Gretchen and I had fun doing our concert for Festival of the Living Rooms today. And it was nice to knock some of the rust off, because there's not been much opportunity to do this in the last year or more.

In a tragic development (just ask the cat), Sunshine's food dish became empty today *and* we were out of cat food due to a malfunction of the ( Read more... )

Yesterday, there was some time after dinner and before sunset, so the temperature being pleasant for a change, Gretchen and I wandered out to the patio to sit for a spell, along with Ruby the Dog.

Of course, the thing Ruby likes best in the world is fetching things and it turns out that I am better at flinging her "squid" toy (a Kong Wubba) than ( Read more... )

For the first time in a year, the kids have gone back to in-person schooling. Gretchen has gone to pick them up. I am up here trying to work with an increasingly urgent Ruby the Dog who has come up here to check up on the only person in the house.

She has now decided to lie down next to me, apparently to make sure that I don't get away...

Today's snow was more of a challenge for the snowblower than the previous. It rather reminded me of the Groundhog Day Blizzard from ten years ago, as there was less snow, but it was definitely heavier. But the driveway and sidewalks were cleared.

We picked up maybe another couple of inches of snow during the day today, so I will get up early ( Read more... )

Not a lot to report today. Halloween decorating proceeds apace. Some laundry was laundered.

And a *second* dog toy was flung (accidentally) onto the roof today. We are hoping to recover them when they come to clean the gutters out in about a month.

In other news, both the furnace and chimney were checked out on Saturday morning. The heat was ( Read more... )

Ruby made her first trip to the groomer in months today. Her claws were trimmed and a metric ton of undercoat was washed and brushed away. This explains what I've been sweeping off the floor. The *huge* piles of undercoat that I've been sweeping off the floor.

Anyway, Ruby looks much better. And her paws are no longer lethal weapons.

Her R-factor ( Read more... )

No bonus round this post, but let's briefly revisit Down the Dog and discuss a few things that did *not* go down Ruby the Dog.

Gretchen was eating some fake crab meat for lunch the other day. Ruby was waiting patiently in front of her, so Gretchen pulled out a bit of the crab meat from the package and gave it to her. Ruby quite politely took it ( Read more... )

I appear to have tweaked my surgically repaired knee this morning while putting my shoe on. It's moderately sore, but seems to be improving, so I just need to take it easy for a few days. Well, it's not like I'm going anywhere ( Read more... )

We have a small silver laser pointer that we refer to as "The Stick That Makes The Fly Dance". It turns out that Ruby the Dog really, *really* likes to chase the little red dot (a.k.a. "The Fly") around. She *knows* that it comes from the stick, but this does not reduce her amusement with the process. It's fun to watch and it tires her out, both ( Read more... )

I made less progress on coding at work today than I might have due to a surfeit of meetings and landing an appointment with my optometrist for late in the afternoon. Since she's only seeing patients on Mondays now and I called this morning, it was a good break, but it's an hour drive each way to Evanston, so it ate up the remainder of the ( Read more... )