Sandy is leaving for NY today with Truman...their last agility trial of the year. Lily, Bub and I will be "home alone" this weekend. I hope Bub lets me sleep in....I know Lily will!

I made a new Doggie Dooley...one with just holes in the bottom, instead of having the bottom cut out completely...a design flaw of mine. I have to dig up the other one...remove it...without getting too much poop on me...and then install the new one. Wish me luck! It's a shitty job, but somebody's got to do it!

This weekend I think I'll clean up the garden pond, remove the lily pads and other greenery and take the pumps out. I have to get another floating heater to keep a hole in the ice over the winter. The fish are still eating...reluctantly. So, I think I'll stop feeding them...unless the temp goes way up. I also think I will be getting a net to put over the pond to keep the leaves and other debris out. That should help reduce the yuck factor.

I'm kind of at loose ends without having the Sox to watch in the World Series. Oh well...there's always next year! The Pats got bad news, Brady's knee got infected and he has to have more procedures to clean it out. That's never good.

I'm thinking I'll try to get some single game tickets to the Huskies....they are picked to be #1 this year and some wags are predicting an unbeaten season. That would be nice!

I subscribed to Consumer Reports Money Guide and I'm going to throw in tips I've learned from time to time in this blog. Here's the first one: some good sites that offer deep discounts:

www.bluefly.com www.eluxury.com www.net-a-porter.com For Clothing

shopper.cnet.com www.jr.com www.buy.com www.streetprices.com For Electronics (they also recommend samsclub, bestbuy, costco, amazon and circuirtcity

That should be enough to get you started. If you ever want to consult with them on other things, let me know and I'll look it up for you!

Big Adventure tonight! The power went out in the neighborhood....which is odd since all the utilities are buried in this area.

Anyway, it hit a bit after five. I had time to gather the lanterns and put tea lights in the other candle type lights. I also got a fire going to keep it warm in here.

I was just cooking my supper on the grill (used the side burner for the first time...to cook my baked beans) when a light went on in the side yard. I said to myself, "oh, Cliff and Kathy have lights...." then I realized it was our motion sensor light on the garage. DUH! I turn around and look, sure enough...lights on in the breakfast nook!

I was looking forward to the peace and tranquility of no electric hums, tv, etc. Maybe I'll go in the cellar and pull the switch!

The dogs got a bit hinky about not having power...they found it very strange and were very clingy for awhile. Then they settled down and enjoyed it.

I got the winter comforter for the bed down from the attic and on the bed...along with the mattress warmer. I'll be all set tonight...I can have the window open tonight...as long as no one is burning wood like last night. I couldn't take the smoke coming in the window...it was really choking me. I had to get up and shut the window. I put the ceiling fan on and that kept me nice and cool even though the window was shut.