May 27, 2009

No Happy Ground Hog Day today! It rained all morning and so far – it’s a lazy day! We had a tasty breakfast and then I continued to fight off my nest building nemesis! While Carlo napped, I played “Hidden Objects” and then got caught up in “Build-A-Lot 2” for someone without the internet I’ve sure been on the computer a lot! I closed up shop in time for lunch and GH – whew…what a morning – no, not really! And the afternoon was much of the same – watching it rain and playing Vista games on the computer.

Carlo added an outlet to the bedroom wall switch, fed the birds and then we grilled dinner – yes, in the rain…pork chops, potato and corn!
We threw watermelon (dry and mushy), the rinds and the rinds of a cantaloupe out by the trees for the raccoons. It rained pretty much the rest of the evening and Carlo did his best to get more channels on TV by running g a cable though the bathroom to join the utility room to the HI-DEF box…he ended up with 9!

And I took several breaks to remove the bird construction and snap some photos of the culprits.

May 26, 2009

My flower beds are all spruced up and it's Happy Ground Hog Day! (with a twist) – Picture this…Carlo checking that all the birdfeeders are hanging, empty but hanging – he opens the front door and looks at the stash of feed and seeds left in covered containers the night before – add your favorite expletive – and witness the seed and feed strewn everywhere and containers open and laying all over and of course the special $hitty treat left behind!

Now we have figured out our visitors have not been squirrels but rather the masked bandits of the night…RACCOONS! We actually watched them several times during the night – when the lights went on - munching away at the feed by the tree, three of them, eating and romping and making squealing noise! Yep, RACCOONS, our new destructive nemesis!

Carlo built a wood crib along side the shed since we have so much wo0d to store. It fits great there.

Paul stopped by for a couple hours and had coffee. When he left there was a man-made (or woman-made) tornado to hit the front porch – I have about one week to win this battle and if you’re placing any Vegas bets – the odds are certainly AGAINST me!
We gathered our dirty clothes and hit the Laundromat. Laundromats are quite the experience – people are certainly different – I watched people scoping out the three washers I was using and noticed baskets of clothes on the tops of washers – obviously an over anxious dirty clothes owner too impatient for the owner to retrieve their wet clothes. I watched dryers sit full of clothes and no one there to empty them and another character go in to the garbage to retrieve a dryer sheet (used). There was even a woman that had two huge totes of clothes – couldn’t help by notice bedding, underwear and jeans. She went by two large front loading machines...one tote in one machine and one tote in the other. She didn’t separate anything! If you do this too – sorry, but I am a fanatic about my laundry. Anyway, it was an experience. Carlo ran some errands while I was there and when he got back, we went to Tamarack for the Tuesday Burger Special – always yummy! After a quick stop at Wal-Mart, we made it back for GH – yay! While I caught up on my show, Carlo helped me out on my never ending bird battle – he sprayed a product that is suppose to distract them – they were still hovering around, so we will give it a chance to soak in the keep my fingers crossed that this works. He also sprayed the deck hoping to keep the raccoons away. Then he spent a chunk of the afternoon trying to tune in an antenna so he could get more than four channels!

My fully stocked hummingbird feeders!

I pulled out the laptop and we both got absorbed in the first game we tried. We took turns, played together and then I took over while Carlo cooked pasta and meat sauce for dinner! He even cleaned up. That made me enjoy it even more! I kept playing until about 10:30 when my eyes would no longer focus! On our way to bed, the flood lights were on and the tree bandits of the night were up to their same MO! One attempted to come onto the porch but our spray protective shield of horrible stench had him attend the buffet by the tree instead of coming onto the porch! But as we watched these bandits by the tree it all made sense, they are the ones that have broken the birdfeeders!

May 25, 2009

Mornings are like an altered version of “Ground Hog Day” (the movie) – Carlo waking up, seeing something has gotten into his bags of feed or emptied one or more of his many birdfeeders or finding damage to a birdfeeder – and then his adding his few “choice” words! Now with the new motion lights, every time an intruder approaches, we have an opportunity, for four minutes, to see; like during the night we were able to see what appeared to be a squirrel tipping a birdfeeder, however, I heard something that sounded like pouring of feed only to find in the morning – after Carlo’s episode of “Ground Hog Day” that the bag of nuts, corn and other morsels were ransacked all over the front porch.

I am still knee deep in this battle with the nest builders – I have sprayed everything I could find to discourage their construction…air freshener, carpet cleaner, Windex, mosquito fogger and brown spray paint – yep, in my crazy frenzy I grabbed the wrong can and got it all over – me! I am NOT giving up!
Carlo ran to Tractor Supply, one of his favorite spots in town, for more seed, feed and lawn stuff. Time to get back to cutting the grass where the tractor cannot reach – yep, it’s green walking mower time – ergh! We worked outside until about 1:45 – we mowed and trimmed and broke for lunch. Hoping to watch GH, I was disappointed it was a rerun so I went back to work – I thinned out the flower bed by the porch as well as the one by the tree. We worked until 7:30; trying to get all the outside work finished due to expecting rain – we built a wood crib along the side of the shed and split a trailer of wood. There is still a tree on the ground that we need to cut up and we’ll have to split it another time. We grilled steaks and all the fixings for dinner and ate around 9:00. Dinner was scrumptious! After eating the exhaustion set in!

May 24, 2009

Carlo has his own feathered drama…he feeds the birds with the feeders he has everywhere…a blue one on this tree, a red one on that tree, a yellow one, an orange one. One with a roof, another with several perches. He really enjoys feeding them and all in all, they are fun to watch (as long as they are not building in the eaves of the front porch!). However, the drama is the destruction that is occurring. We thought it was the squirrels or some large bodied creature we saw moving about. We woke up this morning to empty feeders and one knocked to the ground. The culprits seem to tip them and knock the seed to the ground. All their little friends scurry about and fill their bellies until they’re fat and full!
Two nights in a row we heard animals screeching as though protecting something or fighting. It was alarming. I thought it is was happening under my bed!

Carlo needed to take parts from the broken yellow and broken blue feeders and make a new one…now we have a custom made O'Wich designed birdfeeder – let’s see how long this lasts!
I checked the back deck and the frog was gone. I wonder how many of these I’ve stepped on since they appear to be leaves. When I first seen it (when I screamed) it reminded me when the kids were small and would be afraid of something. After getting comfortable with the idea of whatever they were afraid of – they would be disappointed when it was gone or no longer afraid if it stayed…like Max, a parakeet or a trout!
And just for the record…when it comes to coffee…anything “French” is not vanilla!!!
After tasty egg sandwiches for breakfast, we got to working outside.

I was excited to find Lily of the Valley in one of the flower beds. I love the scent. Then I planted hummingbird flower seeds under the arbor and we trimmed back some trees – I had to operate on myself to remove the thorns from when I grabbed a stalk of something. We then headed down to the river to cut up the trees damaged by the beavers – while Carlo chain sawed I cleaned up the twigs and branches and put the wood in the trailer. We pulled the trailer to the third tree (by the easement) and Carlo got the ticks and other bugs off me – I love the serenity of the outdoors but from the inside!!! These little things along with the nest building buzzards frustrate me…and now I have tried ridding them by spraying air freshener and carpet cleaner…DON’T ASK! I am not throwing my hat in (yet) but this battle between me and the feathered one is getting harder!

With our trailer filled in a heaping pile, we pulled it to the wood crib – we’ll split it tomorrow – and we took a much deserved and much needed lunch break. After lunch Carlo mowed grass, I blew leaves and as easy as it sounds and as quick as I wrote it, it took about four hours for us to do all of this. We stirred up worms and ticks and mosquitoes. At 5:00 pm we decided to call it quits as we verbally went over the lengthy to-do list for tomorrow – until then, we’re gonna rest, go to dinner, and try to enjoy our vacation!
We tried Bud’s Pizza and we really liked it ~ glad we tried something new. After dinner we picked up a few things from Wal-Mart. We were back by 9:30 pm and my friend – the frog – was sprawled out on the patio door screen. I was able to snap a couple of pictures of him and then he was gone – we’ll have to look for him in the morning!

May 23, 2009

After a 6 plus hour nap, it’s close to 3:00 am and I am wide awake and itching like crazy. I am covered with mosquito bites and hope a hot shower will numb the itch – around 8:00 I noticed something hovering around the flowers that were waiting to be planted – Carlo said it was a hummingbird – so now I’m excited since we hung the hummingbird feeders (how are hummingbirds going to know we’re ready for them?!) It flew away as I was situating myself and my camera to get its picture – and me screaming as the leaf I was moving off the chair ended up being a leaf frog!

And then Carlo laughed at me! He was disappointed that there weren’t many squirrels around and wondered where they have gone. A gray squirrel knocked down one of his freshly filled feeders and was feasting and there was also a red squirrel that was running under the car and then under the truck – there may be more to come of the red squirrel – but for now he had run into the woods.
Before we left for breakfast and finally food shopping, I again cleared out more construction debris – I think (loosely stated) I am still winning!
We gave the family restaurant another try since the last time we were there it sucked. We had the buffet and should have just ordered off the menu. But at least our bellies were full to grocery shop – with our small list in hand it’s hard to believe anything was left in the store as we exited with a full cart! While I put the stuff away, Carlo headed to Do-It-Best for more project supplies.
Tom and Judy stopped by for a visit and a beer and then Carlo finished installing the NEW motion light for the front porch. The one we originally bought wasn't working right. Later we’ll know if it works outside of the test mode! He even installed a solar powered motion light for the shed!

I am still actively shutting down the work site but am felling as I am losing the battle – maybe the ant killer I sprayed will work as a better deterrent! We just wasted the day away by sitting outside and relaxing.

We planted the flowers and checked that the frog was still alive and he was! We grilled brats and hot dogs and enjoyed every char-broiled bite. So far as of 8:30 pm I appear to be winning the battle with the feathered beast!

May 22, 2009

It rained during the night which ended up being good since it was so humid yesterday. The weather forecast is in the low 70’s for today – hopefully it doesn’t rain all day since we want to work outside! As 'predicted' we woke up hungry and to an empty fridge. Carlo ran to McDonalds while I enjoyed watching the turkeys scurrying about and of course – a cup of coffee.
After a tasty breakfast, we did some odd jobs – hung a shelf and paper towel holder over the kitchen sink – hung the wind chimes – got out the motion light for the front of the cabin - hung a toilet paper holder and of course, there was a problem with the TP holder, but nothing a little liquid nails didn’t help out with!
Paul and Betty stopped for a quick chat as they returned from their Friday errands. We cleaned up some twigs and branches and Carlo fired up the chainsaw and took down a couple of trees.
While I washed the patio furniture, Carlo hung the motion light on the front porch. Now, not only am I nuts about “swatting flies” but now I am on constant patrol on the construction occurring in the eaves of the front porch…the birds “think” they’re gonna build their nests there and I think otherwise. I have my trusty broom to assist me in thwarting their construction and every time a delivery of building materials shows up – I am on the prowl to remove it…so far, I am winning!
Once we got done, we headed to Lake Delton to the Home Depot. Our little list ended up close to $400 and we didn’t even get everything on the list – we needed screws, washers, hooks, a shelf, a light, poison ivy killer, ant killer, mosquito repellant and so much other stuff! Once it was all loaded in the truck we went to Wal-Mart for patio chair cushions and some other items that were on sale and $200 later (yikes) we were on our way to lunch - Wendy’s in the Dells. This would have been a good time for a video camera – no one eating in there, employees everywhere and boy were they ever friendly but in a weird sort of way and they were very excited to deliver hot fries to our table. Then they were all off to watch a training video. But the funniest was the guy trying to put up the “open until 1:00 am” sign. The sign appeared to be vinyl and he was applying it to the exterior window with soap and made several attempts to hang it and smooth it as it kept falling – a couple of times! He smoothed and wiped and smoothed and wiped again and for whatever reason, we thought this was pretty funny. Carlo said the guy took a 3-second job and made it 30 minutes! We left as he moved on to his next window application…I guess you had to be there!

When we got back, I put the cushions on the chairs and they look pretty good and are quite comfy. I installed hooks to the inside of the cabinet door to hang utensils on and I put the deck box together. Carlo set up his new solar powered motion shed light and he put the PVC pipes together – with adhesive – for the shower. Yet another unfinished project left for us, courtesy of the previous owners! But now it’s done and it’s done right.

We picked up some flowers for our flower box and I’ll plant those tomorrow. And as of 7:30 pm, with as much as we did get done today – we still have yet to go grocery shopping! By 8:30 I was deep in my night-time nap mode!

May 21, 2009

We came up in two cars – with the hopes that my two days to work will be approved for T/C – but just in case, two cars was a good idea! We arrived around 1:15, unpacked and it was time to see GH. Carlo, not being a big GH fan, went for bird seed, fed the birds and fogged for mosquitoes and other bugs.
We measured for the stone we hope to have delivered for the driveway area – egads – 16 yards…to be continued!
I called work and those two days were approved – yay! I am officially on vacation until June 8th!!!
I cleaned off the deck and porch, moved the patio table and grill around and we made out our grocery list. We decided to go to Kmart for cushions – which we only window shopped for and then went to Tamarack for one of the tastiest pizzas I’ve ever had from there! We decided to postpone shopping until tomorrow – we’ll be sorry when we wake up in the morning – HUNGRY – with nothing to eat! Not sure what time we called it a night since I had to wake up from my nap to go to bed!