fossilfreak

 

369 recordings of 31 types, 18 old SVU. 21% clear.

 

After I got home from the garage on Monday (the 23rd), I called Sacramento Suburban Water to report that I have an underground leak in back. I've noticed the last week that there's a wet spot (with really green grass) back there. Such timing! It's pretty much where the old pipe will join the new one when they move the main to the front in the next few months. The so-called "customer service" person, who didn't give me her name, said I would have to get a plumber. Wait a minute, it's your pipe. No, if it's on my property it's my pipe.

 

I did have the satisfaction of slamming the phone down, and have decided to let it leak until the water company comes to join it to the new main. Then they probably will fix it! I told Vince this and he said it'll be a lot on the meter, and I told him I don't yet HAVE a meter! That's what moving the main is all about!

 

I forgot all about the WPAC breakfast on Tuesday and arranged to go to Elk Grove. You know, I don't much like the new restaurant so I didn't care. I was a little later than I intended going down anyway because I was looking for my camera. In the end, Tuesday evening, I found it in the shelves in back, which I've been cleaning. For some reason I thought it was the one I dropped into the ocean in the Galapagos, and I somehow thought my new camera was silver. Nope, it's black, and the ocean camera turns out to be red. Now I have all the cameras of the past 10 years. (Only the ocean one is completely broken. The Canon (which I *loved*) was warped after I dropped it while chasing after Gareth, the first Sony, red, which Rich gave me, was beginning to make rattling noises, and I discovered it would cost $200 to repair, or $200 to get a new one, decisions decisions. The new one was the one I dropped in the ocean. Its replacement is the one that was lost in July and found in September, and it was beginning to go bad. The lens doesn't open automatically, and when you try to view pictures, they waver through a number back and forth. So I was reluctantly going to replace it anyway!)

 

Anyway, I finally made it to Bernadette's. She went shopping for the material for Joanna's costume. She had the house all decorated and I kept reaching for the camera. No luck. Padreic now has a splint and has to spend a little time walking. He still was attached to the iPad and cried when he had to put it down. I read him "Green Eggs and Ham" and "Are You My Mother?" and he seemed to like them well enough. When I picked up the kids Joanna had a good report, for 4 of the last 5 days. However, the next day she was too excited that Grandma was coming and so was in trouble again. Daddy had warned her about that.

 

Vince's call was going to be short because they were caring for the brother of a kid in the hospital in Seattle. However, he was able to stay on while I rapidly rattled about the last two weeks, and told me a lot about A.J., who is having trouble adjusting to school (I think making Kindergarten all day, as Washington did, is a huge mistake!) and who is emotionally very young. We won't be talking this week, because Tuesday is Hallowe'en and I'm busy the rest of the week.

 

 

Wednesday I had a Rich dream, something about being in Marrakesh with the grandkids (not Bernadette) and trying to get out of the hotel (and getting lost, of course) and someone giving me a LOT of stuff for them... he was very little help, which isn't fair to him, he would have been much better in real life.

 

Bernadette and I took Padreic to Wee Hallowe'en. Since I forgot to bring dollar coins for the meter, I bought quarters from Gareth's bank. We found a parking place across from the museum and went to check in. We had to wait for our turn about 30 minutes, but they had a yarn spider web to play with. And here I had all those little remnants of yarn (and still have a few) that I could have donated to the museum. I will, next time I get to that part of the cleanup again. We saw a Sherlock, a dinosaur with little brother dinosaur still coming out of the egg, a home-made stegosaur (likely carnivorous!) and a family with two of the 101 Dalmations and Cruella deVille. It's so neat to see the little kids, because the parents go all out to make really cute costumes.

 

 

Padreic was a little bemused at decorating his goodie bag and getting the first two prizes in it, but when we got to the place where the prize was a jingle bell, he'd caught on and "me! me! me!" The ballet was the Nutcracker... I would really like them to do something else, like Peter Pan, something I know Joanna would like. (The Nutcracker is too crowded.) At one of the last stops, in the galleries in front of the Yosemite picture, a cowboy sang "Home on the Range." A young mother with two little kids was in the gallery and they came to listen to the song. I thought it would be a shame if they didn't get the little prize (a beanbag with a picture of a horse) so asked the cowboy if he had a couple of extras and I gave them to the kids. No flamenco dancer this year, but outside a guy played a tuba and recited (with great panache) "Custard the Dragon" which is one of my favorites.

 

We went to the refurbished Tot Room and Padreic got a lot of exercise walking a bit around the ship and up the ramp. His legs are getting stronger.

 

I picked up the kids and read a couple of chapters of Pinocchio, and Grandma arrived just as I was about to finish. So I did and said goodbye to all and came home to cut into my little pumpkin and stuff it. (Actually, I cut it in the morning and got the seeds out, then kept it in the fridge till I could make the stuffing. I just used stuffing mix and the boullion gel I decided to try.) It turned out well! Enough for two days. The big one will be almost a week's worth of meals, and I intend to stuff it with quinoa, sausage, and ground turkey!

 

Thursday I detected a smell in the bathroom. This is unusual, believe it or not. I got a pine candle and set it in the bathtub (and closed the door so the cat wouldn't get curious and ignite himself) and after a couple of hours it smelled great. However, by that time I got a worse whiff in the playroom. I checked for cat misbehavior, but no. Then I thought it might be gas, the water heater. I went out to check and the top of the door (which is a heavy press to fit door, not a proper door) was open. I pulled it all the way off but I couldn't tell if the pilot light was out or not. There was no discernible smell there. I put the door back on and worried, but decided if the pilot was out I could start it the next day, when I had more daylight to work with.

 

Meanwhile, my velociraptor came!! So I finished cleaning off the shelf and built the dinosaur (HEAVY!!) and put it up. I've been cleaning the shelves in back... there were SO many things just thrown up there.

 

 

I didn't sleep well and woke up early Friday fretting about the pilot light, but when I checked to see if I had hot water, I did! The room really smelled bad, something rotten somewhere. Maybe a rodent got into the water heater compartment and died? Then Saturday it was fine. So I may never know.

 

It was Renaissance, and a really fun one. The morning seminar was developments in architecture and I saw a lot of places I want to go see for real. One of the really modern ones is The Barn, in West Sacramento! Another place he talked about was a development downtown made with modular units assembled in Tennessee. Then the time travel movie was Brigadoon. I've seen it before, and I do like the stage version better, but it was a fun change from the mind benders of the past few weeks.

 

Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol 1 p. 547
153.9 miles
mild

371 recordings of 51 types, 75 old SVU. 17% clear.

Saturday, September 2, I went to the WPAC breakfast. It's at a new place, so I got there a lot quicker than I used to. So I sat in the corner and talked to a couple of guys, and wasn't that happy when Ralph came along, but it turns out he's interesting. Also, he makes model ships so I need to talk to him.

The cat got locked in the pantry, and this time he urinated copiously. Grumble.

In church I said hi to a number of people. It was the 50th wedding anniversary for one couple who I talked to about Renaissance and the Camino (they may walk part of it next year.)  I'm happy for them, but envious as well. 

I gave the last of the Betsy-Tacy books to Gerrie, who called later to thank me.

My Canadian friends, Nancy and Doug, invited me to stay. So I'm serious now about driving to Ottowa from Pittsburgh next spring. This is the one thing that was Rich's job, hiring rental cars, that I haven't yet done.

I sorted through the SVU episodes and there were a number I had already seen, so that's why that number is lower.

On Labor Day I started the Trip Advisor reviews. I only did three, and have so many more to do. My current goal is to finish them all by the end of September. 

I finished crumbling up dipping chips at the bottom of the bag, and used it to crust a chicken breast before I fried it. YUMMY.

New Orleans handled Katrina so badly, and continued whining afterwards, and Nagel was re-elected and talked about a "Chocolate City." I decided then and there that I never wanted to go back to that place.  The way the people have handled Hurricane Harvey in Houston (how alliterative!) has made me interested in seeing it after a few years. So I looked up things to see... oh, yes, the Johnson Space Center!  Vince, of course, knew this!

Tuesday I cut fur mats off Spooky. I haven't had a cat mat up since long-hair Smokey, before I met Rich.  Spooky is short-hair, but sheds a LOT and is not the most fastidious cat.

I went over to the Tuesday morning breakfast. Afterwards I mailed the book to Sue from Ashland. It was too hot to go to the board meeting in the afternoon.

Fires and smoke everywhere!

Sometime that afternoon the squirrels took off with the two tiny pumpkin starts! AND the squash, and I have no idea how they got that (it was huge and I was going to have it that night)! This may have been my last chance for pumpkins (no, I have one more female flower and I'm going to net it the second it has flowered and been visited by a bee!)

Vince called. The boys started school this day. And there was a harvest moon.

Wednesday was my mammogram, then down to Elk Grove. I started Pinocchio with the kids.

Jeo, one of the first geocachers I ever knew, died! He'd been in the hospital a few years back and I thought he would die then, but he came out and seemed to be pretty much back to normal. I'm so sad.

I try to sponsor kids who are fundraising for local schools, so when this teen turned up on my porch selling cookie dough for El Camino's water polo team, I bought one. I talked to him a few minutes, then brought him the money... he said "how do you spell Yarnot?" and I asked "how do you know my name?" and it turned out he's a neighbor!  From the house where they have the Hallowe'en parties! Oops.

Thursday I went into Hoarder central and moved stuff so as to get to the windows. I  started sweeping there, too.

Outside there was a truck vacuuming out the storm sewers.  Then it broke down and this ENORMOUS tow truck came to get it.  Never a dull moment in this neighborhood!

I had a nice but small fish tv dinner. I wanted to add one more fish fillet, so I put it in the microwave at the same instructions as the dinner. No. You can't do that... smoke started pouring out of the microwave and it took quite some time to clear it out of the kitchen.

When I went to water the peanut plant, I startled up this HUGE black widow. Lesson learned, when I clear the junk and the cacti away from the back windows, I must be sure to wear gloves!

Friday I did clean the back by the high windows, wearing gloves of course. There was so much dirt and leaves under the boards Rich had there as shelves, that my dustpan broke.

Then it was Renaissance. The morning seminar was about the theater scene in Sacramento. I mostly went so I could tell about Patience, the play Bernadette is in.  Someone else did that, anyway, so I didn't have to.

The time travel movie was "Somewhere in Time." Schmaltzy, but fun. Chip (the teacher) says the watch is an "ontological paradox" (because there is no origin.) This gave me a great pun, (what is a "phylogenical paradox"? To recapitulate) which no one understands. I had a hard time seeing this movie because Mr. Big Head came in late and sat right in front of me. Every time I almost could see, he'd move his head. He even had his cell phone on and it rang.) I believe the people behind me could see my occasional "choking hands" reaching for his neck. In the end, though, I was even polite to the creep.

On the way home I bought a Power Curve power strip (the 15 foot cord is of the most interest, because that would mean I could move the TV in front of the fireplace without rewiring one outlet) and a Spin Broom. As seen on TV. Unfortunately, that doesn't work as nicely as the tv would have one believe.

Then I was making cookies for tomorrow's memorial meeting, and put three pans into the oven at once. Because I messed up the preheating, the cookies were in too long and the kitchen filled with smoke, again. This time I apparently started burning the cookie pans, aluminum, because I accidentally had a whiff of it and couldn't breathe at all. Since then my persistent cough is persisting even more, and I'm a bit worried about shortness of breath. This time I locked the cat away and opened all the doors and waved the smoke out.  I did eventually make some cookies, but maybe I should just stay away from the kitchen.