Finding Spudo

Getting the spuds in he ground was the easy part. Before they could be planted I had to find them . I knew they were somewhere in the house, but the last place I remembered seeing them was in the back of the car.

So I checked the back of the car. No spuds. I looked in the basement, surely, I would have stored them here in long term storage paradise, its dark, its dry and its the text book location for spud storage. It wasn't where I put them. I think about the time I scored the spuds that the basement was flooding and I wouldn't have wanted them down in that even temporarily murky, humid hell hole. Neither the basement and I were not in a good place at the time.

I searched on. How about one of the closets? The hallway closet is a nice place - but its full of very happy sheets. The bathroom closet might have been an option but I think I rejected it because of the frequent showers and I was afraid the on and off humidity wouldn't be good for spud storage.

I moved upstairs, could they be that easy to find? Did I put them under the bed? The cat does spend a lot of time there, so maybe I rejected that idea and too much for the cat to resists. I don't think cats like spuds, but you never now, Ace carries grudges. I know the bags were paper and that would have been a turn off for him - he's a plastic man himself but he's been known to get curious about perhaps the chances for hidden plastic. So I kept on.

How about the attic? Too cold. A good choice, really, but I didn't go that way. Too easy.

I checked the basement again, could I have moved them there at some point? It could happen. I had absolutely no memory of where I put them and that could be because they got shifted around frequently. But would I do that? Wander around the house with bags of seed potatoes? Don't even I have more to do that that? I would hope so.

I was getting really annoyed with me.

Back to the basement, back to the car, searched the closet  again . Poked around the downstairs bedroom. Decided to really search the back of the car, then do a more through check of the basement. I was burning day light here and I had officially spent more time trying to find them then I did digging the potaotoannis trench in the yard.

Exhausting the possibilitys of the places they were not, I went back to the bed room and looked under the bed. Safe, kept cool but not cold, unmolested by the animals, forgotten by me.

BINGO.

It took no time to get them put to bed and tucked into tubs and then I went back inside to bang my head into the wall.

Gov. Tea Party

Govenor dosen't want to talk about how corrupt he is.

Garden Update 2 2014

Here comes the sun!

With the snow melting and time wasting, it is finally right to put the potatoes (mostly) in the ground! Yay

First i dig the potatoanis trench, easier than I thought, longer than I had planned.It was warmer than it has been and it stopped snowing,leaving the ground soft for digging but a bit mucky in places. So messy in places and there was a nasty wind. Weep for me.

 I knew I wanted to get them into the middle garden but I am also trying to keep in mind that the corn also has to go there and has to have room. I dug the trench around the outside of the space and feel pretty confident that I can have both there and be good neighbors. The potatoes will be ready to go May 6 and by the that time the corn will still be very young and not be bothered, hopefully.

This is all Yukon Golds, I did well with the spuds I planted in the ground last year and I did a half ased job with them, and had very low expectations. They did very well and I am hopeful that if I plant them on purpose from the get go, I can have a good harvest.

They are being planted in February, I am aware of that. Last year I put them in the ground around this time and we had a freeze, I figured hat all was lost for them so I pulled out that batch and started over. The "frozen" spuds got thrown around the yard as toys for the dog and then dumped into the garden to be tilled in.

I ended up with several volunteer potato plants as a result. It taught me that 1) Spuds are studs and you 2) Can Not Abuse them Enough . If there is an eye on any piece, no matter how tiny or shredded or frozen, it will grow.  I'm not going to ignore what I have in the ground now but I'm not going to hover.

I didn't give up on planters. I have four and they all have red potatoes planted. I like these and they did well in pots before.

The main plot

Friday Cat Blogging

The Day After

It stopped snowing and I went to work, it started the snow and I went home. I watched four hours of Law and Order : Vincent De'Onfrio . Then I pulled out my snow shovel and shoveled snow.

I am not good at it. At all. I'm fine with that because I am comfortable with my amateur status, I feel no urge to go pro. I do know understand why they sold an ergonomic shovel, the whole thing would have been less unpleasant and I might have done a better job.

The Garden in Winter

Dog snuggy

Pretty (cold)

Waiting

Well, the positive thinking helped.  No snow here yet, its been dry and cold and other than near constant alerts that we're all going to die - everything is as it should be.

Rocket got a nice walk and hopefully tomorrow will have his first real agility class, or as it is, his first real Intro to Agility class. The "real" agility class is  two classes in the future. In this class I have been told to expect Baby Agility . 

I personally think he is well  beyond "baby agility" but he does have a lot to learn and so we will be happy in baby agility and  will probably at times be defeated by it, Rocket will be fine but I'll find a way to do something wrong and that will upset me and I will be depressed  by this but we will get better and we will graduate to real agility.

In honor of the cold here is Rocket in his new hoodie, Its not quite large enough but it was $5.37, so its okay. I really wanted  a heavier sweater but there were none to be found that would fit - either too small or too large and too large is as much of a problem as too small..

Thinking positively

We are all going to hold hands and pray that the weather gods and their minions the weather forecasters, are all going to shriek Psych! and its not going to do what they are threatening us that they are going to do.

URGENT - WINTER WEATHER MESSAGE NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE RALEIGH NC 422 PM EST MON FEB 10 2014 ...AN INITIAL ROUND OF WINTER WEATHER IS EXPECTED ACROSS SOUTHERN PORTIONS OF THE AREA LATE TONIGHT AND TUESDAY... ...A MORE SIGNIFICANT WINTER STORM WILL AFFECT THE REGION WEDNESDAY INTO THURSDAY... .AN ARCTIC AIR MASS WILL MOVE INTO THE REGION TONIGHT THROUGH TUESDAY. A LOW PRESSURE SYSTEM WILL DEVELOP ALONG THE GULF COAST TUESDAY NIGHT...THEN TRACK NORTHEAST ALONG THE CAROLINA COAST WEDNESDAY AND THURSDAY. SIGNIFICANT WINTER WEATHER IS EXPECTED IN ASSOCIATION WITH THIS SYSTEM...THOUGH PRECISE DETAILS REMAIN UNCERTAIN.

 I'm clinging to "PRECISE DETAILS REMAIN UNCERTAIN" I'm going to go with that this is some sort of drill. ALso, I only heard about this whole thing on accident on Saturday when this freaky Agility Mom said something about it in passing to someone else. So, I haven't had time to make plans for this.

For instance, I do not have any ramen. I'll let that sink in, I do not have any ramen ! What if the weather minions aren't just indulging in some meteorological  masturbation? I mean, they could>/i> be doing this just to make themselves feel good, right?  The winter is long and the weather has been boring here I mean I am pretty sure the Wake County schools are still open tomorrow and they close at the bat of butterfly's wing in Africa. 

As far as I know, its just cold. Very. very cold and cold is not a probelm, cold does not stand in the way of getting to where you are going. We can be hopeful. I am not happy that it looks like we might be in line to miss our first real agility class! This would be our second missed class due to weather and we haven't even really started yet. Sigh. I am suppsed to get my potaptes into the ground this weekend but if the ground is covered with snow its going to be another week and it will lengthen the season another week. With all this damn cold the wasps had better been whipped out.

Opening Himamony

Another full and exciting weekend!

Saturday Rocket and drove out beyond the beyond to run through tunnels at a agility ring. We hadn't been  real ring before one before and I didn't know what to expect, everyone else and their little dogs knew what they were doing. They wanted me to "walk" the course before we went out there, I didn't know what this meant, I had to leave the ring to go get a map and then I didn't catch that the little numbers at the beginning of the tunnels were supposed to mean something to us. They meant that this was the order you were supposed to run through them. Duh. Rocket ran through all of them no sweat, in the wrong order, going through the wrong end. But he did it without stopping and without messing around. We have our first class this Wednesday.

I skipped First Fridays to watch the Olympic opening ceremonies. They were nice, I really liked the dove dancers at the end, that was impressive - but the rest of it was a exercise in propaganda. I wasn't impressed. China was impressive, also an exercise in propaganda, because that is what an opening ceremony is. I think it has something to do with the tone, you can say : This us, this is who and what we are. We are this - and do it without shame. The Chinese said "Hey, there is a billion of us. We have history beyond your knowing. We are communists.". They weren't ashamed or trying to pretend they didn't kill millions, they didn't lie about, they just didn't mention it. The Russians seemed dedicated to pretending they did not and that was the failure. I should not see you lying.

The Russians mistake was telling their history through Putins' eyes, changing History to fit History.

I also feel sadly, disengaged. I just had to pull myself away from Bad Ink , a show about correcting bad tattoos - like I care! To watch Ladies Figure Skating, which I do care about every four years. But I'm not feeling it and I feel bad about it.

Friday Cat Blogging

Is it time for the Olympics all ready?!

Brutality with sparkles wrapped in a flag.

Yay weekend! Yay First Fridays! Yay Tunnel Fun for Charity!

My plans for the weekend include: Only doing stuff I want to and doing my laundry, which falls firmly into the need category so it makes the grade.  I also got the most recent Muppet movie from Netflix and I think that sounds like fun. Also the Olympics start. Am I going to be the  only one  holding my rosary and rocking back and forth for the next two weeks?

But come on! Who is really ready for the Olympics to start? Remember the Greeks outing? Nightmare! But it was okay and the Chinese - Okay bad example, they had  billion workers and an Autocratic government, they were done, early, under budget and at attention. Still way, way out in front in the best display ever of monolithic statehood at the opening ceremony. Message : Yes, we did kill a lot of our people. Listen to the drums  now. PS. Fuck you."

I don't really know if they were early or under budget but like they would tell us anyway. I bet the toilets worked though and they would absolutely never admit that 1) They had cameras in the bathrooms or that 2) the cameras in the bathrooms were of any use at all. The communists  are all over the board now aren't they? Do you think the Chinese are all "Well, everyone thought we were rigid and scary but at least we had the International Village finished before they got here" or "We didn't have terrorists,  that doesn't happen to us. Um, why? we're CHINA." They just don't make autocratic dictatorships the way they used to.

 The Opening Ceremony Message:   What will the Russians say about their past? or will they without shame just trot it  all out under a banner : YOU WERE AFRAID OF US  Or will it be endless repetitions of Back in the USSR, even though there is no such place now. Will they illustrate how they felt spending the last few years carrying a flag into the stadiums marked "Coming Soon"? That's going to be interesting. What will they say about the Communism? Gulags? The Five Year Plans, the  purges, Stalin, Khrushchev? Perestroika? Russia has a whole lot of history, what  was done to it and what they did to themselves, most of it with its own people bloody, starving and in chains.

Will there be miniature Giraffes? Will Putin ride into the stadium shirtless and wearing ass less chaps astride a lion? Will they feed a homosexual to the lion?  Will they think this is okay? Will they care?

Maybe there will be a thousand women dressed like  Anna Karenina? a thousand simultaneous productions of The Cherry Orchard and Uncle Vanya  airblown Frozen Palaces - Maybe we shouldn't talk about Palaces... Is there any part of Russian History that doesn't end up with slaughter?

How excited do you think the Germans are to be going back to Russia? Not a lot of good memories there, the Finnish?  Maybe we are all too young now.

Agility

I went to Intro to Agility orientation class.  Its not going to be a hardcore class,we will be using "baby sized" agility um,rides? I'm not sure what they are called en mass yet. I don't think Rocket needs baby sized,  agility, um toys? but  he does need to learn focus and I hope this class will get us there.

Rocket says he doesn't need baby sized anything.

This weekend we are going to a fundraiser the school is having to raise money for the Canine Cancer Society,in honor of Daisy.  That's kind of sad, but we get to play with tunnels and I all ready know that Rocket likes tunnels, and so that's kind of happy.

And I get to go out to their real agility facility - its way out in BFE, but if we end up liking agility, we will have to get used to going out there and its for charity and it will be fun and it was only $5.

Into the dark

Rocket passed a little test Tuesday night. I went to my nephews Birthday party and left Rocket at home by himself and he did not destroy anything or pee all over the room!, true I was only gone for two hours, but I think he did well. I left him his dinner but he didn't eat it either. When I came back,I spent some time sitting in his room with him, this was very confusing to him so I need to do this a lot more frequently. He kept pacing the room and going back and forth to the door. He would look at me with great confusion in his face. He did finally eat his dinner though.

I don't get it. I go away every day.I come back every day.I have even started to come back for lunch when I can.I always leave and I always come back. The dog behaviorist guy told me that he handles it better during the day because its during the day and its normal for members of the pack to go places while its light. The problem happens when a pack member goes out at night, this is troubling. The guy said that  Rocket gets upset because at night the pack is back at the den and everyone is together and safe. Rocket gets upset because it is upsetting to a dog for pack members to go out at night, alone and unprotected .

I am the alpha, at least I would hope so and I can see why  the beta dogs would be upset by me leaving. But, I have to go out sometimes! I have a life. I am a very big dog and I ride around in a big steel dog crate.I like to bring him with me when I can but I can't take him everywhere and as it gets warmer I can't bring him with me at all - that big dog crate gets hot fast..

But, the work continues and progress happens.

Tonight I go to the orientation session for Rockets'  Intro to Agility class that starts next week. He's going to be alone for at least two hours while I'm there, but he will have spent the whole day in Day Care and that always exhausts him, hopefully he'll be too pooped to pee  and too catatonic to do anything catastrophic.