Butterfly

When the weather is nice, I go sit in my vehicle at lunchtime. I prefer to get out of the building if I can and have a quiet place to sit where no one is going to bother me.
A couple weeks ago as I was walking back in I noticed a butterfly on the side of the building just above the ground. It wasn't moving at all so I pulled out my phone to snap a picture. At first, I wondered if it might be dead.

After I took the picture it fluttered it's wings ever so slightly as if it was waving to me.

The butterfly counts not months but moments and has time enough. -Rabindranath Tagore

 Beautiful and graceful, varied and enchanting, small but approachable, butterflies lead you to the sunny side of life. And everyone deserves a little sunshine. -Jeffrey Glassberg

I just want to say...

Me and Presley

Ok, I got over the fact that I hate the way I look in these pictures. Besides, it's all about baby Presley anyway.
 These are right off Amanda's phone, I didn't bother with trying to fix them at all. I wish I would have fixed my hair before the picture was taken though. It was too hot to really care.

A family dinner

Before I get to the subject of today's post, I want to mention that this is day 1 of 11 straight days I'll be working. We are short staffed and there's someone on vacation so I'll be working without my regular days off. I'll still post but may not respond to comment or comment on your blogs until I get back to my normal schedule.

So, my family dinner on Sunday went well. This picture is kind of on the dark side but I got everyone sitting at the table.

The cutest of the bunch was this little peanut.

She has 3 big dogs at home so she was thrilled with Gibbs and would smile and giggle whenever he was in sight. She even got a little puppy smooch from him.

Gibbs actually didn't pay much attention to her. I suppose once she's chasing after him he'll take more notice of her presence.

I have a whole bunch of pictures of me and Presley that Amanda took with her cell phone but I'm holding off on those until I can get over the fact that I look horrible and fat in the pictures.

Happy Birthday in heaven

Today would have been Wade's 60th birthday.

It looks like he might be holding a phone in the picture. This is actually signature Wade pose. He's giving me the finger only more discreetly than usual.

Preperation

Yesterday I accomplished two things. One was to do the dishes and the other was to put the leaf in my dining room table. Today is the first monthly family dinner. I figure my kids can at least take one day a month to come and visit and while they're here I'll make dinner.

From my deck

The other night I took my camera and went out on the deck to see what I could see. It wasn't dark yet but the moon was quite visible. I can't get good moon pictures but I thought if I tried while it was still light it might be better.

The tree in my next door neighbors yard is full of red berries and I liked the way they looked.

This bush is in a yard a couple houses over. Those pink flowers caught my eye.

I have no plan for the day. I'm going to play it by ear and see what I feel like doing. What are you going to do today?

Drink Coke

On the wall by the step going into the room previously known as the man cave, there are two signs hanging. Neither one of them falls into the wildlife category.

These are signs that I've had around the house since I was married to my first husband. He used to work for a shop that made porcelain enameled signs. There were all kinds of nostalgic type advertisement signs. The employees were allowed to take home the ones that didn't pass quality control. At one time we had a ton of these things. When he left he didn't take any of them and I think I ended up giving quite a few away but I kept a few. These coke signs were two that I kept.

If you are a cola drinker, do you prefer coke or pepsi? When I was in high school I always drank pepsi. Somewhere along the line I switched to coke and then at one point when I was dieting I started drinking diet coke.

Alone vs lonely

I used to be frequently lonely but rarely alone. Now, I'm mostly just alone and sometimes lonely. I'm the type of person who can be in a large group of people and feel like I'm invisible. I guess I'm sort of a lone wolf.

Well except for this guy.

Sort of a morbid thought but I can't help wondering, if I were to die at home, how long would it take before someone found me. Maybe I should teach Gibbs how to dial 911

Cheating

With a little help from facebook.

I've got nothing

I have nothing for today so I dug in the archives and found this picture of a much younger and very scruffy Gibbs. I find it utterly adorable.

Yesterday I had an appointment with OVR which is the Pennsylvania office of vocational rehabilitation. I had filled out an application to request help in obtaining hearing aids. When I went to the ENT they did a hearing test and told me I could benefit from hearing aids. I was told that they start at $1,000 each. When I told her there was no way I could afford something like that she had given me the information to apply to OVR. It sounds like everything is going to go through so maybe I'll be hearing better soon. 
When I got home from my appointment, for some reason I was dead tired. This did not go over well with Gibbs. He sat there staring at me and whining. He eventually realized I was not going to give in and go play and I was able to nap for most of the afternoon.

More from the cave.

Yesterday's pictures were just some of the things that sit on the ledge that goes around half the room formerly known as the man cave.
Here's a few more.
This is a metal piece that Wade bought before we were married but while we were dating.

Another bear. He looks like he could use a good dusting or maybe he was rolling around in the dirt.

Of course you have to have a buck.

I picked these trees up at a craft show. They are cut all the way through so you can separate them or push them all together. If you are observant you will notice the dust and cobwebs. If you aren't observant, forget I just said that.

In the cave

So back to the room previously known as the man cave. Like I said yesterday, I like the woodsy, wildlife theme in the room. Wade was the one that did all the paneling and the ceiling in the room. He had some finishing work to do but never got around to it. Over the years I bought him various things for birthdays and Christmas to decorate his room. We have a drug store right next to the where I work and they sell a lot of gift items. Most of these things came from there.

The clock never kept time because Wade took the batteries out of it. He said it made too much noise and drove him nuts.

Bear with me while I show you a few more things.

I hope you don't think I'm nuts for buying this squirrel.

I wonder if you would moose me if I didn't blog.  This little guy was a Christmas ornament but he was too cute to pack away so he sits on the ledge with the other things.

Sorry about the corny play on words, I couldn't help myself. 

Now what do I call it.

For the past 12 years, the room in the basement has been referred to as the man cave. What do I call it now?  I've been asked what I'm going to do with it. Am I going to keep it as it is, or change the decor? Honestly, I rather like the woodsy, wildlife theme going on so I have no intentions of changing that. I do kind of hope to one day get rid of the futon that is there. It's usable but not the most comfortable thing in the world. It will do for now. There was also another couch there but it had to go. I had it hauled away. Then the chairs that you see against the back wall, one had been in this room and one had been in the living room. I moved the one from the living room down there and it worked for me.

Gibbs is good with it this way too.

Oh, and the cheap black coffee table that's falling apart, it needs to go to. But again, it will do for now.

Thoughts

I wasn't going to bother posting about this but this is a good way to get it out and let it go. In the past two months, I have heard all kinds of things. Most of it has been the typical sorry for your loss. There have been a few things said that even though I let them slide at the time, they really did annoy me.
Here they are, in no particular order.

• "insert name of person," said that you aren't going to be able to afford to stay in your house. Someone told me that one about a week after the funeral. I had no idea that anyone knew that much about my finances. 
• You really didn't have that much of a marriage, did you?
• Well, it's not like you guys were that close. Yes, these last two comments were really made. Maybe Wade and I didn't have the best marriage, but that didn't make the loss any less painful. I suppose people thought that because I was married to an alcoholic and we didn't spend a lot of time together like most couples do that it was insignificant. 
• This last one I just hear the other day. Are you still in your house?

I have to wonder how many people in this town are waiting to see how long before the moving van shows up in my driveway. Maybe they are even taking bets to see who get the date right. 

No bluffing

I went to my computer to write yet another post about Erie Bluffs State Park. It looked like it had done an update and restarted so I typed in my password, hit enter and NOTHING. When all else fails, unplug the computer and plug it back in. I got to the sign on screen, typed in my password, hit enter and it looked like it was going to do something but I got tired of waiting. I figured I'll just do a quick post from my tablet and throw in an old picture.
I started doing that but decided to go check on the computer and WOOHOO, it's cooperating. I guess it's just like me. Not as speedy as it used to be.

Anyway, a few more pictures from the park. I saw rows of these in several places.

Somewhere in the park, there is supposed to be some awesome views of the lake but this was the best I could get through the trees.

Just a path through the woods.

The trails are pretty well marked with signs like this one. Looks like someone lost a hat.

More from Erie Bluffs.

I forgot to mention yesterday that the trip to Erie Bluffs cost me $25. On my way home my low tire pressure light came on. Not a big deal, it's been happening every couple months or so. I've got an air compressor so I just fill them up when the light comes on. When I got home and looked at the tires the one in the back was almost flat. WOW, it never goes down that fast. I called the guy down the road that does my inspection and he told me to bring it down and they would have a look at it. It cost me $25 to get the tire fixed but on the bright side, it was cheaper than having to buy a new tire.

I spotted lots of wildflowers along the way. I especially liked these black-eyed Susans.

I don't know what the purple stuff is but it sure looked pretty.

I liked it so much I took two pictures.

The goldenrod is always a sure sign that fall is on its way.

As I was nearing the parking lot a butterfly kept flitting around me. Every time I raised the camera it would disappear. Try as I might it would not let me take its picture. I think it was teasing me and daring me to try and catch it.

Erie Bluffs State Park

First, let me apologize for the surprise ending to yesterday's post. I had not intentions of ending that way but as I was writing it occurred to me that it was getting closer to Wade's birthday. It fit the rest of the theme.


On to Erie Bluffs State Park. A while ago, while doing a search for hiking trails in the area I found this park. I've been wanting to go and check it out and finally decided to go for it. I didn't explore as much as I would have liked but I think if I had someone else there I would be braver. I kept imagining myself getting lost in the endless trails.

Just a few from the day and then more tomorrow.

This was just after I left the parking lot. I had no idea what was in store and at this point, I thought it didn't look like it was going to be all that great. I was wrong.

The scenery alone was enough to make it worth the trip. This is only 12 miles from my house. I thought for a while that I was going to be really hot if I had to keep walking out in the sun but eventually I got to the wooded areas.

This isn't a trail but I was standing on one looking into the woods. It's really very peaceful.

I headed down a hill as I was going through the woods and when I turned around it occurred to me that when you walk down a hill, you eventually must walk back up.

This time last year.

This time last year, my hydrangea bush had flowers all over it. This year there's not a single bloom

This time last year I had 2 tiny little tomatoes. This year I didn't even buy any tomato plants.

This time last year I was already working on crafting for the next show. Of course, that little spurt didn't last but this year I haven't done anything.

This time last year I was wondering what to get Wade for his birthday. This year I'm wishing I could.

Calculating

Way back when I was first married and my daughter was just a wee one, I used to carry a calculator through the grocery store. I had just so much to spend and couldn't go a penny over. I'm back to that method of shopping. Not a big deal really but Gibbs has one question.

He wants to know if I budgeted in for treats. But of course I didnGibbs.

All in a days work

Whenever there is a cake order for a Saturday, Kelly, the girl who works my days off says she'll make me a deal. She'll do the one job I hate doing if I'll make the cakes for her day. I always jump at the deal.
Yesterday when she came in to work the first thing I said to her was "Wanna make a deal?" A little while later she took another cake order so I had to ask if that was going to be part of the deal too.  Two cakes in exchange for doing a job I don't like to do works for me.

This is one of the cakes I did. I forgot to take a picture of the other one.
 The customer asked for a red border, no flowers, black writing and black scroll work on the sides. My writing was a bit crooked but other than that I thought it looked pretty good.

Just stuff

I finally got Wade's checking account closed out yesterday. One more thing to cross off my list. I have a phone appointment today with Social Security to tell them where I want the lump sum death benefit deposited. You know that whopping $250 dollars that they give you. I kind of find it funny that they word it like that. One time lump sum, like it's a really large amount. All joking aside, it's better than nothing and it will pay a few bills. After that, the last thing that I will have to deal with will be tax time.


This is the fish tank that the algae eater jumped out of. Move off to the left of the picture and that's where I found him on the floor. Sandra asked why I never posted a picture of the aquarium. I may have way back but here it is. One fish and an algae eater. When that fish dies, this thing is out of there. 

One more from the top.