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It's Fall already!
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dooley's Blog
Not enough plants!
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Fri Aug 18, 2006 4:20 pm Last week, Julie sent me some flower seeds, but I haven't had a chance to do anything with them. The neighbor told me if I filled some gallon pots with potting soil he would give me some plants from his window box. Two days ago, I was in the garden and saw some pots already filled with potting soil that I filled in the spring and didn't do anything with them. So, I put them over the fence. I noticed this morning they have plants in them so he must have found them. He hasn't given them back yet but maybe he just hasn't had an opportunity. Yesterday, dr and I went up to Prescott before I had to go to work. He had an errand to do. After we were close to Watter's nursery so I just had to stop to see what they had on sale. We bought a mauve wallflower for half price. It looks good. Just a clearence sale I guess. I told dr it was a good thing we didn't live very close to that nursery. They had a lot of plants on sale. I just couldn't buy them all. But, after we stopped and had something to eat we were still half an hour early so we stopped at K-Mart because it's close to the library. Well, we parked close to the garden dept and went in through there. Mistake? I guess it's the way you look at things. They had potted mums for $1.49 so I bought 8 of them in various colors. Since it is my day off and not sunny and hot maybe I will get out and plant them. dr bought me some padded thingies for wearing on my knees when I garden. They work well but are hard to walk in when you need to go and get something. They do go on and off easy though. I walked out with Chance this morning. It's became a routine thing with her. As soon as I come out of the bedroom she herds me toward the door. I have to go out and check out the whole yard. We even go out in the back, back yard to check for kitty cats. We could get lost in the weeds back there. I got Chance's yard done this week. My back can attest to that. Maybe I can con Dan into doing the rest of it. He's at a library conference in Flagstaff for a couple of days. But, he'll be back. The coreopsis are going strong. Cosmos are starting to bloom. The orange poppies are going well. The morning glories have taken off anything big enough to climb. I had to untwist Cardinal Vines from the apple trees. The butterfly bush has dozens of blooms. I didn't see any butterflies but is was damp. dr says he sees them in the afternoon. The four o'clocks were still open. I went into the garden. The squash are doing fine. Just little ones this morning. Which is fine. I have at least a dozen in the refrigerator. Maybe I'll cut some for the freezer today. I checked the tomatoes. They aren't doing well, between the grasshoppers and the horned worms, the leaves are disappearing. Lots of green tomatoes though. I checked out the front yard. The half price geraniums are doing well. Growing and dark green. One is getting a flower already. Some stones are falling out of the stone wall in front. dr says it's too much rain at once. It's these gullywashers we have had this past week or 10 days. Toni, come and get some of our rain. I would like the rain to come down nice and gentle and soak into the ground. Instead, it comes pouring down and washes ruts and plants and anything else in its way. Oh, well, at least its rain. We need all the rain we can get with the housing developments that are springing up everywhere. My tea is getting cold. Better stop before I have a book here. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 654 times
This week!
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Sat Aug 12, 2006 3:18 am Boy, this week went fast. It seems like it was just Monday. There is always soooo much to get done and I seem to look at it and (working in a library with access to lots and lots of books) I sit down and read.It was a strange week at the library. On Tuesday night there was a soccor meeting on the fourth floor at the Recreation Dept. Parents who were attending brought their kids and turned them loose. They were running up and down the corridors and in and out of the library. In the end, one girl was chasing a girl who had taken a note not meant for her. First girl was trying to run and read at the same time and ran into the sliding glass doors of the library. These are large, heavy doors of safety glass. The glass did not break but she knocked both doors off the track and one was a stationary door that didn't move. The custodians were in the hall and one went up to the meeting to get the mother. The head person in the library really chewed them up and down about running in the library and not respecting anything, etc. The mother came down and the girl who had not said much, burst into these phony tears and told her mom that she'd just been sitting in the library reading a book and was walking out still reading and walked into the door. (Hard enough to push both off the tracks?) The father of the other one was very reasonable and apologized and said it wouldn't happen again. Next morning mother of the first girl calls the library director and and hollers about the night supervisor chewing her daughter out when it was really the other kids who were making the noise and her daughter just happened to walk into the door. Funny thing was, she wouldn't leave her name. On Tuesday night, there were only two of us working. Normally there are four of five. But the volunteer didn't come and two employees are on vacation. So, there was only the night supervisor and myself. I thought that we wouldn't get anything shelved because she had to be on the reference desk and I had to be on the checkout desk. But, the day people knew there was only going to be two people and pitched in and had almost everything shelved before they left. I was able to work between checkouts and keep the books checked in and shelved. I think maybe it was because about 2:30 pm it started to rain and it stormed really hard and it rained until after 9 pm so a lot of people stayed home. It was a fairly quiet night. Last night wasn't too busy either. I bet tomorrow will be busy. School started there this week and the library will probably be full of kids. I thought it was funny because school started on Tuesday. Wednesday night a boy came in and checked out three large books on science projects. That teacher is getting started fast or he is homeschooled. Today was my day off but I had a routine doctor's checkup. It went okay and there were no problems. I have to go have some lab work and make an appointment for a mammogram but that's routine also. The doctor took care of the billing problem that I'd been fighting about since January. I think billing depts. always give people a hard time. DR said the doctor could fix it because ultimately he's the boss. We went to lunch and stopped at a couple of stores. I bought a wristwatch and a new purse. We bought a few groceries and it was almost 4 pm when we got home. Much too late to start anything but dinner. I took the easy way out and put a chicken in the Nesco roaster and some frozen potato rounds in the oven. We had fresh melon and grapes with it. Then, I went out and sat with Chance until it got dark and then it was to late to call Wannabe. I feel bad about that though I did send her an e-mail. I'll call her before I go to work in the morning. I got a survey for a family reunion that will be held in the spring. They are going to hold it in Phoenix so I will go. DR says family gatherings are too noisy and they hurt his ears. I agree that our family gatherings tend to be noisy. I have three sisters and three brothers, though only two brothers now. But his family has five children and they all still come. Well, guess this is turning into a book. Bear project is at a standstill. Will try to get into gear soon Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 635 times
weeks about over
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Sat Aug 05, 2006 4:25 am This week is about over. It had a couple of events in it. The summer reading program finished. That was considered a success. I started the different hours at the library. Those went fairly well. I would do things a bit different, but I'm not the boss so I guess it will stay the same for now. Tomorrow will be the first Saturday that I start at ten. I will come home at the same time. Brian won't be able to go to the flea market as rain is predicted. If it's like yesterday and today, it will be locally heavy. I guess it depends on what they mean by locally, but today it hit both places. The geraniums that I got at WalMart on Sunday are doing well. I've kept them watered and put some plant food on them. We went for a sandwich before I went to work on Tuesday. That was the first day I went an hour earlier. I was almost late for work because we got held up by an accident ahead of us. It took us a long time to work our way forward to the accident sight. The one car had its front end all bashed. They must have towed the second vehicle away because nothing else was there and that one car must have hit something. It was cleared all away went we went back the other way. We had to eat our sandwiches very fast though. I thought it went very well last night and this morning when I was driving through that heavy rain. The wipers wasn't keeping up with the rain. Visibility was practically nil. I followed tail lights a lot. It was like driving on this silvery white surface because you couldn't see the road. Traffic slowed and no one tried to pass and we drove out of it in a while. It was intermittent the rest of the way this morning. Last night, just as we were pulling into the parking lot, the sun came out. It was still raining and almost instantly there was a huge rainbow that went the entire arc. It was huge and bright and looked like it was right in front of us. DR was wishing he had the camera. He says he is going to start carrying it with us. The other day, I was in the garden and saw a black butterfly with blue spots on its wings. By the time I got back with the camera it was gone. It was the same the day I saw the oriole on the fence preening. I ran to get the camera but it was gone by the time I got back. It seems like we need several cameras stashed in various parts of the yard. That won't happen anytime soon though. This morning when I got back from the meeting, Chance wanted to go outside so I went with her to survey the yard. She wanted into the lower yard so I got the clippers since I wanted to cut some horse nettle. I opened the gate and she took off like a shot. I didn't know it but there was a cat laying in the strip of flower bed. The fence didn't stop her, she flew over it and took off down the flower bed chasing the cat. The cat escaped damage by going out through the squares in the fence. The flowers didn't escape the carnage. Quite a few of them are flattened. A big cosmos is broken and didn't get a chance to bloom. But, how can I holler at Chance when she was just chasing the cat out of the flowers. Never mind that she wasn't supposed to be there. DR says next year he will install a stronger fence that Chance can't fly over. Due to some intermittent rain, I got a lot done on the bear project. Now, it's time to stand back and decide what's next. I do have to buy some ribbon and need to decide what color. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 494 times
Summer Reading Program
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2006 8:57 pm Today was the last summer reading program. We had a good time with the kids. Today, we had 14 kids and several moms. We gave away the prize books. Two went to kids in the same family. Their dad had commented that they were sure to win a prize since they had the numbers. They have ll children with another on the way. Only six came to the summer reading program though. One was only two but her name went into the box each week because her older sisters helped her. She won a book that she probably won't be able to read for several years. We played a game today with balloons. I wrote a direction on a slip of paper, inserted it in the balloon and blew up the balloon and tied it. The teams each had a box with balloons in it. One member had to run get a balloon from the box, take it back to the team. The team had to break the balloon and do what the direction told them to do. Sometimes the whole team did it and sometimes they chose one member to do it. The first team to get all the balloons broken and the tasks finished won. Wouldn't you know the team with the youngest members on it won. They had a boy who just turned seven. He was wearing these cloggy boots and they would put the balloon on the floor and he would jump on it and it would break. The other team tried jumping on the balloon, but they were mostly wearing flip-flops and they just wouldn't work. They did have a lot of fun and the mom's had a lot of fun. One mom was taking pictures with a camera that made a video or CD, I'm not sure which. It was a very small camera. They were turning points in for prizes. We had hot dogs, chips, juice and Otter Pops. You know, I think we forgot the Otter Pops. We were going to give them to the kids as they left the library and they are still in the freezer. I'm surprised some of the kids didn't mention it. Our animals on parade went clear around to within a foot of where they started. Two sisters claimed the prize because they had put their sticker up side by side and one fell off. It was a gift certificate to a book store so they will go and find something they both like. A helper from the school won the adult gift certificate. Some of the other mom's didn't think it was fair because she didn't come these last two weeks. But, she did help with all the school children when they came and her name went into the box everyweek. There were 790 animals on parade which is a total of the books the children listed on their reading charts. There were a few more than that because some kids came after the prizes were drawn and given and they had about 40 more books but they couldn't be counted for prizes. Some kids left their books in the book drop too and these couldn't be counted because they weren't listed. So, all in all it went well. Only one organization failed to show up for their program and Dan had talked to them on Monday and the program was on Tuesday and they had totally forgotten about it. That was the wild animal program. So, it is over for this year. Next year the theme is "Get a Clue at the Library." Mysteries! Already thoughts are in the works. Magnifying glasses! Sherlock Holmes! Detective badges? What fun! Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 540 times
This and that
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Thu Jul 27, 2006 4:59 pm Well, I think I've been keeping busy. I don't know what I've been doing though. I made zucchini bread yesterday. The zucchini keeps on coming. DR says we need to freeze some for winter. I guess I should put freezing bags on my shopping list or his shopping list. The days seem so short lately and it's still summer. I leave here at 5:15 and get back about 9:30. DR comes along and does shopping then comes to the library and reads all the papers and then retires to the southwest room and writes stuff. We don't spend a day shopping now. He does some each night and gets the list whittled down as I add to it. We can catch the specials that way. The times goes fast at work and I've been getting the carts empty most nights. Yesterday, the director called me at home and said how pleased he was with the job I was doing. He wanted to change my hours some. Not adding, just rearranging. I'm not sure how I like the new hours. It doesn't make much difference what hours that I work but now I won't go in to work until 10 am on Saturday so I won't have those two hours before the library opens to get things done in the high traffic areas. I guess the people will just have to look around me for books. Also, Brian won't be able to drop me off and go to the flea market. He says it's okay, he can go on Sunday if he wants to go. He says we'll try the new hours a couple of weeks to see how they work. Maybe, I'll go back to the old ones. Yesterday, I had to go an hour early and do a computer class on sexual harrassment that's mandatory. They just discovered that I hadn't done it. Wow! I will get paid an extra hour for it. The library director dashed in from a meeting last night to meet me. He goes home before I arrive and doesn't work on Saturday so he hadn't met me and he was hearing good things. Whoopee! He didn't stay a minute, I bet. Off he went, satisfied with what he saw, I hope. Yard work hasn't been getting done as fast. I need to go cut some horse nettle. Brian says it has pretty purple flowers and it does, but it spreads fast and is stickery so I don't like it. There is some other lacy leafed weed that is trying to take over too. It's supposed to be only 78 degs. tomorrow so maybe if I get up early I can get them cut out. The coreopsis has been blooming great and this morning I saw a cosmos starting to bloom. The poppies are about done, but the Mexican Primrose hasn't started to bloom yet. I have two tomatoes almost ripe enough to pick. I was thinking of picking them now before the bugs discover them. There are two or three that are being dried by the hot sun before the get ripe. Maybe I'll have sun dried on the vine tomatoes. The ground is still wet so I think they are getting enough water. I don't want to drown the plants. We got the big pot and the potting soil for repotting the mimosa tree. I may get that done this morning. I think I'll put it in the shady area in the herb? garden. No herbs in the herb garden. Maybe, I'll move the pots of herbs from the garden to the herb garden. They don't seem to like the hot sun too much. Take daily watering. Something is eating on the basil. There are brown tunnels in the leaves. I need to cut them back some anyway. Oh, well, I'm rambling on about nothing so guess I will go work on the Bear Project. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 499 times
Strawberry jam
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Wed Jul 19, 2006 6:40 pm Last evening when I went to work, we went a little early because I wanted to stop at WalMart. After, we had a sandwich and it was a little early so we stopped at the grocery store. We found some strawberries on sale so bought a few. This morning I was going to get up early and make strawberry jam. It thunderstormed during the night so I woke up for awhile. So, I didn't get up quite as early as I wanted. DR cut the strawberries while I got the jars and lids ready. I bought some No Sugar Pectin. You can use Splenda or just make it Low Sugar. I just used low sugar. We made 11 six ounce jars of it. DR already gave one to the neighbor. That's okay. We have grape jelly left from last year so we have more than enough. Whenever we give jelly or jam to neighbors, friends, relatives or whoever I always ask them to return the jars. Most do, but some don't. The ones that don't return the jars don't get any the next time. Jars are expensive to buy so I like using them again. The grapes will be ready soon so I can start making grape jelly again. I guess I should start watching yard sales and the flea market for jars. People give me big jars but I don't like putting jam in big jars. It gets sticky or hard before it gets used. No kids to help out. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 570 times
Still here
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Sat Jul 15, 2006 4:02 am I'm still here. I've been busy or I've been working or I'm tired. I'm still getting used to working and being on my feet for three hours steady. On Saturday, it's eight hours. Last week my ankles were swollen at the end of the day. DR made me sit in the recliner with them up for the rest of the evening. The rain made everything grow, even the weeds. While I was at work last night, Dan cut the grass and weeds in the backyard. I was going to do that this morning because I don't like it too high when Chance is out there. Ticks and fleas can get into the tall grass and I don't like to think that Chance will get them on her. I haven't found either and I don't want to. The squash in the garden is growing as fast or faster than I can keep up with it. Yesterday, I picked three squash(summer type) and I kept one and gave two to the neighbor. I look and there were some small ones but nothing ready to pick. I went out to water the herbs in pots sitting in the garden. I found four squash. Two were way bigger than I like them. I gave them to Dan to take to his friends on Sunday. I couldn't wait until Sunday to pick them or they would be gigantic. The tomatoes are growing bigger and bigger. They should quit growing bigger and get ripe. I don't mind smaller tomatoes if I am going to cut them for salad. I even prefer smaller ones if I am going to stuff them. Today was a day off. So, we ended up in Prescott Valley. DR needed to go and pay on something and we wanted to go to some yard sales. We found a good half a dozen, just driving down the main streets and following the arrows. We bought a few things. I found a little backpack filled with little bears. There were seven bears, two frogs and a rabbit. They are small bears and will go with the small bears Christmas tree at Christmas time. Somehow they have all ended up on the computer desk. I'll have to find a spot for them, they can't clutter up the desk like this. I found a piece of plaid woolen material. Enough to make a skirt or pair of slacks if I buy some lining material. It's a red plaid. Dan wants it for a summer kilt. I told him no. It's too hot for a summer anything and besides I bought it for myself. I only had to pay $2.00. I thought for sure she would say at least $10.00. I bought a wooden sleigh too. The runners are off, but DR said he can fix those. A big bear will fit in it after it's fixed. I might paint it and put some stencil's of some kind on it. We went to the buffet place for lunch and then I went to Office Max to look at computer keyboards. We wanted a bigger one because the one that came with the computer was small and the keys were close together and it was hard to use. We were only going to look at what was there and get some prices. We ended up buying a Microsoft Wireless Optical 400 keyboard and mouse. Dan installed the software when he came by after work. It was more a matter of uninstalling the old ones and hooking up the receiver for the keyboard and mouse. He programmed some of the keys. Now, I just have to figure out what the others do and how to use them. Dan clicks here and there and it's already to go. It takes me longer to figure things out. Must be old age creeping up on me. My dad told me once that 65 was when you started getting old. I was 65 in January, but I don't feel old. I wonder when I will start it coming on. DR says my short term memory is getting a bit shorter. I don't notice that either. DR says it's when he says he wants to go to the bank and I turn the corner for the post office or go straight to go to the library. Well, you can get to the bank either way but it's not the direct way. Oh, well, I'd better go do a few things. Six AM comes earlier when you start to get old. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 518 times
I hope not!
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Mon Jul 03, 2006 5:15 am This catagory is labeled daily happenings. But, I hope I'm now writing about something that happens daily. Chance was laying by my feet sleeping and suddenly she jumps up and runs to DR's chair and begins sniffing around it. DR has already gone to bed. So, I get up and go and tilt the chair so I could see what was under it. I dropped that chair so fast. I put Chance out in the laundry and shut the door. I opened the front door and tilted the chair. With a stick, I tried to shoo the biggest tarantula I've seen out the door. But, it wasn't having any of that and ran under the entertainment center. I certainly can't tilt that to get to it so it will have to wait until morning when DR can chase it. I'll need a bigger stick if I'm going to help. They will bite. They would rather hide than attack though. If we find it tomorrow, I'll see if DR will take a picture of it. Earlier when Dan was here Chance was sleeping on his lap and she leaped off and ran and was looking under the entertainment center. Dan was saying that he had seen a big tarantula out by his place the other day. I wonder how it got inside the house. It must have come in to get out of the rain but how. It is at least three or more inches across. For those who don't know, a tarantula is a BIG fuzzy spider. They can be poisonous to animals. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 555 times
Strange weather
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Sun Jul 02, 2006 4:19 am Arizona has some strange weather. I know it is the desert but why is that an excuse. We go for months without rain. It's dry and you water every day and still nothing grows. The squash stay little and the ants pick on it. Then, there is the forecast and there is 14 days straight with thunderclouds and a chance for rain. It's not monsoons because the weatherman says for monsoons, Phoenix has to be over an arbitrary number on the dewpoint chart and it hasn't reached one day on it yet. But, here we are have storms every day. Some are dry with wind and thunder and lightning. Some have sprinkles and some bring a deluge of rain and it runs off down the hill before it can soak into the ground. It's still not enough rain. The dry lightning causes fires. There were 9 of them over the state last night. The one by us has turned into two and they don't have any percentage of containment. One is burning up a valley toward Crown King. They are expecting to need to evacuate it by tomorrow. That town has been there more than a hundred years and now because of dry lightning and drought conditions that have killed thousands of trees the town may burn to the ground. Today, Dr wanted to go to the flea market. All week there was a white cloud on the weather chart. Last night it turned to a thundercloud. So, he waited until morning to see what would happen. It was overcast when we got up but didn't look stormy. He loaded the truck and dropped me off at the PV library and went to the flea market. He stayed all day. No wind, no rain but it was very hot. No rain tonight. No rumbles of thunder, no lightning, no wind. But, what about tomorrow. There is another thunderstorm on the chart. It says a slight chance of an afternoon thunderstorm. But, do I believe the weather charts anymore. Not hardly. I have an errand to do for my neighbor that will take probably an hour and a half in the morning. Then, I will have the afternoon to enjoy. I would plan to cook out but then it would rain for sure. So, whatever I do will be on the spur of the moment so the weather god will not have time to spoil it. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 513 times
Computers down
Category: Daily Happenings | Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 6:51 pm When Dan came home last night he said the computers went down at three o'clock. When I went to the Prescott Valley library at six pm they were still down. The air conditioning for the building that houses the main computers that all the libraries connect to went down and they had to shut off the main computers because it was too hot for them. So, they said they weren't going to be able to do anything with them until this morning. We had to do all check outs by hand. We had to write down patron's library card number and the barcode number of each item checked out. Do you know how many books get checked out from three o'clock to nine o'clock. Pages and pages. This morning someone will have to set at a computer and enter each item into the computer. But, we couldn't check anything in either so everything was put on a counter in the back to be checked in this morning. I could only shelve what books were on the carts and then I straighted all the shelves, bringing all the books to the front edge to make them look neat and easier to read the end labels. I also helped check out with all the number writing. Now, tonight I will have a lot of books and video's to shelve because I will have what was checked in last night and all of today. They do have some volunteers do shelving during the day but most of it is done in the evening when it is less busy, patron wise. So, I will earn my keep tonight. I don't mind shelving books. Someone has to do it and it was what I was hired to do. Dooley This blog entry has been viewed 501 times
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