The Needs of the Many...

outweigh the needs of the few.

Except in this case, that is.

LLAP, Mr. Spock, Thank you for sharing your gift with us these many years.

Up in Arms

I think I've sprained my left elbow.  I thought the pain, tenderness and muscular tightness was the tendinitis which has bothered me on occasion.  But then I realized that I remembered a door shutting quickly and smacking my left elbow a couple of days ago.  Which was about when it started hurting.  It's bothered me the last couple of days and it has also made it difficult to sleep at night because I sleep on my side.  I generally start out on my left side but sometimes I will wake up on my right side.  I've been trying to prop it up at night and start out on my right side, but I keep waking up because I'm on my left side and my arm hurts!  Usually because I'm actually sleeping on it.  I'll probably drag out the splint from Otter's broken arm many years ago and use it the next couple of days.

Having had my arm broken twice (the left one coincidentally) and having had sprains before, I can say firmly that sprains can hurt worse than breaks!  Probably because a break is generally immobilized in a cast or splint, which also makes it harder to forget and use the limb in a way it should be used.

And as if that weren't enough, the extreme cold and dry air of the last several days is also doing what it generally does:  I'm having an asthma flare.  Not bad, but any asthma is "not good."  I'm trying to stay indoors, which is what I've been doing for the last several days, but there are times when I have to go outside.  Like from the front door to the car, car to the office, etc.  I had to go to the post office today to renew the P.O. Box and I also had a trunkload of stuff to donate to Goodwill so I had to be out in the air a bit.  But Bill had already noticed the signs of an impending flare so he had a nice, warm fire going when I walked in the door.  The thing about asthma is that if it's a mild flare coming on, it's not always noticeable because I'm used to dealing with it so it is somewhat routine.  If it's a bad spell, that's different.  But sometimes it's slow and sneaky.  It won't be bad, I just don't like to deal with it.  But I've never had it as bad as Otter or Froggy's eldest son had to deal with.

Nice surprise!  I just changed the tv station after the M.A.S.H. reruns we usually watch in the evening.  When M.A.S.H. ended, I turned the tv to PBS.  It's the start of their spring pledge drive.  They are running a BeeGees concert!  I absolutely, love love love the BeeGees, pretty much from the earliest time I became aware of the existence of Music.  I can NOT stand disco, but I'll listen to anything and everything done by the BeeGees.  Otter frequently points something out to me:  the BeeGees are disco.  My answer?  NO, THEY ARE NOT.  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.  :)  Also, I think that I came in at the same point in this concert that I did when I saw it the first time.  Just after it started, so I'll get to see most of it.  Hope the dogsters don't mind me singing!  (Not even asthma can stop me if I want to sing and especially not singing along to BeeGees songs.)  

I don't think that there are actually words to express how important Music is to me.  I can also say that I don't know of too many other people who actually Lettered it in in high school!  I'll always be proud of that fact, although I was't too pleased with Mom when she gave my letter sweater away on accident!  (S. TEXAS, sweaters were more common than jackets seeing how we almost never actually had weather that required jackets).  Bill will probably be glad that Dr. Who was not on the schedule for tonight, because I am not changing the station.

Anybody needs me for the next couple hours, don't expect to reach me.  MUSIC TIME!

Joining the Spinning Ranks!!!

For some reason, these spinning racks are suddenly very popular among crafters.  I've been seeing them on a few blogs lately and I have been lusting after one for a while.  I have absolutely no place to put it OR much use for one.  I bought one for Billyboy a few weeks back which only made me want one more.

You can buy them here:  Spinning Rack either online or at one of the actual store.  Here's the link to the store:  One of Bill's favorite places!  He has a list of places he'd like to live, hardware & tool stores are at the top of the list.

I gave in today.  I got the last one in stock, but they will restock pretty quickly.  It's still boxed and is sitting on my craft desk.  Where it will probably be for a while!  I might paint it, because it's a tad bit plain in the grey color.

The snow is mostly all gone, except for just a few spots that are constantly shady.  It's very muddy now.  It was a nice day, sunny and very pretty.  Tonight, it's all going to change and it is going to be very cold.  The cold front should hit around midnight tonight and the windchill in the morning could well be 0.  OR MAYBE EVEN BELOW 0.  Poor Otter has to be at work at 4:00 in the morning to stock the store for the next ad coming out.  She has the car because nobody wants to get up and get her at 3:30 in the morning to get her to work on time!

I know, we're such mean parents.  :)

Light. Not Supposed to be Heavy. Heavy Stuff is Probably Going to Miss Us.

They were not even close!  It wasn't light.  It was heavy.  The heavy stuff hit us head on.

I took these this afternoon:

The footprints are Bill's, his/Otter's car is parked behind the White Lightning.  Look at the street and the end of the driveway to get an idea how deep this stuff actually is.

Standing on my front porch for this picture.

Also taken from my front porch.

This was taken on the back deck up near the door, where the snow was blown by the wind and doesn't look like the rest of the yard.  The focus of this picture is actually the bird tracks.  They were all over the deck.

And the back yard!  There were a whole lot more before I took the picture, they left right before I got this and then they all came back after I took the picture.

The back yard, taken from the back door.

More little birdies!  At one point, a dove came in for a landing and it stayed for a long time.  There was also a female cardinal, but she left as soon as the male showed up because he was interested in her but she was just looking for a meal.  Several chickadees, two kinds of sparrows and quite a few starlings.

This morning, I refilled my two feeders and took them out to the back yard.  I dropped one of them as I was hanging it, about 3/4 of the seed spilled on the ground but the birds don't really care where it is as long as they can eat it.  After I came back inside, I looked out and the yard was suddenly covered in lots and lots of little birdies! They were going after the spilled seed.

It was pretty cold this morning, but not snowing at that point.  The snow was expected but it just hadn't hit us yet.  I headed on to work but then I remembered that I forgot to go to the gas station on Saturday when Otter and I were running around before I took her to J's house.  Then yesterday I just had a couple of close errands and I forgot about it again.  This morning, I was nearly to work when I remembered and I thought I'd just get it after work.  Then I thought about it again (and heard a weather report) so I stopped to fill up the car right away.  And nearly froze!  It was very cold and it had gotten pretty windy.  But I'm really glad I remembered when I did.  Because it started snowing about an hour after I got to work.

I parked in the garage at work today.  About 12:30, I realized that the roads were getting bad so I decided to leave at that point.  And that's when I discovered that the very steep driveway was snow covered.  And icy!  I literally slid down the entire thing and had pretty much no control over the car, speed OR direction.  I'm just glad that nobody was coming down the street, but I did finally manage to get the car stopped.  The street was very bad, but once I got out of the neighborhood my office is in, the main street looked ok.  It was ok and then it was not ok, then ok again, then not ok, etc.  I had to go to the post office and the street it's on was terrible.  So was their parking lot.  I also stopped at the UPS place to check the box.  Their parking lot was not too good.  Both places were on the way home, otherwise I would have skipped both of them.  By the time I got home, our neighborhood street was pretty bad.  And slick.  I put my car in the driveway and it's not going anywhere until tomorrow morning, and that might not be early.

The dogs were happy I got home early, they came in and immediately started a game of dog war.  Then they both more or less collapsed in a furry heap and went to sleep.  I think they have the right idea.

One more thing:

Because, after all, # 4 is the REAL Doctor!

Just a Dusting Today

Both snow and real dust!

The forecast was for a light dusting of snow, dry and no ice really expected.  They seem to have gotten it right, which is somewhat scary in fact! :)  Anyway, it's very cold and that actually started last night.  The flurries were supposed to start overnight but they were a little later than expected.  It might have finally quit now (mid-afternoon) but the snowfall was heavy at times this morning.  It's only sticking a little bit on the ground, it's a fine powder and grainy.

I've also been dusting in the living room.  We cancelled the satellite tv service a couple of weeks back, since we pretty much never watched it.  Even before Otter moved out in October, we didn't watch it very much and we watched it even less after she moved.  We probably should have cancelled it a while back but it didn't really occur to either of us until we decided to switch internet providers.  The equipment was rented, I couldn't remember if we bought it originally or if we were using their.  Since it was theirs, they sent us a box to return it to them in and a list of what they needed back.  Bill had to get on the roof and get something off of the dish itself, which he did Thursday - before I got home, even though he insisted that I had to be here in case he did what he's known for!  When I got home with a carload of groceries as originally scheduled, he'd already been up there and got the piece.  The receiver box, both remotes and some other equipment needed to be unwired from the tv and that's what we did this morning.  We had to get the attic access cleared again because some of the wiring, etc., was in the attic.  Bill didn't realize that until AFTER he'd put all the pachinko machines back in place after the recent clogged drain/leak we had.  So, all the machines had to be moved back out of the way and Bill got to get up in the (very cold!) attic this morning.

While he was up there, he also got another plastic shelf set out for Otter - he couldn't find the last piece so she's getting a 4-shelf unit instead of a 5-shelf set but I don't think she'll care.  She has a complete one now, she's using it as her pantry shelves since her apartment doesn't really have one.  She wants to use one as her craft stash shelf since her dining room is now becoming her craft room.  I think she'll probably use the 5-shelf set as her craft shelf and switch the pantry stuff to the 4-shelf unit.

Also, Bill got a small wooden rocking chair that was stored up in the attic.  It was Otter's when she was a toddler, she used to sit in her little rocking chair in the living room at our old house and play with her toys or watch Sesame Street on tv.  She used it a lot and she still has fond memories of it.  It's hers and will always be, but I'm going to use it as a decor item in the craft room (that's what I'm calling her old room today.)  I'll post pictures later, when I get it situated.  It was pretty dusty, I didn't realize that it was not wrapped or boxed but was just up there.  I wiped all the dust off when I was dusting the rest of the living room and I think I'm going to hit it with pledge or whatever wood cleaner spray I have - I forgot what kind it is.

The main dusting was the entertainment center, which I hadn't done in a while, and the Fenton glass that was on it.  After the satellite receiver was undone and off the tv, Bill also removed the surround sound unit.  It was going out, two of the four speakers quit a while back (the ones by the couch) and Bill took the rest of it down today.  All that's left besides the tv is the vcr/blu-ray and the vhs recorder (we occasionally use it) and that left two shelves empty.  Which means that we now have enough room for all the dvds/blu-ray movies we have and the Bibles which were stored on one shelf are now being moved to my library shelf so I have plenty of room for the Fenton now.  I dusted it as I put it back on the entertainment center and it's only somewhat arranged.

I did quite a bit of rearranging in the craft room yesterday.  This is the current state of the Stash:

The two smaller drawer sets are stacked on top of the 5-drawer units.  The purple one in the corner doesn't have the wheels on because one of them kept falling off so it looks shorter than the rest but they are all the same size.  I took the wheels off the two smaller units.  On the flatter set, the top drawer is holding the doilies for my eventual curtain and the white 3-drawer set has netting in the middle drawer instead of actual yarn.  The netting will be used for dish scrubbies, eventually maybe if I ever get around to it and my skin cooperates!  Netting is pretty hard on the skin when crocheting with it.  I did get a little more yarn at Michael's last week, but the Stash hasn't really grown much.  I just spread it out a bit.  I have labels in front of each drawer showing what kind is in the drawers.  The two with TEXAS stickers has the Really Good Yarn.

I would love to actually get to use it, however the tendinitis is really bad at the moment.  It was getting better, treatment is mostly just resting my arm and I've been doing that.  But I did aggravate it a bit when I was rearranging my craft room yesterday but I was still able to put two rows on KN#3's blanket yesterday.  But then we had to move stuff around today and all the stuff I've mentioned already, and the end result is that my left elbow really hurts right now.  I'll rest it again a few day and let it recover.

This is the doily project I have in mind.  This is the window at a specific vintage/antique store that Otter and I go to whenever we get a chance.  When we were in there a couple of weeks ago, I asked it I could take some pictures since I got my idea here originally.  The lady that owns the store was quite happy to let me and very interested in what I'm going to do.  She wants to see a picture when I get it finished, but that may be a while.  It will take a huge number of doilies.

She used a pink fabric on the curtain rod to give her curtain a little color but I'm using different colored doilies in mine and it's going to be on a window that will have a minblind so I probably won't use the fabric underneath it.  Also, she has a shaped pattern and mine probably won't.  She said that her doilies are pinned together but I'll probably sew mine to attach them to each other.  It's really pretty in person and she did a great job.  I've bought a lot of my doilies there, she realizes that they are not worth a whole lot of money and sells most of her for anywhere from 50 cents each to a buck or two for the bigger or fancier ones.  Which is a fair price, but I still see them in antique stores/booths for several dollars each - for the little, plain ones!  They aren't that hard to make, I just don't like thread crochet and I don't mind paying a little more for the old ones or intricate ones.  But plain doilies in one color with basic stitches?  No.

Otter come over yesterday after she got off work.  She brought the car back for Bill for this coming week, brought her laundry (of course!) and brought fixins* for the salsa she planned to take to J's Oscar watch party today.  She used my Ninja blender to make it.  I suggested she make more than she intended to, salsa has a tendency to disappear fast and hers is pretty good.  She used Bill has her taste-tester and then she make sure to leave him a bowl full.  He ate his already!  Anyway, she had asked me to take her to J's mom's house for the party and since we were concerned about the weather for today I actually took her over there yesterday.  J's mom was glad to see her and she'll be there for a couple of days.  On the way, they live in a small town that's not exactly neighboring to our small town but is still pretty close, we went to a thrift store.  We went to Goodwill and they were more crowded than I have ever seen them.

Turned out, all their clothing was 50% off and they were selling a lot of it.  Otter and J are going to TNT this summer, they have already decided on their cosplay and Otter's basically consists of a purple suit (pants and jacket) and a bright green shirt, with a bright orange necktie.  She found a pair of pants that are slightly too big but we can take them in easily.  She found a blazer style jacket that is not even the same brand and the pants but it's almost the exact same color, it might be a little big but that will actually work for what she's going for.  She found a long sleeve not quite acid green shirt and the entire outfit costs her less than $10.00.  She is probably going to buy some bright orange fabric, possibly felt, and make the necktie.  She's going to use on of Bill's ties as a pattern template.  The pants and blouse were fine to be washed in the machine so I tossed them in with my laundry today.  The jacket has to be dry cleaned, I was going to take it this morning when I got out before the snow got too heavy (it never did actually get heavy) but they were closed  I'll drop it off tomorrow and pick it up Thursday.  She's still working on the shoes she'll need, but she does know she'll need a short green wig - bright green.

This is the costume idea, the Joker and Harley Quinn from Batman, specifically from The Animated Series:

(Ignore the small kid in the middle of the picture, this just was the best picture I could find that would show the costume characters).  The Joker has a darker tie in this picture but her idea is orange and a regular necktie, as he's shown in a couple of different ways and the orange tie will still be Joker appropriate - it does matter in the cosplay world!  Same thing for the shoes.  The makeup will be easy, basically just white with bright red lipstick for the Joker's mouth and probably Harley's as well but I'm not sure about that.

However, there is a twist to their idea.  Figure it out yet?  Go back and reread the paragraph before the picture if you haven't quite got it yet.  I think they have a wonderful idea and it will probably set them apart from just about anyone else who decides to go as the Joker and Harley.

Which is what they are going for, actually.

*Fixins is one of our favorite words!

It's Beagle Wednesday!

It hasn't been Beagle Wednesday in a while, and Maggie is overjoyed with the Westminster Dog Show's Grand Champion is a fellow beagle!  But I'm confused about something. Miss P (which is also one of Maggie Moo's many nicknames) is described as "calm."  Calm is not a word I would associate with a beagle!  They are the orignal adhd dog and are closely related to the Energizer Bunny.  They have two speeds:  Warp Speed x Infinity, or OFF.

This picture isn't sideways.  She was snoozing with her rear right up against the couch!  I don't know when this was taken, but it was before we cleaned the carpets on Black Friday 2014 because that's when we moved her blankets.

This is sideways, however,  It's Frasier's tracks in the snow a few weeks back.  It might have been the snow on my birthday.  Anyway.  Look at the prints.  They are single file, just like his coyote relatives would walk.

This is a closer shot.  You can tell that it's two feet in each print, his front feet are very close together.  His back feet are also single file, but not always in exactly the same steps.

Maggie Moo walks like a dog, not a coyote.  She's making her way outside, beside his footprints so it's really noticeable how different their walking patterns are.

This is the nest in the maple tree in the back yard.

This is the nest in the redbud tree.

Closer shot of the redbud tree nest.

Close up of the maple tree nest.

This is the shelf in the front/craft/guest/YARN room.  It was Otter's originally, her room as a baby was done in a carousel horse theme.  One of Bill's sister's painted the horses and then attached small dowel pieces to the tops so they became carousel horses.  Over the years, the dowels fell off and they were just horses.  Otter never wants to get rid of this shelf, but it's on the wall in her old room and she's leaving it in my custody on a strictly temporary basis!  So, I'm using it for my toys!  I have 5 different yarn spools and my decorative spinning wheel.  I was thinking of getting a real spinning wheel and setting it up in there with some yarn attached, but they are big and it would take up more room than I wanted to lose.  Also, I don't like to take a functional item and turn it into non-functional decor - which is what would happen, since I am EXTREMELY allergic to wool.  One of the antique/junk stores we shop at occasionally had this adorable little dustcatcher for several months and it would always tell me it wanted to come home with mer.  I ignored it for a while, then I finally decided I'd better buy it while I could because I'd never seen another one like it and I was afraid someone else would grab it.  So I finally bought it and it promptly fell apart when I got it home.  Cue glue gun!  It sits on a small rug and it has a small stool sitting beside it.

OK, it's time to go cover the beagle!  She's messing around with her blankies, she was asleep at my feet underneath the afghan but I guess she decided she'd be warmer if she moved to her blankets, seeing how they are by the fireplace and there is a fire in it.  Frasier is stil snoozing in the same spot he's been in for something like an hour - at my feet on top of the afghan.  Maggie had to fight her way out from underneath it, thanks to big brudder Frasier!

Shovels

We're pretty much all thawed out now.  I got out yesterday about 4:00 or so to check on the roads.  Once I got out of the neighborhood, the streets were mostly ok but there were patches.  We thought the plows had gotten to us by that time, which they had.  Sometimes they don't get this far out, sometimes they do.  I don't know if they have any rhyme or reason to their schedule, once they get the specific areas such as hospitals, police department, etc. done.

Anyway, I went to Wallyworld and their parking lot had been plowed.  The plow was still there, it was running and the driver was standing inside the store doors.  It looked like he was trying to get warm.  There was a huge amount of water on their parking lot after the plowing.  I was able to get a 25# bag of birdseed.

This morning, I waited until the traffic had time to get over with before I left for work.  I did have a few spots where it was icy.  At one point, I was behind a plow/sand truck.  He was getting spots that had been missed the day before and I could tell when he put his plow down because he was sparky!  Once I got to the street I work on, it's a residential street since we're in a duplex, it was obvious that it hadn't been touched at all.  Because most of the houses/duplexes on that street are actually businesses, it doesn't generally get the traffic that most other non-residential streets get on bad weather days.  It was a slip and slide all the way to the driveway.  The driveway was snow covered, but I made at attempt to get up it so I could get into the uphill driveway.  Actually, I made two or three attempts.  Then I gave up and parked in the street!  I was only about 2 feet short of being able to get to the garage, but it just wasn't happening.  With the street being essentially a solid sheet of ice, it was an adventure walking across it!  Once the sun came out, the driveway started thawing out.  All except for the last few feet which were shaded.  I spread a little ice melt out on it and went inside.  After a while, I checked it and the ice melt had worked somewhat.  I got out the snow shovel and got a little ice/snow off in the tire track areas and put more ice melt out.  I did that a couple of times and it's really hard to operate a snow shovel when you have tendinitis in your left elbow!!!  The rest of the driveway was melted off and starting to dry out pretty good when I left at 3:30.  The street was mostly thawed and a lot of it was dried as well.

We were supposed to get a fast moving rain storm with high winds this evening.  We could see the clouds.  Some of the early reports were actually that it was huge, wet snowflakes instead of rain.  We got nothing out of it, so I'm not complaining.  It will be very cold tonight, we should be getting a very hard freeze tonight.  But it should be ok as far as driving in the morning.

I fed the birds this morning, and they were waiting on me!  Feathered pigs.  I put out two feeders and tossed out quite a bit of seed on the ground.  There were kitty paw prints on the front porch when I left.  I saw several squirrels today.  I hope that all the animals mean that winter's done!

But I'm not in a hurry for SpringStorms.  Not at all.

Wow. They Actually Got it Right.

The forecasters, that is.

It started barely sleeting last night about 9:30 and I went to bed shortly after that.  When we got up this morning, everything was white & fluffy.  And cold!

Last night's sleet (which I was hoping was just rain) was followed by more sleet and then snow on top of that.  And a little more sleet/freezing rain/ice after that.  We watched the news coverage and they were reporting bad road conditions.  When they started showing the small town we live in and interviewing a police officer who said to stay off the roads if you can, I decided to take that suggestion and called in.  I'm blaming Younger Boss because this only seems to happen when he goes on vacation!  If he goes away during the Spring, we get Spring Storms.  If he goes away in the summer, we generally get what we called gully washers in S. TEXAS.  (Lots and lots and lots of rain.)  Anyway, Otter was supposed to be in at 8:00 and she said her boss called her and he was going to call the rest of the scheduled employees to ask them to come in if they could.  She had never actually driven in/on this stuff before, so she called me and we gave her some suggestions about what to do and what not to do do.  She lives very close to the police department and that is one of the areas that gets plowed first, and she also lives close to one of the major intersections in our area which is also one of the earlier spots that get plowed.  But the news reporter was actually standing at that particular intersection and that's the area the cop was pointing out as bad!

Otter decided to try and go in, she texted me after she got there - took about 40 minutes instead of the normal 5 or so.  She said it "Was.Not.Fun" but she got there safely.  She called me after she got to work.  Since some of the areas had been scraped already, some of the road was ok but some of it was still icy because they mostly just got the snow cover off - it takes several passes sometimes before they get the ice layer removed.  But she lives here and she needs to know how to deal with it.

We are out "on the edge of nowhere" and the plows very seldom actually get to us.  The neighborhood still looks pretty bad, and I'm not going to even attempt to get out.  There was not much going on at work, Younger Boss is gone this week and the Teenager had already announced that he was not going to come in at least today and probably not tomorrow due to the weather.  Besides, when the police tell me to stay off the road I figure that they are saying that for a reason and I'd better listen!

The fireplace has been going ever since we got up and it will probably be burning all day.  The dogs have been out once, but it took a little convincing to get them to actually go out the door!  They came back in pretty fast, too.  Then they went back to sleep, Maggie was in front of the fireplace on her blankets and didn't move for at least an hour but I could tell she was still breathing at least!  She's now on top of the afghan I was using.  Frasier was where she is now for a long time, but now he's moved to a spot in front of the coffee table and much closer to the fireplace.  Goofs!  But smart goofs.

I brought my birdfeeders in last night so they wouldn't be iced over this morning.  I went to fill them up this morning and discovered that I only had enough seed for one feeder and it's not quite full.  The bag I thought I saw in front of my workbench turned out to be potting soil.  I put out a suet feeder along with the one feeder.  IF we are able to get out later (which I don't think is even going to be attempted), I'll get more.  Most likely, I'll get it tomorrow.  If anybody has any left, it goes fast once the flakes start falling.

Today won't be above freezing and tonight will be very cold.  The streets may thaw out a bit with traffic today, but tomorrow morning may be even slicker.  But the temperature tomorrow should be in the low 40's so it might be better during the day.  Otter has to go in at 8:00 in the morning, she works until 1:00 today and also tomorrow.  She'll play it by ear in the morning like she did today, but she will probably go in.

Tonight's dinner plan is chili.  However...

It's about 9:30 a.m. now and they are still telling people to stay off the roads.  The current temperature is 21 degrees but our windchill is somewhere around 8!  It will feel like mid- to upper-teens this afternoon.

Maybe

Winter's not over yet!

We could get anywhere from 2" to 6" of snow tonight into tomorrow.  Or we might "just" get sleet and freezing rain overnight.  Or we could get both snow and ice, which is the worst of the possibilities.  Snow is it's own issue, ice is bad but snow over ice can be worse because people might not realize that it's not just snow!  It's hard to drive on ice, but snow covered ice is harder because people get complacent and think that it's only snow and not ice.

(I know, I'm rambling.)

I had to run a couple of errands today (translation:  I went shopping.) and my last one was a stop at Wallyworld.  I needed three things:  cheese, tortillas and fruit.  I'm trying to make sure we eat more fruit so I buy a few days worth every few days.  We just finished up the oranges I bought the other day, the fruit bowl now contains apples.  Anyway, Wallyworld was very crowded for a Sunday.  There were a few people obviously just buying regular groceries.  A few people were just getting a couple of things like I was.  But the majority of the crowd (and it was a crowd) seemed to be filling their baskets up with BMT supplies!  It's not going to be another 2011 level ice event, people!

I did bring in a little firewood, we had some inside already but Bill's going to be home tomorrow and he'll probably want a fire in the morning.  He's off for President's Day and then he's taking a couple of vacation days as well.  I brought my birdfeeders in, I'll fill them and take them back out in the morning.  I'll see how it is in the morning, if I do stay home it's at least a quiet week because Younger Boss is in Florida this week and the Teenager had already announced that he wasn't going to come in if the weather was as cold as it was supposed to be.

Otter and I did not get to the used bookstore yesterday.  She woke up with a pretty bad migraine headache so she was down for the count all day.  I went with my original plan, which was to go to the library.  Roomie has what is probably the flu-ish bug that we had recently, so they were both home sick yesterday.  I went over to Otter's apartment and got her dirty laundry, I washed it for her last night and took it back this morning.  Along with orange juice for Roomie, cranberry juice for Otter and milk.  And a package of donut holes, just because they are always fun.  Otter was fine this morning, which is her normal pattern with a migraine.  Roomie was staying in bed, I told her to stay warm and gave her/Otter all the "mom instructions."

After I took the stuff to them, I came back home and read the paper.  Which was my undoing, because I found the Michael's ad.  YARN SALE!!!  They really, really hate me at Michaels.  Of course, I found a few that I needed.  Actually, I did need some of what I bought.  The rest of it was just yarn that I wanted and not for a specific project.  I'm now back at maximum density and rapidly approaching critical mass.  Of course, I have tendinitis issues at the moment so I'm not really able to do much crochet!

Last Sunday, we were watching Frasier and were very worried about him.  This week?  Well, he's spent quite a bit of his day running around the back yard at full speed, again and again and again to infinity and beyond.  Just like a (very large) puppy!  A very happy, very large puppy.

fridayfridayfridayfridayfriday... Oh Yeah, it's Friday the 13th!!

I'm not superstitious at all, but today has certainly been one of "those days" and I'm glad it's about over!

I think Otter agrees, based on the texts she sent me today.

On that note, I think I'll have a drink and put my feet up tonight.  And that's about as productive as I'm going to be!

Winter is On It's Way! Again. Stupid Groundhog.

(For the record, I did clean first.  But it wasn't my first choice).

Looks like the groundhog is still mad at us.  And he's going to take it out on us starting sometime Sunday.  Afternoon or evening, or thereabouts.  Winter Mix is the correct term.  Monday is supposed to be brutally cold, with the high temps being in the 30's for the afternoon.  Tuesday morning is also supposed to be pretty cold.  It's still "up in the air" if we'll get any actual sleet, which is the most likely.  Or snow.  Or if it'll just be very cold and raining.  We'll probably get something, cold is pretty much guaranteed.  We just don't know what it will contain!

Otter is coming over Saturday with her laundry when she gets off work.  We're going to take one of the two remaining loads to the used bookstore to turn in and I think we'll probably hit the library as well.  I'll get her to work in the morning and pick her up when she gets off, then she'll come home with me and get the car.  Bill's off Monday for President's Day then he's taking Tuesday and Wednesday as vacation days, so she'll have the car through Wednesday at least.  She's had very little experience driving in winter conditions, she's had the lessons/lectures/passenger experience many times but she hasn't really driving in anything other than a small snowfall.  Mom's nervous at the thought, but she's gotta learn sometime!

This is my back fence.  Bill noticed something parked on it one day a couple of months back.  He noticed it for a couple of reasons:  it was suddenly very quiet, no bird noises at all.  And there were suddenly no birds in sight, anywhere, they were there and then they were gone.  He discovered the reason, a hawk sitting on the back fence.  We see them pretty often, but they don't usually park on the fence like that.  One time, we watched a squirrel running along the top of the fence.  Until it nearly ran right into a hawk that was sitting on the fence!  I had no idea that squirrels could put the brakes on and back up at warp speed!  I don't think that hawks are normally squirrel predators, but if it was hungry enough it might have gone after the fluffy tailed critter.

This is the tulip bed last Fall when we were planting.  We cleaned the ground off, stirred the dirt up with a shovel and treated it with oil/soap/water and then left it to sit for several days.  When it was time to plant, Otter mixed up the bulbs and tossed them all around the bed.  Last time, she had them in patterns.  This time, she decided to mix them up randomly.  They are just now beginning to poke up through the dirt and it looks like there will be a lot of them that will come up.  This will probably be the last time we'll have tulips for a couple of years.  We might expand the back fence to the side/corner of the garage, which will mean that this area will not get the sun it needs.  We'll probably have them again in the future, we're just not sure where they'll be.

This is also from last fall, it's the crepe myrtles.  They are not right up against the fence, it just looks like that in the picture.  They are planted between the trellis pieces which have honeysuckle planted against them.  It looks like at least some of the honeysuckle has survived both the mowers last year and the winter.  I can't tell for certain, but the crepe myrtles look like most of them have made it as well.

Hopefully, we'll have all of them come back and they will grow fast this year.  Same thing for the honeysuckle.  They'll all bring butterflies and hummingbirds, probably honeybees as well (but wasps and yellow jackets are not invited or welcome).  Most importantly, they will block the view of the neighbors behind us into our back yard and dining room windows!

Just a Few Things

I have heard # 4 described as "your friendly neighborhood/galaxy psycopath" and I think that might be right.  (Of course, Bill also operates at a level of insanity that few people ever manage to accomplish!)

Serious problem, running out of redshirts.

(Can't think of anyone this could be...)

The yarn wins.  The yarn always wins.

Nope, I don' think even a scarf would have helped # 11!  (Or 12, according to the War Doctor storyline.  Which would mean that the current # 12 is actually # 13?

Today is the first day I really feel like I'm recovered from the bug.  Bill was quiet last night, he didn't cough all night and he hardly snored.

End of the Season

Apparently, we are in the beginning of the end of mountain cedar pollen season.  Or at least that is what the weatherman on the news just said.  Of course, the mountain cedar might not know that - from what I can tell, it blooms 24/7/365!

Last Fall, we had one of the many 8-legged visitors we get.  This particular one was hanging out between the corner of the house and the honeysuckle trellis.

The web was hard to see, unless I happened to be at just the right angle.  It helped that the spider was actually on the web, he'd been hanging out up on the rain gutter and not actually on the web.

Here's a close-up.  I know some people don't like spiders, but they are actually pretty neat.  They are very important insects and play a major part in the ecosystem.  This particular type pulls it's legs up close to the body and gets very still.  They essentially play dead, until an unsuspecting bug flies into the web.  Then, they use all 8 of those legs and they are FAST.

When he wasn't on the web, this is where he was hanging out at.  The web was attached at the corner of the rain gutter.  Technically, it was probably a she and not a he - I think the majority of spiders that make webs are actually the females.

This is the toy we bought Bill last fall at his favorite tool store.

The firewood we got was from a lumber yard, it's pieces of wood that was originally used to hold things like pipe stacks together when they are delivered.  It's untreated so it is safe to burn, but some of the pieces are pretty big.  They are generally rectangular and some of them are pretty thick.  Which is when the wood splitter comes in handy.

They are pretty easy to use, it's all hydrolic and it does require a little upper body strength but it's not hard in the sense of swinging an ax would be.  The wood is placed in between the moving part and the stationary end, then there are two long arms that are swung which causes the spring to move.

The spring moves the flat piece which forces the wood against the stationary end which has a pointed wedge.  As the wood is forced against the wedge, it splits.

(Bill was being a good boy and wearing his sun hat!)  He's holding on to the two arms, they are swung one at a time and it's a pretty good workout for the arms and upper body.

This is actually the start of the process.

This is the woodpile before he'd done a lot of splitting.  Some of the wood was small enough that we didn't need to split it, but a lot of it was too big.

This was something else from last Fall.  It was originally part of the maple tree right outside of my dining room window.  That tree was pretty badly damaged several years back when we had the big ice storm.  It's still hanging in there, but is lost a big limb in a storm last Fall.  This piece of the limb was on the ground, the hole is a woodpecker nest.  It probably didn't help the tree's integrity, woodpeckers can be very damaging in their hunt for insects and also they nest by burrowing into the tree itself.

Frasier seems to be back to normal today.  I was really afraid that we'd have a bad surprise this morning, but he was fine.  A little groggy because I gave him a tranquilizer after all last night because he was a little restless, but happy to see me.  When Bill got home today,someone was coming over to see him so he put the dogs out in the back yard.  I picked up Otter and J so that she could get the car tonight, and when we got here I could see Frasier wandering around the back yard.  I let the dogs in and Frasier was just overjoyed to see J, which is unusual.  He likes people, but he is a very protective dog and especially if Bill is not in the same room I am.  He's met J before and likes him, but today he was just super affectionate.  Later on I was out in the back yard watering the crepe myrtles and honeysuckle, and the dogs came back out with me.  Frasier spent most of his time running around the back yard repeatedly.  He was having a great time and was like a puppy.  At the moment, he's grooming Maggie.  He woke her up to groom her!

Picture This

I've finally gotten blogger to load pictures!

I had to switch to a different browser, I'm using the Chrome one from Google.  It seems to work better and faster, and it lets me post pictures now.  There were other issues besides just the picture problem.

This is what we did last Black Friday, when everybody else was shopping.  We cleaned the living room carpet.

I was standing in the front entrance when I took this picture.  To the right side of the picture is the loveseat, standing up on it's side against the wall.

This was taken from the opposite side, and the edge of the loveseat is visible on the left side of the picture.  I was in the dining room for this picture.

This picture is back at the entrance way, you can see the fan that we used to dry the carpet and the couch is behind it.  The carpet cleaner is in the middle of the room, the window and door face the back yard.

Another one from the entrance way.

This is my craft/play/guest/YARN room.  The sofa table was moved in there while Bill was cleaning the carpet, but it eventually made it's way to the pachinko work/junk room:

This is the area where my desk used to be, now it has what was Bill's desk that has been turned into his main work station.

This is the closet in there, and this is actually a lot neater than that room usually is.  Seriously.

Mr. Dignity!  Or not, actually.  Otter was cleaning out things prior to her move, she found the Batman cape which frequently decorated her traffic cone and we put it on the dog.  He usually won't put up with being dressed, but he did this time.  He gave us quite a scare this morning.  He was walking through the kitchen and he slipped.  His legs went out from under him, and then he couldn't get up.  I was about to follow him out to the garage, I didn't see it happen but I was behind him and was there as soon as it did.  He moved his front legs, but he couldn't seem to get his back legs to move.  I yelled for Bill and he came running, I held Frasier's head and petted him while Bill checked for anything broken or out of place.  When he didn't feel anything like that, he very gently tried to lift the dog's back end up but he still acted like he couldn't get his legs to where he wanted them to be.  We gave him a minute, then Bill carefully scooted his legs up against his body and we tried it again.  He was able to get up, but he was very shaky.  I took both dogs out to the garage and to the treat can, which was where we were heading originally.  Frasier was happy to get his treat, but he wouldn't come to me for a long time.  I opened the back door and he wanted to go out, but he wouldn't as long as I was standing there.  Same thing for the gate.  I finally stood where he couldn't see me and held the door open, he went out and stayed out for a while along with Maggie Moo.  I walked up to him once, and he went to the other side of the yard.  Eventually he went to the door to be let back in and he let me pet him then.  But once they were inside, he wouldn't let me close.  I waited him out, he finally came back to me for petting.  He went back outside to their yard and laid down in the sun, he seemed to be happy there but he was still not acting like he was back to normal.  After a couple of hours, he seemed to be fine and was bouncy and playful with Maggie while ago.  But we are still watching him.

This is just a cute shot of a very contented beagle.  She is smiling in this picture.  This was taken the same day as Frasier BatDog.

Otter's apartment:

Her kitchen.  I tease her about this being the first and only time it was neat and uncluttered, but she is her mother's daughter so she cooks.  She texted me a picture of last night's dinner, she made tacos.

 

This is the living room, although it's now Roomie's area.

The dining room.  Otter's going to put the workbench against the far wall.  That is the kitchen to the right of the picture.  That's my purse and camera case on the right hand side counter.

I was standing in the hallway just outside of Otter's room when I took this, it's the living room turned bedroom and that's Roomie sitting on her bed.  The front door is the one pictured.  This was right after they moved and they were still partially boxed.

Otter came over to do laundry today, she brought J with her and then he helped Otter and Bill move boxes to the attic.  After that, Otter sorted through all the books she has to resell.  The book store has a limit of 36 at a time, so Otter sorted her books out into piles of 36.  I kept back a couple and she gave J a huge paper sack full of books.  We took one bag to the bookstore, she now has over $100 credit and there are still two more loads of books to take.  We also went to BigLots, then we stopped at Little Ceasar's pizza for lunch for everyone.

Now that I can post pictures again, I have a few things to put on the craft blog.  Possibly today, but it depends on how long it takes to go over Bill's email change list again.  I'm pretty much done with mine, but he has several we want to to check and there are probably a few he hasn't done at all.

Now, I'll go back to watching my dog.