What color is your eye?

I'm back! I didn't even go anywhere. Just had a bunch of things to do, is all. Still have a bunch of things to do. Yesterday we took En to the airport after stopping to let her say good-bye to Gramma. Then Da and I went to his appointment in San Bernadino for getting his new prosthetic eye. I really don't like that place. It seems that they think we have nothing else to do but wait on them. I don't know how many times they have had us come back. After all, Da had the surgery to fix the eye socket in January. Allow healing time. Get checked. Allow more healing and shrinking time. Get checked. Make the new eye. Wait all day while the guy paints it. What is there to do in San Berdu? I leave Da there while I go to Riverside and get a mammogram. Oooh, fun. Without my supervision they have decided how to paint the new eye. It looks yucky. They matched it to his real eye and that looks yucky. Why did they do that? Oh well, I'm the only one that really sees it anyway so it doesn't really matter. Go back again to see how the fit is. There has been more shrinkage of the transplant. Need to build the prosthetic up some more. I asked them why he made it look yucky. Some stupid answer about balance or something. Since they have to build it up he says it is no problem to paint it a better color. Who wants to see scarred corneas? He only has one, why make it look like he has two? I get to pick what color eye I want Da to have. Yay! We stupidly forgot to bring his old prosthetic to match. It was a copy of a copy of a copy anyway. Go back again. I have lost track of how many times we have gone back there. Yesterday he had to build up the back instead of the front. He had to make a mold. He used molding stuff that a dentist uses. He apologized for the cherry taste. Da's eye socket didn't taste it. After he put the gunk in the socket the office manager (his wife) called him out of the room urgently. Da is wondering how long he has to have this ooey gooey stuff in his eye. I am doing a logic puzzle. Thankfully he came back after just a few minutes. Then he tells us to come back in an hour and a half so he can finish the eye. What? What is there to do in this 106 degree heat in San Bernadino again? Might as well eat. We used the navigator in the car to find a Cold Stone Creamery. Yum. It was right next door to Quizno's so we had a sandwich first. Go back to the office. The eye is done and we don't have to go back for six months. Everyone is happy. On the way home En called. She got back safely to Seattle while we were still on Ramona Expressway.

Reboot

Whew. The day is at a close now. Da and I had our teeth cleaned. Then I took Da home and picked up En for an outing. We picked up some flowers at Stater Bros. and took them to Gramma in the hospital. She looks okay but very tired. She didn't want to let go of En's hand when it came time to leave, but I figured she needed to rest more than visit. Kedge was due to arrive in half an hour and Bcky and the Twizzler popped in and out as I was putting the flowers in a vase. She doesn't sleep well in the hospital and I was sorry we had woken her. Off to Kedge's. Finally. Gramma was too tired and not feeling well enough for us to disrupt her rest on Monday as I had promised so we postponed til today. With En at the keyboard we finally got Kedge and Gramma's internet connection all figured out. The router/modem only needed to be rebooted. How were we to know? Did you even know that you can reboot a router? I thought I would have to reset it but no, rebooting did the trick. En checked everything and figured that was the only thing yet to be tried. She even got a semblance of a network going between the two computers. She downloaded a good spyware utility, too. The printer is hooked up, the driver is loaded and printing happens, howbeit poorly. I cleaned the nozzles and realigned the print head. I think the print nozzles are still a little clogged. It has been sitting around for a good while so I think it will fix itself with a few printing jobs. I put shortcuts to her blog on her desktop. Now we have to get Gramma well and home and rested enough to write something for us.

Pomp and Circumstance

Saturday was the hottest of the year so far. We sat in the sun with umbrellas waiting for the ceremony to start. We had to laugh in unison as our arms were wet with sweat and we stuck to each other in the closely spaced chairs. But it was worth it to see Ta get her diploma. Except we couldn't see her because she was so far away. We did hear her name called out and we took a picture of the stage at the appropriate moment. We all wished she hadn't given me her cell phone to carry because she lacked pockets in her robe. She later told us that others were on their phones constantly. She could have told us where she was in the crowd on the stage. We could have found her easily afterwords. Moral: Always keep your cell phone with you in a crowd.

You can see the necklace I gave her. It is a turtle that I got at the Supreme Court in Washington DC. There it represents the slow but steady pace that justice takes. I thought it was fitting for Ta. Here she is! I'm so proud of her.

Clear Polish

Today was not very productive or interesting. I feel all deflated because of the internet connection problem at Gramma and Kedge's. The printer is too fancy for the new/old computer. I have an extra printer for Gramma so that is okay, but it takes a USB port and the pc only has two. They are being used for the keyboard and internet connection. So I found an old keyboard that I think still works. I can't get over there to fix it all up until Monday, so I have to have an unsolved problem hanging over my head. I don't like that. I have no idea how to go about solving the internet thing. I want to eventually set up a network between the two computers so they won't need two printers, but the internet connection takes priority. Meanwhile Gramma needs to print her stories for her writing club. I think she is still using her old word processor machine. I did get to polish my nails, though. I use three coats of clear so they don't break and peel.

Do I have to eat that?

I looked out the window and I saw two birds cuddled together on a rock. How cute is that? Lovebirds in my backyard. The next day they were back. I got my binoculars and bird book and identified them as Black Phoebes. Then I watched them for a while. Pretty soon a third bird came to join them. Then a fourth. The latecomers would flitter off and come back to the "lovebirds" and stuff bugs down their throats. The "lovebirds" were actually fledglings being fed by their parents. They could fly but were not quick or agile enough to catch anything. So Ma and Pa did all the catching. Quite fun to watch. After a while, one of the fledglings flew up to the fence and sat there while Ma caught another bug. She stuffed it down the little one's throat and flew off after yet another bug. No sooner had Ma flown off than the little one spat out the bug. I guess he didn't like Ma's choice for lunch. Kids are kids no matter where you go.

Piddly-doo things

I got a little worried there for a minute. SAJ wanted to come over and see my garden. Yikes! It is really not looking very nice right now. When I take a walk through it I can pick and choose what to photograph. When someone else walks through it, they see it all. I still have not checked out the last four sprinkler lines. They are the ones down the hill. When I look over the edge, it looks all dry so I'm sure there will be major problems with the lines. I hate that job 'cause my knees don't like going up and down the hill so much. Checking sprinklers means a lot of up and down, back and forth. There are a lot of fox tails, too, and they get stuck in my sandals. Ouch. But I will get to it soon. Instead, though, I weeded and planted half a flat of zinnias. That is more fun and I can do it sitting on my bum. Then I had to check out the Flylady's web site cause you know SAJ might still come over. The first thing the Flylady said was to polish the kitchen sink. Oohck. The grout has been deteriorating and it looks very bad. Hmmm. Idea...use the dremmel rotary tool that I just got to grind down the dogs' toenails. Worked like a charm. All nice and recaulked. It still is not cleaned and polished. I'll do that tomorrow between loads of laundry. (I am almost ready for you, SAJ.) I had to go online to investigate refinancing student loans as the one Ta has is a variable rate and they are threatening to hike the rates substantially. She only had to borrow for two quarters and she needs to start a credit history or else we'd pay it off. Then I went on to Kedg's blog and fixed the problem she was having (and Kafryn too). Gramma's blog is ready for her input as soon as she gets internet access. Make your links. Then I played a lot of solitaire. Now you know my day. How was yours? I think I'll go play my Sims now.

Ta's blog

Ta is now blogging! She gave the go ahead to post her address so look to the right and go!

Jus' Walkin'

Thanks to a bit of advice from Kafryn, I went outside in the daytime to take pictures. The orchids do look better in the daylight. The only problem is that the breeze makes it difficult to focus. Oh well, I will practice. While out there I took a walk around the yard and discovered other things blooming so I will subject you to pictures of them. HA. First is a bloom of the chilopsis tree out front. Notice any similarity to an orchid?

Next is an agapanthus about to burst open. It is the first one this season.
Then a daylily. It seems to glow from the inside.

I'm moving to the back yard now. Here are some asiatic lilies. You can tell them from oriental ones because they look up and don't have a fragrance. They are trying to hide the drying foliage from my dutch iris and not doing a very good job.

Moving down the hill I come across the first blooming frond from one of my butterfly bushes. Yes, they really do attract butterflies.

It looks like this will be a good year for apricots, doesn't it? My poor trees get neglected too much yet still produce.

I'm almost to the bottom of the hill now.

I see that my other variety of chilopsis is also in full bloom. This is a dark red one. I like the form of this multi-trunked tree/bush. It makes the last terrace an inviting place to stop and rest on this walk.









At the back gate I have a chitalpa tree. Actually, I have two because I like them so much. Both of them are in the lower part of the back yard which I call "the flat".
I think it is one of the prettiest trees for this area. It provides a nice shade and doesn't care for a lot of water. It is just now starting to bloom and it will continue blooming through all the heat of our summer. I wonder why we don't have more of them? It is related to the chilopsis but is a more substantial tree.

Lastly, I see that some Mexican hats have once again sprung up. They are the only flowers that come back reliably every year from a wildflower mix that I strew years ago.





Now I have to climb the hill again, thanks, Kafryn.

P.S. Hey, did you know that if you click on a picture you will get a large view of it? Try it on the daylily and the chitalpa tree.

Orchids

I love orchids. Who doesn't? They were the flower of choice for my wedding bouquet.



I have been intrigued by them since forever. They are so intricate.

Right now I have 21 plants of assorted varieties. Some are easier than others but I like them all. Of those 21, three are blooming
(see them?) and four more are in bud about to bloom.

And the blooms will last for weeks!



Some of them even have a fragrance that will fill a room. Not these ones, though, they are just for looks.


I wish my photographs would do them justice. These photos just do not show their true color and pizazz! Maybe if I tried doing it in the daylight?


Nah, night time is my time.

All fixed

Yay! I have it all fixed now. I did it my usual way--ignore the problem and it will go away, and it did! But just to make sure that I don't get the problem again, I went in and deleted the music from my web pages. Sorry, you will have to do without that irritating music. It was hard to read with that noise in the background anyway. My other problem that I never told you of was with my printer giving me communication error messages instead of doing what it was told to do, that is, print something. I spent about 20 minutes with Dell tech support and we fixed the problem. Now I don't have to feel like returning the printer anymore. I like having two printers connected to my PC, the laser for fast stuff and the photo one for color stuff. Now they both work. (I like HP printers better.) Someday, when I am really stressed for time I will figure out how to set up the fax capabilities. Not now, though, I need to do it when I need it done already.

Links

I have added some more links to my links list on the right------>
The problem is that my website over at Verizon is giving me grief. I thought it would be nice to have music playing on the site as you read the stuff. So I found some music and figured out how to put it on. Oops, the files were humongous. Search for smaller files of music. Found some, actually a lot. Quality suffered alot but it was okay. Now, I have decided to link to this page and when I try to navigate around those sites I get an ActiveX error message and IE crashes. every. time. I can't even get in to edit and take out the music thing that is making it crash. If you want to look at those pages, be sure to maximize the window first and then move the error message out of the way so you can read the page before clicking on okay. When you click okay the thing crashes to desktop. If anyone knows how to fix it, please let me know. If it works for you, let me know that, too. Especially page 2 of Crafty Things and page 2 of Orchids.

Ta Ta for now

Ta has left. She is on her way to Idaho for 5 months. It is such a bittersweet feeling even though I know she will be back in two weeks to walk in the graduation ceremony at UCR.



Still, she is gone. My baby is all grown up.*wipes away a tear*








While Ta is not really known for procrastination like some others, she does do things on her own time table, which is certainly not mine. We finally got the hiking boots and socks she needed and an air mattress yesterday along with a mouse and case for her laptop. We rediscovered that neither of us really enjoys shopping all that much. It was nice to have that one last outing together, though.





<--Here she is studying some birds in Hawaii several years ago. Very typical.

She is going to be sharing a house with four other girls. One of the girls is from Alaska and she has been in Idaho since the orientation was over in Chicago. She has spent the week scouting out a place to rent for all of them.




Kind of difficult to satisfy five different girls over email. I'm glad the guy on the team said he'd rather get his own place.

I set up a blog for her to keep me updated on all she does up there and will post the address once she gives the go ahead.