Within our hearts in the garden

October 8, 2009 | Family,Garden,Iowa,Stuff

My red peppers? Finally turning red. Yay!

Let the sun run down right behind the hill

October 6, 2009 | Iowa,Stuff

The red and white and starry blue

September 29, 2009 | Stuff

This is on our new flagpole.

Happiness is …

September 17, 2009 | Friends,Stuff

… a friend who gives you zucchini bread, still warm from the oven.

Cause you look good in your underwear way out in the country

August 15, 2009 | Family,Florida,Iowa,Stuff

This is what we were doing a year ago. Wow. Time flies.

I can smell clearly now, the poop is gone

June 15, 2009 | Iowa,Stuff

Look what finally got done Saturday. I feel so much better now.

Mushrooms and earthworms, fancy stuff to eat

June 9, 2009 | Iowa,Stuff

Then there’s the digging that will cost me money. A lot of money. I haven’t gotten the bill yet, but I’m dreading it. I’m so tired of this whole process. Nobody has done sh*t with the septic tank for this house in 35 years. How do I know? NOBODY knew where it was. For one brief brain-splattering moment, we thought it might be UNDER THE GARAGE. Turns out it wasn’t, but it was close.

Anyway. For almost a whole dang year now, I’ve been trying to get the stupid thing pumped / serviced. I’m a fanatic about preventive care. As painful as the whole process has been, I’d do it again over having the septic tank back up and ruin the house in, say, the middle of January.

It took me months just to figure out who does septic stuff here. By the time I talked to him, it was the middle of winter, and he suggested I call back in the spring. Which I did. Only to have him ask, “Do you know where it is?” Uh. No.

So then I had to track down a construction company to poke and dig around to find the thing. Before that happened, the telephone company had to come out and spray orange paint where all the underground lines were. Then the construction company was here here several times, probing the back yard, shoving plumbing snakes down pipes, getting nowhere, then pulling a toilet (which, by the way, they can’t PUT BACK because they’re not plumbers), then getting a plumber (who bills separately, natch) involved … and finally getting the backhoe guys here.

Now? We know where it is. We have access. And they made it sound like we found it in the nick of time. Which kinda, sorta makes me feel a little better for being so crazy-compulsive about the whole thing. But … can I get the septic tank guy to return my calls?

Guess.

Welcome down underground, hunker down a spell

June 8, 2009 | Iowa,Stuff

We’ve had lots of digging with big machines lately. These pictures are from the day they put down new cables for the telephone company. I scared them a bit when I told them to let me know if they find the septic tank because that would save me the money I’d have to pay another company to dig and find it. Much to their relief, they didn’t find it. But they shook the house, rattled the windows and made a big mess. Though I doubted it could be done, they actually cleaned up fairly well afterward.

‘School’s out’ gets illustrated

June 5, 2009 | Family,School,Stuff

I started singing Alice Cooper’s School’s Out for Summer when I did the last pickup of the school year. They asked to hear it on the radio. I said I’d find it on blip when I got home, and I did. We listened to the song (but didn’t watch the video). They all drew pictures.

This is Cooper with a “rock-n-roll guitar” raising the roof on the house.

This is Cooper singing.

This is the guitar.

That thing in the park?

May 19, 2009 | Stuff

It’s a disc-golf basket. Disc golf. Wow. I never knew such a thing existed. Never mind a Professional Disc Golf Association. Want to see a world champion at work? Here ya go.