Where's my winning lotto ticket?

Wow - Washington DC is gorgeous with the snow, but it's crippling the city. Mother Nature can be cruel.Today I took the ACE train to a client in Sunnyvale.

The rest of week I take BART to Pleasanton. Bart is a great alternative to driving because I can read or knit on the way, and then I get in a brisk 8 minute walk to and from the client's office.

Unfortunately, taking public transportation also means that I have to be around people in close quarters who I would never invite into my living room under any circumstances! I'm amazed at how stupid some people are.

Whether it's unsafe driving, inconsiderate behavior (such as the ubiquitous loud cell phone talker), or just annoying habits (like those who clear their throats constantly and have turned it into a performance), I sometimes have to remind myself that taking the train is still better than driving. And when I question it, I remind myself of the Friday I drove to Sunnyvale and it took about 22 minutes, but going home it poured the whole way, visibility was low, a few idiots were still going faster than it was safe to do, and it took me over an hour to get home.

NOT ALL CLIENTS are CREATED EQUAL

Have I mentioned lately that I am glad I am a consultant and not an employee? Oh, there are so many reasons I prefer this, but some clients are better than others. There, I said it. At one client I have my own office (yes, with a door), my own laptop, my own printer, a great cafe, a manager who calls me for special projects or to cover for her when she is out, and I even sit across the hall from a famous former football player, but ................

I have another client where I sit in a tiny cube (not just a cubicle, but a TINY cubicle), in a noisy office with a guy who clears his throat to what can only be a song in his head, and even when he closes his office door, I can still hear him, a Southern belle who sits next to my cube who is rather bitchy and is on the phone doing collections and admitted to me that she cranks up the accent because people listen more, a shared printer down the hall, certain websites blocked, and people who just don't get what this position entails.

And then I come home to my cats and I realize that cats are so much better than some of the people I encounter in a day.

Cats and Yarn and Weather and Things

What a cool gift - my friend went to an Alpaca farm in Washington state while on vacation, and she brought back a hank of this lovely yarn sheared from Xavier, as you can see from the label with his picture. She announced to me that she had an ulterior motive - she also brought me a hank of yarn for me to make her a scarf. I thought that was a very cool idea. I'm going to use Diann's yarn winder today and then we're going to knit.

It's mostly about the cats. Is Mowry adorable sound asleep half hanging off the window perch?Wait, it gets better. He's sleeping all curled up in a ball.
Mr. Trouble jumped on the window perch, but there was already a cat there! I'm sure he knew that. While it looks like he might want to eat Ziggy in this picture.....
And not much better here ....

they actually posed for me here. There wasn't any panic or hissing or anything else. I finally picked Mowry up and moved him to the scanner since he's lighter and Ziggy was here first. but he came back up. Here's a closeup.
Eeek, it's a mouse. It's a very realistic cat toy mouse. The floor is scratched where the track was for the old closet doors. I need to try Murphy's Oil or lemon oil or something to try to make it look better.
Finally Ziggy is alone on the perch. What a great view of the Niles sign and the green hills on this lovely clear day. More rain is expected next week. We need the rain, but we also need a nice break from the rain, which we got yesterday and we are getting today.
Yesterday Alex went to the vet for his annual exam and shots. He was so scared he just put his head down on the exam table and let me pet him while we waited for the vet. He was red-tagged with a caution sticker from when he was extremely grouchy and uncooperative a few years ago when he had crystals and was in the vet hospital for a few days, but he's actually very easy for the vet to check when he's feeling okay, but scared, as he was yesterday. When the exam was over he couldn't wait to get back into his carrier. Of course getting him into the carrier to take him to the vet is a different story. Will actually covers Alex's eyes so he can't see that he's going into the carrier.

What've we been doing this weekend?

I took a few great pictures today, but somehow when I thought I was downloading them to my computer, I did something else and now they are lost.

We are running out of our favorite coffee, but since our closest Costco doesn't carry it, we have to find a Costco that does. I called the new Hayward Costco and was told they carry it, but the last time I called Santa Clara and was told they carried it, I found out when I got there that they didn't. They got an earful from me! We once bought about 8 bags when we were in Reno and stopped at Costco there! Gotta get it when we find it.

It's cloudy again, and was even drizzling outside while the sun was out. Today was supposed to be the one day without rain. The nice thing is that in winter when the trees are bare, we can easily see the Niles sign from our window.
The birds were happy to see sunshine this morning. While it did cloud over, the birds were still enjoying the dry weather.

It was pretty dark outside yesterday!I love looking at the webcam in Durango, Colorado. Look at all this snow! They moved the webcam and now it shows the quaint town even better than before!


Look at the icicle on the camera.



Here's the webcam. No wonder there are sometimes icicles on the pictures!


Back at home Alex was hiding in the closet atop the plastic drawers getting my hanging clothes full of his fur!
This was yesterday when he was doing his "Sprawly Boy" thing atop the window perch.
Ziggy was sleeping on the bed, his new favorite spot.

Will took this for me on Thursday when I was away at a client's office. Look how close the 3 stooges are sleeping together. Ziggy on the left, Mow needs no identification, and that leaves Alex on the other cat bed on the right. Places eveyone!
On Friday I worked at home, but we took a break and went to an estate sale in Hayward where I found this lamp for $10. It came with a light red/burgundy lampshade that was way too big for it, but we did some moving around and put the burgundy lampshade on a lamp in the living room, and this is how it looks with a more appropriate lampshade.
Those are monkeys climbing up a palm tree. I needed more light so I could see when I go into my closet, and this is perfect.


I finally have a crystal ball! We had to replace the lost finial on the monkey lamp.
We're on a roll. We found this lamp at an estate sale today for $5. Will already has this, but it's smaller and not actually a lamp, but a votive candle holder. This one is a lamp. It's from the movie "A Christmas Story" and is fitting for the sunroom.
He also found this collection of 45 rpm records in the case all for $1.

Then we went to the Farmers' Market and met Ken and Diann at the Depot Diner. I know we need the rain, but we don't need it all in a period of a week. More is expected tomorrow thru Tuesday.

First Sunday in 2010 --- before we go back to our regular programming

I saved work to do today, but then today was a gorgeous day, so so far I've gone to a garage and estate sale (more later), the grocery store, walked into town, and did some yard work (more later).

The other night I caught Mowry and Ziggy on the chair sleeping. I moved the chair back out from the bedroom to its place in the living room. While I liked having the chair in the bedroom, it allowed Mowry to discover that he can jump onto our bedroom window sill, which will be bad in the summer when the windows are open because the screens are special and are alarmed (instead of the window being alarmed).

Is this adorable? Ziggy seems to be accepting Mowry. He doesn't seem afraid of him most of the time.

The favorite toy was up on the couch. I wish I could have seem whomever did that with it in his mouth! Also adorable.
I got this yarn a few years ago, but I hadn't done anything with it until recently, when I started a short scarf. Then I decided that the hat I made Will last year was too small, so I made another hat for him. It's lovely, soft yarn that I need to find again at Stitches this year. That's not where I got it, but I'm hoping they have it in another color. I saved the tag so I know what it is. Our local yarn store doesn't carry it. I tried to find it there on our walk into town this afternoon.
We found an estate sale and a garage sale in Pleasanton, but both were BAD. They had this box with yarn and these needles outside with a free sign. They were at the point of giving away whatever they could. I wonder if there was other yarn before it got down to bare bones? They also had some black yarn, but I didn't want it, so I left it there. Oh well. this mohair might come in handy if I decide to knit another hat. I just like to display old needles, not use them, because I prefer to knit on double pointed needles on everything but socks.

I took out the clippers and went to prune the roses, but instead I got to chopping the Meyer lemon tree. It's probably not the best time to cut it, but it was way overgrown going over the roof, etc., so I wanted to the branches while I can reach them. We both did some chopping, and we ended up with lots of lemons. We took a handful to our local coffee/sandwich shop earlier in the day. I emailed her and asked if she wants more - we can bring them tomorrow. If not, I can bring them to the office I'm going to on Tuesday, or post them on the local neighborhood email group. The avocados were given to us by a friend with a grafted tree-some of the green ones (like our trees produces) and the black ones that we were told are Mexican avocados and are smaller and ready to be eaten. I put some on our sandwiches today and they were quite good.

Pictures on Sunday ... knitting and cats

I found this yarn online. It's Deborah Norville sock yarn (who knew the former short-lived host of The Today Show would have a yarn brand) from Joanne.com that was half price and free shipping. Who could resist? And what's best? I like the colors even better now that I've knitten it up than I did when I picked it. I keep the closet door closed, but these brilliant felines have figured out how to open them. They are mirrored doors, but that doesn't stop these guys. That's Alex sleeping atop the plastic container I keep yarn in. He's right under my hanging clothes, so I'm sure they are covered with fur. You can see Alex's white chin and long white whiskers. That's Ziggy on the floor. He was headed over to the floor section to the right that both have been known to frequent.

A close up of Alex on the plastic container. He hates bieng spotted.Wow! This is pretty close for Mowry and Ziggy.
Mowry was trained as a kitten to enjoy human tummy tickles.
This is something I have been hoping for since we got Ziggy. Yes, those are all 3 cats on the bed at once. Alex in the foreground, Mowry, who can't be mistaken with his orange fur licking himself, and that is Ziggy to the right of Mowry. He's in a little nest right where Will sleeps. Will is his favorite human.

Lots of Pictures on Christmas Day 2009

It's Christmas 2009! It's hard to believe it's almost 2010. Last night we had Ken and Diann over for dinner. Kathryn was home sick with a cold and couldn't join us. I like to do a winter theme on the table.

I finally found something to make with the yellow yarn that was in the free yarn bag I got in April 2008. It's hard to imagine that this....

Will look like this when it's done, but that's what it will be.It's Christmas and my Christmas Cactus is blooming. It's actually near the end of its bloom, but this counts.
Will did some rearraning in the garage so he could fit his full drum kit. He uses his smaller cocktail drum kit now, so these are in hiatus for now.
Meanwhile, I was outside doing clipping and photographing things. I thought this picture was interesting. The rose bush has long stems and I was taking it against the house. The shadow is from part of the bush that isn't in the photograph.My carrots are growing, but I suspect they may be growing around each other underground because I didn't thin out the plants.
The camelias are getting ready to bloom.
The pink camelias next door are already blooming. I love the view over our fence.

The Meyer lemons are aplenty again this year.
I planted this nastertium, which I hope grows like it's supposed to so I can rip out the annoying asparagus fern. The fern has clovers growing thru it and it collects leaves. Its only purpose is to hide big roots from the non-producing avocado tree. Too bad only one of the two avocado trees produces avocados.

Then we went inside for lunch - a sandwich of leftover roast beef - and we watched TV. We alternated between the Yule Log

which cracks me up every year - I JUST missed the hand putting a new log on the fire....

and Celtics basketball. Eddie House is shooting a free throw. I don't see him doing that all that often.

Ziggy was on my lap for awhile.

It's all lighting - I took this standing up of the Lakers - Cavaliers game, and there wasn't any glare on the screen.

Sorry, Mom, I know you're a big Lakers fan, but with 3:34 left in the 2nd quarter, they were losing. It's 47-30 Cavs.