Pepper On Purse

Pepper the Cat goes likes to rotate his sleeping spots every couple of weeks. This is his latest...curled up on top of my purse, which I keep on the kitchen island.

His new habit is making it hard for me to get out of the house.  I'll be glad when he changes to a new place!

Five years ago today: Bright and Shiny

A Loyal Customer

Last week, Shirley's comment on my post about fresh flowers brought back a long-forgotten memory.

In the fall of 2000 Son Tony was a sophomore at an all-boys high school. One Thursday night he came home and told me one of his classmates had asked for a favor the next night.  The classmate was going to a dance at his girlfriend's school.  The girlfriend had a friend that needed an escort.  Would Tony do it?  Being a nice guy, he said yes.

It was Tony's first high school dance, and he was oblivious about the etiquette involved. When I asked him if he'd thought about a corsage for the girl, he just shrugged his shoulders. Of course, since he didn't know his date I knew he had no clue what color her dress was. I didn't want him to show up empty-handed, so I told him I'd take care of getting a corsage the next day while he was at school.

The next morning I went to a nearby grocery store that had a nice floral department. When I asked the clerk if they could make a simple corsage for that night, she said, "Not unless you ordered it ahead of time.  We've got all the orders we can handle". I pleaded with her, but she refused to budge.  I came home, got out the phone book, and started making calls. The first two tries yielded the same result. However, the third call, to a small independent florist, had a more positive result.  They said if I'd accept the flowers they had in stock they could put something together.   Later in the day I picked up a beautiful corsage, accented with translucent ribbon that would coordinate with any color dress.

That florist been my go-to shop ever since.

First Name Game

Back in November of 2009 a friend challenged me to complete the Last Name Game. It was a fun challenge to come up with answers to the game categories that started with the first letter of my last name.  Fast forward to today, when I received a similar invitation.  However, this time the answers had to start with the first letter of my FIRST name.  Most of them were easy to come up with,  but I really had to think about a couple.

If you try it, let me know how you do.

• First name: Kathy
• An animal: Kangaroo
• A boys name: Kyle
• A girls name: Kristen
• An occupation: Kindergarten Teacher
• A color: Kelly Green
• Something you wear: Khakis
• A drink: Kombucha Tea
• A type of food: Kale
• Something found in the bathroom: Kleenex
• A place: Kathmandu
• A reason to be late: Keys Missing
• Something you shout out: Kirbibble!

Five years ago today: To Market, To Market

Wet Grass. Bare Feet. Marvelous!

All day long I did adult things...I scheduled work for the next couple of weeks, cooked lunch and cleaned up, did laundry, and attended a meeting with Hubby Tony to plan an event that's happening this fall.  After the meeting we came home and I shredded a pile of papers for Tony, who's been cleaning up the filing cabinets in the office.

Each time the bin filled up I took it outside and spread the shreds around the tomato and pepper plants that constitute my garden this year.  The intermittent rain we've had the past two days was coming down once again. During the last trip I walked out to reach the far corner of the garden strip, and the moisture oozed in between my flip flops and my feet.  It felt really good, and made me realize I hadn't walked in the wet grass for a very long time.  Tonight would be a great time to change do just that.

I came inside, dropped off the shredder bin, and told Tony if he was looking for me I'd be outside.  I left my shoes by the front door, then stepped back into the natural world.  

The past week has been perfect for growing things, and the grass (and weeds) were tall and luxuriant.  I walked across the front yard, stopping to pull up a couple of tiny maple tree sprouts, then headed to the back.  The yard was soft and spongy, and made a squishing noise as I walked across it.   I strolled along a mole run, which felt really strange with bare feet.  When I reached a molehill, the mud squeezed up between my toes.  it felt so good I did it a second time.

The area by the sewer tends to be wetter than the rest of the yard.  Tonight it was saturated!  I stood in a large puddle of water for a couple of minutes, then headed back towards the house.  When I reached the front door my feet were wet and covered with mud and grass clippings.  Since I was returning to the adult world, I stopped to remove the mess before I went back inside.

Five years ago today: Stand For Stan

When They Said Seven Days They Meant It!

For Mother's Day this year I received a bouquet of flowers from ProFlowers. The arrangement of pink tulips and blue iris was beautiful, and guaranteed to last for seven days.  I cared for them according to the directions, but in the middle of the week the iris looked past their prime and the tulip petals were falling off left and right.  I threw the stalks into the compost pile, then sent an email to the company letting them know.

The next day I was pleasantly surprised to receive a response from their Customer Care department, which indicated I could get a replacement for the original order, a different item of equal or lessor value, or a coupon to use at one of their related brands.  It took me a couple of days to decide what I wanted. The original bouquet was no longer featured on their website, so I decided to go with a arrangement of 20 multi-colored tulips.

My new order was delivered yesterday.  When I opened the long, skinny box I found all of the tulips were in bud form (just like they were the first time). I placed the the bouquet in a vase with water and waited. This is what they looked like today:

The pastel colors look great on my kitchen table. I hope this arrangement lasts as long as it's supposed to.

Five years ago today: If The Shoe Fits

Gutters, Gutters, Who's Got The Gutters?

It was the first week of April when our area had a massive hail storm, and a month later when we received a check from our insurance company for some minor house damage from that storm.  Since that time I've been looking for gutter, painting/staining, and carpentry contractors to do the repair work.

For each type of work I contacted several companies that had good reviews on Angie's List, then waited for them to get back to me with estimates.  It's the busy season for outdoor home repair and many of our jobs were small, so it was a challenge to find someone who was willing.  Finally I got a gutter company, and when one of the painters agreed to take care of the carpentry, too I jumped on his offer.  Last week I signed both contracts. Each company told me the jobs would be scheduled around the weather; on average May is the wettest month in our area, and in the past week days without any chance of rain have been hard to come by. None of the work was critical, though, so I was in no particular hurry.

This afternoon the doorbell rang.  When I answered it I saw a man, wearing a t-shirt with the logo of the gutter company, who told me they were here to do the work.  I was pleasantly surprised, but also annoyed that the main office hadn't called in advance.  Fortunately I'd already done all my errands for the day and had the afternoon free to stay at home.

The installers parked their large truck right in front of my driveway, set up their equipment behind it, and got to work.  Three hours later the old gutters were gone and the new ones were pretty much installed.  Unfortunately, they'd discovered a rotten board on one of the front eaves and couldn't hang that portion of the gutter. They'll have to make another trip to replace the board and finish the job.  However, there's a 50 percent chance of rain tomorrow and a 60 percent chance on Friday so I don't know just when that trip will happen.

Five years ago today: Handy Laundry Guide

One Project, Two Hacks

I love reading about household tips or hacks that let you do things easier.  Today I came across the post 21“Sweet” (Non-Food) Uses for Sugar at One Good Thing by Jillee. Some of the uses I already knew, but others were new to me. For example, I learned that you could clean a coffee or spice grinder by grinding sugar in it.  The theory is that the sugar will absorb and clean out the oil that has built up in the machine.

Hubby Tony got a new coffee grinder last Christmas. We only treat ourselves to bean coffee on the weekend, so the grinder doesn't get heavy use, but as far as I knew it hadn't ever been thoroughly cleaned. I decided to give the sugar treatment a try.  It only took a couple of minutes to run a scoopful of sugar through the grinder, but in the interest of getting the innards really clean I disassembled the grinder and used an old toothbrush on the crevices.

When I was done I had a container of dirty sugar that smelled just like coffee:

Clean grinder - dirty sugar

Instead of just throwing it away, I decided to incorporate the sugar into a scrub and use it on my cracked heels. I decided to do the exfoliation outside to cut down on the mess, so after I carried everything to the back patio I mixed a little olive oil into the sugar, massaged it all over my heels, then rinsed it off with water. It made my heels feel and smell great.

Ready to go!

'How To Make Mistakes And Miss The Voice Within'

This afternoon I was tidying up my Inbox, getting rid of some emails and moving others into folders.  Tucked way back on the third page I found a message that contained words of wisdom from Sacred Threshold: Crossing the Inner Barrier to a Deeper Love by the spiritual writer Paula D’Arcy.  The words were so inspiring I thought I'd share them with you:

Guaranteed Ways to Miss the Hidden God (or, How to Make Mistakes and Miss the Voice Within)

1. LIVE your life at high speed. No exceptions. Run hard.
2. STAY scattered and distracted. The more clutter and activity, the better.
3. TAKE everything personally. Never evaluate. Agree.
4. USE blame liberally. It's so invigorating. I wasn't responsible, you were. Everything's your fault.
5. DON'T laugh, especially at yourself.
6. STAY tied to your past. Elevate it to greatness. Live remembering and longing. Or missing. Why do it halfway? Go for it.
7. USE the word 'because.' 'I can't change, because.' Because is so little appreciated as a solvent for responsibility. Try using because. This will work.
8. NEVER question or think for yourself. Just keep moving and accepting. (Refer to #1 and #3.)
9. CONTINUE to think of God as invisible and distant. Surely not present in this room. At this moment. Not while I'm reading a book.
10. REINFORCE the belief that your life is going to happen soon. This is not it, not yet. But one day. Maybe when I finish reading.

Howdy! Welcome!

A friend of mine is on the planning committee for a convention this weekend.  Her schedule is jam-packed with last minute details, so she asked me to pick up one of the convention speakers at the airport today.

I have no idea what the woman looks like, so I'll be standing just outside the secure area holding up a sign with her name on it.  I see that all the time when I'm in airports, so it must work.

Five years ago today: All Done

Frittering

After breakfast I was supposed to be gearing up for today's house-window-washing extravaganza, but instead I was getting distracted by all the new things waiting for me online.  (Ten new emails in my inbox!  Eighteen new blog posts in my reader!  Thirty one new status updates on Facebook!)  I justified my preoccupation by telling myself I was just waiting for the angle of the sun to change so the kitchen windows didn't get all streaky when I clean them, but I knew that really wasn't true.  I was just having trouble getting motivated.

As I scrolled through all those new Facebook updates I saw that several friends had posted their results from a test called Which Side Of Your Brain Is More Dominant?.  I decided it couldn't hurt for me to see what it was about, too. (All in the interest of knowing more about myself, right?  Definitely not to waste more time!) The quiz had questions about a turning figure, choosing colors, picking out the most appealing picture from an array, which picture was similar to another, which direction I crossed my hands and legs, and which eye was dominant.

Based on the quick test, I found out that neither side of my brain is more dominant; I use both sides equally.

The information interesting but try as I might I couldn't figure out how to apply the results to my cleaning task for the day, so I reluctantly moved away from the computer and got to work.