CapTel

This week, I finally finished my evaluation for assisted technology. It was recommended that DORS purchase a CapTel phone for my use. For those of you who don't know anything about CapTel, it is a phone that provides captions for phone calls. My hearing is getting dramatically worse and that was one of a few recommendations that they made to make my life a little easier. I look forward to finding out if I qualify. If I don't, I can still qualify for a free phone through a program set up for progressive hearing loss patients.

Boooooooooomer!

Just when I had given up on seeing Boomer on his back listening to music, I came into the bedroom today to find his using my pjs as a bed and listening to music that Ty cat obviously turned on for him. These cats are so spoiled.

Go To Sleep, Little Ty

The sleeping kitten is our third cat, Ty. Ty has mastered turning my alarm clock on... well turning the Nature Sounds mode on. He turns the sounds on, goes onto the bed, flips onto his back, and THEN... Sleeps. The green plaid things are Stephen's Sleep Pants. The purple is my nightgown.

OMG! ANTS!

Saw our mailperson come towards our door today. When J. went out to greet her, she stated J. HAD to come see our mailbox. We had hundreds of ants all over the box. And the mail-lady stated, in the last stops, EIGHT of us had these ants (out of 12). J. immediately came in and got me. The photos don't show it clearly, but we had ants, ant eggs, ant feces, and the like all over the box. J. immediate grabbed the hose and WHOOOSH. Goodbye floating ants.

And That's Something To Think About!

Jane and I were on the Light Rail from Glen Burnie to Baltimore today. I had a job that took me into town. I always like going into Baltimore because it usually means getting a chance to walk through Inner Harbor. Today was no different. The only change from the norm was that I encountered a couple of things that were different from the norm.

When we got down to Light Street, there was a group of protesters. They were protesting unfair wages and benefits from a local construction company. They were protesting in front of a 10 ft. tall inflatable skunk. Now, with this interesting visual, you would think they could come up with a witty sign for the skunk like, "Doesn't that stink?" No such luck. They seemed to think that placing a picket sign in his hands that said "Fair pay for a fair day of work." What a waste of a giant inflatable skunk! Then again, where do you get a giant inflatable skunk? I cannot imagine he was easy to find.



The next thing that was odd was that we ran into a second protest less than 50 ft. away. This time they were women with peace stickers. Jane took one of their stickers. I did not. Because of this, I was labeled as a "Sellout to the man". Ummm... I didn't want a sticker. Didn't say that peace isn't a good thing. When is attacking someone who doesn't want a sticker and accusing them of being a sellout "peaceful"? So, my thought in connection with this is... if you are promoting yourself as being peace loving, isn't it kinda hateful and not peaceful to attack those who do not accept your stickers?

Third... I want to state that I think everyone should go to see How to Train Your Dragon. It is a really cute movie.

My goal for the next couple days is to get out with a camera and get some new photos. I've been busy with work and going to the gym. I promise I will be better about posting new things.

Aftermath - Saturday

As of this morning at 11:54 am, this is what the house still looks like. You can see that the driveway is pretty clean (as is Jane's black car - whereas mine is still snow covered). No path has been attempted to try and get to the front door. This is because the snow is as hard as concrete and no one uses their front door in West Laurel anyway. So, 4 to 5 ft. snow wall surrounds the driveway on all sides.
This is the mailbox. The postman is actually pleased with this solution because at least he can get up to the box.
This is really a photo just for my mom. She asked how road clearing was going. This, mom, is snowcrete. It is an icy, hard, frozen mass that snow plows don't/won't scoop. It is going to be there until it melts because we won't be seeing any more snow plows (that is until the next storm on Tuesday or the proposed biggie next weekend).
This is the shot down the other way from our driveway. As you can see, there is barely a one car width path plowed to get a car through. And heaven help you if you get out of that path. You can't see anything coming at intersections. It is probably best not to be on the roads still. However, so far, we have managed to need to go out three times in the last two days and I have "an appointment" tomorrow at 11 - so we'll go out again.
This is a close up shot of the neighbor's house to our right. This is a rather large icicle that starts at their roof, goes down, at some point bent towards the fence about 4 to 6 inches from the original icicle, is running frozen down the front of the fence AND straight down from the original icicle. I love this!!!
Here is a better "far away" shot of the icicle. Try to ignore the white blotch in the middle of the photo. The camera is getting foggy at this point and I was ready to come in.

And, last but not least, a sad note. The Laurel "unofficial" Christmas Tree had major damage. The official post says that the tree lost 2/3rds of its branches. Regardless of its fate, it is a treasured Laurel icon and its previous grand dame status will be missed.

The Clean Up

Big O' Snow Ball. Stephen found this chunk in front of his car. He went to shovel and couldn't lift the shovel. This is what was stopping him. Snowcrete!