All I wanted to do Was Make a Birthday Card

I take out Tablet and begin to draw a cake.

Things go smoothly (this should have been my first clue.)

I finish drawing and embellishing the cake (it turns out great, if I do say so myself) and save it to my gallery because I’ve been burned before.

I decide I should start a new layer for the candles since there are going to be so many and I don’t want to mess up the beautiful cake I’ve just finished.

This is where it all starts to go wrong.

 I start drawing the candles but after a few I think (another red flag of things to come) I could just import this into Computer and duplicate the candles to save me time and effort.

So I ‘turn off’ the cake layer and go to save the candles as a separate file and…….AAAARRRRGGGGHGHHHH!

I deleted the cake.

Now on computer this is no big deal you just go into the recycle bin and retrieve it. But on Tablet the operating system             DOES NOT HAVE A RECYCLE BIN!

(I consider this a major flaw from the system developers. Haven’t they ever gone ‘oooops’ and accidentally deleted something? What were they thinking? That nobody makes mistakes? Or has second thoughts? C’mon! We’re all human! Get with the program here guys!)

So I do what any normal person would do. I Google how to retrieve deleted files for android.

Because starting over is NOT an option.

This process involves USB cables, syncing Tablet with Computer, updating drivers, and delving into the deep dark recesses of Tablet where everyday, normal human beings dare not tread.

Several hours and multiple You Tube videos later I’ve downloaded and uninstalled at least three different ‘free’ programs that promise to find my deleted file.

I give up in frustration, uninstall all the downloads on both Computer and Tablet, put all the settings back to normal and redraw the cake.

(There comes a time when the balance of how to fix it or just do it over tips to just do it over!)

I redraw the cake, save it AND e-mail a copy to myself, just in case!

Then I switch over to Computer to tweak  a few things, duplicate candles to the required amount and print it out.

Wait, the colors are all wrong! AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!

Once I finished calibrating my printer………….I finally got everything all lined up, colors corrected and printed out!

Whew!

So what I thought would be a nice, quick, personal, handmade card turned out to be an all day (and half the night) ordeal of frustration and stubbornness!

I hope you like it! There aren’t too many people I would do this for! Happy Birthday!

I'm Ready

Yes, my snorkel is Pink (IRL)! 

??????????

OMG

Hey Look! It's Raining....for a Change......

It's rained two out of every three days since Memorial Day! 
(No wonder I'm bummed!)

Not Feeling Wordy.......

'Stuck'

I Saved the Best for Last

One of my mother’s favorite stories about BigBrother was this one:

BigBrother played hooky from school…..with a GIRL! (He must have been about fifteen, which would make me ten.)

I don’t know how my mother found out but we went looking for him.

Someone told her they were in the woods behind the shopping center. 

Anyway, she sent ME into the woods to get him. (I don’t know why.)

All the way home as BigBrother and his girlfriend sat in the backseat looking guilty, I sat in the front seat, facing backwards with my chin resting on the headrest and asking, “What were you doing in the woods, BigBrother? Huh? Huh? Huh? What were you doing?”

My mother thought it was hysterical. 

BigBrother, Episode……..I’ve Lost Track

BigBrother was a very helpful child.

He was always taking it upon himself to do thing for our parents.

They were big ‘do it yourself-ers’, our parents.

My father was a master wallpaper hanger (that’s where I learned all my curse words, but I digress.)

In one of our houses my parents finished the basement into a rec room.

They sealed and painted and paneled and tiled.

BigBrother wanted to help.

So one night he went down into the beautiful new rec room and commenced to ‘paint’ the redwood furniture that was to be the room’s décor.

With the paint brushes my parents left sitting in a coffee can of turpentine.

As the turpentine dripped through the slats of the furniture it ate away at the lovely new linoleum tiles.

My mother said they had to scrape the tiles up with a putty knife it was so gooey!

I Thought It Was Dead

It looked dead.

It was there all morning.

It didn’t move.

Until…….I went to dispose of it.

Then it made a break for it!!

EEEEEEEEK!

It was just playing possum!

I wasn’t prepared for battle, just disposal. (They are two separate and distinct events and call for totally different combat equipment!)

But I triumphed! (After a slightly comical display of unladylike behavior!) 

FLUSH

FLUSH

FLUSH

Just to be certain it was really gone!

(It occurs to me I spend a great deal of my time in skirmishes with exoskeletons……L……)

Tourists

My mother always lamented when we lived in New York we hadn’t done any of the ‘touristy’ things.

So when we moved back she declared the first week as ‘WE’RE GOING TO GO EVERYWHERE AND DO EVERYTHING THAT A TOURIST WOULD WEEK’.

We did the Circle Line Tour, visited the Empire State building, the Chrysler building, we went to Liberty Island and climbed the Statue of Liberty.

We toured China town, the Battery, Greenwich Village, and Central Park.

We went to FAO Schwartz, Macy’s, Saks Fifth Avenue, Bergdorf Goodman……

And you know what the clearest memory I have of that week?

How much my feet hurt!

Then I Had This Scathingly Brilliant Idea

Which has turned out to be a real mathematical pain in the arse!

But I started it and I’m going to finish it! Even if it kills me! LOL

I still don’t know what I’m going to DO with any of it. Just maybe play with it.

Wait…….maybe one of my creatures is going to find his way into town….hmmmmm…..

Errata

It occurred to me after I published yesterday’s post I forgot to give proper credit to my good friend Laurie for her contribution in dressing the lovely ladies. 

All the clothes in yesterday’s post were made from her delicious Gelli Plate prints! 

Thank you Laurie! 

I’m sure you’ll see your prints popping up in all sorts of my things! 

Then I Joined a Webinar

Give Your Collage Extra Personality

With Jenny Cochran Lee.

Collage, faces, crazy mixed up paper dolls. How could I resist?

............you can see where this is going, right?

I have no idea what I’m going to do with these when they’re done. But I’m having fun cutting and pasting.

First I Made Envelopes

Lots and lots of envelopes.

Why…. you may ask? I haven’t the slightest idea! LOL 

I have all this scrapbooking paper (I don’t scrap!)

In a mindless moment in front of the boob tube I just started and I couldn’t stop, until Husband asked what I was doing! 

Then I realized I was done with envelopes.

(I'm sure someday I'll need them!)

I Should Be Working

Instead I’m cutting and pasting….

To be continued......

We Interrupt Our Regularly Scheduled Post……

To bring you THIS!

MAIL LOVE

All this scrumptiousness is brought to you (meaning ME….. LOL) by the lovely, talented and ever so generous Ann Hyde

Thank you Ann! 

Dear Mom,

Remember when we used to refer to the places we lived by their addresses? The house at 98 Manor Rd?.....when we lived at 7 Endicott?....

I was thinking about that today and it occurred to me this address doesn’t really lend itself to that kind of alliteration.

……Remember when we lived at 1234 north east eleventh place?

Too many syllables!

I wish you were here to hear my train of thought because I know you would get it.

On the one hand I wish you were still here. On the other hand I’m glad I didn’t have to see you sink into senility. Or suffer more pain and degradation with what the ‘medicos’ were doing to you.

Remember all the plans we had for when I would take early retirement?

The plans for shopping and lunches and taking the boys to fun places?

You almost made it.

I retired four months after you died.

It’s not at all like I thought it would be.

I miss you.

Wherever you are I hope you know I'm thinking about you more today. 

Happy Birthday.

Too Pooped to Post

Grandpa’s Rocking Chair

Or I should say, the rocking chair Grandpa made for me.

My father had lost his job. In order to make ends meet, my parents stated selling their extensive antique collection.

One day I came home from school and found my clothes piled on the floor where my dresser used to be.

My mother said the antique lady my father had sold the furniture to was coming back.

And she had something else to tell me.

My father sold her my rocking chair!

I was livid!

It was MY chair!

He had no right to sell it!

So my mother and I devised a scheme to save my chair.

We switched it with another rocker in the house.

The problem was my rocker was child size.

The other was not.

When the antique lady came to pick up the next load of items she immediately saw the difference.

“That’s not the chair I bought. I want the one I bought.”

I said, “You can’t have that one. It’s mine and I don’t want to sell it.”

We argued a bit, she offered me more money. She tried to intimidate me. She called on my mother to intervene.

My mother said it was mine to do with what I liked. Either take the other rocker or leave without any.

(Mom was kind of wonderful! ♥)

So the antique lady grudgingly took the other rocker and left.

When my father got home that night I told him in no uncertain terms to lay off MY STUFF! 

The Case of the Missing Bug

There is was.

In the corner.

Six little legs pointing to the heavens.

Dead.

I noticed it out of the corner of my eye.

I meant to get rid of it but I was in the middle of doing something else.

I’ll get it later.

Later….my hands were full.

I’ll get it later.

Later…..goes on for a day.

When I finally remember and go back to get it, it’s gone.

The dead bug is gone!

Did it suddenly reanimate and walk away?

In its place is just a small pile of dust (for lack of a better word.)

(For the sake of honesty in reporting this pile of dust could just be an indictment on my housekeeping skills, not really relevant to the dead bug issue.)

But now I’m wondering who/what took the bug.

And should I be fearful that whoever/whatever it is….is coming for me?

I Have Issues with Inanimate Objects

They don’t like me.

To be fair, the feeling is mutual.

Like toilet tissue.

Why do the manufacturers feel it necessary to super glue the end of the roll to the next layer, making it nearly impossible to start unraveling the damn thing without shredding it into long unusable strips?

I picture a demented little man operating the gluing machine in a factory somewhere laughing maniacally as he thinks about all the frustrated people trying to open a new roll and getting his jollies!

And then there's the computer. 

I find myself yelling at the computer when it doesn’t cooperate.

I say things like, “Oh c’mon! You KNEW what I meant!”

It does, you know.

Just try Googling something and watch as it finishes your sentence for you! So don’t tell me it didn’t know what I meant when I misspell a word!

I know it’s just screwing with me.

I once had a sewing machine that gave me so much agita that one day in frustration I started beating on it with my good Gingher pinking shears! I chipped the sewing machine (who, by the way, never forgave me and acted even worse after that!) and I broke the scissors!

And don’t get me started on child proof bottle caps!

I’m convinced that inanimate objects are far from inanimate.

They are sadistic little creatures whose mission in life is to frustrate, confuse and annoy us until the inevitable day when they will take over the world!

Oh Boy, New Toy!

It finally came! My new Gelli Plate!

I’ve been hearing and reading about this technique all over the place. It sounded interesting, but do I really NEED a new toy/technique?

It was my friend Laurie who finally made me want one.

She creates the most gorgeous backgrounds for her journal pages. (When I try, I either don’t go far enough or I go too far and both ways end up a hot mess! LOL)

I suggested she start a website or an Etsy shop to sell her pages to background impaired people like me!

(ME FIRST! ME FIRST!)

  

So, anyway, I broke down and ordered one.

Now what…….?