Saturday, August 29, 2009

Time to Meet Freebo the Hobo Spider

Freebo the Hobo Spider
This little critter was the latest new addition to my home...
Winter is coming and with the added habit of leaving my front door open to watch for my favorite neighbors, the Gardner house is taking on new tenants, in the form of spiders the size of hamburgers...
The interesting thing about this little surprise was how I found it...
Throughout the process of cleaning and setting things up around the house, I would continually unleash spiders from their homes in my living room... The practice for removing and relocating these little critters involved imprisoning them in a plastic cd case and unleashing them on the neighbors at a safe distance...
After the last release, I had throw the plastic lid to the cd case behind the front door and gone off to bed...
You can imagine my surprise when I woke to find a new bigger spider resting in it in the morning...
I don't know it the picture does it justice as this thing was about the size of the palm of my hand...

I really hate these things, and immediately dropped it off at the neighbors for research and further inspection...
Later that evening while cleaning, I hear the door open and Autumn announces that she is returning our little friend back into my house...
I wander around the kitchen to find her standing with the familiar enclosure in her hands and then her rushing towards me and launching the contents in my face...
Of course, I scream, throw my drink into the air, and retreat to the kitchen, to find the entire house erupting in laughter, and a makeshift spider, constructed of patches and ribbon lying on the floor...

Good times guys, way to show the love...

Out with the Old

Off to Springtucky
One of my favorite things

So lately I have been trying to follow my family's tradition of changing my surroundings on a regular basis... The goal of this is never to be held back by the things in my home and to be continually improving the things around me.

As a child I knew never to expect to see the same home I had seen upon leaving for school. Many times I would return to find the house had completely changed beyond recognition... One example was when I was living in Florence Oregon in a small two bedroom apartment...
I left our house with its rather simple decor to find a small Forest in our living room.
In my absence my dad had replaced all the furniture with logs and installed a complete forest of trees in the living room.
Beyond that he had released our pet cockatiels to run free and fly about the house....

I have no plans to take such actions, as the availability of trees for home decor seems limited in this area.
But the other tradition in creating a dynamic home by continually replacing furniture with new interesting pieces seems like a good goal to keep in mind.

Friday, August 21, 2009

After Lemon Traditions

After Lemon Tradition


Each year, for the third year running, Autumn and I have had the tradition of ending each Scandi-Fest Lemonade event at the Horse Head, with a Polaroid in front of the dart board, in celebration of a great Summer and a good time.

Umbrella

Umbrella

Squishing Caterpillars

My New TV

I just got done watching L.A. Story...
A film I faintly remembered from childhood...
All I could recall was Steve Martin hugging a sign post.
I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by the film I found lying by the dumpster in my apartment complex.
I was laughing all night about him shooting at drivers on the freeway, and getting held up at the ATM.
One line in particular cracked me up for hours,
in reference to shaking hands with new acquaintances at a social gathering, he said...

Harris: I'm not kissing anyone hello anymore.
Trudi: Well just shake hands with them.
Harris: Are you kidding? I just wash my hands and I shake hands with some guy that feels like he's been squashing caterpillars.

Too Fun...

Friday, August 07, 2009

Another One Bites the Dust

So today was an eventful day...

I sold my Digital Rebel Camera... in only a few hours...
We posted it on Craig's list and within a few hours, a large biker was standing in my living room...
As off putting as he might have been, he seemed nice enough...

Prior to that I spent my day with my face pressed against the car window while driving past numerous garage sales... One of which offered popcorn for a quarter... A refreshing service when compared to other sales that had boxes of Penthouse scattered across their yard...

After entering an unappealing cul-de-sac and turning around to leave I noticed a familiar contraption...
With the car still running I dive out the door and hand the lady 5 dollars for a Cuisinart Ice Cream maker...
Having fought off three other contenders... down the last second..,

Six hours later, after properly chilling the freezer bowl...
I heat up 4 cups cream, vanilla, sugar, and mint.

With everyone standing by I put it all together and pour it all in...

Seconds pass before they look up and ask why I had spent all that time freezing the thing, only to pour boiling milk into it...

Yet another seemingly simple contraption beats me again...

20 minutes and I will be ready to throw it all away, if it doesn't burst into flames first....