What is your passion?

     Everyone has one, two, or more things that they are passionate about.  For me it’s The Curmudgeon, the dogs, writing, and my gardens. 

     I have no idea what I’d do without The Curmudgeon, he’s my life. 

     For over thirty years I ran a small, local Bull Terrier club rescue and I have to say I miss it terribly.  However, I also have to say that I no longer have the energy to do it.  We rescued and placed well over thirty Bull Terriers in happy homes and only ever had one bounce back.  Two of our own dogs were rescue Bullies we didn’t place but kept.  Sadie and who the Curmudgeon fell for like a ton of bricks, and our sweet Patty our last rescue.

     Writing, I try to write every day, even if as of lately it is only blog posts.

   What are you passionate about?

     My gardens, they have suffered the last year with me being so busy at the MIL’s house, and with all the rain we’ve had–too much rain.

Morning? Nope.

 

     I got a call from the place that delivers meats to us.  They wanted to make an appointment to come and take our order. 

     “So, do we set an  appointment for 9 a.m.?”  She asked.

      I laughed.  “I don’t do mornings.”

     “How about 1:00?”

     I laughed again.  “How about Two?  At one I’m barely on my second cup of coffee.  By two I’d be awake enough to do an order.”

     “And can we make it on Monday?”

      “Nope.  Let’s put it off a week.”

      She sighs, “Okay.  How about December 4th?”

     “Perfect.  See you at two then.”

     Wait until she sees the complete change in our order.  I pretty sure there will be some tearing of hair. 

Conversation with the monster under my bed…

     “You’re smaller than I remember.”  I rolled over and leaned down to peer under my bed.

     “You’re much bigger now,”  he said.

     “We’re you always that color?”

     “Nope.  It’s dustier down here.”  He smiled a toothy grin.  “You’re mother and grandmother kept their house cleaner.

     “Yeah, well I never did claim a prize in Better House Keeping.  However, I’m not the worst one around either.”

     “True.  So, what was it you wanted to ask?  I don’t often make an appearance for adults.”  He blinked his big red eyes.

     “I don’t know.  You came to mind tonight for some reason.”

     “I’ve got kids beds to be under.  If you you have nothing important to ask me, I have to go.”

     “Okay, with us moving so much, how did you manage to find us?”

      “That’s easy.  We each have certain bed bottoms as part of our home.  They’re like doors.  You bed bottom was always the same door no matter where you moved.”

      “Wow, how many doors do you have?”

      “I’m not allowed to tell.  Now I have to go.”

When I buy a new car…

     The Curmudgeon says when we sell the MIL’s house I will get a new car.  I’ve always had used cars never a NEW car.  I get to pick any car I want.  I’m not sure if I’ll go for a Smart car, an HHR, or another mini van.

     I do know that when I buy a new car it won’t be silver.  I decided that this morning when I looked out my bedroom window and saw that all but two cars parked on our street were silver.  There wasn’t a single open parking space out there so that’s a lot of silver cars.

     My new car won’t be purple either–I don’t like purple.

     When I buy a new car it will, hopefully, have enough room for a dog crate in the back.  If I buy a van I’ll have them keep the rearmost seat.  I pulled the rearmost seat out of the van I have a long time ago and have no use for one.

     My old van won’t be traded in, it is going to go to the neighbor over at my MIL’s who helped G and I so much with the clearing and cleaning.  She needs a car.  All she’ll have to pay for is the title transfer.

     I wish someone would hurry and buy the house.

     When I buy a new car it’d better last for a long time since it will probably the only new car I buy.

Dang it, where did it go?

     (Thank you for eating my post WordPress.  I shall attempt to recreate it.)

     Life at Chez Doggonedmysteries is very exciting.  The Curmudgeon went to bed around 9 tonight.  The pups dashed to their crates, Gavin barked to have the doors close and covered around 7.  Parrot dogs.

   I am awake and working on a second draft of my post at 3:30 in the morning.  WordPress ate my first draft…wow, high drama.

It’s black Friday–I’ll stay home

     If retail clerks refused to work the crazy hours and if people weren’t so greedy, there would be no such thing as Black Friday.

     I worked retail for many years.  Black Friday is the worst day of the year.  I’m not sure when it started, but in my early retail years the day was like any other.

     Greed is the only answer to the question, why do they do it? 

     Back when I bought Christmas presents, decorated, and in general, let the retail world dictate my December, I did manage to finish my shopping long before November and December rolled around. 

     Quite a few years ago, The Curmudgeon and I decided that if a holiday created too much pressure to allow one to enjoy it, why bother?  It’s not as if the season were a favorite for either of us.  Mostly it reminds us of lost family.   We’ve both had too many family deaths at this time of year.  I’d just as soon skip from here to mid February.

     These days I only buy or make one ten-dollar gift for my dearest friend of 38 years for her celebration and because she loves this time of year. 

     The Curmudgeon and I buy things we want, when we want them, instead of waiting for a holiday to come around.  We don’t decorate, I stopped baking ridiculous amounts of unneeded sweets, and we’ve found that we enjoy it this way.

   

And so today goes…

     It’s Thanksgiving.  The Curmudgeon and I are going to enjoy a lovely dinner of roast chicken (he won’t eat turkey), sage stuffing, gravy, Harvard beets, cranberry sauce, and we have a slice of cheesecake for each of us for dessert.  Okay it isn’t a completely traditional dinner, but we aren’t your traditional family.

     After dinner we’ll enjoy a movie marathon of some DVDs we bought lately and hadn’t had a chance to watch yet.

     The Curmudgeon will fall asleep in his chair with Patty.  Gavin will be snoring away in my chair with me.  I will be thankful That I get to enjoy watching all three sleep.

     There’s something to be said about a very small family.  There’s no noise, no pressure, and no fighting.  How thankful can I get?  Plenty thankful. 

Another senior moment

     Earlier, much earlier, I had an idea and thought, “wow, that’d make a great blog post!”  I didn’t make a note, should have.  For the life of me I can’t remember what was so brilliant.

     Is it any wonder that every flat surface in my house is covered with sticky notes?

     They aren’t just my sticky notes, The Curmudgeon has his share of them too.  His are far more cryptic than mine.  For example, do you have any idea what sw=E4 Z22 2:30 means?  Neither do I.

     Mine are more like, livingroom rugs 11′ by 8′ and 8′ by 5′.  Then there’s “Dn’t fgt Lot ticks.”  Easy peasy right?

     However, here I am writing away and I still can’t remember what that brilliant idea for a blog post was, DUH.

Hey, I really did need more books…

     I ordered three new books today, The Thinker’s Thesaurus, Word Painting, and The Wrong Word Dictionary.  It’s Signals catalogues fault.  I found The Thinker’s Thesaurus in it and didn’t like the price so I went online and found it on Amazon for five dollars less. 

     You know how Amazon is, they always offer you suggestions “if you like that you might like this’ and that’s how I ended up buying the other two books.  {Sigh}  I’m weak. 

She’s baa-ack and creepier than ever.

     I really could’ve gone the enitre year without having the Target lady show up on their commercials again.  Please Target make her go away, she’s downright creepy.  She’s the stuff of nightmares.

     I’m sure I’m not only person completely creeped out by her.  I’ve begun to change the channel the instant she shows up on the screen.  Is this good advertisement?

Crazy Bull Terrier day

     Take two bull terriers add a sunny brisk day and you have chaos.  Gavin and Patty were like two three-year-old  kids on a sugar, over activity, and a we-swiped-Mom’s-coffee high.

     Hyperactivity at its worst.  When they weren’t bouncing off the walls and each other The Curmudgeon and I were targets of their over zealous glee and mischievous mirth.

     It was with great relief on our parts when three o’clock rolled around and both were looking for The Curmudgeon to go up for his usual nap.  They were tired.  He went upstairs, both dogs dashed for their crates, and waited for me to shut the doors, give them cookies, and cover the doors with their towels.

     Five minutes later the snores coming from the crates were proof that they aren’t as young as they once were.  They snored for two hours straight.  I had to wake them for dinner.

Leaf blower/mulcher works like a dream!

 

     With a yard full of leaves and not being exactly eager to rake them, I ordered a leaf blower/mulcher from Amazon a couple of days ago.  It arrived yesterday.  The Curmudgeon has one in the shed,  but it is gas powered and weighs a ton–I cannot use it.  I am now the proud owner of a Greenworks electric blower/mulcher with metal impeller.

     I spent the afternoon outside moving leaves to the street where the city will pick them up.  A few times I had a cross breeze that brought to mind the saying about ‘herding cats.’  I had to quit when it got too dark to see.  Half of the yard is finished. 

     When I went inside, I had two dogs that were crossing their legs, doing the pee pee dance, and they were HUNGRY.  The Curmudgeon was hungry too.  Oops, my bad. 

     Another sunny day today means I’ll try to finish the yard…