July 30, 2007

And here we are at the end of July already, won't be but a few more days till the little ones start back to school. In fact in Newton, Kansas my youngest grandson starts on August 15th, of course they get out the first part of May next year, while the other kids that start after Labor day get out almost the middle of June.

Talked to brother Harold tonight, having trouble with my emails going through, so had to use the telephone to get some phone numbers to call tomorrow. Called my sister this morning, hadn't been able to get an answer from her vis the computer system. She had it disconnected, had a bad lightning storm awhile back and she unhooked the telephone line. She didn't realize that all those email messages are still there waiting for her to read them. No doubt over 3/4 can be discarded as they are the cutesy things, that I delete without reading.

Unless someone wants to give me a message, I find it better to just delete. I was hounded for months by two sisters who had e-mail, not to be so cheap and get hooked up, so I'm hooked up now, and now I can't very often reach them. Computers are very special instruments however and getting smarter by the minute.

Wish my email connection would dis-connect after 10 minutes if no action. Tonight I checked emails before dinner, and forgot to disconnect, I guess, cause after I came back from CityTeam which was about 8:15, Donna asked me to fix the computer, she couldn't make the phone calls I had asked her to make at dinner time.

This is going to be short tonight. would like to put on a picture, but the one I'd like to see didn't turn out too good, I had the flash turned off on my digital camera. ugh!

So cherrio.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

There you have it, picture on the left taken at 8:05 tonight, just 2 hrs 20 minutes ago, can't get much better than that sunset, taken off my front porch. And the picture on the right, shows the paver stone path to the gate leading out onto the sidewalk. This picture taken last night right after I had trimmed off the black weed blocker fabric on the right hand side. Haven't trimmed off the left side, as I need to fill in some dirt against the paver stones.

And thanks to Sandra, she is the first to acknowledge that she read my blog. To her goes a nice ice cream Sundae. To those who are faithful, there are rewards, so the rest of you when you read this new blog, let me hear from you. Who knows what reward you might receive.

Recently I had a email from a good friend, who had sent I guess some sort of card, that required uploading an attachment. I didn't open it, but have been deluged with spam sort of mail all in this same vein. Please, I like my emails to be something of a more personal way than some pass it on or you'll have bad luck, or pass it on and you'll have good luck.

I don't believe in LUCK. What happens, happens, and if its GOOD well I know where goodness comes from and if its not so good, I can handle that too. I walk under ladders, I don't care if a black cat walks in front of me, and I break mirrors without any great thought that bad luck will befall me. Try it, it works for me. And if you don't know what I'm talking about, ask me. I'll do my best to explain.

Had a nice post card from a dear friend, Lisa, who just now happens to be biking across part of Ireland. She was in Clifden which is on the West coast of Ireland, right next to the Atlantic. Now I know it sounds a bit strange to refer to the Atlantic on the west coast, but that's where it is over there in Ireland. She is encountering lots of rain, so my prayer tonight for her, is that the sun will come out and she will have some decent weather for the remainder of her bicycling trip. Wish some of the bicyclists here in Portland would take a trip overseas to bike around on, instead of changing 4 lane roadways to 2 with bike paths on both sides. That my friends is the heighth of stupidity on our city engineers.

Roads are made to move traffic, not jam them up. Got to get off that subject, or else my blood pressure may rise. Hope to see many of the Buck family on Saturday as Donna and I j0urney to Cottage Grove area for a picnic along a nice river. Weather doesn't look too promising, but I'm sure the family will survive no matter rain or shine.

Enuf for tonight, I could go on forever, but think its time to say, Cherrio

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

A lot has happened around my house since the May 29th blog, when you see lumber that has been sitting on my back porch for 20 plus years being carted off. And, from where I sit right now, the project is far from being done.

Pictured this morning is the start of a path to the sidewalk towards the street at our home. Three blocks wide, makes a nice 21 inch wide sidewalk where before a cracked 18 inch walkway stood for 70 years or more. Its not finished, believe I have about 4 more feet to go before I reach the gate, and it may not get finished today, as I woke to a nice gentle falling rain. But that's okay, I can use the break today, have another project in the basement going. But, wait, lets go back a few days.

Saturday the kids, their wives and all the grandchildren were here for a work day (wasn't my idea, but one of our kids idea) and we broke out the old sidewalk, and put sheetrock on the ceiling of the laundry room. Took awhile for everyone to get here, and by the end of the day a lot had been accomplished. The temperature was in the 90's which didn't make for too nice a time working in the sun, and I'm sure one of our group suffered a mild sun stroke, as he chilled, vomited, and had rapid heart beat for a short time. I'm very happy to report he's okay, and it reminds us however how fragile our bodies are.

One of my joys was watching Karl swing the sledge hammer to break up that old sidewalk. He's not very old to be doing what he was doing, but the concrete yielded to his continuous blows. He is a winner for sure in my eyes today. The taller guys were busy holding the sheetrock to the ceiling while others used cordless screwdrivers to secure the sheetrock to the joists with screws.

But, now comes the fun part??? for me???. I get to finish the projects. There is still that 3 or 4 feet to the gate, and from the back porch to the alley which runs behind our house, there is another 25 feet still needing sand, and paver blocks to put down, and I'm just guessing it will be my job to do it. Oh Yes, there is screws in the ceiling that need to be covered with sheetrock cement, seams to be covered, (several layers is recommended) and of course, later comes paint to cover it all.

I'm not complaining for recently I've found a new zest in living. I'm not sure when it arrived or just why God has allowed this in my life but I'm enjoying it. I'm still working on that bathroom project at Sue's house, and when its all done, I'll try and insert a picture for you to see. There is a slight delay on the bathroom project, as this week I've been busy with my Kansas family being here, and next week is our church's Yearly Meeting and I'm a delegate from our church, so next week's time will be in a different direction.

Maybe just maybe, I'll squeeze in a few more bricks, and smudge a few more gobs of sheetrock cement to finish off my many projects.

To my one or two readers, I pose this question, is this really worth my time sitting here and blogging away to myself???? Can I hear from you? Do you ever tell your friends about this strange father or friend who is trying to brighten the world in this way? Let me hear from you, my email is howardonna@aol.com.

Cheerio

Monday, July 9th, 2007

Just had to bring this picture up today, as a father, we love to see our children grow, and the same holds true with our grandchildren. It now seems like yesterday that our first grandchild was born, and now he will be a junior in college. Our youngest grandchild will enter kindergarten this fall.

Well, these wild strawberries are much like our children and grandchildren, they continue to grow and grow. Just yesterday, I took some of the many, many runners that these plants shoot out and replanted them in the trainyard.

Oh, so you didn't know we had a trainyard at our house? Well, years ago when I was 60, I got my first electric train. It was a HO gauge and I soon found out that I needed glasses on to put the train back on its track. So, I gave it to my son, and I went to O guage railroading, which my youngest grandson is right now playing with. He loves trains. But, the trainyard came about as I also had a "G" scale (Garden) in my back yard.

At first, I had this train running just below grade which was kind of awesome, except, you had to get down on your belly to work on the track, too much strain on the old body to do that too long. So, I decided to bring it above grade, and I built up the track about 8 inches above the lawn height. AND, before the transformation took place, I grew older too. When I saw that this was going to be more than I had bargained for, I gave the G scale train to my son too.

In the meantime, we have this wonderful big circle around the sumac tree just inside the back yard gate, and inside the circle are these wonderful growing strawberries. They do produce fruit but we have yet to tasted them, for whenever one gets almost ripe, they disapear. We believe that the opposums or raccoons are eating them, but of course they disapear in the middle of the night, so we never know who gets them.

Well, its almost breakfast time, so I close for this time. cheerio

Saturday, July 7, 2007

Wow, the time just flies by, so it seems. June 23rd, my last blog was ages ago. So far back, that I can't remember what all took place that date except it looks like the Oregon State baseball team won the College World series.
And, since then, my sister has flown in from the Denver area, spent a few hours with us before going to Corvallis, home of those Oregon State Beavers for a IFYE conference. She returned at the end of the week, and enjoyed some delicious red raspberry picking at my neighbors berry patch, which I maintain.
I've enjoyed working on my daughters bathroom, thought I was doing a terrific job, till I connected the new light fixtures and the flaws just jumped out at me. Will try and do some finishing touches today on it. Did get the new bath cabinet installed on Thursday, and discovered that I needed to plane down the face boards before they would slip behind the window sash. Hope I took enough off yesterday.....
We've had some hot weather, and looks like next week may be hotter yet. Tomorrow my daughter, husband and grandson arrive from Kansas for 10 days with us. Should be fun, except that hot weather is going to make some uncomfortable sleeping for them upstairs.
I've managed to drop another couple pounds since I started couple months ago. Back on my list Doctors visit, they said I weighed 202 lbs, too much for this old guy, on the 4th, my weight was 186 lbs, so I'm very happy about the loss of pounds, and will keep working on it, so someday I'll see my toes again, when I look straight down.
Its time to look for breakfast, so I close. cherrio