Janet's Ordinary Life

poop

January 28, 2014 in Bitch and moan, General | 3 comments

The apartment complex I live at has group mail boxes in different places, sort of like this but more utilitarian-there’s no pretty finial on the top.

Mine is in front of a breezeway which has apartments on both sides of it. There’s a bit of lawn in front of the breezeway, with sidewalks. One of the tenants has a really cute beagle, and he’s very nice, but since the snow fell, I’ve noticed he doesn’t always pick up the pooch poo. It’s unsightly, not to mention unsanitary, and every time I’ve gone to check my mail, I think to myself, “Pick up your dog’s poop, for ****** sake!”.

Well, today I was walking Daisy, and he was coming home and said “hello, how are you?” to me. I said “fine, thanks, how are you?” all the while my brain was screaming “PICK UP YOUR DOG’S POOP!”. I felt like I was two-faced, but I can’t think fast enough to say “by the way, is that your dog’s poop, or has someone else not been picking up after their dog?”, because that’s entirely possible. There are people who don’t seem to grasp the concept that other people might be walking on the grass, and step in something they don’t want to step in. This really gets my goat since that reflects badly on all dog owners who walk their dogs. Maybe I don’t have enough to do, but sometimes I get so riled up that I wish I could spend the day sitting out of sight, waiting to catch the offenders. I’d pick up after their dog, tie a pretty ribbon around the bag’s opening and attach a note saying “I think you forgot this” and drop it at their door. That’s a lot nicer than what I’d really like to do, which is deposit their dog’s leavings on their doorstep. That wouldn’t be very nice.

As it is, I’ll probably wind up picking up the offending poop myself. Sigh.

peeking

January 3, 2014 in General | 3 comments

In the apartment complex I live in, the front and back windows are low to the ground and all have vertical blinds, which I hate, but that’s not what I want to talk about here. Thing is, hardly anyone has their blinds open even when they’re home, and still fewer have their doors open. I have to wonder about people-what is it that makes them live in a cocoon where no natural light gets in? I have my blinds open from when I get up until it’s dark, mainly because Daisy likes to see what’s going on out there. Even if I didn’t have an inquisitive dog, I’d still have the blinds open because I like daylight, and I also like to see what’s going on outside. I think that if I lived like they do-closed up-I’d be so depressed I wouldn’t want to get out of bed.

Now, I know that people don’t like the thought of other people looking in their apartments and seeing what they have, but I have discovered that during the day, you can’t see in the windows when you’re passing by-and the blinds can be opened in a way that passerby’s view is mostly blocked. So I just don’t understand it.

happy 2014

January 2, 2014 in General | 4 comments

I’m glad this is a new year-the last year wasn’t much fun until late summer/early fall, then things started to get better. I have high hopes for this year, and since I’m a pessimist, that’s saying a lot. Smile, even if you don’t feel like it!

shortbread, round two

January 22, 2013 in Tasty! | 3 comments

I’ve got a lot going on, but I’d been thinking about shortbread a lot lately and decided to make some, it doesn’t take long. This time it turned out better-thanks, Holly, for telling me not to turn it out of the pan immediately after removing from the oven, even though the recipe I use says to. There was minimal breakage this time, and I cut the shortbread into squares. Maybe next time I make it, it will be perfect!

oh, well

January 1, 2013 in Tasty! | 3 comments

Last night I decided to bake shortbread-I’d been wanting to try it for a long time. The recipe I used said to use two 9″ cake pans but I looked at the comments on the recipe and someone said she used a 9X13 pan and it worked fine, so I tried that. When it was done, I immediately turned the pan over onto a couple of cooling racks, and this is the result:

It tastes good, at least. I’ll be trying again, and this time I’ll use smaller pans.

New Year’s Eve

December 31, 2012 in General | 2 comments

I hope everyone has a Happy New Year-and I hope that 2013 is a better year for me.

2012-not a very good year

December 30, 2012 in General | 5 comments

I just looked at a compilation of stats that WordPress made for this blog, and it made me a little nostalgic. This is the first time in probably six months that I’ve come here, having clicked a link from the email, so I haven’t even looked to see what my last post was.

My friends know that it’s been tough for me. My mom passed away in July, and the ensuing months have been a whirlwind of packing up, getting rid of stuff I don’t want, and painting, and having the house up for sale; miraculously, we got a buyer and if all goes well, I’ll be moving to an apartment with Daisy, probably at the end of January or beginning of February. It’ll be hard on us both-me because I’ll be living in a new place for the first time in 26 years, and poor Daisy will be losing her nice big back yard and have to be leashed every time she wants to go outside, which isn’t going to be fun for either of us. I got a membership to a dog park and she loves it, but it doesn’t make up for not being able to go outside any old time she wants. So it’ll be a big adjustment for us both.

It occurred to me that it might be helpful to write about the next step in our lives, so I think I’ll be back to writing here more often in January. I’m hoping that 2013 will be a hell of a lot better than 2012.

camera shy

February 26, 2012 in Daisy, photos | 8 comments

I still have a photo of Spot in my wallet, in the window where my driver’s license is. I don’t plan to take it out, but it occurred to me that it might be a good idea to have one of Daisy too, to show people. It was a nice sunny day today so this afternoon I took the camera and Daisy outside to try to get a really cute one. It turned out that getting Daisy to pose looking cute is harder than getting blood from a turnip. First, she kept getting distracted, first by a cat walking in a yard two houses away, then a bird. I kept trying to coax her onto the patio, and when she got there, she wouldn’t look at me. Then when she did look at me, she’d turn her head just as I pressed the shutter button.

When I uploaded the photos, I looked at them all and they told me a story. I picked the best ones to show here.

aw, come on Mom...

I repeatedly asked her to sit. She responded by wiggling and rubbing up against my legs.

Then she jumped up on me.

you want me to what?

We need to work more on “Sit”. She decided she didn’t want to sit, and instead, lay down on the patio and rubbed her back on the ground.

maybe if I play dead...

When I didn’t buy her “playing dead” act, she decided to turn on the cuteness.

please, scratch my tummy?

I can only resist that for so long.

SCRATCH MY TUMMY!

so I obliged.

that feels so good...

I thought placating her would make her more agreeable to posing, once she got up.

get that camera away from me!

Actually, she was wiping her eyes. I just thought it was a good “Oh my god” illustration.

I decided to try again another day, and go through the ones I already have of her outside to see if any would be a good wallet brag photo.

thinking of spring

February 20, 2012 in Greenish thumb | 5 comments

The only good thing about February is that seeds begin to make an appearance in stores. A few days ago, I was in Lowe’s for something else and was stopped in my tracks when I glimpsed the display of seeds. I picked out some, and am regretting not buying a couple of others, but I’ll go back and get them. I don’t have enough room in my flowerbeds for all of these, but that’s what containers are for.

So far, here’s what I picked out:

Cerinthe-I just liked the looks of it. I try to have at least one weird-looking flower every year.

Convolvulus-I like the blue flowers. I’m still learning to spell it.

Snapdragon-I’ve never grown them though I like the colors. I’m especially looking forward to this one.

Sunflower-this is a dwarf variety, it’ll only grow to 16″. Mom objected strenuously to the giant ones I planted in the flowerbed next to the driveway last year, and I still wanted sunflowers but these should be short enough that she can’t complain.

Zinnia-one of my favorites, I hope they do better this time than they did last year.

I’m now waiting impatiently for it to be warm enough to start the seeds outdoors. I’ve never had any luck with starting seeds indoors, but I may give it another try this year.

Valentines

February 13, 2012 in Memory Lane | 4 comments

In honor of Valentine’s Day, I dug out an envelope with old Valentines that seem to be from when I was in the first grade, some 45-odd years ago. I don’t know why my mom saved these and not ones from other years, but I’m glad I have them.

I thought it would be nice to scan them for posterity, since they’re so old-fashioned. Not a Disney character among them! (click to enlarge)