I Survived

I made it through the long night of storms.  National weather service confirmed that six tornadoes touched down in Mississippi last night.  I've read of five deaths, but none in Mississippi that I know of.  I shared a video on my Facebook page that someone took here in town.  Since it's a FB video, not a YouTube video, I can't share it here, but you can go look on my wall.  I've set the post to public, so you can see it even if you aren't in my friends list.

I got to work today, and that's all we were talking about for a while.  Lots of my coworkers said they had hail, and one coworker said she had all the windows in her house blown out.  The front office area of the plant had some water damage, but I don't know whether it was from broken windows or what.  One of my coworkers said the roof collapsed, but I can't confirm that.  I went up to HR for something, and we got to talking about that big storm that hit the plant back in 1999.  The HR person wasn't there back then, but I was.

I was at home, but since I lived within shouting distance of the plant at that time, I was right there in the thick of it.  The thing I remember was trying to open the door to get the dog (that would be Katie, for those of you who remember my dogs) inside, and the suction was so strong, I couldn't get the door open.  I said the dog would have to fend for herself.

She was fine, by the way, and lived for 10 more years.

I got to work the next morning, and the roof of the warehouse had been peeled back like a sardine can, and insulation was everywhere.  The wind hit so hard that the entire building was knocked askew.  Naturally, we didn't work that day.  They handed out the paychecks (it was a Friday), and sent everyone back home.  In the end, the plant was shut down for a week while they got a team of structural engineers to make sure the building wouldn't collapse on us.  I would have enjoyed that week a whole lot more if I'd known they were going to pay us for it.

Ah, good time, good times.

Speaking of work, my supervisor told me today, no more overtime.  It's going to be strange being able to sleep until 5:30 after getting up so early for so long.  Oh, it won't last long, though.  When we get back in January and begin ramping up production for peak season, they'll bring back the overtime.

Maybe then, I'll have something to talk about.

Oh, The Weather

outside is frightful, but it ain't snowing.

That's hail, thunderstorms, and tornadoes out there.  I got hail the size of ping pong balls and strong winds at my house.  It got so bad, it bent my flagpole.

My house looks nekkid without my flag on it, but I'm glad that's the worst damage I got.  I'm thankful for my carport, and I'm so thankful I went ahead and got that tree cut down.  I have a feeling these winds could have sent it tumbling.

One of my friends -- who lives pretty close to me-- said she had a funnel cloud go over her house, and some on the local FB group said she saw one go over the lake.  The worst of it has passed me now, but I still have friends facing this front.

My poor cousin Kathy...she and her family were in Gatlinburg yesterday, and had to evacuate due to the wildfires.  They drove back to Alabama today -- just in time to get caught in this mess.  I know she's seen all the weather she wants to for a while!  Still, thankful everyone I know is safe.

Now, how about something a little more cheerful.  I took a chance and put my tree skirt down Sunday afternoon.

So far, so good -- meaning the cat hasn't peed on it yet.  Let's hope that trend continues...

It's Beginning To Look

a lot like Christmas.

Well, a little like Christmas.  Yes, the tree is finally up.  When I got to this point, I seriously considered just leaving it like this.

But I didn't.  I'm still debating on putting a skirt down.  My cat likes to pee on them, you know.

 I really missed Cody helping with the stuff up high.  I had to get the ladder out to put the angel on top.  We were texting, and he said it felt really strange being on his own at this time of year.  I know what he means.  This is the first year in a long, long time that I've been completely on my own.  I do hope he can get some time off and come home for a day or two at Christmas.

Speaking of, I've got to go into that furniture store and raise heck.  Do you know I still haven't gotten the mattress I ordered from them?  Yeah, the one I ordered back in October.  I could have gotten one delivered by wagon train to Oregon by now.  Calling them has not produced any results.  They keep saying "any day now".

Back to decorating...I got two of my nativities put out.

Still trying to figure out where to put the rest of my stuff.  I've got all these shelves now, and don't know what to do with them.  I kind of wish my cousins Shelbi and Brittani were here.  They have the knack for decorating that I just don't have.

By the way, Navy scored 75 points against SMU.  Just thought I'd throw that out there.

Before I go to bed.

It's Officially Christmas!

I hope you all had a nice Thanksgiving.  I did, even though it was just me.  I'd asked Cody if he was coming home, and he said, "I'll try"  which is Cody code for "I don't really want to but don't want to hurt your feelings by saying so."  So, I wasn't really expecting him.  I had me a modest little dinner, just turkey, sweet potatoes, stuffing out of a box with giblet gravy (that I made), and jello salad.

I keep saying that one year, I'm going to get the hang of cooking a turkey.  This was not that year.  I probably should have taken the tent off sooner to let the skin brown a little more, but it tasted good anyway.  I'm glad they only gave me an 8 lb turkey this time around.  As it is, I'm going to have quite a bit to put into the freezer.  I reckon I really ought to find me a feller to help me eat up all this food I've got stashed away.

The rest of the day was filled with the parade, the National Dog Show, football, and watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.  Oh, and knitting.  I've been working on this scarf, and I must say, I'm very disappointed in the yarn.

I'm not even halfway through the skein and I've already found three knots.  Three!

Even worse, where the knots are interrupts the color changes.  Instead of having the nice, gradual blend like you see in the picture on the band, I have jarring, sudden color changes.  I got so frustrated that I wrapped it all up and stuffed it into a bag in the craft room.  After contacting the Lion Brand company and letting them know how disappointed I was, I picked up my sock yarn blanket and started a new square.

Much better...

Today, I got up and just took it easy most of the day.  My big accomplishment was to get all my Fall decorations down and packed away.  I was amazed at how easily everything went back into the storage box.  I usually have to wrestle, rearrange, and repack several times to get it all back in.  I was pretty pleased when I got it all back in the first go.  Once I'd hauled the box out to the shed and started bringing in the Christmas stuff, I figured out why it all fit back in so easily.  I'd left an entire bag full of stuff on the love seat.  Sigh...

Anyway, this is as far as I got with putting out the Christmas decorations.

I'd scooted the love seat over a little bit to make room for the tree.  I quickly discovered that I hadn't scooted it far enough.  By that time, the dog was sleeping on it, and I didn't want to disturb her.  She's old and cranky, you know.  I had to get on to her for snapping at the cat, who is also old and cranky.

Aaaand that's when any semblance of productivity ground to a halt.

I will try again tomorrow.

The Day Before

It's the day before Thanksgiving, and yes, I had to work.  It seemed like it was the longest day at work ever, but eventually it did come to an end.  Then I had to go to the store.

I debated for a long time whether I really wanted to go or not.  OK, I knew I didn't really want to go to the store on the day before Thanksgiving, but if Cody does come home tomorrow, he's going to want cranberry sauce and Dr Pepper.  Alas, I had no cranberry sauce and Dr Pepper.

I debated some more.  If I did go to the store, he probably wouldn't even come home.  If I figured he wouldn't come home and skipped going to the store, he'd be here bright and early tomorrow morning.  Expecting cranberry sauce and Dr Pepper.  What to do?  What to do?

Then I remembered....

I have no whipped cream for the pumpkin pie.

What is pumpkin pie without whipped cream?  I needed whipped cream.  So, I girded my loins and went to the store.  On the day before Thanksgiving.

Got the Dr Pepper.  Got the whipped cream.  Picked up another gallon of milk and some egg nog while I was there.  But I couldn't find the cranberry sauce.  I went all over the grocery section twice but still couldn't find it.  I considered leaving without it, but I'd already been through so much.  One more trip around the store, and finally I found it.  Cranberry sauce.  There on the top shelf.

I knocked down three little old ladies and climbed up some guy's back and snatched the only can they had left.

OK, not really.  I just got a can, but that isn't as Indiana Jones-ish.  Or as funny.

I got the can of cranberry sauce, checked out, and headed home.  Whereupon I discovered that I'd gotten the wrong kind.  I got whole berry sauce, not the jelly.  Cody likes the jelly.  Not the whole berry sauce.  Too bad.  I'm not going back to the store. He'll just have to eat what I got.

Except he probably won't even come home, since I went through all that just to get his cranberry sauce.

The little twirp.

First Frost

I've been having a hard time blogging lately.  I can't seem to think of anything to talk about, now that I don't have any projects going on in the new house.  I guess I'm kind of going through a post-painting letdown.  I still have to get the crown moulding up, but at this point, it's going to wait until after Christmas.  And I still have to get my mantle put back up, but I'm finding that rather intimidating at this point.  I may have to put out a cry for help.

Maybe the cutie that likes to flirt with me at the hardware store could do it for me....

Sunday morning, I woke up to a frosty white world.

That little fire in my wood heater sure felt good.

I'd originally planned on getting out that afternoon and working on cutting up that big pile of wood in my backyard, but I decided it was too cold.  What I actually did was to finish knitting a hat.

The yarn is some I had in my stash.  I think it's Red Heart in the colorway Gumdrop, but I'm not entirely sure.  I thought I had enough yarn to make a pom pom, but I didn't.  I tried, but it turned out a little too scraggly.  I stuck it back in the craft closet for now, because I couldn't bear to just throw it in the garbage.

Sunday's frost, followed by another hard freeze Sunday night, pretty much put the kibosh on my flower beds.  Today after work, I got out and pulled all the dead things up.  My poor beds look so empty and forlorn.

But they're better than being filled with dead plants.  I might get some winter flowers to plant in them for now.  Maybe pansies or something.  I'll have to research before buying anything.

What I have discovered is that there are spider lily bulbs all over this yard.

Even some still in my marigold bed.

Once the ground softens up enough, I'm going to transplant them into more convenient locations.  One of those locations being the bed right behind my house.  Maybe some along the side of my house.  I don't know yet, but anywhere is better than out in the middle of the yard.

Now, for those of you who didn't catch it earlier, we are working three days this week.  There was a rumor going around that we would only be working a half day tomorrow, but the Big Boss negated that.  "He can work all day, he doesn't have to cook," I said.

That being said, I'm going to end this post and get the first layer of my jello salad done before going to bed.

I don't know if Cody will be coming home, but whether he does or not, I'm still having a Thanksgiving dinner.

So there.

Yesterday And Today

I had a blog post all ready to post yesterday.  I'd mentally composed it while I was at work, and reworked it until I thought it was spot on.  It was a great post, another Dear Coworker post, or maybe a Thor's Day Mayhem post.  I hadn't decided which version to post, but either one would have been a doozy.  After I got home, I received some news that just threw my whole day out of sorts.

Back when I was growing up, our across the street neighbors had two kids -- a boy and a girl.  The boy was older, and he was the same age as my sister.  John and Susan, and my younger brother and sister were tight as kids.  They were like the fantastic foursome of our street.  Yesterday morning, John's wife posted that they'd had to rush him to the hospital, she didn't say why, only that it was bad.  After I got home from work, my sister informed me that he had died.  He was only 46.

I've known him pretty much all his life, and that just took the wind out of my sails.  After that, it just seemed somehow wrong to be sarcastic about a coworker, so that post will be postponed for a few days.

Now, let's brighten up this post with some good news, that being that I finally got my curtains hung back up.

Well, I got one set hung up.  These are the ones that used to hang in Cody's room.  I haven't hung the curtains on the small window yet, because I need to buy a curtain rod for it.  I know the bed is not centered under the window.  I may move it, I may not.  Depends on how it looks once I put the bookshelf I plan on buying in the corner and see how much room is left.

The only other thing I did was to go to the store and buy things for Thanksgiving dinner.  I wasn't sure how much to get, because I don't know if Cody is coming home or not.  I asked him and he said, "I'll try."  Not sure what that means, but oh, well.  I'm going to cook for me, and if he does come home, I'll just have fewer leftovers.

While I was there, I finally broke down and bought me a slightly smaller stock pot.

I'd had a great big one for a while.  I think it's a 16 qt, but I'm not sure.  I bought that one back when the plant was giving us those 20 lb turkeydactyls every year.  I needed one to boil the carcass down and make soup and it was big enough for that.  Last week, when I was cooking gumbo, I said to myself for probably the gazillionth time, "Self, you need a smaller stock pot."  So, I bought one.  This is an 8 quart pot.  I think I will break it in tomorrow, when I boil down the sweet potatoes for the casserole I'm going to make for Thanksgiving.

I also went buy the hardware store to see if they had those hooks to hang my Christmas lights with.  The outside lights, that is.  I was going to get some cup hooks and just screw them into my eaves and leave them.  I want the smaller kind, 1/2 " or so, and nobody seems to have anything smaller than 7/8'.  I can't even find them on Amazon smaller than 3/4".  I may have to settle for those, if I want to hang lights this year.

If you know where I can get some 3/4' cup hooks, I'd appreciate a link.

Oh, and the whole point of telling you that was that the same clerk who'd chatted me up a couple of weeks ago was in there, and he remembered me.  I never considered myself much of a memorable person, but maybe I am.  Too bad he's so much younger than I am, or I might just need to make a few more trips in to that there hardware store.

Speaking of Christmas, it looks like I might get a few blooms on my Christmas cactus after all.

I'd put it on my front porch for the summer, only my front porch got way more sun than I thought it would.  That's also why all my impatiens died.  Next summer, I'm going to put it in the back yard, where it's shadier.

I've got this little spot between my back doors and my little chimney that is just begging for a plant stand.

I know that's not a good picture, but it was raining, so I couldn't get out into the yard.  Well, I could have, but I didn't want to take a good picture badly enough to get soaking wet.

We've got a cold front moving through, and tomorrow night will be our first freeze warning of the year.  I stood in my back yard and took a picture of the tallow trees behind the fence, just in case.

We didn't get much fall color this year.  I think because it's been so very dry.  We're still under a burn ban over most of the state.

Sounds like the rain has slacked off a bit, so I'm going to let the dogs out to tend their business, then I'm going to bed.

Goodnight.

Trading Paint

When I moved into this house, I found several cans of paint in the shed, left by the previous owners.  They'd been sitting there for I don't know how long.  Last weekend, when I was taking my own leftover paint out there, I said to myself, "Self, you ought to do something with that there old paint. Then you could put your own paint up on that shelf."

I was originally going to just throw it away, but then I thought that someone might want it.  I advertised it on the local Free-Bees group, and sure enough, someone very soon piped up and said she wanted it.  Today after work, I took 6 cans of paint to our prearranged meeting place and gave them to her.

Since I was in town already, I said to myself, "Self, you ought to run by that there hardware store and see if they have the hooks you want to hang your Christmas lights up with next weekend."  I headed on towards the hardware store, but as I was coming up on the local closeout store, I got the urge to turn in there. 

"Nah,", I said.  "I don't want to go into Wall's.  I hate that store." 

I started on past, but the urge returned, even stronger this time. 

"Well, I'll just run in for a minute,"  I said.  Wouldn't hurt to see if they had hooks. They didn't have hooks, but they did have the little detail sander I've been wanting, and for only $17!

It was the only one they had, and I pounced on it like a cat pouncing on a mouse.  Except not my cat.  Because she's lazy. 

"I am not," said lazybones.

I brought it home and plugged it in to make sure it works, and it does.  Now, I just need to find something to sand. 

While I was in the closeout store, I picked up some Christmas kleenex and 'Merica Duct tape.

Because Christmas, that's why.

And 'Merica, that's why-er. 

But I still haven't made it to the hardware store.

Blogiversary

Yes, friends, eleven years ago today, I wrote my very first blog post.

And the world has yet to recover.

We've come a long way from my sketch of Squeaky.




Cody was only 12, Squeaky was 4, and Rylea and Jesse hadn't been born yet.



Cody was shorter, as were my blog posts.

Honestly, I never thought it would last this long, but I'm sure glad it has.  And I'm thankful for every one of my readers.

I hope you stick around for the rest of it...

Monday, Monday

Why dost thou trouble me so?

I know this may come as a shock to some of you, but yes, I messed up some parts at work.  Let me rephrase that...someone else messed up some parts, but I didn't catch it before I brazed the headers up, so that makes it my fault.

I didn't have to stay late.  My group leader said, "How many parts does second shift leave that are wrong?  How many orders do they skip?"  I told her, "I'm not going to be judged on what second shift does.  I'm going to be judged on whether I do, and I'm going to make sure I do right."   She tried to tell me not to stay, but I went over her head to my supervisor and told him I wanted to stay and make sure the parts were re-done -- and correctly this time. That's what I did.

It was 4:00 when I left the plant, but it felt so much later.  The time change,  plus winter coming on, all makes for a very confused internal clock.

Speaking of, I finally broke down and turned my heater on yesterday morning.  It got down into the mid 30s for the last couple of nights, so I felt justified.  Up until now, a little fire in my wood heater has been enough to take the chill off the house.  Now that my bedroom is finished, I need to get back to that big pile of firewood in the back yard.

You know how every house has that one surface where all the clutter collects?  Look, I cleaned mine off!  It makes the kitchen look so much brighter having all that junk off of the bar.

Pay no attention to the junk in my cabinets.  Why on earth anyone would take off the doors of their cabinets is beyond me.  I asked the seller to put them back on, but they didn't have them. They claimed there were no doors on any of the cabinets or closets when they moved in back in the '80s.  That is definitely on the list of my things to rectify.

My scarf is moving right along.

I've already found one knot in my skein of yarn.  That is very disappointing.  FYI, you can't spit splice acrylic, no matter how woolly it feels.

Just thought I'd throw that out there.

I Reckon

I reckon I really ought to blog.  Since it's been so long and all.  But there really hasn't been anything to blog about -- since I don't usually discuss politics on the blog.  I'm just glad the election is over -- and that's all I have to say about that.

The good news is, I finally finished painting my bedroom.  This weekend it was the trim around my windows and doors.

Let me tell you something, I will never question how much professional painters cost again.  They deserve every penny, because painting is hard work!  I'm done for a while, and I'm glad it's over.  Once I'd touched up the few spots I needed to, I hauled all my painting supplies out to the shed, where they will remain for the near future.

When I looked at my comforter and picked the colors I wanted to use, these looked more tan/brownish.  On the wall, they look more gray.  But, if I hold up a pillow sham up to the wall and the trim, the colors do match almost exactly.  Weird, huh?  But it looks nice, and that's all that matters.

Look, the colors even coordinate with an afghan I crocheted 23 years ago, before I learned to knit.

Tomorrow, I'm going to get my curtains hung back up, and the room will be mostly finished.

Decorating is another matter.  I'm just totally not good at that.  I've found a few things on Amazon that I like and may get.  I think I might get this bookshelf to replace the two smaller shelves I have in there now.

A couple of days ago, one of my knitting friends on Facebook posted a picture of some new yarn she'd found.  It looked really nice, so Thursday when I went into town, I looked for some.  I know I'm not supposed to be buying yarn, but yesterday was my birthday, so I splurged.

I thought maybe I'd knit charity hats out of it, but it's single ply.  I don't trust single play to hold up under hard use, so I cast on a scarf for myself.

I'm using my old standard One Row Scarf pattern.  It's knitting up really nicely.

While I was in the yarn department, I picked this one up, too.

It is really soft and silky, but it's 100% acrylic.  It doesn't feel like it, but it is.

Now, I need to go browse patterns.

Home Again

Home again, home again, jiggety jig.

Yes, my line at work opened back up today, so we were home again -- well, those of us who didn't get laid off last week.  That would be most of the temps.  They are shutting down a different line to rebuild it and moved those workers over to our line.  No more temps!

That's not exactly true.  We do have a few temps, but it's not like the entire line was staffed with them, the way it's been since it opened back up in January.  I'm telling you, things went a whole lot smoother with experienced workers who actually have a vested interest in doing a good job, as opposed to new people who think, "Why should I care?  I'm just going to get laid off anyway."

I've got a new sub-brazer over there with me, too.  She's been at the plant for several months, but is new to brazing.  I think she's worked out there before, because the first day she walked in, she greeted me by name.  I have no idea who she is or how she knows me, but apparently she does.

Over the weekend, I finished painting my bedroom -- the walls at least.  I still have to paint the framing around the doors and windows and stuff, but that's the easy part.  

You can kind of see my comforter peeking out from under the afghan and the dog's blanket, so you can see how well it matches the paint.   It really makes the room look brighter and more open.  But now I've got all these blank, bare walls that need to be decorated.  That is something I'm simply not good at at all.

I still haven't done anything with my bathroom, other than buy a new shower curtain.

Dolphins in the bathroom.  Lighthouses and sailboats in the bedroom.  Yeah, the sea runs deep in my veins.  I keep telling you my ancestors were Vikings.  One of these days, you'll believe me.

One benefit of moving all my bedroom furniture to paint was that I found the other half of my favorite pair of earrings.

It had been missing since I moved last year, and I was afraid I'd vacuumed it up, or left it in the trailer house or something.  I kept thinking I should toss the remaining earring, but I didn't. Good thing, because when I moved my dresser, there it was.  The missing earring.  Home again, home again, jiggety jig.

Yes, I wore them to work today.

And I probably will again tomorrow, too.

An Unusual Week

I went in to work Tuesday morning -- the plant being off Monday for maintenance and moving machines -- and when I got over to my line, all the work that had been there Thursday was gone.  My first thought was that the maintenance men had moved it.  No biggie.  I'd go find it after I'd gone upstairs and run off our daily production schedules.

I got upstairs and sorted through the stack of schedules to make my copies, only there wasn't one for my line.  What?  I went down to the tubing department and logged in to their computer.  I called up the schedule for my line on the company intranet, and the page was blank.  I went to line 4 and talked to their brazers.  We discovered that all of my line's work had been added to their schedule.

At this point, I was confused, since Boss Man James had said that my line -- which is normally the temp line for the summer peak season -- wasn't going to be shut down this fall.  I grabbed a broom and started sweeping until someone got there who could explain to me what was going on.

Soon, Boss Man James came and and said that my line would be shut down for the week, and he wanted me to go work on line 7 until my line opened back up.  So, that's where I've been this week.  Those of you who know me know that I don't handle change well, so I've been a bit discombobulated these last few days.  That's why there haven't been any blog posts.  Now that I'm combobulated again, I'm ready to catch you up.

Yesterday I got in there and painted those last two walls of my bedroom.

I was painting all those horrible grooves and thinking, "Boy, it's going a lot faster this time around".  Then I heard the school bus rumble down the road.  It was a lot later than I'd thought it was, so it wasn't going faster after all.  Once I got the grooves painted, doing the walls only took a few minutes.  However, I quickly realized that I would not have enough paint for a second coat.

This morning, I ran in to the hardware store and bought another gallon, and got chatted up by the sales clerk.  For those of you who do not watch tons and tons of British television, that means I got flirted with.  Either that, or he was being really, really, really nice -- I never can tell.

While I was there, I picked up this nifty little gadget.

It's for doing the corners.  Pretty cool, huh?

And this one for edging around my door and window frames.

If you're going to do a job, might as well do it right.  I wasn't pleased with the way the walls looked after using a paintbrush in those areas.  Tomorrow, I'm going to put the second coat on, and we'll see how well these things work.

Once I'm done with the bedroom, I'm going to get back to working on cutting up and splitting that huge pile of wood in my back yard, so I picked up a splitting wedge for some of the bigger logs.

The sales clerk asked me if I was going to do that myself, too (having previously asked me if I was doing the painting myself -- no kids or husband for me to recruit).  He said he felt like he should come do it for me.  I told him if he did, I wouldn't argue.

Don't be getting any ideas.  He was nice, but barely older than my son.  I'm not in to that whole cougar thing.

Other than going to the store, I didn't get anything done today, because we had a company picnic out at the lake.  They had lots of things for the kids to do -- face painting, bouncy houses, a balloon guy-- those sorts of things.  My coworker Edna said they needed to have some hammocks out there for us old folks.

One of the things they had was a pumpkin patch where the kids could go pick a pumpkin, and they had markers and stickers for them to decorate their pumpkins with.  I asked the lady if it was just for kids, or if grown folks could get a pumpkin and decorate it, too.  She said I could get one.  This is what I did:

Then I came home and watched Star Trek Beyond.

Yeah, I'm a geek.  And proud of it.

Live long and prosper.

Not So Fast

The plan was to get in there after work and put a second coat of paint on that one bedroom wall.

The reality was, I got up this morning and could barely move.  Seriously.  I was so sore.  After shuffling around around the plant all day looking like Tim Conway's little old man, I decided that there wall could wait until the weekend after all.

Supervisor Ronny stopped me and suggested I put a coat of Kilz on the wall before I painted it.  When a year or two have gone by and I forget what a headache this was and paint my living room, I'll remember that.  Ronny said he used to do that kind of work, and that's how he did it.  He also told me once that he used to be a lumberjack, and he was OK.  He slept all night and he worked all day...

I spent the rest of that day singing old Monty Python songs.  Here, I'll share it with you so you can have an earworm, too.  You're welcome.



Well, this post sure got weird in a hurry.  Let me try to redeem it with the new Piano Guys video:




There, that's better.

(Don't ask.  Even I don't know.)