Horatio

Dark chocolate is one of my favourites. For Easter, we did a chocolate taste test of dark chocolate bunnies. We had a solid Dove bunny, a hollow Godiva bunny and a hollow Lindt bunny. The test was a blind taste test. I put the pieces out and made them all the same shape, size and thickness. There was a clear winner. Would you like to guess which one what the winner?

Hopefully, everyone had a very nice Passover and Easter holiday. We had a very nice Easter dinner and enjoyed our chocolate bunnies. Pictures to follow.

This is so strange, twice I have tried to respond and it will not take my reply.

What a time you have had! I am so happy to hear that your mother is doing better. That is terrific news. I am sorry to hear that your one week vacation turned into a fifteen day quarantine. Now you get to start planning on your vacation for next year. Preschool will be good for McKenzie as she will learn so much and the child tax credit will help with the expense. That is good to hear. McKenzie is certainly growing and developing into such a wonderful little girl. It is not long before she will be a teenager. Right now her preschool will give you a little break on educating her and worrying about babysitters. This will be a good thing. Plus, she is enjoying herself, so everything is working out for the best. How many days per week does McKenzie attend school? How is work going for you? I hope that your job is not taking too much of a toll on you. My new 'job' is a house renovation after the sale goes through. I will keep you posted on that. I purchased a ton of seeds and will be planting them in the spring and after the summer. That will be fun. It will be an organic garden, with all the ingredients for a salad. There will also be pomegranates, a variety of citrus, avocados, and then a collection of cool sunflowers, lavender, and poppies. I am excited for this. So, I will be able to tend to my garden whilst the workers are working in the house. Photographs will follow after we close on the house. It is a little bit strange, as the pool is in the front yard, but you will see what it looks like. Overall, the house has been the same since it was build in 1974. There is bright flaming orange tile in the kitchen with a bright orange ceramic handing lamp. Very, very seventies. I will be back in touch soon.

We have moved to California. Not the sunny beach and surf that you see on the television. But the centre of the state. What is scary is that all of the food producing land, is being sold for development. My question, is anyone thinking of where our food is going to come from if we continue to spread out instead of up? If we do not think about food now, the United States will be relying on others for our food. If the other nations need food for their people, what will we do? This is a very scary thought, as we put farmers out of business. Just something to think about.

I am now going to sound like one of those relatives at holidays... 'look at how much MacKenzie has grown!' She is getting so tall. MacKenzie was a beautiful baby, but she is turning into a very beautiful young lady!!! How old is she in this picture? How old is she now? I just love this image with her and the bubbles. What a fantastic photograph. Thank you for the information regarding cats. I was totally unaware. Another good reason to have a dog. Ha, ha, ha. When we bought our house, the previous owner had cats that sprayed and the house smelled awful. We almost did not buy the house because of the smell. Everyone told me that I would never be able to get rid of the smell, but I did. We removed the carpet and the flooring, all the way down to the original concrete from when the house was built. We put in wood floors with a visqueen liner to protect against moisture. Plus, when you put two coats of paint over the old paint, all of these things help quite a bit. When I worked at a veterinary technician, we had a cat brought in by the owner. When we x-rayed the cat, there was this curly thing in it's stomach. No one could figure out what it was, but the veterinarian thought it would be best to operate and remove the object. It was the old type telephone cords, from the handset to the telephone base. The way we found out was when the veterinarian called the cat's owner regarding the need to operate. The telephone was answered, but no one was talking. The owner called us back and she said that she knew what the cat ate. When she had picked up the handset, the cord was only about six inches long and was not attached to the rest of the telephone. Thank you for your compliment. These next two courses are really more difficult. I cannot decide if I am reading too much into them or not, but we will see. As I see the charts the economists have included in the one book, I see the deficiencies in the charts. You can make any chart to prove the point you wish to make. That is very frustrating. The move is going to happen by the fifteenth of the February. I am already starting to box up the house. This is all that I feel like I do. Box up our house and move somewhere. I will be happy when we finally decide where we wish to end up, and move there. It will definitely not be California. As soon as we can move out of that state, we certainly will. My guess is that this is a three to five year move. Today I am going out in search of pretty rocks. I am heading into this one area to look for a variety of coloured agates. You ask, what am I going to do with them? Put them into a box for their final destination, our last home. The rocks will then be placed into their permanent home, the garden. For my adventure, I rented a bright red Ford F-150 pick-up truck. I would have much preferred a more subdued colour, such as black, but this was the last pickup truck the rental company had. Plus, as I was inspecting the vehicle, it was dirty on the outside and inside. They had not cleaned the truck. I pointed this out to the agent and had him notate the record. Now, when I return the truck, even dirtier, there should be no problem. I need to run as I am leaving the house in about forty minutes to start my adventure. Talk to you later. Thank you again for the photograph! MacKenzie is gorgeous and growing faster than ever!!!

I will wait for your updated photograph of MacKenzie. As for the cat, I had no idea cats would do the things your cat does. I find it interesting that she will make noise to wake you up. That is so funny. Of course, not for you, but when you are outside looking at the situation, it is quite funny. Your cat eats plastic? YIKES!!! That is so serious! I wonder what it is about the plastic that would make her want to eat it. These days, almost everything is plastic. That is very scary. Did I mention, your cat has a wild personality? What would make a cat want to pee on something? I understand animals mark their territory, but on wrapping paper and ribbons? That is so interesting. I guess we know who rules the house. I do not like recliners. For some reason, my body just does not fit in them. They are uncomfortable to me, no matter how I try and sit in them. So, I could never imagine sleeping in one. There has been quite a bit happening lately. I completed my two courses and received an A and an A+. This semester I have Aviation Economics and I am happy that course is online. The second course is a live class and I may drop this. We are moving again. On the tenth of February we are moving from Nevada to California. This might put a crimp in my studies and I do not want to ruin my A average.

Wishing everyone a wonderful 2021! Let us hope it is better than the previous year.

Yes, I am very happy those two course are over. Next semester is Aviation Economics and I have already started reading the textbook. This is going to be a hard course. Lots of charts and graphs that make absolutely no sense, even when they are explained to me. Then I have added one more course as an elective. We shall see. You have to show us a photograph of MacKenzie with the narwhal. I can only imagine what her expression was when she opened up her present! When you told us about the cookies, I could actually smell them. What an incredibly, fantastic idea. That sounds like a wonderful gift that everyone would love to receive. What I did not know, was that the cat would get into the presents. What makes the cat want to get into the presents? Is it the bows or ribbons? Was there a certain smell that would attract the cat? I had no idea that a cat would get into presents. Would you please tell me more? Anyway, I hope that you got everything in place before MacKenzie woke up. Sleeping on the couch must not have been fun. We had a very quiet Christmas. Mostly we received things that we needed, such as coats, clothing and books. Then we cooked too much food. But, we turned it into frozen meals for the future, so the food was not wasted.

We would like to wish everyone a very happy holiday season. May you find inner peace, good health, much happiness and lots and lots of love. Happy Hanukkah Merry Christmas Happy New Year!

It must be such a terrific feeling to see MacKenzie learning about new things. And you get to introduce her to these wonders. As far as my day, it is much better now that the semester is over and my grades have been finalised. The next semester starts in two weeks. Two more courses to take in the spring. How is work going? Are you ready for Christmas? The last gift on my list is being shipped, via FedEx overnight, on Monday. That is cutting it too close for me.

Two nights ago, we had an interesting moonrise. You could not see the pink clouds with the naked eye, but the camera picked up the pink of the fading sunset. Plus, if you look directly above the moon, almost near the top of the frame, you will see Jupiter and Saturn very close to each other.

Let me update this as I was a couple of days early... HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOPAZIA, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU! I looked at my calendar and had a note to make sure that I did not miss your actual birthday and I wrote the first birthday greetings a few days early. Have a wonderful day today!!! Horatio

I hope your day was the best!!!

Dear Topazia and Toto, We would like to wish you a very happy birthday with many, many more to come. We hope that you are having a wonderful day. May you have a wonderful day today and always. Happy birthday to you both! Horatio

A spray bottle in my pantry.

An apple a day...

Ha, ha, ha! I am more forgetful than both of you.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! This Thanksgiving will certainly be one that we do not forget. Please take time to enjoy your family and friends and know that life will be back to normal soon. Enjoy your day. Horatio

I have taken care of the name change. He is now filmsean.

Yes, this is a birthday that I would not like to repeat. Thank you for the birthday wishes. For some reason, I was thinking that when I was released from the hospital and went home, I would miraculously be well the minute I walked in the door. Well, it was very nice to be home, but the recovery took a little bit longer than I wanted. I did my own detective work on my wallet. I narrowed it down to an emergency nurse, who logged the wallet, but never put it into my bag of belongings, and the person who took me upstairs to the operating room. When I was speaking with a neighbour, she immediately said that the nurse stole the wallet. As I was not totally coherent, I would not say that. But, it is very odd that someone would not have put my wallet inside my bag. Now is the difficult part, I am attempting to replace my documents. How is it that the driver's licence bureau cannot get your name spelt correctly, when you are only requesting a duplicate licence? This really boggles my mind. Just print out the information from the lost licence on to the new license. Why change the name? Anyway, my new motto is, never carry anything in your wallet that you do not want to lose. Carrying all of this other stuff really does not make any sense. Thank you for your compliment on my pepper. It reminded me of a salamander type animal.

It was the day before my birthday and I was feeling like I was coming down with a cold. By that night, I had no appetite and went to bed very, very early. This did not last long, as I was up in a few hours feeling sick and feeling really, really bad. By noon the next day, I was quite a bit worse. After speaking with my doctor, I was on my way to the emergency room of the hospital. The doctor removed my appendix that night around 20H00. On top of all that, the hospital lost my wallet. What a way to spend my birthday... in the hospital. The good news, I am on the mend to getting better!

If you would please give me the new user name you would like, I will change your user name for you.

Playing with my food again...

I will see if I can redo it. Would you email me and let me know what your old username was and perhaps I can be able to change it for you. darker52843@mypacks.net