Bolder or Dumber?

I imagine this conversation:

"Maurice, go scout out some food for us."

"Sure, be right back. Mmmm, butter."

"Hey, Betty, Maurice never came back, can you go check on him and bring back some food for us?"

"Sure, be right back. Mmmm, butter."

"Hey Steve, wonder what happened to Maurice and Betty. Maybe they got lost in the dark. Maybe you should go and check it out while there are still lights on and they're watching TV."

"Sure, be right back. Mmmm, butter."

So that's how Steve got caught in the trap after dinner last night. Maybe Steve really had a mousy name, like Micky or Squooshie. Or he really was a "Minnie."
I didn't ask.

Fixin' Stuff

Yesterday, if you hadn't heard, the Montgomery County traffic signal computer crashed. On the same day, the Metro (buses & subway system) communication computer crashed. I immediately thought it was sabotage, someone was up to something no good. Maybe I watch too much TV. Oh, speaking of which, have you been watching Flash Forward? It's on Thursdays at 8:00. And this morning Dan told me they have a character on 90210 with my maiden name. How cool is that? And this is a week after they had a character with my daughter's name. Neither computer problem affects me, but I hope they fix the computers soon. Well, maybe I don't, Mo. county folks are snooty enough, wouldn't dare live in PG county, well, HA, look who's laughing now.

Another thing fixed: I got the link in my sidebar working to my brother's new blog. He got the posting-by-email thing working too, so now he can take a picture with his blackberry and email it straight to his blog, which he did.

We had to delete another mouse this morning, I can't wait until we get their entry-way fixed, my handywoman is coming next week. Can't wait! I'm tired of these varmints helping themselves to shelter in my house. Yuck.

Another Place to Visit

I'm trying to get my brother started in the blogging world.

He's a long distance trucker and does runs all over the east coast. I thought it would be cool if he'd post pictures of where he goes every day. I get calls from him, "I was in Maine yesterday, the leaves are still pretty," and I'd think "show me!"

He'll be posting at Beagle Adventures when he figures everything out. Hopefully I'll get my sidebar link to his page working tomorrow.

Please stop by and visit him sometime.


 

Ceramics Mob

Saturday Kevin and I went to the ceramics studio for firing day, the day when the high-fire and raku kilns get fired. Kevin and I did a couple raku pieces (pictures later) and they turned out great.

Remember back in June when I posted about my car's twin parked at the art center?

Turns out, the car belongs to Eunice, a delightful woman who also takes ceramics classes. I think she likes it as much as I do that our cars have a twin, and we joke about driving the right car home.

On firing days we park behind the studio near the kiln instead of the front public lot. At the end of the day, it's easier to load your car that way. She opened the back of her car to load her supplies and I hollered over jokingly, "Get out of my car, Eunice!" She just turned around and grinned.

I need to pause her and explain about echolalia if you don't know already. Many people with autism will echo what they hear without the same inflection the original speaker used. If I ask Kevin, "How was your day, Kevin?" he'll reply "How was your day, Kevin." with a very flat voice. I'll have to repeat the question before he realizes it was a question for him to answer and not just blindly echo back. He is a full-fledged teenager now and his voice is so low, his echos come out quiet and almost gravely.

So, on Saturday when he hears me holler to Eunice, he repeats it a moment later in a voice that's so quiet, low and flat, it sounded like a mob threat: "Get out of my car, Eunice."


 

Too Much Top Chef?

I woke from a dream the other morning, but didn't remember much of it until later in the day when I was cooking in the kitchen. That's when I remembered Bryan Voltaggio was there, but not his brother Michael. Mike Isabella may have been there, too.

Bryan, Michael, and Mike are "cheftestants" on the current season of Top Chef and are from the DC area. I can't remember what the dream was about, nor any dream for that matter, I just tend remember people and/or places, and in this case I remember hanging out with Bryan, the better-looking Voltaggio brother, and having a very nice time.

Don't tell my husband.


 

Life in the Age of Technology

I found myself asking my husband to delete the mouse in the mousetrap over the weekend.


 

Connected or Not

Our modem died at home so we've had no DSL for the past week or so. It's amazing how we've become accustomed to having the 'Net available all the time, surf this, look up that. Now I've had to read my FaceBook feeds on my phone, as well as other web look-ups. Not so fun on a 3" screen.

I like that some sites/companies have streamlined sites for mobile devices, but sometimes they are too streamlined. Amazon and mobile eBay are fine if you know what you're looking. I don't always. I like to surf around.

Oh, and I can't print out quilting patterns from my phone, either.

We started having trouble with our service around the same time we turned down Verizon's generous offer of Fios service, phone and 'Net for $80/month. Currently we pay $50 for phone and DSL, and that includes taxes. Why do we need to pay more, right? Dan assures me it's purely coincidental our DSL service is going out at the same time they want us to upgrade to Fios. Really?

Anyway, after resetting the modem and router on my own, I called Verizon the other night for help. The guy stepped me through the modem reset procedure and tried to get a connection but it failed, we need a new modem. Good news is, they are going to send us one. The bad news, another weekend without the 'Net.

We've been toying with the idea of a DVD recorder for a while and Dan saw an ad for one at Kmart a couple weeks ago, but we missed the window. If we have one and get it hooked up, we can save stuff to disc from the DVR and therefore not worry about disk space.

Yesterday I was at Costco ordering new glasses for The Girl and noticed they had a Sony DVD recorder. I bought it. I didn't unload it right away, it sat in the trunk for a couple hours until the hubbub of the evening settled down. By the time I brought it in, the store was closed. I mention this because there is no manual in the box. And we have no Internet so I can't print off a new copy. Grrr.

Now I'm back to work, and Internet access, but I can't remember the model number of the DVD recorder I bought. Sheesh.



 

Can I add any more links to this post?

It was such a lovely evening last night, after the the frigid rainy mess we had last weekend, it was a delight to walk around Capitol Hill with my kids and drink in the balmy air.

I have a guy who cuts my hair, and has been, on and off, for nearly 25 years. I did cheat on him with Nick Arrojo a couple of times, but I'm not going to let that bother me. I love catching up with Evan, hearing about his wife and kids, wow, they are getting so old now, but I guess we all are. I've kept with him from shop to shop, wherever he worked, and now he has had his own shop, Randolph Cree, on Capitol Hill near Eastern Market for many years. I'm please for him it's going so well.

I've needed a haircut for a while and Fern's been bugging me, too, she wants her hair cut also. So I finally remembered to call and made simultaneous appointments for us. Kevin went with us and sat still with a promise of a burger from Good Stuff Eatery afterwards. He'll do pretty much anything for a burger and fries, even sit in still in a hair salon for an hour. (Kevin could have stayed home with Dan, but my ulterior motive was to keep him from crashing in my bed at 7:00. I hate that.)

Good Stuff, or "Spike's" as we call it, is several blocks away down Pennsylvania Avenue. It's run by the Mendelsohn family, but Spike is most famous because of his appearance on Top Chef a couple seasons ago. The burgers are great and the Village fries are to die for. You should stop by if you're ever by there.

But I still couldn't believe how pleasant it was out last night, folks were dining outside and I hardly needed a jacket. Except for the fact there was homework to be done and Flash Forward to watch, I really didn't feel compelled to hurry home. I'm gonna miss this when winter rolls in.


 

The Need for Technology

Think about this for a second: Sewing a patch on a pocket.

You either have to sew the pocket closed or take the pocket off.

I've mentioned before about me sewing badges for Girl Scouts. Now the word is starting to get out to moms of Boy Scouts and I've gotten five Boys' jobs in the last couple weeks. The Boys have a lot of stuff on their sleeves, which are a pain to work with so I charge $2/patch instead of the base price I charge the girls of $1/patch.

BSA has a new uniform shirt, created for for today's guy. They've put a "technology" pocket on the sleeve, complete with an earphone cord eyelet. Well, that's real sweet, very forward thinking, really, but dumb as a box of rocks. This "technology" pocket is gusseted and is on the left sleeve, where a position patch goes, like a patrol leader patch or a scoutmaster patch.

Did I forget to mention these Boys' patches don't iron on? The Girls' patches iron on, granted, they don't stick well if you don't follow the directions, which is the reason I have created this little service in the first place, but they do iron on. I typically iron-on the girl's patch, then sew around it so it stays after washing.

I can't do that with these stupid pockets. Who thought of that, anyway! Oh, yeah, Boys.

My friend told me the Boys do have stuff called 'Badge Magic' for placing patches on pockets. I told a mom I could have her son's shirt ready by Thursday. I wonder if I can find this stuff by then? Where do I even look?

In the mean time, I have a pocket full of checks from moms who pay me to do this service for them, it's a nice way to get a little play money, so I can't complain too much. But still, patches on pockets? Really?



sheesh.

Post script: Badge Magic is a mail-order thing and not very cheap. I'll stop at the craft store on the way home and get some washable permanent fabric glue for less than ½ the price.

Mid-week Rambling

I'm so behind in blogging. I'm still doing the single mom thing, Dan doesn't come home until tomorrow night late. I'm kinda caught up on laundry, maybe just one regular load and one utility load to do and the hampers will be empty. I can't get too excited about that though, Dan'll be bringing home a suitcase full of more laundry.

The local power company has been doing work in our town to improve the reliability of the power supply. That means they are ripping down the trees within twenty feet of the lines.

Here's our backyard before:



Here's our backyard after:



Entrance to the neighborhood before:



After:


Depressing, isn't it?

We're getting $100 per tree they took out. They call them vouchers, but really we have to pay for any new trees out-of-pocket and they will pay us back up to the limit with proof we've installed trees from the approved list. Nobody bothered to mention to us the value of ten full-grown trees is about $10,000 and $1000 in vouchers won't even come close to providing shade and a privacy barrier like we had before. Furthermore, the price of the tree does not include installation. I went to one nursery to check out what they had in stock and their labor charges. I calculated each tree installed will be about 175% of the original price.

I've envisioned filling that space with a row of pink crape myrtles. They grow pretty fast and are so pretty in the summer. Two problems: the smallest size starts at $150 ($262 installed) and I'd need/want seven for a total of about $1840 which is way over our allowance, and they are out of pink ones and I don't like the white or purple crape myrtles.

I started considering other options, different varieties of trees and large shrubs. I started poking around on the 'Net and one click lead to another and I found a coupon offered by the state of Maryland for $25 if you plant a tree on their list. Many of trees on the state's list match the trees on the power company's approved list.

There is a nursery, one with a more expensive reputation, that takes the state coupons. I poke around on their site. Well, they have plenty of the pink crape myrtles in stock, which start at $130, are on sale and can be installed for about 128% of the original price. It looks like I can go back to my original plan, or at least start planning based on my original idea.

Maybe I should look into fruit trees while I'm at it....

Quiet

The house is quiet, I haven't even turned the radio yet. The refrigerator kicks on, it seems so loud when there's nothing else. I hear the mailman's truck stopping and going outside. I've just dropped the kids off at their Saturday morning activities, Fern to skating and Kevin to Swim-n-Gym, so I'm "free" until I have to retrieve them. Dan left this morning for a conference in San Francisco for the week. I'm torn between taking it easy this morning with some quilting and trying to get some stuff done while no one is in my way.

Maybe I'll do both.