magick musings…

…falling from the sky?

Could it be? Yep, it’s rain. Much needed rain. Although it frizzies my hair. And gets my dirty car dirtier. And all of my 10 umbrellas are in the trunk and I never think of getting one out until it is too late.

But North Texas needs the rain.

I was asked why I don’t blog as often as I use to. My answer is that I didn’t work full time then. And anyone who has worked full time knows how it sucks you dry.

Speaking of work…part of my company has relocated into a new home. Well, not new as it has been around awhile, but new to our company. Once they get 288 of 800 employees settled in, we will take up three floors of the 36 floor building in the downtown area. My office is bigger and nicer although the view is now of the parking garage. 🙁

We have dubbed the garage the ‘Speedway’ because people fly through and will run over your a** if you are not careful. And if you hesitate in any way – you are toast! You can defilnitely tell the ‘newbies’ by the fear on their faces as they walk to the elevators dodging the vehicles playing ‘chicken’ with cars and people alike.

You think I am kidding. If I make it my office alive, it is a good day.

Gotta run. Working on an article for my chapter’s newsletter and it will be due in a few days.

Here’s a pretty picture:

~Sandy

…was hotter than the blazes and Sunday promises to be even worse here in North Texas!

What’s up with that? It is even hotter and more humid than the Texas coast.

I so cannot wait for October.

Watered flowers yesterday and, in spite of the heat, they seem to be flourishing. I am amazed at how well they have done this year. They actually look like they are on steroids.

They weren’t the only things that got wet as SOME people cannot be trusted with a water hose.

The heat will do funny things to you. Making a trip inside for a beverage, I spied a water bucket in the garage and got the bright idea of another use for it. I took it around back (heaven forbid any of the neighbors would see) and filled it with water. After toting a chair from the house, I placed it and the bucket just so, made sure my beverage was within reach, and lowered my blistering feet into my new ‘pool’.

Ahhh! It’s a mystery how your whole being can be affected by the comfort or non-comfort of those appendages at the end of your legs.

Laugh yourself silly, but it works! But why does the phrase “You might be a redneck if….” keep popping up in my head.

Bought a new bathing suit! I haven’t been bathing suit shopping in five years and decided that sometimes you just have to face the music and do it. So I hit Dillards bathing suit department and the first rack I found said “Inches Away”.

Cool! And at 40% off, this sounded promising. I tried on different styles and colors and found a couple that didn’t make me look like a popped can of biscuits and I WOULD be caught dead in. Or at least caught in public with. Both are very pretty and I love the way both fit. There are miracles in this world.

There was some guy sitting not far from the dressing room door. Evidently, his significant other placed him just right so she didn’t have to come completely out of the dressing room where ‘OMG! someone might see in her bathing suit’ (and I could so relate). She would try on a suit, stepped out of the changing room, go to the door of the dressing room where only he could see her and get the thumbs up or thumbs down from him.

What was funny was the other women trying on suits and go out there and ask his opinion. One woman asked him to close his eyes when she walked out. I can still hear him mutter “But you’re going to the beach! People are going to SEE you then!!!”

Men! They just don’t get it.

Played with my blog again and this is my latest. Brenda says this one has no personality, doesn’t tell who I am, but may have to leave it for awhile until I come up with something better as my writing is suffering and I feel the muses nudging me to get back to work. I think I have worked out some of the plotting problem I was having. Need to just get the rough draft down. And quickly.

Have a great Sunday!

~Sandy

…to decide!

There are so many cute blog themes out there. If, by chance, you have checked my blog the last few days, you may have come away dizzy because every day I have tried a new look.

Brenda has let me know, without hesitation, which ones she likes and which one she doesn’t.
Michelle says they are all cool. It’s up to me. She’s a Gemini so relates well to my ever changing Libra mind.
Denise is away at RWA Nationals in San Francisco but, if she was here, would tell me to decide and quit messing around. (Take pics, girlfriend, I am so jealous!)

Every one of them has their positives and negatives, but it is fun trying different things.

I just wish I could find what works for me. My next project is learning how to make headers.

Did I tell you we’re having a heat wave here in North Texas? 100 plus heat for several days now. I heard 15, but what do I know? I am busy playing. Inside. Where it is cool.

Okay, back to work. When I got stuck with my plotting, my writing suffered. Even blogging feels stilted when you don’t do it on a regular basis. I have noticed that not everyone blogs as much. That makes me sad even though I don’t get to blog read and surf as much as I used to. My favorite ones that used to have readerships of 100-200 are now down to 40-50.

I have worked through a bit of the problem, so have to get back to writing and see where it goes.

Day-um! I knew I should have never set those goals! And somebody put them on the calendar!

What’s a girl to do?

Get her butt back in gear, that’s what.

But before I do, here’s some wishful thinking:

Hey, it’s my life, I can dream! It may be I like this picture so much right now because I am listening to Kokomo by the Beach Boys as I write this.

~Sandy

…thanks to Brenda for providing me with this…

1. Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.

2. Don’t worry about what people think ……… they don’t do it very often.

3. Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian anymore than standing in a garage makes you a car.

4. Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.

5. If you must choose between two evils, pick the one you’ve never tried before.

6. My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.

7. Not one shred of evidence supports the notion that life is serious.

8. A person who is nice to you but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person..

9. For every action, there is an equal and opposite government program.

10. If you look like your passport picture, you probably need the trip.

11. Bills travel through the mail at twice the speed of checks.

12. A conscience is what hurts when all of your other parts feel so good.

13. Eat well, stay fit, die anyway.

14. Men are from earth. Women are from earth. Deal with it.

15. No man has ever been shot while doing the dishes.

16. A balanced diet is a muffin in each hand.

17. Middle age is when broadness of the mind and narrowness of the waist change places.

18. Opportunities always look bigger going than coming.

19. Junk is something you’ve kept for years and throw away three weeks before you need it.

20. There is always one more imbecile than you counted on.

21. Experience is a wonderful thing. It enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.

22. By the time you can make ends meet, they move the ends.

23. Thou shalt not weigh more than thy refrigerator.

24. Someone who thinks logical ly provides nice contrast to the real world.

25. It ain’t the jeans that make your butt look fat.

26. If you had to identify in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved it’s full potential, that word would be ‘meetings.’

27. There is a very fine line between ‘hobby’ and ‘mental illness.’

28. People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them.

29. You should not confuse your career with your life.

30. Nobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and dance.

31. Never lick a steak knife.

32. The most destructive force in the universe is gossip.

33. You will never find anybody who can give you a clear and compelling reason why we observe daylight savings time.

34. You should never say anything to a woman that even remotely suggests that you think she’s pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment

35. The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that deep down inside we ALL believe we are good drivers.

36. Your Friends Love you anyway.

~Sandy

In case you haven’t noticed…the Word Meter is mooooving!!!

…what the animals do on the Fourth of July?

Despite the hot weather, it was fun. Rode the monorail around the zoo and got to see sides of it that couldn’t be seen from walking through.

Figured out that spring and fall is probably better times where the animals are more active.

~Sandy

…this weekend!

Got so much done. Cleaned house, laundered the laundry, ironed the ironing, trips to Home Depot, grocery store, Bed, Bath & Beyond, cooked dinner for tomorrow night, caught up on desk work both personal and as Treasurer for Yellow Rose, worked in the garden and watched THREE movies.

There just isn’t enough weekend to go around. All that is left for tonight is to ‘reaching for my keyboard’. I know, I know…should’ve done that first. Bad Sandy!

I am excited, though, as next week is a very, very short work week. Woo Hoo! Can. Not. Wait.

The flowers are looking wonderful. Had to replant a few since that very last frost got them and I couldn’t, hard as I tried, to save them.

Here are some pics to prove that I do have a greenthumb.

~Sandy

I haven’t been to the island of Galveston, Texas for years and had the opportunity to spend a long weekend on the Gulf Coast of Texas with Galveston being the primary stop. The road trip in itself was so much fun thanks to some wonderful people. During the trip, we ate enough seafood to supply iodine for a small city and I highly recommend Willie G’s on Pier 21 for their gumbo. I haven’t had Shrimp Gumbo that good since the last time my sweet grandmother made it and she always made the best. I miss her and her gumbo.

We visited Moody Gardens and toured the Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition. In quiet reverence, it told the heartbreaking events of April 14, 1912 aboard the RMS Titanic. As you gazed upon the different items brought up 12,500 feet from the bottom of ocean floor, it was amazing to realize that someone actually held, wore, or used it as they while traveling on the ‘ship of dreams’. It brings home the fact that life is fragile, life is precious and to enjoy every minute of it.

Galveston has changed so much in the ten years I last visited. They have added so much sand in certain places to supply a ‘beach’ for the sand and sea worshippers, that in some places, the seawall is no longer seventeen feet high. But Seawall Boulevard is so much more now than the tiny tourist shops renting rafts, surf boards, and seashells.

We walked the beach about 10:00 pm one night and we stopped to gaze at the stars. The sky appeared huge with the stars twinkling on a black background. Beautiful! We were enjoying the feel of the waves rushing over our feet and the sand’s sucking motion when the waves receeded until I felt something moving under my foot.

I glanced down and there was a big ass, foot long, white, fang nashing, neon (Trust me, it WAS glowing in the dark!) snake trying to burrow under my left foot. Needless to say, I screamed, everyone else screamed (probably including the big ass snake before it disappeared in the sand) and I almost killed myself and everyone else trying to get traction in the sand to hoof it out of there.

Definitely ruins a romantic evening.

~Sandy

I found a new recipe to fix fresh asparagus and it is to die for! I think even if you didn’t care for asparagus, you would like this. You could almost make it a meal in itself, but it went really well with the crockpot roast, mushrooms, onions, and carrots. Have some other new recipes to try like Chicken Divan, Chicken Primavera, and Chicken, Rice and Broccoli casserole that is looking good to me right now. Must be in the mood for chicken, LOL!

Have also planted flowers out in the yard. 😯 I am not necessarily known for my ‘green thumb’ but never say never. Put some in the flowerbeds, some in pots and some in hanging baskets. Take a look here:

Can’t wait for them to grow and spread. Still want to plant some impatients and moss roses. I like lots of flowers. They even survived the spring storms that spawned tornadoes all over North Texas. The subdivision did just fine, but today got to see some of the damage that tore down trees and fences and roofs. Brenda C’s big old tree, I think she said an oak, was damaged and now she has an 8 foot stump in her yard.

Had our Yellow Rose RWA meeting yesterday and had guest speaker Candace Havens. She is so inspiring. A marvel at all she gets done in her busy life.

Didn’t get as much writing done as I planned last week, but will make up for it this week. I love my story, but hate when it wants to take a change in another direction. Stop! I am the writing goddess and they have to do what I say!

Speaking of… back to work…

~Sandy