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For the price of two Shillings (I have some weird terms for mundane money) and some legal fees, I am now officially Stephen R. Bierce, Esquire for acquiring 49.44% of Rather Manor. Dad arranged to have my name on the property deed in place of my mother's to save me the possibility of estate taxes if anything happened to him.

I'll need to get together with my siblings, my niece and my nephew about further redistribution of stupf. The problem with such family get-togethers is of course some people exercize too much EQ and do too good a job of entertaining for much to get done.

* * *

My brother is now a Blackjack dealer at the Harrah's casino in Cherokee, North Carolina. They had no shortage of applicants but how he told me he must have been one of the best ones. I wish him all sorts of success.

* * *

Yesterday I wasted a lot of time watching the movie THE SCARLET AND THE BLACK on TH¡S network. It was about a young man who is the illegitimate son of one of Napoleon's generals, and his travels in French high society as the post-Waterloo Reformation begins to implode. And the ghost of Napoleon himself hovers around, giving advice that eventually gets him killed. (I'm spoiling this because it is far too long a movie and so slowly paced you're better off finding the Russian version of WAR & PEACE.)

If you had a famous ghost giving you advice, would you always obey it? Or would you tell him to go to blazes and try to break the cycles?
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Mom passed on today just before 1PM local time. She had taken a bad turn overnight. I was with her at the end, along with a family friend who is also a retired nurse. I don't think I'll get into details here, and if I'm out of circulation for the next few days I hope you'll understand.
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A very good visit from my sister, her husband and her son yesterday.
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Lessee...

* Mum had a good Mother's Day weekend. Lynn, Livingston and Egan were over on Saturday and we did Spaghetti Feast. I got Mum a pair of garden gloves and two bags of Russell Stover chocolates. Livingston returned our VHS player after repairs; we haven't had the opportunity to try it out yet. We sent Ollie's old toaster oven back with them for Geneva, as we heard she needs a better one than the one she has.

* A game store in Knoxville had a sale so I bought three Wings of War planes (an SE5A, a Wildcat and a ZeroSen). There are a lot of downloadable resources on the WWI game but not on the WW2 game, so I'll probably need to get the WW2 deluxe sets in the future.

I'm already planning out larger architectures for mainstream scale models. A double-size set would work for 1/72nd scale WWI and 1/100th scale WW2 planes; a triple-size is right for 1/48th WWI and 1/72nd WW2 models; a quad-size set would be needed to play using 1/32nd~1/28th WWI or 1/48th WW2 planes. A quad-size card would be roughly the size of a board of the kind used to stiffen packs of comic books.

I'm also adapting my ex-clicky Crimson Skies planes to the Wings of War system, but I'll need more info about the WW2 game before I can complete the porting.

* Mum's garden is beginning to recover.

* We got a box of goodies from the Winterization program, in addition to the work that will eventually be done upgrading Rather Manor's infrastructure. Basically, we got a supply of flourescent squiggle lights (which we've been already using for about ten years), thermometers, aerator faucet and shower heads, a duct cleaning brush, and a smoke detector (the source for yesterday's DRAMA TAG).

* Model meeting is tonight. Oh boy.
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It would be an uphill struggle but I'd have to make the effort. I think it would be like my relationship with my brother and sister, or mine with my sister's children. We dwell upon the differences but every so often we realize how alike we are at our cores.
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Nephew is here so...

1) I can't work on much in the way of models as the guest room is also my workshop.

2) I had to get up early (in my terms) so he could have breakfast.

3) Had to get him playing the Wii so he wouldn't gorge himself on Easter candy. The incidental music for Legend of Zelda is looping in my head.

More to come.
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Actually, here's a meme idea.. Go back one year in your lj, link it to your current entry and comment on it... what's the same, what is different, was the Denubian crisis of planet Zyborg ever resolved to the satisfaction of all MarkLark?

Okay, I'm game. July 20th, 2007 AD would be This Entry, and since then I've been sorely tempted again and again to buy two-for-one packs of doughnuts, and my willpower has overwhelmed my vice every time.

I only weigh twenty pounds more than my nephew. And I'm thirty years older than him.

FP
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Depends on the game, of course. Most of the time, tho', I prefer the act of discovery. There was one time I was at my sister's, playing my nephew's Sonic The Hedgehog game for the very first time, and I found a prize in it my nephew had never seen before after scores of previous playing sessions. That impressed both of us.
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Found at a Dollar Tree store. I bought it because it resembles my sister's VW "New" Beetle, which is also white. I'll give it to my nephew when I see him at my sister's "official" second wedding next week.

FP

And BTW...

Mar. 30th, 2008 12:09 am
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...As I forgot, because I was enjoying the absense of John Williams music in the air accompanied with sporadic Industrial Light & Magic sound effects, my nephew Egan went home this afternoon after lunch. Mommy (my sister Lyn) came and picked him up.

He maxxed the points on his game at Four Billion, but I don't know if he got all the Golden Blocks.

The Force is strong in this one.

FP
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1) Got my car back from repairs yesterday afternoon. Turned out the part shown in the repair manual and the part we actually needed were two different things. Took the wrong replacement back to Hillbilly's (Dad driving me in his Buick), exchanged it for the right replacement (which didn't look too good, but looked much better than the obviously and comprehensively burnt-out unit removed from Moonshine's dashboard) and got it to the Mechie. I stood in his driveway for about twenty minutes while he installed the replacement and put the dashboard back together. He had his ancient stereo system (it had a built-in 8-Track) playing the Knoxville Cliché--err, "Classic" Rock station.

"Who Are You?"..."Sharp-Dressed Man"..."The Girl's Got Rhythm"..."Turn The Page"..."Rockin' Into The Night"..."Love Hurts"...

And irony's jukebox hit "Take It Easy" when Mechie had finished his work. (At least no heavy metal band has yet remade Willie Nelson's "On The Road Again"!)

2) Egie's still playing Star Wars Lego. Current score: 178,000,000 points. He's already unlocked all the characters and vehicles and now is working on collecting all the "gold blocks" to pay off Jabba The Hutt.

It's a lousy day today, so we'll give him some slack. It's overcast outside and a little chilly.

3) Spent last night trolling through LiveLeak again. It's not that I'm not finding minkable stuph, it's just that I'm not so much in a mood for posting embeds this time around.

FP
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1) My nephew Egan has been staying here this week. Most of his time is alternating between playing Star Wars Lego on the Wii and reading C.S. Lewis Narnia novels. He sleeps in the guest room, which means I can't do any work on my assignment model for IPMS. Yes, we are trying to get him involved in the outside world here, but he won't have none of it. He is very much like I was at his age...and it still worries me a little.

2) Moonshine is in the shop. The resistor for the heater/air conditioner dashboard fan needs to be replaced. In another "Raiders of the Lost Part" safari, Dad and I went to Hillbilly's Auto Parts junkyard in Strawberry Plains for the replacement resistor. We got it for $5, which is a great magnitude better than the $33 the Chevy dealer wanted to charge for a brand-new part, special ordered and shipped and handled. We're having our usual shade-tree mechanic do the work because it goes under the dashboard and that means some tricky finagling with the air bags.

3) I've set a job interview appointment for Tuesday morning in Asheville. Only I have absolutely no idea where in town it is. So I'll need to contact Bro overday.

4) I'm trying to decide what I want for my Midnight Snack. Looks like it's going to be Cinnamon Toast.


FP
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ExpandPhantoms And Falling Leaves )

In local news, we had a birthday late lunch here for Mom. That went pretty well, for the most part. But then nephew had to somehow whack himself into something in the kitchen and chip one of his front teeth. Poor kid...inheriting the Bierce gene for pushing the physical laws envelope. We are a rather expensive breed when it comes to hurting ourselves. I hope this is as bad as it gets, tho'.

FP
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Family get-together/picnic overday. Menu included the mafalda, deviled eggs (which nephew especially liked), cajun goulash/salad (made with red beans & rice with corn and other veggies added) and barbecued sausages of various types. I'll probably eat more mafalda tomorrow...we had a good share of leftovers.

I learned that I don't like vinegar-flavored potato chips, and that while I can tolerate sausage flavored with basil and sun-dried tomatoes, it's probably a dish I won't buy for myself.

FP
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Dumbledore's Army are on their way...

Just saw HP: Oo'P this midday.

Loose thoughts:ExpandPossible Spoilers HERE )

More to come.

FP
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Lego people scale to roughly 1/45th.



The above is how I know. Nephew is visiting, and I helped him build this, which I surmise he got for his birthday (which was about a month ago or so).

Never dreamed I'd ever blog about Legos.

FP
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I just learned less than an hour ago that my nephew is coming to stay here for an extended weekend. He arrives the day after tomorrow (Thursday) and goes back a week from today (next Tuesday).

So I have to clear all my work out of the guest room and forget about it till he leaves.

My father bought a small cabinet for CDs and DVDs mail-order and I put it together for him. If he only told me he was wanting one, I could have found a nicer one for probably less than what he spent, somewhere local.

My folks rarely include me in household decisions. No matter how many years I have to live in this house--it WON'T be a home.

FP
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I'm decompressing now after our family Christmas gathering/banquet/gift exchange. At the last minute I changed my mind about buying a gift for my nephew and got him a NewRay Sopwith Camel toy from the Red Roofs KayBee. I gave my niece a Parrothead t-shirt...it's so too big for her she may recycle it as part of a skirt, which I guess would be clever.

I still owe people gifts, but I'm a firm believer of the notion that Christmas isn't over till the last gifts are given and received. Over the years, I've given gifts weeks before Dec 25th, and weeks after, and often months before or after. It's the sentiment that counts, not the timeliness.

So we watched a lot of football and ate spaghetti & meatballs, and (family friend/"adopted brother") Kiyo folded a pair of Dollar bills into a cat and an elephant (numismatic origami is a long-standing hobby among the Asheville side of our set). Nephew Egan showed off his Lego robot.

We didn't sing carols. If Grace was said, it wasn't said at my table. (Nine people; two tables.) Our collective formality was rather informal. I guess nobody felt any need to invest much sentiment into the event.

Still, it was nice. Hope if you have a family gathering tomorrow, you enjoy it as much as we have ours.

FP
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Hey.

I'm trying to talk my parents into taking my nephew to the zoo. I mean, the kid likes animals, and the zoo's not far away and it's cheaper than many of the other touristy things to do in this area.

"He's bored," I tell them.

"He seems to be happy," they tell me back.

"He's doing a lot of the same things I used to do when I was bored at his age."

"Are you bored now?" they ask me.

I didn't really want to honestly share my exact feelings. But no, I'm not bored. I just want nephew to go back to his Mommy and tell him something better about his visit than "I ate good" or "I saw a lot of movies."

FP
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...Billy Crystal, that is.

Showed Egan City Slickers for his movie tonight and he had all sorts of fun. He was charmed by the opening credit cartoon and never let go. I wonder now if we'll have to get him up on a horse...or a cow.

FP

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Stephen R Bierce

March 2022

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