How a Class-A Piddler fills her time

I've had a couple of weeks of spare time since classes haven't started yet.  I spent a little time up at school last week, finishing some projects up there and will go up a few more times next week just to finish up before summer school starts.  I'm not working summer school this year--two other librarians wanted to do it and I like/trust both of them to leave the library in good shape.

The rest of my time mostly has been spent in the yard.  Admittedly, we don't have much yard to fuss with.  Most of it is xeriscape (rocks & native plants) and while the yard is about 12 x 12, it isn't real grass.  Throw in the patio and it doesn't leave much to do.  I've got a few pots although fewer than in years past and most of them are now filled with perennials so I don't have much to do in the spring in regards to replanting.  But, even with a low maintenance yard, there has still been enough to do the pass the time and fill up more than a few days.

I have had to do some replanting this year.  As happens with all living things, plants get old and die which is what happened to the Mexican feather grass that we had.  I wasn't a big fan of this grass, although I didn't know it when it was planted by the landscaping company six years.  I like the look of the grass-it's a wispy, happy little grass; I didn't like the little seeds that blew all over and all the little volunteer feather grass we had growing.  There were four of them that had all died over the winter.  I replanted one spot with a red yucca.  We've got three of them in the yard already.  Paul laughs that I get excited about the flower stalks every spring, as if I have anything to do with them.  But the yucca outside our front door has eight! this spring.  The new guy is little bitty--only a one-gallon plant--so it will be a year or two before it has a flower stalk.
The red yucca beside the front door.  See!  Eight flower stalks!  The other two well-established red yucca have four and one flower stalks respectively.
The new wee yucca just planted this spring.

Where the other three grasses had been, I planted some cheapy grasses I picked up at the grocery store when they had bedding plants for sale last month.  I'm thinking I'd like to do something that flowers there instead so I'm going to go to a native plants nursery and look at penstemon.  Since the flowering plants in the landscape are reds and purples, I'll probably get one of those two.  Or go crazy and get a combo of the two. There is actually another drip for a grass that died long ago that I never replaced. As I was studying it out this morning, I think I'll get a couple of grasses and a couple of penstemon. Maybe. I might be otherwise inspired when I get to the nursery. I also planted a new columbine plant called "Winky" that is red and white. No flowers on it yet but at least it's still alive.
The petunias beside the front door. The columbine is peeking out beside the second step (between the hose diverters).
A better picture of the columbine and a pot of portaluca/moss rose/whatever it's called.  We've had a nice amount of rain the past two weeks so I bought a downspout diverter.  It will probably not rain again for months.  I would really like to put a rain barrel at this downspout--it would collect rainwater from about half our roof.

I've spent quite a bit of time cutting back some plants that have gotten overgrown.  The chaste tree in the front was really thick but when I started trimming out some of the dead twigs and some larger limbs, I discovered a nest so I'm leaving it alone until fall.   The Apache plume in the backyard had gotten really big and unruly.  I was geekily excited this spring when I bought a hedge trimmer specifically for the Apache plume.  It looks goofy now because I cut out quite a bit of dead that was on the one side.  I think/hope it will fill back in.
The Apache plume in the back, pink gaura (whirling butterflies) in the front. The gaura is my favorite plant in the yard. There are two here at the side of the house and three more in the backyard. There were three others but they didn't do well since the spot I'd planted them is pretty shady.  I pulled those out earlier this spring and put in some shade-loving plants that supposedly have purple flowers.  Haven't seen those yet but they've only been in the ground a month or so.

I needed to move one of the large moss rocks and rearrange some river rocks to make a better spot for the portable hammock we got at Christmas.  Every year, we have issues with ants and as I was cleaning up the Apache plume, I noticed tons of ants swarming around.  As I was moving the river rock, I found out why--under some of the rocks were what I've determined to be cricket eggs.  Blech.  We'll be having fewer crickets this year (and hopefully fewer ants as well).  I was worried that it was cockroaches.  We've had some in the past few months which totally grosses me out since we've had maybe one in the previous nine years.  I know it's a result of living in a city but it makes me feel like a bad housekeeper.  My next task is to find an exterminator that is pet-friendly so I don't have to worry about the Jubinator.  (And I totally don't know why I just shared that about the cockroaches.)

While I was doing rearranging those rocks, I decided to add a couple more brick paver steps linking the front walk to the backyard.  The bricks edged the yard when we had real grass and I'd put in the other five several years ago. I'm not sure why I stopped--probably got tired and just never got back around to it until now.
The hammock fits perfectly. The two new steps are at the middle and end of the hammock. And you can see how goofy-looking the Apache plume is. Paul says it looks like a backwards comma. Here's hoping it fills in soon. I moved the pot of daylilies in front of it hoping the large gap wouldn't be as noticeable. I don't think it works.

No real excuses

Holy cow!  I can't believe it's been three weeks since I signed in over here.  Things have been hectic with the end of the school year, both work and classes.  It's all over so maybe I'll be a bit more inspired to write over here.  It's not that things haven't been happening and I need to write.  Some of it is stuff that won't be published but most of it is.  Just need to get my stuff going in one direction and then I'll be keeping this place a little more active.

Another use for all the schooling

All the way through Ireland, Paul and I entertained ourselves by anthropomorphizing the donkeys we saw all through the countryside. And if could have brought one home with me, I would have.
Imagine my delight when the link for a video about the Bibloburro came across my email today. There was also an article about the Biblioburro in the New York Times last fall. An elementary school teacher in Columbia operates a bookmobile with his donkeys and a bunch of books. This could totally be my next gig.

New and Improved now with more snuggle

Apparently, Jub has gotten over the moody teenager stage and has moved on to being a fairly pleasant beast to spend time with. We haven't been able to say this in a very long time but Jub is being nice. And friendly. And actually wanting to hang out with both of us. He's always tried to hop in Paul's lap any time Paul sits down but now Jub is just hanging out in the room with us, chatting a little, asking how our day went, spending a little quality time in the evenings. During Spring Break, when I was working on the computer while sitting at the dining room table, the cat would hop up on the chair and sit behind me. Just saying hey. The oddest thing he has done occurred one night at dinner when, as Paul and I were sitting next to each other at the table, the cat hopped up with his left paws on Paul's chair and his right paws on my chair and sat like that while we finished eating. He'll also sit in the chair across from us while we eat dinner so all we see is a little head popped up:

This morning, Paul sent me a picture of Jub lying on my slippers in our bathroom, taking advantage of the morning sun coming in the glass blocks in the bathroom. Apparently, he's done this several mornings in the past if my slippers happen to be there. The other morning, I got out of the shower and Jub was sitting on the vanity, waiting for me. He sat there while I toweled off and continued my morning routine.  And just, you know, hung out with me while I did my thing.
We are absolutely thrilled Jub stopped being completely territorial and yowling at our guests. Now, he's become a little welcome wagon of one, greeting guests and ushering them into our home. Paul's parents came over last Friday to help us with the new guest room futon. When Jub saw my mother-in-law standing in the hall, he let out a happy little meow and he did a happy little tail flick and came down to say hello. Some glimpses of the old Jub remain when our friends with a 4 year old and an almost-2 year old came over one Sunday afternoon--he was less than thrilled to be noticed by the two Pink People, as Paul called the girls who were dressed all in pink.  But he liked the parents and was content to chat with them for a bit.

But I have to admit that we're a bit confused as to what to do with a friendly cat. We've never had a cat like this--one you can pick up and hug on and love on--except perhaps when he was a wee kitten.  We've always referred to Jub as cantankerous and cranky and crabby because, well, he fit the definitions of all of those.  I guess until the pod is found and our lovable grump of a cat returns, I'll just take advantaged of being able to pick up the cat as often as I can without fear of being shredded.

Return to sender

I'm registering for summer and fall classes at UNT.  I'm taking 5 hours in the summer and 6 hours in the fall (2 classes each semester).  Hopefully by December, I'll have 18 hours completed which is halfway through the program.  I spoke with one of the advisors in SLIS yesterday and I'm not completely sure I'm on board with what she suggested.  I'd originally signed up to be in the General Practice program because I thought that would be the most useful if/when I decide to leave a public school library.  I have the education background and experience in the school library setting so I didn't think the School Certification route would be necessary.  Speaking with the advisor, she seemed to think otherwise.  During the course of the conversation, I agreed to have her change my focus.  I'm still not convinced that is what I want to do.  I still think General Practice is what I want to do.  I think I'm going to set up an appointment to speak with my actual advisor when he is in ABQ for the NMLA conference in April just to talk out my concerns and questions I have.  The end goal is the MLS and I'm not sure it will much what classes I've taken since I'm not looking at a highly specialized program of study.  But I don't want to be shooting myself in the foot either.

As I was registering, I clicked on the address information that is listed.  A mailing address is shown (our address here in ABQ) but there wasn't a home address.  I also wanted to see if there was a way to add my cell phone as a contact number.  I had to smile when I saw the permanent address listed--apparently, I'm still on the UNT records from my first go-around there 16 years ago.  But I'm afraid I won't be getting any mail sent to the Texline address.  No one by that name has been there since 1997.  I'm tempted to leave it just for sentimental purposes--I definitely smiled when I saw that post office box listed.  I've always loved to get the mail.  I still go to the mailbox every day, much to Paul's amusement (although, he's coming around to my mail-checking ways).   As soon as I could drive, I took it upon myself to be the one to go every day to pick up the mail.  And, frequently, to send a letter down to Lubbock.  It cost 25 cents to mail a letter way back then and a couple of times of week, I would take in a quarter or some assortment of nickels, dimes, and pennies to buy one stamp. I never bought a book of stamps. I'm not sure why it never crossed my mind to spend $5 to buy one.  The Texline postmaster knew exactly what I wanted every time I walked into that little foyer--she never asked if I wanted to buy a book of stamps either.  Perhaps she was enjoying seeing a little teenage love sent one stamp at a time.

I think sentimentality is going to win, at least for the time being. My current mailing address is correct and so is the phone number so I'm not missing anything important.  And it's nice to be reminded of a time when the most pressing bill I had was buying a 25 cent stamp.