i'm a slow learner . . .

when i say it takes me a while to get up to speed, i'm not talking minutes or seconds, i'm talking years.  light years.  eons.

an example you ask?  my 1988 honda was nine years old before i discovered the coin change holder while looking for the fuse box.  and it's not like i hadn't missed it.  i could never understand why the car didn't have one. 

another?  kidlet used to do her homework on the dining room table.  to me, the lighting from the chandelier was good but not great.  it was also a pain in the ass to dust.  all those little globes facing upwards catching every dust mote that happened to waft by.  she never seemed to mind the lack of direct lighting but one day, doing close work, she reached up and flicked a little here before never noticed  switch and a little light came on flooding the area with a right proper beam.  how could i have missed it?

but i am catching on.  remember my newly purchased red bedspread.  i was bemoaning that fact that it was actually too ample in size.  first time i have ever complained about that!!!  so as joanie and i were doing our early morning meanderings, i groused and she suggested i turn it one quarter turn on the bed.  now i'm not saying i would never have figured that out by myself but it probably would have been the week before it died of old age.

but now we come to the corker.  my bathroom vanity, not having been updated since the house was built in 1988, has a set of six round light bulbs above the mirror.  being blinder than a bat, i buy the highest watt bulbs i can find.  starting last week, i noticed that after standing at the sink for more than a minutes or two, a light would flicker and it would all of a sudden become noticeably brighter.  it kept happening and i kept trying to remind myself to check it out and replace the faulty bulb.  today, i remembered.  it wasn't a bulb.  it was the fluorescent recessed lighting in the soffit.  say what?  in the seventeen years we have had the house, i never notice it and apparently they have never needed to be changed in all of those seventeen years.  go figure.

i'm waiting for the day i wander around the house and discover kidlet has a brother that i failed to notice.

doodle-o . . .

i'm still here folks.  at least i think so.  been doodling away the time until the return of kidlet:

keeps me off the streets and out of the traffic.

nothing else much has been going on.  baby steps.  baby steps.  baby steps.

doodle day four . . .

and yes, i missed a day.  today's prompt was to doodle and find the faces.  here we go in black and white:

 and then in color:

the background is still white.   my cell takes not so wonderful shots. 

fun to play with.

day 2 doodling . . .

so this a doodle camp but my idea of camping doesn't have bugs, sweat or rocks under my spine.  india ink, cold press paper yes, roaming bears, no.

here's day 2:

what's it really look like?

except the brown pillows are moving elsewhere.  oh, and it took the cats three long hours of hunkering around the bed before they decided the new bedspread didn't bite.  pippy wouldn't even sleep with me last night.  silly beasties.

busy. busy. busy.

week two of kidlet being mia.  i am keeping myself busy.  eating.  well, that too.  i am a stress eater.  no surprise there.

back in may, i signed up for doodle camp.  yep, an on-line, back to grade school, doodle all over your paper bag book covers, camp.  so glad to see tinka, marg and jana along for the ride.  class started monday. 

here is my bound doodle book.  please do not ask how many times i stuck myself with the needle or had to pull out the knots from the waxed thread.  the instructor said to measure out about two and half arm lengths of twine.  i must have monkey arms.  i had way too much left over. 

and my first doodle.  ever wondered what goes on in my brain?

wonder no more.

this morning i finally made the white eyelet pillow shams to match the white eyelet dust ruffle that goes with the red spread for my bed.  after a year and a half of sleeping with non-washable poly and imagining hundreds of little cat butt prints, i tossed the old set in favor of all things washable. 

i'd show you a picture but i'm getting up the nerve to try and change the dust ruffle on my king-sized tempur-pedic mattress by my lonely.  last time i attempted it, it crashed down on me and nailed me like a slice of baloney between two slabs of wonder bread.  this time i will at least have my cell phone with me.

and to keep myself occupied at night, i gather up a nice glass of cab and a book.  just finished #47 for the year.  books, that is, not bottles of wine.  

fat cats rule . . .

no one woke me up this morning.  i actually got to sleep in.  pippin, as usual, was in the crook of my leg, snoring softly, but no one else was around pawing, smacking, starting a commotion. murmuring:  hungry.  hungry.  hungry.  i was wondering if maybe i had accidentally locked the other two in another room. 

finally i got my lazy body up to check.  somehow they had gotten the top off the diet kibble again and gorged.  bear was stretched out on the landing in all his mammoth glory.  i swear he burped as i passed by.  ninja was hanging off the top of the recliner with a very content look on her face and a burgeoning stomach.

one step backwards in the battle of the bulge.

it's going to be a long month . . .

and when i get stressed, i clean.  actually it is the only time i deep clean.  started today by doing all the hand wash, the regular laundry and ironing.  all is done except for the hand wash that has not yet dried.  note:  you know the warning labels on clothes that say dry clean only but come back from the dry cleaner slightly less than white?  i have a rayon top that was now decidedly gray.  it was do or die.  i soaked it in ivory and bleach and it came out white.  take that you erroneous label!!!

of course pip has not helped.  she ate her breakfast, jumped up on the high window sill above my bedside table, looked around and lost her cookies . . . all over my notebooks, ipad mini box, files and a paint box.  yeah, there is a jumble of goodies by me at night.  everything survived except one note pad.  sorry, but there was no way to wipe off enough cat yak.

the other night, the alarm system decided to wail at 12:08, long after i had gone to bed.  by the time i came to my senses, slithered down the stairs to turn off the system and trudged back up to get the phone, my alarm company had hung up.  i called back and let them send out the cops.  a really nice female officer came.  not sure who startled whom more, she because she thought the house was empty or me because i was thinking she was the burglar.  all was good, except for the mud she tracked all over that house.  that will be wednesday's project.

and so with today's chores managed, i played with photoshop.  my favorite toy of all time:

good night Junie Moon.