Author Archives: Pamela

The Berry Invasion Has Begun

Last Sunday I was all excited because I found a few berries and it looked like a few more would be getting ripe soon.

This weekend was another one where all the time got away from me and there I was doing my 30 minute gardener routine. I saw some berries out of the corner of my eye and I ran out there before dinner to see how many I could pick.

I quickly filled up my bowl and had to run back for the second container. That’s all from one week. There’s a ton more out there.

I need to start planning berry goodies.

Posted in garden | 2 Comments

Thoughtful People

So AARP was super nice to send me this. You know, in case I wanted to reinstate my membership which was purely because of a joke on my spouse. I’m not even 50 yet. And I’m not sure I’d join even then.

But, who wouldn’t want a free trunk organizer? My trunk is a disorganized mess. Just kidding. What is all this stuff that older people are keeping in their trunks? Right now mine has a bunch of spilled bark dust and a yoga mat.

Posted in doing it wrong | Comments Off on Thoughtful People

FAN APPRECIATION DAY!

Just got back from Fan Appreciation Day at Jeld-Wen Field home of the Portland Timbers. More photos to come. Here I am next to the players bench. The coach stands in front of the bench here. I said a bunch of bad words and kicked it in his honor.

Also, this is happening. I think I’ll do a lap around the block on the way home from work tomorrow and turnover the magic number. This is my second time turning 100K in my own car and I remember doing it once in a car with my family. I remember us driving around and all watching the odometer and shouting: 99997! 99998! 99999! Very sweet memory. I wish we could do it together tomorrow.

Posted in pamily, TIMBERS! | 1 Comment

Walking in Place

Kira these are the raspberries. I found a few ripe ones today.

Since the beginning of the year I keep thinking I have one more big project to finish and then I’ll have a weekend where I can take it easy and catch up on all these loose ends that are getting looser by the minute.

This weekend didn’t work out with extra time either.

If I owe you a phone call or note or said I’d do something for you — maybe next weekend. I have one more big project to finish.

I haven’t even had time to watch all my soccer. One game a day is all I’ve managed to cram in. And none of the games I’ve seen so far has blown my socks off. Who should we root for in England v. France tomorrow?

Every time there’s a once in a lifetime astronomy event, I never pay much attention because it’s cloudy here 385 days a year. There was that venus across the sun thing happening and it was not cloudy so I went and did the homework to see how I could go about viewing it. The instructions said to go some place where they’re projecting it and watch it there.

I’m thinking: watch it projected or wait until tomorrow and look at it on the Internet, what’s the difference?

I also tried just looking at the sun even though the directions said not to. It just looked bright and hurt my eyes.

I baked another loaf of total fail bread. The crust is like crumpled concrete. The inside is dense and tasteless. I can’t understand what I’m doing wrong. I need to get out all my bread notes and see if I can troubleshoot it. Baking bread used to be my super power.

I can hardly keep my eyes open so I’m going to bed.

Posted in baking disasters, doing it wrong, garden | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Graduation

Today Sinéad graduates from high school.

This is a me holding her when she was one day old. Wow.

I have a million notes here for stuff I want to write about but the EuroCup started today! Team Germany!

For some reason I thought the tournament started tomorrow so today was to be my day of amazing productivity. I was only productive until I realized that the Poland v Greece game was on. First impression: Poland has the cutest goal keepers. Other revelation: Michael Ballack is doing commentary for ESPN!

Already I love this tournament.

I’ve got thirty soccer games to watch this month on top of my usual Timbers duties plus the US Mens National Team has its first World Cup qualifier game tonight. I’m going to be busy.

Posted in pamily, TIMBERS! | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Point of No Return

I’ve had a gift card for new exercise clothes since my birthday. I tried to use it at least a half dozen times but always seemed to get interrupted before I was finished or else when I finally found the perfect item it was only available in XXS or neon green.

I like to go through the comments where people describe the fit. If there are lots of comments that the clothes run small or that an item looks cute but is uncomfortable on, this is helpful information but it’s time consuming.

I finally sat down with all my notes and figured out what I wanted and placed my order. And then when it arrived the pants were too tight. I think they might have been doable but I don’t like skin tight pants and would never have wanted to wear them so I decided to do a return.

The invoice that came with the order exclaimed how easy returns were! Then proceeded with three paragraphs of tiny writing that made no sense. Use the pre-printed return label. There was no pre-printed return label. Use the same packaging the clothes came in. You mean this plastic bag that I had to rip open to get the clothes out?

This company has about 5 brands You had 45 days to make the return unless you only had 30 days to make the return although some clothes could be returned anytime. You could return them to an actual store unless you couldn’t. You could call and they would credit the return but charge your credit card and then credit it back and upgrade the shipping.

On and on it went. I seriously considered whether it might be easier to just lose weight so the pants fit.

Finally I called and navigated one of those phone trees that makes you say what you want to a robot. You can’t just press a button. I prefer to press a button. It also had no choices that fit my situation: “Doesn’t understand return procedures” and it took a few rounds to get it. But finally, Mitsy picked up the phone. She was super perky and ultimately very helpful. She ran me through an equally confusing thing about my credit and gift card. Something like it takes three weeks to get the gift card return because you have to get the credit in the same form you paid and I used a combo of gift card and credit card. But I could get the exercise pants now if I gave her my credit card and then use the new gift card on a future purchase. Or I could wait and call back. Or I can get one pair of pants now and one later. Let’s check how much we have in stock.

I was still confused but Mitsy’s over-powering confidence urged me to a decision. So I think I bought a pair of bigger pants and then will get a gift card in a few weeks and can start all over with a new order. And if I don’t like the new pants, I will keep them anyway.

Posted in doing it wrong | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Garden Update

I won’t write any more about snails but know that I could. A lot more.

The tomatoes that I grew from seeds have been put out in the yard into the walls of water. I forgot to make a note to remind me what kind I saved. Probably whatever produced the best which was either Stupice or Early Girls or possibly Romas. I’m going to buy a couple more plants from the farmers market. I think I’m going to skip the more exotic varieties as they never seem to produce many tomatoes and the ones they do seem to go bad more quickly than I can deal with them.

Currently I have what looks like an abundance of potatoes. Since last fall whenever I found wrinkly potato in the back of the bin I ran out and buried it and now they’re everywhere. There are tons and tons of raspberry blossoms. I’ve got mesclun greens coming in. The apple tree looks loaded. I’m going to have to thin some of it out or hit my head on low drooping branches all summer. Peas are growing like crazy. The sunflower sprouts are everywhere. It’s looking good out there given how neglectful I’ve been. I’ve been preoccupied with other projects and the garden has been close to dead last in the priority list.

The pumpkins sort-of slipped my mind. I’m going to start in the house this weekend.

Posted in garden | 1 Comment

Have Another Piece of My Heart

The Portland Timbers are dismantling my heart piece by piece from the inside out. This is starting to remind me of all the times I was madly in love with someone who was completely wrong for me but I wasn’t about to give up as long as there was a tiny bit of hope. I’m still going to stand by my men because that’s the kind of girl I am, but I wish I could spend the day on the couch finishing my wine cube and eating a bucket of cookie dough and watching Sense & Sensibility and The Lake House.

Posted in TIMBERS! | 1 Comment

Infestation

I have picked so many giant snails out of my front yard, I’m starting to fear going out there. Normally I just pick the ones I find in the process of my regular gardening. On Sunday it was drizzling which is perfect snail picking weather, if you didn’t know, and I got my bucket and went to town. I stuck my gloved hands into corners and moved rocks and dug around in bushes.

And I kept finding more and more and more snails. Big giant ones. On the lawn. In the future pumpkin patch area. Around the porch. By the window. It started freaking me out. Where are all these snails coming from?

I don’t know anything about snail biology and I don’t want to but I found two on the tree that were all tangled up and apparently getting it on. Can’t they do that in someone else’s yard?

And of course I read too many Stephen King stories when I was a kid and in the back of my mind I can’t help but worry what will become of me if the snails take over the world.

Posted in garden | Tagged | 4 Comments

Nerves

I came home the other night and spotted a rose in my neighbor’s yard. I was about to start whining about my roses and I noticed this.

Remember when I broke a wheel on my office chair?

I broke another one. I’m not really sure what I’m doing that’s so rough on the chairs. I just sit there and deal with documents.

I *did* eat a lot of brownies this week.

And this.

I have an awesome dentist and I’m pretty relaxed about the dentist anyway. I had an appointment this week that left me a tad traumatized.

There’s one corner of my mouth that doesn’t seem to numb totally or else it wears off super fast. My sister said she has a similar problem. I’m not sure what’s going on there but I mentioned this to the dentist and she said, “Oh yeah?” And then broke out some more stuff. And usually I just deal since the drilling doesn’t last forever but she asked me to let her know. So we stopped again in the middle and dosed me some more. It didn’t take long but I was glad when it was over.

Then I was so lightheaded I was afraid to stand up. That’s never happened before but I’ve never had brontosaurus novocaine before, either. Also, I didn’t eat before my appointment and I got busted. Eat before your dentist treatments! I took my time walking back to the office and I got a chai (sugar! fat!) and felt normal by the time I finished it.

Posted in doing it wrong | 2 Comments