Feel Like Complaining

I got a new HP printer a little over a year ago, just a cheap one to take care of my occasional printing needs. I've always had HP and most of the time bought their cartridges fearing the voided warranty if I used off brand or refilled ones. After the installed cartridges ran out on the new printer, I started buying them at Cartridge World, much cheaper and good quality. All was fine until a few months ago when I needed to print something. My printer refused my request telling me that I didn't have the HP black cartridge installed. I tried over and over to no avail. How can something like this just happen overnight? I started researching online and found forums as far back to 2010 that others were having the same issue. From what I can conclude is that when I did an HP update on either my computer or printer, it made it impossible to use foreign cartridges. I read where some were able to reset the chip or work around it somehow but it didn't seem to have a lasting eff...

It is time again for our family vacation. We're going earlier this year because of training my husband will have to do for work next month. We have the same girl to take care of the yard and our Sweet Nellie so we're set. Actually we left two days ago and are hopefully having a good time. I just might have some pictures up on my photo blog if you're looking for a change of scenery. Hopefully pictures won't be delayed because wifi here sucks!!!! This year I let The Kid plan the whole itinerary. We're staying on Washington's coast but will head down into Oregon too. I let her pick what we will do and when. It felt good to let someone else do the planning for a change. I think my Mom might miss me but my older brother will be around so she can call him if she needs something. Another reason for leaving early, so we could coordinate vacations and one of us would be in town. So I'm off, but have enough in my blogger queue to hopefully keep you enterta...

Every extreme season, summer and winter, the media slams us with tips, rules, and demonstrations of the season. The only ones that need repeating are to keep kids and dogs out of hot cars. People are still not learning that one. It's the same spiel, year after year. I think the only ones they are educating are martians from another planet because we all know this stuff. Summer: 1 Drink plenty of water and stay in cool areas. 2 Open doors early in the morning to cool the house down 3 Shut blinds and curtain 4 Wear lightweight clothes 5 Don't exercise heavily 6 Demonstrating the usual frying of egg on pavement to prove how hot it is Winter: 1 When shoveling snow, lift with your legs, not your back 2 Wear layers 3 Demonstrating the usual freezing a wet t-shirt to prove how cold it is 4 Demonstrating how fast skin freezes 5 Explaining wind chill factor So since we are all so stupid I think this weekend when it will still be 100 degrees out, I will put on some s...

One night I turned the A/C off and headed to bed. As I lay down I heard this faint banging/knocking sound. Since I sleep in the basement it was hard to tell where it was coming from so I got up and turned my lamp on. I thought it might have been outside but as I headed to the door I could now tell it was coming from the furnace room which is right next to me. This is where the ghosts live and I really didn't want to open the door to investigate but I knew I wouldn't be able to go to sleep if I didn't check it out. It was the A/C unit, sounding like metal does when it's cooling down or something. I could see some darkness on the floor but couldn't open the other door because I have a book case in front of it. The door to spooky town In the morning I had my husband help me move the book case so we could open the little door and found that the floor was wet. We assumed it was the condensate pump because it has happened before. Of course it was a Saturday and br...

This little story has gotten me more bugged than anything ever has. And all because of some baby birds. We have 3 bird houses and one of them is in our Oak tree in the front yard. It's kind of a cheap one that came in a kit and my Mom gave it to Hubby one Christmas. It's all separated in the back but has still raised a few families of babies. After my walk one day I looked out front and saw that it was on the ground. I ran out because I knew there were babies in there. I picked the house up and one little guy had fallen out. He tried to get away from me but I scooped him up and shoved him in the hole. By then Hubby had come out and I told him to get the ladder so we could put it back up. Then I noticed the bugs on my hands and arms. I had only been holding the house for a few minutes but I was covered. I wiped them off and set the house down until the ladder came out. I volunteered to do the climbing. He handed me a new nail with a bigger head and I hammered away until it...

Isn't this a beautiful tree? We planted this one in 1998, soon after moving in. It's a Weeping White Pine (we do like our Weepers, don't we?) and it looks so grand and healthy......until I looked at it closely after moving a sprinkler recently. Maybe I'm just a little more aware after already having to take one out. I saw some white fluffy spots on some needles, kind of webby looking. Then I looked at the trunk and was horrified, it was coated white. I came running in with gross white stuff all over my hands and showed my husband. We both started searching the internet to figure out what it was. He found it first--Pine Bark Adelgid. I can't even pronounce the last word, but basically kind of like an aphid that feeds on mostly White Pines. Both winged and non-winged babies are born and the winged creatures take off to find a new tree to attack and the non-winged stick around to have more kids which suck the life out of your tree. It's really not all that ...

Although Summer has barely begun, it has been off to a lovely start. School is out and everything is quiet. We're able to sit on our yard swing in the early mornings or evenings. So far, I've had nothing stolen out of our yard. Our not-so-close neighbor has decided that he CAN park in his own driveway. He either moved a few cars up or out of the way in order to do that. It wasn't that hard now fella, was it? Without school in session, traffic is lessened and my morning walks are so peaceful I can actually hear the birds. Our messy neighbors have had a relatively clean yard since the husband moved out (force-ably). The wife has had different people moving in and out but I think they are just there to help with rent. There have been absolutely no issues at all. Our next door doggy hoarder neighbors have brought one more home. After they got down to the legal limit of 3, I guess they felt that had to save another one. It's a little Doxie mix which loves to bark ...