fossilfreak

 

334 recordings of 30 types. 2 old SVU, 71 CPD. 24% clear.

 

Wednesday the 28th of February I ordered A.J.'s birthday presents, some wooden track and a roundtable.

 

The water company finally made it to my end of the street, and put their portapotty out in front of my house. They started digging and I left for Elk Grove. 

 

The Wee Wednesday program this day was about sculpture, solid shapes, lines, colors. Padreic talked a lot to Miss Jill at the beginning but didn't contribute when we were up in the galleries. It's such fun to see him growing every week and improving socially.

 

I was planning to bring the big kids here on Saturday to watch "Lady and the Tramp." Joanna kept coming up with reasons she couldn't. She "was planning to sleep in." That's OK, I'll come after lunch. Then she had some other plans for Saturday.  I finally said to her "look, I know you don't like me, but you're stuck with me." Gareth heard part of this and wanted to know more, but I told him it was not his business. 

 

The TCM movies today were "Grand Hotel"  and "Tortilla Flat."

 

Thursday we had a record 1.5 inches of rain. Unusually enough, I managed to get back to sleep despite the early wake-up when the rain started. Then it was really pouring.

 

I saw a palm frond down in the street and luckily the rain was light at that time, so I went out and put it into my yard.  Then, about an hour later with the rain bucketing down, I saw many more fronds in the street. They would be obstructing traffic, so I headed out to get them in. In the end, there were 24! They were down the street and in the neighbor's yard, and I got thoroughly soaked.

 

When I went out later for a single one (light rain again) I was only out of the house for maybe 2 minutes. It was time enough for Pharaoh to get into the kitty litter (I'd forgotten to put the baby gate back up.) Since it was so miserable outside, I sent him to bed. He knew he was in trouble, for sure.

 

I'd ordered charcoal filters for the kitchen compost crock. The ones that came were too big, but scissors took care of it.

 

The tax people called (I was planning to call them this day) so I set up my appointment.

 

Friday was Renaissance. My hands got SO COLD driving to the campus that I stopped at the bookstore for gloves. They turned out to be $20 but worth it. I am leaving them in the car until the big freeze is over.

 

The documentary was about Floyd Norman, an African-American animator for Disney. Fascinating stuff. It was more about ageism than racism. In any case, he's still there.

 

The time travel movie was "O Homen de Ono" from Brazil, which was a real mind-bender. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

 

We had more rain. 

 

I used a can of salmon from 2010 and made salmon patties. Which were quite good.

 

My tax form from St. Philomene's came and the bookkeeper missed $600! I thought it was $50 more, but it turns out Mass stipends aren't included.

 

The TCM movie was "The Time of their Lives."

 

Saturday I went to the WPAC breakfast. Again, it was crowded, but it was enjoyable. I got back in time to tell the gardeners to skip the swampy back yard, so they cut up the palm fronds. 

 

I was going to have the kids come, but when I put "Lady and the Tramp" into the VCR it wouldn't work (and it has worked with this television, on this particular outlet, before.) Worse, it grabbed the videocassette and wouldn't turn it loose.  It wasn't until I was taking the machine apart, on Monday, that I discovered the control panel. (As I seem to do every time.) Anyway, I called to cancel having the kids. Sulk.

 

I will have to get a remote as well as speakers for the White Elephant when I set it up, because how else can I go to different inputs? 

 

TCM movie... "All Quiet on the Western Front."

 

371 recordings of 36 types. 6 old SVU, 36 old CPD. 24% clear.

 

 

Friday (December 1) was the last day of Renaissance. I decided to skip the morning class and take the bag of kids' books in after the movie, when I can move the car closer to the drop-off place.  I did find a parking place near the class, and took my seat cushion in, left it and my coat, and went to find some lunch. I had my tuna bahn mi and tea, as usual, took it back, and settled in comfort to watch the movie.  It was Predestination. It's an expansion of a Heinlein short story. I was thinking the original, All You Zombies, story could be applied to the Holy Trinity. It almost makes God easier to understand.

 

I had weird dreams Thursday night, involving online friends I don't know and haven't met, Digital Donna and Rhianna Lewis (well, I did meet her, 5 years ago).

 

I have gained at least $3K on the stock market. I hope this lasts, since I've come to realize I have more money than time and must do the things I'd like to do more quickly than I was thinking earlier.

 

Saturday I went out to the WPAC breakfast. Then I had about an hour before I had to go to Elk Grove to fetch the kids, and the gardeners came during that time. I was a bit early for the kids so sat and read for a while, and then took them to see "Christmas with the Little Women."  Too many words, not enough action. Joanna has given up on autographs, apparently. 

 

To my house where they painted little boxes. In a couple of weeks we'll trim them up. 

 

After I got home again, my DVD of Doc Martin season 8 came!  This took up my time till I was done with all 8 episodes and the bonus disc. I'm eager to go through the whole series now.  And there's one more year to go.

 

10 years ago I was 25 pounds heavier with high BP.  Currently I'm nearly back to where I was after the Camino, which would make my doctor happy if only she was still my doctor.

 

Sunday I woke early, and couldn't get back to sleep. Every time I'd get close I'd think "this is it!" and of course woke myself up.

 

So I got up and put the tree up, risking electrocution with the semi-broken outlet. Half the lights on the trees are out. At first I thought I'd have to go buy more bulbs, because I couldn't remember where the spares were. They were attached to the tree. I tried replacing a bulb or two, but it seems one of the strings is out, so I guess it's the fuse... but where does the fuse go? I tried one funny shaped bulb socket, but it wasn't it. Argh.

 

By 0730 I was at the Hilton to be on a mock jury. There were 22 jurors, and we signed a confidentiality agreement. So I can't tell anything about the case. We heard synopses of both the plaintiff's and defendent's arguments and saw some slides to give background, then split into two juries in two different rooms (all by random, as was the choice of foreman, so no time was wasted.) We deliberated (with a camera working) for about an hour and came up with a verdict. Apparently this law firm does a lot of these (there were three sessions about this one in Sacramento) and usually all the mock juries tend to come up pretty much the same. They present these to the lawyers, sometimes leading to settlements or a bit of a change in the arguments. I got $125 for this, as did the 60 or so other mock jurors, and add in the cost of the rooms at the Hilton and the equipment, all paid for by one of the parties.  Wow. It was fun, and they'll never ask me again (or anyone else. One and done.) In fact, they didn't actually ask me this time, it was a letter from a law firm for Richard, so of course I opened it. Decided it might be interesting and filled out the form and was accepted.

 

In the afternoon I went back out to the wilds of Citrus Heights to see "Holmes for the Holidays." It was a nice job and I sat with a nice lady in a better seat than my last one. I will continue to come out here next year. Free wine with the show!

 

368 recordings of 29 types, 16 old SVU, 22% clear.

 

I waited around for the gardeners so I could ask them to please put the leaves into the leaf bin, then I took off for Elk Grove. This meant I got there a lot earlier than I actually meant to, time to have a little chat with Joan. She thinks the parents are too hard on Joanna, that she should be allowed to do her little Magic Schoolbus kits even if she's being punished. But what can get her attention? There has to be something that she wants badly enough to try to behave for it! Then it was time to leave. "Gareth, get on this side, Joanna, go around. Gareth, where are you going?" Oh, says Joan, you shouldn't make statements with more than one instruction, because the last one is the only one they remember. She knows this because she was a teacher. (This is likely why she says everything twice, though I notice that habit a bit less these days.) Grrrrr.

I brought her the last of the pomegranates, the squirrels can have the rest. What a year!

 

Because I was still early, I could stop at my house to put the gate up if the dog had stayed out of the kitty litter. Of course he hadn't, so I put him outside for the rest of the afternoon. Then we went to see "Cinderella." Still too early so we started walking, and ended up in the nature area for a few minutes.

Waiting for the play, Joanna was bugging Gareth, and I threatened to sit between them. She just can't help herself. Watching me, she "just happened" to poke him... so I sat between them. Joanna was less interested this time than I would have thought, though she did yell out what color Cinderella's dress was supposed to be. She wasn't interested in autographs at the end. (It later developed that she was in a hurry to see Grandma, having forgotten that wasn't going to happen until the party, or as it happened, not till she got home after the party.)

 

We ran a couple of errands for me. I left them in the car while I picked up a couple of tickets for a movie on Thursday. Then we went to Papa Murphy's where I got a jack-o-lantern pizza. The guy didn't hear me say "yes" to the family size so I said it louder, and I suppose I was rude. Anyway, he apologized for me being rude, so I feel terrible.

 

Back at the house I had a Hallowe'en Lego set out and some seasonal stickers. This kept them pretty well occupied, as well as Gareth reading the science books. Joanna couldn't be bothered, but the stickers were a hit and she made a jack-o'lantern with the Lego. We tried to make spidery chocolate chip cookies, but it didn't work. The last hour or so they were wild, and Joanna decided "fart" was the funniest word in the world. I finally said that if she said it one more time, she'd have to spend time sitting on my bed.

 

She really canNOT help herself. It may have taken 30 seconds. She started to argue, realized it wasn't working, and went into the bedroom. I only made her stay there about a minute, and she was slightly subdued when she got back. I made the pizza.

 

I read some more of Pinocchio to them (only two chapters left!) and then Bernadette came with their costumes. We got changed and were ready to go across the street to the party.

(I really am not hanging from the ceiling!)

Which was fun as usual. Gareth had too much sugar, I suspect, and began to feel wonky, so we went home a bit early, leaving Joanna and Bernadette to go through the haunted house. (Which is in the neighbor's back yard!) Very clever costumes! I especially liked the KFC family... Colonel Sanders, two chickens, and two buckets. We found Waldo. Oscar and Cookie Monster were there.

 

Instead of a scythe, I had a pizza cutter. It's a shame I didn't think to remark I COULD MURDER A PIZZA until two days later. I did mutter, under my breath as I was trying to peel the lid off a container of salad dressing, that "you would think Death would have a better grip" and sent someone into hysterics.

 

On the whole, a nice day!