Off the grid

February 17, 201416 Comments

My computer died last week. It’s my own fault; I left it out where Thumper could reach it and he finally succumbed to temptation and decided that Mommy’s computer needed playing with. When Daddy busted him, he dropped it and broke the charger cord. But since my husband is the handy sort, he patched it up with some electrical tape and it was good as new.

For a while.

Last week, my computer decided it no longer wanted to recognize my adapter and instructed me to use the correct adapter for my computer because, until I did as it suggested, my computer was no longer going to charge. I scrambled to get some things printed for our taxes and get my photos backed up to my external hard drive, but my last-second backup failed as my computer finally lost power. *sigh*

So now I’m in the market for either a new power cord or a new computer. The new cord is clearly the cheaper of the two options, but my computer really needs replacing. It’s five years old and showing its age, but I’m not holding my breath on getting a new one any time in the near future. At any rate, my posts may be a bit sporadic until I get one or the other (new cord or new computer). While WordPress has some fantastic mobile apps, I much prefer an actual computer to mobile posting. It’s just easier, at least at the moment. Maybe one day I’ll be so used to mobile computing that it won’t be an issue, but for the time being, I’ll stick to mobile posting as a last resort.

And who knows? Maybe I’ll actually get some writing done! 😀

How do you handle techno-glitches?

Oh, the weather outside is frightful…

January 10, 201412 Comments

…It doesn’t show signs of stopping…

This week was full of weather, among other things. From the much-discussed polar vortex to today’s (tonight’s) ice storm, it’s been a frosty week.

Don’t believe me? Here’s the proof:

This was even prettier once the lights were on.

Beautiful…and treacherous.

So pretty!

Frosty trees always inspire me.

And, joy of joys, we’re supposed to get two inches of snow on top of all the ice. And I have to brave the weather tomorrow so that someone can come and look at my house. Here’s hoping they put in a reasonable offer.

Tuesday already?

July 2, 2013July 2, 20134 Comments

Hi, everybody! Thank you all for stopping by. I know it’s been a bit quiet here lately and unfortunately, I think that trend may continue for a while longer. Between the upcoming holiday, my impending camping trips, the new job, recovering from Saturday’s successful garage sale, and something else that I’m not quite ready to discuss in detail (though I did vaguely mention it on Twitter yesterday), I’ve got a lot on my plate at the moment and something’s gotta give. Sadly, I think my writing is it.

So, I’ll try to pop in here as often as I can. I’ll try to do the same for Facebook, even though I know my presence there lately probably isn’t what it ought to be. And Twitter? I’m still searching for a mobile app to replace my beloved Tweetdeck. If anyone has any suggestions for apps they love, I’m all ears (though for the record, I’ve tried HootSuite and I just don’t like it as well). Let me know in the comments! Maybe then I’ll at least be able to keep up there.

Until next time, folks, have a happy Fourth and stay safe.

Garage sale thirty

May 18, 201311 Comments

Score one for the savvy garage saler!

So today was the City-Wide Garage Sale in Reinbeck. No, we didn’t have one, as we’ve done in years past, but I had planned to actually go this year. It started off as such a glorious morning: I slept in, then woke up to find that Seymour bought the kids an old (and by old, I mean antique) school desk to keep their coloring books and things in for a decent price. When I realized that it was garage sale day and that he was out looking at things instead of working, I decided to get the boys up and do the same. I haven’t gone garage saling in years and it was a beautiful morning for a walk.

And that’s where things went downhill. Seymour found a train table that he wanted me to look at, so I tried to get the boys ready in a hurry so I could go look at it. Bubbles packed some milk and cereal to go for the boys and we were off…till Thumper dropped his all over the bottom of the stroller. The back seat of the stroller has a crossbar instead of a tray, so when he tried to set his cereal container down on it, it tipped over (and he refused to hold onto it). Then he screamed all the way to the sale and half the time we were there.

I finally managed to calm him down, and then Miss Tadpole tried to give him back his cereal, which started the whole thing over again. By then I wanted to scream, so we ended up going home. Seymour had some errands to run out of town and promised to stay with the kids when he got back so that I could still hit some garage sales early this afternoon, but by the time he got home, the garage sales were only scheduled to go for another half hour and at that point, either people have closed up or they’re starting to. *sigh* So much for my glorious garage sale adventure.

Time suck

March 10, 2013March 10, 201316 Comments

DST

Only someone as evil as Count Rugen could have developed a system that deprives me of an hour of my precious, precious sleep every spring.

Winter in Iowa

March 5, 2013March 10, 20139 Comments

Snow Cat (Photo credit: clickclique)

I’ve had it with winter. Specifically, I’ve had it with all the white crap Mother Nature keeps dumping on us. I nearly got stuck at work yesterday because the city does such a lousy job clearing the streets, and the same thing happened again today. After narrowly avoiding the embarrassment of having to ask my boss to give me a push, what happened? I came home and promptly got stuck in the mouth of my driveway, with the back end of my van sticking out into our very narrow street.

I was stuck so tight that after the kids and I tried to get out for about ten minutes, I went across the street and asked the neighbor for help (Seymour wasn’t home yet). It took the two of us a good half hour and maybe a little more to get my van free. The city I live in (yes, I know, it’s a small town, but that’s how we refer to our municipal government) doesn’t do any better when it comes to cleaning streets than the city I work in. So in short, I’ve had it with winter.

Now, don’t get me wrong. When the sun shines on newly fallen snow and it sparkles like a thousand diamonds, I love it as much as the next person. I appreciate the beauty of snow. However, I hate dealing with it. I hate driving in it. I hate shoveling it. I hate cleaning it off of my car.

But at times like these, I often think of a joke my dad shared with me once. It’s about winter in Iowa and, given the trials I’ve had with the snow today and the fact that it was three years ago today that I lost him, this seems like a good time to share it again. I’ve posted it before, but here it is again in all its snowy glory:

Dear Diary. . .

The mummy, she lives!

December 19, 2012Leave a comment

I started this nice little post about this article I read this morning after following a link someone posted on Facebook and it was really very touching, so it made me want to write my very own little post on the same subject but then I got busy at work and didn’t have a chance to get back to it and now I have the time to work on it, but since I have neither the inclination nor the capacity to do so (although I suppose it could be argued that the coherence of this incredibly long run-on sentence means that I very well could write the dang post – I’m just too lazy to make my brain cells actually work), you’ll just have to wait till tomorrow to read it when hopefully the kids ~~will~~ won’t have a snow day and I can get some rest and kick the crap out of this stupid bug that has me in a choke-hold.

Monday cometh

November 25, 2012November 27, 20124 Comments

And another long holiday weekend bites the dust. I find myself wishing that tomorrow wasn’t Monday because I’ve got loads more writing to do and little time in which to get it done. Oh, well, I guess. C’est la vie.

Strange times

November 20, 2012November 27, 20126 Comments

Yesterday, the courthouse groundskeeper was busy putting up fresh evergreen garland around the lampposts that dot the square. Today, he was busy mowing the lawn and it felt like spring. I know it’s Iowa and the weather will change at the drop of a hat, but dude – it’s November. Get with the program.

Just don’t swear. You can hold off on that till after New Year’s.