Weekend Update....

If this was Sunday night, this would be my weekend update. If I did weekendly updates. But per normal I'm a large, fluffy white wabbit without a wocket pawch. Would that make me a puka? hmmm.

Friday night I set my head to losing weight...which normally means I will eat low fat, stay away from the cookies and Australian licorice and gain weight. So after reading up I bought myself some Alli. We'll see how that goes. I also began my food journal... again, because for me that is a crucial tool of conscienous dieting.

I also set my head to getting my new cutting garden done.


See not far along after months of ... stop and go work.

The weather forecast was for high winds, Friday afternoon my friend Merlin the Windwand Man clocked 48mph winds. Saturday was forecasted to be as or more gusty*, so I wanted to get an early start.

For the first time in months, I put off my chores, put off my grocery shopping and was in the nursery by 10am buying the remainder of the blue stone for my path. I also picked up more lupin, echinacea, rudbeckia, cupid's darts, asteamaria, and speedwell (definately need more speedwell.) And oh mi gosh what do I find in the lilly garden?

The first lilly of the season...

By two o'clock, a four foot square of solid clay broken up I was ready for a break. Sitting on the deck enjoying some lemonade we kept hearing this raucous chatter and squawking.

Poor mama Flicker was trying to keep up with the demanding mouths of her young. Through the binos we could tell there were at least two. The old "squirrel tree"** is about one hundred feet or so from our deck (crap I don't know how far it is, it's farther than six inches.) My camera doesn't zoom in well enough.

We finished off the afternoon setting the foundation for our new solar fountain's base.

Sunday morning, wind was up early, we mixed the cement, fixed the solar pump's wire through some protective conduit, did our first pour only to find we'd threaded the wire through wrong. Can we say "Cluckster suck?"

Seriously we should be Laurel and Hardy. We worked out the wire, rethread it through and filled the base with the remainder of the cement.

Just to make sure it was still working we hooked it up.

It worked for a whole ten minutes. I don't know if the pollen clogged it up or what. But after blowing on it, knocking on the basin I couldn't get it to work.

So I picked up my toys and walked away. At least it is in, the cutting garden is closer to completion. Too kewl.

Sith,
Cele

* Saturday the high wind was 58mph, Sunday 63mph, and Monday before noon it already had a high winds of 38mph.

**I named the snag the squirrel tree years before it became a snag. For years you could watch baby squirrels venture out from their nest in the tree at the start of summer.

Talk Thursday: Attitude Adjustment

Probably, everyone needs an attitude adjustment, but unless your mom and dad sat you down and pointed it out, most of us don’t notice just what adjustments need made. To me life is a continual progression of changes, and errrr, attitude adjustments.

Apparently I use to be a negative personality. My second husband pointed this out to me over two decades ago. I was pretty stunned. What, me negative? Worse I wasn’t just negative, but I was quick to make that negativity known with rapidly offered comments that I didn’t like a something and someone, or other some things.

Yes, even I had noted this distasteful quirk in my demeanor. Not that I needed to comment, not that anyone wanted to know… It was just, me. Not a very pleasant part either.

So I changed. Yes, there are people I don’t care for, there are things I don’t enjoy, but unless the conversation is deeper and more one on one, I keep my thoughts to myself. Most of the time my goal is to leave people smiling, loved, and happy.

On the other hand I am a bit of a homebody and yes, a loner so I don’t offend too many people with the lingering remnants of me past.

So I open my arms to you. Welcome you into my life, my home, and my heart. Oh and for Fii – WARNING - the weather is for sunshine next week – that means wind somewhere between 10 and 2… a lot of wind. And if it gets too hot in the valley (three days in a row) look for fog. Have a great vacation. I look forward to seeing you Wednesday.

Sith,
Cele

Well Steve, now that you mention it...

I had never watched ice carving. The finished product has long enchanted me. And then Sunday morning as we waited for the auction to begin on the final day of the 2009 Oregon Divisional Chainsaw Sculping Championships they announced they were having an ice carving demonstrations.

First he explained the three day long process of freezing the 300 pound block of ice. Most ice has cloudy deposits locked inside. This he explained was because the water was still as it froze.

Instead of allowing the water to remain seditary in the process, the water is continually slow circulated leaving a clear block of ice. Except for one small pocket of cloud which they remove and fill will water for the final freeze

I tried to use my video function, okay I used my video function but it was a fuzzy video and I won't make you suffer.

I'll just let you see his steps. But it was really cool watching the chainsaw throw ice all over in a spray as he divided the wings. His sweeping arcs as he carved the neck. Amazing.

And then he poured water all over it and was done.

Sith,

Cele

Wood Chips

Oh dear bloggees, I am falling behind. I still owe you a Talk Thursday, but today…yes, the Monday after it’s time for the Oregon Chainsaw Sculpting Championships in Reedsport. An annual Father’s Day weekend event that Ducky and I never miss.

Officially one hundred and fifty years old on February 14th, Oregon celebrates her 150th birthday all year long. This year’s extreme art extravaganza focused on that sesquicentennial milestone.

The Oregon Chainsaw Sculpting Championships features around 20 chainsaw artist who travel the world competing in the Echo Cup Challenge. Chainsaw artist from not only across the States, but also Australia, England, Japan, Germany, and Sweden vie for the first leg’s points.

This year there were fewer moose, a lot of bears, and a few nautical themed pieces, like Oregon’s Cape Blanco (pronounced Blank-0) Lighthouse.

The majority of main event pieces in the competition drew from a series of Oregon’s historical points

A few whimsical pieces

And I think this is my favorite main event piece.

Each morning the carvers are challenged to a quick carve at 10:30. For forty five minutes they carve what ever the wood blank has told their artist eye is captured in side.

Each evening at 5:30 the pieces are auctioned off. It’s a win, win, win situation for the chainsaw artist, the buyers, and the Reedsport / Winchester Bay Chamber of Commerce.
Father’s Day Weekend, next year, be there. Ducky and I will be.

Sith,
Cele

Random Things with photos

And oh look, it’s eleven. I decided to start doing Photo Friday to give me another inspiration for blogging each week. Well wouldn’t you know, they seem to always have topics I can't figure out. That is unless I shoot cars, car parts, and more cars. But because of Photo Friday it made me start carrying around my camera with me. Which lead to several pictures taken while I was out making sales calls last week in old town Florence.

I was able to spend a good portion of last Sunday working on my new cutting garden. It is slow going, the new solar fountain hasn’t been put into place, awaiting Ducky to make a pad to secure it against the wind and … thieves.

In the mean time Ducky’s Lily garden totally rocks. No lilies are blooming yet, that should happen in July and August, but the lupin are most beautimous. Pictures of those tomorrow. Today you get last weekend’s pictures of two of my three chain trees.

And my mother's wild iris to enjoy

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: I’m Late

My mother always taught me it is socially appropriate to arrive five minutes late. Which is fine for say pregnancy, a class reunion, baby showers, private parties, but not appropriate for say, Thursday night dinner. Mom. Just saying.

My mom is always on time for Thursday night dinner with the girls, except when she has to pick up my grandmother. Which is every other Thursday night (the night we meet) because at the age of almost ninety, my grandmother has no concept of time and has usually had too rousing a day at her pinochle club. Hey, it happens.

Headline: Pride goes before the fall.

Finding a parking space on an early fall evening in Old Town isn’t an easy feat. My grand mother suffers from advanced osteoporosis and, while she can walk, doesn’t walk far well. So imagine my delight to arrive for our 6pm reservation at the Waterfront Depoe (the best restaurant in Old Town Florence, heck in Florence) and find not one, but two parking spaces being vacated. I stood in one parking space and watched the second being filled, hoping, watching, fingers crossed that they’d soon show so they could park within a reasonable walking distance for my grandmother. But then a car (not considering my fat ass any sort of an opponent) forced me back on to the sidewalk and the space was gone.

Ten minutes later, as I worry our reservation was gone, a third space opened and yet still no mom and grandmother. In the long run (20 minutes after our reservation) they show up, I’d just watched the fourth and fifth spots open and instantaneously fill up. Being slightly peeved I comment, with probably abruptness, that had they been CLOSE to being on time they’d have been able to park near the restaurant, instead of mom having to drop grandma off at the curb and then driving a block and a half away for a parking spot. My standing in front of the community’s most popular restaurant reminiscent of a rejected, stood up wallflower on date night is of no consequence. They’re probably thinking I’d been use to it.

Flash forward two weeks. It’s fifteen minutes before I leave for our Thursday night girls dinner out and I’m at work. The phone rings – a big client calls. Calls again, vacillating whether I know how to spend her dollars. And then calls again. A fourth call and $1900 order later I arrive at the restaurant, ten minutes late, to hear my grandmother tell me, if being on time is so important to me, I should try being on time. Note she was sitting nice and cozy in the booth of a local, not too busy – there is always parking in the front –Mexican restaurant, discussing the weather with my mother.

I tell ya, being righteously peeved comes back and bites me in the considerably large butt every single time.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: The Psychology of Running...

...Demented if you ask me, which you didn’t but there you have it all the same.

Sprint. I ask, "Where is the snake?"

Jog. Have you seen what that does to the gravitational pull of the breast? No, thanks.

Run. By choice? You’re insane.

Marathon. Masochism.

I don’t run, by now you’ve probably figured that out. There was a time once when wanted to run, like the wind, on the beach, fleet of foot. I envied those whom I saw flying across the hard pack sand. I tried it once and ran the mile from the North Jetty to Driftwood Shores and then walked back. It was exhilarating the endorphins must have kicked in fairly fast, because I don’t even remember being winded.

The next morning I wasn’t too sore so I tried to do it again. Had this been in the day of cellphones I might have tried calling 911 it was that terrifying and debilitating. I couldn’t breathe, my leg muscles contorted in agonizing spasms, and I may even have lost consciousness once or twice and that was in the parking lot. On the beach I couldn’t seem to find a rhythm, two left feet plodded - thunk thunk th-thump in the hard pack, or maybe that was my heart pounding in my chest. Whatever. The sea lions heartily laughed in the surf. Sand dabs move faster.

The time has long since past where I’ve acknowledged that once I’m finished with a hobby (sport) – it is for life. I thrived on back packing and hiking all through Girl Scouts. I was the first in our family to water ski. Rollerskating? Remind me to tell you my Roller Derby story sometime. Surfing was a budding passion in high school until we moved to Oregon. I once dreamt of being a dancer and took classes for years. I pumped iron like a religious maniac, six days a week, two hours a day, for several years. I survived parasailing for a whole marriage. Running lasted a whole day and fifty yards. Where’s the psychology in that?

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday – Saying Goodbye

I’ve been trying to remember how long Talk Thursday has been around, I’m fairly certain it’s about two years. Sacred Sister enlisted JA and I to play along with her and well that is the beginning. Then Sacred (my Valley Sista Surfer Chickie) moved on. Sad, I miss her.
Just as she was saying Adieu, Angie and then Sid were signing on. Sid recruited Eddie, Lyn Blossum, and Jenniphur and then JA was gone. Sadly we’ve not been able to recruit more people who want to share and address a topic each week. Please leave me a message if you’re interested… because I’m fairly certain we’re interested in you.

Now Angie is leaving us for her life. I hate when I come second to real life. Bummer dude. She’ll be missed, but the truth is she’s been saying good-bye for a while now. A single mom with a burgeoning life – that frankly, calls. I understand. Good luck and bonne vie, bonne sante, bons souhaits. No, I don’t speak French.

Strangely, yesterday afternoon I over heard a conversation being held loudly via cellphone that somewhat is connected to the topic; it might ring eerily familiar to events in your own past, it does in mine. To paraphrase what I heard

“I was so over her and going to break up, but she broke up with me first. I was devastated. I mean she dumped me, I was depressed for a good three weeks.”

Now what is wrong with this “Saying Goodbye” senario? It isn’t about the splitting up, it isn’t about being “so over” it is about being dumped.

Oh, I know the dumped end of breaking up. I think I broke up with boyfriends a whole three times, maybe four, could Keith get back to me on that? Scott was pretty pissed by my 14 year old daughter beat his ass at chess that I don’t think he noticed the break up amid his temper tantrum. When I realized Steve was in actuality a stalker, who – yes folks, got that close to me, called me damaged goods for months. Being in radio isn’t without its draw backs…who needs a possessive stalker anyway? And then there was Greg. Damn that is the one that hurt, but I couldn’t take his drug problem around my daughter. As for all the rest they dumped me.

Dumping is nothing new to me, boy friends, girl friends, husbands – been there, done that – got the diploma. For all the dumping I am stronger, clearer minded, and self-dependent. Saying Good-bye isn’t an end, it is a new beginning, for you, for me, for those who move to new paths. For those moving into this path, welcome; to those moving on good luck.

After all life is about saying “Hello,” and “Good-bye.”

Sith,
Cele

Letters From Home – Memorial Day 2009

While the majority of Americans enjoy a three-day weekend, I work – radio stops for no one, accept for the random “Act of God – Mother Nature.” It’s not a three day vacation most of our nation’s (or any nation’s) armed servicemen.

Those who know me even the smallest amount, know I am pretty much against war. It doesn’t mean I don’t know that at times war is a necessary evil – WWII is the perfect example. But while we were helping one people we were doing harm to some of our own through prejudice and fear.

"The only thing we have to fear is fear it'self - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified, terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance." FDR upon his first inauguration.

I am not the only Quaker who thinks this way, not the only American, not the only human. But I do honor our veterans, those who have joined our armed forces for whatever belief, reason, or cause. I honor you. I honor your memory. I honor the comforts and loves you left behind to do what you thought what right. I honor you.

My father served. My brothers have both served; the youngest will retire after twenty plus years of service to the Air Force – all over the world, in two years. My father joined to escape a nowhere life of poverty and violence. My younger brother, well I’m not sure why he joined. And my youngest brother found a world wide traveling life that has taken him to the highest ranks of the enlisted. For whatever reason they joined, had war called I’m sure they would have done what they signed up to do. I know Buddy has. I honor him.

This morning I play songs that honor the sacrifices of our soldiers, citizen soldiers, those who give what I haven’t.

Letters From Home – John Michael Montgomery

I hold it up and show my buddies,

Like we ain’t scared and our boots ain’t muddy, and they all laugh,

Like there’s something funny bout’ the way I talk,

When I say: "Mama sends her best y’all"

I fold it up an' put it in my shirt,

Pick up my gun an' get back to work

An' it keeps me driving me on,

Waiting on letters from home.
written by: David Lee and Tony Lane

Florence has erected a Veteran’s Memorial Wall in the new Veteran’s Memorial Park on the Siuslaw River. It is simple, even stark, and somehow peaceful. My mom, Ducky and I have purchased three bricks to honor my father and bros.

This weekend I took Burp down where he made etchings of each brick Furby brick and one that was purchased in the memory of his other great grandfather, who until that moment I’d not known had served in India. Hmmm. We took an extra moment to remember my father and discuss a story of his from his stint in Panama. Now Burp wants to go see a Panther.

Having lived during the Viet Nam era I remember the revulsion that greeted our veterans when they returned answering a call from our country’s leaders. I am heart broke at the hatred they found upon their return home. I mourn the loss of all that they were. I revile the old men who sat cozy in their air-conditioned offices, thousands of miles away from harm, making decisions that kept then safe while sending tens of thousands of men and women to their deaths for oil and greed.

“We have met the enemy, and he is us.” Pogo

I sincerely hope we have learned lessons by revisiting our own personal history. I hope that despite what our personal beliefs we honor our veterans.

To those who serve,
Thank you,

Cele

Photo Friday - Shiny

I know later I'm going to have this "Ah, Ha!" moment about what picture I should have posted. For now I am stumped and the lighting sucks. And it's sunny. pfft!

The color of this car can only be described as "Vesuvius". It was all pretty and shiny, and I really, really wanted to take it home. I think Ducky would have noticed had I put it in my pocket.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday: What It Is…

It is everything, it is nothing, it is the past, and it is the future. Most of all it is whatever I want it to be, what ever I make it.

It is the want to be thinner, as someone once said, “There is a skinny person inside of me wanting to get out.” Yes, I am fat. It was not by choice, but maybe it was by karma – and those pesky little jeans. All those times, in my thinner years, I noticed someone’s wide butt, cellulite legs, a paunch and thought, “I won’t ever let myself become that big.” Darn, darn, darn now I own them all. I did not say when I grow up I want to be lumpy and sad, but here I am. Maybe what it is …is young, thin arrogance. Maybe it is ignorance, I definitely know it is seemingly impossible to be rid of.

It is the wish to be kinder. I have an opinion, despite Madonna’s mantra that everyone is entitled to her opinion, not everyone needs to know mine. Those self-abusive enough will stop by my blog, read three paragraphs and then run in the opposite direction without leaving a comment. I don’t need to slash and burn with my words, but I do need to give my compassion, love, and patience to those who are bruised and in need; to become a better person through the osmosis of the best of my spiritual family. What it is should be easy.

It is a wish to share the best of me with those I love and who love me. To accept and love them for their faults and who they are, not who I want them to become. To remember that often what I dislike in others are the very things that can be found within myself. What it is …is the conscious decision to rebuff and countermand hatred and disparity.

What it is, is what I make it. It is what ever you make it. I will not harbor anger over what I alone cannot change, but I will patiently work to change injustices, wrongs, and prejudices one person at a time. It takes one person, one step, one smile to open the door to the next. What it is, is something I can do with the thought in mind that I too can change the wrongs and misjudgments inside of me.

Sith,
Cele

Rhododendron Festival – 2009 Pacific Wonderland

I live in heaven, I love where I live, I live where I love. Florence is a small town to most, sometimes too big to me, but it offers all I want. And my husband is willing to commute eighty miles each way to work. Thank goodness.

On the third full weekend each May Florence celebrates our native Macrophyllium – Rhododendrons.

And some not so native, but beautiful all the same.


We do this with an annual festival that is three days of sun (oh please lord), classic cars, and a parade.


My job is to run all over town on Saturday of the festival, interview people, and remind everyone of the sights they don’t want to miss, bring them the sounds of what they are missing, and remind them to cross traffic on Highway 126 at signaled intersections. In Florence there are only four.

This year I had a two hour break mid day so we started by visiting the car show.
Over four hundred entered this year’s event at Three Rivers Casino. What a cluster !&#! of a traffic jam… but the cars were divine.














Ducky and I have a Rhody tradition. After I get off work Saturday afternoon… usually around 6:30, we go to old town Florence and watch KCST’s Classic Car Cruise.



After we sit and watch the first two or three circuits the cars make, Ducky and I begin walking.

Now, true Florence is not large, Old Town is even smaller, but it makes for a nice walk, we stop and chat with old friends, watch the cars and make our way to the west end of Bay street for a Mocha. Then we walk all the way to the east end of Bay Street (wow, three blocks) and have an elephant ear from the carnival and find a bench on the boardwalk and enjoy the evening.

For the week or so before Rhody Festival I write a parade script. Spend the majority of Sunday of Rhody Weekend broadcasting said script in all its hometown Rhody glory.





BTW, it’s really hard to take pictures while you’re broadcasting the parade.

And then I go home and crash.

I’m at the crashing part.

Sith,
Cele
PS just 363 days until Rhododendron Festival is here (May 22nd – 24th 2010.)

Photo Friday - 2009 Self Portrait

I have been thinking about participating in Photo Friday for a while. Steve always post some kewl pictures. Then I found out my new friend Maya at A Day In The Life does Photo Friday (psst her artistry scares me.) But Tewkes' (honey you may run, but the name sticks) always does Two Things Photo (her eye boggles my mind, I wish I had a smigeon of her talent) and she does 100 Strangers which is a lot more than photography. They all have the big, kewl cameras, I've got just my little Fugi thingie, and my Pentax (if we waited for me to develop film it we'd be past the second coming,) but I want to play.

I'm still contemplating Two Things.

My first Friday Photo: 2009 Self Portrait


At first I wasn't happy, and then I thought about the textures behind the glass, the obfusticated quality it lent the "portrait." Kewl, what lies underneath.

Cele

Talk Thursday: I Never Thought I’d Be….

This incredibly late… on just about everything. The older I get it seems the less adaptable I have become. Eight months ago… or so my work schedule changed by only 90 minutes, but I now seem to have little time for blogging. Throw in a community festival or three, Home and Garden Show, new garden, Radio Auction, and damn where did the time go? I should be a large white rabbit with a pocket watch and spinning head, ushering little girls out of the garden who want to dine on my mushrooms and new blooms. But again darn I was late and the rabbit’s gone.

I use to read my growing length of favorite blogs, comment, because you know me, I have to put my four bits worth in. Come home peruse my favs again and yeah more comments. Now I barely get my make up on in the morning, purse loaded with lunch and my bed made before I am almost late for work. I might get to check my blogs again before Ducky gets home from work, but usually it’s not until after dinner. Argh.

Age is not really a problem for me, accept the days, months, years, crap decades are flying by. I look forward to what awaits me on other plans of existence, but I am enjoying all the things here. Not that I get to choose the time I move on, but I’d like long enough minutes, hours, days, weeks, and yes, years to savor the moments and people. Savor like a wonderful wine or chocolate that you hold on your tongue to take in every little flavor bud and relish it with zeal.

This was specifically brought home this morning and last night. I had wonderful visitors, two delightful people I would love to tuck in my pocket and keep forever. But our visit was so fleeting, (insert heavy hearted sigh) sadly I have not one little picture of their visit. So Janet and Maya will have to come back soon. I need pictures. Delightful, wonderous, cheerful, funny people I want to savor. And damn, time was short and fleeting. I hope they come back soon.

Sith, (Scottish Gaelic word for peace) (Irish Gaelic for Banshee that fits too I hear)
Cele

PS if you think this isn't late.... again it's last week's topic. (shakes head in shame and disgust)

Talk Thursday – We All Make Mistakes

Boy, am I late. I don’t seem to have any energy. Is that the problem with my TT post? No, that would just be an excuse. Thing is I have no energy. What I do have aplenty is fodder for last week’s topic.

We do all make mistakes; one of my mantras is “A mistake is worth making if you learn from it” which goes right into my other two tenets of life 1) Where we’ve been is who we are and 2) It’s all about the journey. Circular logic.

When I was young, I thought I was always right when the reality, as I see it now, is I was right about thirty percent of the time, with the ratio going up daily dependant on the lessons learned and retained. I learn through my mistakes- made many, many times over. On the other hand my daughter Psam seemingly learns from my mistakes; Misery learns just like me-fall on my butt time and again until the lesson is pounded in. I’ve always try to remember the mistakes I made and realize that my girls are where I have been, let them learn. Thing is they are learning much better than I ever did.

I have always given with my whole heart. My father would point out this friend or that who he felt was “using me.” I never truly understood, I still don’t, and I’m thinking I never will. Am I naïve? Could be. I want to think that people are as honest and open with me as I am with them. And yet, even I know that is somewhat fool hearted. I want to see the best in people, the honest endeavors, the pure emotions and revelations because that is what I want others to see in me. When I find myself motivated by something less than pure I fall in my own esteem. Honesty has become a personal benchmark in my life and personal growth.

I have also come to value friends more than maybe I had in the past. I’ve always made friends quickly, but they weren’t always fast friends. Now I know quality in my friends is far more important than quantity. My pages at FaceBook and MySpace are becoming a reflection of my importance in the word and meaning of friend. I idon’t just say yes to a “Make me your friend request. Especially on FaceBook when you see my friend listed, they are my friend. Maybe in a different degree from one to the next, but they are people I have met, people I have spent time with, people I value with my heart. Some are new friends, some are old and endearing friends. But one mistake I have made that I can’

A River of Time has created a chasm between now and then with many early and mid-life friends. I grow, or they grow more, we grow apart because the land in between was not tended with care and respect, value and devotion. Sad, that is the mistake I regret.

My friends, I value you.

Sith
Cele

A through Z --- Get to Know Me…

Yesterday my friend Bob aka Jonas’ ball boy, tagged me on FaceBook. I am known to love me a MeMe and his answers were delightful. Now I have known Bob for decades, infact he’s the first person I met at school when I moved to Florence. In the first class (advanced composition w/ Mr. Danielson) I sat down in an open desk and the boy in front turned around and looked me directly in the eyes and said, “Marsha?”

To which I responded, “John,”

He has much been my friend ever since… I’m not sure when I learned his real name. Now we work together. He’s a pretty solid person. Now my answers to his MeMe.

A through Z--- get to know me!

A - Age: 53
B - Bed Size: My share or the actual size?
C - Chore you hate: Mopping
D - Dog's name: Arlo Peppertree the retalatory pisser (he was once known as Tank)
E - Essential start your day item: Hot shower followed by pots of coffee
F - Favorite color: Green and Vesuvius (Landrover orange / cinnomon)
G - Gold or Silver: Silver (but I mix)
H - Height: Shrinking (it changes almost daily) at one time I was 5’11”, I’m much shorter now
I - Instruments you play(ed): I always wanted to learn piano, my mom could afford guitar (waste of money, time, and finger nails.) Now I’d like to learn Hammer Dulcimer and Auto harp
J - Job title: Operations Manager / Program Director / Sales Rep / She who comes when called
K - Kid(s): Yes, one and two halves
L - Living arrangements: We agree to legally live together and mutually like and love each other beyond the intended extent of the law
M - Mom's name: Mom, duh. She actually changed her name and like me goes by her middle name. Vicki
N - Nicknames: Cele and Tanglefoot (oh unless you’re my Mom, and then it is Beast, Grace) Debi
O - Overnight hospital stay other than birth: Is that my birth or hers? None.
P - Pet Peeve: This is Bob’s answer, but it is so excellent, I’m going to expound on it. “People that don't take the time to learn how their public services are funded and organized. Police officials that make it damn near impossible to reach them in a timely manner. Public servants that don't... serve”…. expounded part… Public officials that don’t think alerting the immediate local media about “Incidents of Public Concern” so we can disseminate important information for public consumption… like not being able to get home because someone killed his neighbor and the only accessible road (for most people) will be closed until the wee hours of the morning. Or how about the electrical systems on the draw bridge burned up and we can’t lower the draw bridge so you can’t go home in a timely manner.” just sayin’
Q - Quote from a movie: "Snakes. Why’d it have to be snakes?" (Harrison Ford, Indiana Jones – Radiers of The Lost Arc”
R - Right or left handed: Right.
S - Siblings: A Pinecone, a Butch, and a Buddy
T - Time you wake up: When my eyes open and I smell the coffee
U- Underwear: Under where?
V - Vegetable you dislike: Okra
W - Ways you run late: People run? By choice?
X - X-rays you've had: Teeth, Dex
Y - Yummy food you make: Well my fat ass says I make lots of yummy things. Ducky is partial to my tacos, chicken enchiladas, and chicken fried steak / mash / gravy
Z - Zoo favorite: hmmmm, the visitors.

I’m not tagging anyone but if you want to play tell let me know so I can learn more about you.

Sith,
Cele

Talk Thursday – Found What I Never Lost

There are moments when it is easier to go with the flow, treading to keep a float until a moment to breathe, a space of peace, or a glimmer of hope floats by. Darn, don’t you usually find, before that happens life takes over and you are flapping those feet faster and faster, while your arms swish your hands back and forth trying to keep up? Swarmed, swamped, swooned. The struggle to get a firm footing once again, beyond the class four rapids that have become life, seemingly lasts an eon. Oh, heck why minimize…not an, but eons.

Last weekend I got to garden. In fear of becoming that old biddy with the pruning shears down the street, may I say, “Oh, joy.” Yes, I had work to be done - my grandma’s meds to dole out, my mother’s lawn to mow, and a book that I was in am in the midst of editing, but to get back to me all it took to become grounded and serene was a bunch of sod, some four packs, and a hand trowel. Okay, there was a shovel, a hand fork, and my new garden bench, but who’s keeping track? Ducky worked to pull out (hack up into bits and pieces and throw away…with a wicked gleam in his eyes and joyous glee) a dying Rhody and I dug up weeds, dead headed some tulips, smeared chicken manure (hmmm maybe that’s where the pink eyes came from?) around, and planted a lilies and cosmos.

It was glorious and suddenly I was back to me, dreaming my garden, burrowing in the soil, and smiling all the while. Well until that chicken manure flew into my eyes. I think I never really lost sight of what I wanted, what I needed, and what I have, but maybe I miss placed it buried under all the harried minutia of work and winter.

Spring may bring warm weather, outdoor recreation for others, for me it brings me peace, grounding, and immense joy… and like Eden, yes there's a devil and a snake in my garden, but one I married, the other eats the bugs.

Sith,
Cele

My First Gardening Weekend of 2009

Spring is here, oh la la. It felt so good to get out and work in our yard, my mom’s yard, and put my new bench into my soon to be cutting garden.

We started the morning out cutting my mom’s lawn. This is something we have done every warm weather weekend since my father passed. It is enjoyable, my mother’s property is like a huge park, with a broad lawn,
little sitting nooks,
and different trees and gardens.
Right now it needs pruned something fierce.

Then we came home and worked on our own yard. As I’ve said many times before, I’m putting in a cutting garden… it started with the lilies Harley (one of my dj’s) gave me for Easter (what a sweet heart) and some new lily bulbs I bought dirt cheap at Bimart. They are right behind my new bench.

Knowing better I left my tulips from last year in ground… dumb, only a few are giving me blooms. I am destined to buy new tulip bulbs every year, it seems only the bright yellows and reds have any staying power year after year. And yet my snapdragons are hale and hearty, a perennial that has always acted like an annual for me. My echinecea are setting up new shoots (woo kewl) the lilies appear happy sending new shoots all over my garden.

Next weekend I will begin laying out my new cutting garden, beginning with a blue stone path. In the lily garden the blue stone path is greened with corisca mint, I am thinking about using a different creeper this time. Four cosmos sit to the east of the new bench in memory of Ducky’s dad who always had a ton to cosmos. My chain tree is waiting at the nursery for planting next week.

Oh, I feel the earth and green running through my veins and I’m estatic. So show me your plants, I want to see your green.
Sith
Cele

My Birdfeeder

Okay, just one of my birdfeeders, because the other should be called a bear feeder. A few weeks ago Fii had some great pictures of birds at her feeder. I remarked that it was just like the last one my dad and mom gave me (extremely amateur birdwatching was something we shared.)

The next morning I hear this knock, knock, or heavy peck, peck at my bird feeder and I am thinking, damn jays. But it wasn’t, a woodpecker was at my feeder. Wow, a woodpeck – I wasn’t certain but I thought it might have been a Hairy, which are fairly common around my woods. Before I can get my camera he is gone, no picture.

As I’m sitting the next morning at my computer and I hear knock, knock, knock (definitely knocking.) I get excited, grab my camera, and run to snap a picture… and it isn’t a woodpecker, it isn’t a stellar jay, no it’s a flicker (cousin to the woodpecker and very, very common in my neighborhood.) My damn batteries are dead. Deader than a door nail. I take them out of my camera, put them in the charger, and then into my camera that night.

No more large birds on my finch feeder. Bummer dude.

Until today, when Ducky getting ready to rip sod out for my new cutting gardens excitedly tells me there’s a woodpecker at my birdfeeder. And a very indulgent one at that. She (I’m thinking) allowed me to walk fairly near to take her pictures.


Now I’m thinking she’s a Three Toed Woodpecker because of the laddering on her back and spots on her wings.

Sith,
Cele

Happy Easter!!!!

Everybody Sing....Here Comes Peter Cotton Tail
Hopping down the candy trail,
Hippity Hoppity, Easter's on its way!!!

Peeps that come in pink and blue, purple ones are just too new.
Hippity hoppity Easter's on its way.
Yellow peeps are right for me, you can have the pink you see,
Hippity hoppity EASTER'S On it's WAYYYYYYYYY!!!!!

Easter's here, and I think you stink,
To request your Peeps yellow or pink,
If you want your Peeps, then take it or leave it!
Cuz’ I got purple, YES! Believe it!

Hop to it!!
Support Purple Peeps!!
PURPLE PEEPS ARE PEOPLE TOO!!
From the Committee To Promote Endangered Easter Purple Peeps - CPEEPPS