Can I get a hand?

When I did the garage cleanup I decided to give all our work gloves a good cleaning as well. Looks like we have 5 pairs, including a leather pair, bought in our pre-vegan days of course.

And then there's one little glove hanging out by itself. A cute little blue checked design. I just wonder where the mate is.

Cleanup, cleanup, everybody clean up!

We have finally had some cooler days around here, which comes as a relief to humans, animals, and electric bill alike. I took the opportunity yesterday to clean out the garage.

I've never been one to fill up the garage with so much junk that you couldn't park two vehicles in there. But things just get....messy. Junky. Craptastic. So once a year or so I give it a good cleaning. (As opposed to my husband's coworker who mops hers each week.) I know you're just on the edge of your seat waiting to see what my garage looks like (lol) so without further ado, I present:

THE BIG GARAGE CLEANUP OF 2010


What you see here in this scintillating picture is the fact that for the first time in forever, we have a completely clear path to the car. Normally there are a few boxes to be recycled, and by the workbench in the back we always had a couple buckets in the way. No more, as they are now at the recycling center (#2 plastic, I was glad to see.) They were previous kitty litter buckets from years ago. We have 2 mop buckets--that should be plenty. Now we can open the back car door easily without a poor dog having to try and duck under the door to jump in the back seat.

Next we have the workbench. You know any flat surface is a clutter magnet, and this is no exception. Things have now been sorted and put in their proper places. This will take constant upkeep to maintain though. If you look closely you can see the legs of a metal frog statue I have. It's come apart in 3 pieces and instead of chucking it I'd really like to figure out how to fix it.

I swear I only very rarely use plastic bags. I will chance to say one a month or less. These come from my mom's house when she sends things over, and a large part of them came from the garage sale we had at my house last year. They are here by the steps just until I go to the grocery store later today and deposit them in their recycling bin. Underneath the bags are a couple bags of packing peanuts. Those will be taken to the UPS store next week as well, where they are glad to reuse them. Next to that are a couple things that are awaiting transport up to the attic.

I have to find a new home for these. What are they? Part of the empty tubs I have collected over the last couple of years from cleaning out things in my house I no longer need!

These boxes are allllll going to Goodwill, along with a few in my dining room, hopefully next week. Next to that you see a power washer, kitty cube, and old vacuum cleaner, all things that my husband has agreed will either be fixed by the end of the month or out of this house!

The side of the garage next to Mr. GV's truck. Bicycles, empty boxes from Mr. GV's work (that are used in weed prevention in our flower beds, a big project right now), a freezer bag, and a chandelier that will go to Goodwill if they will take it. Otherwise it will be leaving this house in some other method. Underneath the table you see a tub where we have our electronics and batteries to be recycled.

And there you have it. The floors have been swept as well and it just looks so much better, like someone actually CARES. Well, I do care. Just not enough to get out there in the summer when it is stinkin' HOT!

Busy times abound

Things have been sooo busy here.


Finally got Macy well, and here comes this one (Gabby) with a big ol' lump on her side. We've had one cat--Amber, also a grey tabby-- die from fibrosarcoma, so naturally that was the first thing that popped into our heads. But it was soft and grew very rapidly, so I really didn't think that was what was going on.


And it wasn't. It was an absess, probably from a bite of another cat. Ugh. I am one of THOSE cat owners that lets their cat outside when she asks aka scratches the furniture/jumps on us in the middle of the night. I would prefer she be an inside cat, but she LOVES it outside. Anyway, she was sedated, absess was lanced, and she came home still stoned from the sedation and with a nice little bald spot on her side. The main thing is, she should be just fine, although maybe posessed if the above picture is any indication. lol



We also had this fun guy around for a week. He stays at my mom's house when he comes in but I try to visit as much as possible, which usually means every day. We had lots of fun as usual. His vocabulary is just exploding and I love that he is putting complex sentences together.

And last, but not least, I spent a few hours with this view:

I took a fall on some water and went down hard on my knee. It happened inside a business, so I was obligated to get it checked out that day instead of waiting to see if it got better on its own. It appears to be just a nice little sprain (which I was surprised to learn from my discharge papers can take as long to heal as a fracture can) so hopefully nothing permenant.

I might be scarce for a while, because I've got a few other things going on that are keeping me hopping. On one knee that is.

Philosiphizin', tunies, and canners

Just a few flower pictures from my backyard:

Blackberry lily. I love these flowers. They are so dainty.

Day lily. Love the color of this one. I have tons of yellow day lilies in front and a few in back of my house, but just one plant that blooms this color.

Canna. These were already at our house when we bought it 9 years ago. The bed they grow in is outside our bedroom, just off the deck. I love lying in bed and watching these tall beauties blowing in the wind.

My granny called these "canners." Growing up I didn't know that much about flowers, and had no idea what these were really called. She also called petunias "tunies." As in "Don't forget to water my tunies" or "You have to pinch the tunies."

Speaking of cannas---I have always heard that in my zone or colder, you have to dig them up in the winter. To this I say: Are you kidding me? Now my beds do need weeding, and I am certainly no professional, but most of the time when I plant a flower it grows. Here is my gardening philosophy: NEGLECT. When I plant something in the ground, I water it in for a while until it gets established. And then it's on its own. Let those roots dig down deep and search out their own water and nutrients. I don't do fussy plants. If it can't make it in the hot, humid South without babying, I've no business growing it. Now of course I'm talking about perennial flowers, trees, bushes. A vegetable garden needs regular gardening of course.

How about you? What's your gardening philosophy?

Let the negotiations begin

You see that box? OK good, because I'll get back to it in a minute.

Earlier this week I cleaned out our bedroom closet. Boy, did it need it. Anything that doesn't belong elsewhere winds up having a home in our closet. I managed to get rid of several boxes and all the clothes are either on hangers or folded. (I like my jeans folded.) Shoes all have mates, except for one house shoe of Mr. GV. It's probably hiding under the bed, which reminds me that when I cleaned the closet I also did a thorough vacuuming underneath our bed. And I ran across a pacifier that belonged to my nephew. There's no telling how long it's been under there. I swear I vacuumed under there not too long ago!

Anyway, I was on the stepladder putting some things on the top shelf of the closet when I noticed THE BOX. The label says "Open Aug 1 2010." Well, that day had already passed, but I wasn't too far off. It took me a minute, but I finally remembered what was in it.

It's full of electrical gadgetry---cords that don't have a label on them, so we have no idea what gadget they go to, generic cords (USB, etc) that you can find anywhere, and so on. Probably there are cords in there that go to things we got rid of years ago. Five or six years back I went through all the cords and such, put them into zip top baggies, and labeled them. So these are what's left from before that time.

The date is on there because we were supposed to get rid of the entire box on that date if we hadn't needed to go into it. Well, guess what. We DID go into the box, twice I think, in the past year.

So.....I'm still ready to get rid of the whole box. lol But I know Mr. GV, who doesn't like to get rid of things, is going to resist. And the deal was that we would only get rid of it if we didn't use anything out of it. Maybe I can renegotiate? Something like---whatever we STILL have in there in 3 months, we get rid of. We shall see!

Food stuff

I have somewhere to be this afternoon, so started bright and early this morning on some food prep.


End result:

For the fridge:

6 pints + 1 large bowl of chili
bowl of kale from the garden
baby spinach (not shown) ready for Mr. GV to use as salad

For the freezer:

brown rice (made earlier this week; I just bagged it up for the freezer today)
lacinato kale
collard greens


Still need to do:

Make cabbage/apple dish
Process oldish apples; I'll dry them, most likely
Cut/freeze a couple of red peppers
Cook/dry/freeze some squash/broccoli, zucchini that are getting old
Go through fridge and freezer and make plans to use up what is getting old

Tomorrow I *hopefully* will get a call from my favorite local organic farm telling me there are enough culled (non-perfect) tomatoes for me to get a 1/2 bushel or bushel. I am going to try canning tomatoes for the first time ever! There are so many reasons I hope this works--they will be BPA-free, so much cheaper than organic tomatoes at the store, and very little waste--just the flats to throw out from each jar.

I promise an update, whether I have success or failure, sometime next week.

Update: The farm didn't have enough tomatoes for me. So no canning for me this year.

"How I spent my summer....and spring" by Macy

This is where we've been spending our time lately:


Our vet's office. In the spring, Mr GV and I took Macy on a field trip to the emergency vet a few counties over because of a sudden case of blindness. Long story short, the blindness was a result of a very low platelet count caused by ehrlichiosis, a tick-born disease. We got that cleared up with meds, and thankfully the vision problem went away and her platelets are normal. For a while we were told "Don't let her jump/run/get hurt because she might bleed to death." The platelets were pretty much unmeasurable. I promise I'm not just being dramatic! It took a few repeat blood draws to determine that she was in the clear. When she had her vaccinations we had it checked again, and it was normal.

A couple weeks ago Macy started feeling poorly. It's pretty obvious when she's feeling badly--mainly there's a lot of panting and she separates herself from us. In the past it's been an anal gland problem. We visited the vet, where we found Macy had a low-grade fever and had lost a couple pounds and got her gland cleaned out, just in case that was the problem. Her bloodwork was again normal.

Fast-forward a couple weeks and Macy was still not well, and actually seemed worse. Added to her symptoms were trembling, lethargy, and lack of appetite. I took her into the vet this past Saturday and she had a fever of 105 and had lost an additional 2 pounds. A loss of over 4 pounds in about a month is significant when you only weigh 62 pounds to start with. Her bloodwork showed infection, although we have no clue where it's located, and she started on Bactrim, a powerful antibiotic. She was tested again for ehrlichiosis, and that was thankfully negative.

Monday night we noticed a bit of blood here and there. And then more blood--on the couch, the bed, the carpet. And it was coming from Macy's nose. There was no gush, mind you, just enough blood to freak me the heck out. We put a call into the vet and she said she thought it was probably a dry nose from all the panting, and to bring her to the office in the morning. (By the way, our vet rocks! We have been to at least 8 vets since we adopted our Sophie cat back in 1995, and Dr. W is the best EVER! I could do an entire post just on her, but I won't. lol)

Here's Macy, trying to shrink as much as possible so she can disappear into the wall and maybe the vet won't see her. Ha! Poor thing has always been so nervous at the vet. She's still bleeding from her nose at times, but there was no bacteria or fungus growing in there, so that's good. Her temperature was also back to normal, so it looks as though the antibiotic is working. And she started eating again and has started gaining weight back.

So hopefully she is on the mend. She is my baby, I've no qualms about saying that!