Flower Day

Well I guess I am not a very good blogger...or maybe I don't have a very interesting life. Haven't had a lot to say lately. Hubby had some surgery, so I have been playing nurse. Poor hubby! It is a big joke in our family that I missed my calling as a nurse. I am just about the meanest nurse you could ever have. Nurse Ratched had nothing on me; at least she had a good hair do. The hubby has survived however and is getting better each day. Anyway today is flower day at the office. Everyone gets some little flowers for the desk. I just love flowers. What little pieces of art each one is.

The Crate is Gone

My little doggies are crate dogs. The one they stay in now is not so much a crate as a huge cage that they stay in together during the day. Anyone that has beagles will tell you that they can have a tendency to have a little case of separation anxiety. I have read a lot on beagles and I think it comes from being pack animals. If you go somewhere they think they should go there too. We are in the final stages or redoing the house and this weekend we decided we would put the crate away and take our chances with leaving the boys out while we are gone. Most people would do this before they redo the house and get new furniture, but not us. We just love living on the edge. Anyway the hubs was taking the crate apart and you should have seen the looks on the boy’s faces. I am pretty sure they think they have finally crossed the line and we are getting rid of them. So here we go on the doggie destruction adventure. You would be surprised how much 2 little beagles can find to get into in 8 hours.

I don't get it...

I sometimes feel like I am just completely out of sync with the rest of the human race. This morning I was so excited to leave for work, because they opened a new road and I can just go straight to the freeway instead of making a u-turn and coming back to the entrance ramp. Well I guess a lot of other people were excited about it too, because there were a lot of people on the new road. The little people that make things work, evidently did not fine tune the traffic signal, so there was a long line there. Only about a half a car could get through the light before it changed. As I am setting and waiting for my turn to get through the light, I watch countless cars pull out from behind me and drive up the next lane and then cut back in front of others to get in the turning lane. I just don't understand what these people are thinking. I mean do they really have a self dialogue that says things like, "My time is way more important than these folks" or "Where I am going is way more pressing than where they are going" or do we just have no time to think of others at all. This kind of behavior doesn’t make me as mad as it does sad. Sad, that this how fellow humans treat each other. I guess it is just the old hippie in me. I want to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony and I want to give them a coke, but cutting just gets my love beads in a knot.

One man's trash

Well this was garage sale weekend. You know, when you drag all your stuff you don't want any more out on the yard and pray someone else will want it bad enough to give you a dollar for it. It is always so nerve racking to think that the stuff you didn't want is not good enough for other people. I always like to pick out the thing I think will be the one thing that people will never want. When someone takes it, you always have such a hard time not laughing out loud. It never fails to amaze me what people will haggle over. My husband had a rolling suit case on the trash and I took it off and put $2.00 on it and you know I sold that little piece of trash for $1.00. Hooray, $1.00 closer to retirement. Some people might say I have a very strange attachment to inanimate objects, I just think everything wants a place to live and nothing wants to go to the trash. OK that might be a little over the top.....Anyway we got rid of a lot of stuff that has been piled up since the remodel and I like to think that someone else will use it and think they got something for a bargain. I am so glad not to have to move it from one place to another anymore. I think we may be getting close to the end only 3 rooms left to do. I can't wait until everything has a place to live.

OK, So I may be a little mean...

So, a couple of years ago my Mom gave my husband Joe one of those remote controls that work on voice command. So Joe gets the thing out and he programs it and away he goes. Now I am setting in my chair (by the way, I don't have a chair anymore since we remodeled) and unbeknownst to him, I have the original remote control. Joe tells the TV to go to channel 2 and presto it does, but I, being the little devil that I am, change it back to the original channel. Joe looks at me like, what the heck, and tells the little remote to go to channel 2. Abracadabra it goes to channel 2 again at which time, I put it back to the original channel again. This goes on for about 5 minutes, which isn't long, but when you are trying not to burst out laughing it seems like a really long time. Joe has worked himself up into quit a snit and is now holding the remote up to his face and asking it "what is wrong you, you stupid thing" and yelling at it "I told you to go to channel 2". Needless to say when he finally caught on to what was going on he didn't speak to me for a little while. I never saw the voice activated remote again, until the other day when we put in a box of stuff to sell at a garage sale. I just can't help myself.

Just wondering

So, do any of you with grown children, get calls like this in the middle of a work day??

Daughter: "Mom, How long does it take to bake a potato?"
Me: "I don't know about 30 to 45 minutes."
Daughter: "That long?"
Me: "Usually, it depends on how big the potato is."
Daughter: "Well, I can't wait that long."
Me: "Well, you could just buy one of those ones in the plastic that you do in the microwave. They come out pretty good and only take about 8 minutes."
Daughter: "But will I like it?"
Me: "I don't know, I think they are pretty good."
Daughter: "I want it to taste like a real potato."
Me: "Well I think they taste like real potatoes."
Daughter: "OK, I will call you back when I get to the store."
Me: "Why are you calling me when you get to the store?"
Daughter: "So you can tell me where they are."

Now, I live in another town, if the potatoes aren't in the produce department in the store in her town, how in the world would I be able to help her find them. One time she called me so I could tell her how to pick out a cantaloupe....over the phone. I can't even pick out a good cantaloupe in person, much less over the phone. The funny thing is I feel like I am a less than adequate mom, because I can't pick out a cantaloupe over the phone. So, I was just wondering if any of you other mom's out there can do it?

What warms your heart?

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I did not have your average "Leave it to Beaver" upbringing. My parents did the best they could and I have no doubt that they love me very much, but Ward and June Cleaver they were not. So the other day I was thinking about my Mom and our relationship. I got to thinking about a birthday I had when I was very young, maybe 7 or 8, and I was really sick. I was home from school in bed and feeling really bad. I couldn't have a birthday party because I was too ill. I will never forget what my Mom did. She called me into the kitchen and boy was I surprised. The room was all decorated with birthday decorations, even balloons and party hats. There were pretty wrapped packages and when I looked to see who the packages were from I realized the party was thrown by all our pets. We always had lots of pets. I had gifts from all the different pets we had at the time and they all came to the party. We had a party with cake and ice cream, just my Mom, me and all the animals. Funny the little things you remember, that will bring a warm glow to your heart forever. Do you have a special memory from your childhood?

3 In the Morning and All is Well

OK, so here are the kind of adventures that go on around here at night. You get in bed and try to get comfortable on the new torture device, also known as new expensive mattress, and just about the time you start to sleep it starts. Murphy my oldest beagle, and there for the head dog dude, will decide that he wants the doggy bed that McGuire (not head dog dude) is sleeping in. Murphy will just stand next to the bed and bark at McGuire until he gets up and still groggy from being sound asleep, looks around to see what all the barking is about, at which time Murphy gets in the bed of choice. Now, I want to make it perfectly clear that there is no permanent better bed. This changes from bed possession to bed possession. So after McGuire and Murphy are settled in to the new bunk assignments, you fall back asleep again, only to be roused by the sound of a little doggy paw scratching on the bed room door. You try to ignore it for as long as you can, but finally you get up and open the door so we can proceed to the back door to go outside. Instead of a wee trip outside it appears it is time for the sentry patrol. Murphy walks to the edge of the living room, takes a good look around, and then proceeds to give me a look like, "Don't worry man, everything is good out here" and goes and gets back in his bed. That's it, that is what he wanted. Now I appreciate the home security and all, but I really need a good nights sleep. I am no spring chick anymore.

Not So Sweet Dreams

OK, so I have slept on a water bed since I was 12 years old. I know, I know, but it is just the old hippie in me and I just couldn't bend to the establishment. So the other day we decided to buy an actual grown up type mattress. After I got over the initial shock of what a grown up people mattress cost, I was so excited to get the thing home. I have been waiting and waiting, because when I tried it out in the store it was wonderful. Like a big white soft cloud. Now you have to understand that we have been remodeling our house for about a year now and our bedroom was supposed to be the last room done, but I really could not wait for this thing to get here. So my husband, Joe, finished it up first so we could have them deliver it. So the other day I come home and there it is, all pillow soft and new. I can hardly wait to go to bed and try it out. So I go to bed an hour early, because I just can't take the anticipation any longer. So the next morning I am pretty sure I hate it and by the second morning I am certain I HATE it. Now I have to tell my husband that the mattress I have been going on about for 2 weeks is a nightmare and I want it to go away. I am pretty sure at this point he would much rather just hit me in the head with a brick sometime when I am asleep and not worry about taking the mattress back.

So we are off to the mattress store……Joe is very excited…..

Griswold Outings

We have an RV, a Bounder much like the one shown here. This is our 4th RV, but our very first new one. All our previous RVs have been used. We always have big adventures in the RV, so much so that both daughters have vowed never to go with us again. I will post adventures as they occur. I would like to make a statement of fact at this point, because it will come up in the future. All stories of RV trips posted are actual fact, not a cartoon or comic strip, they actually happen to us.

The beginning of beagle adventures

I love my beagles. I never in my life would have thought those words would come out of my mouth, but there they are. Well I guess they really came out of my fingers, since I am typing, not talking, but that is another topic. My love affair with these, not so right in the head creatures, started about 5 years ago. I was working in Louisiana (I live in Houston, TX) one day and happened to see an animal shelter and just stopped in. My youngest daughter had been wanting a puppy of her own for a while. I looked at all the cute little pups in their cells and then I saw Nick. Nick was the only puppy who just sat and looked at me with a look that said "what are looking at?", no jumping or crazy excitement. When I went over to his cage he went and got his ball and promptly brought it over for me to inspect, not touch mind you, just see. I was hooked. After going through a lot of paperwork and last minute background checks, to make sure I was fit to take this little guy home, there was a fast trip to Wal Mart to buy a carrier and misc. items and we were ready to go. My first clue that this was maybe a bad idea was when we put him in the passenger seat and I reached over to give him a treat and he bit me. I just assumed it was nerves. You know what they say about assuming. Myself and a fellow employee snuck him into the hotel, with the wink from the front desk manager that we knew, and he spent the night with me in the Holiday Inn. Now as most of you beagle owner should know, keeping a beagle quiet in a hotel, or anyplace for that matter, is not an easy task. Anyway for all his bad behaviour, he wormed his way into my heart faster than any dog I think I have ever had. The looks these guys give you. When my daughter moved out, I just had to go and get my own, because I missed him so much and that is how the beagle adventures began.