Slowly but Surely

Posted on November 25, 2014November 25, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Sorry there was no update last night. I got caught up in the sorting, cleaning process. Yes I now have water in my kitchen sink. The plumber set up my facet and spray and the other gadgets completely backward to what I am used to but it works. Maybe he is left handed or maybe I’m the backward one. 🙂

The plumber said he had never seen cabinets and counters like these. He kept checking them out. He said most places he’s been have had wood grain or white cabinets. He thought my off-green (the color name is “Ocean Floor”) was a nice change of pace.

The cabinet guys came back too and made custom shelves so my new cabinets are ready for stuff! They were impressed with the counter tops too.

I went a little nuts at Bed, Bath and Beyond for expandable drawer inserts and a holder for cookie sheets and other baking pans. Then I discovered that I can order them through Ebates.com and get back some $$$. So I finished my order there and earned $5.00 back! It gets paid quarterly so I may do more ordering through that web site. We’ll have to see.

I ran some of my decorative dishes through the dishwasher . They seemed to have a thin coat of grime. I guess the cooking oils had coated them and then the fine sanding grains all stuck to them. They didn’t come clean so I did an internet search and found out that a light scrubbing with baking soda , of all things, should cut the grease and clean them up. And it worked! Cleaning the Kitty Kat Teapot now.

Who new that baking soda would become my new go-to cleaning product. This old dog just learned a new trick!

My electrician is coming tonight to put in an outlet box so the tile people will leave a space for a new outlet. Then tomorrow the condo association is sending their electrician to upgrade my electrical panel.

The tile people are due sometime tomorrow too. Is the end in sight?

A “Clowder” of Purrr-sonalities~6

Posted on January 19, 2014January 19, 2014 by Dusty Roads

Well that theme kind of got away from me.

I’ve read that when a novelist starts writing they don’t know where the story will end up. They start with an outline and change it as the characters evolve. I think that’s what happened in this series.

When I started A “Clowder” of Purrr-sonalities” I was only going to write one short post mainly featuring Buddy and how much he has grown and changed in the year he’s been here. What prompted it was what happened after my shower that morning.

Buddy came in the bathroom right after I got out of the shower. He sat on the towel at my feet and watched me with the hair dryer. I took a minute to give him his morning “blow dry” . Then he did something that concerned me. He hopped in the tub, which was still wet from my shower and started licking the bottom of the tub.

He didn’t seem to care that his butt was getting wet and there wasn’t all that much water if he was thirsty. I was afraid there might be some soap residue so I ran to the kitchen for a trusty plastic bowl, filled it from the sink and set that in the tub.

Buddy checked it out, looked at me and proceeded to take a long drink.

Cats can be territorial and recently I read that they don’t like to have their water right next to their food. Rocky will drink from the pet fountain but Smokey and Buddy do not.

Smokey and Buddy prefer the green plastic bowl in the living room. Even Rocky occasionally drinks there.

So maybe Buddy is being pushed aside when it comes to water. I hadn’t noticed it but then I don’t sit and stare at them either. So now my tub now has a plastic bowl of water in it too.

See how short that was? Kind of hard to believe it evolved into a mini book! I think I’ll give you and the cats a rest for a little while. Let them do something special before I make them a subject again.

Housetree

Posted on August 26, 2013August 26, 2013 by Dusty Roads

You’ve heard of tree houses especially now that Animal Planet offers Tree House Masters as a series. Those houses they build are amazing but I got a kick out of one house we saw on our cruise around Cape Ann. That house reversed the idea of the tree house. A tree is growing right through the deck and it’s a big tree too.

I don’t have the history of the house but I imagine that the deck was added later and there was a tree growing there already. Of course I could be wrong. Maybe the deck was there and when the tree got too big they cut a hole for it to grow through. Either way it’s a pretty interesting feature.

I’m not sure if you can really see it in the pictures but that large tree next to the house is growing right up through the deck. The house looks like it’s well maintained and having a living tree growing through my deck rather than a bunch of potted plants, well that would be a big plus in my eyes.

What do you think? Would you want a deck on your house with a tree growing through it?

Lighthouses of Boston Harbor

Posted on August 23, 2013August 23, 2013 by Dusty Roads

The Boston Harbor Cruise Whale Watch provided an opportunity to get a peak at 2+ of the lighthouses that protect Boston Harbor.

As I mentioned before there are 2 Boston Harbor Cruises that feature Lighthouses. Expert members of the American Lighthouse Foundation narrate the tours. They begin in Boston with passes by Long Island Head Light and Deer Island Light, and then a pass by Boston Light, the oldest lighthouse station in America. Heading north, the tour will pass by Graves Light, Hospital Point Light, Marblehead Light, Fort Pickering Light, Baker’s Island Light, Eastern Point Light, Ten Pound Island Light, Straitsmouth Island Light and more. The Northern Lights tour culminates with a view of Thacher Island, site of the only still operating twin lighthouses left in the country.

On our jaunt to look for whales we passed Boston Light with Graves Light behind it.

From certain angles the two lights line up front to back. Boston Light is located on Little Brewster Island in Boston Harbor. The current lighthouse is not the original structure.

During the American Revolution, the original lighthouse was held by British Forces and was attacked and burnt on two occasions by American forces. As the British forces withdrew in 1776, they blew up the tower and completely destroyed it. The lighthouse was eventually reconstructed in 1783, to the same 75-foot height as the original tower. In 1856 it was raised to its present height of 98 feet.

Graves Light is visible from Little Brewster Island and Boston Light. Graves light is located on The Graves, the outermost island of the Boston Harbor Islands National Recreation Area, 9 miles offshore of downtown Boston.

Minot’s Ledge Light, officially Minots Ledge Light, is a lighthouse on Minots Ledge, one mile offshore of the towns of Cohasset and Scituate, to the southeast of Boston Harbor. It is a part of the Town of Scituate. The current lighthouse is the second on the site, the first having been washed away in a storm after only a few months of use.

The Nantucket Lightship which we passed moored in Boston Harbor is now a museum. The Lightship Nantucket or Nantucket Shoals was the name given to the lightvessel that marked the hazardous Nantucket Shoals south of Nantucket Island. Several ships have been commissioned and served at the Nantucket Shoals lightship station and have been called Nantucket. It was common for a lightship to be reassigned and then renamed for its new station.

At 8:00 a.m. on December 20, 1983 the Lightship 613 was relieved by a Large Navigational Buoy, making Lightship 613 the last Lightship on station in the US and on Nantucket Station. In December 1983 the Lightship 613 was sold to the New England Historic Seaport to become a museum ship in Boston.

So lets see. So far this summer I’ve seen Gurnet Light, Bug light (Duxbury Pier), Chatham Light, Boston Light, Graves Light, Minot Ledge Light and the Lightship Nantucket.