Chop, Snap, Crack, and $120 Later

Yesterday I found two men going from house to house cleaning up the yards and cutting down hedges and tree branches in my neighborhood. It was Sunday, so that made them even more noticeable, since Floridians are notoriously sleepy on Sundays. Yes, they must have heard about the HOA Nazi's demands and are taking advantage of it. Because, you know, when you have to cut down branches and trimmed hedges and are looking for ways not to do it, what easier way to avoid that than when two guys with rakes and power tools stop right at your door and offer their services to do that immediately? No waiting! No sweating! No need to even pick up the phone! Okay, go ahead, cut, chop, rake, shape.

So they made their way down the road to my little jungle and knocked at my door. Of course I hired them on the spot, seeing that they had already done such a fine job with all my other neighbors' yards. I gave them ice tea and generally helped out with the smaller stuff because I needed the exercise (my butt, it groweth).

They were funny as heck. One of the guy's name is Kermit and being African American, he told me his parents must have hated him. I asked him whether he allowed his friends to call him Kermit. He told me his friends called him Frog.

And you know what? Frog is a cool nickname for a SEAL. I'm so going to steal that to introduce this character I'm writing right now. ;-) So now you know where I get my names and ideas.

So now--neat and nice bushes. Do you think the HOA Bitch will leave me alone for another week before she threatens legal action against me for not power-washing my sidewalks? I give her ten days, tops.

(((shrug)))

(Oh, I am soooo bad. My next door neighbor is also on the HOA board, although she hasn't said anything to me. We get along pretty well. She saw me loading half a dozen boxes of books into my truck and asked me what I was doing with them. I told her that I was taking it to the UBS to get some money to pay off the cost of the yardwork yesterday. Hee. Bet you I started a nice gossip topic. Wonder how poor I'll be by the time that story gets back to my ears. Double Hee.)

I know I'm terribly behind in updating all my other blogs. It's been a crazy couple of months. I find that the more I don't work, the more chores I have to do. And of course, the eyelid surgery thing took about two weeks of my happy schedule.

Tomorrow I'm going to look at a couple of the conventions mentioned here by a few of you: the Atlanta Con and Denvention. I don't have much information about it. And oh, RWA San Francisco is coming up soon! Better get airline tickets soon before they cost me a month's mortgage. Grrr. Where is my jetpack? Where is my molecular transfer machine? Instead, I'm probably going to have to look at some personal stuff to sell on EBay to get that extra money so I don't feel too guilty about taking off to San Francisco.

Are any of you living in that area planning to at least drop by for the Literacy Signing? RWA Con doesn't happen very often on the West Coast, so do please try to make it, if you're located nearby.

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My recommended read of the week: Gena Showalter's The Darkest Night. It's a different take of the Pandora's Box myth and it has some pretty darn sexy sounding warriors. I think most of you will like the book.

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