Testing Out My Blogging Software

     My parsley has been growing all winter. I’m not bragging, I’m just saying.

     This is a test post, really. A lot has happened to me technologically speaking since I took a break from blogging. The hard drive on my laptop crashed and I lost a lot of stuff, like Windows Live, which is a free blogging software program I’ve used ever since Little Miss, aka Claire from Cadence of Life introduced me to it way back in the day. I just downloaded it again this morning and wanted to test it out. I lost a lot of other stuff when my hard drive crashed, so my son-in-law, Paul, introduced me to Mozy, which backs up my computer throughout the day so I never lose anything again. He also introduced me to Skype Recorder. Now when I’m interviewing people for my articles I use a headset and call them from my computer, which is way cheaper than any land line phone plan (it’s $2.99 a month), and the free Skype Recorder automatically records everything in crystal clear sound. Plus, with Mozy backing everything up, I don’t have to worry about losing my interview. Basically, Paul has made my job a lot less stressful. Maybe my hard drive crashing wasn’t such a bad thing after all.

     And in weather news, although the winters in El Paso are mild compared to most parts of the country we do get snow. Nothing much, a dusting really, and certainly not enough to shovel. We don’t own a snow shovel, but I think we should buy a window scraper. We got some snow a few weeks ago so I took these photos of it on the truck

 

and on the rosemary bush out front.

Technorati Tags: El Paso,Snow in the Southwest,Mozy,Windows Live Writer,MX Skype Recorder

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The Bucket List: Gardening On The Cheap

I’m always whining about gardening in El Paso and how difficult it’s been for me. So this year I resolved to have container gardens. Since money is tight I’m planting seeds. But I’m also looking for instant color, so I’m buying mostly annuals, which pretty much goes against everything I’ve ever believed in. I believe perennials give you more bang for your buck, like years worth of bang. But I can’t afford to spend $12.99 or more on a plant that might die in a week. So I’m going with annuals and a few veggies.

Because I’m spending money on annuals, I can’t really afford to go out and buy the beautiful pots I’d like to get. But I need deep containers so my plants will think they’re in the ground. So I’m trash can and bucket gardening. No one can see the garden but us, because it’s inside our courtyard where I can keep an eye on it 24/7. I’ve gone around and collected all the unused trash cans we’ve got, and I’ve been buying buckets. The cheapest buckets I’ve found are the Home Depot utility buckets for $2.79. I drill holes in the bottom, drop in some newspaper and rocks for drainage, then add my special soil mixture. And of course (the most important part) I’m turning the bucket so the giant Home Depot ad doesn’t show.

Here’s a pepper plant and his friends oregano, snap dragon, and the petunia gang. I took this shot about a week ago.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here it is this morning. So far, so good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s some lovely bucket salvia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s some bucket petunias below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here’s my one big perennial splurge, trash can Rudbeckia and a hollyhock.

I went to the store yesterday with a specific “bucket list” of what I wanted and here they are below. I’ve got to plant these today. They’re already well on the way to looking good (unlike the half-dead marked down K-Mart plants I bought weeks ago), so hopefully they’ll keep on keeping on and encourage the rest of the garden to do the same.

I’ll keep playing chakra music to my bucket garden and talking to it, and I just know the garden will cooperate. OR I WILL FLIP OUT.

I’m not really supposed to on here right now, taking photos and blogging, because I’ve got too much work to do so I’m gonna run. Happy gardening, everyone!

Technorati Tags: gardening, cheap plants, inexpesive ways to garden, container gardening, gardening when your broke, cheap containers, gardening in El Paso, gardening in the Southwest

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Postcard From My Neighborhood

This is my new Mexican prayer flag. At least I think that’s what it’s called.  It was my neighbor’s, but it blew into our yard and got caught in our pine tree. I was glad it happened. I’ve wanted one of these for the longest time. I never would have been able to get to the top of that tree to hang one as perfectly as this, and now I don’t have to. The wind did for me.

There’s a lot of stuff I now covet in this neighborhood. I see it when I’m walking Sydney. I don’t the names of any of it…just as I’m sure someone from El Paso couldn’t identify all the flora and architectural nuances of a New England neighborhood. So I’ve made up my own names for this stuff.

Here’s a sampling of stuff in my neighborhood that I want.

Below: This tree. It’s a couple doors down from me. I’d like to climb it:

Below: This courtyard. We have a courtyard too, but we haven’t done much to it yet. This one is delightfully green and looks like I could rollerblade around inside.

Below: This bush. I don’t know what it is, but I want one.

Below: My next-door neighbor’s door. I want it. At Christmas they make it look so beautiful I could cry. Because it’s not mine.

Below: These people’s colored tin lizards. Real ones I hate.

Below: This bush that grows pink feathers. I call it a feather bush.

Below: Another courtyard perfect for rollerblading. (Is it necessary for me to mention I don’t even own any rollerblades?)

Below: These people’s courtyard gate. Behold the gate. I’d put a big dog in the courtyard and let him stand at the gate all day to scare away the solicitors who come to the door. Like the Avon lady, and the guys with Chihuahua license plates on their trucks who ask me if I have any work for them. I should say, “Sí! Please rearrange my closet…it’s a disaster!”

Well that’s it for today. When walking Sydney I’ll continue to take photos of all the stuff I covet in my neighborhood and post them here. It’s tough, because I don’t like getting caught, but for you guys it’s worth it.

Technorati Tags: southwestern, west texas

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Tuesday in El Paso

 

Does baking my own dog biscuits save money? I like to think so. But the star-shaped biscuits creep Timmy out.

    

     We’re in technology hell, you guys, HELL. Our Time-Warner telephone and Internet has been cutting out on us for three months. Our phone goes dead and our Internet comes up blank THROUGHOUT THE DAY AND NIGHT. If you’ve tried talking to us on the phone you know exactly what I’m saying here. You’re talking away and then suddenly you’re saying …”Hello? Hello? Are you there?” because we can hear you but you can’t hear us. So be careful what you say at that point.

Buck was talking to a guy on the phone when the line cut out. Buck actually heard the guy say, “Hey, this asshole just hung up on me!”  And of course our line was down for an hour, so Buck couldn’t immediately call him back and tell him what happened.

We’ve had our lines monitored by Time-Warner, tests run, and eight Time-Warner techs have actually come out to the house and each one claims to have found the “problem.” Each time they say it’s fixed. It is never fixed. Today I spoke with yet another supervisor, and this one told me there was nothing they could do for us. I asked him, “Should I get a new provider like AT&T or Comcast?” and he said, “I don’t know.”

In addition to the phone and Internet problems has anyone noticed how thin magazines have gotten lately? Well even if you have, I bet it’s not making you wake up in the middle of the night gasping for air.

Speaking of waking-up-gasping-for-air-and-then-what-do-you-do-because-it’s-only-4:30-in-the-morning-and-you’re-wide-awake? here’s a photo of the moon I took at 4:30 Monday morning. Or maybe it was Sunday morning. I wake up too many mornings like that to tell them apart.

     Prior to taking this photo I asked Buck if he cared to join me outside, but he was too busy  trying to breathe himself. 

      This post was supposed to be about baking dog biscuits. Here’s my advice: Do not make them star-shaped. Timmy never knows how to grab the star-shaped biscuits. He curls back his little lips and gingerly grabs it with just his tiny fangs then immediately drops it and licks it to death. It leaves a wet mark on the carpet and it’s a problem.  

Technorati Tags: Time-Warner sucks, hate Time-Warner, homemade dog biscuits

 

 

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Today In El Paso

 

Well it’s December 2 and as warm as it’s been lately, I’m beginning to lose faith that my trash barrel zucchini plant will ever yield any actual zucchini. That’s what I get for shopping a 99-cent plant sale in October. Gardening here in El Paso is a bitch. For me, anyway.

In other El Paso plant news, I bought a rosemary Christmas tree at the supermarket last weekend. I have high hopes for it, as I always do with rosemary Christmas trees, but I have yet to keep one alive. Maybe here in EP I’ll have better luck, seeing that it grows like a weed in my front yard. I put this one in my kitchen, said a few prayers over it, and now it’s a waiting game.

 

I’m working at the kitchen table today

because some dog who shall remain nameless peed directly into the power strip in my office, thereby shorting out the costly-costly power strip. It was actually sizzling and sparking, and the pee turned black, so I yanked the plug from the wall and ran from the room.

For background ambiance in my kitchen office today, I have a DVD of the Andy Griffith Show playing on an endless loop in the background.

And in closing, I’d like to report that the Thanksgiving ham marathon has ended. All that was left was the bone, making it no longer my concern. Timmy and Sydney can work it out. We’re done with it.

Technorati Tags: rosemary, dogs, baked ham, Andy Griffith, work from home, zucchini plants

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Friday “SO FAR”?

I’ve been working this week, which is a drag because I took this job so I wouldn’t have to work. But I wanted to share this headline with you from Wednesday’s paper. I don’t know if the rest of the U.S. is aware of what’s going on here right over our border but it’s shocking. To read more about it you can click on the photo if you feel so inclined.

To leave you on a happier note, Stella is spending the afternoon safely napping:

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Yesterday’s Flood

Reflection of a tree in a puddle on our patio.

We got hit with the tail end of Hurricane Dolly yesterday. According to the El Paso Times we received 3-inches of rain in a matter of minutes — and I can totally testify to that. That’s the way it goes here in El Paso…you’re dry as dust for weeks, then you’re suddenly underwater. The rain has nowhere to go, it just piles up and before you know it you’re feeling like a pioneer frantically trying to improvise some method for keeping the rising water out of your fracking house.

Reflection of the sky in a recycling bin filled with water.

I’m still playing around with my new video camera and the movie editing program  I’ve had for years but never used. I went outside and shot some video as soon as the rain stopped pounding us. Sorry about the abrupt ending but I hadn’t really planned on posting this, then I thought, oh what the hell…

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Don’t Know Much Geography

My sister called the other day to warn me there was a big storm expected in San Antonio. I had to tell her that El Paso is almost 600 miles from San Antonio. This is not unusual, most people back home don’t realize El Paso isn’t near anything. For instance, people often suggest we bop up to Austin, as it’s a very cool town and we’d undoubtedly love it. The problem is it’s 590 miles from here. It’s like driving from Boston to West Virginia. 

Some people realize that El Paso is on the border of Mexico and New Mexico, so they often ask me why I don’t go to Santa Fe for a shopping trip, as it’s very artsy and seems like a place I’d like to shop. They’re right, I would love to shop in Santa Fe, but it’s 320 miles from here, which is like driving from Boston to New Jersey.

Whatever.

If I didn’t live here I wouldn’t understand it either. I’m so bad at geography I can’t recall ever having it in school. What little I do know I forced myself to learn when my own children were in elementary school and I bought placemats with a giant washable map of the United States on the front. I didn’t want them to be as ignorant about it as I was. I’m better than I was, but every once in awhile I’m shocked when reminded of the existence of Delaware.

El Paso isn’t like anywhere else in Texas, or even West Texas for that matter. And El Paso isn’t exactly like Mexico, either. When I Googled El Paso I stumbled on a blog where someone described El Paso like this:

The city’s surrounded by hills and mountains, and half of them have crucifixes on top.

That’s not accurate, but I can see where a stranger passing through might get that impression as you do see a lot of crucifixes here. But the writer also felt there was too much graffiti, and I think he might be mistaking Juarez for El Paso, which is easy to do if you’re on the highway. While driving on I-10 you run parallel to Juarez. He probably saw this:

As graffiti goes, that’s pretty impressive, right up there with David’s Chicken Farmer I Still Love You. But on the whole you don’t see much graffiti here in EP. If you do see it there’s a phone number you can call day or night to report it, and the city has graffiti removal trucks that will go out at 2AM if that what it takes to remove it. We do have beautiful murals, though. I’ve posted this photo before but here it is again, me in front of my favorite mural downtown:

El Paso really is a place like no other, and as much as I complain about it, my biggest gripe is probably that it’s not my hometown and I often feel  like a stranger in a foreign land — which I am. We do have a terrific friend here, however, an artist and fellow writer known online as Raging Storm (the name of his former rock band). He does his best to explain El Paso to me, pries me from the house for shopping excursions, and indulges what he calls my “obsession” with the Virgen de Guadalupe. He isn’t wrong, it is an obsession, but I like to think of it as Catholic-envy. Yesterday he dropped by and gave me a tiny painting he got for me at an art gallery here in EP. It’s tiny, about 3″x4″, and very cool. I’ll be hanging it later this week, or Buck will be hanging it, actually. After the whole cup hook thing, I promised not to puncture anymore of his paint.

I really am planning on getting a video camera VERY SOON, because I want to take you on some tours around town. In the meantime I found a YouTube video of the very same drive Buck and I take whenever we go anywhere. It’s by Mr. Peabody1974 and I think he did an excellent job, I hope I can do as well when I get behind a camera. I don’t think Peter Parkour will want to view this, however. Peter and his wife drive a big rig along this road (I-10)through El Paso fairly often.

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No Good Deed Goes Unpunished – A Mario Update

I went out my front door today — surprise surprise — and I was thrilled to see that last week’s flood gave our bushes a new lease on life. Look what all that water made them do!

I got so excited, I stepped out into the street to take a couple shots from a different angle.

 

And then I looked down and saw that Buck’s new friend Mario left that freaking beer bottle right in front of our house. This after Buck specifically asked him not to! So he’s a litterbug as well as a stalker.

Why God why?! No good deed go unpunished.

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Update on Flash Flood

I didn’t want to leave off my last post with the water rising at our backdoor, in case anyone wondered if I got washed away while posting. I did not. Buck was coming home from work and was on the road during the flood, so I’ll hopefully be interviewing him later today about that experience. We’re expecting another storm today, so the interview may have to wait.

We got nearly 3″ in about an hour. To give you an idea of what happens in a flash flood, here’s a photo from today’s El Paso Times taken by the obviously brave Mark Lambie. That ring around the SUV is a median strip up the street from our house. In some areas, people had to be removed from their cars through their sunroofs.

El Pasoans or anyone else from an area where flash floods are common must think I’m insane on this subject, but it’s just mind-blowing to us. It happens so fast, I had no firsthand knowledge of this sort of thing before I moved here and neither did Buck. Driving in a hurricane or blizzard, yes; flash floods, no. It’s scary but fascinating too, and I’m always in awe as I run around trying to bale out the doorways before the flood comes inside.

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