The return of the lazy blogger

Dear all 5 blog readers, I have decided to create a new blog post, so as not to be outdone by Roo. You really should read her latest blog post about Dieter Dolls here.

Life has been going on slowly, but surely. I've actually had some energy lately, so I've finished several craft projects, some of which I may someday post a picture of if I remember. I've also accomplished several things at work that I have successfully postponed for months.

The Wii Saga
In my new purchases news, I bought a Wii at the end of May; however, said Wii is still not hooked up. Why, you ask did I buy a Wii when my parents already have one next door. Because I'm fat and would like to be not so fat...and I get sick in the heat and the parents house isn't very cool. I am only allowed to exercise on my Wii, should it ever get hooked up. All fun games must be played at Ma and Pa's house (at least until I lose my resolve) Why isn't the Wii hooked up? It isn't that hard, you say. Let me share the saga. I go to hook up the Wii and discover that all of the working ports on my switch box are full. So, I go buy a newer, bigger, better switch box and go to hook it up, only to discover that the power strip is full. I buy an extension cord to run from another plug (so I don't blow a fuse). I go to plug in said extension cord and discover (remember) that I live in an old house and all of the plug-ins have two holes and not three. I go buy several adapters so that I can plug in my extension cord (and other things throughout the house. I think I am ready to go as soon as I figure out which outlets are on which circuits.

The Smells in my Life
Also, my house currently has a very funky smell that I cannot figure out. There are no dead vermin that I can find. I found a puddle of water in the kitchen, which may be the source of the stench, but have not yet figured out where it came from. I tried to open the fridge to see if a more horrific waft of putrid air of the same variety would assault my olfactory senses. (Loo and I are very practiced at identifying and producing smells in a fridge. Ma suggested that the puddle of water was something that got in the house and died and then liquified. I informed her that I would have noticed the smell earlier. So, I have spent the last night and probably tonight next door at Ma and Pa's house, avoiding the nasty smell at my house.

As for the good smell in my life, I picked up food from my new favorite drive-through in Delta, El Jaliciense and it smelled fabulous. The smell of the churros and the healthier food mixed together was almost more than I could handle on the drive home. I do have to say that Chewy made a good decision selling water stock to open the restaurant.

Social News
All I can say on this front is that yesterday when Ron P. came into the office, I requested that he bring me back a husband from Scotland, when he, his wife, son Doug, and daughter-in-law go across the pond this summer. Note to MBC: You may also try to find me a Scottish husband while you are traversing the British Isles. Irish, Welsh, and English candidates are also acceptable.

Have a lovely day and enjoy this post. At this rate, you won't see another post for a month or two.

Moving, Moving, Moving

I've changed my blog background, and I realize that the font is a little hard to read, but you'll just have to deal with it, so there.

We moved cattle today and it went very smoothly--only one cow jumped a fence. That is pretty darn good. We move them 1-2 miles and my job is to stop traffic at the south end, where the cows turn. I had 12 vehicles stopped on the highway on my end and Ma had seven or eight. "A" came down to help with the fun and learned how to wave her arms to scare cows. You may visit here blog here for more details and photos. You may also visit Ma's blog for a more detailed account.

Not too much has been going on in my life recently. A mouse had the nerve to get in my car and die. This is my second car, and a mouse has died in each one. I'd appreciate it if they would choose someone else's car to die in. However, the smell has finally dissipated, thank goodness. Dead mice are a hazard of living on a farm. Live ones, too, but I don't want to say that. Work continues onward and has been a bit busy for the last couple of days, but I've still had plenty of time to stay up on my T.V. shows via the Internet.

I'm excited for "So You Think You Can Dance" to start this next week. It is much better than American Idol, though I wonder what MBC will do when she is in Europe for the summer. Guess she'll just have to watch them on YouTube.

Well, that's all the fun for today. I hope all you family members participated in our 1K walk today, so that you earned your participation prizes.

Fun, fun, fun

I know, I know. It's about time I posted again. I thought that I would post about my fabulous weekend that I had, as well as other happenings. I went up to SLC to pick up a work project and then spent the rest of the day shopping with Ma and Loo. We finished about 10:30 p.m. The next morning I had the maintenance done on my car, which only took an hour-and-a-half, (I know the punctuation is screwy on that phrase) even though we got there at our appointed time. When we got back in the car, it stunk to high heaven. We thought perhaps they had just spilled oil, so we rolled down the windows and aired out the car. We returned to Loo's house, and I chatted with S.Q. who was there for a few minutes, and then I went to hang out with Ark. Ark and I commenced with more shopping as that is what we do best together. We didn't actually accomplish a lot, but I did get a fabulous new coat that is sort of a lime green, or as FarmerBoy says "the color of a baby's poop after he's eaten strained peas". I like it--the coat, not baby's poop. I would post pictures, but my camera batteries are dead, so I cannot take a picture. Anyway, following our shopping expedition, we picked up the illustrious and cold-medicine doped MBC, before picking up pizza and going to the new Bond movie. It was good, but not as good as the last. It's hard to beat the initial chase scene in Casino Royale.

Moving on with the week. Work has been pretty slow, though I've had to deal with several angry people. I was very polite on the phone, though I was thinking mean thoughts in my head. Also, Pa looked at the car this morning and discovered that the oil cap had been left off when the oil was changed. I was not amused, nor was I impressed. I took the car to the proper place to have the oil changed (most of you know where that is), and they screwed it up. I called them up on the phone, was polite as usual, and proceeded to make the dealership aware of their error, and that they would need to come down here to fix the problem, as it was quite a distance to drive. They were happy to oblige, as they probably didn't want me suing them. When the technician got to the house, he apparently thought that it was clear out in the middle of nowhere (D'ya think? Why did you think I wasn't about to bring the car to you 70 miles away, so you could fix your mistake?) Anyway, hopefully they've refilled the oil, replaced the cap, and washed the engine.

So, there you have it--all of the excitement in my life.

Happy Trails!

P.S. If you didn't notice, this blog is written in the stream of consciousness style, my personal favorite.

I Laugh in the Face of Danger!

I just read an article that told me that my life may end in early demise, due to things in my house. There is a list of 10 common household items that may be dangerous. Here they are:

1. Mothballs--Whew! I don't use these because I'm too lazy, so I just let the moths eat holes in my clothes--oh wait, they are all over the place in my Grandma's house that I live in. Check.
2. Pesticides--I don't use pesticides, I just kill the bugs with my hand, shoe, or whatever heavy item is handy. Safe.
3. Pressed Wood Products--Darn it! I look at pressed wood paneling as I sit typing this. Also, all of my high-quality furniture is made of pressed wood. I may have to get another furniture supplier. Check.
4. Carpet--The article refers to new carpet. Thankfully, there has been new carpet in the house I live in for 40 years. Carpet was made better back in the day and lasted longer. Safe.
5. Laser Printers--Uh-oh. I've used laser printers since they came out. In fact, there is even a color laser printer at my house. I wonder if color laser printers give off nastier things than black and white ones.
6. Lead Paint--Check. I was born in the seventies. Duh!
7. Air Fresheners & Cleaning Solutions--I try my hardest not to clean, so that keeps those chemicals at a minimum. I don't know an air freshener strong enough to override the smell of manure, so there is no use in trying. Safe.
8. Baby Bottles--No babies now or in the near-future; however, my bottles were probably toxic, but I'm not dead yet. Check.
9. Flame Retardant. I don't own any, so I may die in a fire, but the retardant won't kill me.
10. Cosmetics. I almost never wear makeup anymore, today being an exception. The people that come into my office smell of manure and have manure on their clothes, so I consider that I look and smell better than them if I shower occasionally. Safish.

Am I going to change my ways because of this report. Not really. Will I continue using all of this cancer causing, death inducing items. Probably. Such is life. The replacements for the items probably will be found to have different death-causing tendencies, so what's the use. I'll be happy and enjoy my life full of printers, pressed-wood products, and lead-based paint.

Living Dangerously

I recently acquired 2000 pre-stamped envelopes for the office, and have now used 28 of them, as well as 3 envelopes that were provided with the bills. What, you ask, does this have to do with living dangerously. I'll tell you. I LICKED them all myself. Yes, even though there is the e-mail out there touting the "fact" that cockroach eggs are found on envelopes and will embed themselves into your tongue and grow into very large cockroaches inside your mouth, I took the plunge and licked the envelopes--with my tongue, no less. I know that my courage astounds you. You may later see my photo attached to that e-mail.

In other news, my Mom and I were eating lunch in my office, when we saw movement in the form of a mouse. I tried to ignore it, but could not after seeing it several times. The mouse then had the gall to climb on top of my fridge and dig around in my emergency food supply. If we made noise, he would pop up his head and look at us as if we were friends calling "hello" to him. Mice are not my friends, as you may know from earlier posts. The solution to the problem--I dumped all emergency food in the trash and took it outside, and my Mom was kind enough to set a new mousetrap to catch this "un-friend", so that the food foraging would stop, though she did say that the dead mouse in the office (which I cannot find, but only smell) probably died from overeating. By the way, it was a deer mouse we saw, so I also live dangerously as Hanta virus comes from deer mice. Deer mice are different than the mice drawn in kindergarten classes. They have very distinct features and look like very intelligent creatures, who condescendingly look at you daring you to outsmart them.

Excitement in My Life

Yes. There was indeed excitement in my life today. So exciting, in fact, that I told my family about it before I came home. So exciting that my Mom, who was listening to my Dad and brother's conversation on the phone with me thought I got a raise. What is as exciting as a raise, you ask? The answer: A new toilet at work. The toilet has been leaking for a couple of months now and I haven't gotten around to calling someone to fix it. I called the plumber, who at first thought it was a gasket that was the problem, but upon further inspection, he found...


...a crack in the tank! I know what excitement in my life. Even more exciting--he left the old toilet as he couldn't fit it on his truck. So, now I have two toilets at work. I hope someone doesn't use the one that isn't hooked up. I better make a sign for it. You would think it would be obvious with it being out in the hall, but you never know. Tomorrow's excitement will consist of trying out the new toilet out and taking off the sticker. Apparently toilets have a sticker that is the equivalent to the mattress "do not remove unless you are the owner tag". Who knew? I didn't. The things I am learning at my job.

The other excitement--I know your brain can hardly handle even more excitement--the plumber also insulated my furnace pipe, so that it hopefully won't freeze and then I won't have to remember to empty the "drain" bucket every couple of days.

Yeah for me! Well, I wish you all many happy flushes.

The Joys of Silage--as promised

I love fall on the farm. I love fall anyway, but I love as the fields begin to turn brown. One thing that fall on the farm means is it is time to chop corn for silage. For all of you that don't know what silage is, it is chopped corn that sits rotting in a pile waiting to bed fed to hungry cows. Cows love silage. I know this because they sometimes break into the silage area to eat it. In this day and age, silage is blown into long white bags. I'll try to post a picture later.

Back in the day, the chopped corn was put into a very large pile between the haystacks (to keep it contained). The top of the pile was even with the top of the haystack. Before I go on, I must state that when I was little, I had a very bad case of "older-brother" worship. FarmerBoy was the older brother that I worshiped. I would do anything that he wanted me to do. We had to make up our own fun in the summers and one fateful day FarmerBoy suggested that we go jump in the silage. I agreed. Why? Because FarmerBoy suggested it and I'd never done it before.

It was glorious. We would climb up the haystack and climb over to the silage pit. We would then jump off, pretending that we were the great gymnasts of the world (at least I did). We would jump, we would flip, we would do anything that we could get our bodies to do. There was a spongy goodness about the rotting corn. It was just as I imagined the big styrofoam pits that the gymnasts use to be. And it was free! And I could walk there! Well, FarmerBoy and I finished our exploits, and returned to the house. Mum, nice person that she was told us that we stunk. I disagreed. FarmerBoy definitely stunk, but I did NOT! All the smell must be coming from him. Mum made us both bathe, so that Farmer Boy wouldn't smell anymore. I just did it because I believe in good hygiene.

This is a tradition that continued for several years. I even remember playing with the neighbors and jumping in their silage pit. Later in life, the silage jumping adventures had to be curtailed as I developed itchy rashes from the decomposing goo.

A lonesome pole cat

I awoke this morning to the putrid smell of skunk. I mean what makes you more excited for your day to begin than the fresh aroma of the country pole cat. I must admit, the title of this blog is a bit misleading, as it was not a lonesome pole cat, but at least two of them. My brother, FarmerBoy, stated that perhaps it was mating season. The internet informed me that this was untrue as mating season is between March and June. Pepe Lepue was not wooing his love, but rather just "freshening" up my house--and my Mum and Pop's. FarmerBoy called me before I left the house to let me know of the wandering feline and to warn me to watch closely where I walked, as these striped stenchors had been on the porch, in the lane, and anywhere else they could think of. Skunk lookout is not a job that I want to be able to list on my resume, but one can always acquire new and useful skills.

As I returned from work, I was in my mode of non-thinking and walked onto my parents' porch to be assaulted by the smell. No, it was not gone and the rain just brings out the fresh skunk fragrance enough to make me wonder if I have absorbed the skunk's perfume as my own. Ah, the smells of the country--never dull.