Playing Ketchup

There I go again, not getting any blogging done. It's not because nothing has happened, just lazy I guess.

The week after I did Chester's memorial DVD I actually got another job! It turned into quite a nice job, over 100 pictures and netted $311. I'm not really sure though that this guy was even gone yet. I was dealing with the wife and she kept speaking of him in the present tense. He was 59 and dying of cancer, so it may have been imminent. They had just celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary in July, sad.

I'm so glad August is gone. It was one of the coolest, wettest Augusts in my memory. September has been just awesome. Temps back in the 70s and 80s. Today and tomorrow are supposed to be mid 80s, then a day in the 70s, then down into the 60s for the unforeseeable future - fall will hit this week. But I used all this beautiful weather getting work in my yard done that I haven't been able to do for a cuppla years. Lotsa pruning, weeding, thinning.

Last weekend Rick and I went to the fair. I haven't been to the fair for prolly 5 years. I wore a dress to keep from being expected to go on any "scream" rides. It worked, we walked around just looking at stuff like a couple of old people. But we didn't get to go look at any critters. I guess I'll have to go on a ride if I expect Rick to look at the animals. Maybe next year. One thing I've noticed that has caught on at these events is teeth whitening. I saw a booth at the Tall Ships in Tacoma, they were doing it for $40. I've been wanting to try it out, I should have done it then. The ones they had at the fair were $99. It was one of the more unusual sights to see. We also saw a drummer group that have been on TV called the Procrastinators. They used stools with pots and 5 gallon water bottles attached for their instruments. They ran around, jumped up and down, juggled their drumsticks and did a very good job percussing. Very entertaining.

Saturday AM was Joe's first day at teeny-weenie soccer. He was probably the youngest one on his team. At the beginning he had no idea what he was supposed to do. When the game started he and 2 of the opposing teammates just stood there looking over their shoulders at everyone else chasing the ball, it was hilarious! But by the end of the game he figured out how to chase the ball too. Shirley and I were his cheering squad - "Give me a "J"! . . . He finally got his chance to kick the ball and what did he do? He picked it up and held it like "MINE!" It was so cute. It was kinda unfair though because they had bigger kids playing who were kindergarten age and knew perfectly well what they were doing, so they dominated the game. But the little ones were still cute.

The big news this week was my hot tub. We finally got it going Saturday. I called my old hot tub guy and he came out (1 1/2 wks after I called, he's painting his house) and pulled out his electronic tester and discovered a soldered-on fuse was blown, which meant that he would have to replace the board ($300 + labor). He "unofficially" told me the problem and suggested I find someone who could solder a new one on. That just happens to be one of Rick's many talents. So we bought the fuse and a fuse holder ($6) that we soldered in place and now we can just change the fuse if it blows again - user friendly! We filled it as soon as the heater element and new seals were in (we knew those needed replacing before the hot tub guy came), did the soldering and reinstalled the board and turned it on - nothing! Woops, the reset button needed to be pushed. Then it worked, so we turned it on and headed for Denny's for dinner. We ate dogs with cream cheese and salsa (try it - it's yummy!) then played bowling on his Wii. By the end of dinner the hot tub was about 6º warmer. By Sunday morning it was up to temp. So last night we went in about 6, earlier than I would have gone in but Rick has to get up early. We sat in the tub and talked and watched the birds at my bird feeder for an hour or so, until we were pruney. I have a pair of quail that come to feed. They came by and we enjoyed watching them, they're so funny how they run away when they get spooked!

That's it, all caught up again. Today I'll go out and place some brochure holders around to drum up more business. I'll also work on my websites, check them out at the top of this blog page, there are 2 now. My first one for photography tips with my services being offered and now a new, free one (the 110mb is a free website server) devoted to the memory DVDs. I also harvested a monster zucchini that needs to be processed and baked into chocolate cake and zucchini bread, muffins, etc, one of those "autumn" things. We didn't get around to picking any blackberries so no cobbler. I love autumn, it's one of the seasons I missed out on growing up in So Cal and Hawaii. Especially the fog, the mist on the fields in the early AM, on the corn fields, on the geese "grazing" in the fields. I'll have to have Rick call me when it's one of those mornings so I can go out and catch some shots of those beautiful mornings.