It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

Ah, the good old days! 1966 when the population was only 88,400. It's now over 210,000 according to signs, but I'm guessing more. When I first moved here almost 19 years ago people would say (with attitude) "oh, you live in Fremont" and now many of them moved here!
Last night we lit a fire and watched TV. As I knitted, I had two cats jump on my lap.
We watched a recorded "Late Late Show" with Craig Ferguson. I know it's not me, its' the blanket. Alex and Mowry LOVE this blanket that I crocheted over 20 years ago!


And here's proof - I left and Alex jumped off, but jumped back on almost immediately. He even has the remote handy if he needs to change the channel, though I don't think he knows how to work it!Mowry loves getting his scratch from his favorite human.
This morning Ziggy was waiting for the paparazzi to finish taking his picture before resuming his grooming.
Lots of lemons out back. These much coveted Meyer Lemons are great, but I can't figure out why the former owners planted the tree right up next to the house by the shed where the trash cans are usually stored.

What a difference a day (or two) makes. Friday we almost didn't get to the parade because it was raining on and off (more like a drizzle, but enough to get us wet), yesterday it was so windy it was blustery, and today it's gorgeous. The crepe myrtle out front has vibrant fall colors, with lots of leaves at its base.Today the leaves at the base are gone, but not because we raked! The leaves were blown in yesterday's blustery wind. Sorry, neighbors! I am convinced that we get heavy winds to finish up Mother Nature's job of getting the leaves off of the trees for winter.

Happy Thanksgiving

One of my goals when we moved here 3 years ago was to have a full green bin each week. It's not hard to do since we also use it for food scraps.

I looked at a picture before we moved here and there were no weeds on this patch to the right of our driveway. Yes, the green is weeds. You could see the brown lava rock in the picture before we moved here!
Boy am I going to hurt tomorrow! I can already feel it. The weeds are mostly gone and some just trimmed. It looks much better. There's the brown lava rock. I don't like it, but I like it better than weeds!
I found this picture I took a few months ago of Mowry. He has beautiful green eyes.

This picture of Ziggy looking out the window cracks me up! He has been leaving us presents a lot lately. Who knew a cat had that much poop. At least he usually leaves it in "his spot" in our bathroom, which is linoleum and easily cleaned, but c'mon Ziggy. This could be a problem in the middle of the night. Euuuuuuuuuu. At least we have a clue that something's up when the rug is munched. He actually tries to cover it with the little rug.My sister is right - we need another cat window perch. I'm not sure we have a place to put it, but we need one. Someone gave this one away and we got it! Will says it was one of the best things I've gotten that was a giveaway. It's first come, first served for access unless Mow gets cranky and chases Ziggy away, which he tries to do often.

The Plaza in our town is almost done. It looks great now that they laid down sod. I didn't realize it was going to have grass. It was hard to picture before the sod was in. The palm tree on the truck looked funny to me!Happy Thanksgiving to all!

It's all about the cats ... again!

I went outside to take a picture of the crepe myrtle tree. It's gorgeous, especially when the sun shines on it. It is one of the few trees whose name I know! While I was out there, Tabby was running from the teens next door, and he figured out going up the tree was the one place he couldn't get "gotten".

I tried to capture a picture of him showing the beautiful leaves, but it was hard to get the sun behind him, his face looking at me, etc.

Back at home Ziggy and Mowry were on the bed together. The orange thing by Mow's tail is his favorite toy. He must have brought it up on the bed before he settled.

Ziggy was cleaning himself, but he stayed on the bed, even with Mowry so close!Here is the orange toy. My camera will not take a good picture of it! Here's Alex and the orange toy with the crepe myrtle outside in the background.

Happy Thanksgiving to all! We have lots to be thankful for. I especially like Thanksgiving because it's not a relious holiday.

Who runs this office? It's all about the cats!

Last night we lit the first fire of the season. It was chilly inside and out, and this made for a cozy Saturday night watching TV and knitting (me).Today's mission (besides cleaning, putting things away, etc.) is to find my coupon holder. I put it somewhere, and now I need it! This sort of thing drives me batty! WHERE ARE MY COUPONS????

In the office, which is the warmest room in the house when we keep the door partially closed due to the heat from the computers, we have one cat window perch. It's "first come first served" for this primo spot. Ziggy sometimes runs in as we open the office door in the morning in order to secure his place. Here's Mowry sniffing Ziggy hoping he'll be intimated and move, which sometimes happens. Ziggy might just be realizing he can hold his own!


Yesterday Alex got there first, and since Al and Mow get along and aren't intimidated by each other, they just shared. Sort of. Note Alex is more on the window sill than the perch! This didn't last very long, but it was a funny photo op!
This morning Ziggy got in the office first, so Alex is patiently waiting on the cat bed on the scanner. Ziggy is very intimidated by Alex, since Alex can be mean and posturing to Ziggy, but today they are ignoring each other and enjoying their own space, even if it is only inches apart!

Earlier in the week I needed to scan something and email it to someone, but luckily she's a cat lover, too, because I had to wait until the scanner was available.

Wednesday Nov 18th ALREADY?

I'm working at home today. I have a cold, and I actually cannot remember the last time I had a cold. Luckily a client begged out for today, so that worked for me. We've rescheduled for Monday.

It's a beautiful day outside. Look at Ziggy on the window perch with the crepe myrtle tree and its lovely changing leaves outside.

Mowry the bully came up and got Ziggy to leave. Then Mowry left, but I made him come back. If he's going to get Ziggy to run away, at least he can stay. This was right before Ziggy chickened out and left. If only he would stand up to Mowry, Mowry would back off. And here's Joe Cool, King of the window perch.

I've probably posted this before because it's an old picture, but no, you're not seeing double. That's Ziggy on the window perch and Alex wishing he was on the perch.

About the only thing I miss about our townhouse was that the office was also a guest bedroom with a pull-out couch, so if we still had the pull-out couch in the office, I'd probably be lying down reading a book and snoozing. I don't really want to go into the spare bedroom - it's chilly in there. The office stays warm from the heat of the computers if we keep the door partially closed.

Cats and Things

I spent Tuesday, Wednesday and half of Thursday at a conference in San Francisco. Will met me Wednesday night and we stayed over. Some people think this is exciting, but it was more a necessity as I didn't want to BART home at 9:30 pm after a vendor dinner I was invited to. The dinner was at Fish and Farm, known for their famous #1 hamburger in SF according to some magazine, but I was disappointed. The salad was salty (who puts salt on salad) and the steak was too pink for my liking. They serve it medium, which apparently means pink. But it was good to meet with my client's client manager and meet other people, so that was good. I also didn't know they do road work all night long in SF.

For us, there's no place like home. We miss the kitties and other things about being home when we aren't, so that's why it's not a big treat to us to stay in a hotel in SF.

Alex thinks if he closes his eyes, he can hide from the paparazzi (that's me!).
Mowry is looking for prey. Look at his belly - it's bald.
Ziggy is sitting behind Will's desk. He hasn't done this in a long time!

There are many avocados on the tree this year, but I still find some on the ground eaten by squirrels, or raccoons, or who knows what.
Look at this cool trash can that we found at an estate sale for $1.50 (MINUS 20% off, but actually less because we bought a few things and the seller took off more than 20%). There were a few garage and estate sales today, much to my surprise! This goes perfectly with our avocado green stove in our 70s kitchen. Instead of using it for trash, we'll use it for recyclables. There is a little bit of rust on it, but the step-on lift mechanism works perfectly! There's even a plastic pail that you can lift out the take to the big trash can.The pepper out back is turning red! I bought pepper seeds because pepper plants are usually the prettiest, but this one really isn't. Next to it is garlic. I'm not sure how you tell when garlic is ready to be picked. I threw a garlic bulb in the dirt and then ended up pulling it out, but apparently I didn't pull all of it out!

I trimmed off dead lavender flowers and now it's come back just in time for holiday season!

Here it is up close.


My carrots are growing! I'm glad I put the tomato cage around it when I planted the seeds because there was a hole in there that looked like some critter was trying to dig in.
Last night someone organized a fundraiser for the mother of a young girl of 20 who was killed when illegal street racers hit her car in SJ. A local pizza place where her mother works donated some of the proceeds and had raffles for prizes also donated. They were looking for musicians, so Will and two of his guitarist bandmates played for awhile, and then his guitar friend Eddy joined them. The pizza was good, and it was a fun time. It was nice to be able to support someone, but sad that it came about because of a senseless tragedy.

Time to make stir fry for dinner!

Kittens and Knitting Needles and Things

Today the kittens from next door came into our yard while I was out clipping. They both climbed into the pineapple guava tree to play. Here's Tabby. He's very shy and unfriendly around us. The white kitten teases by coming up to me, and then running away. I found this set of size one double pointed needles on their original card with the 75 cent price on it!), size 2 dpns rubber banded together, and size 5 dpns, also rubber banded together. One of the size 2s is a little bent, but it's metal, so I think I can fix that. I got all of them, plus a sealed notepad for my gift drawer for $1.25!!!!

It was a beautiful Sunday. The weather was cool, but not cold. I'm going to be cooped up in a conference Tues - Thurs. For some reason, 90% of conferences I've attended since my first one in 1987 take place in an interior room in a hotel (read: no windows!). Only a few times have I gotten lucky (one time was in San Diego bay) and had a window.

I'm getting used to being back on Standard time, but I do miss having it stay light later.