Hughes.net Satellite, Greenhouse and Celebrations

OK, you would think after the second time I would learn, but no, it took the third time. I get the blog all typed on Blogger Dashboard, photo added, click “publish” and I get a message from Hughes.net, our satellite internet company that states something about “web acceleration” and “unable to perform last task.” And everything is lost. So, I am now typing the blog into a word processing program and cutting and pasting into Blogger Dashboard. We don’t know if the problem is Blogger or Hughes.net or Hughes.net in combination with our new computer’s Window’s Vista.
Yesterday Michael had a doctor’s appointment in Big Timber and he dropped me off at Cinnabar Creek, the greatest little store owned by good friends of mine, Jeane and Kathy. The store is the local gathering place for all the specialty coffee drinkers and people just wanting to sit and visit with friends. When you walk in, the store just smells so good; coffee, candles, lotions. They also have a fabulous selection of books, jewelry and other stuff. So, I got to have a coffee treat and visit with friends while I waited for Michael. After he was finished, we headed to another local institution, the Frosty Freeze for lunch. Our restaurant selection in Big Timber is limited but “the Freeze” serves decent food and great ice cream. It is a sure bet that you are going to run into someone you know, too.
After lunch, we headed to the greenhouse owned by friends Lola and Jim. I wanted to pick up a few plants to put in my portable planters that I put on the deck in the summer. Not that I think summer is coming anytime soon. I am starting to think it will be summer in the rest of the country while we are still trying to start spring. Jim and Lola have been to Alamos, Mexico where we spent a couple of months this past winter. They have a travel trailer and a condo in Arizona.
Just as we were heading home, the cell phone rang and it was Michael’s son inviting us to a spur of the moment birthday celebration for our graduated granddaughter, Laci at the Rib and Chop House, a great restaurant over in the nearby (60 miles, we Montanans have to travel far and wide to eat and shop) town of Livingston, MT. So, we picked up Michael’s father Nat and headed over in the early evening. We had a wonderful time, good food and good company. Laci’s eighteenth birthday isn’t until June 5 but she will be at boot camp in Texas by then.
Today we are putting the concrete forms back up that the mudslide dismantled for us last Friday. The concrete truck comes tomorrow. Yesterday, it never got above 40 degrees, it has rained and rained for the last seven days and it is cold, windy and miserable out there and there is lots of nice, juicy mud to stick to our feet.
But even if it is miserable, it sure beats going to work in an operating room, something I did in my previous life.

A Montana spring photo, the sharp pointed peak is Boone Mountain and we can see these mountains from our place. While we were getting rain, the mountains got snow.