Blog Archives

Hi,

It’s been a few days, again.  The flowers are definitely showing their heads these days.  I transplanted those super cool, cold hardy hibiscus from by the trellis to over at the wall by the water feature.  I haven’t seen any green there yet.  They do normally come up a little later than the other plants, I hope they’re OK.

I heard from my college friends, Dave and Claire, they’re planning a trip here the first week in May.  They’ve been living in Angola Africa for the last three years.  I usually get to see them once a year when they make their trip back to the states.  Always great to see them and great stories of safaris and other exotic trips.

I went to the Western PA bed and breakfast association www.westernpabandb.com.  There’s over two dozen members, mostly from north western PA and eastern Ohio.  I’m the farthest south.  We talked about recruiting more members for the Pittsburgh area and even south into Greene county so we cover the entire western portion of PA.  They, we, are creating an association Facebook page and then we all become fans of that and fans of each other.  They had James from www.bryanserver.com stop by to talk about social networking.  We also talked about cost effective ways to get our association better known.  Many thanx to our host, Rose from Chapel Valley Estate Bed and Breakfast www.chapelvalleyestate.com.  A very nice Inn with a wonderful country setting just past historic New Castle.  If Rose’s breakfast are anything like the lunch she served us, it’s a winner.  🙂

We had our neighborhood association meeting here at the Parador with Allegheny West www.alleghenywest.org.  We’ve had our differences in the past (a subject for future posts), but they are my neighborhood association and like to keep informed about what’s happening in my neighborhood.  I generally try to make most meetings and went over to Calvary Methodist Church, where the meetings are held.   The president, John M broke his collar bone yesterday riding his bike and no one else had a key, so we met here.  There was a fair amount of good information, but of course, they had to continue their assault on the Steelers.  This time, as is their current normal, it’s parking.  Eight days out of the year, we have a Steeler game.  I don’t understand why they hate the Steelers like they do, a limited days in the Fall and Winter we have some excitement here and the neighborhood organization hates it.   The Steelers were here at Three Rivers Stadium (the stadium before Heinz Field)  before just about anyone currently in the neighborhood was here.  Why would you move to a location that has something offensive to you and hope it goes away?

Good night,

ed

Hi,

I had lunch yesterday with Judy from The Carnegie Museums www.carnegiemuseums.org yesterday at The Warhol www.warhol.org. Judy is in charge of corporate sponsorship for the Carnegies.  We had a great conversation about The Parador, naturally, but also what she’s doing to promote the Carnegies and why.  Lunch was pleasant, they had pretty much ran out of sandwiches, but the quiche was good.  After wards, we went up to the fifth floor to see Bunny Yeager’s show.  Bunny’s in her 90’s now, but was one of the early Playboy Bunnies and an amazing woman.  When you go in the gallery at the end left side of the floor, there’s a series of photographs of stunning women.  Some in bathing suites, some in high end fashion outfits, most were blond, some where brunette.  I was thinking that they all looked a lot alike, that Bunny had very specific taste in what she wanted to photograph.  We asked the attendant outside the room about the photos and she explained they were all of Bunny over the years.  Dah me.  Bunny would make her own outfits, set the scene, set the lighting, position the camera and then have the photographer snap the picture.  Pretty amazing.

Vera from Office Depot called me this morning.  She gave me the most sincere apology I think I have ever gotten.  She has worked extensively to correct the error and I am thoroughly impressed.  It seems she has tracked down all the places my name had been given to and had my name removed.  She asked for my patience until the end of May to be sure I don’t get any more unwanted mail because of Office Depot.  I am certainly impressed and Office Depot now has a loyal customer.

I went to LMS Greenhouse and Nursery Tuesday to get my Jack’s fertilizer.  Jack’s is the best water soluble fertilizer available to the general public.  LMS is in Allison Park, which is a bit of a trip from here.  I’ve gotten my Jack’s from them in the past, but never really paid a lot of attention to what they carry.  They have a great selection of tropicals, some are hybrids you can leave out all year, some you have to bring in when it gets cold.  All look very healthy.  One of the things I like about them, they have large specimens for people that want instant gratification (that’s me frequently 🙂 ), and you pay the price for LMS growning them.  Or, if you are frugal (which is me frequently 🙂 ), they have smaller versions at very affordable prices.  One of my happy scores was a small elk horn fern.  I had this gorgeous specimen in Florida that I brought up here and ended up killing.  I think I’ll do OK with this guy now.  When I first moved back up here, there was so much going on that I didn’t give the plants the attention they deserved.  I also lost this fantastic pony tail palm from my poor tending.  The two pony tails I have now are not as unique as the triple trunk specimen I moved up here with, but I love them the same.

Madona and Danny were here about a month or so ago and when she got home, she sent two toys for da boiz and a plaque for me.  Well, RJ has fallen in love with this toy that is three cloth rings put together like a chain.  The the fool plays with that one a lot and when he has the end link in his mouth (as apposed to the center one), the other end drags on the floor.  Well, he’ll step in it and it will be caught on his leg.  He can’t figure out how to solve the problem, so he just hobbles around like that.  Of course his rude dad, just laughs at him.

Colin and his girlfriend should be arriving shortly, they are my only check-ins today.  (Colin used to live over in the Mexican War Streets, he moved back to NJ and is in for a visit).  After that, I’m headed out to Betty’s for our weekly visit, I’m bringing a roasted chicken and she’s happy.  🙂

The Parador Inn of Pittsburgh now has a face book page, if anyone wants to become a fan.

I’ll ramble again soon,

ed

Good Morning,

Northside was really jumping yesterday afternoon.  The Pirates got 39,000 fans for their season opener.  There was cars and people everywhere.  And they won.

My head’s peeling.  When I was out at Betty’s on Thursday cutting up the fallen trees, I did take a bandanna, but had it wrapped as a sweat band instead of a head covering.  The trees in her woods just have buds, not leaves yet, so I was in the sun all afternoon.  You’d think at this point in my life, I’d have learned my lesson by now.

Lisa and Mike stopped by Sunday with the newly covered cushions for the Veranda wicker furniture.  The old fabric really wasn’t worn that bad, but it was a light color and really showed the dirt.  Besides them being all fresh and new, I like this pattern better than that tan with palm trees.  This fabric is black with tropical flowers and I think it fits the wicker furniture better.

Update on Office Depot.  When I called Vera, the customer service rep, last Thursday, she said Office Depot does not sell or share their mailing lists.  I faxed her a cover letter and copies of the two solicitations I received from the Pittsburgh Business Times and USPS with Allan G’s name on top, just as Office Depots catalogs were.  She called me back this morning to let me know that she was wrong, Office Depot does “rent” (was the word she used?) their mailing lists.  She apologized and claimed they have stopped this practice.  I told her that after a year of trying to get my address removed from their mailing list, in good faith, that they now had sold my name to others was just unacceptable.  What I want, is for Office Depot to get my name off these mailing lists, this is the only acceptable solution.  I am in this annoying position because of Office Depot’s initial incompetence and then greed.  If I receive another solicitation addressed to Alan G, I will pursue all avenues I can find to complain about Office Depot.  First of all will be a follow up to the Palm Beach County BBB (where Office Depot’s headquartered) and I believe the FTC is one venue I can pursue.  I’ll have to look into what other grief I can cause them.  As you can tell from past posts and this one, I hate corporate America and and their greed.  How we have just become statistics to them and how they tout in their ads how special we are to them.  Yet as they get bigger and bigger and turn more things over to automated systems, we end up on mailing lists and have to fight for over a year to be removed.  Yes, I’m ranting, I’m sorry.

I finally sent Jerry L an E-mail over the weekend.  Any of you that stayed at The Parador of the Palm Beaches, would remember Jerry as my Manager/Housekeeper.  Jerry was great.  We really haven’t kept in touch (my fault) since.  When I left, he took over managing the property for the new owner that was running it as short term stays, which meant intransigents which meant drugs.  (Not all intransigents are druggies, but you need to manage your property to keep that element out and the new owner was just concerned with the revenue, not the quality of renters).  So I hooked Jerry up with an acquaintance of mine that was running a motel up in West Palm.  My first two trips to Florida after moving back up here, I stayed at Sam’s place, but Jerry had already quit with no notice, I just had Sam’s side.  The motel was fairly rough, but my first year down there Sam told me of his plans and showed me how he was trying to clean the place up (so he said).  My second year down there, the place as so bad that when I came back to Pittsburgh, I put all my possessions I had with me down there in the Loft and fumigated them for bugs.  A couple of months later, friends of mine from the Mad Hatter bar in Lake Worth (where I used to tend bar) sent me an article about how the West Palm police had permanently closed the place because of drugs and prostitution.   In my E-mail to Jerry I passed this on to him.  He hadn’t heard and was glad for the update and then filled me in on his side of the story.  Always get both sides of the story.  I was surprised that Jerry would quit with no notice, but people do what they feel they must.  After hearing Jerry’s side, I’m surprised he put up with it as long as he did.  In his E-mail, he spoke of coming to Pittsburgh for a visit this summer to see the New Parador, I hope he makes it.  He was always a good guy and good friend, the best kind of employee anyone could ask for.

It was gorgeous this morning when I got up, all bright and sunny and sixty degrees.  It’s just got all overcast.  That’s OK, I don’t have any gardening to do today, so if it stays like this, it will encourage me to finish my Office project.  This weekend I purged my files, I don’t need warranties on appliances I had in Florida, nor do I need instructional newspaper articles on how to grow palm trees.  I would like to finish this so I can have a clear and uncluttered desk and get back to the manuscript.  Maybe this is just an excuse to put it off further, but I don’t think so.  When I was last working on the manuscript, I kept seeing the piles of paper on my desk and would get distracted.  I probably have the smallest pile of pending issues I have had in over a year.

Darn, I thought this was going to be just a short three liner post.  Have a great day all,

ed

Hi,

Well, I’m tired, sore and my bald head is sun burnt.  Went out to Betty’s today and almost finished cleaning up the woods from all the snow storm damage.  Anyone know someone that wants firewood?  Most of it’s cherry and there’s some big logs and a lot of smaller.  I then took her out to South Park’s Club House for some artery clogging deep fried fish sandwich and French fries.  All and all a pleasant afternoon and evening.

I finished the book, Stones into Classrooms.  A very good book, this is the third book I’ve read in the past few months on Afghanistan.  Those people’s culture is so different, I find it very intriguing to learn about.  Generally all we Americans know is the atrocities carried in the newspapers.  Greg not only gets into how important relationships are over there (more so than here), but also gets into how the different tribes and regions customs are so different.  Yet within their local codes and customs, they understand each other and know how to get along.  This is so different from the dynamics between the Sunnis and the Shiites in Iraq (not necessarily a good or bad thing).  He also describes the tribe that live in the highest habitable (if this word really describes the harshness of this area)  area of Afghanistan next to China and in the Himalayas.  Possibly the most interesting part of the book, for me.

Well, as I said, I’m sore, tired and sun burnt.

good night,

ed

Hi,

What a beautiful day.  Started fairly chilly, in the 30’s but officially hit sixty six degrees, but was over seventy by my thermostat.

Yesterday and today I finished up the Courtyard.  The gardens are all weeded and mulched.  The elephant ears are planted.  The water feature is cleaned and up and running.  It’s so cool to walk out into the courtyard and hear the water.  The buds on the white lilac tree have grown noticeably since Sunday.

Modcloth www.modcloth.com was here today to do their photo shoot for a new retro line of clothes they are debuting.    Very nice people, lots of pictures.  The outfits they were shooting were very cool also.  They were taking shots on the Veranda, in front of the Carriage House and even on the beach.  I look forward to when they post them to see how the backdrops (my spaces) look hopefully accentuating the outfits.

Spent some time sitting on the front porch reading my book, Turning Stones into Schools, by Greg Mortenson.  It is so nice to be able to sit on the porch again.  With as much as I love the Courtyard and hanging out on the Veranda, I also love sitting on the front porch watching the street traffic and seeing friends and neighbors you don’t see anywhere as much in the winter.  And speaking of Turning Stones into Schools, it’s a great book for anyone.  It about the Central Asia Institute (CAI) and their goal of stopping fanaticism by education.  They have been building schools in the remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan.  They’ve built schools in the heart of the Taliban controlled areas and extremely remote locations in the Himalayan mountains.  And they are focused on educating girls, because under the Taliban, girls have been pretty much forbidden to receive education.  What I found most interesting is how Greg describes the inner relationships that are important in those cultures.  His enthusiasm is contagious also.

Tomorrow is Soup Night at Calvary Methodist Church, my good friend Lisa from Fabled Table www.fabledtable.com runs it.  She’s a great cook (chef) and they offer tasty inexpensive food.  It’s from five p.m. until seven p.m. if anyone local reads this.

I think that’s about it for today,

ed

Hi,

Dreary day today.  It started out fairly overcast and then got totally cloudy and was raining fairly hard.  That’s OK, it’s that time of year.  Yesterday was pretty nice and I got all the gardens cleaned up and mulched, except for the area around the water feature and where the elephant ears go.  It’s still a little early to plant the elephant ears, but I may plant them just to get all the gardens finished (planting them now won’t hurt them, they just won’t do anything until the ground is warmer).  I also got all the life jackets, fish netting, witch balls, etc out of the basement for the “Beach”, cleaned up and scattered around the Beach.

In December, 2008, Allan G rented the entire Inn for a workshop with a group of associates from U Pitt.  He rented a white board, easel and markers from Office Depot and had Office Depot deliver and pickup the equipment.  About a month later, I started getting Office Depot catalogs addressed to Allan G at my Inn.  I called Office Depot and the customer service representative I spoke with asked for the codes on top of and below the address.  She said everything was taken care of and I was deleted from their mailing list.  She asked that I wait eight weeks for the system to clear out anything that was already scheduled in the system.  Three months later (and three catalogs) I again called Office Depot and went through the same ritual.  Again I was told I was removed from their mailing list and to please be patient for eight weeks.  Two more times I went through this and then contacted the Better Business Bureau in South Florida (where Office Depot’s headquarters is).  I did this through the BBB’s web site and within a week I had a call from an Office Depot manager that apologized and asked me to detail what I had gone through.  I gave her how everything had happened, she said she saw what had happened and would be able to remove me from their mailing list.  Of course she asked me to be patient for eight weeks for the changes to take affect.  I have not received a catalog from Office Depot since.

BUT, this week I received a solicitation from the Pittsburgh Business Times and the US Postal Service addressed EXACTLY as the Office Depot catalogs were, Alan G with the Parador Inn and my address below that.  THEY SOLD MY ADDRESS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I’m assuming they did not do it in spite, it was probably just one of those incredibly stupid things greedy big companies do when people are taken out of the system and the system takes over.

I gave four tours yesterday to brides (one is already scheduled for August, they just wanted to see the rooms again to do room assignments).  This afternoon I have a neighbor’s daughter coming over for a tour for her wedding.  Also, Danielle stopped by to see the place.  She’s the photographer for ModCloth www.modcloth.com , they do new retro clothing here in Pittsburgh.  It looks like they are going to use my place for a photo shoot Wednesday for some new clothes they are coming out with.  Cool.

Well, it’s still pouring down rain, it looks like da boiz aren’t going for a run in the park today.  They don’t mind, I do.  🙂

ed

Wow, it’s been a week.

When I started this, I didn’t plan on making entries every day, but once a week is way too long.

The TV poltergeist struck again twice.  The TV in African Tulip lost reception.  Global Satellite came by Tuesday and started poking around at it.  For those of you that know African Tulip, the TV is in this huge eight foot high by eight foot long armoire.  The armoire was in it’s exact location when I bought the property.  The wall behind it was the old maid’s closet that we gutted to add the African Tulip bathroom.  Since there is very few “hollow” walls in the building (the entire property is brick construction, even the interior walls), we ran a ton of electrical, plumbing and air conditioning through the open space and then closed everything up.  Denny couldn’t get a signal at the jack attached to the back of the armoire.   We  moved the armoire and still no signal coming out of the wall.  Denny went down to the DirecTV junction box downstairs and checked all the connections again and found the problem.  The next the signal died in Lady Palm.  They came out and promptly fixed that.  As of this writing, all the TV’s are working fine.  Lets hope they stay that way.

I stopped by Dragun Supply and ordered my yearly mulch supply.  Since I’ll be spreading the mulch this weekend, I decided to spread the compost I’ve been working on since last summer.  This is my first venture with composting.  I know air and moisture are very important for things for rot, so I put a layer of sticks on the bottom of my composter before starting to drop my kitchen scraps and leaves so it wouldn’t get too compact and air could circulate.  Mistake.  The vegetable matter rotted and the sticks were still there on the bottom as sticks.  I had to dig the sticks out by hand (through all that mush) so I could remove the compost.  A big mess.  And with this being my first time harvesting my compost, I don’t know what to expect.  There are lots of worms and other critters working their magic in there.  The compost on the bottom was pretty much indistinguishable from what it originally was, except  for the egg shells.  I guess maybe I won’t try composting egg shells.  I’m not too worried about the shells not being totally composted since I’ll be spreading the mulch over the compost.

It’s so exciting to see the tulips, daffodils and hyacinths growing and flowering.  The purple plum tree’s buds are swelling, the white lilac tree has small leaves all over it.  There’s all kinds of nubs of growth coming up in my gardens. The days are significantly longer, finally.  I think the thing I like least about winter is the short dark days.  I definitely don’t like the cold, but the short dark days are the worst.

Da Boiz and I went out to Betty’s yesterday.  As I’ve been working my way down into the woods, the destruction for the snow storms is even worse than I initially thought.  There’s three trees down, not one.  And there’s a lot of branches that should actually be considered trees they are so large.  I broke my chain saw out there last week, so I just went out there and used the lopers to trim all the small branches off the big stuff.  Next week, I’ll be able to quickly zip through all the branches and trees and cut them into manageable sized logs I can move.  But I still have another full day’s work pruning down one more area of downed trees and branches before I’ll be able to cut those up.

Good night,

ed

Hi,

I advertise on bedandbreakfast.com. They have started a blog and after entering their blog and typing a long and thought out narrative, I went to post it and it said I had a wrong URL.  I initially had clicked on their link and started typing, pretty frustrating.

Yesterday, I cut the major limbs on the purple plum tree in the parking lot damaged by February snow storms. cleaned up the mess and took it all out to Betty’s.  She has 3 1/2 acres and lets me drop vegetation in one of the valleys.  While there I took a couple of truck loads of storm damage I had cut up in her main yard down into the woods also.  Worked in the Courtyard this morning, move the cold hardy hibiscus from by the trellis (so the don’t compete with the clematis) over by the wall near the water feature so they stand out better.  Also planted two dozen tulips/hyacinth along the fence with the arondo donax.  I planted them sort of under the three new evergreens so when da boiz go running up to the fence to bark at the poor pound puppies going for their walks, da boiz don’t trample the new flowers.  Hosed off the wall between my Courtyard and my next door neighbor Eleanor.  It seems to leech salt out  of the bricks (or some white powder residue on the bricks) that comes off fairly easily.  Unfortunately, the old bricks seem to be turning to powder.  When I hose it off, the water runs down gritty red.

My good friend Lisa stopped by to pick up the fabric I got and the Veranda wicker furniture cushions.  She should have them done in a week or so.  For any of you that have been here, she’s the one that made all the cushions for the window box seats in Chenille and Oleander; she made the drapes in African Tulip and on the third floor landing in the main stair case.  She made all the drapes on both floors of Bougainvillea.  And if you see a tropical pillow here, guess who made it.  Oh, sorry Lisa, I almost forgot, she also did all the frog patterned chair cushions on the Veranda also.  Lisa, who used to own The Ugly Duckling restaurant, now has The Fabled Table www.fabledtable.com , a cooking classes and catering company.  After speaking with her, I was surprised how well she’s doing.  (Not surprised because of the quality or price she’s famous for, but surprised because she’s only had this venue open a fairly short period of time).  She’s so busy with corporate and social catering that she’s talked Mike into working with her.  Mike’s her boyfriend (actually manfriend would probably be a better term).  They’ve been together for a good while now and it’s great to see to people that deserve each other (and I mean that in a good way).

Good night,

ed

Hi,

Finished painting the Veranda wicker furniture and cleaning up the gardens in the Courtyard.  There’s all kinds of plants poking their little green tops out of the dirt.  Spring is here!!

I got a very cool E-mail yesterday.  Jill had stumbled on my Blog and saw my comments I made about having trouble with RJ being so greedy.  Jill’s rescued a dog and was having trouble getting the new dog and the old dog to get along properly.  She found a lady, Debbie that’s a dog trainer and she highly recommended her.  Debbie’s web site is www.powsitivereactions.com , if anyone is interested.

As far as RJ goes, we’ve actually been making progress.  Twice now when we were leaving to go out on some errands, he was running around Razor nipping at him and wasn’t listening to me telling him to stop and was left at home alone.  Talk about having an effect.  When we were leaving the next several times and he tried torturing Razor, he responded pretty quickly when I told him to stop.  Yesterday when we were leaving for our walk, RJ again was unbridled energy racing like a fool through the dining room.  He was left home alone and Razor and myself went for the walk.  Razor had the best walk he’s had in a year.  When we went for our walk today, I can’t say RJ was a star puppy, but he didn’t knock any chairs over or upturn any rugs.

Something I really hadn’t noticed, was that Razor hasn’t been playing with toys lately.  Razor hasn’t been much interested in toys for the past few years.  But he did on occasion chew on a bone.  RJ wants everything.  He will drop the toy he has in his mouth if Razor picks something up and take Razor’s toy. And Mr Nice Guy Razor lets him get away with that.  So a week or so ago, I decided if Razor won’t be the Alpha dog to the puppy, I’ll take his back.  Anyone that knows me know that I have no problem being Alpha.  And it’s actually working.  Not only does RJ let Razor alone when he has something, Razor is actually now defending himself.  Now none of this is 100% of the time, but we are definitely working towards the right direction.

ed