KABOOM and the Bedroom lit up

KABOOM and the bedroom lit up. And it's NOT what you think - get your minds out of the gutter, People!

I awoke with quite a start before sunrise this morning as the entire bedroom lit up from a flash of lightening and an immediate BOOM, which indicated that the lightening had struck extremely close. The biggest issue with this was that Hercules (white kitty) was sleeping on my feet, which were uncovered by the way. He flew straight up in the air, which must have been at least three feet, then down again and like a cartoon cat made running motions with his feet. Unfortunately his claws were out, and I now have three very deep, long scratches on my leg.

On top of that, we’re dog sitting for the next six days, and Grand Dog Daisy hates thunderstorms. So the lightening and thunder precipitated a lot of whining and unrest. Poor thing. Beau on the other hand, sleeps right through everything. Typical man, he’s just like Ole. You could blow a stick of dynamite under the bed and neither Ole nor Beau would wake up. And that’s no lie!!

So Daisy was trying to comfort me with my cat scratches and I was trying to comfort her from being unnerved by the thunder.

Lovely Daughter and The New Man flew out to Reno this morning and won’t be back until next Thursday, so Daisy and Beau will live here on a full-time basis. Not that they don’t almost do that now – at this point they only sleep at Lovely Daughter’s house. Oh, well, what’s a bit more dog hair (snarky comment).

Don’t get me wrong – I’m an animal lover and have been all my life. I’ve got the softest heart of anyone in the world when it comes to animals whether domesticated or wild. But at this point in my life I’m just so tired of cleaning up all the hair I don’t even know where to begin telling you about it, so I won’t. Rosie the Rhoomba makes my life SO much easier, BUT . . . . I can’t tell you how nice it was to set Rosie off the other day, head for the grocery store, and have a freshly vacuumed carpet when I returned. And I need to clarify – it isn’t just the hair, but also the sand and dirt that gets dragged in. Oh, well, enough complaining. I love them dearly and will miss them dearly if Lovely Daughter has to move from this location due to County ordinances. We’ll miss her too – just thought I should stick that in there – it isn’t JUST the doggers we’ll miss.

But I won’t miss getting cat scratches on my bare leg at night, believe me. But I will miss Simon, my senior citizen. He’s such a gentle old duffer. All he wants to do at this point in his life is sleep and be close to someone.

So anyway, where was I before I digressed? Oh, well, it really doesn’t matter. New thought: (Remember, these are ramblings of an Old Woman.)

I’m not going into the Diaryland issue – that’s been covered enough already. I’ve made my opinions known by jumping ship and moving here. I really can’t express to those of you who are still on Diaryland how simple this site is to operate. Give it a try, okay?

Let’s see – what’s happened since I last made an entry here. Hmmm. Okay. Last night – Friday night – karaoke at the Local Watering Hole. We didn’t stay long because Ole volunteered to Rise and Shine at 4 a.m. this morning to take Lovely Daughter and the New Man to the airport to catch their VERY early morning flight to Reno. He’s such a dear, isn’t he? The only problem is he can’t hear the alarm clock when his hearing aides are out, so I had to wake up anyway just to keep poking him to get him out of bed at that hour. But he got them there on time for a 5:30 a.m. flight (remember we’re not at the edge of the world, but you can see it from here). I just spoke with Lovely Daughter and she said they had a terrible flight – lots of thunderstorms and the plane they were supposed to connect with in Denver had been struck by lightening in the air, so the mechanics were giving it a good go-over. As I told her, better on the ground than having trouble in the air, ya’ think? But as a result they were several hours late getting into Reno. But they are there, on the ground, safe and sound and enjoying themselves. Already lost money on the Kentucky Derby, but oh, well, you can’t take it with you, can ya’?

So Ole and I and the two grand doggers spent the morning being lazy after having to break up our night’s sleep. Stayed in bed and watched a movie or two, ETC. Finally got into gear about noon and started prepping food for tomorrow.

You see, tomorrow is our 40th wedding anniversary!! Can you believe I’ve put up with him (and vice versa – snicker) for that long???? We opted not to have a BIG party like so many people do for that milestone, and just invited some friends over for supper. If it’s not raining we’ll grille on the deck. I’ve got everything else ready, so it’s just a matter of marinating the chicken and ta-dah – I’m done!

If I have time tomorrow I’ll try to post some pictures of the EVENT that took place 40 years ago. Jeez, that sounds like it was the Dark Ages, or something – 40 years ago. Well, I guess it actually was the Dark Ages back then. Lots of reminiscing to do tomorrow. Oh, the stories I can tell – unfortunately most of them are PRIVATE – only for Ole and me – snicker.

Well, enough for tonight. Hopefully we won’t have anymore lightening strikes on top of us like last night.

Please leave comments – and I’m just not organized enough yet to have a Notify List going, so you’ll just have to put up with an email. Sorry.

Da Latest Gossip

Okay - much less stress over here. This site is SO EASY to operate compared to Diaryland it's unbelievable. Any of you who are getting disgusted with Andrew's tactics need to take a look here and simplify your lives.

I discussed the entire "Diaryland issue" with Ole last night. Explained to him what was going on and what Andrew's fees were for a gold membership. Ole thinks they're highway robbery. He was in business for 30+ years, in sales where margins and profits are the Words of the Day. It's his opinion that Andrew should be making a killing only charging a buck or so a month if all his members were paying members. I would have gladly paid him a fee if his prices were fair, but they are a bit on the exhorbitant side for the service that you're getting. He's only driving himself out of business. Only ensuring that folks go elsewhere because they don't like his manipulative manner of doing business.

Okay - that's all on that front. I guess I've made my point.


On a brighter note, spring has officially arrived in Minnesota. I can tell by the chirping gold balls that decorate my tree in the backyard. The Gold finches are here in very large numbers and make the tree look like Christmas tree that glows.

And Mama Wren is back too - she wakes me every morning about sunrise with her very loud song that's right outside my bedroom window in a spruce tree. I think she's chewing out Man Wren for being so slow in finding a place to settle in. But then that's how males are, right? Take their own sweet time at things like that.

And some of Ole's fruit trees are in bloom. I managed to capture this yesterday. Seeing a Swallowtail butterfly in our part of the world is quite rare. Although there are a ton of other butterflies out already. Must be the warm days we've been having lately.

Although I suppose I better not hold my breath. Up here in the North Land strange things have been known to happen. Ole and I were married on the 6th of May and it snowed that morning!

Ya, it sure looks like Ole vill have plenty of fruit dis year to make his homemade wine. I yust have to make sure he has clean socks on vhen he gets in da tub to stomp on it!

Well, Folks, I need to head to town to the grocery store and lay in some supplies. We've invited a bunch of friends over on Sunday and we're putting on a bit of a "feed" to celebrate our anniversary. I gotta start cookin' today, and Ole's going to grille.

BTW, I'm working on getting a Notify List organized so that those of you who are interested in continuing to read me will know when I post the latest Gossip!! Everyone needs to sit and yak awhile over coffee and cookies, ya' know.

PS: Remember to post a comment - just click on the word "comment" down below . . .

I Got a Bit of Snoose up My Nose

I got a bit of snoose up my nose this morning regarding Diaryland. I know that there are those of you who support Andrew and his server problems, but I think there are better ways to handle the situation than to just cut everyone off with the exception of the Gold Members. How about giving all “freeloaders” a 30-day free trial to see whether or not they like Diaryland before they start paying a monthly fee. Wouldn’t that make more sense? This type of behavior only makes me NOT want to become a paying member and to look elsewhere for service. And if he truly is having trouble rebuilding his server and it’s taking this long, maybe he’s got the wrong boys doin’ the job.

ANYWAY – enough on that subject.

I wrote something several days ago regarding May Day. I suppose it’s really not relevant anymore, but I’m going to post it anyway – just because I can – so there. (Gotta get rid of that “snoose” in my nose, ya know.) So here goes:

When I was a kid we used to celebrate May Day every year. By May 1st the weather is usually warm and sunny on a daily basis, a very definite reason to celebrate in Minnesota. And then there was Mrs. Broberg, my grade school teacher, who definitely believed in all things traditional. And May Day and May Poles were on her list of traditions.

We had a tall pole in the schoolyard located so that we could use it as a May Pole. Every year one of the bigger boys would shinny up the pole and attach a bunch of crepe paper ribbons to the top. Then Mrs. Broberg would drag the record player outside, set it on a little table, run a bunch of extension cords back to an electrical socket, and we would practice the May Pole dance. Heaven forbid it would rain at anytime during the week that we would practice, because then the crepe paper ribbons would run and bleed and one of the bigger boys would have to shinny up the pole again and replace them. May 1st would finally come, and all the parents would be invited, chairs set up out in the schoolyard and we would perform the dance.


We girls were all dressed in dresses that matched the pastel color of our crepe paper. And we wore big beautiful hats made from paper plates covered in crepe paper flowers that we had spent hours making. The half of the girls would have a ribbon and walk to the right; the other half would take a ribbon and walk left. We’d walk in opposite directions holding the ribbons tight, and as we met, we would alternate by going under the ribbon of the first girl then go over the ribbon of the next girl and so on. This up and down or in and out movement would create a weaving pattern down the pole as the ribbons got shorter.
Of course there was a series of winding and unwinding the streamers to the music, a few dance steps tucked in here and there, and when the pole was finally all woven we would end the celebration with cookies and Kool-aid in the school yard.

Then it was home to deliver all the May baskets to our friends. Sneak up to their door, leave the basket, knock on the door and run as fast as you could. I don’t know why we felt we had to run to get away because our friend was also out delivering May baskets and wasn’t home to chase and kiss us anyway!

May baskets were a real competition as to who could build the prettiest. We’d work on them for days ahead of time selecting just the right paper, ribbon, and contents for each friend. They were usually made of old wallpaper, construction paper, gift wrap, etc., with pipe cleaners for handles and maybe a few silk flowers or curly ribbons attached for decoration. We’d save our money and shop for penny candy to fill them. Back then a dime would buy a sugar high that would last for days. Root beer barrels, fire balls, lemon drops, sweet sippers, bubble gum, well, you get the idea. It was almost Halloween repeated in the spring.

Do the kids still celebrate May Day by delivering May baskets? Or is that something that has faded into the past. Lovely Daughter is 31 now, and none of my friends have school age grand children, so I’m just a wee bit out of touch. It’s certainly something I look back on with fond memories.

Tap, tap, tap on the microphone - This is a test

(Blowing in microphone) Testing - testing - testing. Just want to see if this all works.