Saturday

Windy, chilly, cloudy, overcast today. Then it started to rain. Forry had gone out this morning and made sure that the temporary splice of the 50 amp cables was well-covered with a plastic bag. We don't often bring in the little shade over the front door like we do the awning, but even the little shade was bouncing pretty good in the wind, so it came in as well.

We had a nice visit via Facebook Messenger with Granddaughter Havela at college in Hesston this morning, then a nice long phone call with Daughter MM this afternoon as well as a brief chat with Son-in-law Todd. It's good to touch bases with family.

I had been waiting for a warm day to wash the sheets, but according to the weather forecast, that's not going to happen for a week or so, so I went ahead and did it. The space between our bed and the wall on the outside wall is so tight, it takes a bit of acrobatics to get the fitted bottom sheet on, so sometimes I procrastinate...

I took another attempt at making beef barley soup this afternoon and I think this time, I got it. Adding some beef bouillon and some mushrooms made a big difference! It was a hearty supper for a chilly nasty day.

No Power!

We were without power last night! And it gets cold in the desert at night! It was 53 degrees in the living room when we got up this morning.

This is what the power cords looked like in the daylight. No wonder we saw such a bright flash when the power went off.

As soon as could this morning, Forry called Gene's RV and A/C Repair. They have a mobile service and the receptionist told him that a technician would call between ten and four and give us a half hour notice before he came out. It was almost four when he finally called, but he showed up about a half hour later. Forry's first idea which the tech concurred with, was to cut the male and female ends off of the fifty amp cable and replace them. So that's what they did.

 

 There are four color coded sets of copper wire in each cord.

 

The tech tried attaching the new ends to the cords, but he and Forry both quickly decided the ends he had were too flimsy compared to the original ones. In fact, he could not get them to stay clamped on -- all it took was one tug to pull them loose.

As a temporary fix, the tech spliced the two cords together. Since he's going to order new cords, it'll be sometime next week before we have a permanent fix. I'm not sure what the tech did while he was checking things out, but we do not have power to the outlets on the driver's side of the vehicle... But at least we have heat tonight.

Crab!

After a day that included draining tanks (Forry), doing laundry (me), adding water to batteries (Forry), we decided we had earned an evening over at the Fort McDowell Casino. They have "all the crab you can eat" on Wednesday and Thursday nights. They have really improved their system. Instead of standing in line for forty-five minutes to an hour, you give them your phone number and they text you when they have a table free.

Since there was a good hour wait tonight, we went over to play the slot machines while we waited. Since we are such big time spenders, the $20 bill we start out with, is what we play with. But, it did pass the time until they had room for us. The crab has been really good this year and I think we've finally got a handle on how best to crack it. I usually eat my fill, then help Forry, who is a bit less dextrous, crack and strip the last of his.

I really wonder how many people they feed on their crab nights? There were still people lining up when we left. You see some people with so many crab halves piled on their plates, they can hardly see over them.

When we got home, we settled in to watch the Gonzaga game. We have been having intermittent power outages, but tonight we saw a flash outside and discovered that we had a bad short where our two power cables were connected (we have an extension fifty amp cord in order to reach the power pedestal as we are technically parked in backwards...). The last week of rain must have gotten the cords wet...

Looks like we'll be talking with a repair person in the morning...

An Early Birthday Surprise

Forry and I went over to the office to pay the rent for the month of March. While we were there, Sandy told us we had a big box. We weren't expecting anything, so I was a bit surprised. We paid the bill, then went back over to Auntie Violet. Then we realized that we had left the box behind!

Forry rode the trike back over and brought the box back. What a surprise it contained. There was a note from Sister Sherry saying she had seen it in the Sundance catalog and couldn't resist getting this for the two of us as an early birthday present (we both have birthdays in May).

It is a really neat piece of artwork. I can't wait to hang it out in the tree where I can see it!

Besides the trip over to the office, we really didn't do a lot today. I put some potatoes into the oven to bake and sauteed some lamb chops for supper. We shared a lemon cupcake we had left from the Olive Mill and watched a dove who spent a good share of the day perched on the fence. The sun was shining and it was another beautiful day.

A Trip to Queen Creek

Last week when Judy and Tim were here, I used the last of my Mexican Lime Olive Oil to make the salad dressing for our salads. Then a couple of nights ago, I used the last of my large bottle of olive oil when I sauteed pork chops for dinner. So today we made an expedition to Queen Creek and to the Queen Creek Olive Mill.

It's about an hour's drive over there as it is on the other side of Phoenix.

While there are lots of olive trees in California, it is our understanding that this is the only commercial olive grove and mill in Arizona. There is a grove of olive trees immediately around the store and mill, and then a large orchard of trees near by. We discovered it at least three years ago and have made a point of buying our olive oil here. They have an absolutely wonderful lime-flavored olive oil that I really enjoy cooking scallops and shrimp with.

 

Several dollars later, my cupboard is restocked! (The dark bottles are today's purchases.)

The Olive Mill has sort of a deli lunch counter. I got Forry a bowl of clam chowder while I ate half of an Italian BLT. They even had a Kilt Lifter to go with Forry's soup. We each had some gelato to go with our lime cupcakes. It was a very nice excursion.

We again had visitors along the road on our way home. I think the horses are enjoying all of the new grass. There was a third horse over to the right as well. Makes it fun to drive these roads -- you certainly want to stay alert!

It's Beginning to Look Like Spring...

All of a sudden as I am out walking or when Forry is scanning the valley for birds and other wildlife, we are seeing flowers in bloom. These are a couple of flowers of a small Brittlebush.

 If you look closely in the shelter of the shrubs, you can see some orange Globe Mallow -

 It was cloudy and overcast all day today. You could not even see the Four Peaks behind the clouds.

There were showers off and on all day today. We actually had quite a bit of rain. The clouds finally started clearing off towards evening. Forry took this picture at sunset -

I am going to have to go looking for my wildflower books. It should be a beautiful spring with all of the rain we've had this winter.

Sunday Surprise

I was very slowly getting ambitious enough to fix some blueberry pancakes for brunch when I opened my email and saw a note from our dear friend Mary. She and her the friend Melanie (whom she's staying with) had come over to Fountain Hills to see the fountain and walk around the lake. She saw how close we are to Fountain Hills and wondered if we could come join them for lunch.

We knew that Fountain Hills was having a street fair this weekend and parking would be a bear. Mary checked on line for a restaurant that might have parking and also would be dog friendly as Melanie had their Golden Retriever with her. They found Phil's Family Restaurant that fulfilled all the requirements. Sure enough, they had parking right in front reserved for their customers. And Mary and Melanie had found a table right on the front porch.

What a delight to: 1. Put a face to someone we have heard Mary talk about - Good to meet you, Melanie! And of course, Phoebe, her beautiful dog. 2. Have a chance to get caught up with a good friend for a little bit. (We'll get in a longer visit this summer when we are all back in Washington State.)

We returned to the RV Park for naps and an evening of watching Professional Bull Riding in Kansas City and the Oscars. Since we had a big lunch, we had what the Mennonites call "faspa," a light supper of WSU's Cougar Gold cheese and Brother Patrick's venison summer sausage. It was another lovely day here in paradise.

Life On a Fence Post

When we looked out the front window this morning, we saw this resident Greater Road Runner sitting out on the fence post just across the walking trail from us. We watched her for ten or fifteen minutes as she preened and groomed herself while sitting on the top of the post. What was sort of funny was a lady who walked by not more than six feet away from her -- and never even noticed her!

We know this is most likely a female, as the male has red and blue coloring just behind its eye that is especially vivid this time of the year.

She spent quite a bit of time cleaning herself and fluffing her feathers.

A man with a dog walking on the other side of the fence finally spooked her and she jumped down and ran off. We have seen Road Runners often on the fence, but I don't know if there are several or if we are just seeing the same one over and over.

It was another quiet beautiful day today. It was sort of of overcast with some high clouds floating over. We didn't do a whole lot, just the regular household chores. I broiled a steak for supper which we had with more of the stuffed baked potatoes that were in our Christmas care package from Daughter Dawn.

Saturday

We didn't get much accomplished today. We had been hoping to get together with our friend Mary, but the friends she is staying with got tied up in their kitchen remodeling project and it just didn't work out.

Not only are the trees along the river valley getting greener and greener, we are seeing more birds all the time. There were a couple of these little birds flitting around the neighbors motor home. I tried very hard to get a decent picture, but this is as good as I got -

We know they are a flycatcher of some kind, most likely a Say's Phoebe.

A Quick Trip to Town

Did a couple loads of laundry, read the papers, and went to the Fountain Hills Post Office to send a Priority Mail envelope off to our accountant back in Moses Lake. That pretty much sums up my day. Thursday night always means Gray's Anatomy, Scandal and How to Get Away With Murder. Now the Gonzaga basketball game is on, so that will take us up to bed time.

I was looking at some old pictures the other day and ran into these from MANY years ago. This one of the little tow-headed boy was taken at least seventy years ago.

This is one of the few pictures that we have that includes Forry's older brother Melvin (killed in a combine accident in 1961). His sister Grace is on the right, his Mother Martha on the left and his father Ernest. Melvin was nineteen years older than Forry and his sister is eleven years older.

It's fun to look at some of these old pictures.  Forry's Mom was as blonde as he is when she was young. Ernest always talked about "seeing the little white haired girl in pigtails and knowing he was going to marry her when he grew up..."

Finished!

Well, I buckled down today and I got the job finished. I only had three months of ranch stuff to enter into the computer and it actually didn't take that long. I got it finished off, then went to send the accountant's copy off. And the dear sweet program told me I couldn't do it until I had downloaded the changes he had made the last time. And of course, I couldn't find them. Thank goodness he was in the office and after an email, quickly resent them to me.

Got the program caught up and then tried again. And of course, it told me the file didn't go through...

But, I tried it again and thank goodness, the second time it worked. Now we just need to go to the post office in Fountain Hills tomorrow and send the packet of 1099s and other documents to Moses Lake as well. Feels good to get this close to being done.

This morning, I saw a Facebook post from Cafe 87 over at the casino talking about tonight's special - a pork loin roast with escalloped apples and pilaf. It sounded good enough that Forry and I decided to go over there for supper tonight. And it was good!

A Special Visit

We've known for a week that Judy and Tim were coming to visit and have been looking forward to it. We've known Judy for many, many years and I think we've known Tim for at least twenty years or so. Both teachers, Judy retired a couple of years ago and now Tim has joined her. They traveled in an Airstream last winter, and this year upgraded to a bit bigger one. They had been exploring California and Death Valley and are now in Phoenix for a few weeks.

Judy had suggested that they stop by to visit and see Eagle View RV Resort, then go out to eat together. I thought we might have a better chance to visit if we just stayed here, so I invited them to have lunch with us. I steamed some shrimp and asparagus spears last night and hard-boiled some eggs. Then this morning I started with a bed of spring greens, then made a circle of cucumber slices, palm hearts. egg quarters, artichoke quarters, yellow pepper strips, tomato wedges and the asparagus spears around a pile of tail-on shrimp. I used the last of my Mexican Lime Olive Oil with the juice of a couple of limes and some honey to make a pour-on dressing.  The salads looked pretty and actually tasted pretty good. Judy brought along the dough for semel which we baked to go with. That sure brought back memories!

It was another absolutely gorgeous day. We were able to sit outside to eat and visit. It was great to get caught up on all the kids and grandkids and what's happening in their lives. We'll probably catch up with Judy and Tim again when we all return to Spokane early this summer. We'll be looking forward to seeing them again.

Another Day in Paradise

It was another gorgeous day today. I packed up all of our rugs and went over to the laundromat in the office building. I had to chuckle. I took my door pass card, but the doors on both sides were propped wide open, even though signs on both doors said, "Air conditioning is on, please leave the doors closed".

The washers and dryers in the laundry are double size plus, so I only needed to use two. I had a couple dollars worth of quarters, but not enough for two machines ($3.00 each), so used the change machine to get more. I sorted through them right away and used the "old" quarters for the second washer and the dryers. After I got home, Forry sorted through the other quarters and added several national parks to his collection. He also added a couple of the ones from the Philadelphia mint that he's been looking for.

I'm glad I don't have to use the laundromat machines very often. I usually wash the little bathroom rugs in my Splendide combo in Auntie Violet, but the kitchen rugs are just too heavy for my little machine. I usually put it off until I can't stand them any longer -- I guess I hit that point today.

A Beautiful Day

We have been blessed the last week or so with absolutely perfect weather. It's been in the mid to high 80s, the perfect temperature for me. Today was another one. There were light high clouds floating overhead day with vast reaches of blue in between. This is the weather we come to Arizona for.

 The Four Peaks were gorgeous this evening as the sun was setting. Shades of purple and pink.

Notice how green the trees in the valley are getting.

Over to the west, that layer of clouds made for a golden blaze of a sunset -

It looks like it should be a painting -

We had leftovers from our Valentine's dinner this evening for supper. I think they even tasted better tonight -- probably because we were actually hungrey.

Valentine's Day

Today was a much better day. After sleeping pretty much around the clock, I awoke this morning feeling good again. After showers we headed into Fountain Hills to get the groceries we had planned to get yesterday. As we were coming home, I commented to Forry that it had been a while since we had seen any horses or cattle on the road (the reservation is Open Range). So when we went around the next bend, this is what we saw --

There were six of them altogether and they were feeling frisky. They crossed back and forth across the road, chasing each other.

The roan horse on the right was fighting with the one in front of her - and got in some pretty good kicks.

 

After we finally got back to the house, we had time for a quick nap before it was time to leave for the We-ko-pa Hotel's Valentine dinner. What a feast we had! The menu showed three different starters: Butternut squash bisque, grouper ceviche and a new greens salad with cranberries and pecans. But, the waiter told us that they were serving ALL three starters with each meal! Before we even got to our entrees, we were pretty full. I had ordered lamb chops while Forry got the prime rib. Needless to say, a good share of our entrees came home with us. As well as our desserts! White and dark chocolate bread pudding which we still have to eat...

Aches and More Aches

I didn't sleep well last night and sometime early this morning, I ended up coming out to try to sleep on the couch. I've spent most of the day there, sleeping and dozing. Just lots of achy bones and joints. I didn't accomplish a single thing today.

Late this afternoon, Brother Pat called to see if we had gotten the mail. Seems he had sent a frozen care package and wanted to make sure we didn't leave it set over in the office. Forry rode the trike over to the office and came back with three packages. One was from Patrick with summer sausage, peperoni sticks, and shelled walnut and hazelnuts. The meat was still nice and cold, so Forry immediately popped it into the freezer.

There was another package from Sister Sherry with Valentine cookies and sweets. So good! I sure do have neat siblings!

Baseball Tickets!

I went back to work on the ranch books this morning and by the time I quit about three o'clock, I had nine months done. It goes so much more quickly now that I have QuickBooks on my own computer. I might even get it all finished tomorrow...

Forry rode the trike over to get the mail this afternoon. There was a fat envelope from The Peoria Diamond  Club. I had to look at it for a minute before I finally realized it must be our tickets for Spring Training baseball. Last year we followed the Mariners around to almost all of the different ball parks in the Valley's Cactus League.It was fascinating to see all of the very different ball parks.

This year we decided we would get Season Tickets for all of the Mariners home games at their ball park in Peoria. It will make driving a bit easier and the park, which was extensively -- and expensively -- remodeled last year is very nice. After I went through the tickets and wrote the dates on the calendar, it is pretty obvious what we will be doing in March!

We went over to the Red Rock Buffet at the Fort McDowell Casino this evening for their crab feed. When we joined the line, we were informed that it would be a 45 minute wait. That's a long time to stand in line! But they have put in a new system where you give them your cell phone number, then you can go sit over by the cafe until they text and tell you to come and eat. The crab, which they call "Queen Crab" was really good tonight, very fresh and sweet. So good!

A Surprise Visit

I did get QuickBooks installed on my computer yesterday and after some stress, bad words and frustration, today I got the ranch books copied and transferred over as well. I was actually getting January and part of February's data installed when there was a knock at Auntie Violet's front door.

Much to our surprise and delight, it was friends we haven't seen in several years, perhaps since their wedding...? Barb and Ken live on Vashon Island in Washington State and are on a camping visit to Arizona. They are camped in their van RV over at Roosevelt Lake. They had come to Scottsdale to use some gift cards from REI at the store there, and detoured to come visit us. What a wonderful surprise!

We spent a couple of hours just catching up with these delightful souls. Actually, it was more catching up with their lives. It turns out that they follow the blog, so they have a pretty fair idea of what we've been doing! It was a good visit. We took a look at their van -- it's a very compact living space with everything a person really needs.

It even has room for Barb's portable harp - a "Harpsicle." Barb has a great deal of musical talent (she and Ken actually met when he followed the sounds of her recorder to her one night) and often plays her harp for hospice patients.

The Fountain at Fountain Hills

Forry has been fascinated by the fountain at Fountain Hills ever since we got here two years ago. It tickles him that he can spot it from Eagle View RV Resort. (We are actually about 7 miles away as the crow flies.) He was playing around this afternoon with his camera telephoto taking pictures out of the back bedroom window.

The town of Fountain Hills sits in what was one of Arizona's largest cattle ranches. The land was purchased in the late 60s and the town was designed by Charles Wood Jr, the same man who designed Disneyland in California. The centerpiece for the town is the fountain which was built in 1970. It's one of the world's tallest man-made fountains.

The fountain sprays water at the rate of 7000 gallons per minute and under ideal conditions, can reach 560 feet in height. It sprays for 15 minutes at the top of every hour.

It is an awesome sight!

I finished up all of our personal tax stuff this afternoon and printed out the report for the accountant. I also installed a copy of QuickBooks onto my laptop. We have had all of the ranch records on Forry's computer, which he seldom uses. I have had to do the ranch books using his computer, which means he has to unload all the stuff he has sitting on it. It's a bit on the awkward side to work on it from my chair.

Tomorrow  I will try to upload the ranch data on a thumb drive and see if I can transfer it to the QuickBooks I installed on my computer. Hope it all goes well...

It's Monday Once Again

After showers this morning, I got busy again on the household records. I was clicking right along with three more months done when Forry came back from the office with the mail and totally side-tracked me. One of the packages was a long-awaited one from Sister Sherry with a copy of the The Canine Chronicle, The Annual.

I had helped Sherry put together an ad for her mastiff, Keiko San with a tribute to his handler Luke Baggenstos. There are eleven pages of "Thank Yous" to Luke and his wife Rowan showing a whole bunch of different breeds of dogs in the over one inch thick Annual. Very impressive!

There was also a box of mail from Daughter Mary Mae. It had all the 1099s we need for our tax preparations, plus the paperwork for the bills of the last month and some magazines and newspapers. By the time I had everything sorted out, some of it shredded, some of it filed and some of it trashed, it was time to start thinking about supper.

Clean-up

This time of year, we see spray crews out everywhere. We see them working along the freeways (Arizona has a lot of landscaping with gravel between plants) and in people's yards. They are all spraying the weeds that start growing in the rocks and gravel. There are a lot of weeds because of all the rain we've had.

Eagle View RV Resort is no different. Last week we came home to a note taped to Auntie Violet's door asking us to move all of our lawn furniture and ornaments off of the gravel unto the concrete pads so that they could spray. There were notices posted in the office as well.

A couple of days later we saw them coming and made sure that all of the windows were closed. There were two guys working, one spraying and the other handling the hose.

They had a tank full of spray on this little cart. This year they are both wearing respirators. I was concerned last year because they weren't...

I don't know what it was they were spraying, but what ever it was, it certainly has accelerated the weed growth. I should have taken another picture today to show how green and big they are. It must have been one of the glycosates like Round-up that push abnormal growth so fast the plant dies.

We drove up the road across the river this afternoon to see what was going on as we have seen people running and climbing over a building made out of rafters and ropes all weekend. As we got closer (it's probably three miles away from Auntie Violet as the crow flies) we could see hundreds of cars parked and lots of people. We finally saw a sign welcoming people to the Spartan Races. Seems they are races for all ages using a combination of distance, sprints, obstacles and mud. Looks like it was quite the thing.

Avian Visitors

We have seen a great many birds on the other side of the fence. There are flocks of ducks who fly in and out along the river and we have seen both the Golden and Bald Eagles. We have seen this Great Egret flying by several times, but this morning it flew by, circled then landed in this snag just beyond the fence. It stayed long enough for me to get the camera and go outside to get a picture. With its huge yellow beak and black legs, it's a beautiful specimen.

Unfortunately, it didn't stay long, but flew back up the river...

The other bird we have seen recently was running along on the other side of the fence, staying ahead of some walkers who never even saw it. Later, we saw it again sitting on a fence post.

There are quite a few of these pretty Roadrunners around the RV park, if you look carefully. They blend very well with the brush and can sit very still. I'm sure they think you can't see them.

Yesterday was a very nice warm day and today was even better. It's the perfect kind of weather as far as I'm concerned. It got into the high eighties with lots of sunshine. Unfortunately, I made myself stick to business inside the RV. I had printed off all of the 2014 bank statements yesterday and today I started putting them all into Quicken so that I can print off a report for our accountant. I kept working at it and actually got all the way through June.

Disappointed...

Today, February 6th, is the first Friday in the month of February. Therefore, there should be a First Friday evening over at Fort McDowell Adventures. We planned to go over - it's about 8 miles from here - have some ribs, listen to some music, enjoy the bonfires and the some mores.

There were a few cars there when we arrived and  a few people, mostly families with little kids, roaming around looking for activity. But, that was it. No lanterns lit, no fires burning, no staff welcoming people, nothing! There were no signs posted saying the event was cancelled, no information on the web-site, nothing!

So we came back home. We thought a bit about going over to the casino or the hotel for dinner instead, but I had bought some fresh soup when we were at Safeway the other day. So Forry had clam chowder and I had some baked potato soup. Not the ribs I had been looking forward to...

Catching Up

I was looking back this evening, trying to think what we had done today. The evidence of some activity is around the living room with several loads of laundry hanging up to dry. Some of it, actually most of it, is stuff I wore to Kansas City last week.

I bought some pearl barley last week when we were at the store, thinking that I'd like to make some beef and barley soup. So that's the other thing I did today. I looked at several recipes on the internet along with trying to recall what I had done when I made it several years ago. I don't exactly know what I was imagining, but I didn't quite get it. I do know that I had forgotten how much barley expands. I could have used half as much and it would have been better. Some mushrooms would have been good as well.

We had moved the lawn chairs, the little table and the javelina and the roadrunner off of the gravel to the cement pad and folded up the carpet when we got home last Saturday. We had gotten notice that the crews were going to be spraying the gravel areas during the next few days. There is a lot of green stuff growing in the gravel -- you can tell there's been a great deal of rain the last month. This morning the crews were out in front spraying the walking path area between us and the fence. Then a bit later they came around behind us on the road and sprayed the areas between the sites.

A Night for Washingtonians

We met four present and former Washingtonians for dinner this evening. Our friends Victoria and Bill spent time with us a couple of years ago when they were visiting Arizona. This year they are heading for the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest. While they were here, we wanted to get together. Vic also wanted to visit with Greg and Jan. Greg and Vic were colleagues at the Washington State Hospital Association years ago. Greg is now the CEO for the Arizona Hospital Association and he and Jan now live in Scottsdale.

Jan made reservations for us this evening at Cowboy Ciao in Scottsdale's Old Town area. The food was wonderful, but the restaurant was incredibly noisy! All plaster and tile, there is little to absorb sound. Our waiter seemed used to shouting to be heard.

It was good to see everyone. I just wish we could have heard each other.

Another Trip

As I predicted yesterday, we ended up going grocery shopping today. After all, Forry did put the last of the breakfast sandwiches in the microwave this morning. It just won't do to not have any in the freezer -- and besides he's out of red licorice. (I'd just as soon he didn't buy the stuff as I find myself eating it too!)

Since I ended up doing a hard reset on our Garmin GPS in order to get it to switch itself to "day" mode, we lost all of the "previously found" addresses. So when Forry put Safeway in its grocery store file, it took us an entirely different route today. We saw some lovely parts of Fountain Hills that we hadn't explored before.

We had already agreed before we left the RV park that we would stop by Denny's on our way home for dinner. The GPS unit tried to take us to one way on the other side of town instead of the one that is just off of Highway 87 a few miles from home. When we realized where she was taking us, we made a U-Turn and went back. The Senior menu is just about right for us -- we both had chicken fried steak and it was very good.

Once again, no little elf showed up to put away the groceries when we got home...

Spending Money...

I am relatively good at spending money. In fact, I think I do it quite well. At least if our trip to Costco today is any evidence. Of course, having Forry along adds to my ability as well!

We have not been to Costco for quite some time. I was waiting until the freezer was empty of meat so that I could stock up again. The one thing that I dislike about our mobile status is the inability to develop a relationship with a local butcher that you can trust. As a result, I pretty much don't buy meat anywhere except for Costco.

So today I bought several packs of meat that I then brought home and repackaged as individual items. I then scattered them around the freezer to solidify. I'll stack all of the packages in the meat drawer tomorrow after they're solid.

If the only thing I bought was meat, it wouldn't have been so bad, but Costco is just one big temptation. So you add in some gruyere and some brie cheese, a little liquid refreshment, some berries, some crab, a bag of frozen shrimp and a pot of pink geraniums and oh my goodness, now look at the tab!

And we still probably need to go to Safeway tomorrow to get groceries...

Super Bowl Sunday

Let me get it off my chest -- I am NOT happy with the way the Super Bowl ended! The last two minutes were awful. 'Nuff said.

I was so tired when I got home last night I did not have enough energy to write anything. When I woke up about three AM to visit the bathroom, I thought about it and promptly went back to sleep.

We have had a fairly quiet day. Forry had recorded a couple of the TV shows I like on Thursday night, so we watched them this morning. Then of course, this afternoon we had to watch the Super Bowl.

I am still quite tired this evening, so will most likely make an early night of it.