A Really Special Lunch

Posted on April 8, 2014April 8, 2014 by Dusty Roads

It’s been pretty quiet around here. The cats play and keep me entertained. The workload has picked up as we move into the spring busy season but the vacation planning seems to be complete and I haven’t started prowling the neighborhoods yet.

But I did have a very special lunch on Sunday. March 3o, 2013 was the day that my department at my old employer was dissolved. Go to Malden, MA or take a lay off they said. I took the lay off along with many others. The ones who stayed have the daily pleasure of commuting from south of Boston through the city to Malden in the north. Not a fun commute even on a good day.

The thing about this department is that we were all “long timers”. I was 6 weeks away from 10 years and one of my co-workers had 25 years in. We were a family and now we were being scattered to the winds. I didn’t mind leaving the company. We were overworked and underpaid while they told us how lucky we were to have a job and what a great place to work, the party line, but I knew I would miss my friends.

We agreed to meet after 1 year to see how everyone was doing and so we did. On Sunday we got together at a nice restaurant for brunch and a chance to catch up. Almost everyone made it. One person had moved away , we didn’t have contact information for another and 2 had conflicts but everyone else was there.

It really did feel like family. Everyone looked great. Everyone seems to be working, maybe not in their favorite job but at least they have landed on their feet. It was a really fun afternoon. There’s talk of doing it again next year. I hope we do. It was really special.

Happy Chinese New Year (A Wordless Wednesday)

Posted on February 12, 2014February 12, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Gong Hey Fat Choy

On the Good Ship Lollipop

Posted on February 11, 2014February 11, 2014 by Dusty Roads

The Hollywood legend who stole hearts with her famed ringlets & dimples — & grew up to serve as a U.S. ambassador — died at age 85 on Monday in California.

Rest in Peace Shirley Temple Black

About Rocky and Me the Selfie

Posted on February 3, 2014February 3, 2014 by Dusty Roads

By now most of you have probably seen Thursday’s Photo of the Day, that “Selfie” of Rocky and me.

I have to share the story behind it. I really wish I’d had a video camera to capture what led up to it. This may turn out to be one of those.. .well you had to be there… kind of stories.

I’d been playing with the idea of doing a “selfie” for one of the daily photos. It’s not the type of picture I normally take so I thought it could be a nice stretch for me. No matter what I came up with, I just wasn’t comfortable. I don’t like being in front of the camera even when someone else is taking the picture but for me to take me? Well it just seemed wrong to me somehow. But I couldn’t let it go because it’s a pretty common practice these days, especially with the advent of Cell phone cameras. Why, whole ad campaigns are built around people taking pictures of themselves.

That in mind I decided that for me it would be easier with a “co-star”, one of the cats would be perfect.

I set the camera on a tri-pod and aimed at the top of the empty cat tree and took a few practice photos for exposure and focus. (Love digital) Then I set the camera to remote release and looked around for a cat.

Smokey and Rocky were both on the multi-level cat tree and Buddy was in the bedroom asleep by the window.

Smokey was asleep but Rocky was in the middle of an ambitious grooming session under the heat lamp. He paused long enough to look at me so I said…come on, you look fine.

Ever so slowly he stood up. It was more like he uncurled and stood up, then he stretched. It was a long, slow stretch. I swear it was like watching slow motion. Then instead of just jumping down he slowly stepped down, one paw at a time stretching each leg and his back as he did. I couldn’t believe it. Was he for real? Talk about stalling!

Now I had to watch the whole stretching process again as he covered the short space between his cat tree tree and the one I had set up.

Once at the bottom of my cat tree he had to give himself another “groom” before climbing up to the top. All I could think of was “What a primadonna!” But like any star, once he was on the set he was all business. He looked at the camera, he looked at me, he cuddled my hand and even tried to do head bumps.

(unfortunately those suffered from motion blur and couldn’t be used).

In less time than it took him to get his silly butt over there, the photo shoot was done and I had a keeper or two for the project. As if he heard “Cut” and “That’s a Wrap” he calmly stood up and hopped down. After a brief stop at the water bowl he resumed his favorite place, under the heat lamp.

And that’s a Wrap!

Housework , if you do it right, will kill you

Posted on January 13, 2014January 13, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Housework , if you do it right, will kill you. This is a quote from Erma Bombeck. Do you remember her? She was a very funny writer. February 21, 1927 – April 22, 1996. She would take a look around her and see the humor in everyday lives. In the course of her career she wrote over 4000 newspaper columns about the life of a midwestern suburban housewife. Her columns appeared twice weekly and were read by 30 MILLION readers in 900 newspapers! She was also the author of 15 bestselling books, most collections of short stories about life in the suburbs.

What made me think about Mrs. Bombeck? Quite frankly, envy. I loved her writings. They always made me laugh. I remember one titled “The Grass is always greener over the Septic Tank”. You know, that’s true. We had a regular jungle of healthy green plants growing over ours behind our house. If only the lawn had looked half as lush.

Her stories were short, humorous and contained a kernel of truth. I never would have given that green grass a thought if she hadn’t pointed it out.

And what about those big holiday meals? For years I’ve been saying I cook all day and the meal is over in 30 minutes! Well Erma beat me to it. Her quote was :Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence.

So here I am staring at the blank computer screen with a major case of writers block. I haven’t been anywhere lately, the weather has been horrible, (it’s raining cats and dogs and pitch black as I write this) and I just couldn’t think of a thing to say. In desperation I thought I could gain inspiration like another blogger friend did from the alphabet.

She wrote a blog post for each letter of the alphabet. Author Sue Grafton is wring a whole series of fictional crime novels known as the Alphabet Series (A is for Alibi, etc. ) so it seemed like a good idea but the only thing that I could think of that started with “A” was Arthritis. Unless you’re a doctor I would think that would be a very painful subject.

That’s when I thought of Erma Bombeck. How did she do it? How could she look around and see something not only worth writing about her everyday surroundings but write it with such humor. She could take everyday events and routines and have wonderful observations. Another example: My theory on housework is, if the item doesn’t multiply, smell, catch fire, or block the refrigerator door, let it be. No one else cares. Why should you?