Carol's random babble

This morning didn't start out too bad. I knew ahead of time that someone was cranky about something that happened last night. Okay, a couple of somethings. One of the somethings was a missed deadline. I finished the task ahead of the deadline that is posted, but apparently behind the deadline that is not posted, that nobody else has to follow, and it's all my fault. I thought I was dealing with that pretty well, and then came the phone call. It was a personal call, on my cell phone. I had to take the phone into the office because the person on the other end wasn't listening to my point of view. In fact, my point of view was a "weak excuse" in his words. I had, apparently missed another deadline. This was a personal matter. I had agreed  to perform a certain task. I thought I still had time, but apparently although Person A said the person (Person B) for whom the task was to be performed would have things going on this week, I was supposed to do it anyway. An...

Okay, so I've had wheels for more than a week. I bought a car on Aug. 9. I got it as a used car place which I discovered is actually part of a dealership - apparently they funnel their lower-priced trade-ins over there. Or something. Anyway. It's a Pontiac Grand Prix, four-door. There's no radio, so I'm going to try to get the radio from the Camry to work, but the wiring is different. There are some wiring issues - the door locks don't always want to lock when I want them to lock so I either turn the car on and keep trying to lock them or go around and lock them all manually. One back window doesn't open. There's something missing in the trunk area to keep water from entering the trunk, so I need to get that fixed. But it runs and it gets me to work and places I need to go. And I'm thankful for that.

Okay, I don't actually have a kingdom, and I do actually have a car, only it's not well. On July 22, I picked Cayla up at camp and on the way home the car developed some problems. When I stopped at Harcourt (because it has a convenience store), I discovered that the oil cap was off. This is not good. We put a couple of quarts of oil in and continued back to Fort Dodge. After Cayla's practice (for her performance in a chamber music recital that evening) I got an oil change. We went to Walmart and headed home. Going through the woods on Otho Drive, the car's problems got much worse, to the point that I wasn't sure it would make it up the hill. Since I didn't want to try to turn it around or back down the curvy hill, I kept it going. The car died after reaching the crest of the hill. I managed to coast most of the way home, got it started and made it to my driveway. And it has sat there ever since. A friend of Kent's has looked at it and said it could b...

I said a long, long time ago, that if cats had thumbs, they would rule the world. This theme has been expanded upon by Bertrum Thumbcat , whose ponderings and plots can be followed on Facebook . I have often accused our cat Booboo of trying to kill me, especially by tripping me, sometimes at the top of the basement stairs. Although this is simply proof that Booboo is not entirely there, or possibly not thinking things through, as I buy the cat food. So that is obviously not in his best interests. I may have proof, finally, of catty plotting. Yesterday I was trying to watch a video online. It was slow loading - watch a minute or two, then pause it to let it load. It took 3 1/2 hours to watch 36 minutes last night and I finally went to bed, leaving the screen up so the video could keep loading (which it did, just fine). But this morning, the image on the monitor was completely upside-down. The cursor worked completely backward, in line with the upside-down image. I was able to Go...

But not quite a grownup. Amanda's birthday was today. She and I went out to Fazoli's for a late lunch, stopped by my mom's and did a (very) little shopping for Amanda. She and I were both tired, so we went home. I took a nap before taking Cayla to church, but Amanda wouldn't go. We also stopped at Kent's before we went shopping. His dad had stopped by and took him out to eat, and gave him an older laptop he had that he didn't need any more. Unfortunately, he can't remember the password, so Kent won't be using it right away. And Kent said his dad told him to tell Amanda happy birthday from him. I did some research on the Carr family and Thomas Nicholson, the Gowrie town marshal who was shot to death on July 11, 1908, by Wilbur Carr. Wilbur's dad was Ira, the younger brother of Lydia Carr Caylor Burrell Baxter, my great-great-grandmother, which makes Wilbur my first cousin three times removed, I think. I think I discovered an error in the 1900...

Kent was called into jury selection today, so he needed a ride to town. His friend Chad needed to go grocery shopping, as well, so I combined those trips. Dropped Kent off just after 9 a.m., put gas in the car ($3.57/gal at Walmart, but 10 cents off/gallon because I used a Walmart gift card), took Chad to Fareway, did a little shopping and went out to the car to wait for Chad. While I was waiting for Chad, I wrote some research questions in a notebook about a relative who is a big black sheep in our family. Wilbur Carr, 23, shot the Gowrie, Iowa, town marshal to death in July 1908. Wilbur's father was Ira S. Carr Sr., and Ira's sister was Lydia Carr Caylor Burrell Baxter, my great-great-grandmother. Which makes Wilbur my first cousin three times removed, if I have figured it correctly. So, one of my questions is what is Wilbur's actual name? I think that in census records he's listed as Wilbur. But most of The Messenger articles about the crime and the aftermath ref...

First a video: Poor kitty. No nap for you! Now to our kitties. We have a bookcase (media tower?) that is about 2 feet wide and about 7 feet tall. I firmly believe that bookcases should be packed with books. The books should be stacked on top of each other, and I've been known to have two rows of books on one shelf, along with the stacked books on top of each row. However. I'm still not organized from when we moved in (September 2008), so many of my books are still in boxes. This bookcase/media tower has a few books, assorted stuff and software cases. But on the top shelf right now is a rock bookend and a cat. Chicken, to be precise - Amanda's cat. Chicken is taking a nap on the top shelf. She likes it up there. She can jump from the computer monitor (the desk is in front and slight to the left of the bookcase). Booboo can jump all the way to the top of the bookcase, and he likes to hang out there. Chicken likes the freestanding pantry we have, but she can't j...