TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

Another night I didn’t really sleep well until it was almost daylight and then I slept until noon.  I didn’t, however, go back to bed like I did yesterday but stayed up and got a few things done.  The Beast asked about Chewlee and I told him she was going to be dropped off by the school bus.  He didn’t say another word but I guess that’s all he wanted to know.  I found him and Dennis sitting on the front porch steps deep in conversation.

Later I found out that Diane was having a shit fit over Jack’s cutting down the trees on the property directly behind where Dennis and Di had planned on putting their house.  Di wanted to buy that lot but Dennis dragged his feet and Jackie bought it out from under them.  He immediately cut down a few trees and he plans on putting a shed or small barn on it to store his ATV plus his tractor/lawnmower and god knows what else will end up in there.  But Diane wanted to be able to have the trees for the privacy.

Like any nutty psychiatrist, at first she went on and on about moving the house over to the lot on the other side of where the big barn is going up and Dennis was ready to wring her neck because it would require the septic field and tank be moved (plus the perk test be done on that lot) and then there is the water line and the gas line…well, you get the idea.  The Beast and I, separately, suggested they just get some mature trees and have them planted since they would end up being cheaper plus they could put them where they wanted them.

Diane made some excellent gumbo made with ham steak chunks instead of shrimp or sausage (or all three).  It had just the right amount of *heat* to it.  Any more and it would have been inedible.  Any less and it would have been bland, kind of.  Her dessert, unfortunately, didn’t come out the way it should have.  She used Almond Milk to make the vanilla pudding she used to make banana cream pie.  Well, Almond Milk, as good as it tastes, is NOT in any way, shape or form MILK.  What happened is it never *gelled* or *set up* as it should have so we made jokes about her serving us the *soup* last instead of first.  Regardless, it was very tasty and we ate it…with spoons mostly. 

Chewlee wasn’t here long.  When her mother showed up, she said in a shocked voice, *You mean Mommy is here ALREADY???*  Too funny!  She told her mother they had to hurry so she wouldn’t miss much of her favorite cartoon show, Peppa Pig.  It will be much the same tomorrow because the Princess doesn’t go back to work until Thursday.

Love you all and I hope your week hasn’t been all that bad.  Be good and have fun. 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

The Princess called me early in the afternoon to tell me that she just told the school to drop Chewlee off at our house every day and, on the days she doesn’t work, she will just come over to get her.   She wanted me to know that Chewlee was so anxious to spend some time with me since it had been a week since she’d seen me last.

I was out on the front porch waiting for her when the bus dropped her off.  She looked so cute in the little outfit she had on.  I’ll be posting it, hopefully tomorrow.  When she got to the porch, she showed me her new backpack then sat down and said, *I was asleep until Mr. Martin woke me up when he stopped the bus.*  I hugged her close and then she suddenly almost exploded with excitement and opened her backpack to show me her new folder and her first Happy Face for good behavior.  Then she started to tell me, excitedly, what a full week of Happy Faces meant to her…..toy AND candy!  I had to laugh.

She said she had a good day AND she had made some new friends, too.  The Beast took some pictures of her because she looked so cute even though Chewlee wasn’t in the mood to have pictures taken but she did manage one or two that looked good.

The Beast decided he wanted to make a meat loaf today.  He had the right idea but he did several things wrong.  He cut the onion and green pepper too big and he added celery (who the hell adds celery to meat loaf??).  He didn’t add enough oatmeal for the number of eggs he added and he definitely didn’t add enough salt and pepper.  I add a few other things when I make mine but, hey, he wanted no help.  But dig this……he never paid attention to how many pounds of ground beef he used, he was clueless about what temperature the oven should be and (since he had no idea how much ground beef he had used) no idea how long he should cook the meatloaf.  But he didn’t need any help, TYVM.    But, add a little ketchup and a little salt and pepper and it wasn’t too bad at all.  I don’t use ketchup but the Beast uses it on a lot of things but I stand by what I said.  It wasn’t bad at all with a little bit of seasoning and some extra chewing.

It was really beautiful out today.  Not too hot, not too cool….just right.    It’s going to be hotter tomorrow, however, so I tried to just enjoy it while I could.  Love you all and I hope you get some relief from all the rain all over the country. 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

I really HATE when the Beast is bored.  He can come up with the stupidest ideas and they usually cost money in more than one way.  He decided he was going to help me out with my dietary needs.  What did he buy?  A juicer.  Now there are many forms of juicers.  The one he chose makes juice with all the pulp included.  Yuk!  I don’t mind a bit of pulp in my juice, like orange juice, but let me tell you, pear pulp and apple pulp can be awful when there’s more pulp than juice involved.

He bought bunches of different fruits.  Bananas, oranges, apples, pears (plus some of our pears from our trees because they are different), peaches, strawberries and both red and green grapes.  Take my word on this…some of those items do NOT go together well.  He just loves to experiment.  He got irritated when he found me scraping off some of the pulp that had risen to the top of one of his experiments that came off like scum, not pulp.

He then decided he needed to buy a separate orange juicer because he didn’t like the superspin effect of the other juicer on the orange pulp (scummy).  So now we have more basically unnecessary appliances that we will have to find storage space when his interest in *helping* me wanes.

He told me in stern terms that I must have a glass of his juice (of the day) every morning.  I’ll do it by using it to wash down my morning pills.  I’ll just spoon off the scum if it has it, regardless of his reaction.  I just can’t choke down that stuff no matter how nutritious it’s supposed to be.

Actually, I know what I need is more veggies in my diet.  It’s too easy when you hit our age to make filling meals that don’t include much in the way of good veggies.  You make hamburgers and that’s filling to you so your veggies might just be a slice of tomato and one of onion.

I bought some V-8 and some Glucerna to help balance out my diet.  Plus I have lots of tomatoes I need to do something with as well as lots of peppers, green and red peppers and cucumbers.  I love cucumbers so there’s no problem there.  I can eat a lot of those with just some salt and pepper.  Or I might dip them into blue cheese dressing or ranch, depending on my mood.  I add celery and onion to my egg salad and tuna salad, too.  The doctor told me to use more breads (other than plain white bread) that are dark.  When I told him I use 5 grain breads a lot, he thought that was great.  I’m not a fan of whole wheat (too sweet) although it’s not too bad as toast.  I picked up a big bag of frozen veggie mix (California blend it’s called).  It contains carrots, squash, broccoli and cauliflower.  It’s yummy and I can actually eat a big bowl of that for a meal at times.  I think that, overall, my diet isn’t too bad as long as it’s not something the Beast fries up.  He actually adds oil to things I would never do.  But I have gotten him to use more olive oil sparsely and he DOES try.  But that’s something new for him.  He loves shortening and lard.  It’s his father’s influence from when he was a kid.  It just doesn’t taste good to him unless it’s dripping grease. 

I spent a lot of time just napping today since I don’t seem to be sleeping well at night.  The days being cooler has helped and I put the fan in my window yesterday and it’s been much cooler in my room for sleeping.  Makes it easier for me to drop off while watching TV. 

Chewlee starts school tomorrow and I will be anxious to find out how her first day went when she’s dropped off here.  It’s been too long since we saw her last.

Love you all.  Have a great week, ya hear? 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

Today was another quiet day.  The Beast never called the vet due to the fact that Baron began to start acting more like himself.  First of all, his appetite returned with a vengeance.  He was eating and wanted more, the little pig.  Took a while to finally get him to stop but the Beast gave him some of the better stuff (veggies and chicken) along with some rice and that seemed  to satisfy him.  A can of his dog food sure didn’t.    He also wanted to lay in the Beast’s laugh again although he didn’t get into is lap fully.  He kept on leg down on the floor.  I told the Beast that it might be that laying fully on those tumors WAS painful and that was why he did that.  Who knows?  He’s got one more week of medicine and then the tumors will be removed so that’s all we have to get through.  I’ll be glad once they are gone.

No Chewlee today because her paternal grandfather came to town to see her and take her shopping for school clothes, as usual.  I hope she tells him she doesn’t like jeans because he takes her to Osh Gosh and that’s mostly what they have for bottoms.  But we shall see. 

I slept a good part of the day due to my intestinal problems keeping me up and down all night.  It was daylight before I felt well enough to trust falling asleep for any length of time and I was exhausted.  I woke up long enough to take my pills, eat breakfast and check on what was on TV.  I turned on the Syfy channel because the movies were so bad, I knew I wouldn’t mind falling asleep during them.    And that’s just what happened.

The Beast and one of his friends from church went over to this old (and poor) woman’s house to install this small AC unit we were using out in the cottage in her house.  She really has almost nothing as far as furniture goes except what people have given her.  The Beast and his buddy both contributed and found her a recliner that looks like brand new at one of the resale shops nearby.  When I heard the price, I told the Beast we should check out some of the resale shops if we have to replace anything before we buy new. 

I was going to give her my craft table if she needed it but someone had already given her a kitchen set so she was okay for a place to eat even if she had company over.  I don’t know what her story was or why she had nothing, not even a bed, when she ended up here in our area but it’s not really important to me.  I just thought it was sad that a woman her age would be in that sad state.  Life is really tough at times.  It’s nice to be able to help someone out that appreciates it.  The Beast said she cried when they carried in the recliner.  She has a TV but had been using a wooden, straight back kitchen chair to watch it when she did.  The Beast said when he carried in the window unit and she realized what it was she couldn’t stop thanking him for letting her use it.  The heat had been keeping her from sleeping at night most of the time.  The Beast said the house she is renting is so small that it might actually be able to keep the main part of the house cool during the day if she shuts the bedroom door.  He told her that and said that she should open the bedroom door around 6pm and it should feel decent by the time she goes to bed (which she said was around 10:30 or 11pm).  There are trees that keep the sun off the back of the house in the afternoon so the house should cool down easily after that.

Knowing the Beast like I do, he will more than likely let her keep the unit if it works out for her.  It will make him feel like a big shot to just give away a unit that’s less than a year old.  I told him I was glad we had two units out in the cottage because I didn’t want mildew in there with our winter clothes stored out there.  He’s got the  unit on a timer and, now that there’s only one unit to remove the humidity that builds up in there, he’s changed it so that it’s running longer every day.  I thought the two units were kind of overkill anyway.  I don’t know what he was thinking except that he originally bought it for one of the small bedrooms (my computer room) and I didn’t want it in there.  I hate AC except during really hot and humid weather.  Plus, if it was in there, it would mean moving my desk and I didn’t want to be looking at a wall all the time.  I wouldn’t be able to watch my TV either….not without a lot of work, anyway.

I did manage to fold some more things that the Beast had thrown in the washer.  Mostly towels and cleaning rags we use around the sink.  We go through a lot of those….more than most people, I’ll bet.  We use them for everything…like dish rags mostly but we do wipe up spots on the floors that we manage to get on them no matter how hard we try not to.  Once we do that, the rag goes into the wash.  I drape them over the washer door to dry until we do a wash.  You can usually find two or three in every load we do.

I’m so relieved that Baron feels better.  You have no idea.  If anything happens to him, the Beast won’t know what to do with himself.  He will miss that dog a lot.  Of course, the same goes if anything happens to the Beast and Baron survives him.  I won’t know what to do with the dog if that happens.  Baron mopes when the Beast goes away for just a day.  When he was gone those three and a half days when he went to visit his aunt, Baron was almost unbearable to be around although he slept with me at night.  But I’m a poor substitute for his *man*. 

Well, love you all.  Have a nice Sunday.  I wish you good weather (or at least not so wet).  Have some fun.  Call someone just to say you love them, if you do.  Life is short and you just never know……. 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

Today was my normal doctors appointment and I felt it should go well.  I found out I have lost 20 lbs. since January and that was a good thing.  I WAS 162 lbs. but today I weighed in at 141.  That explains why my new pants that I bought a size smaller were not small enough and I had to buy a belt to keep them where they were supposed to be.  BUT….and this is a biggie…..even though I have been watching what I’m eating and trying to keep a balanced diet, my A1C was just horrible!  It was up to 11.2 which is like having a daily sugar count of 250-300.  The doctor said that it probably means that my poor pancreas is tired and not producing as much insulin as before.  He added a new pill (glyburide) to go along with my two metformin tablets.  I used to take glyburide years ago and have no memory of when that changed.  Hey!  I’m an old person now and my memory fails me on occasion.

Anyway, I will take them for the next three months and, if my A1C test doesn’t turn out better, we are going to discuss the pros and cons of using one of the new insulin shots.  ***Shudder**  However, now it comes in the form of a pen that doesn’t require refrigeration and you can use it just once a day.  Much easier than the old way that required a vial of refrigerated insulin and hypos.  That would be scary with Chewlee around and her determined curiosity.  I can’t think of anything worse than having to keep hypodermic needles around with her here almost daily.  She’s very nosy.   

He urged me to keep bottles of the Glucerna shakes to use rather than skip a meal so I picked up some to try.  Not all of those type of supplements are palatable.  I haven’t tried any yet but will probably try it for breakfast tomorrow.  We shall see how that works for me.  I also bought some 5 grain bread and another dark grain bread that has apples in it.  I can cut a slice and toast it to eat along with drinking the Glucerna.

No Chewlee today because her mother sprained her ankle and can’t walk (or drive!).  I swear, her exercise classes are killing her.  This is the second time it’s happened.  She needs to lay off that for a while or find a better coach.  This one is hurting her.  Anyway, I may drive over there tomorrow if the Princess still isn’t fit to go to work and keep her for the day.  It’ll help out the Princess and give the Beast something to do.  He was talking about taking some new pictures of her and I think Chewlee will like dressing up for those and doing her hair in different styles. 

Baron is not himself and we aren’t sure why.  He’s lost interest in damn near everything and won’t even climb in the Beast’s lap.  Even Dennis noticed Baron’s demeanor.  He’s not even interested in his food and we even added his favorite veggies.  The Beast stopped the medication from the vet but we will get him into the vet tomorrow come hell or high water!  I’m worried sick about what might be wrong with him.  He’s too good a dog for this to happen. 

It was cooler today, thank goodness but it was overcast and looked stormy.  So far there’s been no rain but it WAS raining in Birmingham the radio said.  It’s only 66 now with a low of 62 degrees expected.  We have a 50% chance of a storm tomorrow so it will be another day we won’t be able to do anything outside.

Dennis and Di are pretty much packed up and ready for their trip to Houston.  Dennis says he will keep us informed, especially since the Beast suffers from the same form of cancer but in his bladder and not his kidneys (so far).  Of course, if they remove the kidney on Dennis, the Beast won’t even consider anything but what he’s going through now since it allows him to keep his bladder (so far).

Love you all.  Hope you are having some decent weather.  If not, you are not suffering alone (if that makes a difference).  Be good.  Drive safely. 

Love you all.  Be good while I am trying to get everything straightened out. 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

….I have an IBS (irritable bowel syndrome….look it up!) attack.  Trust me, it’s not fun and can be incredibly painful.  I tried to relax for a bit but fell asleep and only woke up long enough to make it to the bathroom.  Luckily, I made it every time.  Not funny when you don’t!

I was exhausted and, when I finally had pretty much emptied my bowels, I finally fell into a more restful slumber that I didn’t wake from until around 2pm.  Tummy was still *tender* but after about two hours up, I feel more human.

I HAD written a blog before the attack hit me but I don’t know what happened to it.  I must have done something wrong because it disappeared into cyberspace somewhere.  Oh well.  It shall be written another day, I’m sure.

I have to tell you this though.  Chewlee, who had been dreading going back to school because she was going to have a new teacher and aide, suddenly got into the spirit of returning to school.  She spent a couple hours gathering up the things she felt she would need for school….markers, crayons, paper……what things she had here and she was trying to put them into a small pencil case.  Given the small number of things she had gathered, I checked and discovered she was also trying to fit her *makeup* into it, too.  Once I made her remove those, she was able to zipper up the case and she was happy over that.

She then selected the clothes she was going to wear telling me that *now that she was in first grade and was older, she was able to pick out her own clothes instead of her and mommy picking them out.*  I told her she needed to discuss that part with her mother. 

She then told me, in a very excited tone of voice, that she was going to have to get to sleep early because she was going to have to get up early in order to catch her bus.  Her face fell when I told her that her mother was going to be taking her to orientation today.  She was really thinking that school was going to be starting today.  I didn’t even TRY to tell her otherwise.

Chewlee also told me that she really hated the fact that she couldn’t just go and play with whoever she wanted to because it was so boring for her to be here all day with us.  She said she only gets to sleep at HER house and here we kept her from playing with the few kids that lived here (not true, but she must tell us where she wants to go and get our permission.  If it’s someone that we know well AND know their schedules, she often cannot go play with some kids).  I told her that once school starts, it will be less boring for her and she WILL be able to play for an hour or so with some of the kids here.

We have a new Mexican family that moved in down the road from us and Chewlee has, of course, made friends with them.  She gets to wheel their baby around in her stroller and I think they both enjoy that.  She plays hide-and-seek with them and a few other things.  She does have a little trouble communicating with the mother but she’s learning Spanish the hard/easy? way.  She also appreciates Dora the Explorer again and pays attention to the Spanish words that are featured in each episode.  I’m also trying to teach her some of the simple words that I remember.  Plus, we always have my English/Spanish dictionary to consult for anything specific she wants to learn.

On another subject, we learned that our friend, Dennis, has kidney cancer.  Worse, it’s the same variety of cancer that the Beast has in his bladder.  Very virulent.  Dennis is going to be leaving for Houston, Texas, to go to the M.D. Anderson Hospital for treatment.  Mostly it’s because of the number of cases like his that they treat yearly (around 300+) vs the number our physicians here may treat (perhaps 5?).  The doctor already contacted them there and Dennis has a case worker assigned to him.  The nurse will be contacting him by the end of the week to give him his first appt. in Houston where he will get a couple more tests done (the doctor there has been sent the tests done here and the results) and then will meet again with the doctors to decide on a treatment specific for him.

They will drive there in the RV, of course, so Di (and he) will have a place to stay, especially if all the treatment is to be done there.  The Beast has told Dennis that he will keep the grass mowed on his property while he’s gone.  Dennis will keep in touch with us here so that we know what’s going on.  I’m saying extra prayers for him that his course of treatment goes well and he returns home soon.  Say a prayer or two for him if you can.  Thank you.

Love you all.  I need to get this posted before the storm hits us that is on it’s way (I can see it out my front door).  I don’t want to lose THIS one in cyberspace, too. 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

Today lessons were learned and not just by Chewlee, by any means.  I learned a lesson, too.  It all has to do with Baron.

When the Beast isn’t here, Baron can be a real pain in my ass.  If he’s not whining, he’s moping.  If Chewlee happens to be here, it can often be worse because she has the freedom to go in and out of the house, whereas he does not.  However, I forgot something.  I forgot about his medications and the effect it has on him.

For example, he is drinking an incredible amount of water (to be expected the vet said) and he’s twice as hungry (also to be expected).  Normally, the Beast deals with all this stuff since he is the keeper of the pills and Baron’s best man friend.  So I forgive myself a bit for what happened when the Beast went to the airport to pick up Tara and her kids.

The scenario went like this:  Chewlee was running in and out of the house while I was talking on an IM to my son, Mustachio.  She was anxious for me to come outside to watch her while she rode on her bike.  She wanted me to see some trick or other that she felt she had mastered.  Baron was right there, at the door and he started whining.  I yelled at him and said I would be out there in a minute (like he understood, right?).  So I was telling Mustachio that I had to go outside for a while to watch Chewlee but we would be back in shortly because it was so hot out.  I knew Chewlee would want to come back inside to cool down and watch her cartoons for a while.  While I was doing this, Baron came into the room, again whining.  I yelled at him and said I would be right there and he left the room.  When I got up, I noticed drops of what I thought was water all over the little hall outside the computer room and leading all the way to the front door.  Chewlee came in just then and yelled, *Grandma!  Look!  Baron is peeing on the floor!*

Sure enough, I looked and he was standing there, looking embarrassed but like he couldn’t help it.  I opened the front door and he stopped peeing long enough to run outside and stop at the tree directly off the stairs and start peeing again.  Me?  I dropped a towel down on the pee and went outside to apologize to Baron.  I should have known he wanted out to pee.  I was amazed because he had to have stood there and pee’d for five minutes solid.  THEN….he moved over to another tree and pee’d some more and for damn near as long.  I couldn’t believe he had a bladder that big!o

I then went into the house while having Chewlee watch Baron and I cleaned up all the pee and the dribbles.  Then I went outside again and sat down on the stairs to watch Chewlee perform her *trick*.  It was no biggie.  She just turned in a circle with her legs out away from the pedals.  To her, a big deal and I clapped for her so she felt appreciated.  Then I let Baron in the house because he wanted into the cool and out of the heat.

After about 10 minutes, Chewlee was ready to go inside for a while.  Later, when she went out again to ride her bike, Baron was laying down near the front door so I said to him, *C’mon Baron.  Want to go out?*  He jumped up and stood at the door, waiting for me to open it.  As soon as I did, he ran down the stairs, over to a tree and pee’d again for a good five minutes.  He sniffed around for a bit, crossed the driveway and over to the neighbors tree and pee’d again for two to three minutes.  And he didn’t even indicate he needed to go out! 

Chewlee kept saying she couldn’t wait to tell Papa that Baron pee’d on the floor.  I told her not to say anything since it was our fault.  She stopped dead and said to me, *It wasn’t MY fault because I had to pee and was in the bathroom.  It’s YOUR fault!*  Stinker.  I was glad her mother picked her up before the Beast got back from dropping off Tara and the kids.  I sure didn’t need her drama when *I* told the Beast what happened.

Before her mother got here, Chewlee noticed that Sam was outside, alone.  She said she wanted to go over there and I told her she couldn’t.  When she asked why, I told her that Papa had said she couldn’t play with him for two days and today was the second day.  Well, she wailed over that and said it was unfair!  I was ruining Sam’s life and hers.  When I asked how I was ruining their lives, she said it was because Sam was all alone with no one to play with.  I told her I thought he could live another day without having her to play with.  She cried and I made her sit in my recliner and told her, *Maybe now you will learn not to lie…especially about something so stupid as you (she) did.* 

It didn’t take her long before she was her old self again.  Once she knows she isn’t going to get her own way, she recovers quickly.  She had gathered together most of her DVD’s she had here and wanted to take them home so she could watch them there.  She still has lots here but I was glad she took them since I will have to move all MY DVD’s once the Beast decides to paint my room.  I also gave her some of her mother’s DVD’s that had been hanging around and a DVD for her Daddy that I hoped he would enjoy (How  the West was won).

Well, no rain until just a few minutes ago when it started storming and the rain came down in buckets.  Guess we will have another hot, humid day tomorrow.  **Sigh**  Love you all.  Have a great week, won’t you?  At least…TRY. 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

There are days I have to give Chewlee credit on the scoreboard for turning a situation into a score for her.  Today was an example (although it didn’t apply to HER lying yesterday).  The Beast was giving her a hard time about not touching a snail.  She got all girlish and said she didn’t want to touch anything that was slimy.  He then told her that snails attacked and ate kittens.  She looked at him, at first, like he had gone off his rocker and she said so.  He kept it up and told her that they (snails) got together and would hide until there were enough of them and then they would jump on the kitten and start eating it.  He told her one of their favorite places to hide was in a cat pooper scooper machine and Chewlee’s eyes got huge because they have one of those in the laundry room for her kitten.  That was when she turned to me and wanted me to say YES or NO to what HE was saying.  She does that because I told her (and have kept my word on that) that I would never lie to her. 

When she did that, I shook my head NO and that’s when she told the Beast that he was lying to her.  He suddenly realized where this was going to go and said, *I was just teasing you!*  That’s when she folded her arms and said, *Uh huh, and   just what makes teasing and lying different???*  I just smiled because there was no way the Beast could try his usual *Because I said so!* or try *You knew I was kidding you!*  To her, it was a plain and simple lie because grownups aren’t supposed to tell kids lies like snails eat kittens.  Worse, that they gang up to attack and eat kittens.    I know!  It’s funny to you and I but it could be scary to a gullible little girl or boy who is told such things by an adult.  After all, we aren’t supposed to lie about such things, right?

We actually had a good day here.  The Beast spent a lot of time with Dennis and even went over to inspect Dennis’s *barn*.  It’s actually big enough to qualify since it was built to be able to house their RV plus their car, his motorcycle and provide ample space for a workshop.  The Beast came home all envious and I told him to cut that shit out.  It always ends up costing us money and that ain’t gonna happen!  We have plenty of room for most anything he wants with the barn and cottage we have.  He has enough room in the cottage to put in a good size workshop if he really wanted one but I guess it’s a little like penis envy among men.  You want what you don’t have. 

I’m going out in a bit to see if I can see any of the meteorites that show up this time of year.  For the next two or three days, they will be showing up in the NE section of the sky.  Actually, they will show up in any large area of sky you can see without any of the city lights showing on the horizon.  Check it out.  Best time is between midnight and sunrise.  I’m going out after midnight and just sit and relax in a comfy chair and watch the sky.  I’ll let you know how that worked out.  All that will spoil it is if clouds move in.

Time to go.  Love you all.  Have a great Sunday.  Tara and her kids get back tomorrow and the Beast will be picking them up at the airport and will get a report on their time up there, I’m sure.  There are a lot of states that could be in real trouble with flash flooding (we are included up here in the mountainous areas) so say a little prayer for all of them/us.  Some states needed the rain but not all at once! 

TALES FROM THE BRAT FARM

Chewlee has started lying lately and it’s mostly about stupid stuff.  It’s hard to fathom why it started or just when but it has to stop we told her today.  Every time she lies, she will be punished by not being allowed certain privileges.  She won’t be able to go play with Sam (one of her lies today was about him).  She said she hadn’t played with him when we knew she had been there.  I had given her permission to go play at his house and I spoke to his mother to let her know the Beast was on his way over to pick her up.  She had, however, grabbed her bike and was on her way home so she didn’t know the Beast knew about her playing with Sam.  I guess she thought she could get another half hour or so to play with him before it got dark.

Now how she forgot about the fact that *I* knew about her playing there AND I had given her permission, I have no clue.  And why wouldn’t I be talking to the Beast?  Kids!  BUT…..now she’s not going to be able to play with either Sam or Ian for a while.  I’m not sure but the Beast may also withhold allowing her to play with Birdie’s kids, too.  I know THAT will be a killer for her.  BUT….the Beast may talk to Birdie and have her talk to Chewlee about lying and God.  Chewlee listens to what Birdie has to say about the things that God likes and doesn’t like.  She takes it very seriously.  So we shall see what happens.

I got my new computer chair today.  I must have sat in and tried about 20 different chairs including the new tempurpedic chairs, which were really great but not the only good ones on the market.  When the Beast tried out the one I picked out, he decided he wanted one for himself, too.  Now all I need to do is find the desk I want.  I think I want to show the Beast the kind of carpeting we will put in here once we get the room painted or at least the kind I think will work out the best.  That way, once the painting is done, if he runs across a good deal on his rounds, he can just order it and have it installed.  If he gets the general type I want, the rest won’t matter.  I want a Berber type carpet.  It wears well and looks nice.  We had Berber in most of our rooms in both our Margate house and the house in Port Charlotte.  Here we will only have the two rooms with carpeting….my computer room and the guest bedroom.

The Princess, when told about Chewlee’s lying, had a simple solution.  Just whoop her ass and she won’t lie because she doesn’t like her ass whooped.  When I told Chewlee what her mother said, she wanted to know two things…#1….is her daddy going to spank her tonight for lying?  and #2….are we going to beat her with our hands or using a belt? 

Love you all.  I’m tired tonight and heading for bed early.  Be good and have a great weekend.