This and That

I don't really have a theme today. Just little dribs and drabs of info and then, if I can sustain some enthusiasm, I'm off to do some spring cleaning, even though it doesn't look very springlike outside presently. Here's a photo I took last night:



Yes ladies and gents, this proves indisputably that it is, indeed, colder then a witch's..... well, moving on...



I loved the way last night's sticky snow turned the entire garden into a bunch of circles, particularly the tomato cages. They remind me of snow "onion" rings. And since you need something to wash down those onion rings...


This is a garden stake I bought at an art and garden show in Eugene on the 4th of July a few summers back. How could I resist it! I carried it around for the rest of the day and I can't remember a time I had so many passersby stop me to exclaim "Where did you GET that!?" I guess there's a lot of magarita lovers in Oregon. I loved the way the bartender (aka Mother Nature) gave this drink a liberal edging of "salt" last night.

I went outside again just at dawn (Rosie has a very small bladder) and noticed somewhat blearily that everything was still frosted and that there was a pink tinge to the sky in the east. I don't get outside much on that end of the day and even when I'm more awake then I was this morning, it always has a somewhat surreal look to it. The shadows seem all wrong. I vaguely recall thinking I should get my camera and take some more photos now that I had light to work with, but apparently I talked myself out of it with the unrealistic argument that it would all still be there when I woke up at a more reasonable hour of the day. Of course I was wrong.

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Did I mention that I won last month's B4B contest? Dang, I can't find the URL to set up a link. I'm soooooooo beaming! The theme was Clubs and I wrote my entry literally at the eleventh hour before the midnight deadline. It was, with great originality, titled Clubs. The selections were read and the winners selected by M. J. Rose, and I win a signed first edition of her new book The Delilah Complex. Not only is that cool regardless, it's doubly cool because I'm a big murder mystery fan.

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I have the first planned trip of the year looming. Saturday, two days, I'm supposed to be in Sacramento for my daughter's baby shower. It's a four hour drive. Since I'd already have a third of the distance behind me, I thought I'd keep going afterwards, all the way to San Diego and visit my son and DIL for a bit. It's perfect timing as they both have some time off work next week for visiting.

I told my daughter I was planning on being there unless illness or weather thwarted me. Well, ahem, I've got two more days to get rid of most of this nasty bug. It's not polite to spray germs all over everyone, particularly a pregnant woman with two small children. Also, two more huge storm fronts (they're comparing it to last year's BIG storm, the one that dumped six feet on us) are due in tonight and tomorrow, so getting up and over the passes might not even be possible. For now I'm working on the assumption I'll be able to get through and I'm working to get life tidied up and plans organized for that outcome. If I think I'm still too germy, maybe I can skip the shower, still drive down to San Diego, and visit with Noel and the grandkids on the way back.

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And speaking of traveling, my son Joe called the other day to tell us he'd jumped out of a perfectly good airplane. Three times!!! William thought that was the height of coolness. Shudder. I'm sooo not the physical thrills type. It was all I could do not to get vertigo on the 4th story roof of the art museum we visited last week. It had plexi-glass railings. I decided right then and there that I will NOT be going up on the World's Largest Ferris Wheel when William and I visit London this May. William really wants to do this. I told him he could go alone, or not go. He said he didn't want to go alone. I said we could probably find another lone tourist that would go up with him. I am however, looking forward to going to the top of the Empire State Building. And yes, I know, that's in New York, not London.

Okay, that's enough rambling. Off to be productive!