Wordy Wednesday: {Dan's} Ugly Busted Toe

I was in the bathroom when I heard / felt a noise like something falling in the bedroom. I did not think much of it because no other sound came with the noise. When I came out, I discovered Dan somewhat curled up on the bed holding his foot. I immediately got concerned as I did not know what happened. He busted his toe while playing a game of "chase" with Abby Gail. I have to say the guy was extremely stoic when his banged his toe. I would have been yelling, screaming, hollering and crying....

Anyway, the game of "chase" usually involves me telling Abby that I am going to get her. She almost always gets excited with tail held high and starts running when I start going after her. She still has not gotten the clue to turn around and chase after me. However, she does turn around and playfully "tags" me on the foot most of the time.

By the way, this was a game I played as a child with my rotten yellow cat and he had it down to a T. We would chase one another for several laps before both of us would get tired and flop on the floor. Abby is the first cat that took to this game somewhat since the rotten yellow cat of my youth. All the other cats exhibited no interest in this game.

So, Dan apparently decided to give "chase" a try this past Sunday (November 13, 2105) and ran smack dab into a leftover piece of board in the bedroom from our remodeling efforts.

{November 14, 2015}

Needless to say, I do not think he will be playing "chase" again in the near future.

It does look a tad worse on this morning. It is dark all around including the bottom of the toe; but, the wound is healing nicely. (I am still helping him wrap up the toe with a bandage in the mornings.) I think the worst of it is over and it is just the healing process now.

Wordy Wednesday

Look! My Bruises Matches my Boots!

Ignore the old lady and focus on the bruises and the boots! This was taken on August 8, 2013 – three days after I became very sick. In spite of not feeling well, I saw the humor of my bruises matching my boots and had Dan take a picture for me. At least, I thought it was funny at the time. It is a girl thing, you know? Wanting something to match. Hey, at least something matched that day! Ha!

Looking at that picture now, I do not think it is so humorous. I think it is the bad memories of what went down at the time coloring my world. I am not going to make excuses for the way I looked (and dressed). It is what it is. Life does go on for the cats whether we feel good or not. I have always tried to make them happy by letting them go out every day (in the evenings) and this was my first time stepping outside since I "crashed". And besides, I mostly just sat there on the front steps while Dan monitored (went after) the cats.

PS: I am much better now; although, I still have my bad days once or twice a week. My health does seem to be slowly improving. At least, I am feeling more like myself most days. And, I actually went outside this morning to wander a bit in the yard and take pictures. My energy (and enthusiasm) is slowly coming back.

A Week in Pictures (#4)

Snout Nose Butterfly 10/14/2012

{To see a larger image, go here.}

While out “walking” Chessie late in the evening, I noticed a lot of these butterflies flittering about and I made Dan go get my camera and managed to snap a couple decent shots. These Snout Nose Butterflies are making their annual migration all over San Antonio – thousands upon thousands of them all heading somewhere in a northerly direction.

Tiny Pink Flower 10/15/2012

I was exploring outside in the morning and noticed this oddly curled petal flower. There were others that did not have curled petals. I am not sure if the flower was just opening or wilting; but, I found it really pretty and interesting.

Alternate view of the same flower:

Note: I could not decide which picture I should use. Dan liked the first and I liked the second. So, I decided to post both. Ha!

A View of some of our Land 10/16/2012

{To see a larger picture, go here.} This is land beside our house that is covered with lovely little yellow wildflowers. This viewpoint will be changing a tad in the future. I am planning to put gardening beds further on up on this spot. That big old brown round thing inside of the fence (near top left in picture) is actually a compost tumbler. This item most likely will be moved to be near the gardening beds. But first, landscaping plans need to be made and ironed out first before lifting a single finger. The white fencing will be done away with in the future as I am not a fan of that kind of fencing. Mold is already forming along one section that is in the front of the house as it is just cheap plastic/vinyl material. There is a section along the driveway that is just plain annoying. We are going to remove the sections of the fencing ourselves and then hire someone to remove the posts. We do what we can ourselves to cut costs.

Sticker Burrs 10/17/2012

{To see a bigger image, go here.}

These Sticker Burr plants are in huge clusters all over our property. We have a huge fight on our hands to get them gone.

Interesting Flowering Grass 10/18/2012

{To see a bigger image, go here.}

I have no clue to what kind of grass/plant this is; but, it sure does have some interesting flowers.

My Darling Brat, Gracie 10/19/2012

I was searching through some jeans and laying them on the bed to determine which ones I wanted to wear. I finally decided on a pair and then left leaving some jeans on the bed to head to an estate sale (which was a huge disappointment as it was more of a rummage sale). When I returned, I discovered my Gracie being a brat lying on a pair of jeans. I had to get the tripod because it was fairly dark in the room. Fortunately, Gracie doesn’t mind noise or the camera. She completely ignored me. After I took the pictures, I fussed at her; but, I pretty much let her sleep. Yes, I spoil her rotten.

Bark Scorpion 10/20/2012

Dan came in from outside and told me there was a Bark Scorpion on the driveway. I was surprised because they are usually not out in the daytime (it was still morning). Apparently, he/she was disturbed and came out of hiding near the detached garage. I quickly grabbed my camera to see if I can finally take some half-way decent pictures of one of these critters. I finally got somewhat decent pictures of a Bark Scorpion.

These things scare me half-to-death. Fortunately, I had on my snake proof boots on (because we were getting ready to mow the land), which made me feel somewhat brave. This one did not even stir. I thought it might be dead. But, Dan got a long thin piece of lumber and touched its tail and it scurried away. These things are lightning quick.

Bonus Picture: Sticker Burr Injury taken by Dan 10/14/2012

Sometimes there is the price to be paid for taking pictures out there on our land. As you already have seen, there are tons of annoying sticker burr plants around the property. I had slapped my leg hard in frustration and one of the “petals” with a kajillion sticker burrs happened to be resting on the leg of my jeans. Yeowch! I screamed bloody murder! Ha! In spite of the pain and immediate evidence of blood, I kept snapping because I wanted to get that one good shot of a Snout Nose butterfly. I counted ten little tiny wounds the next morning.

Photography, especially in nature, can be hazardous to your health. Ha!

Thursday's Thoughts

Let’s see, what happened since my last Thursday’s Post. I did not post one last Thursday because there was not much to say.

By the way, my husband, Dan, posted about the demo with pictures two weeks ago. I believe I neglected to tell y’all. Here is the post. You will find a picture of me hard at work with a jackhammer removing thinset.

On the weekend of July 14th and 15th:

• We met my niece and her friend at EZ Restaurant located at the Alamo Quarry Market. I really enjoyed the visit with them both. The restaurant is wonderful with absolutely delicious food. We plan to go there every time we go to the Quarry.


• Since we were at the Alamo Quarry Market, we did a little shopping at Amy’s Hallmark which was perfect timing because it was the first day of the Keepsake Ornament premiere. We collect the Lionel Train Series. And yes, I do believe we have all the trains pictured at the link.


• We also shopped at Whole Food Market – my favorite place to shop for a few grocery staples. I discovered the 365 brand of cookies that tastes just like Oreos! I think Dan was in heaven because he had not had any for eons. It’s his favorite cookie. Note: I do not buy Oreos due to the HFCS (also known as “corn sugar”) content. I do not need the temptation of Oreos lying around. But these 365 cookies, they are an acceptable compromise!


• We only had Sunday (July 15th) to work on the house. I vacuumed up most of the dust and bits of tile from the den and hallway while Dan ripped up the carpet and baseboard in the Master Bedroom. We then filled up the few gouges made from our lack of experience with the jackhammer.

Filled Gouges Drying

{Do you see eyes and hands or mittens? I did. Yes, I know. I am weird.}

{P.S. This is actually in a bedroom where we discovered gouges underneath the carpet.}
For the life of me, I cannot remember what events occurred during the week after the weekend of July 14th. I do know that I struggled with depression. When I get into this sad state of affairs, I often neglect things and cannot remember events unless I write them down. I have not been writing down stuff like I should in eons. I really should start doing this again.

Anyway, on the weekend of July 22nd and 23rd:

• I finished vacuuming up the dust Saturday morning in the bedrooms. I did not want to be tracking all that stuff onto the flooring underlayment and the flooring themselves. Dan helped me with the kitchen after he was done doing whatever he was doing. The dust (from destroying tile and thinset and pulling up carpet) is evil and insidious getting in every nook and cranny.


• We laid down the flooring underlayment in the den. It was slow going; but, we got most of it done. By the way, we have pictures of the process; but, they really belong to Dan. You will have to keep an eye on Dan’s blog for those pictures.


• We started putting down the flooring. Let me tell you, the beginning is always the slowest part of this job. Once the flooring was established, the process went quicker.

Here I am taking a break

• A word of advice: If you do flooring yourself and want the process to go real fast, pick out flooring that has the same length. The flooring we chose has varying lengths; so, the process of laying them down goes a little more slowly due to a variety of factors including avoiding joints of the floor boards from lining up.


• Dan did not have the proper tools to fussy cut the floor boards with, which kind of sort of slowed us down. Shhhh, do not tell him I said this. Ha! Actually, he reads this blog. So, he is going to find out and will probably give me a light whack. I think it will be worth it because it is the truth. Ha!

Dan the man working out what to cut where

• When we finished up on Sunday night, we were just under halfway done in the den. We have so much more to do! It is going to take longer than we estimated to get the flooring done. But, that is okay, we are most likely still saving money by doing it ourselves instead of having someone do it for us. Dan figured out that it would cost a minimum of $3,000.00 to get it all put down. Yikes! And then, you also have the pride factor of doing it all yourselves.


• Dan ended up with sore knees. He actually bought some knee pads Saturday evening. I already had some knee pads for doing basting (quilting) work on the floor which is hard on your knees. They do really save your knees and are wonderful items to have on hand.


• I did end up with sores on the back of my knees from the straps of the knee pads. They hurt really bad and I could not see them very well. Dan said they looked like sunburned or chaffed skin. I woke up Sunday night with a stinging type of pain. On Monday evening, I had Dan take a picture of the one on my right knee (which was the worst one) simply because I was dying to see what they were really looked like.

• I was surprised to see that they were not as bad as they felt. This made me feel better about the sores. In the meantime, I have been racking my brain trying to come up with some kind of "knee sock" to protect our skin from the straps as I really do not want to wear jeans. No solution yet!


• We had an A/C guy come out Tuesday morning (July 24th). Sometime Sunday, the A/C shut off and it got really hot! I commented to Dan that I was getting very hot. I did not understand it and was feeling sick from the heat. Dan discovered it was 84 degrees! Yikes! And, the A/C was not running. For a while, we could not figure it out. Dan called an A/C company and left a message. And then, I noticed something flashing on the thermostat. It turned out the batteries were dead. We replaced the batteries and the A/C kicked on approximately 5 or 10 minutes later. We talked and decided to have the A/C company come out anyway and do an inspection along with a consultation on the garage (because we are going to convert it into a studio in the future). Anyway, while Dan talked with the A/C man, I had fun puzzling out more flooring to put down.


• I have been doing boring stuff this week like washing clothes, sheets, dishes and whatnot. I am actually looking forward to Saturday!


• Piece,

Thursday's Thoughts

A lot has happened since my last Thursday's Thoughts post. By the way, I just reread that post and discovered a major flub. And yes, "flub" is a legit word. The writing error drove me batty and the perfectionist in me could not leave it alone. So, I ended up editing the post to correct the mistake.

Garner is All About the Frio River
We went camping at Garner. We were there for almost a week and had a wonderful time. There was family around and thus, things seemed more normal. Garner isn't Garner without family. I loved seeing every single one of them. I did have a meltdown on the first day when I saw my eldest brother exiting a path from the river while sitting at our campsite. At the time, he was the spitting image of my Dad and I miss him so much. But, life goes on, right? Right.

As soon as I find the time to go through the pictures I took, I will post them. The general and family pictures will be posted this blog. However, the flowers, bugs and more will most likely be posted on my Pictorial Reminiscence blog simply because I do not desire to overwhelm my readers with a deluge of pictures. I will put out announcement(s) pointing you over to the other blog whenever I post update(s).

When we left Garner, we practically did a 180° in focus. We looked forward to our new house and started making plans. We decided to put the garage conversion on hold due to a variety of reasons. The process of converting the garage will be a lot slower. I think we are just anxious to move out of this rental and into our own house.

So, we cemented some of our plans and went over to the house this past Saturday after renting jackhammer. By the way, we rented the jackhammer from Saturday morning to Monday morning for the price of one day's rental. This is an awesome savings in my book. Anyway, our goal was to rip up the tile from the living room, hallway and the closets along with all the carpets in the bedrooms in one weekend. By the way, we are leaving the tile in the kitchen and bathrooms.
Dan started the work in the hall closet Saturday after lunch. Whenever he took a break, I would take over the work. We finished the hallways and the closets (three in all) just before five o'clock. The carpet was pulled from Bedroom #1 and #2 Saturday evening. We never did get around to ripping up that carpet from the Master bedroom; but, pulling carpet is easy. We began ripping up the tile in the living room just after eight o'clock Sunday morning and finished just before three o'clock. And yes, we had lunch. It turned out I finished up with the last of the tiles. He started and I finished. I thought it was interesting, no? Anyway, both Dan and I were so happy. We decided to just clean up, pack and head on home.

The State of Things
Let me tell you, ripping up tile is hot brutal work. I have an enormous amount of respect for people who do this for a living and never ever will I criticize the cost of labor. It is well worth it to have someone do it for you! With that said, I have to say that there is a sense of pride and accomplishment for managing to complete this work ourselves. And, we saved megabucks.

Anyway, shall I list the minor causalities? No? Well, I am going to list them anyway. Ha!

• Dan pulled a stupid and scraped the top of his middle finger while shoving tile aside without his gloves. It was a bloody mess; but, not really a bad wound.


• When I first took over the jackhammer, I slipped and fell on my right knee receiving a very tiny wound from the broken up tiles. I thank God that I decided to wear jeans even though it was extremely hot (90°+ temps) because the injury could have been a lot worst without the jeans.


• Dan got a major blister on one of his palms.


• I got three major blisters -- one on each thumb and another on the side of my right heel. Only one of these blisters busted and, as a result, it became very painful.


• I banged up the side of my right knee (with the jackhammer) over time and, as result, there is now a lovely bruise.

The plan for this coming weekend is to rent a jackhammer again to get rid of the thinset, pull up the carpet from the Master bedroom, scrape up the glue from all the carpet in all three bedrooms, rip up the baseboards and throw it all into a dumpster that we hope to get from a trash company. We will see how well we will do this weekend.

We purchased the hardwood flooring this past Monday and will be picking them up Saturday morning. We will take them to the house and leave it behind to get acclimated in the house. We will purchase the necessary stuff to put down flooring next week. The ultimate goal is to start putting down the flooring in two weeks (July 7th).

Wish us luck!



{You might also be interested in reading Demolition Man.}

Wordy Wednesday

Warning: Do NOT advance to the bottom of this post if you get queasy at the sight of blood and/or wounds. Thank you.

On Thurday, January 19th, around 4 PM, I started making Mini Meatloaves for dinner. These have become a favorite that I/we make once or twice a month.

I started out with the cheese. We get a block of cheese and grate it instead of buying shredded cheese. It is so much better and more delicious if we grate the cheese ourselves. Even the mozzarella for our pizzas is bought by the block and grated ourselves. It melts better and you don't have all the additives that you get with package shredded cheese. (Some of the additives in those packages are to keep the cheese separate inside the package and can be avoided if we grate cheese ourselves).

You would have thought I learned my lesson over the fiasco on Christmas Eve using a Zester. But, nope. The Christmas Eve incident was minor compared to what I did last Thursday. From now on and forevermore, I will never touch a Microplane Zester again. It will either be a box type grater or I will use Dan as slave labor ahead of time to get what I need for my meals. Most likely, it will be the latter. Ha!

Anyway, It was a disaster of epic proportions. At least, it was in my mind. I immediately went to the bathroom to take care of the wound. it was bad enough that droplets of blood ended up on the floor and onto the paper towel roll.

I had read that applying ice to a wound is not a good thing. So, I immediately applied pressure with a paper towel after giving it a quick rinse. I knew it was too small of a wound to require emergency care. But, I could not get it to stop bleeding. After about five to ten minutes, I eventually gave in and sent a message to Dan. I also said to myself "frak this, I'm going to ice the wound and see if it helps."

Dan arrived about 25 minutes later and the wound was still bleeding something awful not to mention the pain was off the charts. It was all I could do to keep from breaking down and dissolving into a puddle of tears because I was in throes of both pain and panic.

Dan agreed with my internal assessment of the wound after taking a look. I continued to apply pressure for a long time. In the meantime, Dan took over the preparations for dinner.

After about three hours or so, it finally slowed to a bleeding ooze. I made Dan take a picture for posterity sake. These pictures was taken approximately four hours after I had hurt myself. Dan then bandaged it up for me with Neosporin + Pain Relief and a bandaid. The Neosporin was primarily used to prevent the bandaid from sticking to the wound. But, I've got to tell you that the Pain Relief part did its job. Within 30 minutes, the pain went from bad to just barely there.

I'm telling you that it was fun and games. NOT!

Snapshots of Christmas Break 2012: Part I

On December 22nd,

we went bowling.

"Whoa! The Dude can bowl" Ha!

My ungraceful self. I am not that fat. I was wearing a huge unflattering sweatshirt. Dan and I tied first game. I did lousy second game. And, I barely beat Dan the third game. I paid the price by being sore for a couple of days.

On December 23rd,

my sister-in-law made these delicious power cookies.

And, I practiced bokeh photography.

Not too bad. It is not quite what I want; but, I think I am getting better. Next time, I should get the perfect shot. Ha!

On December 24th,

I managed to zest my thumb.

Now, why in the world would I take a picture of my thumb? I actually was practicing with the macro lens using my thumb as the subject. I could not get the picture I wanted. Something to do with layers, lighting, and crap. This is actually a picture I converted to a black and white image and then bumped down the transparency to 50%. The result is not so bad if I say so myself.

Two men were trying to get a tape out of a ancient video camera and once they got it out, they attempted to fix the camera. I do not know if they succeeded or not.

This young man played babysitter for his older brother's two dogs.

This is Banjo. I really liked this dog. He's a good temperament and size. I could not get a decent picture of Juliet, the other dog. She has a lot of white and that tends to wash out. Maybe next time?

My handsome husband!

On December 25th,

We had dinner.

And, then we all (including the dogs) went over to Mother's place to have a "jam" session on my youngest nephew's newest toy.

Mother enjoyed listening to the music while eating Thanksgiving dinner.



And, then certain people got goofy.

Part II to come at a later date.

Wordy Wednesday

The house I really liked bit me! I mentioned on facebook that a house I really liked gave me a really ugly bruise. Well, here's proof.

Last Thursday, about a week ago, we went to look at houses. Yes, we're looking for a house of our own. What fun! Anyway, we really liked the second house we looked at. It was spacious, the Master was downstairs, and it had dual thermostats. However, it had a couple of issues that we're not sure we can live with.

The kitchen had an "island", which had an "overhang". The island had a back splash with bar-like area. Only, it wasn't quite wide enough to be considered a bar. The backside of the island was towards the hallway, breakfast area and living room.

Well, while I was waiting on the guys (Dan and our realtor) talking things over, the island (aka bar) reached out and bit me in the hip area! Actually, I had forgotten about the overhang and leaned into the island to rest on. Talk about pain. It hurt so bad. I told Dan I was going to bruise. And, sure enough, I did.

I wonder if this is an "omen"? My thoughts still return to this house from time to time as I liked it. A Lot. Will I learn real quickly to avoid the overhang? Maybe. I thought I would avoid the molding corner at the bottom of the stairs at our old house; but, time after time, I would be in a hurry and run into it. And, time after time, I would sport a bruise. So, I have my doubts.

The incident happened last Thursday night (9/30) and this picture was taken Sunday night (10/3). I'm still bruised and it still hurts if I bump or touch it. It turned really dark; but, it is finally turning into a sickly shade of green and yellow around the edges, which indicates that it's finally fading.

And now, I'm off. Today is going to be a fun day!