Off Topic: That Was the Week It Was - July 3, 2016

Good morning! Since it's Sunday morning, it's time for my weekly off television topic reflection on the week gone by in both words and photographs I've taken along the way. If you're here for Big Brother news, everything I have for you can be found at this link. I'll be posting another live feeds report tonight as well as live-blogging the aired show. But this ain't that. This post is a year-round regular "feature" while Big Brother is a summer obsession. Or, something like that.

I'm finally on a staycation, my last one until September. From what I can see, a heat wave is due to be taking up a good half of my week. Grr. I'm not a summer person unless we're talking staying inside with air conditioning. That's what I'll probably do for a lot of the week. I have the BB live feeds, some other summer TV shows, a couple of new books to read and plenty of diversions.

My three and a half day work week this past week seemed to last a good ten days. I believe I'm actually pining for the day I can finally retire. Yeah, you heard me ... pining.

About the only good thing work-wise which happened this past week is that I received my catalog to choose my recognition award. Every five years of employment at the company gets to choose an award. Since I'm up there in years, I have some pretty decent choices. The last time (five years ago), I got a flat-screen LED television. This year, if I had a car, I'd be tempted by the cool kayak. If I had a lawn, I'd be tempted by a very nice charbroil gas grill or the smoker/grill/roaster one. There are a few cameras catching my attention, a larger HDTV set, a home entertainment system, a quality cookware set ... oh, decisions, decisions. Several watches and pieces of jewelry are in the catalog, but they're really not my thing.

Onto the photos I took this week:

Little green apples

I took trash out to the dumpster in the back of my apartment building's parking lot. I happened to notice a small half-eaten green apple on the ground. I looked up and saw the apple-eater with another one in his paws.

Flower of an hour

Thanks to Bernice, I now know what these beautiful flowers which are usually closed are! You can tell that they're a hibiscus type flower. These just sprouted up like weeds near the Bridgewater Train Station. After the jump, I have a photo of the plant itself.

My town (Plainfield, NJ) had its 93rd Annual 4th of July Parade yesterday.  If you want to check out the photos I took or the "story" below won't work for you, the actual slideshow on my Photobucket account can be found at this link. The link to the album is right here. It was great to see all the children from the city schools involved this year! While the Plainfield HS Marching Band is usually in attendance, the younger kids got involved with their Drama Club (do they still call it that?) doings.

**CLICK THE 'READ MORE' LINK TO SEE THE REST OF THE PHOTOS**

Anybody want a scooter or a bike?

Apparently the children who live in the apartment down the hall from me have visitors. Perhaps I'm cynical and jaded. But I KNOW if I left something of any value outside my apartment door, I could kiss it goodbye. Of course, these things don't belong in the common corridor anyway. But I do think they were just visiting.

Fresh paint

Mario Camino has really fixed up that building he bought on North Avenue. The apartments are beautiful. But I'm still not willing to pay the rent price asked, about what I pay for my own apartment, for no elevator, no laundry room and living next to a bar. I wouldn't mind at all living above a restaurant and bakery, though! It's fantastic to see the improvements on that block!

What? I'm not invited?

This is the apartment with the bike and scooter visitors. Ah, that's why they're there.

Flower-of-an-hour plant

It just sprouted on rather barren land as you can see!

Barclays Center is using Plainfield?

This was an oddity in the 4th of July Parade -- an ad for the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. We're not that far from Brooklyn, but it's not around the corner either.  I'm sure Barclays paid to do this. But it's still rather odd.

Good morning, glory

These grow all along the back fence by my apartment building. I'm waiting for the pink ones to bloom.

Get it?

My building has a huge problem with people coming to the dumpsters at night and dumping all kinds of stuff -- mattresses, construction materials, furniture, landscaping debris and more. I don't know if the landlord did install a camera, but I see the signs are already lessening the dumping. Good.

Yikes! It's a DUEL!

In the midst of the parade action going on, I spotted this saber action across the street.

Vincent will be spoiled this week

Not that he isn't spoiled every other week. But, this week, he'll have me around for most of the week.