Showing posts with label employment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label employment. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Four coyotes

Nice and cool and wet this morning. It actually stayed that way all through the walk, too, although the sun came and went. We didn't meet anyone, but I did learn something. Crows really croak. Like frogs. Bullfrogs. Grrroak. I never knew. I would not, however, have minded in the least if the crow, after educating me thus, had either gone somewhere else or shut up. He kept flying, back and forth, overhead until we got out onto the road. Sheesh. He must've thought I really needed the lesson drilled into my head.

Quiet day, really. Reading The Forever King, somebody's sequel to their slightly modified--majorly modified--version of The Once and Future King. Several characters, including Arthur, have reincarnated, and a couple never died. It's not bad, I suppose.

Went over to Syd's to be briefed on the house-sitting. Since it seems the camping trip is a week later than thought, she doesn't need to arrange anything separate for the weekend. Also Phil told her there will be no camping trip, because of Austin's wedding, but I'm still not sure whether he was clear on the actual date at this point. Hope lives eternal....

Larked about seven-thirty. It was really nice out: cool, cloudy, no visible sun. Lots of bugs, though. We were more than halfway along the narrow, twisty second leg of trail when I saw four coyotes: parent leading two pups, with the other parent bringing up the rear. Lark, fortunately, never saw them, but we came under some rather suspicious scrutiny. The adults seemed to feel were best left alone, I'm glad to say. Later on, as we came up the road, a doe bounded across; I'm still not sure if Lark found her or not, because she went off-trail for awhile when we came up to the point she crossed.

15 pushups 20 situps

Monday, July 20, 2009

Some sort of big mix

Got up more promptly than otherwise, but lost any time gained thus by following the dog over to Sid's and falling into conversation with her. She says we should be able to figure something out for this weekend, which is when I'm supposed to be house-sitting, and also when the church camping trip is. Actually I'm house-sitting Wednesday through Tuesday, but I'm asking for Saturday and Sunday off. Which, Sid says, can be arranged. Probably.

FOUR HOURS A DAY?!?! LIUGF;OIHDG[ODIFS VKJNS'E! 

Kill.

Went to the doctor's office with Grandma and Syd for Grandma's INR test. Six milligrams, come back Friday. Stopped at King Soopers; Lark was low on dog food.

Had a nice long talk on the phone with home after dinner. Lots of stock news, heard everyone's voices. Doug cracked up completely at Syd's remark about reincarnating as my dog. Had to lark as soon as I got off the phone, though; it was nice and cool after the evening's rain, but there were a lots of bugs chewing on me. There was a magnificent red buck watching us from the other side of the valley, once. We only met one person, and jogger and his dog. He grabbed the dog immediately he saw us, and held his collar until he figured he was out of range. I had to leash Lark, though, or his calculation would've been way off.

Started reading Legacy about as soon as I learned my comp time was limited. Grrrrr.

Thursday, July 2, 2009

Husky/Sheltie

Bleh. Zombie blobs. I spent most of the dream waiting for everybody to be dead at the end. I think most of us were still alive when I woke up, though. It was all kinda weird, anyway....

We went for a walk about nine this morning. It was much too hot. We met one person, a man, with a familiar husky-sheltie in tow. Oh, and a man on a bicycle. Otherwise all sightings were at a distance. I think I should've gotten a boonie hat while I was at the army surplus. The hat I'm borrowing from the Seamans is nice, a good, natural color that doesn't jump out, but I'm gonna have to give it back eventually. Also boonie hats are crushable, so when I'm not wearing it it can just go in my pocket like everything else. I'll just carry a red scarf or something in my pocket in case I need to be visible for, say, a medical helicopter. Spellcheck, by the way, acknowledges "boonies" but not "boonie." Pft.

After I got home and recharged, Grandma had me do the kitchen floor. That was okay. Then I had to do the greenhouse. Geh. It is impossible to get the dog hair out of there enough to even half ignore it while scrubbing. I want my vacuum! 

Sid came just as I was starting in the greenhouse to discuss me looking after Maddy while they're gone. I have to go give her a little canned catfood and make sure she's alive Friday night, Saturday morning and evening, and Sunday morning. Well, sure, I can do that. For ten bucks. Seems reasonable. A day.  .........!!!!  Sid said if I felt like it was too much, I could go over there and read or something to keep her company a little. ............I'm getting my revenge by sending her pictures of adorable Craigslist dogs. Or expressing my gratitude, I don't know. I'm sending her ads, anyway.

Incidentally, I have got to remember that the clothing biases are completely different here. B would wince at the brown army t-shirt with the hemmed BDU shorts. Sid and Grandma say I look cute. -_-; Well, thanks, but.....it's very disconcerting. Not least because that's definitely not how it's designed to look. Not that I expect to look intimidating, but.....how about utilitarian?

Started Mistress to an Age before lunch. Finished the first chapter, plus all the prefaces, by the time Grandma said it was lunchtime.

There are six ads for Rottweiler puppies in the newspaper, plus one for a brindle male Rottweiler/mastiff puppy (tail docked) for....wait for it....$500. Plus various puppies and mixes (there were rottie/bloodhounds posted today) on Craigslist. Dad should come out here for a month or so. I'm sure Rick knows somebody he could stay with.

Jinn came by with some shopping commissions from the Sunshine Market and a negative review of the place. "It's overrated," she said, giving us a bag of cherries, cartons of blueberries and blackberries, and some lobster tails. Lark was delighted to see her. On a related note, I need to start letting her out more during the day. Actually, she's tied out right now, but that's due to trouble on the other end: some kibble got caught in her throat, and by the time she coughed it up, her gag reflex was thoroughly engaged an she couldn't stop throwing up. It improved somewhat after I put her out, but she's still retching a little, occasionally. It's raining now, though, so I'd better go let her in.

Grandma's wandering around without her cane. I think I'm going to have a heart attack.

It's four-thirty and raining buckets. With wind. And big fat drops. The windows are all shut and I can still smell the rain.

Dinner was the lobster tails. They were delicious. Grandma boiled them and served them with melted butter, and they were great. Note to self: when interested in a guy, try the Lobster Test: does he mind paying an arm and a leg? (You can skip this one. Split the cost or buy them yourself for dinner at home.) Do either of you mind watching the sort of messy eating lobster entails? How resourceful is he in figuring out how to eat the stupid things? I look forward to such an excuse. Lobster has a purpose! Yay! (Besides the physical and intellectual workout, of course.)

We larked a little after seven. The rain had mostly stopped, confining itself to a sporadic misting drizzle. It was cool out, and I wore a hoodie and my boots--which, naturally, turned out to be useless against tall wet grass. What astonished me was that the creek was running. Not all the way to the crossing, but there were signs--dried foam--and runnels, from earlier. Higher up it was going strong. It was noisy up at the culvert, where crossing the rocks was like walking over a symphony of water, possibly by Stravinsky. It began to rain as we came back up the Heller road, leaving me unsurprised that we met no one until Eagle Rock. A woman from the big house on the Circle was coming down from getting the mail. Lark was suspicious, but she wriggled up once we got closer. We cleared off when she almost pawed the woman's skirt. I went over later, after putting out the trash, to ask her if she wanted her trash hauled out; she was weeding the marigolds, and explained, through a thick accent, that her husband took it out every day--I'm not sure where: the noun was too accented. The people living there are widely said to be the parents of the Pole on the hill; nobody talks to them much, but Maria is thought to do for them. Possibly. It feels like a victory, though: contact made! I've been eyeing her for a while, you see.....