It's been a good year

I've put a couple little funnies on Facebook that speak to our fear of what might happen in the coming year.  Here's one of them.

It's true, a lot of awful things happened in 2021.  Covid just refuses to die out, parts of the world are burning while others are flooded, tornadoes seem to have moved to the deep south instead of terrorizing Missouri and Kansas, earthquakes are becoming commonplace.  We've had more catastrophes than I can count, and you can't help but wonder where it will all end.

However, this morning I thought of all this and asked myself, "Have these things ruined my life?"

Just this morning I've enjoyed re-creating a dessert my mom used to make often for several years somewhere in the 60's:  Woolworth's cheesecake.  That isn't what Mother called it, but when I began googling for the recipe, I found out the dessert was served at the food counters in Woolworth's.  It isn't a true cheesecake, although it has cream cheese in it.  I guess my mom got tired of it, because by the time I married Cliff, she had totally stopped making it.  I always loved it, but had only made it once after discovering the recipe.  Today I made it again.  I always feel like I'm honoring my mom when I try to duplicate something she made when I was a child.  

I love to cook, and I've done plenty of it this year.  It makes me happy.  This morning I boiled turkey bones for a couple of hours so I can make turkey frame soup.  I got four cups of meat off the bones that would have been thrown away with the bones.  The turkey came all the way from Carthage, Missouri, to make me happy.  (The son-in-law's mother provided it.)

I so enjoyed my garden this past summer.  We were very short on rain, but the rains we got seemed to come at the right times to keep my corn growing.  We've enjoyed my Bodacious Sweet Corn so much!  I served some in a slow cooker at our Christmas get-together.  Oh, and I started a strawberry patch that I hope will give us lots of berries this coming spring.

If I'm careful and don't hurry, I can still go for my walks in the pasture with Gabe.  It's one of my favorite things to do, feeling the warmth of the sun in summer, and the brisk, refreshing breeze on my face in winter.  Oh, and the smell of the woods is wonderful!

Cliff and I haven't had Covid yet.  Of course we're vaccinated, but many people have still gotten it in spite of the vaccine.  So far, so good.

We have a dog and a cat to entertain us (and cost us money, but they're worth it so far).

We have typical old-people problems, but that doesn't mean we can't enjoy ourselves.  We have plenty of fun times, and the grandson is right next door to help us with anything we can't manage, and never complains about doing it.

We've never lacked for food or clothing, and this year is no exception.  We can be warm in winter and cool in summer, with a roof over our heads that doesn't leak.

Cliff and I are both thankful that we're able to read any library book we want on our iPads.

Oh yes, and the Kansas City Chiefs!  I never thought anybody would catch me watching football, but those guys' personalities got me hooked.  I'm truly going to miss them when the season's over.

I could go on, but I hope you see what I mean:  I can't say 2021 has been awful for me, personally.  I feel bad for those who have been hurt by all the calamities across the world, and almost feel guilty that I have it so good.  But I can't let the problems of others make me forget how much I have to be thankful for.

And on that note, I wish you all a happy new year.  If your year was awful, I hope 2022 treats you better.  As long as I'm able, I'll try to keep on the sunny side.

What a great Christmas Eve afternoon we had!

Because I decided late in the game to prepare a Christmas meal for those of our relatives who cared to join us, I went with preparing what I had on hand rather than going shopping and spend a lot of money on things I didn't have.  There was no Oreo Delight, simply because I didn't have any Jello Instant Chocolate Pudding.  I simply made two pumpkin pies and one Cherry cheesecake pie.  Looking back, I wish I'd made bread pudding instead of pumpkin pie, which we had on Thanksgiving.  

Let me stop right now and confess something:  I've never thought about it before, but I seem to prefer doing all the cooking!  Not because I think I'm such a great cook, but because I can fix what I like best, the way I enjoy it prepared.  Never before have I admitted that to myself, let alone others.  Of course, that usually means a lot of work on my part, but it's what I like to do.  Everyone is willing to bring something, which is fine as long as I can make the stuff I like to eat.  

I didn't even wear myself out cooking, either.  I boiled the chicken on Monday, then deboned and de-skinned it, put it back in the broth I cooked it in and put it in the freezer.  That part of my chicken-and-noodles was done.  On Tuesday I rolled out and cut the noodles, put them single-layer on cookie sheets, and put those in the freezer.  On Thursday I made the Ree Drummond mashed potatoes, put them in a pan, and covered them with foil (just like Ree does it).  All that saved me a lot of time and energy on Friday.  I used the grandson's oven to heat the fully-cooked ham, which left my oven free for the beans, mashed potatoes and rolls.  I gave Cliff the job of going over to the grandson's house, making the graze, and applying it to the ham.  Then I did something I'm sure most organized cooks have been doing for centuries:  for the first time in my life, I wrote down what time each item on the menu had to start cooking in order to have dinner at 3 PM.  I ended up at one point having an hour-and-a-half doing nothing, so I peeled some sweet potatoes I hadn't planned to use and cooked them.  That worked great, except for one thing:  I would have done better forgetting about the sweet potatoes, because I already had enough on the menu without them, and I had a couple of great-grandchildren showing off their cuteness outside:  Our daughter's family all came early, and I was cooking then.  That's my own fault, though.  I'll remember that next year and get my priorities right!  If I see idle time, I'll make a note to use that for family time, not for cooking another item we don't need.  One other thing I regret is that I wanted to get a group picture of all thirteen of us; several people had left before I thought about it.

Did I mention it was 70° outside?  Because there would be only thirteen of us, I had planned to eat in our trailer house, although I was a little concerned about all of us being crowded into our limited space while Covid is rampant.  Once I heard the forecast for Friday, we moved the meal to the shop, where the doors were open, we had a lot of space, and the children could play outside.  As if it were meant to be!

This is Ivan, my youngest great-grandson

He's 18 months old, but bigger than most two-year-olds

There were thirteen adults and the two great-grands.  No picture of Amara, my sweet and lovely great-granddaughter, who I think is going on three years old, and of course we missed the ones who weren't here.  After today we're done with leftovers.  All I need for New Year's is a big pot of the most delicious black-eyed peas I've ever tasted, discovered just a year ago.  You know, for good luck.  I'm not superstitious, but it's fun to pretend.

And that's how our Christmas gathering turned out.

Almost Christmas

For some reason, I have little incentive to blog lately.  I'm not depressed at all, just not in the mood to blog.  I tend to get that way around the holidays; then when the new year starts, I'm back.  I did a lot of grocery shopping today, and we got home shortly after noon and warmed up our dinner.  I'm a morning person, and once I've spent half the day shopping, I don't want to do much the rest of the day.

Shopping, of course, was awful.  We went to Aldi and Walmart, and both were crowded so badly it was hard to get around through the crowd.  I got my chicken cooked for the chicken and noodles we'll have Friday afternoon, and put the chicken and broth  in the deep freeze, so that's done.  I may make the noodles ahead tomorrow and freeze them, too.

I noticed Walmart is seriously low on toilet paper again!  Not that I need any at this point, but there are certain things I watch, just to see what sort of shortages we're going to have.  I wanted to make a Kraft cheese ball, which requires three different Kraft jar cheeses and some cream cheese, but I figured those would be sold out at this late date; I was right.  I wanted to buy some cream cheese, too.  There's plenty of the cheap brands, and I got some of those, but there are a couple recipes that really need the Philadelphia cream cheese.   I'm not making a sixteen-course meal, though.  So I'll get by just fine, whatever I make.

It sounds like the Covid is beginning to disrupt things again; it's starting to affect the NFL quite a bit.  I guess it keeps us on our toes, trying to figure out what's going to happen next.

There's a young fellow who delivers a lot of our Amazon stuff... not a UPS guy, he comes out in an Amazon vehicle.  He doesn't look over sixteen, but I'm sure he is older than that.  If the cat, Blue, is on the front porch when he comes, he always pets him for a couple minutes before he leaves.  Blue knows him now, and makes sure he gets his loving every time he's here. 

Right now, I'm out of here.  It's a beautiful day outside, and I heard we may set a record high for Friday.  Global warming has caught up with us.

Have a great Christmas, everybody.

A song that reminds me of a happy time

I'm sorry for my absence, but we have been running up and down the roadways for the past two days with one thing and another.  No, we weren't Christmas shopping; we got away from that long ago, except for gifts to favorite charities.

This morning, something made me think of a song from the time when our son had entered the Army and our daughter was still at home.  It was time for Jim to graduate basic training and I wanted to see the ceremony, which was at Fort Benning, Georgia near Columbus.  Cliff has never enjoyed driving a car for such a long trip and because of that, he didn't want to go; I don't drive and never have.  Rachel, our daughter, had her driver's license, and she was glad to get a chance to go on a road trip.  We've always said she should have become a truck driver:  She was and is an excellent driver, and always liked being "on the go", so she became my driver on the trip.  I've always been glad I got to see our son graduate.  When all those soldiers came out in front of the crowd, they looked so young!  That's when it occurred to me that most of the soldiers down through the ages have been teenagers.  I knew my Uncle Paul and my sister's husband, Russell, had fought in World War II; but I never thought about them being barely out of their teens!

Jim stayed in the motel with us that night, I recall.  I don't know what time of day Rachel and I left Columbus to make the 13 hour trip home, but it seemed as though we drove and drove, and were still a long way from home when darkness caught us.  I told Rachel that we would stop at a motel whenever she needed to, because we were still a long way from home.  We came to a stretch of highway where we weren't seeing cars going either way, and I remember saying, "This feels like something out of the Twilight Zone."

On we went, with me reminding her once in awhile that we could get a motel.  "We will if I need to," she said.

The radio was playing the stations she chose, and in this strange atmosphere where it felt we were the only two people alive, Lionel Richie came across the airwaves singing "Say You Say Me"; I'd heard it before, but never paid attention to it and did not know the words.  However, when Lionel got to the chorus, Rachel said, "Sing it with me, Mom."  So I picked up the simple chorus easily and we sang together down that lonesome highway whenever the chorus came up.

For years I'd listen to that song, just to remember that magical night when all was well with the world and my daughter and I were having such a good time.  I never paid attention to the words of the verses, but sometimes I'd sing along on the chorus.  There's nothing like a song to make you remember certain times, people, or places.  For some reason, I forgot the song entirely for a few years, until today.

This morning I crawled in bed with my husband as I do every morning.  We spent some time just talking and enjoying one another's warmth and company when "Say You Say Me" came to mind.  I told the Alexa device beside his bed to play the song and for the first time, listened to all the words.

Say You, Say Me

Say you, say me say it for always
That's the way it should be
Say you, say me, say it together
Naturally

I had a dream I had an awesome dream
People in the park playing games in the dark
And what they played was a masquerade
And from behind of walls of doubt a voice was crying out

Say you, say me, say it for always
That's the way it should be
Say you, say me, say it together
Naturally

As we go down life's lonesome highway
Seems the hardest thing to do is to find a friend or two
That helping hand
Someone who understands
That when you feel you've lost your way
You've got some one there to say, "I'll show you"

Say you, say me, say it for always
That's the way it should be
Say you, say me, say it together
Naturally

So you think you know the answers, Oh no.
Well the whole world has got you dancing
That's right, I'm telling you
It's time to start believing oh yes
Believing who you are
You are a shining star

Say you, say me say it for always
Oh that's the way it should be
Say you, say me say it together
Naturally
Say it together, naturally

Source: LyricFind

Oh, by the way:  We never did stop at a motel; Rachel kept driving, and once we passed through St. Louis, she said, "Oh no, I'm in Missouri.  I'm not stopping now."

And we arrived safely at home in the wee hours of the morning, although when we had only about twenty miles to go, a deer tried to wreck us.  As I said, my daughter is an excellent driver.  Just get her a large bag of Cheetos and a Diet Coke, and she'll go anywhere.

I googled the songwriter and found out Lionel wrote the song himself.  Never believe everything you see on the Internet.  The site where I found the lyrics said Willie Nelson wrote it.

Sunday Stealing

1. Have you ever been caught outdoors away from shelter during a thunderstorm?  Several years back we borrowed Cliff's brother's motorcycle on a sunshiny day and rode to Versailles, where many of Cliff's relatives lived.  By the time we left it was evening and the skies were darkening with clouds.  We started our one-hundred-mile ride home; soon the rain came down so hard and fast we couldn't see where we were going; cars were pulling to the side of the road, and there we were on a motorcycle!  Lightening was all around us, thunder was deafening.  We parked under an overpass for a while, but it was obvious the downpour wasn't going to let up, so we went on.  It was one of the scariest experiences of my life.

2. Did you ever build furniture forts as a child?  Yes

3. Do you use any medicines daily?  Yes, two for blood pressure, one for depression, and sometimes one for GERD. 

4. When was the last time you used a disposable camera?  I don't think I've ever used one.

5. When was the last time you flew on a plane?  Last October, when we flew to Georgia to visit our son and his family.

6. How many first cousins do you have?  Probably 20 or so; I'm too lazy to count them.  Some have died.

7. What’s the longest period of time you’ve gone without sleep?  Probably 24 hours or so.

8. Did the house you grew up in have a big yard?  Which house?  We moved a lot.  However, I believe all of the houses had big yards, since we were in a rural area.  There was always plenty of room for a good-sized chicken pen, too.

9. What has been the most difficult class you’ve ever taken?  Probably math; I never liked math and was terrible at it.

10. What’s something that’s much more difficult than a lot of people realize?  Trying not to gossip or say negative things about people.  "Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless."   James 1:26

11. What are some things a house would need to have for you to purchase it?  Electricity, air conditioning, Internet, a roof and a floor... and 40 acres.  Oh wait, that's the house I have now, and we already purchased it.

12. Would you ever go out in public wearing pajamas?  Depends on what you call public.  I have gone for my walk in the woods many times in my pajamas; also to the mailbox, but the neighbors next door would be the only ones who saw me... and I'd be on my own property, so who cares?  I have never worn pajamas to Walmart or church or any public place.

13. Have you ever had a lemonade stand?  No

14. Do you think you look older or younger than your real age?  I don't use makeup, so I probably look older, although my husband thinks I look younger than most people my age.  He also thinks I'm beautiful, so take that opinion with a grain of salt.

15. Where have you lived throughout your life?  Southern Iowa, Northern Missouri, and now Central Missouri (east of Kansas City).

Play along if you like, at the Sunday Stealing blog.

It's a bleak-looking day

In spite of the clouds, our temperatures are heading to the sixties today.  Gabe and I are back from our walk, which called for a light coat over the sweatshirt I'm wearing.  I also wore my KC Chiefs sock hat, and kept both coat and hat on all the way.  Many times I'll start out with a coat and end up laying it on the ground to pick up when I come back that way, but not today.

We went to a funeral Monday about 80 miles north of here for a cousin's husband.  The cousin is one of us four baby girls born in 1944 in the Allen family.  Norman hadn't been really well for some time.  We noticed how weak he seemed at the reunion in August.  His passing is a poignant reminder that this is the time of our lives when any one of us could be the next one to go.  Ah, but I've had such a good time on my pilgrimage that even when the time comes, I'll likely be reluctant to go.  

Cliff has been piddling in the shop quite a bit with his tractor project, which the grandson helps him with when he comes home from work, as well as on weekends.  He supplies a lot of muscle that Cliff no longer has.  Arick had Covid early this year, and it had just lately been enough time since he had it that he could get a booster; it made him pretty sick and very tired for one day, then he was fine.  They warned him that would probably happen; he's a believer and doesn't want to have covid again.  I wouldn't be surprised if all of us eventually have it, the way it keeps morphing.  More and more I get the feeling it's going to be around forever.

Oh, I MUST recommend the book I'm reading:  The Boys, by Ron Howard and Clint Howard.  I haven't read far yet, about 100 pages into a 500-page book, but I was hooked immediately.  I'm a big Andy Griffith Show fan, even now.  Ron credits his dad with teaching him how to act when he was a childhood thespian.  He obviously has a profound love and respect for his parents.   

Below, I took a photo of one page, just to help you get a feel for the tone of the book.  Click on it and it will appear larger, if it seems hard to read.

This book has given me a smile on almost every page so far.  Your library will have it, but you'll probably have to get on a list.  I'm pretty sure I waited a month or so before it showed up on the iPad.  

That's all I have today.  Let's hope we all have a happy weekend.

The day Alexa lost her skills

Yesterday morning I awoke at 2:30 A.M.  I never went back to sleep, but since I have an Alexa device who answers to the name of Ziggy in my bedroom, I had him (he has a male voice) play my Pandora station that plays hymns sung by country music artists.  I kept it turned low, and lay there in bed listening until 4 A.M.   But later, when I told my living room device (actually named Alexa) to play a song by Marvin Rainwater, she repeated my request and then said, "I can't access Amazon music right now".  

I then asked the kitchen device, named "Echo", to play the song.  Again, no access to Amazon music.  Finally I tried the one named "Computer" in the master bedroom.  They were apparently all on strike.  

Cliff suggested I unplug each of them and plug them back in to reboot them.  I told him I had a hunch this was an Amazon problem, not a device problem, but I tried it anyhow.  It didn't help.  Finally I tried to contact Amazon and that didn't work.  Their help page wouldn't even show up online, and this confirmed that they were having a very large problem.  The six o'clock news further confirmed it.  

However, by the time I turned in last night, all was well.  I told Ziggy to play the meditation music I always use to fall asleep by, and he obliged.  I understand that some folks with those robot vacuums couldn't use them without Alexa; I guess those need her to work.  Anyway, I'm glad my devices are done going on strike.  We use them for music, grocery lists, and weather checks.  We also ask them fairly often how many miles it is from our house to various locations, and ask questions about whether our favorite actors and singers are dead or not.  Trust me, we'd really miss them if we didn't have them.  Especially for the music.    

I think I'll listen to those Marvin Rainwater songs now.

PS:  I'm back, having listened to Marvin sing.  I didn't know he was such a terrible singer!  He's a little before my time as far as listening to country music is concerned, so I wanted to see what he sounded like.  It seems as though he's trying to copy Hank Williams, but doing a poor job of it.  

Licking Toads

I was reading the blog of a lady who lives in Hawaii.  She and her husband had been trying to figure out if they were looking at a toad or a frog.  Someone mentioned that if you lick it, you'll know if it's a toad or a frog because toads are poisonous. 

Years ago I read an article in the Kansas City Star, and it inspired me to write a poem about licking toads.  Lacking anything better to write about, I'll share my poem.

 LICKIN' TOADS

August, 1991 

(c) Donna Wood    

 
I've always read the papers, and I've read some funny stuff,
But I read something recently that struck me pretty rough:
It seems somebody figured out that toads will make you high.
You can lick 'em, or chop up their skin and smoke it, when it's dry.
The side effects are dangerous, but if you come through alive,
You can tell your friends you smoked a toad and, somehow, still       survived.
The ordinary garden toad, they say, will get you by;
But that Colorado River Toad will really make you fly!

I know it may sound funny, but I'd like to meet the guy
Who figured out that licking toads is going to make you high!
The first time he tried licking toads, had he had a couple drinks?
I wonder what he looks like, and I wonder how he thinks.    
He probably introduced his friends to the joys of licking toads;
Did they smear them with some jelly?  Did they try them alamode?
I s'pose one day somebody said, "This lickin' toads is grim; 
Let's kill the little fellas, and then we can smoke the skin! 

I'll bet they traveled near and far and searched the country through
Before they figured out that not just any toad would do.
One day, out in the Rockies, lickin' every toad he met,
Some weirdo hollered, "Over here's the best toad I've licked yet!"   
That poor old toad was popular:  they passed him all around.
The Colorado Spotted Toad was the best they'd ever found!
It's a psychedelic pleasure --- even better than LSD,
And with hop-toads running everywhere, you can have this thrill for free. 

Well, now it's made the papers, so the whole wide world will know,
And folks'll be lickin' and smokin' toad, anywhere you go.
You'll see them in the gardens, and in the middle of the roads
Pursuing that elusive high you can get from smokin' toad!   
Forget the crack and cocaine, and the marijuana, too.
That stuff is so expensive, when just any old toad will do.
It's a wonderful experience, a psychedelic thrill,
And the only little problem is, it could just get you killed!
 

  

Sunday Stealing

 SUNDAY STEALING

1. What are your plans for December?  I have no plans.  Life will go on as usual.  Unless it doesn't.

2. How do you celebrate your wins/success?  I would think a win or success would be its own reward.

3. Are holiday movies only for the holiday season?  Not necessarily; if you like a movie, you should watch it anytime you want.  When I'm feeling down, I sometimes watch "It's a Wonderful Life", because it makes me feel like I might have some worth after all.

4. What would you consider a waste of money?  That's probably a different answer for every individual.  Anytime my husband and I eat out at a sit-down restaurant it feels like a waste to me, because I know I could get a lot more food for that $40 or $50 than what I'm eating at that one meal.  If it's great food, it's OK doing it once in a while, but eight times out of ten, what I end up getting isn't as good as my favorite foods eaten at home.

5. What do you like to eat for breakfast?  Steel-cut oats with apples and cranberries cooked with them; almost any kind of fruit that's available; Grape-nuts.  But every once in awhile I have to have biscuits and gravy or some cheese grits. 

6. How do you feel about poetry?  I especially like poems that rhyme, but I like well-written free verse if the right words are chosen.

7. Are you shy?  In some ways.

8. Do you take time to reflect on your goals?  I've never bothered with goals much.  I go with the flow and take what comes.  I'm seventy-seven years old, and it's worked for me so far.

9. Something you are curious to know more about?  Lots of things, but most of my curiosity can be taken care of with Google.

10. Something that makes you feel fancy?  I don't think I've ever felt fancy in my life, and I'm not sure I'd want to.

11. How you’re still handling the pandemic?  Pretty well, really, as long as I don't have to deal with anti-vaxers and other people who think they know more than doctors.  So far I think I've unfollowed or unfriended all of those on Facebook.  That helped a lot!

12. A close friend you’ve never met in person?  I don't even have a lot of friends, period.  I did meet one of my best-ever friends in a Christian chat room and eventually met her face to face several times.  My husband admired her, too.  She died several years ago. 

13. Do you get in on trends early or later?  Never

14. What is something you do on a regular basis?  I go for a walk with my dog most days; I read in my One-Year Bible first thing every morning.  Of course there  are lots of things every housewife does on a regular basis, but who counts dishwashing and cooking?

15. Do you enjoy spending time with family?  Yes. 

Stolen as usual from Sunday Stealing.

I love the sound of autumn leaves crackling when I walk

 

All is well

 Blue did NOT have a broken bone; something attacked him and injured his left hind leg.  That's the second time this has happened to him; it's been nine months since his last experience, which you can read about HERE.  I waited too many days that time, for sure!  I think it was even the same leg that was injured.

Obviously I don't learn from past experience, or I wouldn't have been so sure (again) that the leg was broken.  I would love to know what sort of animal has attacked him; knowing my cat, though, he probably dared them.

The vet trimmed and cleaned the wounds and sent an antibiotic home with me to give him twice a day for ten days.  I took this video of him grooming his wounds this morning because he didn't feel like grooming himself all day, yesterday.  This morning when I let him inside from the back porch (where he has a temporary litter box), he went first to his cat tree, stretched and clawed the bottom post of it, then got in the position to jump up on it!  I didn't allow that, but gave him a place of honor on the sofa.  When he got down a while ago (I helped him down) he went in the dog's kennel/cage, went to a back corner, and is napping again. 

Miracles still happen

Tuesday, my inside-outside cat Blue came in limping horribly.  He could barely stand to touch his left back foot to the floor, and limped pitifully when he went into the kitchen to get a drink of Gabe's water.  When he laid down, I looked his leg over and found no scars, bites,  or blood.  I told Cliff that if he was the same Wednesday morning, I'd call the veterinarian.  That night I carried him to the front door, lifted the top of his igloo house, and gently laid him in his bed.

Yesterday morning, Wednesday, he was nowhere around.  I called for him, but had no luck.  I told Cliff, "My heart is heavy, but I'm not going to cry.  I will tell you, though, that we aren't going through this again, this business of getting a cute little kitten, falling in love with it, spending money for neutering and all the other expenses, only to lose him."  I felt guilty for not listening to my husband, who had offered to put some oil-dry in a litter-box and put it in the pack porch where Blue would have been safe from harm.  

I went out for a walk with Gabe later and noticed him sniffing at something on the back deck; I looked to see what he was smelling, and I saw what looked like two bloody paw prints.  Cliff agreed that's what it looked like.  We figured some dog or coyote had taken advantage of the situation, grabbed Blue while he couldn't run, and hauled him off for supper.  Every once in a while I checked the cat's igloo house on the front porch, but it remained empty.  

I knew I wouldn't sleep well last night, so I took an over-the-counter sleeping pill.  I did pray that whatever happened, my cat didn't suffer.  I was positive he was dead, and I told God, "I don't have much faith that I'll ever see him again.  It would be a miracle if he shows back up at this point."    

This morning I took Gabe out for his early morning pit stop.  He climbed the steps to the front porch and sniffed at the round door of the igloo.  I thought, "Aw, Gabe misses him too."  It was dark, but I took the time to stick my finger through the round door of Blue's house... and felt fur!  I turned the flashlight in that direction and there was Blue's face looking out at me.  I sent Gabe in and asked Blue if he wanted to come in.  He was very slow, but he did crawl out of bed and in the door, and even ate some cat food before he laid in his inside bed at the bottom of the cat tree.  At this point, he wasn't touching the floor with his back foot at all.  When Cliff got up and saw him walking in the kitchen to get a drink and said, "Looking at the angle of his leg, I think it's broken."

So I called our regular vet in Lexington; wouldn't you know Thursday is his day off.  The lady suggested we go to Odessa, where they have three vets.  We have to wait until 4:30 to take him, but he does have an appointment.

Boy, I hope we can afford this; he's now used up three of his nine lives.   

Blue's waiting in his Igloo.  All he wants right now is just to be left alone.

Thursday Thirteen

 PLACES I HAVE LIVED

1.  Guss, Iowa

2.  Villisca, Iowa

3.  Eagleville, Missouri

4.  Riverside, Missouri

5.  Eagleville, Missouri

6.  Harlem (an unincorporated area of Kansas City, Missouri)

7.  Kansas City North, Missouri

8.  2638 East 11th Street, Kansas City, Missouri  (my first apartment, and there was one in North Kansas City after that)

9.  Sugar Creek, Missouri

10.  Blue Springs, Missouri

11.  Oak Grove, Missouri

12.  Coffey, Missouri

13.  Wellington, Missouri

There were more than this, though.  When my parents and I had the Villisca address, we moved a couple of times in the same area; the same was true when we lived in the Kansas City area.  I think my mother liked to move into old two-story rental houses, clean them up, paint the woodwork, and wallpaper every room.  The last five places are where Cliff and I lived after we married; we've lived in Wellington since 1975.