Pampered Chef Stole My Soul

As if I don't already have enough domestic happenings on my plate, I made the mistake of attending a Pampered Chef party hosted by one of my friends.

We certainly had a good time, and I got to see some of my old co-workers. Catching up was fun. Good wine, good food, good company - it was a great night.

And then the demonstration began.

As much as I go on about the glories of not cooking, I really do enjoy it. Any bless my dear Hubby's soul, he had to endure the wretched process of my learning to cook. And he never complained. Not once. He should be nominated for sainthood, truly.

Once I finally got the hang of cooking out of a box, I decided to purchase my first cookbook and actually learn how to cook. The more I did it, the more I liked it. And the more Hubby seemed to enjoy the food, as well.

Lately, I've gotten kinda lazy - but I still enjoy delving into the depths of the kitchen time and time again.

Attending the Pampered Chef demonstration seemed to reawaken something within me. I really didn't intend to order much. I knew that I wanted the can strainer…seems like a nifty tool to have around, after all.

But then I got to see all the other nifty tools. Ooohhh…a pizza stone. I've been wanting one of those. And an egg separator - how ingenious! I have no idea how to separate an egg! I need that!! And a scoop, guaranteeing perfectly proportioned cookies…yum! *Gasp* You mean you can use stoneware to cook bacon in the oven and not have to turn it? What a perfect addition to my arsenal for weekend breakfasts! And I have to have the cookbook that has the recipe for those yummy sandwiches that the chef made…I just know that my Hubby will like those!

And that is when my soul disappeared. Now I have a wish list. A food chopper to finely chop up those necessary ingredients for yummy recipes. Hubby loves cheese, so a cheese grater will be a must. All the better for grating cheese for all those pizzas I'll be making. And a mandoline - I never thought I'd want one of those, but just look at what you can do with this one! And their egg slicer seems to work much better than the cheap one I used to have. And wouldn't Hubby just love to have a cut-n-seal for his sandwiches? We'll have kids one day, and I forsee lots of pb&j happening… Hmmm…those measuring spoons were pretty nifty. And I really need to get a lift & serve to get the pizza off of my new stone. And one measuring cup works two ways for liquids and solids? I need that!

The stainless mixing bowls and glass batter bowls are must-haves. And just think of the fresh lemonade I could make with that citrus press!Oohh…a magic ice cream scoop! Definitely a necessity! I loved the feel of the cooking utensils in my hand - nice and hefty. And black! They match the rest of my motif! I never saw a need for a garlic press before, but this recipe sealed it. I need one.

I'm forcing myself to stay away from the pots, pans and knives. Just a couple of years ago, I upgraded ours to what we have now and I love them. Never mind that the Pampered Chef offers lifetime warranties and their pans are so thick. And Teflon coated on the inside and the outside.No…avert thine eyes, woman!

Now I need a bigger kitchen to store all the new things that I want. A renewed love of cooking is awakening within me. I don't think that Hubby will complain. Not at all. When I turn into that crazy woman in the kitchen, cranking out new recipes and improving them over time to our own tastes, I think he'll be very satisfied to sit at the dinner table and revel in the new flavors. Yes, cooking is an art, and I feel a sudden urge to dabble again.

Sigh. My soul is gone. CURSE YOU, PAMPERED CHEF!

I Am My Own Worst Enemy

Lessons in self-sufficiency are an ongoing process for me. When you live the life that I do, you learn to count on yourself as often as possible. As much as I prefer to have things done for me, I don't always have someone around to take care of things that I would prefer not to do.

As is always a pattern in this life, Hubby is gone again. I am left on my own - to take care of the house and the furry ones and go about my day-to-day activities. I have a partner, but he can only do so much from half a world away.

In the past, we've lived in apartments. If something went wrong, I had a team of maintenance men that I could call upon. Now, we own out own home. Such responsibilities fall upon us. Or, as of late, me.

Hubby wanted to hire someone to take care of the yard maintenance while he is away. Looking at the big picture, and noting that this sacrifice that we are making has an end goal of crawling out of the pit of debt that we've found ourselves in, I said no. I would take on the yard myself and save us money in the process.

I am such a fool.

I've since discovered that I hate mowing the yard. It might not be so bad if our yard were level. But our front yard has this weird mound in the middle. Pushing our mower up this mound is quite a chore. And this is after I get the silly thing started!

I would love to weed-eat the areas of the yard that the mower won't get to. However, I am unable to get the weed-eater to start, leaving me in the awkward position of having to use scissors to cut down grass in such obvious areas as the edge of the patio and our garden border. Perhaps I'll try it again tomorrow.

I'm in the process of trimming up the shrubs in the back yard. I don't mind this so much, I just have to break the chore down into a few shrubs at a time, as I'm limited in my ability to dispose of the clippings by the capacity the yard waste bin.

I still have a couple of shrubs to crop down completely. Today, as I was pushing the lawn mower through the back yard, I bumped up against something that I thought was part of an unwanted shrub. As I pushed forward with the mower, I heard an unwelcome snapping noise.

It was a sprinkler head.

Shit.

I am such an idiot!!

After I finished mowing, I turned my attention to this new crisis laid before me. I pulled the sprinkler head right out of the ground, and could see where the pipe had broken…right where it screws into the rest of the system. And part of the pipe was still in there. Great.

Fortunately, Hubby has a plethora of tools at our disposal. I retreated to the work bench and came back with my gardening trowel and a pair of pliers. I dug around in the ground to expose the problem area, and attempted to remove the broken piece of pipe with the pliers.

No luck.

I should add here that I know nothing about sprinkler systems. This is the first one I've ever had in my life.

I sat there, on my knees in the yard, furiously wishing that Hubby were here. He would know just what to do. In fact, he has performed repairs on other areas of our sprinkler system, and I remember seeing him use pipe threaders, hack saws and special glue. How the hell am I going to perform such an intricate repair with the little bit of knowledge that I have in this area?

Sitting there, in the grass, facing this crisis, I became a little bit overwhelmed. I don't really know anyone that might be able to help me. Hubby is gone. All of my family is thousands of miles away. What am I going to do?

It took me a few minutes, but I finally collected myself. Silly girl! You can absolutely take care of this! Get off your ass and figure something out! Just as quickly as it began, my pity party was over and I was in control again.

What to do? Move it to the internet. Google is your friend. I conducted a search…praying that I could find advice for removing the trapped piece of pipe and that I wouldn't have to cut, measure, thread and glue.

Within a matter of minutes, I had found my solution and was on my way to the hardware store, broken sprinkler pipe in hand. I had learned that my problem was a broken riser (whatever that is!) and I would need a tool called a "nipple extractor." While perusing the sprinkler section, I found pre-threaded pipes in varying lengths and picked up a couple of different lengths just to be sure. I also decided that I wanted a pop-up sprinkler head instead of the stationary kind that sticks up from the ground and got me in this mess to begin with!

In no time, I was back home, in the back yard, and with my new "nipple extractor" I had the broken piece of pipe dislodged in no time! Trying out different lengths of pipe, I found the one that would leave my new sprinkler head flush with the ground and began applying Teflon tape(something I learned from watching Hubby) to keep the joints from leaking. In no time, the sprinkler was assembled and my hole in the ground was gone.

Feeling this renewed sense of accomplishment, I moved on to my remaining yard tasks for the weekend.

In the big picture, today's crisis was pretty minor. But it served to reinforce to me that I can handle whatever falls in my path. I may have to give myself a little pep talk to make it happen, but I can handle anything.

I'm achy and sore, but I've managed to accomplish quite a bit myself. It would be so much easier if I had Hubby here to do these things for me, or share the load. Living the life that we do doesn't always allow for that, so I've learned how to handle things on my own. I've learned how to make things happen, and I'm proud of myself for it. And I'm pretty sure that Hubby is proud of me, too.

Broke And Broken

What a weekend!

Flush with payday cash, and tempted by the gorgeous weather outside, I decided to tackle a few projects in the garden.

In a burst of excitement on Friday, I skipped out of work for about half an hour to run up to the hardware store to purchase the savior of my summer…the ten foot patio umbrella. This just may be my best purchase all season, as it will make my patio a manageable place to spend my days when the sun and heat kick in. Looking forward to the three-day weekend ahead, I also purchased some garden edging and a flat shovel to assist me in my upcoming projects.

(Side note…I spent the rest of the day on Friday threatening to make anyone that irritated me the "first blood" to stain my new shovel. Ha!)

Priceless was the look on the guy's face at the hardware store when I convinced him that the seven foot tall partly assembled umbrella would fit in my car…no problem. When he asked me if my back seat collapses, I responded, "Nope. But we've gotten six foot tall bookshelves home in this thing before. It'll fit. No problem." A few minutes later, I was driving off, my umbrella securely angled across my passenger seat into the back seat behind me, with the guy holding the box and just shaking his head. See…it fit!

When I got home Friday evening, I just couldn't wait. Fred and I descended upon the patio with my new umbrella. It is ridiculously easy to assemble…however it requires a certain amount of grace and balance, as the umbrella mechanism is pre-assembled onto part of the pole. It took me a while to get the hang of it, balancing this top-heavy bohemoth, but I managed. It was obvious to me that this was technically a two person job, but Fred was offering no help. In fact, he was pacing the floor, as he always does when something that he doesn't understand is happening and it makes him nervous.

Saturday was spent pruning more shrubs in the back yard. Damn, it looks good! I'm just making guesses at my rose bushes…I really don't know a lot about caring for these gorgeous flowers, but I think that I may have gotten them trimmed up nicely. I still have a few more bushes to cut back (I'm limited by the capacity of my yard waste bin), but I am so pleased with how the back yard is coming together.

I also tackled a ginormous yellow jacket nest that I found hidden inside one of my overgrown shrubs. That was pretty scary! Just another joy of homeownership that Hubby is missing out on by being gone.

I also spent Saturday playing with my new satellite-dish like umbrella. Even though I was spending minimal amounts of time on the patio, I unfurled the umbrella so that I could see its effect on the area. As the day wore on, it became obvious that I had placed it on the wrong corner of the patio Friday night. So, taking a break from the shrub trimming, I maneuvered the top-heavy bohemoth into place. Again. Fred kept his distance, probably wise for the poor pup.

My last task for the day was putting together a new area of my bird sanctuary at the end of the yard. I picked through my marvelous PetSmart deals and selected a bird feeder, stand and copper bird bath to place at the end of the back yard. An ideal location for bird watching from the patio. As I was driving the bird feeder stand into the ground, I told Fred that when I'm cursing the birds for chirping outside my bedroom window so early in the morning, remind me that this was my brilliant idea.

We wound up the day relaxing on the patio. I was sipping sweet tea (I'm so Southern!) and Fred was basking in the sweet smells of the outdoors.

Sunday dawned and I decided that this would be the day that I tackled the project that has been sitting at a standstill since the heat of last summer. I would finally tackle the side yard paver project!

Holee Cow.

Alongside our house, we have a sidewalk that connects our driveway to the back patio. Between this sidewalk and the fence that divides our property from our neighbor's property is about two feet of dirt. What the purpose of this is, I don't know. It was filled in with mulch when we purchased the house. But over the past year, the mulch has broken down and weeds have sprouted up in its place. I've decided that twelve inch square masonry squares (pavers) and gravel would be the ideal way to fill in this void in our landscaping. It would also make the ideal foundation for a container garden that I would like to place in this area.

I pulled out the waste bins and my rectangular planters, clearing the way for the project to begin. Hubby had laid down about twenty five pavers already, but looking at the weeds that had grown over the seasons, I have since decided that a weed barrier will need to be placed down under the pavers and gravel to discourage any more unwelcome growth.

So up came the pavers. Up came the weeds. And I had to wrestle with the umbrella again, as it has been determined that the ideal place for it is right in the path of the pavers. It took me awhile to attach the garden edging to the fence (forty two feet of it!) that will keep the sand and gravel from spilling over into the neighbor's yard. Fred was ever attentive…once he got over the constant banging of the hammer to nails, he was right there with me, the best company to have. Once I was done with the edging, down went the weed barrier. I stood back and admired my progress. Now the fun would begin.

Off to the hardware store I head. In addition to the five seventy-pound bags of sand, twenty bricks, five additional pavers and ten retention wall bricks, I pick up a little plastic cart to assist me in carrying it all. The guy at the hardware store was put to work loading all of my new purchases into the car. (I love this hardware store because they load the heavy stuff for you…my kind of place!) My poor car has suddenly become a low-rider under all this unexpected weight. Fortunately, it's only a couple of miles to the house!

Once home, I wish that I had someone to unload the heavy stuff for me, as I begin to pull out the five seventy-pound bags of sand, twenty bricks, five additional pavers and ten retention wall bricks and haul them around to the back of the house.

I eventually get it all unloaded and crack open the bags of sand. They get poured down on top of the weed barrier and spread out in an attempt to make the ground a little bit more level for the pavers. As rain begins to fall from the sky, I start putting down bricks and pavers. About halfway through the pavers, I take a break and head inside to wait out the rain. By this time, I'm beginning to feel pretty sore.

When the rain breaks, I return to my task. Eventually, all the pavers that I have are laid out and I start shoveling gravel into place. I'm so pleased with my progress! As I empty the wheelbarrow of two bags of gravel and note how much turf it covered, I look at my remaining two bags and determine that I'm going to need at least two more. sigh. While I'm at it, I look at where the patio umbrella will rest and determine that I need three more square pavers to make a solid foundation to rest the base of the umbrella on. And that still leaves a rectangular area bare…hmm…I had noticed something called a masonry cap that is basically a rectangular paver. Maybe this will work? Armed with a measuring tape and dimensions, I return to the hardware store.

I find that they're out of the gravel that I need. Damn. The guy in the warehouse looks at me and asks, "Back again?" when I pull up to get my pavers. "Yup. I'm almost done!" I reply.

Back home to unload the new (heavy) purchases and haul them out back. Once they're in place, I spend a few minutes getting them leveled out to make a place to rest the base of the umbrella. I then use my retention wall bricks to keep the gravel from spilling into what will become a flower bed along another side of my patio and I'm back to spreading gravel. Soon, all of my gravel is spread, leaving a bare spot in the middle of the project. Yup…gonna need at least two more bags. sigh.

But not tonight. I'm grimy and sore and tired. I put all of my tools away. I reassemble the umbrella, embarking on the fine balancing act. Again. Fred keeps his distance. Again. The grill is moved back into place, the waste bins are returned to their stations. For the night, I am done. A cup of hot tea, two Advil and the television await me.

I awoke this morning with a revelation. How will I keep the umbrella sturdy when the wind comes? What will keep it from rocking? sigh. I peek at the base of the stand (an "X") and determine that I should add three more square pavers to the list. These can rest on the stand, holding it in place and keeping the rocking to a minimum.

Bidding Fred farewell, promising to return shortly, I hop into my car and head out to another location of my favorite hardware store. Tickets for my gravel and pavers in hand, I decide to take a quick peek at the nursery, just to see what is in already. Ah, heaven! Vibrant colors and fragrances…I cannot wait for planting season! I take a few notes…plants that catch my eye that I will research later on at home.

When I pull my car around to pick up my gravel and pavers, I am delighted to find that they do indeed have my gravel, but appear to be out of the gray pavers that I wanted. Groan. You've got to be kidding me!I ask the guy if I can have the tan pavers instead. They won't match the rest of the project, but they'll coordinate beautifully with my mocha umbrella. They'll be tucked in a corner behind the grill, anyways. And I don't want to have to make another trip to the store! Reaching agreement, I am on my way.

Arriving home, I unload my purchases. Three pavers to anchor my umbrella (and they work nicely!) And two more fifty pound bags of gravel to fill in the bare spot in the project. In no time, I have the gravel spread out and am so pleased with the final result that I'm not even bothered by the fact that I probably need to purchase one more bag to bulk up a couple of thin areas.

Finally, this project, seven months in the making, is complete! I place some planter stands along the fence, envisioning my container garden in place once planting season begins.

Oh! Planting season!! I've got Dahlia tubers in the garage that need to be planted!! Back outside I go.

It doesn't take me long to determine where the new additions to my garden will go. I pull up some spindly snapdragons and get to work. I've got ten holes to dig, and I ache so much! But since I'm down here, I might as well pull some weeds before they get out of hand. When I'm finished, I take a few minutes to check out my other babies…the bulbs I planted in the fall. My tulips are peeping through the soil. Daffodils appear to be getting ready to bloom any day now! Freesia is filling out nicely and my blue poppies are leafing up nicely. Soon, color will return to my garden!

I've got plans. Next payday will see the addition of new plants. Probably my remaining two jasmine for the back yard. Since I've built the retention wall for the area of my patio that will be home to a flower bed, I'll pick up a cube of garden soil and most likely some lavender and a vine or two. In the front garden, gazanias and osteospermum will make a debut at the base of my tree. Perhaps a flat of some other colorful addition.

And I need to tackle the weed infested area under the cypress trees. I see the purchase of more weed barrier in my future. And mulch. Don't forget the mulch! I think that my newest plan is to put weed barrier down covering that entire area, leaving gaps for the trees to get water. I'll mulch over the barrier to make it more attractive, then set pots of gorgeous grasses on top of that. Low maintenance. I'm lovin' it!

Hmmm…I'm going to need more pots.

Is it any wonder that I'm so broke?

Anxiously Awaiting...

I live in a relatively mild-winter climate.

Yet I cannot wait for spring!

Hubby and I got very lucky in our new home. It's not be the subtropical climate that Florida has to offer. In fact, think a bit closer to desert. We have desert on the other side of the mountains.

No, our environment is warm and arid. Humidity doesn't really exist here. At least, you can't slice it with a knife like you can back home. Here, the air is dry. And HOT in the summer. Locals balked at the 110 plus degree heat that lasted for a week or so this past summer.

With such hot summers come mild winters. We had about a week of below freezing nighttime temperatures this year, but nothing quite like what I experienced back in Germany.

Spring isn't even here yet, and I'm already puttering about in the yard. I spent a couple of hours last weekend trimming up the shrubs in the back yard. One rose bush got pruned, and two bushes received a major haircut, while that evil Oleander is just about cut all the way down. I clipped until my yard waste bin was full, and then had to stop. Otherwise, I would have kept on going…removing most of another large shrub at the corner of the house, and trimming down the remaining bushes. The intensive pruning will continue this weekend.

Now I'm starting to imagine what plants I want to plant in the front garden. I'm envisioning my possibilities for the area under our Cypress trees. I'm starting to put some serious thought into what vines I want to plant next to the patio. I'm beginning to amass the final materials for the side yard paver project. I actually plan to start laying the foundation for that tomorrow!

And I've decided to tackle the problem that I have with the back patio. Namely, the lack of shade. Our patio faces West, making it the target of intense afternoon heat. Last summer, the cement got so hot that our poor pup couldn't even stand on it!

Eventually, we intend to build a pergola over the patio. This shade structure will offer welcome relief from the heat of summer. However, the cost is a bit much for us to tackle right now.

Today, I found a temporary solution. I purchased a cantilevered patio umbrella. This massive umbrella measures ten feet in diameter…pretty impressive! And it hangs over the patio from a stand that sits off to the side. There is a little dial to spin, causing the umbrella to open and close. The movement reminds me of a flower opening. Seeing the umbrella opened to its full extent reminds me of a satellite dish.

Now I will have shade as I work at my temporary potting station on the patio. A welcome relief, considering I intend to start a container garden once I have the pavers in place alongside the house.

My pup will be able to enjoy the outdoors along with me…he will have welcome shade to retreat to when he cannot handle the intense beating of the sun.

I'll be taking advantage of the cool weather to tackle some of the labor intensive projects around the house. But with my new weapon, I look forward to longer days to spend outside, basking in the warmth of the seasons.

Shade.

Ah, spring. I await you.

Just My Luck...

I've spent the past couple of weeks embarking on a new project.

I've been working on my old photos. Corralling the ones that have been scattered around in boxes and miscellaneous albums into one location. I've got so many old photos...photos that I really don't remember exactly when they were taken and some of the names of the people in them are kinda fuzzy.

The photos were in various locations throughout the house...in photo boxes in my craft area, in boxes in the guest room, tucked away in other albums. Now they're all in a series of albums ~ rescued from their dark box, scattered envelopes and non archival-friendly album storage.

In addition to undertaking this task, I cracked open the three albums that contain photos of me in my youth. Baby photos all the way through my adolescence. Many of these photos are polariods and have faded through the years. Since I was reorganizing the other photos anyways, I figured that I might as well start the task that I had intended for these photos all along...I scanned them into my computer, one by one. I now have digital records of the photos...preserving them in a format that should endure through the years. Eventually, I hope to purchase a quality photo program that will allow me to restore these faded photos to their former glory.

When I was working with the photos and sliding them into their new homes, I was taken back. Many of these pictures seem like they were taken a lifetime ago. Indeed, as I stared at the cherub-faced Me in the older photos, it seems so long ago! Even as I looked at the "older" Me, the one that appears in my teen-years photos, it is like I wsa sucked through a time-warp and plunked down in the past.

It got me to thinking. Look at Me back then...and look at Me now. We're two very different people. Yet I recognize that the Me of the past directly influenced the Me of the present.

Past Me had no idea what awaited in the future. Yet it is her actions that brought Present Me to the place that I am today. And it's crazy...simple actions had such an impact!

I bonded with my childhood best friend in elementary school. That bond brought me into the Masonic family in the very early 1990s. That formed for me strong bonds of sisterhood among other members of my Rainbow Assembly. Strong bonds with certain sisters brought me into the world of DeMolay, where I was privledged to serve as Chapter Sweetheart of my local chapter. Because of my bonds with these sisters, my interest in DeMolay continued past my year as Chapter Sweetheart, and I became involved with DeMolay, and later Knighthood, on a state level.

The friendships formed during this time remain with me today. And a friendship formed during my state travels lead me to meet the man that I would later marry. And my bond with my husband has taken me around the world, and settled me in a place that is about as far away from home as I can get and still be in the country.

Amazing.

And the little girl in the pictures never had a clue. Yet the actions she would take started the chain reaction.

It is because of her that I am the person that I am today. Because of her, I have seen and experienced a life that others can only dream about. I have changed over the years...leaving the little girl in the photos behind. Through an awkward adolescense, the teen years and young adulthood, those various incarnations of Me have continued to evolve into the person that I am today.

I am strong. I am confident. I have a very strong moral base...instilled in me by my family and strongly reinforced by my years in the Masonic Lodge. I am proud of the life that I have led. When faced with challenges, I met them head on and chose an action and a path that I can be proud of. And I continue to do that today.

I have had experiences that continue to amaze me. I have always been a very lucky, and my lifetime of experiences reinforces that. I am lucky to be where I am today, to have been where I've been in the past, and to love and be loved by the people in my life.

Yes...I am lucky. The hand that I have been dealt has been a good one. Perhaps there have been some things in my life that might have played out differently if I had chosen another course of action than the one that I took. But would I be where I am today if something had changed? I don't think so. I look back and see the small actions that brought me to where I am now, and am grateful that everything happened the way that it did. I am happy in my present. I look forward to my future with open eyes and a steady hand.

Three Months Gone

Today marks three months since Hubby officially left home on his journey to the sandbox. What has happened and changed over the past month?

- I've been waiting for it, and this is the month that the other shoe dropped. I really miss my Hubby. Whenever he leaves, the first little bit is like a mini-vacation. I don't have to cook, the house stays cleaner, laundry is magically cut in half and I get full control of the TV. But before too long, the house and bed are just too empty. I knew that that feeling would be coming along soon, and it would just be a matter of time before it snuck up on me. I knew it would hit like a ton of bricks, and boy did it! We've made it through the first three months…now to make it over the "hump" and into the home stretch…

- Number of meals cooked this month: 0 
  Running total for deployment: 0
  (Note that I do not count frozen pizzas, chicken nuggets or baking a hamburger in the oven as cooking.)

- Really, really, really had to resist jumping for joy when I found out that my new job comes with some perks like a discount at a major office supply store. Seriously…I LOVE office supply stores! Unleash me in one, and I can be happy for hours! I've already picked up those multi-packs of Sharpies!! And STORAGE!!! WOOHOO!!!

- After a slight pause in the festivities, Scrapalooza has regained momentum! This month may have only seen the scrapping of 46 pages, but I have ordered and/or accepted delivery of four hundred and forty seven photos that, when combined with the photos that I already have printed out and on my desk, will bring me through October 2004! I'm getting closer to being caught up!! And wow…I do take a lot of photos!!

- Another little photo project has been completed. I went out and bought some empty photo albums, and corralled all of my loose photos together into them. Photos that go waaay back to 1989! I can't even hope to begin to scrapbook these photos…I'm so far behind already, and looking through all of the pictures, I don't remember the names of half the people in them. Fortunately, at some point in the past, I had the foresight to go through and put a box of photos in something resembling chronological order, in little envelopes with the approximate date and event name on them. That was a big help in completing this project!! In addition to emptying two boxes of photos, I emptied out several magnetic-page photo albums (so very much not a good way to store photos!) and got those photos into the new albums. Archival friendly! I've also located a few additional rolls of DeMolay pictures that are in need of scrapping…from right before I pulled up my roots and moved overseas. MyJody…HELP!! And an interesting little factoid…My Hubby's first appearance in any of my photos? Conclave 1995...Daytona Beach…helping to throw Rhonda Livingston into the pool. I just barely knew him then. Ah, the memories…

- Had to put on my Techno-Geek hat and pull the printer and scanner off of Hubby's computer and install them on my laptop. So very Chloe O'Brien of me!!  Just about killed myself fishing around under his desk trying to figure out which cord goes to what. How in the hell does he function in such a state of disarray? Everything was a giant tangle! After much cursing and other unpleasantness, I managed to get them hooked up to my computer and even tracked down all of the software to get them going. It's a good thing I know how his mind works, otherwise I would never have been able to find the software. All would have been for nothing! Fortunately I'm not totally computer illiterate. Just mostly. I managed to get it all hooked up and working. It was a good day.

- I'm rodent-free! After tiring of my attempts to clear my garage of the rodent that was eating all of our grass seed, I had Terminix come back out and replace the glue boards with snap traps. That night, we caught the rodent. Turned out to be a field mouse…his home having been disturbed by construction in the empty lot next to our cul-de-sac. Now he is gone, and I don't feel the need to tip-toe through my garage any more. Woohoo!! Now about those pesky termites that I found out we have…ah the joys of home ownership…

- Ordered our new "America the Beautiful National Park Pass." We love having this pass, as it allows us unlimited entrances into the threeNational Parks that are practically right at our back door, as well as whatever other National Parks we happen to visit throughout the year. This new version of the pass is also good for various other federal lands, giving us even more opportunities to get out and see the areas around us. I broke in the new pass the day after it came in by taking a friend up to Yosemite, and witnessing the winter wonder of the picturesque valley. All while managing to not slip and fall on the snow and ice covered trails. The most amazing thing from this trip was witnessing ice falling down a waterfall, and hearing the cracking noise echo through the valley when the ice actually broke. Spectacular!

- Bringing me closer to my goal of owning a Jeep in 2008, I started up "the fund." By the end of the year, I should have a nice little nest of down payment that will make this particular dream a reality. 2008...The Year of the Heep!

- One month on the new job has opened my eyes to the number of complaints about animals that citizens can log. Holy cow! And so many of the calls are repeats…there can be one animal in a situation, and multiple people will call on it. Which is touching, really. Until you get a particular animal that a lot of people might not know much about, and they all start calling us to express their concerns. All I can say is that we are very familiar with the status of a particular horse in the city, and he is fine. The horse is OK. Please stop calling about the horse. Oh…and the otherhorse…he doesn't die every Sunday. He just likes to lie down while taking a nap. He is fine, too. Really. I promise. Now put down the phone. Go on with your daily activities.