Just So’s You Know

Just so's you know I am not in the habit of murdering Christmas cacti, my other three are doing very well.   Here is the proof of life:  

That's partly why I don't understand why this one is struggling so much. 

I think one thing I'm going to try is to move it back into a smaller pot.  Most of the websites I've researched say they like to be just a bit root restricted, though not completely root bound.  It may be that her pot is too big.  I'm going to go look here in a little bit to see if I have a pot.  If not, I'll get one next time I go into town.  I may have to go to Lowe's, as Walmart probably won't have any this time of year.  

Ideally, I would wait until late spring early summer to move her, but given how much she is struggling, I want to give her the best possible shot at surviving, so I'm going to go ahead and re-pot as soon as I can. 

Speaking of, do you remember the bit I pulled up that looked like it was dying?  I had put it into a vase with water, but it didn't look like it was improving any.  I know people who can root Christmas cactus cuttings in water, but I've never been successful at doing that, so I took it out and put it into a pot.   

I've rooted multiple cuttings this way, so I'm a bit more hopeful that this will work.  If not, it will end up in the compost  -- which is where it would have gone anyway.   

While we're on the subject of plants, look at this!  Do you see?  The little green bits are my garlic coming up. 

I didn't expect them to grow so quickly.  I've got three, even though you only see two in the photo.  Full disclosure, these are the ones which had the most growth even before I planted them, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. 

And it looks like my celery is taking off, too.  It's definitely improved since I cut the wilted parts off.  

In other news, my big project for the day was to move all of my old firewood up closer to the house.  

There wasn't as much left as I thought there would be, but I also moved some of it over to this side.   

Most of this is smaller pieces, which I want to save for the fire pit, but that's neither here nor there.  The point is, I finally had the right side of this shed cleaned out

 and ready for my new firewood rack.   

Even though I took a couple of breaks to watch Special Forces: 

The World's Toughest Test, it didn't take long at all to put the rack together, and here it is:  

I even started putting a little firewood into it. 

That was all I did, because by that time my legs were aching from squatting down to put the thing together, and of course, this thing didn't even offer to help. She just sat there and looked disapprovingly at me.    Kind of like Inspector Gadget does.  

Once I get the dirt emptied out of my wheelbarrow, I'll start moving wood in earnest.  

Well, the rain they promised us didn't arrive, though it's looked all day like the bottom could drop out at any point.  They're still saying we have a chance of scattered showers, but most of it has gone to the south of us.  We have a much better chance of rain on Tuesday, then it's going to get cold again.  If I had known we wouldn't get any rain, I'd have put a little fire in the fire pit and sat outside for a bit.  

As it is, I sat inside and finished this hat.  

Yarn:  Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn

Colorway:  Plums

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8

And finally, the lady who wanted the glasses hasn't showed up yet, either.  I'm not too worried about it just yet, because if she planned to come by after work, it's still too early for that.  I'll give her until Monday, and if she hasn't come by then, I'll post them into the group again.  

Keep your fingers crossed.  

Oh, I almost forgot.  Spoiler alert, Jusse Smollett was one of the first people to get DQed from the Special Forces show.  Not surprising, all he did while he was there was moan about how nobody believed him when he faked that hate crime against himself. 

"I got attacked, and they all said I was lying!"  

Yeah, because the two guys you paid with a check to attack you said you paid them to attack you.  And the hardware store where you bought the rope and bleach -- which you paid for with a check -- said you bought the rope and bleach yourself.  Not only that, do you really expect anyone in deep blue Chicago would be claiming that it was MAGA country?  

Son, your story has more holes than a slice of Swiss cheese and if you hadn't been pardoned by the Autopen, you'd still be in prison.  

I'm also getting tickled at Kody Brown getting a reality check.  He's running up against people he can't push around, and it's hilarious to me to watch those DIs stand up to him while he pees his pants.  

In fact, I think I'll go watch the last episode and see if he survives.  

Laters. 

I'm Free!

I had planned on going to the store straight after work this afternoon and getting that out of the way and over with, but I got so excited about being off until next month, I completely forgot and came home.  Oh well, I can always go one day next week -- except that I'm out of milk, so I guess I'll go tomorrow.  

Except that it's supposed to start raining tomorrow, and rain off and on for the next five days.  Then it's going to get cold again, so I got my little piece of visqueen out of the shed and put it onto my wood pile. 

It wasn't big enough.  I have a whole roll of the stuff somewhere, but I can't remember where I put it.  No matter, I still have all of this wood from the last batch I bought and the little tree I got cut down last spring, which I'm going to use up first.  

By the way, I got my Voya claim back, but instead of buying another garden bed, I bought a firewood rack.  I haven't put it together yet, because I want to move all of that wood on the right up to the house and stack it near the back door.  Then I'll clean that side out really well and put the rack there.  I'll feel better with the wood in a rack so that the stack is more stable than it just being piled up there with nothing but hope to hold it in place. 

As soon as I get that done, I'll start moving the new wood into the rack, and by the time I need it, it'll be good and dry.  I mean, it's already well seasoned.  My coworker told me it's been in a barn for about 7 years.  His son is the maintenance man/caretaker at someone's deer camp.  He takes care of the cabins and grounds, and whenever he sees a fallen tree, he cuts it up and puts it into a barn on the property.  When he has time, he cuts it up and splits it, then my coworker sells it for him.  

Heh, he told me when he pulled into the parking lot at work, he had people coming up to him asking how much he wanted for that wood.  He had to tell them that wood was already sold.  I told him, "See, I'm drumming up new business for you."

Speaking of projects, today's project was to move the pile of dirt that used to be here and I didn't think to take a before photo until it was too late, 

and combine it with this larger pile of dirt.  Size 9.5 women's house shoe for scale. 

So now, I only have one pile of dirt instead of two.  It's the little things.  I still need to get a dirt work guy to come take down the high spots, but that isn't going to happen today.  Maybe one day this week, I can get that call made.  

You know what isn't a little thing?  Goofball sized hail.  

Yes, this is a real tweet.  I went to NWS Memphis X account and verified it.   And yes, I do know it's a typo, but it's still funny.  Of course, my first thought was, "Hail as big as my cat??? WOW!"  Because she's a goofball, you know. 

When I got home this afternoon, I posted these glasses in the local free-bees group, and got a bite on them pretty quickly.  

She said she's going to come get them tomorrow afternoon, so fingers crossed that she shows up.  She also asked if I wanted a kitten, to which I said, "No, thank you."  

That's about all I have for today.  I've found a new season of Special Forces: World's Toughest Test on Hulu, and I need to watch it.  This season has Johnny Football (Manziel), Jusse Smollett, and Kody Brown on it.  

That ought to be interesting. 

I Can Haz

Firewood!

As expected, my coworker delivered the load of firewood right after work.  It took him two hours to unload and stack it all, and though I'm glad to have the wood, I was also glad when he'd finished and gone.  I can't ever seem to relax when someone else is at my house.  Even if it's only outside. 

I've got some visqueen in the shed, so tomorrow I'll cover the stack before the expected rains begin.  

Just out of curiosity, I looked it up in the blog, and it was two years ago almost to the day that my last load was delivered.  I still have quite a bit of that load left.  Maybe even enough to last the year, but that's something I don't want to run out of.  

Better yet, that's something I can mark off of my to-do list, which now looks like this: 

 

For reference, this is what my original list looked like. 

One day this next week, I'm going to try to get up on the roof and run that brush up and down my stovepipe a time or two, then that'll be one more thing I can mark off.  

Oh, and while he was here, the deer decided to make an appearance.  He called me out and asked if those were my pets, and was impressed at how unafraid they are.  I told him they are used to me being in the yard, and I can get almost out to the fence before they run away.  

In other news, I have one more day of work, then I'm off for the rest of the month.  As is their custom, the plant fed us today.  Chicken tenders and fried catfish, with fries, hushpuppies, and salad.   The food was good.  The process...not so much.  They gave us an extra 15 minutes, and it was a good thing, too because it took longer than that just to get through the line.  

I was silently fussing all the while:  "How many times do we have to tell you?  Have the plates made up ahead of time!"  Such a simple thing to make the process so much more efficient, but they never listen to me. 

By the way, Inspector Gadget is mad.  See, ever since they told us we had to start wearing steel toed boots a couple of years ago, they have a truck that comes around every year -- usually in November -- where we can get some, and the plant will cover up to $100 of the cost.  

Yesterday, IG told us at the morning meeting that we could not go out to the shoe truck during work hours.  We had to go before or after work, or on our lunch break.  It didn't make any sense, especially with as much time as we stood around doing nothing while waiting on work yesterday.  Well, someone went to HR and complained, and apparently word got back to the new boss.  He said they had to let us take turns going during work hours.  

You could practically see the steam coming out of Inspector Gadget's ears. 

I tried not to laugh.  At least, not very much.  I mean I didn't laugh very much, not that I didn't try very much. But I got me some new work boots.  I'm not looking forward to breaking them in, though.  Good thing I just bought a new pair from Amazon back in the spring.  I can still wear those for a while.  

And finally, I realized somewhere around noon today that I had totally whiffed on a very important day-- my twentieth blogiversary.  It was Saturday, and I'd wanted to do something really special, being that 20 years is such an important milestone, and I got so caught up in football that I completely forgot.  

I was going to highlight some of my favorite posts, and talk about how blogging has changed over the last two decades, and even about how it might be making a comeback, given how toxic most social media sites have become.  But I didn't do any of that.

Oh, well... maybe I can work some of that into future posts.  Right now I've got to go get a good night's sleep so I can start dreading the next phone call I need to make. 

Laters. 

About Had It

I've about had it with these Monday night games, I'm telling you.  Yep, the Cowboys played on Monday night for the second game in a row.  Of course, they had a bye week in between, but still...As usual, I fell asleep, this time at half time.  I woke up briefly with three minutes left in the third quarter, and the next thing I know, Kimmel was on.  

I turned that off really quickly and went back to sleep.  

Alas, the night was still too short and that alarm went off way too early.  I just wish my work day had gone by as quickly as the night did.  I was another one of those days when we spent more time waiting on work than actually working.  I hate those days.  They go by so very slowly.  

To make matters worse, we have Inspector Gadget standing over us every day, telling us to hurry up, get our numbers up, do better.  Just like all the others.  They can't seem to understand that we can't braze parts we don't have. I mentioned that to one of my coworkers, and she replied, "He's nervous about his job."  I'd heard he's already got two strikes.  If he fails at this, he's gone. 

Oh, don't get me wrong.  I don't think he's a bad person, but not everyone is cut out to be a supervisor.  I'm thinking, surely there's something else he can do out there that is more suited to his skills and temperament. 

On a similar note, my other coworker did come tell me, "I think I'm going to bring that wood tomorrow."  I started to ask him about his grandbaby's program, but didn't. I figured he's a grown man and can get himself to where he needs to go on time.  Then he told me he was going to bring the entire trailer to work and come straight over to deliver it afterwards.  

Knowing he wasn't coming today, I got my little garlic cloves together and planted them.  

I'm not exactly sure why I took a picture -- you can't see them.  Because they're planted.  Under the dirt.  But what can I say?  I am who I am.

I was only going to plant three, and mince and freeze the rest, but the more I peeled, the more I found that had sprouted.  I ended up planting 8 cloves.  If all goes well, I'll have a nice garlic harvest next fall.  Or whenever you harvest garlic.  I'll have to look into that.  

Oh, and don't worry about that big hole.  That's the space I reserved to plant another rosemary plant in the spring. 

While I was out there, I trimmed some of the dead bits off of my celery, which I'm hoping will strengthen the new growth. 

Then I trimmed the dead bits off of my lemon balm, 

 along with the other transplanted herbs, but I didn't take pictures of the rest of them.  

Speaking of pictures, this one popped up in my Facebook memories.  This is what Gloria looked like a mere seven years ago. 

I do wish I knew what I'd done to have nearly killed her.  The good news is, she hasn't dropped any more segments since Sunday, so maybe she's on the upward way.  

New heights she's gaining every day

No higher plan that she has found

She'll plant her feet on higher ground...

OK, then, I guess that means it's time to stop for the day.  Maybe I'll go sing some hymns or something. 

Laters.

Last Week

Why is it that I can sleep fine all weekend long, but on Sunday nights I toss and turn all night?  So it was last night.  I don't think I got to sleep before midnight, but that alarm is relentless and went off at 4:30 anyway.  

I did not want to get up, I'm telling ya, but somebody has to pay the bills around here, so out of bed I got and off to work I went.  Shortly after I got there, I tracked down the coworker with the firewood, and said, "I've been checking the weather forecast, and it's supposed to rain on Friday.  We might need to re-schedule that delivery."

He replied, "I saw that too, and was going to come talk to you about it."  We chatted a bit, discussing options, and he said he'd get the wood to me before the rain moves in Thursday night.  I think we settled on them (my coworker and his son) coming tomorrow, but I'm not completely sure.   I'm mostly sure, because he said he's got to go to his grandbaby's program on Wednesday.  He didn't go into details, so I don't know if it's school or church, but it doesn't matter. It's his grandbaby and he's going to be there.  

I mentioned that the rain is supposed to start sometime Thursday night, so he may want to bring it before then.  That leaves tomorrow.  So I guess he's coming tomorrow.   I think that's what we decided on.  I guess I'll be surprised, too. 

In other news, I forgot to tell you yesterday that I got my second batch of sweet potatoes boiled down and mashed, and wouldn't you know it, I have enough for another casserole and another pie.  I thought I'd bought fewer.  I guess I didn't. 

While I was doing that and cleaning up afterwards, I discovered some of my garlic that I'd bought back during the summer to make pesto with had started to sprout.  

I'd intended to mince what garlic I'd had left over, but I never got around to it.   I asked Gemini, and he said, why yes you can plant that stuff and it'll grow.  Tomorrow after work, I'm going to sort out the cloves that have sprouted and plant them in this bed, next to the celery  -- which is finally looking like it might survive. 

The taller stalks look pretty pathetic, but it looks like new growth is coming up from the bottom.  So, squee.  I'm excited about that.  

At the other end of the spectrum, I'm pretty concerned about Gloria.  Friday morning, I came into the kitchen to discover she had dropped a lot of segments.  Leaves.  Whatever they are.  

Saturday, she seemed better, then Sunday she dropped another segment.  Only one, so that's a good sign.  She hasn't dropped any more since, and I'm hoping whatever was distressing her has passed.  I think I might have been overwatering her again, so I've cut way back.  I also found out that you're not supposed to let them get below 60, and I'd left mine outside until it got down into the 40s.  Maybe that's why mine have been struggling.  Next year, I'll know better and will bring them inside any time it drops into the 50s.  

In knitting news, I made one slight adjustment to this hat.  

The fabric seemed just a little too stiff to me, so I moved the hat to a larger needle.  A US 5, for my fellow knitters.  

For you knitting muggles out there, it's pretty common to knit the ribbing on a smaller size, then switch to a larger needle for the body of the hat.  I did not tink back to the ribbing before I switched, since it was only about half an inch.  Even so, it already feels better.  It's much easier to knit, as well.

And finally, as promised, I dug the set of 8 glasses out of the big box, and put them into a smaller box.  

Then I pulled these five goblets out and put them into a separate box as well.  

I haven't posted the photos in the give-away groups yet, but I will.  Cross your fingers that someone comes and claims them.  

I hate to just throw stuff like this into the garbage.  

Beautiful Sunday

It was another one of those days today.  You know the kind I mean -- a day so beautiful you can't stay inside, so I sat out in my chair for a good bit.  I read a couple of chapters of my book, and just sat there enjoying the day for a while.  Then I came back inside and watched TV and knit.  

Last night, after I blogged, I remembered this was the weekend A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving is free on Apple TV, so I watched it while knitting on the latest sailor hat. 

I finished that hat this morning, while watching the latest Great American Christmas movie, which I'd DVRed last night so I could watch the football games. 

Yarn:  Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn

Colorway:  Sunset

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8

It didn't take long until I had cast on another one, and  have made good progress on it, while finally getting around to watching The Christmas Chronicles on Netflix.  It was pretty good, but not something I'll watch over and over again.  

Anyway, here is hat progress. 

Yarn:  Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn

Colorway:  Plums

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8

I have one more skein of the Hobby Lobby yarn after this one, then I'll have to do some more in Red Heart until I can get back up to Batesville.  This will be my last week of work until after Thanksgiving, so maybe I can get up there one day while I'm off.  

Looks like I'm going to have to take that box of glasses and mugs up there anyway, because no one has yet come to get any.  I guess those are things everyone already has enough of.  Maybe I should dig out the fancier glasses and advertise them separately.  I'll do that tomorrow after work if they're still there. 

And finally, I checked the weather report and it looks like I might have to re-schedule my firewood delivery, because it's supposed to be raining all this weekend.  I'll talk to my coworker about it tomorrow. 

That's about all I have for today, so I'll see you tomorrow. 

Laters

Quick Post

This'll be a quick post, because once again, I'm going to need all of my screens to watch the games I want to watch.  I already watched Navy hold off South Florida, and LSU squeak out a win over Arkansas in The Battle Of The Boot.  

Right now, I'm watching Alabama vs. Oklahoma, and I can't decide which team I want to lose.  I suppose it'd have to be Oklahoma...Texas, Ol' Miss, and Mississippi State all play later this evening, and all at the same time. 

But I did want to take time to give you a knitting update.  I finally made the transition to the second color in the Demeter hat, and I like the way the colors blended.    

I did it by knitting one round with a strand of color A and a strand of color B held together, then a round of two strands of color A, then a round of A & B, then two rounds of color B...you get the idea.  I just hope I remember what I did when it comes time to add color C.  

Heh...

Yarn:  Jem Luxe Fibers

Colorway:  Demeter collection 

Pattern:  I'm making it up as I go

Needles:  US 4/ 3.5 mm

And I finally cast on another sailor hat.  

Yarn:  Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn

Colorway:  Sunset

Pattern:  Basic Beanie

Needles:  US 8/ 5 mm

In other news, nobody has bitten on the box of mugs and glasses yet, so I guess I'll call the soup kitchen and see if they want them.  If not, I'll haul them up to Goodwill in Batesville next time I go.  Before I do that, I picked this one out to keep.  

It's actually a soup mug, and holds about a pint of soup.  

I was eating Campbell's potato soup in this one.  I'm going to go get the rest here in a minute.  

I changed my mind this morning and moved the peppermint into the center of the planter.  

I'm sure it'll do better there than in the corner.  One of my plans is to make peppermint extract with it, and maybe regular mint extract with the other one.  I might even try again with an orange mint from a reputable place like Burpee.  We'll see. 

And finally, your meme of the day:  

It's even worse when the road has no lines on it...like here in my county.  

OK, I'mma go get my soup now, and since I finally got around to baking my birthday cake, I'll have a slice of that, too.  

Laters. 

It’s Something

I'm sure you'll all be pleased to know that I got my pathetic self together enough to box up all of the mugs and glasses I no longer want and put them out into the car port. 

Oh, don't worry.  I still have plenty of mugs in the cabinet.  

More than I need, really, but most of these have some sentimental value -- and some I just like and didn't want to give up, even though I seldom drink from them.  

I advertised the box in three local groups, but so far nobody's bitten.  I'm hoping it's because most people are still at work.  Maybe someone will claim them, because there's some nice drinking glasses in that box.  I'd hate to have to throw them into the garbage.  

On a similar note, my coffee pot has this base that you can remove, and dispense the coffee directly into your insulated mug. 

I used to do this all the time, until I bought my ice maker and didn't have room for the pot any more.  I'm probably going to start doing it again, now that I have my baker's rack.  I showed Cody a picture of it, and he wants to get one for him and Brennan.  He said she's been wanting something like that so they can have some more counter space, so I sent him the link to this one.  

Once all that was done, I went and pulled up all of my dead basil.  For a dead plant, it still smelled really good.  I put it all into the compost, but wasn't ready to stop playing in the dirt, so I transplanted my lemon balm. 

The freeze got the leaves, but the roots are still healthy -- at least they were until I ripped them out of the planter.  In two years, it had grown such an extensive root system that when I tried to pull it out, the whole planter lifted.  I used my fingers to loosen the soil as best I could, but still broke a few of the smaller roots before I could get it out.  I only hope I didn't damage it too much.  

I'm going to give it a few days to settle in, then I'll trim off all of the frostbitten parts and hopefully, it'll come back in the spring.  I'd thought maybe I could get six of these into that bed, but from the look of things, only two will fit.  Two should be enough, though. 

While I was at it, I also transplanted my Greek Oregano.  

This bed wasn't quite full of dirt, and I had to pile it all up on one side until I get some more.  That brick thing is there for erosion control until I can fill the other side back up.  I'd thought briefly about moving the dirt from this planter,

but didn't, because I'd have to buy more dirt to fill this one back up anyway.  So, I'll just buy dirt for the bed, then move my French Tarragon into the other side. 

The last thing I did was to move my mint plant from the pot it was in to the other side of this planter.  

 The label said it was an orange mint, but so far, I'm not getting a hint of orange from it.  I think it might just be plain mint.  I didn't move the peppermint.  I'll just let it spread and take over the entire half of the planter.  I put a plastic divider between the two sides -- right underneath the wooden one.  Hopefully, that'll keep them separated.  

That was the end of my gardening adventures for today -- unless I get a wild hair and go move my Rosemary into its permanent spot.  Might as well...

OK, I'm back and miss rosemary is all settled into her permanent home. 

And my little herb garden is well on its way.  

There has also been knitting, but that update will have to wait until tomorrow.  Right now, I need to go do something about all the stuff on my kitchen counters.  

But I'll probably just sit and watch TV...