Mosaic Mom

Please pray for our friends Jimmy and June who live(d) in Metairie, Louisiana. That's right outside of New Orleans. No doubt they were hit hard by Hurricane Katrine. Hope to hear news of them soon.

Also we are just beginning to get reports that the nursery businesses in South Florida were also hit hard. This will affect friends and business colleagues of ours, too.

Here is another of the Art Cars. Love the lips!
Notice how thin the crowd was. It was/is blistering hot. We are at 51 days over 90 now and no relief in sight!

New meaning to the concept "Rat Bike"...

Yesterday's temperature was 93 degrees so the new record is 48 days above 90 and counting.
It was so hot at the Art Car Show that I ducked into a store just to cool off. I spied this. I had never tried Birch Beer so I bought one.
It was delicious. Like Root Beer but sweeter. Was it more vanilla or more anise? Not sure but it was tasty.

Here's a car for Neppy to drive to work on her daily commute on I4...

It's a record! According to the weather wonks, we have had 47 straight days above 90 degree heat. This breaks the old record set in 1981. Today they were predicting a chilly 89 degrees what with the clouds from Katrina. However the Hurricane moved west, the sun is sizzling here and it looks like we're in for day 48.

I am going to brave said temperatures and go over to the Art Car fest this afternoon. Will have some photos to post later.

I felt really, really bad for not traveling out of state to attend my Aunt Jo’s Birthday party, but in the 27 years I’ve lived here, if memory serves me correctly, there is always a hurricane the week of August 24th. This year is the same.

Hurricane Katrine has sprung up and will hit Florida tomorrow. It is supposed to run from Miami over to Tampa then cut back from Tampa through Orlando to Jacksonville. Talk about getting scoured! We are in for some rain.

I will spend today getting gas and maybe check out Publix. They are having a Buy 1 Get 1 Free Sale on pork n beans. Ragu is on sale and so are pineapples. But if the parking lot is full, I’m just going to ditch. We’ve got enough dried beans.

An effect of last year’s hurricanes is Termites. Lots of trees and branches fell last season, so it was a feast for them.

There are swarms of them at the moment. They come in the house at night, flying towards the light. Because we have pest control service, they are dying, but I will have the bug man check extra in September.

Plant Daddy and I have been married 26 years! Yay!

Gonna go to Lobster Rouge...gonna eat coconut shrimp....Yay!

I will always remember happy summer days picking blackberries with Aunt Jo and my Pennsylvania cousins! That was great fun.

I will mosaic again when the temperature in the studio falls below 90 degrees. That is all.

You have noticed that there is a lack of mosaics going on here at Mosaic Mom's. It's the heat.

In five of the last 6 days, temperature records have been broken. It's been in the upper 90's every day. Today the weather wonks say it will cool off to an astonishingly cool 94 !

I am not even going outside these days. Except for quick forays to the mailbox, laundry room and freezer room. I pretend it is mid-January in Minnesota and I am snowed in. That makes the cabin isolation a little more bearable. I draw the curtains against the heat and pray the power (A/C) doesn't fail.

We are swimming a lot, trying to water the newly planted landscape in the early morning or in the evening, but other than that...nothing, nyet, nein, there is no good reason to be outside.

The odd thing too is that this is the first time in 27 years that Plant Daddy and I have a wedding anniversary coming up without an active hurricane in the Atlantic!Wierd weather.

This is not my back yard. I borrowed this picture from another site.Just call me Goldilocks.

Last night the weather finally cooled off a little so I decided to walk a lap around the field. I got about half way and smelled something really foul and musty. I figured the bear was sleeping in one of our oak trees. I was scared of meeting up with Mr. Bear so I walked really really fast.
I came around the corner though and found the source of the smell. Our neighbor is fertilizing his hay field. What a relief! No Bear.
But if it doesn't rain soon all that fertilizer is going to burn up the pasture grass.

This notice was stuffed in our mailbox yesterday....


Warning
Black Bear In Area

We have had sighting at the exterminating company building area, the Diner, and on North Drive. He is moving! He has been seen in yards and on front porches. This bear has a beautiful black coat and a radio collar around its neck. Sightings are at night or early morning.

The Wildlife people say we should create a less bear friendly area: Do not put any garbage or garbage cans outside. Do not have any cat or pet food outside. Remove all bird feeders from your yard. Do not add to your compost piles. It has come to our attention that people are feeding and leaving food outside for raccoons. This is against the law. They carry rabies and the food is easy pickings for the bear.

If the bear does not have a food source, it will eventually wander away. Bears are basically lazy and will eat food that is easy for them to get. These Florida Black Bears are apparently non-aggressive, but be cautious, as you would with any wild animal.

The issue of at least a half-dozen cats disappearing lately- Susan at Wild Life said most likely it is either a bobcat or coyote disposing of them.

Please pass this information to all your neighbors, as everyone does not have a computer.

Wild Life will relocate bears only as a last resort.

Report bear sightings to Wild Life. This is going to take a 100% effort to discourage this bear.

I am reading Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov. This is the first paragraph…

“…Professor Timofey Pnin. Ideally bald, sun-tanned, and clean shaven, he began rather impressively with that great brown dome of his, tortoise shell glasses (masking an infantile absence of eyebrows), apish upper lip, thick neck, and strong-man torso in a tightish tweed coat, but ended, somewhat disappointingly, in a pair of spindly legs (now flannelled and crossed) and frail looking almost feminine feet.”

Oh my god! It’s a description of someone I know!!

Some people read this blog looking for mosaics. But mostly only my family reads this blog. So this is for family...

There is some wierd e mail thing, probably a virus. You might get an e mail that lists the same last name...so it looks legit. It looks like it is from me.

You can open it to the first page but then you notice that the server address is wrong. I have not changed servers. My address is still the same. Delete anything that says "telus". It isn't me.

The sinuses got really really over the line bad last week, so I actually went to the clinic last Thursday. They gave me a bunch of pills...tan pills, blue pills, spray stuff...Nothing is working.

Someone over the weekend told me he had a friend who , like me, has not been free of sinus problems since the hurricane. This guy packed up and left the state.

Some days, that sounds like a great idea. But I really think of Florida as home. Don't want to move anywhere else. So I guess I'll just keep hoping for an early freeze this fall.

They got the pineapple I had been growing since January.

As you know, Mom has a bad case of CRS disease...(Can't remember shit).

I walked into the studio this morning to find that I'd left for lunch yesterday and never washed up the grout leftover in the bucket.

Bye, Bye nice bucket. Bye, Bye nice stir spoon.

I am so happy to report that...Yes, Casey got the case of Ramen Noodles! Yay!

I am happy to report that we rounded up the stranger cat, named him "Elvis" and found him a new home! Yay!

I still have a space alien baby growing in my left nostril, but I got a new bottle of spray and shrunk it...as in "I'm melting...nargh!"

My thumb is still bleeding but I was well enough to grout today. Yay!

I do not have a prion disease, so I read an article about infectious blue-green algae diseases just in case.

I had a thought about the class of La Grange High School 1970 all getting together to make a mosaic. Then I thought the better of it. I think I'll skip the reunion.

As for the cost of gas, I'll order seeds from the seed catalog and plan on going to town for shopping once a week! Back to the Land! What's old is new again.

Ten Things to Worry About Today

1. Ramen Noodles...Did Casey get the case of Ramen Noodles? Did he get the cash inside the case of Ramen Noodles? Should I have sent Mac and Cheeze instead?

2, Coyotes...Did a coyote eat Maggie?

3. Stranger Cat... There's a stranger cat lurking about, eating all Zeus's food. Will he beat Zeus up? Did stranger cat kill Maggie?

4. Carpenter ants...There are a lot of them in the bathroom. Will the shower fall in one morning as I'm sudsing my hair?

5. Prions..Will I die of a prion disease?

6. Will the tip of my thumb fall off? It was doing so much better before I applied mortar this afternoon. Now it is all shrivelly.

7. Will George ever get any of my messages and call me?

8. Should I go to my High School Reunion?

9. Could I afford the gas to go to my high school reunion?

10. Is there a space alien baby growing in my nose or did I just get a snoot full of mortar again today? Darn that hurts.

Here is where I had lunch with Suzy, Linda, Pat and Wanda today. We all had the chicken salad but god different dressings on the side. I got Shallot Vinegarette. It was passable, but the Poppy Seed that Wanda got looked great.

Then we went upstairs to check out the room where Suzy's daughter, Jeanine, will have the wedding reception. It is going to be nice. A long narrow room, but the lay out for the buffet and guest reception will be excellent.

Then I went to Lowe's to get a bag of mortar. I'm making a driveway marker rock.

Went to Publix for potatoes. Went to Discount Auto store for air freshner. Plant Daddy's truck was smelling pretty fishy but now it smells like rosebuds! Do you think he'll like that?

It has been tricky using the wet saw one handed this week. With my left thumb out of commission, I have to hold and push with my right hand only. Not the smartest thing I've ever done.

Well, it got worse. Today while helping Plant Daddy install irrigation hose in the new beds, I sliced the pointer finger on my right hand. Nargh!

I am going to be severely limited for a while. But what's scary it accidents happen in 3's. What's next? My toes? Yikes!

My thumb is healing. It looks like the tip might fall off, but what the hey, it doesn't hurt, so I don't care.

I couldn't mosaic yesterday so I cleaned out my office. I found some old letters that made me laugh.

One was from my college buddy, Terrie Jarret Henderson. She became a teacher and as a hobby she is a Story Teller. You know, dresses up and entertains kids. Love it.

The other was a poem about spouse abuse by my Junior High School buddy, Hazel Voorhis Smith Glover Ray. She became a priest. You know, dresses up, tells stories, and entertains kids.

On a sadder note, Mosaic Cat, Maggie is missing. She is very old and was hardly a peppy kitten.We have never had a pet go missing. Usually we find the body some where and can bury it in the rose garden/pet memorial cemetary. But we just can't find her anywhere. This is very sad. I keep opening the back door to see if she's returned to sitting on the hood of the car again.

There will be no mosaics for a while.

No washing dishes. No cooking.
No washing hair, showering, laundry.

No gardening.

Even typing the blog is dicey.

I had a little accident involving my left thumb and the weapon of mass destruction pictured below.
I was cutting packaging strips for the dog water stands and I slipped…Ouch!

Whoo! Hoo! She's 22.
Happy Happy Birthday to You,
Little Mind Escape!