Up a Creek in Lower Slower Delaware

Dr Pepper, What Happened?

August 29, 2008

Has it changed? Or is it me? I used to like Dr Pepper. I’d get it when we stopped for fast food. Since I retired, I have plenty of time to cook so I hadn’t tasted it much in the last few years. A few weeks ago, we were out doing errands and I was rather tired so I stopped for burgers and I got Dr Pepper. It seemed weak, but I thought it was from all the ice. The other day, Doug picked up a case of Dr Pepper at the supermarket. He has always been a Dr Pepper fan. He said to try some. Even straight from the can, it did not have the burst of flavor that I have come to expect. It’s kind of—–boring. What happened?

Be sure to get my good side.

I decided to work on my quilt this afternoon. I needed to lay it out on the floor so I folded up my cutting table so I would have plenty of room and light. Zip took this as a sign for a photo op so here you are. Maude could have cared less.

I forgot to take pictures of my gloves, not that I have gotten that much done on them anyway.

Tags: Dr Pepper, Maude, Sanquhar gloves, Zippo
Posted in Knitting, my pets, Sewing | 1 Comment »

Two Lifetimes Ago

August 28, 2008

I lived in Martinez, CA. It was a nice friendly little town. I liked living there. What I didn’t like was my husband. He made me crazy. So I took my two babies and came back to Baltimore. I went back once when my mother-in-law was dying of cancer. She told me I did the right thing. Her son was stupid. She made me feel so much better. I still think about her. She was always so nice to me. I was happy that she got a chance to see her grandchildren again.

Sometimes, I think about the old couple who lived down the lane from us. You could not see the house unless you were standing out front. Mr had the whole yard planted with all kinds of vegetables and herbs and flowers. My back yard was planted with corn. Every morning, there would be a bucket of fresh vegetables on my porch. He took me around his yard and showed my where onions, garlic, peppers, herbs, etc, were stored. When I could I would go visit Mrs. I’d cut through the side yard trying not to step on anything including Mr who took his siesta on the ground. Mrs was in a wheelchair. She never told me why and I never asked. The house had no steps and all the doorways were wide. She said Mr built it that way for her. She would fix iced tea and usually had homemade cookies and I would talk about the babies. I really liked her. But the most memorable thing about her were her dogs. She had six or eight chihuahuas. They were hard to count and they were all the same honey color. And they were all very well trained. They did all kinds of things, not just tricks. They were helpful. They were fascinating.

Tags: old neighbors
Posted in Family and Friends, Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

I Am SO Full!

August 27, 2008

I went to the dentist this morning to get some work done on my lower plate. They took out the liner and put in a new one. Then, I went to the mall and got a haircut. The last haircut I had was awful. I went to a new place in town and I will never go back. I hate to have to drive 20 miles just to get a haircut, but what do you do? My hair looks good, but I still have a few inches of color in it. It’s not very gray and the color I used wasn’t dark so it really doesn’t look bad at all. It was about 1PM by then and I was really hungry. I got an orange smoothie and headed home. Along the way, I stopped at a roadside stand and bought blueberries, Lima beans and corn.

Doug wanted hamburgers with mushrooms and onions in gravy, mashed potatoes and corn. I could never make this again and be perfectly happy, but he loves it so I make it occasionally. And I did have some nice ground sirloin. He ate three ears of corn and I had one. How does he do it? He just had a physical and blood work and all is well. I can’t eat like that. It’s disgusting!

Here, I am just about to start on the middle finger of my gloves. I made the thumb shorter than it was supposed to be. It was too long. I worked on the finger at the dentist. It is the the same width as the first finger. It was easier to figure out this time.

Tags: Add new tag, dentist, Sanquhar gloves, supper
Posted in Family and Friends, Knitting | 1 Comment »

Yesterday was Pretty Lame

August 26, 2008

I know. I wasn’t in the mood. I wanted to get to bed early, but it didn’t happen. It got humidduring the night and we had to turn the air on this morning. Our morning walk was pretty awful and we were glad to get back. We’ve been spoiled by all the lovely weather.

The index finger is finished except for the sewing. I prefer to only get my needle out when it is absolutely necessary. It was supposed to be three squares wide and high. That made it way too big. I like my gloves to fit. I do have gloves that are too big, but they go over my other gloves. I don’t do that much anymore because I don’t find myself standing around in the cold waiting for public transportation. I have nothing against it. It’s just that I no longer have to wait for the 0530AM train in the middle of winter. Yeah. OK. Let’s get back to the finger. It wound up being 2 and 2/3 squares wide. The third that is missing is not noticeable because it is on the inside by the middle finger. The directions also called for three complete squares high before starting the decrease. I started decreasing in the third row of blocks. I decreased in the full ones and started decreasing in the 2/3 block when it had the same number of stitches. It turned out very well and fits perfectly.

I have since started the thumb which was also too big so it is being redone. One of the nice things about gloves is mistakes are so little.

Posted in Knitting | 2 Comments »

Do You Have Your Ducks in a Row?

August 24, 2008

I’ve been working on it, but they won’t listen.

Tags: ducks
Posted in Stuff | 1 Comment »

A Little Humid and Overcast

August 24, 2008

My knees were not happy today. As a matter of fact, they woke me up at 4:50 this morning. I didn’t walk very far either. At least it never got over 80 degrees and a very nice breeze came through all afternoon. I got the index finger on my gloves done, but I didn’t like it and tore it out. I started again and it looks much better.

: one finger

Posted in Knitting | Comments Off on A Little Humid and Overcast

Venting

August 23, 2008

I’m glad I did it. I feel so much better today.

I finally tackled the weedy mess on the other side of the garage. I am getting some Iris and Daffodil bulbs from Kevin in the fall and I want to put the Iris there. I found an old mostly dead rose bush so I cut it way back. We’ll see on that. I like roses, but not the thorns. There are also two ugly, prickly, little bushes that I think I will dig up.

I didn’t get much knitting done and I didn’t take a picture.

Elvis and Maude

: a good day for turtles

Tags: turtles
Posted in my pets, Stuff | 1 Comment »

Measles Vaccinations

August 22, 2008

Well, I’m all worked up now. I just read about an increase in measles. Why? Why? Why? There is a wonderful vaccine out there people. Don’t you know what this disease can do? Do you know what it can do to your unborn child? How can you be so stupid? Come here. Let me knock some sense into you with this brick wall here! When I hear about crap like this Ijust get so upset. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. But what do I know? I’m just an old woman. I do know one thing. If there had been a measles vaccine when I was young, I would be the mother of three live, healthy children, not two.

OK. Here’s what you came to see. It was a great day and I got a fair amount done.

Snaquhar Gloves

Tags: measles vaccine, Sanquhar gloves
Posted in Family and Friends, Knitting | 2 Comments »

What Can I Say? Another Great Day

August 21, 2008

I don’t think it got up to 80 today. The geese seem confused. Little groups of them are flying around in different directions with their horns blasting. Can you imagine what they’d be like if they had drivers licenses? I would like to say something about Canadians here, but I won’t.

Sanquhar Gloves

As you can see, much progress was made on my gloves. I even made it through the dreaded thumb gusset.

Maude helping

Tags: Canada geese, Sanquhar gloves
Posted in Knitting | 3 Comments »

Finished Quilt Back

August 20, 2008

quilt back

It was hot again today so I was able to finish my quilt back. And it is the exactly right size. Sometimes, I am so good, I can’t stand myself. It isn’t even a 1/4 inch off anywhere. Now, I have to sandwich it together, which sucks. It means I’ll have to completely clean off my cutting table. Trying to do it on the floor would kill me. I also have to decide how I am going to quilt it. I never done anything this big before.

I have got to take a better picture of the top

Doug is not stomping on Gus. He is about to rub his belly. No wonder he follows him everywhere.

Tags: quilt back
Posted in my pets, Sewing | Comments Off on Finished Quilt Back