Let There Be Light!!

 Gosh .... you just cannot beat these cool mornings and warm afternoons.  This is what spring SHOULD feel like.  I doubt it's going to last long however, so I'm enjoying every second of it.  Every second of it that is until the boom box next door got turned on louder than ever.

I was really hoping for a weekend of quiet while I lounged on the patio.  I didn't even have to open my door.  I could hear the mixture of hard rock and mariachi inside with all my doors and windows closed.  Yes, it was THAT loud.

Should I risk my life and property by asking them to turn it down just a tad?  Yup ... that's exactly what I did.  I drove around to the front, to see just how far back on the property the house sits.  That's funny ... it's not that loud out front.  

Come to find out, the boom box was in the back of the house right under the patio, making for the perfect bullhorn effect into my house.  How is that possible?  

I asked them very nicely and politely to please turn it down a poquito, por favor.  The crew didn't seem too happy about that, so I left.  Turns out it worked ... they not only turned it down, but moved it to the front of the house.  YAY!!!  By the way, there is no garage.  This is just a HUGE house that sits WAY close to the property line in back!!

Off to Harbor Freight I went ... dreaming of lighting up my back yard.  They had the lights for all of $20.  Even if they only last one or two years, it will be worth it.  I was surprised when they asked if I wanted a free tarp.  FREE?  Of COURSE!!  It's the perfect size to replace the one on my SKUNK trap.  Won't the people who are building that house be surprised when they find out they are in the pathway of skunks.

I quickly discovered there was no way I could get the lights on the top rail without pruning the rose bushes.  The gardener started that big job, but he didn't have the right pruning device.  I'm thinking I may have to buy one myself to get the job done.  These have just grown WAY too big.

Even with gloves, I got stuck several times, not to mention walking on all the previous ten years of thorns the old gardeners blew into my corral.  When I walked into the house, my rug followed me.  What the heck?  Those old thorns stuck in the rubber soles, catching the rug and dragging it behind me.  The next hour was spent extracting them.  Note to self .... wear leather sole boots next time.

And then all the work stopped.  It was time for the Preakness ... the second in the triple crown of horse racing.  I'm really not about horse racing ... but to watch these gorgeous horses run is just amazing.  Seize the Grey won on this day, mostly because the horse had run in mud before.  It rained the entire morning, making the track a muddy mess.

It's also interesting that this horse was put out on a marketplace where 2500 people bought a piece of him. That's right ... he has 2500 owners.  That will make the money pot pretty small for everyone.  

Mystik Dan who won the Kentucky Derby came in second ... on the far side ... and Catching Freedom third.  

All that excitement made me hungry.  This is the last meal from the last box.  I've switched over to "healthy" meals that do not include pasta, like most of these do.  This was garlic chicken with lemon spaghetti.  

I have noticed a problem with these meals.  They only take 30 minutes to make, but dirty up practically every dish and pan in my house.  That means the dreaded WASHING DISHES.  Yes I do have a dishwasher, if you don't mind listening to it for 2-1/2 hours on the fastest cycle.  And YIKES ... this has 730 calories if you eat just one serving, which I admit is HUGE!!  Not the chicken of course, but the amount of pasta would feed four people.

Here it is in all it's glory.  This is one fourth of the entire amount.  It was quite tasty, the lemon adding a little flavor to a terrible white sauce.  The chicken was ... well ... chicken.  Not much garlic was hurt in the making of this dish.  I should have added more.  What I DID add was some mushrooms I had that weren't going to last long.  Maybe that's what messed with the flavor.

As soon as it was dark, I rushed outside to see if the lights would turn on.  YES!!!  We have lights.  I admit, I measured wrong.  I should have gotten TWO sets, because wrapping them around the fence took up twice the length.  This is at 5:00 in the morning, and as you can see, the tree lights are out.  I guess I will have to move those from under the tree.

The lights carry on to the left for quite a distance, but you can't see them for the rose bushes.  Hopefully those will get trimmed up this week.  

There was another interesting "happening" on the street corner ... the neighbor that got three hours of yard work while I got only 15 minutes?  He has a new gardener too.  Gosh, I thought the guy was doing a fabulous job on HIS house.  Now I don't feel so bad for canning him over my 15 minutes.

I'm off to Harbor Freight once again for another set of lights.  Oh yes, I did go through the six different settings from quick flash to slow flash to "glow" to just ON.  I could have a real psychedelic light show happening in my back yard if I wanted to!!!  Wouldn't that be fun!!!