Apr
3
2010
Home By Christine Eclavea Mercer | 2 comments

Front Porch

Ah, the porch.  The most fantastic, wonderful place in the world to relax and drink coffee when the weather is good.

Front Porch

Front Porch

We had the house assessed a while back and the assessor said that the porch would sell the house, but sadly he hardly ever sees anybody using their outdoor spaces.  Not so for our family.

Technically speaking, the house is considered on the small side, 1900 square feet I think.  But we have a wrap around porch that spans the front of the house, out a few feet on one side and out and around the corner of another.  On the back of the house we have a deck.  So I have never felt deprived of space.  We have a basement too, that DH mainly uses.  I do not love basements.  I like to be out in the fresh air and natural light.

Okame Cherry Tree

Okame Cherry Tree

DD and I spend most of our time out here on days like today.  I am sure that I have waxed poetic about the porch before.  I have always wanted one.

Right now the porch is dirty.  DH has been talking about pressure washing it and the house and driveway for about a year.  And it could use a coat of paint.

DH just hacked back the bushes in front of the porch.  They had grown up past the railing, which I like.  The giant bushes hide the porch from the front and make it quiet.  But now that they’ve been pruned to about three feet, the porch seems to have grown, even though the bushes did not extend onto it.  What an odd perception.

Blah-blah, blah-blah.  Really, I am just enjoying Spring.  Both kids have Spring Break next week.  So I am trying to find many fun things for DD to do.  So far we have a family visit and a trip to a bouncy house scheduled.  I also plan to take her to the park and library.  And maybe if DH is not horribly busy, I can take her to have lunch with him.

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Mar
23
2010
Home By Christine Eclavea Mercer | 1 comment

Library Wifi Success

Hooray, I’ve got a reasonably useful connection in the library.  That only took an hour.  Bah.

For anybody who needs to know, the secure connection at the Forsyth County Public Library requires WPA2/TKIP.  Not AES.  And Service Pack 2 for XP.

Yes, I’m sure you wanted to know that.  However, that has been my morning, the upside of which is that I can now vacate the distraction of my house to this location which is relatively free, and very clean.  I say relatively free, because we pay taxes.

I am also free of the distraction of any typical social network, i.e. Facebook, and Yahoo Groups.  That’s sort of a bummer, because I just tried to shut off my Yahoo Group notifications and will have to wait until I get home.  But since the idea is not to read them anyway, not a big deal.

DH wants to go away for a few days over Spring Break.  His idea of a good time is going to a remote local with either nothing to do except golf, or absolutely nothing to do.  This does not work for me managing a five year old.  She needs bounce houses, and swimming pools and movies and trains and things.  Otherwise, she’ll be a miserable little child who would be happier at home with her friends and her stuff.

Anyway, we’re looking for a place where everybody can be entertained that isn’t incredibly far away.  Atlanta, of course, has everything, but is too close.

Weed-whacking Equipment

Weed-whacking Equipment by dvs

DH was super-industrious this weekend, which culminated in the breaking of a somewhat expensive garden tool.  Ugh. These projects always spawn more projects.  On the bright side, the cars are all freshly maintained.  And the part of the yard that doesn’t require the broken tool looks terrific.

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Mar
21
2010
Home By Christine Eclavea Mercer | No comments yet

Hampton Park Library

Our new county library opened.  It’s a miracle.  It was scheduled to open this past Fall, then delayed.  And since something seems to always go wrong with a new municipal service, I had expected it to be delayed again and open eventually.  Not so.  I am happy that my pessimism was unwarranted.

DOWNSTAIRES LIBRARY EMPTY SHELVES

DOWNSTAIRES LIBRARY EMPTY SHELVES by Yuba College Public Space

I didn’t give much thought to how entirely convenient it is to have a library five miles from the house.  It’s almost on on my way to and from DDs school.  I might drive a mile or two out of my way to get there.  But that’s incredibly close compared to driving fifteen miles one way with no other reason to be in that location.

The wifi sucks, however.  And in the area near the children’s section, there are tiny chairs and tables, and one lounge area for grown-ups that is not conducive to laptop use.  I made it work.  But it wasn’t comfortable.  I downloaded a document for an alternate setup to connect with the counties wifi.  I hope that I can configure it next week, and that it will work consistently, rather than intermittently.

I saw several college or high school looking students with laptops.  If I have time, I’ll inquire of somebody else with a laptop if they have good service.  I have found that asking the library staff yields very friendly dialogue, and an absolute dearth of useful technical information.

I could use the library computers.  But that rather defeats the purpose of owning a laptop where I can have all of my information, instead of just what is hosted.  Also, part of what prompted me to have a laptop is that the library computers have annoying pop-up screens reminding me of how many minutes I have left, do I want to renew, blah, blah.  It’s distracting.

On the other side of the library, nowhere near the children’s section are rows and rows of computers and laptop hosting stations.  That’s terrific if you’re studying for an exam and don’t want to be disturbed.  But it isn’t great for me who wants to go there after school with my child and work while she browses the children’s books.

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Mar
18
2010
Entertainment By Christine Eclavea Mercer | 1 comment

The Pacific

We watched the first episode of The Pacific on HBO.  It was great, as I expected. Except that I am familiar with the history, which makes the story somewhat less mysterious since I already know from the first episode who is going to die.

This doesn’t make the series any less interesting to me.  But the element of suspense that Band of Brothers had for me, where I had heard of a few of the battles and locations, but had never heard of the characters, is not the same.

I worked at the Naval Hospital at Camp Pendleton in the 90s.  So I absorbed some historical information without actually intending to do so.  This is not to say that I didn’t find military history interesting at the time.  I was just working and going to school and didn’t really have time to pay it a whole lot of attention.  I don’t think I had cable; because I didn’t have time to watch tv.

In any event, I managed to learn who Basilone, Leckie and Sledge are.  Though given my location at the time, it probably would have been hard not to learn those names.  That and the fact that I am a warehouse of useless information, that occasionally turns out to be useful.

Iwo Jima Memorial

Iwo Jima Memorial by kanu101

And so continues my obsession with made for HBO series. I used to rent all the HBO series. Then we got them on Netflix. And now we have HBO with Comcast, free. Free from Comcast of course, means that they’ll be charging us for it any minute.

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Mar
16
2010
Life By Christine Eclavea Mercer | 2 comments

Bright Red

The color red must need a lot of chemicals to be created. Because I am having as much luck finding a bright red handbag as I did trying to find a bright red lipstick without a lot of chemicals in it.

And I’m not looking at an ingredient list for a bag. I’d just like it to be a brand that isn’t going to fall apart. And by that I mean, that I have used them and haven’t torn out the lining, the zipper, etcetera within a short span of time. Those brands all seem to carry no red at all, or a deep red.

I don’t understand this. Red occurs in nature.

epiphanie

epiphanie by MissMessie

What I should do is buy a red fabric that I love. And make it into a bag. But that requires energy. And if I had energy, my house would be cleaner.

Maybe it’s 80s nostalgia. I nearly bought a lime green bag.

Ack. I wrote this post almost a week ago, but didn’t post it. Nice job – not. I have since given up on finding red. I ordered an aqua color Tignanello bag.

Tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day. DD proudly told me she found something green to wear: panties. Of course, I explained that she won’t be showing those to anyone and found her a green pair of pants.

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