Eye Candy Friday

Dear CoWorker

In you are going to buy a Dr. Pepper out of the vending machine, then throw this much

of it in the trash, then I don't want to hear any more about how you never have enough money. 

I got no sympathy for you.

Thank you.

That is all.

Work In Progress

Normally, Wednesday is the day I give my WIP update, but since the only think I've been working on lately is the blankety blank cross stitch, it's all I have to report on.

Here it is:

It's getting there.  I still have to fill in the white outline of the Fleur-di-lis, put a star for New Orleans, and fill in the rest of Louisiana and I'm done. 

What?  Another S?  Where? 

Looks fine to me just the way it is.

Snicker snort.

Tuckered

I'm plumb tuckered.

We had some bad storms blow through in the wee smalls that woke me up.  They were bad enough that Rylea asked to come into the bedroom.  She never does that.

The stormy part continued probably until around 6 or 6:30, but it rained most of the day.  Why does it always seem to rain when I schedule a vacation day?

When you work 6 days a week, sometimes you need a catch up day, and that's what today was supposed to be.  I guess it's a good think I hadn't planned any yard work.  I got most of what I wanted to get done done, except shampooing my carpet because shampooing my carpet is the bane of my existence.

Actually, people who constantly have to tap or bang on things are the bane of my existence.  And people who hum, and people who have a string of spit connecting their top and bottom lip when they talk, and...

OK, I have a lot of banes of my existence.

Rain is not one of them.  I love rain.  I don't love having to get out in it so much, but I love rain.  So do my flowers.  The bed got a good soaking last night, and the flowers are singing with joy.  

My zinnia is coming on,
 

and from the look of things, I'm going to have a lot more zinnias coming on soon.

That's mud on the leaf, not fungus or something icky.  I've got some buds on my four o'clocks, too

I think my marigolds are defective, though.

Marigolds are supposed to keep bugs from eating your other plants, but mine aren't.  You can see in that bottom picture that the plant right next to the marigold looks like something's salad.  I'm going to have to do some research and see what other strategies I can come up with.

Music Monday

After last week, do I even need to explain?

A Bud!

I have a bud on one of my zinnias!

This is one I planted myself, so that makes it doubly exciting.

I also found a little skink that has been hanging around.  OK, it's not a toad, but they do eat bugs and such.  I found one website that says they eat slugs, too.  So I want to keep him.

In an attempt to keep him hanging around, I found a couple of my old snake hides that my snakes have outgrown, and put them in strategic places in my flower bed. 

If he has safe places to hide, maybe he'll stick around.

 In the meantime, the blankety blank cross stitch is back on track, and coming along right nicely.

If this keeps up, I might have to drop the blankety blank, and just call it The Cross Stitch from now on. I just have to finish the Fleur-di-lis, do the S and the A, and a star to mark New Orleans, then I'm going to just outline the shape of Louisiana and fill it in.  No more referring to the pattern!  That'll make it a lot easier.

Speaking of patterns, I I think I would have done better if I'd shopped around and found one professionally drawn.  This one isn't the greatest.  Someone just lifted a graphic off the internet and plugged it into an unregistered chart generating program.  It doesn't seem like she proofread it or anything.  I've done a bit of tinkering already, and probably should have done more.  If I had more time, I would, but I don't.  Anyway, this is the picture Shelbi wanted, so that's what I'm doing..  

Squeaky says, "I know you ain't puttin' no New Orleans Saints thing in my house!

Oh, for charity?  That's OK, then.  Carry on.  But don't forget my scritches."

Day Off

We were supposed to have had to work today, but they ended up giving us the day off-- for Randall's funeral.  I know all the maintenance guys would want to go, and all the other supervisors, and of course, the front office people. 

It's been tough on all of us, even those such as myself that weren't really all that close to him.  Randall was one of those rare people that everybody loved.  In all the seventeen years I've worked out there, I never heard anyone say anything bad about him.  He was quiet and kept to himself a lot, but he was nice to everybody.  It sure is going to leave a hole...

I spent a good deal of my day working in the flower bed.  I finished weeding and deadheading, and moved a few things that were too close together.  Then I swiped a soaker hose and gave the garden a good drink.  I mean a really good drink.  That seemed to perk everything up.  I also finally got the last of the spider lily bulbs planted.

I took my garden claw and tilled up a bed.  Spider lilies don't really need to be planted very deep, so the claw was enough.  Well, I got the dirt loosened up well, then just kind of tossed the bulbs out there.  Wherever they landed was where I poked them down into the dirt. 

And that's that for planting, for this year anyway.

I few days ago, my friend Cyndye was remarking how the sweat runs down into her eyes and gets on her glasses when she works in the yard.  I mentioned that I have that same problem, and wondered if they still make those dorky looking sweat bands that were so popular a few years back.

Dang if she didn't up and send me a couple.  Dallas Cowboy colors, too.  Yeah, my friends know me well.  

I wore one while I was puttering around in the yard today, but it was so cool that I didn't really need it. 

I spent the rest of the day working on what I've come to refer to as "the blankety blank cross stitch".  About a week ago, I discovered a pretty grievous error, and had to rip out the entire Fleur-di-lis.  Normally, I would have ignored such an error and kept on going, and I tried to this time, and kept on going.

Perhaps I shouldn't have.

See, when I got to the bottom-- after spending days ignoring the aforementioned error--  I discovered that the bottom of my Fleur-di-lis would have overlapped the top of my letters.  So, out it had to come. 

Since picking out cross stitch-- especially black cross stitch--is a rather tedious and nerve racking experience, I relieved the tension by picking out one length of floss, then using that length to cross stitch the letters. 

Now, I've got the entire thing picked out and started over, and we're once again moving forward instead of backward.

I just know I'll be glad to get the dumb thing done, so I can get back to knitting.

It's Been Rough

I was at my brazing stand yesterday, just brazing away, when I heard a pop. 

I didn't think too much of it, since the newest automatic brazer has been popping like that for the last couple of weeks.  But this pop was different. 

This pop was immediately followed by a very loud boom, and the sound of metal hitting the floor. 

Something on the auto-brazer had exploded.  I'm not sure what.  Something with the hoses they said.  And the girl who was standing closest to it when it blew lost the hearing in one ear. 

Before you ask, yes she was wearing ear plugs.   No, they don't yet if the damage will be permanent.  They are sending her to a specialist to see what can be done for her.


I was at my brazing stand today, just brazing away, when I heard a bunch of yelling.  People were pointing and running.  People were crouched around someone on the floor.  I didn't know who it was, or what had happened.  I saw Mr. Brown kneeling.  I saw Billy running.  Someone called 911.  Mac was doing CPR.  They brought out that defibrillator thing.  Adrienne came out from the front office.  All the maintenance guys were crowded around, kneeling, watching, worrying...

Slowly the word came.

It was Randall (the head of the maintenance department). 

He'd had a heart attack.

He was dead, dudes.  Dead.  Not breathing.  No pulse.  Mac had brought him back. 

After what seemed an eternity, the ambulance finally got there.  The EMT's worked on Randall for a long time, then finally lifted him on to the gurney and took him out. 

He had not regained consciousness. 

I haven't heard any more about how he is doing.  Maybe I can find out something tomorrow.

For now, all we can do is pray.

Houston, We Have A Problem

I suspect that much like an alcoholic needs to avoid bars, so do I need to avoid garden centers. I just went to buy milk. And a few little other things. Really, I did. But I wandered into the garden center...just to see what they had.

Zinnias. In a nine pack with a convenient carry handle.  And since all the ones I'd tried to plant had died, I brought them home with me. 

Yes, that really is a toy snake on the box behind the flowers.

No, don't ask...

Um, where were we?  Oh, yes.  The zinnias.

They are now safely tucked into the flower bed with the rest of my conglomeration.

Now if only the rest of the stuff I planted will start blooming.  I pat my foot impatiently at you, stuff!

In the meantime, the grass clearing continues.

It's slow going, but I'm making progress. It seems the grass comes back faster than I can pull it out. And I invariably pull up something I'd wanted to keep.  That's why I have to keep buying plants.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Well, it's all part of the learning process...at least, that's what I tell myself.

You can see there in the corner the little white picket fence I bought.  Maybe in the next couple of days, I can get it installed where I want it..

I'm going to put it around my coneflowers. I think next year, I'll add three more coneflowers, and those will be the only perennials I will keep.  I'm having such fun with these annuals, I'm wondering why I never had them before. 

OK, I admit, I know why I never had them before. I didn't think they were cost effective. I mean, you have to keep planting them year after year. They just weren't worth it.  In my mind, at least.

Now that I've grown a little older, and a little wiser, I realize... some things are worth more than their cost.

War

I have declared war on two of the banes of my existence. Can you guess what they are?

Today was National Hug Your Cat Day. 

By logical extension, that would mean tomorrow must be National Bandaid and Iodine Day.

Squeaky says, 

"Remind me to buy stock in the bandaid company."

Yes Indeedy

I have been gardening.

The petunias are looking lovely as ever.

The things I planted in the beds are coming on, but it's June now, and I'm ready to see some flowers!

You hear that, little plants?  Flowers!!  I want flowers!  NOW!  

Funny thing is, most of this stuff I have no idea what it is.  OK, I know what the little gold flower is because I bought that one, but the rest of it...

The stuff that looks like grass is.. well the stuff that looks like tall grass is the Blazing Stars that I didn't really want.  The short stuff that looks like grass is...um...grass.

That thing on the left, I have no idea what it is.  That's the problem with planting a wildflower mix.  I don't know what stuff is.  I know, it's supposed to be a surprise, but still...Oh, the thing right above the marigold is a four o'clock.  I'm pretty sure. 

I know what these are, too.  They are my purple coneflowers. 

I bought some little white picket fencing stuff to put around them, but I got back into the house without taking a picture of it. 

Here, you can see I've started pulling the grass up, now that my plants are getting big enough that I can tell what I want to keep, and what I don't. I got a lot done yesterday when I was cool outside, but today it's right back to being hot.  No, I still don't know what most of it is, but it's big enough that I can tell what is a real plant and what is grass.

  Speaking of, I still have no idea what this is. 

I thought it was morning glory, and it might still be a wild type of morning glory.  I'm beginning to think it was something that fell out of my birdfeeder years ago. 

Imagine my surprise yesterday when I was walking through my front yard and saw these:

Two more little Lily of the Valley trying to come up.

Now, of course, they are safely tucked into the front bed with the rest of them. 

And that's my gardening update for today.

I know I promised some of you a cross stitch update, but I don't want to talk about it.  Let's just say, it involves undoing three days worth of work. 

I really don't want to talk about it. 

Humph...

Awesomeness

It was a short night, followed by a long day at work.  Then I came home and worked in my flower bed for a while.  I'm tired.  I'm going to bed.

But before I do, I'm going to leave you with this little bit of pure awesomeness.

Words Of Wisdom

 "Gun control is a tough sell when there are zombies and cannibals making headlines." ~ Cam Edwards

Logic

No one uses logic these days.  Well, almost no one.  Too many people don't even know how to use logic.  Let me give you a lesson in logic.

Let's say, for example, a certain website claims to have 2 million registered users.

Now, let's say that the number of users logged in to this website averages 4000 or thereabouts.  We'll just use even numbers for the sake of example.

We know due to web tracking and hit counters that only about 10-20% of registered site users are actually active on the site.  This holds true for most websites, not just our fictitious one. 

Let's say, for the sake of example, that the owner of the site claiming 2 million members has already admitted to exaggerating the number of registered users.  For what reason, we don't know, but that's irrelevant to our lesson.

Therefore, from the statements made above, and using logic, we can conclude that the claim of 2 million website members is false.  Continuing with our use of logic, and simple mathematics, we can conclude that the actual number of registered members of our hypothetical website is somewhere around 200,000 - 400,000.  Still impressive, but a far cry from 2,000,000. 

There.  Do you see how we used facts, statistics, and our brains to disprove the 2 million member claim of our hypothetical website?

That, my friends, is called logic.

Learn it.  Use it.  Pass it to your children.

You'll be glad you did.

Disclaimer:  The website in this hypothetical situation is purely fictional.  Any resemblance to any website or actual events is entirely coincidental.  

Just Sayin'

Lazy people have no business calling people out for being lazy.

Arrogant people have no business calling people out for being arrogant.

Stupid people have no business calling people out for being stupid.

Selfish people have no business calling people out for being selfish.

Just sayin'.