Brrrr

I put my geraniums back outside because the weather has been lovely and what happens? We get wind and rain and cooler temps. Poor things were totally battered by the wind. and of course we just turned our sprinkler system back on and it poured last night, lol. I think I'm going to go turn it off for tonight, I hate watering while it's raining!

Anyhoo. Happy Mother's Day to all you moms out there. I got jewelery from my DD, a hand beaded bracelet :) I love it.

My baby

My darling daughter was born at 1:26 PM, May 9, 2009. She was a big baby, 8 lbs. 15 oz.

Today my little one turned 9 and as she's all too ready to tell me, she's not a baby anymore!

Happy birthday, dear daughter. You'll always be our baby *grin*

PS Two of the girls invited did respond, because we nagged them, lol. Both very last minute and while the kiddo is happy, I'm still peeved.

*sigh*

My daughter's birthday is coming up in less than a week now. We kept her invite list small, just 5 kids. I asked for RSVPs on the invites and would you believe I've not heard from a single person? How rude is that? No wonder kids are so screwed up now, their parents who really should know better are just as bad.

So for the education of anyone who might not know: An RSVP means let the sender know if you will be coming or not. Either way. It's just good manners.

"R.S.V.P. stands for a French phrase, "répondez, s'il vous plaît," which means "please reply." The person sending the invitation wo­uld like you to tell him or her whether you accept or decline the invitation. That is, will you be coming to the event or not? Etiquette rules followed in most Western cultures require that if you receive a formal, written invitation, you should reply promptly, perhaps that same day. For hosts who are planning a dinner party, a wedding or a reception, this is important from a practical point of view, because they need to know how many people to count on and how much food and drink to buy. More important, though, is the simple courtesy of responding to someone who was nice enough to invite you, even if it is to say that you regret that you will not be able to attend." --How Stuff Works

And really it's a child's party. It's going to break my kiddo's heart if no one shows up. At this point I am ready to make other plans for us for the day so she won't feel bad and if anyone responds at the last minute tell them to shove off :(

Broken Down

In more ways than one.

I broke down and gave in to peer pressure to read Twilight. After two of the ladies at work read it and raved about I thought about reading it, but the waiting list at my library is a mile long so I put it off. But the ladies conspired and brought in a copy for me to read, lol. I'm on chapter 4 now. I'm withholding judgment for now, Edward's back and forth like a fiddler's elbow and so am I, lol.

The other thing that was broken down was my truck this afternoon. I left work a bit early. It was really quiet, the guys had their tools out and were plotting new ways to take over all the space around them and it's lovely outside. Climbed into my truck, turned the key and nothing. Wtf? I looked to see if I'd done something stupid like leaving my iPod plugged in. Nothing obvious. The truck's light are automatic, so it couldn't be that.

I had to call the hubby to come jump start me. Luckily, that's all it took. I mean, as soon as his car started my dashboard lights came back to life, so it was pretty obvious the truck would start. He followed me home, just in case. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will be ok now. I don't work 'til 3 PM tomorrow, so it leaves it a lot of time to decide to die, lol.

Edited to add: The truck did not start for work, so it goes in Friday morning. I'm hoping that we will get it back by the time I go to work again at 3. *Crossing fingers that it's something simple*

Jumped the shark

*Sigh* I used to love the tv show Ghost Hunters. I loved the way the went into an investigation with the intent to debunk and put homeowners fears to rest. To hear the "H" word from Jason was a rare thing, and usually had to be pried out of him by other team members.

But over the last several seasons the team has primarily gone into commercial locations, locations that I suspect are less interested in help getting rid of a ghost than they are in proving a haunting, purely to cash in on the additional revenue a haunting can bring in.

My first hint of things to come was when the crew went to the Moss Beach Distillery. The Moss Beach is a well known fake, with gizmos planted through out the building to "enhance" guests experiences. If I knew the place was a fake, why the hell didn't GH? They either need to boost their research or they went in with the intent of "exposing" the fakery to boost their rep.

I don't think I've seen an episode over the last two seasons that hasn't offered up some evidence of the paranormal, unless maybe a more recent epi in an old bowling alley where my hopes were falsely raised that the debunking was back.

Things like jacket collars so very obviously pulled, hangers conveniently tossed from off camera, EVPs that are just soooo damned convenient, they've all made me very skeptical of the show. And don't get me started on GHI!

But last night was the final straw. GH has jumped the shark. To investigate their own "haunted" inn was just too much! And to pull GHI into to give it an air of respectability... Whew. What's that smell? Something stinks of blatant and shameless self-promotion.

Bye - bye Ghost Hunters. I'll miss Steve and Tango's antics, but I'm so over Grant and Jason :(

I really should update my reading list

but I'm too bloody tired tonight, lol. Hubby's had a cold and starts coughing the moment he lays down, poor thing. And of course that keeps us both awake. Now my throat is starting to hurt and I am sincerely hoping that it's not strep.

Anyhoo, as usual I've read many books since my last post. The sad thing is, my waiting list at the library has dwindled to only 14 books! And 3 of those are for my daughter.

Part of the problem is, they don't seem to be ordering the books I want to read. Like the new Broken Heart Vampires book that comes out next month, and Undead and Unwelcome, which also comes out next month. And the new Laurell K Hamilton book that I can't seem to stop myself from wanting to read, if only to see the train-wreck that Anita's life has become. I mean, this sentence from chapter one sort of says it all, when Anita is talking about family pictures, "When you're sort of living with, at last count, four men, and dating another five, or six; who goes in the pictures?" Shesh.

Did I mention that my daughter is now reading some of the books I read when I was her age? And it tickles me pink that she's reading Trixie Belden and loving the BWGs! And she's doing a book report on The Great Brain. Again, I love T.D. and his brothers, lol.

Anyway. I started this post by saying how tired I am, so why in the heck am I still here? Lol. Night!

"The rain, rain, rain came down, down, down

in rushing, rising, riv'lets." --The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh

That's how the last few days have been. At work we had a seriously leaking roof in several place, most notably in the print area. One leak was a pour, as opposed to a drip.

At home it appears our vent in the master bath has a drip, hopefully something as simple as just needing to reseat the cap. Mighty disconcerting when you get up in the middle of the night, more than half asleep and something cold drips on your head, lol.

And my friend Alan is now in a hotel with his family and their weekend company because the ceiling in their kitchen caved in due to the rain. Shesh!

The good news is it's sunny today, and is supposed to stay that way for a while now. And the mountains look brilliant in the distance, all snow covered.

Well, at some point I am heading to whatever hotel Alan is tucked up into to meet a fellow WoW guildie (his father in law, lol) from the small guild I belong to on Alan's server. And I desperately need to go do some dailies on Annstás to make some money to cover the repairs I've had to make thanks to a couple of painful Ulduar 10 person runs, lol. (Hint: Brand new level 80 really isn't up to Ulduar, but it was fun!)

Just when I thought it was safe...

to put away the electric blanket! I walked out of the house yesterday to a cold mist. Yuck. Didn't think to go back in and get a coat, just hustled to the car to get out of the yuck.

So by the time I left work at 3 PM, it was raining hard. And cold. By the time I ran the gauntlet (thanks go out to the ass who was turning and didn't signal so I had to stand in the rain waiting for you to drive by and then you didn't. Loved that.) and got to my truck I was soaked and peeved.

However, meeting the "girls" after work for drinks and appetizers was lovely and put me right back in a lovely mood, lol.

This morning it is still raining, which on the one hand is a good thing, it was supposed to turn to snow overnight, so I will live with the rain! But on the other hand, it's gray and wet and cold out there, lol. I try to tell myself that we are living in a drought, and that the rain is good for us. But my aching knee doesn't care about that and the thought of going to work in a bit is not a happy one.

Oh well. Nothing I can do about it. Guess I'll grab some more coffee and watch the rain for a bit before I wake the kiddo. Ciao!

All quiet

Not much happening here. Been rereading a lot of books, as you can see from my reading blog. Enjoying having three days off this week, with another to come quickly on Sunday since we are closed on Easter.

Finally got my death knight to 80 in WoW and really, just don't know what to do with myself now, lol. I started a shaman a few weeks ago, maybe I'll play her. She was actually meant as a joke. My guild has become flooded with characters that are called soandsosangel (so and so being the husband of the hubby and wife duo), and when someone suggested I make a character named after my hubby's character, I created a character called Imnoangel instead.

If I were to play any other character really, I'd rather just move one of my older chars from hubby's account to mine and continue to level that way. I've abandoned a priest, a mage and a warlock on his account, lol (I also abandoned a warrior, hubby took her and leveled her to 80 while I played my DK, so we now have a wide variety of characters to chose from). Gnorma, a gnome mage, is the most likely to be further leveled, purely because she's the highest level, at 47.

Then again, I've a gnome DK on another server that I created to help a coworker level, I may go back to playing her (I love her, just because of her name, lol. She's Abbygnormal *snicker*)

Oh! Ummm, hi!

So the blizzard wasn't really all that that much of a blizzard. We did get 9" of snow, and for a while there it was total whiteout. School was let out early Thursday and Friday was canceled completely, so the kiddo got a long weekend to play in the snow.

By Saturday most of the snow was gone again, since we warmed right back up. Typical March weather for us, lol. In fact the weather right now is much more typical than it has been all winter.

Anyhoo. Not much knitting going on, some reading. But mostly playing WoW again lately, since the hubby talked me into signing up for some raids lately. And strangely enough, I find I'm actually having fun, rather than dying of impatience every five minutes. Yes, there's a lot of standing around, but it's not as terrible as I feared, lol.

Going to grab some breakfast and play my death knight for a bit. Ciao!

In for it!

"A BLIZZARD WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 6 AM MDT FRIDAY.

SNOW WILL BECOME WIDESPREAD OVER THE ENTIRE AREA BY MIDDAY...AND
BECOME HEAVY AT TIMES...ESPECIALLY THIS AFTERNOON AND EVENING.
NORTH TO NORTHEAST WINDS OF 20 TO 30 MPH WITH GUSTS TO AROUND 45
MPH WILL PRODUCE BLIZZARD CONDITIONS AND CONSIDERABLE DRIFTING
SNOW ON THE PLAINS BY AFTERNOON. THE WORST CONDITIONS ARE EXPECTED
TO BE IN AREAS SOUTH OF A LINE FROM BOULDER TO AKRON.

TOTAL SNOW ACCUMULATIONS BY LATE THURSDAY NIGHT WILL RANGE FROM
6 TO 12 INCHES ACROSS THE NORTHEAST PLAINS...WITH 8 TO 16 INCHES
OF SNOW FROM THE DENVER METRO AREA TO LIMON...AND ONE TO TWO FEET
IN DOUGLAS AND WESTERN ELBERT COUNTIES. THE SNOW AND PROLONGED
WINDS WILL ALSO PRODUCE CONSIDERABLE DRIFTING OF SNOW."

We've been lucky this winter. Too lucky, 'cause Mother Nature has decided enough is enough and it's really ugly out there. In fact, I walked out into the living room (we've been tucked up into bed, reading, this morning, lol) and looked out the window and immediately pulled up the school district's web page. It's almost total white out out there, between the snow and the wind. Sure enough, the schools are all closing this afternoon. It didn't say when though, so we called the kiddo's school and they said we could come get her now. So hubby is on his way to get her and stopping for milk on the way, then we are going to hunker down for the rest of the day.

I'm supposed to go to work at 3 pm today, but I'm kind of thinking that may not happen. I hope not, because it's only supposed to get worse. I worry about my co-workers though, because both managers on duty today come from the next town over, as do the copy specialist and several others. Not a nice drive anywhere at this point, let alone along the very open highways between here and there.

Anyhoo, now I am waiting on pins and needles for the hubby and kiddo to get home. He's much better at driving in the snow than I am, thanks to safety training he was require to take at his old job, but it's still nerve-wracking, knowing how ugly it is out there.

UPDATE: Almost 8 1/2" now, with some pretty hefty drifts out there in the backyard. No school tomorrow for the kiddo. Good news is the wind died down around 1pm and the roads are just snow covered, you can at least see again. We got off fairly lightly, areas just to the south of us got a foot or more. Of course it's still snowing so who knows what we shall see tomorrow. But we are all safe and warm so it's all good :)

Home again.

Well, actually home again for several days. We got home Friday night and I went back to work Monday. Kind of a fast trip, considering all that driving.

But for the most part it was a good trip. We had absolutely wonderful weather, with only one day a little chilly, the rest of the time it was unseasonably warm. Even the day we spent in Madison was nice enough that we only needed light jackets/ sweaters.

Madison was wonderful by the way. Even if they didn't let me look for any yarn shops, lol. I could totally live there. We had a great time with friends we hadn't seen in years and got to see some of the U of Wisconsin campus. And to top it all off, our friends live only blocks away from the zoo and it's free! So we walked over there and spent some time wandering through the little zoo. Of course the kiddo loved that.

And as a little side note, the giraffes at the Henry Vilas Zoo came from the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs (they let you feed them there, lol. It was way cool when we were there), so that's kind of neat too.

Anyhoo. I'm still tired from the trip, and had a bit of an emotional melt down Monday that I am still tired from as well, lol. So I think I am going to go soak in a nice hot bath and read. Ciao!

On our way!

We're leaving shortly for Iowa. Our yearly pilgrimage to the old homestead and Gram. Not sure what all we are going to do when we get there, but the weather is supposed to be quite lovely for once, so yay! Makes a change from our trip last April and rain, rain, rain and cold!

No WoW for almost a week, but I am taking some books and my knitting. And I never did check the mail yesterday, so I may do that before we go, just in case my needles are here. (Scratch that. Can't find one of my balls of yarn for the socks, and no time to look now).

Anyway, gotta give the upset cat some more attention and then get moving. See you all later!

Tools of the Trade

Tools I am taking with me on my USB drive to give my mother's PC a tune-up next week:

1. Portable Firefox
   Brilliant! I can run my preferred browser with my bookmarks straight from my jump drive!


2. Defraggler
   Because the built in defrag tool is rubbish!

There are a few other tools I will take with me, but I can't give away all our tech secrets, can I? Lol.

Other tools I am taking with me:
Size 10 1/2 straights, 10 1/2 circular. Lots of green Cascade 220.

Tools I will not be taking with me because they didn't arrive in time:
Size 3 40" circular needle for two socks at one time, Corntastic Yarn. :(

Knitting.

I am! But not what I was knitting. I picked up my knitting for my Flowers on the Go bag and looked at the mess it was and cringed. My join was lose and really the whole 6 rows of it looked awful. So it hit the frog pond.

And really, why the heck am I knitting a purse when I am trying to get away from carrying one at all? Lately I've been looking into just carrying my most frequently used cards (Sam's Club, debit, ID and library cards) with me. I've been looking for a hard card case, something I could just slide in my back pocket and not have to worry about.

Part of that is due to the fact that my old boss had her purse stolen last year and it was a nightmare. And we all carry way too much stuff with us. With identity theft on the rise, most prevention tips tell us to only carry the cards we use with us and to never carry your Social Security card with you. So why the heck am I carrying around store cards that I honestly only use once or twice a year?

And why am I carrying around a checkbook? I can't remember the last time I actually wrote a check at a store.

So anyhoo. What to do with all that green yarn that I would never use for anything else?? I wandered through Ravelry and finally decided to make a modified Booga bag. I've cast on 64 stitches and I'm going to knit for 60-ish rows on the bottom before I pick up stitches. It'll be my yarn bag for home. And if I knit fast enough, I may even be able to get my mother to line it for me next week, lol.

Mother Nature has an odd sense of humor

There's snow out there, y'all. Snow that we actually desperately need (rain just doesn't do it when the ground is rock hard. It just rolls off, snow on the other hand, seeps in). But that doesn't make it any less of a shock to the system when really we've not had much winter this year.

My mind knows that March is typically one of our wettest months, but this winter has been absolutely atypical. Anyone who says there's no such thing as global warming, or that it isn't as bad as everyone makes it out to be, needs a smack to the head. Or just to be brought to Colorado in July, because it's going to be an UGLY wildfire season.

Anyhoo. There's just enough snow out there to make my morning drive obnoxious, so I'd better get moving. Have a good day, y'all.

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?*

Wow! It has been in the 70s the last few days and absolutely GORGEOUS! And of course, I've worked the last two days, lol. But tomorrow is supposed to be almost as nice, and I'm off work so it's all good.

Not much knitting going on here, but a lot of reading. I just can't seem to work up enthusiasm for knitting right now and I don't know if that's my projects or just me. I did pick up 2-at-a-time Socks though, and I've found the pattern that I am going to use for my daughter's Corntastic socks, Pitter Patter. It's a very simple pattern but that's what I need if I am going to try making them two at a time, lol. I just need to get a 40" circular now. It would be nice to have them ready to go for our trip to Iowa later this month.

Anyhoo. I'm tired and thanks to a co-worker, cranky. I'm going to grab something to eat and go see what's On Demand to veg to. Ciao!

*Shakespeare, Sonnet 18

"Mama said there'll be days like this...

...There'll be days like this, my mama said." -Dusty Springfield

Ah yes, today was one of those days. From the moment I woke up all too early til right now. I basically informed my boss this morning that I was going to go work in the copy section the moment someone else came in. He said, "Maybe." I said, "No maybe about it." And when D. came in at 10:30 a.m. I said, "Seeya." And off I went. Lol.

So I spent most of my day with pretty much just the head of the copy section and away from anyone I might be tempted to growl at or bite ;)

After work the kiddo read in her room and the hubby went and got food. I hid in the bedroom and watched Mike Rowe milk spiders.

Then I made the mistake of opening Sims 2 whilst the kiddo was in the shower so I could see what the new pets I imported yesterday looked like. Then the kiddo had to make a new family. But she dithered and dawdled and didn't even get one family member done by the time I came in to read. So I gave her the choice. Turn it off and read stories or keep going without stories before bed. When she continued to say "just a minute, just a minute," I turned the lights off and said good night. What I really wanted to do was scream and gnash my teeth and growl. Like I've wanted to do all day...

*Sigh* Must be bedtime for me now.

To quote Miss Scarlet, "Afterall, tomorrow is another day."

Not a wild night

Poor hubby has a miserable cold, so we put off a nice dinner until he feels better. No fun going out for a meal you can't even taste.

It was a nice night though. We dropped the kiddo off at a local program for kids (it was packed, lol. Every parent in town went, "Woot! No babysitter scramble!" Including us.) and actually enjoyed a few hours to ourselves in the evening. It's been a very long time since we've left the kiddo with anyone and gone out in the evening. And I think the last time we actually went out on our anniversary was before she was born!

The brilliant thing is, she had an awesome time and wants to go again. She immediately saw a couple of friends, though she didn't hook up with them for a bit, like I said, the place was packed with kids. They talked and played and watched other kids. The event is at the local rec center every Saturday, and there's tons of stuff for them to do. I see a few more nights out for all of us coming :)

Hubby and I did go out for burgers. Our local Culver's offered free two scoop sundaes with your meal so that's what we did. After we rolled out of Culver's we headed for the next town to the east, since they have a Border's and I had gift cards ;)

I really have a hard time finding things in Borders. It's not my fave bookstore. And Seattle's Best Coffee? Yuck. Even their frufru drinks are bitter. But free books are free books, so we go, lol. And after about 20 minutes I did find the book I was looking for, so it worked.

Anyhoo, the kiddo has finally stumbled out of bed, so I shall get us breakfast. Ciao!

Valentine's

Always a big day in our house. It's hubby's birthday and our wedding anniversary. It makes 18 years this year and it's also hubby's big 4-0.

At this point last year I wasn't sure we'd make it to 18 but I am very glad we have. He's my best friend in addition to my love and I'm very thankful to have him in my life.

Funny enough, his 40th doesn't seem to be bothering him. It's bothering the hell out of me though, lol. It reminds me that next year it's my turn and I feel very very old. It's had an odd effect on my psyche as well, since I've been having bad dreams lately, nightmares about growing old and infirm. It's silly since I know 40 isn't really all that old, but apparently my mind is having a hard time accepting that deep down.

Anyhoo, hubby is sick on his birthday and feels like crap, so I don't know that we are going to do anything tonight. Poor guy.

I was playing WoW this morning, but I am dreadfully bored at the moment. I think I shall just go read. I'm officially on book 29 for the year already, lol.