by Judy Handley | Aug 3, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 215: Just a Day in the Life
Date: Tuesday, August 3, 2021
Weather: Overcast; High Temp 75, Low 61 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
I’m not going to win any gold medals for my house cleaning hurdles and dog training sprints, but I’m slowly chipping away at the to do list while relaxing and enjoying life and spending my evenings until almost midnight watching the Olympics. I have been an Olympics junkie all of my adult life, with Summer Olympics being my favorite. Swimming, diving, and gymnastics were always my favorites, but in the 2016 Olympics I added women’s beach volleyball to my favorites list and this year I am loving all of the track and field events and really enjoyed skateboarding and surfing. US Soccer, both the men and with the women’s teams, was a bit of disappointment, but I’ll still watch the US women go for the Bronze. Tonight, I was so proud of Simone Biles on the balance beam, bringing home a Bronze for her performance. I cannot imagine how hard it has been for her to withdraw from the other competitions, but I think the whole world was pulling for her tonight.
The price I pay for staying up so late is that I have been slowed down a bit during the day. But that’s okay. I am making some progress. Today I set up a new aquarium. I think I had some sort of strange algae growing in the old one and decided to retire it for now and try a new one. I made a little progress on window and cabinet cleaning. And I also attended a drop-in hour long dog training class from 5:30 to 6:30 pm. Shadow is making progress, little bit by little bit. But as the trainer, Ian, said this evening, “No matter what the literature says, a ‘doodle’ is a ‘doodle’ and they love to jump.” Shadow is certainly proof of that. He would win Olympic Gold in in any dog running race and the high jump to catch a tennis ball mid-air. Reining him in so he does not jump up on people is proving to be a true challenge, but we will persist.
by Judy Handley | Aug 2, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 214: Day Off
Date: Monday, August 2, 2021
Weather: Beautiful Day; High Temp 78, Low 58 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
What a beautiful day to just lay back and enjoy being. The weather was perfect and it ended up that I didn’t spent the afternoon with Ollie. He was deeply immersed in a building project and then had a friend coming over at 3:30. That meant I had the afternoon off and I enjoyed doing very little. I did roll up the Maui mat. It is 6 feet by 9 feet and is rigid foam. I rolled it as tight as I could and put it in my car to take to the Goldstones. The boys loved taking it to Maine last summer and requested to do the same this year. I did a little shopping for supplies needed for some of my planned projects while I was in town and then headed home to watch the Women’s Soccer Olympic semi-final game between the US and Canada. The US team will not be vying for the Gold in Tokyo as expected. It was a disappointing performance for the US team. Canada has not beaten the US team in twenty years, so they were ecstatic. I finished my evening by watching more Olympics. Hopefully tomorrow I will attack my to do list like some of the Olympic champions attack their races.
by Judy Handley | Aug 1, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 213: New Month, New Training
Date: Sunday, August 1, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 76, Low 62 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
Weatherwise, this first day of August on Cape Cod was much like yesterday—sunny and warm. Not as hot as I like it, but it was a lovely day. Ian, The Reliable Dog Trainer, offered an e-collar training starting today and I decided to give it a try. I am probably just throwing more good away as other training attempts with my little wild man have not worked. Some people view e-collars as cruel, but the way Ian does the training makes it feel okay to me. During the class today, Shadow was a super star. It was when we got home and I tried to mimic what Ian had done in class, that it didn’t work. Shadow is a smart dog and the minute he saw that I had the remote controller in my hand, he recognized it and evidently decided he would just glue himself to my leg. I was supposed to walk in front of him and say “come, come” while feeding him treats. After a few round of that, I was to add a slight zap, zap with the controller while still constantly giving him treats. When I did that, he stayed right next to me the whole time and then he laid down. Ian mentioned that as a possibility for some dogs. He called it Velcro dog and it usually means the zap is too strong, but it was only on a 4 out of 100 levels of stimulation. He had not reacted that way in class using the same setting. I stopped for today and will try again tomorrow using only treats. Then on Tuesday, I’ll add the zaps and see what happens. Maybe all I need to do is just hold the remote as he obviously doesn’t want me to use it. We were trained not to use the stimulation as a negative for now but simply train the dog to come using food as a reinforcer. Only after a few weeks of this can I use it train him not to jump on people. It is long process and I sincerely hope it works. I love my little wild man and he is such a good dog when I am the only other person in his life. But when you add anyone else, he immediately wants to jump up on them and lick them in the face. Training Shadow has been more challenging that I would ever have thought, but I really don’t know what I would do without him. I shall persist.
Ollie and I will spend tomorrow afternoon together and then I will begin my two weeks without grandchildren. I started the house cleaning this afternoon, one of my goals for the two weeks. Today I mostly I only thought about it while watching the Olympics. Tuesday I will seriously attack the job. And when I am not cleaning, I will do gardening and spend more time working with Shadow. At least that is the plan.
by Judy Handley | Jul 31, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 212: Strawberry Rhubarb Pie
Date: Saturday, July 31, 2021
Weather: Mostly Sunny; High Temp 72, Low 56 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
This crazy weather just bing bongs all over the place. Today was sunny but cool, especially after the sun set. At least we had sunshine during the day and no mosquitos at night.
I invited Heather and family over for dinner tonight and Ollie came early to cut Shirley’s grass and make a strawberry rhubarb pie with rhubarb Olga Mitchell gave him. Ollie is good little yard worker and is quite competent in the kitchen as well. I prepared the strawberries and the rhubarb, but he did the rest. The recipe called for lemon zest and I thought I might need to help him with that. But no. He did a better job than I would have. We had the pie for dessert and it was delicious.
Sam and Jonah leave for Scout camp tomorrow. When they return next Saturday, they leave for ten days in Maine. Ollie and Jed leave Tuesday for Maine. Ollie and I will hang out together on Monday, but then I will be without grandkids until August 19th or 20th. It will be a little lonely around here, but I have a list a mile long of things to do while the boys are away.
We all talked to Justin and family tonight via Skype. Coco had a great birthday yesterday and was still partying tonight. I can’t wait until Thanksgiving when I get to see Justin, Jo, Ziggy, and Coco and have my whole family together for a few days.
by Judy Handley | Jul 30, 2021 | 2021 Life Logs |
2021 Life Logs, Day 211: Happy Birthday to Coco and Rockin’ with Ollie and Jonah
Date: Friday, July 30, 2021
Weather: Mostly Sunny; High Temp 82, Low 54 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
My youngest and only female grandchild, Coco Annabelle, turned nine today. I gave her roller blades three years ago and it was time for the next size, so that was one of the presents I sent her. The other was a felting kit and a book explaining how to do felting. Jo sent a video of Coco opening the new roller blades and she was over-the-top excited. Then Jo sent another video of her looking quite competent on those new blades. Happy Birthday, Coco!
I picked Sam up and delivered him to Olga’s to do more yard work early this morning. Then I went to get him and we, along with Heather and Jed, went to see the culminating concert for Ollie and Jonah’s week-long Rock Bank Camp at Falmouth Academy.
In only four days, fifteen kids who had never played together before, learned to play four songs: Brain Stew, Seven Nation Army, Funky Town, and We Will Rock You. We were all quite impressed. Ollie played electric violin and Jonah played electric bass guitar and they rocked us all.
Then we celebrated with a lunch from the French bakery that we ate on the library lawn. A little later, the Goldpebbles went home with me to chill for the afternoon. On the way to my house, we stopped at Walmart to do a little shopping for ‘essentials’ for Scout camp coming up next week.
It was a beautiful afternoon, but when we got to my house, all three boys just wanted to read. So, Jonah and Ollie read in the backyard and Sam read down on the dock.Sam and Jonah head to Scout camp on Sunday for a week and on Tuesday or Wednesday, Jed and Ollie head to Maine. Then the next week, Heather, Sam, and Jonah will join them. Once they are all away, it will be very quiet around. But I have lots of projects to keep me busy!
I spent my evenings right now watching the Olympics. After I took the boys home and before the Primetime Olympics began, I watched the last half of the US Women’s Soccer team playing the Netherlands. Like the last game with Australia, this one ended in a tie. But because it was a quarter-finals game, both teams could not advance. It ended in a shoot out and the US came out on top. Go, USA.
