Some women prefer flowers, chocolate, expensive jewelry (actually, that one still works on me), extravagent gifts... Let me tell you, if you're out to make my heart pitter patter, cleaning out the garage will do it. Or laundry, that one works wonders too. Maybe some dishes, clean out my car, remember to record my favorite show on TiVo...Ahhh!
Nick and I pulled up to the house today and Bo had the entire garage unravelled everywhere, organizing and cleaning. Ahhh! Being able to find just want I am looking for on it's assigned shelf beats flowers that wither away any day.
Friday, April 8, 2011
Thursday, April 7, 2011
*Waiting*
I try to disconnect myself from all things political. It's a frustrating revolving door of chaos. But right now, I would really like to see some resolution of the government budgets so we aren't shut down Friday as well. Being a government contractor, Monday is a big, fat ? for us too...
A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have. - Thomas Jefferson
A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have. - Thomas Jefferson
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Geocaching...or Trinket Chasing?
Geocaching. Please tell me someone has heard of this. Courtney enlightened me today to an activity that apparently has been around for YEARS. And I literally mean around me - at Walmart, the elementary school, in a creek bed, Home Depot, maybe the gym...
I've never heard of such a thing until Courtney was telling me her and her boyfriend use their spare time to hunt. About an hour's worth of conversation at work today lead me to conclude this is a huge hide and seek Easter egg hunt for crap.
So, if you have never heard of this, where have you been? In a hole with me. There's a website and an app!! Holy moly! As I understand it, people will post longitude and latitude coordinates on a website leading to a location where an inconspicuous package of some sort has been left for capture. It can be anything, mostly something of little value no one wants, but you have to find it to figure that out. Once you find it, you log into the website and acknowledge you were victorious and leave something in return. And this goes on and on and on. Some locations have stayed strong for years.
That's basically the gist of it, but let's talk about the website - geocaching.com. It's pretty intense. In a discussion forum format, users will create a geocache with small hints and as folks find and re-populate the site, they discuss it. Some morons will give away the exact location of the trinket and ruin the fun or give further hints. {The idea is to never get caught while searching for the exact location of the item.} So, the website will tell you the approximate size of what you are looking for, if it's safe to go at night, if it's kid friendly, is parking close by...etc. Really?!
Then there's another catch - there may be nothing in the wrapping but a passcode or card. If there's a passcode, you simply log into the website and announce you found the geocache and move one. All that searching and there may be nothing? Or there may be a card wishing to "travel" to certain locations. For example, when I go on vacation to New York I can geocache. {because I would have nothing else to do in the wondrous city of New York? Right.} I can log the history of where the card has travelled across the country.
I could go on and on about this because it is just so bizarre to me. I think it has to beg the question, what if someone uses it in a malicious way? To lure a certain type of person to a remote location? Plants a bomb in a box? Leaves a sawed off finger? Scary Mary.
I was explaining the concept to Bo over dinner and he was as interested to hear about it as I was to explain it. I told him...there's a large decorative waterfall/fountain/pond-ish entrance to our subdivision made mostly of rocks piled together. I'm going to go buy a fake rock and put some Happy Meal toy in and post it. It would make my day to drive home and see someone trying to secretively turn over EVERY rock looking for what will inevitably be a let down. Bahahaha!
Someone please comment on this post and tell me if you have heard of this? I'm baffled and even more confused that it has survived over so many years.
I've never heard of such a thing until Courtney was telling me her and her boyfriend use their spare time to hunt. About an hour's worth of conversation at work today lead me to conclude this is a huge hide and seek Easter egg hunt for crap.
So, if you have never heard of this, where have you been? In a hole with me. There's a website and an app!! Holy moly! As I understand it, people will post longitude and latitude coordinates on a website leading to a location where an inconspicuous package of some sort has been left for capture. It can be anything, mostly something of little value no one wants, but you have to find it to figure that out. Once you find it, you log into the website and acknowledge you were victorious and leave something in return. And this goes on and on and on. Some locations have stayed strong for years.
That's basically the gist of it, but let's talk about the website - geocaching.com. It's pretty intense. In a discussion forum format, users will create a geocache with small hints and as folks find and re-populate the site, they discuss it. Some morons will give away the exact location of the trinket and ruin the fun or give further hints. {The idea is to never get caught while searching for the exact location of the item.} So, the website will tell you the approximate size of what you are looking for, if it's safe to go at night, if it's kid friendly, is parking close by...etc. Really?!
Then there's another catch - there may be nothing in the wrapping but a passcode or card. If there's a passcode, you simply log into the website and announce you found the geocache and move one. All that searching and there may be nothing? Or there may be a card wishing to "travel" to certain locations. For example, when I go on vacation to New York I can geocache. {because I would have nothing else to do in the wondrous city of New York? Right.} I can log the history of where the card has travelled across the country.
I could go on and on about this because it is just so bizarre to me. I think it has to beg the question, what if someone uses it in a malicious way? To lure a certain type of person to a remote location? Plants a bomb in a box? Leaves a sawed off finger? Scary Mary.
I was explaining the concept to Bo over dinner and he was as interested to hear about it as I was to explain it. I told him...there's a large decorative waterfall/fountain/pond-ish entrance to our subdivision made mostly of rocks piled together. I'm going to go buy a fake rock and put some Happy Meal toy in and post it. It would make my day to drive home and see someone trying to secretively turn over EVERY rock looking for what will inevitably be a let down. Bahahaha!
Someone please comment on this post and tell me if you have heard of this? I'm baffled and even more confused that it has survived over so many years.
Monday, April 4, 2011
One Proud Pink Petunia Plant
The maintenance crew at my office is constantly swapping out the flowers, almost weekly. I had to take this photo from somewhat far away for you to get just how many flowers are in this flower bed. And how funny it was to me that someone accidentally picked up one pink petunia plant. There are two flower beds this size by the way, and one little pinkie plant slipped in. Oops.
(Look hard, it's towards the back.)
(Look hard, it's towards the back.)
Monday, March 28, 2011
A Post About Nothing ... and Yard Work.
I sat down for just a few minutes to do a little Internet browsing and wound up with 60 pounds of dog sacked out on top of me. They're so innocent when they're sleeping - awake not so much - but I hate to wake them when they're so snuggly. So, you get a blog post from me. Mostly because I've browsed every website I can possibly think of and I'm bored.
Oh, the things I could be getting done right now. Bo's track meet tonight is at a school with dreaded outdoor lights on the track, which means an ETA of most likely midnight. I should be... doing laundry, doing dishes, finishing taxes {can you tell I'm floating our money 'til tax day on that one?}, some ironing, planting the remainder of plants I didn't finish this weekend...whew, wearing myself out typing all that.
However, we did get through one major accomplishment this weekend - yard work. Eight hours of yard work I might add. Saturday morning we went to Lowe's - along with every other spring chicken getting a jump on their chores. We left with a new lawn mower, edger and lots of fabulous flowers. Dang - I'm thinking a picture would be a great addition to what is turning into a house posting, but it's dark. I'll catch you up with a picture later.
We did not leave with one item I was regretting around hour 6 - a blower. There was already a lawn mower and edger on our flatbead cart and I was getting so tight with money I was starting to squeak. I suggested to Bo we should go with either a blower or edger, but not both. This was yard work argument #1. Well, I learned my lesson later on when I was designated the sidewalk sweeper. We need a damn blower. I was so tired of sweeping I was just doing good to sweep the clippings into the sewer drainages on the curb. {That stays between us. Although I'm sure some nosey neighbor watched me do it and will be reporting me to the city for illegal dumping.}
I thought it would be a great time to go ahead and get rid of all the existing mulch in the flower beds since I would be planting flowers. The homeowners before us had used recycled rubber tire mulch - great idea aesthetically, but that stuff doesn't decompose into the soil. Making an effort to "green up," I decided to rake it all out and re-mulch with wood chip mulch. Brainiac idea a quarter of the way in. My hamstrings were killing me from so much mulch scooping. {Did I forget to work out my hamstrings at the gym? Holy moly, I'm still recovering.}
Bring on yard work argument #2. Rubber mulch is heavy. I could only fill up garbage bags halfway or they were insanely heavy. I accumulated about 10 bags and suggested we condense the bags into larger contractor size black garbage bags. Well, that makes them impossible to pick up. And with the bags ripping and spilling mulch and the Rickners mid argument, we had to part ways for some time.
When it was all said and done, we got the front and back yard mowed and edged, old mulch gone, 12 new bags of mulch laid, new flowers in all the flower beds and bushes trimmed. Not bad for a days work, minus 2 big arguments and several tiffs throughout.
Oh, the things I could be getting done right now. Bo's track meet tonight is at a school with dreaded outdoor lights on the track, which means an ETA of most likely midnight. I should be... doing laundry, doing dishes, finishing taxes {can you tell I'm floating our money 'til tax day on that one?}, some ironing, planting the remainder of plants I didn't finish this weekend...whew, wearing myself out typing all that.
However, we did get through one major accomplishment this weekend - yard work. Eight hours of yard work I might add. Saturday morning we went to Lowe's - along with every other spring chicken getting a jump on their chores. We left with a new lawn mower, edger and lots of fabulous flowers. Dang - I'm thinking a picture would be a great addition to what is turning into a house posting, but it's dark. I'll catch you up with a picture later.
We did not leave with one item I was regretting around hour 6 - a blower. There was already a lawn mower and edger on our flatbead cart and I was getting so tight with money I was starting to squeak. I suggested to Bo we should go with either a blower or edger, but not both. This was yard work argument #1. Well, I learned my lesson later on when I was designated the sidewalk sweeper. We need a damn blower. I was so tired of sweeping I was just doing good to sweep the clippings into the sewer drainages on the curb. {That stays between us. Although I'm sure some nosey neighbor watched me do it and will be reporting me to the city for illegal dumping.}
I thought it would be a great time to go ahead and get rid of all the existing mulch in the flower beds since I would be planting flowers. The homeowners before us had used recycled rubber tire mulch - great idea aesthetically, but that stuff doesn't decompose into the soil. Making an effort to "green up," I decided to rake it all out and re-mulch with wood chip mulch. Brainiac idea a quarter of the way in. My hamstrings were killing me from so much mulch scooping. {Did I forget to work out my hamstrings at the gym? Holy moly, I'm still recovering.}
Bring on yard work argument #2. Rubber mulch is heavy. I could only fill up garbage bags halfway or they were insanely heavy. I accumulated about 10 bags and suggested we condense the bags into larger contractor size black garbage bags. Well, that makes them impossible to pick up. And with the bags ripping and spilling mulch and the Rickners mid argument, we had to part ways for some time.
When it was all said and done, we got the front and back yard mowed and edged, old mulch gone, 12 new bags of mulch laid, new flowers in all the flower beds and bushes trimmed. Not bad for a days work, minus 2 big arguments and several tiffs throughout.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Oopsies.
Shooter was playing outside with Bo and got thirsty, but dropped his frisbee just a little too late..into his water bowl. Haha
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