Here’s what I think about that Mindude. 
LiLi I suggest you lobby for roses and Godiva chocolate or whatever chocolate you think is the good chocolate. After all, a growing baby needs his/her chocolate to build strong bones. That should be enough to convince Mr.LiLi.
Well, my tile project was a bust, literally. Two of the biggest tiles in the center of the montage exploded into a buncha pieces and dust. Frankly, I’d have tossed the whole thing into the trash, but the teacher insisted I could salvage it, so I used some clear glaze to try to stick the broken parts together. :rolleyes: The worst damage was to the barn and silo tile, so I just kinda piled all the broken pieces together and said it had been hit by a tornado. Hey, it’s my art - I can interpret it my own way!!! So I glazed it all the best I could and left it to be fired.
We also did our raku firing, and it worked out kinda cool. I had made a small dish, and I selected the green-to-gold glaze to coat it. The way the firing was done, the pieces are first put into a gas-fired kiln in the open flame till they glow orange-hot. Then you put shredded paper or wood chips or other things into the bottom of a trash can, put the glowing pieces in, top it with more paper or chips, let it ignite, then cover the can. Once it goes out, you take the pieces out to cool.
Mine came out kinda cool looking - the glaze is metallic. To bad the bowl was a so-so piece.
Work today was boring. I had to go to more training <yawn> and I didn’t get a lot out of it. But my computers are all working correctly again, so there’s that.
I took my van for an oil change and tire rotation today, and when **FCD ** got home, we build the supports for my display shelves. Tomorrow, he’ll finish with the hinges and cut the shelves. I’ll take the pics of my pots and start pricing everything.
I’m also waiting to find out if I have power for the craft show. From the tone of the email I got back, I suspect I’m in the non-electric zone. Which is fine - I’ll just do handworking demos or decorative work. We shall see.
Hey, look - it’s time for ICE CREAM!!! 
Can I have Captain Phil for dinner instead? WOOF!!!
Oh, I didn’t even notice the crab he’s holding.
I saw him first and I’m a lot closer to him than you are! Nyah-nyah!
Were you not taught that sharing is a virtue! 
Spiders are icky. But I’m generally the spider-killer in the family/group. I’ve had a couple of roommates who were deathly afraid of spiders; I mostly think they’re ugly, so I was the lucky winner in the “who gets to eradicate the spider?” sweepstakes.
Today was our big annual plant-shopping day. It was fun, but exhausting. It was just a bit too warm and sunny. Even though we were under a (glass) roof most of the time and I was wearing a hat, I pretty much melted. I got home and crawled into bed for about two hours.
So I’m not working in the garden tonight, but will instead hang out on the couch, go to bed early and worry about everything else in the morning.
Back to bed…I’ll try to stop by in the morning…
GT
If it’s bearded, rides a Harley and makes insane amounts of money, nope!
This is turning into a good week - One of my bestest friends back home in the UK had a beautiful baby boy last night.
Tiny (mom is little) but perfect baby Josh!
Yay for babies!
Happy Birthday, Sean!!
rosie, don’t be blue. . .you’re supposed to be. . .well, rosie. I hope you feel better soon. Anything we can say to cheer you up? I’m sending healing vibes and cheer-up vibes your way. Think of all the fun things and fun people you’ll be able to do and see with your new knee. Heal soon.
For all of you doing the spider links. . . ::glare:: I opened one by accident without knowing what it was. Yack!!
Thanks to brainpasture for filling the time before I finally posted my OP, I had it written in plenty of time to post by midnight, but photobucket took for-freaking-ever to upload my photos.
Very nice story about Ralph, although the ending made me teary eyed, as did some of the following stories. When my brothers and I were in diapers we had a black and tan german shepard named Schnapps, mostly called Schnappsie. She was a very good babysitter, removing our diapers before my mom knew that we needed a change. She always chased the grey squirrels, but quit after she caught one and it ripped her face up. On my seventh birthday we were in the family station wagon going to pick up my birthday present - a big dollhouse! Schnappsie began to run after the car, and as we turned out onto the busy road she was hit and killed. As my brothers and I were all piled into the back of the station wagon we saw it all. After stopping to take her body back to the house we went to get the dollhouse. I never did like the dollhouse, after months of happy anticipation.
To everyone who commented on my photos, I am glad that you enjoyed them. I enjoyed taking them, and being out and about for no other reason then visiting some of my favorite places.
It is so gratifying to run into an ex who has since lost all his hair, while your current man has hair to spare, isn’t it puggy? That’s not a slam against all men who are in various states of hair loss, it’s the ex-factor which makes it sweet.
I believe the word for that in English is playpen. By the way, thank you for the music referral from last week, I haven’t had a chance to do any searching yet, but I appreciate the information. I do love folk music, and music with any Spanish influence. I know what you mean about not understanding most of the lyrics and still have tears streaming, music moves me to tears often, even music without lyrics, I am such a sop! Oh, and thanks for requesting the merger of the MMP’s!
Hmmm, MBG, just how do you picture Kodiak? Should I post the photo of the McDonald’s and Pizza Hut? Maybe the closed KFC and Domino’s? I only covered a small portion of the road system before I filled my memory card, I’ll show more photos of different places on the island as time goes by.
You know MamaTigs when my mom comes up for a visit she always raves about the purity of the air, and the incredible distance of visibility. When I left Washington the air was still clean, and even from as far north as I lived Mt. Rainier was visible on a clear day. Apparently it is no longer.
As MamaTigsH mentioned we call them pussy willows, as they are willow branches, and the catkins are soft and grey like pussy cats. I’ll go ahead and volunteer for TMI for the week, when I was a very young child (maybe as old as five) I shoved a pussy willow catkin up my nose. I have always been an allergic person, and my mom was concerned when I had thick green discharge coming from my nostril. A visit to the doc and he removed a nasty pussy willow catkin from my wee nose. Apparently I had shoved that thing far up, and I remember the removal as being extremely uncomfortable, although the backed up mucus drained quickly and I felt oh so much better!
Oh enipla we still have snow, and the ground is still frozen 4 - 5 feet deep! Here is a small indication of it:
Hi db, glad you enjoyed my excursion. My dreams of bears generally entail my watching in horror as a bear eats my children. I told my then therapist about my dreams and asked what he thought they meant. He asked me what I thought they meant, and I said “That I am afraid of bears!” He laughed, and we agreed that there was nothing hidden in those dreams! I did just purchase a book entitled Kodiak Island And It’s Bears by Harry B. Dodge III. I haven’t read it yet, but I have looked at the photos and looked up some of the old time guides whom I either know/knew, or know their families. It looks to be an interesting book.
boofae your visit to the Sikh temple sounds fascinating! You have so much going on in your life, I get tired just reading about your exploits!
hehehe Ellen, not only do we have mallards, we have a duck with ducklings crossing sign on the road by Beaver Lake. We also have just about every sea duck there is, and they are very good roasted!
I am so sorry StGermain, and I feel your loss.
Thanks for the comments brainpasture. Pretty much anywhere on the island a ten minute walk puts you in the Bush, away from people and in the midst of wildlife. It really is very cool to be able to truly get away from it all without ever having to get into a car.
FCM my mom had a dog named Deeogee, and my uncle had a dog named Phydeaux. Different sides of the family, weirdness on both sides!
Yeah, but I told you what happens when a bear gets stuck in one of the dumpsters…
Heffaroo I don’t know where you visited Alaska, but your description was dead on for Larsen Bay (the village) and not too far off from Kodiak city! We are just a big village here after all.
Summers here are glorious SCL, even though I whine about the drizzle and clouds, it’s my own fault for choosing to live on a rock in the Gulf of Alaska. A couple of years ago I was in Anchorage, and in some of the flower beds at the hospital there were artichokes flourishing, with flower buds larger than my fist! I wanna live where I can grow artichokes! Things like impatiens, hostas, begonias and fuchsias do very well here, along with the indigenous siberian iris, mosses, ferns and devil’s club though. Zinnias just sit and mold. I am totally with you on the book situation, skiffman is always ready to “donate” my books to the local thrift store, yet he has piles and piles of things like a gazillion VHS tapes no one has ever watched, and empty cd cases for cd’s that are no longer with us, and trashed cd’s for which there is no cover even if they were playable. The last time we moved I trashed the entire jumble of cassette tapes, there were hundreds between the both of us, and since we never listen to the tapes, it was just so much more junk. Or, in his mind, Junque, lol!
Yes tarra Satine is a she. Her name is Mojo’s Come What May, call name Satine. Have you watched The Moulin Rouge? She is named after a tear-my-heart-out song, and for the (female) lead character. And thanks for saying that she’s pretty, I don’t have many litters, but she is one of my home bred pups, and I think I did a good job of matching her parents up. Both of her parents live with me, along with her grandmother, aunt, half uncle, half brother/half uncle, a full sister and one of her littermate brothers is boarding here for the time being. I also have a couple of male outcrosses who are also related within five generations or less. People think I am the crazy dog lady, but they keep me company, and the house isn’t devoted to dogs, although there are a number of open crates and kitty/little doggy beds strewn about.
ems Squeeeeeee!!! about the house!!! I hope that it quickly becomes your home!
Aw Gleena, I hope that you are able to get your dog/cats/SSG thing straightened out with no more problems, it’s such a bother when certain people decide that their rights are more important than yours.
Oh and li-li I love your comment to the telemarketer!
I am phobic about spiders, I am NOT opening any more spidery links…eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!
Currently I am having to deal with the big black ones that come in every spring and fall, they freaking JUMP! Actually my dealing with them involves backing as far away as possible, pointing and squealing until someone comes and squishes it. I am truly a wuss when it comes to spiders and a few other bugs. Bears I can handle, but not spiders. (or cockroaches, or earwigs, centipedes and millipedes and anything slimy like slugs. shudder)
Wow bobbio, what a major f-up your wife and you have been through with the hospitals and diagnosis. Give her my best, from one lupie to another, and I know that you are taking good care of her. Sucks about the truck though, from lack of air bag deployment to the totaled vehicle with one payment left. Probably you could use a hug as well, so consider yourself hugged!
Actually tel your earrings sound cool, even if you are lopsided! If you were my daughter you would have the rainbow in one ear and a pair of small hoops in the other, so I don’t think your arrangement makes you a nerd!
Yay for gallbladderless welby! Yay for the good drugs, too!
Oh Taters I hear the same song from my parents regarding Washington’s taxes, and how all the money goes to Seattle proper and to hell with the rest of the state. My dad was talking about moving to the dry side, apparently there is a “movement” to induce Olympia to spread the money equally. It may be my hometown, but I do not see myself living there again. Seattle on it’s own is so different than when I was growing up, and now the area north and east is so built up. When I went to high school in Marysville the school was surrounded on two sides by cow pasture, and the other two sides were cornfields. Now they have built over all the Strawberry fields, and they don’t even have the Strawberry Festival anymore. I imagine that Sea Fair has also evolved to the degree I wouldn’t recognize it. I would entreat you to move North like I did, but even we are having freakish legislation, the politicians are all on the take, Ted Stevens, and his son Ben Stevens for example, just google the names + Alaska. Add the fact that Exxon (which is now a very bad word here) has yet to pay for the disaster in 1989 and that there is a group trying to open a gold mine in the headwaters of several major salmon spawning streams, and the proposed gas pipeline people are trying to get our gas shunted off through Canada, well, as soon as I get my kids grown and on their own footing I would really like to head deeper into the Bush and off the grid. Raaa, that’s my political grrr for now!
Poor Maggie, I sure hope that the tumor removal goes smoothly and that after all is well for her and you, dogvalet.
I have some more purging to do when skiffman goes back out fishing, I wonder what I will find underneath his piles. Hopefully nothing as large as a bed!
In my experience blackberries cannot be removed or trellised, they can only be occasionally whacked into a resemblance of domesticity. Just sayin’…
swampy when you refer to “bald peanuts” are you saying boiled peanuts? Because I have heard of them, but they don’t exist up here, and I have to wonder at the lure of boiled peanuts. I love peanuts (well, all nuts, which accounts for some of the people in my life!) but boiled?
Good Luck on the job hunt Nashiitahsh, and now I can’t get the thought of pool bottoms covered in frogs eggs, eeeeeeeeeeeee!!!
Top of page four, I am not opening either of those links pugs, I know that there be spiders there!!!
Happy Birthday Sean!
Well, this is as close as I am going to get to being caught up. Our weather has turned overcast and drizzly again, and even though I can see flats of bedding plants through the Plexiglas walls of the local greenhouse they haven’t opened yet. Traditionally June 1st is reserved as the beginning of planting season, and buying stuff now requires that it be brought in and out of the house every day. My fingers are itchy to get into the dirt, but I have to wait. I am really loving my haircut, the kids are all good, yesterday was the anniversary of our first wedding so I got a dozen yellow roses, two bars of Hershey’s All Natural Extra Dark Chocolate, one with macadamia nuts and cranberries, the other with cranberries, blueberries and almonds, fairly good stuff. Oh and some Jelly Belly’s, cuz I really love them, and a book which was begun by Michael McDowell and finished posthumosly by Tabitha King. With Sunday being Mother’s Day, it looks like it will be a good week for me!
I was going to add a few more photos here, but I think this is plenty long enough for now! I’ll show you more Kodiak later.
Ta!
Happy buffday, Sean!
CanineValet, sorry to hear about Maggie Wonderbeagle’s medical woes, I hope she comes through ok. Sadly it’s often the bank account that suffers the most!
Kai - when I first moved over here, I was living on my own and didn’t know anyone at all so I joined an activity club. Since then, I seem to have no spare time at all, and that was about five years ago! This weekend’s fun and excitement involves a long drive down to Southampton and an underwater helicopter escape - the event write up says this: “The session starts with a full safety briefing, and you will have to sign a medical form declaring any medical conditions. You will then enter the pool for the first 45 degree exit from the capsule, which will prove challenging, everyone will also have a second safety briefing while in strapped into the casual. Then the fun really begins the scenario; your are onboard a helicopter, on your way to the North Sea Oil Platform, then you hear a loud bang! lights start flashing, alarms start ringing, the pilot is sending out a mayday (we are ditching, prepare for impact)… You will be strapped in and the lights will go out, sirens will sound and you will be turned upside down for you escape. To finish the session you will have a life boat drill, in storm force simulated conditions, and maybe even a race or two. The 2 hour session proves to be a great fun experience.” I think the only medical condition here will be insanity!
Rosie - sorry your post got et, and sorry you’re feeling blue. Perhaps a little magenta will brighten your morning.
Serious question time - a friend of mine has just bought himself an Orange SPV M1000 and wants to know how to set it up for WiFi. Why he’s asking me is anybody’s guess, I know as much about WiFi as I do about nuclear physics, so you can guess just how much that is! Anybody got any bright ideas?
Happy Belated Birthday, Sean and Josh!
I’ve spent the morning being trained. Yesterday afternoon got trained too. The guy from yesterday was pretty surprised that I was familiar with the material he was showing because I spent a couple months saying I was familiar with it and he spent the same couple months ignoring it and I finally gave up. I have more training this afternoon and tomorrow morning.
Had to tell the people from the supermarket to not bring the clotheswasher today, because of the afternoon training 
So they’ll be bringing it on the Wednesday after I come back from Spain, which means I know exactly which clothes will get packed to bring to Spain: the dirty ones!
Talked with Mom on the phone, verified where and when is it we’re having the lunch. I’d asked Bro but he’d said “oh, same place as always.” “Same place as always” is the same place as two years ago and twelve years ago but none of the years in between! But, “same place as always” Mom reminded me that there’s very good stores Back Home so if I don’t find stuff I like-like-like in downtown Barcelona it’s not like we live in the desert.
Before I got this job, I was able to get a visit with the neurologist (I have vertigo and tremors and dissociation problems, which are bloody fun, specially when the episodes include anxiety and depression). The neurologist wasn’t very convinced that I have anything which may be neurology related, but every other specialty she said I should see was one I’d already seen and been pronounced perfect by and she has it in the 'puter, so she couldn’t say I was just pulling her leg. She ordered an MRI (low priority) and a bunch of blood tests which I was supposed to get done within days of the MRI; I fully intended to go home and get all tested up at whatever time they gave me for the MRI. At some point I mentioned I found it strange that the letter for the MRI hadn’t arrived yet and asked Mom if she’d ask about it - and she said it had arrived and she’d canceled it. Have I ever canceled a doctor’s appointment for her? No, I’ve called her and read the letter over the phone and then rescheduled if necessary. But this is one of those things where it isn’t even “my” Mom, it’s the majority of Moms who do this
SiL-now-my-GP wants to order some tests she’s thought of but she thought I might still have the list of what the neurologist ordered and what the hell, we may as well do it all, so I read the list of Stuff The Neurologist Ordered for Mom. I don’t even know what half of it is. When I read “HIV” Mom went all “uh? what, you need to be tested for HIV?” “well, it’s pretty much a standard now, plus it’s one of those things you can have for years and not know, they do it in the yearly checkup for workplaces too so I’ve had it twice already. Which means if I test positive this time I got it from somebody’s foul armpits in the subway, given the state of my sex life.” “Oh - so any day they’ll start testing me for it.” “And Grandma.” “Should be Grandpa… :p”
Good Mornin’ Y’all! I sit here caffienatin’ up and wondering why I got up at freakin’ 5:30 A.M.! I guess it has to do with conkin’ out at 8:30 P.M. and sleepin’ like a log all night. I didn’t even get up to pee! Remember folks, once you’re over fifty the definition of pullin’ an all nighter is not wakin’ up and havin’ to go pee.
Here’s hopin’ everybody has or maybe had a good Thursday!
Morning all! I am up and caffeinating, then off to work. I’ll probably stop at Wally World on the way home for some tuna for the beagle.
Nava, you’re having armpit sex on the subway? You naughty girl. 
Funny you mention that. Both Boxers last night took an annoying interest in my boiled shrimp.
Up. At work. Caffeinating. Can only type in sentence fragments.
There is a wet cat on my lap. She was playing in the bathtub.
Cat for sale. Useless but cheap.
Nava, it’s not good manners to have sex on a busy subway.
Good morning, all! It’s less smoky than it was yesterday down here in south Florida, but it still feels yucky. Stoopid subtropical storm blowing smoke from fires hundreds of miles away to over here… It makes me glad I’m not a smoker, as my little asthmatic lungs don’t like being hazed up like this.
Nava, lucky they don’t ask about subway armpit sex on those questionnaires, eh? Apparently the testing they do “over there” is quite a bit more invasive than what I’ve been through here in The States. I’ve only had to pee in a cup to make sure I’m not a druggie.
I’m sitting in an office with other people, one of whom sits with her desk at a perpendicular angle from mine, and is the closest in proximity in the office. She also eats at her desk, makes smacky noises, and had tuna fish salad sandwich for lunch yesterday. I can’t necessarily tell her to stop (she has seniority over almost everyone in the dept.), and I can’t time my lunch to hers, as she eats intermittently throughout the day. No matter whether we eat at the same time or not, there will be moments throughout the day where she’ll be smacking on something else. Tomorrow is my last day, and I am glad I have a lot of self control, because otherwise I would have been fired for making her cry from her complete lack of manners or ability to give proper instructions or remember anything. :rolleyes:
Happy Belated Birthday, Sean!
Don’t need a wet cat, sorry.
In fact, I have yet to find a ‘useful’ cat, they’re just fun to have around. EXCEPT when they go on running-around-the-house-at-full-speed-and -across-the-bed-you’re-trying-sleep-on jags at 4 in the morning. Then the bathtub might seem like a good place for them.
(You listening Cuervo??)
It’s one of those days today that’s so nice out, I want to be ‘sick’. But I can’t, too many things I’m committed to, and they’re ALL indoors!!!
Crap.
In this morning’s training, the four of us were having to look at the screen on the trainer’s laptop (no projector); thankfully he had it on a desk. He smells weird! Part of it was the three-piece suit, I don’t know what laundry service he takes those to but they always smell bad. Part of it was that I was having strong impulses to offer him some sugar-free chewing gum every time he opened his mouth… do people really not notice when their breath stinks bad enough to known a lab out?
Guess whose cellphone kept ringing until I suggested maybe he should switch it off, proposal that was enthusiastically seconded by the other two students :smack:
Tachi, in Spain drug testing for jobs would only be done for people who work with heavy machinery or who seemed intoxicated while in the workplace. But a yearly checkup is understood by most companies to be one of the requirements of the national Labor Safety Law. Most of mine have included chest Xrays or, if the “mutua” doing the exam already had a perfectly-fine Xray on record and since I’m not a smoker, just an examination of my spine by touch; weight, height, blood work, urine; for people over 50, feces; a look at your teeth (they don’t do dental work but they tell you if you need it). Last time, the doctor gave me this offended look and said “you have two fillings!” “yes, is that supposed to be news? They’ve been with me for 20 years”
