Little Bits

Today finds me with a little bit to say about a lot of things but not a lot to say about anything.  Soo…here’s a compilation of those Little Bits…

Fortune Cookie was RIGHT!  

Sort of…  Last week I treated myself to lunch at Panda Express.  The fortune cookie that came with the lunch said I would soon find a new source of money.  Hhhmm…will my freelance quests have positive outcomes???  Will I win the lottery??  Will I win the 10% off coupon drawing at the Patternworks or the gift card prize for taking Michael’s on-line survey??  Is a new job coming my way???

The answer as of today?  I played the lottery Saturday and I won!!!  SuperLotto Plus to be exact!!!  Yep…I won $2!

New Jammies

I did stop at Kohls yesterday and picked up a fifth pair of jammies.  After taking off the coupon and the Kohls cash and adding in tax I paid $12 for them.  I bought a pair with a purple top and black background bottoms with purple and green verticle solid stripes alternating with white, purple, green and yellow verical stripes made up of dots.

Fruit Loops

I’m not a cold cereal kinda gal except for occassional bowls of Raisin Bran or Frosted Mini Wheats (the latter are great for nibbling dry) but this past Saturday I bought a box of Fruit Loops.  After putting away all my groceries I grabbed a bowl and filled it with Fruit Loops.  Three questions instantly came to mind. 

1.  When did Fruit Loops change to pastel colors?

2.  When did they add blue to the color palette?

3.  What happened to the sugar crystals on the rings (close examination of one ring was necessary for this question).

At least they tasted like I remembered…!

Earthquake!

This past Saturday night I was still awake at 11:54PM when I heard it coming.  Yep, I could hear the earthquake coming for 4 or 5 seconds before it finally arrived.  When it did arrive it was a disappointing 1 or 2 seconds in duration — ca-chunk, thunk, and it was done, no real shaking. 

As I retrieved my laptop to check out the quake’s location and strength I was wondering if that was it or if there’d be a bit more to this quake.  Those few seconds of being aware that it was coming built up my anticipation…and what actually happened was NOT worth the anticipation.  On the other hand, there was no damage so that was definitely a good thing (of all the quakes I’ve felt since I moved here none have been strong enough to do any damage and that’s fine by me)!

The quake was a 3.3 centered about 25 miles from the house…a baby compared to the 4.7 and 4.9 ones that I’ve felt, and the 3.7 that was centered closer to my house.

No Turning Back

The non-refundable deposit has been made for my BIG adventure so there’s no turning back now!!  The adventure is scheduled to begin at 10:30AM on Saturday, January 30th.

Really — this is a SERIOUSLY big adventure that will have you debating about my sanity, or lack there of.  Check back here the weekend after Thanksgiving for all the details so you can weigh in on the sanity question.

Toothpaste on my Shoulder

I have NO idea how that happened, but it did!  I’ve monitored my tooth brushing routine for more than a week and am still so clueless that I’ve decided I’m never going to know the answer.

The Friday before I went for my haircut I brushed my teeth then went into the kitchen to put together my lunch and my eat-on-the-go breakfast.  I came back to my bathroom, looked in the mirror, did a double-take, uttered “HUH?”, frowned, took off my red t-shirt, scrubbed it with the washcloth then put it back on.

Seems that somehow I had managed to get 4 pencil sized dots of blue toothpaste on the front of my t-shirt just below my right shoulder.  I didn’t have the rechargeable toothbrush in motion when I took it out of my mouth, at least not that I could remember, and the t-shirt was clean when I put it on, but somehow toothpaste ended up on my shoulder.

Since I already had a red barette in my hair and wasn’t willing to change it, and my other red t-shirts that are okay to wear to work were in the laundry, I had no choice but to wash off the toothpaste and put the t-shirt back on. 

Turkey Anyone?

I am the proud owner of a 21.1 pound frozen Butterball turkey!  And it only set me back $10.34!!!  The turkey was 48 cents a pound if you spent $50 or more at Winco (most awesome food store).  I rarely spend that much but I did stock up on a few things, including a splurge on the aforementioned Fruit Loops, so my total would exceed $50 and I could bring home my treasure.

The turkey is buried in Fritz (the chest freezer in my garage) and will be thawed over Christmas so I can cook it and then restock my freezers with all the frozen meals.  My record is 66 meals (fresh and frozen) from an 18 pound turkey so I’ll be curious to see what the take is from 21.1 pounds!

Oh yeah…to make room for the turkey I had to take out the 3 containers of turkey stock I’d frozen this past summer from my last turkey cookfest.  This weekend I’ll make the soup from this summer’s turkey and then in December when I cook the new turkey I’ll freeze more stock and make that soup in April.

Coyotes

It’s been a quiet summer as far as they mangy four-legged wild animals go but they’re making up for it now!  They are in howling overdrive, and not just in the middle of the night – last night they were screeching at 8PM!!

I had never heard coyotes before moving to Southern California and when I did hear them I didn’t know the noise was coyotes until I talked with my neighbor and he filled me in.

If you’ve never heard coyotes the best way I can describe their howling is that it sounds like a screaming baby…a baby that doesn’t need to take a breath.  It’s a little on the high-pitched side and for me, it doesn’t really sound like the howling that Hollywood has made famous in their movies and TV shows.  It is much more annoying.

I’m not sure exactly where the coyotes are but they’re not in my neighborhood.  They may be in the field behind my house as when they wake me up out of a sound sleep I have heard them screeching and some dogs yelping, and there are some barely visible houses back in that field. 

All I ask is that the coyotes stay away from the herd of sheep.

It’s Cold!

Our daytime highs have been struggling to get higher than the mid-70’s lately, sometimes not even reaching 70!   That wouldn’t be bad if our overnight lows weren’t going so low — yesterday morning it was a chilly 36 degrees outside with last week’s lows being in the mid-40’s.

That wouldn’t be bad either IF I remembered to do one thing.  CLOSE my windows at night!!!!  Sheesh…the house has been as cold as 62 in the morning when I get up!   This past weekend I actually went outside a couple times and sat in the sun in order to warm up!

My house only has one window that faces south, a huge advantage in the 110+ summers but a disadvantage in the colder months as the sun work its magic and heat up the house.  November is way too early to even consider putting on the heat, even for just one cycle to take the chill out of the air.  Instead I’m bundling up and toughing it out – in other words, I’m practicing for my trip back east next week!

The good news?  The previously mentioned coyotes were screeching early last night so I remembered to close the windows!  The house was a *toasty* 64 degrees when I got out of bed this morning! 

Wrap Up

OK, that’s it for today’s round of Little Bits.  I’m off to get my morning routine going so I can scoot into work early…  Have a SUPER day!