From The Mommybot

Yesterday was cold, today was...60.  The erratic temps are apparently continuing on from the summer.

Went to Spokane yesterday for my monthly errands.  I felt a sense of urgency so left here at 8 am, and got back about 6 pm, soon after dark.  Was cold, but the ice on my car's windshield was just slush and taken care of easily by the wipers.

The priority was getting the car as ready for winter as I could afford, which didn't include a radiator flush, just an oil change and tires diagonally rotated.  The tires took the longest.  I had a couple hours to kill so I walked down the road a ways and went to a car parts store where I bought a tire gauge and some gas additive, and the feed store next to it where I met an odd 5 month old kitten that if I had the room, the money, and no cat who is prone to greet others by socking them in the eye, I'd have bought her for the $30 they were asking to cover her worming and shots.  She was odd in that she was terrified of moving fingers (she hid in her boxes with her ears flat to the sides, shaking a little - not the typical 'Ima gonna pounce!' excitement) but when they stopped moving she would venture out and attack.  As soon as they moved again, she retreated.  She was also odd in her coloring - black and white, but white hairs were interspersed evenly throughout the black, giving her black a 'roan' appearance. 

I think 'Tohru' would suit her.  But only if I win the lottery first.

When I got back to the tire place, I sat down to read the local paper, and found an ad for a car that sounds almost identical to mine save for being a year younger with 100 thou less miles (my next oil change will be at 202 thou.  And I put all but 25 thou of that on it.  Really.).  And most likely what I like to refer to as the 'baboon butt' redesign.  And for about the same amount the transmission rebuild is going to cost.  It will probably be gone by the time I have anything close to that money, tho.  Still, I picked up a copy of the paper later at Borders when I couldn't find any news stand thingies that still had any, along with a cheap copy of Fruits Basket #1.  There was also an ad in there for a Suzuki Swift that sounded like a good little car for less, but its my understanding their lack of weight and more compact wheelbase (as opposed to the Neon's wide and low one) tends to be detrimental when you're driving on packed snow and ice, which is what the northern fifty miles of this highway is for several months a year.  Well, that and it would crumple like a tin can in the kinds of accidents my Neon has survived with animals.

After that I jammed on over to Walmart for oil and groceries, then down to Petco where I got into an amusing conversation about large male cats and challenge of finding litterboxes they can use, then Fresh Abundance where I was hoping to get some free range organic turkey quarters but had to settle for a little one pound of grassfed non-range beef, Dr. Bronner's, and my usual green smoothie (ended up getting a conventionally grown turkey quarter today at my local grocery).  Then back up the road to a different Jiffy Lube than the one I've been using for the last 5 years, since they were no longer allowed to give me much of a discount for bringing my own oil (just $3 off for not using their oil, are you kidding me, on top of their signature service not coming back down from $50??).  The shop I went to yesterday, however, didn't charge me anything at all for oil since I brought it in, and their signature service was SLIGHTLY less expensive.  Was still more than I wanted to pay, but my car at least needed fresh oil and fluids topped off, and new, less crappy wiper blades.  I did check with other cheaper shops in the area, but they were all booked until the next week.  Oh well.  I wish they'd come back down to $19 again.  Or even CLOSE to that.  :(

Then it was Grocery Outlet (I loves me Grocery Outlet!  They even get organic surplus stuff now!) then back to Walmart to get an air filter and a couple other things I forgot.  I do the replacement of the air filter myself 'cause it takes all of about 2 minutes, despite what Jiffy Lube claims.  I did forget to actually do it today, tho.

Nothing exciting about Halloween this year...except I actually got Trick or Treaters!  First time since I moved here back in 2005.  Just a handful, tho, and the big kids outnumbered the small.  Luckily I hadn't eaten all the Smarties!  I'm addicted to those damn Smarties...the American ones, sugary circular disks served up in cellophane twisted on the ends.  I'm told the Canadians know them as Rockets, but since I haven't gone to Nelson in several months I couldn't verify that.

Picked up a new gc, too, dragged into the car by one of my current fosters.  He was very very quiet and just sat in a corner...until he was told he was allowed to play and ask questions and generally be a little boy, and he's just gone ape all over that.  From what I can deduce, he was a little white boy who was in a very strict home where he wasn't allowed to be a kid, just a seat decoration who had to ask permission to do everything.  He completely lit up when he found out he could play with the toys here as much as he wanted, and even take them to bed with him.  :)

--Moony

Well, just a few days to November, and the broccoli and carrots as well as the strawberries and yarrow are still alive outside:And a President who doesn't support organic like his wife does.

--Moony

The last two days I've caught two black Labs and returned them to their owners...well, the second only sort of, 'cause no one knew the dog but one of the local pastors had had a really annoying barky black dog in his yard when I lived in the apartments nearby and the gate to his yard had a broken latch and the dog had an anti-bark collar on, so I guesstimated the dog was his and left her in there (the gate was tight enough to close without the latch).  Last night I spent a few hours talking to the owner of a black Lab that I helped catch, because he'd been chasing the dog all day and was so tired he had just pretty much collapsed and was sitting against his trailer calling the dog kinda weakly.  Everybody knew THAT Lab, tho, including me.  Giant 2 year old puppy named Sam.  His owner gave me some seeds from the deep purple hollyhocks his grandparents had planted many many decades ago, and invited me to garden over there next summer if he's still there.  I probably won't, but I suspect that won't happen anyway.  Its actually a nice corner lot with a somewhat dilapidated single wide trailer on it, but apparently people are interested in buying.

Today its very nice, in fact its spring-nice.  Warm breezes and all.  I'm wondering if this long winter is going to start late like the last couple of years and last loooooong into spring.

--Moony

For some reason the wall on the outside of my apartment smells like wet paint, especially in my closed off bedroom.  I contacted my manager and she came and smelled it, too, but we couldn't figure out the source, other than it might have been the guvmint came in and sprayed around the buildings before it rained, and it washed down under then might have soaked into the wall.  Same wall the carpenter ants like to enter through, too.

She told me, tho, that I totally missed a town event yesterday when I answered the Creator's urge to get out of town for a while.  I missed Mel Gibson walking around town.  Yep, THAT Mel Gibson.  Apparently they're scouting locations, or might already be filming up above the town (unlikely since we'd have probably seen them scouting before this).

--Moony

My building manager stopped by about half an hour ago, so I told her about the incident and she recommended I write up a report, so I did and its in her hands now.  She also told me that he was drunk yesterday, and is drunk pretty much most of the time.  He also calls her all the time, asking her to come over, bring him things, etc.  She's pretty cool.

Now, I'm cooking cherry cola chicken and plan to put some of it on a pizza.  The chicken takes over 3 hours, with turning it over every 30 minutes, but its worth it.  Darn, I'm hungry already! :9

--Zhora

Yesterday was okay except for two things.

Madeline is having a relapse, so she's back on the Pepcid.  She's having a bit better day, playing some, tho she's still sleeping a lot.  And she woke me up at 7am instead of 5.

The other was that I found out that the neighbor of mine that looked kind of nice in a Dr. Kevin Fitzgerald kind of way (If you've ever seen Emergency Vets or any of its sequels he's the one with the abundant white hair and 'stache)...is a creep.  He decided to walk along with me yesterday as I was returning from the store.  Ostensibly it was to chat, asking about my cat, which would have been fine...had he not been walking half a step behind so he could keep glancing at my butt where he thought I couldn't see.  Of course any alert woman watches out of the corner of her eye when a guy hangs back like that.  Plus he kept referring to me as 'honey' and 'sweetheart' despite this having been the first time we ever talked at all.  When we came to the walkway for my apartment he asked my name then leaned inappropriately close (as in two inches from the top of my chest close - I was wearing a black t-shirt so he didn't get a look at anything) and called me 'honey' as he moved off.  I told him I didn't like people I just met calling me that so he added 'ma'am' to the repertoire.

So I've decided that my walking stick will be named 'Nutcruncher' and I will introduce him to it at the next opportunity.  I will introduce his nuts to it only if necessary after that.

--Zhora

20% chance of snow this evening and tonight, and 40% chance tomorrow of sleet and snow, with freezing rain for Wednesday.  I still don't have anything to put the dirt from the red muckbucket and wooden drawers in.  Might just have to cover them up and put them in the storage unit like they are.  Eh...no not the drawers - if they break it would be a big mess in my storage unit.  Maybe I'll just toss them under the porch in a little bit.  My Scarlet Keeper carrots and the broccoli are still in it...but I guess I'll have to give up on getting any seeds from the broccoli, as they're still just green, and pick the carrots tonight.  The Purple Dragons in the muckbucket can probably hold out a bit longer.  Both are covered with towels and the broccoli a garbage bag, and the muckbucket is next to the door so it shouldn't freeze yet.

I picked some of the apples off the apple trees out front, as many as I could knock off with my 6 foot walking stick.  There are at least a dozen or more still on the tree but they'll have to be picked via ladder by the maintenance man.  I walked around to a few neighbors and gave them most of the apples.  They're red and yellow striped and kinda tart along with sweet in the way Granny Smiths are, but no one still knows what variety they are.

It doesn't look like my tarp is going to work for covering my car because its too small, but since I was out there trying it out, the new maintenance man (ex husband of the new manager) offered to bring a tarp he has that should be big enough to cover my entire car.  I'm also going to have to figure out where to park it off the street since there's a possibility it will break down.  I want to be able to get it out if needed, but I also don't want to make the transmission have to do as much work as it did the last two winters with having to be moved from one side of the street to the other every day so the snow plow could do its job.

--Moony

GARDEN: the thyme, rosemary, oregano, feverfew, and tobacco have joined the aloe indoors, and except for the rosemary they're doing well.  I could not believe that nowhere in my area had 7 or 8" pans for pots (you know, the clear, cheap ones), so I improvised by bringing in the white wire shelf and stacking them instead of arranging them around the light like I wanted to, and putting the thyme and rosemary in the lid of a pan I threw away.  Unfortunately the rosemary didn't drain as well as I thought it would when I watered them after bringing them in, so its not terribly happy right now.  But its still alive at least, and should recover.  I'll have a picture up soon.

COMPUTER: The HD is physically fine, the 'Open the Gates' files are still corrupted.  I haven't set up the new machine yet because I am hoping to aquire a small, rolling desk from the secondhand store across the street to put my TV and components on and then move my shelves and other things around.  I'm waiting to see if the person consigning it will sell it for $5 instead of the $10 its listed at.  Its one of those cheap pressboard ones you get at Office Depot and very small, so I don't want to pay $10 for a used one.  I might, but I don't want to if I don't have to.  I think the guy had it in the flea market sale back in September for $5, but I could be wrong.

ME: Okay.  Have an apartment inspection tomorrow, so I have to clean a couple more things, but I have kind of an upset tummy from waking up with a headache.

--Moony

Today was payday, so I headed off to the city for errands.  The biggest being seeing if I could locate an acceptable new monitor for around $50, the money I'd usually have been able to put in savings.  And I did, at the liquidation store.  A used but checked out okay Sylvania 20 inch LCD.  It has one dark gray spot, and wiggly lines while it warms up, but the colors are working fine, so I can live with it.  

The other was to look for Red Dwarf DVDs at the pawn shops.  I was in a pretty crappy mood last night and watching my RD VHS tapes always cheers me up.  But I only have about a third of them, and a Season 5 DVD and I figured people would be dumping them with the rest of their regular DVDs in favor of Blu Ray and HD...but nope. :(  I did find Kung Fu Panda, tho, Willow, the second volume of the first .hack//sign series, and Spider-man and Galaxy Quest which I mostly needed to replace my VHS.  Oh, and the South Park movie, also needed to replace my deteriorating VHS.

I was in a very sad mood the whole morning with no good reason except for maybe PMS. Eventually I remembered to shield myself from to test whether it was coming from me or I was picking it up from someone else, and I was picking it up from someone else, from some of the entities I know.  I got that 'my father has died' and kind of freaked out 'Don't tell me such a thing until I'm somewhere I can verify it!' tho thinking on it later...I was translating 'my' to my own point of view, when it wasn't MY 'my' but the other person's.  That's one thing that can be hard for empathic people to remember, that its not always your own emotions and thoughts, and that you must have enough objectivity while experiencing it to check.  If shielding dulls or eliminates the feeling, its not yours.

I did call my parents and make sure that everything was okay anyway.  They'd been trying to call me anyway, before they leave for their France trip on Friday.  We had a good talk about how my Dad is doing (much better, thank you :) ) my Mom is doing, what I'm doing, what they're going to do in France.  They're going to do another Rick Steve's tour, with added on visits to where my mother's ancestors came from, which happens to be where rare Poitou donkeys come from, too.  Look 'em up, they're neat.

--Moony

Some days have good points, and really sucky points. 

Good: cancelled the mammogram that my nurse health provider talked me into and I had a really bad feeling about; took a little drive to a nearby town 'cause my car needed it; rearranged part of my living room.

Bad: got home on fumes and had to transfer a few bucks out of my increasingly anemic savings account to have enough gas to get to the gas station tomorrow, and in doing so noticed that my gas gauge may be off; I got into a tiff on a small forum I'm on, only to find out I'm in the wrong because of information I had no access to, which brought up the hurt I get when left out of things by 'friends'.  I pushed the link down my bookmark list so I'm not tempted to go there for a while - I think I need a break; and the worst - my monitor was flickering.

--Moony

Tomorrow is supposed to be a 'red flag' day, aka hot as hell and dry.

But Tuesday is supposed to possibly have snow showers.

Hope the bats get out of here quickly.  They were apparently made sleepy by the low temps, as I heard them chirping at eachother last night so they haven't left.  Of course if they don't, I hope the buildings are warm enough for them.

--Moony

If you ever get a chance to eat a Sweet Chocolate pepper, do so.  They have a distinctive, delicious fruity flavor.  Like green peppers cooked in sweet and sour sauce.

I picked the Minicor carrots today, got about a hundred.  None of them are full size, about half-size or more, and half of them are the size of large lima beans.

The tiny ones make an interesting stir fry. :)  The rest are still drying outside.

--Moony

Looks like I've got most of my Christmas shopping done, but not as much as I'd hoped.  The flea market and vendors at our local street fair have been a great resource for me that way the last few years, finding really cool stuff for not much money.  But not so much this year.  Even tho I usually buy ahead, I just haven't been doing it as much this year.  I have a bad gut feeling about Christmas, really.

My neighbor asked if Madeline was okay, since she and her grandchildren hadn't seen her out on her tie for several days.  I don't put her out if I don't want to get dressed, like I didn't yesterday. In fact, I slept most of the day away.  She's doing fine after that day o' barf.

Me, I spent last night feverish to the point of sweating, and kicking myself for not ordering earlier the herbs I KNEW I needed to.  Of course, I did that last night, while also sucking down echinaea and Vit C tea.  I feel better today, but my savings are going down the drain.

--Moony

Yep, its possible!

--Moony

Madeline started upchucking this morning, so I gave her some Pepcid.  Then I went and snagged myself some animos because I realized I haven't been eating enough protein lately and catching up with it would suck my savings and my annoyance level would rise.

I'd left her loose in the apartment, which went fine.  When I got home, she wanted to go outside and I put her outside on her tether.

This went fine, too...until after lunch.  See, I leave the door open so she can come back in, only she decided to come back in specifically to barf, all over her cat tree, with extra helpings on the carpet right inside the door.  So I put cat and cat tree outside while I cleaned up the carpet and the cat tree.  She was still barfing, so I decided to leave her out there until she was done, and came back in and got on the computer, closing the screen door behind me.

Then I heard it.  About 5 feet behind me.  I turned around to check on her.

To find she'd pushed out a corner of the screen in order to COME BACK INSIDE TO BARF. 

And she did it to the inside corner, which will be hard to temporarily repair until HUD replaces it.  The door already has an open corner where she busted through last year, but I was able to flip the door so its on the top corner.  Not this time, obviously.

And terrific...upon turning in the work order paperwork, I've been informed that I will be charged for it.

--Moony

Called the doc in Seattle again.  Found out that the only day she actually tried to call was not only the one day I was out shopping all day, but that it was her LAST day as well.  And I had to repeatedly tell the receptionist, who I didn't recognize, that no, I didn't want an appointment, I'm on the other side of the state, I wanted to talk to the current doc on the freakin' phone.  The doc who is..only there on Fridays.  Sigh.

I wish the damn VA would just put a women's clinic together for this side of the state already!

I think I may be low on aminos - all the things I've had cravings for the last few days have been animo related (meat, corn, dairy products) and I haven't been eating a lot of protein lately.  but I made a purchase I shouldn't have, a set of Animated dinobots and assorted Star Wars things but I made the offer and I stand by them, and will have to dip into the savings for aminos and vitamins.  Also snagged gray Shockwave for $5 off at Kmart, and their last set of G1 Robot Heroes.  That last I almost got to walk out the door with for free if I hadn't decided to look and see exactly how much I paid for Shockwave and noticed that the cashier had forgotten to scan them before she put them in the bag.

In other shopping news, I was skunked at the comic shop and Barnes & Noble in the mall as far as the Allspark Almanac, but I went to the comic's sister store and while unsuccessfully looking for it on the 'Newly Arrived' table, I spotted it on the IDW shelf!  Yay!!!  Yes, it is very very fangasmy!  After that it was to the organic store for a yummy green smoothie, then the sewing machine store with the employee who apparently hadn't had her coffee yet because she was rather rude when I didn't know right offhand what kind of needles my machine takes.  Stopped at the Grocery Outlet and stocked up on canned goods after that, then headed home because I was getting tired.  There were a couple of stops at feed stores on the way in an attempt to get some polybags for holding my container dirt when I break down my planters, but no go there.

Arrived  home tired, and still haven't cleaned the kitchen or put the cans away, then went to the movie mentioned in last post.  The gc's started heckling it, it was that bad...

--Moony

I decided to cut down my broccoli today, and feed it to the worms.  With the heat the leaves turned very bitter, and the stems were pretty woody, so I left the one that I want to get seed from ('cause I'm really curious about whether its a crossbred or not) and one to shade the Scarlet Keeper carrots who'd be shocked by suddenly getting a lot of light.

I didn't cover the sweet potato and pepper last night, as the forecast was for a 51 degree low, but I looked at the history this morning and it went down to 38!  Argh!  The pepper was no worse for wear, but the sweet potato did have some burnt edges (along with all the holes from buggies!).  Since its not terribly hot today, I'm going to assume they'll need covering again tonight.

I may go out a bit later and plant some of the actual kale seeds I bought a couple weeks ago in the spot where the broccoli was...the same spot that still has the 'Kale' marker, even. XD  But I've been suffering from low energy, and do need to clean the kitchen finally, and might go to the post office again.

--Moony

( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )

Seems like I hear that at least once every time I take Madeline with me on the two block walk to the post office.  People are just darned amazed that a cat will willingly walk on a leash.  Apparently the idea of training cats just blows people's minds, too...generally people who've never bothered beyond the litterbox, if that.

She actually hates going in the building once we get there, but she gives me the 'you're leaving meeee?' look and meow if I leave her behind on her tether.  Of course she also doesn't like to encounter dogs, but we usually don't have a problem with that as most people (MOST) that bring their dogs to the post office have them on a leash, too.

She panics quite a bit still, but I've applied something I learned when training Brawn to her.  When a horse is calm, their head is low, neck even with their back or lower.  If you teach them to give to pressure on the upper neck on or near their poll (for non-horsey types, that's the bump between their ears), you can induce that state of calmness in a fractious horse.  One thing a cat does when they're calming down in a stressful situation is sit.  So...yes, I've taught Madeline to sit on command.  Its handy, just like it is with dogs, for keeping her from trying to dart out in the street as well as getting her to calm down. :)

I got my TFA: The Arrival today, so decided to sit on a bench up the street and read it and have her watch people, but it started sprinkling.  Madeline was running as much as possible home...but guess who decided twenty feet from the porch to stop dead?  Yep. :P

--Moony

Using Lemon Leftovers (rind) to Make a Simple, Organic Skin Balm

Preliminary Injunction to Halt Mandatory Vaccinations Issued

Cancer is Getting Harder to Beat and Avoid

Tired again today.  Very tired.  Wish I had the money for the gas to drive to Spokane and get a blood test, see if I'm anemic, but I've gotta save that for the trip down there next week.  Its raining, too, and nice and comfy 70's. 

Decided to throw out my Fatal Fury:Legend of the Hungry Wolf tape because all the bloody violence scared one of the gc's so bad last night he ran and hid for the entirety of the film, and I couldn't think of any redeeming value the film had.  The Motion Picture had more story and better music, but I may have sold it.  Regardless, the thing I liked best in the entire series, the song 'Oh Angel', I've had as an MP3 for years.

--Moony