Bee-dle Juice, Bee-dle Juice, Bee-dle Juice!!

Originally Bee's name was going to be Aoife - I had researched names trying to find something dignified and a little unusual. It's a gaelic name that means "joyous, beautiful" and is the name of a warrior princess in legend who freaking wins everything. But before I committed  I gave it a test run and quickly realized that it sounds very much like "Ava". The other problem was pronouncing it based on the old irish spelling - there are a lot of lovely old irish names but unless you're from Ireland or the late 1700's chances are the rest of the population is going to mangle the crap out of it on a daily basis. When we used to go to the beach back on LI there was a little girl who's name was Y'aile - it was a lovely french name - unfortunately no one who frequented the beach happened to be french. You always knew when she was around because you'd hear this little voice saying "NO, my name is not Yale! It's YA- aile!" - I'm sure at some point in her life she has given up and is now a lovely woman named Yale. But I digress. I hung in there thinking maybe I could use the american spelling??, but that is no longer the romantic Aoife, but Ee-Fa. yeah, no.

But then the breeder had sent me a few short videos of a white pawed puppy zipping around nosie-rosie - I had to laugh and that is how her name instantly became 

Bee. 

It's turned out to be a very appropriate name - she is bouncy, zipping around at all times. And it's one of those fun names - Busy Bee. Bumble Bee. Bee-nie. Beedelia. Bee-a-roni. Bee-dle Juice. I can go on and on. Having a puppy in the house is a lot of fun and quite exhausting at times. Her first project was to try and electrocute herself by chewing on wires. David suggested NO and a squirt bottle. I pointed out squirting a dog with water while they chewed on a wire was probably just going to kick it up a notch and suggested maybe just putting the wires up til she got older. With the girls visiting that added a whole other dimension as I pulled Polly Pockets out of her mouth for the 400th time along with crayons, barbie, and other sundry items. We spent days with no one leaving anyone alone but they all had fun. The girls loved Bee and Bee loved them. Christmas evening Bee got sick - I think it was because there was so much food she did get some and just a lot going on. She had awful going every hour diarrhea - she does not want to go in the house so she'd cry and out we would go. Again and again. 

She is better now, she's been to the vet and has medication, despite all the diarrhea she somehow managed to grow anyhow and gained 3 pounds. She is eating everything at this point, the vet suggested rice, yogurt, chicken and bone broth - I have little hope of her ever eating regular dog food again. She is growing so fast she will be a dog in no time - and we are so happy to have a dog in the house again, let me tell you! A dog just adds so much to your day - someone to play with, walk with, snuggle in the morning. David has started training her so she can be a great gun dog and I'm hoping in the spring to find somewhere to start hiking again. We have a lot wrapped up in you Little Bee. 

 

Busy Bees.

So the past 3 weeks have been busy busy! Our Bee is a great joy to us of course, a lot of work she is but so nice to have a dog back in the house. We had planned previously on having the girls here for the week - had not thought the 2 four year olds and a puppy thing out. Hmm. I picked them up on Saturday morning, they were great on the way back and ran around over the top excited for the first few hours. The first day was rough - Bee was jumping and biting, the girls were shrieking, which made Bee crazier....ARRGH. But by the next afternoon everyone was better. The harder parts were keeping all the little toys from Bee, teaching the girls not to feed her.... but we got it done. C and D are very fun this year - both are super into arts and crafts so it was a Crafty Christmas!

We did cookie baking and you can do that sucessfully with preschoolers - the secret is to have everything out at once - if you turn your back on them to get the flour they'll polish off a full bottle of sprinkles before you can say STOP and knock everything on the floor. Use cups to cut out the cookies - they seriously do NOT expect to be doing reindeer and santas and it's too hard for them, a circle is very do-able. We did a simple sugar cookie dough with colored sugar and sprinkles, it went very well. We also did a construction paper chains, we made lions with glue on googly eyes, played Candy Land in which they shamelessly cheat, declared themselves the winner and leave. We went to a playground in town where we were the only people in the park - it was like playing in Cherobyl but they had a full 45 minutes of running around. The neighbor stopped by one day on his tractor, D was devestated when no one got a ride but Poppop saved the day by pulling out the lawn tractor and they rode down to Mr. Sam's to visit the cows and horses. 

Brandy arrived on Christmas Eve - they were very excited to see her after almost a week apart from her. Kim and Steve arrived along with Celia, Gabe and then there were four dogs in the house! Bee was having a great time romping with a crew of tiny dogs and yes, we did observe COVID guidelines, we were less than ten, two households. I broke out the china - I have a full set of Noritake circa 1961 in the sputnik design and we had a wonderful dinner. Celie and Gabe have never seen the house so they got the Grand Tour, we had a big ham and a tofurky roast - it felt like a real holiday.  The next morning it was  mayhem - C &  D are at that age and it only took about 10 minutes for the living room to turn into a sea of wrapping paper and toys, with occasional  chasing Bee to get back contaband. I made lasanga for dinner since we'd done the Christmas ham the previous day and then it was bath time. 

It was a good day.

Saturday early afternoon they packed up and left since we all have to go back to work on Monday. 

During this Bee developed diarrhea - we spoke to the vet on Saturday and gave Bee Pepto to see if it would help - it did a little but she continues to have bouts of it so she will see the vet tomorrow. It's been exhausting, she does not want to go in the house so we are up and down with her throughout the night. She's still eating,drinking and playing so hopefully it will be something that passes soon. So, but aside from that its been a wonderful week and holiday - such a relief after all that's happened   this year. 

 

The Covid-bury Tales

Last week we finally got our puppy - She started off in Colorado, Jeff met Daniel in Utah to transfer the puppies (he picked up a total of 5!), then off to Washington arriving Saturday night. We live about 5 hours from Jess which is where they were being dropped off before all the prospective owners arrived to Moses Lake. They were very well traveled puppies by then. Since I knew ahead of time the when and where's I took Monday off knowing we would not get home til Sunday afternoon. Then I made the reservations which can be a little dicey when you've never been somewhere. Fortunately there were some major chain hotels - sometimes it's fun to stay in a non-national brand but we have also had some interesting stays in places that looked straight out of pyscho type movie set. I made the reservation online ( and if you have AAA - use it! You can get some pretty good discounts). But then I called the next day, worried that they might be closed due to COVID - I was obviously not the first person double checking because the desk clerk was yes, we're open, yes you have to wear a mask, yes, we still have breakfast.......

 

We left early Saturday morning and decided to take a secondary road since we've never been to that part of country, the first part was really fun. We drove through all sorts of small towns, the weather was good for the first part of the trip, but.......here is much different than the east coast. In NY if it's cold on LI, it's cold upstate, if there's snow upstate, there's snow in PA,etc..... When we left Clatskanie it was sunny and in the 50's but as we drove the temperature went down and it got all icy and rainy. One thing we had not realized was our road wound through the Cascade mountain range so we were driving in 23 degree foggy weather up and down mountain roads. Along with this we were going through some major ski resorts. On a Saturday where it is madatory that everyone out to ski must spend at 30 minutes standing around in the road admiring each other's ski equipment. Suffice to say that was not fun. 

We were glad to get done with the mountain ranges - it flattened out and on we went. We stopped at a rest area and I forgot my mask in the car, but it was still pretty early. Of course someone came in the bathroom and it was a super strict person who when I went by her acted as if I had committed a crime against humanity - 😨

The rest of the trip was uneventful - COVID makes weird because you can't stop at a restaurant, every time you get out of the car you have to mask up, etc... we arrived at the hotel with the desk clerk stationed behind a giant sneeze guard, checked in. The pool was a waste, only one person allowed at a time(?), what ever! We had brought food and our coffee gear with us - the coffee gear of course most important. I have a mini kureg, coffee creamer and sweetener I bring so we don't have to get up too early. Dinner was take out - I feel terrible for all the restaurants - it's stupid really. We can fly on planes, etc.. but we can't sit in a restuarant? We went in, ordered, sat and waited while chatted with the woman behind the cash register - there were only two people running the place! We left a good tip and back to our room. I went out for a little while, it was ok. We made it Jess's first thing in the morning , so glad to finally have a dog back in our house!

 

Get Out Your Erasers

So. The last we spoke David and I had put the Astoria house on the market, we had a few lookers - and then it hit the fan. Just a heads up, there might be some bad words peppered here and there but over all it's not bad. The market here was strong but with the recent turn of events with the election and COVID our RE had told us things were cooling a bit. It was shown a few times and we knew it was going to take longer than it usually does since the house was in the upper range pricewise. You still have people looking but the pool is much smaller - still no big. We are in a good spot and can afford to hang out a bit. Then someone really interested looked at it, they were considering dividing the lots, wanted to give us a big down payment, a couple  monthly and then a big payment - we were mulling it over. We cannot be 100% certain but we are pretty sure The Shithead in an effort to encourage us to sign ran down to the local town hall and gave them a lot of false information about David doing work without a permit.

Grrr. 

David went down to speak to them and yes, there were a few things, most of it due to the fact we are not familar with things here but most of it was nonsense. The straw that broke the camel's back was when the town hall guys said to David "we understand you were doing work in the basement"(when this person was looking at the house David WAS in the basement which is why we suspect who it was). David looked at them and said " I was PAINTING the walls, do I need a permit for that too???". This whole thing plus a local rumor mill has just put us off. We've had worse Small Town HIjinks and Nonsense but honestly, we are just tired and our Bullshit tolerance is at an all time low. The deciding factor though was our accountant whom we should have called first. We still have our wonderful guy Tom Graney in  Irwin PA if you need a guy - we just love him. He ran the numbers and with the RE fees plus capital gains we were looking at a major hit. So, in the end it was actually a good thing because had we gone through with it we could have stood to lose a lot of money unnecessarily which is never our intention.

So we needed Plan B. 

The Astoria house will add about 20 minutes or so to my daily commute which is not great but given that I was commuting 3 hours a day in PA not the end of the world. To add to this is I work from home most of the time so if I can get most of my field work on two days a week and I continue working 4 - 10 hour days, hmm. That's very do-able. Kim and Steve will be half an hour closer to us, I think everyone is excited about that. We are planning on moving in January which will give David time to finish this house - there are things that we needed to finish and for us to move to the other house. We're going to use a property management company and make sure we are protected before renting this place - the rent will cover our small mortgage and taxes for both places. In two years we can sell the property in Astoria without capital gains as it will be our primary and then can either move back to Clatskanie for two years or just sell it. We are hoping to retire on the beach when all is said and done, a little place with a boat and hibachi and of course a guest room for visitors. 

 

Playing with Food

For the past few months I've  been enjoying cooking  - I've always enjoyed it but due to my long work hours in the past  was not able get too creative. I tried a little here and there but you know if you're short on time you almost always screw it up. There's nothing worse than trying to short cut your way through a complicated recipe only to end up dumping the whole sorry -and often expensive - mess in the trash. To add to it you have to either find something to replace it or just order a pizza, I had just found it too anxiety producing in the past. As we get together every week  with our friends it's a fun excuse to find something new to serve. Kim is working to control her blood sugar and we are both trying to lose weight -  that makes it challenging. It could be annoying but it's not - I've been having a ball low carb, low calorie no sugar wending my way through all sorts of different foods. And yes, I've had a few bungles - but that's to be expected. We've discovered that low carb/low calorie does not always translate into low blood sugars - we quickly discovered a lot of the rice based foods - rice crackers for instance sent the glucose readings through the roof. UGH. We both have been tweaking different foods  and researching - it's interesting to see what works and tastes good at the same time.

Recently I've been experimenting with different types of cuts of beef - since I can't eat it I have to cook blind, I use David as my tester if he's around. He's a good sport though occasionally flinches, like when I handed him a spoonful of pesto - that's one of those foods that looks horrifying but tastes great. He's gotten more adventurous and found he liked it, then went on to try the peppers. This weekend for our weekly dinner with Kim and Steve I made a Beef Roulade, Tofu Roulade, rolled stuffed roasted peppers. You might say.......

I was on a roll.😅😆😛

I had bought a flank steak that cost $23 - ON SALE so you know I was being careful. To start with you have to butterfly the meat and it is recommended this be performed by a butcher as opposed to a vegetarian  that has never seen a flank steak- despite all the cautionary articles I read  at the end it was not that difficult. I had frozen it so when it was partially defrosted I started cutting it - it was easy.  I beat it with a rolling pin to make it thin, then marinated it for 24 hours. I stuffed it with fresh mozzerella, pesto and spicy peppers - rolling it up was a whole other ball game trying to do it evenly without pressing it too hard while keeping the whole thing from sliding around as it was covered in marinade. I had boiled whole sweet peppers and peeled them, I used riced cauliflower, sauted onions and low cal whipped cream cheese and rolled that up. It was supposed to be an appetizer but they were freaking huge so they became a side dish. The tofu roulade came out way better than I thought it would, I used flax meal to stiffen it up and then used the same ingredients to fill it. 

I roasted butternut squash and teeny potatoes, we use Whisp Parmesean crackers for the cheese and crackers - not only are they low calorie/low carb but they don't wreak havoc with Kim's diabetes. Kim made sugar free brownies for dessert and we've found a lot of no sugar creamers that taste pretty decent. In the end the menu was 

Wine and Beer 

Parmesean Crackers and Brie

Caesar Salad

Roasted seasoned small potatoes

roasted and seasoned butternut squash

Stuffed peppers

Beef Roulade

Tofu Roulade

Sugar Free Brownies and coffee

And it was as much fun to make it as it was to eat it.

Bon Appetit!!

 

Vacation Days

We've been here for about a year and a half now, we've done a little exploring but nothing too major. Kim and I had discussed doing a weekend somewhere and a couple of weeks ago I had mentioned I would like to see Long Beach. We've done a few events there but it was more driving to and then home.  Kim and Steve thought this was a great idea and offered to start looking for a place to stay. They're frequent users of air bnbs and just love them - I've never done that but it sounded interesting. Kim found a lovely place within walking distance of the beach. It was a townhouse - 2 beds, 2 baths, full kitchen, living room, fenced patio, dining area. So if you've never done an air BNB it's a bit different than renting a hotel room -  the initial cost is $177.50 for two nights which is 355. But then you need to add in cleaning fees ($100), service fee ($64) and then occupancy taxes and fees - 58.67 which raises it to $577. BUT then you have to half it - $288 which comes to $144 a night which is reasonable. Plus you're only eating out if you want to so overall it ends up being cheaper - but the best part is you don't end up feeling like you've spent the weekend sitting in your bedroom. It was really a lot of fun. Kim brought thier little dog Piggles since dogs are allowed. 

We left a little early - check in was 3 but I wanted to look around and there was a yarn shop I've been dying to  visit. We arrived in around an hour and a half (not far at all!), the yarn shop was lovely and there was a great pyrenees to pet. Kim called to let us know we could check in early so off we went. The town house was beachy themed, we brought out own coffee, beer, wine, snacks and breakfast food - this I really liked because I do like to eat out, I do not like to eat out all day. We went off to explore the town as the place we were staying was right in town AND 5 minutes from the boardwalk. The stores were very touristy, fun to look in and nothing I wanted to buy. Moving around a lot you tend to lose

your taste for buying random knickknacks. Dinner was at the Lost Roo, food was great. We spent the evening playing a card game and then off to bed. David and Steve cooked breakfast, we lounged around playing with the dog and chatting, then off to the boardwalk. Everyone is distancing and a few people were wearinng masks but it wasn't really necessary, was it? The surf was full of green algae, that apparently is normal for this time of year but oh my, how yucky.  There are whale bones but they did not live up to thier hype. I had visions of Pirates of the Carribean sized bones, rising from the surf  with a house sized rib cage. Sigh. They were poking out of the grass and knee high. They were a bit sad. After that we drove to Cape Disappointment to see the light house ,  then to Oysterville. We went to Long Island, then back home to eat out again. We had a great time and it ended much too soon. David had to meet the heating guy out at the flip but not a big. We had to be out by 11am, so we started the towels and stripped the bed, took out the trash, wiped down the counters - that's the other difference. Did you know the airBNBs rate the guests? If you leave the place a shambles you get a bad rating and then good luck renting again! Since  a lot of them are privately owned it makes sense. So we said goodbye and drove home to unpack, then David left to meet the heat guy. It was fun arriving home in a little over an hour was great. Wash is started and everything is put away, it was a short vacation but it was a lot of fun. 

 

Water, Water.

A couple of weeks ago I heard David go outside at some point during the night- I briefly wondered why but then fell back asleep. FYI - I am not your Go To person for emergencies, I tend to sleep right through them. Years ago our yard was on fire during the night - the whole nine yards including firetrucks, neighbors, etc... yep. Slept right through it. But I digress. I got up a little later to get a drink of water......nothing.  

No water.

 

Here in Oregon you can have a well, city water or....a neighborhood community water system which we have never had. Water can  be quite expensive here, especially when you get inland. We had never heard of community water before. Here is how it works:

Where we live they can't build anymore houses, there are a total of 16 which are supported by one big pump house. The big benefit is the cost - $15 dollars a month for unlimited spring water - no chlorine, no chemicals - it's a clear as a bell. It's actually weirdly clear but we love it. Then there is the downside - you cannot leave your hose running as it will reduce the water pressure to the other houses, not  a big as I wouldn't do that if I had city water either. But the big drawback is if it breaks - you get a leak, the neighborhood is responsible. And did I mention it's an honor system? And not too many are honorable? From what I understand from the neighbors years ago most of the people living here were farmers so everyone was essentially home. If it broke you had a lot of hands. Later, there was a group of retired guys who considered the water system sort of a hobby. And now, now you have a small group that goes out. Unfortunately we have a much larger group of people that hide in thier houses waiting for someone else to fix it. 

David waited til the sun came up, took his shovel and headed to the neighbor's, he and two others worked for about 10 hours - then had to stop. The next day another showed up but David said two of the neighbors on thier daily walk stopped to thank them for their help(??) - I wonder if not everyone knows they are supposed to be helping too. The leak was underground so one of the neighbors called his friend who is a witcher and he came with his dousing rods. David said that was pretty neat and he found the leak pretty fast. This is only the second time it's happened (once before a cow stepped on the line) and thankfully it never goes on for a long time. And it's not all bad, David does enjoy spending time with the neighbors, everyone standing around after telling stories and laughing. I suggested to David maybe they need  a rotating roster but he said maybe when they have the yearly meeting - he said he was pretty sure the lazy neighbors would be raising the roof over that! It's not a huge deal - more of an annoyance - while it's being fixed if it goes on for longer than a few hours they turn it on for an extended period of time so you can shower, wash dishes,etc....   and we do store water just in case - glad it was over fast.