Blogger Hiccup

Blogger seems to be pouting about something or other and won't let me post comments on anyone else's blogs.  I am reading your blogs and enjoying your blogs.  I just, at the moment, can't tell you about it with comments.  And darn it.  I had a couple of really good ones, too!

I hope this case of Blogger Hiccups is cured soon.

Things Are Looking Up

My body seems to be in fairly good working order.  The weather has cooled down a bit with temperatures not reaching 70 degrees.    Seemed like a good bread baking morning.

A while ago Jess from Scratching To Escape left a comment here saying he liked my posts about bread making.  I joked back that the next time I baked bread, I'd make a pan of cinnamon rolls for him.

There ya go, Jess.  Now if you can just get that Star Wars Teleportation Device working...

The Universe...

is conspiring against me.

My arthritic hip seems to have healed enough to allow me to get out and about again.  So I planned to catch the bus this morning and head for the grocery store.  Planned, that is, right up to the time I woke up this morning with mild stomach flu type symptoms.  Nothing serious, but just enough so I think it might be wise to stay put another day or so.

Time was I would get all mad and upset because of a small set-back like this.  Not any more.   Things usually happen for a reason.  I'm supposed to stay home today.  So I will.  At least I still have my sense of humor.  I chuckled to myself when I browsed the news this morning and read about a stupid criminal in the Twin City area.  Seems he burglarized a home, stealing various articles and cash.  While there, he used the homeowner's computer to check his Facebook page.  And forgot to log off when finished.  Which led to his capture.  The story is here.

So I think I will go make myself a nice cup of tea.  The last time I dehydrated apple slices, I saved all the peelings and dried them, too.  Did the same thing with the pulp left over from making and canning cranberry juice last fall.  When I run the dried apple peels and cranberry pulp through my little grinder and add a spoonful of honey, it makes for a wonderful soothing tea.

I have tea.  I have my Kindle.  I have a comfy rocking chair.  If the Universe conspires to keep me in the house for another day or so, I might just as well enjoy it!

The Sun Shines...

on my little corner of the world today.  I haven't even checked the weather forecast.  I just want to enjoy the day without knowing if it will last or if more rain is coming.  Sometimes ignorance really is bliss.

I'm working really hard to become mobile again.  That means that today I am spending less time sitting and more time up walking and getting the day to day household stuff done.  This seems to be disconcerting to my Yorkies.  It has taken a long time to get back to normal (whatever that is).  They must have gotten used to seeing me quiet as opposed to my usual moving about, for today they are tag-teaming me.  One of them spends an hour or so following me wherever I go, tags off to her sister, who then spends an hour following me wherever I go.  This has been going on all day.  I finally had to kennel them both for a while so I could get them out from under foot.

It has been a bit frustrating to be sidelined here at home while grocery prices continue to move skyward at an alarming rate.  I was glad that I had so much food canned and dehydrated, for it really helped to have it over the long miserable winter and then for the past few weeks when I couldn't get out.  But supplies are starting to run low.  I like to have lots of hamburger and turkey canned and I am now down to 8 pints of burger and 6 pints of turkey.  Turkey prices haven't gone up too much, but the price of hamburger has doubled in the past year.  Those two things are at the top of my grocery list.

For the rest, I will just wait for the sales and stock up then, except for onions.  I love onions for cooking and I like to have lots dehydrated for that purpose.  A 5 lb. bag of onions, once dried, will easily fit into a quart sized freezer bag, which solves some of my storage problems.  I saw that Sam's Club has a 50 lb. bag of onions for about half the price per pound of the grocery's 5 lb. bags.  I may have to see if one of my kids is feeling strong enough to haul a bag up here for me!

Time to get back at it.  I've sat long enough.  I'm really looking forward to seeing what the outside world looks like again.  With any kind of luck, that will be sometime this coming week.

Life is good.

Storms

Sometime in the middle of the night, my little watchdog woke me up.  She was barking and pacing frantically, and her sister was guarding my living room windows.  Within just a minute or two the first crash of lightning came, along with heavy rain.  The girls headed for their kennels, their duties completed.

It was a doozey of a storm.  Nearly constant lightning and accompanying thunder crashed and rumbled.  The rain continued, and finally eased up close to dawn.  I dozed for a while until the second wave hit.  This one wasn't as severe or as long in duration.  It is going on 10 AM now, and the rain is still falling, but the thunder and lightning have moved on.  I waited for the power to go out, but luckily that hasn't happened in my neighborhood.

A little over an hour ago I turned on the scanner for my county.  Streets are flooded.  Water is boiling up out of the storm drains.  The main highway running southwest of here is closed in several places with water over the road.  County roads are flooded or washed out.  Several creeks criss-cross the area and most of them are over their banks.  And a mud slide has closed yet another road.  Even the levels of water in some of the lakes are threatening homes along the shores.

The Department of Transportation has had to close so many streets and roads that they ran out of traffic cones and barriers.  My oldest son, who lives southwest of me posted on Facebook that anyone going to work where he works would do well to wear their bathing suit.  He works nights, and is sleeping now, but I'm sure he will call and tell me about it when he wakes up.

I live about two city blocks from the Minnesota River.  I haven't heard whether the river is still within its banks.  The founding fathers of my town had the good sense to build on top of the hill that runs down to the river, so flood waters have never reached this far.

I am astounded at the number of people who drive their cars around the barriers and into the water on the roads and then can't figure out why their cars stalled.  I can hear the frustration in the voices of those who have to rescue these fools.

It is a really good day to stay inside where it is dry and warm.  My Kindle is fully charged up.  I was going to bake some bread this morning, but have decided to wait until the threat of power loss is over.  I have several projects to work on that, should the power go out, will not be affected.  And I am seriously considering building an ark.

Creating Monsters

I am only one person here in my little apartment.  But I have trouble cooking for one.  Comes from years of cooking for a family.  Take yesterday, for example.  I tossed pint jars of mixed veggies, tomatoes and beef cubes into my crock pot.  Added some dehydrated onions and seasonings.  Let it simmer all afternoon and then thickened it to form a gravy and spooned it over baking powder biscuits for my supper.  For lunch today I heated up leftovers.   And darned if there still was enough left for another meal.   But the third time around isn't nearly as appetizing and rounds one and two.  I suppose I could have frozen the rest of the stew, but I tend to forget about it once it is in the freezer.

My Yorkies had been hovering around my feet while I was heating up my lunch.  And they continued to stare longingly at me while I ate.  I usually feed them dry kibble or once in a while my homemade dog food.  But with the grocery prices headed upwards at an alarming rate, I really don't want to pay for the meat I need to include in the homemade recipe.  I was remembering that all of the farm dogs I had over the years were more than happy to eat kitchen scraps and leftovers in addition to their dry food.  Even though my Yorkies are the size of large rats, they are technically still dogs.  I think.

So I divided the last of the stew into bowls, crumbled up the last two biscuits over the stew and set the bowls on the floor.  I don't think either of them even tasted the food, for they pretty much inhaled it.  Good to the last drop.

And then they both waddled off to their respective kennels, where they are still napping.  I didn't know Yorkies could waddle.  They can.

I have either created monsters who will want all of my leftovers, or I have killed them off.  If I have killed them off, at least they will die happy.  If they live and want leftovers, great.  Dog food ain't cheap these days, either.

The End of an Era

When I was sixteen, getting my Driver's License was the most important thing in my life.  The day it arrived was cause for great celebrating on my part and cause for worry and dread on the part of my parents.

My Dad taught me how to drive.  He started by taking me out on the frozen lakes in winter, showing me the various steps in forward and backward motion, how to shift and how to brake.  Then he turned me loose and let me practice out on the snow covered ice, where I couldn't do much damage.

When I had my learner's permit, we traveled the gravel back roads running between the corn and soy bean fields.  When he felt that I could drive those roads safely, we graduated to the blacktop county roads and finally to the two lane state highways.

From there it was on to town driving. This was a fairly small town with a population of maybe 10,000 people at that time.  He taught me to drive the residential streets and the busy downtown area.  I learned to parallel park.  I learned that if you pay attention you won't squash the kid who dashes out in the street in front of your car.  I learned that just because the law says you have the right-of-way at an intersection doesn't mean that the other driver knows this.

When it was time to take Drivers Education classes, I was ready and passed with flying colors.

But Dad wasn't done with me yet.  One warm summer morning Dad asked me if I wanted to go to Minneapolis with him...a distance of about 100 miles.  I loved road trips with Dad.  I was ready in two minutes flat.

Road trips with Dad weren't just about the trip.  There was always a stop at some little cafe for coffee and maybe a slice of pie.  Then there was a stop at a roadside stand to buy whatever fruit was in season.  This time it was cherries.  We drove along, munching on red ripe cherries, spitting the pits out the windows.

When we reached the outskirts of the city, Dad pulled over.  He told me it was my turn to drive.  "But you are driving through downtown Minneapolis," I objected.  "No, you are," he said.  So I did.

Minneapolis was a scary place for a country girl to drive.  If the freeways had been built then, I don't remember them.  We took two lane state highways right into the heart of the city.  I was terrified.  If Dad shared my terror, he hid it well.  He sat in the passenger seat, looking out the window and enjoying the view.  He offered no advice.  He didn't tell me how to handle each situation that presented itself.  He just let me go.

Years later I told him how scared I had been on that drive.  He just smiled and told me that he knew I could do it.  He said that if I could make it through the city just once, I would never have a fear of driving anywhere ever again.  He was right.

And now I have come full circle.  My driver's license was due for renewal last week.  Although my arthritic hip is much improved, it has not improved enough to be able to go to the courthouse.  So I just let my license go and later I will get an ID card for when I need to prove who I am.

I thought it would bother me to let go of my driver's license, but I am gratified to find out that it really doesn't.  After all, it has been at least 10 years since I owned anything to drive.  Physical limitations keep me from even thinking about long trips alone.  I manage just fine with the use of the local bus and of adult children who take me where I need to go now and then.  So in reality, nothing has changed.

As my Dad aged, his memory and sense of direction seemed to fail him at times.  He would set out to drive somewhere, get turned around in his mind and wind up miles away from his destination.  Because of the severe Minnesota winters, we were always fearful that he would get lost and wind up frozen in a snowbank somewhere.

I just told Youngest Son that even though I intend to live long enough to be a problem to my children, my continuing to drive long after I should stop is not a problem they will have to deal with.  And I believe I am OK with that.