I spent the morning in my vegetable garden, turning over and weeding my four raised beds and planting various veggies. (Including tomato plants, I am a mater racer of the first order, probably going to be running around like an idiot in a week or so covering them up to protect from a late frost.) It was wonderfully peaceful and not only felt but sounded like spring. The birds were merrily singing, and I would cock my head occasionally to try and identify a particular song. The male Red Bellied Woodpecker was heartily rapping on my metal gutter in an attempt to convince the females in the area that he is the hard-headed (literally) stud of the neighborhood and they would be simply nuts to pass him up. As the morning wore on lawn mowers, sleepy from their long winter hibernation, sputtered into life all around me, as neighbors prepared to give their lawns their first haircut of the year. Cabbage white butterflies danced in the air, looking for some unsuspecting cabbage to lay their eggs on, and occasionally stopping to feed from the bright yellow wild strawberry flowers. I made a mental note to plant some mustard for them, their caterpillars love it. To my utter delight and surprise I saw two Eastern Tiger Swallowtails sail above my head. Their flight is not supposed to begin until May. My instincts were right, it is going to be a good year for butterflies. In my turn around the garden I noticed that Spring was truly upon us. Hosta plants, always a sign of the times, are pushing their spikes above ground having hunkered down beneath the soil all winter. My Elephant Ears, a plant I am told I can not over-winter here, are again coming up for their fifth year, bigger and better than ever. And, the most joyous harbinger of Spring, the apple blossom and my prized Lady Banks rose are blooming. I had lusted after a Lady Banks for years and last year I finally managed to find one (wouldn't you know it, this year they have dozens of them for sale at Lowes.) Almost as if by request, this afternoon we had a heavy rain storm, which saved me the chore of watering in all the plants and seeds that I had planted. In short order I should be harvesting fresh radish and baby lettuce leaves for home grown salads, which are so superior to the store-bought kind they are almost beyond comparison. Come summer, when the temps are reaching the upper 90s, and when I sink my teeth into a tomato still warm from the sun, I will remember this day, the most perfect Spring day when I listened to the Earth wake up, and I, like the birds just reveled in the season.

So yesterday evening I came home from work, tidied up as I usually do, put away a load of laundry, packed my husband's bags for the next couple of days, and did some dishes. I then sat on my patio, in the screened gazebo, with a nice glass of wine and chilled. (a large glass of wine that is, I am a large glass of wine type of girl, ask anyone who knows me). So the boxers came out to join me and shortly thereafter Lucky came out to join us all and sat, quietly, minding his own business, under the patio table. At some point, Cueball took it into his pea sized brain to attack Lucky. This is a stupid thing to do on two counts a) Cueball hardly ever wins, Lucky with his much longer and sharper teeth almost always gets the better of Cueball's saggy jowels and any blood that is involved comes from Cueball, and b) Cueball knows that the result is going to be me grabbing him by the collar and dragging him off which results in him being put in some sort of "jail" for an hour or so. In any event, before I could get my hand under Cueball's collar he managed to knock over the patio table on which of course was my very large glass of red wine (Yellow Tail Shiraz-Cabernet) so the patio table went one way and the glass of wine went the other, landing for the most part on Cueball's back. Once Cueball had been dragged off to "jail" I realized that he had been the recipient of the entire glass of very red wine all over his back, and he was, not to put too fine a point on it, now purple. So I have a purple boxer. I have thought about bathing him but you know, I think he should be required to suffer being purple for a while considering his transgressions, I think that perhaps walking around like a purple poof for a while will do him the world of good. Of course, that is making the assumption that Cueball actually thinks about anything, and the jury is still out on that one.

but my husbands kids want more photos on the web that they can use as wallpaper on their computers in husband's office.... so forgive me for this indulgence.... I give you the West Columbus High School Marching Vikings, the best band in North Carolina as far as I am concerned but then again I am a little biased to say the least...:)

While most folks will tell you that they know this because they have been watching their local weather man, if I had listened to my local weather man I would have expected the storm at about 3pm this afternoon, but no, it was still balmy and sunny at 3pm, and still at 6pm it was wonderful, at 7pm however Lucky, my cocker spaniel/black lab cross jumped up onto my lap and attempted to crawl up onto my head. "oh" I said to myself "there's a storm coming". Lucky hates storms, he takes them personally, as if they are actually out to get him and the best place to hide is with his head in my armpit, thinking, as he does that if he can't see it, it can't see him. So while Lucky was busily stuffing his head under my armpit the marble sized hail arrived, then the rolling thunder. If nothing else Lucky is a wonderful barometer, I know at least thirty minutes before it arrives that a storm is coming. Right now he has escaped to the bedroom (I let him in there) where he can hide in the closet until the storm passes. He never used to be like this, but one year he got heartworm (despite being on prevention) and had to go into the vets on an inpatient basis for chemo. While he was there in the vets, there was an horrific thunderstorm overnight and he has been terrified of them ever since, I think he associates thunderstorms with chemo so it is no wonder that he is terrified. Still, the pounding rain will at least wash away all the pine pollen which is playing damn havoc with my sinuses and my eyes at the moment. I woke up this morning and my eyes were glued shut, I hate it when that happens! Hopefully this storm will roll through pretty quick and there will not be too much damage. In the meantime you can reach Lucky in the bedroom closet.

As I have told you I have been in the process of refinancing my home. After hurricane Floyd, because we had no flood insurance (we were not in a flood zone), we got a disaster assistance loan from FEMA to help us rebuild. As a result of this we were consistently "upsidedown" with regards to equity since 1999 which made refinancing our high interest mortgage impossible. Recently I had vinyl siding put on the house and figured that perhaps the value might have increased enough that we could refinance our high interest mortgage. So we had the house appraised. And guess what, it just appraised at TWICE what we paid for it in 1991. Not bad going for 14 years. I would love to hear of another investment where you get 100% return on your investment over the course of 14 years. I had always been taught by my mother that if you were going to spend money on accommodation, always spend it on a mortgage as opposed to lining a landlord's pockets. (She recently sold a house, which she bought for 4,000 british pounds for 65,000 british pounds) When I first moved here my husband wanted to rent a small apartment, I insisted on buying a house (I think he objection to a house had more to do with having a lawn to mow than it did anything else). I think that right now my decision has been proved to be the right one. Not only that, but while it appraised at twice what we paid for it, with the current market in this area, with there being more buyers than sellers, and a shortage of single family houses, houses are not only selling above appraised value but are selling at much above LISTING price due to the desperate buyers out-bidding each other for the few and far between houses that are on the market which according to a story I read today go from listing to sale in TEN days. I know people are talking about a "bubble" in other areas of the country, but here the "bubble" has only just (in the last two or three months) begun to inflate. Who knows where prices will go? Don't stuff your pocket full of rent receipts, stuff your house full of equity, it is well worth the money. Finally factor in that we are about to receive an influx of 3,000 more marines to Camp Lejeune, (with all their dependents) and who knows what the market will do? Way I look at it, I am refinancing my mortgages and paying off all of my other debts and I STILL have equity in my home. Can't beat that. As Lex Luthor said in Superman "stocks may rise and fall, banks are no damn good but people will always want land" (or something similar to that) smart man that Lex Luthor.