2 books added to the list and lot of rambling from me

Actually I haven't yet added #17 and #18 to the list of books read, but by the time you all read this post Dear Mom and Memoirs of a Geisha will have been added to that list.
Dear Mom- Thank You For Everything is a book my oldest son gave me for my birthday. Wasn't a long book by any means but the sentiment behind it is HUGE! And it's a book read so on the list it goes!
Memoirs of a Geisha was an excellent book. It is hard to imagine a man writing such a book from a woman's point of view and making it so believable. He did a wonderful job! Loved the book!

I told you all last post I was going to show you some chunky pages but I have yet to get around to scanning all of them. Only one has been scanned just to check out the new 3in1 machine. It works wonderfully! No chunkys this time though cause I still have one more to make to get all of them done for that swap. I have three ATCs ready to scan as well so next post you'll get an eyeful.

I also told you all I would tell you about my birthday loot. I think the easiest way to tell that is by a list. So here's the list!
I guess it doesn't matter who gave me what... does it? Or does it matter???? Maybe it does...... It does matter to me, but it doesnt matter here I guess. I've already recorded it my journal and there it does tell who gave what so I've already covered that info.
1. 3 vintage glass coffee mugs with wood and metal handles in shades of pastels; blue, green and pink. I will be using these in my deskroom to hold pencils and the like.
2. 2 paperback novels---My sister Linda took one of them home with her to read. I forget what the name of that one is...She said she had started it some time ago and couldn't get into it and she wanted to give it another shot so I let her take it home. The other is a novel by Barbara Delinski. It is next on my to read list.
3. Black paper notebook. I have trouble finding black paper for my collages so this book will come in handy for more than a few things.
4.BUNCH of ribbons/arty stuff
5. Flag for the yard.
6. Windsock for the yard... a decorative one, not the real thing like you'd find at the airport. I'd love to have the real thing attached to the tall pole out in the backyard though! That would be cool! Not sure where this one will end up in the yard.
7.The glass mugs came in a nice basket to store things of the artsy variety in in the deskroom. I'm not sure the packaging can be counted as a gift as well, but I'm doing it.
8.Pad of watercolor paper! Yes! Yes! One can never have too much watercolor paper and it matters not that some of the pages from the pad are gone. I was very pleased with this gift! Very pleased!
9. A stack of pretty envelopes of different colors. I use tons of envelopes so this is a very useful gift.
10. Wooden elephant. He is pretty cool... carved, wood burned to show his features.
11. A very cute ceramic elephant that is pretty big. He's sitting on his knees! I love him! Ma gave me both of these elephants just mentioned.
12. A dozen red pencils with very fat leads. Most useful for drawings!
13. A dozen blue drawing pencils.
14. Some big push pins for my bulletin board. They are pretty cool. I've never seen any this large. They are metallic colored in different shades.
15. A watch with three different beaded bands that are interchangable. I needed another watch too!
16. Gel pens. Most useful for artsty stuff!
17. More ribbons and embellishments that I picked out myself.
18. 3 in 1 Machine and two extra ink cartridges.
19. Giant bottle of Tacky Glue. I go through that stuff like it's going out style!
20. 2 clay elephant votive holders and a dozen votives to go with them. The votives smell like magnolias if memory serves me correctly!
21. Book... Dear Mom-Thanks For Everything
22. $10 bill that I used as a bookmark and will use as a bookmark until I'm in dire need of ten bucks!
23. Very pretty box that I will use to store things of the art variety in. Again, I'm not sure you can count the packaging of your gifts as an actual gift....but I'm still doing it!

My friend Helena brought me the elephant votives and an Imitrex tablet for a killer headache I had on my birthday. The Imitrex tablet was the best gift of them all! I have a prescription for Imitrex but I didn't have any of my prescription left and I really needed a mega good drug to knock that headache out of me. I'd had it for almost three days by the time Helena brought it me. It did the trick and I was free from that killer headache within 20 minutes of taking that tablet.
I also recieved a lot of birthday wishes from my pals over at AFA.
There were hugs to be had and lots of love shared from those I love too.
And if that isn't enough...my sister Susan cooked my favorite meal of roast beef, potatoes, carrots, onions and gravy. Ma baked a chocolate bundt cake and my brother Sam showed up for the celebration too. Even though I felt like death warmed over on my birthday, it was an excellent day actually.
And yes, I still feel older.
I know you all are thinking, "Good Golly, she sure got a lot of presents!" Yep, I did! My family is like that on Birthdays and Christmas. You can expect a lot of presents for your birthday and you'll be most surprised by them too!
I always buy myself something for my birthday each year and this year it was a new set of 24 fine point sharpie markers. I was in need of a new set as the fine points are getting low on ink and I use my sharpies/markers a lot.

I finally got around to bringing all the presents I got at Susan's house home today. Only four days after the fact....Susan jokingly said she was about ready to claim them as her own as they had been sitting in the rocking chair in her diningroom for four days! I retrieved my garden cart at the same time. That thing has been at her house for better than a year now. I got a new garden cart and she cabbaged on to the other one. She was laughing when she said, "Bring my cart back!" I was about a third of the way across the yard and hollered back at her, "If you want it, it'll be at my backdoor!"

It is raining as I type this at 2:20 in the morning on Thursday. The dog was out in the front yard in the rain a little bit ago barking his fool head off everytime it thundered earlier. He acted like he had no clue where that awful noise was coming from. Thunder never bothered him before tonight. He's a silly thing!
I'm glad for the rain though. So far Mother Nature has been watering my 147 little evergreen trees. They are doing fantastic!

Billy was missing for three days. I found him on Monday morning in the burned house. Locked in. RJ fixed it so the cats could come and go as they please in the burned house. There are rodents out there that need to be caught and that is the cats' jobs. They can't do it if they can't get in there on their own and they don't want to be locked in there with no food or water for three days. Billy wasn't a happy camper. He was happy to see me, but you should have heard that pitiful yowl he let out when he discovered someone was close enough to hear him.

I need to take the van to Shorty tomorrow and have him change out that front passengers side tire for the one RJ put in the back of the van. The tire was still inflated this evening but it won't be for much longer... it has a slow leak, it's bald as a baby's butt and it makes the van drive 'funny'.

I saw the oncologist on Tuesday for this wretched blood disease....polycythemia vera.... He gave me good news though. No phlebotomy this go around. My numbers were sitting at 48. On the low end of high but he was pleased with them nonetheless. He wants me get my blood checked every three months and go see him in a year if all goes as planned with the numbers. He also said I HAD to quit smoking. He gave me the scare tactic... telling me about a man my own age who he was seeing after me who had lung cancer from smoking. It scared me but I've yet to put down the fags for good...yet. I need a plan for quitting smoking and I don't have a plan at the moment. It's on my agenda though. At the top of the agenda!

So, I'm a year older but not sure I'm any wiser... Guess that remains to be seen!
You all have a fantastic Thursday. Go get some hugs! You know they dont carry over from one day to the next. You have to go get new ones everyday for them to count. I missed out any hugs today....I'll see what I can do for Thursday! Be good to one another!
Peace
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