We use a k800 keyboard - it lights up when your hands approach it. And since our computer is in sorry of a dark hole, it's very helpful. Particularly for my favorite dinosaur.

I dunno - if probably freak and it would be hell freezes over before dogs went loose

Cyanurate, short for cyanurate acid which bonds with chlorine to keep it from dissipating in response to sunlight. It's either added to outdoor pool water as it's own product or in the form of trichloro-s-triazinetrione in tablets. But you don't want to much or all the chlorine gets bound and unavailable for sanitation.

Went to look at the K800 and it seems as if Logitech isn't doing it anymore and the few that are out there are priced beyond ridiculous!  I do like that backlight - I guess I'm gonna have to go looking around even though this is working right now.  BTW "not working right" was the letters may or may not show when typed, may duplicateeeeeeee at it's own pleasure, or maybe just not type at all for a sentence or three.  I sorta touch type but not properly - I look at the kbd a lot more than I should.

On a side note, I do not like Logitech.  I've used wireless kbd at first and the kbd/mice for about 20 years and Logitech wireless mice were nice for a while and then I couldn't seem to get one that worked - at least not for very long (> two months if that)  I've been using TeckNet for several years at the moment I'm using this mouse which is great since I really don't like the size of most mice (while I like the MS KBD, I hate the bulk of MS Mice.)

Just out of curiosity I went looking and this looks like a possible consideration - two things make me back up a little:  1) I want keys that have a throw to them - similar to a typewriter (but not so extreme);  2) the compact feature (cutting down the sixe of the keyboard by shifting keys on the right.)  If MS stops making/selling the KBD 5050 I'll have to go looking for an option.

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You know what's really bad?  I walk into the kitchen and step over a dog - now that's normal - but 5 minutes later I walk back out of the kitchen and step over the same dog who's laying in the same place / position and I have to check to make sure they're still breathing.  It's been hot enough during the day (we've been right at 100 every day for the last week / 70+ at night) that I get concerned about the pups - can't use water to cool them, they all run from the hose or at least move away from it!

Kye laid in the same spot, the same way, from 9am to 8pm the other day. He is a noisy breather so I always know he isn't dead but I never really know if maybe he had a silent stroke and is paralyzed. He wasn't, and the instant I made him move he needed to pee something terrible and had to rush him out but he is getting where he is very selective about his movements.

Im just impatiently waiting for winter. Its like melting hot out. I think we hit 84 both inside and outside yesterday. Could be i was actually feeling the super high uv. We broke down and bought an ac this year.

I'll see your 84 and raise you 20! We've been at 100 plus / minus a little, predicted high today is 95° Thankfully the humidity has been running around 10-20% but mostly on the low end of that.

Early for me this AM - it's 07:30 and I'm trying to wake up. Got a project to try to do before it gets hot - currently 78° but the sun's coming over the hills so we're gonna warm up quick.

Don't hate me: it is 9:41 AM and had warned up to 59⁰. Our anniversary was yesterday and we debated whether to go to winery/brewery with outside music and take Ami or leave Ami home and go to inside restaurant. Temps clinched it - at 60⁰, cloudy and windy, we opted to eat inside. Lots of rain last few days and now through Wednesday, temps will remain barely comfortable daytime and low 50s, high 40s until Wednesday. I have peppers and eggplants chomping at the bit to get into real soil with room for their toys to spread out but Cornell guidelines say wait until nighttime temps reliably above 55⁰ so I'll continue the inside nighttime polka

Emily - nice to hear from you again, I was begging to work a bit, hoping you were just busy and not ill.

Tomorrow is the last day Fedco is accepting sweet potato orders. I'm debating. I've always wanted to try growing them but minimum order is 25 plants at $39. A bit of an expensive gamble for me. So I'm on the fence... The long range forecast has better than equal chances of warmer than usual weather but slightly better than normal chance of wetter weather.
But the wetter than normal weather seems prediction send to go to equal chances starting in July. So maybe...

I got my sweet potatoes in a couple weeks ago. I would have liked to have had them about a month ago at least but Johnny's really holds onto them. Not sure I will go that route next year. The price of sweet potato dog treats sealed the deal on growing them. I can pay a pretty steep price for slips and recoup in treats alone pretty fast. I'm growing them in strawbales so at least the rain isn't bothering them.

Welp. I ordered them. They get drop shipped from their supplier. Orders for Missouri would have shipped the week of May 3-13. Here, it's just plain too cold. 49⁰ overnight, current 59⁰ and I'm cold, sitting in kitchen, heat on, sweets pants, long sleeves shirt and fleece lined vest. Scrunched up in my chair and grumpy. Supposed to be even colder tonight but gradual warmup coming. So they say.

This is one of those times where I'd exchange my weather for almost anyone else!! Amy's talking about how cold it is and I'd take her 60° - at least compared to my 100° Florida and other points east are getting flooded - shoot, even Houston's getting flooded (çourse when you build a city in a swamp what do you expect?) and we haven't had more than the passing shower for 'most of a year.

Yeah, I look at a lot of the country's weather and am glad we didn't move south years ago when husband wanted more sun. And so is he - he now finds he tolerates much less great than when younger.

We were beautiful, albeit rainy, pretty much until this week. Nights been in the 50s and 60s, days might get around 80 but many haven't. Now we shooting into the 90s and about to get steamed to death by the humidity. And the ticks have been horrible this year.

Another cold day here 1:45 PM and still 55⁰. Low tonight still in the to 40s but warmup starts tomorrow. At the moment I just cannot get warm! Just ate a bowl of chili and still cold. Thinking I may need to increase my muscle mass. But that's not gonna happen overnight. But the electric blanket on our bed will - and it's calling, loudly! All my plants are in house. Except for my lettuce bowl. Long range forecast calling for very hot summer. I hope so, sweet potatoes will need it but I'll believe it when I see it.

Jenn - what kind of sweet potato snacks do you make for the dogs?

I just slice sweet potatoes into quarter inch thick chips or so and dehydrate them. Nothing fancy. Kasper loves them and they smell so good.

Hmm, not sure that would appeal to Ami. But I love sweet potatoes. Hopefully these will grow. I think I'm gonna put them in the daffodil bed that borders the driveway. It used to be packed full of Happy returns Daylilies but I lost a lot of them on the center of the bed to Canada thistle and, to help get rid of the Canada thistle, I had the wood chips from 4 large trees taken down put on there to smother the thistle. That was about 5 years ago. The Daylilies on the edge of the bed have come back fine but the center is is kind of bare and vulnerable to a bunch of weeds. I'm thinking of covering the center with builders paper and planting the sweet potatoes in that - hoping that all the foliage will cover the area. Filling in with whatever annuals I can find at local nurseries. And also hoping the set potatoes will put out some flowers. The soil there is rather loose thanks to all the wood chips and is about the only place that gets sun from morning til night at this point. Over 37 years, trees grow up and what was once sunny everywhere is now, at best, maybe 6 hours. Unless I can get the makes in my family to take down several large trees on the perimeter of my vegetable garden. Notably, a couple of hickory's that have become rather large. The ash are all almost dead due to the relatable away borer. And then there's all the pine trees...

Ive been all over the state recently and also back to the local problem we have every tourist season where the cell tower get overlaoded, so like landline era for 3 months. I dont have the link but the va hospital in aurora closed all ORs and dental procedure rooms that used reusable surgical equipment. Mystery goo or something so 3 times they rescheduled jerrys surgery hasnt happened yet now they are saying they have no timeline to reopen so transferred him to uchealth spine clinic. So we go to aurora monday for that then he has hernia surgery on his ostomy on the 20th. Somehow with all of this i got my hours back and then some at the liquor store, so on paper i work 70 hours a week even if 40 of it is home health care related stuff for jerry. But other then todays extreme heat related car buying adventure ive been really well. Just about ran the explorer into the ground and had to replace it today. If i just use ot to go to town for work it will probably go another few years but i peiced together enough paperwork to take a guess that the explorer is at around 310k miles and it cant handle the thousand or so miles i put on it every month much longer. Heads are at the machine shop for the truck so im hoping its done next month.

And then there is getting ready for fire season. We lost a bunch of aspens to heat last year. Then all the aspens on the property line and some of the cottonwoods seem to have become beaver casualties. The mini chainsaw is awesome, amy if you dont have one you should. Mine is under 6lbs with the battery.

The only plants i have going this year is the raspberry bush that i swear died and the unkillable chives outside and 2 clusters of ginger plants that dont look very happy and the mini rose bush that ive been trying to bonsai for 2 years now. Im not sure if it ended as a giant bonsai or a dwarf but its small for a 3 year old bush. My lawn seems to have failed.

@al no weird weather? Like its been raining daily and outside of the monsoon it doesn't rain, it does that rain way up high that dries before it gets near the ground, otherwise it snows. i went to peublo to buy a 06 expedition and it was 101out Explorer has no ac and ive had a headache since. I was never so happy to get back to 75. But i have to go back to that god forsaken heat friday to get my Explorer back.

Glad to hear you're alive and well. But not the heat part. You sound really stretched. That rain that disappears before it hits the ground? Virga. Bad for small airplanes, suggests down drafts, generate microbursts.

Today was a crap day ( not weather, finally drying out and getting warmer) Hubby has to take the Corvette down to the local mechanic for oil change and new battery. We got it started with battery pack but I get a call, come pick him up. After the oil change and battery, car is throwing a service column lock error and is undriveable. Get home and the 2 Adirondack chairs and double Adirondack bench we ordered from Amazon arrived. Box all untaped and styrofoam bits everywhere. And the back bottom support piece fractured in multiple places. Hopefully not gonna be a hassle with return or replacement. If I can't get it replaced, I want all 3 pieces to go back and may have a problem getting RMA on that - a third party seller. Broke my rule on not using 3rd party but our current Adirondack stuff is about 35 years old and falling apart. That was real teak and solid. This stuff I just ordered is nowhere near the same quality but fits the budget. And has

the double Adirondack bench that Ami likes to use.

Ugh. Late. Big boy is gonna wake me somewhere around 7, better get to bed

@lostmaniac Weird weather ... well, it depends on what you wanna call "weird" ... 95 plus for the better part of the last month.  (( Mostly over 100 but enough in the 90+ that I have to reconsider my "high" ))
It looks like he monsoon season this year is gonna look a lot like last year - non-existent - and if that's the case then I (and a lot of others) may consider looking else where ... too hot with no water, that really doesn't work.

VA - there get to be times where I just feel like saying "The hell with it all!"  I had blood work two months ago with no major problems.  Due to the distance to the nearest VA facility, the VA had me go to another PC who redid blood work and I now have Kidney problems (Stage 3b failure), an overactive thyroid (known about for 50 years but hasn't been a problem) and Hep C to which I can only say "What the hell??"  I'm going beck to revisit these but he'd better come up with something better than "I think ... " or I'll reconsider the distance to the VA clinic.

It's really too early ( at 10:30 ) to 'crash' but we're at 86° with 50% humidity - it's hot and muggy and this isn't Texas weather!! If it's gonna be this humid, how about a little rain, PLEASE!!!!!!

Our high today is 81 but im in monte vista so jerry can get a tooth pulled and its already 80 here. Usually we dont see temps like this until August after the nonsoon.

If it gets too hot ill go swimming. My neighbor down the road has a tube with a built in cooler. He ties it to a tree and just sits there when it gets above 80. Its not too bad of an idea if you like beer i guess.

Is it just here or why is goat meat so hard to find. When i was in md they always had it sitting next to the lamb and both normal and asian grocery stores. But i live in a mostly Hispanic area and when i ask about goat meat i get funny looks. It makes me wonder if ive missed something culturally.

82⁰ here but low humidity. Ami seeeks shade. I'm washing outdoor metal furniture, trying to get salary off.

@aljones -been thinking about your labs. Darned on me (in the middle of the friggin' night, trying to fall asleep) Anyway, have you been taking a lot of Ibuprofen/Advil for your hip/femur break? Known to cause both acute and chronic kidney disease. If you have, stop the Ibuprofen, see if your kidney function returns. I can't take any of the NSAIDs because it causes peripheral edema. Which sort of suggests a kidney connection. First thing I'd do is repeat the blood work. And get a copy of all your lab results for the past several years, wondering if VA had been overlooking earning signs. Also - the BS may not have been testing for Hep C. It's currently recommended that PC docs ask their baby boomer patients if the want to be tested, apparently, our cohort has a lot of hidden hep C.

Mine are almost always off last time it was very off. Also the hospital lost my labs so i gave them a copy that i had from a yr ago that had extra stuff then normal and my vit d was critical low.

Yeah ibuprofen is bad so is naproxon and topical anti-inflammatory stuff.

@amymeme the va said the same thing about hep c testing to jerry

Mother nature is still not done messing with me. Extended forecast. High 80s, low 90s, all sorts of hype about heat wave. Good. Sweet potato slips arrived yesterday. And I bought 3 bronze orange canna cannova plants to go in the middle of them. But it seems our heart wave is preceded by a cold front with a high today of only 68⁰ and overnight low forecast in low 40s. Guess my heat lovers will stay in house tonight.

@amymeme While I buy acetaminophen 200 at a time (for cost) I seldom take them but do for headaches; I'm more apt to use Aleve for joint pain or for bursitis - but more than a couple a month is rare. I don't do drugs ....
TSH was very low so T4 was correspondingly high. It was treated in the 90's by irradiation and ignored from that point.
Vit D - oh, my god, it's high ... well, it doesn't take much time in the sun here to take D to a high point.

My biggest problem is that I'd prefer to have the VA work on me ... in general I have less problems with the VA than with community caregivers ... but the community is 80 miles away and VA is closer to 300 and I'll be damned if I'm gonna go 300 miles just to have someone draw blood!

ARGH!!!!!!

Welp. You're in a pickle, Al. I guess the first thing to do is repeat the bloodwork to see if it's accurate. I'm no doctor but it doors seen to me that a couple sleeve a month would damage your kidneys. And I believe acetaminophen is more a problem for your liver than kidney but I could be wrong.

Yeah we prefer the va also. And the local clinic can only do so much. Its got telehealth and a np. Otherwise its pueblo denver or colorado springs. All far. Clinic is still 52 miles 1 way so i feel you.

Crazy how grow lights qork for vit d. First year i didnt do plants first year of this vit d problem.

@amymeme so today it snowed here. Not actually unusual but not common. but never following a heat wave.

Spider broke into the tote bin i have dog food in and ate 2 lbs of freezedried food and who knows how much of the boys dry food. That was a whole week of squirts food. Its one of those day i hope she takes after her wolfy side and doesnt get sick or keep me up all night needing out. Or worse shitting on the floor.