Moms

Happy Mothers Day! For all the work that you do, have done, or will do, thank you moms everywhere. I got a chance to visit with my mom last night.

For those of you who have been waiting on adoptions for over two years, and feel you may not technically qualify, well, in my book you do. Happy Mother's Day!!

Saturday!!

Who in the world does not love a Sturday!?! I do!

OK, so I woke up on the wrong side of the bed. I might have been a LITTLE BIT grumpy this morning, though, I am positive Cora did not even notice. I don't even know why I was grumpy, though waking up about 5am on a Saturday might have had something to do with it.

We went to town...well, first we went to see if we could find a dresser for the kids' room at some yard sales. Remarkably, neither of us was in the true yard saling spirit. We ESPECIALLY were not when we visited the local vocational college; which was holding some sort of HUGE yard sale where people bought a spot to display their junk. We went through the whole riggamarole of locating a parking spot and walked a quarter of a mile to discover they were charging three bucks a head just to get in and look at peoples' junk! That would have cost us six bucks to go in and look at...pardon my Portugese(French seems so overused)...other peoples' shit, that we probably would not have even bought! That combined with our moods had us walking back to the truck in about two seconds.

We ended up buying a new pine dresser. It is very well built by a local craftsman. We plan on staining it (By WE I mean Cora) and perhaps adding a bit of a jungle touch to it (the jungle touch will come from me, since I am SO primal [which means I eat with my hands]).

I worked in the yard and cleaned off the patio...which is really just a concrete slab and is worthless to us, since we don't park any vehicles on it and it's too hot in the summer to use for... ANYTHING. Cora wants to either stain the dresser out there or in the kid's room. We shall see what transpires tomorrow.

Tonight we will travel the thirty miles down to my parents' house and celebrate an early Mother's Day.

Other than that, I have not done a whole lot of anything...

Tanks For The Request!!

I got a comment this morning requesting requesting some photos of our tanks. Never one to shirk my duty, I stepped up to the task and took a few pictures. Here they are! Above is a female Maroon Clown, whose name is Marvin, that is in my 30 gallon tank.

This is a Zooanthid polyp. they seem happy in Cora's tank.

This is an overall photo of Cora's 16 gallon tank.

Here is one with the skunk clown in it.

and this little guy is Cora's Cardinal fish...she is photo-shy.

Today was a fun day. I played Peter and the Wolf for the music class I subbed for. It was not bad. I did fight the nods for about a half hour during the one o'clock hour. It was quite a struggle to keep my eyes open. I was watching Peter and the Wolf for the umpteenth time, I was comfortable and it was dark. Other than that, it was a great day.

After I got off work I came home and miled my painting...somewhere in Florida. I am more than ready for the weekend, though!

Friday Has Arrived, Let's Get It Over With!

Ah, I can see it coming in the air today. Friday. I get to sub at the El today. This is Teacher Appreciation Week, so I am getting a few of the benfits. It was Soup at the "Evil I" this week. Who knows what the wonderful teachers will have at the El today! Either way, though, Fridays are always a pleasure at the El (food always makes the day go better!).

I got a few more aircraft accident reports that are post-1955. One is for a B-52 that went down near Yuba City. Yuba City is the sister city of Marysville, which is where we lived for two years...I wish I had known of it at the time...but my wreckchasing abilities are still young and I doubt I would have been able to locate it then, let alone now. I will likely be getting a few more reports up this coming week on my airplane site. I am amazed at the number of hits I keep getting since a slow start last Spring. I have slowly added more and more content to it. I am also geting an idea of what is working and what is not. I have gotten lots of compliments on my airplane site...but what are they gonna say? Nah, that site sucks! Still, it seems to be a place of interest for people. I hope my three readers will tell nyone hey know about it who might be interested.

Well, I have a painting to ship today. I will have it packaged up and ready to go this afternoon...after work. Post office doesn't open until I am gone to work.

I lost my sea urchin this week...I have no idea why, but he died. All my water parameters appear to be in the norm and actually healthy...good thing I removed him from the tank, as his death made the water in the hospital container a nasty hazy brown...I am not impressed with dead sea urchins...they don't smell very good either, if anyone is interested. Cora's Coral Tank is alive and well and looking good! The two fish we put in a few weeks ago seem to be getting on well and, apart from the skunk clown apparently not being particularly brilliant, prospering.

The sun is out and I am looking forward to a wonderful spring day! I hope everyone else enjoys a similar day.

Where's the Rain?

It is supposed to rain this afternoon, but all I see are those big fluffy cumulus clouds that don't look like the plan on dropping anything. I DID NOT get a job today. I am really sure of it now...no one called asking why I wasn't there and I double-checked, triple-checked, quadruple-checked, and...well, you get the picture.

I have been busy cleaning. I have done several loads of clothes, a load of dishes, mowed the lawn, set up my garden watering system (trust me, it's cool), repacked the bedroom closet that I had to unpack to get at the water heater, folded numerous clothes, checked the mail, dropped off a tool I borrowed, and took the garbage out. It still needs help, but the house is looking better.

I need a haircut, so will go in and get that in while. But, I still have things to do. The wind continues to blust, but overall it is a nice day out. Well, back to folding cloths.

Oh, YEAH! Happy Cinco de Mayo!!

What Day Is Today, Again?

So, what day is this? I taught second graders today. I thought I would be teaching them tomorrow for some reason...good thing the secretary called me about the time the students were coming in. It took me only ten minutes to drop everything and show up at the school.

I could not understand why not one job had come up for today. I was up late last night watching the computer and again this morning at 5AM. Still, nothing. I resigned myself to staying home and doin some of the house work and chores that did not get done this weekend. I was doing exceptional!! I had a load of clothes in the wash, a load of dishes on their way into the dishwasher, I'd picked up the mail, folded clothes, and taken out the garbage. I was just finishing the dishes when the secretary called. She asked me if i was working today, I said no. She said she had me down...then I realized I had mixed up the days!! ARGH!!! I told her I would be right there!

I wore shorts to school for the first time ever, today. I did not take the time to change, nor did I grab my bag, nor a lunch... I felt that it was my screw up, I should pay for it. As it was they welcomed me with open arms and understanding expressions. It was the first time I have ever done that: forgotten about a job. I actualy thought I had it for Tuesday. I doubt I'll ever do that again.

I finished a painting tonight, but I am not sure I am happy about it, yet.

This weekend I managed to plant tomatoes, zuchinis, cucumbers and squash. I also planted the flowers and some herbs. The rain today probably helped the vegatables nicely. Cora worked on dresses. We also got to see Cora's Grandma. I took her some of my famous potato salad (let's just say BACON and leave it at that).

I still don't have job for tomorrow. I am sure this time!

Happy May First!

So Wednesday I spent the day working on the hot water heater. To say that it was a bitch would be an understatement and serve no purpose but to make me hate hot water heaters more. I spent thee hours on my knees in a semi-fetal postion removing water from the tank by hand. Which was often intermixed with moments of tension when the plasticbag I was using to stem the flow of water from the hole the element had occupied came free just a little and the flow of water mimiced something a submariner would wish to avoid. The drain faucet let only a small trickle out of the hose I had run through the house and outside, so I had grown tired of waiting and decided to tempt fate by removing the element at the bottom of the tank and taking water from that hole...how stupid. Of course, once I had removed the element it was impossible to replace it with all the water coming out in a one inch wide stream.

In fact, maybe I should not have read so many submarine books. And all those submarine movies? Yeah, nix on those too. I was even sweating. Granted, there were no depth charges raining down on me, but I thought I heard sonar! I finally got it empty and changed the element. I just wish I had had some of their damage control items...something better than a plastic bag to stick in the hole.

Still, I survived! and now we can wash clothes and take hot showers!! Now that we have hot water back, we are aware of our previous element's slow slide into hell. I thought I remembered hot baths turning me pink...but recently they had not done that. Nw...well, it's back to hot baths again!!

Yesterday, the weather great and I mowed the lawn. Today the weather looks spectaculr! I get to be a PE teacher today at the intermediate! I am excited.

This weekend promises to be another work weekend. Still, we may make some time for fun.