap.

Flipping a bottle has turned commercial

Cereal Milk

The epitome of laziness.

It's soooo much work to eat the whole bowl of cereal to

get to the cereal milk that they saved you the time.

Tina's Smothered Burrito

Anthony said it sounded naughty.

But, how could a red hot beef burrito covered with

salsa con queso be dirty with all of that hot cheese

heaped onto a red hot beef burrito?

Now I need a cold shower.

There's a section of the freezer at Walmart Market dedicated to Paleo.

When you want tasteless food easily prepared in a

cancer causing radiation producing microwave, here's your solution.

Hey Anthony, come back! I have that chorizo you've been wanting.

Black Friday Red Cross Blood Drive

I volunteered to take a shift manning the station's booth at the Black Friday Red Cross Blood Drive on Black Friday.

Blood drives are challenging. Many people are scared of needles, organizations like the Red Cross have a number of restrictions to determine if you're eligible, and it's one of those things that you don't know you need until you've had an accident or require surgery. I wish more people would donate.

A few photos:

Angelica

Edward, Eric and Amy throw a mini football in the parking lot

Letting it fly

Choo choo!

Balls!

Radio and TV stations booths

Red Cross rolls in this whip

Thanksgiving 2017

Anthony and I went to his mom Patty's for Thanksgiving again this year. His brother Michael was also there and his girlfriend Serena.

The food and the company were fantastic.

Food's ready.

Time to eat!

Anthony piles food on his plate

Then piles more piles on his pile

Here's my plate of food.

The Diet Coke will cancel out whatever calories are on the plate.

Yummy!

Serena and Michael are ready to dig in

Happy Thanksgiving!

I look like crap

I had this ridiculous inspiration to dress up as the poop emoji for Halloween this year. I wasn't the only one who had this idea. I searched Amazon and came up with multiple configurations for sale including a little plush sash poop and the one I chose, the inflatable poop.

I had problems with it from the start. When I opened the package, the power pack that powers the fan motor to keep it inflated had imploded inside and wouldn't work even after I took it apart to try and fix it. So, I went to Party City (fail) and Spirit Halloween (success) to try and find a replacement power pack. I ended up having to buy a whole costume (another $40, which made the cost over $80 total for this Halloween get up) and discovered after going to the Halloween party that Anthony and I attended that it had a tear in the side and wouldn't stay inflated unless I held it together with my fingers.

I did get some laughs. So that made this crap not a total loss.

My co-workers Gary and Lindsey and me, as an inflatable poo emoji

FranKENpoo

Attack of the 50 foot Ken Carr

The six foot Ken Carr cardboard stand-up has come in handy for the production department at the TV station. They've borrowed it to do some testing with the green screen in the studio.

I went into production control to see what they were doing with it and it was being put onto a video of the traffic camera on I-10. It looks like a giant Ken Carr is standing on the freeway.

Giant Ken Carr on I-10

My right foot was crushing that car.

Oopsie

Here are two bonus photos:  I paid for chair massages for my co-workers Alex and Matt just so I could get these ridiculous photos of their faces through the donut shaped things on the chair.

Matt

Alex

Yes, it does rain in Tucson

Tucson has received more than double the normal amount of rain that we get in July this year. The explosion of weeds in the last week in my backyard has been testament to the extraordinary amount of water than has fallen from the sky.

Over the weekend, we had a slow moving storm that went over the house and it turned the backyard into a lake (temporarily). The grass (if you could call it that) was cut super short on Saturday afternoon and as of this writing (Wednesday night) has already grown two inches. I'll be back out there again this weekend to chop it down again and spray the back area of rocks to make an attempt at killing the weeds that have quickly grown.

The rain made for some semi-dramatic photos:

Water water everywhere

The heavy rain was putting everything underwater

This was a couple inches of water up near the house

Lake Ken... just need a boat