crows like deer food

we noticed that while we have not seen our deer much since the weather has warmed up, the deer food was disappearing anyway - turns out crows like the deer pellets, too!!!

speaking of crows, they sure seem to be getting bigger all the time! One of our cats, Buddy, was facing off against a couple of crows last week and he wasn't intimidating them in the least. In fact, Rick went out and brought Buddy in the house before the crows decided they could probably take him!

Been out and about quite a bit lately - now that it is getting milder we have a few sign posts left in over the winter that we have to retrieve. In our travels, we have noticed a LOT of solar panels springing up all over the place. Not large solar farms, but lots of small home-owner panels in back yards. Looks like a lot of people are taking advantage of the government's offer to buy power that is put BACK into the grid. Not a bad idea - but not sure I like the amount they are going to be paid - that money has to come from somewhere, right?

and I can tell you, that if I was a hydro worker, I'd be concerned that when lines are shut down for maintenance, that someone SOMEWHERE isn't putting electricty BACK into the grid that could catch the worker by....huh....surprise? I'm sure this has been looked into....but might be a problem.

the cynical part of me (a very LARGE, cynical part of me, btw) suspects that a couple of large corporations (wind farm and solar) lobbied for this "green" program whereby they produce and sell "green" electricity and get paid whopping amounts of money for it and the government looks like it is trying to be green. I think the powers that be that "thunk" up this program figured they would be dealing with a few large companies only. Instead they had so many unanticipated applications from home-owners, the applications process was running 18 months behind. Not to well thought out if you ask me.... (nobody asks me, of course)

Personally, I think that it would make more sense to encourage people (by way of some rebates perhaps?) to replace their conventional hot water heaters with tankless ones. This would save most people a ton on their electrical bill (I see mostly electrical HWT's although some are gas), it would put much more water on tap instead of sitting in tanks AND would reduce our over-all energy consumption. Anyone I know with a tankless system is happy with it. Tankless systems are pretty well all the rage in Europe - with all the to-do about going green, why not promote something simple like this???? Picture all the hot water tanks in a city being emptied - hey, we might have sooooooooooo much water we could once again return to real flush toilets instead of the low flush ones!!! imagine!!!!

okay, that's my rant for the day - thanks for watching. hahaha

today's picture - crows eating deer food - large, scary crows!

nice afternoon

Phil and Janet were up yesterday afternoon to retrieve their VW Rialta - which we had been keeping for them over the winter. Popped in the battery and it started up right away. They plan to take it to the Juno Awards in Toronto and since Tasha the dog will the accompany them on the trip, the Rialta is a much better option than a motel/hotel. Tasha LOVES the Rialta.

All well with Phil and Janet - we had a very nice visit together - but as they had their van that they drove up in and the Rialta, the opted to hit the road before it got dark.

Week as been fairly quiet - I sold a house on Monday (always nice when that happens) Business has been fairly steady. I guess things are tougher in Ottawa for agents as I have two Ottawa agents coming out to Renfrew to show my listings. A few years ago that would hardly EVER happen, the Ottawa agents would refer their clients to someone up this way. I guess times are tough.

Well, I guess I better get some chores done - can't spend all day on the lap-top

pictures today are to show how much freaking snow we still have on our front yard!!!!

nice weather!!!

This weeek has been unseasonably warm - good to see the snow start to go. Several days of warm weather and rain have really helped melt the snow. Mind you, there is still quite a bit to go yet!

Jamie's finished his level 3 automechanics course - this level also offered a bonus 1 week prep course for writing the final exam for his licence - which Jamie took, of course. And he passed both his level 3 exam as well as the final exam for his licence. So, it's official- he's a licenced mechanic! I think his plan eventually is to open his own shop, but that's years away yet. At least this should translate to a good raise for now!

Rick spent today working on his Jetta - it needed brakes all around - he's known for some time, but, as he does the work himself, he had hoped to put it off for a month or so until the weather is nicer, but the brakes were bad, so today seemed like a good day to do it - it was plus 12 and that's probably about as warm as it'll be for a while. Can't complain, it's really the first thing we've done to the car in over a year.

We're still seeing deer - well, we see them as long as Kris puts out the deer food. They are much bolder now that when they first started coming around.

Today's picture is some "snow" pictures I took a few weeks ago and a neat sunset picture I snapped only moments before the sun went down.

snow day!

wow - last couple of days have been crazy weather. Snow, rain, snow again! Rick had to snow-blow the laneway yesterday morning and then again this morning. Hopefully that will be the last blast for the winter - I think we've had more snow in the past couple of days than we had through most of February! Guess the snow-mobilers will be happy.

We been getting lots of deer - they are very nice to watch - they used to only come up after dark but now they are getting bolder and we see them during the daytime.

Jamie has finished his level 3 mechanic's course - straight A's he tells us. And on Friday he wrote his exam for his licence - we don't know if he passed that exam, but he seems fairly confident about it. He and Julie are still liking their little apartment in Ottawa.

Rick and I have been fairly busy - lots of driving around- February was quite busy - but I think this snow will slow things down a bit. we'll see how it goes.

pictures today - snow and deer

snow be-gone!

Today was very warm - plus 11 at one point. Rick and I drove up to Eganville and on the way back we noticed that the snowmobile trails were nothing but grass and mud - some of the fields were just acres of water! amazing for mid February

I've really noticed, too, that warmer the weather, the busier Rick and I get! So, we've been quite active this past week.

Well, it was Speedweeks in Daytona this week! I've watched as much as I've been able to (hard to fit it in sometimes) Now, I don't mean to offend and Dale Earnhardt Sr. fans, but as it is the 10th anniversary of Dale Sr.'s crash in Daytona, the media is totally freaking MILKING it! Honestly, I'm starting to turn the sound down.

I was watching an interview with Jeff Gordon this afternoon and in the middle of Jeff, Ricky Craven and Rusty Wallace yakking it up about racing against each other back in the day, the reporter totally interupts them with her - "Jeff, how big an influence was Dale on your career?" ENOUGH ALREADY!!!!! PLEASE STOP!! They weren't even talking about him, you silly twit! It was like some alarm went off in her bubble head saying "we haven't mentioned Dale Sr. for 10 minutes - must talk about Dale Earnhardt....." jeez

Tonite, we caught the truck race - good race - Michael Waltrip won (btw, d'ya think it was a conincidence that Michael's book about racing with Dale Sr., hit the bookstores this week????) anyway, the first freaking thing out of the interviewers mouth when Michael climbed out of his truck was referencing Dale's crash 10 years ago (to the day - could it be more dramatic????) and how this win meant more to Michael because it came 10 years (to the day).....

And much to his credit, the only one not milking the story is Dale Earnhardt Jr. I think he's saying "enough already" too!

Anyway, glad to have racing back, I'll just watch it this weekend with the sound turned down.

We're off to Bill and Andrea's for the Daytona 500 on Sunday. Can't wait!!!! (hopefully, they'll want to watch with the sound down too - hahahaha)

Today's pictures deer, Buddy in a tree and a woodpecker at the suet ball.

Monday is a full day for us with some showings and a home inspection in the afternoon. Nice to be busy!

Deer, Oh Deer

As you can see by my pictures, we are attracting lots of deer - putting out large quantities of deer food will do that! We're not proud - we bribe 'em!!!

We've been busy enough - showings over the weekend and more towards the end of the week. Which is pretty good for this time of year - February blahs and all. Always good to be busy in our line of work!

Cats are still going crazy over that laser pointer Rick bought last week. Buddy, Nibbles and Tigger LOVE chasing that little red light around. Missy, on the other hand, appears to be terrified of it and takes off like a bat out of hell every time she hears the clicking sound it makes when you turn it on.

Things are ramping up for NASCAR season. This Friday will see the first of the season's practice etc. on TV. wheeeeee.... stay tuned, though I'm sure to be complaining soon as to how badly my preferred driver is doing.

potato cannons are soooooooooo passe

I'm sitting here in our lovely Eganville office - rather quiet - well, totally quiet - so I was surfing the web and I ran see this headline "teenager makes a homemade solar death ray" http://video.ca.msn.com/watch/video/homemade-solar-death-ray/1gla2uoo7?from=en-ca-hpquad that's the link if you're interested

Anyway it brought to mind Kris and Jamie's experiments with potato cannons - for those of you who don't know - a potato cannon fires off potatoes (and other sundry items) it is generally made out of plumbers PVC pipe and some sort of excellerent - such as aerosol furniture polish. in his day Jamie built some fine, FINE cannons - he would spend his last dollar (or mine) on some pvc piping.

Back then, I always kept a running grocery list on the fridge and Jamie would add "spray can of endust" to the list on a regular basis - took me a while to catch on to that, mind you - I THOUGHT, he and Kris were spraying the Endust on the floor so they could chase the cat and watch poor old Sandy scramble around on a highly polished patch of floor while they laughed thmselves silly. But, no the Endust generally for the potato cannon (although they did that with the cat too)

As for the potato cannon (or spud gun) Jamie did make some doozies - probably dangerous too, now that I think about it. I'm not sure what is so wonderful about loud noises and objects shooting into the air, but it was incredibly funny to Jamie and Kris - they would fire the cannon then giggle like girls as the potato splatted on a tree in the bush! hmmm

It all ended badly, though. Jamie was working at Home Depot when he told a young co-worker all about these potato cannons, The young fellow built one - a really freaking GOOD one, according to Jamie, and brought it into the store to show Jamie. Somewhat concerned (and probably totally impressed) Jamie told the kid to get it out of the store. Unfortunately it was discovered and Jamie was fired on Monday morning for not reporting a weapon on the premises. Home Depot takes these things very seriously - apparently their HR person was NOT from the Ottawa Valley where such potato cannons are well known as a hunt camp requirement.

anyway, back to my point (what was it????) oh yeah, this kid in the States has totally outdone Jamie's weenie potato cannon and built himself a solar death ray!! wow - he should try getting a job at Home Depot......