Monday already? I'm not ready for another week!

I went to my parents' house yesterday to fix their computer problems. Not that I'm blaming AOL for their machine's ailments, but when I deleted AOL's folders from Explorer (it wouldn't let me uninstall it, it locked everything up when I tried) everything was cured. As my son said, installing AOL is like Jehovah's Witnesses knocking at your door - they seem friendly and nice enough, but you can never get them to leave. AOL and Earthlink Total Access (both came pre-loaded on their computer so my parents had sampled both to see which connection they preferred)were not being used and yet had somehow insinuated themselves into everything, so that attempting to open Internet Explorer caused both programs to jump in the way, screaming "Use me!" and slowed performance to a crawl. They're gone now, and everything is working normally. Just say NO to AOL. Driving there and back and peforming a few hours of computer maintenance and tutorials was my Sunday - I left at 9 a.m. and got home at 5.

After I came home from a drive across the state and back there there were still a few hours of daylight, so I decided the pond needed a water change. It needs a lot of things, but a water change was something I could accomplish. So I dropped the water level (by the simple method of turning the frog fountain to drain into the dirt instead of the pond) and cleaned out some of the dead leaves and goop in the bottom. In doing so I found that the goldfish are all fine and healthy, and there are babies among them! The snails have also multiplied and some frogs have moved in as well. It amazes me that such a small pond - only about 250 gallons - can sustain so much life, with so little attention from me. Or maybe that's why it's doing so well. I finished adding the fresh water just as I started losing daylight, so I couldn't address the fact that the little frog didn't want to attach back to its hose again. I have no cute fountain effect now, just a recirculating hose dripping back into the pond. I think it's time to replace the hoses, I need to measure the fittings this week and order some parts.

Yesterday in my "ample spare time" before and after the above activities, I started crocheting a cat blanket, just mindless half-double crochet on a size K hook, and in the race of the mindless cat blankies, crocheting certainly seems faster than knitting. I'm using the Homespun in "Disco" and I'm not that crazy about it now that I see the fabric - it's not bad, it creates a sort of confetti-like flickering of color with black that is quite nice, but it has no striping or shading effects. It's going to be a big soft quick blankie, and that's what matters. Somebody stop me if I talk about buying more Homespun - after I finish what I have that will be more than enough critter blankets and time to focus on another charity.