twentyfive things about Pat

A bouquet of random things. Guess which ones are true.

1. Pat is very creative. (See the early days of her blog pumpkinknitter.blogspot.com with her story of the Littlelace family. I couldn't wait for the next episode.)
2. Pat knits splendid lace.
3. She participated in the Traveling Stash. Whatever happened to the traveling stash?
4. Pat is married to a sky pilot (minister).
5. Pat has a heart big enough for multiple kitties and one poor homeless dog, now named Buddy.
6. Buddy will tell you that Pat is the bringer of all that is good in life.
7. Pat has grandchildren.
8. Pat can out-walk most twenty-year-olds.
9. She takes marvelous photos of the Grand Canyon.
10 She loves to go on crusies.
11. She took marvelous photos of Alaska.
12. She bought quiviut in Alaska.
13. She took marvelous photos of Mexico.
14. She took marvelous photos of Las Vegas when she worked there as a concierge in the Luxor.
15. She is a kind and generous woman.
16. She is an awesome cook.
17. Her snickerdoodles are to die for.
18. She has a wonderful garden.
19. She can spell xeriscape.
20 She can xeriscape.
21. She practices her spirituality, rahter than just talking about it.
22. She doesn't talk about it much.
23. She loves fine linens.
24. She has a splendid sense of humor.
25. She's a bold and trusting woman and a delightful friend.

Tomorrow, I think I'll do 25 things about Sue who got me started on this. It's fun!

helmet liner

I saw a news blip about a group of knitters in Denver who did a marathon knit-in of helmet liners for the soldiers in Afghanistan. So, since it's my job to keep people warm, I looked up helmet liners and knitted one. With more fingerless mits to match. (the second pair of mitts in this yarn.) Now, I'm trying to get in touch with someone who might actually know a soldier in Afghanistan. I can send it to one of the on-line groups, but I'd kind of like to adopt someone if I can. Send him goodies, letters, that sort of stuff. Or her, as the case may be. I don't know if we ought to be at war, but I do know I can support the soldiers who are there.

My friend Susan did a fun thing with the "25 random things about me" meme. She offered a second meme of 25 things about the first person who comments. (I might have to make some up) So I'd like to give it a try, too. First 25 random things about me. Tomorrow, 25 things about the first person to comment.

1.I am a native Oregonian
2. I am 5ft 11 inches tall. That used to be freakish. Not so much now.
3. My twin brother and I were adopted as a set.
4. My two older brothers got to pick the names for the babies. I was named after an arabian mare.
5. I don't remember when I learned to knit.
6. I spent a year in Denmark when I graduated from college
7. That's where I learned to weave
8. I spent 12 years as a sample weaver in the fabric design department at Pendleton woolen mills.
9. That was the best job of my life.
10. I and 6 other hand-weavers were replaced by a computer.
11. I love fish (to eat)
12. I love kitties (to cuddle)
13. I am lactose intolerant.
14. I love "Dancing With the Stars"
15. I love dancing.
16. I love to sing.
17 I LOVE musical comedies.
18. My favorie color is pink/purple/blue.
19. favorite fiber is silk.
20. favorite place is anywhere DH is.
21 favorite gem is pearl
22. favorite season is spring
23.favorite cartoon is "What's Opera Doc?"
24. rosepetal black tea
25 lemon scones

next chapter

As luck would have it, and luck was very much in my corner, I got to work on Tuesday before the snow hit. The I-5 freeway was closed for a brief spell and traffic was snpw-snarled most of the day. Finally, about 3PM it began to melt. By 5, when it was time for me to drive home, the roads were clear and wet, and the traffic clots had dispersed. I got home safe and sound.

But I was cold. I was cold clear down to my bones. I took a hot bath and went to bed early. DH reports that when he came to bed, I was curled up tight, which is quite unusual because I usually sleep flat on my back like a neatly laid corpse. Around 4AM I woke feeling miserable. I was cold again, and aching and my stomach was quite unhappy. I made a dash for the bathroom, and spent most of the next three hours there. Have you ever been shivering so hard that you thought you would fall off the toilet, but couldnb't grab a bathrobe because you were, quite literally, in the middle of a shit-storm? I snagged the shaggy bathmat and huddled under it till the storm abated. Then I took another hot bath, called in sick to work, and dashed back to the toilet.

Ewww! Gee, Roxie, thanks for sharing THAT!

I can tell when I'm really sick when I want to have Jello. I lived on Jello, tea, and chicken broth Wednesday.

Anyhow, I am keeping down solid foods today. Oatmeal tastes really good! This is two weeks in a row my Thursday has been interrupted by illness. Either I'm getting it all taken care of at one fell swoop, or my subconscious wants me to stay home and sleep more. Or maybe it's the nine hour stint administering GED tests on Tuesday that is screwing with my system.

Today, I had to put on clothes, because a Geek was coming to fix our TV remote. He just left. What a dear boy Craig was! He's a science nut, a biology and physics major in college, and a technical writer for lab equipment. And a Geek-squad employee. I showed him my moebius scarf. He was totally amazed. WE got into a lovely discussion of the value of hand work as opposed to machine made. I want to adopt him.

What is it about this time of the year? A friend just lost her father. Another friend just lost her daughter to breast cancer, and yet another friend had a big heart attack. She's younger than I am! She is recovering, but it will be a long haul. They kept her in a medically induced coma for several days, and now it's a question if she has lost any brain function. Wayyy scarey!

Cherish the people you love. Life is so uncertain!

Meanwhile, check out what a knitter can do. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopic/howaboutthat/4245919/psychiatrist-knits-anatomically-correct-wooly-brain.html

He lied!

The weatherman said we would have a few snow flurries this morning, followed by warming temperatures in the afternoon. So I put on my big-girl panties (metaphorically speaking, Barb) and drove to work through the light little flurries. Two hours later, those damn little "flurries" have ;ayered on about half an inch of the whitstuff, and it doesn't show signs of stopping. If I have to drive home in this, I will probably soil my big-girl panties. When it comes to driving in dicey weather, you can count on me to panic.

blogging from work on my lunchish break. Wanna go home now. (sucks thumb and wraps other arm around head.)

It's happened again

I woke up this morning to see more snow. Yuck, yuck, yuck!

There isn't much, and it's melting even as I type, but the weather gurus predict a bit more of the flakey stuff tonight.

So for all you folks in Oz, here's another shot of the whiteness. By the way, DH thinks we may be able to afford a trip to Australia in March of 2010 for my 60th birthday. What should we do and where should we go?

Meantime, I'm knitting more fingerless mitts. I pulled into the gas station on
Wednesday morning, with the air temperature at about 38. The nice man pumping my gas (it's against the law to pump your own gas in Oregon) had no gloves, and was standing with his hands in his armpits. So I peeled my fingerless gloves off my hands and gave them to him. What the heck. It's my job to keep people warm.

More knitting

And a nice kitty photo because Ben is such a handsome boy! Nothing like a kitty photo to start your blog-shots.
Here's another moebius. I knitted this one wider and it has sort of a different look. YOu can put the fold in front and make a sort of shawl collar of the straight part and tuck it stylishly under a coat for wonderful warmth.


Or you can pull it up over your head and say, "What big eyes you have, Grandma!"

That thirtysix hour thing I had is gone. I took ZiCam all during the seige, and thank God I was able to lie down and sleep out the fevers. And I really AM all better now.

And I want to thank my dear freinds for your kind, confirming, and comforting words. Bless your dear hearts. It's just Roxie as usual.

my bad

I don't know if it was a karmic snap-back for my tasteless attempt at yarn humor, or if it was just one of those things that's going around, but I got hit by a 36hour thing that felt like my sinuses were stuffed with lead birdshot and swamp ooze, and all I could bring myself to do was sleep, drink a little tea, and run to the bathroom. Then fall back asleep again. The cats have been delighted. Except for my dreams. The pastel carnivorous unicorns stalking me through the moonlit field of marijuana cacti while a sinister capital E giggled in the background pretty much pegged the needle on my WTF meter. I obviously get pretty twitchy during these dreams. Sometimes, cats digging in the claws to keep from getting launched off my fiercely flinching torso have managed to wake me right up. Other times, when I do wake up, I find new scratches that DIDN'T manage to wake me. But I'm feeling much better now. (Does anyone else hear John Anniston on "Night Court" when those words come up? He would relate something bizzarre he would do before his electroshock therapy, then smile beatifically and say, "But I'm feeling much better now.")

Anyhow, I AM feeling much better now, and if I need to apologize to anyone for my lack of taste in the previous post, I do so.

While sweating and dreaming, I came to a realization that I should be knitting more fingerless gloves. After what I paid for that insight, I'm not about to turn it down. Fingerless gloves are next on the list!

send the kids to bed. Yarn pr0n

A while back, in my effort to shrink my stash, I sent three cones of white wool weaving yarn to Dave Daniels who has been weaving through his stash like a spider on espresso. And Dave, being the artist/ generous dude, and enabler that he is, dyed it up and sent back three 0ne Thousand Yard skeins. Are these not to drool over? He has such a WAY with color

In fact, when it comes to Dave's dying, the colors are so luscious that I just want to wallow in them. Roll, roll, roll in the yarn!

They're almost good enough to eat. No doubt about it, Dave gives good skein.

I was tagged

Lisa, http://lisanowak.wordpress.com/ tagged me with a meme. List six things that make you happy, link back to the person who tagged you, and tag six more. Oh, and let the person who taggeded you know when you post.

Well, I don't tag others, but if anyone wants to play, by all means, let me know when you post and we'll all come see what makes you happy.

What makes me happy? Well, for starters, I do. I am responsible for my own happiness. May God have mercy on anyone or anything I expect to MAKE me happy. I know that money doesn't buy happiness, but like well rotted fertilizer, money makes it easier for things to grow. Good health, a warm dry house, and congenial company also promote an environment of happiness, but with the health and the company, it becomes a chjicken or egg thing. It's easier to get congenial company if you're happy. And happiness promotes good health.

But as for that list of six:
1. Sharing a life with a smart, funny, kind and generous man makes me very happy.
2. Kitties make me happy. Of course, when the blind crippled senile boy leaves me a big stinky present in the hall, and I step in it barefoot on my way to the bathroom at ohdarkhundred, then cats can piss me off, too.
3. Sunshine makes me happy.
4. The act of creation makes me happy. Whether I'm making a hat, a story, a quilt ora a batch of cookies, the act of bringing something into existence just trips my triggers!
5. Old musicals make me happy. I want to believe in a world where people burst into song, then segue into dance, and by the end of the final reel, the guy gets the girl,the bad guys get their comeuppance, and everyone lives happily ever after.
6. My friends make me happy. You guys are a treasure! Thank you.

Tomorrow, photos of something else that makes me happy - yarn dyed by Dave Daniels! Squeee!!!

You can't always get what you want . . .

This was supposed to be a cat-bed or a nice deep basket. I knitted it with four strands of Pendleton weaving wool held together, then ran it throught the wash and dryer with a couple pairs of jeans. It fulled beautifully and and shrank only a little. I set it down on the floor for the kitties and seasoned it with catnip. Would they nest in it? (OK, everyone who owns cats - let's do this in unison. ) HELL NO! They would crumple down the edges and bury their fuzz faces in the catnip. Then they would grab the kitty bed in their claws and rub it over their ears. After enough catnip, Fly wound up lying UNDER the cat bed in a drunken stupor. But none of them, not one, was the least bit interested in using it for a lovely, cozy kitty nest. Hairy-butted ingrates.
So I am using it instead as a splendid tea cozy and too darn bad for the cats.

On our way home from Free Geek yesterday, our car suddenly swerved into a tiny parking area and began to jockey for a parking space. I looked my inquiry at DH and he said, "Didn't you see it?" It was a sign reading, "Foxfire Tea - wholesale and retail" These are people who really know their tea, and if that isn't enough to win your heart, they have friends who use left-over tea to dye fibers!! There was yarn dyed with black tea, with rooiboos tea and with coffee. There were gorgeous silk scarves dyed with various black, green and herbal teas and with coffee. I was smitten. We bought two kinds of blooming tea balls, some white rose and lavender tea (it's mild and flowery and I could just sit and sniff it all day long!) and right now, DH and I are drinking Iron Goddess of Mercy black tea. It's delicate, with a flavor like honey, but not the sweetness, and then you taste the TEA! Delicious, fascinating stuff. And for lunch, we are eating rosemary Triscuits wirh sliced ham and chedder cheese. Life is GOOD!

The wind continues to blow. Many power outages happened during the night. Luckily, they didn't happen to us. But the streets are thick with fir twigs and small branches, and every oak that held its leaves this long is naked now. Dry bitter wind and a lying sun that promises warmth but is cold as rented love. I am SO grateful to have a warm, dry house to live in.

Next knitting project: another moebius scarf using up some left-over greens. There's a red-headed math teacher at school who may appreciate a seamless moebius strip. And then, well, I could always use another tea cozy . . . peach and pink maybe. Or hats? Or vests? Or a sweater? we'll see what comes to the needles.

whether report

There is a merterologic high to the east of us, and a low to the west off the ocast which is a condition that invariably produces strong, dry winds. In other locations, such winds are called Santa Ana, or mistral, or other evocative names. Here, the local weathermen took a vote and decided to call them chinook or coho or some other salmonish term. I just call them a bastard. They are the kind of winds that make squirrels chase dogs and mild-mannered housewives take an axe to the neighbor's dead plum tree. People with wind chimes should not be surprised when they are silenced by a shotgun at three AM if the east wind is blowing. I'm afraid that it has gotten to me. I got the wind in my ears and have been re-arranging shelves. I am even, God help me, arranging books according to size, rather than according to topic and author. This is madness, but only by doing this can I get everything into the space. It's like defragmenting a hard-drive but not so efficient. We had some electronics that had given up the ghost, so this morning we took them down to "Free Geek," where they would be repaired, or canabalized for spare parts, and anything workable would go to charity. And having cleared that much more space in the garage, I realized that if I shift these books over here and those over there and get rid of the magazines I have saved for 15 years and never looked at, then I could move some yarn out of the pantry . . .

DH and the cats have wisely settled in out-of-the way places. And the smell of moth balls is giving me a headache. Or maybe I've tweaked my neck. And if those damn windchimes don't stop tinkling I'm going to DO something!t But the yarn is now in only three spaces instead of five. Stash consolidation is a goood thing!

A good day off.

Isn't that a lovely sunrise to start with? The sunlight has been bright and yellow all day long, and it makes something small in my chest hop up and down for joy.

I ran errands, mailed things off, dropped off deposti bottles and recycled plastic grocery bags, picked up more cat food, all the daily diddly. when I got home, there was a box on the front porch. Galad ( http://galad-whenigrowup.blogspot.com/ )sent me a present from Arizona!
This luscious skein of mocha and cream and cafe' au lait superwash merino is from Spritely Goods, The colorway is Coffe Pot Rock. I thought it was a paen to lattes and mochas, but no, it's a salute to a geologic formation in Arizona called Coffee Pot Rock, which happens to be colored in these yummy soft neutrals. I've been squishing the yarn and petting it and considering what it wants to be.

Also from Spritely Goods is a bar of Lavender soap wrapped in thin wool fiber which has been lightly felted into a perfectly fitted covering. What a brilliant idea! Scruby stuff as part of the bar!

Don't miss the magnet showing London Bridge where it now sits in Hake Havasu City, and a little lapel pin showing Kokopeli blowing his reeds and dancing. Kokopeli rocks, too. As does the cute little knitted lambie on the postcard.


The cats, of course, played with the box, tissue papers and ribbon. So it was fun for the whole family! Thank you, Galad!!

PS, I don't realy mind spiders all that much. But it would be a shame to spoil a good story just for the sake of the truth.

know anyone who's moving?

I just spent the last two hours in the garage engaged in a great flattening fest. Our garbage company recycles cardboard for us, but it needs to be flattened. So, being the good citizens that we are, the cardboard cereal boxes, shoe boxes, flats that the bottles of water come on, clever little cages for the clementines, all have been tossed into our garage till I can get around to them. They were blocking out the light. I had to edge sideways to get around them. It was time to flatten.

Since some of them have been in there for months, I always carry out the flattening with a great deal of song and dance. I rap and rattle the stacks of boxes, calling out, "Yoohoo! Spiders? Here I come a-flattening. Will all the black widows please pack and move to Palm Springs? Here I come. Shoo, shoo, shoo. Run away." I firmly believe that the black widow spiders are no more interested in seeing me than I am in seeing them, and want to give them every opportunity to vacate the premises. Occasionally, one will go mad and dash at me. That's when the dancing starts. After many bursts of wild flamenco stamping and fierce cries of passion, ("Fuck! Oh fuck! Where did it go?") I frequently find that I have annihilated a tiny baby dust bunny, a clump of black thread, or a flicker of shadow. Well, the damn thing shouldn't have attacked me in the first place! Cripe! What's worse is that I use a cheap, ill-made, highly illegle switchblade to slit the box bottoms that are taped shut, and am often clutching it with one hand, thrashing for balance, and slapping madly at my ankles with the other. Honest to God, when you know there are black widow spiders stirred up and running rampant, every hair on your leg telegraphs creeping arachnidal sensations to your brain. The adrenalin could satiate a squadron of sky-divers for a week. And you wonder why I don't do this more than once every six months? My heart couldn't stand the strain.

But there are also many good sturdy big grocery boxes, suitable for packing up household goods. You used to be able to go to the local grocery store on Monday evening when all the produce came in, and get all the boxes needed to move, but grocery stores flatten and sell those now, so it's either buy boxes from the moving company, or scrounge from your friends. So if any of your friends are scrounging, I gots some good boxes. It'll be six months at least before I tidy the garage again.

how to wear a moebius

It's alpacca and silk and soft and lilac and warm as mink in heat. (ahem)
It makes a grand collar for an added layer of coziness.

But as a fascinator, it is beyond wonderful! It keeps the ears warm and holds the heat in like a nice hat, but doesn't scrunch your hair.

Cast on 100 on a 40 inch circular. Push it around to the end and pick up 100 off the back of the 100 stitches you already have on the needle. It's awkward, but possible. Keep trying!! Then, start knit one, purl one forever. You will be knitting from the center out. This is two skeins wide with a band of yo, k2tog when I got crazy bored, and an edging of ch3, sk1, sc. (yes, I frequently go to the dark side to use up the very end of a ball of yarn in a simple edging.) Tah, and might I add, DAHHHHH!!

Monday again already?

Sunday was gone in the flicker of a movie. The insurance adjuster came and checked our crawlspace and the sub-floor is dry! Hooray! No massively expensive reconstructions will be necessary this year. We need to change furnace filters and get the heat ducts cleaned, and the great flood of '09 can fade into the mists of memory.

So, to celebrate, we got Wall-E on demand. I'm not sure what DH thought of it. I was charmed, but not overwhelmed. I can see why it's a good kid's movie. It would also be a great movie for a deaf person or for someone who didn't speak English. The range of expression evinced by the body language of robots, was quite impressive. Of course, the use of reflections in the robot's eyes, and good old sound effects contributed a lot, too. The "larger" message available to adults was so broadly drawn, in such simple colors, that even I could get it. It had a happy ending and didn't insult my intelligence, and that's all I ask of a movie anymore. I'm done with films that are going to "Change Your Life."

I spent the early afternoon watching "Sanctuary" recordings, and ironing tablecloths and napkins, or, as a friend has called it, "polishing the linen." There is something quite satisfying in putting a nice shine on beautifully woven fine linen with your hot iron. Crisp stiff napkins will hold some lovely decorative folds. And meanwhihle, the good guys work together despite their desperate differences to overcome the evil deeds of the bad guys. "Sanctuary" has lots of sly references to early 20th century adventure literature and I always feel so tickled when I get something.

Speaking of getting something, here are pictures of two of my splendid Christmas gifts. TW, bless her thoughtful heart, gave me four hand-painted cups with 6 matching saucers. (Ah, the joys of garage sales!)



And MJ's sweet husband, RW, found this lovely dainty dragon for me. Her name, I have decided, is Daphne.



I don't collect dragons, but she just tickled my fancy. And I felt this was a delightful reference to my book, "Sanna and the Dragons." Miss Daphne Dragon may appear now an then in more photos. Obviously, the camera loves her!

Again the Portland Purls assemble

Fourteen happy women crammed in shoulder to shoulder, eating and laughing and drinking tea!


I served gingerbread topped with orange marmelade, then yogurt cheese, and it got rave reviews! I also made ham turnovers, but those were a lot less successful. Oh, yeah, they were fit to eat, but I'm gonna have to learn how to make a decent piecrust before I try that again.

I had such fun with this table setting. The plain white cloth was too blah, but I didn't want to add something that would detract from the pretty hand-painted cups and saucers. (Hand painted was my theme this month.) All my colorful table linens are soo busy with flowers and patterns. So what else? How about a shawl? I dyed this silk and knitted on it for a month and wound up with a long, long wrap with turned out to be perfect! Then, there's the problem with the lighting. The dining-room light is good in the center of the table, but there are shadows at the ends. Candles! But not formal tall candles. Floaties! Don't I have some champagne coupes? Oh, better yet - these nice old compotes!

And to top it all off, piles of clementines for color pop.

One of the guests was joining us for the first time. She confided to me, "It's been years since I've heard such interesting conversation!" The friend she came with said, "I'd have to quit my job to follow them all. Isn't this fun?"

It IS fun! Even though I didn't sit down for the first fourty five minutes, I loved, loved, loved it! And all that trotting around, keeping the teacups filled helped to burn off some of the cookies and gingerbread I ate. It's all good!

Floods are subsiding,

and knitting has gone on.

A hat for my nephew in LA - the Eagle Scout.

And since I have also made a hat for his dad, I figured ought to make one for his mom. As a mom, she already has eyes in the back of her head, I figured she would enjoy just a nice warm cap.

And now I am knitting a moebius band on one circular needle just because I can. It's going to be a neck gaiter for me, in a blend of alpacca, merino and silk. Yummy!

Tomorrow, knitting here. I have made gingerbread with orange marmelade and yogurt cheese, a batch of oatmeal cookies, and little ham and onion turnovers. Photos tomorrow when everything is set up. TW gave me four new cups and saucers for Christmas, and I couldn't wait to use them!

It's a day

full of clouds and rain. Strong winds from the south bring warmth and rain that melts the snow. We call these winds tha Pineapple Express, since they come straigth up from Hawaii. So, while we gird our loins for further flooding, here are some nice pictures of flowers.

Sometimes, for no reason at all

I wake up at 5, even on a Saturday. And when I go out to get the paper, I see something like this.
I'm sure there's some way to capture the twinkle of the reflected pink glow on the snow, and I'm just not photographer enough to do it. (What is ISO anyhow?)It was so cold that my nose hairs froze, but such a lovely sunrise.

I took my cup of tea and huddled at the window, watching the progress, and occasionally popping outside for another shot of the changes. The people who take their dogs out for walks in such shattered crystal weather are heroes! Dogs make people healthy by making them walk, and cats make people healthy by breathing tiger's breath on them. Then I slipped back into bed and spent about an hour sort of snorkling on the surface of sleep, watching the pretty bright dreams swimming past, occasionally lifting my head to make sure I wasn't too far from shore . . .

When DH woke, we went out for breakfast, then headed to Sears and bought a sump pump, brought it home, and discovered the the water had subsided enough for us to turn the furnace back on, and the sump pump was not necessary. (We kept it anyhow.) Some of the heat vents bubbled like squelchious subterranean monsters, but in due time even that cleared up. So we have heat again, huzzah!!

Still, we will need to get the subfloor inspected, and the ducting will probably need to be replaced (molds and fungi love warm, dark moist places like pre-soaked heat vents.)And it looks like the budget takes another hit. WEll, we will still be richer than 98% of the world. I won't complain. If I have to give up my car, though, I'll pitch a whinefest the likes of which have not been seen since the last spoiled 13year old left the neighborhood.

In the meantime, I have finished another BSJ for the orphange. It really isn't as deformed as it looks in this photo. Just hard to get

Howdy 2009

We started our new year with a fabulous brunch at the home of PW and TW,
and Ethel, who, as you can see by her profound rotundity, is an excellent advertisement for the quality of the cooking. Brunch was southern themed, with black-eyed peas (for luck) and grits, and sweetpotato hash with smoked turkey, crowned with poached eggs. For that bit of exotica, we also had mimosas made with blood-orange juice or pomegranet juice. Appetizers of wonderful soft cheese and crackers, and artichokes with remolade. It was a splendid party and a grand time was had by all.

It is no comment on the hosts or the company (five more intelligent, well-informed and witty people) what so ever when I say that I made a distressing discovery during our splendid afternoon. I'm rather a shallow person. People were discussing politics and economics, and I found my mind wandering quite far afield. These are serious, important topics,and they did not engage my attention. I was enthralled by PW's tales of growing up in NewYork City, and by stories of various musical tours that PW or JE had worked sound or lights for. In fact, all the stories on any topic held my attention, but when we moved to the doom and gloom of the current economy, and the possible future, I was looking for sand to stick my head into.

How does one become less shallow, more serious and inclined to listen to business reports on the tv, rather than Bugs Bunny cartoons?


That night, it snowed again, and I had to go in to work, so I pulled on my big girl panties and hit the streets. I drove slow, and the roads weren't bad at all.


The campus, in snow, is beautiful.
Beautiful!

Deer tracks across the parking lot slush.

The snow had been preceeded by a lot of rain, on top of the meltwater from the past two weeks. Flooding and landslides are all around us. When I woke up to head to work, the house seemed cold. I checked the furnace and it was burning away like fury, but no heat was coming through the vents. DH lifted a vent to find water in all our heat ducts. The crawl space under the house has flooded and though we have electricity, we have no furnace. Thank goodness we have a gas fireplace!!
Cats like a nice fireplace!