Slept in until after 7 this morning. It’s an unusually cool morning — the golfers teeing up just outside my patio doors are wearing long pants, jackets, toques and some even have mitts on! I made my morning coffee and sat down in the living room to read all the latest news on my MacBook. I sat there so long I had to hurry up and make my oatmeal so I could have breakfast before lunchtime.

I had two things on my t0-do list today: fix the outdoor lamp on the garage and make supper for my dinner guests, Robert and Arlene. So after breakfast I got to work. I couldn’t figure out why the light wasn’t working — and then I couldn’t figure out what kind of a light it was. It wasn’t a ‘bulb’ lamp; I was a round circuit board with lots of non-functioning LEDs on it. Is this fixable? Replaceable? So I tinkered on it for quite some time before texting John P. to ask what I should do about this. He texts back that the fixture is only 2 years old — and LEDs are supposed to last forever. I took a photo of the circuit board and used the image to have Google figure out what it was — and that led me to Lowe’s. The actual part was no longer available, but I decided to hop into the van and go see what I could find at Lowes. I had removed the fixture from the garage wall and took it along. I was hoping to get a replacement that had a square wall plate that would match (or cover) the square of ‘old paint’ that was left by the original  fixture. Well, there were no outdoor lamps in my price range that were going to nicely cover the old paint — so I picked something that was ‘close’ but not very expensive. And when I got home and connected up the wires and bolted the lamp to the wall, it didn’t look too bad.

After a quick sandwich I got to work on the second chore of the day. I cut up some vegetables and fried up Italian sausage and chicken. Once I had the sauce mixed I set it to simmer for about an hour. Robert and Arlene arrived at four o’clock. We had some drinks and Robert surfed through all my ‘NHL’ channels, looking for the Jets game. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t get it on my TV, but Robert was persistent and sure enough, at five o’clock there were the Oilers and the Jets playing on Winnipeg ice.

By six o’clock it was time for dinner. Robert helped cook the (gluten-free) pasta and Arlene put the salad fixings together. Supper was served — and my sauce turned out pretty good. Too bad the game didn’t turn out so good! The Jets played well but the Oilers played weller, tying up the game and then getting a power-play winner in the last minutes of the game. Robert and Arlene had been busy packing the car and the motorhome today. They plan to leave very early tomorrow morning. After a small dish of ice cream for dessert, we said our goodbyes. I’ll see them in early January in Phoenix. Happy trails.

I put the dishes into the dishwasher and sat down to watch the Thursday Night NFL game and write my blog for the day. Hmmm… the only photo I took today was of the defective LED light — and that’s even less interesting than this whole blog entry, so I’ll go ‘sans-photo’ today.