EXTREME BULLS AND QUILTS

 

It's interesting how a huge conglomerate on the internet called GOOGLE can't seem to get their act together.  Maybe it's all those DEI hires.  I'm sorry, but if you want the best employees with the best work ethic and the highest level of knowledge, you need to hire people based on their experience ... not their gender or the fact that they passed high school.  I would even suggest you CAN'T send them feedback unless they have every spec of information on you for their purpose (whatever that is) ... thus the copy of your drivers license or passport.  That way they can find you if they want to.  What a world we live in today.

I contemplated that as I headed out for an early morning run.  Jog actually.  I never was after the blue ribbon.  Not that I came in last, but sometimes I was pretty close to it when I hit 65.  Seems running was for the younger crowd.  I didn't start the long runs until I was 50 years old.  I just ran those marathons to see if I could do it.  

The sun wasn't even up yet on this morning, and it was COOL .... oh so cool!!!

The forecast finally says we are out of the 90's except for that last one.  Good grief .... it's the 15th of September already and it's still HOT.  Time flies by so fast I think it's going to be Christmas the day after tomorrow.  At least it feels like it.

I purposely scheduled NOTHING on this day.  Mostly because I rest up a bit for today's Bingo adventure.  My only to-do was come up with new prices for the Bingo Kitchen.  As you can see, inflation has NOT hit the Elks Lodge Bingo parlor.  You can get a fabulous hamburger AND fries for $5.50.  A lot of folks just come in for the food and leave after they eat.  Bingo is the only event we have that is open to the public.

Here's the problem ... the more you charge for food, the less they buy in for Bingo.  We would rather they donate money to our kids charities, so I can only raise the prices 50 cents, even if we should be charging at least a dollar more on every item.

With that done, I switched on and off from sewing to rodeo.  This one from Photography by Gini shows the bull fighters playing with the big boys.  There's no one on the planet in better shape than these guys who keep the bulls off the riders once they hit the ground.  

And hit the ground they did.  This kid is probably ten feet off the ground.  Extreme bulls are the meanest worst of the worst and the most fun to watch.  Most of the riders are 5'6" and weigh maybe 140 pounds.  The smaller you are, the easier it is to stay on.  It's crazy to watch!!

When commercials hit, I would rush to the sewing room to stitch up maybe three pieces before running back to watch the bulls.  There's more today and tomorrow, so I'll be glued to the TV.

Later on, I stitched up the rest of the squares with only a few rip outs.  I hate it when that happens!!  At any rate, all 64 little square are done.  Now I get to stitch those 64 into 16 big squares and start on the borders.  That means you will see this picture probably six more times!!

There will be no running this morning.  I'm saving up all my energy so I can wear the armor until 9:30 tonight.  Hopefully the cooler weather has soothed the hot heads and we won't have any problems.  I did not mention that the week before, one lady swiped someone else's bonanza tickets and tried to turn them back in for the money.  We don't do that.  

She got in quite the conflagration with the King, but he held his tongue.  That is until she got to the back door because he asked her to leave .... and she spewed out a bunch of bad words.  The King had enough and said a few things himself before banning her forever from the building.  You just never know who you are going to be dealing with at Bingo.  Luckily it wasn't ME doing the dealing!!

By the way, thanks to a reader, I have found if you click on the last blog posted from your Reading List and click on the name of the blog, it will bring up their latest blog for you to read.  An extra step for sure, but at least you can now see and reply to bloggers.

LIZARD PATROL

 LIZARD COUTER:  22

It was a lovely Sunday, but WAY too hot.  Thus the "before" sunrise picture on this morning.  I hit the road early for my two mile run.  It was a slow one.  Some days you feel like you can run forever ... and some days you feel like you are going to die.  This was the latter.

I got back to find Miss Kitters laying on my velvet antique stool ... where she is NOT allowed.  Yes, that's my camera on the floor on the right that she knocked off.  I'm hoping it still works.  

As I reached for the camera, I spotted something moving in the living room.  BIG SIGH ... BIG!!  There was a poor little lizard trying to escape under my roll of quilt batting.  I moved it ... he moved further under, until finally he had no place to go.  It looks like I'm squeezing him to death, but I barely had a hold of him.  Out the front door he went.  Yes that makes 22 lizards ... no telling how many I haven't found yet.  I have since been on Lizard Patrol.

It was a little cool outside and the wind was blowing, so I sat out in the sun reading for a time.  Watch Kitty took her position in the shade.  She bothers me constantly, so I was lucky she stayed in one spot this time.

I did household chores for awhile ... like all of 5 minutes ... before hitting the freezer for lunch.  My tip of the day .... don't freeze that beef stew.  The only thing that's good when thawed is the beef.  Note to self ... next time make a much SMALLER recipe and eat it in three days.

I spent the afternoon working on the quilt again, only to discover it was wrong.  It has two variations of the same color fabric, both noted as F in the pattern.  I knew not which one to use first.  It looked okay when I was done with the one block, so I continued.

Of course it turned out to be the wrong fabric.  I was soured on taking it apart since I had already done that to 16 pieces.  It's just going to be wrong.  Maybe you will be able to tell when it's finished, maybe not.  I almost have another four big squares complete.

When things go wrong, I eat ice cream.  This time however, the freezer was bare.  No problem ... I'll just make some.  This was another chunky peanut butter delight ... to which I added three chopped up peanut butter cookies.  

The best part by far, is I get to lick the beaters.  Don't lick the bowl because your tongue will freeze to it.  Instead, I used a metal spoon to get out every single teeny tiny bite.  It made my day. 

The rest of the evening I lounged in front of the TV watching rodeo.  It's the end of the year and all the guys are trying their hardest to break into the top 15 money earners.  Only those 15 in each event, get to go to the National Finals in Las Vegas.  That's where the BIG money comes in.  

It's been a real fight since Shad Mayfield, calf roping sensation, not only had his hip replacement done, but  a knee at the same time.  After missing almost 6 months, he's back good as new and winning up a storm.  If only we healed up that fast.  

On another note, I tried and tried to give Feedback to blogger.  To tell them about not getting blogs I signed up for.  I'm sure they already know, but hey .... why not inundate them with messages.  Here's the problem.  Apparently you can only report something if you are an adult.  My birthdate on that site is 1965.  I'm pretty sure that makes me 61 years old, yes?  NO ... it says I must have parental permission in order to report a problem.  If I want to report, I have to prove to Google by way of a picture of my drivers license, a picture of my passport or a picture of my credit card.  ARE YOU KIDDING ME?  There's no way in HEQQ that is going to happen.  Nothing like stalking people and setting up a database with all the info required to invade your privacy and bank accounts.  There should be a law against that!

Still missing my Cooper so very much.  I can't seem to get into any kind of routine.

QUILTING AGAIN

It appears Blogger STILL has not gotten their act together.  My "reading list" has not updated in days.  So if you are posting blogs and I'm not commenting, that's why.  I think maybe I have to copy and paste the blog address into my search engine to have them visible.  There used to be a link where people could add their email address and it would automatically be sent to them, but I have not been able to find that yet.  Hopefully they get THIS one fixed soon.   

It's HOT.  The mornings are not even worth going outside for.  That's why I took this picture at 4:00 in the afternoon.  Yes, it actually WAS cooler with the breeze.  That's a tiny mirror image (sort of) to the right.  It's the neighbors flag behind the trees.

I was out the door as early as possible.  I turned the sprinklers off on this day so the weed stuff would work.  Sure enough ... this was bright green, now turned brown.  Possibly from the heat, but I'm hoping it stays that way.  Though I love vegetables, I am just not a gardening girl, especially when it comes to flower beds.

Next up I went through the videos of foxy.  Oh look ... he found another delicious egg hanging out on the driveway.  These guys look pretty young ... maybe the kids of the kids from a couple of years ago.  I really never expected them to come back after the house next door was built.

Once he ate his prize, he came back for more and got a little too close to the camera.  I'm surprised he didn't knock it off the bucket.  Isn't he or she a beauty?

Watch this one to the end.  Just look at that gorgeous tail!!!  Kitters got in on the action too.  She was outside at the same time in the very early morning, hiding under the van watching them.  Those darn interlopers!!

The best news of the day ... I got another haul of fresh tomatoes from a neighbor.  What could be better for lunch than homemade onion sourdough with cheese and tomatoes.  I was in HEAVEN!  To be honest, I really didn't think this bread would set well with my stomach, but amazingly, I have no problems eating it at all.  Does that mean it's all the additives they put in bread to keep it somewhat fresh? 

At long last, only because there was nothing on TV, I put one quilt block together.  I hate it when the directions are so vague that you really can't figure out what you are supposed to sew where.  I stitched 16 pieces together, only to find I had done it wrong.  It's just so fun to rip apart every stitch!!!  

On the other hand, it's truly amazing what happens when you see a bunch of these with no rhyme or reason .............

Turn into this.  Not sewn together yet, but you get the idea.  I really wasn't thrilled with the colors at first, but I like them in the pattern.  This came from a jelly roll of 20 different fabric designs.  I'll work on it here and there.

Dinner was ...... well ...... dinner.  I had some frozen shrimp.  Truly, they don't even TASTE like shrimp, so I loaded it up with garlic and butter, a kind of shrimp scampi.  The tomatoes were MUCH better!!!

And so ended a very hot day.  Kitters and I both laid low in the semi cool house, just waiting for fall to arrive.

My tip of the day.  If you remember to plug your phone charger in to the outlet, it will actually CHARGE your phone.  

I TAKE THAT BACK!!

LIZARD COUNTER:  21 

Good morning once again from sunny California.  Our temperatures went through the roof yesterday, and I'm praying that was the end of it.  It hit 109 in the next town over, where unfortunately, I spent most of the day.  When I got up in the morning, it was 80 degrees.  YIKES!!

Now that Blogger is putting up photos once again, this was the first thing that greeted me the last morning.  Sadly, this one didn't make it.  This is why the lizard counter is now up to 21.  

In a flash it was time to head to DMV.  I take back every single good thing I said about this place.  Yes, the reservation system seems to be working better than sitting for two hours, even when you HAVE an appointment.  

They called my number and I handed the gal the paperwork.  I didn't received my stickers.  "That's because you renewed it in person".  No ... No I didn't.  "YES YOU DID".  I'm sorry, but NO I DID NOT.  I paid it online.  "If you have this paper, that means you paid it in person".  I was almost screaming at this point ... I PAID IT ONLINE.  THAT'S WHAT THEY SENT ME AFTER I PAID IT.  Oh she said.  Well if you get a late smog AFTER paying it, you have to come in to the office to get the sticker.

I thought your plan was to get people OUT of the office.  You have moved absolutely everything to on-line to do just that.  And now you tell me you are making it so we have to come IN TO THE OFFICE?

Yessiree ... that is exactly what they have done.  They get the smog via electronic means.  Why don't you just mail out the tags????

So that pretty much ruined my day.  To make it a little better, here is a LIVE lizard who is only about 1-1/4" long and was hiding in my garage.  Hopefully he survives.

From there I rushed off to the quilt store.  These two bags had four quilts in them.  Hopefully they get done by the first of October.  No idea what the price will be because they charge by the inch of quilting.  That's why a queen sized quilt will cost you $225 dollars depending on the pattern you choose.

On the way back, I stopped in for fuel.  Did I miss something?  Last week diesel was $6.79 a gallon.  Now Chevron has it up to $8.59 a gallon?  YIKES!!

I went across the street to my favorite station and STILL paid $7.46 for diesel in the van.  At least I didn't need that much because the tank was already half full.

What about the trustee meeting?  It was the usual fighting and bickering with a complete lack of interest in the money problems.  That's what happens when you have people who have never run a business, nor keep track of their household expenses.  It's frustrating to say the least.  I had a headache in the first two minutes.  Unfortunately for me, it drives me crazy, keeping me awake half the night.  

I thought I might be  headed out to HORROR RANCH.  Oh yes, it's soon to be October and Halloween time.  Come to find out, the last gal I taught to use the infernal machine, owns that place.  Who knew??  She asked if I wanted to help out.  You know me, I'm all about Halloween scary things.  

But on second thought, I backed out when I saw their hours ... working until midnight four days a week.  Midnight and I don't get along any more!!

This boy ... he didn't care one bit about Halloween ........... just throw the ball Mom!!!

NEVER FORGET

 

NEVER FORGET

We are ever so lucky we were not in New York on this day 25 years ago.  I feel ever so blessed that I get to look out my window and see this beautiful sunrise on this morning.

It seems that many folks, even in New York, have completely forgotten what happened and who caused it.

Just imagine if one of these people was you and your only choice was to burn alive or jump to your death.

2977 people died on that day and we should NOT FORGET them, or those that rushed to try and save their lives, who also lost their own.

We can never forget this happened or it will happen again and again.  I'm praying for the families of those who were lost on this day, and those who sacrificed their lives to save others.

THEY'RE BACK!!!!

LIZARD COUNTER:  21 

True to blogger form, it will not let me upload pictures, only videos.  They better get their act together before everyone flees the sinking ship!!!  

To start the day, I had a lovely picture of a dead lizard to show you.  Yes, that makes 21!!  This one was a breakfast special.  Oh the fun!!

The morning went by quickly as I raced off to Hilmar to have the last four veteran quilts quilted.  Of course I had to wash the dirt off the van windshield first so I could see.  True to my luck, I forgot to fully close the driver window.  There went 30 minutes drying up the interior.

On the way home I got diesel.  I'll wait to show you that picture until Blogger straightens up and flys right.

Backing into the back yard, I noticed I had forgotten to grab the camera from the night before.  I put a nice egg out for whoever might be interested.  At first it was Kitters.  I knew the egg I put out was missing, and I thought it might have been her that took it.

NOPE!  THEY'RE BACK!!  The foxy twins are back in town checking out the grocery store.  Sorry kids, the store is closed except for one lonely egg.  It didn't take long for him to snag it.

Not long after, I discovered not one, but TWO were visiting.  I'm glad to see them back, but that's probably why the wild kitties have been few and far between.  I did notice last year however that the cats and the fox were in the same locale and not the least bit interested in each other.  At first sight, you know what I thought this was, right??

Oh so sadly, I spent the next FOUR HOURS ... a record ... at the accounting job, trying to teach the new gal how to pay bills online.  It takes forever when you first start because you have to input every name, address and account number, not to mention being extra careful to choose one of MANY accounts to take the money from.  

By the time we got done, I was exhausted.  I always am after a late night of Bingo!!

Today will be no better as I have that DMV appointment, followed up with a Trustee Meeting.  Let the good times roll!  That's a joke.  

Here's hoping Blogger gets back on track.  I'm tired of messing with them!!  I'm not sure if it's the new updates they are not compatible with or if they got hacked.  

Anyhoo .... see you tomorrow, God willing and the creek don't rise!!

BINGO IS HERE ONCE AGAIN

 

OH WHAT A BEAUTIFUL MORNING .... oh what a beautiful DAY!!  Isn't there a song like that?  Well it really was a gorgeous cool morning, but I don't know what happened to the day.  We were cruising at 100 most of the afternoon and it's supposed to be up to 102 today.  Spring didn't last long at all!!

Watch Kitty kept watch the entire time.  Her face has finally filled out quite a bit from her starving stage.  She is soft as can be and spoiled rotten.  That little pink spot just makes you want to BOOP her nose.

So we got up .... milled around a bit and had coffee before chowing down on 1/4 of that egg and potato burrito I got.  I added a little ketchup for moisture.  Boy do I love this food.  Way back when I worked at the County, I used to buy three of them every morning for my "crew".  It was that or McDonalds egg McMuffin.  That's when things were CHEAP!!

After my wonderful cup of Joe, I surprised myself by actually going into the sewing room and cutting up the fabric for a ME quilt.  I even sewed one block which you can barely see on the directions.  That's a lot of piles of small pieces, so we shall see how it goes.

Time flies when you're having fun.  Lunch came around and I heated up the two chicken tacos I got.  This time I pulled all the lettuce off the top first.  They look nice, yeah?  By the time they were done, they fell to pieces.  I should have eaten just one they were so full of yummy chicken.  Now I was stuffed and miserable and heading to BINGO!!

I left Kitters sleeping in her spot on the bed.  She sheds a LOT and I am not a fan. Amazingly, she only sleeps on that pillow case.  And so I was off to help clean up after a big event so the kids could set up for bingo.

I should have taken a picture.  What a mess people leave when they don't have to clean it up themselves.  AND the amount of food wasted is epic.  What happened to the starving children of the world?  Many plates had huge untouched pieces of chicken that went in the trash.  They had to PAY for those meals, so I don't get it.  

Anyway, I scraped roughly 75 plates and kept 150 pieces of silverware from going in the trash.  At least I didn't have to do the dishes ... we have kids for that.

Here's the GOOD NEWS!  Upon the threat of the kitchen manager and myself quitting completely, we have now hired a REAL cook for the Bingo kitchen.  No, we are not going to make near as much money, but we don't have to worry about a volunteer not turning the gas off and the building exploding.  It was not a popular choice, but we won out.  

I talked to the kid and explained what we expected and how HE was the boss, not the bossy gal who he would be working with.  He's new to that experience, but he did great.  Sadly, he is on the list to become one of our next Sheriff Deputies, so we will have to find someone else before long.  

With having to pay wages in mind, I checked out the board, thinking of raising the prices a bit. We don't like to charge much so more people come to play Bingo.  I had it all figured out until the "boss" said he thought we should leave them alone.  Hey ... we are PAYING for a cook now!!!  That one is still up in the air.

Let the BINGO flaming arrows and pitchforks fly!!!  I worked the first two hours while waiting for my replacement.  She hasn't been here in awhile due to a misunderstanding ... she thought because I was training another spare person that she wasn't needed any more, even though I explained everything.  I just needed most of the night off to keep track in the kitchen.  

It all went well with the caller telling everyone OVER AND OVER to yell really loud.  If he doesn't hear you say bingo, you don't get the money.  Sure enough, one lady said bingo so quietly that NO ONE heard.  Someone next to her screamed it out, scaring everyone half to death.  Thanks to them, she got the money.  

It always amazes me who wins.  Those that pick through every single packet looking for their WINNING numbers .... they never seem to win.  I just grabbed 5 cards off the top for one girl and she won not once, but FOUR times.  You just never know!!!

Everything went well for the rest of the night.  I stayed in the kitchen, kept the girl at bay so the cook could COOK.  He did an EXCELLENT job ... double fried the fries (YUM) and cooked the burgers to perfection.  Not only that, but he cleaned the grill and the entire front before going down a checklist and turning everything off.  BOY HOWDY ... this kid is GOOD!!  The cherry on top was that we didn't have 11 cooked hotdogs left over to be thrown away at the end of the night.  

With all of our stress having flown out the window, the Kitchen Manager and I were ecstatic!!  I don't care if we don't make ANY money.  It's worth every penny!!

And so ended a long night of bingo.  My temp cashier was short $10.00.  Not surprising really.  A bank teller she is not!!  Do I care?  NOPE ... not one bit.  

Today I'm off to drop the quilts at the shop for quilting, followed by accounting work.  I hope you have a GREAT day!!!

GOOD DEED UNDONE

 It was a beautiful cool morning.  There's nothing better than opening the door wide, taking in a really deep breathe and then smelling DAIRY.  Those of you who know, know it well.  Frances knows!!  It all depends on how the wind blows around here.  There's garlic, onions, chicken manure on the orchards (the absolute worst), neighbors burning their trash ..... and DAIRY.  

It didn't seem to bother this guy at all, which is the reason I got scratched.  He likes to hang out in the mornings and is the cause of lots of yowling.

Kitters then runs out the back door, MAD, as you can tell by her ears ... and surveys her territory.  

I got caught looking.  HOW DARE I!!  I snuck back in and closed the door.

It was baking time.  I preheated the oven to 500 degrees.  That is the problem.  I never know for sure exactly what temperature my oven is.  I've used three different gauges inside, and none of them seem to be correct.  

Having been dumped out onto parchment paper, it was ready for slicing, making the beautiful structure on top which never seems to appear on MY loaves.

It's dropped in the now scalding hot cast iron pot, covered and baked for 20 minutes.  Though it should bake at 450, I set the temperature for 445.  Lower, right?  WRONG!!  Not low enough.

Once the lid is removed, it is baked for another 20 minutes.  I've no idea what happened, but it is almost burned.  Oh it's edible ... the inside is fabulous, but the outside crust, not so much.  You can't tell here, but it is pretty black on one side.

I sliced it up, forgot to take pictures, and stuck it in the freezer.  The crumb is not as good as the previous loaf, though this time I followed the directions exactly.  C'est la vie.

I sat with Kitters for awhile, before coming up with a great idea to celebrate the holiday.  I would look on Facebook and find a few cottage bakeries selling their goods out of their house.  I would go to said house or houses and buy them out, just to surprise someone on Labor Day.

Off I went with a list, down our newly paved road.  For the last two weeks, I've had to navigate through the back side of my neighborhood just to get to a street not blocked by asphalt trucks.  Oooooohh it's so smooth to drive on!!!!

I got completely lost because my phone all of a sudden went ballistic and not only locked up, but all the icons changed to just words.  What the heck?  There must have been something there that scrambled everything.  That has never happened before.  It was just too weird.  

Three blocks over, my phone finally came back on and directed me to this address.  I had even stopped to pick up a bundle of cash.  This would be my good deed of the day.  I was so excited to see what they had for sale and to see their surprise.

NOTHING ... they had nothing.  They were closed up tight.  Gosh ... it's a holiday ... why aren't you taking advantage of that!!

I drove away, trying to think of somewhere else to go.  Ahhhhh the Mix Bakery!!  The best cupcakes in town.  CLOSED ... THEY WERE CLOSED.  Someone was telling me it was not the day for a good deed.

Totally frustrated, I stopped in at the smallest taco shop in town ... a tiny little drive through that I barely squeaked through with my truck.  I haven't ordered here in ages and really didn't know what to ask for.

So here we have 5 taquitos smothered in guacamole and lettuce, with rice and beans ... one HUGE egg and potato burrito and two crispy tacos.  Yikes ... it came to $40.00.  I gave them a HUGE tip and told him it was for being open on a day everyone else was closed.  It's a small family owned place where the entire family works.  They deserve it.  Too bad bakery .... too bad.

I ate three of the taquitos, but nothing else.  Boy did they fill me up fast!!  Too sad the bakery was not open ... they could have taken advantage of everyone else being off work for the day.

And so my good deed was undone and done again!!  Maybe next time home bakery ... maybe next time.

My sweet boy would have made it all better had he still been here when I got home.  I love Mexican food, but not near as much as I love this guy.