Walking around the neighborhood

So, walking around my neighborhood, I counted, well I tried to count the squirrels but there are so many of them! And they are loud and fuss at me when I walk under "their" trees. It was a good year for acorns last fall and now the critters are big and numerous. I suspect some of the neighbors are feeding them.
My next door neighbor puts out veggies for the bunnies, but I've never seen the squirrels stealing from that supply like they go after seeds in the bird feeders.

One thing that really surprised me was the big mango tree overhanging the fence on Gateway Blvd. I must not have ever walked there when there was fruit on the tree. It sticks way out, making that fruit available for anyone who can pick it. Too bad I don't care for mangos, with as many as grow around here. Here's a picture of the tree, which is near Gateway and Lawrence, if anyone wants to come a-pickin!

I can't tell you if they are ripe or not, though.

Bland chips, but chips nonetheless.

They are toasted tortilla wedges with a hint of cheese. Just a hint now, because "we" are watching how much cheese and other delicious stuff "we" eat. I love chips, I could make a whole meal out of them and dips/spreads most nights. Love love love the crunch.

But chips and crackers come with a high calorie price. I'm trying to come up with a suitable substitute that doesn't have me pretending crisp vegetables are really chips. Come on people, veggies are good but they are not crackers.

These chips are bland. Really bland, but they are crunchy so I'll make them again. Plus I still have a lot of tortillas left.

Wildlife in the 'hood.

It's a good year for wildlife in my neighborhood. And domestic animals gone wild, too.

We have a bunch of these bunnies out chomping on the grass, at dawn and dusk. And lately they have been joined by domestic rabbits that have either been released or escaped. Last week in a small rainstorm I saw one of each near each other looking all cute and everything.

I'll save my comments on the squirrels for later, but rest assured, they are out there in full force too. Can the foxes be far behind?

*I am not able to get a photo of the bunnies, so I'll give credit to the poster at Wikipedia who shared the one above: I_Am_Ninjor.

I just love my new carpet cleaner!

It's a Bissell lightweight that I got at the big box discount store. You know, the one with the funny looking customers. Except for me of course.

I did my daughter's former bedroom with it and boy did the room need it. First of all, I gotta say, that detergent for carpet cleaners is expensive! But the good news is it only took a couple of tablespoons for the whole little tank, and that tank did the whole little bedroom.

It didn't take out the dents however. And no matter how much I clean it, there is that tramped down area around the edge of the former bed. The photo makes it look even worse!

Now let me tell you the sad tale of the little Hoover that didn't suck. I bought a rug cleaner at the other big box discount store, you know, the one that is much more pleasant to shop in. I had that cleaner in my garage in the box for a couple of months before I opened it up and assembled it. Then I discovered it wasn't sucking up the dirty water. In fact on the tiles it just blew it around. It too was very inexpensive, but I hadn't saved the reciept, so now I can't return it to the store.

I'm offering it up on the local Freecycle to see if anyone wants to try to fix it or if anyone can convince a store to take it back. Good luck to them.

In the meantime I may have to go in there and do the walls with a magic eraser. All the walls up to 3 feet off the floor are covered with marks and stuff. My gawd those two "kids" were hard on the house.

If this is all I have to be bugged about...

Don't you just hate it when that woven strip in the towel shrinks up the 2nd time it's washed? It makes it harder to fold them, and it just looks bad. The towels in this group all did this except the one that was being used that day. This happened 5 years ago and I'm still pissed about it. Damn dryer in my rental apartment, anyway.

If this is the biggest complaint I can come up with then I'll take it.

Our annual drought.

The lake behind my house is freakishly dry. We are not supposed to have a beach on it AT ALL. Although it is fun to see the birds on it sometimes. The same birds are not so visible when they have to be on the grass.

They don't talk about our usual drought on the news these days because the DCF screw-ups, the economy, and the tsunami in Japan with the atomic disaster are out-shadowing our little water issue.

Dress shopping, an exercise not enjoyable yet.

Bealle's only had one dress in my size appropriate for an afternoon wedding. ONE. So I moved on to the mall.

Penney's was remodeling and the women's department was not well labeled. They had rack after rack of dresses. OMGZ they were so cute! So many in my colors, too! Wait, where are my size? I wandered around for 15 minutes before finding the one rack with 5 different dresses in my size range. Only 3 of them were in my colors, so off to the dressing room with them. Yeah, I know I need to lose the socks, but my last shopping trip in dress shoes ended with a blister, so I wasn't going there!

There were only 3 fitting rooms, so I got to wait in line for a booth. Once in I decided I kind of liked all three dresses, but one was somewhat better fitting than the others and wasn't so revealing of underwear etc. so it was the winner. DING DING DING!

The encouraging or discouraging thing is that I am only one size away from being able to shop from the hundreds of dresses instead of the five. Not that i wear that many dresses, but the ones in my closet have been there since I was married, that's how old they are. Sometimes you gotta update your stock, ya know?