Pets, Photography

As Promised, with a Side of Cute

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First, the cute, in the form of Miss Harriet Brown.

The rest of the photos were taken this morning from the driveway. I’ve been meaning to get some pictures of the driveway itself for months now. It’s more off-road than on-road. The center driveway photo shows the trench SBC cut when they laid phone cable. I have no idea what on earth they were smoking when they did it. It should have been laid along the edge of the driveway, not in it. After repeated complaints about poor sound quality and dropped calls, they eventually came out and moved the line. Unfortunately, they did not do anything about the huge trench they’d made.

Every time it rains, water funnels down the driveway and washes away the gravel, widening and deepening the trench. Last summer, while I was house sitting for the neighbors, we had several days of heavy rain. The bottom of the trench shifted and deepened, and my poor little car was eviscerated and mortally wounded. So, that’s why, when I was car hunting, I wanted something with both high clearance and part-time 4WD. I do not want to repeat that particular experience.

You may ask why we don’t just fix the driveway? I rent, and the folks who live next door don’t own the driveway, either. They only have an easement to use it. The owner keeps chucking gravel at the problem, but it’s only a bandaid solution. Maybe it’ll be fixed, someday, but I’m not holding my breath. In the meantime, I now have an off-road vehicle.

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The Driveway of Dqqm

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Abandoned Truck Bed & Cap

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Old Tires

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Abandoned Trailer

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Gas Easement

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Pylon

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Bird House

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Fence Near Entrance to State Forest

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Stream Along Driveway

Pets, Photography

Happy Post-Turkey Day

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Wednesday Sunset (top) and Friday morning frost (bottom)

It got relatively cold last night, with lows around 12F, so there was a good layer of frost on everything when I got up this morning. And, guess what? I still don’t have a window scraper! I don’t have a winter coat, either, so coming home from Thanksgiving dinner was a little brisk. I usually wear layers, instead of a coat, because I like being able to vary my outer-wear to suit the needs of the day. Indiana weather is so changeable that I always end up being too warm or too cold if I wear a coat. Last night’s freezing cold temperature took me by surprise, though. The weather guy kept saying “It’s gonna get really cold,” but he never got around to saying just how cold before I had to turn off the teevee and leave.

The Orphans’ Thanksgiving dinner was wonderful. D. brought Quorn cutlets, which are now my favorite meat substitute. Oh my, are they good. She put barbecue sauce on them, which I usually can’t stand, but they were so good that I didn’t mind. I brought a left-over one home with me, and they heat up well in the microwave. Often, veggie burgers will get texturally weird when re-nuked, so I was surprised at how well Quorn fared when re-heated.

I took Harriet along with me, which is always a little stressful. She doesn’t get along at all with the resident bitch, and can be tweaky in large groups of people. She did fairly well, though, and even sucked up to one of the guys, which surprised the hell out of me. She’s always been freaked out by strange men. It was wonderful to see her enjoying being around other people. Unfortunately, though, she got a little resource-guardy during dinner, which resulted in a big snark-fest. It wasn’t serious–no injuries–and consisted of a lot of snarling and posturing and no teeth-on-skin, but I think it was a little nerve wracking for the non-dog folks who were present.

Overall, she did pretty well, considering. She’s always going to be tweaked in the head, no matter what is done to desensitize her. She’s just hard-wired wrong.

And, poor dog, her weekend is going to get even more stressful, but in a good way. As always, she’s going with me to visit my family. She likes car rides, and loves visiting my mom and brothers, but no matter how enjoyable it is, it’s still stressful. She also has to have a bath today. She’s very good for baths, even though she can’t stand getting wet. Everyone in my family is allergic to cats and dogs, so I always bathe Harriet with Dr. Bronner’s castile soap the day before we visit, then wipe her down with Allerpet-D right before we leave. It works pretty well.

Now, off to wash the dog and clean out the car. It’s amazing how quickly I can fill a car up with junk. I’ve had it less than two months, and it’s already full of trash.

Crankypantsing, Pets, Photography

Happy Monday

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I’ve been trying to remember to take photos of the sun shining on the dewy fence. It’s all grown up and, ahem, “rustic” looking right now, which is kind of picturesque. I’m not a big fan of yardwork, at the best of times, and with the uncertainty of my living situation, I’m feeling even less motivated than I normally do. My other excuse is that we’ve been getting an unholy amount of rain recently. It finally cleared up today, after 24 solid hours of rain, but it’s hot and humid and there’s no way the grass is going to dry any time this century.

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The previous day had started with pea soup fog–dangerous, but beautiful in a spooky sort of way.

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And now for the gratuitous dogblogging. That’s the lovely and talented Miss Brown, doing a canine headstand. She props herself against me, then inverts herself until she’s standing on her head. She started to slide out of position when I got up to get the camera, because her support was gone. I had to act quickly, in order to get this picture, so it’s a little blurry. But I think you can get the general idea–top of head on couch, butt in air, much funny to be had by all.

Oh, and note the glowy, non-photo blue eyes. They’re proof positive that she is eeevil.

In other news, I stayed home from work today to do some more car shopping. It looks like I may end up with a Ford Taurus wagon. It’s bigger than I want, but at this point, I’ll take anything with wheels and an engine that doesn’t hemorrhage oil. Oh, and a hatchback. I found plenty of smaller cars, but none were a closer fit than the Taurus. I went ahead and got my financing sorted out, so that I can pretty much just go in and pick it up on Wednesday after co-op delivery.

I’ve also been checking out rentals in Bloomington, and am pleasantly surprised at how many ads there are for pet-friendly housing, most all well within my price range. Whew! And it’s a good thing, too, because my landfolks are really starting to make me uncomfortable.

Ralph came over on Saturday (he showed up while the SBC guy was fixing my phone line), and told me that when Katrina left, she’d broken all the windows and toilets in their old place, and had burned all his clothes. Sweet fancy Jeebus! I can’t even imagine doing something like that, no matter how pissed off I was. That’s just seriously uncool. And, according to him, the property is his. He’s supposedly coming over this weekend to fix things. I’ll believe it when I see it.

Then, this afternoon, Katrina called. She says the property is hers, and that she still wants me to sign a lease. Ostensibly, it’s to protect me. Hell, NO. I have no intention of getting in the middle of their little shitfit! I told her I didn’t think it would protect me, as leases aren’t transferable. She disagreed. I told her I didn’t want to sign anything right now, but thanks anyway. She seems to think Ralph will kick me out. So what? I don’t think he will. I like Ralph, we’ve always gotten along just fine, and I don’t think it would be in his best interests to kick me out–if he does, no biggie, I’ll just move. Then Katrina told me that she’d called Ralph and told him I didn’t want him bothering me. As in, he’s not supposed to talk to me about anything related to the property or my living here. Not only did I say nothing of the sort, but what the hell business is it of hers?! The only thing I told Ralph is that I don’t want to be in the middle of their drama. I told him I was perfectly happy to deal with him instead of her, in fact, I’d prefer it. At no time did I tell him or Katrina that I didn’t want Ralph to “bother me.”

Photography

Three Sunrises

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The sunrise this morning was quiet and lovely. There was a hard frost and the air was fresh and crunchy, like grannysmith apples. There was also a bit of fog, so the light was both magnified and diffused. I took these pictures just after the sun had fully crested the eastern ridge. Because I was facing into the sun, the pictures turned out much darker than the actual conditions were.

The dogs also enjoyed the crisp, sunny morning, entertaining themselves chasing rabbit tracks and digging for moles. You can just make out Elliott silhouetted against the grass in the first picture.