New Camera's are FUN...

As a lot of people know, I have decided to invest in a really good camera. Even two days in, it has been worth it. That is not to say my pictures are great, but I certainly am remembering the fun of being able to play with aperture, shutter-speed, etc. Just some samples from the last (first?) couple of days.

The girls:

The cats:

The Tree's:

The yard:

FINALLY! It is ready...

...ready to use... Task 2 - BRING IT ON! :)

It was quite the chore. I really thought it would never be working. We got it all over here, only to end up in a month long decision making process as to where it was going to be set-up.

We finally picked the spot... we were going to have it run parallel to the house. We hired the electrician to come put in the wiring. After some back and forth, it was decided that it was ok to install a plug on the pumps.

So... pool in general area, pump has a plug... 220V installed... check. We decided to try the pump. It was a good thing we did... it did not take long to realize that the system was busted. It was the water pouring out of the bottom of the heater that was the dead give-away.

Apparently, the heater needs the tube to actually be ATTACHED in order for it to work right.  It did not take us (the royal 'us') to fix that and get it all put back together... gave it a day to make sure it was all hooked up, gave it a test and, voila!... everything seemed to be ready to go.

We decided to change the orientation of the pool because the way it ended up was a lot more level. It would have taken a lot of work to even it out the other way.

We got it filled... it took about a day and a half with one hose, but it was full! Unfortunately, it was also sinking into the ground in a way that was, shall we say... not good. Apparently, the mass of the weight sits on the OUTSIDE of the feet. We then spent a day or so draining the pool... *sigh*.

Once it was drained, we dug out around each of the feet, installed 2x8 planks for the feet to sit on. Once that was done, it was just a matter of getting it filled again and turning on the system. We had a bit of a problem the first day with the heater. There is a little dial inside the heater that sets the pressure at which the heater turns off if the pressure drops. For some reason, it was set all the way open, so there was not enough pressure to allow it to turn on. Once I figured that out, it was just a matter of waiting a few days for the water to get warm enough to be able to swim.

I have been swimming since Sunday and it is wonderful. I started out with about 10 minutes. The next day, I was able to swim for 15. Yesterday, I turned up the current a bit and swam for 30 minutes. Today, I was up to 35. Tomorrow, I am going for the grand total of 45. We will see how that goes. :)

It makes me feel so much better to be exercising again.  I only hope I do not disappoint myself and stop.  Going to work on that.

Reminds me "Why"

People ask me how I can do what I do for a  living... I think they only see the death.

Which is why it is nice to every once in a while to see the other side of it all:

"This patient is a 9-year old girl.  She was having trouble reading her schoolwork.  She is now literally the top student in her class!  Thanks for the great tissue."

I love my job.

It is a fine line between Gingerbread and Pumpkin Pie

I made gingerbread the other day... not the cookies, but the cake.  Of course, I could not simply follow the recipe... oh no... that would be too easy!

So lets see... increase the ginger and cinnamon (they never put in enough of that)... oops... no 'light' molasses, so what can we do?  Hummm.. ok, dilute the regular molasses with some light corn syrup... that might work.

It actually turned out ok.  Not enough spice flavor for me... after I was done, I realized that I really did not want gingerbread but spice cake.... heh.

I tried another batch yesterday.  I went with the higher level of ginger and cinnamon, the diluted molasses and added nutmeg, allspice and cloves.


Result?  A ginger bread cake that tastes like pumpkin pie... this time it seemed a little dry to me... I think I need to cut back the baking time, but it does give me an idea... maybe I will add some pumpkin next time!

Almost Party Time!

Jake came for a visit (yah!).  So far, we have not done much (unless you count three trips to Costco for swim meet supplies), but today, Reg and Dharma are heading down to help us eat up the special Carne Asada Jake brought up from the OC.  Sis and the girls were supposed to come, but life intruded, much to my sorrow  :(, but we will package some of the goodies up and drop it off for them, on the morrow.

Another exciting thing:  I got to use my new birthday gift food processor... it is amazing!  I made the salsa last night in about 15 minutes (usually takes at LEAST an hour) and this morning, I prepped all the fajitas vegies in about 15 minutes, including clean-up!  The pic below is just 1/3 of the vegies!



The salsa turned out a little less 'chunky' than I like, but I think that is just a matter of me practicing and putting smaller amounts in at a time.

From T-Mobile Pictures

Right now, the chicken is in cooking ... once that is done, I will put the enchiladas together and that should be about it.  The boys are making a last minute shopping run... so it looks like we are about ready! Weeeeeeeeee!

And the seasons just keep turning...

It is that time of year again.  I was going to use some old scavenged windows and build a greenhouse... But then I saw this at Bi-Mart:



 

For the price, I could not have bought the hardware and lumber I would need to build the greenhouse.  This one can be put up and taken down each year.  I had started some seeds last week in the house.  No sign of life, but after one day in the greenhouse, things are already starting to pop ... I figure the greenhouse accelerated them by at least two days.

Now I just have to get the garden ready to accept them in a few weeks... :)

It is never JUST a quick fix...

I am really not ignoring people (intentionally) right after asking for writing suggestions. As is the story of my life, as soon as I do something like that, things suddenly get out of control.

Today's saga...

After a weekend spent in an emergency mold-remediation party at a family members house, we  had reached the 'procrastination wall' on fixing the floor under the toilet... what a joy!

Once the toilet was pulled (and the pipe stuffed with paper-towels to keep debris out),  the linoleum was pulled up... I am not sure which was more disgusting... the rotten wood (seen below in black) or the old linoleum that was never removed... what in the WORLD were those 70's people thinking!



During the tear-out, we also found evidence that at least one of the walls had one of the mirrors that had a red mottled design all throughout it.  And the LOVELY original wallpaper!




The farther into it, the worse it got ... and I am not just talking about the quality of my pictures (sorry about that!). 




But as time went along, progress was made:



Of course, with that much damage, the cast iron flange was destroyed, so there was much blue language flowing freely during the closing phase, but, eventually... Success!



I will have to say, however, that as spring cleaning goes, it is a LOT easier to clean the toilet when you have plenty of access to all sides...  and I am sure my neighbors were ever so appreciative...



We still have to pull the toilet again to do some shimming and lay the linoleum, but that will be a story for another day...  :)

Suggestions log...

In a conversation with Qual (Qual-person not Qual-kitty), I was explaining to her that I really enjoy writing, but that it is hard for me to come up with things to write about.  Part of the reason I do not keep up with the blog as well as I should because I do not feel I really having interesting things to write about.  She indicated that perhaps my daily minutia is more interesting to people than I think, so I have decided to try a little experiment.

I am going to be 'religious' (heh) about checking the blog comments for a couple of months.  If someone has a suggestion for me to write about, please comment and make the suggestion.  The topics could be anything from a question they would like me to answer to simply a topic they would like to suggest that I write about.  The more research I have to do on it, the better!  Anything is fair game... questions, opinion topics or just plain old informational writing.

Help me out folks... I need to get my writing skills up and ready for the MCAT essay section, so start throwing things at me.

Task 5 - Two down... sort of...

On my list of 5 Tasks for the year (Ephemera: Time for reflections is over... now it is DO IT time.) two of my Task5 UFO's were two small cross-stitch pictures ... a present for someones mom.  Tonight, I finished the cross-stitch phase...
 

I say sort of, because although the cross-stitch part is done, they still need to be made into pillows... and then sent off.

We will see how long THAT takes me.

But I thought...

Lots of time spent driving to various donors equals a lot of time to listen to talk show podcasts.

Listening to the Thom Hartmann (02/08/2010) show a few days ago gave me a particularly strong moment of "But... wait!" when Thom's guest Dale Robinson of the www.teaparty.org and self proclaimed 'founder' of the teaparty movement said:

You can have a single payer health care system without the government involvement... my solution is to have a heath savings account with a health savings co-op... where the American people would own a part of...

 Ok... but wait... I thought that was what the government is supposed to be... a co-op that the American people OWN.

Granted, with the way things are, it is NOT that way.  The recent pole ( Poll information )showing that 80%+ of the American people think that their representatives are more interested in the special interests than their constituents and want the entire congress kicked out.  I get that only 8% of the people are interested in having their representatives re-elected.  But instead of saying "we should start another program that the people own", why not focus on taking back the program we ALREADY own?

Time for reflections is over... now it is DO IT time.

So the new year came... and went... my birthday came... and went.... both are big times of reflection for me. What do I want out of the year to come... my future, etc.

This year, I have decided to start small. I have decided to wait one more year before starting school. I have a job I enjoy... not something I would consider as a career, but something that I think I will be able to continue enjoying for another year. It is rewarding and it gives me free time (sometimes!) to do what I want to do.

This is not to say that there are not a lot of things I can be doing during this year to prepare for school. So that is Task (capitol "T") one.

Task 1: Taking the MCat once more is job one. Starting to review year one books.

Additionally, I have let my health get out of control. My asthma is not good and other than work, I have been sedentary. So...

Task 2: Get back on track, healthwise. Everything is on track for getting my committed exercise program started March 1. Until then, I am going to start some less formal things... back to yoga!

Another reason I want to wait another year is that there are a lot of things I want to get into place with the house. We need a new roof, part of the house jacked up, the bedroom remodel, new bathroom, kitchen remodel, old bathroom remodel. A couple new windows, a deck and my greenhouse. The barn needs some more work. That is a lot of work and I would like it all done before I start school. I want a nice nest so that I can concentrate.

On a smaller scale, I want to organize. Soooo...

Task 3: Organize... sort, toss, give away, scan the paperwork.... this one is already in progress... over the past couple of days, I have dedicated an hour a day to getting boxes unpacked, clothes sorted. It helps that there are some tenants who need a lot of things...

Task 4: Remodeling

My last goal for this year is to get all the craft projects caught up. I have everything I need to do it... now I just need to get it all done.

Task 5: Craft UFO's (Unfinished Objects) - it would depress me too much to list them all, so I will just post them as I finish them.  Heh... 

Basically, I am considering this my year of batting clean-up... getting all of my hanging chads knocked off in order to clear the way for starting another chapter all fresh.  I am going to be using this blog for accountability... I will label based on Task number as I go...