Relaxing

Okay, not really relaxing, more like working on stuff I want to.

I'll tell you more about my weekend later....

Analytics

Occasionally I take a look at the Google Analytics site to keep tabs on web site visitors.
Here are the most recent Google searches that brought people over here to this blog:

1. weird load stickers
2. why can vultures eat rotten shit
3. west virginia
4. mud boots
5. should i refrigerate my dogs stool sample
6. halloween
7. "office mess" jokes
8. "weird load" bumpersticker

Cooling Off

This is how the kids around here cool off:


The world's biggest sprinkler!



Wonder what would happen if there was a fire?

Halloween in June

Love the fingernails:

Thoughtful devil:

The one flip-flop makes this monster extra scary:

Where did her its other shoe get off to?

New Driver and Goodwill Steamer Trunk

Like every other American, I cringe when I find a visit to the DMV inevitable.
This time was especially cringe-worthy.
My oldest son, PR (sometimes known as Grunt), was ready to take the test for his learner's permit.

The DMV offices here in West Virginia are not the greatest place to visit, but when I remind myself of the nightmare(s) that was the Illinois DMV, West Virginia seems like a picnic.

Fairmont's DMV is in the Middletown Mall and has abbreviated hours. It's very small and, probably for that reason, seems much better than the other, larger, alternatives.

He passed the test and drove me home (most of the way).

I will stop talking about the new driver here, but this is a blog-worthy subject, so expect at least a few revisits.
What I really wanted to talk about is the Goodwill in the Middletown Mall.
I love thrift stores, so of course we browsed through and saw this steamer trunk:

It's a pretty sophisticated piece of luggage: drawers, hangers, ironing board, little round puffball things:

What are those things? Holders, hangers, shapers for something?

It has seen a lot of use, but it is in good condition. I thought it would have been cool to see stickers of all the inspection points or ports it has seen -like a cartoon- but there were no identifying marks or information of any kind.

Nope. I didn't buy it. The price tag said $150. and that's over my thrift store browsing limit.

Skunk Dog

Skunk

The last post, 'Lazy Pictures', was not meant as an omen. I've only been lazy about blogging, not about everything else.
I've been busy at The 123 (go here to the main page or here to the blog for updates). Right now I'm laying tile (well, not really right now - right now I'm blogging when I should be tiling - See? that's why I haven't been around here much).


Maisie investigated her first skunk.
Blech.
Hopefully it will be her last.

S & I were on the deck late Saturday evening. Maisie was out patrolling, her usual evening dog duties.

"I smell a skunk," S said.
It took a few seconds for my brain to process what this meant.
My first reaction was to call the dog, but my immediate, second reaction, was NOT to call the dog.
Ugh.

The dog came anyway, wiping her face with her paws.
Then she wiped her face on S's leg.

Fortunately (or unfortunately, actually), S's dog, B, put a skunk in her mouth several months ago (maybe I can get S to tell you that story), so S knew what to do.

Here's the skunk recipe: http://home.earthlink.net/~skunkremedy/home/sk00001.htm

While I mixed this concoction, S stood at the kitchen sink with one leg on the floor and one leg in the sink, scrubbing off Maisie's smelly gift.

I lathered the dog from head to toe and left her outside to marinate.

30 minutes or so later I rinsed her out, and while she didn't smell like roses, she was tolerable enough that I didn't make her stay outside for the night.

Now, if you get too close, she has a faint skunkiness about her.
I don't know how long it will last.

Lazy Pictures

(I took the picture and then uncovered his head so he could breathe.)

I have a few reasons for posting these lazy pictures:
1. I couldn't stand the Chicago River being the first thing I saw when I came over here.
2. I'm shaking my head over Dick Cheney's little joke about West Virginia and vowing not to waste my time addressing that idiot's comments. Except to say it's obvious he's not from here. Thankfully. (Okay, stopping, really.)
3. I just came in from playing in the garden and a nap sounds pretty good right now.
4. It's going to rain -again!- and that makes the nap sound even better.

Chicago River

In the comments on this post I mentioned Chicago.
I knew one day I would have a use for this picture:



Union Station is out of the picture to the left - it's the main train terminal where you come into the city. I'm not sure which street this is, but it's one of the bridges that cross the Chicago River and into the main part of downtown (to the right in the picture) - walking toward Lake Michigan.

Writing that -'the main part of downtown'- almost makes me laugh now, but it didn't back when I actually went downtown. The parts of town -the blocks and various neighborhoods- are like a West Virginian's knowledge of the names of the ridges and back roads. The same, but very, very different.

And, too, I have to point out the significance of 'I'm not sure which street this is.' I don't know because they all look the same to me. I know how cliche that sounds and I'm sure if someone from Chicago read this it would make them as mad as someone saying that all our hills look the same, but, for me, it's true. I found my way around by keeping Lake Michigan to the East in my brain and figuring out which east/west street I had to be on in order to make it back to Union Station (yes, they have names, but I can't remember them right now). Even when driving, if I kept Lake Michigan in my brain, I could find my way around. Mostly.
The kids used to only-half-jokingly ask, "Do you know where we're going, Mom?" I'd answer with a direction: north, south, east, west and they'd groan and crack jokes about being lost and never finding our way back to the house. But, really, if I could keep the map in my head, I was usually fine. I eventually got to know the main north-south and east-west roads and I was fine. Or as fine as I ever got in Chicago.
What I missed were the hills. Here, nestled in the hills, the directions are still there, but more important as directionals are the ridge lines and contours of the land. I never got used to the flat, square grid layout of Chicago.
[PC took this picture sometime in the past year when he was in Chicago on business (I haven't been there since we moved back here).]

I took a land management class while we lived there and one of the things that we studied was the history of the Chicago River. That's what this post was originally supposed to be about, but I kind of wandered off course, huh? Well, I'm running out of time this morning, but I'll get back to the Chicago River and my reasons for taking the class sometime soon....