mm's mostly-off-from-work friday....

ok, so....i only had to work til 9:30 am yesterday.....given my monday night work in my third county that only happens once a month....and so i headed to lexington.....making the goodwill rounds, prior to meeting my eldest for lunch/shopping.....we ate at ramsey's, the one in his neighborhood north of campus.....a neighborhood sort of place, very homey.....and then we ventured down nicholasville road toward the malls....omg.....i do this so infrequently....head to malls....that i was unprepared for the mayhem....the office depot....the one by the best buy....is only accessible by a most inconvenient sideroad....and once in this captive parking lot....one might as well plan on staying a spell....we returned the office chair i bought for andrew 2 weeks ago....and upgraded to a chair that adjusts in numerous ways....the manager was somewhat distressed that it came back in one piece rather than in the box.....saying something about it not being professionally assembled and they couldn't resell it unless they took it apart and reassembled it....but she relented and agreed to take it back if we bought another chair.....the process of test-sitting chairs took some time......but did give us some peace from the throngs of shoppers, as office depot was clearly not the destination of choice in a strip mall that also boasts bedbath&beyond, bestbuy, and toysrus......it took us as long to get out of that parking lot as we had spent doing the return......and then we headed upstream into the belly of the beast-fayette mall- just to dillards, and only because that was where i bought jeans for andrew the last time we had such an outing.....4 years ago.....and this also took some time.....to select the perfect pair of jeans is exacting.....for some.....i was wearing flannel-lined jeans that i bought at the l-burg goodwill before my group on monday evening.....i grabbed them from the rack, exclaimed 'these are in my size'.....and put them in the cart......i don't even try things on in goodwills anymore....it is worth the $2.50 per item to take them home without disrobing in their dressing rooms.....if i choose not to keep something i bring it back before the deadline(with receipt) or donate it for the tax deduction of $2.50 per item.....works for me....and takes up far less time.....but i digress from the jeans......he tried on 12 pairs and bought 1 pair.....as we pulled out of the dillard's lot, we opted to make out way through the backlots, believing that there is now a connector to man-o-war through the brand-new mall extension (old navy, etc)....this proved a reasonable alternative to the gridlock that is northbound nic-road traffic.....we made pretty good time going north on clay's mill and then harrodsburg road......taking him back to his place before i turned south again.....i did make a stop at l.barn.....which is something i had never doen on friday evening.....they were doing wine tastings....this time with bordeaux reds in many price categories....most were free, with the margaux tasting costing $1.....heck, i spend a buck to taste a margaux.....after the cheaper vintages, the margaux was supurb....and i'll keep that in mind if-and-when i am moved to spend $35 on a single bottle of red......i was gone from home 12 hours, counting my brief stint at my paying job....and i was ever so glad to reach home....to dine on the beef that i had thoughtfully put in the crockpot before i left home.....1 pound of beef tips, a can of mushroom soup, 2 cans (drained) of mushrooms....serve with some buttered noodles.....mighty tasty dinner entree for the tired and hungry shopper.....