Solitude

Kicking Off the Long Weekend......RELAXED

But clearly not as relaxed as some other members of the household.

Seriously? What a life!!


However, WE are headed up to the cabin again....for the second weekend in a row and I'm quite pleased about that. Have a great, LONG weekend!!

Double Standards Are Not Impressive

When we first moved into our new house, we were handed a copy of the subdivision covenants, which I read thoroughly. I knew we were going to run into a problem with Eric's work truck and trailer. But we took a shot anyway and kept it parked on the street, in front of our house. Of course, it didn't take long for the neighbors to take a convenient walk by our house and ask us if we had had a chance to read the covenants. And to provide us with an extra copy. So nice, these people are. So we took the truck and trailer off the street and parked them on the side of our house - there was plenty of room. Parking them behind the fence was not an option, as we have a boat already parked back there. Again, I knew we were pushing the rules since neither the truck nor trailer were behind a fence. But we were running out of options. It wasn't yet approved for Eric to leave the trailer at the jobsite, and he wasn't going to leave it parked out on some busy street for someone to break into.

We finally received, via letter, a formal complaint from the HOA(ssholes), setting forth that we had 10 days to remove the truck and trailer (from our own property, no less) or an injunction would be filed with the court.

Checkmate.

So Eric finally cleared it through his company to have one of the other guys take the truck and trailer and drive it until the next job, where they could be left at the jobsite, if Eric buys a hitch lock. Which we can do. Fine. Problem solved.

Until this last weekend, that is.

Now, we drive down the street and see this:

and this:

neither of which, as we so clearly know, are allowed.



So what's the catch? Why are these allowed to be parked for a week straight with no action?


Double standards drive me nuts! I'm all for rules; but they need to be applied across the board.





(excuse the poor quality pictures - I only had the phone camera on me)

Organization Turns on the Nerd in Me

Do you see the mess below?

It's my scrapbooking mess. MESS being the operative word. I wasn't able to get the BIG table that I wanted, so I am quite cramped with my small table. And the small table would be sufficient IF I could get all the stuff off of it.

So I asked the hubby if he could build me some shelves. But that would require actually going to pick out wood, sanding, painting, installing, etc. And I was wanting some immediate results. And I remembered some white, metal shelving that came with the house. So I marched out to the garage and found my treasure. And then set the hubby to work.

Then I took all the stuff off my table and gave it a new, more organized, spiffy home. And I LOVE it.

It's so neat and orderly......and that makes me a happy gal.....who is now off to scrapbook!

Random Fact #60

The thought of white water rafting scares the bejeezus out of me! I'm sure it's a thrill of a ride, but the fear of falling out, hitting a rock, and bleeding to death and/or drowning is enough to keep me out of that raft. I'm more of a calm-river floater, where I can float at a slow pace and take in the scenery......while sipping on an adult beverage.

An R&R Weekend

So, as you all know, this weekend was our much-needed girls-only weekend at the cabin. I invited some close friends....pictured below.....Nicole, Jacque, Abby, Steven (I know he's not a girl, but I made the guest list and he was allowed), me, and Tracy. We had a great weekend and I hope everyone is refreshed and rehydrated with NONalcoholic beverages. Because let me tell ya, we stayed up until 4 am both nights partying away. It was so much fun!!

On Saturday, we decided to go on a little hike/walk. We probably went back into the mountains a couple miles and the dogs had a really good time too.

On one of our stops, we noticed way high up in the tree, an osprey nest. It was massive! The picture doesn't even do it justice.....but it was pretty high up. And the mama was NOT pleased that we were hanging around.

She started circling the nest and squawking (or whatever noise they make).

She wanted to make sure we stayed as far away as possible.

And eventually, she started bringing in twigs to add to the nest. It was very cool to watch.

So then we started back....but not before arranging for a group photo!

Once we got back to the cabin, it was time for dinner. Jacque brought all the ingredients for an authentic mexican dish. It was A-mazing!

Then we built a fire out at the fire pit and the drinking began again. There was an obvious theme to the weekend activities.

And today, before we headed out, I took the troops down to the swimming hole, a/k/a heaven on earth. The water was running really high.

But that didn't stop two members of the troops.