First was a stop at Staples to buy a new chair mat. After considering what was on offer, we decided to get a smaller mat and set it on top of the existing one under my desk, over the spot where the first mat has cracked.
Next was Safari RV Parts. About a week ago, Lisa smelled a slight leakage of propane from the hose feeding from one of the two bottles on the travel trailer, so she shut off that bottle. This is annoying because the normal situation is to keep both bottles open with a fail-over valve that opens when the first bottle runs out. That way you don't run out of propane, say, overnight when you really don't want to have to get out and switch bottles in -10° C temperatures. So we needed a new feed hose. Annoyingly, they didn't have one as short as the existing hose, which is going to make for an unnecessarily interesting exercise in getting the longer hose to fit in the smaller area.
Next was the only actual Christmas shopping: Lisa wanted a small living Christmas tree, and the places in Fernley that have had them in the past were long since sold out. We found a few left at Moana Lane Garden Center Nursery. Lisa has hopes of re-potting it after the holiday and keeping it around until next year.
By then it was time for lunch, and we went to the Atlantis buffet. The line was about twenty people deep, and I had Lisa hold our place while I went over to the kiosks to check in with my club card. The kiosk spit out a 2-for-1 lunch coupon at the buffet! Good timing, that.
Suitably stuffed from the lunch buffet, we waddled over to Grocery Outlet (after a side trip to the adjacent Jo-Ann Fabrics, where we were unable to get a length of 2-inch adhesive Velcro we want for a project to hang removable curtains in the back of my van because Jo-Ann was out), where nothing looked good, but we bought some groceries anyway.
Next was Cost Plus World Market for some small goodies that we've not found in other stores, particularly a type of scone mix that we like.
Then it was on to Whole
Lisa remembered after we left Staples that we needed rubber bands, so when we headed up to Sparks for our big grocery shopping, we went to the Office Depot across the street to get a box. Then we hiked across the parking lot to Home Depot to buy Lysol spray, as it seems to be the only place we can get regular original scent Lysol, grocery stores (and even the other Big Boxes) carrying only the various scented types.
Winco foods was our major grocery shopping stop, where to Lisa's annoyance she found the same bag of C&H sugar she'd bought at Grocery Outlet cost less.
Finally it was on to the Nugget in Sparks, which is no longer John Ascuaga's, although his name still appears on the sign, as the sale to the Big Eastern Interests closed a few days ago. While at the start of the day we'd been planning on having dinner here, we were still feeling the buffet lunch; however, we did go to the steak house and asked after our favorite server, William, and they actually called him up to the front counter. Lisa gave him a Christmas card from us to him and his brother, who is also a server there. He seemed genuinely happy to see us, and we apologized for not coming in for dinner tonight but said we would be back soon. (We may have dinner here on New Year's Eve, which we plan on spending at the Nugget. We'd originally planned to spend the night at the Nugget, but by the time we decided to book, the room rates had gone higher than we could stomach. As we do not drink alcohol, the only issue is being very tired to drive the 30 miles home after Midnight on New Year's day.) A brief visit to one of Lisa's favorite slot machines was cut short when she hit the bonus round on the fourth pull, putting her ahead of her initial stake, and her rule is that whenever she's ahead, she stops playing.
After a very full day of running around Reno/Sparks stocking up, we were happy to get home, and I was pleased that the walnut firewood had retained enough coals for me to get the fire going again without having to start from scratch, even after close to eight hours. Aside from deciding to book ahead for Christmas Day dinner at the Nugget (which I've done), we have no elaborate plans for Christmas this year. It's mainly a couple of extra days off at home for me, a rare luxury indeed.