Letter to Me

Dear Me,

Remember when you managed to write pages upon pages in your books every day?  What happened?  You really need to figure out the whats and whys, kick them in the ass, and get back to work.  This is taking too long and it is too important to keep screwing up.

Sure, many things have happened this past year.  In fact,  for several years you’ve had a number of life changing events happen.  Don’t take them for granted, use them.

Your Father, Mother, sisters and parents in law are gone, use all that sorrow, hurt, pain, and emotion in your writing.  Stop bottling it all up inside and set it free in your writing.

Your Husband, Aunts, Cousins, and friends love you.  Embrace that love and bring that joy back into your writing.

All my love,

Me

 

New alarm clock

     Gavin has either taken it upon himself to be my alarm clock, or he’s decided that he wants some private Mommy time.  Lately, I’ve heard him wandering down the hallway and flopping down in front of my bedroom door a little before I would be getting up.

     Yesterday, The Curmudgeon remembered how I’ve often asked him to not let me sleep too late, and he came to wake me.  Gavin followed, squeezed in the door past his Daddy, and piled on the bed with me.  He was ready to settle in for a good snuggle when Patty decided to join us.

     The disgust on his face proved to me that he’d wanted me all to himself.  He got up, left the bed, and went back downstairs.  He was NOT happy.  Poor Gavin.

     Patty, on the other hand, was happy.  She got to bounce on the bed, make him leave, and then chase him downstairs.

     I think that when I hear him flop down outside my door tomorrow and let loose with his usual sigh, I’ll let him in and close the door so Patty can’t ruin his cuddle.  Sometimes he just needs some alone time with me.

Just another day in in Paradise.

 

     I was happy as a pig in a mud puddle when I got up yesterday and heard that The Curmudgeon had gone to the drug store to get the dogs’ allergy medications. 

     I was almost ecstatic to find out he’d also gone to the computer shop and picked up my desk top.  Almost, because I had a question about my lap top that I’d planned to ask my computer Guru.  Now I’d have to make a trip over there another day since he’d have to see the computer to answer the question.

     The Guru had loaded the desk top into The Curmudgeon’s truck and it was my job to get it out, bring it in, and hook it up.  The Curmudgeon can’t haul heavy stuff, he has no idea how to hook up a computer, and it was getting close to his nap time.

     To my surprise he’d bought a wireless mouse–um, didn’t I just order one the other day?  Well, it hadn’t arrived yet.  Okay, two computers & two wireless mice, that works, no complaints from me.  By that time my grin had grown.

     He tells me he’s going up for a nap.  Oh, joy!  I can work on my computer in peace.  Working away getting things set up the way I wanted them when I heard The Curmudgeon coming down the stairs and cussing on his way down.  This didn’t bode well.

     He’d broken his new glasses and practically dragged me out the door to run to the shop so they could fix them.  Even though the sign on the front of the shop said ‘open’  the posted hours for the day said ‘closed’ and so did the locked door.

     Arriving back at the house, we found all the other things we’d ordered last week, crammed between the doors, except for the carrying case for the lap top….  Monday is looking good for that.

On the road back to writing well

 

     I can pick up my desk top computer today.  Yay!  I hope he has good news to tell me about my data.  I am glad we purchased the lap top even though it will take a little while to pay off that once clear charge. It did come in handy for the time it took to fix my old faithful desk top.

     I will set the desk top up on my desk in the living room and take my lap top up to my bedroom.  I’ll have a place I can escape to where I can write in peace once again.   The antique desk from the MIL’s house is in the bedroom which will make it a decent writer’s retreat. 

     It will be nice to have the lap top to take with me when I find a new I-need-to-get-out-of-the-house place to write this summer.  I used to go to our local Borders but now that is closed and I really do need to find a new place.  The B&Ns here have tiny cafes and they aren’t very friendly to anyone who wants to sit there for more than a few minutes.

     I am scoping out a small coffee shop that might allow long-term seating with coffee purchases.  It isn’t far from the house and their coffee is wonderful.

Yippee! New faucet!

Old chrome faucet, leaky and full of hard water stains.

Lasted about 15 years.

Took longer to remove this than to put in the new one below.

New faucet, stainless steel and no leaks!

Maybe this one will last 20 years?

Thanks to Barry for removing the old one and installing this in an hour.

The Curmudgeon says that he knows it would’ve taken him two days.

Passwords, a touch of insanity

     How many passwords do you have?  I’ve changed all of mine.  If a psychiatrist ever saw my new ones, I’d be residing in the nut hut.  I don’t have passwords by the ‘dozens’  but I do have several.  Most places today require a minimum of 8 characters and at least one should be a number.

     Creating passwords is  interesting.  Passwords are also a bit telling.  Many people use the names of their pets–not a good idea folks.  You need to find cleverer things than that.  Don’t use your birthdays, anniversaries, or the grandkids names either.

     How creative can you get?  As creative as you want so long as you can remember them.  I have had to change passwords a few times because I forgot what one I used for the account.

     Some of mine  can tell you exactly where my head was at the time of creation.  No, I’m not spilling the beans.  I don’t want to change them all again.

No dog left behind

     Yes, Bullies are short bus dogs.  Patty proved it yesterday.  Not to be outdone by her brother’s ear hematoma, she came darned close to breaking her neck THREE  TIMES. 

     It began in the morning when The Curmudgeon had Gavin outside and Patty was left to her own devices.  The Curmudgeon came in and he found her poorly balanced on the radiator at the kitchen window.  She was so intent on her balancing act that she didn’t hear him open the door.  He asked her what she was doing.  She startled and he had to grab her in mid-air to keep her from taking a bad fall.

     Later, I took her outside and when she was ready to come in, she dashed for the door so fast that she missed a step.  Had she not had a leash on I think she would’ve fallen off the porch steps.  That was two.

     Around dinner time she decided to egg Gavin into playing.  She huckle butted around the living room, bounced up on the love seat, went to dive off and fell on her face.  I started to run over to her, she stood up, shook herself, and gave me that ‘I meant to do that’ look that they all have.  That was three.

     Yeah, my dogs ride on the short bus.

A Gavin update

     Had Gavin at the vet’s this evening.  He checked Gavin’s ear and wants to leave the stitches in another week to make sure enough scar tissue builds up to prevent this from happening again.

     As usual, Gavin was not thrilled to be there no matter how many cookies he got.  Yes, he’s a short bus dog for sure.  His vet adores him even though Gavin will not look him in the face.  Gavin will close his eyes to take a treat so he can’t look him in the eye.

     When we got home He leapt about with Patty like a puppy.  He was very happy to be home after the torture of having NOTHING DONE to him and many cookies.

Back it up…I should tattoo that on my hands.

     So I’m sort of getting used to the new lap top.  I do love the wireless feature.  Being able to take the computer to my bedroom, my chair, or even the kitchen has its perks. 

     I do hope my computer gets fixed sometime this week.  I also hope that I didn’t lose the couple batches of pictures and some writing I’d done and hadn’t gotten around to backing  up.  Nasty little F*tards who send out viruses and make us average people suffer are worthless pieces of crap.   Normally, I made regular back ups, but since the heart attack, I’ve neglected several things and that was one of them. 

     Oh well, you live and learn–sometimes.  You think I would’ve learned since my hard drive crashed a couple of years ago, but NOOOOOO, I forgot for a few months.  Yes, Dave I lost a lot of the book if my computer guru doesn’t recover everything.

     You all have a good one and don’t forget to BACK IT UP!

Another day…

     We didn’t get as much snow as it had sounded like we were going to get, much to my relief.  AJ came and had our driveway and walk cleared in no time.  The street isn’t in bad shape so if we have to go anywhere we can easily go.

     If I was on my desk top I would’ve taken and downloaded pictures for the blog but I have no desire to load my lap top with pictures now.

     Each time the dogs went out they reacted differently to the snow.  One time Gavin loved it the next he couldn’t get out and back in fast enough.  Patty raced about eating snow on a few trips and on others she too would dash out and right back in.  I have weird dogs.  Another Bull Terrier owner calls these dogs ‘short bus dogs’ by cracky she has the right of it.

     You all keep safe and have a good one.

So they say we’ll be getting snow…

     Sometime in the wee hours of  this morning we’re to get a snowstorm.  I am not looking forward to it.  The one we had in October was plenty enough for me.  At least I have my winter boots by the back door so when the dogs need to go out I can switch from my flip-flops to my boots.

     I had rather enjoyed the strange weather that was (so far) this winter.  Weeks of fifty degree days kept me from complaining.  Look out, because when the snow hits, it’s going to be bitch, bitch, bitch!  Hehehe.

     I won’t say how the dogs will react since they always make a liar out of me when I do try to predict their behavior.

     Hey, all of you who aren’t getting this weather, enjoy what you’ve got.  For those of you who are getting the snow, stay warm and drink some cocoa for me.  You all have a good one!  I’ll catch you later.

I still want my old desk top

 

     I’m glad The Curmudgeon shies away from using my new lap top.  This is a good thing because it means he’ll leave it alone all the time once my old workhorse is back home.  Yeah, the lap top is cool, but I’m used to my desk top and I miss it.

     I did have a difficult time getting used to the mouse pad, so when I am using the lap top at my desk, I hook my mouse up to it.

     I have no idea how long my old work horse will be in the computer hospital–not much longer I hope.  However, if he can save most of my hard drive he can keep it for as long as he needs to.

     I still want to shoot the malicious turd who malware bombed me.  I had some pictures on that computer I hadn’t saved to my flash drive yet.  {Sigh}  I hope they aren’t lost forever.  Hell, just shooting them isn’t good enough–they should suffer through a bunch of torture first then get shot.

     You all stay healthy and have a good one!