Bits and Pieces

I know - here I am again, not blogging for weeks. Well, life has been too interesting in some areas and not interesting enough in others. There are big things taking place in my children's lives that I'm not really free to blog. And then my own life is kind of on hold - my work, my business, my life.

So, to follow the theme of bits and pieces:

• I have two weekly family obligations now - I babysit Joe and Shayne on Fridays and on Tuesdays Heather, Hunter and I go shopping together. I'm enjoying both so far.


• My business is at a standstill, I intend to advertise in the yellow pages and maybe the local newspaper when I have some available funds. In the meantime, I'm looking into selling photography, online and locally. The trick is finding the right outlets. Rick has been saying I should contact the local paper to see if they'll do a little story on me and my fledgling business. Hey - free advertising, right?


• We have been in a deep freeze since the weekend and it's supposed to continue at least through next weekend. As usual, we have the cold temps but not the precip. We did get just enough snow to make everything slick and it refreezes every night where the sun hit and melted during the day. Our next chance for snow is tonight or tomorrow. That's fine - I'm ready - bring it on!


• I have an offspring going in for some exploratory surgery this Friday, laproscopically to begin, then more if needed. It will hopefully ease this person's mind and eliminate some frustrating symptoms. They will be staying overnight.


• Rick and I, his daughter and her boyfriend flew over Snoqualmie and Blewett passes last wknd to Leavenworth, a Bavarian village just over the Cacsade mts from us. We had an interesting day but it was a little too crowded for my taste, even though the crowds were supposedly half of the normal Xmas wknd crowds. Then we flew back that evening over Steven's pass. Basically the whole day was spent in the snow on both sides of the mts, in the car and on foot. Brrr!


• I'm still putting together things to send to family members that I reconnected with last month. Honest - I'm working on it!


• I updated our smugmug galleries, in particular the "Family" category that I had only one gallery in, despite having the mob that I do. That is now corrected and the most popular person in the family according to "hits" on our website? - Joe!


• Rick's cousin lost a cat to a coyote, then miraculously got her back! Turns out it was someone else's cat that was in their yard that was attacked, their "Snowball" (no - she's black) was sleeping in a closet and wasn't discovered for a couple days!


• Another of my offspring is having serious marriage difficulties and is leaning on family to get through it. As much as we'd like to see things work out, it doesn't look hopeful. But we'll be there regardless.


• My Montero is down at Dale's, he's always offering to help me sell my vehicles. Well, this one just isn't getting any attention, I had more interest after I raised the price so I just raised it again, we'll see. I also have the title to the van I drove up from Calif so may proceed on that sale as well. I'm just waiting for the ice to dissipate first, I don't want anyone test-driving it right now.


• Here's a rant - why do they have to screw things up that you've used for years? In this case I'm talking about ground turkey chubs. I've been using them to make all my hamburger dishes since the 80's. Now everything I make from it tastes tainted. The "meat" doesn't look the same either. So, after all these years I'm switching back to ground beef. I could spend $4/lb to get the better ground turkey but part of the reason I initially switched was cost and that's no less a factor still.

Like I said - bits and pieces. I hope that covers everything. Maybe something bigger will jump in my face and lead me to a more interesting blog.