I don't have a lot of shoes which is unusual for a woman I have my walking shoes and a spare, 1 pair of slippers and 1 pair of flat shoes that i can't get into anymore because my big toe joint hurts when I put them on.Had to wear them for my friend's funeral last year and they wasn't very comfortable.
Just a bit of routine maintenance on my tenor saxophone. It's a Japanese manufactured, Yamaha YTS 62. I've always considered them a mechanical marvel, little changed in over 100 years. Lots of rods and levers required as it has twenty-two keys and you only have two hands! Some keys are open and others closed in the "rest" position. They are operated by the four fingers, thumb and palm of the left hand and the four fingers and the side of the index finger of the right hand, the thumb just used to support the instrument. They are very tactile and ergonomically designed, so your fingers naturally rest on the keys when you hold the instrument. Maintenance is just brushing off any dust, light oiling of moving parts and dragging "powder papers" between the pads and the ports to remove any stickiness. Theres also a long brush you can use to dust the inside of the body. With the mouthpiece, you just need to remove the reed, change it if necessary, or wash it under a tap and give the body of the mouthpiece a good clean out. A box of reeds can have "good and bad ones," though they all look the same, so you always nurse a good one. A further job was to replace two missing rubber "stops," which prevent part of the lever of a key from banging against the body of the instrument when the key is depressed. A bit fiddly as they are a tiny bit of rubber not much more than about 2mm square. So it's job with a tiny bit of glue and tweezers. Quality branded saxophones are expensive to buy, mine has risen a third in price in the ten years I've had it, but are supplied with a cheap plastic mouthpiece. The manufacturers know that the talented players (I'm not one) will use one of their own choice rather than that supplied, often using the same one they had on their previous instrument. Mouthpieces have different gaps between the tip of the mouthpiece and the reed, identified by a number, a personal choice. This is mine, it's a metal Otto Link Super Tonemaster New York and I use a Rovner fabric ligature, with Vandoren ZZ reeds. To give you an idea how ridiculously expensive it is to have as a hobby, a box of five of these reeds is now around £20. Reeds come in different strengths (thickness) too. The higher the number, the louder it will sound. There's also a choice of exactly how much of the reed you have protruding (if any) from the tip of the mouthpiece and where you position the ligature, the choice is endless. The "in joke" amongst saxophone players, many of whom struggle to find work in the music business, is.. How can you recognise a professional saxophone player's car? It's the one with the pizza delivery sign on the top.
Well, today was a great day! I received a call from a home-bound friend, asking if I could bring dinner to her--leftovers would be fine. Meals on Wheels wouldn't be able to add her to their list until Monday. Whoopee! I get to cook for her for three days! I asked her for preferences in foods, thawed some home-made rolls, and started on tonight's dinner with fresh vegetables and a nice pork chop. She understands there is no dessert since my husband is diabetic, but she doesn't care. I'll take her a hot meal about 5:30, and ask her if she would like grilled chicken with green beans and baby red potatoes for tomorrow. Lunch is a pasta salad, and tomorrow's lunch will be a steamed vegetable salad (Salad Nicoise) with French bread. I may throw in a rose bouquet!
I watch some of these videos and this one is so sad and what will happen to those puppies and the mother when they go back to the owner.
Today the bf and I took the roommates kids (11 yr old boy and 13 - almost 14 - yr old girl) to the 4H fair. I'm exhaustipated!
4H fairs are so much fun! Watching the youngsters show their cattle, goats, sheep, chickens--I love those fairs! Our local fair is in August, and my husband always wants to know why I want to attend. "You have chickens, why do you want to go look at chickens?" Because they are there!
We've a Baumatic oven in our kitchen, we've had it several, years, it replaced a top of the range Stoves we had when we had the new kitchen. I gave the Stoves away after a year as you couldn't really clean the roof of the oven as it didn't come with a removable top liner. So some of whatever you cooked last time, dripped onto what you were cooking next time! When I complained, the manufacturers suggested we used a toothbrush to clean around the elements! Anyway, the Baumatic needs a new door seal as when the oven gets hot, if you open the door the top part of the seal droops down a bit as it has expanded, so when you close the door, you don't get a good seal. It should be a straight forward replacement as there's removable plates inside the corners of the seal with a pin in the middle that just hooks into four tiny holes in the body of the oven. One of Baumatic's websites doesn't work, (why don't they close them down when they open a new one?) On the new on, the seal listed is obviously the wrong one and it's priced at nearly fifty quid! Couldn't phone as they don't work Saturdays. I found another supplier of Baumatic spares and was surprised to get a response at 9.00pm to my much earlier sent e-mail! I guess someone is working from home. They're quite helpful I've sent them a photo of one of the corners of the seal with the clip and they are going to check for me. But I spent over an hour tryng to sort it out in the afternoon. I've also been looking on the internet for another Acer Palmatum Taylor, as the one we bought on eBay two years ago got killed off by that sharp frost a couple of months back. I say "bought" but I got a full refund for it as it was nothing like the illustration on the website. I must have tried over tweny places, but no one has got any, though a few will e-mail me when they are back in stock. As I suspected, afterwards I was able to remove over twenty cookies these sites had left on my laptop. Sites now have to ask you to accept cookies but many don't and those that do won't give you a straight "yes or no," choice. I only keep cookies that retain passwords. The rest get deleted before I close down my laptop each night.
This is my Leak 2000 tuner/amplifier. It was made in 1976. I bought it quite cheaply on eBay over ten years ago to replace a Philips 790 tuner/amp I bought in 1972 which had given up the ghost. These Leaks are very popular and one in full good cosmetic and working condition will fetch over £100. I use it mainly with my jukebox wall box systems to play mp3s through it and my big Goodmans speakers. It's also used if I want to listen to the radio, (rarely), play a record or a cassette. It's also connected to the TV, so I can through it and the speakers, channel the TV sound, or a stick with music in the side of it. Or any of this lot under the TV. Yesterday, I turned on its radio and moved the tuning knob to find a station, but nothing happened. When I took the top off I saw that the cord that drives the tuning gang had come of the wheels. I guess due to lack of use. So this afternoon I decided to repair it. I have a service manual which has a whole page on how to "re-string" the tuning cord. But you need a special tool which I don't have, the cord is most unco-operative and unsurprisingly, a bit stiff after all these years. I had to make do with different hooks I made from gardening wire. The access is terrible. There's an illustration in the service manual to show you which way the cord goes around the wheels. The cord travels round two little wheels at one end, one part moves the pointer along the dial, the other end goes twice round the spindle that is connected to the tuning knob, then twice round a three inch wheel connected to the tuning gang, then round two little wheels at the other end. It was an absolute pain to do and took me the best part of half an hour. I had to remove part of the front trim to get the cord round the right-hand wheel as there's a little metal plate that's supposed to stop the cord slipping off at that end. Then I had to make sure the pointer was in the right position. I then gave the wheels a spray with switch cleaner, oil would just gum them up. Job done! I'm now "all systems go." Though I've no idea when I'll next use the radio. But, "I like my stuff to be working," even if I rarely use it.
All day we've had sunshine and showers, been able to miss them while walking the dogs, but the last walk it was very warm and I took a chance and didn't take my jacket and got wet. At least it was the last one and i could dry myself off.
We had showers, light ones that didn't amount to much accumulation. They did diminish the chance of grass fires from fireworks on the 4th. Since I couldn't be out without becoming wet, I baked cookies and made sure the cats on the porch were dry. Tomorrow is picking the gardens again, and perhaps making Marinara sauce.
@marlingardener I hope you're friend appreciated the home cooked meals. A huge step up from Meals on Wheels!
Cayuga, thank you! Yes, she did appreciate the meals I brought and mentioned that to me several times. I love to cook, and when someone likes my cooking, it gives me "warm fuzzies" all over!
Today hubby had his hernia repair operation, it went well but the surgeon said that it was a really bad one He's home now and fast asleep in his chair and he said that all that he wants is a lot of cups of tea, but he's asleep.
