We got Lolli & the kids all moved this weekend. It went pretty smoothly - with the exception of having to wait an hour and a half for the landlord to show up with the keys, well that and the fact that the power had some how been shut off in the week between the girls seeing the unit and actually taking possession. Minor issues when you have a couple of kids to feed, bath & bed down. But Lolli's daughter and kids went to stay at grandpas (10 minutes from the new place) and Lolli came home with us. Luckily we had plenty of trucks and people to move the stuff. So once we got in it all went quickly.

We got home Saturday night and while I made Manicotti (sausage, leeks, spinach & four kinds of cheesey goodness) Lolli & Jay made this:



Unfortunately Pumpkin sat alone all evening on the front porch as we didn't get any trick or treaters. Never have. Seems no one wants to go up to the scary house on top of the hill.

Sunday was a pretty quiet day. My Mom and a friend stopped by to walk their dogs. So we walked up to the top of the hill. We were standing up by the goat pens talking and watching the goat antics. One of the does, Bess has gone into season. Mr. Deeds was very assertively trying to 'charm' her through the fence. All the other goats of course are right there watching. So were standing there and just as there's a lull in the conversation, Belle (Mr. Deeds 1st 'wife') says 'No'. I kid you not. As plain as day and enunciated clearly, without any hint of goat bleeting. (i.e. No-o-o-o) A perfect No. If I'd been alone I'd have thought I imagined it. Now, I don't think Mr Deeds has much in the way of charm and you certainly don't want to be downwind of him, but I guess Belle still has a soft spot for him.

OK, I guess you had to be there.

Monday was quiet and uneventful. Jay and our lead tech are in a class all this week so there's not much going on in the office. The low point of the day was getting in my jeep to go home at 5:00 in darkness. Bleh.

This morning I went down to permit office and took my camera thinking I could get pictures of the views. Unfortunately I hadn't accounted for building security frowning on me taking pictures at city hall, even if it was just out the windows. A more humorless chap I'd be hard pressed to find. Apparently he didn't think I was cute OR funny. Anyway, here's the outside of the building from a block away. It's the odd shaped one. The Department of Planning's on the 20th floor with 360* views of the city, bay and mountains. None of which you get to see here today.



Then turning around, here's a picture of my favorite church in Seattle, St. James Cathedral.



Ok, well just the bell towers then. Here's what it looked like long ago.



Then in 1916 it snowed 3 feet in one day and this happened:



It lost it's dome.

Still all and all it's the best place in town to go to Christmas Midnight Mass, and they don't even care if your not Catholic!



One of my favorite things about the building is the 'Great Oculus' The eye of God looking down from heaven. You can see the lighter area in the Transept in the picture above.

The eye of God, or the hole left over from the rotunda falling in? I guess it's a matter of faith. All I know is it's an awe inspiring place.



Gratuitous picture of my smiling dog, because it's my blog and I can if I want to.



Hope your all doing good!

B

Now, where was I...

It seems that I've let a another month slip by without posting. I'm lazy, I admit it. No excuses.



Life is good, no complaints. Things at the farm carry on much as always. Except for the trees loosing their leaves and the eternal rain. I really wish we had more variety of types of trees around the house. Maples just aren't very interesting in the fall. The leaves turn yellow one day and drop the next. The cedars and doug firs are nice, but I'd love to have some oaks in the mix. I'll have to keep that in mind come spring, maybe do a little gorilla gardening on the city's green belt.



We re-homed the goatie twins about 3 weeks ago now. The original folks who said they wanted them didn't pan out. Jay posted an ad on Craigslist on a Sunday night at 8:00 pm. he got 4 serious replies the next day, picked one and the family was pulling out of our driveway with the goats by 7:00 pm the next evening. He had told me all along that there was a market for them and I was the 'Doubting Thomas'. He was quite proud of actually having cash in hand for Summer & La De Da. Unfortunately I couldn't stop myself before reminding him of how much money was spent to produce those two. I really need to work on my internal edit function. I really can be a bitch sometimes.



Anyway, he was quite pleased. Those were kids born to an un-registered doe, so having them go sell so quickly was even more of a surprise. We both thought there'd be less demand, but there ya go. The folks that bought them have a small farm just down the valley from us and 3 kids 8 to 14 years to look after them. Also the Mom is a Vet's asst. so we couldn't have found them better homes. The new-ish registered doe has been up in Mr. Deeds pen for the last few weeks so more babies should be coming soon.



Work is going well, we could have more money coming in but we can pay the bills and still stick a little aside each month so no complaints there either. We did loose our youngest team member this last Sunday when he broke his leg (badly) and will be out for weeks if not months. Fortunately with the unemployment rate what it is we shouldn't have too much trouble finding a new person. I'd really like to find a woman to fill the spot I'm just not sure how to go about it. I'm sure they must be out there but I've never had any apply. It's a detail oriented job which (not meaning to be sexist...) I think would be ideal for a woman. While it does take some strength it's not like you have to be a weight lifter or anything.



Jay had surgery on his foot two weeks ago to remove a small 'nodule' from the bottom of his foot. It hurt him a but when he walked. It was nothing, so much so that I can't even remember what the doc said it was. It was fun to have him somewhat immobilized on the couch and all drugged up. He was pretty entertaining. Not that it lasted very long, He's not one to sit around, unlike me.



We lost our dear friend Buster this last weekend. Bus was the ex of Jay's cousin, the same cousin who sold us the farm. They were still very close regardless of breaking up. A smart, funny man we'll both miss very much. We lost so many friends in the late 80's & 90's that it was almost a common occurrence. Now when it happens it's a bit of a shock. He had lived for many years with AIDS and like most people who live with it, went up and down health wise. The drug treatments can keep them living for years. I guess we just got complacent, it just didn't occur to me that Bus could die this time.



Bus's dog Gage, a fine yellow lab gentleman with a touch of hip displactia, had been staying with us and cousin while Bus was in the hospital. Jay & I wanted to keep Gage as he's one of the puppies Bear was raised with and we love him, but Jay's cousin wanted him too, so we let it go at that. Besides, do I really need a large dog with medical issues? We'll still be able to see him and he'll be good for cousins heart right now.



We're going to be helping Lolli move this weekend. Her oldest girl has separated from her husband and she and the kids have been staying with Mom for the last few weeks. While this has Lolli in grandma HEAVEN, they need more space. The bad part is the new place is about twice as far away from us as the current one. It will be closer to grandpa, who's also helping out so that's a good thing. I'm not too worried about it, Lolli will need a break on a regular basis so I know she'll still be coming to stay with us when she can.

Bear's in my lap and I csan't type oveer him o I'll -stop licking me! close for now.

XO-B&Bear

rambling brain mush, shaken not stirred.

My blogging muscles have atrophied. I've been meaning, trying to post all week but just haven't found anything to post about. So I'll just post any way. Just to get the ball rolling here.

It's been a good summer - not great or fantastic, but good. The weathers been summer-y but not all out SUMMER, well except for that one week of 100*+ temps that did a number on the ferns and hostas I planted, but they survived and so did I.

Work has been busy, which is good. There was at a luncheon put on by one of the general contractors we work with about week ago, kind of a round table discussion on ways to bring in more business in this 'recession'. Many of the people/companies at the table are really having a tough time finding work. We've been fortunate, with the exception of a slow spring when no one was spending money were doing ok.

I love being in our new building. Little things like not having to move boxes to open a file cabinet to big things like having a big park and river side to walk during lunch or when I just want to get out of the office for a minute. The local mall is just down the road but I've been saving that for lunch hours when the weather turns on us. It's been fun getting to know the neighborhood feral cats. There's about 1/2 dozen of them. All skinny and skulking around. Their really not feral per say - as they will come up to you and let you pet them. Poor flee infested things that they are. There's also a group of five kittens (so tiny) in a bramble patch across the road. We called the Human Society but they aren't taking any more animals due to budget problems. Calling Animal Control is pretty much a death sentence (the county is pulling their budget as well) so we didn't try them. I know the right thing to do is to have them taken in, I just can't do it.

I took a walk over by the river after lunch today. Watch a train carrying Boeing fuselages from the Renton plant into Seattle to get their wings, tails and wheels put on before being flown up to Everett (Say hi Moohaa!) to get their paint jobs before being delivered to customers. While i was looking across the river at that I noticed a family of raccoons washing their faces in the river. Looked like parents and an adolescent. The big one spied me across the river and told the others o high tail it for the underbrush. They were fun to see.

I was driving back from having coffee with a blogger friend yesterday and drove by Boeing Field. There are like 20 planes sitting down there all painted and ready to go. Something I've never noticed before, they usually move those puppies right out. It made me wonder if customers are delaying taking ownership of the planes or something. Then about 1/2 a mile further down the road I went by the Union Pacific rail yard. There's about 50 idle engines sitting on the tracks. Again, something I've never seen. Makes me wonder if the recession is as 'over' as the nice folks in the administration would like us to think.

I've had a lot of fun gardening this year. Tomatoes came in awesome, Corn that wasn't suppose to be midget, but is, I haven't tried yet as he years arn't big enough and probably won't ever be. The peppers came out great and the peas, but I didn't plant enough of those - I'll know better next year. Strawberries were great but we didn't get many. Meaning Jay & I didn't get many. Bear can pick his own and does.

"Bear's Farm" now has 7 resident goats. Jay's been 'working' on me for weeks/months to get a registered doe so he can raise & sell registered kids. I finally caved. I was sitting outside on night and just got to thinking: Who am I to stop him? he does the majority of the work with them so what am I bitching about? - I won't bore you with my list of REALLY good reasons why we didn't need another goat. The two youngest babies are already promised by way of a craigslist connection Jay made. So we'll wait and see if that really works out. Anyway, Jay's got his new baby Cinnamon and he's happy. He (we) bought me a laptop and wireless router to keep me quite about it. Which might work for a short time.

I hope you all had nice summers - I intend to be a little more present around here after being a flake for the last 3 months. Just be happy I made that promise not to rant about politics a year ago, there's so much political crap going on out there it's hard sometimes to keep my yap shut!

Later!

Cuz you all love goats right?

Sorry - I should write a real post but we've been up all night playing goat midwife. I'll be back soon to catch you up on the last month or so. We're all good here. Bess delivered two healthy little does this morning. Jay helped a bit with getting front legs lined up but Bess did the rest. Jay wanted a little buck for company for Mr. Deeds but two live does has him wagging his tail pretty good. (Right up until he crashed a few minutes ago) Ok. I'm rambling - Here's are Bess's girls, Summer and La De Da.

The little train the couldn't

We're taking vacation days today and tomorrow for a four day weekend. Took the new light rail train into downtown, well almost. The train that doesn't quite go to the airport, (that link isn't quite finished yet) didn't quite go to downtown today either. It stopped short of the downtown tunnel where you had to transfer to a bus. We passed on that part. Both trains and buses are suppose to use the tunnel but apparently there are a few kinks.

Tukwila Station - about a mile north of the airport

Art ! (?)

Green River

Franklin High School

Downtown - just coming out of the Beacon Hill tunnel

Home of The Evil Coffee Empire

Jay at Stadium Station not waiting for me - The end of the line today

Miss Bess will be having her kids here in the next week or so. Our Vets 25th anniversary is on Sunday and Jay's been asked to bring the goats down for the party.

Oh boy.

We'll see how that works out.





Does this post reflect the complete mellowness that I'm feeling?

***YAWN***

-yep

nap time.

A short quail tale.

I don't feel like writing about the Quail but I said I would. Well, I'll spare you the whole long story. It's enough to say 100 were ordered, 80 made it to us alive. The numbers dropped precipitously since then and this morning there were 3. I know the post office called the morning they got the package, unlike the last order of chickens, they can't be blamed. Why we lost them all we can't figure out.

What were we going to do with them? I have no idea. I don't why Jay & his buddy ordered them. It's a shame though, poor birds - maybe if the 3 live well try and keep them around as pets.

A job I want:
Kitty corner from our building is the warehouse that stores the Miss Budweiser hydroplane. Two people (seem to) work there. The only thing I've seen happen there so far is these two guys playing their remote control cars in their parking lot. It's not like I'm some over-worked wage slave chained to my desk or anything but jeez guys, wax the boat or something, at least try to look like your working.

From "The list of projects & dreams"
Ok, so now that the office is finished we get to move on to new projects. It's really a pity that Jay can't stand to have nothing to do. We're going our tonight to source material for the new "raised beds" or new garden in what is now part of our driveway. Don't worry there's plenty of driveway to go around. My idea was to build to 'C' shaped raised beds that face each other. Their not going to be "raised beds" really as much as they are really tall, large planters. They'll come up about 28"-32" - tall enough to easily sit on the wall while rooting around in the dirt. Here's a crappy little drawing I sweated over for about 2 minutes to show you.



So the roundy things are the existing trees and shrubs - the two red things in the middle are the planters - they should end up about 4 feet across - leaving a little "room" in the middle will probably have a fountain and a chair/table in it. It's about 10x10 in there - the whole thing is about 24' x 24'. The weird rectangle at the bottom is the side of the house. Hey, I'm NOT a graphic artist, ok? I originally wanted them built out of railroad ties but my contractor (Jay) says that would look too much like a fort ( I shrugs me shoulders & shakes me head) I already ruled out the fakey home depot retaining wall bricks. (I'm sure I posted about this before) So even though timbers would be SO much easier to work with, and I think would look just fine...were going rock shopping tonight - WAA-HOO!!

The best part is Jay is "on the job" so this project isn't destined to end up half done, like one of my projects. (refer to the half painted yellow patio table & chairs or the 1/2 done oil painting for starters...)

Anyway....

It's Friday afternoon, the sun is shining and it looks to be a great weekend. Hope your having fun!

Life in the big city (well, Seattle at least)

I got home last night to a neighborhood swarming with the police. When I turned on to the main road at the bottom of the hill I could see two state patrol cruisers blocking off two streets to the south of us and could hear sirens all around us. About 15 minutes after I got home and was out back with the goats a cop in SWAT tactical gear came around from the front of the house, didn't even hear him pull up. Anyway, he told us they were searching for an escaped rapist that was attempting to hide in the woods around us. I have no idea where he might have escaped from or when or where they rape occurred. He left us with the advice to bring the dog in the house as they were bring in the police dogs. We never heard anything after that - I watched the news and looked in the paper this morning but I can't find any report of the whole thing. It's not the first time I've seen a big police response to something and then never saw a news report - makes you wonder.

THEN! this after noon Jay came into my office and mentioned that he noticed what looked like blood and a hand print in the hen house this morning. I started to give him a hard time about being clueless but then I realized that he really hadn't put two and two together. Anyway - I'm going to check it out when I get home and see if it really looks like a bloody hand print. I'll call the cops if it does. I guess I should be more freaked out about it but I'm not. Well unless it really is a hand print - I'll post an update on what I find -

ANYWAY----

On to something better - Pictures! ok - here's my new office


And the view out my much loved window to the parking lot...



And the other two side of my fish bowl (I kid, it's not bad at all)



Out in the shop...Big Red there needs to go to the dump then he can go back to storage - we only us him once in a while


Down the long hall way - we have 4 office across the back of the building and to big ones above, upstairs


And finally, Jay's office. We'll be working on getting him some big boy furniture soon - Right now it looks pretty funny - the "admins" have office suites, the owners have crap!


Come back tomorrow and I'll tell you about the 100 baby Quail chicks that were delivered yesterday - tiny TINY little peepers.