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But damn I’m ready for warmer weather. Not sure what it is this year, but I have just not been in the mood for the below freezing weather. Today for example, we’ve had sun, snow, more sun, more snow and it never got above 31F. Brrrr…..As it is, we started a fire at 2pm.
Meanwhile, we are working on the business plan yet again. Dan has done the financial data and I’ve done the narrative. I’m seeing business plans in my sleep.
At least I’m not outside shoveling snow.
This week has been frigid! 30+ degrees colder than normal. We got 6 inches of snow on Sunday and not a lot of it has melted, because it has been so cold. -10 Monday night. 4 last night and right now at nearly 2pm, it is just barely 35 outside. BRRRR!!!!! Only good thing is that my parents bought us half a cord of wood. Otherwise, I’d be in bed!
Last week was hectic. We took a trip to Trinidad and visited with Economic Development and the local Chamber of Commerce. Depending on how a meeting goes tomorrow, we may be changing our business plans for 2011. Exciting and nerve wracking all at the same time.
This week isn’t much slower paced either. Lots of work stuff, and Dan had to go to Denver for some Workforce stuff. He will be home tonight. Oh, and to top it off, Ian’s truck hates me. It died on my half way to the school board meeting last night. I left it there, as I couldn’t get it started. I had to walk home from the meeting. BRRRRR!!! Dan gets to deal with it when he comes home. Not exactly what I would have wanted, but… oh well.
As I said, we have a meeting in Trinidad tomorrow, Dan has two computer jobs and on Monday we take Morgan up to Fountain Valley School for an introduction day. It should be interesting. There is some other stuff next week too, but I have to get it all down on the calendar. I just hope it warms up soon.
Oh my gods it is cold!
Last night when we went to bed it was -2F outside. We stayed up long enough to welcome in the new year and then crawled in bed! Hot water bottles are a blessing. This morning when we got up it was 30F in the house. BRRRRrrrrrRRRRrrrrrr!
We started a fire and turned up the electrical heaters and by 5pm, we got the house up to 50F. (16F outside) This happened just in time for the couple from Falcon to come meet Spike. They came in and met him and decided that they would take him home. I hope that all works well for Spike!
I made pinto bean soup for dinner. The ham bone from Yule dinner is cooking away in it, and will be Brandy’s as a treat. Now to decide whether to make corn bread or just heat up tortillas.
I’m waiting for that heatwave of 46F tomorrow!!!
After the hectic pace of last week and a weekend spent in Littleton, my brain refuses to get online. sigh.
Friday morning we left early for the Denver Metro Area. Our first stop around noon was our hotel. It was the Hilton Garden Inn. Oh my gods, what a cluster F&)(c(*)(*!!! We booked the room through Priceline.com. Paid for it on December 6th. This is rather normal for us, as we do our best to get a good deal on a room. And to be honest, we’ve been going to Denver a lot lately on business. We started checking in when the clerk asked for payment, and refused to register us. We explained that we had paid on line over two weeks previous. “Sorry, we never do it that way”, was her line. That started a 90 minute disagreement. We had proof that we’d paid online. Emails, bank statement, etc. She wouldn’t budge. We asked for the manager. “Sorry, he’s gone for the holidays”. Grrrrr….. So, we paid again. This stay had just hit the $200+ mark. We normally pay about $80. Her only consolation was that she gave us tickets for breakfast, as they don’t do a free one. Whee…. $40 worth of breakfasts. We were not impressed.
However, the disagreement had taken so long that we left without ever going up to the room. Instead, we went straight to David and Mari’s house. We had cooled off a bit on the drive over and spending time with David and Mari mellowed us right out. We chatted about knitting while Dan worked on Mari’s laptop. Around 3:45 we had to head out the door in order to be to my sister’s house on time for dinner. Lots of hugs and kisses and promises to be back soon. 🙂
We made it to my sister’s house in 32 minutes. Not bad for across town at the beginning of rush hour on Christmas Eve. Dinner was deli stuff, beer, wine and …drumroll… Cheesecake!!!! Now, you have to understand that I can’t eat dairy of any kind. However, my clever sister Lori made me a SOY cheesecake using a Martha Stewart recipe! Oh my gods it was good. We ate until we were ready to burst and then spent lots of time looking at old pictures that my Dad took. It was a really good evening.
We went back to the hotel, which was an alright room, but not as good as others we have stayed at. We had a cup of tea, a shower and then crawled in bed. The fridge kicked on every 30 minutes with enough noise to wake us up. We tried to sleep in to make up for various long nights and it didn’t work. Between the noisy fridge and a very hard bed, neither of us slept well. We were up by 8am. We got dressed and headed down to breakfast. That was nice. A buffet of fruit, pastries, cereals, and eggs/meat to order. We had omelets, fruit, juice and coffee. Afterwards we headed to Lori’s house in Littleton.
Lori’s was a beehive of activity. Bill was working the smoker while Lori, Mom, Dan and I worked on the rest of the feast. Dad was being a holiday paparazzi taking photos like mad. 🙂 Maybe that should have been Papa-razzi. 🙂 Lori was doing her best to see how many times she could put rabbit ears behind people’s heads.
We opened presents before lunch. Everyone liked the hats I made. I was a bit nervous that Sean wouldn’t care for a lime green polar fleece hat, but he liked it. Mom and Dad loved their book. Dan got Kobolt tools and a tiny pair of vice grips. I got a beautiful Talavera serving bowl. Dad of course took more pictures
Around 3:30pm, we sat down to a dinner of barbecued smoked pork, beef tenderloin, grilled chicken, potatoes au gratin, sweet potato casserole, home made bread, green beens and hominy, and cranberry chutney. It was heavenly. Once again, ate way too much. And yes, I had another piece of the cheesecake as well as a slice of the orange cake that Lori made. Dad took pictures at meal time and had Dan take some too, so that everyone would be in the pictures.
In an effort to not explode, Dan and I went for a walk around my old neighborhood. We went down to the Sundial/Rose Garden and then to Sternes Park. We scared the geese into the lake and had a good time. When we got back, Lori had a game for us to play… Apples to Apples. It was fun, and I won twice. LOL. Afterwards we watched the last quarter of the Dallas Cowboys and Arizona Cardinals football game. It was really good. However, it was late and we were all sleepy. We said our goodbyes and headed back to the hotel. I will have to return a plate to Lori as I have the last of the cheesecake!!!
When we got back to the hotel, I went to make a cup of tea. No tea cups, no spoon. We looked everywhere. Everything else was where we had left it, but not the tea cups. I went down to the desk and complained. Okay, I stormed down to the desk and growled. The clerk blinked, stammered and went to see if our cups were in the kitchen. He found them and our spoon. His explanation for the removal of our cups were that they looked like the hotel dishes… WRONG. Sorry, Walmart gold and brown cups with a leaf pattern on them and a 1960’s spoon do not look like industrial silverware and Black cups and White plates. GRRRRRrrrr….. We were not pleased. Oh, and Dan figured out what was going on with the fridge. When they put it in the little cupboard, they forgot to tighten down the board that holds it in place and keeps it from vibrating out of the cupboard. He tightened it up and it was quiet. Sigh… So, we washed our cups, had tea and watched the second Mummy movie with Brendan Fraser.
Next morning, we did sleep in a bit, but were still down in time for breakfast. That bed was way too hard to be comfortable!!! We packed up and left by 11am. Home to Walsenburg by 2pm. I swear that there were spy cameras, because we no sooner walked in than the phone started ringing. We finally got to return the truck to Dad around 3pm. We had dinner at Subway, because neither of us wanted to cook. We cleaned up the Christmas stuff, and unpacked from the trip. After that, Dan did some work and I played around on the computer. We were so tired, that we crawled into bed by 9.
And now for a little Christmas past…
We got about 6 inches of the stuff by morning. Morgan was disappointed that school was not canceled. She had great hopes of watching Babylon 5. Oh well.
Here are some pictures. The cat is one of the ferals we call Red Tom. The rest were taken from the top of the stairs or on the sidewalk.Dan of course is doing the shovel work.
Not what you think! Geeze some people have dirty minds!
It finally snowed. So, none of us have felt like going outside. Not even Brandy.
So, today was rearrange the furniture day. We did this 6-8 months ago, and I had one plan and Dan had another. Guys won that time. This time, we did what I suggested a while back. I think it looks good. Dan is happy. The house looks much more open.
Geeze! I keep waiting for life to slow down. Guess that won’t happen any time soon. Last week was busy with cooking more pies than I ever want to do again. At work I did 46 pecan tartlets, 4 pumpkin, 3 coconut cream, two pecan pies and one chocolate cake. Oh, and I helped with about 15 more pumpkin pies.
Plus, I had my baking to do on the day. We had roast pork with green chilies and garlic, stuffing, sweet potatoes with pecan crumble on top, brussles sprouts, green chile relish, and pecan pie for desert. Yum.
We also took care of my parents cat Elway, did two computer jobs -one of which involved a trip to Denver and back in a day- and all the normal everyday stuff.
I thought this week would be quiet. However, for a Monday, it was hell. Woke up sick. It snowed And…. At 6pm, Brandy went charging out the back door to defend Ian and Emma against…. a skunk. She got it full in the face at close range. Awwwwgh!!!! Two hours, hydrogen peroxide, baking soda and VO5 shampoo, lots of water and towels and she smells better. Granted, the house still stinks. Gaaaahhh!!!
Tomorrow I have a school board meeting to cover and then Wednesday thru Saturday we will be gone. What a week.
Although my birthday was last week, my presents arrived a little later. Thursday night, a big box arrived. Dan gave me the box and smiled. Opening it, I found a really cool garden tool set with seat. 🙂 Of course it was snowing, but… I will use it as soon as I can. 🙂
Then we went off to Denver on Sunday. We got to see my friends Mari and David. I haven’t seen them in about 6 years. They had never met Dan either. We had a great visit. Our hotel was very nice too. The best bit of course is always the long soak in the tub! Monday morning, we headed for the Federal Center to get USGS maps for my Dad. He is teaching a map course. We stopped at Isis, but the guy who buys books wasn’t in. Oh well. We had a coffee at Starbucks and headed to our computer client. Our client had gotten her new printer and digital camera. The printer is one of those all in ones that does everything except wash the windows. 🙂 It is a really fantastic and we will be buying one for the business. The digital camera is very nice too.
Afterwards, we headed for Pueblo where we met with another client. Or, at least Dan did. I had an asthma attack, so I stayed in the warm car. It was snowing. Once he helped her find a computer, we went to Bingo Burger for dinner. Yum!!! Once again, I had the lamb burger.
The drive home was okay. Some light snow, a bit of ice, and not much else. Dan told me to go straight in, and that he’d unload the truck, because of the cold and my asthma. I walked in and what did I see? A box from Dell! My other prezzie had arrived. I am now the happy owner of a Dell Inspiron 1545. I opened it up and played with it for a bit. Windows 7 is okay, but I told Dan he could load Ubuntu 10.10 on it in the morning. He did. 🙂 
This is my old laptop. The CF 50 Panasonic Toughbook. It did pretty well, but it had major graphics card issues.
Here is my new computer. 🙂 I’m very happy. I just about have everything set up the way I need it. Now to just find time to do some writing!
We had snow yesterday. Today it is a whopping 48 degrees, and the sun we had lasted for about 45 minutes. Brrrr!!!
Yesterday, I headed down to the gardening meeting in hopes of planting my squash seeds. Half way there, it started graupling. By the time I got to the community center, there were snow snakes blowing across the parking lot. It was too cold to even pull weeds.
Today hasn’t been much better. I’m just glad that it was warm while we washed Nibbler. He stank so bad that we had to wash the pup! I did housework today as well. Mopped the floors which are still drying. It is just too damn cold to be May!
Oh well.
Two more assignments in the business class and I will be done. Huzzah! This has not been one of my favourite classes. I’m very tempted to switch online schools.
It is a WARM day today, which is a really nice change from the cold and Snow of yesterday. I have the doors and windows open and I’m letting the air warm the rest of the house. I’m also glad that it is warm, because Dan is working on my car yet again. sigh…
Today is Ian’s 20th birthday. He’d planned to go to Pueblo, but with the car not working right, he just hung around the house. I’m making him a carob mayo cake and barbecued beef for dinner.
Plus, tonight is the RE-1 school board meeting which will probably be a LONG meeting. The alcohol issue, drugs at school- Peakview, and a bomb scare at the high school. Not exactly what most school districts want just before the end of school. We had an irate member of the public try and tell me how bad Morgan’s school was too, because Gardner was letting students shadow at both RE-1’s high school and Re-2’s. Gee, where has he been for the last 20 years? Oh well. It should be interesting.
We went to Walsenburg lumber and got glass, caulking wood putty and sandpaper so I can fix the back window and my dresser. Wheeeeee!!! I got a new story up too. I’ve managed just about a story a day on that blog. Also got a power point presentation done yesterday for college. Here’s hoping the professor reads and grades the right one this time. Yes, I’m still irritated over that.
