Last Tuesday morning,
we went to the dentist in Lincoln so Larry could
have his teeth realigned. That was 18
days later than it should have been, on account of their computers going
down. Have you ever heard of a doctor’s
or dentist’s office closing for two and a half weeks, because of a virus in
their computers?
When the alignment was done, we looked for a place to eat
breakfast. We had a gift certificate for
Cracker Barrel, but the restaurant was about twenty-five minutes to the north,
and we wanted to head south because we were going to the little town of Victoria,
Kansas, to pick up a baler Larry had purchased at a very good price on an
online auction.
We decided to head south, and stop when we spotted
someplace that looked like it might serve good food.
That place presented as the Homestead Plaza
Truck Stop. A big sign on the side of
the building advertised ‘Home Cooking’, so we pulled right in.
I had a BLT and coleslaw, and Larry had a
chicken fajita omelet and pancakes. All
of it was totally scrumptious (though the coleslaw might’ve been better with a little
less vinegar, but quantity of vinegar in coleslaw is strictly a matter of
opinion, isn’t it?). The restaurant seemed
old-timey and nondescript, but someone back there in the kitchen certainly knew
how to cook!
It’s called ‘Homestead’ because it’s quite
close to Homestead National Monument, where an early settler’s log cabin has
been beautifully preserved. Ten people
once lived in that cabin.
It’s 85 miles from our house to Affordable
Dentistry; 261 miles from the dentist’s office to Victoria, Kansas; and 277
miles from Victoria back home again.
Total mileage, 623.
It was a bit foggy when we left home, and it
stayed cloudy most of the day, with a bit of rain sometimes and a ferocious
downpour near Salina, Kansas, around 3:00 p.m.
Before the rain, the clouds were behaving strangely, swirling slowly
here and there, with multiple layers going myriad directions and dropping wispy
little tails like small, mischievous whirlwinds. I pulled up several weather apps for the area
on my laptop and discovered that yes indeed, they were under a tornado watch in
that very county.
But nothing more significant than the hard
rain occurred, and Larry and the man from whom he bought the baler were able to
load it onto his trailer without getting rained on, though there were ominous
clouds all around.
By this time, it was well past suppertime, and
we were hungry, having had nothing to eat since breakfast. I had a wallet full of restaurant gift
certificates – but there are none of the restaurants for which we have gift
cards between Victoria, Kansas, and Columbus, Nebraska.
I have no idea why we didn’t stop and eat in
the relatively large town of Hays, Kansas, population 20,845. Evidently we weren’t quite starved yet? Or maybe we wanted to get away from the approaching,
possibly severe, thunderstorm?
We did take the time to stop at the
Goodwill, though, as it was just a couple of blocks from the station where we
put fuel in the pickup. That, because
I’d forgotten my sweater at home, and it was going to get chilly that night,
and restaurants are notoriously cold (except for those that are notoriously hot).
I found a nearly new purple velour zip-front
sweater for $3.49, and a cream-colored skirt made up of a dozen or more swirled
gores, with every other one of eyelet lace, also $3.49. Exactly what I’ve been needing. Larry got himself a couple of pairs of almost-new
jeans, one black Levi Strauss and the other navy Wrangler, for $3.99 a
pair.
By the time we exited the Goodwill, we were
hungrier than ever. We love Mexican
food, and there were a couple of authentic Mexican restaurants in towns to our
north. So we drove right past multiple
Mexican restaurants in Hays and happily headed north.
The first Mexican restaurant, El As De Oros
was closed. In fact, it is closed all
day every Tuesday. You will not eat
Mexican food in Plainville, Kansas, on a Tuesday, no you will not!!
Not to worry; there was another Mexican
restaurant just 15 miles to the north.
But it was getting late. I checked their hours.
They were going to be closed by the time we
got there.
Why do they close so early?! We needed to eat there! waa waa waa
This is cruel and unusual punishment.
Just look at the interior hand-painted décor:
The outside was pretty, too.
There seemed to be only one other acceptable choice
in this town of 1,840: Dairy Queen.
Larry got a grilled chicken sandwich, and I ordered
a grilled chicken salad.
We splurged and had Blizzards for dessert. Larry had a Royal New York Cheesecake, and I
had a Summer Berry Cheesecake.
Then away we went, hurrying northward before
the thunderstorms caught up with us.
By the time we went through Wood River,
Nebraska, thirteen miles southwest of Grand Island, it was a quarter ’til
midnight, we were tired, and tired of riding.
So when we went under the pedestrian bridge that crosses Rte. 30 in Wood
River, Nebraska, we decided to stop and take a walk over it. I’ve wanted to do that ever since they opened
it in September of 2012. Larry took
these pictures of the inside of the walkway and the town from the top level of
the walkway with his phone, as I’d left my camera in the pickup.
Wednesday, a friend who was planning to visit
our church told me, “All I carry is my phone with Bible App. It has my daily devotions and is pretty easy
to navigate.”
I warned him, “Don’t forget to turn your
ringer off! 😅 ... or you’re
liable to join that select group of people who are suddenly scrambling madly to
shut off ring tones (or just dashing pell-mell for the door).”
The precursor to that scenario was
when some friends of ours, years ago, brought a wind-up teddy bear to church
for the baby, because ‘the baby can’t wind it up’.
Problem: Baby’s older sibling could
and did wind it up.
Suddenly, we were all being serenaded with
the dulcet tones of ♪ ♫ Lullaby, and Good Night... ♫ ♪.
The father (let’s call him ‘Parker’), holding
the toddler who had done the winding, got a bit panicked at this turn of events
and picked an odd solution: He handed the singing teddy to his wife
(let’s call her ‘Petunia’), who was holding the sleeping baby.
Petunia then leaped to her feet and rushed
out, carrying a sleeping babe and a singing bear. 🤣
The noon hour found me trotting about making
coffee, feeding the cats, filling bird feeders, watering porch flowers and
rinsing out and refilling birdbaths... blow-drying my hair... curling it... then I went back out to the kitchen
to rewarm my coffee, and, as is my habit, while the microwave runs, I skip
quickly into the living room and play a song or two on the piano.
I slid onto the bench, launched into The
Upper Window – and suddenly there was a stirring on the nearby loveseat,
and Larry, who, unbeknownst to me, was lying there trying to have a nap, raised
both arms in the air in an ‘I surrender’ gesture.
I abruptly stopped playing. “Oops,” I said. “I didn’t know you were here! I wouldn’t have been making all that noise,
and never would have started playing the piano!”
He laughed... was soon back asleep.
But Teensy then spied him, leaped up, and
landed ker-THUD right on his stomach, as he is oft wont to do (which is why we
had to always shut our bedroom door at nights, after that cat came along). Larry turned on his side and repositioned
Teensy, tucking him snuggly against his stomach and above his knees, and the
cat happily snoozed on (though I disturbed him momentarily, taking a picture).
Larry’s nap ended up lasting an hour,
rather than half an hour, which was just as well, considering the late
hour we’d gotten home the previous night.
It was Nathanael’s 13th birthday and
Malinda’s 2nd birthday that day.
Wouldn’t you know, neither of their gifts arrived, though they were supposed
to. The doll I’d ordered for Malinda
came Thursday, so I took it to her. It
came with quite a few accessories. Malinda
was especially taken with the very small, but very real, diaper.
Nathanael’s gift still hasn’t come, so we got
him something else.
We are absolutely inundated with mosquitoes
here. When I go out to work in the yard, I must first drench myself in
bug repellent, if I don’t want them to eat me alive. They delight to lurk
in all the greenery around the property. If I jar the hostas, clouds
of the nasty things rise from them.
 |
| Red Admiral butterfly on Old-Fashioned rose |
I worked outside for a couple of hours
Thursday morning, and had to reapply bug spray every half an hour or so. The roses are blooming profusely, and I
discovered some tiger lilies blooming in one garden.
Here are more pictures from the yard:
I actually sewed something the other day! – I
put the casings back in some curtains I washed, before rehanging them. 😉
The lady from Harlan, Iowa, Jennifer Perkins,
who appraises my quilts, wrote back to me, and we made an appointment for
Saturday afternoon – and I wouldn’t have to go all the way to Harlan,
Iowa: we would meet her in Omaha; she was going to be there at a quilt
show. That would save us a total of about 100 miles or so. Plus,
the convention center is right across the highway from Cabela's, so we could
pick up something for Nathanael while we were there.
Friday, I hung the wind spinner my sister
gave me on one of the new shepherd’s hooks – and discovered it perfectly
matches the birdbath.
And I posted more pictures:
Several
people, after seeing the pictures of the Dipladenia blossoms, told me they had
never heard of that plant before. I hadn’t
heard of it either until Larry and I saw them in the Wal-Mart nursery. They
were in a bucket that I knew would fit in that big pot on my porch. I read the
tag... looked this way and that (reminiscent of Moses, eh), saw that there was
no one else in the nursery, and howled, “I want a Dipladenia! I want a
Dipladenia!”
Larry
laughed, of course, stuck the pot in the cart, and said, “Well, just HAVE your
Dipladenia!”
(It’s
a fun word to say: Dip-luh-DEEN-yuh! Dip-luh-DEEN-yuh! Like in the funnies ‘Pickles’ when Earl says
to his wife Opal, “Your name sounds funny when you say it over and over fast: Opalopalopalopalopalo-----”
Next
frame shows nothing but his feet sticking up from his tipped-over chair.)
I
spent a couple of hours in the flower gardens Friday morning. Every two or three days, I pull enough weeds
to fill the wheelbarrow heaping full. I
haven’t even touched the long, wide row of daylilies that grow alongside the east
fence. I should give them a little
attention before the weeds take over, and get too big to pull out. I tell you, when I planted all these flowers
back in 2003, the year we moved out here, I didn’t give a thought to how
much energy it would take to keep the flowerbeds looking nice, nor how my
agility, dexterity, and nimbleness would flag in the coming years! Maybe I thought they’d tend themselves,
if I just planted them thickly enough?
A
quilting/gardening friend asked, “Do you compost your weeds?”
I
replied, “Well, if you call ‘making a pile way down yonder in the onion patch’ ‘composting’,
then, yes, I compost.” 😅
It was the longest day of the year that day. There were almost 15 hours of sunlight.
I like lots of sunlight. 🌞
’Course, I like wintertime, too. Nope, I don’t suffer from SAD. 😃 (Seasonal
Affective Disorder)
Guess what happened that day? (Did you guess?)
I finished cleaning out the cubbyhole in the
bathroom under the staircase (it’s a fairly large cubbyhole, with room for more
than a dozen big boxes and bins)............ and I found my lost wedding
dress!!!!!!
It was way back in the farthest corner, under
the lowest step, in the large box the cleaners packed it in, sealed, and
wrapped with plastic. It will be 40 years ago this July that that dress was
cleaned and sealed into that box.
I thought I’d stored it in a room downstairs
where Larry built shelves... but it wasn’t there. It wasn’t in any of the upstairs cubbyholes,
either, where I’d hoped to find it a couple of years ago when I totally cleared
those areas out. I’d despaired of
finding it, thinking it must’ve gotten ruined when the basement leaked, and
someone hauled it out, not realizing what it was.
Then, for the cherry atop the Sundae, I found
a box full of my favorite sweaters, including the bright red sweatshirt with
the Hershey’s candy bar appliquéd on it, along with the embroidered words, “Hand
over the chocolate, and no one will get hurt.”
There was also a large box of my summer tops.
I washed them and hung them to dry. I’ve been needing those!
Larry will be happy, too, because I found a
big box full of long-lost short-sleeved shirts, two boxes containing long-sleeved
shirts, and another holding his best sweaters and cardigans.
I packed these things away before any of the
youngest four children married and moved out when we needed more room in
closets and dressers, so they’ve been in that cubbyhole for over a dozen years.
The Jeep was loaded with stuff for the
Goodwill... and a large garbage can was full of all sorts of jetsam and flotsam
that wasn’t quite nice enough to take to a secondhand store.
Next, the laundry room and our bedroom.
But that was enough, for that day. I retired to my recliner, laptop on my knees,
and soon Teensy sprawled out between laptop and stomach, and I do mean ‘sprawled’.
I was having a hard time reaching over
him to type, especially with this bum shoulder that I hurt scooping mulch with
a pitchfork.
Loren and Janice
gave me this mallard feeder some years ago. I hung it on one
of the new shepherd’s hooks.
I fixed
Victoria’s bamboo chimes and hung those outside, too. I reckon I’d better give them back to her,
though!
Saturday after Larry got home from work
shortly before 1:00 p.m., we hurried off to Omaha to meet the quilt appraiser. She went over my New York Beauty quilt and
pillow sham with a fine-toothed comb, then told us that we should walk around
the quilt show, see the quilts, and the things the vendors were selling.
I said, “But we didn’t pay the entrance fee!”
She told us not to worry about it; there was
only half an hour left before the show would be closing, and we were welcome to
just enjoy it, for having come for the appraisal.
So we thanked her... and did just that.
Too bad I didn’t have my camera with me; it was out in the pickup, and the pickup
was a country mile away. Anyway, there
was no time to lose, if we wanted to see everything. And see everything
we did! Fasssssst.
I drooled over a 26” Gammill – painted
bright, metallic, glittering, sparkling, shimmering, dazzling red.
It was computerized, and quilting away at a complex feathered design as we
stood there watching.
The man at the booth asked if I had any
questions. Questions? No questions... but I did have a
remark. I grinned at him, pointed at the machine, and said, “It’s red!!!”
He laughed. (It is undetermined whether
the laughter was with me, or at me.)
I had not known that the La Vista (Omaha
suburb) quilt show was open to the public, as it was put on by an Omaha
Quilting Guild. I wondered if, when guilds put on shows, only guild
members could enter quilts in the shows, or could Jane Q. Public enter, too?
I looked up this particular show online, but under ‘Entry Rules’ it only says, “Sorry;
the show is over for this year. Thank you to all who entered!”
Departing the convention center, we went
across the street to Cabela’s to get a birthday gift for Nathanael. Hannah had said he would like a hoodie – and
lo and behold, they were having a sidewalk sale on clothing, including hoodies,
with 25% off the lowest markdown on the tags.
We found him a gray one with ‘Bass Pro Shop’ written on the front. We would also give him a cap that says Bass
Pro Shop on it.
After leaving Omaha, we headed to Sioux City,
where Larry needed to pick up a large air compressor he’d purchased online for a
smashing price.
There is still a great deal of flooding along
I29. This lake is supposed to be
a field!
After picking up the air compressor, we found
a Texas Road House in Sioux City where we could use our gift card.
The first sign that this might not work out
just the best was when we couldn’t find a parking spot in the entire lot, even
though it was quite large. We finally
parked behind the building, way at the back, with the employees’ cars.
We walked around the building... headed in...
And met an older couple coming out. The man told us, “We got here at 5:30 p.m.
(it was 7:30 right then), and only got a table a little while ago! Had to wait until some tables opened up.” He laughed, “But the food was so good, it was
worth the wait!”
We went on in... saw a narrow side room with
benches against the walls full of people, their knees nearly touching...
another small square side room with people standing... If one would wish to wait, how would
one get in line? We couldn’t tell
where the end of said line might be!
Perhaps one was supposed to get a number at the hostess desk? There was a line there, too. Where were the instructions?! Plus, the music was brain-jarring
loud. It wasn’t too terrible, as
it was old-time folk/country; but ... TOO LOUD.
We stood there with our elbows halfway up our
arms and our kneecaps halfway up our legs; then, in unison, we turned toward
the door and headed straight back out.
Maybe we can find another Texas Road House
someday in Northern Siberia.
We spotted a Panera Bread restaurant across
the parking lot, and trotted over there.
It was nearly empty. The music
was yucky modern pop, ugh. But at least
the volume was lower than it had been at the Road House. Still, for a couple of hours thereafter, I
had lyrics stuck firmly in the ol’ grey mattuh.
At least these particular lyrics weren’t bad, as in nasty,
but boy oh boy, were they ever stupid.
Stupid, stupid, stupid. And
stuck. Right in me po’ li’l head.
The food was pretty good, though I was
surprised to find that Panera Bread is something of a fast-food joint. (It was the first time we’d ever been in
one.) We both got Chicken Tortellini Alfredo.
I also got half a Roasted Turkey, Apple and Cheddar sandwich and a mango smoothie; Larry
got diet Mt. Dew. Why did I order so much more food than
Larry did?!
I could only eat half of the Chicken Tortellini Alfredo; I gave Larry the rest. I’d intended to order soup; not sure how I
wound up with that. I like it
better when we get different things, and can then sample bites of each other’s
food. The sandwich was yummy, but I wish
they’d have toasted my bread. Maybe one
can ask for that?
Yesterday morning about the time we were ready
to head out the door to church, the cats were both collapsed in their beds, as
usual, after a busy night of romping around outside. Tiger doesn’t do as much romping as Teensy;
he’s too tubby to romp much!
It was overcast and looked like it might rain.
And it was still snowing in the Rockies!
Some of the higher altitudes – 9,000 feet and up – got two feet of
snow on the first day of summer. The
skiers are happy!
After church last night, we
went to Wal-Mart for some of the food I can’t order online, and a gift for
Jacob.
Home again, we had
scrumptious sandwiches of butter croissants, Carving Board turkey, Pepper Jack
and Mozzarella cheeses, vine-ripened tomatoes, and butter lettuce. We put Bolthouse Farms Classic Ranch yogurt
dressing on them. Yummy! That was good.
I worked in the yard this
morning until I got too hot and too mosquito-bit. Somebuddy ran off with not just one,
but both bottles of bug spray! The yard looks pretty now,
but I don’t, with big red welts all over. I clipped
Larry’s little Bug Off battery-run fan bug repellent on my shirt, but it didn’t
help much.
At least the bites quit itching in a day or
two. But Larry has a spot of poison ivy
about the size of a quarter on his upper arm, and a long ‘scratch’ of it on his
upper leg. It itches badly, even when he
applies Ivarest to it – and it’s been there for a week. Meanwhile, I have found poison ivy in our
back yard several times, and pulled it (with gloves, of course). Once or twice I thought perhaps it had
touched my skin, but I scrubbed with all my might and main shortly thereafter,
and so far have suffered no ill effects.
I just noticed more of it growing around our big cottonwood tree; I need
to get it out of there.
This afternoon I headed to Hobby Lobby
to get a gift for Lydia, to drop off some things at the Goodwill, and then to take
Lydia and Jacob their birthday gifts.
Jacob is ten today. But before I
got out of the driveway, the Jeep died; and before I got to Old Highway 81,
just a few hundred yards down the lane, it died half a dozen times. So I turned around and came back home. I don’t care to drive unreliable vehicles,
thank you very much.
The Jeep is more likely to do that when it’s
hot, hot, hot, after sitting in the sun. Heat stroke, maybe?
I wish we could get it fixed. Larry has tried... Columbus Motors has
tried. (It usually behaves perfectly,
for them.) I want it fixed! We still have a year before it’s paid off,
and I’m really, really looking forward to no monthly payments on a vehicle! Sigggghhhhhhh...
Ever since Larry got dentures in January, I
like to send him helpful, informative articles on the matter. Here’s the one I sent him this afternoon:
Man loses dentures... looks under table –
and discovers that his little Shi Tzu dog Maggie has found them:
We drove the rest of
the way home laughing.
How do you like this cute little guy who came
to help while I was working in the flower gardens? It’s a Northern Yellow Sac spider. Scientific name: Cheiracanthium mildei.
Can you see all of his eyes? There are eight. Most spiders have eight eyes (though some
have only six or four, and a few have only two). I’ve never seen a spider with less than eight. Each of their eyes are ‘simple’ eyes, not ‘compound’
like, for instance, the honeybee’s.
Speaking of camping... Joseph told us that his little girl Juliana thinks it’s not camping if you don’t have
marshmallows.
On their way to
Nebraska from Kentucky with their pickup and camper, they stopped at a
campground for the night. Joseph asked
Juliana how she liked camping.
“We aren’t camping!”
she replied.
“But we’re at a
campground, and we’re in a camper!” Joseph told her.
She shook her
head. “Not camping,” she informed
him. “No marshmallows!” 😅
A couple of nights last week, I worked on making a
music/photo video DVD of Kurt and Victoria’s wedding pictures – I promised it
to Kurt’s parents a long time ago. It’s
done; it’s quite nice. BUT. It won’t save. It saves the project, but not the
movie itself.
Movie Maker, it turns out, is seriously outdated;
Microsoft stopped making it and updating it two years ago. Something in its program files is not
compatible with my laptop – and probably never will be.
So... after a lot of researching and reading, I downloaded
a new (FREE!) video editor called VSDC.
I have yet to try it. After all
that struggling with Movie Maker, it was late by the time I downloaded the new
editor, and I was getting sleepy. The
more I tried to figure it out, the more braincells tumbled out of my head. I am now officially dumber’n a post. Googoo-blah-blah-googoo-blah.
Ooooh!!!
Thunderstorm with high winds approaching! Gotta bring in the porch flowers, quick,
before they get ruined.
...
...
...
Okay, I’m back. Did you miss me?
High winds hit Tennessee a couple of days ago,
and uprooted a giant tree at Todd and Dorcas’ house. It fell and smashed the brand new woodshed
Todd had just built. But none of the
goats were injured, and nothing hit the house, thankfully. The goats thought they had a wonderful new
Adventureland, and were happily scampering across the downed shed roof into the
other pasture. Baby Gray, whom Dorcas
has raised from a newborn, was frightened enough to be extra clingy that day,
though it didn’t stop her from clambering atop the shed to nibble on tree
leaves.
Todd and Dorcas are glad they had the very
big and very old trees that were right beside the house removed, or this story
might have had a much worse ending.
Tomorrow I’ll get
back to cleaning. I
believe I must really enjoy cleaning, because I’m barely five minutes into the
process, and I find myself singing away! 😄
Oh, look! The
Stargazer Lilies have bloomed! At least,
that’s what the person who gave them to me called them. But... I think maybe they look more like
Asiatic lilies. What do you think?
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
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