Yes, I am off again to the land of camels and sand.
The flight from Houston to Dubai is 16 hours.
Here’s something to keep you occupied until I get there:
Be sure to let us know how you did.
My first try, I made it to level 5.
Oh, spring is almost here! I love spring even more than Christmas, if you can believe that. I start getting itchy to plant flowers and make everything look pretty. If you haven’t noticed, I have little in the way of patience. When I’m ready for it to be Christmas, I just put up my tree. Like the day after Halloween. When I’m ready for it to be spring, I start planting flowers that may or may not be ready to put in the ground, and hope for the best.
Yesterday, I decided the birds needed a new bird feeder. The old one had hung from one of the big trees in the backyard for two years now and was starting to show its wear.
I headed off to WalMart (and yes, I do spend too much time in that store) for a new feeder and seed. When I got there, I couldn’t remember if I still had any fishing line left from when I hung the feeder two years ago. You know, I’m old and have that CRS disease, so I figure I had just better get some more.
For those of us who aren’t fishermen, let me tell you, there are 8372763 kinds of fishing line. I didn’t know which one to get that would hold a bird feeder with 5 pounds of seed in it. None of them had a picture on it, you know like “this will hold this size fish”. I know what a 5lb fish looks like. I selected two, one said it was 50lb line and the other said it was 15lbs line, but it said “Big Game.” Like I said, not a fisherman, but doesn’t the phrase “Big Game” bring to mind a fisherman strapped into a chair, battling with a huge marlin?
I went in search of some expert advice. Of course, I bypassed any Walmart employee because they are notorious for being in a section that is not theirs and therefore not knowing anything about the source of your question. I saw a group of men and wandered over. I asked one if he knew anything about fishing line. They all started laughing and pointing at each other. I had the feeling they were just caught playing hooky from work (to go fishing) and were tattling on each other.
I asked one of them about the difference in the lines, the 50lb and the 15lb. After he pointed to the 50lb, I asked why the other said “Big Game”. Then he started talking about blah blah the fight, blah blah, the amount of line out, blah blah blah. Then he asked if he lost me. I said, “Yes, because all I want to do is hang this bird feeder from a tree in my backyard.” That gave them a chuckle and they all pointed to the cheap 50lb line.
When I got home, I gathered my tools, brought out the good ladder instead of the step stool (this may not seem important, but trust me, it is) and headed into the backyard.
To be able to get the line over the branch of the tree, you need to tie some weight on it. Do not use the wrench. While this may seem like a really good idea because it has some heft to get up and over the branch, the chances of it coming down and hitting you square in the forehead are higher than you would think. Not that this happened to me or anything. Use the kong.
The reason for using the fishing line over a tree branch, is to keep the feeder far enough away from the tree so the squirrels can’t jump on it, and the line keeps them from shimmying down to it. (look at that, shimmying is a word, but not redownload. hunh)
Once you have the line around the tree branch, hang the feeder from it and then tie it up. Be sure to get a feeder that has a lift off top, as it is now secured to the line and you won’t be able to take it down. Just lift off the top to fill it. And now you have a pretty, squirrel proof, bird feeder that looks like it’s hanging in mid air.
Okay, I’m ready! Bring on the spring!
Last week I put out a challenge to my Aunt’s posse, as well as my faithful readers, to create a sentence of up to 12 words, with each word starting with the same letter. We have had some very clever entries.
Here they are in alphabetical order:
Darling Dawn dauntingly delves deep, deeper…discerning, delightful, dreadful, dingy, dubious ditties.
Making Monday’s merry means making mischief my main motivator.
Mister Man mostly misses me Misses moist Monday morning massages mainly.
Monica Madison, Minneapolis movie mogul, manipulated many.
Playful, peppy, puppy punished providing playful, puzzling playthings.
Scorned, sensitive spirit sends soul-searching sentiments…searing silence…suicide.
Time to tell Thomas to take Thelma to testify to the truth.
Wood’s wenches wreck wrongdoer’s worth.
Zany zoologist Zarathustra zipped zealously Zimbabewards, zestfully zooming Zues’s zillionth Zamboni.
The judges had a lot of fun discussing the entries and were amazed at the creativity. When the votes were tallied, the Merry Monday sentence had the most votes. Congratulations to Tracey M.!
Stayed tuned for future non-math contests. Next time, I might even have a prize!
Tomorrow is my blog’s one year anniversary!
I can’t believe I’ve stuck with something. Finally. I have a small tendency to get excited at the prospect of getting started on something (dance lessons, Spanish class, dog trainer school) and never quite follow through. It’s not that I don’t have the desire, I just the think the thinking up the idea is more fun than actually doing it.
But my little blog has lasted for a whole year. I’m proud of me. In fact, I’m so proud, I think I’ll go ahead for another year. What do you think?
For those of you who may have joined us mid-season, you can read my very first post right here.
This next year should prove an interesting one, as we just found out CGMan is coming home to the States. Yay! We’ll get to live in the same house again. We have decided that living apart is for the birds and as we look for new opportunities, we’ll be doing it together. Wherever that may be. (I’m just hoping it’s not in a place where it, you know, snows. Gah!)
I’m not really into stats, but I happened to take a look the other day, being as how it was my birthday and all, and noticed I have quite a few regular readers and a lot more page loads than I would have thought.
So for my blog birthday, how about all you quiet readers de-lurk for one day and say Hi? I’d love to hear from you. I love hearing from my faithful readers, too!
Happy Birthday to my blog! Looking forward to another chaotic interesting year.
P.S. For Meg: today is also the day I quit smoking, three years ago. Of all the celebrations I have in a year, this one is my favorite.
I have had a busy week. I know some most of you think I sit around and eat bonbons all day, but that really is not the case. I sit around and drink vodka all day. You know, I raised three kids almost stone cold sober, but these dogs are driving me to drink. I swear to goodness, you would, too, if you had to deal with the likes of this:
This is my vacuum cleaner 
This is my vacuum cleaner after a certain bulldog got bored while mommy was writing her blog: 
I took it to the vacuum repair shop (yes, they really do still have those) where they told me it would cost more than I paid for the vacuum to replace the cord. *sigh* You know, if I had a really expensive vacuum cleaner it would have one of those thingies that pulls the cord back in and I wouldn’t need to come to the vacuum repair store and spend my spring sandal money to get the cord replaced. Well, hell, let’s be honest, if I could afford one of those really expensive vacuum cleaners, I could afford a maid to come vacuum for me and take her vacuum with her so my dog wouldn’t chew up the cord. Anyway, since I never really liked that vacuum cleaner to begin with, I wasn’t going to pay that much money to get it fixed, so off to Wal-Mart I went to get a new vacuum.
I got one especially designed for pet hair, but you’re not allowed to use it on the actual dog. It says so all over the box. Seems to me if they made one you could genuinely use on the dog, it would take out an unnecessary step. But whatever.
Oh, and while all that was going on, I recovered the cornice board.
See? I really do do stuff.
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