Thud and his lovely family had a baby boy yesterday, and Vinogirl became an auntie again. Congratulations to their wonderful family, and may they all be blessed with health, happiness, and prosperity. :)
I'm good with clean clutter. Where the dust buffalo roam, and whatnot. Do put your feet up on the table. Don't leave shit molding in the sink. That sort of thing.
Besides, this is a house of puppies, and there's only so much order I can truly stand.
Have a beautiful Saturday.
When I have courteous and polite people to deal with, I'll exhaust all resources to engineer a good outcome for them. I'll do my best at every turn, but when I'm badly treated, I'm certainly not going to open myself up to further opportunities to enjoy more abuse.
I really wonder what people think they are accomplishing when they threaten, bark orders and serve up heaping helpings of withering contempt to the people who assist them in service positions? Such people think they can intimidate other folks into doing a better job. Not so, I say.
These are precisely the same people who probably routinely send food back to the kitchens of restaurants they frequent. I am sure they are in part frustrated by the generally poor quality of service they encounter, because they merit no better. I guarantee you they have ingested more than a bit of someone else's bodily fluids. I mentioned this to one such person once, citing the likelihood there'd be extra additives in their replacement plate of hash, and they said, aghast, "they wouldn't dare." Guess what, sweetie? They totally dare. They were probably hugging themselves with glee as they peeked from the kitchen and watched you nom up their spittle. Or worse.
Bon appetit.


see the full effect, but the lacquer must have a violet mica therein, because there's a corona of purple around the downward edges of the nail surface with this one. Reminds me of the blue-violet iridescence of Swallowtail butterfly wings. Gardener nails!
That reminds me-- must get some monarda (bee balm-- also known as bergamot) for the flying jewels-- the love to eat the plAnt and will make their cocoons on same. *joy!*
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When I'm talking to that lady in one vendor's office (usually after I've said "yes sir" or "no sir" at least once), having taken their name at the end of the call to find I was speaking with Belinda, well, I remember that when I call that particular office these days, but will I ever learn, generally?
I have one customer now who makes Dr. Girlfriend sound absolutely powder-puff. This customer was offended by their previous represenative to the point that they asked for their account to be reassigned to me.
Goody.
I'm kind of wondering if the previous rep was just taken aback, having called her "sir." Still, I vow to not make assumptions, and to do better. I really don't want to offend.
Labels: faux pas
Trigonometry.
I can't wrap my brain around it.
I'm wrung out on this stuff.
What's going to suck most monumentally is that I'm worried now that this trigonometry is going to scuttle my very high A. :(
Okay, maybe I'm whining just a little. I'll be so glad when this semester is over in a couple of weeks.


This place is at the back of an 1860 Victorian house at the edge of a town. The area with the vines over it is where the herbs and flowers for sale are displayed. The rock-edged planting beds are where she has her kitchen garden. The place is just wonderful and it was so inspiring. It's incredible what you can accomplish with a garden if you just start doing a good job clearing away the weeds and invasive plants, amending the soil properly and taking time to establish good perennials for the area.
I hope you like garden posts, because there will be a bunch to follow. When I got home from Dallas Sunday afternoon, several things I'd planted last year had bloomed to welcome me home. I felt rewarded. Gardening makes me so happy, and it feels good to have my own little plot of earth again. :)


Then there was this wonderful fuzzy plant called Bunny Ears. FURRY! Very cute.
I did acquire several other plants, but I must show this impossibly lovely old-fashioned varietal geranium. The blossoms are impossibly magenta-- almost a red-black. Thought you might be able to get a sense of them, but the photo does not do them justice-- they fairly glow with a dark wine colour. Beautiful. Incredibly fragrant, too. I often wonder how such grand flora could ever have fallen out of fashion. More garden pics to come.

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One recipe was for Sole Meuniere and this couldn't be more quick or simple, with very good results. I made mine with an inexpensive tilapia,but I'm sure this would work well with several varieties of white fish. The fish only takes a few minutes to prepare, so go ahead and spend the 20 minutes preparing the salad first. I made this quinoa salad. Delicious. Quinoa is a sprout, though it's often referred to as a grain. It's a metabolism-boosting food, and it gives some of the effect of eating a starch (a little like tabloueh) but to much better effect, food value-wise. Due to the processing, there is usually a film left on the sprouts, so you'll want to make sure that is off. I bought pre-washed quinoa because that was all they had at WalMart, but if you buy the other variety, be sure to plan for enough time to soak it for 10 or 15 minutes and rinse prior to beginning the cooking process.
By the way, a friend adds quinoa to her chili, and it's a marvelous addition to the dish. :)

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Came home from Dallas to find a package awaiting me. I couldn't remember what I'd ordered. Himself blinked innocently.
OMG OMG OMG it's SO cute. Thank you!!!
Who is my anonymous benefactor?*thrills*
Look at that adorable tail, those unblinking eyes (clearly bent on mischief) and those mad Ninja Bunny skills!

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This orange is so intense and the petals seem impossibly thin and fragile, yet they push skyward despite the wind.
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Not pretty.

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love this song.
Come!
Come here at once!
Come! On a night with no moon because
all of my being is now impining...
Mosey over to JPG's wonderful archived piece from 2008 for more, and I always love Blackfork's blog for his evocative posts on the subject of the Texians' struggle for independence. No small wonder that to have descended from such fearless folk is a point of much pride and honor amongst contemporary Texans.
Labels: Texas Revolution
At once modern and ancient, Kiran's music is folk-style settings for Ghazals, an ancient Persian and Punjabi style of poetry. I have two of her cds on my iPhone (that's partly why I was so distraught at having lost my music library) and I adore this song in particular.
Funny thing is in my house, the chiweenie is the one (along with a certain Jack Russell Terrier) who is doing the prodding, and I'm the one trying to play possum.
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Yays!
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I'm speechless. I can't say anything. I have no words. Well, okay, one word:
Ignorance.
Cold Comfort Farm
I LOVE this movie! I ordered it some weeks back and it finally came in. Got home from school Wednesday night, popped the vid in the player and peered out from a pup pile on the loveseat.
Tee hee.

My teeth don't meet properly. I had my teeth cleaned about a year ago and (as I suspected, based on jaw pain), the day my doctors predicted has arrived: my misaligned teeth are finally causing my molars to crack because the back tooth on each side is the only place where my teeth touch. I know: weird, innit? I don't think I look like I Have a skeletal deformity, but I do wonder what it's like to have your teeth meet, and I'm looking forward to that. I'm probably going to start the pre-op work in May and although I dread it, I'm looking forward to an end to the jaw pain and the fear of losing my teeth due to something that simply can't be fixed with braces or hygiene. I've never had a cavity, by the way, and even though I knew something had cracked back there, hearing the pronouncement by the dentist was a little heart-wrenching.
I dread the surgery, but it has to be done. They put braces on the teeth, make a dog-leg cut in the mandible, and then re-position the whole mess. I wont' be having any slicing of bone on the upper area or the chin. Still, yuck. It's incredibly creepy to consider, and at once, miraculous as well. This will take me out of commission for about 6 weeks. I'm planning this little delight to happen about mid-October. More on this later. You don't miss what you've never had, and it's going to feel strange to have my front teeth cut like a proper bite should, but I sure as hell won't miss the constant jaw/ear pain.
Srsly.
I am so hating on you right now. If you thought birds were angry, well, you have NO IDEA.
I never plug my iPhone into the computer and now I know why. I plugged the phone into the computer Monday night and *poof!* All my photos, my iTunes-- all that stuff is now GONE with the flapping wind. I don't get it-- how did this happen? It's got butt-tons of memory.
I am steamed.
Phone numbers?
Gone. All gone.
SO... if you're my friend, please send me a text saying "I am (your name here)" so I can save your number with your name, mkay?
Steamed.



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I've had 14's Gallery Of The Absurd on my sidebar for years because she's spot-on with her caricatures, and her text is hilarity con carne.
This one takes the cake, though. Go read it. The illustration is magnificent. :)

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A lovely little pair of purple finches were making a nest a couple weeks ago, I noticed. That's one of my favorite local wild birds, so I was pleased they chose my porch. Monday, my gallant fellow climbed up and snapped this photo of the fruit of the little pair's loins. Or future potential fruit. Or. Whatever.
Wednesday, the nest was bare, bereft of its little clutch of eggs. :(
THere were no broken shells about, so I'd rule out predator birds who would have eaten the eggs. The nest was intact, just the eggs gone. I dunno-- snake? I've never seen a raccoon around here. I'm puzzled and a little sad.

My little mitts are screaming. I have vowed that from now on, Sunday morning is my date with the garden. Last year I laid a very good foundation for more intensive work this year. I put some heat-hardy native perennials in strategic spots and 95% of those are back so far, so in that I am well-pleased. I spent a goodly bit of time weeding, and the muscles around my fingers are aching in a terrible way, today. I know it will come sooner or later, but I'm such a hands-on person that I really dread having arthritis someday. It's gonna suck.
That said, I took my handy dandy weeding tool about and popped up loads of dandelions and milkweed. There's a techinque to it, and when you have it down, it's kind of satisfying to slide the blade into the soil parallel to the plant, prise slightly and then the rewarding *pop* as the root gives way and pops free like a little carrot. That said, it's a shame the milkweed is such an odious plant in other ways, because it had a very lovely dusty blue and dusty purple cast to the leaves, and if it weren't such an exponential proliferator, I would let them go hog-wild. Not to be: out they must go.
Again, my paws are aching. *whimper*
I put out a lovely purple creeping phlox that I just love-- they make such nice mounds of color that come back year after year. Then I put a lush gallon pot of hydrangea at the edge of the porch step. I'm hoping for a massive profusion of blooms there soon.
A lovely Purple Finch couple have taken up residence in the nesty corner at the top of the porch ceiling. There's a lovely fat blue egg in the nest now, and since I'm going to be a Granny to a little birdie family, I thought I'd better put out a birdbath. Found a lovely one at Tuesday Morning. Himself most gallantly got me a couple of finch feeders and my little avian paradise is on its way. Put up a lovely hanging basket with blue lobelia and red pertoonies (that's what ancient Mrs. Kennedy fetchingly dubbed petunias) and some lovely yellow daisy flowers. I'm determined to have the place looking like a jewel box by the time Fall rolls around.
It's good to be gardening again. It's been too long. :)
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Other stuff that should die screaming:
Car sound systems that jar the bowels of neighboring motorists. Incinerate. On the spot. No questions asked.
Vandals. Die. Screaming.
Mondays. I've got a mad-on for Mondays. Why don't I like them?
More caffeine, pls.
Labels: die screaming
Loved this movie.
Tsk. Tsk. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhoneLabels: because I'm classy.
Name: Phlegmfatale
Location: Elsewhere, Texas, USA
I'm not whining;
I'm unburdening.
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