Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Modems and Frogs and Chocolate, Oh My!

The phone company sent over a new modem with built-in wifi capabilities. When Ivan has time to install it, we'll see if that improves our service.

Meanwhile we've had company for a few days. This morning Joe's been teaching Ivan how to use a program available for PC users that is like an online notebook, keeping track of all kinds of info in various folders and sub-folders.

There have been lots of talking, lots of eating, lots of laughing... and trying to stay cool. The power outages continued for about 24 hours and then improved. Yay! It's no fun when there's no power, therefore no fan action, and the heat index reads 96º. When our friends arrived on Monday we were on the back patio under the awning, trying to catch every little tiny breeze that happened along. Yesterday and last night it stormed off and on, but the rain didn't cool things down as much as it usually does. But at least we have fan action!

Ivan and Joe were over at the lot yesterday when the storm first hit, and Ivan snapped a photo of the wall of water that came washing down our street :(  I'll be sharing the photo on Project 365 this weekend, but just let me tell you, seeing the photo was rather disconcerting! Ivan says we'll have to be careful how we level the property to build, so we don't end up with water coming up to the house whenever it rains really hard like that.

Hard, fast rains always leave a pond in the back yard here for an hour or two and last night it brought out the frogs in force. I counted at least nine hopping around our tiny back yard, swimming where it was deep enough. We'd gone outside to take advantage of the cooler temperature and the frogs kept us thoroughly entertained for a while! An oddity: one of the frogs was much lighter and greener in color than the others which were a brownish green color that blended more with the grass and plants. I tried taking some photos but not sure any of them will be good enough to share.

Isn't my life too exciting for words? Try not to be jealous. If it makes you feel any better, I just ran out of the yummy Millstone coffee beans I brought back from the U.S. and can't have my morning cup of hazelnut. Tragic, no?

What makes me feel even worse is the news that cocoa is expected to sky-rocket now that turmoil in the Ivory Coast is threatening to cut off up to 40% of the world's cocoa supply. YIKES!

Now THAT is truly tragic!

9 comments:

Oldfangled said...

Aww, watching the frogs sounds fun!

The Bug said...

We have a couple of very fat frogs that lived in our garden & flower bed. Guess they're hibernating now? We thought they were great fun, although not very active at all.

That IS tragic about the chocolate! Maybe this will help me lose weight?

Betty W said...

I wish my life were peaceful enough to watch frogs right now. But work is keeping me really stressed. I´m glad you got some rain. I totally know what it´s like when the power goes out and we sit in the heat waiting for a cooling breeze.

riTa Koch said...

Hope is on the horizon--faster internet access + easier organization! But when you minus coffee and chocolate = X ? Let us know what that equation is. ;)

Skoots1moM said...

froggies...funny!
wonder if the lighter green was a youngster?
hope your power stays on...i would be dying, for sure.
and, the news of cocoa...TRAGIC! that means all our favs will be going up, up, up in price.
may god send you cool breezes ;)

sara said...

yea for faster internet!!! I hope it works!

the cocoa news has me in a bit of a shock! definitely tragic!

Mari said...

Yes - that is tragic! Now the faster internet - that's wonderful. Hope it works!

Jen T said...

Please tell me you're kidding about the cocoa crisis..I don't think I can handle anymore bad news in the world! Ok, one, thank you for coming by & I'll email you how I did the mirror. Now, seriously, the rain & frogs & heat AND you don't have your coffee?! You are tougher than I would be! Can I mail you some coffee? Do you have someone hooking you up? If not, please tell me...we can't let bad things happen to good people! JenT
PS I'm totally serious about the coffee!

Lhoyt said...

Looking forward to hearing how the new modem works out.
BTW, I got the keyboard changeover figured out on the new laptop my family gave me for Christmas, so now I'm able to spell correctly in both English and Spanish--not that I always will, but at least the potential is there.