A True Story

Our house is second house from the end of a dead end street, with another dead end street almost directly across from us at a 45º angle. We’ve lived here 12 years, so we know most of the cars and people that come into this area.

Last fall, I was sitting on the sofa and saw a couple of guys with clipboards walking toward the end of the street. I figured that they were selling something probably not legal, and watched as they knocked on first one neighbor’s door, then the another.

One of the fellas went down the dead end street across from our house and the other fella knocked at my door. I opened the inside door with a Louisville Slugger just slightly behind my back. Can’t be too careful these days.

Through the door:

He:     Good afternoon ma’am and how are you this fine day?

Me:     Fine — what are you selling?

He:     I’m not selling anything today, but because the construction company that I work for has an overabundance of shingles because of a purchasing error, I am offering to the fine people in this area a one day only offer to estimate what it would cost to re-shingle your roof at below cost prices. I can see that yours needs to be re-shingled in spots. (I probably should mention that our roof is 3 years old.)

Me:     Really? Well, I can’t make any kind of decision without checking with my husband (I love to play the “little woman” card when it behooves me to do so.) If you’d like to leave a card and any literature you might have, I’ll be sure to have him give you a call back when he gets home.

He:     Well, we’ll be up in this area again because we’ve gotten 4 or 5 re-roofs to do on this street alone in a couple of days. (Yeah, I’m so sure) You can talk to your husband and let us know when we come back.

Me:     Okay, I’ll do that. Have you checked with my neighbors across the street? Their roof really needs some work and I’ll bet they will be glad to talk to you. (I checked across the street — the mister was home, the missus was not)

He:     Great thanks for the tip and I’ll be back in a couple days!! (He’s just about jogging to get across the street)

I shut the door and begin to laugh. I see roofer guy knocking on the front door. The door opens and my PC (my neighbor) appears in the doorway. I see roofer guy waving his hands, gesturing, pointing to the roof, back across the street to me, back to the roof, then to his clipboard…..

Before he can go any further, PC gets a look on his face. I see his hands waving, gesturing toward the roof, pointing across the street, back to the roof, then his finger pointing repeatedly at roofer guy’s chest. Roofer guy is backing up, backing up, tripping over the step and almost going down, backing up and I see his head nodding with his hands up in the air as if to wave him off. He heads around the house and up the other dead end street to find his buddy. Together, they double time it down the street and out of our neighborhood, all the while roofer guy’s hands are gesturing and his mouth is running as fast as his feet.

I don’t think I told you that PC stands for Police Chief.

Feeling a bit fluffy? Take heart……

….and For My Next Trick, Ladies and Gentlemen…..

The lower part of our building is rented by two professionals. The lunchroom is also part of the lower part, but we rarely use it. It is used mostly by the tenants downstairs. It has come to our attention that they have a bit of a “ahem” rodent problem down there. Suggestions such as “maybe taking out your trash every night” and “it’s probably not a good idea to leave dirty dishes in the sink” were met with a frosty glare. I have to say that they tried those recommendations after they were suggested, (hard to believe that it had to be suggested, but there you have it) but it was a case of horse and barn door at that point.

Enter a bug guy. (You know them — guys in brown uniforms with large spray cans of who knows what wearing rubber gloves and goggles. They always try to tell you that the can contents are not toxic to anything but bugs. Bah!!) This bug guy spent nearly two hours down there setting those snappy traps and the sticky traps. We were starting to believe that he had set a trap down for every square foot of floor space. Kind of like the Sylvester and Tweety cartoons with the yard full of dogs.

Later that day — I go downstairs to pull a couple charts for incoming patients. (We have a utility room under the stairs that is just for old charts and other odd stuff. Like mice, apparently.) Although I have tried to make the filing as simple as possible, sometimes it’s a bit confusing and will involve opening several storage boxes before finding the chart you need.

So here I am, heaving boxes here and there and not really watching what I am doing. Or where I am stepping. Suddenly, my foot (I was wearing my old faithful Börn clogs which have a rubber sole) didn’t feel quite right. Looking down, I see that I had managed to step onto one of those sticky sheets. Darn little sucker wouldn’t come off. I took off my shoe and pulled on a corner of it for all I was worth — nothing. Tried using the other hand. Nada. (Of course my thumbs are so strong, I don’t understand why I was having a problem.) Finally, after pulling on this stupid thing for what seemed like hours, and thinking to myself, “terrific, I’m going to have to go upstairs with my shoe in my hand and find somebody to get this thing off for me”, I threw the shoe on the floor. Looked at it. Looked again. Stood on it with both feet. Bent over and hit my head on a box. Swore. Twice. Stood on it again. Pulled on one corner with both wimpy thumbs. Slowly, slowly it came off — then apparently decided that it had had enough fun with me and came off all at once. At which time I fell on my butt and hit my head on a box in back of me. More cussing. Even more being glad that there was no one there to witness my theatrics. Threw the sticky little #$@&^%* down on the floor again, picked up my charts and made my way back up the stairs, thump, whsht, thump, whsht, thump……. TGIF!!

Middle of the Night Thoughts

It’s 2:02AM in New England. I had a two week reprieve from the insomnia that has plagued me for years. It was great while it lasted but now it’s back.

Our new Berber carpet was shampooed just a bit ago. Tonight, the cat decided to barf all over it. Do cats have some kind of gene that makes them barf only on fabric/carpet covered items? I’ve never heard of any cat barfing on wood floor.

I’m reading another fabulous, reading just to be entertained book. Great flawed characters and well fleshed out personalities. It’s a horsey book, and usually that’s not my thing at all. (Sara, if you read this post, please don’t be offended) But my good friend K told me to read it because she knew I would like it. It’s called Riding Lessons by Sara Gruen. If you would like to read the editorial reviews, click here. My synopsis — girl has exciting life ahead, girl meets with tragedy, girl settles for for a watered down life, girl gets her passion back. My kind of book. Buy it!

I’m coming down the home stretch — I am 3/4 done with son in law’s socks and should be finis tomorrow. After looking long and hard for yarn to make a pair of socks for myself, I ordered SC-S Lovebird by Seacoast Handpainted Yarns. Holy moly, my mouth waters just looking at it. For sure I will not be able to put it down once I get it so I need to finish the SIL’s sockies. I still have to choose a pattern but I may just use the one that I’ve been using for the last few pairs that I’ve made. It’s Cat Bordhi’s Simple Sock pattern from Socks Soar on Two Circular Needles. A very easy pattern to follow with techniques using 2 circular needles. Sure beats DPN’s.

 

 

Inland Empire Girl’s blog has a Sibling Assignment on it from Raymond Pert to focus on a piece of music that you listened to between the ages of twenty five and thirty. If I were asked for my favorite piece of music from that period, it would be this one.

You Make My Day Award

Isn’t this just the coolest? The You Make My Day Award (okay, who is thinking Dirty Harry out there?) is ‘awarded to people whose blogs bring you happiness and inspiration and make you feel so happy about blogland‘. My friend Christy awarded this to me a couple of days ago and I am just thrilled and honored to receive it. Thanks bunches for the generous and warm words, C. Her blog, Gathering Around the Table was one of the first blogs that I read when I first tried dipping my toe into this blogging stuff. Her stories of her early childhood and her siblings and of course, her fabulous photos, bring a kind of peace to my mind. If I could return this award to her, I would because she always makes my day!

I’ve cut back on my blog reading a bit, but there are a couple of blogs besides C’s that I just enjoy reading so much, that I won’t do without. Giving them this award will probably come as a surprise, because I don’t do alot of (if any) commenting on their posts but I am a frequent visitor just the same. Just call me a …..

Patois’ Whee! All the Way Home has been a source of humor and insight that by turns makes me giggle and then makes me think. She sprinkles her blog with delightful stories about motherhood (Daughter, Eldest, Youngest) marriage (Husband) that have me laughing out loud. Just love those Weekly Wonderings!!

Sandy’s Knitting is one of my favorite knitting blogs — mainly because it is knitting mixed with family and cats and life in general in the most amusing way. Knitting information, humour, and life, life, life — it’s like head candy!!!

The last blog I would like to award is Becca’s Byline, written by a very intuitive and articulate lady from my generation, who can say things in ways that I would not have though of (or is it ways of which I would not have thought?) She writes of reading and life and family and pets — and written so eloquently. I admire her writing style and stories immensely. Our lives have mirrored each other in many ways — she just says it better than I do!!

Do You Find Yourself in Catalog Hell?

I get easily 15 or 20 catalogs (not even counting junk mail!!) every week — and found this site while reading our local paper. I signed up and have started (hopefully) getting my name off their lists. It’s called Catalog Choice and it’s free– my favorite kind.  Maybe it can help somebody else, too.

And I was like whoaa!!!

GrandDolly loves “Finding Nemo” or as she says “Melmo” (or something spelled similar to that). Needless to say, we have watched this movie ALOT! My favorite character is Crush, a 150 year old turtle with a surfer dude/Zen master personality. I “borrowed” this from icanhascheezeburger.com –

moar funny pictures