Checkers

Things get busy around here during the holidays. Our friends know why and I will not go into details here. But on top of our usual hub-bub, we have had an issue with our cats all getting sick at once. Very confusing to us, and life has become miserable for them. Humans understand when they are sick with a cold to ride it out; animals just want to hide from it.

Checkers

About 12 years ago we have a nasty storm around Christmas time (sound familiar?), with winds and blowing snow. More wind that snow, and bitter cold. We had decorated our house for Christmas with a large plastic light-up Santa that I had purchased with one of my first paychecks as a teenager (that is another story). We tied it up on top of our porch roof, but it could not stand up to the winds that day and blew off the roof with a tremendous crashing noise - at 5 am, of course. My husband ran outside as the sound was so loud, we thought a car had crashed into the house. The news of the 'death' of my Santa did not go well, but even worse was our front door did not shut all the way against the horrible wind when he came back in. When the door blew open, one of our cats, Scottie, ran out. We spent two weeks searching for Scottie, going door-to-door, posting fliers - the usual. We purchased a humane trap, set it in our back yard and put in his favorite food to temp him. That is how we got Checkers. (We caught Scottie the day after.)

We could have let Checkers go, since she was feral, but she seemed so calm in the trap that we brought her in and confined her to a bathroom until she could acclimate to her surroundings, and until we could get her to a vet to be sure that she did not have anything that would hurt our other cats. I would go in to visit her, and she would come up to me very shyly, full of trepidation, but willing to be pet and held. These little visits were very precious to me.

We took her to our vet and Checkers was in perfect health, about 6 months old, and, of course, ready to be spayed. She came home and took up residence in the bathroom until she was healed. Having sniffed each other through the bathroom door, there was very little excitement when she joined the rest of the group. Then she met Ike, our pure white deaf cat. It was love at first sight on her part and our little cuddle sessions were now over. She bonded to Ike and I guess she figured she only needed him and the female human was now unnecessary. I was disappointed, but she became Ike's hearing buddy, so I did not push the issue. The only times I got to hold her again were when I was able to trim her claws, or when we moved. These escapades consisted of corralling the poor cat into a small space, donning oven mitts, and wrapping her in a towel or shoving her in a carrier.

The minute she arrived here in the Poconos house, she laid down her boundaries: feed her, let her buddy up to Ike, and let her hide when we come near. We tolerated all this because she was the world's best mouser. No fooling around with the prey, like the rest of the cats; she would just whack it! We started calling her Ms. Soprano.

I believe, and our new veterinarian agrees, that one of those mice that dared come into our house brought this bug that they are all suffering from now. Checkers, being the real assassin, got it the worst. We were able to catch her to take her to the vet only because she had grown so weak. She had pneumonia.

The vet told us we would have to medicate her everyday and really subject her to some intensive care. We knew that once she got her strength back, if she did, she would fight us. It would all be torture to her. She was so sick and she had no fight left in her. I know she told me it was time to go. I know, silly, talking to a cat, but I swear when I told her what we thought about doing and that Ike would be joining her soon (he is 18), she relaxed and gave me a final gift. She let me hold, cuddle and caress her beautiful fur one last time. No more fight.

We buried her under the magnolia tree where we have the others who have passed since we moved here. We have a spot next to her for Ike when he chooses to go. I think he misses her, I know I do.

I know this is a self-indulgent posting. Thank you for reading.

First Snow

So we had our first snow for the season this week. We received 3 to 4 inches, no biggy, and it was 'fairy tale' snow - it only gathered on the trees and the grass and melted on the roads. No hard freeze that night, so we have a Camelot situation. Pretty good. Now, the bad news - our beautiful fall foliage was still on the trees, so the heavy, wet snow caused some damage and power outages. And we all complained, boy, did we complain. Nothing cheerful about getting snow on October 15. Especially with all the foliage tours and Oktoberfests planned for this weekend.

In the scheme of things, it was not as bad as the first snow last year on October 28. This was predicted, unlike that one, where a few flurries turned into approximately two feet! I noticed many people had a more resigned aura about them. It is going to happen, we will complain, and life goes on. Are we prepared? The stores rushed the snow blowers and salts out front, moving aside the Christmas decorations. (Halloween, Thanksgiving - that stuff is in the back marked down already. One town has their Halloween parade today - not like Halloween is on a Saturday this year - just get it over with!) But I think most people figured this would melt and we would be okay, depending on how many snows they have seen. Now the one that was predicted for tonight into tomorrow is another matter. This one may cause a little panic, as it is associated with a "classic Nor'easter" - batten down the hatches, matey!

On another issue, the flu (scream here). My husband got his flu shot last week - not the H1N1 - and the vaccine was administered into his arm and shot right back out! The pharmacist giving the shot had never seen that happen before - neither had my husband, of course. The two men just sat there and looked at each other for a while, after the original exclamation of "huh?" "What now?" The pharmacist examined the needle - nothing wrong - he examined the arm - nothing wrong - he harrumphed and mumbled and my husband is asking "Well?" No bone was hit, and no offense to my hubby, but his muscles are not that pumped. So, we have to go back in 1 month for another flu shot, for free, because we are not sure if any vaccine got in at all. Weird. Can hardly wait for whatever the H1N1 vaccine brings.

The Unfinished Projects of Spring

It is Autumn. Where did the Summer go? I took a long walk around the house and I noticed all the unfinished projects planned last spring. I am not frustrated; I am more amazed that the time escaped us.

The tree that fell last winter - still there. Like I expected to get up and leave (leaf?) or something. We had discussed getting a lumber company or logger to come out, thin out some of the overgrowth and pay us for the lumber. But the economy beat us up on that - if people are not buying houses, or fixing things up, they do not buy lumber and so the loggers do not look for the little purchases and clean-ups - they need to make money on the stuff people are buying. We could pay to clean it up, but that is an expense we cannot handle in the priority of things.

It is what we call a 'yay/boo.' Yay, that huge tree is not hurting anything, really. Boo, when it toppled, it must have disturbed the water table, so the pond is no longer there in our woods. Yay, we had less mosquitoes and we did not have to treat the pond for standing water. Boo, we did not see the ducks or hear the frogs as they enjoyed the pond.

Hedges grow extremely well in the wet summer we had, so we never got them trimmed as much as we would have liked. We did get a garden planted, late, but we are still picking squash and we put in a second planting of lettuce to hopefully get picked before a heavy frost. The corn gifted us with maybe 8 ears before it got sick and died. Nice corn stalks, however.

I have to believe that it will all be accomplished eventually. As my husband always says to me, "You are the only one bothered by it!"

When we start a new project, like the garage project, sometimes normal maintenance can suffer. We had a chilly day this week and when we took our warm jackets out of the closet, one of them had mildew on it. One of those rainy days caused water to seep in under the door of the closet, causing a moisture build up and attacked my husband's canvas cowboy coat. (I think it is a costume type thing - the South Philly boy in a cowboy coat and Stetson - oh, yeah, cowboy boots too. Go figure!) So washing and spraying with Lysol was the chore for that day. The excitement goes on...

Garage Organization

I have not posted lately, because we have been in the middle of one of our 'to do' tasks - clean and organize the garage. This is our first garage in a house that we own - we had a garage at a place we rented, but the place was so large that we loaned the garage to a friend who was moving from out of state. So, we have proved the old saying that you expand to the space you have, meaning the garage was very full, or at least appeared that way. Is a garage really meant to park a car inside? Really?

The expedition started with a thought out plan of where everything can go. Right! We pondered (mulled) this for a couple of weeks and made every excuse as to why we should not do it each day - it was too hot, it was too cold, too rainy, too nice to be cooped up inside, etc., etc. But finally, after going in the garage to look for something that I know we had and now could not find, we knew it had to be done now. My husband was between jobs, so we had no money and no place we had to be. No excuses....

First is sorting. That is followed by "What is this?" Followed by "What does this go to?" And then "Why do we have this?" After spending an inordinate amount of time figuring out what things were, we spend even more time getting it out of there. Really, have we only lived here four years? I knew moving in on April Fools Day would come back to bite us!

Next comes the arguing. "Why is this here?" "Do we really need this?" "Have we ever used this?" "How does this work?" "Why did we buy this?" We didn't get as angry as we could have, as we knew this would be a very trying experience for both of us. Nice thing about getting older; we have had the big arguments and we realize that we will probably get the same answers, so we just walk away, cool down and get back to work.

This all took about a week of sorting, organizing, hanging, and tossing. Then comes that proud moment when we can see the floor and there are work surfaces again. When we go to get a tool and it is where it belongs and only takes a minute to retrieve, as opposed to an hour of cursing trying to find it ("I know I put it here - Who moved it?")

So I took some pictures so we can record this great moment in history (the ones below show a little work still to be done). And, so far, we are taking great pains to put stuff where it belongs. If this works, cars will be in the garage - what a concept!

Stray Cat Syndrome

As I have said before, we have cats. By many people's estimation, far too many, but they are all loved and they are all spayed or neutered. The majority of them are also older and have started developing the usual problems of age. In a sense, we are all older in this house and everybody is incapable of kittens.
All of our cats came to us in one form or another. For a while we seemed to have kittens growing in our yard in NJ and we found homes for most and adopted some of them. We only 'paid' for one kitten and that was the first thing my future husband and I bought together. We had just moved in together and we wanted to bring home something. We had only $2 between us, but the pet stand at the Collingswood Auction had stray kittens for only $2. So we agreed on a beautiful calico kitten who that night sat under the middle of the bed and cried her lungs out all night. The cat that I already had when my husband to moved in, Vanilla, was deaf, so he didn't care. Vanilla lived to be 21 years old. The crying kitten, Ms. Kitty, stayed with us for 18 years. They remain in our hearts.


More cats came and stayed and passed on since then and we never paid to adopt another kitten until Gracie, who was a rescue and the organization insisted that making people pay shows that they will be invested in the animal and will not harm them. (Just come to our house!) But two of our boys were strays and they have a different mentality - that mentality is reflected in their feelings about food. The bowls must be full, the food bin must be visible, and if these things are missing, the boys are absolutely sure that they will once again feel like they are starving to death. These 'little' boys are very rotund and there is nothing much we can do to prevent them from eating short of locking them in a room and listening to them cry bloody murder (can you tell we tried?). We let our crew eat dry food at will, and the majority are in good shape, but these two stray boys. They do not eat ALL the time, but the food has to be there ALL the time.

This Stray Cat Syndrome applies to many things, and not only to cats. In our current economic situation, I guess you could say that this mentality applies to money - it should always be there. In my case, I always want water around - I may not drink it, but if a bottle or glass of water is not nearby, I get really thirsty. This feeling applies to cars as well - I do not go anywhere for days on end, but when we only had one car and no car was available to me waiting outside my door, it just felt wrong. I feel this way about my family as well. I may not get to see them very often, but they should always be there. And they are not there anymore and that is wrong.


Thank heaven for my husband and my cats. And our friends whom we do not get to see often enough, but we know are there. And that is comforting.

Hubby's Bad Day

We have had a lot of rain, which makes grass grow very well, of course. So well that even some landscapers are complaining that they cannot get to all their clients to get their grass mowed before the next rain. Poor Guys! But this also means that homeowners who do their own lawn have to coordinate when to mow so that it is not raining and there is enough time-off to get everything done. (On that matter, why do we worry about it so much? Where we live there are forests and open fields and nobody cares about them. I guess it is leftover from where we lived before, where you could be fined by the borough for not cutting your lawn.) Still, when a bird lands on the front lawn and disappears, it must be time to mow. And not a little chickadee-size bird either - more like a robin-size bird! But finally all the planets aligned and a day-off occurred during a sunny, dry day. So the hubby puts on what we call his 'devo suit' - a white coverall - and starts by spraying around the house the bug killer stuff we hook up to our hose. Precautions are made, windows are shut and he wears the devo suit, baseball cap and respirator. I get this vision of someone coming to visit who is new to some of this stuff and seeing him - I think it could really be frightening! So that went well, bugs killed, windows reopened, respirator removed and he progresses to the riding lawn mower. Mower starts up fine and off he goes to mow the front lawn to save the birds from disappearing again, donning his now traditional straw hat to prevent sunburn on his head and neck.

During all of this I am in the house doing that never-ending domestic enterprise - laundry. My being in the house keeps our cats calm, as all this outdoor activity can be upsetting. Remaining calm, they sleep through most of this. This is good. Laundry in the washer, I get the idea to fix a door that is sticking, so I go out to the garage to get a tool I need. My husband swears that nothing goes wrong with whatever he is doing until I am within earshot. I walk outside and hear a very unnerving 'crunch' sound that comes from under the mower. He immediately turns the machine off - wise move - and walks around it to see if he ran over something. And I innocently walk up behind and and say "That didn't sound good." Of course I scared the heck out of him and he starts his usual tirade about nothing goes wrong until I am near, etc. I start to walk away and look at the mower as he backs it up and I notice that something is really amiss. Mower is running and is very noisy, so now I am doing hand puppets to get his attention.
"What, what!"
"Something is lose under the mower!"
"What?"
"Like I know!"

He gets off the mower and starts to try to roll the mower over to look underneath.
"That is not a good idea!"
"Yeah, I know, and why are you still here?"
"Honey, just lay on the ground and look underneath."
He lays on the fresh, mown grass.
"Honey?"
"What?"
"Remove the key."
The undercarriage that holds the mower blade housing in place had dropped its tie-rod, or at least one of the tie-rods. The air is now very blue and I am not talking about the sky and the better part of valor made me move quickly back inside.

Out here in the country/woods it is not unusual to hear banging and clanging and gunshots, echoing through the mountains, the noise could be miles away, so it becomes background noise during the day. I did not hear my husband trying to bang a pretty mean bend out of the tie-rod with the sledgehammer. I did not hear him cry out in pain as he hit the bejesus out of his thumb with the sledgehammer - it also helps that the washer was in its spin cycle and making its usual racket. However, when he tried to get in the door and there was torrent of very-bad-words because I had absently mindedly locked the door, I knew something was wrong. Oops!

Many ice packs later, and a fine lunch (oh, yes, I was cooking while all this banging was occurring too), he insists he will now fix the mower. Right! Of course, the tie-rod had a nut on the end that no amount of persuasion could get that sucker loose. I am of the belief that a new day may be a an opportunity to start anew, but he is determined to get the machine running and to get this lawn mowed! Realizing that he is licked with this nut, he drives into the nearest town to the auto repair shop where he knows the owner and, looking pitiful with a banged-up thumb and grass in his beard and hair, begs him to get the nut off the rod. That worked, and he drives back in triumph, puts the rod on the mower and finishes the front lawn. Back lawn - another day.

We are not at the end of the day, just half-way through. He removes his devo suit, showers and drops the shampoo bottle on his toe! He is now convinced that staying in bed the rest of the day is sounding like a fine option. But, we muddle on and because there is that little voice inside saying 'This is not your day!' everything he touches goes wrong. Little things, like dropping anything he picks up, putting clothes on backwards - this could really get to a person. So, we nap, and he rolls over onto the now very sore thumb. We decide to go out to dinner, but he insists that I drive (I would anyway) and I am happy to say, getting away from the house was a very good idea. Nice dinner, come home watch TV, go to bed, put his pajama pants on backwards...tomorrow is another day!

We Grow Squash Well

How these postings seem to get away from me. Mind you, I have some of my best postings being written continuously - typed is another thing. However, I can honestly say I do my best writing where nobody sees it - now if my brain could only learn how to type!

In the garden department, we appear to be good at squash; I really wish that I liked squash more than I do, but I will use it. Garlic does much to make anything palatable, as does butter, but we gave that up for gall bladder season. None of our produce is real tasty, but I understand that comes from too much rain and neglect. We have the neglect aspect down very well.

We have been trying to use the all-to-often rainy, cool days to do some more work around the house inside. We finally got the inside of our sun porch painted and our next big project is to organize the garage. How does that happen - you start with everything in its place and then it seems to find a new place. Like most men, my husband has the 'horizontal disease' - if there is an empty, flat surface, whatever is in your hand at the time gets put there. I sometimes feel like such a nag, but knowing how we forget where we put things makes me more strident in advocating that things have to be put back where they belong! It is very frustrating when we know we have something and we cannot find it, so we buy another one. IF you are lucky, you find the original before you start using the new one, but that rarely happens. Why do you think there are so many open packages in the hardware stores?

So a simple project takes all day and at least two arguments - or at least they used to. Now we do more planning before we start something, usually taking an hour or two the day before to find everything we need before we start. We have been amazed at how quickly we can do a project, clean up and then do something we want to do on our days off. Brilliant this planning stuff!

On top of everything, our PC died - brain hemorrhage or something. Feels like your whole world collapses when that happens. Fortunately, we had bought an external hard drive and all of our information was backed up on that. We looked into getting the PC fixed, but with prices going down so much since we bought it, it would cost as much or more to fix than to buy new. (Some repairers charge a fee before they even tell you if it can be fixed. ) Still, I tried to muddle through fixing the thing. I pulled out all the start-up discs that I had and I am re-booteding better than Nancy Sinatra, until the system asked for the blue disc. Blue Disc! What Blue Disc? I don't have a stupid (not what I really said) Blue Disc!

In moving the PC from one house to another, heaven knows where this disc went! Organized and well packed, and probably so well packed it got thrown away - or something! Thank goodness for friends. Our dear friend met us at a half-way point between our houses, where we had a lovely lunch, and then she loaned all the discs she had to help us to try to bring our PC back from the dead. It looked like we were passing something illegal between cars in the parking lot. So we come home and I load those discs on our PC and our system is now regressed to 1998! Which means nothing that we have saved can be recognized anymore on that PC.

But now we had to wade into the murky world of buying a new PC.

Here is where you realize how much you depend on the Internet; normally, I would research on-line for the best deal and then go to the store. Oh Right, the PC is Dead! So now we are spending the better part of a week in our spare time going store-to-store to get the best deal. In the end, we were at a shopping center that had two stores that sell PC's and laptops, so I am in one store, on my cell, calling my husband who is in the other store to see who has the better price, deal, etc. (Yes, like those Sears and Home Depot commercials.) We decided on a laptop, which had more on it than our old desktop. But the salesperson was insisting it is not good, we need bigger, better, he has a degree in Computer Science, on and on. Finally, I looked at this skinny little kid and said we are not using the thing for games, it is better than the one we were using pretty darn well up until last week, and Consumer Reports recommended the one we picked for people like us (a euphemism for over-50). Then I walked away and said to my husband to handle it from that point. I figure my husband can win through intimidation, since he is a big guy. Of course the kid tried to sell us the extended warranty - which costs almost as much as the laptop! Right! No! Even the check-out person asked "is there a reason you are not buying the two year warranty?" We don't want it. "Really?" Now we feel like she is saying 'do you have to heads and are you out of your mind?'

This laptop can do so many things that I didn't know I ever wanted a system to do. But one purchase leads to another - new mouse, USB extension plug, DVD camcorder.... hope this all works out!

Birds, Bees and Bugs

It has been pointed out, ad nauseum, that we have had only 9 days without rain since the 'unofficial start of summer' - Memorial Day. I have heard from some people starting their gardens that the excess water has caused no end of heartache, including flooding and rotten seeds. We tried to plant a traditional garden and we could not find more than one square foot that was not inhabited by rocks, tree roots and various other impediments. So we are trying a 'raised' garden - sort of. We did not build all the nice walls and make it look pretty; we just laid down newspaper, threw purchased soil (cheapest we could find) on top and planted. We surrounded the ugly garden with some fencing that was left in our barn and, amazingly, things are growing! We have already eaten some of our lettuce - we have tasted better, but this is the stuff that we grew! The corn is trying, as is the squash and some basil. That was all we planted, as this is our first attempt, except for some tomato seeds we planted in containers. Those seeds have been lost due to over-flowing container pots, especially after we had three inches of rain in less than an hour, 2 days after we planted the seeds.

Now, we did try to go out and do the traditional weeding, raking and all that, but the bugs have been overwhelming and, well, it has not stopped raining long enough to get anything accomplished. Do not get me wrong, I don't mind getting wet, but the areahas had some pretty impressive thunderstorms, with lightening, wind, etc. Not smart to stand outside in a thunderstorm holding a metal rake!

Mrs. Birdie - our lodger in our breezeway nesting on our motion light - keeps a close eye on anyone who comes and goes through any of the doors - occasionally, harmlessly, flying over our heads to warn us away from her nest. She should be well fed with all the insects this year! The one bug that has not shown up too much this year are the gypsy moths; it seems all the moisture has caused trees to develop a fungus that kills the moth larvae. But nobody told the 'dumb flies' that were brought to the area to eat the gypsy moths - while they don't bite much, they are annoying. And, of course, mosquitoes are more plentiful than we remember - wet, moist weather, duh! We wear the "OFF clip-on" which works very well to repel flying insects, but if they are ravenous enough, nothing stops them.

I have not seen any honey bees either, but that is a national problem. Bumble bees are going crazy on our rhododendrons, which have bloomed late this year, but are glorious. I look at them from inside - way too many bees to get up close. This is Independence Day weekend, the big launch of the summer season around here. Almost as if it were planned, it is supposed to sunny and warm this next week. I will believe that when it happens. The good news in all of this, besides the outstanding flowers blooming, is we have not had to water anything yet. We even gave up collecting anymore rain water - we have plenty.

Our basement is another matter. It could really use some dry time. So could I.

Serendipity

In my previous persona as a NJ State employee, I was responsible for project planning, among other responsibilities. The state had me trained as a "Certified Project Manager" and I knew how to develop projects, illustrate them on graphs, lay out timelines, contingencies, variables, etc. I guess my bosses saw a very organized individual in me and wanted to utilize that talent - or nobody else wanted to do it! In any case, I knew the most valuable resource - and the most unstable resource - were people. I could plot and plan tasks down to days and prepare for every contingency but my human resources would always throw me a curve. So I got good at begging, cajoling, pleading, bargaining, and anything to get the job done. I also got good at generating paper - everything looks more impressive on a long graph with critical points, etc. I discovered most people cannot really read these graphs, or they looked so complicated that they did not want to. So I would get compliments on the graph and it would be placed, carefully folded, into the back of the supervisor's notepad or briefcase - never to be seen again.


I have known many people in my life in bureaucracy who depended on plans and were sure life was better with a plan. I had one friend/supervisor who laid out her life up to when to sell her house and retire and move to Florida - and it worked out for her! She had minor setbacks, but she somehow did not let anything prevent her from her goals. She sold her house within one week (full price and a 250% profit), found a condo the next week, practically planned her retirement party and I believe is very happy with achieving the plan. I do not think she is the type to allow herself to truly relax and is probably planning her cruises, parties and possibly her funeral! I just hope she has not planned when she will 'check out.'
My life here seems to be without a plan and I tend to allow serendipity to determine what gets done each day. I still make lists of what needs to be done - I just do not put time limits on completion. Things will get done when our resources and time allow. If the day is sunny (not many of those lately), work outside. If it is too hot/rainy/buggy, work inside painting rooms, sewing, fixing whatever (something always needs fixing). Tired, not feeling well - nap. Tired of being in the house - go somewhere. The only time I need to plan ahead is when something involves another person, such as a doctor's appointment or visiting a friend. After all, just because I let serendipity rule in my life, I am sure that other people need to plan. I understand both ways.

I am still organized, just not as much with my time. And it seems things get done better now since I do not worry about completion mandates as much. At least not like I used to.

Spring Surprises

The gentleman who built this house around the 1930's seemed to really like doors. This is a smaller house - or at least it was at first - with two, maybe three doors at the outset. When we moved in, it had five entrance doors available. The front door nobody ever used, except to move stuff in, or for deliveries (delivery people used to get particularly vexed choosing which door to get us to come to). What used to be the attached garage had been turned into a laundry room/extra room sometime after the free-standing garage was built, sometime around the 1970's, so another door was added there to cross under the breezeway to the garage. After that a sunroom was added on, which is the way in for everybody who knew the previous owners. There was even a little note pad attached to the wall near the inside entrance door to leave a message in case they missed you. And, of course, the back door to the 'root cellar,' which my husband insists on calling the bomb shelter (60's damage - duck and cover!)

So the door we tend to use the most is the door from the laundry/office/cat litter room out to the garage. It comes out the side of the house, under a covered breezeway, and it prevents some of our lovely springtime (or anytime) mud from coming into the main part of the house. So imagine my surprise when I innocently walked out that door and was 'assaulted' by a bird in the breezeway. Yes, visions of "The Birds" went through my head and I backed up inside as quickly as I went out. I waited a few minutes, looked for the vicious birdy, and then went about my business, convinced that bird would never come that way again and we can go about our usual routines.

Wrong! Last week we were coming home after dark and I noticed something different about our motion-sensor light for the breezeway. It looked different, or dirty, or something.... The vicious birdy had built a nest on top of our light! Pretty savvy - covered, protected, warm - pretty perfect for a mommy bird to hatch her eggs. Not so for us, however, as we are forced to use another, not so convenient door for our entrances and exits. Cannot bring ourselves to remove the nest and hurt the babies.



As far as our other doors... we really saw no sense to the real front door, since nobody uses it, so we walled it off. What used to be the front room with that door in it we now use as our master bedroom, so the opening is sealed, save for the top to put in our air conditioner. We don't use the AC much and I did not want to block a window opening that would allow fresh air in.

In addition to all those, we think there was a separate entrance to the cellar, that has since been walled in. I think the old man was just looking for escape routes!

God's Flashlight

Amazing! We hit close to 90 degrees yesterday! Again, not really ready, as most of our summer clothes are still in the attic. Yes, the weather people predicted this, but it gets so we do not trust them very much. Besides that, we are in the 'higher elevations,' where exceptions to the predictions prevail. We coped okay - t-shirts and jeans are suitable all year and always available.

For the cold weather we cover the windows with plastic, put up heavy drapes, and arrange the furniture to prevent any winter chills. Now with the nice weather (we hope) the plastic has to come off, the drapes washed and put away to be substituted by lighter curtains, and the furniture can be placed to enjoy the lovely views of the blooming flowers and trees. So as this occurs, God's Flashlight comes out. This is an expression my husband has developed that explains the angle of the sun coming in the windows 'just so' to highlight the "floating fairies in the air" (dust) and the muted sheen of the furniture (more dust). This is why we have spring cleaning!

I feel it is a never ending battle here in the woods. The air is clean, but the pollen is plentiful. And we have cats and the ever present litter boxes. (There is no such thing as a "dust-free litter." - those marketing people need to really use the stuff - in a home - with windows open - and really, truthfully tell me their litter is "dust-free!") In addition, the winter containment harbors the dust and the removal of the adaptations just releases the result. So we try to keep everything clean, take a day or two as the official spring cleaning days, and the next bright, sunny morning - the dust is back! Never ending battle.

Fires

We have not had rain for a while, so everything is very dry. The humidity is low, which makes for beautiful blue skies, but fire danger is very high. We have a burn ban in effect (the day after my husband had his fire incident), but people being as they are, some insist a campfire or or burning trash is their right. As a result we have had some massive brush fires, some very close to our home. We respect the firefighters and what they have to go through, so when we hear the trucks from the station up the street, we are understandably concerned.

It is quiet here. We have cars go by and logging trucks and school buses, so we are used to those sounds. But when a State Trooper puts on the car siren in front of your home, you pay attention. That is what happened to me this morning, sound asleep, the siren goes off and I 'stuck the landing' before I was fully awake. I was up, on my feet, looking out the window before I knew why, what time it was, where my husband was - I was prepared and unprepared all at the same time! I figured I had a decision to make - not sure why, but I was decisive. I decided to go to the bathroom! I realized very soon what had occurred and started to laugh - some way to start a day! I found out this evening the trooper was called to a chemical spill on the Interstate - our road is a shortcut to get the next entrance.

Restaurant Time and More Adaptations

My husband has gotten a new job, working at a restaurant 6 nights per week. As a consequence, we have switched over to 'restaurant time.' Anyone who has worked at a full-service restaurant knows what I mean by that. In the real world, people work all day and relax and sleep at night. And sometimes that relaxation takes 'real people' to a restaurant to have dinner and drinks and talk. Other people have to be there to prepare, serve and clean-up after, hence 'restaurant time.'

My husband goes into work around 4 pm each day and is there until closing and final clean-up, which means most nights he does not get home until midnight - and this is the off-season yet! Once the season starts, I probably will not see him until 1 or 2 am. I understand that, as we both worked in restaurants when we first met - in fact, I got him hired as one of the cooks for the chain that we both worked for. (I got the job immediately after we met, so I had them hire him.) As a manager, I often walked out of the restaurant at 2 am and drove the 45 minutes home; I know what it is like to get home so late, so I prefer to wait up in case he is too tired to drive, or so I can see him for a little while before we go to sleep.

So we sleep in a little later now, and try to get the appointments and necessary matters done in the late morning/early afternoon. Now if Mother Nature would adjust her clock - the cats want to be fed, the birds get noisy at sunrise, deliveries arrive - we are not ready! The cute little woodpecker certainly did not get the memo - he is still trying to peck a home into our metal antenna - go Woody! (pictured below) - but metal pinging at sunrise! Naps are becoming an important aspect of our day.

One day off per week now, so we try to pack a bunch of stuff into that one day - visits, shopping expeditions, intense yard work, etc. Last week we did some shopping for yard stuff, then came home and tried to get yard work done. I thought a nice big lunch was in order, so I went inside to cook while my husband did some yard clearing and burning of the wood cleared. Next thing I see is him running back towards the faucet (you see where this going, don't you?), then running to the garage, then running to the faucet - all the while with expletives being quietly mumbled! I know he did not want me to know, and did not want me to get involved, as there is an element of embarrassment involved here. So I waited until the running and cursing stopped, walked quietly out the backdoor to 'announce lunch was ready' and feigned surprise that the brush in our back yard was blackened and, now, non-existent. No harm done, really - he contained the fire before it spread too far or progressed into the woods. Really, this will probably help the grasses and ferns that grow there, and that area is greening up already after a week. But the prospect can very be scary - fire in our woods and all.

Oh, yes, it snowed yesterday. I think this makes 7 months of snow now? Supposed to be near 80 this weekend.

Motivators and Spring Longing

Sometimes the 'Powers that Be' send along powerful motivators to get a person to do certain tasks; or to accept the concepts and feelings that are inevitable. Looking around our yard, we are motivated to clean up and start planting. (Of course, there is a 'but') - But the weather does not seem to want to make up its mind! It is snowing now - just enough to annoy my husband, I swear. It is something we should expect and accept, since we are in the Poconos, right? We had 50 mph winds this week. Silly me put out some new pinwheels and whirligigs along our fence in the front - we picked them up later that week in the woods. Guess we will wait to put them out again, or find another way to stick them in the ground.

Health issues are extremely powerful motivators. After the realization hits home, an acceptance follows. My husband is Diabetic, as are many people in the US now. Almost a fad, huh? But a person has to accept that changes need to be made or the consequences can be bad. So you watch the sugars and carbs in your diet, move on and adapt. I have developed problems with the digestion of fats. Inevitably my gall bladder, so I got angry, make another change in the diet and move on and adapt. Those 'Powers that Be' are forcing us to eat healthy and we are better for it, but it is annoying. There is a whole preparation to eating out - something we both love to do. The Internet is useful there, as most restaurants have their menus on-line and national chains have nutrition information readily available. Still, good thing I can cook, but that may be the reason we ended up with these minor difficulties. We must tell ourselves that we are basically very fortunate and move on.

On the Spring (in name only so far) front, we have violets and crocuses growing in the sheltered areas by the house. The ducks have landed on our pond - which still has some ice on it - and are quacking up a storm. The frogs have not come out yet - still too cold. We were doing some work outside this week and an osprey flew overhead. Boy, do they move! It dive bombed out of the sky and then pulled up and quietly landed on a tree branch. Amazing! That bird's cry is piercing and loud.

We also saw some of our eagles back, as well as the bats that live nearby, probably in our old barn. I think we have a cat nesting for her kittens in the barn as well. We do not go back there often - the barn houses our lawn tractor and not much else. Some would say to knock it down, but I like the way it looks like a part of the woods.

Evaluating the Damages

This was a surprise. I had heard a large boom during one of the winter storms; after I had looked outside to see if anything had fallen on our house, I attributed the noise to 'snow thunder' - a phenomenon we get during rapid weather changes.Now that the snow is melting after 6 months of being on the ground, my husband and I could tour our grounds to survey the damage. I never expected one of our huge trees to have fallen over onto the pond. When we found this tree, we just stood there trying to figure what we do now. There are services that come in to clear this type of thing, but more and more there are companies that will pay you to log on your land. Now we are looking around the property to see if we have enough trees to have a company to thin them out and we could get PAID! That would be nice, and a lot less strain on the back - arms - shoulders, etc.
It was close to 60 degrees yesterday, and my husband's day off, so we started the clean-up. A beautiful day, but a lot of work. Chainsaw, reciprocating saw, shovel, pitchfork - we were armed! Old clothes, hats, safety glasses, gloves - we were ready! We were sweating! We were the rural cleaning force for clean yards everywhere! Well, our yard anyway...

We lost just about all our lilac trees and bushes due to the early snow in October, so they had to be cut down. I do not know if they can regrow, but 'people who know' say they may, but smaller. I am happy to say that part was easy. We also cut down an old pine tree in front of the bathroom and dining room window - amazing the light we get in those rooms now! We had high hopes of getting the entire yard of damage cleaned up in one day - right - sure! But I am proud of what we did get done before our exhaustion took over. This is where we have to admit we are middle aged and cannot get as much accomplished in one day.

And it snowed the next morning, as well as the morning of the first day of Spring. Makes it hard to be optimistic that Spring will really arrive soon. It seems to be here in name only.

To Everything, There is a Season...

Everyone gets to experience the traditional four seasons - summer, fall, winter, spring - but in the Poconos, we have many more seasons. Of course, there are the Hunting Season(s), something many people look forward to up here, as well as various Fishing Seasons (ice, trout, etc.), Camping Season, Boating Season - any season that gets the blood pumping in the followers of those activities. There are the sport seasons - Baseball, Football, Hockey, etc. But up here, we have some of our own special seasons:

Mud Season - comes right after the ice thaws and before the greenery starts. This season is especially appreciated by people with light colored rugs and new wood floors. Not much you can do about it and some communities celebrate it with special fairs and activities. An extra special attribute to the mud season is when it freezes again and makes for better slipping when driving or walking.

Road Repair Season - a special time that allows people from all walks of life to gather together on their way to -anywhere- to share in the joy and camaraderie that comes from the frustration of not getting where you are going. This season comes right after the Ice Season that causes other traffic delays, but is a contributing cause for Road Repair Season.

Ice Season (also known as Winter) - another source of frustration for drivers, and as mentioned above, closely allied with Road Repair Season. I give all the credit in the world to the plow drivers and salters, but they sometimes miss spots, or spots re-freeze, making for spectacular driving calisthenics. And, of course, all that freezing, thawing, salting and plowing leads us to...

Pot Hole Season - we have some of the most spectacular pot holes that I have ever witnessed in my years of driving. Axles have very little chance if it were not for the deft driving that a person develops up here.

However, worst pot hole that I have ever heard of occurred on the Belt Parkway in NYC. The traffic reports on the radio station went something like this:

10 after the hour= "We have a report of a pretty big pot hole on the Belt Parkway this morning. Be careful, as it is in the left lane."

20 after the hour= "We are getting a report that a Volkswagen Beetle as driven into the pot hole and has become stuck. That makes this a pretty big pot hole and we advise you to be careful and stay out of the left lane. NYC is sending out a crew to assess the situation."

40 after the hour= "Okay folks, this is a new one on me. The city has sent out the crew and they have put a flag on the car to alert traffic of its location. I guess they cannot get the car out, I don't know, but I would avoid the left lane of the Belt Parkway by any means possible!"

Sometimes I miss New York City traffic reports!

Clean-Up Season - before planting season, there is the traditional time for cleaning up after the ravages of Winter. As I said before, we had a lot of downed limbs and bent bushes from the ice storms. We also have some clean-up to the house and certainly some painting is in order soon. As far as raking the lawn of little bits and pieces, I prefer to leave that to the next season...

Windy Season - "March comes in like a lion," right? Well, we never raked our leaves because October must come in like a buffalo or other large animal. Someone got our leaves, but we got all the twigs and other roughage from the somewhere or somebody's lawn, but I have faith that the winds of March will just blow that stuff on along somewhere else. If not, in April, we rake - cannot rush these things.

Growing Season - I hope we can have one this year. It is shorter than I have been used to, but a couple of dear friends had a garden up here last year and the 'fruits of their labor' were wonderful. I hope we are as successful. But, of course, then we have to contend with deer, birds, etc. trying to eat our garden. Then will come...

Harvest Season - we hope...

Adaptations

I have noticed a phenomenon of 'hardening off' for people, animals, and plants during the cold winter months. I know many of our plants were severely damaged by our early, heavy, wet snow storm at the end of October - the plants had not had the opportunity to harden off yet to prepare for the snow. We have many broken limbs and bushes smashed by the weight of the snow caught in the leaves that had not fallen off yet - they just were not ready.

People get used to the cold as well and 'harden off' - we had a warm spell and most people were in shirt sleeves, no coats and shorts in temperatures that would have required a warm jacket on people who are not used to our often-bitter cold. Even now, I find we walk outside without a coat to tend to things that do not require a long time outside, but during the bitter temps we always put a coat on. By way of explanation, current air temperatures are now in the 30's during the day - much easier to handle than the 'teens and below that we have just lived through. We are hardened off. No guarantee the temperatures will not drop again, as snow is again predicted later this week. After all, the stupid groundhog did not see his shadow!

Birds get used to the cold somewhat, but when we have a break in the weather, they go crazy! Nice to walk outside and hear all that type of noise though. Some of the birds we have here have made adaptations that are very puzzling. We have a woodpecker who every year for the past two has tried to build a nest on our old, unused TV antennae. The antennae is, of course, a heavy aluminum type and has probably been attached to our chimney for 50 years. We have not taken it down because it is 'up there' and not hurting anything, and it is so well tethered in place with wires attached to adjacent buildings and other poles that we are afraid of starting a house-of-cards effect. So the woodpecker still tries to build a nest for a potential mate each spring and clangs his head on the metal trying to bore a hole in that thing. Annoying noise, but we admire his tenacity.

Another bird we had last year, and I hope comes back this year, provides moments of amusement for our cats (if you know about cats, moments of anything is an accomplishment - they get bored easily!) This bird is a bit of a clown, trying to sit on one of the guide wires for the power pole in our yard. The wire is attached to the ground at a 45 degree angle, but he still tries to perch on it, sliding down, getting back up, over and over again. On top of that, he is insisting that it is his right and this is his territory and swoops at anything that comes close to him. I am not afraid of him, but I do tend to wait until he flies away before I go outside. I just have these visions of the bird pecking me - I think it is Alfred Hitchcock damage. So I have adapted to him.

We will Swing Around

A phrase we hear a lot up here, "We will swing around to see you," is shorthand for 'we will come over whenever we get to it and when we want.' We hear this phrase uttered by friends, professionals, service personnel - and we find it a little maddening! We call up to get a repair for our hot water heater (which is new, but has taken a fit) and we explain to the manager/scheduler/wife that we need the plumber to come by at certain times so he can review the situation with my husband, who works evenings. So we get a phone call, after my husband has gone to work, that the plumber was going to swing by to assess the situation - now/today! So we call the manager/scheduler/wife, since we cannot call the plumber directly (cell phone service out here is another story) about the importance of seeing this guy at a certain time frames. "He is very busy," she says " putting in new tubs in condos, etc." That is very good and speaks highly of his abilities, but just 'swing around' anytime!

It is the culture up here, more relaxed and laid back. We got used to service people giving time frames in NJ, albeit very broad time frames, which they did not always adhere to. And it explains so much - why some places are open when they want, why you cannot reach individuals, why we have a veterinarian who comes to your house ('swings around') instead of you bringing the animal in. We have been late for appointments, not often, but a few times, and nobody gets upset. Worried, but not upset. In NJ, I was late for a Doctor appointment due to traffic and my Doctor was enraged! She lectured me about how it messed up her whole appointment schedule and never asked if I was okay. I apologized profusely, reminded her of how I have waited for her, but she was still incensed.

Our previous repair guy, a young man who has recently passed away, was always punctual, or I should say, always early! If he said 8 am, he was here at 7:30 - so he caught us in our night clothes more than once! He was from NY and had moved to escape as well. He had seen the 9/11 attacks from a roof in NYC, and that event and vision wore on him. His work was a personal mission, so everything had to be perfect - he would be heartbroken to know our water heater is acting up, since he installed it. But he often remarked about how people never kept appointments up here, or just showed up. We thought it was funny - now we understand.

Some of this 'swing around' stuff is charming. Our power/telephone pole is next to our garage, 400+ feet from the road, and I never thought about it until I looked out and saw a man climbing up the side of that pole early one morning. Of course, it belongs to the power company and they have every right to examine it, but I was getting dressed at the time! We are so far out, I do not have curtains in all the windows, especially if all they face is the woods, which is the side of the house where the pole is! After getting dressed and talking to the gentleman, I am pleased that they only certify the pole every five years. So he will not be swinging around for awhile.

And yes, some of our friends 'swing around' - we don't mind that. One of our friends yells at the house when he drives up "Are you dressed yet?" Charming...

More Introspection

I have been reflecting a lot these days - maybe it is a part of cabin fever. For you weather watchers, we are expecting a foot of snow in the next 24 hours, at least in the higher elevations, so that means here.

Anyway, introspectively, we have crossed a bridge in our country that I honestly never thought I would live to see. I remember the 'race riots' of the 1960's and the animosity that festered then. I also remember my father and oldest brother being the two biggest racists that I will ever know, my brother being the worst. If they were alive now, they would be sure the world is doomed.

My father was an "Archie Bunker" from All In The Family - they could have modeled the character after him. And yet, that was one of his favorite TV shows. I do not think he understood the main character was flawed; I think he thought he was right. My father hated certain ethnic groups - actually, I think he hated all ethnic groups - but he had an interesting array of friends. One of his best friends was actually a black man who was 'passin' - pretending to be Italian. My father never put that together, even when the daughter was very dark and had very curly hair. My mother told me about the guy having to do what was best for his family and I should not tell my father. The daughter was one of my friends in grade school and we never discussed the issue, as that was how it was done then.

We lived for a time near the Garden State Parkway, and during the riots in Asbury Park a gentleman's car broke down, so he came to our house to use the phone for help. He was very nervous, as he was an African American man entering into a white family's home, pretty far from other houses and in the middle of the night, amidst all the racial tension. My mother answered the door, let him in and gave him a cup of coffee and a couple of aspirin. After he took the aspirin, he panicked and was obviously afraid that my mother had poisoned him. It took a lot to reassure him that there was nothing wrong. I remember pondering how he was as frightened of us as we had been taught to be frightened of him. My father was asleep upstairs during all this. Being deaf, he did not hear anything, and as usual, my mother said I should never tell my father about the incident. But it made me realize that this was a person, not the stereotype that my father, and later my brother, preached about.

My father gave me a lecture once on who to marry. By the time he was done, there was pretty much nobody left! No Catholics, no Jews, no Blacks, no Orientals, etc. I took it all to mean that nobody was good enough for his little girl, but he was serious and threatened dis-ownment if I crossed any of the lines. I will say here, the lines were crossed...

My brother was so prejudiced that he would quit jobs if he were forced to work with someone outside his beliefs. And yet his first marriage was to a woman from a foreign country! Hard to figure, but I am sure he would threaten to move to Canada if he were alive today.

I am sure there are people still like my father and brother today. I hope they are more open to a dialogue to resolve their issues. Or they at least stay quiet.

Okay, This is Cold!

Seems I talk about the weather a lot - and I do! I talk to my friends and they always ask "How cold is it?" I think it makes them feel better about the moderate amount of cold that they have in NJ or wherever. But this week - this is cold! Below zero air temperature and who knows what wind chill. Has not been this cold since 2005, as the local weather caster, Joe Snedeker, likes to point out - and we know how we can trust weather people! He did make one point - people are proud of their cold. It is a competition to see who can take home the imaginary prize for coldest temperature. I think today was minus 15! Okay, you win!

Reminds me of how cold it was when we were looking for this house - should have been a clue, huh? We had the one house we called the 'ice house,' whose driveway was so slick with ice we had to hold on to each other to get back to the car - human-chain style. This week my hubby and I were walking to the bottom of our hill to get to the car and were reminded of that incident as I slipped and grabbed him by the collar, chocking him, to get my balance. We were fine, but he did not appreciate being used as a prop to hold me up! To explain, we park at the bottom of the driveway so there is not so much to shovel when it snows (note 'when,' not 'if'). One detail - when the driveway is all ice, how do we get to the car? Slide, Charlie Brown, slide!

We bought a snow blower yesterday - finally. We give up.

A Trip to IKEA

We have many places to shop up here, but we do not have any place like IKEA. I am a big fan of that store; it amazes me how the furniture and home goods are designed for limited incomes and space. After all, I am frugal (frugal=cheap), and my husband and I have gotten some pretty good deals in the things we need over the years, especially at their original Plymouth Meeting store. This time, we needed a new mattress.

We have purchased IKEA mattresses before; they are usually well suited for our body frames and the cost is affordable. The nearest IKEA is Elizabeth, NJ, so we planned a day trip on a weekday to avoid the crowds. I looked up the directions on their website, thinking they may have insight into a shorter/faster route. I really should know better! After a tour of the Ironbound section of Newark, NJ - following the directions as written - we arrived at the store in time for lunch. Of course, the weekend crowds had depleted the menu items available in the restaurant, so we had some of what was available. Swedish meatballs are always good, right?

Anyone who has purchased a mattress knows you have to do a lot of laying down, and try each type available. After choosing the mattress, we had to load it into the car. Did I mention we have a Toyota? It has flip down rear seats, but this was a queen-size mattress. It would have fit, too, since the mattress is sold rolled and shrink-wrapped - if the car did not have this area behind the seats that frames in the opening to the trunk - if that were not there, we would have simply slipped it into the car. A friendly IKEA employee offered to help, so there were three of us trying to get this inner-spring mattress into a Toyota trunk, yelling at the top of our lungs at each other. The yelling was because the Elizabeth IKEA is next to Newark airport and it was prime-time in jet landing land! At one point my husband pulled the poor employee off his feet (he was a little guy) when he did not hear that my husband planned to spin the mattress around. I was thinking by this time, 'if I see this on one of those hidden camera shows...'

Tying the mattress to the top of the car is not a good idea - we did that once years ago and drove around the Washington, DC Beltway with my husband holding the thing on when a truck sent an updraft and almost sent our mattress (and car) into the next state. We learned then, and several times again with other items, that there always has to be a better way than tying anything on top of the car.

We came home a more tried and true way, but of course now we hit the real rush hour for people coming home from work. So we are in heavy traffic almost all the way home with a mattress sticking out of the trunk of the car. When we reached home, we were so exhausted from the noise, traffic, general stress, that we went to bed like a school night. After all, the next day, we were expecting more snow!

By the way, we did not get snow - we got freezing rain and ice. Much worse for driving. However, I got up last night around 4 am to see the moon coming in our west-facing window and reflecting off the ice covered trees. Sparkling ice crystals and brilliant white snow - Hollywood could not have created a more beautiful scene.