Thursday 7-9-26 Happy Thursday & Having Fun

 

Happy Thursday!!!

Happy Thursday. I hope everyone had a great day. Keep cool when every possible.

We had another 100 degree day. We spent the day indoors doing this and that. The morning temperature was 76 degrees and the high was 100 degrees. We also had wind.

 It's hot

Larry spent the day reading. He has been reading Crossing to Safety, by Wallace Stegner on and off for a few days. Today he decided to try and finish it. He liked the book and said the author was terrifically talented. The author wrote many books when he was alive. 

Relax with a good book

I played the Daily Challenge of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Free Cell Adventure of 20 games. I only did 19 of the games. I played the event for 1 hour, 26 minutes and 28 seconds before giving up. This put me in 21st place in my group. I played Angry Birds Friends and Angry Birds 2.

I worked out with my Wii Fit for 45 minutes. I did my own routine. I worked with the Aerobics menu for 8 minutes with two exercises (Rhythm Boxing for 4 minutes and Super Hula Hoop for 4 minutes, Balance Games menu for 10 minutes with two exercises (Ski Slalom five times for 5 minutes and Snowboard Slalom five times for 5 minutes), Strength Training menu for 7 minutes with three exercises (Sideways Leg Lift 20 reps for 2 minutes, Single-Leg Extension 20 reps for 3 minutes and Single-Leg Twist 20 reps for 2 minutes), Training Plus menu for 10 minutes with two exercises (Perfect 10 for 2 minutes and Table Tilt Plus three times for 8 minutes) and Yoga for 10 minutes with five exercises (Half Moon for 2 minutes, Standing Knee for 2 minutes, Sun Salutation for 2 minutes, Tree for 2 minutes and Triangle for 2 minutes). I had a great workout.

  

Aerobics (Rhythm Boxing and Super Hula Hoop)

Balance Games (Ski Slalom and Snowboard Slalom)

Strength Training (Sideways Leg Lift, Single-Leg Extension and Single Leg Twist)

Training Plus (Perfect 10 and Table Tilt Plus)

  

Yoga (Half Moon, Standing Knee, Sun Salutation, Tree and Triangle)

I worked out with Just Dance 2014 for 30 minutes. I danced to 9 songs, which were 20 minutes with Applause, Aquarius, Could You Be Love, Candy, She Wolf (Falling To Pieces) and In The Summertime) and 10 minutes with Blurred Lines, Miss Understood and Where Have You Been. I had a fun times.

Just Dance 2014 (Applause, Aquarius, Could Yo Be Love, Candy, She Wolf : Falling to Pieces and In The Summertime)

Just Dance 2014 (Blurred Lines, Miss Understood and Where Have You Been)

I worked out with the Synth Rider for 30 minutes with four songs two times. The songs were Behemoth, Carol Of The Bells, Got You and Hex. I had a great workout.

Behemoth

Carol Of The Bells

Got You

Hex

I played eight games of pinball. I played four games on the mini cabinet, which were Ace of Speed, Attack From Mars, Pirate's Life and World Joker Poker. While playing Attack From Mars I became high score #2. I played four games on the big cabinet, which were Apollo 13, Star Fox, Transformers and Willow. While I played Willow I became high score #3. I had a fun time playing pinball.

Ace of Speed (Mini)

Attack From Mars (Mini)

Pirate's Life (Mini)

World Joker Poker (Mini)

Apollo 13 (Big)

Star Fox (Big)

Transformers (Big)

Willow (Big)

A few days ago I decided to reassemble the Horse Of Iron jigsaw puzzle. I assembled the puzzle back in October of 2018. It's a 1,000 pieces puzzle in the shape of a train engine. It's going to take awhile because of the shape but it 's going to be fun.

Horse of Iron

We watched YouTube videos.

In the evening we watched Avatar from our movie collection. The are three movies, the first was done in 2009, the second in 2022 and the third in 2025. We had the first two and this week Larry purchased the third. We want to watch them in order so tonight we started with the first one, it is a very good movie and the graphics are still terrific. The first Avatar movie is the highest grossing movie of all time, it took in almost 3 billion dollars.

When Larry went to bed I watched You Got Mail and Men In Black 3 from our movies collection. I ended up doing 4,000 steps.

 

  

Wednesday 7-8-26 Three Dances, Workout & More

 

Awesome Day!!!

We had an awesome day with a lot of sunshine. The morning temperature was 74 degrees and the high of 100 degrees. 

Hot Day!!!

I attended three virtual dances. First was Di Green and Terry McCann's Weekly Plus at 10:00 for an hour. Loren Smith filled in for Di because she's in Germany. He called one tip of Plus and called three tips of A2 because he noticed everyone there was A2 dancers. Larry danced with me the whole dance. It was a small group of 5 participants. During the dance Loren cued a few C1 moves, which were Ah So, Squeeze the Diamond, Follow Thru and 2/3 Recycle. We figured it was a small group because of the European Square Dancing Convention in Germany. Larry changed our camera view so the dancers could see our floor and where we were on the floor. Lise was happy Larry was dancing because she can see where she should be. She dances the man part. We had a super time.

Second was Ett McAtee's Weekly C1 at 1:00 for an hour. She called four tips to 7 participants. She called a lot of Switch The Line and Switch The Wave. She has her sequences written down so when the dancers are having problems she will recall the sequence. This helps because she doesn't do too much cueing. I hadn't danced to her in a long time. In fact I didn't dance to her all last month. I had fun dancing with friends. 

Third was Dave Eno's Weekly C1/A2 at 6:00 for an hour and a half. Karin Rabe, Greg Moore and Dave Hutchinson helped him call the dance. The format was three tips of C1, three tips of A2 an two trivia questions in between the A2 tips. During the C1 session Karin and Greg called the first tip, Dave Hutchinson called the second tip and Dave Eno called the third tip. During the A2 session Karin and Greg called the first tip, Dave Eno and Dave Hutchinson called the second tip and all four callers called the third tip. During the C1 session we had 8 participants from Australia, United States and Canada. During the A2 session we had 11 participants from United States and Canada. Ros from Australia watched because she just had a knee replaced. I had a fun evening dancing with friends.

Participants during the A2 session of the dance

In between the dances I played games and worked out. Larry continued playing on the computer.

I did the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Easy Street Mini of 5 games. It took me 10 minutes and 34 seconds to complete, which put me in 14th place in my group. I played Angry Birds Friends and Angry Birds 2.

I worked out for an hour. I worked out with the Wii Fit for 31 minutes. I did two exercises from the Aerobics menu for 10 minutes (8 minutes with the Rhythm Boxing and 2 minutes with the Basic Run: Long Distance), three exercises from the Strength Training menu for 9 minutes (3 minutes with the Balance Bridge 10 reps, 3 minutes with the Single-Leg Extension 20 reps and 3 minutes with the Torso Twist 6 reps) and six exercises from the Yoga menu for 12 minutes (2 minutes with Chair, 2 minutes with Deep Breathing, 2 minutes with Downward Facing Dog, 2 minutes with Half Moon, 2 minutes with Palm Tree and 2 minutes with Warrior). I had a great workout.

Aerobics (Rhythm Boxing and Basic Run)

Strength Training (Balance Bridge, Single-Leg Extension and Torso Twist)

Yoga (Chair, Deep Breathing, Downward Facing Dog, Half Moon, Palm Tree and Warrior)

I worked out on the Synth Riders for 30 minutes with three songs two times. The songs were Calling Out, Revenger and Showdown. While working out with Calling Out I earned one outstanding score. It was a great workout.

Calling Out

Showdown

Revenger

I played ten pinball games. I played five on the mini cabinet, which were Ace of Speed, Creature From The Black Lagoon, Jaws, Lord of the Rings and Michael. I played five games on the big cabinet, which were Apollo 13, Big Bang Bar, Dark Chaos, Monster Bash and Star Fox. I entered my initials on the board of Apollo 13 because I played the 13 balls multi-ball. I had fun trying to get on the board in both the menu cabinet and big cabinet.

Ace of Speed (Mini)

Creature From The Black Lagoon(Mini)

Jaws (Mini)

Lord of the Rings (Mini)

Michael (Mini)

Apollo 13 (Big)

Big Bang Bar (Big)

Dark Chaos (Big)

Monster Bash (Big)

Star Fox (Big)

After Dave's dance we watched a documentary on PBS called Armadillo Man: Trips of Jim Franklin. It was about Jim Franklin, who was an iconic poster artist who established Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin. It was a good documentary. Then we started watching the season of Happiness on PBS. It's a British comedy. After Larry went to bed I watched Avatar from our movies collection. I ended up doing 3,000 steps.  

 

   

        

Tuesday 7-7-26 Dancing with Loren, Project, New Electric Company & More

 

Smile it's summertime

We had a beautiful day with partly cloudy skies. The morning temperature was 72 degrees and the high was 99 degrees.

Our contract with Discount Power expired yesterday. For the past couple of weeks Larry has been keeping on eye on electricity rates from other providers. He found Chariot Energy was almost 30% less than Discount Power, using their online system he was able to move us over to them. As soon as he changed over we received an e-mail from Discount Power saying that our contracted was cancelled. 

We started the day off by attending Di Green and Terry McCann's Weekly A2 dance at 10:00 for an hour. Di and Terry are going to be in Germany for the next two weeks so Loren Smith covered for Di and Terry. Loren is covering this week but won't be able to cover next week so we won't have a dance. Loren called four tips of A2 to 10 participants and one tip of C1 to 6 participants. Loren did an excellent job of calling. When the dancers had problems with a move he would walk us through the move. Larry danced all of the tips with me. We had a super time dancing to Loren and with friends.

I did the Daily Challenges of Solitaire and Mahjong. The event was Event: Two Game Tango of 20 games (10 Klondike and 1- Spider). It took me 2 hours, 47 minutes and 51 second to complete, which put me in 17th place in my group. I played Angry Birds Friends and Angry Birds 2.

I worked out with the Wii Fit for 45 minutes. I let the Wii Fit choose my routine. The routine consisted of 12 exercises, which were two from the Aerobics menu ( Advance Step and Super Hula Hoop), one from the Balance Games menu (Lotus Focus), four from Strength Training (Lunge 10 reps, Row Squats of 15, Torso Twist 3 reps and Tricep Extension 10rep) and five from Training Plus (Bird's Eye Bull's Eye, Obstacle Course, Rhythm Parade, Snowball Fight and Skateboard Arena). I worked out with this routine for 33 minutes. I did three exercises from the Training Plus menu for 12 minutes (Basic Run Plus for 2 minutes, Perfect 10 three times for 5 minutes and Table Tilt Plus two times for 5 minutes). It was a great workout.

Wii Fit Plus Routine (earned an extra 2 minutes)

Aerobics (Advance Step and Super Hula Hoop)

Balance Games (Lotus Focus)

Strength Training (Lunge, Rowing Squats, Torso Twist and Tricep Extensions)

Training Plus (Basic Run Plus, Bird's Eye Bull's Eye, Obstacle Course, Perfect 10, Rhythm Parade, Snowball Fight, Skateboard Arena and Table Tilt Plus) 

I worked out with Gold's Gym for 30 minutes. I did my own routine from the Advance Menu, which were Warm Up: Left and Right Step Combo for 8 minutes and Ducking Combo for 22 minutes. It was a great workout.

Left and Right Step Combo and Ducking Combo

I played eight games of pinball. I played four games on the the mini cabinet, which were Fun House, No Fear, Pirates of the Caribbean and The Godfather. While playing No Fear I became high score #1. I played four games on the big cabinet, which were Apollo 13, Dark Chaos, JP Space Cadet and The Big LeBowski. I didn't get on the board but I had fun trying.

Fun House (Mini)

No Fear (Mini)

Pirates of the Caribbean (Mini)

The Godfather (Mini)

Apollo 13 (Big)

Dark Chaos (Big)

JP Space Cadet (Big)

The Big LeBowski (Big)

We watched YouTube videos.

In the evening we watched Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. It a good action movie. After Larry went to bed I watched Aquaman and Men In Black II. I watched Aquaman to refresh my memory. All the movies were from our movies collection. I ended up doing 3,000 steps.