It's Just Sunday and I Don't Know What To Call This

I'm tired, so forgive me if I ramble.  I probably will.

We picked up the remaining 6 pachinko machines today.  The one Bill got yesterday actually was a more rare machine, so he gave the seller a little more than he asked for.  He got a good price on them, fair for the seller and for Bill.  But he's out of room for more of them.  Which won't stop him if he/we/I/Otter come across another machine - kind of have to get them when you can.

I did manage to get a little crochet done this weekend.  Maggie got a couple of walks in.  Bill got more machines.  All in all, it's been a pretty good weekend.  I just wish that it was longer.  Yes, I know I was off on Friday!  I'm just not in a hurry to go back to work tomorrow is all.

Otter's plans for her move are firmed up.  They are going to sign the new lease tomorrow and hopefully they will get to see the inside of the apartment so Roomie can figure out how she wants to arrange her bedroom.  They've seen the floor plan and I think Roomie has a general idea but she really needs to actually see the space to figure it out.  Otter is probably going to arrange hers like it is now in their smaller apartment.  Bill and I are going to see about taking Friday afternoon off.  Roomie is off work on Friday but Otter has to work until noon.  The plan is to get started moving Roomie's stuff and helping her get her bed set up while she's there because she has to work on Saturday.  After we get her situated and her bed put together, then we'll start moving the rest of their belongings.  We are going to get as much as possible done on Friday afternoon, but I won't be surprised if there is still stuff to be moved on Saturday.  Roomie has to work Saturday and Otter has to work the morning, but she'll be there around 10:00 or shortly afterwards.  I am probably going to start on the kitchen stuff or anything small that I can do myself and let Bill work on things like taking their beds apart; the kitchen is basically "take it out of one, walk across the hall and put it back in the same place in the new one" and hopefully that won't take too long.  Otter said that they've been packing already and I really think it is possible that we can get all or at least most of it moved on Friday.  Either way, Saturday is to finish up moving anything left and then the old apartment will need to be cleaned.  It's a lot of work, but not as much as when they moved in - for one thing, we don't have to spend time loading the trucks, driving there, unloading and carrying up 3 flights of stairs.  Even though it's going to be sweaty work, it will all be indoors and we won't have to be outside in the heat.  They will still need a couch of some type, I'm going to suggest they consider a futon or something like that.  But they'll figure that out later on.

I've been thinking about moving the rock garden.  Even though we put down several layers of thick plastic, it has had a lot of dirt blown in over the last couple of years - thanks to the builders behind us that left scraped dirt lots for weeks on end and it gets windy here.  Because of that, I am having to deal with pulling grass and weeds out of it on a fairly regular basis.  Sometimes I wonder why we even bothered to put the grass block down, since there has been enough dirt blown in to give the grass an easy way to still grow!  We've been looking around the house and we're probably going to move it to the front yard.  In front of the house, along the front and up against the house.  It will be long and narrow and I will probably have to get a lot more rocks.  It also might be something we do in stages.  I think I'm going to get bricks to give it a defined edge, I have sandstone on the edges now but I don't have that many and I don't want to buy more.  The sandstones I have now will be incorporated in it somewhere, along with most of my concrete animals and I'll probably put a few potted cactus plants in it but probably not the fountain/planter.  It will be underneath the overhang of the roof and slightly back from the edge.  It doesn't get enough light to actually plant most things, I did have hostas planted there and they looked really good.  They don't need as much light.  But then we had a really hot summer and it was very dry, and no matter how much I watered they just couldn't take the heat and I decide not to replant them.  It's basically just a dirt area where nothing will really grow well.  It's going to be a fairly big job and we'll wait until the Fall because it's just too hot right now.  I told Otter to ask J if he might want to help, and that I will pay him and also provide pizza.  (I think the picture above is from the original size, before we enlarged it.  It's from 2009.)

 OK, I'm tired and hungry. It's time for nachos!

Pinks, Blues and Puppy Dog Tails

The redbud tree is still brilliantly pink and it's still drawing honey bees from somewhere close by.  Looks like hundreds of them!

 

The baby bluebonnet in the whiskey barrel has friends now.  I found two tiny ones in the yard, in the general area of where some were last year.  We had so many naturalized ones last year!  Bill isn't willing to leave un-mowed spots all over the front yard this year, so I'm transplanting them to the whiskey barrel as soon as we find them.  So far, just two but they were tiny and I'm thinking that there will probably be more.  If they get transplanted when they are still fairly young and small, they generally make it.  They don't have deep roots, but they still don't like to be moved once they get to a certain size so I have to get to them early.  He was going to mow today, but it's been slightly rainy so he's waiting a day or two.  Even if it hadn't rained (which wasn't much), the weeds (not much grass yet) were still just a bit too damp to mow easily.

 

Frasier was obnoxiously clingy yesterday morning.  After the 3rd or 4th time of having to practically push him out of my lap, Bill finally yelled and him and the dog got the point.  For a while!  He seemed to feel ok, he was just overly needy for some reason.  He's fine today, I think he's hanging out in the garage at the moment.  He likes it out there.  It's misty and cool today, but he spent most of yesterday afternoon snoozing in the sun in their yard.

 

Otter's plans for the day got rearranged.  She was going to meet J at the theater and they were going to go see the new Captain America movie.  But she woke up with extremely bad allergy symptoms.  She took an allergy pill, then she laid down on the couch after breakfast and went to sleep.  So we just left her there and went to church without her.  She was just waking up again when we got home.  She felt a little warm to both of us, so I took her temperature but I didn't think she actually had fever.  Turns out, she did.  Just a degree, but it was enough that she decided to stay home today.  I think she and J might attempt to go see the movie next weekend.  She's been parked on her bed most of the day and has taken Tylenol, along with lots of liquids.  She's a lot better so we think it probably is allergy and not anything else.  She will take a nighttime allergy pill when she goes to bed tonight.

 

I went to the booth to put some stuff out and rearrange, Otter asked me to pick up her schedule at work for her so I did that at the same time.  She's got more hours this coming week, so she was happy.  The booth made me happy, I put one of my vases in it Thursday or Friday and it was gone today.  It wasn't Fenton, it was probably by the Westmoreland company and it was signed.  I don't remember price I had on it.  The large oil lamp we have had in the booth for several weeks was also gone and I think it was sold this time - the last time, it was moved to a different booth (probably by a shopper who changed their mind) and one of the owners brought it back to me when he found it.  I changed a couple of prices and rearranged quite a bit.  I'm not sure if anymore shot glasses sold or not, but possibly.  There were so many that I can't really remember.  I probably won't go back there for a few days.

 

Now that the Aripachi machines are gone, Bill got my path from the garage door to the kitchen door cleared off.  No more having to drag groceries through the house and around two nosy puppies!  He also had room to get back to his workbenches so all the his junk stuff is now back where it belongs and out of my way.  I gave him until today, the Statute of Limitations on My Work Bench was up and I was going to take care of it myself if he didn't get it moved by today.  He was off Friday afternoon so he got busy.  Yesterday, I rearranged a lot of my shelf stuff and found a few things to clean out, get rid of and/or take to the booth.  All my birdfeeders are now back on one shelf and my/Otter's planting stuff is on it's own shelf.  We use the workbench for repotting plants, as well as for crafting.  I transplanted a small cactus from a long planter into a smaller pot, since I now have room on my bench.

 

Now, to get all the pachinko crud pieces out of the living room!

I'm Rambling Today

It's Wednesday, but I can't think of much to whine about.

 

Well, there is the fact that the house behind us is being built and it's a safe bet that they will be able to see in our windows.  But I'm not going to worry about that until/if I have to.

 

Froggy, you asked about the crocheted pot holder.  I'm not telling!

 

I hate these:

They are so unsafe.  Why not just write your ss#, bank info and address on your car?  Since anybody who sees the stickers can already tell how many children, their gender and approximate age and it's not difficult to look up addresses with car license plate numbers.  I'm just wondering what numbskull thought that these things were a good idea.

 

But, I do like this one.

 

Probably no surprise to anyone who knows us!

 

We (mostly Bill) got finished with the tree limb yesterday, after we got home from Bil's birthday dinner - we actually got him to go out this year.  We met one of our neighbors in the process.  When the electric company let Maggie out a few years back, the lady that found her lived across the street and down just a bit.  She sold her house to her daughter (or granddaughter, I'm not really sure).  The daughter's husband was out in their yard, he was playing with their kiddos and he saw Bill with his saw so he came over to help.  We had a nice visit, but Bill probably feels old since the younger guy thought the older guy (Bill) needed help!  Turns out that his wife is a TEXAN and also flies her flag.  Their neighbor on the other side will turn it upside down (as a joke, he's not being malicious) and hubby said she gets really riled.  I think he was surprised at just how testy she gets!  That makes 3 other TEXANS (that we know of) in the immediate neighborhood.  Since he is a fan of "that" Oklahoma school, I would imagine that it is not a fun place around his house in early October!

 

Otter is off with a friend today.  They didn't have any particular plans, but you can bet that shopping is involved.  She'll eventually be home, hopefully she'll still have some money left! :)

 

I had a cactus casualty.  My prickly pear.  It was never the healthiest plant, it was nearly dead when I bought it and I was surprised it lasted as long as it did.  I put the cactus outside days ago and then forgot all about them.  Then we had rain.  Lots and lots of rain.  It might have survived, but it wasn't a big plant and it had a run-in with a hailstone.  I had another cactus, it was tall and has pink thorns.  It's really pretty.  It was in a cast-iron pot that I found at a thrift store a few years back.  I drained the water out of the pot but then I realized that the pear was too damaged to make it so I transplanted the pink one into the pot the pear was in - it's a large cooking pot with pink enamel paint.  It took a little care, I used a plastic serving fork and dug a circle around the pink cactus, then I gently held it with a kitchen tong and stuck the serving fork underneath the cactus.  Once the pear was out of the pink pot, I stirred the dirt up a bit and then planted the pink cactus in it the same way I took it out of the cast iron pot - with the tongs.  I think it survived being swamped by so much water, it looks like it so far anyway.  I'm going to leave it outside, we are not supposed to get rain to speak of for a while now.  The cast iron pot is going to be refurbished, which means that I'm going to take a brillo or SOS pad to it and a lot of water (and elbow grease!), then I'm going to dry it thoroughly.  At that point, it's probably going to be painted with a specific pain for cast-iron and I think it's going to be part of my fireplace décor.

 

I also found another venus fly trap plant, it's still small but it will grow.  It's in the kitchen window at the moment, happily sitting in a small container filled with distilled water.

Blinded by the Light

Well, actually we aren't blinded and the light no longer shines through the dining room windows.  Bill got the mini-blinds up and it looks great.  Now that the curtains are down, it actually looks less cluttered.  We rearranged the plants, same ones are still there but the cactus and ivy have now switched sides.  Also, I trimmed the ivy as it was long enough to ensare the beagle (and I think it might have tried to a few times!)  I washed the curtains, but then I decided against moving them to the living room window.  They had some discolored places that I think were actually sun fades.  I'm still going to replace the curtains in the living room window, just not sure what color, etc. I'll be using yet.  But we don't have to worry about the neighbors (current and/or future) being able to see inside from the outside any longer.  Just hope we can remember to open the blinds for the plants in the morning!

One of Otter's cactus plants is blooming.  It's a small one and we really weren't sure about it.  It hadn't grown at all since we bought it last spring but apparently it's still alive and happy since it's suddenly covered in deep pink almost purple blossoms.

It was cold today.  The forecast was for low- to mid-50's.  At noon, the weatherman on the news made the comment that we'd be lucky to get up to 50 and he was right.  (Rare occurance for them to be right).  It was grey, cloudy & windy all day.  It's going to be in the high 20's tonight.  We've used the fireplace once already, Saturday morning.  It was nice to sit in the living room with our coffee (and dogs!) and enjoy the fireplace.  I also changed out the filter in the humidifer tonight.

Bill's better, he went back to work and mananged to stay all day.  He's still coughing and congested but I think he's a little better.  Otter and I cleaned/decluttered/dusted the dining room this morning before we left so that he wouldn't have to deal with a lot of dust tonight when he put the blinds up.

Otter's oral surgery is 3 weeks from today.  She keeps reminding me that she'll need lots and lots of yogurt and jello.  Guess she doesn't want me to forget!

Sunday Discoveries

We've discovered a couple of things lately.

Like this.  It's a robin's nest and is still in the construction stage.  We've been watching mama bird for a couple of days, she is very busy.

If you look at the left near-top corner, you can see what appears to be a string hanging down.  If the picture wasn't so shadowed, you could probably tell that the bird nest is being built right outside our back door!  She's picked a good spot, right up under the roof so it's protected from rain and would be hard for a predator to get up there.  We're not going to stop using the back yard, but we are going to give her as much room as we possibly can.  The dogs big yard time is going to be curtailed for a while, at least once the eggs appear.  (I'm partially reflected in the glass on the back door with the camera in front of my face).

This is Maggie about to make a discovery of her own.  That's a cactus she's sniffing!  She didn't actually come into contact with it, but her little nose was close.  Otter thought that she was going to have to pull cactus spikes out of her dog's nose, but the beagle seemed to figure out quickly that she needed to leave it alone.  She might have actually touched it just enough to know that it was going to bite her and then she left it alone.

It was so nice yesterday that I moved all of our cactus plants out to the deck.  I'm probably going to leave them out now, unless I know we're going to get a lot of rain.  The one that Maggie Moo was investigating is one that we got last spring at a cactus show.  I can't remember the name of it, but the spines are the prettiest pink/lavender color.  It's planted in a cast-iron cooking pot that I found at a thrift store for next to nothing last summer.  I think it might have cost me around $3.00, and it also has the lid.  It worked great for a cactus.  The cactus planters will eventually get moved to the rock garden.

Quite a few of Otter's tulips are now up.  I forgot to get a picture when I had her camera earlier.  She's gone to the movies with a friend, and she keeps her camera in her purse so it's not here.  But the tulips look really good.  The movie she's at is The Hunger Games.  She's read the books and enjoyed them, although she said that the ending was not very good.

My allergies are starting to ramp up.  Early, but not unexpected given the weather we've had.  I don't particularly like having allergies, but I do so I have to deal with them.  Otter said that hers are starting to bother her as well, and Bill's been sniffly the last couple of days.

It's also supposed to be a bad year for ticks and fleas.  The dogsters will probably go see the vet in the near future, Maggie will need her routine butt squash next month.  I'll probably start the frontline soon, although I usually don't buy it at the vet's office because it's about 1/3 less at another place.  Frasier is probably going to get a good brushing out soon, he's very fluffy and he's also shedding.  He gets regular brushings during warm weather, and he seems to really enjoy it.  Maggie usually gets one too, although she's smooth coated so it's just affection for her.  I have noticed that the birds also seem to like it when the dog gets brushed; Frasier fur was part of some of the bird nests we had last year.

Tomorrow, I'm ordering a birthday cake!

Sunday Critters

We have a couple of critters around our house.  Furry, 4-footed with cold noses and they go by the names of Frasier and Maggie.  But sometimes we have other critters that come to visit.  Sometimes, we see them.  Other times, we see evidence of their presence.  Like this morning.  Judging by the paw prints on the El Camino hood.  The latest visitor was one of these:

We've also had a few of the next one to deal with, they tend to get underneath the windows in the front of the house and relieve themselves:  We've tried moth balls, which do help to a point, but orange scented cleaning spray works the best.  I happen to be out of it, and I've noticed that the neighborhood cats have been back in our yard again lately (and on top of my car, Bill gets fun animals but I just get cats!) so I think I'd better get some more soon.  We just spray it where we don't want cats and it keeps them away.  They don't like the scent.  I usually get whatever brand the dollar store has, it doesn't matter if it's a good cleaner or not because I'm just going to spray it on the ground in front of the house, underneath the windows.

But this next one is the one we really REALLY don't want to deal with:

We've seen a few, but not for a while.  Although Thursday morning, it was pretty obvious that there was one somewhere in the vicinity.  We could smell it when we went out the front door, although I don't think it was too close.  We just don't want Frasier to find a black & white kitty to play with!  I think I'd just go get a tranquilzer gun to use on the dog, then I'd shave him and see about dunking him in something.  He might not be allowed back in the house for months!

We get the occasional coyote as well, but since we already have one of those living with us, we don't worry too much about them.  We hear them more often than actually see them.  I think we might need to replace Frasier's collar soon, the color is fading quite a bit.  He hasn't gotten out since the privacy fence went up, but he is smart and I really don't want to take a chance of him being shot by someone who thinks he's a (full) coyote.

We also have moles, voles and gophers.  Although Frasier and Maggie do their best to keep them under control.  Haven't seen any snakes lately, nor any frogs.  Usually, lots of frogs are around OR lots of snakes.  We seldom see much in the way of frogs if we have snakes.  But the snakes are happy, because they get to eat!

Otter and I went to a cactus sale this afternoon.  We got a couple of smaller ones, nothing spectacular this year.  It was at a local park that has a garden center, and there were billions of honeybees all over the place.  And millions of squirrels - Froggy, remember feeding them?  That's where we were today.

Bill transplanted a small mimosa tree that sprung up in the back yard spontaneously.  It's now in the front yard.  He's not sure if it is going to make it or not, he tried not to cut the roots too much but he's afraid that he might have.  We'll watch it and see what happens.  If it doesn't make it, we'll probably see about buying a small tree.  This is the time of year to plant them, you can plant trees anytime of the year but Fall is the best time because they will spend the next few months growing a strong root system and that will make it easier for them to survive the spring storms & wind we get.

Although we got some of that wind last night!  We don't watch tv before sunset, just a movie (we take turns picking a movie to watch) and a couple of religous shows we tape during the week but not actual tv watching.  I was thinking about heading for bed about 9:30 last night, I turned on the tv to see if the news was on the local Fox channel yet and it was on, but it was also weather warnings.  We had the potential for a really Bad Thing, but fortunately that disolved and we "just" had lots of wind and a thunder storm.  I'm not sure what the official measurement of rain is, but my empty buckets on the deck both had about 2" of water in them this morning.  My rain barrel is happy again!

I'm going to make a pot of pinto beans shortly.  And a pan of cornbread.  Except that I'm out of jalepenos, so my cornbread will have to be plain.  Oh well, it will still be good and we'll eat it.

I got some crochet done yesterday.  I got out the afghan and put a couple of rows on it, but it's still a little warm to work on it.  It's big enough now that it covers my legs up when I'm working on it and it is warm!  I made a few squares for a project I've been working on for myself, and I looked through some of my patterns but haven't found quite what I want yet.  Froggy, I'm going to make you a few more pot holders but I'm trying to find different ones.  I had been thinking about socks and have a pattern book, but after I looked at it yesterday I think I've decided against socks.  At least for now.  For one thing, most of the patterns I can find are for smaller socks.  Bill wears size 12 or 13 shoes, so small socks just are not going to work for him!  Also, most socks need to be stretchy, and the only yarn that really is stretchy enough for socks is wool or a wool blend.  And that won't work for me.  Although, if I can find a good pattern that is the right size for Billyboy, I'll probably buy sock yarn and attempt it using my gloves.  But that mostly depends on finding patterns that are big enough, and the only ones I've seen that would work for him sizewise are not anything I really think he'd wear.  I have cotton yarn that I was originally going to use, but it's not stretchy enough.

It's clouding up again, we might be in for more rain.  It's cool enough that we have the house open.  It's really nice, although the humidity is beginning to bother me.

But it could always be worse:

Haven't Blogged Much Lately!

It's just been a really busy few days.

We did get rain the other night. Bill said that the rain barrel was full, but it was only about 1/4 full. However, it is doing what it was designed to do and the plants inside the house got rain water from it so they were happy.

Except for one cactus. It did not get water, it seldom does anyway. But somewhere along the line, it apparently did get watered too much. Because it collapsed on itself like a telescope. I think it must have been "in the firing line" of runoff water from one of the other plants that was above it on one of my plant stands. Froggy, it was the taller one in the pink pot. I dug out my leather gloves and took it out of the pot. Then I had to put it inside of a small box to throw it away, it had long thorns! It was very mushy! It was almost like a gel inside of it. So far, the other one in the pink pot looks good. I think I'm going to relocate the remaining one to a smaller pot and transplant the prickly pear to the pink pot.

Let's see, what else? The rain storm the other night was actually pretty bad, it was a "springlike storm" which is not good. We got a lot of wind. I mean A LOT OF WIND. Nothing tornadic in our area, but there was one confirmed tornado northeast of Tulsa - towards Hominy. There was one home destroyed, no real injuries to speak of at least. Some of our patio furniture was rearranged, and the two remaining dead limbs in one of the front trees are now on the ground beside the tree. One other result of the wind: the neighbor with the dogs had no more excuses left, she had to put up her extremely tacky yard art! It blew down, it was still in her yard but just barely.

There are two new holes in the fence. One of them is right next to the two new boards Bill installed a week or so ago. He's going to take the two boards that he took down from the fence (they are partially broken), and he's going to attach them to the fence to cover the holes. He's going to use long screws, and they will stick out pretty far into the neighbor's yard. He's thinking that it might keep her dogs off the fence. We'll see. Then we are going to see if we can find out just how many dogs she has. Then we're going to turn her in to the city. I don't know how strict the city is about that, Tulsa was pretty strict but I'm not sure about the smaller town we live in now.

I had a cooking experiment today! Those are words that usually strike fear into the heart of my family, well mostly Bill anyway. I decided to try my hand at making egg rolls. I found a few low-fat recipes online. We had them for dinner. They were baked, so very little fat. Just a little olive oil that I used to slightly cook the veggies. They were ok, but I don't think I'll make them again. They came out ok, they just were kind of bland. And since they were veggies, I'm hungry already! Also, it is not cheap to make them and I can buy a package of low-fat freshly made ones at Wallyworld when I want them. Which isn't often anyway. We didn't use all the wrappers, Bill wants to try his own experiment tomorrow: hot dogs baked in egg roll wrappers. I'm trying to keep an open mind about it.

We took the dogs for a walk today, this is the first time in almost a week that we've had time for it. They were very excited when they realized that they were getting walked. Maggie was almost frantic, in fact. She was just crazed, no other word for it. Frasier calmed down pretty quickly, but then he's normally a very mellow dog. But not Magster! :)

We are probably going to plant the tulips tomorrow. And maybe relocate a few more of the iris plants. Also, there is a Fenton signing event in the afternoon. I guess it's kind of a no-brainer that we'll be there! I think I'm taking my $3.00 thrift store basket and one of my figurines. I'm not sure if Otter is taking any of her pieces or not, she might take one of hers and another of mine or two of mine, if she doesn't take any of her own. I'm not sure if she has any more that are unsigned.

More tomorrow! Or sometime soon, anyway.

Some Mid-Week Thoughts

I like Wednesdays. It's very easy to figure out why - because Friday is the day after tomorrow. Yeah, I know - but it works for me. It makes the week seem not so long as it does on Mondays.

I watched part of the debate last night. I heard something very interesting. Obama said that he WOULD drill offshore. I wonder what kind of shoes he was wearing? Flip flops maybe? Other than that, I wasn't really impressed with either of them.

It was very nice this morning. It was 45 degrees when I got up at 5:00. Glad I brought the cactus in when I did. I watered the outside plants very well this morning, they will be coming inside in a few days. After they've been well checked for stowaways! There are only two still out there, everything else is either inside already or tossed in a couple of cases. I'm out of places to put them, I'll have to do some creative rearranging.

We probably need to get our tulip bulbs soon, they will need to be planted in a few weeks. I guess we'd better also get busy with the tulip bed. It will need to be weeded (again) and treated. I'm also going to move a few more iris bulbs and plant bluebonnet seeds in the whiskey barrel.

Jan/Azbax, I hope that you keep visiting my blog! Miss hearing from you, girl. Email me now and then, please.

Froggy, you can't be for OU. You can be for another Texas team, but you CAN NOT BE FOR OU AND STILL CONSIDER YOURSELF A TEXAN. Especially after OU kicked A & M's rear end last weekend.

Some Boring Sunday Stuff

It's early, 6:43 a.m. as I type. But I'm probably going to update this during the day so by the time I actually get this posted, it could be midnight! :)

I had a Borg Queen moment yesterday. In what was formerly known as the eBay closet, we have two plastic 5-shelf units. One on each side. One of them still has eBay stuff (actually empty shelves where eBay stuff used to go), and the other one is half mine and half Bill's. My half has sewing & crochet stuff, Bill's half has computer stuff & a printer. We each have two shelves. The 5th one has some surplus stuff and some of our weather emergency supplies. Anyway, back to the point. I think I had one anyway. One of my shelves had about 4 large paper grocery bags and the box my sewing machine came in. All were full of scrap fabric, misc. fabric and sewing supplies. I took them to the living room yesterday and dumped them out. Otter and I went through them and found a lot of older fabric to put on eBay, a large plastic trash bag is now full of fabric and older clothes and is destined for Goodwill, and we now just have one bag of fabric/family clothing to keep for eventual quilt squares. I now have a place to put my picnic basket with my crochet stuff, I was tired of tripping over it. I still need to go through my second shelf, but mostly it needs to be rearranged. It's got stuff like my sewing machine and my thread on it. I don't think that there's much, if anything, that I'll get rid of on that shelf since I cleaned it out several months ago.

Maggie thought that she should get to play with all the stuff we had piled in the living room yesterday. When she wasn't allowed to, she got right up in my lap and pretended to be unloved. Frasier had zero interest in the fabric, etc., he just wanted to get Maggie's chewbone. Which he did, as soon as she came over to help us.

I thought about taking my cactus back out yesterday morning, but I never quite got around to it. Which is a good thing, because we had a nice rain storm in the late morning/early afternoon. A little thunder, but not really bad weather. Just a nice rain. And Bill had to go unclog one of the rain gutters in the middle of the storm, since it was overflowing and he was afraid that if he waited the entire gutter might fall. It just had a couple of leaves that were blocking it. But he did get wet!

Among other things, I did get my pink robe put back together. The same one that Mom brought me in the hospital when Otter was born. Yes, I still have it Froggy! I've put it in the quilt scrap pile several times, but I keep taking it back out. It's had seams that came apart as the thread is kind of old, the hem came out and both sleeves hems were coming out. All of it is because of the thread. I've made several attempts over the years to replace my robe, but I'm very attached to this one. I found it in the quilt scraps pile yesterday and I decided to go ahead and patch it. So I got the sewing machine out and got busy. I know it seems strange, but this robe has a lot of good memories associated with it - Mom gave it to me and Otter's first days of life. So it was never going to be tossed, it would and may still eventually become quilt scraps.

Ok, it's nearly 7:00 now. Time to go get Otter out of bed! I'm sure she'll be pleased. Well, that's what I'll tell myself anyway! She probably hopes that I've forgotten what I told her at bedtime last night: the house is a wreck and we're going to clean today! I feel another Borg Queen moment coming on.

Why Do People Think I'm Stupid?

Specifically, the people who call me on the phone and pretend to be my credit card company. The ones who get mad at me when I won't give them my personal information. That is today's gripe. We were eating dinner when the phone rang, Bill answered it and then handed it to me since the person said that they were with our credit card company and I handle all our finances. I take the phone and the woman immediately starts telling me that I have to tell her my name and phone number to "verify." Which is when I said to her that she should already have that info and if she wants to tell me what she has, then I'll confirm or deny. She didn't like that answer. She kept asking me for my info and I finally told her that I didn't call her, she called me and that she could tell me what she had or I would NOT give her any information. Then she said that she just didn't see why I wouldn't tell her what she asked, since they had it all already. And I said that if they really did have it all already, then why did I have to tell her what she already knew? At which time she got really snippy & rude and told me to have a nice day - except that somehow I just don't really think she meant it. Then she was still talking when I hung up, I think she was complaining to someone else that was there since she wasn't talking to me. I'll call my credit card company tomorrow to confirm that it wasn't them, just in case but I don't think it was them. For one thing, they wouldn't be rude since all their calls are monitored. When I've had to talk to them, they have always been very professional.

I guess that's the latest scam. We used to get calls from people claiming that they were with eBay and needed us to confirm our information. But we never satisfied their inquiring minds, either!

I decided not to postpone the inevetable. I brought some of my plant stands inside and relocated the cactus plants to the dining room. I'm going to have to do some rearranging now. But that's fine, it's fun.

Magginator is suddenly shedding. All over the place! Otter tackled her with the brush tonight, which the dog absolutely loved. It helped, but there is still fur flying and it's beagle colored.

Since we're discussing dogs, Frasier needs to be mentioned so he doesn't feel left out. I was awakened very early this morning by what I at first thought was Bill snoring. I was about to poke him in the side and tell him to roll over, when I realized that the noise was coming from the foot of the bed and that it was Frasier! He was talking to me. I think he was hoping for an early breakfast. Which he did NOT get, by the way. But it was funny.