Weekend

I had a pretty much perfect weekend.

It started Friday afternoon, when I read that there's a Northern Mockingbird nesting in the area, and went to see.  A couple other birders were there, and they helped me find it at first, and then I walked around and saw the parents feeding the kids.

Here's a parent with a face full ready to go feed the kid.

A friend of mine emailed about taking a bike ride, so we met on Saturday for a ride, starting from a point a bit out of town, and going further out, so that she'd see a new part of the local trail.  We were chatting along, and talking about a sort of local famous author's place of birth, so we decided to go in the afternoon.

It's about an hour drive away, near a place where I sometimes go to ride my bike up a road to a bakery (weekends only) and then back.  Along the way, we passed the turn off to a really great pizza place out in the middle of farms, and we talked about how good it is.  We went to the little author museum, and then drove to the bakery, but alas, it was closed.  Then we went to the birth site and looked around.

We talked about getting ice cream at a creamery not far, and then I had this idea that we could skip the ice cream and go for pizza (and get ice cream there if we chose).  My friend thought that was a good idea, so off we went.

And it was a very good idea.

 

This is the back of the pizza place.  Behind the camera is a corn field.  Off to the left is a field.  Off to the right is a mowed area for kids to play.  And all around, farms.  But this place is packed.  And the reason it's packed is because it's so amazingly good.  The pizza has this amazing thin crust, and the toppings are light (at least on the pizzas I prefer here), and they're delicious and practically melt in your mouth with goodness.  (I hadn't been here for at least a year, and they've added more covered areas, so there's more shade for eating.) 

 

I think they open at 4:30, and by the time we got there at 5pm, we were #40 on the order list.  And before long, I saw a person with #80 pass.  It's a fairly long wait for the pizza, even though each takes about two minutes to cook, because they can cook only two at a time in the wood fired stone oven.

 

That was Saturday.

 

Sunday, I was sort of frustrated by this dirty carpet in my living room.  What with having plants in there all winter, it was gross, and you can see the gross because it's basically off-white.  So I decided to do the carpet cleaner thing.  I used the cleaning solution twice over the whole area, and also did clear water twice, and by the time I finished, the rinse stuff the cleaner pulled up into the container was less gross than it had been, but still, I bet I could have cleaned it twice more and rinsed it twice more, and there still would have been dirt.  But it looks a whole lot better than it did!

 

I'd finished the carpet and was sitting and relaxing, when a couple of friends stopped by out of the blue, so we went out to dinner, and had really yummy Mexican food at a place I rarely remember but really like.  This couple lives a few small communities over, about an hour away, so I don't see them often, but it's always nice to see them and chat.  So it was an unexpected pleasure for me.

 

 

Today I've made a huge list of stuff that needs to be done before I go away on vacation.  I'm sort of stressed, but I think it's all do-able.  And having the carpet cleaner makes me feel a lot better about things for some reason.