I had an easy fast yesterday, and hope others did also.

  

Alex and I went to dinner at Carrabba's last night to break the fast and also celebrate his 'new' car.  Our meals were delicious, as always, and as usual I had the talapia Nocciola, along with a salad and nice crisp green beans.  I was pleasantly surprised when Alex grabbed the dinner check and treated me!

He also ordered the chocolate dream cake for dessert (I'd been pleasantly full after my reasonably healthy dinner, but who can resist that?)

When we got home he brought over Due Date (reminded me of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles) which I'd never seen and thoroughly enjoyed watching with him.

  

Alex already has a buyer for his Altima, some neighbors up the street; that transaction is due to happen today.  Nice for him that he doesn't have to go through the usual hassles of selling a car.

On my agenda today is to mow the front yard once the grass dries out.  Of course it'll still need some weed-eating around the edges before it looks pristine (and that'll have to wait for Tom) but the yard will sure look a lot better than it does now!

I never did post the following, which was written Friday afternoon when I was still busy crossing more stuff off of my list.  Some of it was quick and easy, like feeding Pokey the last of the cantaloupe rinds (not  to worry about her - I cut up another one later that afternoon) and filling the hummingbird feeders.  

Other chores were a little more time consuming, like washing all the filters in the vacuum cleaner.  At least I know the filters do their job... you should have seen the dirt that rinsed out of the foam ring (shown drying on the turquoise part so it didn't blow away.)  I also had my preying mantis keeping an eye on things. <g>   That mini-bench was one of my finds from yard-saling recently, and replaced the broken red Adirondack chair that used to sit there. 

While all the filters were busy drying I headed off to Target; at the top of my list was a new iron.  When I wanted to use my old iron before leaving for San Francisco it wouldn't work in the usual outlet, but heated up just fine after plugging it into another (though less conveniently located) outlet.  But when I needed to iron some fabric a few days ago to make up fat quarters for AQG the iron wouldn't work in the 'new' outlet either.  Obviously it was time for a new one!

On my way home I listened to NPR's Science Friday with Ira Flatow, which turned out to be a discussion of the upcoming lunar eclipse.  Here in Arizona we will get our view EARLY in the 'morning'.

The entire event, from the time the moon first touches the partial shadow of the Earth called the penumbra (literally “almost shadow”) to when it finally departs once again, will take place over a little more than five hours, starting at 1:15 AM PDT and ending around 6:30 AM, as twilight begins to grow.
But if you’d like to concentrate your viewing enjoyment to a shorter span of time, start watching closer to 2:15 AM. At this time the moon begins to enter the Earth’s umbra, or full shadow where all of the sun’s light is blocked, and you will see a very noticeable bite taken out of the left edge of the Moon. For the next hour and ten minutes the umbral shadow will spread across the Moon’s disk, until at 3:25 the eclipse enters totality, when the Moon is completely engulfed in the darkest central core of Earth’s shadow.
Totality, frankly, is the best and most beautiful part of a total lunar eclipse, so if all you want is a quick glimpse of the eclipse at its peak, check it out sometime between 3:35 to 4:24 AM PDT. Mid-eclipse, when the moon is deepest in Earth’s umbra, will be at 3:54 AM.

The man being interviewed (who runs 'something' astronomy-related in Cinncinati that I don't remember exactly) was explaining how to get good moon/star pictures with an iPhone (not that I have one, or understood what he said...) and in the course of the interview said that he's chosen to fly to Arizona for the best view the eclipse!  He also mentioned the upcoming Orionoids ('shooting stars' leftover from Halley's Comet) which will peak October 21, but be visible up to a week before/after that date.  Mark your calendars!