Here We Go Again

 Hello? National Weather Service?  Yes, I’d like to cancel my subscription to the storm of the week club.

Yep we got more coming tomorrow night.  Hopefully it won't be nearly as bad as last week.  But this is springtime in the South.  Heh, some time ago, an obnoxious know it all informed me that maybe I needed to move away from here, but really, where are you going to move that doesn't have weather?  If it's not severe storms and tornadoes, it's hurricanes or blizzards or droughts or floods...that's the human condition.  It's always going to be something.

Here we go again also.  I found out today that one of my fellow sub-brazers has COVID again.  Poor thing, I really feel for her -- it's her fourth time having it, and when she gets it, she gets it bad.  The first time she had it, she got long COVID, and hadn't even gotten over that before she got it again.  

Speaking of work, yesterday, we were way behind on our brazing, because we didn't have any parts from tubing to braze. There is this one group leader....nah, I'm going to keep my mouth shut.  Anyway, she was calling all day long, "[Parts Stager] we need headers to line 6.  [Parts Stager], line 6 is down waiting on headers."  Really.  All. Day. Long.

At one point, I turned around and told Group Leader Shark, "Can you go back there and put some tape on her mouth? I'm sick of hearing her!"   

So, there I was, frantically brazing up parts for -- yes, her line, when I hear a noise behind me.  I turn around and see her picking up hot headers with her hands as if she were going to carry them all the way back to line six.  She had gloves on, but that's not going to keep the heat from getting through them. 

Without thinking, I said, "You're going to want a box."  As in, to carry the hot headers in.  So her hands wouldn't get burned.  Sigh...

Sometimes I'm too nice for my own good. 

By the way, the engineer known on this blog as Dude is leaving.  The plant, not this blog.  He got a better job, which isn't really hard to do given how bad things are out there.  The guy who is replacing him is all gung ho about getting stuff done.  A few days ago, he was collecting some of our raggedy, falling apart brazing jigs to fix them.  Some of the brazers were say, "Even Dude didn't do that!"  Then he told me, "If there's anything you need, just let me know."  Bless his heart.   He means well, but he's going to run into the same problems Dude did.  He's going to have to fight the front office for everything, because they're the ones who don't want to spend any money giving us what we need to do our jobs.  

I mean, there's a lot we need, but we aren't going to get it.  Even when we needed new parts trays for our brazing stands, Dude had to order just a few at a time to get them past the budget police.  Same thing is going to happen when Gung Ho tries to get us anything.  The plant really does expect us to make silk purses out of sow's ears.   

And finally, I finished reading a couple of books and have started two new ones, both of which I've read before. 

First up: 

The Book Of Three, by Lloyd Alexander. , which is the first book of the Prydain Chronicles. 

And secondly, 

Greenwitch, the third book in the Dark Is Rising sequence. No matter how many times I read these, they're still just as good. 

Of course, it helps that it's been so long, I can't remember what they're about....

And that's all I have to say about that. 

Turkish Delight

It all began with a meme…

No, let me back up a bit. It all began with a book— a children’s book entitled The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe by C. A. Lewis.   If you've read it, you know what I'm talking about, but for those of you who may not have, one of the children in the story is beguiled by the White Witch when she gives him enchanted Turkish Delight -- which is a candy. 

Ever since the book was published, there had been a debate on whether Turkish Delight is actually good or not.  Of course, there are two schools of thought on that.  Some people love it.  Others hate it.  There doesn't seem to be any in between. 

Kind of like with Peeps or Circus Peanuts...

But I digress.

A few weeks ago, one of my friends posted the meme below, 

and the discussion began again.  

Now, I've always loved Turkish Delight.  I make it every year for Christmas, and it's the one everyone requests over and over.  Of course, I've only made lemon flavored, because that's the recipe I have.  I'll post it down below.  From what I can tell, it's also a Christmas tradition in England.  Even the boy who played Edmund in the movie had said how much he was looking forward to shooting that scene, because he'd get to eat so much Turkish Delight.  

That was pretty much my only experience with the stuff, so I didn't really understand the animosity towards it.  However, in the discussion my friends were having, it seemed to me that the ones who liked it had only had homemade Turkish Delight, and those who thought it was horrible had only had store bought.  I've only had homemade, so you know what I had to do.  Yep, as soon as I got my tax return, I ordered some from Amazon. 

This stuff is actually made in Turkey, so it's as authentic as you can get.  It has four flavors:  lemon, orange, mint, and rose.  I opened the box, and this is what I saw. 

I'd originally planned on filming myself tasting these for the first time, but I didn't feel like fooling with setting up the camera and all, and besides, my vlogs don't seem to be that well received anyway, so you'll just have to read about it.  

Here's my verdict.  The orange, lemon, and mint were pretty good.  The flavors are a lot more subtle than say, orange slices or lemonheads, but overall I liked them.  The rose flavor, on the other hand, was as one of my friends described -- like eating soap.  It reminded me of the old Rose Milk Skin Care Cream (do they even still make that?) my grandma used to buy.  In other words, it was terrible. 

Overall, I'd say I guess it depends on which flavor you get.  Any flavor but rose will be OK.  Not really strongly flavored, but not terrible either. 

In other news, I finally got motivated and sewed the buttons onto the Calorimetries I'd already finished. 

I took them to work and let the coworkers who'd bought me yarn have the first pick.  I'll most likely wait until I have a bunch more before I take them in again.  We want to avoid the drama of last time. 

Finally, I was able to talk to my friend from Winona and she didn't have any damage to her house.  Still, they'd spent the night in a shelter after a family member called her and told her to go.  She kept talking about a storm chaser in the road, but she didn't know who he was.  I know it wasn't Ryan Hall, because he was live streaming on YouTube.  It might have been Reed Timmer, but he'd have had to absolutely fly down the road to get from Rolling Fork to Winona that fast.  

Brandon Copic was also in Rolling Fork, so I have no idea who it might have been.  My friend said that storm chasing is something she could see me doing, and I said, "If it had been a thing when I was younger, I'd totally do it. "   I'm too old now, and would have to stop to pee too many times...Oh, did I just say that out loud?  

And as promised, here is my recipe for lemon Turkish Delight.

 Turkish Delight

3 Envelopes Knox Unflavored Gelatin

1/2 cup cold water

1/2 cup hot water

2 1/2 cups granulated sugar

1/4 tsp salt

3 Tbsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp lemon extract

Powdered Sugar

Line a plastic sandwich or similar sized box with plastic wrap.  This is very important as it's almost impossible to get the candy out of the box if you don't.   

Soften the gelatin in cold water and set aside.  In a medium saucepan, bring the hot water and granulated sugar to a boil, stirring constantly.  Lower the heat and add the salt.  Stir in the softened gelatin and stir until completely dissolved. 

 

Cook at a simmer for 20 minutes.  It's not necessary to continue stirring at this point. 

Remove from heat and let cool for ten minutes.   You can skim the foam if you want, but it isn't really necessary. Stir in the lemon juice and extract until well blended.  

Pour the mixture into the sandwich box, cover and let set until firm, usually overnight.  Remove from container and peel off plastic wrap.  Yes, this will be a bit difficult, but keep plugging away at it until it all comes off.  Cut the candy into squares and coat with the powdered sugar. 

Don't eat it all at once.  

What Can You Say?

What can you say after a night like last night?  Anything I talk about will seem trite and trivial by comparison.  

The images that have been coming out from places like Rolling Fork, Winona, and Amory have been simply breathtaking.  Unimaginable devastation and destruction, and so much loss of life.  Last count had 23 fatalities.  And thank you to all of you who messaged or called me to check on me.  I really do appreciate it.  

This crazy girl here lives in Winona, 

but I heard from her last night.  She had gone to a shelter, and is OK, but I haven't heard yet how much damage -- if any -- her home sustained.  The entire town is still without power, but I know several of the churches down there are feeding people, and helping as much as they can, so I'm sure she's being taken care of. 

Heh, the Governor was in Winona for a little while today, and he also went to Rolling Fork and Silver Spring, and I keep imagining her walking right up to him and giving him an earful.  She's never been shy about saying exactly what's on her mind, and that's part of the reason we love her. 

The only other things I've done today, besides grieve for my adopted state, was to get out and scatter my wildflower seeds behind the fence.  We'll just have to see if they grow or not.  Also, I played closet Tetris will all the junk in my junk room floor. 

I still need to organize and cull stuff, but it looks so much better not having the floor all cluttered up. 

Finally, I started watching a new-to-me show on PBS called Vienna Blood.  It's about a cop and a psychiatry student who solve murders in Vienna back in the early 1900s.  It's pretty good so far.  

A Weather Shanty??

Well, I did it.  I returned my book on foraging this afternoon, but ordered another one.  This one says it's about edible plants in the Southeast, and got good reviews.  Let's hope it's more helpful than the other one. 

By the way, I'm so glad we have a UPS store here now.  All I had to do was hand the man the book and let him scan the QR code and I was all done!  I didn't have to put it into a box or anything.  They take care of all of it for you. And it's so much more convenient than having to drive all the way to Batesville every time I need to return something.   

Also, my other package got here today, but I'm not going to show you what it is until I can do an unboxing video.  Maybe tomorrow, if I survive tonight's storms that is.  Yep, it's definitely springtime in the south and we are expecting severe weather. 

I'm all ready.  I've got my plan in place, my phone on the charger, my back up power bank charging, and the weekend off. 

It was about this time last year...I was at work, just a working away, when all of the sudden, everyone's phones started blowing up.  

"Look!"  we all said, showing each other our phones.  "We're under a tornado warning!"  As we stood there looking at our weather apps, Supervisor Jeramy walked by, looked at us like we'd lost our minds, and called, "Go to the shelter!!"  

The shelter!  Oh yeah!  Let's go to the shelter.  And off we went. 

Sitting there in the shelter, a little ditty kept running through my head...and now, after a bit of tweaking and a whole lot of marinating, I present to you, sung to the tune of the popular sea chanty The Wellerman, my creation. 

The Weatherman

There once was a man who watched the skies

He studied it with knowing eyes

The satellites, the radar scans

He is The Weatherman

(Chorus)Hear what The Weatherman says

We gotta go get the milk and bread

When he says a storm will come

To Walmart we'll all go

The radar turned all shades of red

The forecast filled our hearts with dread

The lightning flashed, the thunder crashed

Oh blow my stormy winds blow!

(Chorus)

There in the sky!  A funnel cloud!

The siren wailing long and loud

"Oh do not fear, for I am here,"

So says the weatherman!

When all around him fled in fear

"Not me!" he said,  "I'm staying here!

I must ensure the people know

To shelter I'll not go."

(Chorus)

For forty days or even more

The sky turned dark, then light once more

But through it all one man stood tall

He is The Weatherman

(Chorus Twice)

I'll see myself out. 

Rumor Mill

 All day long, the rumors were flying.

"We're having an emergency meeting at 1:30!  They're putting us on 4 days!"  

As is the way with most rumors, it turned out not to be true; 1:30 came and went, and no emergency meeting, and they're not putting us on 4 days -- at least not yet.  Of course, I already knew it wouldn't be this week, because shortly after lunch, Supervisor pulled me to the side and asked me to come in at 4:00 tomorrow to try to get caught up on a couple of lines. 

It's only for one day, for now, but it is overtime, so yay!  Supervisor said he's got to try to sneak people in because upper management doesn't want us getting any overtime, not with things going the way they are.  I'm still hoping things will pick up and be a bit more normal.

Last week the plant was planning on having some sort of St.  Patrick's Day dress up thing on Friday, but when they shut us down for the week, that got postponed until today.  There wasn't a whole lot of participation on day shift, but second shift really got into it.  I saw several people dressed up in matching outfits, but only managed to get one photo of my friend Bryan. 

Man, I didn't even recognize him at first.  He looks so different with that fake beard! It wasn't until he spoke and I recognized his voice that I knew who he was. You can't see in the picture, but he even had shamrock socks on. 

Then I took a photo of Cyn, 

but when I showed it to her, she said, "Oh, no, Becky!  That won't do!  All that gut hanging out!"  So she sucked in her stomach and said, "Hurry up and take another one!" 

"Hurry and take the picture!" she said, and when I'd done, she let her stomach loose with a great sigh of relief. 

You see what I have to put up with all day?  You see?????

In other news, I think I'm going to return my foraging guide book.  Nothing wrong with the book, it's got lots of great information, but as I was perusing it more closely, I kept noticing words like

throughout the northern United States

in southern Canada

in the northeastern states

All well and good if you live in those areas, but I need a book for the South.  Many of the plants in that book aren't even found down here, and a lot of the ones I can find locally aren't in the book.  And really?  A foraging book that doesn't even mention dandelions?  

At least it had cattails in it. 

Finally, I came home and moved a few more daffodils.   

I think that's going to be it for this year.  Only now, I'm drenched in sweat, so I'm going to go take a quick shower then head to bed early. 

Overtime in the morning, you know. 

Halfway

I'm halfway through my first week back at work, and boy am I tuckered.  Seems the older I get, the harder it becomes to get used to standing on my feet all day.  At least I got to come straight home today, and didn't have to go anywhere afterwards.

So what did I do?  I got my garden claw out and stirred up my compost pile. 

I need to do this more often, so the soil is good and aerated, which will make the organic matter decay faster.  But while I was clawing to my heart's content, the weirdest thing happened.  I could have sworn this old dog kennel (which is what the previous owner had built here) was clean when I started, but look what I clawed up. 

It's a plastic dog toy.  It had to have been in there when I moved in, back in 2015, but how I missed it is beyond me.  

I'd intended to get out and plant a couple of packets of wildflower seeds behind the back fence this afternoon, but I just didn't.  I'll probably get it done this weekend, since they're saying we're beyond frosts for the year.  I did go out and check my pecan tree, and I saw tiny little leaves forming way up in the top branches, so that's a good sign.  

What I did instead was to get my hummingbird feeder filled and hung up. 

I usually try to get it out by the middle of March, but this year I wanted to wait until after this latest freeze.  Oh well, it's out now, and hopefully the hummingbirds will find it soon. 

I've been thinking about cancelling Hulu completely, at least for a while, since everything I'm currently watching on there is available on either Prime or FreeVee.  I've already cut off live TV, but that hasn't been a problem for me.  I've discovered that most stations let you watch live TV on their websites, and there are plenty of past seasons of stuff that are available for free. CBS is weird, though, because you can watch live on the website, but not on the app.  So, I just need an HDMI cable to connect my computer to the big TV, and we're good to go. 

Of course, there is always YouTube if you can put up with the ads every two minutes.  I just turned off a documentary because I got so sick of it being interrupted by ads.  I know they depend on ads to support themselves, but sheesh.  Enough is enough. 

I forgot what else I was going to talk about, so I guess I'll just get off here for now and go work on them @#$%* scales some more. 

Laters.

I Don't Want To Go

I had to go to the dentist after work today -- just for a semi-annual cleaning and checkup.  Nothing serious.  I was dreading it all day long, though, because I have one tooth that's been sensitive here lately.  "Oh, great!"  I said to myself, "He's going to want to pull another tooth.  I don't have that many left!"  

I groused and grumbled and "I don't want to go to the dentist" mumbled all day long, and it turns out my dread was all for naught.  The dentist checked the tooth really well and didn't find anything wrong with the filling and no new decay.  He said the sensitivity might be due to the changing weather.  I said, "I'd wondered about that, because it does seem to hurt more when it's cold."  

He told me to keep an eye on it and if it still hurt once the weather settles down, call him back and we'll see what we can do about it.  So that's a relief.

You know what else is a relief?  This:  

Pay no attention to my patio bricks that desperately need power washed.  Do pay attention to those tan wormy looking things.  Those are oak tassels.  The Great Pollening is almost over.

Just in time for Tornado season --followed by Sahara Dust Season and Hurricane season.  Yippee!

All the meteorologists are saying the long range forecast shows no more frosts in this area until Fall, but so far, my pecan tree remains leafless.  I think I'll wait until I at least see some buds before I go planting my wildflowers.  I have, however, moved Marty Mac and most of my other plants outside.  I can move them back in if I need to.  I'm going to wait until after the next round of storms to move my Whatever Cacti outside.  I think that's why they look so pathetic, they're getting too much water.  Even after I move them outside for the summer, I'm going to bring them inside when it storms, so I can better control how much water they get.  That will be healthier for them than letting them drown every few days. 

In other news, the things I purchased in my little shopping spree have started to come in. 

My pack of buttons got here today, and I must admit, they look nicer than I thought they would.  There are so many colors, I should be able to find a button to match every headband -- of which I finished another one yesterday.  Or Sunday.  I don't really remember.  The days all seem to run together now. 

What with the economy in the state that it's in, I figured this book might come in handy. 

I haven't had time to really look through it -- dentist appointment and all -- but just a quick glance through it, I've discovered I've got more wild edible plants in my yard than I thought. Besides the wild onions, mint, dandelions, and potential blackberries, I mean.  Oh, and I forgot to mention my roses.  I mean, I forgot roses were edible.  All varieties, including mine.  

I should probably stop trying to kill them, then, huh?  

This book even has ideas on how to prepare the plants for eating, so that's cool.  I'll be looking through it more, and hope to start harvesting a few things as the weather grows warmer.  

I've got one more package that's supposed to be delivered Friday, and there will be a video accompanying that one, so you have something to look forward to.  That's it for my shopping spree, except for the hair snakes I bought for my bathtub drain -- but I didn't really think you'd want to see those.  

I haven't mentioned my piano playing in a while, so I probably ought to catch you up on how it's going.  I've decided to set my book of Hanon exercises aside for a while, and work on learning the scales.  I felt like it would be more beneficial in the long run for someone like me, who just wants to play for fun.  

Right now, I'm working on the C Major scale, which -- believe it or not -- is kind of tripping me up.  I can play one octave just fine, both in parallel and contrary motion.  It's playing multiple octaves I'm having to work a bit harder on.  Somehow, I always end up with my fingers in the wrong place.  

Oh, don't worry.  I'll keep plugging away at it until I have it down pat.  Then I'll have to learn the arpeggios.  I don't even know what an arpeggio is, but  they're in the book and I'm going to learn them. 

By golly. 

First Day Back

Man, when that alarm went off at 4:30 this morning, I did not want to get out of bed.  It had been so nice to be able to go to bed when I was tired and get up when I woke up naturally, but that's all over now. Sigh...

OK, so yesterday when I was listening to those mix tapes, I ran across one that was -- less old than the others.  I mean, like 25 years old as opposed to 40.  Yeah, now that we've established that I'm old, let me get to the point.  I was popping those tapes into the player, just to see what they were since most of them weren't labeled, and I found one that was a recording of a CD I'd bought. 

Back before they had CD players in cars, this is how we had to listen to music, kids.  Well, I put the tape in and hit play, and the song started playing.  As soon as I heard it, I knew what it was.  I only listened for a few seconds, just long enough to identify the tape, then went on to the next one.

When I got into my car to go to work this morning, guess which song was playing -- on my MP3 player.  Yep, the same song that played on the tape for those few seconds.  Honest and for true.  Just in case you're wondering, it was this song.

But wait, there's more. 

Yes, that's not the only freaky coincidence that happened today.  Remember when I commented about the pen pal who said she was looking forward to many years of correspondence but never wrote back?  Guess what was in my mailbox when I got home from work?  Yep, a letter from her, and the first line was an apology for taking so long to write back.  Cool!  Now I have two letters to answer. 

I've got to get back to cleaning, but not today.  Today, I'm tahrd.  By the way, I ended up taking about 60 pencils to my coworker for her grandson to use in school.  I had no idea I had that many left from when Cody was in school.  What was I doing with so many pencils????  Her grandbaby is in second grade, so he ought to be set for a while.  

I guess that's it for today.  My brain is so tired I can't even thing of anything else to talk about.  Mainly because I stayed up and watched Sanditon on PBS last night.  Remember before streaming when we all used to watch the same thing at the same time?  Even though we weren't physically together, we still felt a sense of comradery from the shared experience.  

I miss those days.  

Last Day

Today is the last day of my Spring Break, and despite having 9 days off, I'm still not ready to go back to work.  I have got to find myself a sugar daddy or something.  In the meantime, it's back to work I go...

In the current chapter of Why Do I Still Have This?, we have...mix tapes!

I tried to listen to some of them, but the older ones especially are distorted so badly they're essentially unplayable.  I only told a half truth up there.  I do know why I keep these.  Back when I was stationed in Italy, I kept my radio on an Italian station to see if it would help me learn the language.  I figured if I listened to it all the time, it would get inside my head more quickly.  

All that to say, despite not understanding most of the words, there were a couple of songs I really liked.  I managed to record a few of them on a mix tape -- which I now can't find.  I hang on to all my tapes, hoping I'll find the one with the songs on it.  I actually found one of them on YouTube, but I can't remember enough of the words of any of the others to even search for them.  A few years ago, I tried humming the tunes into one of those apps like Spotify or whatever the other one was, but didn't have any luck.  Maybe I'll try again, now that technology has advanced more. 

The good news is, that whole big box of junk has now been reduced to this small box of junk.

I'm pretty sure most of it can be tossed as well.  I'm going to take the empty plastic box and start trying to sort through all this junk next.    

Most of this is knitting projects or yarn, so let's just hope I don't get distracted. 

You know those stickers that people put on their cars that say 13.1 or 26.2?  Those are for people who've run half marathons or marathons.  A few years back, I found one appropriate for me. 

The last thing I did was to get out all the letters I've gotten from my pen pals over the last few years and sort them into stacks.  

All but one of these people has stopped writing.  Heh, one of them closed her letter by saying she was looking forward to many years of writing, and I never got another letter from her.  There are a few of them that only wrote one letter, and then never wrote back, and others I wrote to first who never responded.  I'm beginning to think it's just me. 

Sigh...I've found one new pen pal on the website, but none of the others I've tried contacting has responded.  I might need to see if there is another site I can sign up for -- one that's not locked down so tightly.  The Global Penfriends site has changed since I first signed up for it.  You used to be able to browse people's profiles, but now you have to wait until they send you a match that they pick out.  

I know they do it for security reasons, but it definitely makes it harder to find pen-pals.  

The new season of Call The Midwife and Sanditon start tonight.  I may be paying for it tomorrow, but I'm staying up to watch them tonight.  

Such A Doofus

I swan, I can be such a doofus sometimes.  

So, Becky, what doofusy thing did you do this time?  Well, I'll tell you.

I was sitting there watching TV, when I decided I need a break from Time Team and Masterchef Jr, so I binge watched all three seasons of The Chosen again.  In one episode, it was a scene which took place at night, just after the sun set by the look of the sky.  There in the background, the full moon was shining bright. 

It struck me then that when he was here on Earth, Jesus walked under the same moon I go out into my back yard to look at.  While I was sitting there, all awestruck that the creator of the universe once walked under the same moon that I do -- you see where I'm going with this, don't you?  

I did the old V-8 forehead smack and said to myself, "You doofus!  Jesus created that moon!"  Which, despite my doofusiness, is still pretty amazing when you think about it. 

I did another doofusy thing today, as well.  I cast on another hat

despite not even being halfway done with the one I already had on the needles. 

And I'm currently fighting the urge to cast on a third.  Clearly I've been infected by cast-on-itis.  If only finish-itis was as easy to contract. 

Apropos of nothing, Marty Mac has come out of dormancy and is putting out new growth. 

I'm starting to put him outside during the day to get him acclimated to full sun exposure, and once it's warm enough, I'll leave him out all the time.   Probably after this next cold spell, I'll be able to put him out for good, and just keep an eye on the weather unless there's a late frost. 

I guess the big news of the day is that I got my writing stuff all organized and put away.  In the top drawer of the little brown filing cabinet I put my stationery and envelopes. 

Into the bottom drawer went my wax stamps, stickers, and washi tape. 

And the pens and ink are safely tucked into the desk drawer. 

I still need to get a lamp of some sort, but for now, it'll do.  Here we see my latest letter from my Canadian pen pal just waiting for me to write back. 

Since I was on such a roll with my cleaning and stuff, I dragged this box out of the back of Cody's closet to begin sorting through. 

It shouldn't take too long, because it's half empty.  It's got junk I stuffed into it in a mad cleaning frenzy to sort through later.  Well, guess what?  It's later.  

I did a quick glance into the box, and most of this stuff can probably be tossed, if I can just bring myself to do it.  Seriously, both this box and the other one I keep showing you -- if someone had come along without me knowing it and thrown everything out, I'd have never missed any of it.  Except that little pink thing in the bottom right corner up there.  I'm definitely wanting to keep that. 

The rest, I'd have never even remember I had it, but now that I am seeing it and holding it, I'm having a hard time getting rid of it.  A big part of it is, I hate throwing stuff into the garbage if it's something someone out there might be able to use.  The flip side of that is, I hate dealing with the idiots in the local free bees group.  

I'm sure you can relate, because stupidity is pretty much universal. 

And finally, James has put their house on the market.  I mean, we all knew it was coming, because he's been talking about it for a year, but it's still a bit of a bummer because it had always been the family gathering place ever since my aunt and uncle built it back in the mid 80s.  Their house had always been the gathering place, even when they still lived on Travis St.  

I told Cody I wish I had enough money to buy it, but it's way out of my budget, and I doubt I could take care of that much land anyway.  Not by myself, I mean.  My other cousin might be buying it, but I don't know.  I hope she does, or one of her kids.  At least that way, it'll stay in the family.  It's all Winfree land out there anyway. 

Now, if you'll excuse me, I got my tax refunds yesterday -- yes, that fast -- so I'm going to go to Amazon and do a little shopping.  Not too much, because I've still got to make up for not getting a paycheck this week.  Oh, and one more thing, I got my unemployment debit card in the mail today.  There's nothing on it at the moment, but I'll have it in case they do another shutdown later in the year. 

And The Cleaning Continues

 Slowly but surely, the cleaning is getting done, and it's about time, too.  But first, let me show you the latest knitting project I finished this afternoon. 

I've run into a bit of a snag, though, because Walmart doesn't have the right size buttons.  I'm going to have to order some, because I'm not paying $10 for a bag of assorted sizes just to get the few I need for these headbands.  

I think I'm going to cast on a hat with this yarn next.  I mean, I still have one hat I'm working on, but you can't have too many projects going, can you, fellow knitters?  

And now, on to the main event. I got the  little brown file cabinet emptied out, and have begun to sort through all the junk.  It's been far too long since I've gone through and tossed stuff.  Don't believe me?  Take a gander at this:

Floppy discs!  Yes, I still had them, and check out the date on the top one.  Seriously.  They're so old, I doubt anyone could get any information off of them anyway, but just to be on the safe side, I took a bunch of magnets off my refrigerator and tried to scramble the data.  

But wait, there's more!

Here we have the back up CDs for a computer that died some 15 years ago.  Why do I still have them, that I do not know. 

If you want proof of their age, see what it says here.  For dependable dial-up service. 

Does anyone even have dial-up any more?  But just in case, here we have a bunch of telephone cables.  Landline cables. 

There are three of them in there, and I haven't had a landline in a decade.  Or thereabouts....

But it wasn't all gloom and doom.  I found this from my Navy days. 

It's a...I don't know what to call it, but it's a thing that holds the 5 x 8 legal pads, which I will now add to my shopping list. 

And the piece de resistance, this scissor caddy. 

It was made by my maternal grandfather, who died in 1987.  Beverly had this one, and before I went into the Navy, we were sitting around doing crafts one day, and she up and gave it to me.  She also gave me the little guard figure, which I painted and glued to the scissor caddy. 

I'd completely forgotten about this, so it was a nice find. 

Other than that, I threw out an astonishing number of return mail envelopes -- you know, the kind you used to send your bills back to the company, back when we used to pay our bills through the mail.  I'd kept them, intending to use them for ... well, I don't know what for, but I'd intended to use them.  I've still got quite a bit left to sort through, but I think tomorrow I'll start getting my stationery and stuff organized.

Now, I'm going to bed.  

Goodnight all. 

And We're Back

We're back to not doing things, I mean.  

Pretty much all I did today -- again-- was watch TV and knit.  I finished a hat, 

and cast on another.  

I also cast on another headband, but so far, it's just the cast on row, so no picture yet.  

The only thing of consequence I did was to move a few more of my daffodils into the back corner of my yard. 

While I was out there, I noticed my mint is starting to come up. 

By the way, if you ever decide to grow mint, be forewarned, the stuff spreads like wildfire and is nearly impossible to kill, so make dadgum sure you really want mint in your yard.  My neighbor gave me this when I first moved in, telling me it would keep mosquitoes away from my back door.  It doesn't, but hey, I've got mint tea whenever I want it.  

I also found something that looks like it might be wild blackberry, sprouted from seeds dropped there in bird poop most likely. 

I think I might try to cultivate these and see what comes from them.   I'm not a huge fan of blackberries, but they do make a good cobbler.  

Not much else is going on, but I did want to show you something.  In that drawer in my computer desk, I found some old USB drives and memory cards.  A couple of them were empty, but others had old photos and some documents on them.  One of those documents was a file sent to my by my brother years ago, in which a cousin had been tracing my maternal great-grandmother's ancestry.  It was all very interesting, but here are a couple of gems I want to share with you. 

This was the first man in that line to come to America, and apparently, he came as either an indentured servant or a full on slave. 

Yes, they had slaves in Europe, and yes, they were white slaves.  Usually they were either criminals sentenced to transportation, or debtors sold because they couldn't pay what they owed, or they were Irish. Peter Wells was made a freeman in 1679, because he either served his sentence or worked off his debt.  I wish I knew more about him, but I had to cut off my subscription to Ancestry.com when the economy started tanking. I know there are free sites out there, but I don't trust them -- especially after one claimed I was a descendent of Jesus Christ.  Yeah...

The second part I found really interesting was this one.  The fourth Peter Wells.  Apparently, that was a family named passed down through several generations.  What is interesting about this one is that he served in the Revolutionary War.  

I've got ancestors who served in every war the U.S. fought in, from the Revolution through the Korean Conflict, except for the Spanish American War.  There may actually be someone in my family who served in that one as well, I just haven't found him yet. As for the wars after Korea, I've got family members who served in those, but they weren't ancestors.  I'm not completely sure about Vietnam, but I seem to remember a distant cousin who fought in that one -- and by distant, I mean 2nd or 3rd cousin.  I'll have to look into that more. 

But not tonight. 

Tonight, I'm going to bed.

Goodnight. 

I Did Another Thing

I did another thing today. I’d better be careful or this thing-doing might become a thing.  

So, what is this thing I did today?  Well, I'll tell you. 

I was just sitting there, not doing things.  Not planning on doing things, when all of the sudden I said to myself, "I think I'll get dressed, go down to Walmart and wander through the garden center."  And that's the thing I did. 

They didn't have much out yet, but it is still very early in the season.  All I came home with was five bags of top soil.  

The first thing I did was to top off this spot where I had my sewer line replaced last fall. 

Now that my sewer line is finally fixed right, and I'm no longer washing all my dirt down the drain, I can finally begin to fill in that canyon in my yard.  Of course, I didn't realize it was the plumbing that was the problem until I dug it up, or I would have had someone fix it long ago.  I was blaming the voles, or whatever it is that is digging tunnels in my yard.  In fact, just a few days before all my plumbing woes started last year, I was fussing at the cat, telling her she needed to hurry up and kill the things so I could get this sinkhole filled in.  Turns out it wasn't the little rodents after all, so the cat is off the hook.

I then put some dirt in this low spot where water tends to collect every time it rains, 

and the rest I put where I tried to dig the sewer line up where it had collapsed the first time, wondering if it had broken there again.   

And the last little bit I scattered over the old septic tank.  The first plumber had filled it in with chunks of concrete, but didn't fill in the spaces between the chunks.  Every year, I add more dirt and when it rains, it sinks down and fills in those spaces.  Eventually it'll get filled up.  I hope.  

Full disclosure, this was actually on my list of things to do this week.  It's just one of those things I didn't really expect to get done, so I can cross one more off. 

While I was outside, I went ahead and started moving some of these daffodils. 

That's something I'd been planning on doing for years, but had never gotten around to it.  I only moved these two for now.  

Because I was getting hot and tired.   I put them out by the back fence, where it has better drainage.  I'll eventually get the rest moved there, too.  Heck, I may even do some more tomorrow.  Since I don't plan on doing any more things.  Nothing that requires leaving the house, that is. 

In the meantime, I'm still sorting the junk that came off of my desk and out of the drawer.  I'm down to this one box left. 

But let me tell you, oh the junk I found!  Like this, do you know what these are? 

They are expired credit/debit cards -- some dating all the way back to 2011.  Back in the day, I'd stuck them in the drawer to "deal with later" and just never did.  Now they have been dealt with and are gone for good. 

Then there are these batteries for a camera I used to have that died 15 years ago. 

I'd kept them, just in case I ever got another camera that used those kind of batteries.  They're now disposed of, too.  

And look at this!  Three staplers.  Three!  Why on earth do I need three staplers?  

I'll keep one, and put the other two into the give-away box -- which is getting quite full, by the way.  I'll need to find a bigger box soon. 

Would you believe, some of these markers are 20 years old?  And would you further believe, they still work?  I mean, there were quite a few markers and pens that no longer worked, but I was surprised at how many did still work.  

And oh, the pens and pencils I had in there!  I've still got tons of them, even after I put these aside to take to my friend for her grandson who is still in school.  

Now this here is a real treasure.  It's the little Gideon New Testament I got in Navy Boot Camp.

I'd brought my own Bible, but as we only had a space about the size of a shoebox for our personal items, it just didn't fit.  I had to send it back home, but they had these little Testaments there for anyone who wanted one.  

I also got one in 5th grade, but it was red, and I'm pretty sure that one got ruined in Hurricane Ike.  

And with that, I think I'm done with thing-doing for today.  Time to knit and watch some more Time Team. 

Laters.