indiana territory

RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!!!

I heard a rustling and opened the door to find that snowman monster reaching over the fence.

posted by Jody @ 5:10 PM 0 Comments

Aruuuuuugggggghhhhh

I have been sick with the respiratory flu, I think. At any rate, I have had a fever and some actual shake me around chills the past couple of days. Last night I was stretched out under afghans and blankets when I heard people talking in the house that there are many police cars outside. I didn't feel like getting up. What a bummer; just how many times do you think lots of police cars will park across the street from my house? And the piece de resistance? A K-9 unit. I could be posting pictures here of a dog on duty; I guess I should have had them hoist me off my sickbed and lash me to a telephone pole so I could provided live-blogging.

posted by Jody @ 1:13 PM 0 Comments

Plague house

Just last night Hibernator listened to the enumeration of flu-ish people in the house and sent us a youtube video of Monty Python's movie with the "Bring out your dead" repeated call. I had forgotten it; I remembered it; I laughed. I cursed myself to fevered spells with chills. I will go to the doctor tomorrow, but until then, let's give a cheer for the immune system.

Give me an "I"

Give me an "M"

posted by Jody @ 3:39 PM 0 Comments

Afternoon in the sitting room

I decided no more, no more total disarray in the bedroom and sitting room; so this afternoon I started. I pulled out bins from the closet and went through them, separating into keep, Goodwill and trash piles. I was brutal; not so much trash, but a lot of Goodwill. That left me with several empty bins so I went into the sitting room and starting filling them with all the things resting on horizontal surfaces. Then I opened drawers and emptied them out - turned them upside down. I did not sort through them today because today was "move the furniture so I can best access the scanner, the printer, the TV and the VHS/DVD player" day. Move out the stand-alone, long ago kid's school desk and slide over the coffee table. Add a wooden thing (scavenged from a redecorating company in another city) about two feet tall with close-set shelves for paper separating. Put the scanner on one end of the coffee table, the printer next to it and on the far end another wooden scavenged thing.

Organize plugs and cords and connectors . . . and vacuum, vacuum, vacuum. The dog, by the way does not like it when I move from place to place. He will not trust me to be right back from the adjoining room. So he was up and down, going this way, coming back and making me feel guilty. I gave him dog treats - my answer for everything.

There was one box in the closet that did not have clothes, but papers and pictures and a jumble of stuff that had hastily been gathered up from a dining room cabinet. I was good and did not go through the photos - but I saw a few from long, long ago and I discovered I am now at that age when those times seemed a different life and somehow I was a different me. The one in the pictures was someone never to be again.

As I said, I did not tarry and go through them, staring for long minutes at a time; but something had been triggered and I got to thinking that perhaps there was a door that needed shutting. Things are never going to go back to what they were, ever. So, I guess you go on, starting from this minute, this very minute and do the best you can . But, damn it, you look out the window and down the road and you still hope to see that past come walking up.

posted by Jody @ 4:17 PM 1 Comments

Harvesting the Heart - Jodi Picoult

I walked down the truncated book aisle at our Wal-Mart and saw this book by Jodi Picoult, who wrote My Sister's Keeper, dontcha know. I took it down from the shelf and saw that it was about a young mother and motherhood and I thought, "Oh, not for me." Still, I opened it and starting reading a passage on page 234:

My father stood up and walked to the window. "When I was very little and we were livin' in Ireland, my own father used to cut the fields three time each summer for haying. He had an old tractor, and he'd start on one edge of the field, circlin' tighter and tighter in a spiral until he almost got dead center. Then my sisters and I would run into the grass that still stood and we'd chase out the cottontails that had been pushed to the middle by the tractor. They'd come out in a flurry, the lot of them, jumpin' faster than we could run. Once - I think it was the summer before we came over here - I caught one by the tail. I told my da I was going to keep it like a pet, and he got very serious and told me that wouldn't be fair to the rabbit, since God hadn't made it for that purpose. But I built a hutch and gave it hay and water and carrots. The next day it was dead, lyin' on its side. My father came up beside me and said some things were just meant to stay free." He turned around and faced me, his eyes brilliant and dark. "That," he said, "is why I never went lookin' for your mother."

I swallowed. I wondered what it would be like to hold a butterfly in your hands, something bejewelled and treasured and know that despite your devotion it was dying by degrees. "Twenty years," I whispered. "You must hate her so much."

"Aye." My father stood and grasped my hands. "At least as much as I love her."

There in the aisle of store of life's details, part of me - the part that I know best - could slip into what the words had said, as if there were not billions of other people on the planet. My feelings were big, like they took up all the space everywhere, as if they were everything.

I didn't want to put the book back and get it from the library. I wanted to have those words where I could just rest my hands on the cover when I walked by a table and saw it. Where it would be a touchstone for that which I feel deeply.

And so I bought it.

posted by Jody @ 12:08 PM 0 Comments

posted by Jody @ 7:42 AM 0 Comments

I thought I had written about American Gangster

I watched it yesterday while I was transcribing - one of my least favorite things to do - and I thought I had written about it. Obviously, I must have done that in one of my alternate universes. But now I am not thinking about American Gangster; I am thinking that I will have to go start the diesel in a couple of minutes so it will be purring when the kids have to go to school.

I am also thinking that I am so glad that wretched transcribing is done. I usually put it off and put it off and then wind up doing it under a great deal of pressure all in one big surge. It is like hitting yourself in the head with a rock for an extended period of time. One option I'm considering is just doing a wee bit at a time, but that would mean planning ahead, and it would mean several separate times in which I whack my head with a rock. I really hate this chore.

But American Gangster was good; I think I'll watch it again . . . while I write the darn article. Auggghhhh. Ok, I will write it tomorrow. Tomorrow is good; Saturday might be better.

posted by Jody @ 7:02 AM 1 Comments

Urban Explorers

I don't know much about Urban Exploring, other than to look at the pictures other have taken of abandoned sites. I think one of my first vicarious forays was into a mental hospital in Connecticut - ironic, huh? Anyway, here is a site I found today and you can see Fort Ord and a lot of other interesting places.

posted by Jody @ 4:35 PM 0 Comments

American Gangster and Redbox and Michael Clayton

Redbox, I was beginning to despair but I think I love you. Because yesterday was President's Day - a holiday, I had the feeling today was Monday. But it is TUESDAY! Tuesday is new movies at the $1 Redbox and I looked in and, even though it is almost noon, managed to get Michael Clayton and American Gangster.

Michael Clayton bombed, according to reports, at the Box Office, perhaps because it is about the big corporate law firms that consume lawyers. The "consume" word I grabbed from Slate Magazine's article on the movie. Okay, I going to go look up American Gangster and see if I'm going to get my dollar's worth. Uh, four stars from Roger Ebert. Well, that's good. Here's his review . I may have to buy these when they go on sale at the video store.

Yes, Redbox, these past few weeks of nothing too good coming out of your little disc ejector . . . and now this. So, it's okay.

posted by Jody @ 12:15 PM 0 Comments

A view of the Peanut Butter Cafe and Roadhouse

posted by Jody @ 2:16 PM 0 Comments

The rain of Indiana

This is the rain of late February in Indiana; it is not as common as the rain of March, but I have seen it before. I was thinking of the rain and the sound of it when I filmed, but it seems "Elizabeth" was in the DVD player and you can hear the music. It is toward the beginning of the film where Sir Walter Raleigh is about to tell the Queen of sailing across the ocean to the New World, watching for the land that appears as a haze on the horizon.

posted by Jody @ 2:09 PM 0 Comments

Letters from Iwo Jima on AMC

Last night I tuned into AMC and started watching Letters from Iwo Jima - so far, so good - then I remembered why I had not seen it before - it is in Japanese with English subtitles all the way through the movie. I read well and fast, but shoot, it's a pain in the neck to have to flick your eyes off the actors to read what they are saying for around two hours. Look somewhere else, blink, realize the subtitle is obscured by the scenery in the film and it is all over. I didn't make it for the two hours; I fell asleep and woke un during the encore presentation. I turned the TV off.

Would it be such a crime to have the dialogue dubbed in - or at least read as in narration? Mr. Eastwood, sayonara.

posted by Jody @ 8:07 AM 0 Comments

Blogging for the mind

I think writing thoughts down, just not thinking them, is a good exercise for your brain. At the very least it can be an indicator of mental decline: Whoa, this sentence makes no sense; Jody is losing it. Of course, you yourself have to notice this if no one reads the damn blog. But that's another plus for writing; nobody reads this stuff but it looks okay in a nice template and kind of makes you feel that you have done something.

Ideally, you should only write when you have something worth expressing. However, it is fun to see the little posts pop up on the computer screen, so you write about something - anything. That doesn't make it interesting, but it does make your mind scramble around. This wouldn't be a problem if something happened everyday to you that people might be curious about: falling off a roof, meeting a wolf, getting your foot caught in a register, meeting the Queen. But here you are in your dull life and so you just get your kicks from putting a noun and a verb together with an adjective and, if you are daring, an adverb. That's okay. Nobody reads this stuff.

posted by Jody @ 7:14 AM 2 Comments

Yes, the sun

I think I love the sun and the blue sky. We have had at least three sunny days this week and I think my spirits have actually lifted. Woo Hoo, we need to sing a song to the sun. Think "On Wisconsin" and sing sun, sun, sun, sun, sun, sun, sun, sun . . . Blue sky. Yea! We have had many, many gray days. I am delirious with the sun.

posted by Jody @ 2:24 PM 0 Comments

A casket for the vampire in your family

Well, this is the place that has vampire caskets:

ABC CASKETS FACTORY - LOS ANGELES
Family Owned and Operated Since 1933
1705 N. Indiana Street, Los Angeles, CA 90063

And here's a picture of "The Count Dracula":

And this is what they say:

This solid poplar casket is made primarily for TV and motion pictures. It is stained red mahogany. This type of casket is called a toe-pincher. It is widest at the elbows and narrowest at the feet. Floral beading is placed on the lid and the base molding. The one-piece lid is highly polished. The special gold colored handles are over 50 years old. Other colors and styles can be custom made.

The interior is a full shirr in thick red crepe. It has a full shirr pillow shaped to match the contour of the casket and a full lining.

posted by Jody @ 4:17 PM 0 Comments

the little ice age

I am watching a program on The History Channel which talks about The Little Ice Age; right now they are talking of the accompanying heavy rains that washed away fields and led to widespread famine. From 1371 to 1391 there were 111 famines in Europe; the Black Death found this environment fertile for its spread and the population was reduced by one third. The story of Hansel and Gretel had its roots in these famines.

People blamed their neighboring areas and many were killed for witchcraft. The Pope blamed the foul weather on witches. Some say 50,000 weather-affecting witches were burned at the stake.

And now, global warming? Careful, don't wear a pointy hat.

As we near the end of the hour, I am learning that The Little Ice Age was 500 years long and in the middle of that span was a 70 years really cold spell caused by a lessening of the number of sunspots sending radiation to earth. During that 70 years, glaciers greatly advanced consuming villages.

A new plant, the potato, was introduced into Europe but the French refused to adopt it; while England and Ireland and the Netherlands ameliorated their famines, the French grew more hungry and restive and the show makes a connection between this and the French Revolution. (See, I guess the peasants wouldn't eat potato bread.)

A book written in 2002 about this topic is The Little Ice Age: How Climate Made History - 1300-1850.

So what caused the warm period before the icing age? Ah, that is probably another show.

posted by Jody @ 4:15 PM 0 Comments

Kicking Horse Pass

No, this is not a football play; it is one of the place I found during a little surf on the internet. I can tell I am going to want to look up more information about this area in the Canadian Rockies, but for right now, you can check HERE to read about the other paragraphs that are above and below these two:

Mount Hector and Hector Lake were named for James Hector but Kicking Horse Pass was named for a horse that kicked Dr. Hector. As the party was struggling eastward towards the pass one of the pack horses, in an attempt to escape the fallen timber that made travelling so difficult, plunged into the river. Hector described the events that followed, "...the banks were so steep that we had great difficulty in getting him out. In attempting to recatch my own horse, which had strayed off while we were engaged with the one in the water, he kicked me in the chest, but I had luckily got close to him before he struck out, so that I did not get the full force of the blow."

Peter Erasmus was Hector's guide during this part of his explorations and he later wrote, "We all leapt from our horses and rushed up to him, but all our attempts to help him recover his senses were of no avail... Dr. Hector must have been unconscious for at least two hours when Sutherland yelled for us to come up; he was now conscious but in great pain. He asked for his kit and directed me to prepare some medicine that would ease the pain." Although not recorded in Hector's journal or in "Buffalo Days and Nights" by Peter Erasmus, there is a story that Hector's men gave him up for dead at one point and dug a grave for him. It is said that he regained consciousness within a minute or so of being buried alive and that he managed to wink an eye to show that he was still alive. Hector's men thought it was appropriate to name the river in honour of the "Kicking Horse" and the pass above was assigned the name as well

posted by Jody @ 10:53 AM 0 Comments

Chiari . . . I didn't know what it was either

posted by Jody @ 7:07 AM 2 Comments

This particular afternoon

From 1 pm until 5:30 pm

Washed pots and pans and glasses and cookie sheets
Crushed soda pop cans
Vacuumed most of the downstairs
Brought in three bins of firewood - after knocking it loose from the frozen pile
Laundry
Fed dog and kids

Okay, it's not like shoveling coal into a boiler below decks

posted by Jody @ 5:33 PM 0 Comments

Breaking Bad

This show on AMC is only seven episodes long, or so I am told; I am beginning to think it might have a nightmare quality to it - a black, black comedy becoming a black hole of "Whoa, what we do when things go not just south, but to the South Pole."

In the extensive promotion for the show, interviews with the main character indicated it would show a nice man becoming a "bad" man. Well, I watched this show about a man with lung cancer deciding he could make a bundle of money for his family when he brother-in-law, a DEA agent, said they might be around $700,000 that was recovered in a drug raid.

Ah, I forgot to mention that Walt - that's his name - is a chemistry teacher, and, apparently, a smart one.

Without going into ever twist and turn of the plot, in the beginning you found yourself laughing as you would at an outright comedy and then it creeps up on you that these are things are not pratfalls - a bathtub full of hydrofluoric acid and a body does fall through the ceiling. However what falls through does not resemble a bathtub or a body; it is red goo.

In the next episode they clean it up, with sponges and buckets and gas masks. In the teaser for next week, the doctor tells Walt's wife that it is lung cancer and tells them both that it spreads.

Four episodes to go. What happens? Will she become a partner in crime. Will they murder together? And if they do make money, will the DEA guy figure out is drug money and seize it?

Oh, by the way, the wife is pregnant.

posted by Jody @ 7:08 AM 2 Comments

What is it with Pioneer Woman - Ree Smith Drummond?

I think it is more than her intelligence, more than her ability to take and present beautiful photographs, more than her ability to tell a story - her story - well. I think a lot of people would like to be Pioneer Woman, or if not exactly her, to be someone living on that modern-day, yet turn-of-the-century ranch, in Oklahoma. A clean innocence of the prairie, the cold of winter and the heat of summer, the power of the land and the mystique of the American West.

A physician for a father, an upscale childhood, a USC degree, a spin in the world of business and tall buildings and a boyfriend with a house by the Pacific. Then later: four healthy children, scions of one of the most prominent ranching families.

It would be a good fantasy to escape into, and every morning, you can click on her website and be there . . . and carry the sense of it through your day.

posted by Jody @ 9:45 AM 0 Comments

Warm feet and dry socks

Yes, yes. Oh, the things we take for granted. I am certain the guys at Valley Forge would have really preferred to be have their feet as comfy as mine are right now - and I wasn't even outside in the real snow cold. I just walked by a door that had been opened for wood for the fire in the warm house.

Jeez, I feel like a wimp. I am a wimp. I need to remember this the next time I mention soldiers suffering and the go on to another subject in a couple of minutes.

posted by Jody @ 12:13 PM 0 Comments

Curbside pickup - I want it

Spring clean-up week in Kendallville will - just ignore the cold, cold, wind-chilling wind outside - be coming around in a month or so, and for several years we have not had curbside pickup. I think it is important that the town incorporate it into the plan, especially since the councilmen who insisted on voting "no" are no longer in office.

It is difficult for a lot of people to get rid of large items and having them around does not foster a good community image. I, for one, would be willing to pay to return to the days when curbside pickup was provided during clean-up week.

Please, Councilpeople, let's consider it.

posted by Jody @ 10:48 AM 0 Comments

WOW - 56 and a ESAA astronaut - but he's sick

I did not realize it but one of the astronauts on the space shuttle which linked to the space station (international, don'tcha know) is German and he's 56. That is only a little younger than I am. But he's sick. That's not good. He can't do his spacewalk, but they say it isn't life-threatening and that's good.

Can you visualize me in space? No, you can't because there is no way I could sit on top of a rocket waiting to be blasted off without dying of fright. I guess that would be considered "more than sick" in "almost space".

Besides, I get motion sick.

The story is at this X marks the spot.

posted by Jody @ 6:42 AM 0 Comments

Well, gee, we didn't really mean it

My mother's cat Tippy passed away last night and she found him under the table on the deck. He looked as if he were sleeping; he was not. We don't know what caused his death, and since it is Saturday and the vet's office is closed, I guess we won't take him in. My mother is going to put his body in a safe spot and when the ground thaws, we will bury him.

Tippy was one of a litter of kittens my mother found on her back porch a few years ago; the mother figured she was an okay person. When Sydney came up, the mother took the kittens and then when she saw what kind of a dog Sydney is, brought them back. Of the litter, Tippy and Inky made their outdoor home with mother. Then one night Inky left and never came back. Tippy was always afraid of strangers, hiding whenever anyone drove in.

Tiffany wandered into the yard later and managed to make a truce with Tippy; and then The Little One showed up. Apparently abused, she was tiny and scared to eat. So mother had three cats at a breakfast bowl each morning. I thought I saw a trend here and would exclaim, "Mother!"

Tippy was not sick yesterday; I researched sudden cat death on the internet and discovered it is most often due to a heart condition. This is sad.

Tippy and Inky were there when Lucy Lib was still alive - the cat who showed up on Christmas Eve, just a few days after my aunt had died and a few hours after that aunt's December 30th birthday. Her daughter told my mother it was her mother's spirit come home - Mother lives in a house that has been in the family for generations.

Anyway, Lucy Lib would follow my dad around, sort of like a dog would. And, indeed, Miss Alice left her alone. Then he died in February of 2000 and mother came home from the funeral and opened the door for Lucy Lib and told her to come in. That cat passed away in the summer of 2006. Lucy's death made my mother sad. Tippy's death bothers me more. He was a spunky little guy.

Sydney and I are sorry about the cat remarks yesterday.

posted by Jody @ 1:37 PM 0 Comments

Prostate cancer, hormone treatment and hepatocellular carcinoma

posted by Jody @ 8:00 AM 0 Comments

Attack of the unknown cat

This is a picture of a dog who had CP on him and needed a bath. His face has been deleted to protect his humiliation factor.This is a picture of, oh, just some dog who has just had a nurse bath.

Sydney got cat urine on him last night. I don't know much more than that because I don't know much about cats, my mother's 8 year foray into cat friendship notwithstanding. My daughter-in-law said, "Oh, my God, was he skunked?" But no, more sniffs indicated the sign of the dreaded cat liquid, which I shall call here "CP". Actually, those would have been sniffs followed by the exclamation of "ew" and then running away.

I called my mother; she thought it was ha ha funny. Well, we will think about our revenge.

posted by Jody @ 11:18 AM 0 Comments

Oh, the morning . . .

Last night I got caught up in a sudoku that I totally goofed up and then Dante's Peak came on about midnight and suddenly I had an urge to watch it - apparently, I was suffering "fried brain sudoku stupid misplacement of a number" syndrome. So I watch a little and then decided I really should go to sleep, but I watched some more; then I took the plunge and pushed the remote button that would turn the TV off. It didn't work, so I watched a little more and then turned the volume all the way down - that button did work. I pulled the blanket over my head and realized I really should go to the bathroom at that point rather than hoping the urge would abate until morning. Finally, I get up and go and when I come back, I turn off the TV which all along was only three steps (at most) from where I had been stretched out.

I stayed up too late and woke up all tired and eye-aching anyway. I guess once you are past the point of no return, you should just keep going. I botched my sleep and I botched my Mystery Science Theater 3000 movie experience. Rats!

posted by Jody @ 7:38 AM 0 Comments

Free rice

No, rice is not being held in captivity; we do not have to liberate it. It is a program that combines one a usual Miss American concern (world hunger) with educational fun. My granddaughter and I have been playing off and on for a few weeks now. Sometimes we play individually; sometimes we play in concert. Anyway, if you click on the bowl below, you can see what I'm talking about.

posted by Jody @ 7:42 AM 0 Comments

While I was in iphoto

I was scrolling through iphoto when my eye fell on a series of pictures from the cemetery in Kingman. I think they are from 2006. It would have been right before Memorial Day week-end. Eight years ago we were just four days away from his death. Eight years.


Miss Alice - Her ashes are buried in front of the stone foundation.

It is different with them gone.

posted by Jody @ 5:45 PM 0 Comments

Well, we didn't expect it this fast

This afternoon around 2:30 I pulled into the drive and passing by the hedge noticed the water droplets were really adhering to the branches - almost as if they were glued to them, or frozen. Ack! Frozen? Well, yes, that was it. By 3:15 pm the little green car was under a tarp and the block heater plugged in and the huge movie-style snowflakes had covered the ground . . . and me. Everything is white now; I guess the muck is freezing beneath it.

posted by Jody @ 3:59 PM 0 Comments

Weather change . . . again

Yesterday was a day of muck, although in the earlier part of the day you couldn't see it because of the MUCK that developed after the extremely rapid snow melt which was accompanied by rain. Last night was a thunderstorm with lightning, somewhat unusual for Indiana at this time of year, and this morning we have cold. Soon it will be freezing again and things will be icy. Why am I writing this? I don't know. I guess because it's weather and it's there.

The little green car which was screeching horribly is back to quiet running, thanks to a belt adjustment down at Vorderman's Motor Werks. Yea!!! The lovely sound of silent running. Oh, that reminds me of Bruce Dern and Huey, Dewey, and Louie . . . and wait for it . . . "The man had a full house and he knew it." (OK, for those not in the know, check the movie Silent Running.

posted by Jody @ 8:58 AM 0 Comments

I so love this commercial

This commercial tugs at my heartstrings. Hank, Dalmation, Budweiser.

posted by Jody @ 8:59 AM 0 Comments

Are my brain cells dying?

There are times when I am listening to someone speak and they will interject a parenthetical "pardon the pun" and go on. For my part, sometimes I mentally smack my forehead when I realize I had not caught it. Ever now and then, I will be reading and there will be a real parenthetical "pardon the pun" and I will usually go on because there is no reason to stop reading. However, sometimes the phrase surprises me because I am not aware of a pun. I will go back and it I still don't get it, I will have to force myself to not linger forever trying to identify that pun.

Here's one in a recent blog post: Digital downloads cost $8.99 on Amazon (free from Limewire or a friend), CDs average $10.50, but vinyl LPs sell for a whopping $14.00 a pop (pardon the pun).

So, where is the pun? I don't get it. Is my mind a plodding one, wandering in a blogging world?

UPDATE: Okay, I've got it. After reading the comment below I thought some more about it and considered perhaps the pop referred to pop music - or maybe a paternal parent was forking over the cash. I went back to the post from which this came and in the paragraph above was a reference to a 15-year-old's remark that music on vinyl "sound(s) better on vinyl, even with the crackles and pops and hisses."

On the pun scale, I give it a "hiss".

posted by Jody @ 8:36 AM 5 Comments

the dog has been fed

"the dog" . . . ."the dog"? For crying out loud; he's not "the dog", he is Sydney and he gets fed every morning and evening. Today it was rice and browned ground beef and chopped up chicken and dog food for 'sensitive stomachs' all mixed up and microwaved. Now he is outside and I am waiting for him to come in, settle down and sleep. We have been through this out and in process several times this morning. Now he is in - again - and staring at the opposite end of the sofa. We have walking around on some afghans . . . circling . . . and down in a curled up position, although his head is still up, not yet resting on paws. YES! Houston, we have head on paws. We are a go for nap . . . we think.

Are you wondering about the punctuation in the first part of this post? Well, I am. I am fairly certain that we were taught to put punctuation outside of quotation marks in circumstances where the quoted section was not actually the complete sentence. I am confusing myself; I am going to research this. Not that doing this will get the house cleaning or get any food cooked, but I think it's important.

posted by Jody @ 7:57 AM 0 Comments

Was I a little testy yesterday?

Maybe that question mark in the title post should end with and "!". Or three of them. So today, to go for more of the snarkiness or just settle back to my usual simmer? Right now I am leaning toward simmering, although if I didn't have these kid responsibilities I just might get comfortable in the crock pot keep warm mode.

The reason I am able to do this right now - this posting, not crock potting - is because we have a 2 hour big D. Yes, the infamous delay status. Friday was a no go, then the weekend and then this morning. How fast is it going to warm up? What are the country/lake roads going to be like? Is fog lurking? Surely, surely, they won't be a closing. Then, again, the Giants did actually win.

Oh, yesterday, while the Giants were staying in the game and actually winning, I watched part of the Death Wish series marathon. Maybe AMC guessed that a lot of people would feel like "offing" people yesterday. They must have also felt people would be too pre-occupied by the Super Bowl to watch the third episode of Breaking Bad and aired an encore of the first two. The third will be broadcast on February 10th. I watched the trailer and more stuff appears to be going wrong as Walt tries to gain financial security for his family while he dies of lung cancer.

posted by Jody @ 7:08 AM 0 Comments

A complaint about internet news presentation

Often when I look at the Internet news headlines, I see a little camera icon at the end. That means you have to watch it; you can't quickly click and see the text of the article. No, first comes a commercial and then the introduction of the story and reporter and, finally, the story.

If you want to linger over a part of the story or go back to check on something, too bad. Well, I find that annoying.

Just now, I saw there was a story on Cooper Manning, the eldest brother. And it was one of those "watch" ones. Yes, it was interesting to hear Cooper's interpretation of the Manning accent, but I really would have appreciated not having to listen to all the repartee between anchorperson and onsite reporter.

posted by Jody @ 5:23 PM 0 Comments

No soup (bowl) for me

I am not watching the Super Bowl this afternoon; not me - no. I don't want Tom Brady to win and I am really sure he will. Either they will take a good lead or they will make people think, "Well, maybe the Giants can win," and then they will score the winning points and crush gigantic hopes into little whimpers.

However, I notice there is not a good movie on any of the other channels and I can't think of a movie I have here that I want to watch, although I did buy a special copy of Casablanca this week.

I think I will sit here and read and eat cheese.

posted by Jody @ 3:26 PM 0 Comments

Kendallville Scotts/Krogers - Coke sign

Do you see "Limit 2" on this sign?
How about this close-up?

There was a sign over the Pepsi products display that had "limit 2" on it. The sign above was over the Coke display. Actually there were two Coke displays; neither had "limit 2" written on the sign above them. So I asked, "Is there a limit of two on the Cokes?" A story employee told me that if it wasn't on the sign, there was no limit." The Coke delivery man was in on the conversation and told me to tell them at the check-out that an employee had told me no limit - just as the sign implied.

So, I put three Coke products in my cart and one Pepsi product and when I went to go through the line TWO people came over and said, "No, no, no." Well, gee, I had asked a store employee. Then, guess what, it turns out you could only get two 24 packs - period - at the $4.99 price - no matter which company it was.

I told them there was nothing on the TWO signs; they did not, as most stores do, say well, then it was their mistake and you could have it for the $4.99. In fact, they made me feel embarrassed enough that I told them I had gone to the trouble of asking a store employee about a limit, making certain it was okay.

I went back to take a picture of the changed sign just for the heck of it - but no one was there to change it.

Shoot, I didn't want to sneak a way to get the pop cheap; I double-checked with a store employee. (Have I said that before?) But, gosh, I didn't want to feel like a pondscum customer either.

UPDATE: Check the fine print under the picture in the ad. It says: Limit 2, please, per transaction. It does not say, "Limit 2, only." It says, "please." So the registers should not be set to charge full price after the first two 24 packs are scanned. But they are.

posted by Jody @ 11:13 AM 0 Comments

Then there is this ornament

This is a piece of one of the old-fashioned coffee pots that are sitting around here, in the fruit cellar, tucked away on shelves in the furnace rooms. They remind me of when I was little. I don't drink coffee myself because when I was young I had active motion sickness and my parents always took an empty coffee can with us in the car. The last thing I smelled before accepting it was time to grab the can was coffee.

Ah, how did I get talking about this when I was thinking how nice it was to hang this thing from Grandma's kitchen on the tree every year - the scent of pine (candle in this room), The Irish Tenors, snacks, and cold drinks?

posted by Jody @ 5:51 PM 0 Comments

Snow, but not so much as expected

Looking out of the driveway.
Looking down Riley to the north . . . Oh, and some dog. Who could it be?

The house in the dark and the snow.

The faithful dog waiting.

And the light in the window for you.

Of course, there is the matter of the freezing rain . . . and the little white balls on the trunk of the car that actually look like hail, or teeny tiny mothballs. I took these pictures after returning from taking Alison to the hospital. Oh, by the way, Summer was us a little after five cheering as the
East Noble Closed message came along the bottom of the TV.

posted by Jody @ 6:55 AM 2 Comments