DANG IT'S COLD!! BUT THANK GOD I DON'T LIVE NEAR MISS RUTH!!! I THINK MY BATTERIES WOULD ONLY LAST A FEW MINUTES!! GUESS MOST OF YOU HEARD ABOUT THE PLANE THAT MADE A LANDING OUTSIDE OUR DOORSTEP IN THE HUDSON RIVER. THE OFFICE WAS CLOSED SO I HAD TO ROUND UP THE BUSES KEYS, FIND A MAINT MAN AND GET HIM OUT THERE TO START THEM UP. THEY EVEN CALLED JIMMY BACK. THE ONES THAT NEEDED NO MEDICAL ATTENTION WENT TO A SENIOR CENTER TO BE SERVED WARM DRINKS. THE OTHERS WENT TO THE NY SIDE. JUST THANK GOD EVERYONE WAS SAVED. BUT SCARY CHIT SKIPPY ALL THE SAME
WE WERE SHORT ONE DRIVER AND I AM SURPRISED THEY DIDN'T ASK ME TO FILL IN!
JEN IS STILL IN TOWN AND WE HAVE BEEN SPENDING QUIET TIME TOGETHER. I THINK WE BOTH NEEDED THIS WEEK OF REST...AND MOTHER NATURE GAVE US A GOOD REASON TO STAY IN JAMMIES TO KEEP WARM
HAPPY FRIDAY/SATURDAY AND HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND!!

HAPPY~ WISH WE COULD GET SHAD'S HEAT...THINK WE NEED TO MOVE FURTHER SOUTH??? I REMEMBER THE 60'S VERY WELL WITH THE COLD WAR THREAT...AND WE WERE ALL UPSET THAT MY ALCOHOLIC FATHER WASN'T DIGGING US A HOLE TO HIDE IN THE BACK YARD!! I TRY NOT TO LISTEN TO THE NEWS NOW!!
HOPE YOU FEEL BETTER IN THE SINUS AREA SOON!

RUTH~ WISHING YOU MULTITUDES OF RAYS OF SUNSHINE YOUR WAY!! STAY WARM AND COZY!!!

ANNIE~ GLAD YOU HAD A GOOD NIGHTS SLEEP BUT BE CAREFUL. NOW YOU WON'T GIVE A CRAP IF ANYONE CALLS OR NOT NOW THAT'S GOTTA BE A GOOD THIONG RIGHT??? STAY WARM CHICA!! AND HAVE A GOOD TIME WITH THE BRO!

CEEJAY~ LET ME TELL YOU THAT I SHOULD HAVE STAYED IN THE "REST" MODE UNTIL THIS "COLD" WAS OVER WITH CAUSE IF YOU DON'T....IT SEEMS TO MAKE THE WHOLE MESS LAST EVEN LONGER IT'S NOT JUST ME EITHER...EVEN THE YOUNGER AND HEALTHIER ONES IN THE OFFICE AND MAINTENANCE HAD THE SAME PROBLEM BY PUSHING THEMSELVES TOO SOON. SO REST UP

SHAD~ I AM SORRY THE JOB DIDN'T COME THRU FOR YOU HOPE YOU FIND SOMETHING YOU REALLY LIKE THIS TIME TOO. ENJOY THE FURNITURE SHOPPING. MAYBE SOME RED WOOD BEING YOU HAVE NO RED WALLS???
:rifl: EVERYTIME I SEE A REWALL ON TV GOING UP AGAIN I LAUGH MY FOOL HEAD OFF. SPEAKING OF WICH...THE SINGLE MAN ABOVE ME PANELLED A WALL IN THE BATHROOM WITH MIRROR AND PAINTED ONE WALL IN THE LIVINGROOM....YES YOU GUESSED IT...BRIGHTRED!! AND YES TOO THERE IS ALWAYS SOME EXCITEMENT HERE AND WHY AM I THE ONLY ONE THAT EVERY ANSWERS THE PHONE WHEN THERE IS AN EMERGENCY GOING ON????

Happy Friday....

Burrrrr in Indiana again. The Indianapolis Public Schools are closed today due to the cold. You know it's cold when they close, cause they NEVER close for anything. All the county schools close but not IPS.

-12 this morning with -36 windchill. Holy cow, poor Ms. Hella Bella did not want to go out and came back in with stiff frozen legs-sorta. She was just out momentarily. I wrapped her up in her afghan my mom made her, till she was warm. She gave me many kisses on the neck for it. Thank God I hadn't taken my shower yet. lol

Holly...Many warm, loving hugs to you, my friend.

Shad...so sorry about the job. There is a much better one out there coming your way, I can feel it.

Michelle...and now your wish has come true....it is FRIDAY now, and not Thursday. ;^)

Happy....12/21/12 is supposed to be either the end OR if we get our acts together and save the earth, change our ways, and do good, it will be a new beginning. All this crazy crap going on in the world has me wondering where we are all going.

Today and this weekend is about keeping warm, eating healthy, and moving my body. I think I am going to start easy and do my water hula hoop and maybe the walking tapes. Anything indoors. Then, of course, hopefully dancing Saturday night to my brother's band. It will be the first time in front of Tony for dancing, so I might need an adult beverage to relax and get the nerve up as I am not all that good at dancing, but I can keep with the beat.

Three of us girls at work are starting on Monday with eating healthy and some kind of exercise, maybe walking the mall. We hope to keep each other motivated. Big plans now we need follow through.

Hello to anyone I may have missed.

Love and Hugs,

HEY YA MEL....we posted at nearly the same time. I did hear about the plane crash in the Hudson, however that everyone survived. What a great thing!!! Hope all is well with you and you are feeling much better. Love ya.

Happy Friday ladies -

It was another cold one this morning: -14 when I left my house, with a wind chill of between -30 and -40. But it's supposed to "warm up" to 20 degrees (above zero!!) tomorrow, which will be nice as my lungs are objecting to this bitter cold. Wooo Hooo! I think this weekend will be another relaxing one for me. I've got a bit of website work to do, but other than that, grocery shopping, laundry and a very minimal amount of cleaning, I'll be taking it easy as I still don't have my energy back 100%. I was hoping to get to the gym this week, but that ain't gonna happen. However, I am taking the stairs now at work...to get back into the groove albeit slowly.

Pretty amazing about that plane landing in the Hudson River! What an awesome pilot to be able to land the plane safely so that everyone could be rescued with minimal injuries.

Shad - I'm sure with your talent and experience, you'll get a great job lined up in no time! In the meantime, good for you for taking advantage of this great opportunity to take care of things around the house and garden.

Hollyhock - My thoughts, prayers and hugs are with you and your family. What a wonderful legacy of happy memories your grandma has left you!

Mel - Good that Mother Nature has made you and Jen take it easy this week. I hope you are both feeling better.

Annie - My doggies didn't want to go out in the cold either! I bundle them up in their little doggie sweaters, but with -30+ degree wind chills, I can't blame them for not wanting to be out long enough to do their business. I'll join you on the healthy eating and exercise starting Monday. What is water hula hoop? Is it like a water aerobics class at the gym?

Happy - I hope you have a fabulous Friday!

Ceejay - I hope you are resting and feeling better. Taking care of yourself is your top priority. Remember rest and liquids. Everything else can wait.

Love, hugs and here's to a great Friday for all of us!

Michelle...

A water hula hoop is actually a hula hoop with water in the cylinder. It is a littler heavier and easier to "hoop" with. It does better for your waste due to the water weight.

Thanks for the explanation, Annie! I learn somethin' new every day!

I am not used to these temperatures. I even put an extra blanket on my bed last night. 11 degree's this morning. It was suppose to go down to 9 degrees.

Michelle
How do you survive in the winter time?


I've made up my mind to run errands tomorrow afternoon when it's suppose to be a little warmer. My pay check can wait to be deposited Monday. I've also got my w'2 so while I'm out I can have it filed.

I'm not going to the aunt and uncle's this week end? This will make 2 week end's in a row but I'm sick.

Ceejay - Good for you for postponing errands until it gets warmer....You need to stay inside and not expose your throat/lungs to the cold. Listen to the voice of experience, right? Rest, rest, rest so you can get better. Sending you get well and :

Rustic Shrimp Stew

Prep: 10 minutes Total: 40 minutes


Low in calories and saturated fat, shrimp contain heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acids, tryptophan (an amino acid that helps produce mood-stabilizing serotonin), and vitamin D, which may help provide protection from osteoporosis, high blood pressure, cancer, and many autoimmune diseases.


Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 pound Yukon gold potatoes, scrubbed, halved, and thinly sliced
2 carrots, thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1 medium onion, quartered and sliced crosswise
2 links (3 ounces) each fully cooked Italian-style chicken, halved lengthwise, thinly sliced
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Coarse salt and ground pepper
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 3/4 cup reduced-sodium chicken broth
1 pound pound shrimp, peeled and deveined
1/2 cup parsley leaves, chopped
Directions
In a 5-quart Dutch oven or heavy pot, heat oil over medium. Add potatoes, carrots, garlic, onion, sausage, and cayenne; season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until potatoes are crisp-tender, 15 to 17 minutes.
Sprinkle flour over potatoes and vegetables. Stir in broth and 1/4 cup water; bring to a boil. Cook until potatoes are tender, about 5 minutes more. Top mixture with shrimp. Cover and simmer 3 to 4 minutes until shrimp are opaque throughout. Remove from heat and stir in parsley.

Hi ladies,

Sorry I didn't get around to posting this morning.

Shad - I am very sorry to hear that you didn't get the job. I'm sure something will come up soon. Do you find that people are cutting back on deployments and therefore assignments for you? We have scaled back the efforts at our place although we seem to have as many contractors as ever. You have me wishing I could go out and work in the garden but that would be quite uncomfortable at this moment What's with all the new furniture - were things empty before or are you just getting things looking nice as you go through and update the rooms? With time on your hands now, you can look for a good deal, I'm sure.

Mel - that certainly is something amazing about that airplane crash. It's quite incredible that the worst that happened is someone has 2 broken legs. I can't even imagine how scary that would be. And apparently the Hudson River is busy with traffic of it's own too. Did you mean that your building was helping out too in the emergency? Thanks for the recipe - it looks good. I'm not sure about the chicken sausage though. I guess it's not too far off from turkey sausage.

Ceejay - I have to smile at your "how do you survive in the winter time remark". We were asked the same thing by one of our neighbors when we had the neighborhood Christmas dinner. I told J that it's just something you grow up and are used to. We live one kind of life when it's warm, and a totally different one when winter hits. It's true because you change your activities, you have to worry about driving in the weather, dealing with giant potholes that will wreck your car, taking care of your pets to the point that sometimes their poor little paws get all cracked from the road salt, etc. And there's the achy bones and the feeling that you will never know what it's like to be warm again in your life. I don't miss that. But I do miss going outside in a snowstorm when the snow muffles the street noises and the snow is softly falling. If it's really cold out, the snow is "drier" and it makes a sound when it's falling. The star filled skies are brilliant when it's cold and cloudless out. And the sky is never bluer during the day on a deceptive sunshiney day when the temps are really down. So it has it's plusses and minuses. On the down side here, we can only wear winter clothes at max about 2 months out of the year. My sister gave me a cuddly scarf from Land's End for Christmas. I wore it yesterday for the first time and probably won't get to wear it again. I also have some cute winter hats that I'd look silly in down here because it's not cold enough (in my mind) to wear them.

Anyway Ceejay - I hope you rest up this weekend and feel better.

Annie - I was going to ask about the hoop too. Thanks for explaining. Sounds like fun and a good workout! That's so great that you found some buddies at work to exercise with and help keep the food on track. It's really helpful to have support!

They have enough people to start the new session of WW at Work. They always go to the wire to see if they can get enough people. Especially this year with everyone cutting back on funds. Although as one of my coworkers pointed out, it's not like we are suffering from a lack of overweight people in the office who probably SHOULD join up New session starts next week. I am torn as to what to do as I actually want to weigh heavy for the first week so I am guaranteed a loss for week 2. I will lose for 2 weeks and then gain a pound or two, stall and then drop again.

Michelle - if you're not 100 percent starting slow would probably be better. Some of your aerobics classes seem a bit intense. Probably difficult on the lungs right now so if you can gradually increase the stamina, that would be good. I guess we have a few of us making a pact to improve things this time around. Those who want in, put you hand in the circle and lay the hands on Do you wear a face mask outside? That dry air just burns the nostrils. Wrapping a scarf around the face just gives you an icy mouth with chapped lips I hear it's supposed to warm up to the 20's this weekend. Whoo hoo!

Shad - I want to see pictures from your garden flowers. You should have a few moments to post now. *click*

Annie - I saw pictures from Indianapolis on the weather channel yesterday. Brrr.

Ok, enough rambling for now...

Morning all,

Yes ma'am Happy. I grabbed my camera and went out to the Butchart of the South and found.......... there are not too many flowers in my poor dried out garden at this time of the year. So I have taken what there is and given you a glimpse of my cleaned up yard.
The first one is my backyard. It is very, very dry. Everything that you can see in it has come through 4 years of drought with no additional water. I've lost a lot of plants and I now treasure these ones as they have proved they are stayers. The second pic is the Bird of Paradise plant and it is just coming into flower again for the first time since the drought. It should look quite good in the coming weeks as there are many buds on them at the moment.
The third photo is the orchid called Chocolate Drop. These orchids came through the drought as well. They are a lot hardier than we think. Chocolate drop has put out 2 stalks of buds this year. The one you see has 6 flowers on it and the second one, not yet out, has 4.
The fourth photo is the elkhorn - actually it is a staghorn when I come to think about it. It started of as one base leaf and one 'horn' and was on a piece of board about 4" by 10". Now we have found it a home in the Calistemon tree (bottlebrush) and it has spread right around the trunk - in spite of the drought! The last photo is the rose 'Jude the Obscure' although I think you will agree there is not much obscure about it. The perfume is just glorious.
So there you go. Now it is time to go out again and check out the bugs on the roses. Hate those grasshoppers.

If you want any full size photos for wallpaper or whatever. Yell or send me your addy via PM.

Big to all you outthere!

ANNIE...YES MY SKINNY FRIEND WE POSTED TOGETHER! STAY BUNDLED UP OR TELL TONY TO KEEP YOU WARM!!!
HOPE YOU DON'T HAVE TO STAY POUT IN THIS COLD FOR ANY LENGTH OF TIME!!

CEEJAY...GOOD FOR YOU STAYIONG HOME AND POSTPONING THINGS. IT'S JUST TOO FRIGGING COLD OUTSIDE! I AM GOINT TO INVEST IN AN ELECTRIC BLANKET JUST TO GET THE BED WARMED UP SO I CAN GET IN IT!!!

HAPPY~ YES I WAS SENT IN SEARCH OF BUS KEYS AND SOMEONE TO START THE BUSES ALL BECAUSE THE MEN THAT WERE CALLED WERE EITHER OUT OF TOWN, AT THE DENTIST, CAUGHT IN TRAFFIC OR NOT ANSWERING THEIR CEL PHONES. SUPER MEL TO THE RESCUE!
WISH WE COULD BOTH GO OUT IN YOUR GARDEN AND PICK SOME WEEDS OR WATCH THE BUTTERFLIES GROW!!!
<----I AM SENDING YOU SOME SUNNY THOUGHTS TO KEEP YOU COZY FOR THE WEEKEND!
I WAS THINKING TURKEY SAUSAGE TOO. I LIKE THEM THE BEST. I AM GLAD TO HEAR THERE ARE ENOUGH PEOPLE FOR THE WW PROGRAM AT WORK. A FRIEND OF MINE JUST JOINED AGAIN FOR THE NEW VERSION MOMENTUM! SO GOOD LUCK TO Y'ALL DOWN THERE IN THE SOUTH!!

SHAD~ THE PHOTOS ARE ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS!! I WILL HAVE TO BE HAPPY WITH JUST LOOKING AT THEM HERE. TRIED TO MAKE A SCREENSAVER OF STUFF AND THE DANG COMPUTER SHUT DOWN AGAIN. HAD A HECK OF A TIME GETTING TO THE ADD/REMOVE SECTIUON TO GIET IT OFF AND THEN RESTORE THE PC BACK TO A PREVIOUS DAY AND TIME ;LORD HELP THESE DIAL-UPS AND CHEAP PCS!!! SENDING A WAVE BACK TO YA KAURANGI!

FUNNY STORY: A WOMAN CALLED THE EMERGENCY NUMBER... "I HAVE NO HEAT" . I FOUND SAL AND WE WENT UP THERE AND LO AND BEHOLD SHE HAD TURNED IT OFF WHEN SHE WENT OUT BUT COULDN'T GET IT BACK ON. THE THERMOSTAT GOT SO COLD WHILE SHE WAS OUT THAT ALL THE NICOTINE GUNK INSIDE "FROZE THE DIAL AND SAL HAD TO FORCE IT ORDER TO GET IT TO TURN!!! IT WAS SO DISGUSTING IT MADE ME SICK TO THINK WHAT I WAS DOING TO MYSELF WITH THOSE 3 PACKS A DAY WHEN I WAS SMOKING!!!
WITH THE STRESS OF OUR HEALTH, JEN AND I HAVE BEEN A BIT AT EACH OTHER'S THROATS AND NOT MELDING LIKE WE USED TO. THERE HAS BEEN A LOT OF FRICTION THAT WE HAVE BEEN IGNORING. BUT THIS WEEK, I THINK WE ARE COMING TO AN UNDERSTANDING THAT IT IS TO BOTH OUR BENEFITS TO RESPECT THE NEEDS AND LIMITS OF EACH OTHER. PEOPLE WILL COME AND GO BUT WE WILL BE FRIENDS FOR A LONG TIME TO COME. GUESS WE LOST SIGHT A WEE BIT ABOUT WHAT IS IMPORTANT TO EACH OF US AND PUT JUST TOO MANY PEOPLE IN THE FRONT ROW SEATS! BUT I THINK WE'RE ON THE RIGHT TRACK NOW. WE BOTH NEED TO PULL BACK EVEN FARTHER THIS YEAR. GONNA GET TO THIS GOAL ONE WAY OR THE OTHER!!
HAVE A GREAT NIGHT.

Shad...i Right Clicked And Set The Bird Of Paradise As The Desktop Background. A Wee Bit Blurry But Beautiful All The Same!!!

I tried it and it does go blurry. I can send you the full size original which is not blurry at all if you wish and you can bring it in on dial up.

Shad - why don't you send me the original and I can re-size it and maybe compress it a bit so it's not going to kill Mel's dial up.

Loved the pictures - and the bird of paradise. For such a severe drought, things have held up better than one could have hoped. You must have a magic thumb!

Mel - don't let anything get between you and Jen I caught those sunny thoughts - thanks, I needed them

Ok, I'm going to go read about the Momentum program - got a feeling I need to do lots of planning.