The Year in Review

I see lots of bloggers doing a recap of all the exciting things that happened during the past year and thought maybe I should do a review, too.

Meh.

I've got nothing.

But, in other news, I do think the economy is starting to improve because yesterday we got, for the first time in a very long time, a credit card offer in the mail. We used to get at least 3 or 4 a week back in the good old free flowing credit days but ever since the big crash of '08, nothing. So, to me that is a good sign that the old mailbox will start filling up with junk mail credit card offers once again. People can now go back to the olden days of credit cards filling up their wallets, shopping for stuff they really can't afford, but, hey, I'VE GOT CREDIT CARDS! Yay!

And, what are our plans for New Year's Eve?

Meh.

I've got nothing.

And, speaking of cats, here is the infamous Bandit getting a snack. He is the only one out of our three tiny ferals that will let us pet him. He's the crafty one, he knows that if he runs across the street and rolls on his back for his belly to be petted that his tricks will EARN HIM FOOD! The big stray in the picture is the one we've been feeding for a while, we call him Sal. He doesn't do tricks or let us pet him, he just meows for his food, but he is willing to share with the little ones.


We think Sal is the kindly Uncle.

Rain!

I was so surprised to wake up this morning, look outside, and actually see wet stuff falling from the sky! We were promised a 30% chance of rain, which always leaves me with that 'yeah, right, I'll believe it when I see it' kind of feeling. We take our weather reports about rain with a grain of salt here in these dry deserty parts of California.

I just wish I could hear the rain, I do miss my old not so well insulated double wide trailer with the metal porch awnings that made even a sprinkle sound like the storm of the century. Nothing more soothing that the sound of rain falling on the roof. The only way to hear it in this house is to open up the window but then you get rain and cold inside the house so we're not going to do that today. Well, maybe I'll open the window just a little.

It's almost the New Year with all that making resolutions and fresh start stuff. I'm not going to bother with any resolutions this year other than continuing to live as frugally as possible. I'm real proud of myself, even though I am not the most organized, creative, or love to be in the kitchen kind of person, I planned some meals for this week that do double duty. Last night I made stuffed green peppers and put two of them in the freezer for a future dinner. Usually I cook the whole batch, have two of them leftover, and then end up tossing them after they've sat in the fridge for a week or so, because stuffed peppers twice in one week just doesn't sound good. And, I made granola bars yesterday, too. Whew!

The Aftermath

Whew, another holiday season over and done with. Not that I really had to do much to prepare since our holidays are definitely low key around here. We did have a fun trip down to Linda's for the day. Not the driving part but the family getting together part was really nice. Keith took a few pictures, most of which didn't come out all that well, but here is a picture of part of the family with Jim looking as if he is either totally bored or taking a nap.


We decided that we are going to try and be a bit more festive next year, like getting a tree and doing something a little more special than our rather lackluster baby chicken dinner and sitting around the house Christmas Day that we had. Keith's mom would really like us to come to Las Vegas one of these years, so maybe if we start planning a whole year in advance we could actually save up enough money to drive out there for a day or two.

We were talking about getting a cat safe tree, no lights on it and either cat toys for decorations or cutting out paper decorations for it. Then we could watch the total destruction and not worry about them breaking anything.

I've got some new ideas for little art block things that can either hang on the wall or stand alone, I've seen them on Etsy and they seem to be popular. I tried to find precut wood for them but they are really really expensive so I showed Keith what I wanted to do and he said he could cut the wood himself and even put the little keyholes in the back for hanging with one of his super duper wood tool things that he's got out in the garage. Now, I'm just waiting for him to have the energy to get out there and do it. I'm trying to be patient but I'll probably end up nagging him about it. Cut my wood, cut my wood!

Here is what our cats do most afternoons. I was wondering if they could possibly spread out even more across the bed.

Christmas. Balls.

Ho, ho, ho, or something like that.

I was on the etsy forums the other day and read a post about how delicious cake balls were. I guess cake balls are the new cupcakes or something, and they are supposedly easy to make and yummy and all that. Basically you take a box of cake mix, bake it up, get a can of frosting, crumble up the cake and mix in the frosting, make little balls and then dip them into the chocolate bark coating stuff for candies. Sounds good, right? Cake and frosting and chocolate candy coating, can't go wrong with that, right?


Wrong.

Okay, the baking and crumbling part was easy, mixing it all up fairly easy, but the trying to get sticky cake and frosting formed into balls, not so much. The recipe tells you to use a melon baller or scoop, but the sticky cake sticks into the melon baller, so I ended up using my hands to roll up the balls, kind of like playing with play doh only messier and stickier.


Then, dipping them into the candy coating stuff was not exactly a piece of cake, either-haha piece of cake, get it? Even though I stuck all the balls into the freezer for a while, they still left crumbs in the coating stuff, maybe I should have just gone with all chocolate instead of white coating.

So, this is what I ended up with.


Not exactly something you would find in a fine chocolatier's shop, is it?

And, how did they taste? Chocolate cake, frosting, candy coating has to taste good regardless of how they look, right?

Wrong.

If you like really really moist cake, you might like these, but to me they were like eating wet cake. Flavorless wet cake. Keith tried them and only got halfway through one. They went into the trash can. Yuck.

So much for making holiday treats this year. Balls.

Last night we were both feeling a little depressed over our lack of holiday festivities and were talking about how we don't really have any traditions that the two of us do or anything. So we talked about next year doing something like stockings for each other (depending on if this year is more prosperous of course) or finding some other little thing that we could do each year. I suggested starting a tradition of driving around to look at the Christmas lights on the houses, and why not start that now? So, I'm cleaning up after dinner so we can go look at the holiday lights and Keith says why not put all the cats in the car so they can see the lights, too? So, I had to explain how putting all the cats in the car doesn't sound like such a good idea, first off, they DON'T LIKE going in the car, and secondly, we only have 3 cat carriers and 6 cats and we can't have panicky cats who don't like riding in cars LOOSE IN THE CAR!

So, I finally convince him that cats and car is not such a good idea and we go for our ride to look at the lights.

We get through our neigborhood and the light for no gas comes on in the car so we go to the gas station and I'm waiting, waiting, waiting, while Keith is filling up the car. He gets back in the car all mad because the gas pumps are not working right and it has taken all this time to pump 3 gallons into the car and they don't have Dept of Weights and Measures stickers on their pumps and he thinks they are trying to rip people off with their gas and this happened the last time he went to this gas station and he's never going there again.

Three gallons of gas won't get us far, so we have to go to another gas station to finish filling up the car. Then he gets back in the car and we drive off to go look for more lights and his nose starts getting all congested and he's trying to blow his nose while driving and I'm telling him to pull over because he is weaving all over the road trying to get his handkerchief out of his pocket and we end up in a festive holiday fight over him blowing his nose and almost crashing into parked cars. He is saying he doesn't feel good all of a sudden and he must be coming down with a cold and I'm saying well, let's just go home then because all the fun has been sucked out of our little jaunt anyway, so we go home. Ho, ho, ho.

So, maybe that could be part of our new holiday traditions, let's yell at each other on Christmas Eve over stupid stuff. That really gets you into that holiday spirit.

And, so now I am waiting for him to wake up because since IHOP is open today, I suggested making breakfast out part of our holiday tradition. Then after breakfast I will make mashed potatoes and deviled eggs for tomorrow's dinner down south, and later I will make baby chickens for our holiday dinner. You know, those little game hens, not real baby chickens. Not enough meat on those. We also got a carrot cake at Vons yesterday after the balls debacle so that we will have a dessert.

Ho, ho, ho...

All Wrapped Up

The other day I got out the one roll of wrapping paper that we bought to wrap what few gifts needed wrapping and as I started unrolling the paper I noticed all these little holes in it. Somebody (Buddy) had attacked the roll of paper. I unrolled about six feet of it before I got to paper with no teeth marks in it.


So, in defeat, I let them all play with the paper for a while. They had fun.


And, don't you wish your office chair had one of these neck rests on it?

Home From Work

Yesterday about 10:30 I was sitting in the front room working on some stuff and see Keith coming up the walk home from work. What the heck? Did he get fired? Laid off? Quit in frustration?

No, he just got sent home early because there was nothing for him to do, and his boss also said he could take today off, too. Hopefully he has enough vacation time saved up so that we aren't short on his next paycheck.

So, since he had the rest of the day off yesterday he drove up into the mountains to the cement plant that is hiring to fill out an application. Our neighbor just started work there and the pay and benefits are good. But. It took an hour for him to drive up there and an hour back. And it started to snow while he was up there. It's considered in the little town of Lebec, but to actually get to the place you have to go past Gorman and take the always empty freeway that heads toward Palmdale and then get off that freeway onto a gravely muddy road that goes to the plant. After considering the long long drive and how much gas it would cost to get up there 5 days a week, and the long long drive, he thinks that if they call he'll have to pass this one by. Our neighbor doesn't mind it yet because he was used to driving long hours to get to all of the temp jobs that he's been doing while looking for full time. We kind of have a feeling that he will get a little burned out after 6 months or so of driving so far, but he's about 20 years younger than Keith and doesn't mind driving an hour, working 10 or 12, then driving another hour to get back home. Yet.

So, it's always weird when he is home during the week and it kind of throws me off of what little schedule I have. I did get the vacuuming done, laundry done, trip to Target for cat litter done, trip to the grocery store for potatoes and eggs for the mashed potatoes and deviled eggs we are bringing for Christmas done, and we are thinking about going to see a movie with our free passes (thanks, Jennifer) that we have been hanging onto for just the right movie to see.

But, right now he is taking one of the many stray cats to the pound. We've seen this poor extremely skinny little black cat around looking for food and were able to trap it this morning. I think there is something wrong with the cat because it just doesn't look halfway healthy like the other strays, way too skinny and almost skeletal. We feel bad taking cats to the pound, but we have so many strays running around, strays that will just keep reproducing and adding to the problem. Next up is Stumpy, but he is a little smarter about going near the trap. I think he's got some infection going on in what's left of his tail, it's even more gross looking these days.

So, that's what's up with us on Keith's unexpected extra day off. He goes back in tomorrow but thinks he will get off early again, then gets a long weekend.

Too Much

I was walking by walmart this morning on the way to the post office (yay, one more order to go out!) and saw all kinds of activity in the side and back of the store, employees pulling pallets piled high with freight from the back of the store to the garden area. Lots and lots of pallets piled high. Moving them from one storage area to another, all of them covered with tarps because it sprinkled last night and all this stuff sits outside the store because there is no more space in the back room. So if you buy some of this stuff that's been sitting outside, chances are it may be a little damp.

Now, you'd think that with only a few shopping days left, all of this merchandise would already be out on the floor, ready for purchase. But not when it comes to walmart. They overbuy, overstock, and in general fill up their store with tons of cheap junk in hopes of making more money, more money. After all, don't consumers like to consume and in order to get them to consume more, you'd better make sure that your store overflows with more and more things to buy, right?

I don't know, but after the experience of working at walmart and seeing how much stuff comes into and goes out of that store each day, it kind of boggles the mind at what a 'buy buy buy' society we've come to be. Spend, spend, spend, and if you don't have the cash to buy the latest and greatest and biggest, we've got an easy payment plan for you at only 29% interest!

Too much stuff.

Cat Stuff

Thinking about buying a cozy new cat bed for your favorite feline? Like this one with the invisible cat enjoying it?


Well, don't bother, save your money and just give them an empty shoe box.


Or just let them use each other for a pillow.


And speaking of cats, old Stumpy is still wandering the neighborhood with his gross stump of a tail. And our little kitten friends are still living under the car across the street. They wait for me each morning and evening and run over to get their handout. The bravest one, who we call Bandit because of the funny raccoon face that it has, actually lets me pet him or her, not sure which it is yet. He or she will roll on its back and let me rub its belly, batting at me with tiny paws. The other two will eat the free food, but don't even think about touching me. Mama cat watches from across the street, ever vigilant.

In other news, this month on Etsy was actually not bad, the best so far this year which really isn't saying that much because it has been a way less than successful year. I was able to buy this week's groceries with Etsy earnings, so that's something right there. I am curious to see how things will go in the new year. I'm also hoping that the job market will open up some around here, you know things are bad when even McDonald's isn't hiring.

We are not doing much for the holidays so I'm not busy getting ready, no big meal planned, no gift giving, no tree (not that we can have one with so many cats in the house anyway), no cookie baking (not that we need to be eating cookies anyway), we're just kind of ignoring most of the holiday frenzy. We will be going down south on Saturday for our traditional family get together, which we missed last year because we were afraid we'd get stuck in the snow on the interstate going over the mountains. Our car would probably have broken down on the trip anyway since it was only a few days after Christmas that the timing belt broke for the second time. Keith's brother called yesterday to see if we wanted to come for Christmas dinner, but we really don't want to drive down two days in a row, plus can't really afford that much in gas, so we politely declined. They said we could spend the night at their house, but I just really don't like to spend the night at other people's houses. I don't sleep that well in my own bed, let alone on someone's hideaway or futon or floor. If it was a really really big house, where you had your own private wing or something, that would be different, but their house is tiny like ours, and I know they don't have a guest room, so couch it would be. Plus we have cats to feed and mashed potatoes and deviled eggs that I'll be fixing on Christmas to bring down on Saturday. Excuses, excuses.
Believe me, I was trying to think of some real fast.

Random Thoughts

So, the phone rings this morning and I answer it thinking that it's Keith calling on his break because usually he's the only person that calls here, and it's not Keith but someone asking for him by his full name, so I'm all excited thinking that it's the HR person from the cement plant so I put on my most professional voice and say 'he's at work, can I take a message' but no, it's a guy from Mitsubishi because Keith looked at cars there LAST JANUARY and did we need any help with anything. Like maybe we are still looking for a car A YEAR LATER? I told him, no we bought a car LAST JANUARY, and are not in the market for another one. Especially since we can barely, just barely afford the car that we bought LAST JANUARY. You, know, the one where we missed out on all the cash for clunkers and the practically giving cars away for free thing.

Buddy is being a little pest today, meowing around the house, biting my leg, rubbing against every surface possible, getting under foot, and did I mention biting my leg? I finally got out the catnip thinking that would keep him occupied for a few minutes and of course every other cat in the house smelled the catnip so they had a little catnip frenzy there, and Buddy has to go around to everyone else's catnip because the grass is always greener don't you know.

Let's talk about the weather now, because that's always scintillating conversation, isn't it? It's gray, it's chilly, and it's fog season. No rain here, but we get the killer fog that always ends up causing multi car pileups on the interstate. Where 30 cars or so end up all smashed together.
There was a rather gruesome crash on the 99 the other day. A truck full of live turkeys, like 1200 of them, overturned and caught on fire. The poor turkeys were stuck in their cages on fire, roasting alive. Ugh. The news showed pictures of the caltrans workers shoveling up roasted turkeys off the road. Ugh. It kind of spoils the idea of having roasted turkey for Christmas dinner, seeing that, and I'm sure the caltrans guys will be having ham instead after that experience.

Not much else going on, I need to walk over to the post office but I am procrastinating because, like I said, it's a little chilly outside. I will force myself to go, though, because if I don't get there before 3, the mail will be picked up and I'll have to drive over to the real post office which is about 7 miles away through heavy traffic. That sounds even worse than walking through heavy traffic right now.

Silly Kitty

I was working at the computer the other afternoon and I hear some strange crinkly noises coming from behind me. I turn around to see Mimi squishing herself into a little basket with an empty plastic bag in it that was on the filing cabinet. Squish squish crinkle crinkle. What is it with cats and any kind of receptacle?

Chick-Fil-A

Yesterday after Keith got home we drove over to the super walmart looking for something that they were out of at our local walmart, which we didn't find but did get Keith the new work boots that he's been needing for oh, six months or so. His company will pay for half the cost of new boots, but you've got to buy them first or order them from the way more expensive online boot places and have the portion that we pay deducted from his paycheck. Ordering boots online doesn't sound like a great idea to me because you've really got to try on the boots before you buy them to make sure that you can stand to wear them all day while working. The boots online are about $150, the boots at walmart about $50.

Anyway, we found his boots but not the other thing we were looking for (a little Christmas surprise for the neices and they sometimes read this blog, so I can't say exactly what it is, but we did find something similar, but they'll just have to wait for Christmas to see what it is) and by then it was getting late and we were getting hungry so we decided to stop at the new Chick-Fil-A here in town.

What is a Chick-Fil-A you may ask? If you are southern, you already know what a Chick-Fil-A is, it's basically a fast food chicken sandwich restaurant. All chicken, all the time.

We had gone online to check out the menu when they first opened, and it's basically fried chicken on hamburger buns, or grilled chicken on hamburger buns, or chicken nuggets, and they even have a chicken salad sandwich, and you get waffle fries with your sandwich.

I was pleasantly surprised with how nice the place was inside, kind of like an upscale fast food restaurant, nice booths, nice decor, and the bathroom was clean, smelled good, and had that more expensive restaurant look to it, with nice tiling on the walls and floors and they were smart enough to put the paper towels right by the sink along with a hole in the counter right under the paper towel dispenser to drop your towel into after drying your hands. No dripping water all over the floor searching for the paper towels which are usually on the opposite wall from the sink.

They had nice music softly playing, like classical music, and we were talking about how people seem to keep their voices lower when that type of music is playing and the atmosphere just seems calmer than most frantic fast food places. They also fill your drinks for you, and then take your tray to your table for you when the food is ready.

They do have a person dressed up in a cow suit wandering around, that was kind of odd and I'm like what's up with the cow, shouldn't it be a chicken? But then, that would be kind of icky because we'd be sitting there eating his brethren while this big chicken was walking around. I finally went 'duh', the cow is because we are supposed to eat chicken instead of the cow's brethren. Duh. Sometimes I'm a little slow.

Anyway, the cow was a little annoying, coming up to stand mutely by our table and then high-fiving us while we have food stuffed in our mouths.

And what about the food? It was okay, nothing that I'd go out of my way to get again, the restaurant isn't exactly in our neigborhood, but if we were on that side of town again and hungry I'd probably stop by. The price for the two of us to eat was like $12.00.

The oddest thing about this restaurant, or maybe not odd for you southerners, is that it is closed on Sundays. Apparently it is family owned and was started by Southern Baptists or some other southern Christian people, and they feel that Sundays are for family, and of course, church going, and if you are going to eat chicken on Sunday, it should be at the big church supper or at the Sunday dinner at Grandma's or whatever. I'm impressed that a company would forego an entire days worth of profits to give their employees Sundays off.

For the rest of you Californians who want to give Chick-Fil-A (love the name, it kind of rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?) a try, there are some in the LA area, and one in Oxnard on Rose Ave, and if you go onto their website, you can get directions and also read all about the cows.

Kitchen Floors and Stumpy

I've talked before about the never ending home improvement projects around our house, in particular the kitchen floor saga. To recap, two years ago (yes, TWO YEARS) Keith ripped up the ugly tract house linoleum floor along with repositioning the center island and building shelves and lots of other stuff, planning on installing a new floor. We bought wood at Home Depot for the floor, getting what we thought was a pretty good price, at around $350 for the whole floor. The boxes of wood have been sitting in the garage ever since, and in the meantime Keith has looked at tiling because he'd really like a tile floor in the kitchen instead of the wood floor THAT IS ALREADY BOUGHT AND PAID FOR.

Well, last week we were in Home Depot looking at nails or screws or something, I really don't remember because I try to block trips to Home Depot from my mind because they are agonizingly BORING. Keith can't just go in and buy a box of nails, he's got to inspect all the nails, compare prices, think about it for a while, and then an hour or two later maybe actually buy that box of nails. Or go home and think about them some more.

So, while he was in the hardware aisle (agony, sheer agony!) I wandered over to the flooring department just for something to do. And what do I find but some really nice ceramic tiling for 99c a 16" square, something like $15.00 a box, about $150 for an entire floor. I don't know much about ceramic tiling, but that price sounded really cheap to me so I had Keith come over and look at the tiles and he really liked the look and the price, too. So, this weekend he finally finished scraping what was left of the linoleum on the kitchen floor (again, TWO YEARS LATER!) and then went back to Home Depot to look at the tile again. I stayed home, needless to say. I told him that if he bought the tile he absolutely HAD TO PUT IT ON THE FLOOR NOW!

So, about two hours later he comes home tile-less. He did his research while standing in the aisle at Home Depot and realized that putting in a tile floor is a huge pain in the ass and unless we could afford to have a professional come and install the floor, which would probably cost about ten times the price of the tile, it was just too much work. We will stick with the original plan of putting the wood flooring down. Since it's already bought and paid for and all. But he's going to wait until spring so that he can open up the doors and windows because the glue will stink up the house so much. So, maybe, just maybe, we will have a floor sometime next year. But, I'm certainly not going to hold my breath.


This is our lovely floor that I've been staring at FOR TWO YEARS NOW. I won't know what to do with myself if we ever actually get that wood flooring in.

And, now for the Stumpy story.

We've got lots of stray cats in the neighborhood, like our little friend Mister that we feed and the three kittens that live under the car across the street that we also feed by default. They have learned to run across the street when Mister is eating and come over and eat along with him. He doesn't seem to mind much and is willing to share. Then there is this huge Siamese that we've seen around off and on.

Pretty kitty, but he lost his tail somehow and now has a gross bloody stump where his tail used to be. Be prepared, this next picture is gross, and I only got the back side of him as he was running off to hide from me.


It's disgusting! We're thinking that he either got grabbed by a big dog or got his tail caught somewhere and it got pulled off. Nasty. Gross. Ick.

Our cats are sitting in the window laughing at him.

Storm Watch!!

Well, not really, but in these parts the TV news people always get really excited and are on 'storm watch' whenever there is a cloud in the sky and the slight chance of rain.

We were told that it would rain all weekend.

They lied.

It rained for about 10 minutes yesterday and must have rained sometime during the night because things were damp outside this morning, but other than that, no storming around here.


I did get a surprise when I opened the front door yesterday and saw this.


Flooding in the gutters! Watch out! You might get swept away!

Hunt and Peck

Keith was trying to update his resume last night. He is worried that there will be layoffs at his job soon since there is no work lined up and they are not making any money. The company that he works for is really large and is buying up other little companies all over the country, but his particular branch seems like it might be in trouble. So, resume time it is. Our neighbor just got a job at a cement plant up in the mountains about an hours drive away and says they are looking to hire a few more people, so Keith wants to get his resume in now just in case. They were thinking they could carpool to work if he does go for the job, but still, an hours drive away is a long long way. The cement plant pays pretty well, it's a union job and starts at like 20 an hour with higher pay in 90 days and higher pay if you work in certain areas of the plant. So, we'll see what happens there.

Anyway, he was trying to update the resume that a neighbor did for him years ago and put on a disc. Now, neither one of us knows how to use the particular program that the resume is on so Keith worked and worked trying to figure out how to change the info that's in all these little boxes in the program. He did pretty well, finally giving up in frustration about an hour later, yelling 'I hate computers!'. We'll try it again after he calms down. He doesn't know how to type so it's really really slow going when he is typing. Really slow.

We got Kelly's bank draft sent off to her the other day. It cost 53.00 to send a flat Fedex envelope to Cyprus. What was really strange is that it cost less to send it the quickest way, about 4 days, than to send it the next quickest, 7 days, by about 20.00. Go figure. Hopefully the money will keep them going for a while. I was researching Cyprus, since I don't know anything about the country, and wasn't even sure exactly where it is. It's near Turkey by the way. They speak Greek and Turkish there, so I'm not real sure how she expects to get a job since she doesn't speak the language, but whatever. I'm sure we won't hear much from her until the next crisis. Poor Keith has gotten to where he cringes when the phone rings because it's probably one of the kids with yet another problem he needs to solve for them.

We finally, finally, got some rain last night and it's supposed to rain all weekend. I know it is not a big deal for most people when it rains, but when you live in what is basically a desert rain is indeed exciting. We got over 1/2" in about 6 hours yesterday, the longest rain and the most rain at one time that I can remember getting since we've lived here. The gutters were running wild!
The cats were a little perplexed, you can't hear the rain that well in the house because it's so well insulated, but you could hear it clinking on the vent in the bathroom and they were kind of looking up at the ceiling, like what the heck is that noise? It's scary!

The Best Cat Toy Evah!

We've spent lots of money on cat toys the past few years. Cat toys that are played with for a few minutes and then promptly ignored forever after. The only cat toy worth the time and money spent on procurement are the little fuzzy mice that come in a convenient five pack and sometimes you can also find them in the mega pack of like a dozen. Our cats, especially Buddy, love these.


They are just the right size to fit into a cat's mouth, they fling well, and they also have a very satisfying clunk when whacked against a wall. Which they usually like to do when we are trying to sleep. Clunk clunk clunk.

Buddy has always delighted in knocking these mice around the kitchen because they slide so well on the still bare concrete floor (whole other ongoing story, there) and they will fit under the appliances, like the stove, washer, and dryer, never to be seen again until we get the fly swatter out and scoop out all the stray bits and pieces from underneath. The last time Keith cleaned out under the stove he found, besides numerous mice, a glue stick, a wad of paper, a bead, a cap to a bottle, and other assorted junk.

Buddy has now been thwarted in his quest to hide everything under the stove, though. Keith cut a piece of wood to fit underneath and keep most of the toys from being swatted under there. Yesterday I found four mice all lined up in front of the stove instead of underneath it, so I think it is working. I'm sure Buddy is totally perplexed as to why his mice won't go under the stove any more. Ha ha.

Even the big kids like to play with these mice, but they only do it if we are not watching. They seem to get embarrassed when they are caught playing, like they are just too mature to swat a mouse around. Harri and Bear will stop what they are doing and kind of slink away if they see us watching them play, it's really weird. So, when they play with a mouse I kindly avert my eyes.

Random Thoughts

I wish Starbucks was closer to the post office that I walk to because I really want a Starbucks. But I am too lazy to walk to the post office and then all the way over to the Starbucks. Which is a long way across many many parking lots. And I am too lazy. But at least I will save $4.00 because of my laziness.

Why do the cats always want to be petted when I am sitting on the toilet? Because I look like I am not busy and am a captive audience?

We have decided that we prefer summer in Bakersfield instead of winter. At least we will prefer it until next summer rolls around and it's once again a few hundred degrees out.

I am procrastinating because I need to walk over to the post office but it's cold outside.

We actually had some of the promised rain last night. At least I guess it rained, the streets were wet this morning. Must be time for STORM WATCH!

I went to the Goodwill bookstore this weekend and scored! I got two bags of books for $8.25, one bag full of vintage kids books and a dictionary for cutting up for pendants, and one bag full of some novels to read. I had bought two paperbacks at walmart because I was desperate for something to read but both books SUCKED BIG TIME so I wasted $12.00 on them. Next time I am tempted to buy a book from walmart I will remember to wait until I can get to the Goodwill where if I buy a book that SUCKS BIG TIME at least I only wasted 85c on it.

We have been watching the first season of The Big Bang Theory, it was on sale at Target for less than the cost of the sucky books from walmart, and we have really enjoyed watching it. We have followed the current season and this show really grows on you. I don't usually laugh out loud at TV shows, but this one has me snickering. Mostly because of Sheldon. And the Indian guy. And it's fun to watch a TV show with no commercials. Now I'll have to wait for season two to go on sale so I can catch up.

And that is all. I'm not having that many random thoughts today.

Fun with Co-Workers and Bosses

We went to the annual holiday dinner party thing that Keith's work puts on each December. The only reason that most people go is because they also get their year end safety bonus checks at the party. It's basically a long meeting in a fancier setting than usual and with fancier food and real silverware. Boring, but there is money involved. And free dinner. And if you don't go you get questioned by the boss as to why you didn't show up.

The Riverlakes Country Club was the setting. They have a nice dining room and nice golf course grounds with a lake and fountains and fancy houses around the golf course. Rich people's houses. Nobody who works at Keith's company could ever afford to live there. Not even the bosses I don't think.

The food was good, a choice of chicken or tri-tip with green beans, rice, salad, and garlic bread. Then slices of cake or cheesecake for dessert.

Then a long awards ceremony where everyone got a framed photo montage of all the safety stuff they did all year and the giving of the checks. Not very big checks, but a check. They used to give out $250 in cash each year until Uncle Sam got wind of it, so now they have to kind of round up your award so that after taxes you still get around $250. We only got $175 because we have the most taxes taken out possible plus an extra $25 taken out of each paycheck in the hopes that we will come out even this year instead of having to come up with $$$'s to send to the IRS like we usually have to do.

Then after all the awards were given and photos taken of each awardee and all the bosses all hand shaking and smiling it was time for the gift exchange. Everyone buys a gift and they all get put on the table and then your name is drawn to go up and choose a gift. They also do the white elephant thing where you can grab someone elses gift if you want. Last year a lot of booze gifts were given and lots of gift grabbing went on, but the boss doesn't like booze so he said absolutely no booze this year. Damn.

There were some nice gifts going around, but for the most part I think there was a lot of re-gifting going on, people getting rid of crap that they got last year for Christmas and didn't want. Keith got a pair of slippers that are supposed to massage your feet, which isn't a bad concept, but doesn't really work that well. A battery goes in each heel of the slipper and you turn them on and listen to them buzz. They remind me of the old magic finger beds that they had in all the motels. Lucy thinks they are pretty fun, though, so at least we can use them for cat toys.


At the end of the evening they did a raffle thing, giving away flashlights and tool boxes, then the very last item was a Savage company watch, which Keith actually won! I was shocked, we never win good stuff.

No!

I don't want to sign your @#$%&*! petition!

Every day I walk by walmart and foods co on my way to the little post office nearby. Every day I'm accosted by the same people in my face about signing their petitions. Twice a day. On the way to and on the way from the post office.

No, I don't want to sign your petition!

Not only are there petition signer-uppers in front of the stores but also people asking for money for a generic 'homeless women and children' charity. No, I don't want to give money to you today and please stop asking me. I might want to give you some money but not when you are so in my face about it.

The only people in front of stores that I will give money to this time (or any other time) of the year are the bell ringers for the Salvation Army. They are always polite, don't ask for money, stay in their spot, ring their bell, and always say thank you if you drop a few coins into their bucket.

Today I actually crossed into the parking lot area just to avoid a particularly avid petition signer person. She still yelled after me to come sign her petition.

Couch Potatoes

See what I mean about cats on the couch?


It's turning into a very expensive cat bed.


Notice how Pepper has her own corner of the couch? That's because she is so cranky and snarly that nobody else wants to get close to her. She even snarls at me when I want to sit down so I spray her with the squirt bottle and then she jumps off and snarls away.


Look at that disdainful expression on her face.

Last night I absolutely could not get to sleep even though I was tired. I went to bed at 11 then tossed and turned until 2 am. I was cold. So at 2 am I got up and turned the heater on, got the house warmed up, and then back to bed. Where I was able to finally fall asleep.
We don't usually leave the heater on at night because it blows right onto the bed and the room gets too stuffy and hot, but tonight I'm going to warm things up in there before I go to bed.

Dry Skin and Snuggies and Seen on TV

I never used to have this problem until I moved to Bakersfield and got old. Gross, yucky, cracked, dried up heels on my feet. Even the WORD heel is kind of gross. I guess they got this bad because I go barefoot around the house for months and months because it's too hot to have anything on your feet in the summers here. So, my feet are just awful. Disgusting.

So, I saw this thing on TV, the pedi egg and thought I'd try that out on my poor dried up nasty feet. It, like most other as seen on TV products, really doesn't do all that much. It's kind of like using a cheese grater on your feet. I guess if your feet weren't too bad to begin with it might do the trick, though. I've tried pumice stones and lotions and wearing socks around the house, but my feet are still one big calloused mess. The only thing that really seems to help much is Bag Balm, you know, the stuff that comes in the green tin and was actually invented to use on cows udders? It's made with lanolin so it's kind of greasy going on, but it really does work on really dry skin like mine. The only problem is that for some reason Pepper loves the smell (she also loves the smell of seasoning salt) and will come and rub against and bite my feet. The other cats don't get all excited over the smell, just Pepper, and she can smell it from the living room and will come into the bedroom looking for my feet. So, what I do is wipe my bag balmed covered hands on a washcloth and let her roll around and rub and bite on that instead of my feet.

It's been getting cold here at night (and in the daytime, too) and we were talking about getting a blanket for the couch to cozy up in and naturally our talk turned to snuggies, because what better way to cozy up on a couch than in a snuggie, right? Just because it will make you look like a dork is no reason to not have the convenience of being able to walk around the house covered in a blanket with your arms and hands free so you can eat your snack or change the channel with ease, right? But, no, Keith will not let me buy a snuggie. Even though I saw leopard and zebra print snuggies at walmart! No, we have to be all boring and settle for a regular blanket.

We do have a few couch throws that we've collected over the years, but somehow they have been taken over by the cats. The past few weeks the whole couch has been taken over by the cats. I think they've been getting a little chilly, too, and the couch is all warm and cozy, so now we have to look before seating ourselves so we don't squash anyone.

And, speaking of snuggling.