Sep 14

Ask Granny

Why are there three 10 gallon buckets of tomatoes in the kitchen?

  • Papa and I picked them

Why did you pick so many tomatoes?

  • I can’t let them go to waste

I’ll try again, why did you plant so many tomatoes?

  • I want to have enough, you never know how the plants will do.

How did the plants do last year?

  • Well

The past 5 years?

  • Well

The past 10 years?

  • Well

What makes you think they might not do well?

  • They didn’t do well in the garden at our previous home up north.

What were the soil, temperatures and other factors like at your previous home?

  • OK, I get the point.  But, some things I learned are just harder to get over than others.  I know the soil is better, the temperature is warmer making the growing season longer, I have more time since my children are grown, and on and on and on.  But I learned that I wouldn’t have enough tomatoes if I didn’t plan enough through the sad experience of not having enough over 17 years ago.

Have you really been in Troy for 17 years?

  • That’s a question for another day, I have some tomato juice to make.

Sep 13

Cats

I have mixed feelings about the cats.  I really can’t imagine live without them, I’ve had one – at least for most of my stay-at-home lives.  Some days, however, I get real tired of them and wonder where I could send them.

 There are two cats in this house, and I don’t own any, and I own both.  Cats are a crazy independent animal, capable of being both yours and not yours as they see fit.  Papa and I were gone a lot this summer, and the cats missed us.  When we came home, they were hard to get rid of, always on the bed, or the seat we wanted to sit in, or our laps.  This is because I am the most reliable household member.  For the most part, I get up at the same time each day, fill the food and water dishes, clean the litter boxes and hang around to provide further entertainment. Not saying much, is it?  But, it’s what a cat likes, consistency. 

I would like a little of the same from them, but I can’t get it.  When I’m sad, I want a cat in my lap, not when I’m trying to write, compose, or read.  When I want to make the bed, I don’t need a cat’s help.  When I put my jeans on the dresser to wear again (pretty frequent in the cool weather when I run out just for a minute and come back home), I don’t want white cat hair on them.  When I’m washing I don’t need a cat in the basement, it’s a pain to find her and bring her back up.

A couple of nights ago, Papa and I had just fallen asleep.  We woke up to the noise of a cat playing with a clear plastic sewing machine bobbin on the laminate floor outside our room.  I said a few choice words, got up, found the toy and put in on my dresser, with my jeans.  This morning, I’m carrying things around, trying to put them away.  I put away most things on the top of the dresser, but the jeans had to stay till I want to go to the store, perhaps tomorrow.  The cat that likes the bobbin found it and started to roll it around on the floor again.  She noticed I was interested, and took it over to store in my shoe.  Then, when I was interested again she carried it elsewhere.

These cats have toys, lots of them.  But we wasted our money.

Sep 12

Things I can’t do anything about.

  1. Upgrading Scripts
    I’m tired of upgrading. I’ve got a few scripts that seem to require more attention than I wish to give.
  2. Weather
    Baby, it’s suddenly very cold outside. I need a warm coat, some thick socks, and some campfire wood.
  3. Mechanical answering systems with question after question
    Is there ever a question you want to hear?
  4. Package delivery issues
    I’m getting empty boxes to return some receivers to Dish Network. They are crushed. DUH..they’re pretty empty except for the crushed Styrofoam inside.

Remedy for scripts–. Well, even though I’m tired, I did the upgrades. No choice, no remedy except not to run them

Remedy for the weather–. Go through clothing. Put away shorts, get out long underwear. I don’t want to do this, but I will. I also took out the fans, closed all the windows and I’m thinking of a thick quilt.

We recently changed TV and Internet providers, I guess you could get the hint. We are the proud owners of a service called U-Verse. It’s a little different from satellite TV, which we’ve had for 4-1/2 years. I have been wanting it since I heard about it, something about new stuff makes me very happy.

Which brings us the the mechanical answering devices. I hate ’em. I also hate the communicating with the foreign sounding customer reps that answer – provided I can ever work through the menu-maze. I’ve been trying to get boxes from Dish Network. UPS is delivering them, but some are crushed, and I haven’t gotten enough good ones yet. I’ve been waiting, and calling, since September 4th. Their 10 days (that they told me it would take to get the boxes) is almost up, and I have 2 usable cartons.

Cross your fingers, it’s not looking to bright.

Sep 10

Monday Morning – What Now?

The garage sale was interesting, to say the least.  Hard to believe that someone would change a price tag on a fifty cent item.  We just sold him what he wanted at the price he wanted to pay, and he promised to return (of course).  When he returned yesterday, we had Papa deal with him.  D3 said she and Papa just stared at him the whole time he was here, and he left quickly.  Figures.

On a happier note, Papa and I saw some a couple of good shows over the weekend.  First, at the Auburn Hills Parade of Stars, we enjoyed the music of Larry Stephenson, the Infamous Stringdusters, Special C , the Austin Lounge Lizards and the Cats and the Fiddler.  Then we hurried down to the Kentuckians of Michigan to see the Bo Isaac Band.  Papa’s pictures are already posted, since Granny has been working so hard!

We enjoyed see Dreama Stephenson again; just a couple of weeks ago Larry played at the Wheel Inn Campground for the Leslie Bluegrass Festival.

GS2’s football team played Friday evening, and the result wasn’t what we’d hoped for.  I’ll bet football practice won’t be a lot of fun this week.

What now?  Clean, mow, garbage, dinner, and a redesign for a website.  No free time today!

Sep 06

Into the Sunset?

Last night after football practice, D1 took GS2 to get his driver’s license.  He was home about 10 minutes when he headed out to go to a drive through.  He told me he’d told his mom that was the first thing he was going to do….

I talked to D2 last night, and she told me that GD1 came home from her first day of school and asked her dad to take the training wheels off her bike.  D2 and S-in-L worried for a minute, and then — off she rode, no problems, no falls.

I remember when Papa and I were the ones going, now, we’re watching all the rest of them go.  Hmmmmmm

Sep 06

How do I Get in These Messes?

To have a garage sale, you need a cleaned out garage, at least that’s what I thought.  So, I started Monday night on the garage.  There was a partly filled bag of “lawn waste”.  Around here leaves, small sticks, or whatever you have from your yard that you can’t use or compost goes into paper bags and is picked up once a week on garbage day. 

Since the bags aren’t free, I decided to fill it by trimming the walnut tree, which scrapes on Lex when we drive out and back in.  I gathered the pruners, the ladder, some more bags…  You know what happened — less than an hour later I had 3 bags at the curb.

The garage cleaning was much the same, one thing really does lead to another around here.  So, back to cleaning and pricing.

Sep 06

Garage Sale?

Well, there is a lot of stuff in the garage, and a forecast for rain for at least Friday.  Figures.  I’m going to price my stuff, and hope for rain overnight instead of Friday.  I’m also going to get those pictures posted, sooner, not later — I hope.

Sep 05

Done Gone?

Where has Granny been?  I’ve been right here at home, with visiting GS3 and GD’s 1&2, at M-in-L’s for a Labor Day holiday, and back home to get ready for a garage sale.  Garage sale?  Well, D3 has items to unload, so I’m going to do the same.  Not to sure how this will go, but we’ve vowed that the items that make it to the garage won’t return to the house. 

It was a lot of fun to have the visiting grandchildren, even if I did get tired.  I’m just now catching up on my sleep!  M-in-L didn’t help, she goes and goes, like the battery bunny on the commercials.  She’s more than a few years older than me, but you’d never know it.

So, I’m cleaning the files off a couple of old computers, emptying basement shelves, trashing some things, and so on.  The sale is probably only Saturday and Sunday, but will open for a little of Friday if we get a little done these next two days.

Photographs from the Manton (Michigan) Labor Day celebration, and the last two Troy (Michigan) HS football games will be posted today, promise!

Aug 27

Got Tomatoes?

After a couple of weeks neglect, I finally got to the garden over the weekend.  Saturday D3 and I pulled a bunch of weeds.  Papa and I took down the fence, then we mowed the neglected yard.  Of all the crazy things, yesterday I picked 7 buckets of tomatoes.  Seven five-gallon buckets.  I hauled them from the garden to the garage with the wagon, 2 at a time.  It was 1:30 when I finished, and 2:30 when I got out of the shower, (had to scrub the shower, not sure I could get clean if I didn’t.)  GS2 carried in all 7 and lined them up in the kitchen.  I could recount the whole sad story, but it is probably enough to say that there was about 1 bucket that wasn’t ripe enough to can.  The rest amounted to 49 quarts of tomato juice.  3 didn’t seal.  Someone has got to carry them all downstairs.  How do I get into these messes?

Aug 26

Small Job

I’ve been busy, to busy to tell you about.  But, you should know this, some maintenance jobs fall to granny, no matter  what.  Here are the tools I used :

 So, now, what do you think I did with them to get this result:

Of course, I cleaned the brush on the vacuum.  Really, I couldn’t push it across the floor, and the brush couldn’t have been picking up a thing. 

Back to the salt mines.