It’s Friday!

Posted on March 17, 2023 by E.A. Wickham

Olive blocked me from packing on my way out of town.

Whenever I get my suitcase out, Olive jumps in. She does’t like it when I’m gone. Usually it means she gets boarded. When we left for a week at Christmas, we took her to a new boarding place. The one she had been to before and was kind of used to went out of business. The last place was brand new and had three-story cat condos with holes to climb through to the different levels. The top floor had a TV.

Olive freaked out. I got calls that she wasn’t eating, drinking water which meant her other bodily functions weren’t happening.

Eventually they moved her into a storage closet, away from the other cats. That settled her down.

In Olive’s mind, when the suitcase comes out, something bad will happen.

Olive wasn’t taking any chances. She slept in the suitcase for hours.

Today I’m headed home to my husband and Olive. Thank you for helping me through my week!

What are your plans for this weekend?

What makes you happy 2.0

Posted on June 10, 2022 by E.A. Wickham

Puerto Penasco sunset — Sunset in Mexico in the Gulf of California.

A year ago today I wrote a blog post “What Makes You Happy.” You can read it HERE. You’ll notice a link to one of our favorite bloggers, LA.

In last year’s post, I included a list of things that made me happy. I thought I’d take a look and see if I can add to it this year. This is what I wrote last year.

This morning I was writing my daily morning pages and I wrote a long list of things that make me happy. I woke up feeling a little down, so my brilliant idea was to focus on what brings me joy and incorporate the things on my list in my daily life — or at least weekly. I had quite a list.
A few of the items were:
A trip to the ocean
A good night’s sleep
Working on a project I’m proud of
Spending time with family and friends
Swimming in the nearby lake
Swimming laps at the city pool
Reading a good book
Catching up with friends via the phone
Hiking

What can I add to the list? Here’s What Makes Me Happy 2.0:

Visits from my kids

Inviting friends over for dinner

Cooking

The Desert Botanical Garden

Musical Instrument Museum

Going to Costco with my husband and stocking up

Watching baby quail

Morning walks

Sunsets and sunrises

Reading blogs from my blogging community

Watching Olive the cat play

What makes you happy?

Do you find time to incorporate these treats into your weekly lives?

Olive playing with her catnip mouse.

Working on the Guest Room as the Guests Arrive: A Horror Story of a Small Remodel Job

Posted on March 12, 2015 by E.A. Wickham

A finished guest room I had envisioned.

We started a remodel over a month ago. We told the contractor that we needed the guest room done, finished, completed no later than March 10th.

WELL. It’s March 12th and it’s not done. The guests arrive for spring break mañana.

Not that I’m stressing or anything. YIKES!!!!

The room today with guests on their way.

It was a simple job really, too small I guess for a contractor to take seriously — sprucing up one room with attached bath. They said, “no problem.” They started off with gusto, a handful of workers spending from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. working away.

I believed that the work would be done. I was excited and happy.

Then there was no one showing up. For days on end.

What’s with that? I have guests arriving tomorrow, and we’ve seen neither “hide nor hair” of workers — except for two separate, brief occasions.

One was to paint the gorgeous wood beams, which my husband (who has absolutely no taste whatsoever — except for his taste in women) had determined needed to be a deep chocolate brown rather than left alone in their natural beautiful state.

He didn’t take into account that the French doors and ceiling fans were a natural color — and they all matched perfectly!

The beams in natural glory.

The other occasion we’ve seen a worker was when one came back to undo the chocolate brown and try to return the natural wood to a close resemblance of it’s former self.