Yardwork

Ron finished the back yard mowing and brought yard leavings to the transfer station. I raked, not much.

He did the front yesterday and it looks great. I raked clumps of grass last evening and emptied the lawn mower basket, which was crammed, this morning.

Yesterday I dug out a big rock after trying to anchor one of the tiki torches to be used to support future bean plants. Arms and legs hurt like the devil last night.

The boys and their Dad waved on their way to their Tuesday night games.

I put the Swiss chard seedlings in the garden this morning. Not expecting much, we’ll see. Watered the new iris plants. Hoses are working great!

Played ball with Jett. Yogurt and Ron’s rhubarb sauce for breakfast, salad and melba toast for lunch.

Fixed; Feeling Better; The Spruces

I found and corrected the error in SendGrid: an extra, misplaced body tag. Now the confirmation emails for BRC2 render correctly.

Did a very light prune of the uphill-side of the rhodie. Not nearly the amount of frost damage as on our side, fortunately.

Last evening, Ron cooked the rhubarb from the Farmer’s Market and it is delicious! Had some on toast for breakfast.

Jett woke us up at 8. I had stomach pains last night but am fine today. Ate a peanut butter and lettuce sandwich for supper: big mistake.

Ron is still haruffing. Me? I’m still coughing up phlegm but am feeling better; this thing, whatever it is, takes about two weeks to leave. Maybe it’s allergies, who knows?

Ron and Jett discovered The Spruces yesterday; he is ecstatic, eager to go back.

I’m trudging through “North Woods”. Intriguing, clever if not fast-paced.

Signed Jett up for Spot/Spotify pet insurance. Got a 15% discount through T-Mobile so opted for a little better coverage at a slightly lower monthly premium.

Ron is off to the transfer station. Lots of paper and cardboard this time.

Pizza for supper. Ron and Jett went for a long walk.

Memorial Day

I finished mulching the corner garden and emptied three partial bags of potting soil and leftover garden soil with worms (!) into the raised beds on the deck.

Played throw-and-fetch with Jett for a while.

Pruned the dead frost-bitten clumps off the rhodie. Ron helped. Sadly, a couple of healthy flower buds got cut off.

Did some work on BRC2. One easy fix that was hard to diagnose: had forgotten to add an app setting for the BRC2 fee to web.config. Uploaded new files.

Jett and I dropped by Pine Cobble School to pick up leftovers: Carbon tomatoes, parsley, chard and a ground cover-like plant with little white flowers.

For some reason, the meaning of Memorial Day is hitting me particularly this year. A lot of Berkshire towns held parades and ceremonies today, but I didn’t care to attend. I’m thinking about the West Point graduates having to listen to a lunatic, and same lunatic posting venom on his Social Media page.

Young Farmer at Pine Cobble, Raining

Jett and I were up at 6:30. Made our breakfasts, let him out, showered, dressed.

Bought eggs from a young farmer at the Pine Cobble School plant sale, then pastries and two Brandywine tomato plants from vendors at the Williamstown Farmers Market.

Stopped at Provisions for Nostalgia almond croissants.

Played catch with Jett for a short while. Rain turned from light to unpleasant.

Visited the Harper Center senior art show. Some fine work but didn’t see the abstract pieces I liked at the library.

Rain

We’ve been warned of a Nor’easter through Friday. It’s been raining; fortunately, got the phlox, a little late-bloomer that looks like a head of butter lettuce and chunks of iris in yesterday.

Spread mulch in the corner garden, more to do.

Changed the sheets yesterday. Ron did a shop. I stopped at the Food Pantry. Did two loads of laundry.

Got a reminder that I have a prepaid card from a settlement with Equifax: $7.44. Used it this morning for a partial payment to National Grid.

Cleared the shop vac hose, finally. It was plugged with lint. Finished vacuuming the third bedroom. A couple of days ago, the blade on the floor fan exploded into thousands of tiny pieces and I’ve been worried about Jett’s getting into them.

Speaking of Jett, he kept me company during a rain break while I planted the rest of the Japanese iris in the corner garden. Fingers crossed that it “takes”.

Mulch, Scam Prevention, Free Plants

We had pizza and listened to a presentation by the DA’s office about scams directed at us, the elderly. Worthwhile.

I finished mulching the area around the hydrangeas.

Afterwards we dug up plants at a house in South Williamstown. Magnificent grounds. Came home with Japanese iris and phlox.

This was the first time Jett rode in the truck. It was a little awkward getting him in and out, but we and he managed.

Back and Forth

My day started early, preparing for the meeting with Andi this afternoon. I found a barcode reader app for the phone which sends the numerical code to the desktop.

I was a couple of minutes late for my haircut appointment but got there just as she was putting a cape on another person. Hairdresser did a nice job.

Quick lunch then met as planned with Andi for about an hour. Got a couple of specs for reports.

Decided it was early enough, around 2:00, to drive to Pittsfield to the Mad Mac people for Ron’s phone.

Incredibly, they fixed it. We didn’t need an appointment and they didn’t even charge! Great to know there’s a certified Apple repair shop less than half an hour and a very easy drive away.

Ron drove us to Walmart afterwards so I could pick up my meds and some Trump bags.

Got home around 5. We watched the news, took care of a few dishes; meanwhile, Ron took Jett for a walk. They are averaging well over 2 miles a day!

I changed the title of the blog to “A North County Blog”.

Reporting Services and MySQL

I kept getting messages that the architectures of ODBC and Reporting Services were incompatible. I couldn’t figure out why that was happening since I thought everything was 64 bit.

Turns out I had to use 32 bit MySQL ODBC drivers to get SSRS to work. This meant that not only did I have to download an outdated driver, I had to find the Windows 32-bit ODBC Data Source Administrator to locate the driver and set up the new data source.

I did get everything to work and ran a report.

It’s awkward to use the MySQL Workbench.

Meanwhile, Ron took Jett for a walk before it got too late.

We had corn, salad and asparagus for a late lunch.

Jett misbehaved a bit, got into trash cans and kept taking his ball out of the basket.

Good rain for most of the day.

We both played catch and retrieve with Jett when the rain stopped.

Better

I’m feeling a lot better. Still stuffy and not up for going out so I missed some music at Williams that I’d been looking forward to hearing.

Ron’s phone decided to stall halfway through an update and in spite of all my trying, it’s been impossible to get it to either finish or quit.

I uploaded changes to BRC2 this morning. Spent some time trying to figure out how to add a report to Remedy. Still working on it.

I played ball with Jett and while I was outside, did some light watering and weeding.

Ron picked up groceries. He’s taken Jett out for walks a couple of times today, including around 8 pm in the rain. Our neighbor Brian spotted him and gave him an official Williamstown COA reflective vest!

Rough Night

I was up at midnight and again around 2. Couldn’t stop coughing. Let Jett out and put his breakfast together at 7. Went back to bed for a couple of hours.

Let Jett out around 11:30 so he could relieve himself. We played a little fetch. He and Ron went out for a walk.

Ron is refilling the mouse traps. We’ve caught three in the last week to ten days.

Slept off and on throughout the day. Feeling better by evening.

Ron brought home supper from Coyote Flaco.