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April 22, 2011

IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!

This will be a repeat of last week - Dave had a broadcast late Thursday night and so won't be home until Friday afternoon to post the journal. For those of you who like to read it early in the day, please check back then.

I started the week out on Monday working my "payback" hours at the Extension Office as an official master gardener. It was my first time and I was paired up with a seasoned master gardener so I didn't feel lost. Together, we solved three problems. A woman came into the office and wanted a couple of plants identified that she had found in her yard. Problem solved. The next was a more extensive problem where someone had brought in a Norway Pine that she thought had spider mites and it turned out to be a fungus. We spent a couple of hours going through information trying to pinpoint exactly what it was. Then there was a lady who wanted to know when to plant onions and put compost on her garden. That was easy! The four hours I spent in the office went by pretty fast. I am good now until May 12th before my turn comes up again. It's been a couple of weeks since our final class, but we finally got our picture in the local paper!

Since it was sunny outside, I spent a couple of hours up at the Waterfront Park pulling weeds and pruning back dead heads from plants. Usually we have a work party on Wednesday, but since I had another obligation, I decided to put in some time on Tuesday. The rest of the crew came back on Wednesday to finish up.

Wednesday was Earth Day and the local 6th, 7th and 8th graders were volunteering their services to various areas to work. I helped a group of them out at the Alder Creek Farm where we did some fencing to keep their ducks from escaping, hauled wood chips for the community garden paths and pitched cow manure into the garden to be planted later this spring. Some of the kids worked at pulling invasive plants along the water bank and working at another watershed hauling woodchips. I had made some cupcakes and they were a bit hit with the kids. It was a sunny day and in spite of the hard work, it was a lot of fun. Afterwards, I came home and mowed our lawn. I was pretty tired by the time I went to bed.

Since I was leaving to help out at the farm on Wednesday, I decided not to go to my water aerobics class. Boy did I miss out on all the action! Apparently, the boiler that heats the pool caught on fire and everyone had to be evacuated mainly because of the smoke. No damage and no injuries but I sure wouldn't want to be getting out of the pool in a wet swimming suit and then having to stand outside in the cold. The pool was closed all day until they could replace the boiler with a spare one that they keep on hand. Anyway when I returned on Thursday that was all the latest news.

I still haven't had my car fixed. It's been a couple of weeks since it was hit and so we stopped by the body shop to ask about it. He scheduled it for Monday, and I guess it will take most of the week. So next week I'll be piloting a Ford Taurus rental car. Oh, well - as long as it gets done.

Dave left on Thursday for town to do a couple of playoff broadcasts. The Blazers won a game last night but are still down 2-1 against the Dallas Mavericks in the best of seven series. Game four is Saturday afternoon. I am hoping they win them both here and if they do they will play the fifth game in Dallas and come back to Portland for another game. These playoff games are "extra" income for us that we don't budget for and we can use the extra cash. Especially since we had to buy a new laptop computer and then the wheel bearing went out on Dave's Chevy. There is always something that comes up.

I am heading into Portland on Saturday and will meet Dave at our daughter's where we will spend Easter. Maybe the weather will stay decent enough for the Easter Bunny to be able to hide the eggs.