Looking for Inspiration

November 3

...and I was doing so well. I did not miss a day in October.

November 4

I have this candle holder in front of the house and I almost never light any candles in it. Since it is getting dark so early, I have to try harder to do it. It is pretty cool looking.

November 5

I did not understand this sign at the gas station. '3 for $5' and below it 'One or two at regular price' I didn't spend much time sweating over it, though, since I don't drink Red Bull.

November 6

Ethel finally came out of Erin's room and started exploring the house. She is turning into a real love. Once I get her, she cuddles and forces me to pet her by shoving her head under my hand. She and Lucy are exploring each other. So far, there have been no fights and no hissing matches. They do chase each other, but so far no cat cuddles.

November 7

She was watching Lucy from under the dining room table.

November 8

This was a total accident. I was holding the camera in one hand and trying to rearrange something with the other, but somehow hit the shutter button. I love how this turned out. I was standing next to our bed and this view is into the bathroom. The frame has a photos of each of the golf courses we played on our 25th anniversary trip to San Francisco and Half Moon Bay in 2004.

November 9

The people I support do a lot of traveling and sometimes they bring me presents. These came from Taiwan or China, I don't remember, but they are ferocious looking creatures.

79% Complete

October 27

Lucy loves the shower. It is embarrassing how dirty the shower floor is. We have a seat in the corner of the shower and she will sit there while I take my shower. This morning she was very intrigued by the drain.

October 28

After Goofy died, we decided we needed a new cat to keep Lucy company. We went to the animal shelter and met this precious angel. Her name at the shelter was Marianne, to go with her litter mates Ginger, Professor and Gilligan. But since we had Lucy at home, we decided to call her Ethel. Amazingly enough, all five of us agreed on the name without any discussion.

October 29

The leaves are starting to fall off the trees in the front yard. I love all the different colors.

October 30

Jim was Bob's Big Boy for Halloween. He got rave reviews from all of his friends and fellow partiers at the bar.

October 31

We always give out chocolate. It is a must, because that is what I like best. What is the point of having candy that you don't like? There could be leftovers (and we always have leftovers!) and it would be silly to have candy we don't like.

November 1

We had so much fun at the Roxy watching Eric's band play. A lot of people from the neighborhood drove up on a Thursday after work to listen to The Jakes. The traffic at the end of the drive was horrid, but it was worth it to see Eric on stage doing a great job and having such a good time.

November 2

The nice thing about having two active Marine bases nearby was that we didn't get commercial aircraft flying over the house day and night. Ever since the bases closed, more and more flights are routed over our house. I was in the backyard taking this photo. I am very thankful that a new airport at the old El Toro base is not going to happen.

More Random Stuff

October 20

We spent the day with Ed, Pat and Kathy. Ed and Pat were nice enough to take us out on Lake Havasu for a couple of hours. When we stopped for lunch, Pat got out her popcorn and fed the ducks. She really loves doing that and she ends up getting a lot of visitors.

October 21

We woke up to howling winds. There were whitecaps on the lake and no one was going out. This is a palm tree outside of our hotel. We got out of town early hoping to beat the traffic home. We made great time even having to drive through some sand storms.

October 22

This is smoke from the Santiago Fire that started the night before at around 6pm. It turned out to be arson and ending up burning almost 30,000 acres. Several homes were destroyed and it took almost three weeks to contain. We got a lot of smoke and ash the first week of the fire, but our home was never in danger.

October 23

I love this desk. I am not sure how old it is, but we got it used when we got married, twenty-eight years ago. It is currently a dumping spot for things that don't have a home or are waiting to be returned to their home.

October 24

This is the sky when I arrived at work. The smoke and ash continued to fill the air. There were many who chose to stay home because the air quality was so bad. We ran our A/C for several days even though it wasn't hot. We couldn't open the windows because of all the junk in the air.

October 25

I love my black cat candle holder!

October 26

Finally, the air is clearing. It was so nice to see blue skies again after almost a week of smoke filled air.

The Home Stretch

I have just about three months left on this project and if it wasn't for our cats, I am not sure I would have gotten this far.

October 13

Dennis had hernia surgery again and he loves to show off his scar. The surgery was the day before this photo was taken. The tapes ended up creating sores along the edges of the scar. Since this was a repeat surgery, the doctor went in through the old scar and removed it. His new scar is much neater than the old one.

October 14

The marquee is being installed on the corner near our house. I hate the colors. The baby poop yellow and burnt orange don't fit the shopping center at all. I keep hoping that these are base coats, but I am posting this twenty-six days after I took the picture and the colors are still the same. I think they are permanent. Yuk!

October 15

Nothing too special about this. It is one of the small trees in the parking lot at work.

October 16

I stopped to pick up dinner on the way home and took this of the ground in the parking lot. Whatever.

October 17

I stole this idea from Marianne. This is the camera I use most often to take my photos for this project. It is compact enough to fit in my purse and it takes pretty nice pictures.

October 18

This night, I stopped at Babies R Us to buy a shower gift and saw this spilled mess next to my car.

October 19

We have two liquid amber trees in our front yard and the leaves are starting to turn color. This is our little bit of 'fall color' in Southern California. There is one stretch of Walnut where all the trees on the median are liquid amber and when they all turn, it is beautiful.