Computers ... Aargghhhh!!

I need a new computer ... I think this one is on its last leg.  My old monitor died in September ... I replaced it.  Do you know that monitors are few and far between?  There are only a handfull available anymore; I got the 20" HP W2027a.  In December it started having fits - white lines across the whole darn thing!  It kept getting worse and worse to the point that it seems to cross out things.  I have to tell you that I shrunk down the Windows area to a normal size, not stretched all across the screen making everything fat.  Anyway, I called the store where I bought it and they told me to call HP directly and they would replace it.  Yup, they had me run through a few tests and decided that it really was defective - I told them that at the beginning of the phone call, but I understand their side of it.

The new monitor cam yesterday afternoon and I will hook it up today.  I have 3 days in which to send the 'broken' one back ... no problem as they are paying for that too!

Then Mozilla Firefox wouldn't open ... it opened the day before, now it wouldn't.  It told me that the profile was corrupt or missing ... Huh?  I searched on the Firefox help site and did find a reference to my problem ... it had me try this, try that, and try this again.  Everytime it wanted me to open something, it wouldn't!  I finally found a recommended site to go through my computer and, oh boy, it got fixed!!  Until two days ago - one week from being fixed.  I've now reset Internet Explorer as my main browser and can get to all my sites again, but I'm not fond of IE.  I happen to feel safer on Firefox.  I don't know what to do now ... my tower is OLD, and slow.  If I get a new one, if that is even possible anymore, then I have to have all my "stuff" transferred over ... I would really like a tablet, but I really don't have the finances for that ... so I keep struggling for now.

I sure hope you all had a good weekend and did something fun.  We still have snow on the ground, but sunshine.  The temperature is all the way up to the mid 30's, but the nights have been in the single digits.  I hate breaking ice for my chickens, but that is part of the joy of chicken ownership.  It does warm me up hacking away at a frozen pot of water, but I reallly can find other ways to warm up ... LOL.  The girls are on strike - very, very few eggs.  It is just too cold right now.

It has been predicted that we are getting some more snow on Wednesday, but we'll see how much.
Have a good, warm day.
(((Hugs)))

Frozen pipes anyone?

It was a beautiful clear sunny morning when I rolled out at about 8:20 ... until I tried to turn on the HOT water ... frozen, absolutely frozen solid.  Not sure exactly where the pipes were frozen it is always disheartening when you realize you have to get dressed and go out to take a look.  UGGH!!

I happened to look at the outdoor thermometer before I left the house and it was -6 ... yup -6.  I just about went back to bed and pulled the covers waayyy over my head, but nope, the pipes have to be melted.  I did what I could from the inside - took off the tub faucet handles, the shields and sat there with a heavy duty blow dryer aimed through the holes in the wall at the manifold for hot/cold/shower.  And I sat, and I sat, and I sat some more ... no hot water!  Damn ...  I called my bestest friend at 9:25, told him what I've done and he said keep on keeping on, and call him by 10 if nothing broke loose.

He called me back about 15 minutes later to say that he was frozen too!  Oh brother.  It only took him 30 minutes to thaw his pipes at the water heater ... good, I'm glad.  He then came down and started in on mine since nothing had broken loose ... oh goodie!  He has a torch that he used, and the blow dryer too.  NOTHING!!!  We were out there for 1 1/2 hour before we got more than a tiny, little trickle out of the hot water tap, both bathroom sink and kitchen sink.  He continued, bless his heart, to work on the pipes ... FINALLY!!!  We have hot water!! Yeahhhhh!!  We then knew we had to do some insulating ... that took another 30 minutes, but we got it done.  By this time it was after 1:00 pm.  I keep turning the water on to make sure it's still there ... can you blame me?

We visited for a while, actually we had to thaw out, had a few drinks - well earned - then we had to clear, actually HE cleared the roof on the chicken yard.  There was about 14-16 inches of snow on the seam, in the middle of the chicken yard roof - it had to go.  I have one of those roof rakes that works super, but I'm a little short to get the center of the roof, so my friend did most of that for me.  This man is such a blessing; he steps in to help when I get stuck trying to do anything.

So, how was your Sunday?  I'm POOPED!  I think I will sleep well tonight, but will still try the hot water when I have to get up to go potty - wouldn't you?

Long post for frozen pipes, huh?

Blessings to all of you, and hope your Sunday was a lot better than mine.

A new year, a new day

Good morning everyone! I was up at 7:20 because I couldn't get comfortable in bed for a little bit more sleep ... it just wasn't happening; my hips hurt too bad.

Just sitting here checking up on email, facebook and reading other blogs. It has been snowing lightly since I got up and I love watching it. We got about 3-4 inches overnight and I think it's suppose to snow on and off today. That's OK, I don't have anywhere to go so I can really enjoy it.

But I get to enjoy it by shoveling a bit and cleaning off the roof of the chicken coop! I sure hope it warms up a bit this coming week as I REALLY need to clean the coop and pen - it is gross! I'm sure the chickens think so too. It is a tough job this time of year as all the 'gross' is frozen solid ... UGH!!

My niece's birthday was yesterday - it is hard to believe that she's 16. WOW! She's a lovely young lady, involved with her horse in the local 4-H program; she got her learner's permit and is looking forward to getting her truck home. It's only a 2 wheel drive so since it won't make it up the hill to her house, it is residing at her Grandpa's house. Bet she's in a hurry for Spring to get here ... LOL

Have a great weekend!

Oh my GOSH, it's me again!!!

Hey everyone, I'm back - or will be officially back after New Year's Eve. It's been a rough year, but I definitely wanted to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Let's hope Santa brings us a better 2013. Hugs to all!

I've been away ...

... and I'll be away for a bit longer, probably into the new year. I have been helping two ladies with the loss of their husband; one is across the street from me, and the other is a wonderful best friend back in the Boston area. I would so like to be able to go to her, but that won't be possible until April to move her out here to be with me in Oregon. In the mean time we talk on the phone a lot and email almost daily. I hope it helps her to know that I'm here ...

I'm only half way done for Christmas and hopefully will be able to get things done in the next 9 or 10 days. I'm hoping really, really hard!! There are a few decorations up, but I haven't had time to decorate much just the special things..

I will take pictures of the gifts I'm making, but doubt I will be able to post them until the beginning of next year - hopefully you will still be interested. I miss posting, but this year has been very hap-hazard and I hope to keep you all posted of what is going on in my corner of the world.

Hugs to all

Believe it or not, I'm still hanging around ...

... reading blogs and commenting, but have sooo slacked off on my own. I just kept thinking about some of the funny and nonsensical posts others write that I love, but for the life of me couldn't imagine myself writing something funny or having silly things happening ... until yesterday. Not knee slapping funny ... but when you think about it ...

I've been camping a couple of times since my last post, one was a relaxing trip and the latest was for deer camp. After the first trip as I went to "dump" the black tank, the handle came off the slider ... can't open the tank to get the "poop" out ... oh bother!! Dale came to my rescue - we used pliers to grab the missing handle area and pulled - sideways. We are working in a space a little bigger than a breadbox. Dale was able to open it and after a ton of rinses and then some more rinses he took the WD-40 and lubed the handle-less rod that opens the slider and the funny rubber ring that it goes in to. That slippery feeling didn't last very long ... bummer.

Yesterday I was trying to do the same thing and the 2 prong hose connector broke. It was a good thing that I wasn't trying to open the slider as the hose fell off. I just closed up the "breadbox" door, put the tools away, threw the hose down and said a few choice words, and finally moved the truck off the lawn. I think I can now say that this year I've had a few shitty camping trips ...

I will replace the whole unit along with a connector. If I think about it, it probably was long overdue for breaking. The camper is a 1990, and I bet these parts were original. If the new ones last 21 years, it might not be me dealing with it - can I hope?

Thanks for 'listening' to my sad, sad story ... LOL

broke my promise

I promised it wouldn't take me a month to post pictures ... I messed up and it is 3 days past a month ... so sorry.

I have about 14 dishcloths hanging around for gifts, this only shows about 5, but most of them are a mixture of different colors and random yarns. These are folded in half so you aren't seeing the whole thing...

Then there are the easy wristers ... I have tons of yarns, and wristers are easy to make. These were knit flat and then seamed. I want to do some in the round as I don't like to seam, so I need to dust off my dpn's (double pointed needles.) The instructions are for flat knit, but I'll just have to pay attention to the increases for the longer ones.

These are kitty blankets, or small dogs for that matter. As I said above, I have tons of yarn that needs to be used and these are totally mindless ... I was given a bunch of fuzzy yarn that I did these with, but not enough of any one of them to make the blanket a solid color ... I don't think kitties will care one whit.

Well, I wanted to show you the mug cozies I made, but Blogger won't upload any more pictures today. I'll leave you with these for now and try again in a day or two...
Hugs

blogging break over!

It was just sort of a break because there wasn't really anything worthy to blog about. I went camping a couple of times; the first over Memorial Day weekend. It was COLD, super windy, and rainy. We endured hoping it would get better the next day. It did, we had better rain, better wind and better cold! We even had 10 minutes of snow flakes. Oh yes, we also had hail. Not the best birthday camp out I've ever been on, but not the worst either.

These grounded pelicans were the only picture I took - I wasn't about to go stand in the rain to get a picture of rain ... LOL!

We do set up a canopy and tarp in all the sides, leaving a loose edge for entry, and have a nice big propane heater inside. We spent most of the 4 days in there. It was even too cold to fish!

The second trip was this past weekend for Dale's 50th birthday! The weather was nice, just the usual wind around 1pm and then again at 4pm. It lasts about 30-45 minutes, and then drops to a nice breeze. The fishing was good - ever have fresh croppie fillets for breakfast? Yummy, yummy, yummy!!! Sometimes I think we eat better when camping than we do at home! Yesterday was actually Dale's birthday and the camp host came to out site and sang a little ditty for Dale. It was so nice, and we all had a good laugh over that.

I've been knitting a lot of dishcloths to keep around for gifts, I finished some wristlets, I started an ear flap hat(for me). Just to keep my hands busy when I relax in the evening I've been practicing a few stitches and what not - most of it eventually gets ripped, but I do keep the good practice pieces. I also do the practice stitches on little gift bags that will hold my beaded ornaments - just to fancy them up instead of wrapping them in tissue paper.

I will get pictures of my projects and add them in the next post - which WON'T be months from now, I promise!

Hugs everyone ...

Not again ...

I'm tired of it, I'm sick of it, but there is nothing I can do about it. It was snowing a lot more than it looks like, but who cares - snow is snow.

Then the next morning I woke up to this. The rock driveway is too warm for the snow to stick, but those little clumps of snow are on top of the pine cones. We got about an inch and it was all gone by the afternoon. A lot of people remember that it has snowed on the 4th of July, but that was before my time here.

My poor daffodils have been laid low three times by snow. I don't think they can take much more as some of them are starting to wilt. I planted some starter Sweet Peas close to them, but they seem to be doing ok.


The pines received a nice little dusting too.

I hope everyone is enjoying Spring sunshine, I can hardly wait until we get some ... LOL!! I hope it is soon as we all leave for camping next Wednesday for a 5 day Memorial Day trip.
Hugs to all.

This is almost May, isn't it??

I started getting this post together yesterday morning, but my girlfriend called and wanted me to ride to town with her - so a day late ...

It started out seeming to be a very nice day ... my border daffodils along the driveway/fence are looking very nice and bright yellow

Some are in beautiful clumps ...

... and some are a bit lonesome ...

I think come September and/or October I will put in more bulbs. I will try to get some of the multi-colored ones, so I have a nicer variety to show you next year.

This is what my beautiful daffodils look like this morning after an inch and a half of snow. If you look at the first picture, you can compare. They have been known to bounce back so I'm hoping they can accomplish this feat once again - and I hope the unopened buds will bloom!

I've also been remiss in showing you my new grown baby chickies. Remember these tiny little fuzz balls?

Well, now they look like this ...

There were 2 chicken girls retired to the freezer because they would lay their eggs, then immediately turn around and peck the egg and eat them!! Can't have that. Egg suckers cannot be rehabilitated, so are not welcome because the girls need to earn their keep!!! The new little babies were introduced to the coop on the 10th of April and seem to like it - except that the remaining chicken that lays keeps attacking them. I sure hope they grow bigger and turn on Chocolate to teach her to leave them alone. Aside from that they do get along with the two OLD ladies who are no longer laying those beautiful green eggs, but are friendly. They too, will have an appointment with the freezer, but not just yet.

The snow is starting to melt ever so slowly now, but it is still only about 25-26 outside.  Thankfully there is no wind (shhhh), but the sky is again overcast.  Not sure what to expect for today weather wise, but I guess I'll take what I get.

Hope you all have a great day.