35 thoughts on “Rants! and Raves! 8-24-13”

  1. 🙂 If I’m not mistaken, next Saturday is the first anniversary of the Wandering Views. We were all worried about losing each other.
    I have to be at the Big Apple Breakfast before 0700 and have Apple Festival Activities after that. So someone has to remember.
    Surprise AJ with a party of some sort.
    😆

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  2. 😦 I heard on the radio that Linda Rhonstadt says she has parkenson’s and has lost the ability to sing. She wasn’t my favorite, but I liked Linda. Real sorry to hear that.

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  4. 🙂 Idaho Mike!

    🙂 The Nest

    🙂 Mumsee!

    🙂 Another beautiful day.

    🙂 More company arriving tomorrow!

    😦 Company means less time working on the house – hope we’re finished before the snow flies!

    🙂 Son had a good date on Thursday and they’re planning on going out again

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  5. Yeah, everything else pales beside . . .
    🙂 Idaho Mike got to return home!

    But other good things are happening too.

    🙂 We got patio furniture at about half price; my husband put together the chairs yesterday, and he is doing the table now.

    🙂 We got our garage freezer defrosted and organized.

    🙂 I finished a project I was making for one daughter for Christmas, have made good progress on my husband’s anniversary present, and am nearly finished with the things I am putting together for next month’s fair.

    🙂 The garage and house are getting organized.

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  7. 🙂 Chas’ gift on 9 June 1957.

    🙂 Idaho Mike and Mumsee!

    🙂 A good week with the new school routine.

    🙂 A brief visit from 2nd Arrow again this week, only one week after she had last been here.

    🙂 Going again to a workshop for piano teachers, a free event and lovely tradition sponsored by a local music store. A local composer, who is a retired professor of piano, presents all the supplementary instructional piano music that has been published in the last year. She also includes new piano music suitable for playing in church. The presenter is so engaging, and has lots of good teaching tips. I always look forward to August, when workshop time comes around each year. 🙂

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  8. 🙂 Yes, definitely mumsee’s good news takes the cake.

    🙂 Wonderful few days spent with our granddaughter. She was so proud to tell people she was with us ALL ALONE WITHOUT HER MOM AND DAD. She is sunshine. At seven she quite knows her own mind and will stick up for what she wants. Her mom was the same. All good if it is kept in the right direction.

    🙂 SIL was hired yesterday for a full time substitute teaching position for the first half of the school year. His last check from the job he was laid off of came this week. They are very grateful to have some kind of job for him.

    🙂 A quilt shop had a going out of business sale, so we had to take advantage of the 40% offered on all the merchandize. My granddaughter had been working on sewing some yo-yo’s, which her mother showed her how to make to keep her busy. I found a template for making the yo-yo’s that made it much easier for her to make. She picked out four different materials from my stash and got busy right away. I cut squares for her and she was pretty much able to do the rest. Every time we got in the car for a drive, she had her sewing bag with her and sewed from beginning to end. I did point out some scenic places and animals etc. I was quite surprised to see her industriousness and enthusiasm for making these. The few dollars paid for that template were so worth it.

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  11. 🙂 mumsee! and Idaho Mike together again on the prairie.

    🙂 Saturday.

    😦 Got up in the middle of the night (2 a.m.?) to let the dogs out (Tess jumps on my bed as the signal) and on my way to the doggie door I twice — once in the living room, once in the kitchen — stepped in “stuff” in the dark. Seems one of the dogs threw up last night so I had some cleanup to do before going back to bed.

    🙂 Wrote an interesting story yesterday about a guy (Kim: he’s a KW broker) who swam from Catalina to the mainland on Thursday to raise money for his church’s project building a school and helping an orphanage in Nicaragua. He’s a lifelong swimmer who’d trained for months but they hit unexpected rough seas that shifted him off course (adding a couple hours and several miles to the route). He made it, but collapsed on the shore with hypothermia when paramedics were called. It also turned out he’d had a mild heart attack from the extreme stress of swimming for 13 hours (about 25 miles). Good news is after an overnight stay in the hospital the docs said it was very minor and no permanent damage, he seemed to be completely recovered enough to go home last night. They’re hoping to have raised $10,000 — people literally were still donating spontaneously as he came ashore — but they haven’t counted the pledges yet.

    😦 It was a scramble to write because I didn’t reach the parties until around 2-3 p.m. — amazingly the swimmer talked to me at length on the phone from his hospital bed. But I was having to rush to turn it in on time, trying to line up photos for submission that we could use — and I wound up missing most of our office’s baby shower for our colleague who’s now off on maternity leave for 4 months. We’ll miss her (but she’ll be glad to be away from all the stress at work these days).

    😦 Still concerned about a friend who’s caught up in what I’m pretty sure is an internet scam. He wants to believe them when they say they’re sending him hundreds of dollars of “commission” checks (for doing nothing) and they’ve been flooding his inbox with stuff. Creepy. Like a bunch of circling sharks, these people are, preying on the vulnerable.

    😦 Very sorry to hear about Linda R and Parkinson’s (which is what the friend I mentioned above now has — one of our former staffers at church also now has been diagnosed with it, he’d hoped to plant a church and is still finishing up some seminary work, probably only in his 40s now). But I liked Linda R’s voice & many of her songs that provided something of a soundtrack to parts of our lives through the 1970s.

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  12. 😦 Rain, rain, go away. Come again another day.

    🙂 Monday is Hubbikins birthday. He will be 50. I have no idea what to get for his birthday.
    🙂 His Baby Boy is coming over to spend the day with him.
    🙂 He wants a big dog. I have finally given in. I posted something on FB last night about adopting a dog from a shelter or giving in to the POWER of Puppy Breath. I have some very opinionated people in my life.
    😦 Still haven’t heard back from the no kill shelter. They had turned me down once before because I have BG and she was only 10 at the time.
    🙂 I did go ahead and register with a Golden Retriever Rescue.

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  13. Kim, the whole rescue vs. puppy breeder debate is like walking into a hail storm right now. 😦 Good luck with the goldens, they’re good dogs. Amos is staying, though, right??

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  14. Chas, I admit I’m cheating a bit with the anniversary gift . . . it’s for anniversary and not for birthday or Christmas because I’m going to like the books as much as he will (or more) . . . so they’re a “gift for both of us.” Our letters (not every word, but a significant portion), my e-mails to a friend that were sort of a journal of our courtship, and photos we e-mailed to each other or took when we were together, finishing with a bunch of photos (black and white) of our wedding day. They should be a lovely set.

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  15. And speaking of pet debates, the indoor-only vs. indoor-outdoor cat issue is something you don’t want to mess with, either.

    When I had Annie in to get her stitches removed last week, I brought it up to my vet, saying everyone was really piling on me saying I shouldn’t let Annie ever go outside. First of all, he told me (I love my vet), don’t let anyone make you feel guilty. He went on to say some cats simply aren’t happy indoors (Annie definitely isn’t and he said they’ve never had a cat that’s been happy indoors only either, that all their cats through the years have been indoor-outdoor).

    Yes, he said, “in general” indoor-only cats do tend to live longer. But he said studies now also are showing that indoor-only cats have higher cancer rates which they think might be related to environment (paints, etc.). And outdoor cats tend to be very savvy and smart and they can (and often do) live very long lives.

    I felt much better after that talk. While I realize Annie may meet a tragic end out there someday, I feel confident that she’s just a whole lot happier having her freedom.

    “They’re cats,” my vet told me. They’re not like dogs, they don’t recognize that “master” or “human ‘parent'” role that we try to put on them. They are who they are. 😉

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  16. 🙂 This is the first pretty Saturday we’ve had this year.
    No kidding!
    As soon as it started getting warm this spring, the rains came. I appreciated them at first because tha farmers needed it. But they started complaining that it was always too wet to plow. Then my yard became soggy. I had wet places today, but I cut through them anyhow. I have ruined part of my yard with mower tracks.
    Even the “nice” days had afternoon showere.
    Today, it’s sunny, 75.4 degrees and no rain in the forcast.
    🙂

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  17. My granddaughter did ask me why they were called yo-yos, since they look more like flowers. I don’t really know, except that yo-yos may have been popular at the same time these started to be made. It is an old craft. One woman, who happened to be present when we were purchasing the template, mentioned that she had one purchased years ago. She said it was for making some type of flower and wondered if it were the same thing. I am thinking it probably is. Many quilt patterns have several names.

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  19. 🙂 Stopped in and got my bangs trimmed, picked up the groceries for work lunches.

    🙂 Next up, the dog park & then making that casserole to take to church tomorrow. Not a lot of room for storing it overnight in my smallish refrigerator, though, it’s packed for some reason right now.

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  20. We’ve had good luck on significant birthdays, like 50, by putting together “50 things we love about you.” Or “50 facts about you.” Or “50 things that remind us of you.”

    If you know enough of his friends and relatives, have them send a list; or just a couple. Cut the answers into small slips of paper (one answer on each slip). Put them in a jar with “50+ Things We Love About You” written on it and they can have a wonderful time reading the sentiments.

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  21. Sounds like a great idea Michelle. Okay I am going to try the rant and rave:

    🙂 Had a wonderful Sports Day on Friday

    😦 one of my students fell on the playground on Monday and had a concussion and needed 3 stitches

    🙂 He was able to come back to school on Wednesday

    😦 We didn’t feel it was wise for him to do all the Sports Day events

    🙂 We figured out he could do the bean bag toss and the rock carried on a spoon

    😦 I forgot about him and didn’t realize he wasn’t with us as we were doing the events

    🙂 I remembered halfway through the beanbag toss and went and found him on the hillside with his parents. He was crying. 😦

    🙂 We all cheered for him and he was able to do the two events and get two ribbons. So glad that God reminded me to go get him. !!!

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  24. http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/08/25/20169597-harsh-dry-winds-hamper-moves-to-douse-monstrous-california-wildfire?lite

    “A monstrous California wildfire that has charred an area roughly the size of Chicago was inching closer to the northwest flank of Yosemite National Park on Sunday, threatening thousands of rural homes, according to officials.

    “The massive blaze was also raging near two famed groves of towering sequoias that are among the largest and oldest living things on the planet. The trees can withstand fire, but brutal conditions — including harsh winds churning as much as 40 mph and thick brush — have prompted park employees to take extra precautions in the Tuolumne and Merced groves, according to The Associated Press. … “

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  27. But, yes, that fire is somewhat in his neck of the woods, although probably significantly southeast from him, I think. Isn’t he on the very northernmost coast of Cali? The fire is more inland — 150 miles from SF, but they were saying yesterday it could be enough to threaten some of the utility power infrastructure that keeps SF going ….

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  30. I have toured groves of sequoias and heard that it takes this kind of fire to allow them to drop the pinecones to grow new trees.
    Hard to imagine a fire that big and in such rugged country

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  31. 🙂 Second cousin’s wedding yesterday. She was radiant.

    🙂 All shopping for “back-to-school” is complete!

    🙂 Successful dentist visit for both girls. No cavities!

    😦 Sister and her family returned to Africa today

    😦 School starts tomorrow

    😦 I somehow managed to gain back the five pounds I’d recently lost

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  32. 😦 My hair is falling out in much larger amounts than usual. Need to get my thyroid checked according to my neurologist. Hypothyroidism runs in my family.

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