demolition, garden club, and a rescue

The mosquitos are so bad out there that if you walk anywhere even near foliage you are immediately swarmed from head to foot. Takes them a few extra seconds more to find you standing out in the open. Rained again early yesterday morning with light sprinkling throughout the day but so far no rain today. That is supposed to change tomorrow and Saturday as another big mass of tropical moisture (not quite a tropical storm) is in the Gulf and headed straight for us. Because, of course. Gunnar bleached and power washed the house yesterday while Rocky worked on demolishing the big planter that lines the small covered porch in the front of the house only to discover that the 8” x 8” pillar at the end that the wrought iron piece sits on that supports the roof is not made of brick but solid concrete. Yay! He managed to bust off a portion at the top with a sledge hammer but it's gonna need a jackhammer to take it down.

I've guess I'm not going to do any more model making until I have cast the ones I have ready. I think. I haven't started anything else and today I went to the garden club meeting and then cleaned the cedar chest. This was the first meeting of the year for the garden club which meets September through June. I usually miss more meetings than I attend because the programs don't usually interest me but today it was about native perennials, my favorite kinds of plants. The club also has a drawing at the end of each meeting to give away the things that other members bring for 'door' prizes, most always plants of some kind or another but also sometimes not plant but garden related. Since the first meeting of the year is always well attended and many people bring something for the drawings there was a lot of stuff today, even I took something, a volunteer confederate rose that had come up. My ticket rarely gets pulled but sometimes it does and even more rarely right away. Today, there was a rain gauge on offer someone had donated. 'I hope my number gets called first,' I told my sister, 'because I want that rain gauge'. Well, it didn't get called first and the lady picked a plant but it did get called second so I wasted no time getting over to the table and then bid my sister adieu.

The other thing I did today was clean the cedar chest that was damaged from Harvey but I couldn't throw it out. I emptied it, washed it off as best I could, and then put it in the garage where it has been for the last year. I got Rocky and Gunnar to carry it in for me yesterday and so I removed the rest of the veneer that I hadn't already pulled off since it was all bubbled up and cleaned it inside and out. I still need to get some good wood cleaner and go over it again and it should be sanded where there had been veneer but that means going outside again and with the mosquitos this bad that's not likely to happen or I could get the wood cleaner and then move it into the back bedroom where it goes and out of the way. Guess which one's probably gonna happen.

Oh, and the other thing I did was go back to the ditch along an empty field where I saw three or four clumps of blooming oxblood lilies (did I take a before picture of them in situ? have you met me before?) blooming in the ditch and dug some of them up. The muddy clumps I dug up expanded when I rinsed them off. Giving some to my sister and the rest I'll have to get planted. Not great timing considering the whole mosquito thing.

rain, boxing, and more little things

Still getting rain. None last Saturday but showers the last two days and predicted for every day this week, of course, now that I'm back to the top of Rocky's list.

I'll be busy today packing up 5 of the Botanicas to send to the gallery in Dallas for their upcoming show. I haven't worked on anything, no drawings, no model making, since last Thursday when I finished the second hummingbird tile model

but I have started to excavate the kiln in the garage. It's not completely accessible yet, but getting there.

Some pics of small stuff...

the anoles are getting bigger

these little beetles have been at it for days unless this is a different pair on the same plant

tried to do an image search for this to see if I could find out what will emerge from this cocoon and google returned pictures of street and other signs...okaaaay

I guess this is an ant but I have never seen one like this before

this little spider was determined to not have it's picture taken and I was determined to take it

came across this little 8” snake, one that I have never seen before, in the garage with a puncture wound behind it's head and the cat laying nearby. it wasn't dead so I moved it to the leafy debris and when I went back later to check on it, it was gone

maybe I should have used this pic to illustrate my boob smushing post

Big Mama's posse is down to six now from the original twelve. either I'm not feeding her often enough to suit her or something has been fishing in her pond

48 color samples and 15 paint samples later...

I've been feeling the air pressure of Rocky's imminent arrival and so I finally went down and got the last set of paint samples last Sunday but didn't get around to testing them out til last Wednesday because rain! I found a nice sage green (thanks to Donna and Leslie for that suggestion) to replace the other green so I tried it first with all four colors but neither my husband nor I liked the lilac which looked pink in the application

so I painted over it. I'm going with just the three colors which solves the problem of having Rocky requote, besides we found something else to spend that money on.

We liked this so well that I didn't even paint a section of the wall with the other combo, the two blues, lilac, and ivory.

Now, if it will stop raining (!) and dry out by the time Rocky gets back around to me, we can get this finished up.

Yay, we finally started getting some rain. We've gotten good showers four out of the last six days. Of course, it took a hurricane in the Gulf headed for Louisiana for it to happen. And it woke the mosquitos up the fierce little bastards. Too late to save the pecans though. There are still some in the trees but the ground is just littered.

One thing the rain brought out, besides mosquitos, is rain lilies. I don't know what's wrong with the camera on my phone but I cannot get it to focus on the rain lilies no matter how many times I tap the screen. I've taken about three dozen pictures trying to get them in focus.

I have yellow ones 

and two kinds of white ones. The small fragrant ones pop up with no foliage. 

The larger white ones in a pot show foliage all year.

I had some pink ones at the Houston house and thought I had managed to get some of the bulbs but I've never seen them bloom out here.

And the oxblood lilies are popping up.

Good thing I settled on house paint colors because Rocky drove up while I was out trying once again to get pictures of the rain lilies and he's going to be ready to start tomorrow, possibly, or Tuesday but first we have decided to take out the brick planter at the front of the house that crowds the covered area at the front door as it's already coming apart. 

So that needs to be done first. After the house is painted we're going to get him to build a small deck there. Because, apparently, we aren't through spending money like drunken sailors.

boob smushing

My phone rang the other day and, as usual, I looked to see who was calling. No one from my contact list and so I didn't answer. It is rare indeed for an anonymous call to actually be one I want to take. I figure if it's important, they'll leave a message and so this call did. It was from my supplemental health insurance provider and they wanted a call back so I obliged. The lady wanted to know if I had had a mammogram this year.

Me: no

Her: it is completely free, no cost to you.

Me: yes I'm aware of that.

Her: has your primary care physician recommended one to you?

Me: yes but I declined.

Her: how long has it been since you had a mammogram?

Me: two, two and a half years.

Her: where did you have it done?

Me: Bay City

Her: would you like me to call and make an appointment for you?

Me: no, I don't see that doctor anymore and I'd rather not drive all the way to Bay City.

Her: would you like me to find a facility near you?

Me: if you insist.

This woman WILL NOT give up!

So she tells me to hold on while she checks and comes back on the line that she found a facility there in Wharton, it's the medical center where I went to get my annual earlier this year from my new primary care physician.

Her: would you like me to call and make an appointment for you?

Me: I guess.

So she puts me on hold again, calls the med center, gets the x-ray department on the phone and then gets back to me. Now we are on a three way phone call and I'm talking with the tech, giving her my information, telling her that I had been to see one of their doctors earlier this year.

Tech: did your doctor request a mammogram?

Me: yes, but I declined.

Tech: are you having any problems?

Me: no, it's just that my health care provider is being a little more insistent.

Which produced chuckles from both women.

So yesterday I went in for my mammogram and had to fill out the form they give you and where it asks for the reason for this visit I wrote 'my health care provided insisted'. The tech is looking over my form and when she gets to the reason for my visit she exclaims, “oh, that was you!”. Never, she says, in all her years has she ever had someone's insurance company call to make an appointment for one of their clients. She was amazed. (They also call me once or twice a year to try and set up a home visit for a general health screening and scrutiny of the home environment to check for lurking dangers which I always decline. I'm not feeble yet, I tell them.)

I would probably been a little more insistent in my refusal of the mammogram if my sister hadn't told me just a few days before that she found our maternal great-grandmother's death certificate and the cause of death was 'breast cancer'.

summer reading list

Only six books this time but in my defense the last three were all 800 – 1,000 pages.

The Forgotten Room by Lincoln Child – another novel featuring Jeremy Logan, the enigmalogist. Logan is called back to his previous place of employment, a prestigious 'think tank' and research facility to try and solve the mysterious circumstances that caused one of the scientists, Dr. Strachey, to commit suicide. He interviews everyone who worked with Strachey documenting his increasing erratic behavior and then begins to explore the vacant west wing of the facility that was undergoing renovation under Strachey's command where days before committing suicide Strachey had dismissed the contractor and workers. Logan stumbles on a hidden room full of strange equipment and enlists Strachey's lab assistant to try and determine what the mysterious machine did while Logan examined the archives and architectural plans for clues but the archives for that time period are missing and the plans don't show the room. Meanwhile, Logan starts hearing weird music and voices. He finally forces the director to release some crucial information and the names of the scientists involved in the original research after another scientist goes mad and the granddaughter of the original architect is murdered. As he gets closer to the truth his own life becomes endangered and it's a race to see if he can stop the weaponization of the device before he himself is eliminated.

Hardcore Twenty-Four by Janet Evanovich – the further escapades of Stephanie Plum, bounty hunter, and her sidekick Lula with Morelli, Ranger, and now Diesel (Diesel is from a separate series involving Stephanie) thrown into the mix and zombies. I'm kinda over the whole zombie phenomenon but she can still make me laugh.

The Party by Robyn Harding – Kim, the 'perfect' mother with the 'perfect' child, whose marriage to Jeff is on the rocks because he indulged in a micro-dose of LSD has decided to let their daughter have a slumber party to celebrate her 16^th birthday but Hannah has recently been accepted by the 'cool' kids by way of popular Noah dating her. Dad slips them a bottle of pink champagne after Kim recites the rules...no drinking, no drugs, no boys (no fun)...and then after several glasses of wine and half a sleeping pill goes to bed without ever checking on the girls. But teenagers will drink and do drugs and sneak boys in and so they do and cool girl Ronnie, totally wasted, falls into a glass topped table and becomes seriously injured (cut and damaged eye) and a little disfigured. Ronni's mom, Lisa, sues the wealthy Kim and Jeff for $3 million when Kim shows little sympathy for her daughter's injuries and ruined life and instead insists to anyone who will listen that it wasn't her fault, that the police cleared them, to a less and less sympathetic audience and shrinking circle of friends. Meantime, the other fucked up cruel cool girl, Lauren starts manipulating Hannah's dad while she and the two boyfriends start to bully damaged Ronnie. I don't know who the target audience for this book is, being full of teenage angst and stuck up wealth. The resolution comes so fast that it seems unrealistic. Anyway, it was a quick grab right before the library closed and I wouldn't necessarily recommend it.

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon – (one or two passages hinted at the Romance genre and so the book kind of skirted along the edges) I had heard about the book and the TV series and I thought it was a man who traveled through time but to my surprise it was a woman. In 1945, Claire and her historian husband Frank, reunited after being separated for 4 years during WWII, she a Royal Army nurse and he in Intelligence, are vacationing in Scotland before going to the university where Frank will teach. After watching a group of village women from hiding during one of their ceremonies at a small stone henge one sunrise, Claire returns later to collect some plant specimens she saw and as she leaves she passes through the space between one of the stones that has split in two and steps 200 years into the past. She thinks at first that she has stumbled on a movie location but as she falls into the hands of one of Frank's many great grandfathers, the sadistic English commander Jack Randall, she is rescued from rape by a member of the Highland Clan MacKensie and is pressed into service to care for wounded Jaime and taken to the MacKensie stronghold. Forced into marriage to Jaime, a Scot with an English price on his head, to save her from being turned over to Randall, Claire eventually reveals her truth to her new husband who returns her to the henge so that she may return to her time and Claire must choose between her life in the future or her life in the past. I pretty much read this one straight through even though it was 627 pages of small type and closely spaced and went and got the next (of 7 total) from my sister.

Dragonfly In Amber by Diana Gabaldon – book 2 in the Outlander series (if the first one skirted the boundary of Romance, this one has dipped a toe in the water). Claire and Jaime, now that Jaime knows Claire comes from the future, go to Paris to escape the English authorities since there is still a price on his head and to attempt to prevent Bonnie Prince Charlie from trying to regain the throne of Scotland but fail. Before the deciding battle starts, which ultimately results in the decimation of the Clans, Jaime sends pregnant Claire back while he joins the battle intending to die.

Voyager by Diana Gabaldo - book 3 in the Outlander series (if the author dipped a toe in Romance in the last book, she dove in head first in this one). It's been 20 years since Claire walked through the stones back into her own time and she, thinking all this time that Jaime was dead, only now, after Frank's death, tries to find out through the historical record what exactly happened to him and the people she knew so that she can finally tell her and Jaime's daughter Brianna the truth. As it happens, Jaime did not die but spent those years in hiding, in prison, and as an indentured servant before being pardoned and freed. Claire returns to the past to find him and their adventures take them to the West Indies chasing after the pirates that kidnapped their nephew eventually ending up in the colony of Georgia.

before and after Harvey

This past holiday weekend marks one year since this little town was flooded to the point of being completely cut off for a few days. One year ago last Friday we got to the house for the first time to find there was still about 6” of water inside and in the yard. A year ago Saturday we emptied the half of the house onto the driveway. 

and the sweeping and hosing out

A year ago Sunday we started the demolition, hauling out wheelbarrow fulls of wet sheetrock and insulation and flooring and paneling and a busted up tile shower and bucketfulls of wet stinky dirt and gravel from the planters inside and the bottom two feet of siding on the outside of the whole house. 

and the spraying of the structure with vinegar and bleach and then waiting while the wood dried out before any kind of restoration could be started.

A year. And it's only been about a month that the inside of the house has been finished and I am lucky at that since my neighbor is a contractor and he focused on helping his neighbors repair their homes.

The change in how it looked to how it looks is amazing. Where before the part of the house that flooded was my least favorite part of the house with its ugly paneling, styrofoam ceiling tiles, linoleum tile or sheet vinyl floors, the tiny bathroom with brown tile and funky wallboard, the back bedroom with the one small window is now my favorite part of the house. The indoor planters and brick wall and hideous paneling in the big room are gone along with the styrofoam ceiling tiles, the room remodeled from ceiling to floor, 

before (can't see the big brick wall on the left or the planters which are behind the plants brought in for the winter)

the water is just starting to come in the house

the new workroom

everything in the tiny bathroom gone except the upper sheetrock and the built-in cabinet above the toilet, 

only 'before' picture I can find which is after the flood but before demolition

after demolition

the new bathroom

end wall of built in shelves in the back bedroom gone as well as the closet that made up the far wall and replaced with some of our etched glass which really opened up that room which before was reminiscent of a cave, cut off from the rest of the house. It had originally been painted a very pale blue/white but grandgirl Jade and I painted it in 2015 so it was better than originally.

before

rebuilding the end wall where the closet was

the new back bedroom 

indecision

Even more paint colors later, I still cannot decide on colors or color combinations. I keep dithering back and forth between a light blue/ivory/rosy mauve (or purple)/dark blue combo (but that's four colors and the price I got is for three) or the same without the white but the white really makes it. 

   

Or I could do the two blues and the white, which is nice but kind of tame and essentially only two colors but it would work too. 

I also like other combos like ivory/blue (or a dark rose color)/green but I don't want a white house 

   

or a light lavender/ivory/green/dark blue which, again is four colors and I'm afraid the light lavender will turn to gray as it ages 

or green/ivory/lilac/dark rose also four colors. 

All the best combos have four colors. And then there's all the options of which colors for the trim, shutters, fascia, and soffit.

This is what the west side of the house looks like:

This is the outside wall of the garage that Rocky had bleached and pressure washed for me before he went off to do another job and it's latest incarnation. Several areas have three or four coats of paint on it. 

I'll sit close, walk back to the back of the big backyard and look. That nice little moss green on paper turned out to look like split pea soup on the trim so that's out. I'm thinking that dark blue is way too dark after earlier thinking I really liked it and I have another option that's not so dark and I don't like it for the (faked) shutters on either wall color. Maybe the light blue on the wall should be toned down some. Basically after looking at this for three days I've rejected all of it. Maybe I'm not brave enough to have a brightly colored house. Maybe I do want a nice tame paint job.

Tomorrow, I'll get some new paint samples and give it another try.