The Blackburn Digest

Guinea Pigs are a “good thing”! Abuelita’s Casita (in its present incarnation), takes two very long days to complete. The Guinea Pigs departed TGFT workshop around 7 PM with the wiring to be done as homework. We were a tired but happy group, our various adobe treatments look awesome. and The Guys now know they need to pre-finish some areas, send the Day One students home with a work assignment or otherwise pare the class back to its planned 1.5 day length. I’m confident I can complete the wiring at home and I have never seen “scale adobe” look this realistic - collectors are going to love this workshop!!

Awoke stiff and sore (the expected result of yesterday’s long drive), but eager to go through the boxes of miniature treasures I brought back and carefully return them to the Conservatory and Oak Shadows. However, I had a trek across San Antonio to make first, to deliver my friend’s room boxes. Driving was the easy part; removing the Very Large (did I mention heavy?) box from The Lady and helping N. carry it through garage, dining room, living room and hallway to its new location was a real test! Took my usual tour of her huge collection, showed her where to dock her camera’s memory card (”No, the port won’t be on the keyboard.”), then had to go poking around her system trying to figure out just where the pictures had been saved to! G-d, I hate Windows Vista!!! LOL! Eventually found enough energy to point my car towards home and “play time”. . . . . .or not.

I put nearly 500 miles on The Lady’s odometer today, and now feel like I put twice that mileage on me! (Dealing with miles of Houston-area traffic added to the *thrill factor*.) Despite the “little football players wearing cleats” which are now running around vigorously on my upper back and the new expletives my wrists & legs seem to have learned, I am a very happy gal!

Being an impatient sort (hehe - that shouldn’t surprise anyone who knows me!), I arranged to drive to Dickinson, TX to pick up my newest miniature treasure -a “Lady Jane” Conservatory - rather than (shudder!) trust the postal system to deliver it to me swiftly and undamaged. I left Casa Blackburn at 9 AM and located the Elmer’s (of “GweChe Collectibles”) driveway a little before our agreed upon 2 PM arrival time. Visited with Carroll & Gary Elmer (delightful people, attendees of many Castine workshops and well-known among discerning collectors of miniatures for many decades. Gary is an IGMA Fellow.) and thoroughly enjoyed a tour of the remaining (and still stellar) collection of artisan’s creations, many of which they are re-homing prior to moving/downsizing.

Spent the AM attempting to do catch-up reading of my various on-line miniaturist’s interest groups. Took myself off to the optometrist’s for my 2 PM appointment, to see what had changed since my last (2005!) exam. Answer: very little, which is Good News! It seems that my oddball “deep astigmatism” is still being counterbalanced by the normal ageing process;)

I am definitely back in mini-mode: SAM’s BD in Tomball this past weekend, more work accomplished on that project this morning, a road-trip to Dickinson, Texas scheduled for Thursday (more about that later) and a 1.5 day workshop with the “TGFTGP” (The Guys From Texas Guinea Pigs) in their New Braunfels workshop this coming weekend! Sort of wears me out thinking about it, but I shall muddle through and enjoy!

Yesterday’s work on ‘Tis The Season (the SAM’s ‘08 BD project) brought me to a point where I could ascertain what paint colors I needed. Of course, Murphy’s Law prevailed - none of them are colors I have in my huge stash! (DH’s comment was, “I thought you already had one of every color!”) Well. . . . . . .theses are tans & neutrals and. . . .no, I don’t have them. Fortunately, Hobby Lobby still has their .77 & .99 cent sale in progress today, so I added a couple of the usually-expensive metallics to my basket.

My second errand was the pharmacy, to pick up the next month’s supply of Humira. I usually do not read the receipt carefully, but this time I found myself undoing the *privacy fold* and received a reality check! “Your Insurance Saved You $3415.29.” Saved is definitely the key word! It certainly made me realize I am blessed to be covered by medical insurance! (The normal dosage of twice a month costs half that - still unavailable to I-wonder-how-many-who-need-it!)

The 6:30 AM wake-up call from the motel switchboard was not a welcome sound, but I figured I’d function a great deal better after a cup of coffee. Hmm, what’s going on here? I plugged the coffee pot in. I turned the switch to “on” . . . .well, there weren’t actually any labels visible, but I turned the switch in the direction opposite to where I found it. I watched . . .I waited. . . I think I actually vocalized a plea or four - but no luck, No Coffee!