Another exciting week...

Well, first, here's a couple of pictures of Woodgie's reaction to the entire week. She's just been defurred (which is probably why the squirrels are keeping clear of my li'l tomatoes. and here they are...). The defurring (supposed to pick up loose hair from the undercoat) picks up vast quantities of her fur and she gurgles as she's being combed. But she gets a bit peeved when I do her tail. We sit on the porch and the fuzz flies all over. I wind up covered in fur, too and have to come in and brush her to get the loose fur that does get caught in the comb and go over myself with a special lint roller for fur removal... I think Woodgie likes to watch me rolling the fur off...

Now, the excitement of the week. I worked, as usual on Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday was my day off. So naturally, it rained. I went out to snip off roses that had gotten blown apart by the rain the night before and slid on the step. I fell and landed face first in my itty bitty garden (the one covered in cat hair at the moment). My chest and stomach hit the violets and other green stuff and me knee hit the sidewalk and my chin and cheek hit the curbing. I was/am okay - my knee was skinned up pretty bad, but I have knee bandages for such occasions. I came in and Woodgie looked at me funny as I put peroxide on the scrapes and bandaged myself up. I got a cut on my chin and I really thought my cheek would bruise, but it didn't.

The roses didn't suffer...

So that was Wednesday. I go into work on Thursday and am just about done when the phone rings at the library at 8:35. It's Steve - he's having a kidney stone attack and wants me to take him to the ER.... So I tell Catherine Adair-Williams ( the new reference librarian - she traded nights with the other librarian) and head out the door. I got home in about 5 minutes and got him into the car and we got to Mountainside in about 15 minutes. I parked the car and went into the ER. He says he feels better now, but we're going to stay because he wants them to make sure it's not going to spring loose again... So I ring Elysha at Robbie's (it was his birthday), give her a quick rundown and get yelled at by a guard for the cell phone. So, after he's had the urine test and blood test and the CAT (no relation to Woodgie) scan, in comes Elysha and Robbie. She was scared after I called and hung up so quick. We assure her it's going to be okay this time and she takes Robbie home. Shortly after, he gets the all-clear - blood work, urine and CAT are all clear, he should go home. So we go home around 11 - about 2 hours faster than the last time.

I go to work the next morning and tell Catherine thanks - that everything went okay and that Steve was okay. Then I hear the witch complaining that the person who "took" her old job is getting a raise. So I look at the local paper. Seems that since I didn't get the opportunity to be a councilperson, they are going to all get a raise, along with the S.O.B. who got on my case. He'll be getting a raise of more than I make in a year. The council members will only get more than I make in a couple months, still not making their "stipend" more than what I make in a year. Still, that rankles me. The township manager currently makes $120,000 + a year. I make a lot less. Even though I'm only part time, I do not get regular raises like the higher -ups, or for that matter, the regular staff at both City Hall and the Library. Just venting here, but the people who do the real work in the town don't get the money. And the guys getting it are saving it - none of them live in Verona....

July 2, 2007

I haven't blogged in a long while. So what's happened?

1) I found the missing Raid yellow jacket trap, reported missing on June 21st. Apparently it was a little heavier than I thought and sank into the shrub on which it was tied. It's working - I haven't seen any yellow jackets since I put it up in its secret hiding place.

2) Still married, but it's been close lately. DH has finished editing his book that he figures will give kids who do miserably on the Math SAT * ( ©2007 collegeboard.com, Inc.) a greater edge. I had to redraw all the graphics because repeated cut and pasting had made the jpg files a bit fuzzy around the edges. I sharpened them up, saved them as TIF files and redid the entire book in Office and saved it as a Word 97 or 2003 DOC file, as well as an Office 2007 file. He sent it off this morning and if I never see it again, it will be too soon.

We also "celebrated " our anniversary by going to the Meadowlands Fair on Saturday, the 23rd. We had pre-paid tickets, along with ride stamps, so we did okay price-wise. The rides are horribly expensive and just a few cost over $20. So we went on the Ferris Wheel, the Crazy Mouse ( a roller coaster that does some incredible turns), the Wave Swinger and a couple others, which I thankfully cannot recall. I was hypnotized again by the incredible Steve Bayner. We skipped the pig races this year. There were a couple of people that I saw who definitely would've been picked to be hog rooters for the pot bellied pigs... DH won a four foot tall Spider-Man, which I had my picture taken with at the Optimum booth. I also got a t-shirt and a tote bag from them. We did not win their plasma TV giveaway, but where would we have put it anyway?

3)Woodgie went outside yesterday and ran off after a cat she spied in the yard next door, which she had to chase off, even though it was twice her size. That panicked Elysha who had to go out and call Woodgie with her cat voice. Woodgie came right to her. Both cats ran off when I went over to look for Woodgie. Hisssssss......

4) I was liturgist at church yesterday, again. I'm off that for the next few weeks, as somebody else signed up. I'm not planning to march with the church float in the Fourth of July Verona Centennial parade. The era for our people is 1930s and I don't have a thing to wear. It's also a fairly long schlep and I'm not entirely sure I want to go to the festival in the Park, as it will be one chaotic madhouse, at least from what I've seen in the newspapers, etc.

5) I got my prizes from "ANYONE CAN PLAY...BUT DON'T CALL US, WE'LL CALL YOU!" Haven't played with them yet, but eventually...That is, assuming I can find them...

6) I played lots of games at MSN's Live Search Club and have received most of my prizes. So far - Microsoft Vista Ultimate, Microsoft Office 2007 Ultimate ( apparently not available - at least to me - anymore), a Memorex 256 MB USB travel drive, and a T-shirt (a man's tee, but only because the women's tee only went to a Large and who knows how large their idea of large is?)that says "Live and Let Live". Still to come are headphones.

7)It was official birthday month in June - first, Kara, then Jenni, then Mom, then a couple of anniversaries and lastly, Woodgie's birthday , which was not a big deal, even though she turned one. Maybe that is why she was so ticked off (not literally - I checked) that she ran off for a while.

So, it's July - aren't we excited?

Elysha is off today to Montclair State for transfer student day - to see what she's going to have to do to go back to school and get a "real" degree. Woodgie's being a nudzh about wanting to go out and I have to work 5-9. DH is off from both school and tutoring at Sylvan today, so, since he completed his book project and sent it off this morning, he's laying around, watching TV.

There's the kit trying to get out....And here's her actually outside, earlier in the month when she was not so avid on getting away. And also my roses which were beautiful - and are about ready to bloom with another big batch of blossoms - some of them all on one stem!



And this one was the best!