“Take away the miseries and you take away some folks’ reason for living.” – Toni Cade Bambara
Monday, May 09, 2005
I’m Losing Things (Maybe My Sanity)
This weekend I lost some things. Maybe it is age catching up to me? I lost (or, at least can’t find): a knee brace (yes, the knee is going again); a quart of hydraulic fluid for the log splitter, and a pen tablet for my computer.
Let me know if you find them.
Posted under: Stuff You Gotta Know! • by Rick on 05/09/2005 at 03:39 PM
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Tuesday, May 03, 2005
Wildflowers at our Cabin
Today, while checking my web site usage statistics, I saw that there was a reference to my web site from a site that features flowers. However, the link to my site takes you to this page, not the wildflower page. So, here is the link to wildflowers at our cabin.
It is about that time of year again! We’ve already seen a few Pasque Flowers.
Posted under: Cabin News • by Rick on 05/03/2005 at 12:27 PM
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Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Heidi Turns 12
Today, Heidi turned 12 years old! The average age for a Bernese Mountain Dog is, perhaps, 8-1/2 or, at most, 9 years old. So, that makes Heidi over 100 years old in human terms.
This photo was taken about 6 months ago, but she looks the same today. Her brown accent colors are mostly grey. Her eyes are a bit clouded. She doesn’t hear great. And, because of hip dysplasia and some neurological problems, she has a hard time walking.
But, she still is alert and has a lot of spirit. She barks a lot—always has—but more than usual. I think because she can’t get around well she wants us to know she is around.
Heidi has always been mischievous. When we first brought her into our home we were living in France. We got her from the deSavora kennel in Switzerland. We had also brought home a boy, Indiana, about 3 weeks earlier. He was a real sweetie, never doing anything wrong. He didn’t bark, he stayed in the yard which was loosely fenced in by a hedge. When Heidi came she showed him how to escape the yard and how to bark.
But, Heidi has done a lot of good, too. She was trained as a therapy dog and participated in a local Animal Assisted Therapy program. She and I worked with children in the area that were in foster care because of abuse or neglect. Often, they would talk to Heidi about things that they would not talk to a person about. She was very obedient and they could “train” her to follow commands. And, she had several games that she liked to play. We’d used her to get the kids to talk, to build their self esteem, etc. But, after about 4 years she got tired of it and a bit cranky, so retired from therapy work.
Please join us in wishing her a happy 12th birthday!
Posted under: Dog Stuff • by Rick on 04/19/2005 at 10:13 PM
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Monday, April 11, 2005
Domenic’s Restaurant
Last week, Lynne and I had a night out. We went out to eat dinner (for the first time in years), and we went to a Rod Stewart concert.
We ate at Domenic’s—a restaurant that is close-by, new, and that we had heard good things about. They have a mostly Italian menu with a small wine list of mostly unknown wines. They are located in a shopping center at the corner of Harmony and Lemay in Fort Collins.
It is a small place with a large bar and about a dozen tables. They do have outside seating for warmer weather. The atmosphere is comfortable.
We each had a small Ceasar salad and we split a main dish that was flank steak rolled up with prosciutto ham and mozzarella cheese inside. It was served in a tomato sauce much like a Bolognese. It was also served with garlic mashed potatoes.
The salads were good. The cheesecake dessert was fantastic.
The main course was very salty and not very hot. It might have been the prosciutto, but I think it was the sauce that was salty. And, we could not detect any proscuitto or cheese in the dish. The potatoes were plain without much garlic flavor. And, the price, for what we got, was very high. Main dish prices ranged from $15 to $20, ours was $18.
Service was average.
Other than a good espresso and a great dessert, the place has little to recommend it. If anyone has had a different experience, please leave comments.
Maybe that is why we don’t eat out very often…
Posted under: Food and Cooking • by Rick on 04/11/2005 at 05:46 PM
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Monday, April 04, 2005
How to do Everything
Well, okay, maybe “many” things.
The other day I was looking for hints on ways that I might fix some woodwork that has dog claw scratches on it and found this website. There are thousands of “how to” articles. And, each has comments from people on what works and what doesn’t as well as alternative ways to accomplish something.
Check it out!
By the way, here is the article on how to repair scratches.
Posted under: Dog Stuff • Stuff You Gotta Know! • by Rick on 04/04/2005 at 09:38 PM
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