Lance in pants

Yesterday morning I had set my tea tray on my bed and was doing a bit of work from a chair in my room when I saw a dark movement from the corner of my eye. There was Goblin with his face buried in my cream pitcher lapping away as though he had every right to be there. I scolded him and he just looked at me as though I was having some sort of break down and had become suddenly unreasonable. He then calmly started to clean his face. A dog at least has a conscience and will look apologetic. He is even now sitting cannot drink milk. Here is what I discovered. Most cats do not have the enzyme called lactase which breaks down the lactose in milk. It causes them to have digestive problems same as a human. Some cats can be given skim milk and some cats can tolerate cream. Cream is all fat and skim milk is not. Mystery huh? Cream being mostly fat has far less lactose, much less than milk. Goat milk also contains no lactose.

I so need this

As we pulled up to a stop light I noticed the hitch cover on the back of an oversized, lifted (we all know what that means) truck and it was a ghastly sight (further indication of the mutant quality of the owner I am sure).  There dangling from the hitch was a deer. Its legs all flopping at the movement of the truck, it was about 12 inches in height. There was a target on its exposed belly and every time he hit his brakes the target bull’s eye lit up with a demonic red light. So wrong!!!

To add to our entertainment of stop light fun we end up behind a Lance brand snack food truck. I love Lance.

 Their cheese crackers, Gold n Cheese is my favorite treat, I had a small snack bag almost every day for lunch in High School along with a Big Red. To my shock I read boldly printed beside a photo of a man’s butt in a pair of jeans “I got Lance in my pants!” 

Well of course you do sunshine!!!  Really??? I can just imagine he has a Lance in his pants or, at least he believes he does and I really do not want to find out. Was this a good idea? Do I really want to eat a snack that I am now imagining has been hanging out in the back pocket of some sweaty guy? It is 99 degrees outside and I am sure he has not been sitting down or it would have crushed the crackers so that means he is upright doing some sort of manual labor getting sweaty. NO I do not want to eat them now!!! Lance!!!!! My company could have helped you with this!! It is what we do.

All this chatter of lances has got Lady Tamara thinking of jousting so now she is going to go watch the movie A Knight’s Tale. She loves Chaucer’s Character.

Cheers!

Night Ship

Has anyone else watched Mary Poppins their whole life and enjoyed it with childish carefree abandon?

  The Merry go round scenes are my favorite. 

Have you ever really listened to the lyrics of the Sister Suffragette song? I just listened, really listened to them. They are delightful!

We're clearly soldiers in petticoats

And dauntless crusaders for woman's votes

Though we adore men individually

We agree that as a group they're rather stupid!

I would like to play the part of Mrs.Banks in a Mary Poppins Performance. Or maybe Cook.

My bedroom is decorated as though a 19^th century Pirate may live in it. I like it that way. Warms golds, browns, greens, reds and deep rich coppery orange all meshed together to create an atmosphere of having sailed the seven seas and brought back exotic treasures, Bits of India, Thailand, the Caribbean, Spain, Mexico, Turkey, Russia and Scotland. I hung a painting on the wall above my bed titled Night Ship by Montague Dawson.

 He was a British painter. I love this painting and wish I possessed the original. But it hangs there in all its blue glory not blending with a thing in my room. It is the first time it has been hung in here. I am going to start switching out my decorative pillows and the curtains and bring in some various shades of blue. I have done my bath area in blues. The jewel tones of a peacock. The bedroom is a bigger project but I started with a red table which is now a lovely Caribbean turquoise that I aged by roughly rubbing off the paint as it started to dry. It has moved the blues from the painting a bit and I like it. My daughter Lovey has decided I need to modernize and is going to buy me a new bed that brings me into the next century. Apparently she does not like my pirate treasure theme. Bring it on little girl!! I can design a room around anything!

My devotional study this morning asks why people limit their joy. They attempt to choose how and when and where and in what quantity they shall experience joy. I cannot wrap my head around this. Why? Why limit joy? I want, nay need!!!! Great gulps of joy. I want to wear it like a cloak that covers me from head to toe. I want to see others enveloped in joy. I find joy in watching the sugar cube dissolve in my cup of tea even while I am in the midst of battle. I am odd?

Speaking of tea….Lady Tamara www.highlandtitles.com must refill her cup.

Have a blessed day!

Laundry DNA

There is a certain amount of entertainment to be had at an airport. I love it. I always have. What better place to view and enjoy people without actually having to interact with them if you choose not to. 

It does require joy, imagination and humor. Shaggy and I spent a lovely 35 minutes awaiting the arrival of her Grandmother. We decided on a theme. If we were to throw a party that night who would we invite? We ended up with a guest list of about 35 people. We sized them up. We watched their facial expressions, their attitude, and had a great deal of fun. We found Medea’s younger sister. We found extreme sports Oakley model, corporate climbing she-male, been there done that sales guy. There was surfer boy and Grandpa in his starched over-hauls. There was Miss Hondo 1978, Fraternity boy 2009, Indiana Jones, and many others. Shaggy even picked a few because they were cute. We heard them announce that flight 209 with smelly boys was on time. We heard a woman chat about how she was in Memphis. We warned people about; laugh now because once they stepped outside the airport the laughter would stop until they left. We giggled at the woman who wondered if the wall mural of Shamu was painted to scale. We kept our voices low so as not to hurt any who might be listening. However some people who were standing near were giggling at our descriptions.

Sunday was the first time in three weeks I was able to ghost hunt. I had missed it. I went back and reviewed my Barbor ghosts. They were all very involved with Masonry, Sons of Patriots, and Daughters of the Revolution, Daughters of the Confederacy, Church and politics. 

What interests me also are naming patterns. Who was named what and why? Alexander Holford, I have yet to find a Holford in the mix. There were Holfords in Moss Side in Manchester but none that married in. Why choose Holford? It is a mystery that has me entangled.

I did a photo shoot of a dance clinic for local high schools and was able to watch some famous dancers strut. There was Kelly from High School Musical at Disney, Marco the Hip-Hop dance king, Roy from some Broadway dance numbers. Hours went by like minutes. When I was attending these dance clinics in High School we had lead dancers from the Kilgore Rangerettes and the like. Marco travels and teaches dance clinics all over America. Is that even a job? I wish I had known those careers existed.

My home is still looking and smelling like a Chinese Laundry. It has been a week. Is maintenance man coming or not? I am washing sheets today. whooot!!!!! Oh speaking of Chinese Laundry… I discovered that my great grand uncle owned Majestic Steam Laundry and that a Chinese Woman lived right next door to him who listed her occupation in a census as Laundress. It must be in my DNA.

Lady Tamara www.LairdOfLochaber.com   is off to do her laundry now. What are you washing today?

Mantoys new adventure

I was sleeping and in the middle of a dream, there is a crashing sound which of course my mind weaves into the story line. But the sound is persistent and does not have a dream quality. It continues and as I awake it is louder and more determined, angry, serious.  I lay there and listen; someone is knocking at my door. I am still adjusting to the sounds of my new home. I get up; softly but quickly walk to the kitchen to check the time, 12:42 am.

 The rapping at my door continues.  I smile to myself and feel as though I have stepped into Poe’s Poem.  I peer through the blinds without moving them and what I see is a man dressed in dark clothing and the light of my porch reflecting off of the shiny darkness of a holstered gun. I move toward Shag’s door in case she has been awakened and comes out asking me loudly about what is happening. One more rap rap rap and then the tapping of shoes walking away.  I have only been living in my new home for 7 days. Who knows where I live except my children and the people who helped me move? Was he at the wrong door? Was he looking for me or Shaggy? Had something happened to one of my children? Brother? Mother?  Is it someone attempting to lure me into opening the door?

I have had no phone service since Monday of last week. My daughter forgot to bring her phone charger and was using mine. When her nanny packed up their things and they left she packed up my charger even though for 4 days I kept reminding her it was mine.  I thought she would be back in town after a few days to pick up her daughter and return it but that did not happen.  I went into pirate mode last night and used Mothers credit card to buy a new charger.  I checked the phone after the man left for messages. There were none that indicated anyone in my family were in immediate peril.  My mother was panicked she had not heard from me in days.  I do not have her number memorized and Shag does not have it in her phone and I was not about to call her at 1:30 am.

Just to add to my nightmare life. I called on Wednesday to set up internet and they cannot get to it until Tuesday of this week.  I have been unable to communicate with the outside world for over a week.  All of this inability to communicate has been traumatic. There are several emergency things happening behind the scenes of my major drama that are also spinning out of control and I can receive no information.

My internet has been activated and the first thing I see as log on is that my precious Mantoy has departed this adventure for a very different one. I knew this was happening.  I believed I would have been called. I never have my phone out at Mothers but that night I checked it every 20 minutes expecting a call. None came.  There are some thoughts I wanted to share with him, a few more postcards to create with him. When I did get to chat with Tav he asked me how my day was.  I said it was not good, that was not rue. Here is why….My day? My day… let me run it down for you up until that phone call.

# no word about Rohan

# vacuum cleaner died

# dryer dead

# bank account over drawn by $256

# I find out on facebook about Mantoy, it is not like we were just casual friends. 

So Tav my darling luv, when I said my day was not so good it was not just about my Mantoy. I am sad that it was time for him to go. I am also rejoicing that our, mine and yours, best friend and companion is no longer suffering, enduring constant battles in a war he did not win.  I am happy that he will not drop any more tears. That he will no longer be filled with doubt and fear.  Tav …… My day was a wonderful treasure because you did call me exactly when you were supposed to. I love love love you!

I put a brand new bag into my vacuum cleaner yesterday and …rumble rumble, whirrrrrr, shrrrrreeeeeeee, it did not do anything except smell like burning rubber. This is the second vacuum to die on me in 3 months. I believe the lesson is… do NOT clean your house.

I loaded the washer, it did its job, I loaded the dryer pushed the button and nothing. I flipped and re-flipped the circuit breaker, still nothing. Then I remembered one of the young men who moved me plugging it in and pop, flash, smoke at the outlet. I reported the failure to the office for maintenance. They did not arrive by 7 pm so now my apartment looks like a Chinese Laundry. I have many more loads to wash. I pray he shows up to fix it today.

Shaggy had a job interview at what the manager said was 2. I drove her over to the mall. It was not till 4. She also had one at 7 at another store. We leave and drive back over at 4. After that we move to the other location and inquire if it is possible to interview now. Interviews had been cancelled until next Tuesday. Glad we checked because I might have been a very angry woman had I had to drive over there at 7 for nothing again.

Now we laid him down to sleep

We prayed the Lord his soul to keep

If he should die before he wakes

We pray the Lord his soul to take

Lady Tamarahttp://www.lochaberhighlandestates.com/  would like to share a bottle of Jameson with all her friends and remember James.

No internet

Hello,
I am writing to tell you that I have been moving. I finally cleared out of my home on Wednesday and have been unpacking and rearranging and decorating and attempting to fit 2700 sq feet of stuff into 1135 sq. feet. It is NOT happening. I got rid of a lot before the move and now have five more huge boxes I need to take to Goodwill and I am still not unpacked.
I also have no internet connection yet. So.......
Lady Tamara http://www.lochaberhighlandestates.com/ has made an escape to the Beach and is relaxing. I will be back to writing letters later this week.

Elliot or RAW

I just found an email I had been sent from online pharmacy with the subject line that says… use your new penis as long as you like…

WHAT THE HELL???

I do not have one of those, nor do I want one. How did this slip through my heavily guarded castle doors? It should have gone to spam land not my inbox.

Mother lives on what she calls the Texas floor of her building. I suppose because it has a few Fiesta Posters that makes it so. Or maybe it is the Fiesta floor. My father bought a painting while we lived in France that he fell in love with. It is a corner of a city street done in oils. It is mostly dark with splashes of red and yellow and shutters in a bright green. It appears to have been painted from the view through a rain splashed window. Mother hung this painting in the hall leading to her door. She decided one day she wanted the painting in her home not in the hall so she had been looking for a Texas themed replacement. I had a painting done by a friend of hers hanging in my powder room of a live oak tree and bluebonnets. There is no room in my new home for this painting so I suggested giving it back to her. I brought it over last night and as I am walking down the hall with it and a little old lady stops me and says “I’ll buy it right now how much?” huh??? I stop and smile. She again says “I’ll buy it right now how much?” It is not for sale it belongs to my mother. She smiles and says as she totters off “If you change your mind….” 

Several more feet down the hall on my way to the elevator I come across a herd of about 9 people of assorted ages and they all just stop and stare; some stopping in mid-sentence and all at the same time causing me a small amount of distress. Is my shirt inside out, my pants on backwards, a bird nesting in my hair, a snake wrapped around my neck? I smile and give them a cheerful “Good Evening” and walk on. A few mumbled hi and hello but they still were staring. I round a corner and head straight for a mirror I must have applied my lipstick to my forehead, a bugger is dropping from my nose, something is amiss. No I look fine, normal, nothing freakishly out of place.

When I get to Mothers home she is sitting outside in the setting sun warming up because she is freezing. The temperature in her home is 84. She decides later as we are trying to find law and order on the TV that RAW wrestling is the open scenario for her show, that they are setting the stage for a murder in the locker room. 

NO Mother this is wrestling. She was actually arguing with me. As she went to her room in search of the schedule I flip the channel over to the real law and order. She notices the change when she comes back and asks if I have decided to watch something else. I giggle (silently in my head) as Elliot appears on screen and she is startled, but recovers quickly and says “that must have been one of those other detective shows.” Ok Mom.

I had read yesterday in a religious leader’s blog as he was trying his best to help his readers cope and understand the shootings in Aurora. He said people make choices to do evil. GOD abhors evil. It occurred to me later that morning as I was trying to wrap my head around his not so inspiring comments that he made GOD sound like he was unaware of what was about to happen and what did happen. GOD who created everything including the way a dog wags its tail upon our returning home that then causes us to smile and love the dog and then we pet the animal and scratch its ears which cause the animal to become fonder of us. This GOD was not unaware. This incident did not surprise him. He made GOD sound like Zeus who sits on Mount Olympus with no concern for the plight of men. I believe this religious leader has a different GOD than I do. I will not stop following his blog because sometimes he has some interesting insights.

That is all I will say about that.

I was in whole foods yesterday checking out with my assortment of exotic cheeses when a manager was announcing a phone call for produce. I had been listening to him all through the store paging and announcing.  He sounded like the caller at a race track. You know the voice that says Lucy Bell is coming up on the outside; Frankenbeen has dropped back behind Fluffybum who is in the lead, yeah that guy. I told him this and he laughed and said yes I try, sometimes it feels like I am calling a race. …and it’s produce on the inside, wine and beer right behind, here comes floral making her move in the turn……

Lady Tamara  www.HighlandTitles.com has more boxes to move downstairs. What are you moving?

Upgraded What?

I am sitting at my desk this morning working early because I have many adventures scheduled for today and I keep hearing noises downstairs. After the first mild crash I assume it is the cats. Not sure what they are into but everything is packed so it must be mischief with a ball or faux mouse. Then another crash and a thump and I am intrigued are they Unpacking, is there a Burglar, are they rummaging through the trash, cleaning up the kitchen and then I hear the crinkling, crackling of a plastic bag.  Scarlet believes plastic bags are for peeing on so I go rushing down the stairs. She jumps as far from the bag as she can and stares me down with eyes that are now larger than her face. Sure enough there is a bag lying on the floor of the living room with a knot tying it together. I am puzzled. I pick it up and untie it expecting a snake or rat or terrifying creature of some sort to lunge at me. In the bottom of the bag is a gallon Ziploc baggie with dog food in it. I keep a little dog food on hand for when Lovey comes by and brings Isis my four legged granddaughter for a visit. I keep it up on a high shelf in the laundry room. Scarlet will eat Isis food while she is here. I assume out of some sort of anti-dog vengeance thing. I free feed my cats so she has food all the time. But today she went in and up after Isis food. It is now on the top shelf of the pantry. What on Earth prompted her today to do this? Hmmmmm…..

The apartment I am scheduled to move into called me Friday afternoon to tell me I could not move in on Saturday.( I had not planned to move in on Saturday) There was an unexpected issue that came up with the apartment. They scheduled me for July 28 (unknown to me until yesterday).  She said I could look at the apartment on Tuesday. I agreed to the afternoon. My daughter was coming with me and as I was talking to my Mother she decided to come along as well. I had been trying to call them all day and there was no answer. Mother and I decided to go on over and drove in to town and picked up Shoey. We arrive at the complex and there is a sign posted on the door be back at 3. We go entertain ourselves for a while and come back. April, we shall call her April says they have not yet cleaned the carpet. Come back in an hour. Not believing this for a minute we leave on another unscheduled adventure and return. As if they will have cleaned over 1300 sq.ft. in less than an hour and have it ready for me to view. Well I must say I was not disappointed. I was supposed to be moving into an upgraded apartment. I am convinced the upgrade happened in 1987. Here is what we saw. Foundation had shifted. Carpets were stained and worn and no amount of cleaning could rescue them. They were old, very old. The sinks were chipped and repaired. Light fixtures were missing. Bare wires were exposed and she told me they had no intention of repairing them. It was to have all black appliances (part of the upgrade I was paying for) and the dish washer was white. The walls I was told had been painted.  (When in 1992?) The floor boards in the kitchen had been replaced with 2x4s that appeared only days old and were unpainted. It was a mess. The entire place reeked of wet dog, rotting wood, mildew and who knows what else. Smells that will never go away. It needs new carpet or floors. Shoey says No Mom! Mother Says NO also. So….. today starts apartment hunting for Lady Tamara www.LochaberHighlandEstates.com  take 2. With 12 days to find one. If the apartment was not ready and they had no intention of making it ready why let me look at it? Why tell me it was upgraded? She then said they were upgrading with new Glamour light fixtures. Not scheduled for my apartment though.

To top it all off while I was relaxing with Christian Bale as Batman Scarlet does the predator crouch and crawls across the living room her gaze locked on the wall beneath a window. That, I knew,  could mean only one thing. Spider. I jump up and sure enough a wolf spider the size of a tarantula is making its way toward a cluster of big black trash bags filled with most of the 38 pillows of assorted sizes I own. That are staged and ready to move. I ran for the spray and we had an epic battle. I sprayed it ran. I sprayed some more it ran some more. Then he hesitated and I sprayed and slammed the can of bug killer down over him and let him stew in the poisonous juice. 

I know I am a Pirate Warrior Gypsy but I am going to confess right her and now. I am ..... never mind!

Need a beach fix....

Shall we go??