Rosebud

My neighbors are making some sort of holiday movie in the back yard, complete with a very professional looking portable camera boom and a wood sled.  I can't determine the plot by just watching them at work.  Not a zombie movie like last time when Eryn was involved.  I'm hoping it's a Finnish war epic.

A Palpable Divide

I put in a new mailbox and boards for us the other day. Our old one was getting old, covered in flakes of paint and rust. It took two tries to put one in, because the first one pinched in the back where I put in the screw and popped its seam. I thought about just smearing it with sealant, then decided if I was that lazy, I could have just left the rusty one in place and not bothered with the whole effort.


While finishing up, I noticed this strange fact. It may be difficult to see it unless you click through to the large photo, but the mailboxes for my immediate neighbors and my neighbors to the north. Black.


All my neighbors to the south. White. North likes black. South likes white. I can't help but feel we didn't learn anything at all from history.

A Discussion with my Teenage Neighbor, Ty

Me: "Hi, Ty. Do you have an extra egg?"

Ty: "An extra egg?"

Me: "Yep. I'm making chocolate chip cookies, and I'm short an egg."

Ty: "Yeah, hold on."

Ty, comes back. "What month is it?"

Me, momentarily at a loss, "Um...April."

Ty: "April?"

Me: "Yeah."

Ty: "Nevermind. The eggs expired March 17."

Me: "Give it to me anyway."

Ty: "Really?"

Me: "Yeah."

Ty: "Really???"

Me: "Yep. Usually the egg just breaks down a bit instead of going rotten."

Ty: "Okaaaay." Hands me the egg.

It made very good chocolate chip cookies. But it's disturbing Ty and Steve have eggs that are five weeks past due.

Pig Nose Extravaganza!

One of the geocaching bugs we picked up, the one attached to a pig nose, asked that it be involved in as many pictures with it on as possible. I've only provided one picture, but it's a collage, so I don't have to feel like I'm shirking. If you need to see close ups, you'll have to root around in my 2007 photo collection near the bottom.

Speaking of geocaching - today I was in the park closest to work looking for four caches, one of which involved taking my coat off and sticking my arm way up inside a tree, and still not finding it, which is scary if you're alone, because you worry about rabid squirrels or getting your arm stuck and having your phone die. I didn't find three out of four I was looking for. That doubles my unfound caches. I'm going to have to leave myself a note not to go to that cachers caches. But the best part was coming back to find two people looming over my car with their phone out. They had called the police to report a car where it shouldn't be - i.e. at the end of a plowed road.

I said, "I was out walking."

They said, "We thought it was stolen. It looks like it's been here quite a while."

I responded, "About sixty minutes." Then I mumbled, "There's still water on the hood" (from the engine heat - it was snowing).

They replied, "You can't drive a car back here."

I said, "Why? It's plowed, there's an area to turn around, and there's no 'do not enter' sign."

They assured me, "Yes there is."

Not really able to argue because I didn't have photographic evidence and the entrance was half a mile away, I drove back out to find no sign. The truth is, I believe them - but it's probably under four feet of snow, and that's not my fault. I can't be expected to do an archaeological dig for street signs.