Beware the Ides of March!

(I just felt like being literary. :)

I've got some photos I want to download, but for some reason, ever since I set the computer up on the new cart none of the USB ports will recognize the camera. Or my external drive. I've been going through all kinds of contortions trying to nail the problem. It's not the USB ports--they read my travel drive, MP3 player, and printer. It's not the cables on the camera or external drive--they work fine on my laptop. I've updated the USB drivers and the camera driver. I switched out the monitor to see if somehow the new monitor was messing things up. Nada. I don't know what else to check.

I guess I can download the pictures to the laptop, transfer them to the travel drive, and then download them from the travel drive to the desktop, but I don't know how I'm going to do my monthly backups. I like to keep my photos and genealogical stuff backed up since they change so often and losing the material would be basically catastrophic, personally speaking. Maybe it's time for me to learn how to burn a DVD--I guess I could keep one for photos and one for the genealogy. Except you can't reuse them, can you? Well, I'll figure something out.

It's gotten cold again--not for long, but it's also snowing (!) with some rain to follow, which will make the leaves I was going to rake wet. Or wetter. The top layers are dry but the lower layers are still pretty wet. And the puppy pen will be wet and messy. Again.

And I'm exercising. If there's one thing in the world I cordially loathe, it's exercise. But I started PT yesterday, and have to go 3x a week for the next 4 weeks, and do these exercises for my quads at home--twice a day if I can manage it. The physical therapist was impressed by how off track my kneecaps are. No doubt this is why it became more and more uncomfortable for me to ride in a saddle (not that I've ridden any lately)--I used to kick my left foot out of the stirrup because it bothered that knee. Anyway, after doing the quad exercises yesterday I thought oh heck, I might as well do something for my arms and see if I can strengthen that shoulder that's bothering me, so I got out the dumbbells and waved them around for a while. Next thing you know, I'll be doing crunches.

I wish I could ride (she said wistfully). That's the only type of exercise I've ever loved. I was never a trained rider, but I think riding a horse bareback uphill and down, ducking branches, jumping logs and creeks, etc., gives you plenty of chance to use your body, and then there's grooming and cleaning feet and so on before and after. And there's nothing like riding a horse you have some connection with, so that you can read each other and trust each other. (*big sigh*)

And oh yes, I have to try to load time onto my Tracfone again. Somehow I messed it up last time, and the Tracfone support folks weren't too helpful.. (Why do companies bother with "support" when they never provide any? Think of all the money they'd save--and probably a lot of frustration and ill will from their customers.)

Last of all, I have to to go Walmart. I think I mentioned that this latest bout with depression has upset the dogs, and Taenzer has been partly expressing this by pooping on the rugs. I like to have non-skid rugs or runners down, partly to protect the floors and partly to protect the dogs' joints! So I need to replace a couple, and I just couldn't find what I wanted at K-Mart. I really tried, but they didn't have anything that looked good with what's in my house and was serviceable and inexpensive.

Hey, Shay, this pic's for you. Back before the bursitis in my elbow made me stop doing needle tatting, I made this doily. It's neat because it's both crochet and tatting. Probably a size 5 thread, variegated as you can see. I just love it. It's never been properly blocked, so all the little picots don't show up properly, but I thought you might like to see it. One of these days I'll figure out how to load a picture onto Blogger so when you click on it you get a full-size picture; I've seen it done on other blogs.