I will huff and i will puff...

Today we had to sort an issue out at the bank. It was the second time we have tried to sort this issue out. The first time, the young woman who had set it up told us flatly that it could not be fixed. The thing is that we are keeping a lockbox for our executor. When our CDs matured, we rolled them over. When we got home and were going through the folder, we realized that the largest and oldest CD did not have any paperwork. 

The girl was certain she had put it in the folder. She hadn't. She said that it could not be reprinted. We received verification paperwork, but there was nothing about the oldest CD.

So off to the bank we went. A woman walked up to us and asked if she could help us, so I began to explain to her. She was helping another customer she said. 

The question begs an answer: why would you offer to help someone if you didn't have time to help them? I mean, we were headed to take a seat to wait. She was the one who asked if she could help us. 

Anyway, when she came out and called us into her office, I pulled out the folders and explained the situation. All we needed was something that we could put in this folder so that our executor had all the information. I showed her the previous folder which showed the CD, showed it matured on Feb 1st, but that nothing came in the new paperwork to indicate what we did with it. 

To her credit, she agreed that we did have to get that corrected. For whatever reason, the address change was not noted on that. She corrected it. While she could not print out the certificate, she did provide a printout that showed that the CD had been contined for another 7 months, what the interest rate was and when it matured. I stapled that printout to the previous information. That was done. 

We went to the Goodwill. I needed a couple plates that I could put in the microwave. We very quickly found what we needed. Tim picked them out. 

What happened next was all Tim's fault. He noticed a store he'd never been in. They had a lot of stuff. One thing I saw, I had never seen before...windchimes for $750. I touched the striker and it was so lovely. The deep tone reverberated wonderfully.

$750, though. 

I looked at the others. A 59 in set could be had for a bit over half that. Still...it was an awful lot of money. We walked around the store a bit, but I could not get those lovely chimes off my mind. Tim  found something that interested him.

At the checkout counter, I made up my mind. I wanted those chimes. Tim was a bit surprised. I said, 'If you want a truck, you buy a truck. If you decide to build on to an already massive garage, you just do it. I want those windchimes. I am making an executive decision here.'

It is the most extravagant thing I have ever done for me. 

I have them hanging in the basement right now. The winds are blowing at 30 mph, with gusts of 65 mph. We don't have power. Guess I will just go to bed.

Oh...my great achievement was that I gave Fred a pill. I lived to tell the tale. No blood was shed. However, the cat is shunning me.

One spring day.

 Today was such a beautiful day, 73°, wind blowing in a very determined (but warm!) way. It is a sunny day, with quite a bank of dark clouds glowering from the west. Tomorrow is supposed to be a pretty stormy day, waking up to thunderstorms, followed by multiple fronts moving through all day long. They are warning of EF2 tornadoes and damaging hail.  Thursday: snow. St Patrick's Day? High of 26°.

Ah, spring! 

So I spent today outside. I planted all the seeds that need started indoors. I uncovered all of the raised beds, stirred in some compost and fine sawdust. I was pleased to see that I have thyme, basil, and garlic coming up. 

I planted flowers, cleaned winter debris, hauled my tomato cages up.

I helped Tim put tin on a roof. Tricky business hauling 4x8 sheets of tin in a brisk wind, but I managed not to blow away. 

PBS News Hour is not available. Anyone else seeing that?

650 ICE agents are still in Minnesota. That is 4x what is expected. They are picking up pregnant women from their scheduled appointments. Women are not keeping appointments and giving birth at home. Medical personnel are mobilized to address this.

Lindsey Graham wants Arab countries to join the fight.

 https://share.google/2P2RtEOEVfUPhxoD2

Who would miss a chance to be a part of this?

*eyeroll*

Still nuts

 My sister and her husband came for black bean soup and fajitas. I was disappointed with my tortillas. The were passable, but not nearly as nice as my daughter-in-law's are. I will try again.

Two games of scrabble. I won the first by the skin of my teeth. She trounced me on the second game.

I watched Hamnet today. What a remarkable film! So very well done. Cried my head off. 

I saw Phantom, stray cat. I also saw him attack Possum. We can't have that. 

My smart watch uses an app. It did not adjust the time one hour ahead for daylight savings time. The watch said I needed to sync it to my phone, but my phone would not allow me to access the account without providing a credit card. It is a free app! I was assured that the card would not be charged...that this was for 'verification' only. 

I clicked out of it. They had no need for that information. My watch reset itself to the proper time.

Country Joe died today. He was 84. 

What it sounds like here.

 The mushroom class was fun. I have a log inoculated with lion's mane. Met some neat folks. The 'teacher' fell into the whole thing by accident. He lived in Virginia. There were limestone caves. He started growing mushrooms. It went so well that he wound up growing high specialty mushrooms for high end restaurants. He had a lot of knowledge. 

I met a bee keeper. There are bee keeping meetings. A chance to learn something new. So that is an opportunity. 

I met a woman who hasn't had a TV since the 1980s. She said, 'I am a weirdo...' A very serene weirdo, I have to say. 

We had our first thunderstorm. Short, sweet but it was a doozy. I love thunderstorms.

Our owl is a Great horned owl. He sounds like he is calling from the swamp. 

No what else is calling from the swamp? Peepers! That is a sure sign of spring.

Lots of little joys. 

But our president is still a lunatic. Stark raving. We have boots on the ground in Ecuador.  He is saying that Cuba is going to be attacked.  I can't believe that our military is violating the Geneva Convention. Every day brings us to another level of crazy.

Thanks Phillis

 Phillis id'ed  my videographer. His name is Lucas Bean. His stuff on cults is very interesting. I am not able to put them on the blog, but I hope you can find him. He showed up on my facebook.

This morning, gas prices were $3.79, up 50 cents in just five days. What are you folks seeing?

We have an owl hooting tonight.

Tomorrow I have a mushroom growing class. Looking forward to that. Also looking forward to a 70 degree day. 

Of course next week, we are supposed to get 3 inches of snow.

I am starting tomato seeds.

It is the little things.

Cult

I was shocked to see a post from a family member today. It basically stated that she always saw 47 as a great man. However now that she has watched him being attacked from all sides, she realizes that to have so many enemies fighting against him, he is undoubtedly the greatest president America has ever had. 

WT actual F? 

I tried to find a video I saw. The guy was making the point that all cults die. He felt that there are 4 ways they end. 

1) the death of the leader.

2) the people inside realize that the promises/prophecies the leader is trumpeting at them are not coming true. 

3) divisions/infighting/power struggles within the cult. (The cult is broken from the inside.)

4) people leaving the cult, and speaking the truth about what is happening inside the cult to people outside the cult. (The cult is broken through outside means)

He stresses that this cult will end just as every cult before it has ended. I find this reassuring for no particular reason. I thought you might too. 

(I cannot find the video. It is raining cats and dogs and the internet is slooooow tonight. When I find it, I will link it here.)

Kristi Noem got fired today. 

https://www.newsweek.com/kristi-noem-mocked-with-jokes-and-memes-after-firing-11630643?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&sfnsn=mo&fbclid=IwdGRjcAQXB39jbGNrBBcG8GV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHvpGnIjqkbtX6j7Fw5fcf-UD6_b4EPoPv_2hR66nCL0HTPF4V-fpgH1_9UWN_aem_Fe_-47Yn9vG7PV4Br-bP1g

Her 'promotion' is a made up position.

I am trying to be cautiously optimistic about her replacement. 

Catching up.

My God. 

Hegseth:

 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/03/us-israel-iran-war-christian-rhetoric

Trump appears to be rotting before our very eyes:

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/us/politics/trump-rash-neck.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&fbclid=IwdGRjcAQUZ1hleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAwzNTA2ODU1MzE3MjgAAR4OzIbz3AnD7FOq4ZCyLHTJSFYrJVngUHnRN68CcyF6HysoJzAc-FFv6GTtcQ_aem_NUkYi-7cBz4hR5H7ablarA

Gas went up 20 cents a gallon over night.

I am a bit overwhelmed by the big picture lately. I am sure everyone is. 

In local news:

I had a trip planned to spend time with my son and his family. The weekend before I left I got hit with quite an intestinal bug. I will spare you details, but I really, really was afraid that I would have to delay the trip. 

I got over myself the day before I was supposed to leave. 

I strongly advise any overwhelmed person to borrow some kids to rebalance your soul. 

The youngest wanted me to come to her art show. I wanted to see it. She was so proud. She likes to give gifts. A painted rock last time. This time it was a plastic heart on a keychain she'd won at preschool. She brings these things to you in cupped hands as if she is presenting you a treasure, and the only response is to cup your own hands and to receive her offering with all due reverence. I immediately clipped that heart to my purse and assured her that I will love it always.  I will, too. Her art show was grand and I loved watching her confidently striding through her preschool showing us around. 

The oldest is 7 and we have our own little thing. Our fairy tea parties have become increasingly fancy.  Her six fairies gather around a table set with fancy miniature china. They carry on polite fairy conversations as quiet fairy music plays in the background. We sit in the middle of her room and have the most wonderful imaginary adventures. The last evening, the fairies, all six of them, told me how sad they were that I was leaving. I told them that we would have a grand party when I returned and that I would have tiny fairy gifts for all of them. My grand daughter was thrilled at the thought of a party of this caliber. She lined them all up in a row to bid me farewell, and I promised to miss them all until we met once again. Then they went back on her window sill, all in their assigned place.

Such sweetness. 

My son and his wife got two date nights in a row. 

I hit their Amish store, which is huge. They had, of all things, cranberries. You know, I had to resort to canned cranberry sauce at Christmas. I could not find the bags of berries to save my soul. After Christmas, I usually buy them up when they are heavily discounted. The bags are tossed in the freezer and pulled out one at a time. I like cranberry relish on my toast. I like it stirred into my homemade yogurt. At 35 cents a bag, a dozen of those went into my cart as quick as a wink. Tim likes blueberries and they had pints of organic blueberries for 75 cents. I also love their cheeses. So many different kinds. 5 lbs of cheese made its way into the cart ss well. No meat this time. We really have so much venison, pork and poultry in the freezer. A good problem to have, to be sure.

My daughter in law showed me how to make tortillas. An old dog learned a new trick. We had a beautiful day. We got in a family hike. We tried to fly a kite. We went out for lunch. We did crafts.  

It was a beautiful weekend, and I needed that. 

Funny story: the morning I was supposed to leave. I could not find my car keys. My oldest granddaughter said 'I hope you don't find them and you can't go home!' It was so fervent that it really touched my heart. It also made me wonder if she had hid them. (She had not. They had fallen out of my coat pocket in their car. )

I am once again home. 

It was too cloudy to see the lunar eclipse. We started the day with freezing rain. 

My sister is coming over to make tortillas with me Sunday. We are going to have fajitas. One old dog reaching another old dog.

I found a cream colored lurex sweater to deconstruct to make my moon for my planned weaving. 

I got a letter from gz, which was exciting.

I got the perfect haircut.

If it wasn't for the fact that we have a lunatic for president, life would be pretty okay.

I am behind in blogs. I will have to catch up.