My neighbor's golden retriever was killed boy coyotes a few days ago. She called to warn me, although i never let my cat outdoors. The dog was with her German shepherd. She let them out, as customary, at 6:15 am, before going to work. The shepherd came back alone, very agitated and the hair standing up on its back. she went looking for the dog with the other one, and they found it not 15 feet from the house.

She called the police, the state DEP and no one really wanted to do anything about it. (It's illegal to discharge a firearm anywhere in the borough, which is the center and most densely populated part of my town.)

My neighbor also has 2 cats. One wetn missing quite some time ago and was never found. We all know coyotes are in the area and i have heard them barking at night. Unbelievably, she didn't sound sound like they were going to start keeping the other cat inside. Her husband, she said, felt it was "cruel" to do so. Not as cruel as allowing your pet to be mauled to death!!! Geez. I just don't get it.

So tonight around dusk i heard a single shotgun blast. I'm sure it was my neighbor's husband, taking matters into his own hands. It would've been easy enough to throw a piece of meat out in a certain spot and then wait for them to show up and kaboom.

I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. On the one hand, i'd be super upset, as she was, if something like happened to a pet of mine. On the other hand, they choose to live in a heavily wooded interior lot. Can you reasonably expect to shoot and kill every wild creature. I don't know. Maybe they'd do better in a condo. Of course, that's how my sister views things. When a woodchuck threatens her garden, she gets her shotgun. My sister can be inhuman at times.

My garden may also be destroyed by a woodchuck here. So far, nothing's happened, but the fencing is flimsy, to say the least. I'm in the prcess of reinforcing it and since my mother trimmed my hair yesterday, i kept the clippings, cut up an onion mesh bag and tied up 5 small satchets of human hair en onion bag. I hope essence of me will keep them at bay, tho no use putting it out yet as tomorrow they're calling for rain.

I cherish my time off and this weekend was great. Worked myself ragged, i must say. I still have Lyme, and since headaches are still with me on and off every other day, or every day as the case may be, doc gave me an additional 10 days of antibiotics on top of the 3 weeks i've already completed.

I'm getting concerned that this is still lingering. It's not a great thing to be on antibiotics long-term. Now i've had to start dosing myself with acidopholus and cranberry juice to avoid getting a UTI, something my doc (of course) forgot to tell me and something i suddenly remembered just when i thought i was getting one.

Had my mom over for lunch yesterday. She brought a yummy chicken salad and BROWNIES. I contributed a green salad and a garden in bloom, which she thoroughly enjoyed. My baby bluebirds have hatched inside the box. You can hear them go nuts when one of the parents brings them a nice juicy grub, a cup of which i conveniently put on top of the nestbox (with velcro) after a bike trip to the bait and tackle shop. My mother had kept complaining that never in her life had she seen a bluebird. Well, i kept looking for them all afternoon while she was here. Finally, from my upstairs office window she sat there and with the binoculars i kept saying look there! No, look there! On the birch tree. Look, in the pine. Finally, she saw them, oohs and ahs all the way around.

I'm still planning a trip to the Asian botanical gardens soon.

Our summer hours at work start tomorrow, so that means i get up a 1/2 hour earlier each day, cut my lunch hour in half and in return i'll get every other Friday off through end of August. It's so worth it. Even on those Fridays i do work, i'm told i can cut out around 2 or 3 as long as no one needs a writer....

speaking of writing, did a bit of freelance today. I was glad to finally do it as i'd been procastinating. I'm not officially doing any more freelance, but this was a brochure i'd written last year, there were delays in the condo project and now it's on and they needed some adjustments in the copy.

I partially fenced in my strawberry patch, which is now in bloom. I don't think it will stop either birds or chipmunks, of which i have plenty, but perhaps the woodchuck, since there's so much else to eat around here (anything green is on his palate) so why work for your supper if you don't have to?

My tiny veggie garden is bursting with little growing things. Peas are furthest ahead thus far, but haven't yet bloomed. Also in there are garlic, peppers, tomatoes, beans, zucchini, cukes and i think that's it.

I completed some fencing reinforcements on just 1 of the 4 sides of the already fenced garden. It's a wire mesh fence, 3 feet high but one foot is buried and the bottom 6 inches are turned in an L shape outward, to deter digging woodchucks. I hear they like peas and beans. It's an awful lot of work to not just dig 6 inches down, but then 6 inches outward. But i can't imagine losing it all, in a single night, after all the work i've put into it. Anyone who's dealt with a woodchuck knows what i'm talking about.

My friend R. has prostate cancer at 60. He had abunch of tests last week and will learn probably tomorrow if it has spread. Not good. He is being very stoic about it and outwardly calm but it has to be nerve-wracking. He is a somewhat fatalistic person, partly becus he's going thru a divorce now and is very unhappy about it.

I calculate that at about $125 a month, i will be spending (based on today's prices, which obviously won't remain at this level) nearly $1500 a year on gas, and that's strictly for commuting.

I have looked into:
* Trains: no train station in my town and a 15-minute ride makes this somewhat inconvenient, plus i hear there's a 1-year wait list for parking at the station. Obviously, our infrastructure is lacking, always had.

* Metropool and nuride.com: matches you up with fellow carpoolers, but those i called either were already taking the train or were no longer working at former job. The chances of finding somehwat with the same hours as me and who lives near enough that i don't have to go way out of my way to share a ride are like looking for a needle in a haystack

* New car? Doesn't make sense; i only have 90,000 miles on my current 9-year old honda; with my roof rack, i'm guessing i get about 32 mpg, not fantastic, but paing $21K for a new Prius wouldn't make sense. (I hear that by 2010, 2 years from now, 3 car makers will have plug-in hybrids that get 100 mpg. You can go about 40 miles on a charge, and then if you have to further, the gas kicks in but even then it's not costing you much becus the gas is used to recharge the battery.) THIS is what i'm holding out for.

* Vespa scooter. These were tempting; they get 70 mmpg but 1) you can only use them part of the year 2) not good in rain 3)i'd have helmet hair and 4) they're dangerous with crazy drivers out there

* the only other option left is to once again ask my boss to work at home1-2 days a week at my 6 month review in july. He said no when i interviewed for the job. But times have changed. Though his commute is even longer than mine, so perhaps he has no sympathy. I ran the idea by someone else in my group who greatly doubted he would go for it, which annoyed me to hear him say that, but i'm not sure if it's his natural pessism or if he's speaking from experience.

Oh, yes, the yardwork. I never, ever realized how INVASIVE forsythia can be. It's on the west side of my house and branching out into a narrow grass walkway and needed to be cut back. It had spread from a huge area of it and i realized it had all but killed a nice mountain laurel by covering it with arching branches. I cut and hacked and cut and hacked, hauling wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow (at least 6 trips) of clippings to behind the toolshed. My god, the work. But it looks so much better. I dug up maybe 5 rooted clumps but there wes 1 i was afraid to go after cus it was too close to the mountain laurel. The mountain laurel has maybe 6 sets of green leaves on it. With the added sunlight, i hope it will sprout more and return to the land of the living.

Last week I learned i do indeed have Lyme disease. Not too surprising, given all the outdoor work i've been doing. So i'm entering the 2nd of my 3-week antibiotic regimen. The only symptom i have had is pretty much constant headaches that never really go away. Once i started the meds, they went away, but now they're back, so i think this thing is still very much in my system.

I just feel discouraged as i am very much aware of the high risk of Lyme in my area. When doing yardwork, i tuck my pants into my nearly knee-high boots and when i'm doing lots of heavy duty yardwork, i also spray the boots with Deet (Off). I also put my hair back in a pony tail and when i've done for the day, soak in the tub. And still, i got Lyme.

Been here 13 years and this is the first time for Lyme, 2nd time for a tick-borne disease. (I had erlichiosis 2 years ago.)

I never saw a tick on me or the rash....

Today was a quiet Mother's Day. Had my sister and mother over my place for lunch. Pasta shells with celery, green pepper and sun dried tomatoes with olive oil and a little mayo. Sis brought a salad fresh from her garden. I also made DELICIOUS cheddar Bisquick bisquits.

I was going to take my mom over to the farm ice cream stand but it was just a little cool for that.

Didn't get quite as much done this weekend as i normally would, and even today i came in the house around 6 pm, which is so unlike me. Usually i spend every spare minute outdoors, but i just don't feel energetic. Saturday i did a fair amount, a dump run with some rusty old barbed wire i cut from the property line between me and my neighbor. It's been there for year's, my neighbor's, and i just decided to cut up what i could see and bring it to the "Metal" section at the dump. Also brought another pile of sticks and branches with the usual trash.

Filled up the gas tank at about $3.89 and bought $85 worth of Stop N Shop groceries, a lot for me, but i stocked up on Lean Cuisines, which are half price this week and very convenient for my workday lunches. Also got 3 loaves of Pepperidge Farm German dark wheat bread, also 1/3 off.

My sister gave me some pepper, broccoli and lettuce seedlings, so i planted all those after they left this afternoon.

I spotted a woodchuck in my backyard this weekend, which was very upsetting becus i had believed them to be gone this year and they are terribly destructive, more so than deer. They willl decimate an entire garden in an evening. My small 6 x 6 veggie garden is fenced, but with the flimsy netting and posts that i think will deter deer, but i am sure the woodchuck could dig under it. My only hope is that there is so much ELSE to eat in my yard that he won't be particularly attracted to the garden, but i really don't know. I've put so much work and hope into it already. I'm considering digging a trench around the entire garden and laying plastic fencing vertically, then horizontally, so that he cannot dig under. But that's a lot of work.

Did a focus group one night last week. Went there right after work; it made for a long evening, but it was $100 cash so i felt it was worth it.

I have some freelance work to do, meant to do it this weekend but once i got into the document i realized i needed more info from the client, so will have to wait for a response back before i can begin. Doing it on a weekend is vastly more preferable to me than being tired and forced to work on it after my regular job.

Still waiting to get a price from the contractor about enclosing my screened porch with windows. His daughter was graduating from college last week. I should hear this week.

The yard is beauitful. My neighbor complimented me on it. He even shut off his rider mower to walk over and tell me as i worked in the side yard. He's the guy who loos like Norman Rockwell, tall, thin and usually with a pipe in his mouth.

The dogwoods are in bloom. I have about 4 white ones and only 1 pink one left. The azaelas, fuscia and salmon colored, are in bloom while the big white ones in back are about ready to burst open.

In the coming weeks i'll see the rhododendrons and mountain laurel.

Bluebirds still seem to be occupying the next box. If you keep from walking in the front yard and perhaps just sit on the front stoop, you can see the male hang out, first on the lower branch of the birch, then on the metal pole/support for the clematis, and at times on top of the box itself.

the hummingbird has also returned for the season and has already settled into the routine of sugar water visits about every 10 minutes or so. Also saw a rose-breasted grosbeak at the feeder, so it's certainly worth it to continue feeding them in the summer. You never know what you'll see. One year, it was a blue indigo bunting, even more spectacular than a bluebird, IMO.

As far as i know, i haven't gotten my IRS refund yet. My sister said the IRS site will indicate what week checks are mailing for certain SS numbers, so i will have to check that out.

The personal challenge i have set myself is to make only ONE car trip per weekend. Yes, I can consolidate errandsd as much as i want, but ONLY ONE trip. So that trip was Saturday, and it was on the way back from grocery shopping that i realized i'd meant to stop at the bait shop for meal worms for the bluebirds, but with frozen Lean Cuisines in the car, i was reluctant to stop, so i didn't.

After unloading the groceries at home, i decided what the heck, let's be adventurous, and i got my unused bike from the basement, filled the tires with air and pedaled down to the bait shop, about a 15 minute pedal each way. Not bad at all and i was feeling very satisfied that i saved the gas. Even surprised that the back tire held, cus there was a patch that looked scraped up and i should really replace it when i can.

Yesterday i was less productive than usual. I started off well, leaving the house by 8:15 am to hit Home Depot to return a clothesline (got a different one), then to Lowes to return a $7 hose nozzle (got a different one for .67) and then to Borders to pick up a DVD for someone i work with who couldn't find this movie near where he lives. Oh, and then dropped about $45 on groceries at Xpect Discounts. I got a box of 7 grain kashi grains for $2.48. When i got home, i realized i already had a box and since this store has price stickers on everything, i saw that the older box cost just $1.98.

I also noticed that at the same store, which is still dirt cheap compared to mainstream supermarkets, the pasta, which i got for ages at .69 a pound, is now selling for .99 a pound.

Prego pasta sauce is still a bargain there for $1.50 a jar.

Yesterday i made a 3 bean salad with canned beans (yellow, green, kidney and chickpeas), plus a chopped up fresh red pepper, plus some vinegar and sugar. Pretty good.

Mostly eating non-meat meals these days. Can't imagine what my food bill would be if i were buying red meat.

I had a hankering for peanut butter yesterday as well, so i made a peanut butter/sesame oil sauce over rice noodles. Umm, think i need to thin out the peanut butter more with water or something, cus it didn't spread as well as i'd like on hot pasta and it was quite filling. In fact, i skipped dinner after having that at around 3 pm The rice noodles became sort of a congealed glob after cooling so i hope i can still eat the leftovers.

I'm frustrated by 3 or 4 projects around here that aren't seeing much progress. One is a broken toilet. The water leaking noise seemed to be caused by the rubber flapper that fits over the drain; the old flapper rubber was basically disintegrating, so i thought for sure that was it. The 1st new flapper i got did not appear to stop the leaking noise so i got another one which requires you to completely drain and dry the tank so you can put an adhesive seal on the drain opening before putting on the new flapper cover, but when i was sopping up the last of the water, i could see water movement around the base of the other toilet valve where the water comes in. The water kept slowly seeping back in so i couldn't install the flapper. Maybe i need to replace that other part as well. I'm wondering if this has reached the point of being beyond my comprehension but i hate the thought of having to spend $100+ for a plumber and what will surely be a 10-minute fix.

Last night NASCAR racing had ursurped Cops on TV, so i spent a few hours of my saturday night stripping wallpaper in the bathroom.

I had a contractor over here last week to price a big job, though i have a fair amount of hesitation about proceeding with it. I wanted to know how much it'd cost to enclose my screened porch, which i enjoy so much. By replacing the floor to ceiling screen with a low (2 foot) wall and the rest of it vinyl windows with screens, i could likely extend the time i spend out there, instead of May through September, probably April through October.

So the cost would be putting in 4 very large vinyl windows, the kind you slide open from side to side, plus a 5th window on another wall that looks into my bathroom. It's the only non double-pane window left in the house, the original window from 1930; i'd like to replace it with a double hung with frosted glass so if someone's in the bathroom, you have privacy but without giving up the light that comes in from the porch.

It's a project i could afford to do, but i guess with the general state of the economy, i feel generally uncertain and anxious about expenses. Maybe partly becus it's just my single income. I've always operated on a pay as you go basis. In other words, i never borrow money, just defer a purchase until i save up for it. (I would just take the $ out of savings.) The downside of that, of course, is you may not get to enjoy something you've wanted. I figure if i stay in this house another 5 years, which i think there's a good chance will happen, it would be nice to enclose the porch now so i could enjoy it for that time, and of course, get some of that $$ back if and when i sold the house.

I don't plan to put heat in the porch, though once it's enclosed it would be easy to do and call it a sunroom. But to do that i'd probably have to let the town know i'm doing that, and then i'd pay higher taxes, so i'm happy to just enclose the porch. I havent' gotten an estimate from the guy yet.

My other concern about doing this job is that right now, when you're on the porch, you really feel like you're outside, probably becus the screen goes floor to ceiling. If i enclose it, i don't want it to feel like a room and i don't want to lose that outdoor feeling.

My friend and neighbor H. has a sunroom that this same builder did, so i'm going over there in a little while to really closely examine his workmanship. I've been in the room before; it's perfectly nice, but it does feel like a room, so i want to check the size of her windows for comparison.

I've been a little upset with my PCP. I had a physical a week ago and i suggested that maybe since they were taking my blood they should check for Lyme Disease, since i've been doing a ton of yardwordk, Lyme is rampant in my state and i'd been having nearly daily headaches. He agreed i should. He said he wouldn't call me prior to my followup appt. unless i tested positive, as of course we wouldn't want to delay treatment. So Friday when i got home from work at 6:15 pm, there was a message from the doctor at 6 pm saying i'm calling about your bloodwork results. Call the office on Monday.

I'm assuming my test results were positive. So why the heck didn't he give me a way to connect with him so i could get a prescription? I could have gotten started 2 days earlier, and apparently becus he didn't want to be bothered on a weekend, he didn't think it important enough. That's really something. I'll need to confirm that's the case, but if it is, i'm just about ready to stop seeing this guy after about 15 years. He's inconvenient anyway, with no weeknight or weekend hours and ALWAYS a 30 to 40-minute wait when you arrive. I'm really upset about the Lyme though. It seems irresponsible to me for a physician to let that go.