A Time For Everything

On June 2, I ordered yet another Pittsburgh Penguins t-shirt. I received an email on June 10th that it had been shipped with an estimated arrival date of June 13th. I originally thought the 12th, but I might have mis-read the email hoping for a gift actually on my birthday. :0)

I finally received my t-shirt on Monday June 19th--seventeen days after I ordered it, six days after it was originally supposed to have arrived.



Why????

No reason that I can understand except I realize it's a low priority package. I get that. Had they charged me TWO more measly dollars, they could have put it in a priority mail envelope at a US post office and I could have gotten it in about three days. How happy of a camper would I have been???

Instead, the company I bought the t-shirt from is using some sort of combination of shipping--USPS and DHL--I imagine to get much cheaper rates. I've experienced that before on something else I bought, but packages then take a meandering route to where they're supposed to go.

If they'd correctly identified the day of delivery, I wouldn't be quite as upset, but when my package sits twenty miles down the road for three days for no apparent reason, I have a problem. It's seriously ridiculous that a package coming from Denver took nine days to be delivered.

I get making a profit on the item, but charge appropriate shipping and get a product into the hands of the consumer even if all the shipping funds are used up. I doubt I will ever order something from this company again.

Has anyone had similar frustrations?

Yeah...I wanted to post something interesting and thoughtful, but it just wasn't happening, so have some eye candy...









Have a great weekend!

Sorry, friends, I'm tired and my brain is too full to pull anything out that makes sense, so I just looked up some interesting thing about hockey and I'm gonna share a few with you. These come from this website if you want to read them all: http://www.kickassfacts.com/30-kickass-interesting-facts-about-ice-hockey/

4. Clint Malarchuk, while playing for Buffalo Sabres in 1989 had his throat slit open (jugular vein) during a game. The only reason he was able to survive was because of his trainer, who a former Army medic. His trainer reached into his neck and pinched off the bleeding until the doctors arrived.

6. Even if Wayne Gretzky had never scored a single goal, he would still have more points than any other past or present hockey player. He had more career assists than any other player has total points.

14. In Space Jam, after Daffy suggests naming the team “the Ducks”, Bugs asks “Please! What kind of Mickey Mouse organization would name their team The Ducks?” This actually did happen. In 1993, Anaheim Ducks were established by The Walt Disney Company.

16. Doctors in British Columbia are banned from talking about hockey during surgery.

19. At the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics, NHL pro Jarome Iginla struck up a conversation with four fans sitting next to his table and found out that they were sleeping in their car. He excused himself from the conversation and booked them at his own expense at the hotel his family was staying in.

20. If both NHL goalies are injured, the team can literally choose any available goalie to suit up and play and this includes fans.

22. Tiger Williams holds the record for most career penalty minutes in the NHL. He has spent approximately 2.7 days (3966 minutes) of his professional life in the penalty box.

27. There are two dozen engraving errors on the Stanley Cup including misspelling Boston as “Bqstqn”, the Toronto Maple Leafs as “Maple Leaes,” and the New York Islanders as “Ilanders.” Only one of the errors is not a spelling error. When the Oilers won the cup in 83-84, owner Peter Pocklington had his dad’s name snuck onto the team roster. The NHL caught the error later and had Basil Pocklington’s name crossed out with X’s.

28. The 1919 Stanley Cup Finals was the only game where no winner was declared due to an influenza outbreak, which hospitalized most of players from Montreal Canadiens and their general manager.

Talk to you Friday...

Haven't been feeling well...

For the last eight, nine years, our company has been managing the facilitation of access to electronic case files for our county by local and not-so-local defense attorneys.

And now, the county, rather than the defense lawyer's association, has switched gears and has opened and is managing a new system. I'll miss the money we (mostly I) earned from handling the system, but I won't miss dealing with the attorneys. Some of them are very nice, but some of them--despite their advanced degrees--are just dumb.

On another "end" note, we're looking down the barrel to the end of another year. Time to start making the final assessments on this year's goals as well as contemplating goals for next year. I already have two floating around in my brain. Other will depend on how I did on this year's.

My four-day weekend was almost too long. I suppose had I not sat on my butt for most of it, it might not have seemed quite so long. It was nice to go to bed and get up whenever the body dictated. Surprisingly, I didn't nap at all during the days even though it was raining and gloomy. DH and I had laptops on our laps and the TV playing for three days straight. We ate when we were hungry and there was no cooking.

Hope your holiday weekend was just as relaxing. But now...back to work!

Have a great week.

Not that I mind too much, it just means I have to pay attention to my time and keep track of my projects. I now have two series bibles on the books, as well as two critiques. There's also my cross stitch project, which I'm thankfully ahead of schedule on, and a writing project due the 23rd.


And just because the above note is boring, here's this...


Hope you're having a good week!

Over the past week, mostly this weekend, I spent way too many hours watching a Travel Channel show call Hotel Impossible with DH. It's not a show I'd have chosen myself, but it was interesting and eye-opening. And, dare I admit, a bit addicting.

I don't know about you, but I've had the random thought of running a restaurant or a bed & breakfast or a small hotel out along the highway...but after the weekend's HI marathon, I'm thinking again.


It's not as easy as it seems on the surface. The show's host helped all kinds of establishments, from historic landmarks, to family run operations, to resort hotels all around the world. (Mostly the Americas)

I'm not saying don't follow a dream, but if you don't have the experience yourself, make sure you have people working for you who know what the heck they're doing.

I think I'll stick with Hotel Giant...

Working mostly.

My responsibilities at work have increased exponentially, so I actually do work most of my day. Yes, I used to have a lot of free time. Not so much any more.

And since I actually work all day, I'm pretty pooped by the end of it, so I read to relax and wind down. What am I reading? Mostly Sherlock fic. Tons and tons of it.

I fit in a bit of housework here and there as well as keeping tabs on a few fandoms, mainly Sherlock and Harry Potter. Yes, Harry Potter. Not as crazy busy as back in the hey day of books and movies, but still active.

Speaking of fan fiction, I'm co-presenting a talk on how writing fan fiction can improve your writing in general to a group of 11- to 19-year-olds at one of our local libraries. I'm actually doing it to help a high school aged Girl Scout achieve her Gold Award. You know how I love fic, so a chance to talk about it seemed like a no brainer!



Have a great weekend.

Well, it's two weeks since I said good bye to my boy. Early days were tough and I still get misty-eyed every now and again. Sonshine called this past Saturday and seems to be fine. I missed his call, but he talked to his dad...

DD has also been gone more often than not, so the house has been very, very quiet. It's not unpleasant.

I'm still working from home with a couple of trips to the office per week, so that's a good thing.

This past weekend, I spent time getting my back yard cleaned up. After the crazy storm we had a couple of weeks ago, the back yard was pretty rough around the edges. So I mowed and raked and cleaned up the patio and the whole thing looks rather tidy now.

All I have left is to get the chainsaw out and cut the fallen limbs into truck-bed lengths to haul to the dump. I have a lot of yard waste to haul to the dump. At least, two loads, if not three...

Oh, wait--I also need to trim the holly and the wild hedge out front. Which will no doubt add a trip to the dump.

But it's fall y'all and fall is my favorite season, so I'm enjoying all of this outdoor work. I love it when the trees look like this, although that means it's colder than I like.

..with my blog and my faithful readers!

Yesterday, I had every intention on working on a post for today, but my writing group's contest closed for entries and it's my job to sort the judges and assign entries. And so that's what I spent the majority of yesterday doing, along with my regular Sunday tasks like grocery shopping and laundry.

So dear blog readers, I have nothing much to share today other than I'm pooped and I cannot wait until "THIS" has passed. I have several things I'm waiting on to pass, but one day at a time...

Hope you had a lovely weekend and here's to a pleasant week.

Nothing sounds interesting to me, so I don't want to bore you.

Have a good weekend and stay warm.

Still pulling out of my dip into depression. Stuff happened and it didn't do my body or mind good. But I stopped listening to the news, so that's helped.

Meanwhile, for the first time in five or six or seven years, the high school is doing a homecoming parade. Sonshine will be marching with his JROTC batallion, not the marching band. I'm really excited, so expect some pictures on Monday.

In other news, I'm reading a book:



So far, so good. This was made into a Lifetime made-for-TV movie. Might just have to check it out... Then again, I haven't been much into movies lately.

Read any good books lately??

It's been a while since I've posted about the yard or the house. Probably since before school started. And as much as I've neglected those things here on the blog, I've neglected them in real life too. The house has gotten minimal attention, but the yard...not so much. Aside from a random mow here and there, I've neglected it.

I feel disappointed in myself about that, but there's so much other stuff going on at the beginning of a school year that I am generally involved in. Not to mention any work things over and above the usual or writing group events and business. And of course I have to rest in between in order to maintain the pace. So ongoing yard maintenance goes by the wayside. No weeding, little watering, no tending... I've even neglected the bird feeders during the week. Poor things.

I had high hopes of keeping up with that stuff, but it didn't happen. I've found that I can no longer tolerate the heat as well as I once could, so even when I did go out, if it was hot, the heat zapped my energy and I got less done than I planned.

But marching season is almost over, so life will get less busy. And fall, while here according to the calendar, hasn't quite reached us weather-wise. Any time now though. And I'm looking forward to it. It's my favorite season. Especially the colors--the reds and the russets and the yellows and the oranges. I guess I should go dig up my decorations and enjoy it inside until it arrives outside.

What's your favorite season?

I leave you with this...



Got it from the Net, not mine.

Have a great weekend.

I think we're almost caught up now, so one more day. We'll see what the weekend holds for Monday's post, but for now...

I bought a new camera a few months ago and though I'm no photographer, I've been taking pictures of sunrises, seeing if I can capture some cool shots. I won't bore you with them all here, but I created a photo album on my Shutterfly. If you're so inclined, you can check them out here. Also, feel free to use any of my pictures for any purpose. Credit is nice, but not required. Feel free to share with others as well.

As for the rest of what I'm going to share...

Wednesday, Handsome the tree lizard was featured. I consider him to be sort of granddaddy-ish as he's the biggest one. There are two other smaller ones I've seen around and then a couple of weeks ago, I spotted this little guy! He's maybe two inches in length.


And I have a flag on my house. Finally! After I don't know how many years. I bought the flag two or three years ago. It's been in the hall closet and I finally made Sonshine put the bracket on the house. It was almost too far up. As you can at the top of the picture, the pole is right in line with the gutter. I just bent the bracket forward a wee bit and now the pole has a couple of inches of clearance.


As you know, Sonshine is a senior in high school this year. I did get a grudging picture of him on the first day...


And last but not least, I've been cross stitching again. I started a new project for myself -- a table cloth. Sort of. I have these two boxes of real old fashioned silver. (DH's grandmother's) The boxes were in my closet for years, but when I re-did the closet, I put them on the top bunk of Sonshine's bed. And then when I had him clean his room, I had him move them into my office/craft room. So when I tidied up my room, I decided to use them as a platform for Sonshine's wooden rocking horse. But, of course, they needed to camouflaged as well as protected. So...I dug out some large count blanket type aida cloth. It's probably five or six squares per inch and very loose.


Then I found an outline of a dala horse and created a pattern...



And then I started stitching!




I miscounted up on that fist one, so I'm going to have to pull it. But the second one has turned out perfectly aligned. It'll post pics once it's finished and in place.

Oh--are you asking why dala horses?? Well, my mom is from Denmark and when I visited my grandparents, they started my collection of the Swedish wooden horses. Which are called dala horses. I've expanded my collection over the years from the first two to ten.


(The huge one was a gift.) And I love them and thought why not?? I chose the orange and green because those are the primary colors of my room.

And I close now--it's almost the weekrnd. Do you have big plans??

Of course, I have a football game tonight, but the rest of the weekend will be devoted to cleaning house, me thinks. It's been far too long since I've done major damage!

See you Monday.

No, I still haven't gotten downright sick, though yesterday I woke up with a headache. And then cleaning products hindered my ability to completely get rid of it. So I had to stop cleaning!

I realized as I was downloading pictures from this week's football game is that I've taken all kinds of pictures to share here on the blog, but that I haven't actually done so. So today and maybe Wednesday and maybe even Friday, depending on how many pictures there are, I'm gonna do just that.

So let's get started, shall we...


Three weeks or so ago, we had a storm system move in and it poured down rain. Even at seventeen and a half, Sonshine still likes to play in the rain. Note the level of the water in the gutter--up to Sonshine's ankles. Close to four inches... And though it's harder to tell, the water almost completely covered the street from one side to the other.


One of my azaleas finally bit the big one. So I dug them both up and replanted the surviving one into a large pot and left it on my patio. I think it likes it better--more shade during the course of the day. It's still alive as of this morning, at any rate. :)



And one more random picture...




Handsome, the huge tree lizard, hung out on the patio one day.

So what's going on with you??

For weeks, probably months, my body has been fighting off something. I feel it as an irritation in my throat. I continue on, drinking a bit more hot tea to ease the symptoms, and it fades and dissipates. I think, however, my luck has run out. Not only does my throat feel irritated, but there's a tickle deep inside my ears, as well as some sinus pressure.

Must I give in to the sickies or can I overcome once again...?

Time will tell and nature will take its course.

In the meantime, it's the weekend and either way I'll be getting extra rest.

Hope you have a great one.

(Too bad it's not another three day weekend...)

Not for any discernible reason. I just felt meh. Then my friend sent me an e-mail. One of those forward things that you're supposed to keep forwarding. And it was just the thing I needed. You might have been the recipient of this same e-mail at one point or another....

The e-mail subject may be 7% or 45 Life Lessons--written by a purportedly ninety-year-old woman. I looked it up on Snopes for some reason and found that it was indeed written by the woman mentioned in the e-mail, only she's not ninety, she's only in her mid-fifties at this point. :)

But some of those life lessons hit home and so I thought I'd share them.

Written by Regina Brett, 50-something years old, of the Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Ohio ...

"To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most requested column I've ever written."

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short – enjoy it.

4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and family will.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don't have to win every argument. Stay true to yourself.

7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

8. It's okay to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.

12. It's okay to let your children see you cry.

13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye, but don't worry, God never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful. Clutter weighs you down in many ways.

18. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.

19.. It's never too late to be happy. But it’s all up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words 'In five years, will this matter?'

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

35. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative of dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. Accept what you already have, not what you need

42. The best is yet to come...

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.


Twenty one, twenty three, and twenty five spoke to me the most. I'm going to put out the nice stuff, what we have anyway, gonna be eccentric now, and be happy, despite what others say and do.

Care to share which one/s strike the deepest chord for you?

I have nothing exciting to talk about today, so I'm gonna just post pictures I've taken of random things over the last few weeks/months. Oh--wait my birthday was exciting and I do have some pictures of a few of my birthday prezzies.

First this awesome planter--don't you love it?? It's sitting right next to my front door so everyone can see and enjoy it right along with me.


My kids, the ones at home, bought me birthday cards! Wasn't that sweet?? The middle one with the chihuahua is from my mother-in-law and it plays music. :)


Also, Sonshine and DD made me PUPCAKES!!!!!!!!! My favorite cake flavor ever.



Let's see...random things...

First a nest of lady bugs in my yard a few months ago. Actually, I can across several beds throughout the lawn. They're probably gone now.


Last weekend I was cleaning up the front yard, raking all the dead leaves out from under the dead hedges, and generally cleaning that area up in preparation for some live plants later...I came across this:


Yes, that's a G.I. Joe doll. He's covered in dirt and leaves and has a leg missing. Sonshine had several of them when he was younger and as he grew up, the way he played with them changed.

Here's a closeup of my Chinese Wisteria...it's growing like a weed and I'm having to wind its vines around the trellis. Can you see the one growing up the brick?

Well, that seems like enough for today. Hope you have a grand weekend!!!!