Something good happened today.

Something else good today -- went for my qtly appointment with the rheumatologist, and she put me on the priority High Risk list for the H1N1 shots tomorrow. Without her intervention I am not sure if I would have been abel to get one, even though I have had pneumonia every time I got the flu for the last few years.

I did call. No return call. I'll try calling again tomorrow. They _did_ have a big event over the weekend.

Good luck, Denver Jude! BTW, I am no one to complain about the not calling back thing... when I was the boss and doing the hiring, I did exactly as DwiD describes above, for the most part. For those that I interviewed personally who didn't get the job, I did usually give them a call thanking them for their time and letting them know that if it didn't work out, I would call them. But, in reality, many who applied never heard from me, if I didn't feel it was a good fit from the get-go.

Brenda

I always thought the ones who call back are really interested, a good sign. Plus, many new hires don't work out and the next one gets the job. At least in the merry world of retail this was true. So, Jude, it may still happen! And think of the photo ops!

On another thread I mentioned my Holiday "gifting" situation with my adult siblings. The good news is that we have all decided to make charity donations in each other's names! I don't know if I am allowed at D.G. to name the organization, but it is one we all like! And my brother who is a high school principal is also making donations for his staff, as gifts. ( They will get cards or calendars as an adjunct. ) I am so excited that we could all agree on doing something that will hopefully have more meaning than our continued support of Amazon! Yes! Changing traditions, one step at a time!

Nice! Good for you, Soferdig!

No, I'm Roybird. : )

Oooops.... too early, LOL! Good for you, Roybird!

I am so sorry to have missed this thread for so long! I love all of your good news and I am especially thrilled that Greenjay now has a place to garden where no one can complain about her choice of plants. You did wonders for that place and I know some of the people who lived there appreciated it and so did the bunny family. Best looking bunny family I ever saw. Can you keep them? Probably wouldn't be right, I guess. Bunny is happy where she is amid the coffee grounds.
Anyhow seriously, how wonderful to have your own home free of HOA's. Now that I have heard your HOA woes I will do my best never to be a member of one. I do hope we will be invited to see the new digs when we come up to DBG and that you will post lots of photos in the meanwhile.
Herb must save all his grumping for you because he has been absolutely charming whenever I have met him -- helping us lug our plants around.
How I wish I could send you some of my gravel. Maybe some day I will post a photo of my gravel piles in the vacant lot. This is the gravel I removed from the front yard and I still have a lot to go.
Roybird you are welcome to lots of my gravel and my truck to haul it with, but I give you fair warning -- it is much better to order it and have it placed near, if not precisely on, the spot where you want it. It is unbelievably heavy. I believe most of my current hand and wrist problems can be attributed to gravel removal.
I do hope to reuse it around my raised beds and my hell strip, but I have plenty to share if you can con someone ( your DH?) into shoveling and moving it.
People who gravel whole yards should think hard first. If I were looking at a house with a lovely landscape of bushes surrounded by gravel, I would deduct about 10k from my offer -- so I could afford good gravel removal.
My good news is that I now have 2 good contractors coming to make an offer to do my roof on Monday. I never thought I could be so excited to spend so much money about something so seemingly trivial as a roof. But now, I totally get that a roof is not trivial.
Another good thing -- my roof has been slowly deteriorating since it was in stalled over 20 years ago. It is made of some wierd composite material that involves a lot of something that looks like, and probably is, ground up used brick dust. It has been dissolving and draining into my flower beds, my rain barrel and onto my patio, etc. etc. and I have always wondered if it were toxic. Probably not, but I will be glad to have a nice metal roof that will not "shed" all the time.

We have a metal roof here and I love it, though beware of falling ice and snow as it heats up after a snowstorm. Otherwise, it is great! So glad you've got some contractors paying attention now.

Thank you for the offer of the gravel, Pajarito. I think I will end up putting up more guttering. I have not had much experience with gravel and it doesn't sound very appealing. I know it is heavy because I got a big box of it from Santa Fe Greenhouses, free, because no one knew what to charge me for it. They had some in bags but they had sold out and I didn't need a truck load. I got them to load it in my car but I had to take it out in several bucket loads, now that I think about it.

I think you made the best decision, roybird, much as I wouldn't mind getting rid of some of this gravel. It really is heavy!

Okay, here is something good for Dnut. A dahlia named after a cow:

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/localnews/ci_13883786

and it was judged best new variety of the year by some humpty-ump or other, too!

not to mention it is very pretty and at this time of year one needs pretty.

if not always.......

What a great name for a cow -- and for a dahlia. I can imagine that one can get quite attached to a cow one raises.

Or to a dahlia! ;-)

Yes!

Here is my something good for today, I finally started painting again for the first time since I got so sick! Looks like it might grow into a decent painting too! Feels good to be back in the paint, trying to keep Cosmo's tail out of the palette.

I too love Dahlia. Now cows are good friends of mine also.

Oh, golly, that's good news, Mulch!

I am looking forward to seeing your next painting, and Cosmo's as well. Give him his own canvas and hang both in the gallery. Wonder if his tail wag paintings will sell. It would be cool if they did. I would set up paint pallets at the right height for Raja and Kelsey. They wag a lot. Might be great artsts disguised as ordinary pets. He, he, he. Somehow I doubt it.

I have seen Cosmo's work and I would not hang it in the gallery. He has even more trouble than I do keeping the paint on the canvas instead of all the surrounding terrain. Considering that I generally would rather he paint the surrounding terrain and not my painting in progress, that might be a good thing.

Your dogs may have more of an artistic eye. Cosmo just has delirious enthusiasm.

I am not sure my dogs have an artistic eye. But they are great tail waggers. If I did allow them to paint, I am certain it would a sort of abstract expressionism.
But I have watched films of elephants painting. Don't know how they do it, but the ones trained to do so can actually do a representational painting. Not sure this would be considered art however.
Anyhow, we finally got a little snow last night, not a lot, but it is still snowing. This will be great for our dried up landscape.

Mulch, so glad to hear that you are painting again! There was an elephant that painted in AZ at the Phoenix zoo, Ruby was her name, and they sold her paintings in the Zoo gift shop. Sadly, she died while in labor. She was much loved. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_(elephant)

Mulch you have given me an idea. So many times I long for the memories of my dogs so I think I will cover their feet and toys and have them "record" a moment of joy on poster board ( and surrounds). Then I can frame a moment of our lives. Thank you. I suspect that water color concentrates would be the best and I will keep them from licking. Lets see start with feet, then tail, then cover a toy and drag it and bounce it as they would.........

Fun. My birds could be abstract expressionists for sure. Mulch, glad to hear you are painting again!

Oh! Pretty birds! So sweet. They seem to be cuddling. Also fabulous photo, roybird!

Glad to hear the paint is being applied (Mulch) and splattered (Cosmo) ^_^ That is a truly, luvly dahlia!

Glad you're back painting mulch. :-)

Thanks everyone. It is mostly good to be painting, except the back of my neck hurts ferociously. It is appalling how poor my physical conditioning is at the moment, that from painting for a couple of days!?! Not even a large brush either.

Sofer, you really must post a picture of your dogfeet and toys painting adventure. This sounds like a fun idea, but one I gladly leave to you!