I am (as the name shows) in northern Virginia. Retired, DH ditto. Homebodies: DH watches TV, I don't. I read anything written in English, but given a choice, I prefer SF, mysteries, autobiographical travel, non-depresssing fiction, cookbooks and how-to books. I've taken up quilting recently, and put pieces into the jigsaw puzzle when DH isn't looking.

I'm don't particularly like doing housework but I do like living in a clean house. I pretty much failed at teaching DH co-op cleaning, but he's good at shopping and likes to work in the garden even when it's 95* out, imo that balances the chores.

My opinion about oven cleaning is why I spent the money to get self-cleaning (not 'continuous clean'). I always felt that anyone who doesn't like the state of the oven bottom can either not comment or clean it for me. An apple pie apparently overflowed recently, the next time I baked, the smoke alarm went off ~ do you know how much smoke just a wee bit of burnt filling makes?! Not to mention the noise of the alarm going off at midnight. Any way, DH learned how to use the self-clean feature and now he checks the oven each time I bake. I guess he didn't like being awakened by the smoke alarm.

Hi lindie. Leone, the female half of gandle and I are retired and really anymore lead a quite boring life, but the older I get I seem to like boring better.

From April 1 to October 31 we work as docents at the local Pony Express museum, doesn't pay very well we are volunteers.

Hope you stick around with us in the party.
We are from Nebraska, but then you knew that.

Hi Lindie, welcome to the garden party. We have eclectic topics here. We live in CA, silicon valley.

Re cleaning the oven, I think it's the pits. I have a self cleaning oven, I have to turn it on to a very high temp and keep it on for x amount of time, totally waste of energy. At the end I have this gray residue that I have to manually clean up. What's more, the instructions says not to leave the racks in the oven because they will not be able to "slide" after the treatment.

We live in Kentucky and are retired. Homebodies also, partly because of health issues.
I also have a self cleaning oven because I don't love to scrub it and do housework only because I have no choice. Meldy already wrote my reading list down, so I don't have to repeat it.
BTW, for a long time I believed the "rack don't slide' if cleaned in the oven. One time I forgot about that. The rack is not shiny anymore, but it slides, even if not so smoothly. Have left in in the oven since.
Nice having I new face here, I guess I was the last one to join the gang. Hope you stay around.

Hi Lindy, glad to see new folks interested in our Party.
I have been playing here since 1997/8, a long time, anyway. You could say I am an old Old member.
Live in California, in the rural North, my daughter and I share acreage, but each have our own shack, a little house, doesn't take long to do housework, so there is enough time for garden and enjoying the natural surroundings, playing with the cats and the dog, taking care of goats and chickens.
Oven cleaning used to be a bane, but I too have a self-cleaning oven and, like Anneliese, I leave the racks in and they slide just fine. I have been putting the grids (the things over the burners) think they call them spiders, in the oven for cleaning also, works just fine,
I don't clean too often, uses so much energy - propane in my case -
DH passed away in '91, so I am my own boss and discovered I do like my company, do a bit of writing.
Anyway, too much about me, I am glad to meet you and hope to see much of you.

How nice to meet you ladies (and one gentleman because with gandle you get two for the price of one, if I understand correctly). From Virginia to Kentucky, on up to Michigan and across to Nebraska and on to California - just we few live almost coast to coast. How lovely.

All these lovely self-cleaning ovens that abound here. Hmmm. Mine is gas, but there are there are precious memories of our electric self-cleaning before we moved ten years ago. The bottom and door of our oven has been sprayed with cleaner and will be scrubbed today. Perhaps by doing one wall at a time, the goal of finishing before Thanksgiving will be met. :)

Speaking of mysteries, meldy, have you heard of the series called "Thoroughly Southern Mysteries" by Patricia Sprinkle? Just finished them and they are delightful for reading on chilly autumn days.

lilosophie, goats and chickens? Oh, what a neat mind picture that conjures.

anneliese, hello to a fellow homebody. Yes, I understand health issues.

And west_gardener, the eclectic topics are apparent in the quotes chosen here.

Hope I didn't miss anyone and hope to fit in. Just tell me if I blab too much!

Hi Lindie. I am retired and live in Baltimore County Maryland. My hobbies are growing Gladiolus and Dahlias and fishing in the surf off Assateague Island. Have been a student of the American Civil War for 40 yrs. Good to see a new face here. Have fun. Steve in Baltimore County.

Good morning, I am Kris and live in Eastern Washington State. I don't post often, but I do read the GP every day. I am a retired accountant and my husband is still working. I love reading, gardening, my five grandchildren and one great granddaughter. I too have a self cleaning oven that needs to be cleaned. Welcome.

Thanks, Steve and Kris, for the welcomes. Washington State must be beautiful, and I'm sure the same is true for Maryland. Steve, I must have already blown it with you by saying water-related things don't interest me. Sorry for saying that! Fishing in the surf and enjoying the sea air is not something I've experienced. It is so nice to meet you both.

I'm in OKC, originally from east of Denver.

I don't have a self cleaning oven, and I can't remember the last time I cleaned it! I don't actually use it terribly often, so that may not be as bad as it sounds. For the next cooking appliance, I am interested in a gas top and the tiny pizza sized oven with the larger one below. That's in my dreams, cause I certainly would not spend that kind of money, but hey, I can look at them!

I read mostly fiction, but this year I listened to "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand. It was very, very good. I was fascinated to read that she has a debilitating illness and can rarely leave her bed.

This year I have taken to "listening" to books while I walk. I have found I truly enjoy it. It makes me forget that I've already walked around that track a million times or so! I can download mp3 versions of books from the library, so they are free! yay! A friend of mine got me started on the Sheriff Joanna Brady series by J.A. Jance and I have been walking my way through them.

I'm probably among the younger posters here, but I've been on Garden Web longer than I can remember...way, way, way back to when this forum just about started. I can (barely) remember some fight from the Beer Garden (which no longer exists), which my faint memory tells me that is how the Garden Party started. (I could be wrong, but that's how I remember it!)

I hate to clean house, do not live in a clean house, but wish I did. Last night I had to administer a lecture to a college aged student (not mine by blood, but by responsibility) about the necessity of putting away all the clothes, picking up trash and dishes to avoid a $25 "failure to clean" dorm fee each week. I felt a little bit like a fraud as I sat there with dishes next to me, a bed full of clothes that need to be washed or hung up and a kitchen full of dishes.... (lecture was administered via email, so my hypocrisy could not be witnessed!) As I was surveying my mess this morning, it occurred to me that someone should fine ME $25 a week and maybe I would spend more time cleaning!

Lisa

Here is a link that might be useful: Oven I wish I had :)

Welcome, Lindie, to the GP. I'm a member who lurked for many years before taking the plunge to post, but have always enjoyed reading everyone else's. I feel lost if I can't come here everyday to visit.

DH and I retired to the Panhandle of West Virginia almost 18 years ago. I'm a DC native and he's a South Dakota boy who never got home after his stint in the Navy. We wanted to get away from the D.C. congestion, but not too far, as our three kids, two granddaughters, and four great-grands still live in the area. No one lives in D.C. "proper", but close enough that we never considered moving to FL on a permanent basis.

We don't venture too far from home, these days, mostly b/c of health issues, too, as a couple folks have mentioned.

My electric oven needs cleaning, right now! The older I get, the less need I feel to spend house cleaning. But since the oven takes only a flick of a switch, I'd better get it done, before Thanksgiving.

Again, welcome.

lisa_h, if I had a stand alone stove/oven I'd want the kind you want. I have had electric drop in cook tops for most of my cooking history, but I always wsnted a gas cook top. So a few years ago we hired a contractor to run a gas line and hook it up to a gas cook top. It cost some money but it was worth it. Lol, both DH and I are happy with the final product. My cooking.

I live in Tyler,Texas.I'm retired from teaching pre school.I live alone and have a self cleaning oven, such a wonderful thing. And frost free refrigerator.I always hated defrosting freezers.I'm an avid reader.Love mysteries.Joined a book group so once a month read non mystery.Knit alot and like to garden.Sort of boring but am very content.

Welcome Lindie!

I'm Robin (or Rob, I answer to both), a Nashvillean (for those who wondered on the other post) who has had houses with large gardens, but currently rent with no garden. I miss the herbs and the daily garden walks to enjoy what was flowering that day. I worked in insurance brokerage for over 18 years, but the climate for that was so bad, my employer sold his business and I went into hospital/research administration. Been here for almost 8 years now. We are the leaders in making personalized medicine a reality, but my education is pre-law with some psychology and criminal justice thrown in. I am glad to finally be divorced (it was arduous), have the most wonderful son in the whole wide universe (he's also the most polite, beautiful, smartest, talented, you name it! I'm not really all that biased about him, as my mom will certainly agree that he is all those things... teehee), two beautiful furbaby rescue kitties (Maggie and Murphy), and been through a massive flood, bankrupted, foreclosed, and beaten to a pulp financially in the past few years. But I am climbing out of all the financial and emotional holes!!!! I always survive. And my family has lived in Nashville pretty much since it was founded in 1797, but I was born while my parents were traveling--I've lived in Maryland, Hawaii, and California in addition to Tennessee. Think that's all that makes me who I am, right now.

We live in So. Cal. North orange county and live in a small house in a big house neighborhood. The yard is fair sized and pie shaped so it is big in the back. We spend a lot of time in the garden. Missy joined in 98 to participate in the rose forum and I joined then too but mostly lurked here for a year or so then started posting.

I retire every night from my tree business and start fresh the next day. Have been spending a lot of the last year at the VA hospital for clinics and a couple of week long stays. Looking forward to a heart operation that is behind schedule from the predicted date. Looks like I will be starting the new year with a repaired heart muscle and hopefully no more meds.

We have cats, birds and plenty of wild visitors for a suburban area. The garden has been the main reason for existence and many social things. Have two boys, lost another and have three grands, girl in college and twin boys in high school.

Family pets and yard pics.

Here is a link that might be useful: Stove I would like to have or similar.

Ohhh, nice stove choice Don! I could never use all those cubbies, but it would be great for big dinners!

Lindie ~ Thanks for the recommendation. I read one some time ago: I'll have to have the library order more.

I have a gas stove, it does a better self-clean than the electric. Yep, energy consuming so it's normally a once-a-year deal; I actually rarely spill anything ~ isn't that what old dented pizza pans were invented for? (put on the shelf beneath the casserole, pie, etc) Of course, the one time I didn't put the pan was the time something burbled over.

Lisa ~ when DD remodelled, she put in one of those pizza-plus-regular ovens. It's okay for pizza and cookies but not much else. Last year I replaced ol'faithful with the smallest standard oven/range combo. The oven is way too big; I feel guilty every time I bake a single loaf of bread. My dream is for a countertop range and a SMALL wall oven.

We live just outside Madison, WI. It's just my husband and I and two very active bird dogs and a cat, which is plenty! We recently bought 56 mostly-wooded acres about an hour away from us, so we're dreaming about how to get the most out of that. Eventually we want to build a retirement home there and raise a few animals for meat, eggs and company. My husband, who's a decade and a half older than I, is in his mid-50s, so the whole retirement lifestyle thing might be nearer to me than to many my age.

Don, that range is kitchen porn, pure and simple! What a thing of beauty! Hope your physical heart mirrors your metaphorical heart in strength and health in the very near future.

I hardly ever clean my oven, but will spray Easy-Off into it and wipe it down if I have to buy some to get baked on messes off the jelly roll pans I throw down under anything potentially sloppy. Otherwise I don't worry about it. If you cook enough things at a high enough heat, eventually the stuff in your oven will stop smoking on its own! ;o)

I'm not much at house cleaning, but the nice lady whom we pay to come do it for us every other week is awesome at it! (Though she assures me she avoids it in her own house too.)

I'm a gardening and cooking enthusiast (which is not the same as "expert"), a bird hunter (though not a particularly good shot) and a reader (though I often do more audio book listening than reading). In real life I talk and laugh easily, loudly and often.

meldy, when we moved into this house, it had the standard (large) double ovens. It suited us when we had the children around and I did a lot of cooking.
When it came time to replace the ovens, we bought a smaller oven to replace one of the ovens, and put a microwave in the other space. It has worked very well for us, but even with the smaller oven, I hesitate to bake just one Baked Potato, we share a baked potato. It's 425 degrees for about an hour to bake a potato.

Somewhere on the Tennessee River, but not in Tennessee.

Nice to see you here at the GP, endorphinjunkie ,

Here is a link that might be useful: Where is Dorph?

Omigosh, there is a wonderful small group here! Thank you all so much for chiming in. I'll stop typing "thanks" so this won't keep coming to the top, but it is very nice to meet you.

Jaz,

you sound like you aspire to be Lilo. Good goal!

Hi Lindie, I'm Tiffany. I visit gardenweb most days, but not always this particular forum. Just depends on my mood and time available. I'm in AL, just north of FL, moved here in 07 from OH and absolutely love it. Nobody is in a hurry, and there's something blooming all year. We often spend Saturdays or Sundays at the beach, or swimming in a nearby cold spring or spring-fed lake. We like camping, inviting tons of people over for a BBQ, exploring dirt roads to see what we can see, fishing, drive-in movies, canoeing, sitting around the fire - ours or somebody else's, kites... I've been to most states east of the Mississippi, Canada, Europe, but am also a homebody most of the time. I also like gardening (obviously,) cooking, cross-stitch and the gridded/geometric art associated with it, occasionally rearranging my seashell collection, reading about any type of fiction and non-fiction from areas of interest, driving my car on a beautiful day when time doesn't matter, watching the sun set, scrabble, and dancing if nobody is looking. I used to like skiing but there is no snow here, and hiking but am too afraid of encountering a poisonous snake to do that here. My daughter went to college this year, about an hour away, and I miss her but am glad she's doing well and having fun.

I've met a very nice man here and am totally in love with him and his dog, and they moved in with my son and I earlier this year. He's smart, funny, fixes things, and does cool stuff like making a fire pit, bat house, tilling up a veggie patch, and mowing with the bag so the grass and leaves can go in the compost and on the beds. The fenced-in yard, central air, much bigger kitchen, and much more light from windows are why we decided on my house instead of his. There are a ton of lizards, skinks, squirrels, birds, and geckos that live here, an occasional armadillo, and various neighborhood cats and dogs that come to the yard to visit our dog. We've had a few hummingbirds and a ton of butterflies this year, they are always visiting the zinnias, lantana, basil, and plumbago.

About a year before I met him, my oven quit working right - it would come on but not turn off when it reached the desired temp, it just kept getting hotter and hotter. Since I hardly ever used it, and 3 of the stove burners still worked, I didn't try to have it fixed or replaced. I was already much more of a toaster oven user, especially in the summer, when the thought of turning on anything that would create so much more heat is just unbearable! When he moved in here, his oven was one of the benefits (major or minor, depending on time of day and what I cooked for dinner - LOL!) It's just a basic one with coiled electric burners and it has a self-cleaning feature but hopefully that would never be needed. There's no dishwasher here, besides me, so it's rare that I would cook any meal without foil. And I've always lined my ovens with foil, and always put a sheet of it or a baking...

Just back from the Beauty Shop so am feeling "beautiful" and feeling much better as I also saw my doctor today and he tells me I am doing so well he doesn't want to see me for six months! That's a good start for the beinning of our Winter here in North-Central Minnesota where it does get cold and snowy. We (that man of mine) are in our early 80's, married for 61 years.Retired but constantly busy. I'm a gardener, a crafter, a reader,a sewer, etc., and Hubby collects red tractors and keeps up with a large lawn, garden and flower gardens. We are never idle and try to keep up with 11 Great-grand kids. It'a fun to learn where everyone lives.
we used to travel quite alot but our traveling days are fewer now.

Hi, I'm Jan. I live in north Georgia. My husband retired
a long time ago and we took advantage of it by traveling
until his eyesight and health started failing.

Four years ago I sold our country house on the lake and moved back to town to be closer to doctors and the hospital. Also moved my daughter in with us, she has a lot
of health problems and it makes it easier for me to care for both of them.

I don't get much time to visit the GP like I used to but I'm still here. I read at night after I go to bed and
love it. It's my down time.

I've met quite a few of the people here in person and they are as dear to me as family. We've lost a few members since Facebook rode in on the turnip truck but I still think about them every day and most still check in.

This is a special place with special people.

Welcome to the party.

Yup, here in Haifa, where it's finally raining - we need every drop. I'm a teacher, mid-50's, live with my sweetheart, we have 4 sons between us. One works in Africa, one lives in Sweden, one in Houston and one has less than two years to go on his military service here.....that can't come soon enough. I garden in horrifyingly bad soil, kill plants often, keep gardening anyway. I read nearly only sci-fi/cyberpunk, etc., but out here it's hard to get the recent stuff, most of what I get is second hand and years old. I knit and felt a lot. I hang out on a number of different forums and check in here about once a week, but I don't always post. These here folks are my friends, and you are welcome!
Peace, Batya

Lindie, thank you for your original post; it's been interesting and fun to learn a little more about "us GPers".

Minnie here a sometime poster I mostly hang out at the KT but love to come over and read the posts
I'm in the very corner of NE Texas

Hi Lindie (and all my old friends here at GP.) I used to live in Detroit but moved with my partner to Guatemala five years ago. We live in a rural area on the shores of a beautiful lake, in the mountains, between two small villages. It's quite a different lifestyle and I love it very much. We have two dogs, three cats and two parrots. We grow and sell coffee for a little income. Unfortunately internet access is expensive and unreliable so I don't get here as much as I used to. But it's nice to drop in when I can. Welcome to GP.

I started to make a list. (I love lists)
If I missed someone or got it wrong pls advise

anneliese_32 6
batya Israel north 8-9-10
don_socal socal
endorphinjunkie z7bAlabama
gabriell 8a Tyler,Texas
gandle 4 NE female half of gandle Nebraska
gardenkat tropical
janis_g z7GA north Georgia.
jazmynsmom Z5 Madison-ish Madison, WI.
kris_zone6 Eastern Washington State
lilosophie California, in the rural North
lindie_mi west Michigan
lisa_h 7 OK OKC,
meldy_nva northern Virginia
minnie_tx
mwheel East. WV-Z.6 Panhandle of West Virginia
oscarthecat z7MD Baltimore County Maryland.
posieh 3 North-Central Minnesota
purpleinopp 8b AL AL, just north of FL,
rob333 Nashvillean
west_gardener CA, silicon valley. lindie_mi