☺ WE LOVE TO CHAT - 7/2 ☺

Oh, my ~ talk about winding down.  I have had two naps today, and I feel like I could use another one...  L A Z Y!!  Baxter cannot quite figure out what I am doing lying down so many times today...  he's easily amused.

I have made a potato salad for tonight's dinner,and Ithink we will have hot dogs on a bun, too.  Why not have a picnic style dinner every now and then.  I'll do the hot dogs in my new toaster oven.  Oh, boy, do I ever love that baby.  And, with my microwave being kaput, it sure has helped.   I am still learning how to use it, but I know it will be a treasure that I wish I would have purchased a long time ago.  Sarah loves the small one I gave her, so we are all happy.

I am working a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle, and it is taking a lot longer than I thought it would.  Good cuts on the pieces (I have seen some where the pieces could fit anywhere, the cuts are so identical), and good color definition - nice sharp lines - and an interesting picture.  The front of an old timey pharmacy, with an Indian standing in front, a boy on a tricycle, a newspaper boy and his dog, and a lady in a red full length dress with a parasol...  fun puzzle. 

You know we were talking about fireworks yesterday, and in today's paper, front page of the local section, a huge picture of some kids browsing in a fireworks shop / tent, and the story line is the vendors are bemoaning the fact that sales won't be so good this year with the 4th being the middle of the week and not on a weekend....  the idea being that people are buying less because they won't have as much time to set off the  fireworks.  Only one little tiny paragraph in the middle of a very long article does it mention that (wink wink) fireworks are really illegal but that (wink wink) the police don't do much to enforce the laws.  If that is not encouraging people to go out and break the law I don't know what is....  egads.  Just pray no little kids lose a finger, or an eye... 

I haven't worked a puzzle in such a long time and I really miss that.  My dog always came in the basement with me while I worked the puzzle, but now he can't go down and up the stairs anymore.  When we have people over and are in the basement my husband has to carry him down and up...makes me nervous and neither one of them likes it--my dog weighs 55 pounds so is kinda heavy.  I have so many puzzles waiting for me that I buy at the library for .50.  The picture you're doing sounds nice.  I have some puzzles where all the pieces may not fit everywhere but all look exactly the same--2 things sticking out and 2 things going in.  I hate those especially if the pic is the sky or water or snow--you end up trying every piece in every spot.  I've put away puzzles unfinished when they were like that cause it wasn't fun.  I like the puzzle pieces with odd shapes, like the parts sticking out shaped like spades, etc.  Oh well, I'll enjoy my dog while he's still here and plenty of time to do puzzles later.  Have fun with your puzzle!

I love doing puzzles too   Years ago we would receive them as Christmas gifts but with having 2 cats who thought it great fun to bat the pieces around, we really couldn't do them.  This last winter we spent some fun afternoons doing some of them when we didn't want to be outside. None of the ones we have are small so we use the dining table for them.   Now that we have no pets, we can leave them there for the duration.

Tasty

One of the more unique puzzles that I have done are from Bit's 'n' Pieces, a catalog company.  They have a special name which I cannot recall but this is the deal:  The depiction on the box shows a fairly normal situation, for example a restaurant scene with lots of people eating, and waitresses serving, etc.... but the finished puzzle is the picture of what happens next: does that waitress coming down the steps from the kitchen fall on the way down, does her tray of food go splattering everywhere, who ends up with food on their head instead of in their plate???  I think it is called Spillsbury...  Now, that is a real challenge since you have no idea from looking at the picture on the box how to solve the puzzle.  I love those.

Thunder is rumbling in the distance, and I am so ready for a little bit of rain. 

The first incident has already happened.... a man has had his thumb blown off and he suffered severe burns when he lit a firecracker in his driveway and had it pointed at himself  instead of away...  he is in the hospital in serious condition form burns all over his body.  'Dear God....

That does sound like a neat puzzle.  I have a couple 3D puzzles that were my MIL, but I'm not sure I'm interested in those...maybe one day.  But I'm still picturing the one your doing now with the old time pharmacy.  Do you know what brand of puzzle that is?  I've been disappointed with some that I bought from the library cause they weren't the neat-shaped pieces.

It's thundering here, too, inbetween the fire crackers!  About that man---oh, well.  He knew the risks.  Maybe that'll make other people think about it.  Or maybe not.  I'm just glad that it wasn't some child that got hurt. 

OK, I am going put my 2¢ in. I love pictuce puzzles, also. Dad and I used to work the sky and water as the others didn't like to work that part of the puzzle and we liked the challenge. First you had to do the border then you could work the rest of the puzzle. I have a number of puzzles (worked and unworked or to work). "Good Night", we all like so many of the same things that it is scary.   I just went upstairs to check what I have. I have 5 of those "hard" ones (Oleos, Fancy Eggs, Pocket Watches, A Stitch In Time (Embroidery Canvas & Thread) and one never has even been opened called Seed Packets). There must be at least a dozen others that are the regular kind. Ohhh I think I need to do the Seed Packets this winter. Too bad we are scrattered around the country "or maybe it is a good thing"!

Sorry about the man and the fire crackers. I don't think just anyone should be able to buy them and shoot them off.  To me that is a pure waste of money. Another 2¢ worth.   I hope we don't have another night of fire crackers but I bet we do "even" if they have been banned because of the drought.

Good Morning, Gang ~ Thursday and we have survived another night of bombardment from all sides.  Poor Baxter was quivering, and he'd jump every time another went off.  And, you guessed it, another victim of a mortar type firecracker exploding...  this guy was a professional working the fireworks show in Dade City, not too far from here, and he was airlifted to Tampa General Hospital with burns over half his body.  The show was cancelled, and, get this, the crowd booed.  They have reset the show for tonight.  Idiots. 

The puzzle I am in the midst of doing now is "Jacob's Pharmacy" by Lee Dubin, 1000 piece, 20 x 27, put out by SunsOut;  www.sunsout.com    The other puzzle I was talking about, where the picture you see on the box is the "before" and the completed puzzle is the "after" version of a comical scene, is a WASGIJ puzzle...  google it and find several outlets.  They are made in the UK, and quite unique. 

I will be a Jen's house most of the day, I expect....  I have a carpet cleaner coming to do her carpets, and of course, I have to stay with him.  I have used this guy for years, not part of any chain, but an independent who works by himself, sometimes with a grandson along, and he's the best I have ever seen.  I could leave him and he'd be just fine, but I'd only do that in my own home....  with someone else's house, I feel I need to stay...  So, I will arm myself with book and some crossword puzzles to keep busy....  not much anyone can do when the carpets are being done except to stay out of the way. 

See you later...  now I have things to do before I can leave this morning, and I'd best get hopping..... 

Good Morning All:

Sorry to hear of another "firecracker" mishap!!  How "uncaring" the crowd was for booing. It was pretty quiet here in the neighborhood last night. I did hear some fireworks (not very close) after I went to bed so the majority of people must have respected "the ban".

Temp 77.3° here this morning and sky is "light" behind the trees.  Where, oh where has the rain gone!!  

Going to the bank and store this morning before it gets too hot. Then I will putter in the house.

CUL

Good morning, all. It's refreshingly cool this morning--lower humidity really makes a difference. We have a day off from it today before it cranks up again for tomorrow. Even with that, we haven't had the nasty temps that you folks in the mid-west are enduring. Still no rain, though. It was quite a day for the beach yesterday.

There were some fireworks in the city last night but thankfully not close. And the police were on top of the ones who were shooting them although it didn't totally stop it. All in all, not too bad. No seriious injuries that I've heard about. Get people in a crowd and some will start behaving badly because they feel anonymous.

Someone shot some into a crowd at the beach last night while they were waiting for the show over the water. I heard it on the police scanner. They said there were injuries but there wasn't anything in the news this morning so perhaps it wasn't too bad. I hope they caught the fools. Years ago when the fireworks in the city were held close enough for my mother and me to walk to the show, we made a decision to stay home after things like that started happening. It wasn't fun anymore.

My SIL and I went to Red Lobster for lunch yesterday. I haven't been there in quite a while. I, of course, ate two of those cheese-garlic biscuits instead of one but it was worth every bite!  I've got to be good today and eat normally for a change--which means cooking for myself.

Have a good day everyone. Talk to you later.

Will wonders and stupidity ever cease?  A woman and a teen boy just came to my door, he was wearing a very large bandage across the top of his forehead and down on one cheek...  he was being forced to apologize to me for putting firecrackers in my mailbox (it had been dark when I got the paper, so this was news to me).  Seems he put in the kind that attached to a string, all in a row, light one and then the next one catches from the string whcih acts as a fuse.  Anyway, he did more damage to himself than to my mailbox, which survived with just a bunch of debris inside and a smoky smell.  He apparently didn't think the fuse was lit, so he opened the mailbox to look inside when it went kablouie in his face.  I felt badly for the kid, but glad his mom took it one step further, by making him say he was sorry.  He said it wasn't his idea, gang influence type thing, and his mom said, "if you are dumb enough to do something stupid, you pay the consequences just as if it had been your idea."  Amen.

Oh, my gosh!! It is a miracle he wasn't hurt worse. He needs to take a class in physics. Apparently he didn't know that by opening the mailbox after putting in the lit firecrackers he gave them the air needed to explode.  Poor kid - bad lesson. Good for his Mother.

Good morning,

Good for the boy's mother Beema.  I'm so glad it was him and not you.  Maybe, just maybe, he and his "friends" will learn their lesson.  Too bad he had to get hurt.  You would think these days that there is enough publicity that the stupid idiots out there would know better.

It was nice and cool when I got up this morning, down in the 50's but it's climbing rapidly.  It's supposed to break here at the w/e but still no rain.

Dinner last night was so good.  I had a half turkey breast that I had planned to cook in the slow cooker but it wasn't defrosted enough before I went out in the morning so about 4pm when I got home I put it in a dutch oven with some chicken stock, carrots onions and celery and cooked it that way instead.  Made a little gravy to go with the mashed potatoes and broccoli.  Finished up with a little slice of apple raspberry pie.

Tonight will be cold turkey, probably in a cobb type salad mix.

Have a lovely day,

Tasty

Thanks for the info on the puzzle, Beema.  When I see one by that company at the library I'll get it.  That sure was a crazy thing that kid did...glad that you didn't get hurt.

The firecrackers were just awful last night.  As much as we don't like when the AC is on, I'm glad that we had all of the doors and windows closed.  But even with everything closed and the tv on the noise was just terrible.  My dog (unlike some of the others that I've had) isn't afraid of the noise or of thunder, but I had to bribe him to go out to pee before we went to bed.  The big booms were going on well past midnight.

We had another big thunderstorm early this morning.  But we're really lucky because other cities very near us lost their power and had a lot of trees falling down from the wind.  It's supposed to be 98 today and 99 tomorrow, but it looks like we'll be able to turn off the AC Sunday since it'll just be in the mid 80's (what they're saying so far, anyway).  It's been around 2 weeks of this awful hot and humid weather and I'm getting tired of it!  I've been putting off planting some more seeds in the garden, but maybe today I'll try to ignore the heat and just do it before it'll be too late for them to grow.  A couple of my tomatoes are turning that sort of funny green color that they turn before starting to turn red, so I'm hoping maybe another week. Or maybe longer....

I bought a half a cardboard box of apricots at the fruit market the other day for $1.  I never saw black apricots so wanted to try them, and wanted some plums.  Both were .97 a pound and my two bags were at least 4 pounds.  Then I saw the box which had both black and regular apricots mixed and figured even if I throw half away I'm still way ahead, so put my bags down and grabbed the box.  I didn't have to throw too many in the compost and still have a lot left.  I think I'm going to try and make apricot jelly or jam today.  I'll have to look up some recipe later after I get home.

carole

Just got home from Jen's ~ the carpet cleaner was there for almost seven hours...  the most boring day I have spent in many a moon, I will tell you.  I sat in the kitchen and worked a gazillion crossword puzzles and when I started to read, I thought I'd fall asleep...  so I would get up, move around a little bit...  try to find something to do.  The garage is just off the kitchen...  I ended up cleaning up the tool shelves, and cleaning the washer and dryer.  Egad, I am sooooo glad to be home.  And, that glass of wine is before me, as I write.

Well, another stray bullet....  you may remember that last year, on the 4th, a 12 year old boy was shot in the head by a bullet that was shot off in celebration from somewhere....  it just happened to hit him.  Last night, while watching the city's fireworks show, a 74 year old man was hit by a stray bullet....  it went through the top of his head, out his nostril, singed his lip and fell on the blanket beside him where he was sitting.  He is going to survive but the doctors are saying it was a miracle that it didn't do more damage.  I swear to God, it's not safe to even have a picnic and watch the fireworks from afar.

I'm gonna have to scrounge for dinner tonight....  I didn't even get the kitchen cleaned up this morning....  See you later...

Isn't it funny how we long for a day with nothing to do and yet, when we get one thrust upon us, we quickly get bored