Overheated

Kicked off a hazy, killer hot morning with travel-and-vacation-themed Looney Tunes shorts. It's "All Abirrrdd" for Tweety when his owner sends him alone in a train's baggage car. Sylvester's also on board, and he's decided Tweety will be an easy lunch. This time, not only Spike the dog, but the conductor make sure he doesn't get his yellow meal.

Porky's on vacation by a beautiful mountain lake. He's hoping to paint some scenery and enjoy the view. Daffy would rather he had a view of him being crazy in "Boobs In the Woods." Porky shows him who's the real boob when he reveals his odd collection of licenses.

Made a quick run to the Collingswood Farm Market around 10 AM. It was surprisingly busy, despite the continued hot spell. (The heat index today was 105.) The tables are groaning with tons of summer produce. I saw grapes for the first time this year. My only real interest were those little yellow apples. which would be the perfect size to carry in my luggage and bring to New England. Also grabbed two small organic onions, one red, one white.

When I got home, I watched two more Sailor Moon vacation episodes, these from the first season, as I got organized, ate lunch, and did a little packing. "Last Resort" takes Usagi and her family to a hot springs, where they hope to have some bonding time. Their vacation becomes dangerous quickly when Mamoru also arrives. He unleashes a demon in the lake, hoping to harness its power, but loses control of it very quickly. The demon thinks Usagi is the one who imprisoned her there and attacks her and her family. The blond teen wants to help, but she can't transform in front of her brother and parents...

"The Summer, the Beach, Youth, and Ghosts" is what it says on the tin. We go back to earlier in the season, when the group consisted of Usagi, Rei, and Ami (and Luna). They've come to the beach for a relaxing seaside vacation...but the trip is anything but relaxing when they get lost and find themselves in a mysterious mansion. Usagi is afraid of the monsters who run the place, but they're more scared of the "ghosts" that have been randomly appearing. Ami wonders if the "ghosts" have anything to do with the young girl and her stern father who own the house.

Headed to work around quarter of noon. Once again, it was fairly dead, especially for a weekend. Everyone must be at the Shore. I did get stuck outside for nearly an hour and a half rounding up carts - and I didn't really need to go out for the half. I had plenty of help from two of the college boys. I mainly mopped and cleaned up the back room.

(I got to see a little of the Olympics while cleaning in the back, mainly rowing and women's diving preliminaries. No wonder so many people around here, especially college students, are rowing fans. The Men's Sculls final was genuinely thrilling. It was literally neck and neck in the end - the Croatian rower won by the tip of his boat over his New Zealand rival.)

When I got home, I went on the computer to work on some writing, but I was tired and didn't get far. Ben asks the twins what they know about Empire Industries. Leia explains that they're an oil and biochemical company that's branched out into entertainment and hospitality over the past few years. Her boss and idol Senator Marta Mothma has a running feud with them. They violate environmental laws and building codes and get away with it because they're influential and very wealthy.

Had the last of the leftover chicken fillets in mushroom-leek sauce with tomato and cucumber slices for dinner while watching Tiny Toons: How I Spent My Summer Vacation. The Toons are hoping for a summer filled with adventure, but they all get more than they bargained for. Plucky regrets having joined Hampton and his family for a trip to Happy World Land - they're a super-cutsey-Brady Bunch kind of a family who pick up psychotic hitchhikers, play inane games, and bring their own food to fast-food restaurants. Shirley the Loon gets stuck on a date with Fowlmouth - she'd rather toss him into the cosmic either. Fifi La Fume wants an autograph from her favorite movie star, but he turns out to be nothing like she expects. Elmyra terrorizes the animals at a safari park. Babs and Buster spend the whole trip down river after a water gun fight gets out of hand, dodging packs of wild swamp critters who think they're on the 4th of July barbecue menu.

I always liked this one as a kid, and I still enjoy most of it today. The larger stories, especially Plucky's car ride from hell, tend to work better than the cliched side stories (and the whole thing with Elmyra is just annoying), and a lot of the gags and references haven't dated well. If you're a fan of the series, by all means, you're going to want to seek this one out, too.

Finished the night with a second attempt at the bonus rounds in Lego Star Wars. I did finally get through the Vader "New Hope" round, despite those annoying buttons you have to run over to get C-3P0 taking me at least ten minutes or more to get all lit up at once. At least I've figured out how to set up the colorful "Lego" sign now. That helped a lot in "Lego City" as well. The problem there was I didn't have the right character to blow up the metal pieces needed to get the last 100,000 beads. I'll try that one again tomorrow or when I get back from vacation.

Oh, and incidentally, my schedule this week is my own vacation. I have a regular day off tomorrow. The real vacation begins Monday. I'll be visiting Lauren in Pittsfield in western Massachusetts, as I did last October. I've been waiting for this ever since we figured out when I was going to go up there in late June. We always have fun when we're together.