We started off the day like we do any other Saturday then cleaned up some more. Amanda put everything back in the kitchen while I mowed the lawn. She took off after a little bit to go see her aunt, Anna Frazelle. Anna’s birthday was a few days ago, but because their phone has been funky Amanda hasn’t even had a chance to properly wish her a happy birthday.
I stuck around and cleaned up my office some. I have several (many several) boxes of comics that I’ve been wanting to sort and take stock of. I’ve been putting off getting them out of the office because of that, but I finally went ahead and put them in the storage area in the office. It’s more like a crawlspace, but it did the trick. That alone cleared up a lot of space. Now I’ve got a crapload of books that Adam dropped off though, and need to do something with them. But at least my boxes of comics are finally put away.
Renee Sikes moved in during all that. She didn’t bring much, but I helped her bring in a few things.
Amanda’s friend from college, Robin (whose last name I can’t recall, but she did go to Southern Durham and we have a few mutual acquaintances) and a friend of hers, John, were going to a wedding and came on to Wilmington to go out to dinner with us. We ate at the Bluewater Grill and to be honest, it wasn’t the best experience we’ve had there. The atmosphere was nice; it was raining lightly but we ate upstairs on a porch overlooking the Intracoastal Waterway and were able to stay dry. However, the menu got a little smaller since Amanda and I were last there and there was very little to eat if, like myself, you don’t like seafood. Because of that I just had a quesadilla appetizer and I drank water, which I often do. I think the waitress thought we would be cheap and didn’t go out of her way to give us great service until Amanda expressed annoyance over having her crab dip appetizer brought out with (tehnically just after!) her main course. After that the waitress was more attentive, but she still didn’t seem to be giving us much effort. I gave her just over 15%, whereas we normally tip 20% for decent service. No matter how bad off we’ve been, Amanda and I have always tried to tip decently well.
After dinner the four of us headed over to Coldstone at Mayfaire. It was raining a little harder by this point though, and the store itself is rather small so we went back to the car to eat our ice cream and shakes. Robin and John left shortly after we got back to the house.
Amanda and I were looking at what all was coming on tonight and I saw that Kingdom of Heaven, by Ridley Scott and starring Orlando Bloom, was coming on. I tend to like such period pieces, so I suggested we watch that and we did.
However, a few minutes into the movie, Brian and Angela Gibson, from whom we bought this house, came by. I knew they were going to, so we paused the movie and I helped load up a fence that they had left here that was stacked up against the shed out back. It took us a little while to get it on there and make it secure, but after we did they, along with their baby Miranda, got a tour of the changes we’ve made to the house.
After they left, Renee joined us in watching Kingdom of Heaven. I thought it was okay. It dragged a little in the middle and I thought it was a little unbelieveable that a blacksmith who is taken in by his long lost baron of a father suddenly becomes a master tactician who is able to defend Jerusalem to a stalemate against the great Saladin. Then again, I guess it went along with the theme of God using us as he will. I did like the way it mentioned how people are fighting over transgressions originally visited against nobody who is still living.
Zach Dotsey
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