The Barney Experiment

Because of the extreme weather we have been having Barney back in the house for most of the day. If you've been reading here for a long time, you know that Barney was a house cat and then we discovered he was peeing all over the place. And no it wasn't because he had a dirty litter box. I believe it was because he was partly feral when we found him and he had not been properly trained by his mother.
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So to recap the whole Barney thing: Our cats lived in the house and as we started finding pee, we thought it was one of the old dying cats. As time progressed and we had those cats put to sleep, we moved Barney's litter box and food and water into the garage and put a pet door in the door to the garage. Well Barney was the cat peeing in the house. So we closed off the pet door to the garage and bought a small doghouse and moved Barney's stuff to the back yard. Well that didn't work out. Possums were eating his food and he got into a $500 cat fight. So we put a pet door from the garage to the back yard. We put his food and water and a litter box as well as his dog house in the garage. I even bought him a heater for winter and he could go outside when he wanted to.
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So now because of the heat, we have been having him in from noon to 6:00 am. My Sweetie lets him out when he wakes up at six, and I let him back in when I wake up at noon. We put a litter box and his food and water in the laundry room. So far he has peed in the litter box twice and in the house nonce. I guess he does most of his peeing outdoors between six and noon.
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We are keeping our fingers crossed and if all goes well and he doesn't pee on anything by September 1st, I'm going to reopen the pet door to the garage and give him full access from the house to the garage to the yard. Hopefully, if all this pans out, he will become an indoor/outdoor cat of his own choosing. Hopefully he won't bring any lizard kills indoors or be followed by some strange animal. For now, we are just waiting, watching and hoping. Wish us luck!

Where's My Mellow?

In the last ten years before Dad died at the ridiculously young age of 62, he was a fun pleasant mellow fellow. I know that everyone that reads this blog knows I adored Dad, but he was not always pleasant. Well, not always pleasant to others. He was always sweet to me with very few exceptions and I was probably equally to blame in some of those because I was a hothead myself at certain ages. Dad was a terrible husband. Dad also made many mistakes when it came to my brother. Both Mom and my brother always say that I was the lucky one. Dad had a terrible temper when he was younger and would fly off the handle. It was just never directed at me. But about ten years before he died, he had totally mellowed out. I assumed it was a natural part of the aging process.
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So either I was wrong about mellowing being a natural part of the aging process, or I am just not normal. I've noticed that I have become less tolerant about certain things. The last time I stopped to pick up a rib dinner at the great rib place, the country music felt like it was stirring my brain and thumping me in the eyeball. I saw the bartender sit the bag down. After about four minutes I asked, "Is that mine?" She looked at my beer and replied, "I didn't realize you were ready to go." I said, "Oh, I am so ready to go. I hate country music." The guy next to me laughed. I continued, "You don't understand. My brain processes country music the same as it would a baby crying on an airplane." The bartender and the guy next to me thought this was all funny and I was not kidding. I wanted to GET OUT of that building.
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I have also become worse and worse about children. Today's parents seem to be clueless and have lost all control and sometimes I just want to shake them and yell, "MAKE IT STOP!" Not the poor kids. The parents.
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And because I've realized that my tolerance is slipping, I started thinking about the etiquette doyens who pretty much say that manners are what separate us from the rest of the animal kingdom. I guess I am becoming more like the rest of the animal kingdom. I'm surprised. I really thought I'd be getting my mellow on. But apparently I am going wild.

The Seven Year Switch

I had always heard that your taste buds change very seven years, but had not given it too much thought. Until this week. I've become a spinach freak. I think about spinach a lot. When I was thinking about spinach and wondering why I want it all the time, it was pretty amazing because I never ate spinach at all until about twenty years ago, and that was only when it was part of something else like quiche florentine. I worked my way up (or down maybe with fewer ingredients) to creamed spinach and finally to just spinach. I love it.
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I've also become a big fan of cooked carrots. Now they do have to be part of something else, like a soup or stew and they have to be really really cooked down, but I love them. Cooked carrots used to be my least favorite cooked vegetable. For 49 years. I really detested them. I used to forfeit my dessert at daycare rather than eat cooked carrots. I always picked them out of canned soups and ate around them in stews.
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I can also eat raw celery now. I used to think raw celery tasted like poison. So I was thinking about all these taste changes and because I am so terrible at math, I thought, Well I'm not anywhere near a seven year thing. Then I remembered that 49 is 7 x 7. And I was 49 until April.
So I guess that old saw is true.
Mmmmm, spinach.

Birthday Twins

(photo from Oprah.com. Please don't sue me.)

I caught the Oprah rerun last week with Barbra Streisand. As a surprise, Robert Redford shows up. Robert Redford walks out trying to rock his 70's The Way We Were hair by wearing what really looks like a wig. I was so embarassed for him.

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The thing is, Robert Redford and Dad were born on the exact same day. Seeing a man Dad's age or I should say, what would have been Dad's age, wearing a wig that was a facsimile of his hair when he was sexy in the 70's, really made me think. Firstly it made me think how cool Dad was to embrace being an old dude. Many people have said Dad looked somewhat like Papa (Ernest) Hemingway. I thought Dad looked pretty cool. Secondly it made me think, what if Dad were still alive and tried to rock his 70's hair? And then I had a good laugh. See, Dad's 70's hair was that really goofy whitemanfro like the dad from "The Brady Bunch." Then as I thought how horrible that would be, I realized that Robert Redford's wig really wasn't much better.

Friday Goofy

The puppy was an unwilling partner in the love affair of Walter and the Pink Pig.

How Gross Is This?

That's the door to the ladies' room at the Movie Tavern. I imagine all that goo is from the "buttered" popcorn. Yuck.
I used my foot to open the door.

No Hello for the Living

I was thinking about something sad today. A few years ago when we had the big scare with my father-in law, his daughters showed up and were frequent visitors. I haven't seen them since.
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See, my FIL is actually my husband's stepDad. He has three daughters from his first marriage. I've met them a few times but couldn't pick them out of a line-up. They are never over there on his birthday or father's day. I know this because we usually are. I've only seen them around the Christmas holidays one time and my 27 year old daughter was still in high school. So that's been a while.
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I wonder why it is that when it comes to old people, everyone makes time for goodbye, but no one ever bothers with hello.

Wishing and Looking Ahead

Dave, one of my facebook buddies, posted that picture today and it was like salve for my brain. I think we are on 30 days this year of triple digits and 23 days in a row of triple digits with this whole next week expected to be in, guess? Yes! Triple digits! We are stilll not real close to the record year of 1980. I think that was 60 days of triple digits and and 13 days of over 110°. The funny thing about that is that was the year I worked as a groundskeeper at my parents' country club. And I had to wear long pants every day except Monday. I guess when I was nineteen, I was much hardier.
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I do have a mental exercise to keep cool. I have booked a trip for October to spend four days with Mom. When I think about the trip I think things like:
1. I bet I'll have to wear jeans
2. I bet I can wear my hair down
3. I may even need a jacket
These are very refreshing thoughts. Just imagining being chilly is nice. In the meantime, I can always look at Dave's picture.

Heat Ennui

I'm pretty much reverse hibernating. It's too hot to do anything. I go to the grocery store on Tuesday, do Meals on Wheels on Friday and we usually do something simple on either Saturday or Sunday. Other than that, not so much. I guess I'll start reading my third autobiography soon. It's the Keith Richards one and has gotten great reviews. I hope he tells some stories about being freezing cold. I can't even remember what that is like.

Surprise!

We went to see Horrible Bosses at The Movie Tavern tonight (Sunday night I mean). I ordered an individual sausage and bell pepper pizza. It was delicious. There was a foil packet tucked in one side between a slice and the pan. It's dark in the Movie Tavern, because, you know, we are all watching a movie. I assumed it was a wet-nap. So after I had eaten all I wanted to eat, I thought, "Ooh that wet-nap was a good idea. I'm going to use that." I figured that was way more convenient than digging through my purse for my hand sanitizer. So I grabbed the packet, ripped it open and poured aged parmesan cheese all over myself. My Sweetie thought it was hilarious. The movie was funny too.

Friday Goofy

............Granny didn't get this far by not knowing how to take advantage of a situation............

And It Was Good!

When I was 5 or 6 my mother was in a bowling league and all the children at the bowling alley were allowed to run around like a pack of wild dogs. I remember playing the juke box and dancing and I remember exploring the back rooms. One time in one of those back rooms, maybe the ladies' locker room, my brother dared to me to touch two electrical wires at the same time. They were sticking out of what had probably been an outlet but was just an open place in the cinder block wall. Being 5 or 6 and not knowing any better I of course grabbed the wires and was thrown backwards by a horrible electric shock. I'm surprised I didn't have a pants accident.
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As all childhood traumas are wont to do, that particular experience gave me a lifelong fear of electricity. Well today, I conquered that fear. I installed a new light fixture in my laundry room:

I did a previous post about the light fixture being some sort of idiotic halogen bulb and how hard it was to replace and that I had bought a new fixture, but in that post I also said I was going to have an electrician replace it for me. Well the first guy came down with a case of mononucleosis and so I called another guy and they kept forgetting about me. So today (Monday I mean) I decided to do it myself.

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After removing the old fixture there was a black wire and a white wire sticking out and I made myself touch them. Not at the same time like when I was 5 or 6. I would stand at the top of the step stool and look at them and then go have a beer and then stand at the top of the step stool and look at them and then go have another beer until I had finally worked up my nerve. I got back up there and quickly tapped my right index finger against the black wire. Nothing happened. I was so relieved. But I did go have one more beer before I touched the white wire.

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Once I realized I would not be shocked, I quickly did all the simple steps and had a new light fixture that uses a regular bulb. I was so tickled. Not that I had a new light fixture and not that I had saved $75. I was tickled because I had done it myself. Myself! I had conquered my lifelong fear and touched those wires. I said, "Let there be light!" I flipped the switch. It came on. And it was good.

The Help

I read The Help recently and found it very interesting. It is set in Mississippi in the early 60's and explores the relationships between white families and their black maids. We had a black maid named Bessie in the mid 60's. She took care of me while my mother slept because my mother worked nights. I think she also cleaned and prepared lunch and dinner. I have very few memories of her because I was a toddler. But I do remember sitting with her on the front porch. Bessie was eating lettuce. She would shake salt between each bite from the lettuce leaf. I remember that I asked her why she was salting the lettuce and she said it tasted good. I asked to try it, and I liked it. That's my only real memory of her. I guess my mother moved to the day shift and I was put in daycare. Plus we moved across town.
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For Mother's Day, one of the gifts I got from my daughter was a coupon good for "A Movie Night Out." So last week, I gave my daughter the book and said, "Read this book and then I am cashing in my coupon for the movie night on August 15th for the movie." The movie opens August 12th and her husband is going to be out of town then anyway, so I figured that's a good time to go. I hope they do a good job with the movie. I'm looking forward to it. And also to a fun night out with my daughter.

Friday Goofy

Walter, though amused by the puppy's antics, did not make note of it in his journal that day.

More Uses For The Internet

I just read an old novel from 1971 that was set in Bergen, Norway. So to get the feel of the place I went to Google Earth to look around. Also some important scenes are set around the Stavkirke of Fantoft. It was described in such a way that I couldn't quite picture it, but I could look it up and there it was (pictured above). I also was able to see what a funicular looked like.
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I first did this years ago when I read The DaVinci Code. Every time a painting was described, I would look it up to see for myself. Maybe it's because my brain is like that of a small child, but it's kind of nice to have pictures to go with my stories.

July? .... Really?

I'm really not sure what happened to June. June was busting out all over and then boom! it was gone. I am very proud of myself for making it through June without going on and on about the heat. I made a vow not to do that this summer. Well, I made a vow not to go on and on about the heat on my blog. I inflict that crap on my facebook friends now.
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I ran out today and bought hanging metal stars for my Meals on Wheels peeps. I gave them festive flags last year. I thought these were cute.:

I just realized that you can't tell from the picture but they are not flat. Anyway, one thing I've learned about old people is they are very patriotic, so I think they will like these. Speaking of old people, now that I am an old person, I decided to do something weird. Well, weird for me. Gnightgirl posted this pic a little bit ago:

I've never had a pedicure in my life and I don't think I've painted my toenails in years. I figured it just draws attention to my Fred Flintstone feet. But after seeing that picture, I called my daughter, the pedicure queen, and asked if she would take me to her place to get my toenails painted funny for 4th of July. So we are going on Saturday. Kate says they don't speak English well, and suggested I bring that picture, so I guess my toenails will look just like that. I wish the rest of my feet did. Happy July!

Crazy Maragarita

I ordered the Dos Equis Margarita because a bartender years ago told me the secret to a smooth margarita was to add beer. I had no idea they put the whole bottle in there. Literally. But man, is it delicious.

Work, Work, Work It Out Baby

I'm not a huge fan of having workmen in my house, but I have a lot of stuff on the burner for this week. See this bizarro lightbulb?:
Well that's the lightbulb in our laundry room. And the brownish parts? Those are the holders of the glass part that I have removed and they look to me like they are burning up or something. Anyway, I decided that A) this weird lightbulb sucks and B) That's all I need to know. So I bought a simple basic light fixture that uses a normal lightbulb like you can find on Earth and won't break in your hand and make you bleed when you are trying to replace it. I mean seriously, what the hell? That's the most idiotic thing ever. For a laundry room, anyway.
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Also we are getting a new air conditioning unit in about 7 or 8 hours and a roofing guy is coming this week to replace a skylight and shore up a section of gutter. All of this is exhausting my brain. I'm going to go to sleep now and deal with all of this la........

Bobkitties!!

How freaking cute are these bobcat kitties? My friend and neighbor Carole went down to the other neighbor's house and captured these little darlings enjoying some fresh rain water. They think they are at least 10 weeks old, so when I saw Timber the bobcat, she must have been out foraging for food for nursing her tiny kits.

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For those who asked, our local animal control does not interfere with these animals. They are considered just part of the local fauna. They really are cute!

It's A Girl!

Timber the bobcat is a female. She had kittens. She had kittens in the backyard, four houses down on my street. That neighbor believes they were born under her deck. We're guessing Timber went off to forage and the babies decided to come out and play. That lady was a little freaked out. I don't know that neighbor, but she called Carole. I am hoping some pictures will get passed my way. I've never seen baby bobkittens. If they are still there tomorrow, I may try to go down and see them. If not, hopefully I will get pictures to share.

Now It All Makes Sense

After being diagnosed with osteoarthritis in my right thumb a while back, I would sometimes look it up and think about it, but maybe I wasn't really paying attention until recently. The other day it was like a lightbulb bloomed over my head like in a cartoon.
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The real reason I didn't see it at first is because I guess it's a normal function to not see one's self as defective. I kept seeing phrases like: Some people are born with abnormally formed joints... and of course, I thought: Well, that doesn't apply to me. I mean, really, who goes around thinking they were born with abnormal parts? And besides, the primary cause of osteoarthritis is aging. And I was aging. So obviously, I wasn't defective or abnormal, right?
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You know how in thriller movies, when the protagonist stumbles upon something and then you get a flashback of a bunch of scenes and you can see that they are putting all the pieces of the puzzle together? It was just like that for me. I remembered that I had my friend Cathy write my daily paragraphs in first grade because it hurt my hand. I remembered all the times I asked teachers if I could type my paper instead of writing it. I remembered how I hated having to do scissor work and how bad scissors hurt my hand. I remembered showing off my "funny double-jointed thumb." It was pretty much just like in the movies as this wave of memories of my whole life and how I avoided things like that washed through my head.
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So I have accepted that I was born defective. My thumbs were not properly aligned. I was a cute baby girl with defective thumbs. Doing normal things like writing, using scissors and using a screwdriver are painful but the good news is, it has nothing to do with getting old. I'm okay with that.

I Still Miss Him

Happy Father's Day

Subliminal Advertising

When I was 19 or so I dated a guy for a short while that was a very good artist. He was also a marketing major working on his thesis about subliminal advertising and tricks of the trade. Although his paper was all about Playboy Magazine, he also had lots of other stuff to show me. The Playboy stuff was fascinating - there was a lot involved and it would take me showing you old Playboys to explain it all. This was probably 1980 or so, and I haven't seen a Playboy in years, so I don't know if they still use those old tricks.
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I still look at ads with a keen eye. The picture above is the new Louis Vuitton ad. The artists have totally reproduced the female anatomy in the crotch of her pants. I was amazed when I saw it and am surprised no one online has mentioned it. Maybe because it's supposed to be subliminal. Maybe everyone else is looking at her eyes. But if you look there, it's pretty obvious.

Much Better!

Apparently a little daylight seeping in helped tremendously with getting the color to photograph correctly. Carole came over and we tested the surge strip. She was very brave and plugged in the fan. The whole surge strip is dead. It was a poor design and the plug slots are all spaced so that I may have plugged into two different sockets. I'll have to get a nice new modern one for over there.

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The paint color is named "Sahara Sands." It has a slight peach tinge to it. Now I can't wait to get a new countertop and sinks. We are going to go to a granite place a week from this Saturday. I wanted to go this weekend but it's Father's Day weekend and I don't want to go out three days in a row. I've lived with that horrible countertop for 10 years so I think I can wait one more week to go looking. And now I think I shall go to sleep.

Holy Cow, What the Frik?

It's always something and if it isn't something, it's something else. My after pictures came out a horrible mustardy color and not even close to the real paint color, so I was going to color correct them in Photoshop. The other computer, the one with Photoshop, overheats and I use an external fan. I had used that fan in the bathroom to help the texture dry and when I just a few minutes ago went to plug it into the surge strip by that computer, crazy sparks flew out! I'm afraid of a bunch of things, but electrical sparks is certainly in my top ten. Why would it do that? I can't begin to explain how irritated I am about that. Anyway I'll just show the mustardy colored pictures, because that's all I have right now and will figure out later what the hell is with that fan.
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So this was the before from the door:

After from the door:

This was the before from the window on the other end:

After from the window:

Here are some close-ups of the texture:

The paint is a different color in every picture which is really weird because this is not Oz and the walls are not walls of a different color. I will try to get better pictures. Maybe daylight will help and I want to figure out what made those crazy electrical sparks from the surge strip. It's a surge strip. Aren't they supposed to, you know, not have surges? I don't get that at all.

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I really dislike being irritated. Being irritated makes me irritated, which is not good. I think I need to go to youtube and find soothing music to get myself back to my happy place. I'll be better next time.

No Pics Yet

I can't begin to explain how tough this last week was. I worked myself to the bone. The BONE. I was sore everywhere. And I was so dead set on having everything finished when My Sweetie got home, I ended up with less than four hours of sleep Thursday night. Or I guess I should say Friday morning. The plumber was supposed to be here at 8:00 am Friday morning to seat the new toilet and I was so tired and dead when I went to bed I didn't even set a clock. I decided I would just wake up when he called to say he was coming or rang the doorbell. I think I went to bed around 4:30.
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I somehow randomly woke up naturally at 8:15 Friday morning and jumped up and ran around doing last minute stuff and finally at 8:45 I called the plumber. I had told them specifically that I needed to be in the shower at 9:30. Well he ended up getting here at 9:00 and left at 10:00 and I was all Mission: Impossible getting ready after that for Meals on Wheels. But I made it there and actually I wasn't the last person to get there for the food pick up.
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I had an easy route and a nice lunch, ran to the grocery store and got home with two hours left before I had to pick up My Sweetie at the airport. I still had to do a lot of post work clean up as well as carefully removing all the tape. I also had to re-hang the window shade and shower curtain. It was 95° outside and felt like that inside as I was rushing around trying to finish. I did a sort of rush job decor wise, but had something nice to show My Sweetie when we got home. I have been making little changes since then. I am almost there and will take picures when I feel like I have finally finished. And I finally got some sleep. That was great.

Slow and Steady

Yesterday went pretty well. I had finished what I wanted to do by 3:00 am. Then I had to shower and ended up staying up until 6:00 am. I woke up at 12:30 ready to go. Today did not go perfectly. The texturing is very labor intensive. After I did that first tiny patch, pictured above, I had a cramp in my left arm and my left thumb was numb. I had some sort of death grip on my mud box.
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Once I figured that out, it went better. I am slightly over halfway done with the texture and have pretty much run out, so when I go tomorrow to buy the toilet, I will get another bucket of texture. It doesn't put me behind schedule because I planned to paint on Wednesday.
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My son-in-law came over and we took out the old toilet. He'll be back this evening to help me bring the new toilet in. My daughter just changed her work schedule to fit with her schooling, so I will be having dinner tonight with my son-in-law. That should be interesting.
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So it's almost 6:00 am again and every single part of me is sore except for my eyeballs and earlobes. I bet I will sleep like a rock. I should go check that out.

Stuff That is Happening and Another Redo

I've been very very very good about keeping my reading glasses in my purse. I bought some specifically for that. They are in a little blue plastic hard case that almost looks like a toothbrush holder. Unfortunately, when I travel things get disorganized, and I never took them out of my backpack and put them back in my purse after the beach trip. So on Friday when I got to my lunch restaurant after Meals on Wheels, I pulled out my USA Today and discovered I had no reading glasses.
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I was able to read the articles okay, but when it came time to do the crossword puzzle, I was having a hard time. I tried looking through the bottom of my beer glass but that didn't work. Then I got the great idea to use my camera, set it on macro and zoom in. Fortunately, as soon as I pulled out my camera, the battery died. Otherwise, the bartender probably would have cut me off.
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I charged my camera battery when I got home and took my BEFORE pictures of the blue bathroom. This afternoon I will start on my redo. Here's a picture from the door:

And here's a picture from the other end:

This is a closer image of the sponge technique I did about 8 years ago:

When I first did it, I really thought it was the cat's meow. And maybe that's because the old wallpaper was seriously heinous, but now it seems really tired and dated. I'm actually going to do a texture before I paint and I hope to do something really cool, but I don't want to say what, in case it doesn't work out exactly. So this afternoon I will sand and prep. Monday I will apply the texture. After midnight that night (they work until then), my daughter and son-in-law will come by and we will remove the toilet. On Tuesday I will buy new mirrors and a new toilet and start painting. On Wednesday I will finish up painting and clean up and on Thursday, the plumber will install the new toilet. At least those are my plans.
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I have all my materials and My Sweetie will be at E3 all week so I can work any hours that I want and play loud music and hopefully everything will go smoothly. I'm looking forward to a busy week of making new stuff. I will chart my progress each day. And I will have fun.

The Beach Trip of 2011 (May 20-27)

I took this picture of my daughter and her husband at the rental car place after we landed in Raleigh/Durham on Friday afternoon:

My daughter made me some French braids that Saturday:

On Sunday we went into Wilmington to go to The Riverwalk and had lunch at The George:

I love how the guys look so cool on The Riverwalk:

My son-in-law and I played a game of foosball at a very hot bar:

And no it wasn't "hot" as in "happening," it was freaking hot as hell in there.

This next picture shows some of our fancy chalkwork:

On Monday, we all went down to volley a ball around and I sucked so bad at it, I designated myself "photographer":

This is Loretta and me on Tuesday just before she left:

A ball and a beer. That's all you really need at the beach:

My daughter, brother and I had a little afternoon excursion on Wednesday and I got this great picture of my big brother:

On Thursday, my daughter interrupted my beer pong game so I could take this picture:

My brother and I were playing beer pong against his sons:

My nephew (the one above in the grey shirt) took this rather artsy shadowplay picture of me making one of my many futile attempts:

It was a great week. We had great food. We played team Trivial Pursuit (I won one game with my youngest nephew as partner). We frolicked, we sang, we picked up beach rocks, we looked at the stars, we looked at the moon. The moon rose deep red two nights just over the pier and it was awesome (in the true sense of the word). We saw sunrises and sunsets. We watched silly videos on youtube and laughed about them all day. And we all made plans to do it all over again next year. I can't wait!