This song is called Alice's Restaurant, and its about Alice, and the restaurant, but Alice's Restaurant is not the name of the restaurant, that's just the name of the song, and that's why I call the song Alice's Restaurant... |
This Trayton and his donkeys Willy and Peanut - aren't they adorable?! |
This is me - aren't I a doofus?! |
We went to see Michael Franti and Spearhead - the stage was too far away to take a picture of Michael, but we had fun sitting (and standing (and jumping)) on the grass there... |
Willy and Peanut wanted to share some secrets with me... |
September means sidewalk chalk art in Forest Grove... |
Dad prefers to take pictures and play with with Photoshop. |
This year I went with a plan... and brushes... and water... |
Alexis was a little faster than I was so she watched me work on filling in my sidewalk square. |
Mom said I was supposed to put the chalk on the ground, not on me, but I don't know what she's talking about. |
Ta da! See - a boat on a river - cellophane flowers of yellow and green - a bridge by a fountain - ok, you try to draw a plasticine porter with a looking glass tie in chalk... |
September also means talk like a pirate day! Woof! I mean Yar! |
Krispy Kreme didn't give away donuts this year but that didn't stop us! No, Dad doesn't look like that! He had to go on a trip so Gill joined us! |
Lu and Ethel joined the family this month too! |
And speaking of old things... I got to try out Jiffy Pop! Why would anyone want to make popcorn in a microwave when you can spend 15 minutes doing this! |
I'm still a doofus, but what do you think of this hair style? |
Well, the travel book is progressing and maybe it will be done by Christmas... It turned out at 80 pages of pictures, but now I'm working on the text to go with it so we can remember what we actually saw! And it has gotten a lot slower since going back to work...
Originally I was worried that maybe I wouldn't have enough to do when I went back. That turned out to be foolishly optimistic on my part. Also, my dreams of not being a manager, at least for a little while... right out the window! I've already hired my first employee and am trying to hire more! I should still end up with a group that is at most half the size of my old one, but we'll see how that turns out I guess. On the plus side - I'm not doing what I was doing before!
As you can see in the pictures, we're the proud owners of more rodents. Lu and Ethel were abandoned by their prior owners and we couldn't bare to see them cooped up in the little cage at the pet store so Lucie adopted "the grannies" in hopes that they will live a little longer than average and will enjoy their remaining time in the spacious cage and playpen at our house. They are pretty adorable though, aren't they?
I'm not sure what else to comment on... we weren't hit by any of the three hurricanes, impacted by either of the two major earthquakes, forced to evacuate due to volcanic activity, or personally affected by all the Oregon forest fires (beyond a little difficult breathing and some ash settling on the deck and cars.) Ironically, September was National Preparedness Month...
"This September, National Preparedness Month (NPM) will focus on planning, with an overarching theme 'Disasters Don’t Plan Ahead. You Can.'
We should all take action to prepare! We are all able to help first responders in our community by training how to respond during an emergency and what to do when disaster strikes — where we live, work, and visit. The goal of NPM is to increase the overall number of individuals, families, and communities that engage in preparedness actions at home, work, business, school, and place of worship."
Though you may have been too busy dealing with an actual disaster (or just following it on the news) to prepare for one during September, but it is never too late to get started. https://www.ready.gov/september