On The Road Again... The Gals and I Do Ikea and It Did Us In!

Be scared world!  Four of us Marysville moms took off for the closest Ikea store (about an hour and 45 minutes away) near Cincinnati, OH.  None of us had been there and our husbands all were thrilled at the prospect of NOT going.  Suicide was even mentioned... those guys just don't know how to have fun.  Mark practically threw money at me in celebration!

So we chatted and solved all the world's problems on the way and I only made a couple of slightly "wrong" turns because I was a bit distracted conversing about 40 different subjects at once.  The first noticeable problem was you would think an enormous store like Ikea would be off a freeway exit, wouldn't you?  Nope, it's not.  You can see it from I-75, but you can't get there from there!  (I was planning on relying on my Jeep's navigation, but since I'm too cheap to update it, Ikea Lane wasn't on it.)

We go in and it's a bit overwhelming.  You get a huge yellow bag and set off up the escalator to the 2nd floor if you are wanting to look at displays.  The aisle winds around a bit like a ride at Disneyland except there is no tram.  Though there are signs, it's still confusing and you feel sure you are going the right way, but you may be making a circle.  You are thinking "Wow, good exercise" the first bit of it, then it's more like "We're too old for this."

The first thing you need to do is grab one of their maps, a golf pencil and maybe a strip of a tape measure.  All of the items are numbered, with a location listed where you can find it downstairs to pick up and buy.  More on that later...

We darted about noticing that though most of the furniture and furnishings aren't exactly heirloom quality, it is very reasonably priced and on trend.  I got some stair tacky tape there for $1.99 a roll that is almost $13 in a big box store!  Some items are upstairs in quantities to buy, but we opted to just write everything down and come back so we wouldn't have to carry it.  Little did we know what a scavenger hunt that would wind up being only to find out everything is on display downstairs also!  I always seem to be behind the learning curve!  If you have kids, it's worth the trip just to have someone babysit them--there is a nice looking supervised play area.

They have a cafeteria style restaurant about like a hospital's.  Food was okay, nothing really to write home (or blog) about.  To keep costs down, they appear to run on a skeleton crew.  Most everything is self-serve in the store.  Not a huge deal until you start talking furniture.  Down on the lower level all the furniture is boxed and on warehouse shelves and you find from your notes which aisle and shelf the things you want should be located.  When you get to this level you grab the funkiest moving grocery-style cart that glides in every direction.  More exercise just trying to control that sucker.  It could go sideways and wipe out a whole glass display if you weren't on the ball or haven't had strength training classes recently.

After dragging a chair and footstool with cushions off the shelf (and of course not fitting in the aforementioned cart) you look over to the self check-out like it's a mirage in the desert.  You are so excited to be leaving that you are a bit perturbed to see that you have to lug (and wrap if breakable) all of your stuff out of the cart to scan, then load it into a blue bag you have to buy and restock your cart.  The line doesn't move terribly fast because of this.

We finished up our gossip (I mean, information exchange) as well as made future plans for our next adventure as it poured down rain coming home.

Later, back at the ranch... I decided to put together my furniture.  I normally have hubby do it, but he was out and I wanted to impress the menfolk around here.  The instructions showed everything in drawings, including the tools.  Looked like any idiot could put this together, but I am not just any idiot!  It took me longer to find the screwdriver than to use it.  That's par for the course here.  Once you get the hang of the drawings though, it's not too bad.  It would be better if you had three hands, because one needs to use the screwdriver while the other this cranking thing.  Who's holding the stupid wood parts together???  I learned quickly to do without the screwdriver.

Well, my comfy and cheap chair is now ready for use...so I will now go enjoy!

Until next time,
Gale

Does Anyone Know of a Shady Park Bench with WI-FI? Part One

The other day I tried out an AARP retirement calculator to see how much we should be saving.  (Of course, we aren't really saving much of anything, so I knew the number would be bad.)  I found out we only have to save nearly 1.3M to retire at age 67.  They said the alternative would be to wait and retire at 87.  I knew that Mark and I would never be able to retire, but confirming it was a bit depressing.  However, if we work hard and save around $19,000 a year, we could maybe semi-retire at a lower standard of living.

What they don't say is how much lower that standard would have to go.  I am willing to give up some things; the dream of a waterfront vacation condo, a Porsche, traveling the world, a sailboat that would stay at the condo, etc.  But, I get the impression we will need to go without the necessities of life such as cable, internet and eating out.  I've already given up shopping except for art supplies (gotta stock up while I can!), we haven't gone on a real vacation in years, we don't use credit cards hardly ever and I've even gone to raising my own eggs!  (Okay, that really isn't a break-even proposition, but it sounds good.  Mark has thousands of honey bees working their bee butts off, but we keep giving them back the honey to eat during Winter.  Out of thousands of pounds, we have harvested maybe a cup.)

So now what do we cut out?  I get my DVD movies mostly from the library or the $1 a day place.  I guess I could cut out my prescriptions, but that could kill me and defeat the purpose.  I borrow books from the library and only have a couple magazine subscriptions (one was free, the other $12.)  I don't even know why I need the WI-FI for my park bench because I don't have a laptop or Ipad.  I have a second-hand Nook in black and white that I like though that uses WI-FI.  On Fridays you can get a free book from Barnes & Nobles.  I could certainly cut out eating and lose a few pounds, but I could live longer (and that would also defeat the purpose!)

To be continued....

Take care,
Gale

Lightning Can Strike Twice--I Couldn't Make This Stuff Up!

Well, Saturday began like any other day.  After errands and chores, I picked up Taylor from a widow friend's house as he helped her all day with moving tree stumps.  We were both pooped, so I told him we could just order a pizza and wings, then get a movie he wanted.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch... I had guilt about the "double secret probation" of the runaway dog.  I put her in a huge crate, walked her on a lead several times a day and sometimes tied her in our fenced backyard while I sat in the swing watching.  She had been fairly calm and I got soft.  I put some rugs and blankets in a big ex-pen in the garage, put her food, toys, etc. in it and left knowing she was able to move around, but still be contained with the garage door closed and the pen double-snapped shut.

So we pull in the garage excited to be home for the day with a hot, yummy pizza and dreams of a shower.  I come on in the house with the booty and asked Taylor to feed the dogs.  Well, that gets the Jack Russells excited and they start barking.  Taylor hadn't put the garage door down yet and that dog freaked out, shoved over the pen and started down the driveway at dusk.  SOB!  He lunged to tackle her on our gravel drive, but she slipped out of his grasp.

He calls me on his cell as he is running down the road and I follow in my Jeep.  He was told she went into the woods, so we circled behind them at our friend's house.  However, she wasn't gonna come when called anyway.  What were we thinking?  I'll tell you what I was thinking...more than worrying about having to call the owners, I was MORTIFIED at the thought of calling the authorities again reporting she got away again.  They owners were supposed to come back Sunday.  Why did this have to happen AGAIN!

My mild-mannered Taylor was very upset, blaming himself, which is ridiculous.  I should have left the car out. So, we pull out of our friend's drive and can make out a silhouette of a dog trotting down the road.  She's too lazy to fight through the woods, so we gave chase and it was her!  As we pulled up, Taylor jumped out with a lead, but she bolted back into another woods with tons of briers.  A minute or so as I parked I heard him yelling unintelligibly something about "you'll never get away again!"

Taylor appears dragging the dog with blood all over him.  He is furious.  As he grabbed her collar, the dog reached back and bit him across his nose and up in it, plus inside his upper lip.  Could have been worse as she must have just caught him with her canine teeth.  I have photos of the mess, but Taylor doesn't want them published.  I called Mark and the owners left the Outer Banks right then and drove all night to get home.  They really do feel bad as they like Taylor and have known him all his life.

When they picked her up, they left some extra money for our trouble.  So, I gave most of the proceeds to Taylor as he deserved it.  He put his logging money with it and bought a banjo.  Now I have to listen to "Dueling Banjos" over and over.  I seem to pay and pay LOL!  His face is healing and we are praying there isn't a scar.  We got out the briers in his hands and arms, but the poison ivy is starting to creep over him.  They are taking the dog to their vet for a mental evaluation.

So, here's hoping your week went better than ours!  The next post is going to be much lighter in content as it was already written.

Take care,
Gale

"If It Weren't For Bad Luck...

I'd have no luck at all!"  The disaster today also came out of the blue.  It was cold and windy and I was in a hurry.  That is the usual premise for nearly all my disasters...I was introducing the little girls (chickens) to the older ones.  I was tired of cleaning out the basement pen, especially when I am still taking care of that dog for those folks on vacation.

Well, I had them safe in the pen, with a vari-kennel with straw temporary house, encircled with an ex-pen  (dog exercise pen, basically portable fence panels--this one is 5 ft high.)  That way they could "talk" to each other through the wire and nobody gets hurt.  This would be fine if it weren't for the cold, wind and rain that suddenly appeared (Ohio weather, there's nothing like it!)  Well, I put the little ones in the vari-kennel with food and water and placed the whole thing in the hen house at night.  The hens had their beaks out of joint this morning though when I decided to let all run together to see what would happen.

I pushed back the ex-pen without thinking up against the back fence I had hooked it with.  This made a little wedge area and the little girls went back there to escape nasty Gloria and Bonnie Blue.  They were stacked up back there when I left but had access to food and water.  I put the crate against the gate as they were escaping through the door gap.

Now this pen has netting over the top and is made of sturdy dog run fence.  They have the best I can afford.  It never occurred to me that it wasn't enough...

I came home from errands to find a hawk staring at me and poor Buffy (one of the three young ones and a Buff Orphington) half-through the fence and decapitated.  It was like a bad dream.  My wonderful neighbor Gerald came over to clean up the carnage as I am just too old to grow up and do it myself.  All the while, five hawks were slowly circling my property.  They wanted to finish their chicken dinner.  Over MY dead body!

Gerald told me that the Game Warden had told him it is legal to shoot a hawk if it endangers livestock or poultry.  I've never shot at a living thing in my life, but I came in and got my Browning Gold Hunter shotgun and some shells.  I sat out on the picnic table by the barn looking like Elmer Fudd waiting for those suckers.  They flew over a few neighbor's away and when they finally circled back I couldn't take a safe shot.  Not really worth shooting a neighbor over, but close.  I noticed my north neighbor came home and quickly went into his house LOL.

BTW, most of you don't know that I am a pretty good shot.  Hubby and I shot sporting clays before the kids got so expensive we had to give it up.  I only had 3 lessons (only time I had ever touched a gun) or so and just for fun competed in the Ohio Cup and actually got third place!  Not because I have wonderful technique mind you, but I had great vision and the ability to correct aim quickly.

Well, tomorrow is another day.  I am taking off work to finish the job on the hawks and the rest of the adding of chicken wire to the lower half of the pen fence.  Taylor helped me a lot with that.  Mark is of course out of town when most of the awful things happen.  The girls are safely in the hen house tonight. Chickens don't do much in the dark.  Tomorrow a.m. I will see what happens.

I don't have a recent picture of Buffy, though she was only 4 or 5 weeks old.  I took more of the first group of hens, just like first children.  I was going to shoot (er, photograph) them this weekend.  So here is sort of an "old" one.

Rest in Peace "Buffy"

August 5 - September 15, 2011

(Front and center on ground.)

Also wanted to mention that Daisy has found a new home right around the corner.  Audra is never home to care for her and trust me, ducks are the messiest pets ever.  Now she is with her own kind in a place where she can roam (watch out for hawks!) and never be eaten.  Here is a photo taken as she left.

Take care, that's all for now.  Next time I want to get back to the lighter side.  Hang in there!

Just Some Updates and An Amazing Race Moment...

Well, it's mid-September and I thought things would slow down!  Audra is settled in at Ohio Wesleyan University, though still overwhelmed with the work load.  Music Ed. students have several more classes than other majors and I think they have them take too many for the first semester in college.

No news on Ivy.  We have come to the conclusion that if she could have come back she would have way before this.  Either a coyote got her, the most likely scenario, or someone picked her up and didn't report her anywhere.  Good luck if they think they are gonna make money breeding this cute little dog.  She's nearly 16 and spayed LOL!

When it rains it pours.  We board (rarely) a 75 pound German Shepherd mix that has many emotional issues as well as hip problems.  She is afraid of everything and you can't catch her.  No one else will do it but the grandparents and they were with the owners.  In a nutshell, the dog went over our fence (so much for the bad hips...) and took off Sat. a.m.  After a four-hour heart attack, several calls from the Sheriff's Dept., a canine officer, his dog, me and Taylor at the side of a freeway, we were able to corner her at, get this, her back door.  She ran all the way home.  She knew the jogging trail once she hit her sub-division, but how she knew to get to it is something else.  I would be impressed if she hadn't put all of us in danger, especially the officer and his dog.  He was amazing.  The owners told us we would have to call animal control and have them shoot her with a tranquilizer gun.  Why would anyone want a dog like that????  They have a 2 year old girl and another baby on the way.  There used to be two dogs, but the other one bit the girl and they placed him.  He was actually the one they thought was "good!"  I give up.  I will not be doing this again!

REMEMBER!  NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED!

I am going to add some photos soon to some of my other posts because I am a bit OCD about organization.  Take a peek when you get a chance!

Have a great week!
Gale