Sunday, September 28, 2008

A gift from the Neighborhood, and the first Ding Dong Award

Last night at 2am my "security system" went crazy. I woke up and heard voices in my yard. Young voices, telling the dogs they were "good dogs" but to "shhhhhh". I looked but couldn't see anything. A few moments later I heard the front gate latch and just figured then had come through the lot behind me. I went back to sleep.
In the morning I putzed, cleaned, and finally opened the shades of my bedroom and saw something very red in the back meadow, tucked under the "trees" (these are actually weeds). It wasn't moving. I continued to clean, the worst case scenarios running through my head.
Finally deciding there was nothing for it, I went out side with treats for the security system - who I know had tried valiantly to scare away the intruders - and spied this under the weeds:On closer inspection I found that it contained:
!!?? What…??? Really - I can't begin to imagine why this keg had to be brought all the way to the BACK of my yard, covered with a RED towel, and left there? - is it for later? - were they dumping it? how drunk were they really? Did they think I wouldn't notice? I discussed the matter with the El's and Mr. El said he'd take care of it. Then I started wondering, is there a refund for the keg? If so - hey thanks! And I also got a new trashcan out of the deal.

And the first Ding Dong Ward goes to…

A little background: My mother always referred to the students she really liked but who did dumb things as "ding dongs." After she died my sister and I picked this up fondly, as we were also working with teenagers and could understand our mother's sentiments. It finally came down to my giving out "Ding Dong Awards" in class - not often - but which came with the actual artifact. I had to give myself one; for writing on my brand new dry-erase board with a permanent marker. My students were thrilled.
Well - I'm ready to start handing them out for the work I'm doing on my house.
The first one is for the windows in my studio:
I painted them open.
Yep - I can't shut 'em - I've tried the knife etc. etc. but its not budging. Plan B is to get the ladder back out and try to lean on it from the top. Congratualtions to me!

2 comments:

McD said...

I think we just won the 2nd ding-dong award. Look at Kiersten's blog about our dishwasher.
If that keg has rootbear in it, stick it on the next train out of Philly.

A Pendley said...

Tara,
I found you through Mike Dean's blog. I hope you don't mind me blog stocking :) I have been wanting to get back in touch with you for a while. I was so excited to see you have a blog. I have a blog but it is private. I would love to send you an invite if you are interested. Just send me your e-mail address. My e-mail address is pendleya@gmail.com. I better go my little ones are needing my attention.
Hope to be in.touch with you soon!
Amy Pendley (Solum)