Bust out with your Clue notebooks

Upon returning home after discovering that someone in Arizona had swiped my debit card number and purchased $3000 worth of furniture at Ikea and $52 worth of food at Jack in the Box (the bigger insult I think. How is it even possible to purchase $52 worth of food at Jack in the Box? Did he purchase Jack's costume as a getaway outfit?), I found this:


No, Alice didn't Houdini Hound it and spirit herself out of her crate. We forgot to put her in there. But boy did she remind us of it when we got home. Not pictured here is our bed. Which she peed all over. Some sleuths out there claim that Madison masterminded this flurry of Kleenex destruction. Perhaps she goaded on the impressionable pit to new heights of tissue paper terrorizing. After all, we know the pup has a propensity for maxipads and premium quality tampons...

So, go ahead, we know the deed happened in the Drawing, er, Living Room. Who was it? Colonel Mustard? The saucy Miss Scarlett? The less saucy but very old Dame Madison? Or the puckish Miss Alice? Please don't leave any of those little metal reproductions of revolvers and lead pipes around. I don't want to find them in Alice's after dinner droppings.

Quivering with excitement for a new school year

It has been a busy summer at 517. I was away for part of May and all of June (with periodic pilgrimages back to SC to visit with Woody and the puppies). Woody was holding everything on the homefront together and completing some impressive improvements to the "grounds" of 517. So when Aug. 18 hit, were we:

1. shocked
2. dismayed
3. quivering with anticipation like the exquisite Mexican jello mold pictured above
4. befuddled as to why our new GPS routed us through Tennessee to get to campus
5. all of the above

If you said "All of the above," you would be covering your arse but you would be right.

So what did we get done this summer? The better question really is what did Woody get done this summer because I mostly sat on my butt in archives. Woody did some impressive stonework in the yard! We now have a flower patch with a fancy rock border:

The pergola on the back porch is covered with jasmine, roses and hanging plants:

Our garden has not been as robust as it was last year. Horned caterpillars and some other guys who pop out their antennae when annoyed (thanks Wanda and David for the tip!) have set about gorging themselves on our tomatoes and parsley. We also have this guy hanging around:

When Woody ripped out the wall around our backdoor he battled with a spider that was Shelobesque in size. The guy in our garden is more like Shelob's flashier cousin. He knows that an accent accessory or two can really lighten up an outfit and be slimming to boot. We're told he's called a Golden Garden Spider. We hoping he dines on caterpillars.