My grandson in Kansas called to wish me a happy birthday today.  "The redbuds are blooming in Kansas so I know it's your birthday," he said.  Another grandson called me yesterday to wish me a happy birthday because the redbuds are blooming in Tulsa and he saw them on the way to work.

I like that better than them remembering a day.  They were off only a little bit.  They will think of me for the rest of their lives when the redbuds bloom.  I think that is wonderful!!  They started blooming here in Edmond today.

The adjuster climbed up on the roof to see what those tennis ball sized hail stones did.  The roof is trashed.  And it's almost new.  But with tornado and hail season just beginning, I'm going to wait because it could get trashed again.  Unless it starts leaking--then I'll have to fix it.  I just don't want to have to replace it two times.  Or more.  That would mean I would have to pay a deductible every time.  It also ruined the roof on my shed. 

Friday mornings are garage sale day with Ann.  I don't know the streets here very well, so I told her if she would drive every week, I'll get the coffee and breakfast.  She said she texted, (or called?) Scott to get us our Jet Star tomatoes.  It's supposed to freeze here Sunday, but I'm planting them after that.  I hope it doesn't freeze again--in April.

I got my succulents planted outside.  My "Hen and Chickens" make it through the winter every year, so I don't have to bring them in.  The others, well, I don't know.  Come winter, I will divide them and bring half of them in.  I don't know if they will survive the cold or not.  But I'm going to find out.

I'm rambling.  Who wants to hear someone ramble.  Boring.

When they installed "Word for Mac" on my laptop, everything changed on it everywhere.  New stuff appeared on different apps, on different things I opened.  I despise change.  I've had so much change in my life over the last eighty-one years that I am reeling.  Just when I adapt, something else changes.  I grew up in a time when you didn't throw stuff out.  You repurposed it. And it isn't because I am growing older.  I never liked change at any point in my life.  Ever.   

I can deal with the big stuff, like moving, (I've moved 27 times) buying a new car, reworking the landscaping.  It's the little stuff that gets me.  The red, yellow, green dots on the top bar of my Mac don't look the same.  I don't like it.  The drag and drop is gone.  I have to choose Cut, Copy, or Paste every time now on Blogger.  Which makes me nuts.  

I just got a pop up that all of you out there are going to have to do something different to get this blog--Pat's coming over today to set it up--otherwise it would vanish.

I am the proverbial "stick in the mud."  Leave everything the way it is so I don't have to learn some new way to do something.  The only improvement I have adjusted to is my phone.  And I hadn't got a clue how to use everything on it before they upgraded it.  Who thinks this stuff up!!

I do like the "ding-ding-ding" on my car when I back up. 

I'm glad God doesn't change.  He is the same "Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow." I don't have to constantly relearn what He wants from me, or how I am suppose to live.  How I am supposed to treat people.  It is comforting.  He doesn't change.  His words are always true.  

The world is what changes.  I'm not sure it is for the better.    

Yesterday was my birthday.  Ta-da.  Everybody has one.  Some of us have had more than everybody else.  In my family, everyone calls and sings "Happy Birthday to You" on the phone.  I love to hear my grandchildren and great-grandchildren's voices singing to me.  So sweet.

My son Scott was the only one of my children that forgot. (And he never forgets.)  He said it was God's fault--that was a new excuse!  He said it was because the redbud trees aren't blooming.

When my mother had me, it was snowing when she went into the hospital.  It was not an easy delivery.  Back then they didn't have the knowledge or instruments needed to correct the problem.  

After twenty or so hours, the doctor came to the waiting room and told my dad (and uncle Cleo who was waiting with him) that he had to choose.  He couldn't save us both.  Of course, my dad chose my mom, and he and Cleo began to pray.  Back then, it wasn't unusual for women to die in childbirth, and my mom was weak from being in labor for so long.

When the doctor began the procedure, I turned.  And was born.  Cleo and Dad said that when they went outside, the snow was gone and the redbuds were blooming.  So every year, when the redbuds start to bloom, I get Happy Birthday calls.  Whether it's the right day, or not.

So, this year the redbuds are late.  Who knows why?  Scott is blaming his forgetfulness on God.  I think I would be afraid to do that!!  However, he tells me that he associates my Birthday with the redbuds and not with a day.

So did everyone else in my family back in 1938.  So did everyone in my family for my entire life.

While we were waiting on the storm to hit, a man I had hired was busy moving dirt and building a raised bed for my garden.  He got most of it finished before he had to head home ahead of the storm.

He is going to finish it tonight.  And then...and then...I get to put tomatoes in the ground and plant okra.  It's like Christmas for me.  I can't get "Jet Stars" here in Edmond.  Scott will get them for me in Pryor.

Brady already planted the potatoes and parsley.  I'm going to plant green peppers, yellow and red ones, too.  And kale.  I gave up on squash.  The squash bugs always get it and I'm tired of fighting them.  

I don't like cucumbers, but I love sweet pickles.  So I'm going to plant cucumbers for the first time ever.  I have a friend in Pryor that makes sweet and sour pickles.  I'll get her to give me her recipe.  Then, of course, I have to make the pickles.  Which I've never done before.  It may be my first and last time.  Depends on how hard it is.  It's been a long, long time since I canned anything. I'll have to buy jars if I do this.  There are still things in life I've never done!!

I am going back to the Apple store this afternoon and get an external hard drive.  Now, when I say, "External Hard Drive," I know what it is.  The language of computers is like Greek to me.  I learned "Flash Drive" a few months ago from Pat.  Just when I get comfortable with the name of something, it becomes obsolete.  

72, 75, 78, 33, 45's, tapes, disks, etc. for music.  The older you get, the more stuff there is in your head that you don't need anymore--taking up space in your brain.  It's that way on every subject.  I don't have a delete button.  Stuff just rattles around up there in the old noggin doing me no good.  It makes learning new stuff seem like a waste of time--because in a little while, it will be obsolete.

On Saturday, I was watching TV randomly, mostly just to have background noise, when I looked up and saw the weatherman all excited, pointing his finger in every direction.  Weathermen in Oklahoma live for the opportunity to predict tornadoes.  They warn us and over-warn us.  Which is good, but it sometimes makes you complacent.

When this storm got on a predictable path, it was going to come over the top of my house.  It was five miles away and zeroed in on me.  That's when I decided to get my phone, purse, and dog and go across the street to the Bryce's who have a cellar, and finish watching it on their TV.

If you have been through a tornado or two, you watch the path, the uptake height, and rotation.  There usually will be a looping hook on the tail of the storm.  The higher the uptake, the bigger the hail will be.  This storm had it all. And our block was in its path.  The hail was the largest I've ever seen, and I've lived in Oklahoma most of my life.  It was somewhere between golf balls and tennis balls--on the tennis ball end.

Of course it damaged my roof.  It broke windows around here.  It was a doozy.  And though the wind was rotating, it didn't touch down thank God.  But we were all reminded that it is March in Oklahoma.  You can never forget that in this state.  Tornado's are coming.  It's just a matter of where, and when.

And even though we get irritated at the weathermen getting all hepped up, we are thankful for accurate predictions.  I grew up back when there was no Doppler, no predictions, no nothing.  Every time there was a cloud, my Mama started frantically rounding up her little chickens--us--and heading us to a neighbor's cellar.  Sometimes we were in the cellar for an hour or more.

Now, I watch it arriving, and only need five minutes to take cover.

My friend Jeanette has spent the entire week calming me down.  I don't get upset very easily, but my computer has been ornery.  I have had it eight years and didn't know anything about computors--and didn't know I needed to back stuff up.  So:  Here I am, writing a book, and through God's mercy I didn't lose it because I didn't back it up.  

I went to Walmart to get a back-up hard drive, got home, and it won't install.  Now I have to go back to Apple and buy an expensive one.  Which is fine, I just want it to work.  I'm tearing my hair out.  I don't do stuff like this well, and when it doesn't do what it's supposed to do, I shut down.

I'm going to start over on Monday and try to do better.  What with spilling my tea on my "almost" white carpet, turning my chair upside down and retrieving my charger cord--disturbing every muscle and joint in my body, four trips to OKC with my Apple and that's just the surface, I've been ruffled.

But Jeanette has calmed me down at every turn.  She's calm to begin with.  I've got a friend for every shortcoming in my life.  God is good.  I need friends.

Brady and I got the potatoes planted.  He also planted the red clover and the parsley.  He had a blast watering it all.  There is nothing quite like a seven year old with a hose.  Water, water, everywhere.  I had a dozen packages of flower seeds that are at least ten years old.  I handed them to him so I could take a break and who knows where he planted them, or if they will come up!  He will forget all about it before he comes back again.  He just wants to get into the mud and water.  Power to him.  However, he got the mud all over his shoes and came in and tracked across my cream colored carpet.  I've been there before. You don't raise four kids without a little mud here and there.

Today, my grandson Brady, is coming over and we are going to plant potatoes.  It will be the first thing I put in the ground this year.  I have twenty-six other things that need to be transplanted, and if we get all of that done, I will go over to my old house across the street and dig up the asparagus I planted three years ago.

Asparagus takes three years to grow before you can pick it.  The roots need to strengthen.  Jennifer and David don't care if I go get it.  I checked!  I bought them another dozen asparagus plants they can stick in the ground.  I don't think I can wait another three years for the new bunch to be ready.  They can.

It is a moot point, because I don't eat asparagus very often anyway.  I'll pick it when it comes up in my garden, and give it back to them.

I love to find things that I can do with Brady.  And he likes to do stuff with me.  When the potatoes are ready to harvest, I'll call Jonathan to bring him back over to help me dig them up.  Brady will love that.  His brother Tate, two years younger, is interested in one thing.  Cars.  I will have to figure out something I can do with him when he is a little bit older.  Tate is a carbon copy of Ken, so I understand his personality perfectly.  Single minded.  Focused.

Brady, on the other hand has a personality like his grandmother--me.  Jumping from one thing to the other, running in circles, bored easily, but ready to do something fun with someone else.  Tate entertains himself.  A loner.  

They are my two youngest grandchildren.  Jon started late, married late, had children late.  But then he is nine years younger than my other three.  My first grandchild is thirty-seven, my youngest is four.  Quite a span.