Almost a year

It has been almost a year since my last birthday. Tomorrow is my birthday and I will be 50-something......again. I will be 50-something for another 5 years.:-)

I just made a rum cake to take to work tomorrow, as it is the rule in my office that on your birthday the birthday boy or girl has to bring treats for everyone. On the way to work I will stop by and pick up a veggie tray for all that are just sick of cake, cookies and sweets. I was supposed to use vegetable oil to make the cake, but didn't have any so used light olive oil. It seems to taste okay. Hard to tell since I am one of the people sick of sweet stuff.

Snow and ice, still on the ground. What a pain! The temperatures are just above freezing, but the ground is still frozen, so it is not melting very fast and the roads are icy in the morning. Usually I can comfort myself with the thought of my annual April/May Palm Springs trip with the girls, but decided that this year I just could not justify the $$$$. So.....no dreaming of pools, palm trees and sunshine. I might be able to squeeze in a trip to San Antonio though for a fraction of going to Palm Springs. We will see.

I have a little pampering planned for my birthday (well, a couple days after) hair cut, color, facial, brow shaping and possibly a mani/pedi. After the well documented mani/pedi from Hell I am a bit hesitant to go down that road again.

I gave myself an early present of a Wii and love it. I haven't been able to get my hands on a Wii Fit yet, but hopefully will find one this weekend. I did get Dancing with the Stars and am having a lot of fun with that. The waltz seems to be the hardest dance. I thought since it was slow it would be easiest. Nope.

Happy New Year to All

Old photos

I am in a bit of cleaning frenzy today and found these old photos.
Between my divorce, my mom's divorces and moving around
a lot, I don't have many pictures of myself growing up.
The first two are of me about 6 or 7 years old when we lived
in Florida. They are all grainy because I just took pictures
of the pictures.

Me (8 years old) and my mom in Florida. Early 60's

About 9 years old, living in New Mexico.




10 years old at the Yucca Motel pool in New Mexico.

Surly teen years. I think about 14 years old. We had moved

to Bellingham by this time. I hated it here.

My 19th birthday (New Years Eve). Still looking kinda surly.

Gotta love that brassy blonde.

19 years old on my wedding day (1973) with my

brother, Sean, and sister, Megan. The blonde is

looking better.



21 years old. This was taken just after Brooke was born.

I look like crap!

Well, back to the cleaning!

San Antonio in November

Another lovely trip to San Antonio to visit Kari.
My friend, Hope, also went. Our planes left and
arrived about the same time, but we were on
different flights. I decided at the last minute to
go with her and it would have cost me a lot more
to get on her flight. Worked out great though.
The weather was perfect....sunny and 70 to low
80's. I now have perfected the Xanax dose for my
fear (sheer terror) of flying. The plane rides were a piece
of cake, although I don't think I could have passed
one of those police sobriety tests when I got off the plane.
I would fall on my face if I had tried that heel-toe walk
in a straight line thing. Generally I do not sleep on planes
or shuttle bus rides, because I am afraid I will snore.
Didn't care and I happily snoozed away on the 3 hour
shuttle bus ride back to Lynden.




Vineyard just outside Wimberly Texas.









Not a very good picture, but it was a beautiful spot.


We did some wine tasting here, but their wine really


wasn't very good.

Crafting at Michaels

On Saturday mornings from 10-noon, for $5 per kid, Michaels
has a crafting session for kids. Mom's can shop while the kiddies
play. This kept them quite entertained for an hour. The older
kids could have stayed longer working on projects, but Dane
was DONE and HUNGRY.


Maia making a scrapbook.


Davis getting ready to paint his initial on canvas



Dane creating design for his mask.




The happy grandkids with their creations!

The biggest hit though were the containers of Flarp I got them.
I heard flarping sounds and hysterical laughter all the
way home! For some reason they kept dedicating the especially
juicy flarps to me.

The love of my life!

Many years ago, shortly after my husband and I divorced, I met and dated a man that I thought was my soul mate. I was completely swept off my feet, head over heels in LOVE. He was........beautiful! Unfortunately, he was also commitment phobic. We went back and forth for several years. I finally realized I was ADDICTED to this man and cut off any contact with him. I did not allow friends to bring up his name. I even wore a rubber band on my wrist for while and snapped it every time I would start thinking about him.

It took a long time, but I did get over him. It helped that he also moved far, far away to another state. I did hear several years ago that he finally did get married......to someone MUCH younger of course. I then found out a couple of years ago that he and his wife had moved back here, but we live in opposite ends of the county. I avoid going to the part of town he lives in or any stores in that area for fear of running into him and his probably gorgeous young wife.

Okay. Today I was standing at the counter talking to a coworker. A man walked in, with his face sort of turned away from me, and I immediately put on the greet the public smile and said "Can I help you?" He turned towards me and I thought that looks like........... then he started to speak....OMG, IT IS HIM! I just turned around and walked right to the back, out of sight. I actually hid out in a back office until he left. I had to hide for about 40 minutes.

Why did I do that? I have gained a LOT of weight since I saw him last many, many years ago. I have no idea if he even had time to register who I was I left so quickly. He only got about two words out. Fortunately, my coworker said he hadn't noticed that I had walked away.

When you run into an old boyfriend you want to look really, really good. You want him to think "Damn, she looks hot. I should have hung onto her." not "Damn, she looks like shit. Glad I didn't stay with her." Although I was having a good hair day, the weight, wearing my Disney sweatshirt and big ole clunky Keen sandals (with white socks) did not make me feel at all old boyfriend worthy.

He, on the other hand, looked fantastic. I now have to quit my job and move to another state.

Winter Blahs

I really have a problem with winter. I HATE IT! Starting September 1 I start feeling the blahs coming on. I am now in my full-blown winter funk. I guess that is why I have not written on my blog.

To help myself out of it, I decided to go to San Antonio with my friend Hope to visit our friend Kari. Thank you Kari for moving someplace warm and sunny for me to visit. I got a great airfare deal, only $216. Couldn't pass that up. We are leaving Nov. 13 for 5 days. This will be my third visit in less than a year. I suspect my next visit will be February the way I am going. I have some sewing projects to finish up before I go. Since Kari reads my blog I can't be more specific.

Weight---*^&($#*)@#!!!! I have been very good at diet and exercise for the last week. I have been weighing myself every day. I have found I stick to diets better if I do this. The scale has been going up and down all week, but according to yesterday's weigh in I lost 3 pounds. This morning I got on the scale and it said I GAINED 0.2 pounds. WHAT!!!! I went for a long walk first thing yesterday morning, very good about food intake, made and ate Zero point Weight WAtchers soup, etc. NO WAY I didn't lose weight. So, I got back on the scale, now it said I had lost 2 pounds. Huh? Got on again, said I had gained 0.8 pounds. Got on again, said I had lost 1.5 pounds. Got on about 3 more times, every time said something different. It is a digital WW scale that I got about a year ago. I think the battery must be going, so who knows what I have lost or gained, or really what my starting weight was. Before I weighed last Saturday, I hadn't weighed myself in about 5 months. Will get new battery today. If I find out that weigh even MORE than I do now, I will beat my head against the wall. I tell ya, stomach stapling is starting to sound like a good idea.

Well, I am off to RiteAid for a new battery and hair dye. I need to cover up the horrible highlighting job I did to myself a couple of weeks ago.

The Date Report

Some of you knew I had a date today, so here is the report.

I was a bit hesitant because this guy, Dave, is 15 years older than me. Plus the whole dating thing makes me nauseous. On the way there I kept thinking "I really LIKE being alone".

We met in Fairhaven and sat on the green behind the Colophon had coffee and talked for a while. Then walked around and went in a few shops. We ended at Mambo Italiano for a drink and some eats. This all took about 3 hours.

The good:
He was on time.
Nice shirt and pants. Not old man clothes.
Shirt buttoned appropriately. No old man gray chest hair showing with gold chains. Yes some old guys think they are hot when they do this.
Clean shaven and well groomed. I HATE facial hair.
No strong cologne. Big turn off.
He did not talk about the ex wife. Been divorced for 3 years. He answered questions when asked, but said nothing negative.
We know some of the same people.
We have common interests and values.
He looked and acted a lot younger than his age. Probably because his ex wife was 25 years younger than him.

The bad:
He IS 15 years older than me. Maybe another 10 good years in him. I have hopefully 20-25.
Hated his shoes. Looked like orthopedic black walking shoes. Probably expensive though.
He has a cataract in one eye that he will be getting surgery for.
We know some of the same people. Yes, I know I put this on the good list too.
It is an hour and a half from his house to mine.

He ended the date with "what would you like to do next time". I guess that is a good sign. Brooke said if he didn't want to see me again he would have just said he would give me a call. We will see. Sorry y'all no pictures, although I did have my camera. I am not sure he would have been too happy if I said I needed pictures for my bloggy friends.

Pillow

I cannot sleep without my favorite pillow. Now this may be disgusting to some. When I got married in 1973 we were given 2 very good quality feather pillows as a gift. My pillow is 35 years old! Honest! I can't remember what happened to its partner. I was divorced in 1982, perhaps my ex got the other one.

Several years ago I had to put pillow into another case as I was waking up every morning with feathers in my hair. I don't dare take it out of the case because I am sure it would disintegrate. Don't worry I always put a another pillowcase over that one. So it is clean....well sort of. it smells just fine to me. Although sometime mornings when I don't wash my hair and just use the blowdryer to fluff it up I get a whiff of sort of a mildewy, little old lady scent.

I have honestly tried to find a replacement for pillow, but nothing can equal it wonderful squishyness. I recently tried to wean myself off pillow, but after 4 nights of tossing and turning I admitted defeat, snuggled up with pillow and slept like a baby. Pillow also scrunches down nicely to fit in my suitcase for travel.

I guess pillow is my grownup wooby. It took the place of BUNNY, my pink stuffed Easter bunny I got as child. BUNNY slept with me every night of my life until I got married. Bunny was very special because he was pink. I grew up with 2 aunts that were close to my age. We always got the same things, but in different colors. I was always given blue, Judy got yellow and Holly always got pink. I felt Holly was the favorite because she got pink. That Easter a mistake was made and I got the PINK BUNNY. I was thrilled.

When I had children I let them have BUNNY to play with. One day I realized that I had not seen BUNNY in a while and started a search. No luck. I asked my then husband if he had seen BUNNY. He said he had thrown BUNNY away because he was disgusting. BUNNY was a little threadbare, his color more gray than pink and his little music box only a memory, but he was NOT disgusting. He knew how I felt about BUNNY. We got divorced not too long after that I believe. I am sure if we were still married, pillow would have joined my beloved BUNNY a long time ago. No heart, that man.

Flood pictures

Muddy water runoff from construction across street



The "river" running over the sidewalk. It had gone down quite a bit by the time
we got there.


This is taken from same spot, just turn around toward houses.
It had a long ways to go to reach the houses.



Mosquito alley. Probably wasn't very smart of us to go down there.
There was so much rain that there could have been another flood
following this one.

photos from San Antonio

Rolling down the San Antonio River.



I just loved these polka-dot umbrellas on the River Walk



It was sooo hot. I left a pool of water when I got up from the plastic seat on the boat.



Yummy Mexican treats at Mi Tierra



Pinatas on the ceiling at Mi Tierra

San Antonio

Day 1--Left house at 5:10 a.m. for 30 minute drive to get on airport shuttle--2 1/2 hour drive to airport to catch plane
FEAR of flying--took half a xanax--2 1/2 hour flight to LAX--2 hour layover--took other half of xanax--got to end of runway and one engine died--towed back to terminal to wait an hour for another plane, with hopefully good engines--took half a xanax--3 hour flight to San Antonio. No Mr. Right on either flight.
Finally made it to Kari and Kevin's around midnight. Seemed to have developed HUGE cankles during flight. Lovely.

Day 2--Slept great--still have cankles. Went toobing down river, with a few little rapids. Great fun and saw a lot of turtles swimming along with us. Took 2 strong Hispanic men to haul me out of toob at get-out point. Thank God no one had a camera for that one. If those guys hadn't been there I would probably be in the Gulf of Mexico by now. Cankles down slightly.

Day 3--Almost cankle-less. Went to Mama Mia. Loved it! Then SHOPPING! Bought 5 new tops. Score. Would have bought more but ran out of time. Slight canklege.

Day 4--Took a barge tour downtown through the river walk. Beautiful, but VERY hot and humid. Mi Tierra for lunch. Yum! There was a fantastic mariachi band playing the whole time. I got their CD. Roamed around the market place and saw Miss San Antonio do some Flamenco dancing. She had nice slender ankles. Jealous. Still can't see my ankle bones.

Kari dropped me off at her house and went to pick up Kevin at work. I took a nap. Woke to the sound of a horrendus thunder storm. I have never seen it rain so hard. The streets were flooded with water. A while later after the storm Kari and I were on her back deck and I said
"Oh, you can see the river from here". Kari "No, we are not near a river." Me, looking again "I can see it through the trees." Kari looks up at this point "oh my God! Kevin!" It was a flash flood! Fortunately, we were in no danger, as her house and the others are quite a bit higher than the "river". We walked down a little later to take a look. It was pretty incredible. Sorry, I haven't downloaded the pics yet. Will post later. I got eaten alive by mosquitoes down by the "river" so we left. I am still scratching at those dang bites.

Day 5--Time to go home. Kari dropped me off at the airport. Took a WHOLE xanax. Lovely flight to LAX. In my drugged state I accidently went to baggage claim instead of catching shuttle to next terminal and then had to walk to the terminal and go back through security. Took half a xanax and had another pleasant flight to Seattle. Very important to take proper dosage of xanax.

Two plus hour shuttle from Seattle to Bellingham--Obnoxious couple with 2 obnoxious small children sat right behind and would wake me up every time I nodded off. The mother repeated EVERY word her kids said and kept telling them how smart they were. At the first stop when a few people got off I was able to move away from them. It wasn't just me, everyone else sitting close to them moved too. I think they got the hint because they toned it down after that. No
Mr. Right on either of those flights either.

Big time cankles, especially on the left. On my flights I did the foot and leg exercises, drank lots of water and got up at least twice on each flight to the bathroom. Problems with them all week. Within a few hours of coming home from work they go down significantly and no problem at all this weekend. Maybe the way I am sitting at work. I took an extra "water" pill, but that did not seem to help. I guess I need to go to doc. Looks almost like a bruise where the left cankle was the puffiest.

Aren't you supposed to ENJOY a pedicure?

Now, I haven't really had a lot of pedicures, BUT, they shouldn't be painful! I was all ready for a day of pampering. I had my haircut and was very happy with it. I called my friend Kari after the haircut all bubbly and cheerful and told her I was on the way for the mani/pedi. Haircut and a mani/pedi are kind of my prevacation ritual. Along with a little self-tanning. I am heading to San Antonio on Thursday for a long weekend with my BFF Kari and you never know when
Mr. Right might be in the seat next to you on the plane.

I show up right on time for mani/pedi, pick out my color, plop my butt in pedi chair, grab a smutty magazine and get ready to relax. WRONG!!!! This gal was rough. She had these long talon-like fingernails that came to a point and the edges were sharpened like a ginsu knife. She kept running the edge of her talon along the edge between my nail and the skin. It felt like a razor blade. At one point, it hurt so much I instictively yanked my foot back, which caused her to paint the whole side of my big toe red. I told her "that hurts". To which she gave me a blank stare. Her coworker at the next seat looked over and they said a few words to each other in Thai and gave me dirty looks. I asked the other one if she spoke English? Again the stare. I said "she is hurting me". To which she finally responded, "you want shorter?". NO! IT HURTS! Tried some sign language of touching my fingernail and saying SHARP....HURTS. They exchanged a few more words and ignored me. It was still uncomfortable, but not as bad as before.

I almost walked out of there before she was done. Then I thought maybe this was one of those sweat shops and they would beat the girl if she displeased a customer, so I gritted my teeth and got through it. Hopefully, someone else would do my manicure, which is what they usually do.
NOPE, not so lucky.

Crap. So here we go. She asked "you want cut?" pointing to my fingernails. HELL NO, not after the clipping my toenails down to the quick. She was rough, but she did not use her razor talon on me again. Usually they have you take off watches and bracelets so they can massage your hands and lower arms. I forgot to take off my watch, so when she got done with my nonwatch arm I said I would take off my watch. She said "NO!" and just lotioned and massaged my hand.

My nails on my right hand look like they were filed on an angle, one side shorter than the other, if you know what I mean. My big toe on my right foot is the same way.

I went up to pay the slavemaster (man) with my debit card. He gave me the reciept to sign and I put zero under tip. When she did a half-assed massage and filed my nails on an angle she sealed her fate on the damn tip. Heck, I wanted to slap her! He looked at my reciept and he and talon lady exchanged a few words. I ran out of there. Anyone know of a good place to go for a mani/pedi?

Happy Birthday Boys and What was I thinking!!

Brooke's Kung Fu Panda cupcakes.

The Birthday boys, Dane and Davis

The Melting Pandas

Last night we celebrated Davis and Dane's birthdays. Brooke make adorable Kung Fu Panda cupcakes and because I think every kid should his or her own cake for their birthday volunteered to make cakes. So on the hottest day of the year I came up with the brilliant idea of ice cream cakes. I didn't want to heat up the kitchen any more than it was (90 degrees) with the oven. Not thinking about the fact that I couldn't have the "cakes" out of the freezer for longer than 60 seconds before everything started sliding off.

Needless to say, decorating them was a nightmare. At one point I actually had the cake in the freezer along with my arms and head. How does Dairy Queen do it? HA! They probably have air conditioning. Then.....I had to drive two miles to Brooke's house. My car air conditioner was just eeking out lukewarm air on high. Fortunately I made all the lights (two), while I kept an eye on the rapidly liquifying cakes.

I whipped in the driveway and ran them to the freezer. Then we forgot them until people were starting to leave! Oops. By then the kids really didn't care, they were full of pizza and Panda cupcakes.

Most important, the kids all seemed to have a great time and those boys made a haul on the toys.

Millie the Monkey

Well, it didn't turn out very well. Lots of little issues. I will not be giving this little monkey to anyone. I think I might try enlarging the pattern a bit. It is much smaller than I had anticipated before I got the pattern. Millie's arm are about as big around as my little finger. Very hard to stuff and sew. You can't really see in the picture, but one arm is not completely attached.
It said to use felt on the face, but I really don't care for it. I think a couple of washings and it would disintegrate. Good trial one though.

30 Minutes of Organization!

Before

After

Before

After

Amazing!!! Everything that was on the tables in the before pictures is STILL on the tables. You can't believe how long I have been putting this off. I can't wait to start sewing. Next on the agenda is Millie the Monkey from a pattern I bought on Etsy.com.

More purses

Two more purses finished. These are fun. I still need to put some sort of closure on the second one.

Kids having fun

Took Gage, Maia and Dane to a coworker's house for a barbeque. They had a great time. Dane loved the landlocked boat and Gage got to do some shooting. We also played horseshoes, volleyball, tetherball and foosball.

They were all sad when it was time to leave. It was a great place for the kids to play out in the country. They even got to get eggs out of the hen house to take home.

Everyone commented on what nice, well-behaved kids they were. Which was nice, since when I first drove up and they all started piling out of the car I could see looks of horror on my coworkers faces. I know they were bracing themselves for a pack of wild little brats.

I made a purse!!!

I have been wanting to try making a fabric purse/tote for several months. Ever since I made a duct tape purse (first picture) for a design class last fall. I made the duct tape purse without a pattern or a sewing machine.

I decided I really needed a pattern so went off to JoAnn's last night. I haven't looked at patterns in a few years so was quite shocked that a simple pattern was $15! I was going to forget about a pattern when I saw a sign that said all Butterick patterns were on sale $1 each! Score! I bought 3 patterns, which will make 15 different purses.

This one was sooooo simple. It took 1/2 yard for the outside and 1/2 yard for the lining that you see at the top of the purse over the handle. It said it was a 2 hour pattern. I was done with the cutting and sewing in about 30 minutes. Took me an hour to sew on the 8 buttons! Geez. I am really glad I got the pattern. Simple as this was I would have NEVER figured out how to make this thing by just looking at a picture.

I need more fabric! I will be at the fabric store as soon as it opens tomorrow.

Connections

I read Tammy's blog today about her cousin and it reminded me of a gal I met many years ago.
I was out with friends one evening at a popular hot spot and it was very crowded. A couple asked if they could sit at our table. The gal (Kathy) and I just clicked and had a ball. Over the months we would run into each other and catch each other up on what was happening in our lives. Our first meeting I learned that she had a boyfriend for 7 years who helped her raise her son and they had broken up a few weeks before. She said he was really wonderful, but he wanted to get married and have a child and she didn't. They were still in contact with each on a friends basis.

I met this guy (Mike) and started dating him. Really nice and absolutely adorable. I talked to Kathy after I had dated Mike a few times and told her I had met someone and what a great guy he was.

Mike and I been dating about 2 months and one night while talking I told him about meeting this gal and how we had this immediate connection like we had always known each other. I did not tell him her name. As I kept talking he started getting this funny, uncomfortable look on his face and then asked "what is her name".

Kathy was his ex-girlfriend. She had told him about me too, but no one made the connection until that moment. He told Kathy about it and she thought it was wonderful and was happy we had gotten together.

One month later...................I had been out of town and came back early so decided to stop by Mike's house, sure that he would be delighted to see me. I walked in and Kathy was there and they were both quite cozy, half dressed and sipping wine at 7:00 in the evening with that rosy post coital afterglow. HA!!! They were shocked to see me. I sat down and acted like everything was normal and asked Kathy how she had been since I had not seen her for a while. They kind of stammered and obviously were waiting for me to blow up. I didn't. Mike finally asked if I wanted a glass of wine. I said "sure". I drank my wine and made pleasant small talk and then said "nice seeing you, but I have to go." and left.

To this day I have no idea how I pulled that off. I never saw or heard from either one of them ever again. Ah, the joys of dating.

My way home

I know I am not supposed to talk on my cell phone while driving, but no one said anything about taking pictures while driving.

I took these on my way home today from work. It was such a pretty day and I am so happy my drive home is not on a crowded freeway. Of course, in the winter I am not quite so happy on those icy mornings.

First picture of Presley smiling

This is the first picture I have of Presley smiling. Isn't she cute? She is six weeks old today.

Beautiful weekend

What a great couple of days. The weather is absolutely perfect and I live for the few weeks a year that we have. I bitch and moan the rest of the time.

I headed out the door at 8 a.m. Saturday for some garage saleing. Not something I usually do, but let me tell you $20 and 3 hours later I was pretty happy with my haul. I managed to put back the old laundry sprinkler bottle like my grandma had when I was a kid and the pink daisy hat/net thing that I wore on my head at Easter when I was about 9 years old. I got a couple of oven to table, to fridge pyrex covered casserole dishes, books, 4 Fire King custard cups. My best find was a 4-cup Hall teapot for $6!! It is green with a gold band around the pot, gold handle and spout. Probably would have paid $20 on eBay.

I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera. It was just such an awesome day. One house I stopped at looked out over rolling hills farmland, with snow covered Mt. Baker in the background. I commented to the owners what a fantastic view they had and they just went "huh? Oh , yeah." They were just used to it I guess.

Got a raise.....sort of

I am a union member, not by choice. They say you have a choice, but if you refuse to join the union you don't get the job...then it is payroll deduction. It is a joke. They appear to be representing my employer, not their card-carrying, dues-paying members.

So got a raise. Yippee!!! I got a whopping $25 more a week. Now, everyone was pretty happy because that is double of what we usually get. We kept thinking there must be a catch. Last night our new contract was signed, sealed and delivered and now in effect. Less than 24 hours later we found out what the catch was. My contribution to the retirement fund was raised, so in my paycheck I am really getting $13 more per week. In the past 3 years my contribution has been raised from 1.8% to 5.4%, wiping out very much of an increase in my take-home pay. Everytime I get a raise, my monthly union dues are also raised.

On the bright side....I HAVE A JOB, with medical, dental, vision, etc. and for the moment my job is pretty secure. We had some open positions and they decided to do a hiring freeze, so they don't have to let people go.

I also have a plan in place in case I do get laid off. This gal will be heading SOUTH to the warm sunny climate of San Antonio.

So for the moment, I am happy I have a job and probably should make myself a bright, sunny, nose-to-the-grindstone employee. This means I need to keep my mouth shut and keep my opinions to myself. That is going to be TOUGH! I love telling people what to do.

Have to go...So you think you can dance is on!!!!! Love that show.

Vegetarian

I might have to be a vegetarian for a while. After the Rice-A-Roni fiasco the thought of eating ANY meat is turning my stomach. I had to make a chicken dish to freeze to take to work. My coworker's wife is having surgery on her arm/hand, so we are all bringing in a main dish and a dessert for him to put in the freezer and whip out to feed the family for a few weeks. I made chicken breasts stuffed with ricotta, spinach and mozarella and covered with a tomato sauce. I was gagging cleaning the chicken and stuffing it. Under normal circumstances I would think this recipe was yummy. For dinner tonight I had mashed potatoes, watermelon and a cupcake. Not exactly balanced, but three of my favorite foods!!

I said we all were bringing in dishes, that is of course the women in the office. The men were offered the option of donating $$$ so the family could get pizza occasionally. Now I know the guys in the office and they MIGHT kick in $5 each. Kind of pissed me off that the "girls" were asked to cook and the guys just had to reach in their pocket and be done with it.

About a year ago we did this, but took money donations from everyone and then did 2 weeks worth of Dream Dinners. Of course, the women were the only ones that showed up to put the meals together. It was fun though and Dream Dinners was giving free chair massages that night. The problem was the dinners actually still require a bit of preplanning and preparation when you get ready to have them for dinner. So this time we figured it would be much easier if they just had a fully ready meal in disposable aluminum pans that just needed to be popped into the oven. No fuss, no muss.

Food Poisoning?

My mother was not a very good cook and totally embraced all convenience foods. She even used the boxed spaghetti dinner. I don't think they make that anymore. This was in the days before jarred spaghetti sauce. Mom was probably first in line at the grocery store when Swanson came out with the frozen TV dinner. She didn't want us kids cooking either. I was only allowed in the kitchen to wash dishes, so didn't learn how to cook (or turn on a stove) until I got married at the tender age of 19.

Now I am a fairly decent cook and enjoy tweaking recipes....BUT....there are a few hold-over covenience foods I have occasionally. Kraft Mac n Cheese, Hamburger Helper and my all time fav Riiiiiiiiiice-a-Roni the San Francisco treat, ding ding. Last night I whipped up some beef RR with a few additions of ground beef and veggies. It was pretty good. I forgot about the leftovers and it was over an hour before I put them in the fridge. Didn't think much about it.

Today at lunch I decided to reheat the leftovers. As I was putting it in the pan I took a small bite...sort of an odd smell to it, sharp and pungent. I stopped and sniffed the concoction in the pan and didn't really notice anything unusual. I took another small bite and again that odd smell/taste. Smelled the pot again, nothing. So I went ahead and heated it up, didn't really notice any more of the smell and it tasted fine, I think. A couple of times I hesitated as I was eating, but told myself it was just my imagination. Impossible for something to go bad that quickly. Right?

Two hours later.....it was NOT my imagination!!! Run for the bathroom. How could something spoil that quickly? My ground beef was defrosted in fridge and the veggies were fresh washed. What went wrong? I guess that one hour at room temperature was enough for it to go bad.

The good thing....I probably won't be able to eat Rice-a-Roni for a couple of years. Just thinking about it now turns my stomach. Aversion therapy

HOT!

Ha! By hot I mean the temperature, not my pink-toed chubbette legs.
I took this picture in the pool at Palm Springs the end of April. Wish I was there now.

It is 8:30 at night and it is still 83 degrees outside and 53% humidity. Inside my apartment it is 85. A couple of hours ago I really couldn't stand it anymore and wished I had a pool to jump in, so I did the next best thing.....took a cold shower. I know there was steam coming from the top of my head when I put it under the shower. I have been sitting directly in front of the fan ever since. About time for another shower.

Sumas Days with Dane

Went to the Green Barn to get some fresh fruit and veggies. They also sell local milk, cheese, eggs, etc. Great place. I normally am not a milk drinker because I only like whole milk. Brooke had told me about this milk that comes in glass bottles from a local dairy and even the 1% is supposed to taste creamier and better than the commercial stuff in the plastic and cardboard cartons. I LOVE the bottle and the 1% definitely looks thicker. I had to pay $1.25 extra for the bottle, but it is refundable. Gotta love a name that says Creamery.

This is Dane waiting for the "big" parade to start. He doesn't look happy here, but once the fire trucks, police cars, horses, 4-H in the parade starting throwing candy at him he really cheered up. It was very hot out and we fortunately found just about the only shady spot on the parade route. They had a great kids fair set up in the park, but Dane didn't last very long and wanted to go home. The car was an oven!! I love the sunny days, but not quite used to the sticky humid heat.






I decided to try a new hair color brand today. I put it on and it smelled horrible and started freaking out that it was turning my sort of light brownish hair to orange. Finally the timer went off and I jumped in the shower. I got the product almost out of my hair and realized I had left the very important special conditioner on the coffee table in the living room, in front of the OPEN window. Hello neighbors. Wrapped a towel around my head and one around my body (it was a big towel), left the shower running, crouched down and made a quick dash to the living room and back. Pretty sure no one saw me. Back in the shower put the conditioner in and it started sort of burning. Great! It actually turned out just fine, a couple of shades lighter than I expected, but at least it is not orange. I have been there a few times before.