An Absolutely Lazy Boring Day...

I was sitting here trying to remember what we had done today. It was an absolutely blah day with nothing to make it memorable. We have been wanting to make a trip over to Desert Gardens to take a look at the spring desert flowers, but Forry thought tomorrow might be a better day, so we didn't do it this afternoon.

I did wash a couple of loads of laundry. One was the bathroom rugs and the other was a load of shirts. When I went to hang a couple of shirts to dry, I got rather frustrated. I can usually hang two hangers on the cabinets in the front of the RV, one on each side. Forry had not replaced the doors on the right hand side that he had removed for the DirectTV guy's abortive attempt to replace our receiver with one that could also record. I must have made my annoyance palpable as by this afternoon, the doors are now back in place...

My run of luck with Words With Friends on my iPad is definitely over. I think I have been beaten by everyone I am playing with the last few days! I need to ramp up my collection of two letter words and of words of more than four letters -- I'd do a lot better. Playing with four or five different people of all ages is quite interesting. The selection of words is sometimes surprising and unexpected.

We did have a nice telephone visit with our eldest daughter this noon. We are in the process of re-writing the ranch lease and had emailed each of the girls a copy in order to keep them in the loop. After all, the next time the lease is up for negotiation, they will most likely be the ones doing it.

Another pair of Alpine Coach owners stopped by for a visit this evening. Sounds like there's an informal Alpine get-together happening at the Happy Hour each evening. We may have to check it out.

A VERY Busy Day!

I'm feeling like I got a lot accomplished today! Forry went over early to the mail box, then to the office with the pink slip to pick up our box of mail that Daughter MM had sent last Friday. While he was gone, I stuck the first load of clothes in the washing machine.

When Forry got back, I sorted the mail, then turned on both computers to pay bills. The stuff for our personal bills at the credit union are all on my computer, while the ones for the ranch are on Forry's. There are a couple of bills that Forry liked to pay by telephone, so we got those taken care of as well.

All the while we were doing the financial stuff, I was continuing to work on the laundry. It was a good day to be doing it as it was warm with a bit of a breeze. The clothes I hung dried very quickly.

This afternoon was the first of the season TV broadcast of a Mariner's Spring Training game. And what a game it was! The Mariners got quite bat-happy and ended up beating the Colorado Rockies 16-6. It was a fun game to watch. We have tickets for the Oakland Athletics game with the Mariners at the Peoria Sports Complex on Friday. I can hardly wait!

Laundry and Ham Hocks

Things are looking up around the Hardt's motor home. I actually had enough energy to not only do the laundry, but make a pot of beans using the ham bone Juni had saved from our Christmas dinner. It's been a couple of weeks since I've had any extra energy at all and it felt good to feel like doing something besides sleeping and napping every chance I've gotten.

I had been totally worn out by my junket into Mexico with the Executive Board and spent most of the weekend recovering from it. It's hard to believe one could rest and sleep so much.

Unfortunately, Forry is still hanging on to the dregs of his cold, or flu, or whatever it is we've had. We were planning to make a Costco run this afternoon, but by the time he got dressed and ready to go, he didn't feel up to it...

Juni and Tom stopped by on their way to town and shared a large bagful of oranges, lemons and pink grapefruit their neighbor had shared with them. Juni also shared some cucumbers, lettuce and other veggies that she had picked up in quantity. We tried one of those grapefruit -- it sure was delicious! I sure hope this chilly weather we're having doesn't affect the citrus crops.

Puppy Fix

Today was laundry day and Auntie Violet is festooned with drying clothes. I hadn't washed for a bit, so actually did four loads. It was chilly today and even with the door and the windows open, they didn't dry very quickly.

Juni invited us over for supper tonight. She was in the mood for some comfort food, so made beef stew today. It was very good -- and very filling! We hadn't been at their motorhome for a week or so, so hadn't gotten our puppy fix in a while. As usual, when we came to the door, there was a regular cacophony of barking, especially from the littlest one.

This is Izzie, a Yorkshire Terrier who is almost four years old --

She had the cutest face...

This is the poodle Tika. She is about nine years old and loves nothing better than to sit on your lap and have her back rubbed --

And then there is this little scamp. Cassie is just seven months old and is a little live wire. She is a full sister to Izzie. Her mother didn't survive, so Juni brought her home and bottle fed her every two hours when she was a baby. She is still very much a puppy and runs the other two in circles.

We had a very pleasant evening visiting, but came didn't stay to late as the guys are planning to get up early go to the wood shop orientation and safety meeting tomorrow morning at 7:30 AM!

A Busy Day

We spent today taking care of details. When we arrived on Saturday, the office was closed and we were unable to check in. So that was the first item on today's agenda. Since this was the first business day of the month, the office was a VERY busy place. The office staff was pretty efficient and it didn't take too long for us to be at the head of the line and relieved of our money. In return, we received our name tags and a large packet of materials. There was a map of the park (with a map of the Mesa area on the reverse); a newsletter of December activities; a telephone directory of the park's annual residents; a brochure with all of the acts and performances schedules this winter; the internet code; the garbage pickup schedule; etc.

Then a trip next door to pick up the key to our post office box here at the park and to pick up the package of mail from Daughter MM that had already arrived. It turns out that we will get our mail at an annex closer to our portion of the park, so we drove over to check that out as well.

Since it is the first of the month, it is also time to pay bills. I pay all of our personal bills with our credit union's on-line bill pay. Forry pays part of the ranch ones by phone and another on-line. That left a few that I had to write checks for to put in the snail mail. Then a couple of phone calls -- one to order more ranch checks and one to figure out why the bill from AAA didn't correspond to the expiration date on our cards.

Forry also made a phone call to one of the advertisers in the resort newsletter to make arrangements for their mobile unit to come and reseal the leaks on Auntie Violet's roof. They called back with a bid which he accepted. They will be here early on Thursday morning to do the work.

And while all that was going on, I was doing laundry. I think I am now caught up with all that had been stacked up while we were traveling. It's so nice to know that all of the long-sleeved shirts and the socks I washed today can be put away for a good long while.

We went over to Juni and Tom's for a bit before supper and got our doggie fix. Then it was back to Auntie Violet to make a meal of the rest of last night's rack of ribs.

A Catchup Day

After a couple of days sleeping and fighting off a not-so-nice head cold, I was feeling much better today. I felt good enough to start doing some of the neglected chores around the RV. I actually did not get much more done then several loads of laundry --

Even in Florida with its temperate climate, it is beginning to look like spring --

The first time I saw Amaryllis growing in the ground and blooming as if they were tulips or daffodils, I wasn't sure they were real. I had never seen them except as a bulb in a pot at Christmas time.

It's been quite warm here the last couple of weeks with temperatures in the high eighties. We had a few rain showers this afternoon that didn't do much to lower the temperature. It's still 75 degrees outside at 9:30 at night...

Isn't Today Monday?

One of the things we've noticed since we retired is how hard it is to keep track of what day of the week it is -- let alone the day of the month! Today has seemed like a Monday all day. I'm sure it's because we took a "mini-weekend vacation" right in the middle of the week.

We got home this morning a little after midnight. It was a very eerie, beautiful drive home from Bellevue under a full moon. As we got to this side of the mountains, there were a few scattered clouds that the moon seemed to be flirting with, slipping in and out and lighting them from the backside.

I had a very productive day today. Not only did I get three loads of laundry done, but I got all of my Quicken accounts up to date! I had been caught up a couple of months ago and for some reason I was sure that I had entered all of the July data the first of August. I must have gotten distracted, because when I went to enter the August stuff, I discovered that only about eight days of July were done... But, anyway, I am now caught up! (This is one of the few resolutions I've made that I've really tried to follow through on. I hate trying to remember what it was I spent $87 on seven months ago and trying to figure whether it was deductible or not.)

A New Antenna Connection!

We stopped at the AT&T store in Spokane yesterday. They gave us a new aircard to replace the one that was just a few weeks old on which the antenna connection had broken. That was really good news as they are $99 a pop!

I have been doing my blogs for the last few days from my iPhone. I'm pleased that I've figured out how to do it, but it takes a whole lot longer with that itty-bitty touch screen.

Almost all of the grain harvest in the area is over (the crops were a bit better then had been anticipated this spring with all of the necessary re-seeding) so last night's rain was much appreciated. Our tenant has his drills up on the summerfallow at the corner and hopes to start seeding wheat this weekend.

I cannot believe the quantity of dirty laundry I am looking at again. I know there were just a few items in the laundry basket when I left for Chicago! I think the soiled items sing a siren song during the night to entice all kinds of other clothing to join them...

My Kindle is Here!

Daughter Mary Mae stuck the package containing the Kindle DX in with the Fixed Rate box with our mail she sent to Moses Lake today. The package really wasn't very big and neither is the Kindle, even though it's the larger one of the two they make. It's plugged in right now getting charged. I will most likely have to go up on top of the hill tomorrow to download anything with it as it does not seem to be getting reception down here in the coulee.

I've finally gotten caught up with the laundry! And between loads today, I was even able to get several months of finances entered into Quicken. I am caught up as far as May. When I lost the mother board on my computer last winter, the computer shop was able to back-up my files for me. But, during the fiasco of the lemon Dell, I lost everything. In a way it is kind of nice to start over again from scratch -- there's a lot less stuff now then there was when I was working.

We stopped to visit Phyl for a few minutes while we were in Moses Lake. It is hard for her to say more than a word or two...

Laundry, laundry, laundry!

This is actually yeaterday's post. I absolutely could not access the internet last night!*%*##

I spent most of the day dealing with laundry. I don't like drying most of our clothes in the dryer, so by the time I'm finished, Auntie Violet begins to look like the old-fashioned Chinese laundry with clothes hanging from every possilbe spot. Since it looks like we may be staying here at the ranch for an extended spell, maybe I can get Forry to put up a clothesline?

The following are pictures of Russian Knapweed, which is the main noxious weed Forry has been spraying for years on our CRP (Conservation Reserve Program) acres. It's a nasty one that spreads underground and is a VERY persistent perennial! When Forry's dad Ernie, first saw it, he took a sample into the Extension Service. They told him not to worry about it, it would "NEVER spread in this country"!!!

I'd like to have the dollars spent on spray -- to say nothing of the hours -- spent trying to eradicate it!

Laundry and Housework and Gardening...

It's always worse when we stay put for a while. When we're moving every couple of days or even a week, we seem to be able to keep "stuff" put away and it doesn't pile up. We've been here at the ranch for almost a month and you can tell!

Even though we did transfer some of the things we had acquired this winter into the storage unit, we still seem to have more things then we have places to put them! We've not been at an RV park where I could take some of my paperbacks to the lending library and they're starting to pile up. I'll be so glad when my Kindle arrives!

Today I've spent most of the day doing laundry and cleaning the bathroom and kitchen. Forry's been vacuuming this evening. It really doesn't take that long to clean the whole motorhome, it takes longer to put stuff away than it does to clean.

I've replanted my AeroGarden and have tiny shoots of both basil and tomatoes showing. My basil did the best of all the herbs I planted before, so I'll try to see if it will co-exist with a yellow cherry tomato plant.

A Quiet Day Today...

Even though I had to get going early for a 7:15 AM conference call for the Mennonite Church USA Executive Director Search Committee, I had a pretty quiet day. Forry went into Ritzville to sign some long-overdue papers for the Farm Services Agency. We have just got to get Daughter MM on a power of attorney for the ranch so that she can sign this stuff off as soon as it comes in the mail!

I spent most of the day doing laundry and found myself most annoyed at the state of my shirts. It seems like all of the ones I usually save for "good" need to be moved into the "everyday" drawer! I don't know why I think they should stay nice-looking forever... maybe because I really dislike clothes shopping?

We had some interesting visitors in the coulee yesterday morning:

There didn't used to be deer in this part of eastern Washington, but after twenty plus years of conservation programs that have promoted miles of grasslands, they've gotten very common. Our tenant Jeff has even seen a moose in the coulee!



This was the view from Auntie Violet's living room window this evening: