I Know You Are, but What am I?!

There are few things about the 80's that are worthwhile mentioning. Yes, it was a dark time of mullets and Three's Company to be sure, but a few bright stars shined like a beacon of hope in the bleak days of my teenage years.

Let us start with the unbelievable Hello Kitty store at our local mall--I KNOW! A whole store devoted to Hello Kitty and Pals. You could see the sparkly pink goodies glow in the distance, beckoning you to peruse their unbelievably adorable goods, and maybe to perhaps part with a small portion of your allowance...I still have my Hello Kitty scissors don'tcha know. And yes, I know Hello Kitty dated pre-80's. But it hit the Midwest in the early 80's, so there.

Luckily, HK lives on, and Thank You God, my daughter is a fan. Which means I can buy HK gear until my heart's content, and this pleases me. No, I'm not all "oh I love Hello Kitty so much I'm going to turn my house into a pink dollhouse of Kitty-lovin shame,"

nor will we be totin' this regal firearm...

but we have a number of sticker books and a stuffed doll or two. And some hair accessories. And socks. I feel pretty good about that, and it satisfies my unresolved childhood desire for absolute cute. See this blog for the antidote. It's hilarious!

Item number two of the few good things that emerged from the 80's: Pee Wee Herman and Pee Wee's Playhouse. God I loved Pee-Wee. Yes, Paul Rubens the person ran into a bit of trouble (what with the movie watching habits and all), and as a result the Playhouse was cancelled. I understood, but it was sad.

But guess what? He's back! There have been 2, count them, TWO Pee Wee sightings in the last week:

Sighting 1) Conan O'Brien's show (sorry you have to endure an ad first)

Sighting 2) Doing an iPad review (hilarious!)

Nothing pleases me more than to see Pee Wee Herman again. Hell, you can even become a fan on Facebook, or follow him on Twitter.

Infinity!

All for now,
Nugget

Dumb and Dumber...

I believe you've been introduced to our neighbors. Such a joy, it's like having our very own reality tv show right next door!!! Yea!!!


So the other night we noticed they had moved their pickup down to the back of their very long driveway. This would be of no interest usually, but on THAT day, we had received another fair amount of drifting, blizzardy-type snow. We sensed a new opportunity to mock them mercilessly, which we really don't need one, but it helps to justify our ridicule.


While getting ready for bed, Hubby Nugget and I bet whether the Crazy Twins would in fact be able to back that beast up the hill the following morning. To sweeten the deal, we speculated where the likely falling-off-the-driveway-into-our-yard spot would be. HN really didn't want to think about that as we have at one point a 3-5 ft drop-off between the two properties divided by our fence.




Prophecy fulfilled! Did I mention it was also like 6 degrees that day? So Mr. Crazy Neighbor gets out there and starts digging snow from the back tires (although it might have been easier to just shovel the driveway PRIOR to this endeavor, but I digress....), and Ms. Crazy Neighbor is standing out in the middle of the street barking orders at him. I'm sure he appreciated all her helpfulness, I know I would. So the scene continues like this: dig out tires, burn rubber, slide deeper into our yard, dig, burn rubber, slide deeper into our yard.

At this point I guess he thought he had better tell me what had happened (cause it's not obvious at all! duh!). He's really not much of a talker, really, just kind of mumbled some stuff about getting his friend to pull him out. I was sympathetic, told him don't worry about the plants there, just some irises and you can't kill them, and he missed the rock wall. Apparently this had slipped his mind because he had the "oh shit" look on his face. And I only mentioned this because it's my beloved ROCK WALL GARDEN. As sad as I am that it's all planted, I really don't want to rebuild that wall.

So here comes his buddy to tow him out of the two ft. snowdrift in our yard with a mini-sized pickup! The thing couldn't even get enough traction on the road to move the chain, and when he finally melted a hole in the snow with the burning rubber of his tires, the chain went YANK and jerked the stuck truck VIOLENTLY. In the meantime, Mr. Crazy Neighbor has his foot to the floor burning holes in our yard. By the time they came to their senses, the truck was in a far worse position than before, now perpendicular to the driveway with the cab precariously resting near my rock wall. Nose deep in snow drift. AWEsome! Good job guys!

Now this is where Mr. Crazy Neighbor has a "lightbulb" moment. He really thought this was a good idea, and that frightens me: "We're really stuck, can I just drive out across your front yard?" Seriously. I shit you not. So this is how it went down:

Me: Um, I don't really feel comfortable with that...

Mr. CN: I will shovel your yard first...(yes, he really said that...I KNOW! He wouldn't shovel his driveway, but now he's gonna shovel my whole front yard?! )

Me (barely able to contain myself): Uh no, we already have water problems in the basement...

Mr. CN: I won't cause any damage...(Oh yeah, how 'bout when you get stuck in our front yard!!)

Me (head exploding from overexposure to stupidity): Um, there are water lines under there...

Mr. CN: I'll just drive out...(oh yeah right)

Me: Um sorry no. But you're in a perfect spot for a tow truck to pull you out...

Mr. CN: (mutters to himself, stomps off sullenly...)

This exchange makes Team Nugget wonder...would he have just driven across the yard if I hadn't been home? Yes, he is just that big of an idiot. Moving to the country is very appealing...

All for now,
Nugget

The Early Bird Gets the Worm, But Might Get Killed in a Late Season Frost...

The planting catalogues are here! Yea!!! Time to think about gardening again!!! I say that as another blizzard approaches...


I never thought I would be one of those people who 1) looks forward with great anticipation to the upcoming spring plantings in October; and 2) peruses seed and bulb catalogues with deep and meaningful purpose. Oh yeah, and I want a goat. Nobody saw that one coming.

Honestly, who could resist that cute face? I will have my pygmy goat one day, oh yes I will. But for now, I have The Bug.

So yes, I am very excited about Spring and have been thinking about upcoming projects. First off, the rock wall garden is complete. The only thing left to do is let it do it's thing. Oh sure, I am going to take the iris, ornamental grass* and some of the sedum out**, maybe move some stuff and add some goodies in the corner near the tree, but other than that (!), really all that needs to be done is to let the ground cover by the road cover the ground.

*OK, so here's the story with that. The iris was planted willy-nilly at the end of '08 because I received it as a late season gift and needed to get it in the ground. Now I have a better place for it, so it gets moved this year. And the ornamental grass, well I put it in the place it now resides simply to prevent erosion. Now that the ground cover has kicked in, the grass can move elsewhere as it looks a bit out of place.

**And the sedum. Sigh. My poor sedum. Oh it's OK, but it really could use some more sun. Some are doing well, like the angelique and blue spruce. But the others, the stonecrops, are just too leggy for my liking. Even though I love sedum, leggy sedum is just plain ugly. So leggy sedum in the front yard are heading to the back where they can bask in the sunlight, at least somewhere in the NE corner.

That leaves a little patch of ground by the front door in need of tendin' to! Wahoo! Another garden spot! Not sure what yet, probably has to be something that doesn't need much light. Maybe rocks. And another tiny tiny gnome.

In the backyard (yes I know we agreed that's Hubby Nugget's domain, but I ran out of places to plant, and I wore him down), I will continue the plantings around the Juniper, another azalea bush to be sure. And vinca. It seemed pretty happy there last year. Of course the beloved Garden of Sedummy Goodness. This will include rocks, and definitely lavender (mmmm). Oh yes, I'm excited. Again, not sure where it's going to go, but I need to be able to see it from inside the house.

On the west side, I'm going to plant the orphan Norton grape from the vineyard. This is mostly so I can practice pruning it. Probably would be a good idea to learn how to prune if one is going to be a grower of grapes and maker of fine wines.

And finally, as if there aren't enough projects already, I will embellish the newly finished rock wall that surrounds the fire pit/patio area with plants from Larry's House of Cheap Sedum (a local nursery that I was told about and am salivating at the thought of visiting this spring...big surprise there).

Come on spring!

All for now,

Nugget