A lesson learned

As you saw, we had more snow this week. It was very pretty Monday morning when I went out to feed the birds (when I took the photo), but it's April! Time for the snow to take off, eh? It was cool for part of the week, but the warm'ish weather is supposed to arrive AND stay this weekend. I'll believe it when I see it.

I learned an expensive lesson this week with a traffic ticket. I haven't gotten a ticket in close to 40 years, and it was my fault. I failed to come to a complete stop before I made a right turn on a red light. I know I did slow down, as I drive a standard and had shifted down but I had to agree with the officer that I hadn't stopped. Knowing I deserved the ticket - he just happened to be there and immediately pulled me over - I was shocked when he told me the ticket was for $230! You can bet I'll be stopping at every red light and doing the count to three thing I learned in driver training, fifty years ago. In fact, later that day I did just that and the vehicle behind blared their horn at me for stopping that long. Hey, I don't want another ticket.

I was heading out to Costco to pick up some items for my daughter. They need police officers in the store to direct traffic. It was stupidly busy - my pet peeve is the folks who stop their carts adjacent to one another to chat so that no one else can get by them. Even with the conjection, I knew what I needed, and was in and out of the store in less than 30 minutes. I use the self-checkout because the line is almost always shorter and I have fewer items than most in the lines.

Wednesday was stitch and chat. We had a nice group, with a new member and a returning member. S is from India and is visiting her son here in the city for a few months. She was working on a crocheted blanket but was very interested in my flowers, so I helped her with the pattern - though I did tell I'd bring a written copy next week. Our other S, has returned from her winter in Arizona. Along with R, I, and myself, we all had a good afternoon visiting and working on our projects.

I was excited on Thursday afternoon to see the juncos are back! It means spring is definitely on its way. I like them too because they clean up the seeds the chickadees, sparrows, and finches drop from the feeder. My friendly Hungarian partridges also enjoy the overflow.

I captured a photo of the pair that seem to be spending a good deal in the back yard. They were huddled together (it was cold that day) and sitting in the sun.

No photo of the visitors, but it appears I have a pair of rabbits roaming through the yard too. This isn't the only evidence they leave behind. I did see one across the street, and it is mostly brown.

The curling has been very good this week, though our Canadian team had their ups and downs. They will be playing today in a must-win game. If they lose, they'll be going home. Last night's game against Niklas Edin was probably one of their best. Speaking of Niklas, he had a shot this week that has never been attempted in competition. I've linked the video here if you'd like to see it for yourself. While curlers do put rotation (in-turns or out-turns) on their rocks, this was a spinner that I don't believe anyone truly knew how it would react. There is already discssion that this may change the progression of the game. Already, one of our Canadian curlers, Mike McEwen has posted video of his attempt at the same shot...and he made it. However, Niklas did try the spinner again in the game against Canada last night and it didn't work as well as the team had hoped.

Beyond that, it's been a generally quiet week. Besides watching curling and baseball, I've been working on the flower afghan/blanket. I've pretty much run out of the yarn I've been using to create the flowers so now I'm putting the larger flowers together. I laid them out on my queen bed to get an idea of the size. It's not quite as big as I'd like but I'll put a row together this week of four or five of the flowers to get a measurement. I need to block the pieces first and that will take some time. 

I don't really celebrate Easter so we won't be having a big meal. The weather is supposed to really improve, so I plan to pull some burgers from the freezer and will use the grill for the first time this season. Today I'l make potato salad to go with the burgers. The only Easter bunny will be the rabbit that has been spotted across the street and it won't be bringing chocolate. 

Have a great weekend everyone. Enjoy your Easter, however you spend the time.