THEY'RE BACK!!!!

LIZARD COUNTER:  21 

True to blogger form, it will not let me upload pictures, only videos.  They better get their act together before everyone flees the sinking ship!!!  

To start the day, I had a lovely picture of a dead lizard to show you.  Yes, that makes 21!!  This one was a breakfast special.  Oh the fun!!

The morning went by quickly as I raced off to Hilmar to have the last four veteran quilts quilted.  Of course I had to wash the dirt off the van windshield first so I could see.  True to my luck, I forgot to fully close the driver window.  There went 30 minutes drying up the interior.

On the way home I got diesel.  I'll wait to show you that picture until Blogger straightens up and flys right.

Backing into the back yard, I noticed I had forgotten to grab the camera from the night before.  I put a nice egg out for whoever might be interested.  At first it was Kitters.  I knew the egg I put out was missing, and I thought it might have been her that took it.

NOPE!  THEY'RE BACK!!  The foxy twins are back in town checking out the grocery store.  Sorry kids, the store is closed except for one lonely egg.  It didn't take long for him to snag it.

Not long after, I discovered not one, but TWO were visiting.  I'm glad to see them back, but that's probably why the wild kitties have been few and far between.  I did notice last year however that the cats and the fox were in the same locale and not the least bit interested in each other.  At first sight, you know what I thought this was, right??

Oh so sadly, I spent the next FOUR HOURS ... a record ... at the accounting job, trying to teach the new gal how to pay bills online.  It takes forever when you first start because you have to input every name, address and account number, not to mention being extra careful to choose one of MANY accounts to take the money from.  

By the time we got done, I was exhausted.  I always am after a late night of Bingo!!

Today will be no better as I have that DMV appointment, followed up with a Trustee Meeting.  Let the good times roll!  That's a joke.  

Here's hoping Blogger gets back on track.  I'm tired of messing with them!!  I'm not sure if it's the new updates they are not compatible with or if they got hacked.  

Anyhoo .... see you tomorrow, God willing and the creek don't rise!!

BINGO IS HERE ONCE AGAIN

 

OH WHAT A BEAUTIFUL MORNING .... oh what a beautiful DAY!!  Isn't there a song like that?  Well it really was a gorgeous cool morning, but I don't know what happened to the day.  We were cruising at 100 most of the afternoon and it's supposed to be up to 102 today.  Spring didn't last long at all!!

Watch Kitty kept watch the entire time.  Her face has finally filled out quite a bit from her starving stage.  She is soft as can be and spoiled rotten.  That little pink spot just makes you want to BOOP her nose.

So we got up .... milled around a bit and had coffee before chowing down on 1/4 of that egg and potato burrito I got.  I added a little ketchup for moisture.  Boy do I love this food.  Way back when I worked at the County, I used to buy three of them every morning for my "crew".  It was that or McDonalds egg McMuffin.  That's when things were CHEAP!!

After my wonderful cup of Joe, I surprised myself by actually going into the sewing room and cutting up the fabric for a ME quilt.  I even sewed one block which you can barely see on the directions.  That's a lot of piles of small pieces, so we shall see how it goes.

Time flies when you're having fun.  Lunch came around and I heated up the two chicken tacos I got.  This time I pulled all the lettuce off the top first.  They look nice, yeah?  By the time they were done, they fell to pieces.  I should have eaten just one they were so full of yummy chicken.  Now I was stuffed and miserable and heading to BINGO!!

I left Kitters sleeping in her spot on the bed.  She sheds a LOT and I am not a fan. Amazingly, she only sleeps on that pillow case.  And so I was off to help clean up after a big event so the kids could set up for bingo.

I should have taken a picture.  What a mess people leave when they don't have to clean it up themselves.  AND the amount of food wasted is epic.  What happened to the starving children of the world?  Many plates had huge untouched pieces of chicken that went in the trash.  They had to PAY for those meals, so I don't get it.  

Anyway, I scraped roughly 75 plates and kept 150 pieces of silverware from going in the trash.  At least I didn't have to do the dishes ... we have kids for that.

Here's the GOOD NEWS!  Upon the threat of the kitchen manager and myself quitting completely, we have now hired a REAL cook for the Bingo kitchen.  No, we are not going to make near as much money, but we don't have to worry about a volunteer not turning the gas off and the building exploding.  It was not a popular choice, but we won out.  

I talked to the kid and explained what we expected and how HE was the boss, not the bossy gal who he would be working with.  He's new to that experience, but he did great.  Sadly, he is on the list to become one of our next Sheriff Deputies, so we will have to find someone else before long.  

With having to pay wages in mind, I checked out the board, thinking of raising the prices a bit. We don't like to charge much so more people come to play Bingo.  I had it all figured out until the "boss" said he thought we should leave them alone.  Hey ... we are PAYING for a cook now!!!  That one is still up in the air.

Let the BINGO flaming arrows and pitchforks fly!!!  I worked the first two hours while waiting for my replacement.  She hasn't been here in awhile due to a misunderstanding ... she thought because I was training another spare person that she wasn't needed any more, even though I explained everything.  I just needed most of the night off to keep track in the kitchen.  

It all went well with the caller telling everyone OVER AND OVER to yell really loud.  If he doesn't hear you say bingo, you don't get the money.  Sure enough, one lady said bingo so quietly that NO ONE heard.  Someone next to her screamed it out, scaring everyone half to death.  Thanks to them, she got the money.  

It always amazes me who wins.  Those that pick through every single packet looking for their WINNING numbers .... they never seem to win.  I just grabbed 5 cards off the top for one girl and she won not once, but FOUR times.  You just never know!!!

Everything went well for the rest of the night.  I stayed in the kitchen, kept the girl at bay so the cook could COOK.  He did an EXCELLENT job ... double fried the fries (YUM) and cooked the burgers to perfection.  Not only that, but he cleaned the grill and the entire front before going down a checklist and turning everything off.  BOY HOWDY ... this kid is GOOD!!  The cherry on top was that we didn't have 11 cooked hotdogs left over to be thrown away at the end of the night.  

With all of our stress having flown out the window, the Kitchen Manager and I were ecstatic!!  I don't care if we don't make ANY money.  It's worth every penny!!

And so ended a long night of bingo.  My temp cashier was short $10.00.  Not surprising really.  A bank teller she is not!!  Do I care?  NOPE ... not one bit.  

Today I'm off to drop the quilts at the shop for quilting, followed by accounting work.  I hope you have a GREAT day!!!

GOOD DEED UNDONE

 It was a beautiful cool morning.  There's nothing better than opening the door wide, taking in a really deep breathe and then smelling DAIRY.  Those of you who know, know it well.  Frances knows!!  It all depends on how the wind blows around here.  There's garlic, onions, chicken manure on the orchards (the absolute worst), neighbors burning their trash ..... and DAIRY.  

It didn't seem to bother this guy at all, which is the reason I got scratched.  He likes to hang out in the mornings and is the cause of lots of yowling.

Kitters then runs out the back door, MAD, as you can tell by her ears ... and surveys her territory.  

I got caught looking.  HOW DARE I!!  I snuck back in and closed the door.

It was baking time.  I preheated the oven to 500 degrees.  That is the problem.  I never know for sure exactly what temperature my oven is.  I've used three different gauges inside, and none of them seem to be correct.  

Having been dumped out onto parchment paper, it was ready for slicing, making the beautiful structure on top which never seems to appear on MY loaves.

It's dropped in the now scalding hot cast iron pot, covered and baked for 20 minutes.  Though it should bake at 450, I set the temperature for 445.  Lower, right?  WRONG!!  Not low enough.

Once the lid is removed, it is baked for another 20 minutes.  I've no idea what happened, but it is almost burned.  Oh it's edible ... the inside is fabulous, but the outside crust, not so much.  You can't tell here, but it is pretty black on one side.

I sliced it up, forgot to take pictures, and stuck it in the freezer.  The crumb is not as good as the previous loaf, though this time I followed the directions exactly.  C'est la vie.

I sat with Kitters for awhile, before coming up with a great idea to celebrate the holiday.  I would look on Facebook and find a few cottage bakeries selling their goods out of their house.  I would go to said house or houses and buy them out, just to surprise someone on Labor Day.

Off I went with a list, down our newly paved road.  For the last two weeks, I've had to navigate through the back side of my neighborhood just to get to a street not blocked by asphalt trucks.  Oooooohh it's so smooth to drive on!!!!

I got completely lost because my phone all of a sudden went ballistic and not only locked up, but all the icons changed to just words.  What the heck?  There must have been something there that scrambled everything.  That has never happened before.  It was just too weird.  

Three blocks over, my phone finally came back on and directed me to this address.  I had even stopped to pick up a bundle of cash.  This would be my good deed of the day.  I was so excited to see what they had for sale and to see their surprise.

NOTHING ... they had nothing.  They were closed up tight.  Gosh ... it's a holiday ... why aren't you taking advantage of that!!

I drove away, trying to think of somewhere else to go.  Ahhhhh the Mix Bakery!!  The best cupcakes in town.  CLOSED ... THEY WERE CLOSED.  Someone was telling me it was not the day for a good deed.

Totally frustrated, I stopped in at the smallest taco shop in town ... a tiny little drive through that I barely squeaked through with my truck.  I haven't ordered here in ages and really didn't know what to ask for.

So here we have 5 taquitos smothered in guacamole and lettuce, with rice and beans ... one HUGE egg and potato burrito and two crispy tacos.  Yikes ... it came to $40.00.  I gave them a HUGE tip and told him it was for being open on a day everyone else was closed.  It's a small family owned place where the entire family works.  They deserve it.  Too bad bakery .... too bad.

I ate three of the taquitos, but nothing else.  Boy did they fill me up fast!!  Too sad the bakery was not open ... they could have taken advantage of everyone else being off work for the day.

And so my good deed was undone and done again!!  Maybe next time home bakery ... maybe next time.

My sweet boy would have made it all better had he still been here when I got home.  I love Mexican food, but not near as much as I love this guy.

DON'T LOOK ... THERE'S BLOOD!

 

 THIS THING IS IN TROUBLE!!!  I knew there was a reason I always liked dogs better than cats.

She is constantly parked by the front door, looking out the window for anything that resembles another cat.  She was yowling, so I went to look see.  It was dark and I stepped on her tail, whereupon she scratched the you-know-what out of me!  I screamed ..... she ran!!!  DON'T DO THAT!!!

I stuck my leg in the bathtub, scrubbed and scrubbed with soap and water, doused it with alcohol and a little hydrogen peroxide just for good luck.  I have since smothered it in Neosporin every hour.  I don't want to end up with an infection up to my knee!!!  Yes it's about 3" long, but to be honest, I can't feel it much any more.  Lucky for her!!!

To get my mind off it, I went for a run.  If nothing else, it helped it bleed all the coodies out.  I really wasn't feel the running part, so I just went slow for not quite 2 miles.  

I was back in time to get the sandwich bread loaf in the oven.  Yes, it looks terrible.  I cut the paper off, placed another baking pan over it for a lid and wrapped it in foil.  

Thirty five minutes later I took the other pan off the top and stuck it back in for another ten minutes.  Isn't she beautiful?????

Oh my gosh, I was so excited this actually turned out and had pretty good crumb.  That means there are not a lot of BIG holes and the texture is not terrible.  Hey, it's my first loaf and I made one big mistake when panning it.  I was jumping up and down it turned out this good.

I toasted up that first piece .... yes, a little too long because I got distracted .... and smothered it in butter.  It was WONDERFUL!!  

I sliced up the rest, but admit I didn't do a very good job.  It's quite soft and hard to slice, even with the wooden contraption.  I tried the other spinning blade, but again, it was too soft.  This all went in the freezer.

HAPPY LABOR DAY!!  Time for more MEN'S work!  Not this one exactly ... I put my XMD sticker on the van.  That stands for Explorers of the Mojave Desert.  There are quite a few of us out there and on Facebook.  A really great group of folks.  The other one shows a scuba diver is on board.

THIS was the Men's Work, in honor of LABOR DAY.  This light on the front of my truck SHOULD look like ...................

THIS one.  I looked in the door where I keep these things and grabbed a new bulb.  I took the entire thing apart, but for the life of me I could not get the bulb into the socket.  It's a push in thing that didn't fit.  Apparently these are NOT the right bulbs.  RATS!!  I put the thing back together and will head to a store today, which will probably be closed since it's a holiday.  Just my luck!!

You knew you would be seeing this.  A grilled cheese with my new loaf of bread.  It was WAY too much for me to eat, but was quite tasty.  Here's the thing I discovered.  If you only eat sourdough bread, it doesn't taste as much like sourdough as if you only ate it only once a week.  I guess you get used to the flavor.  It's also interesting that this homemade bread does not bother my stomach one bit.

The entire rest of the day was spent making a loaf of onion sourdough.  Mix, rest, fold, rest, fold, rest ... you get the picture.  After ten hours, this was the last rest before she went in the fridge for the night. I'll bake it off this morning.

I have finally eaten all the Caramel Popcorn and am on to the Kettle Corn.  Thank you Scouts of America for the sweet treat, even if it did cost me $20.00 a bag.  I hope the little girl won big with her sales.

It's time to bake the bread, so I'll get to it.  I hope everyone has a nice relaxing COOL Labor Day.  We are supposed to celebrate it, not actually LABOR on this day.  So have a good one!!!

HURRY UP AND WAIT!

 No lizard counter for two days.  I'm hoping that's a good sign.

It was a gorgeous morning with the moon shining high in the sky.  Cool was the name of the game until about noon when it began to heat up.  I was a lazy bum this morning and spent NO time running OR walking.  It's time for sourdough!!

It takes a lot of stuff to get this going.  First you take the sourdough starter out of the fridge and feed it flour and water in specific portions.  Everything has to be weighed.  This happened at 7:00 in the morning.  No one ever said this was a FAST hobby.

The starter sits on the counter until it doubles (or more), before it can be mixed with the other ingredients.  That takes 4 to 12 hours.  On this day, 6.5 hours.

While I waited for that, and it was still cool, I began the tire game.  Good grief ... ladies, this is what MEN are for.  It took forever because the valve stems are not all accessible.  I increased the pressure on the front from 61 to 65 pounds.  The tires are rated for 80, so I should be just fine.

The problem are THESE valve stems.  This is for the inside dually.  It's made of rubber and flexible.  Just try sticking something on the end of that and pressing in.  The first time I let out more air than I put in.  

You would think the OUTSIDE dually would be easy peasy.  Umm NO!  Because they faced it the wrong direction and put a tiny little cap on that you cannot get your fingers on through the little hole.  What a pain THAT was.  

And of course you cannot FILL the air valve stem unless you happen to have a reversing whatchacallit.  Luckily I do.  It took some wrangling, but I finally got it done.  The back gets 60 pounds each per the door sticker.  Also rated at 80 psi, maybe I should put a little more in when I'm full of water.

In case you were wondering what I use to air tires up, this is my usual choice.  I have a huge air compressor, but it is too cumbersome to move around.  I actually carried this one in my Class A for its entire life.  Never needed it, but I carried it anyway.  Now they have hand held gizmos, though I'm not sure how they work.

With the starter finally at the perfect stage, I poured it in a bowl and added water, maple syrup, avocado oil, flour and salt.  I'm actually making sourdough sandwich bread.  It's my first try, so we shall see how it goes.  After three stretches with 30 minutes of rest in between because it's just SO taxing ..... it will now sit and "fluff up".  Once that is done, it will go in the pan and into the fridge overnight.  Like I said, this is an all day project.  Baking takes place the next day.

While the bread did its thing, it's a hurry up and wait process, I was bored to tears.  Here's Kitters giving me her early morning pats on the hand .... SCRATCH MY HEAD MOM!!  Yes, she got a little carried away, but stopped short of the whack she knows is coming if she put those claws out.  I'm pretty sure that's how I got that finger infection.

Back to the bread, here we are waiting for it to rise.  How much you ask?  I have no idea.  Nowhere does it say how long to let it sit.  Online, they came up with this idea.  You put a small piece in a glass of water.  When it rises to the top, your bread rising is done.  It never did rise to the top of the glass.  UH OH!  

And so I took it out of the bowl, threw it around a bit on the counter, pulled, pushed and shaped it completely wrong according to the directions I read later.  Into the fridge it went until this morning.  Now I think it's WAY too over proofed and will turn out ten inches high with too many holes.  This sourdough stuff is hard to learn!!

And so I will say Happy Labor Day Weekend with a beautiful sunset from the Mojave Desert because we don't seem to be having any here.

Here's my boy once again, needing a haircut, just getting caught lying on TOP of the high back of the couch.  I was always afraid he would fall off, but he never did.

BLOGGER WORKS AGAIN

 I can hear everyone clapping this morning!!  Blogger will now let you post comments again.  When it first started happening, it didn't seem to affect me ..... until it did.  I checked first thing this morning and it is working once again.  So please ... comment away.  Those of us who write this crazy stuff every day truly appreciate your words!!  It keeps us in contact with the outside world!

It was a lovely dark morning when I took this picture.  The moon is almost straight overhead.  I'm guessing that sailor's warning thing has to do with the clouds bringing bad weather, but it sure is pretty over here in the valley.  Clouds mean cooler weather for us.

I was off to accounting once again.  I know .... on a FRIDAY?  They were anxious to get on the Bill Pay site and not pay for checks any more.  I had a little trouble getting started, since every bank seems to have a different Bill Pay company with different ways of doing things.  I don't like this one at all.  It's so tiny on your screen that you can easily make mistakes.  PLUS it takes TEN DAYS to get a check out if not done electronically.  We'll see how it goes.

On the way back home, since I have to take the long way around due to repaving our road, I cut through a couple of orchards.  It pays to have been a kid on a horse roaming the countryside.  Harvesting is in full swing, meaning we all try to stay inside so as not to breathe in all the dust from sweeping the sandy soil.

For those not familiar with this, they have a machine that goes down the rows, grabs the trunk of the tree and shakes it to death.  It's kind of fun to watch.  The nuts fall to the ground, but they then have to be swept up and collected by another machine.  Many have tried shaking them into big canvas sheets, but it never seems to work as well.  The dust from sweeping is epic, sometimes even closing down the roads.

The trailers go to one of just a few processors located here, who sell them to Blue Diamond or whoever, for hulling and packaging.  VOILA!!  You get almonds in a can.

Then it was off to the lodge to discuss all things Bingo Kitchen.  We've been having problems getting volunteers to cook.  I wouldn't mind doing it since you get off EARLIER than I do at the cash register, but alas, there is no one to take over the register.  Maybe that's a good thing.  I think we are going to have to actually PAY someone to do it.

By 3:00, I was home again.  I checked on my ant colonies, to find them pretty quiet, so I proceeded to sprinkler MORE of that powder stuff over every ant hill I could find.  They didn't like it one bit.  Too bad, so sad.  Go somewhere else!!!

That's when I heard the doorbell.  It is not a good thing when Nancy sits home for several hours with phone in hand.  There are too many things I find I can't live without, meaning LOTS of deliveries.  Somehow my tire pressure gauges disappeared.  I had not one, but TWO very expensive ones, which are no longer in the vehicles.  I ordered two of these, and they work really well.  Easy to use and no guessing.   I'll use this one when I put a little more air in the van tires.

I have also been noticing the angle of the sun has been hitting my tires on one side.  I know, I should have ordered WHITE.  I wasn't thinking about the sun heating up the black ones.  Will it make it worse?  They don't cover the back side at all and the sun only hits it in the morning.

And then there's the sourdough.  I've picked up a couple of things to make it easier, and hoped this lightweight steel pot would be better than my very heavy cast iron, especially since this is what one of the best Sourdough teachers uses.  

Ummmm that would be a NO.  It's WAY too big.  And it says to use in "moderate" heat, so how is it going to work in a 500 degree oven?  Sadly, this is a return.

That was it ... my entire day wasted on accounting work, with a little Christmas thrown in at the end.  Amazon has turned into Santa Claus for me!!!

On today's menu is sourdough sandwich bread, followed up with bagels.  Not sure I'm going to have enough time to do both, but we shall see.  The best thing about making your own bread is you can slice it thinner ... plus there's that thing about all the preservatives and crazy things they add that I don't.

On another note, I don't think I'm ready for another puppy, so I told my friend I was having second thoughts.  I'm hoping not to offend her, but I'm gone too many hours too many days to be potty training a puppy, let alone the fact that it would be left completely alone all day long and probably killed by the cat.

 Yes, I'm still missing this little face so much.