The Molly Bawn Chronicles

Palachinki Fit For A Prince

2012-01-26T19:39:00.000-08:00

Every time I make crepes [once in a blue moon] I wonder why I don't do it every week! You'd expect that something so delicate and dainty and scrumptious would be difficult to make but they're super easy.......
My mother-in-law, Maria, who is gone to her hard-earned, eternal reward, R.I.P. called them palachinki, which seems to cover Ukrainian, Czech and Polish versions, and possibly others. She always made them with a sweetened cheese filling, and if she needed something from The Prince, making palachinki guaranteed she'd get it! Back in the Old Country, The Prince's mother went to what would now be called "culinary arts school" but was probably called plain old cooking school back then! He frequently waxes poetic about what a wonderful baker and cook she was. Maria, my mother-in-law, was the only cook who came close to being the equal of Mama!

He is 89 years old now. Mama is long gone, and so is Maria. And his teeth don't fit properly, and are uncomfortable, in spite of the small fortune he spent on dental work. He can't hear, and doesn't listen anyway, and keeps his hearing aid in the safety of a velvet lined box. He's on a mission to find a cure for old age, but he's not having much success. Everything but the blandest food upsets his stomach. He laments loudly and frequently that Americans don't know what good cooking is. And me? Can't refuse a challenge. He's probably manipulating me! But no matter. Today I made palachinki. Because I can! I mixed up the batter last night which didn't take more than five minutes. The crepes are lighter if the batter sits overnight [or at least a few hours] in the fridge.

My first few are usually not so good, but after I hit my stride [or the pan gets hot enough!] I'm as good as his Mama! Who's going to prove me wrong?! I cook them just until the edges look dry, then flip, or, if not feeling courageous, turn them with a spatula, and cook a few seconds more, until some freckles form on the underside.

I cool them on a wire rack, then stack them on a plate with wax paper between.

The cook always has to sample a few. Wouldn't want to go poisoning anyone! This cook tried a few, a la Blister, with a sprinkle of sugar and a squeeze of fresh lemon. Oh, yum!

She did manage to restrain herself so there were a few left for The Prince! This last one, obviously, would not pass quality control....but the cook's not fussed. It tasted just as delicious to her as the perfectly round ones!

When the children were growing up palachinki disappeared as fast as they came off the pan! Sugar and cinnamon was the favourite topping. Roll them up and eat them on the spot! They also taste yummy spread with your favourite jam. And, if you want to get really fancy, pour brandy on them, light a match and you have Crepes Suzette! Leave the sugar out of the batter and you can fill them with vegetables or any other savory filling.

But for tonight---Maria's cheese filling, which mixes up in about five minutes. It consists of 1 lb.Farmers' cheese, 1/2 cup sugar, 1-2 tsp vanilla, a handful of raisins, two egg yolks and a dash of salt. If Farmers' cheese is not available you can substitute half cream cheese and half cottage cheese, well drained, or half ricotta. If the mixture is too thick you can add a tablespoon or two of sour cream.

Mix together, spoon onto the crepes, roll them up and place in a single layer in a baking pan. Sprinkle with sugar and chopped nuts and they're ready for the oven.

Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for twenty minutes. Remove the foil and bake five minutes more.

After his first bite The Prince gave me a thumbs up! Gasp! No complaints? I hope Maria is watching from the Great Kitchen In The Sky. I was never quite good enough, but damn! I can make palachinki fit for a Prince!

They've Got To Be Joking!

2012-01-24T19:52:00.000-08:00

I promised myself [or the gods of unfinished projects] that I would do some hand quilting before going to bed tonight. It's on a beautiful quilt that I just-need-to-finish-already. But first, a quick peek at a few blogs. That's a rock my good intentions have perished on before!

I was happy to see a post from The Lassie who has been very quiet of late, and delighted to hear that her baby boy was born just before Christmas. Which would explain the un-blogging. That, and not having an easy birth. I was eager to congratulate her and offer some comforting words. But I had to log in or register in order to read the full post

Wordpress instructed me to enter my name and password. Hmmm. This could be tricky. I try to operate with as few passwords as possible, not having exactly a steel trap between my ears.

I tried

It didn't work.

Either Wordpress had never heard of me, or I had forgotten who I was, or where I was going, or what day of the week it was, or what my password was, or if I was still on planet earth or off in la-la-land!

Wordpress graciously offered to e-mail me a new password. I clicked over to my e-mail to get it.

Here's my new password:

VLP1Zbcipox2

?????

There are rude words that occurred to me, but I'll content myself here with question marks.

Are they serious?

Or are they bored at Wordpress tonight and having a little joke?

Have a little mercy boys!

Proof That I'm An Optimist

2012-01-22T21:42:00.000-08:00

I can't help myself.

I make New Year's Resolutions every year, in spite of an abysmal trackrecord. Have to maximize that surge of energy that comes with hanging a brand new calendar on the wall.

"Organize the sewing room" has tenure on my list. It is the granddaddy of my resolutions, an outgrowth of another one --- to bloody well finish what I started---an unspecified number of half-done, almost there, and barely out of the starting blocks quilting projects. It's been on the list as long as I've had a sewing room, about twelve years. What a luxury to have a place where I can leave the machine set up, ready for whatever opportunity---five minutes here, half an hour there! You'd think I'd keep it neat as a pin, but it always seems to be in some degree of chaos..... I never actually get it as organized as I would like, but making a resolution to at least attempt the daunting task encourages me not to give up the fight! If I did, then I'd have to sit and sew in the midst of what can, at times, look like the aftermath of a hurricane. In my heart I am a tidy person. [No cackling from the peanut gallery please.] In the rest of the house everything is pretty much in its place, but step over the threshold of the sewing room......and it looks like the National Guard needs to be called in.

Or did.

I've been in there every day this year so far,sewing and organizing...

My sister-in-law stopped by the other day. Flushed with pride in my accomplishments, I took her back there to show her my progress. She stood in the doorway, nonplussed. She would never say ---

"So. You got all the pins into one box. What do you want? A medal?"

She's too polite for that.

But she was thinking it.

I could tell.

She was less impressed than I that I had organized my button collection.

Such dilemmas. All those lone, spare buttons in their tiny zip lock bags---should they be in a jar of their own or mercilessly ripped from their tiny bags and tossed in among the monsters in the general button jar, there to sink to oblivion, down through the spaces between bigger, flashier numbers? Or would it maintain for them a little shred of dignity to leave them in their little bags along with the wisps of matching thread?

She probably didn't even notice that there is now only one jar for pens, fabric markers, chopsticks [invaluable for poking out corners], small rulers and other such essential gadgetry, whereas, as recently as last week, there were at least four. And how could she know, without trying each one, that all the remaining pens actually work?

The fact that all the spools of 100% cotton thread were on the spool rack, and organized by colour, did not move her, any more than the fact that their wrong-side-of-the-tracks cousins, those no-account cotton polyester blends, were herded together into a spare tin, there being no room at the inn [or on the spool rack] for the likes of them.........

No. I guess it's going to take more drastic changes for her to acknowledge what a good girl I am. Like getting rid of the chair with the irreparably broken back, which is, nevertheless, earning its keep as a beast of burden, laden down with quilts half-done, a project box, a Bean shirt needing repairs, and several lengths of flannel, variously intended for pajamas bottoms and baby blankets.

"What's with the doll cradle?" she might ask.

To which I might reply "A perfect place to store fat quarters!"

As it is, you'd barely know there was a doll cradle under there.

"And the German sewing basket?"

"I just need to make a nice cushion for the seat and it will be a very useful member of the sewing room team!" I'd keep to myself the fact that I've "just needed to make a nice cushion for the seat" since I got it, second hand, in Germany back in 1991. Was that really [gasp!] twenty years ago??

The Bean arrived home for the w.e. on Friday night.

"You have to see the progress I've made in the sewing room," I enthused.

He stuck his head around the corner.....

"Looks like you've just moved stuff around," he said with a grin. He likes to mess with my head.

"And what's with the cradle? You're surely not planning.....??."

"It's a doll cradle." Smart ass.

The OC will be home next weekend. Surely he will see what tremendous progress has been made. Although..... maybe not. The Bean did not inherit the smart ass gene from me.

Most obvious of all, I need to organize the fabric stash. Which I have been doing, inch by tortuous inch. One thing I've learned from separating the fabrics into colour groups is that blue, in all its incarnations, is my hands-down favourite colour. As if there had ever been any doubt. But here is the cold, hard evidence......

If you had asked me last week how many pin cushions I had, I would have had to make a wild guess. Now I know that I have seven. I probably don't need another one, so I can scratch off the list whatever tentative plans I had for making one of those extremely cute ones over at Bunny Hill Designs!

I have to admit to a sneaking suspicion though.

I think creativity thrives more in chaos than in order.......This resolution gets re-incarnated every year...... Maybe it is searching for enlightenment, and when enlightenment strikes I will realize that the quest for order is futile. Because we certainly don't want the flow of ideas to dry up!

Maybe I'll just have to make peace with the chaos!

Words Out Of The Silence..........

2012-01-16T19:05:00.000-08:00

Sunday. A good day to give the flabby blogging muscles an overdue workout. I've been reading here but uninspired to write. I breathe in, I breathe out, but things are quiet, which [lest the gods think I'm looking for some action] is a very good thing! Sirs, in case you're listening, I'm fine with that---breathing in and breathing out that is. Slowly. No need to get my pulse racing, or my knickers twisted. I will not complain if this turns out to be a very dull year. A person needs a dull year here and there to balance out the others. What some might find dull, for me will be pleasant. Yes, really! Aren't you glad I'm so easy to please? No need to arrange a big lottery win for me; no cruises required; no big birthday bash, though "many years from now" has finally arrived. I am on the verge of finding the answers to all those perplexing questions---

"Will you still need me?"

"Will you still feed me?"

"Will you lock the door?"

Meantime, while I breathe, slowly, in and out in anticipation ---

"I can knit a sweater by the fireside, Sunday morning go for a ride,"

"........doing the garden, digging the weeds" and keeping the ship afloat, playing in the sewing room, stirring the soup--- "Who could ask for more?" So, gentlemen, please note----happy as a clam, just the way I am. Save the drama for someone else!

The grass is brown, the trees are bare, the season of cracked fingers is upon us! There's a cold glitter to the sunshine----a good day to stay warm inside, to write and catch up. Christmas is already a distant memory. We found a beautiful tree this year, even had it up before Christmas Eve---quick, someone! Take her pulse! She's not herself! Of course I didn't take it down until Little Christmas, while neighbours all around dragged theirs' to the curb on St. Steven's Day....Agh! I can't do that. Never understood why Americans are in such a hurry. After Christmas is the best time, when all the fuss and bother is over and you can sit, of an evening, with your cup of tea, in the soft glow of the Christmas tree lights, and let your mind wander.

I'm not a great shopper so my Christmas shopping was done, to a large extent, on line. And guess who I met?
Santa Claus himself! Disguised as a young man named Jeremy. Having read about Kendamas on another blog I decided to order some for the grandchildren for Christmas, with an extra thrown in for The Bean, who the grandchildren see as one of them anyway, just a whole lot taller. On-line tracking showed they were delivered three days after I placed my order.

But not to me.

Several phone calls and e-mails later, I still had not received my package. And time was running out. Kelly, our mail delivery girl, was apologetic, sure she had delivered the package, but unsure if she had put the key in our box. It left me with a sour taste in my mouth that someone mistakenly received a package, with my name and address and didn't think to bring it to me, or at least return it to the Post Office. Oh,oh...Tidings of comfort and joy.

That's when Santa [aka Jeremy at KendamaUSA] rushed gallantly to the rescue and shipped the appropriate number of Kendamas to their various destinations and got them there in time for Christmas! And didn't charge me another penny. And was so polite and friendly throughout. A scholar and a gentleman--- His mother should be proud!!

One of the nice things about Christmas in Florida is that it's warm enough to barbecue. The OC outdid himself this year and grilled the most delicious roast beef ever. The Prince of Carpathia joined us, along with my sainted sister-in-law. The Girlfriend "took one for the team" as the Bean put it, listening with limpid eyes to the thousandth telling of the threadbare tales......We were sad to have so few of the siblings and co. 'round the table with us but we take what we can get these days....Maybe we'll have better luck next year. We compensated somewhat by Skyping and phoning points North, South, East and West.

So! Courage my friends! Onward into the New Year, to face, or embrace whatever it brings.

Happy New Year everyone!

"God Bless Us, Every One!"

2011-12-23T16:06:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas!

Flurries....

2011-12-14T22:31:00.000-08:00

So, you're wondering what happened to the rest of "Auntie Ita?" It's coming, it's coming, but in the meantime we've had flurries. Yes, I know that sounds improbable, given that this is Florida and all, but I wouldn't lie---we have had flurries! Flurries of sewing, shopping--God bless the internet!--and flurries of baking. Not to mention the flurries of anxiety at having left everything to what feels like the last minute....... wasn't it only yesterday that we served up the turkey??

Every year I promise myself I'll start, at a leisurely pace, in January and by December I'll have beautiful gifts made for everyone. I hate buying stuff "Made in China!" And besides, Auntie Ita coached me well in the joys of handmade gifts. She dropped the ball on teaching me how to pace myself though!

So there I was, this past week, stitching like a mad woman to make Mug Rugs, having belatedly had the brainwave that they are what I would make for everyone at the office. Have you heard of them? I found them here as I wandered hither and yon on the "quilternet." Not just a coaster, yet not quite a place mat, the first one I made was fairly small, a cute little mini quilt! Flushed with success, I made another. It was slightly larger, but, guys use bigger mugs I reasoned, so it was all good. I managed to curb my enthusiasm for the next few, but then my designs got more involved and...... well, I haven't yet made one big enough to use as a tablecloth, but it's only a matter of time! I probably got a little carried away but what's not to love? You can design, execute and finish in a couple of hours....heady stuff for a dyed-in-the-wool procrastinator like me!

And then the flurry of baking. Ah yes. I was making a cake last night for today's lunch-time party at the office so I thought "Why not be super efficient and make a batch of Peanut Butter Kiss cookies while I'm at it. " I measured out the dry cake ingredients in one bowl, and the wet cake ingredients in another, and set them together at one end of the counter. Likewise for the cookie ingredients but at the opposite end of the counter......Well, you can see where this is going!. In spite of painstaking efforts at order and organization I managed to goof. Manfully helped I was by the Bean, who, at a critical moment in the proceedings, came swanning through from the garage, blathering about orchids he was mounting on pieces of wood, and expecting me to be fascinated by it all. So there I am, listening and doing my best "fascinated" imitation, meanwhile picking up the dry cookie ingredients bowl from one end of the counter, carrying it to the other end and efficiently dumping the contents into the bowl of wet cake ingredients, all without spilling anything on the counter.

Sooo efficient!

Except, it slowly dawned on me, as I added the chopped nuts with a flourish,

WRONG BOWL!

Under normal circumstances I behave like a lady. Under normal circumstances I do not curse.

These were not normal circumstances.

When I calmed down, which took a while, I scraped the sludge-like batter into the pan and grumpily shoved it into the oven. After all, there were two sticks of butter in there. If nothing else, I could chalk it up as a science experiment.

It wasn't quite as dense as a block of cement, but it was close! I propped my eyelids open with toothpicks and continued baking into the wee hours of the morning.

This evening there has been a flurry of wrapping for a Christmas box for California Girl whose livestock logistics do not permit a trip home for Christmas. The baking flurry continued as I wanted to make those Peanut Butter Kiss cookies. There's just enough room in the box to squeeze some in before sealing it up. But the devil was standing behind me as I took the first batch out of the oven. He made my hand slip. Up flew the cookies into the air, then gravity kicked in and they crashed to the floor. This time I think I actually invented some new cuss words---very loudly invented some new cuss words!

I think it's time to hang up my apron. The last thing I need is to precipitate a flurry of psychotic episodes and have to spend Christmas on the psych ward!!

Ode To Auntie Ita

2011-12-08T19:58:00.000-08:00

Of all the gifts I have ever received the ones from Auntie Ita are the ones I remember best. She had a knack for choosing gifts....Or maybe she was just a good listener with a lively imagination. It was she gave me the Katie books ["What Katy Did," "What Katy Did At School" and "What Katy Did Next"] at the exact moment in my life I was ready for "chapter" books. And after I read "Little Women" she took me to see the film starring June Allyson and Elizabeth Taylor. That's when I decided I didn't want to be me anymore, I wanted to be Jo. Auntie Ita brought a new outfit for my doll, Susie, whenever she came to visit. She was a marvelous knitter and the doll outfits usually consisted of a skirt and cardigan, or jumper, with a matching hat and sometimes even gloves and shoes. Her work was exquisite and I loved the buttons and fasteners and ribbons, all the important little details to which she paid so much attention. I was learning to knit in school and she encouraged me to make stuffed teddy bears, hot water bottle covers, tea cozies and such. Guess what everyone got for Christmas?

I loved to get on my bike and cycle across town to spend the afternoon with Auntie Ita. She lived in a tiny little cottage at the bottom of convent grounds. I think it used to be the convent gardener's cottage. Her fron garden was a joyous riot of flowers and rose bushes. Inside, her living room had a narrow shelf all around, full of photos of her friends from down the years. Maybe it was there that I developed my fascination with the stories old photographs tell.....Happy people, suspended in a moment in time.....What became of them? Are they still smiling and happy? What turns did their lives take after that photo? How magical an instrument a camera was to be able to capture such moments.......In between the photos there was a profusion of knickknacks and souvenirs. What my mother called clutter, but to me was an endless collection of stories.... just ask the question!

On rainy days she would let me crawl up into the tiny attic at the back of the cottage. It was like heaven for a child like me, an Aladdin's cave of yarn, scrapbooks and crafty treasures! On fine days I'd be off outside to play with the Breen boys from the big house next door, and the snooty, almost-too-good-to-play-with-me girls who went to Laurel Hill, the posh school behind Auntie Ita's cottage. It was on one such occasion that I suffered one of the greatest humiliations of my life. The time they uncharacteristically let me be the first to climb a certain tree. Flushed and flattered, up I went. Hoots and jeers and uproarious laughter broke out below as the assembled multitude craned their necks for an eyeful of the horrible, old fashioned knickers my mother made me wear! They were mawkish pink and came almost down to the knees, which had elastic, the better to seal in the warm air and keep you cozy, albeit extremely unfashionable.

But Auntie Ita knew how to soothe the humiliated. She made the best comfort food---strawberry jam and banana sandwiches on thick slices of fresh bread. My mother made ham sandwiches, chicken sandwiches, cucumber sandwiches and egg salad sandwiches, all of which tasted delicious, but only Auntie Ita thought far enough outside the box to serve up sandwiches of strawberry jam and sliced bananas!

One year she gave me an autograph book for my birthday. I still have it. On the first pastel page she wrote "It is not of much use to be entreated to turn over a new leaf when you see no kind of reason for doing so." Good advice, even today.

The entries go downhill from there, with gems from school friends such as "I wish you luck, I wish you joy, I wish you first a baby boy, And when his hair begins to curl, I wish you then a baby girl." We were cooped up all day with the nuns, catching occasional glimpses of boys in the far off distance. We were understandably intrigued by this other half of our species about whom we knew so little. Well, some of us, those with boys on the brain knew a bit more. I was of the prim, goody-two-shoes camp, having no desire to come to a bad end, which is what having boys on the brain allegedly led to. So quoth the nuns who were committed to keeping us in the dark. Boys were like strange, exotic animals. Fascinating, yes. But what, exactly, were you supposed to do with them? The nuns weren't telling. But look at us now. Nature finds a way!

The ever popular "Roses are red, violets are blue....." and variations thereof shows up on several pages of the autograph book, some of them polite, others not very, as illustrated by the one that ends with........."the smell of your feet would give me the flu!" I thought that was tasteless, even at the time, but didn't want to ruin my book by tearing out the page.........

[to be continued]

Norman Rockwell Does Not Live Here...........

2011-11-26T08:00:00.000-08:00

The table has long since been cleared, the dishwasher loaded, the leftovers stowed, Tom's carcass simmered overnight, turkey soup made, supped, and frozen.

There has been a rare sighting of the OC at the head of the table. The Prince of Carpathia faced him at the other end, with his Nursemaid in attendance, she giddy with joy to be dining on food not tasting like farina! There were not one, but two Sons, one Girlfriend, myself and the cat rounding out the company, though I hasten to assure you the cat was under the table....

The Prince was animated to have an audience for his stories. He fancied himself a wag and master teller of tales in days long gone. Most eyes get glassy when he starts on the thousandth telling, but hark! Yon maiden, the Girlfriend, she of the limpid eyes and the spellbound look, thinly covering her desperation---he has found a live one and has pinned her in place with his own ancient blues. No pity from her Boyfriend who is enjoying her predicament. Oldest son, more tolerant, asks leading questions, tongue in cheek, as though any encouragement were needed! Other conversations fly back and forth, plates are refilled, wine glasses replenished, and if the Prince is a little miffed that everyone is not hanging on his every word he has learned to deal with it. He sees it as one of the more disturbing trends in modern society. But what can you do? The tales must be told, over and over and over again.

The turkey was juicy, the mashed potatoes fluffy, the gravy tasty, the cranberry sauce tart, the sweet potatoes delectable, as usual, the new recipe stuffing uninspiring [back to the tried and true next year!] the green salad crunchy, a perfect compliment to the creaminess elsewhere.....Pumpkin praline cheesecake for dessert and no fear anyone would go to bed hungry.

Everyone behaved themselves [well, the Prince did try to get on his Obama hobby horse, but voices were raised and he doesn't have the strength to shout......] So yes, you could say that everyone behaved themselves.

There was no bloodshed. In spite of its ever present possibility, we do have much to be thankful for!

And so we gave thanks, with hearts hopeful for the future, and glad to be together in the present.

Ragged And Random.....

2011-11-20T08:20:00.000-08:00

My sister, The Little Blister, appeared on my blogroll yesterday! No warning, no mention in our last phone conversation, just there: "Empty Nest, Riseoutofme." I felt a surge of delight! How long has it been? A year! Twelve long months of nothing new? I speak to her regularly by telephone. I had her here in May and June. But I love it when she writes, and reading her blog was another connecting thread that I have sorely missed.

What brought her back? Loneliness? The rattling emptiness of her nest? We long to have time to sit and think, time for ourselves, time to finally do all the things we never had time to do while they were growing up. Time to read all the books, time to write, time to sew. So we sit and think....

........about them, about how far away they are, about how much we'd like a "just because" call. Sometimes I ruefully think I'm getting my comeuppance. How did my mother feel when I blithely took off across the ocean without so much as a backward glance, and only a sporadic letter here and there? No computers, no cell phones, just miles and miles of distance....and silence. I'm so sorry mum. Now that it's too late.

The older I get the more I appreciate my mother. She was a very private person and things were much more formal back then. She never bared her soul to me. She was the mother and I was the child. No blurring of the lines...... How appalled she would be at this blogging lark, where you hang your heart on your sleeve, for total strangers to see. I used to be more like her, but life has a chastening effect. It humbles you and makes you care much less about keeping up appearances, especially if those appearances are false.

But, ay. Total strangers. There's the rub. With actual friends spread far and wide you get to thinking of your blogging friends as real friends. Connecting with them lessens the lonliness. And life is a lonely business.

There, I said it.

Humans need connection, at least the female of the species, And the male too, though they're more about the tough exrterior, and maybe some of them don't need, or even want, connection on an emotional level ----- God forbid I should be emotional. How weak and needy and annoying. Just give me the facts ma'am; stick with the facts and we'll be on terra firma......Oy.

The lure of the blog....Reach out into the darkness with a humble bouquet of random thoughts, some of them ragged and ill-formed, but no matter. There's always a chance you'll hit a chord and some empathy will come winging back to you whilst you sleep, and there in the morning you find it. Validation. Your crazy thoughts are maybe not so crazy after all. Others have felt just so. Thank you God for bloggy friends!

I would hazzard a guess we're not the first to feel this way, to long for the empty nest and then not care much for the cavernous echoes.

Freedom takes a little getting used to when your life has been over-scheduled for thirty years, but we're up to the job. With a nest not quite empty yet, I'm ready. Put me in coach. If we can only weather this latest glitch, I will be embracing freedom, though, sigh, I'm not holding my breath.

We're in this together Blister. Not just you and me, but anyone who has ever arrived in the delivery room and realised, in consternation

"There's no room here to turn around, I have to see this through! "

And see it through we did. Thus far. They just forgot to tell us, amid all those contractions, that it wouldn't end when they turned eighteen; it wouldn't end when they graduated from college.....

What they forgot to tell us was that it would never end. Being a mother changes you forever. Crazy, crowded nest, nest with only a few stray feathers, or Empty Nest. No matter. They've got us in thrall. Until we die.

Courage Blister! You'll have more time to write!

NaBloPoMo Dropout

2011-11-15T19:50:00.000-08:00

Ambitions were lofty but then I just couldn't---Drone on and on about the humdrum details of my days---every day. You should be grateful.

Today for instance. Would you prefer to hear about my alarm clock making rude and obnoxious noises at 6:30 this morning, and my brain indignantly responding.........It's Tuesday for pity's sake! I get to sleep at least one more hour....But.......oh yes! I did agree to go in for an hour to cover for an absent Pat who, sadly, had to attend the funeral of a dear friend;

Or about my visit to the doctor where I was scolded for not having shown my face since May......Really??May?? I thought time flew when you were having fun, so what I want to know is where's all this fun I must be having if time is flying by so quickly?? Since I'd played hooky for so long, the rn, Donna, lined up all that had to be done [to keep me from crumpling into a pile of dust on the clinic floor] starting with a TB test on the forearm-sting like a bee, come back in two days---what? Can't I just call and tell you how it looks? But she was adamant. The law requires that I actually see it...That's what I get for playing hooky....Another hour-long drive in two day's time.....that must be a component of all that fun I haven't been noticing myself having! Likewise the chest x-ray for which I was lined up next. [RA is what ails me, though as long as I take the magic potions it really doesn't bother me.]

Or, how about getting blood drawn? Hmmm? Always exciting.....We have to make sure those magic potions don't suddenly turn toxic and mess with my innards...]Jeff the big, genial, teddy bear of a man who draws blood left me sitting a minute while he went off to find butterflies---No, not out in a meadow, but in the supply room. His preferred method. How he wished he'd invented them.
I agreed, and we sighed a while about how, if he had invented them, he would not be here drawing my blood, but off sailing around his island in his yacht. For myself, I told him, I'd be happy to have been the office grunt who had the bright idea for Post It notes......And Pat would like to have invented Whiteout......and if the moon were made of green cheese the residents of Wisconsin would be ecstatic! I wonder what it is, maybe frustration, at a lack, that sows the seed of an idea for a new invention?

Or maybe you'd find it more riveting to sit in my passenger seat and navigate the tortuous path from the doctor's office to the university; you could read the map so I wouldn't have to, thereby enabling me to safely arrive at, and inspect the Bean's new living quarters.....

Or how about joining us on the trip home? We stayed off the interstate, choosing instead the quieter, more scenic route, only to inch along at tortoise speed due to, not one, but two accidents, within a few miles of each other. Which totally negated the restorative benefits of the scenery.....

You see what I mean? Could you stand a daily dose of that?

Rejoice and be glad.

How about a nice cup of tea?

Bliss = A Good Book

2011-11-06T08:20:00.000-08:00

When The Little Blister came to visit, back in May she came laden, as usual, with books, because we are Barbarians here and she wants to civilize us! So I piled them on top of the already groaning stack on my night table. One of them was The Elegance Of The Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery. It took me a long time to get into it. At the time I was mired in other matters, and by the time I'd crawl into bed and open the book, I was too exhausted to read more than a few pages before my head slumped over and my eyes sealed shut. I expressed to her my lack of enthusiasm.

"You just have to read more of it at each sitting," she scolded me. So, like a good girl, I soldiered on. And was glad. She recommends going back and reading it again, but, too many books, too little time.

Next I started on Ghost Light by Joseph O'Conner, a fictionalized story of a love affair between the Irish playwright, John Millington Synge, and a working class girl who acted in some of his plays. He was of the Protestant landed gentry and she a Catholic from a Dublin tenement. Not the usual recipe for great Irish romance! It starts when she is an old lady living in a London slum, freezing because she has no heat, and close to starvation because she has no money for food. Bleak sounding I know, but a story wonderfully told. She warms and nourishes herself, and us, with her memories.

Here's a taste from the last chapter......

"There are eras of every life that have a carapace about them, a scar grown out of the woundedness. We gaze back on them as though they had meaning, contained intimations of future things - the seeds of the very subsequence we are now in a position to see. It is tempting to persuade ourselves we suffered a kind of illiteracy - we could not read the runes because we were young, or green, or undiscerning, or blind to the consequence. But that is not the truth, or not the whole truth, unmediated; for we sensed, even then, that this framed time must end and that all would be changed from this out. But we were adrift in a maelstrom of human feeling; already it was too late to swim. And we must somehow have wanted it, preferring the storm to the harbour; the hurts, the shattered feelings - the hurts to others too. We are innocent of nothing we chose. All our lives we do battle in the manacles of our mothers. But even the shaken chain has its music."

There's still a tottering pile on my night table, but they can wait. I'm busy rereading Ghost Light.

Give it a try. You might love it, as I did.

Thank you Little Blister!

And thank you Mr. O'Conner for a great yarn.

Oh The Cuckoo is a Pretty Bird,She Sings As She Flies----In English, Irish, Latin, French....

2011-11-02T19:49:00.000-07:00

There was a brief lull in the action this morning at work. For several minutes after messages were listened to and charts pulled for the day the phones didn't ring and we got to talking about what we'd do if and when we ever have enough time on our hands. I'm there two days a week and Pat, who manages our small office, is there four days. She would like to get more time in her sewing room. I'd like that too, but I'd also like, some day soon, to be involved with teaching English as a second language. Pat, who is a very positive and encouraging person, was instantly enthusiastic and said she thought I'd be wonderful at that, especially as I knew what it was like to have to learn English..................

Ahhhh, say what?

"What do you mean Pat?" I asked, puzzled.

I speak English, have done all my life. And I can limp along in German and French, albeit causing great mental anguish to myself and whoever is listening. None of which makes me any more qualified than the next person to teach English to foreigners.

Turns out Pat thought I'd grown up speaking Irish, that everyone in Ireland spoke Irish. Which is a logical thing to assume. but so far from the truth. The Sassenachs did a grand job of almost squashing Irish. Children back in the old days got punished for every word of Irish they spoke, so very soon, being Irish and therefore brilliant, they learned to speak English instead. When I was a child, and Ireland was independent again, Irish, which is a very difficult language, was just something we had to slog through as the nuns tried to undo the damage done by generations of English rule.

It was an uphill battle. They started us in Kindergarten and pounded it into our heads every day until we left school at eighteen. I liked it well enough, but shhhh! Don't tell the nuns, I liked French much more! That is something I can only now admit. Back then I would have been branded a traitor. How unpatriotic! Irish was up there with Latin. I loved the words, but Dear God! The grammar!

On our honeymoon we drove all around the west and northwest of Ireland. One day, walking along a road in Donegal we met a local. He raised his hat to us and greeted us in Irish.

"Dia is Muire guit!" I gamely replied.

All those years of daily slogging should be good for something, right? And besides, I had a newly minted American husband to impress and I was quick to recognize an opportunity to knock his socks off. So I spouted some small talk about the weather to our new acquaintance. He wrinkled his weathered brow in puzzlement. He didn't seem to comprehend a word and hit me with several sentences in a row, not one word of which I could understand. I knew he was speaking Irish, but that was as far as it went. The newly minted husband was having trouble keeping a straight face, and my own face was turning a deeper shade of red with every Irish word the man spoke.

Ochone, ochone!!

Alas and alack Patricia my dear, I won't be bringing any special linguistic brilliance to the teaching of English as a second language!

Note to Ali Honey: I don't think I speak with too much of an accent. At least not until I hear my own voice on a phone message....Then I think it's my sister I'm hearing!

Strange Sounds From The Cuckoo's Nest

2011-11-01T21:23:00.000-07:00

There I was this morning, sitting at a corner table at a Dunkin' Donuts, not in my neighborhood, a cup of coffee untouched in front of me, gazing out at Tampa driving by. The morning was clear and crisp. The sky was wish-you-were here blue, proving that,while blue skies may be a component of happiness, they cannot do the job alone. An Hispanic woman sits with her back to me, energetically bombarding the man sitting across from her with questions, giving him no space to answer. Another little Latin lady pushes a broom by my table and smiles. I smile back.

Across the street a sign for "Lupton's Buffet" peeks out from behind a palm tree and transports me instantly to our first base in California and Claire, who lived down the street from us and was doing a PhD in mediaeval literature. I imagine she felt, as I did, that she had arrived in Outer Mongolia, but this was where Uncle Sam had sent our second lieutenant husbands so there was nothing to be done but grin and bear it. The husbands all car pooled to the rocket lab every day and when the car of the day arrived at Lupton's the door would open and disgorge N, briefcase in one hand, hamburger and coke in the other [at 6:30 a.m.!] proving that just because you were a graduate of Yale didn't mean you had a clue. Just look at Dubbya.

But Claire was classy. I took a Rennaissance Literature class from her that made me wonder why on earth I'd done P.E. But then, that was back when I didn't have a clue either. We dipped into all kinds of famous and fascinating works including Dante's Inferno [Claire's cat was named Beatrice] and The Decameron. They're on my bookshelves still in hopes that one day soon I'll drop everything and read them. I've heard of procrastination and taking a while to get around to reading something-----but forty years?? The time may finally be right, the stars correctly aligned.....should start with the Inferno, as, given the events of the past year, it would be, hands down, the most appropriate choice.

And then I was out of time. The last of the morning customers, sitting alone in the corner, intermittently chewing on the end of my pen and scribbling, because it's NaBloPoMo time and I'm going to do one day of it at least.....

I have Not Lived In Vain

2011-10-22T20:21:00.000-07:00

No, I did not help a fainting robin unto his nest again, but I saved this butterfly! They laughed hysterically when I came running into the house in search of an implement to free him......

But I had the last laugh as he fluttered off to freedom!

Time For The Birthday Song!

2011-10-13T15:37:00.000-07:00

Here she is with the love of her life..........

And here she is with his foal, who wants to be her main squeeze, explaining to him that he needs to mind his manners.

And here she is, canoodling with him anyway because he said he was sorry and she's a pushover for anything with four hooves, a mane and a tail, especially these two....

Happy [belated] Birthday R!

Death, Taxes, and Lost Elasticity

2011-09-14T19:07:00.001-07:00

bra_20, a photo by wallygreeninker on Flickr.

Death and taxes. And several other pesky things in life......They're here to stay so you might as well put on your big girl panties and put up with them.....

You have to clean the toilets regularly, and sweep the floors, and change the sheets, and feed the natives, and clean up cat barf and straighten the cushions and clear out the newspapers, and make up things to blog about because Isabelle is squemish about pictures of dead squirrels!

Having gotten by with casual clothes for the past decade, you now find that the little part-time job you've taken on requires you to look respectable when you turn up for work, so, in spite of a closet bulging with shorts and jeans, capris and sweatpants, tee shirts and comfy knits, you find yourself with "nothing to wear." And you know they'll frown if you turn up naked....

So, off you go to the store, determined to start at the skin and work your way out. Is there a sight more pathetic than a woman of a certain age in search of underwear? She enters the store in cheerful mood. She's just had a nice lunch and there's a spring in her step. How difficult could it be to find a couple of new bras that will help to restore a semblance of her youthful shape? Intrepidly she approaches the lingerie department. True, it's been a while since she bought the threadbare articles of underwear she is currently wearing. True, they've lost their elasticity. True it's just habit that makes her put them on at all, since they're long past holding anything up, in or together.

But times, it seems, have changed. They're not selling bras anymore. The lingerie department appears to be selling body parts. To wit, matched pairs of bosoms, ringed around with wire. Rack after rack after rack of them [no pun intended.] White ones, cream ones, beige ones, brown ones, taupe ones, black ones, pink ones, blue ones. Even purple ones.. She inspects them tentatively. They don't need a woman to give them shape. They're already molded into some mad scientist's idea of the perfect womanly shape. She feels embarrassed touching them, as though someone might rear up indignantly and accuse her of taking liberties.

Is it possible that women nowadays, on their deathbeds, can selflessly decide to donate their bosoms to science, or industry, on their demise? To be whisked off to some bosom refurbishment warehouse, sprayed and sanitized, smoothed and buffed and plasticized, then delivered to department stores for sale to the hopeful who have reached that time in life where their elasticity is shot?

They do not hang there limply, waiting to be filled. They are already filled, with some kind of gel, or plastic, or rubber, or foam --- who knows? Back when the earth and I were young they used to call such things "falsies." Something with which to augment your "gifts" if you thought the good Lord had been less than generous. I never owned any, since, from the beginning, I was an advocate of truth in advertising. Not that I ever tried to advertise. The "gifts" were an embarrassment. They got in the way of climbing trees. They made boys smirk. I couldn't see why they had to be introduced at a time when you were already ill at ease in the world, neither a child nor a grownup, and confused about your place in this whole business of living.

It was my grandmother who pointed out to me [more puns, please pardon] that it was time for desperate measures, not in any verbal way, but by surreptitiously slipping a small package to me as we were leaving after one of our Sunday visits. Opening it, safely at home in my room, I was mortified to find a little lacy bra. What does it tell you about growing up in the fifties, in Ireland, that evidence of normal, healthy development was cause for embarrassment rather than celebration? Those nuns have a lot to answer for! So now, every day the embarrassing parts in question , which amounted to a barely perceptible swell, had to be maneuvered into ridiculously pointy contraptions designed, undoubtedly, by sadistic males, that made you look anything but natural.

Fortunately, the sixties and flower children and throwing tradition, as well as caution, to the winds, were at hand. Of course those who embraced this new freedom and burned their bras are probably now, in their dotage, carrying their bosoms around in one of those waist packs.

But, I digress. Back to our shopper. Oh, oh. Here she comes, heading towards the door. She looks a little pale. Pale green that is. The cheerful bounce has gone from her step; likewise the gleam from her eyes. Even her hair seems to be drooping dejectedly. She was brave [or more accurately, foolhardy.] She faced the monster and the monster won. Her ego has been battered. She is still wearing her saggy old undergarments. She has failed to find replacements. She refuses [a glimmer of rebellion still?] to buy body parts when all she came looking for was a simple undergarment.

Her plan? To go home and make a nice strong cup of tea.

And let 'em swing.

Vehicular Squirrelicide

2011-08-27T20:51:00.001-07:00

A squirrel darted into the road, just as I was pulling away from our mailbox the other day. He was a squirrel of very little brain. They're all squirrels of very little brain [With apologies to Lone Gray!] They run out into the road, see your car, stop, overcome by indecision, dither a moment, change direction, stop again, and then, at the worst possible moment, run right under your wheels. Sometimes, miraculously, they run between the wheels and dash to safety....Not this one.

Dead Squirrel, a photo by idoru45 on Flickr.

My heart sank when I heard the small, sickening "Thunk!"

"Oh no!" I wailed when I saw him in the rear view mirror, lying there, legs frantically kicking.

"Murderer!"

Squirrels are plentiful. Not an endangered species in these parts, but I hate to hurt anything. Well, almost......I am completely cold blooded about mosquitoes. Sentient beings are one thing, mosquitoes quite another.

Tears of remorse squirted from my eyes as I willed him to regain his footing and run off into the grass. It didn't happen. He was a goner. When I reached my driveway, I turned around and drove back to the scene of the crime, hoping that he would no longer be twitching. If I had killed him I wanted it to have been swift. There was no twitching. He was lying perfectly still, eyes staring, blood oozing from his mouth. But at least he wasn't a little one. I wouldn't have a squirrel mother's broken heart on my conscience....... This fellow had been around a while, buried a lot of nuts. He might even have been the Cheeky Charlie who climbs on the pool screen and chatters insolently at El Gato. If you blocked out his bushy tail, he looked very much like a rat. Which only made me feel a tiny bit better. If it was his day to die I'd have much preferred not to have been the instrument.

Glumly, I drove home.

Roadkill is a fact of life here. We live in an area that, fifty years ago, was completely wild. We frequently see possums, armadillos, gopher tortoises [these are the most heart breaking,] squirrels, and, recently, a bunny, lying by the side of the road, having come out on the losing end of a spat with a bigger creature, one made of chrome and steel. I always feel a pang of shame when I see them, as this was their habitat long before it was ours.

Nature is so practical and efficient though, it never takes long for roving bands of buzzards [I think of them as Men in Black--nature's sanitation crew] to find the roadkill and clean it up. When I drove by the mailboxes the next day the squirrel was gone. I know the county doesn't work that fast!

In the long run, one less squirrel in the world won't cause me to sleep less soundly [Sorry Calvin!] I just don't want to be the one culling the herd.

Forty One And Counting.....

2011-08-22T21:25:00.000-07:00

It's not that you're any braver in youth than in maturity, you're just less experienced and a lot more naive. What? Listen to cautionary tales from your elders---old fossils! Of course I'd never have said so, but come on, my parents were in their fifties, ancient! What could they possibly know about being young and "in love"? For that matter, what did I know about any of that? But I was an expert, based on? Grimm's Fairy Tales? My vast [not!]experience with the opposite sex? The fact that I'd read every word of Archbishop Fulton Sheen's advice to lovelorn youth as serialized in the Sunday Independent? How is it possible to think oneself such an expert when one isn't? Youth. That must be the answer. A commodity, according to my father, wasted on the young! They weren't pushy, those ancient Irish parents of mine. Careful to acknowledge my grown-up-edness. Aware, perhaps, that too much protest would make us more determined. Not that that stopped the parents of the Foreigner. They protested long and loudly, even threatening to boycott the whole event. Which merely served to make their son dig his heels in all the harder. Still, a few tentative "Are you sures?" Brushed aside by Miss Know-It-All's "Of course!"

The day dawned beautiful and sunshiny. Sixteen year old Blister looked stunning in pink, her hair a glossy brown mane. Mother looked every inch "mother of the bride" in a stylish cream dress, every hair coaxed into it's assigned place under her elegant little hat. Dad looked as ever, one of Nature's Gentlemen, lean as a thoroughbred, ears protruding, togged out in his best suit. Brother was scrubbed to beyond-recognition shininess, Gentleman's Quarterly how are you, in a collared shirt and tie and smart suit. Handsome Fr. Neville swished about in his soutane and his Cary Grant dimples, making all the ladies swoon, and curse Rome for making priests celibate.......All the aunts and uncles were in from the country, in their Sunday best, eager to get a good look at "the Foreigner." The Foreigner himself looked very spiffy in his double-breasted, dove-grey suit and his shiny new wing tips, which glisten still in his closet today, worn just the once! Behind his birth control glasses, the brown eyes that had been my undoing were as brown and handsome as ever. But, did they even know each other, these two who were about to promise for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, 'til death do us part? When the dust settled and the guests were gone, would they be tongue-tied and lost for words?

Dad made a big to-do of surreptitiously slipping a little satin draw-string purse into my hand at the reception. It contained several large, heavy crowns, old coins not in general circulation. They were a symbolic dowry, since Dad didn't have a stable of race horses, or forty head of Herefords to bestow on the Foreigner for taking me off his hands. They never made it out of The Old Ground. Because it was the height of foolishness to give them to me in the first place, in my excited and scatterbrained state. I often wonder who found them and if they felt good about keeping them....

And a week later, blithely kissing Mum and Dad goodbye at Shannon Airport, as though we were merely flying off to an adjacent county instead of the other side of the world and the rest of our lives, pretty much without them.

Who can put an old head on young shoulders? And would it even be wise, were it possible? Would the human race die out without the foolhardiness, innocence/ignorance, reckless abandon of youth?

Is it love that makes the world go around? Or is it sticking with the promises you made, gritting your teeth when the going gets tough, hanging in there when all you really want to do is run home, screaming, to mum and dad..........? Then one day, forty one years later, you find yourself sitting on the couch, blogging about it, trying to see the big picture, and you realize that now you are the ancient, irrelevant parent, you are the one anxious for them to choose wisely, you are the one trying not to be pushy, but asking tentatively "Are you sure?" The truth is no-one is ever sure. Life is like a swimming pool. You just have to close your eyes and plunge in.

We Weren't Looking For It, Trouble Just Found Us!

2011-08-19T14:37:00.001-07:00

caged lion, a photo by insane photoholic on Flickr.

I feel like a lion in a cage. Usually I enjoy being alone. I have the house to myself. The Bean and GF left for the beach, a last grab for summer fun before classes start on Monday. It feels abnormal for the Fall semester of university to start in August, but this is Florida, and this is how they do it here, and no-one is interested anyway whether I think it's normal or not.

The heavens opened shortly after they left and I stood at the window and watched the deluge. After it spent itself, and the sun came out again, I still stood, watching large, stray drops plonk onto the pool surface and ripple out in liquid circles 'til they met each other and died.......

We've had our share of excitement here this past week, God knows. You'd think I'd be glad of the quiet and not be so restless!. Coming home from the usual visit to the Ancient One, one evening last week, we were on the main road, with the right of way. A shiny new red car was stopped at a stop sign to the right of the intersection we were approaching, but as we came into the intersection the red car started coming across! The Bean managed to swerve so that the red car, when it hit us, hit the back passenger side of his car and not the front where I was sitting. No-one was hurt, thank goodness, but our hearts were pounding. A cop car was cruising through the neighbourhood just as we got out of our cars, so no call had to be made, he was right there. A little bantam rooster of a lady got out of the red car, all consternation, twittering a mile a minute about her brand new car, and she never saw us and the sun was in her eyes and oh my poor aged aunt I just picked her up and we were going for ice cream, are you alright auntie? Auntie was sitting impassively in the front seat, watching the shenanigans through hooded eyes, her aged face an expressionless mask, beneath her crown of immaculately combed and sprayed hair. She appeared to be unhurt, but her niece continued to twitter, while the nice policeman took care of the police report. He made soothing noises at her but pointed out the pertinent fact, setting sun in your eyes notwithstanding, you did hit him ma'am, even though we know you didn't intend to.The twittering continued unabated while red ants tried to attack us on the grassy verge, which put her in mind of her husband's friend who didn't have his epi pen with him, got bitten by red ants, swelled up and died, such a tragedy! All this in a very "oi, oi" New York accent!

She was a nice lady and it's too bad she and her aged aunt didn't manage to go out that night for ice cream without causing themselves and us so much trouble. It's been back and forth with insurance companies for several days, but now it's all ironed out. Her insurance is taking care of everything, though they did, inexplicably, deem the Bean's car to be a total loss! Whaddyamean a total loss? It's dented for heaven's sake!

Even though it's twelve years old and has mucho mileage, it was still running well, but they estimated the damage repairs to be more than the value of the car. As he emptied out all his personal stuff from it last evening he looked very sad. You know how attached guys get to their vehicles.......So, he'll be looking for a new [to him] vehicle as soon as they send him a check.

Whew! Meanwhile they've provided him with a rental, and he just called to say they arrived safely at the beach and the sun is shining.

As much as I enjoy my own company, I'm restless today. It's Friday, so I'm going to go get a pizza and inflict myself and it on a friend who is housebound following eye surgery this morning. Hopefully no-one in a shiny new red car will hit me in the pizza joint's parking lot!

Mumblings And Mutterings, All On A Summer's Day....

2011-08-17T20:13:00.000-07:00

I spoke to The Blister on the weekend. She had zero sympathy for my tales of killer heat since she was huddled in socks, jeans and woolly jumpers in what is passing for summer this year in Ireland. So, I'm left to mutter and mumble to myself about 95 degree weather, sopping humidity levels, afternoon lightening and thunderstorms, and weeds as high as your eye.

Summer was a delicious word fifty years ago. Summer meant "No more Irish, No more French, No more sitting on the hard old bench!" Freedom 'til September! We didn't get sent to camp, not for soccer, not for gymnastics, not for dance, not for violin. Our days were our own. After stuffing us full of porridge, or, if she was feeling indulgent, Cornflakes, our mother would wave us out the door to play. We had to report back for lunch at midday and teatime at six. We were expected to behave ourselves and not draw the neighbours on her....Other than that....freedom! Onto the bike and off down to the North Circular Road.

Patty S's garden stretched back for what seemed like miles behind her house. We played Cops and Robbers, and Wild Indians, and then, tired of how the boys were bossy and wouldn't play fair, we'd repair to our "club house" at the bottom of Jane W's garden. It probably looked like a makeshift lean-to, but we had pride of buildership, especially when the inevitable rains came and our clubhouse kept us dry, albeit cramped like tinned sardines! Repairing to anyone's house was not an option. The houses were too small and there was too much of a raggle-taggle team of us for any of the mothers to gladly grant us entry. Patty's mother had been a raven-haired beauty in her youth, but was now wracked with arthritis. She would come to the door occasionally, but we were never invited in. Jane's mother was English, and stylish, and made me blush when she admired a waste paper basket I'd made from a cardboard box and wall paper. Nobody at my house noticed that I had a talent for such things. Who knows how different life might have been had Jane's mother been my mother, which I devoutly wished were the case. Which wasn't very fair to my mother who was overwhelmed with the hand life had dealt her and struggling to get through the days with my brother; but when you're young you only see things from your own perspective. And I wanted a mother who was stylish and kind, smiled when she spoke to you and took the time to really look at, and appreciate, what you had made. The lovely English accent didn't hurt either. We were supposed to hate the English, but we met so few of them, they were more a subject of awe and fascination when we did.

Some summers we were transported to the seaside at Ballybunion for a couple of glorious weeks. We rented the same house each time and once my grandmother, from my father's side, came to visit us there for a few days. I remember walking along the road to the beach with her, just the two of us. She was a tall, tweedy woman and I had the temerity to ask her how old my daddy was. She loftily informed me that he was as old as his tongue and a little bit older than his teeth.... Talk about a conversation killer. I was mortified. Undoubtedly she thought children should speak only when spoken to, and certainly should not ask saucy questions. I'm not sure if I met her again before she died, which she did before I was ten. I do remember sitting in her garden having tea once. I was very impressed that the milk was in a silver jug but I have no recollection of any conversation. Maybe by then I had learned to keep mum! When we'd come back from the seaside, our house and street and garden seemed to have shrunk, we'd grown so used, in a short time, to wide open expanses of beach and Atlantic!

Eventually summer rolled on into September, school started again, new books had to be covered, new pencils sharpened, school shoes polished every night [whether you wanted to or not! Does anyone polish shoes anymore?] and before long, summer seemed like a distant dream.

Here, summer is to be endured; ways must be found to muddle through so we can get to the beautiful days of Autumn, Winter and Spring ! If you played Cops and Robbers in this heat you'd end up for sure in the Emergency Room. If you played Wild Indians, ditto. You'd also have people lecturing you about racial sensitivity and political correctness. And if you played either of these games at my age they'd cart you off to the psych ward! I'm trying to stay cool, trying not to pace. I don't know when I last made a waste paper basket from wallpaper and a cardboard box, but I think Jane W's mum would love the quilt I'm currently working on!

Beam Me Up Lily.....

2011-07-29T21:54:00.000-07:00

A recent package brought me this lovely birthday gift from oldest daughter that she knitted herself! Just looking at it transports me here .........

To wild and beautiful, heathery gray and drizzly Ireland, with its wonderful misty light. [quitchyerbellyachin' Blister!] After the first thousand days, unrelenting sunshine loses its allure. This bag takes me to a place fit for human habitation. Thanks Lily, for the bag and the trip.

Fair And Balanced........

2011-07-24T06:42:00.000-07:00

I am a little bit ashamed of my last post. Unworthy of the person I want to be, of the example I want to give my children and others. How many hundreds of times did I say to my children "If you have nothing good to say, say nothing at all!" I know that there are better ways to cope. He and I will never be soul mates, but life has thrown us together, so I'll be trying to keep to the high road instead of the seedy alleys of bitterness and resentment. If I should ever write a novel though, I'll be drawing heavily on him for my villain!

Meanwhile, in the interests of fair and balanced reporting..............
He has had a really interesting life. His family was a prominent one in his small, east European hometown, where, for many years, his father was the mayor. He became accustomed early in life to special treatment. His mother's pride and joy, as a young fellow he would not drink milk if Maruschka, the servant girl, had milked the cow, only if his mother had. My mother-in-law, may she rest in peace, always called me Maruschka.....Hmmm!

During the War he was plucked from in front of a firing squad, moments before he was due to be shot, when a high ranking officer, walking by, recognized him as a fellow countryman.

He had several other very narrow escapes, balanced by a good portion of both good luck and ingenuity.

He is fluent in a whole string of European languages;

He found ways to survive and put food on the table when all the odds were against him;

His children were always fed and decently clothed and given to understand that they'd better work hard in school...... Or else.

He helped many friends and acquaintances get to this country, after he was established here, by agreeing to be their sponsor.

He introduced us, but regretted it when we decided to get married as, in his opinion, the entire Irish race were a crowd of rowdy drunks.

He almost didn't come to our wedding when I dug in my heels and insisted it be in Ireland.....

But then moved heaven and earth to get me and my toddler home when my own Dad was dying and time was running out.

He was tall and handsome [and vain as a peacock.] Still the nattiest dresser in town, and a fine looking man for his age......As he will be the first to point out to you [in case you didn't notice.]

How'm I doing? Fair and balanced, with just a few wobbly bits? That rebel Irish brat inside me keeps leaking out through the cracks. I'm doing my best though, to shove her back in.....and point her up the hill to the high road.

Chinese Laundry Service

2011-07-17T18:07:00.000-07:00

Okay, So I'm not Chinese. But laundry is one of my talents. Five children, one sweaty husband, years of practice. I can do it in my sleep.

Visiting the Ancient Hypochondriac the other day, I patiently listened to the Organ Recital. I arranged my face in a suitable facsimile of concerned interest. Although, if he is as intelligent as he never tires of telling us he is, he must realize,on some level, that I'd rather stick pins in my eyes [or his] than hear the whole litany again. Nothing daunted, he mercilessly makes me listen to the in-depth details of the latest ache. It is futile to raise a squeak in protest because, although he sees my lips moving, it only makes him talk louder.

My theories are:

He knows I'm trying to talk common-sense to him but he is not interested in common sense;

He sees my lips moving but is much more interested in the sound of his own voice than the sound of mine;

He doesn't give a rat's ass what I'm trying to say, he just wants to be talking;.

I'm Irish, how could I possibly know anything?

I'm female, how could I possibly know anything?

Or.....

All of the above.

By his reckoning I should be barefoot in the kitchen, cooking palachinki for him, and keeping my opinions to myself.

Organ recital over, very little sympathy forthcoming, he starts complaining about his doctors. Too bad they can't do more than practice medicine. He won't listen to them, but if they won't be quiet and listen to his theories about what is wrong with him, they must be incompetent. All they're interested in is money. If I were his doctor I'd be interested in money too. Specifically, how much I'd have to pay him never to darken my door again. Incidentally there's a pot of gold waiting for the doc who finds the cure for old age. Dr. Kevorkian doesn't count. Besides, he already found the cure for himself.

Half an hour is my limit. Less if he starts in on Mr. Obama. As I trotted out the door, I spotted some laundry and offered to take it.

"No, no, no! O will be here on Tuesday. She'll do it"

I thought of O, giving up the job she loves, leaving her cozy house empty, leaving her friends, her daughter, her garden and her familiar neighbourhood, to come and live with this ancient, petulant, hypochondriac, and I thought the least I can do is a few bits of laundry so her first job when she lands won't be washing his underwear!

Ah so!

Stitchin' with The Blister

2011-07-16T20:17:00.000-07:00

I just popped in on Dianne to see what she's been up to lately [while I've been having my fainting spells!] As usual, she's been busy. And as usual, she made me laugh! Her take on "incentive" made me think of The Blister and how she banished "procrastination" to the back kitchen, and somehow cracked the whip of incentive and got me stitching on old projects instead of thinking that I should stitch on old projects! And indeed, she rolled up her own sleeves, threaded her needle and finished this table runner.........

Then loaded up the needle again and finished this ancient Christmas table topper.......

She was "willing to work," and I was "willing to let her," but for some reason she thought that I should work too! So I made these shopping bags, as gifts for her friends back home.

At least they were "made in America," something that is getting harder and harder to find! And because she needed a duffle bag for herself, we made this beauty,

and decided that if we ever found ourselves living close enough to each other, we'd go into business and call ourselves "The Bag Ladies!"

Her ongoing project, which she worked on between times, was quilting on my [in-] famous ladybug quilt, which is promised to Little Brit grandson, who at the grand old age of two, is already specializing in the study of ladybugs!

Because she stitched so diligently, and has the calluses to prove it, I have no choice but to carry on, finish it and make her proud.

The thought of her wrath if I don't should be incentive enough!

Ennui

2011-07-13T19:59:00.000-07:00

Rule # 3: Don't use foreign words. Sage advice. If you're writing in English, then, damn it, write in English. But "ennui" is such a lovely word, and so much less boring than "boredom," I'm going to break my own rule, just this once. "Ennui." Leave it to the French. It conjures a picture of a slender Victorian lady, with Gibson girl hair, fainting on an old fashioned couch---pass the smelling salts please.

Not that I'm bored. Too busy for that. Just suspect that anything I write will bore the britches off the reader or, to put it more Frenchly, might induce in said reader a sense of "ennui."
"Is this the best she can do?"

Ennui didn't get a look in while the Little Blister was here. Five glorious, ennui-free weeks, awash in beaches and rivers and laughter, kayaks and manatees and more laughter, shopping and eating and sewing [My, how we sewed!] And laughter. Did I mention the laughter? Gales and gales of it.

That's what I miss the most. Seemed like everything was more fun with the Blister around, from the first cup of coffee to the final "Oiche Mhaith!" [Oops! There I go, breaking the rules again!]

And now she is gone, and the everyday routine has closed over the space she occupied. And not just gone. Incommunicado [there I go again!] As far as I know, she is off in France, climbing around among the rocks, at very high elevations. Sigh. While I am fainting here from the ninety degree heat. Pass the smelling salts.

And so, I wonder, how did it come to this? An aging Irish lass, lover of laughter and language, conversations about everything and nothing at all, little Blisters, offspring, grandchildren and friends----all of them miles and miles and miles away.......How did she get here, to this table, sitting alone in this sweltering heat stirring her tea?

Overcome by ennui.

*Oiche mhaith = "Good Night" in Irish.

Old Stones, Old Bones

2011-05-14T22:06:00.000-07:00

This time two years ago I was visiting The Little Blister in Ireland. One of the places our mother liked to go on a Sunday afternoon, when we were young, was Lough Gur, so, one sunny Sunday afternoon we set off. I hadn't been there in years, and had never been since its archaeological significance had been played up, to turn it into a tourist attraction. It was early in the season though, so we almost had the place to ourselves. It is a beautiful place, lovely for walking, so, since I was there and you weren't why, don't you traipse along behind us if you have a few minutes.....

I was afraid the development might have ruined it, but it was very low key, and nicely done. The visitor's center was designed to look like the ancient dwellings that were discovered in the area.

Information boards weere posted along the trails, like this one showing a replica of an ancient shield excavated nearby.........

One of the things I love about where I grew up is the proliferation of castles and old ruins. They pop up on the horizon when you least expect them. My mother had no patience with my fascination with what she dismissed as "piles of old rocks," so I never got it out of my system! This one is right up against a farmhouse, on the road in to Lough Gur, surrounded by muddy fields dotted with cow pies. Obviously they're not trying to attract tourists! I ventured as close as I could, until the Blister, with a wee bit of mother's impatience, warned me that, if I wasn't careful, I'd get the two of us in trouble for trespassing!

A little further out the road from Lough Gur is the area where our mother grew up.We decided to drop in, unannounced, on the farming cousins. If you warn them ahead of time they make an embarrassing fuss, and need a week to prepare, so since we didn't have much time, we thought we'd just pop in!

We'd never have done that with my mother's generation, but the cousins are in charge now and they're as casual as we are. After a lovely visit, and quite a bit of fuss, in spite of our clever plan, we chanced upon this little cemetery on our way home.

We hopped over the wall and landed in the middle of this patch of bluebells.....

Cemeteries are fascinating, the older the better. When my youngest daughter was little, she'd point excitedly at any cemetery we passed on our travels and say "Look Mom! Heaven!" I wouldn't say that a cemetery is exactly my idea of heaven, and we might not have been quite so brave had it been "a dark and stormy night!" But it was a beautiful Spring day so we weren't too worried about running into any ghosts or banshees. The Blister did get the shivers in a few places though........

She absolutely would not walk down the right side of the ruined church above. I walked there regardless, and was unaware of anything otherworldly, but then I'm not as finely tuned for things supernatural as she is!

This arch was the door into the church.....My eyes love arches. They look so elegant, and isn't it said that the way the stones are fitted together in an arch makes it one of architecture's strongest designs?

Singers and story tellers have always been held in the highest regard by the country people in Ireland. After all, they needed some bit of entertainment after longs days in the fields.

Eventually, after all the joy and sorrow, heartache and toil, each of us will be no more than a shiver on someone's spine. But if the shiver could be delivered in a setting like this, looking out over a peaceful lake, I'd be one happy ghost.

So that is where I was two years ago this month. Were you able to keep up?

And this is where the Little Blister will be in less than a week!

Racoon Post Missing In Action!

2011-05-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

There was some funny business going on last evening with Blogger. Between the hopping and the trotting my last post "Cactus For Breakfast" has vanished, without a trace. In answer to some questions in the comments, yes, that is a raccoon. They are common in this area. I've seen them most often down by the river. They are scavengers and like nothing more than rooting through garbage. I suspect that he and his compadres, even though I've never seen them back there, are the critters that poke around in our compost pile way out back. So no RR, I did not feel inclined to invite him in for some antacids! In spite of those appealing eyes and funny mask, he and his ilk are not welcome here! Besides, they can have rabies and who needs that? He must have been disappointed to find no garbage, but, rather than leaving with an empty belly he decided to snack on the Christmas Cactus.......Big mistake, as his pathetic air demonstrated, not to mention the various nasty green deposits he left on the porch!

Looks like Blogger is back to behaving itself today, so no harm done......

Listening To The Quilt Gods

2011-05-08T11:01:00.000-07:00

It all started out innocently enough. One day back in February, I was "playing" in my sewing room and came across a sample of a dimensional bow tie block that a quilting acquaintance had shown me how to do about a year ago. I decided to try it. It turned out to be simple. The third of three seams was a bit fiddly......

.............but I soon mastered it.

So I made a few more.............
.

And then a few more..........

An idea was forming....It was so easy to make, and I've always liked Bow Tie, so I thought I'd make a new throw quilt for the back of the sofa. The one that currently lives there is ancient. And faded. It was the first quilt I ever made. Trip Around The World. I've known for some time now that the trip was over, quite a while ago, for this particular quilt. But the cat likes to perch on it on the back of the sofa, and the menfolk like to tease the cat by moving their fingers around under the quilt and tantalizing him. Who knows what goes on in his feline brain when they do this. All I know is that it causes great hilarity [we are easily amused in these parts!] and also some little rips in the quilt. So, in addition to "ancient," and "faded," it can also say on its resume that it is "tattered." Not shabby chic. Just plain shabby.

Bow ties to the rescue! I had perfected the technique and could pop out a finished block in just under five minutes. My cunning plan was that to use a variety of light background fabrics and a different medium or dark for each bow tie. This is what saved me. Making the same block over and over has limited charms. Dying of boredom is not the way I want to go. I became reacquainted with all the little bits and pieces in my stash, and even rediscovered some fabrics I'd forgotten about!. Each block was like making a mini quilt, the most fun part being matching up each background with a new bow tie fabric.

Before long I had enough bow ties to cover a small country. Whoa! Let's not get carried away here. So I stopped and laid them out to have a look.[see photo above.]

Before I sewed them together I decided to move them around to see what other effects I could get.......

Hmmmm. Interesting. I would have to think about this for a while. Let it simmer, as it were, on the mental back burners. While it was simmering I went, one weekend in March, to a quilt show. And saw this:

Interestinger and interestinger! Close up inspection revealed that this design resulted from alternating bow tie blocks with nine patches. I went home, head buzzing, and started making scrappy nine patch blocks.

Now we were getting somewhere!

To pin all those blocks on that design wall I had to climb up and down from my [fortunately] sturdy table, over and over again, pins clamped between determined lips. I would climb up to rearrange some blocks, then climb down to get the overall effect from the other side of the room. And people think us quilters get no exercise! Dissatisfied, I'd have to climb up again, over and over, until finally I was happy with the distribution of colours. Time to stitch them all together before I had a chance to change my mind again!

!

And here's my quilt top. I'm happy, but not done yet. There's a small matter of borders, both to make it bigger and also to frame it.

But with all those scrappy fabrics, and every colour of the rainbow, how would I find the perfect fabric? I had a beautiful red, left over from another project and used in one of the bow ties. I had just enough to make a half inch border. But what to use for the outside border? A quilt shop seemed like a good place to start. My sister-in-law was visiting for Easter. She always likes to go to a quilt shop when she visits, to drool over all the lovely fabrics, so off we went. Its a tough job as the cliche goes, but someone has to do it. I suffered agonies at the quilt shop, surrounded by such a wealth of gorgeous fabrics. It was really difficult to choose, but I kept coming back to two different blues. Sister-in-law weighed in, as did a couple of the shop ladies, and finally a decision was made. S-I-L bought fabric for a baby quilt for a co-worker and, several hours after we'd come in the quilt shop door, we headed out in search of lunch. Choosing fabric is exhausting work and when a decision is finally reached you realize that all that agonizing and hand-wringing has left you weak and ravenous!

Nice blue, don't you think? I wasted no time getting the borders on as I don't trust that I've chosen well until I see it stitched onto the quilt. But now I'm confident I chose really well. I love it!

The day may yet come that I plan a quilt from start to finish, on paper, before making that first cut or taking that first stitch. Meanwhile I'm quite content letting the quilt gods whisper in my ear at every step of the process. Sometimes I am more surprised than anyone at the results! I never agonize at the outset about what I will use as a border or what kind of sashing I need. It's too early for all that I am confident that all will be revealed in the fullness of time!. Without a set of rigid ideas, the quilt will tell me in what direction it wants to go......It's more exciting that way. I like going into my sewing room and not knowing quite what will happen.

Sometimes I'm happy with the results; sometimes not quite; this time I am delighted

Of course it's not finished yet! But I do already have a couple of options for backing..........Meantime, every time I look at it, I smile!

Counting Blessings....

2011-05-01T16:54:00.000-07:00

We've been picking blueberries for more than a week now. In our own garden. Thanks to the interest, patience, persistence, perseverance and unfailing green thumbs of The Bean. Until now I've sort of taken it for granted. Yes, he loves to grow stuff. There are always pots of this and that, in various stages of growth all around the house and garden.

His fruit tree experiments are lined up on the patio in various stages of growth....His orchids fill all the available space on the patio windowsills. Inside, on the kitchen counter, there are always cuttings of some kind, in jars of water, growing roots.....

And we always have bags of dirt and cow manure to step over. It's not very tidy. Better Homes and Gardens would not come here for a photo shoot....... though Organic Gardener might.

He would like to be a farmer. Except we don't have a farm. His great grandfather in Eastern Europe had lots of land. Until the Russians decided he should "sign it over" to the state. My maternal grandfather was a farmer, and my uncles, after he died, and now my cousins..........In Ireland. With his talent he should be a farmer.....

I went out to the garden to pick the latest batch of blueberries this morning. The bushes were laden down with fruit, and it made me so happy, just standing there in the sunshine, filling my bowl with those little berries. When I came in I went to find him [in front of the computer---finals are coming up]

"Stand up," I said, "I need to hug you!"

"Why?" he asked.

"For giving me the simple, but unbelievable pleasure, of picking these in my own garden," I said, and showed him my overflowing bowl of berries.

Small blessings in the form of little blue berries. A big blessing in the strapping son who grew them.

So, breakfast was a no-brainer.... Yup....... Blueberry pancakes.

You could still taste the sunshine.

Don't You Wish You Could Go To A Ceilidh?

2011-03-17T20:08:00.000-07:00

It's late on St. Patrick's Day and I haven't posted anything, but since I can't leave this blog silent on this day, of all days, I'll take the easy way out and share my favourite Celtic Woman song with you. Hope you had a happy day!

My Own Blue Bayou

2011-03-11T20:24:00.000-08:00

The inmates didn't do much exciting last weekend, the one swotting for mid-terms and the other compulsively sewing. Since the weather was dull and gray, it was no hardship to be indoors, and now the scholar has good marks and I have the makings of a new quilt for the back of the sofa, to replace the rag that currently lives there! More on all that soon.

Meantime,Tuesday afternoon fairly sparkled with blue skies and sunshine. The scholar had a break from mid-terms and I was free, so it didn't take long to figure out there was only one sensible thing to do.....Down tools and head for the river!

It was a glorious afternoon and, being the middle of the week, we had the river to ourselves. The scholar loves the tranquility, the wildlife and the workout. As soon as we were in the water, he disappeared off upstream in a spray of water and a flash of oars, leaving me to doddle along peacefully at a considerably slower pace.

Doddling quietly along should not be confused with "dawdling," which, while it does have the advantage of being a real word, does not adequately describe the art of doddling which is my own patented way of drifting along, willy-nilly, hardly using the paddles except to fend off attacks by overhanging branches; Gazing dreamily about, on the lookout for birds and flowers and wildlife, and wandering into quiet loops to better examine interesting root formations on the banks, where one could easily imagine colonies of Rattys, Moles and Badgers living out their days!

Without the splash of paddles to break the spell, the peace of the river fills up all the empty, lonely corners of your heart. It is so calm out there. Nothing but clear, blue-green water, birdsong and rushy sounds, inner peace and darting fishes. If there is a place to find the answers to life's perplexing questions [thank you Guy Noir!] or at least to escape from them for a while, this is probably it.

There weren't as many birds as usual, though I did spot a few herons. I saw several large painted turtles feeding on the river bottom, and some fish called, I think, alligator gar, with really long pointy snouts, that I had never seen before. They sped through the water in groups of three or four, in perfect synchronization with one another, as though in a well choreographed, fast-paced dance!

Since we are well into March, I didn't expect to see manatees. I figured they'd be moving back out to the gulf now that the weather is getting warmer, so I was surprized and delighted to come upon a mother and calf, quietly munching away, just beneath my kayak!

A case could be made for saying that a manatee has a face only a mother could love!

But they are so huge, and so gentle, that you find yourself falling in love with them anyway..... These two were completely calm and accepting, and happy to share the river with me. I must have stayed in that spot for almost an hour, just hanging out with my new pals! As they munched their way slowly upstream I paddled quietly along beside them.

It almost seemed as though they were being playful.....I'd have the camera poised for a shot and just as I clicked [and had that confounded delay!] they'd veer off under me, so I ended up with some very "arty" shots of shimmering shadows! But they also co-operated enough that I got a few decent shots too. Like this one....

I'm so glad we downed tools and went to the river on Tuesday! Since then it's turned cold again [I'm sitting here shivering], then the tsunami hit Japan, then California Girl called to say they were under a tsunami watch....And Mr. Gadhafi is still in power......Just the world as usual, hurtling along regardless! We can never know what lies in wait 'round the next bend so we might as well seize the day, or the afternoon........preferably out on the river!.

My Pal, Vidal

2011-02-20T18:00:00.001-08:00

Sassoon-Deconstructivism
Originally uploaded by manos.spa

I was listening to the radio one day recently. Someone was interviewing Vidal Sassoon. Remember him?

It was the mid sixties. America was fighting in Vietnam. Twiggy was making emaciation so sexy that curvy women were jumping off tall buildings [well, thinking about it, anyway.] Hairstyles ran to flips and bee hives, teasing [back-combing] and lots and lots of hair spray. Looking natural was considered un-natural! Instead, we were supposed to torture ourselves by "setting" our hair in "curlers" every time we washed it. These were cylindrical torture devices with prickly bits to catch and hold the hair. I'm pretty sure sleeping in them caused brain damage as well as painful dents in the scalp. Rebellion was frowned upon. What? Go out without setting your hair? As soon as I washed my hair my mother would miraculously appear, all business, ready to set it for me. She was probably afraid I'd just comb it and go, and how would she ever live with the shame? Arguing with one's mother was not encouraged back then so I would grit my teeth, groan inwardly and submit.

My mother was petite. And stylish. It was a penance for her to have string bean daughters instead of dainty persons who enjoyed wearing make-up and letting her "beautify" them. Looking back, I realize the problem was that I was born either too late or too early. I would have fit right in had I been born a hundred years earlier, in my grand mother's day. Likewise if I'd been born when my sister was. But, I was born when I was born and so had to submit to my mother's plans for the perplexing question of how to turn her duckling into a swan.

I hated it! After every last hair had been tightly wound onto rollers I'd have to sit under another instrument of torture---the hairdryer. After my head cooked for half an hour and I began to think it would surely catch on fire, my mother would reappear brandishing combs and brushes and the dreaded hair spray. Taking the curlers out was torture in itself, as those prickly rollers did not easily release their prisoners. Some hairs inevitably got yanked out by the roots. Ouch! Then she would brush vigorously, but the hair promptly "boinged" back to sausage shapes. She was not a woman to give up easily. There were ways to make my hair do what she wanted it to. Teasing, or backcombing, for instance. Lord, how I hated that!

"Only a little," she'd coax. "Just to give it a little height."

Additional height was the last thing I needed. I was already taller than I was comfortable being, I didn't need six more inches of fluffed up hair! And besides, why would you tear perfectly healthy hair like that? And then, to add insult to injury, she'd spray the whole lot with hair spray. Because everyone knows that Prince Charming, when he finally shows up [and it could be any minute now,] will be longing to run his fingers through my helmet! Finally satisfied that I looked presentable she'd encourage me to go look in the mirror, hoping each time that this time I'd love it. Poor woman. Her efforts were wasted. I was an unappreciative ingrate, but would manage a sickly smile so as not to hurt her feelings. Though now I have to wonder why my feelings weren't taken into consideration? Considering it was my hair.

My sister [aka Rise, the unblogger!] was only six years younger than me but we seemed to belong to different generations. By the time she came along, rebellion was all the rage. "Teenagers" were beginning to be looked upon as a breed apart, in need of special handling. I don't think her glossy mane was ever wound up in curlers. If anyone had tried they'd have had to catch her first!

And then, one day, Mum sent me off to town for a haircut. And didn't come along to dictate how it should be done. Vidal Sassoon had just exploded onto the hair style scene with his radical ideas.

No teasing.

No hair spray.

It was all about the cut.

This was my kind of guy! I went, in one short half hour, from a boring school girl haircut to the very latest sculptured hairstyle. Vidal, he said in the interview, would like to have been an architect if he had not been cutting hair. Not such a stretch. In the past I'd come away from the hair dresser's feeling naked, as though I'd been scalped. [My hair was wavy and it was my mother's considered opinion that it looked better short. My considered opinion didn't get a look in]

From this haircut I came away feeling gorgeous! Me! And it wasn't because of any artifice. It wasn't because my hair had been teased to within an inch of its life, or sprayed until it was stiff as a board! I couldn't stop smiling. I felt beautiful. For the first time in my life.

Next day, of course, I had to go to school. And face the nuns. Amazingly, the haircut looked just as good after I'd slept on it. My friends were wildly enthusiastic. The unassuming MB had gone and done something daring! There were some raised eyebrows and pursed lips, notably from the Mag, to whom this new haircut looked alarmingly unsuitable for a convent recruit [she was still entertaining hopes for me at that stage!] The Mag was the squirmmeisterin, but this time she didn't succeed. I just tossed my newly glamorous head and refused to feel bad about looking good!

Vidal came along just in time to save me. If growing up was to be about masochistic hair setting rituals, I wasn't sure I wanted to have anything to do with it. His architectural approach was perfect for the way I thought. A good cut every 4-6 weeks and the rest of the time just comb and go! Maybe growing up wouldn't be so bad if you could do it your way!

Does A Bear Poop In The Woods?

2011-02-16T19:10:00.000-08:00

It was brown, at first glance, when we walked in the woods on Sunday. Chilly enough for a sweater but blue sky and sunshine spilling down. The recent rains had made the carpet of leaves squishy in low spots while the higher ground was already dry and crunchy. We squished and crunched along companionably enjoying the fresh air.

If I were a woodland creature I'd hope this cozy dwelling was available for immediate occupancy.......

...........at the base of a mighty oak, with a swimming pool located conveniently nearby........

Mother Nature is quite the decorator. We found a fallen tree bedecked with these frilly fungi....

There's not much colour yet in the woods, but these tiny flowers peeked from beneath the dead leaves......

.
And this gorgeous vine surprised us round a bend in the path. We'd seen its fallen blossoms along the way and wondered, then came upon the real thing. Mystery solved.

Well content, we climbed back into the car and headed for home. Gradually my nose became aware of an unpleasant odor........."Did we brush off some plant in the woods that had a nasty smell?"

Unpleasanter by the second.....Oh crap! We hadn't stepped in something, had we?

Indeed we had. The waste product of some, undoubtedly charming, woodland creature was thickly adhered to the sole of my shoe...........The offending shoes were removed, gingerly placed in a plastic bag and relegated to the trunk.... No harm done.

As I was saying, it was brown in the woods on our walk on Sunday..........

Itching To Quilt.....

2011-02-14T18:32:00.000-08:00

Last week came a package from my friend Em. Inside, some bits of fabric. Em knows I'm a quilter. What she doesn't know, and I have no intention of enlightening her, is that I am a horrible fabric snob. I know that the W store sells fabric, but I cringe when I hear anyone talking about actually using it in a quilt. Fabric from the J store is sometimes acceptable, but, for the most part, if I'm going to spend half my life making quilts I want the best quality fabric available. Of course I'd rather not have to pay top dollar for it, so my favourite parts of quilt shops are the sale shelves!

So, back to Em and the fabric of dubious origins.....I had mentioned to her once that I was making blocks for breast cancer quilts. That may be what started this....... I scratched my head, surveyed the bits and puzzled what to do....These bits were not particularly suitable for the BC quilts. They looked more like leftovers from projects she'd done with her several granddaughters. An idea started to form. It grew and grew and my grin got wider and wider......I'd make her a quilt! Don't groan. This was an excellent idea on many fronts.

It would be small, something she could use as a table topper.
It would be simple. I'd start with nine patch blocks and let it evolve.
It would be finished within a week, so, no danger of adding to the UFU pile.
No agonizing allowed. I'd just cut and stitch, with my eyes closed if need be.
I would use only Em's bits and fabric I already had.
Best of all, play therapy, badly needed, for me!.

I made the blocks on the weekend, and alternate blocks at spare minutes during the week. At first my alternate blocks were square within a square. But, do you know how boring they get after you've made four? Deadly! So, what to do? Em's bits were mainly reds, pinks and greens, several had hearts, so I dug around and found some blocks leftover from a ragged hearts wall hanging I'd made years ago. [Vindication for saving useless crap!] They were a bit too big, but a little judicious surgery took care of that!

Onward! No agonizing. Lay them on the floor, switch 'em around, stitch 'em together! Smokin'!

Rummaging in the stash produced fabric for borders and backing. Before you could blink I was pinning layers together. The end was in sight!

I attached my walking foot and sat down to quilt. And that's when TROUBLE reared its ugly head.

One furlong to run and my horse quit. Sat down in the middle of the track and wouldn't budge! I foolishly urged her on, when, obviously, she wasn't up to the job. Drat! Two lines, the width of the quilt, of ugly puckers! I sat for an hour unpicking those ugly puckers, glaring all the while at my recalcitrant horse. She's a game old girl, my Bernina. We've been together for twenty years. We've made some beautiful quilts and had a lot of fun in the making. But I've been neglecting her and she just couldn't take it any more. She's way overdue for some R&R.

This morning I made a reservation for her to spend a few days at Dr. Gregor's spa for tired and creaky, overworked and cranky Berninas. She'll stay for a few days and enjoy some badly needed, richly deserved, pampering at the expert hands of Dr. Gregor. He'll give her a full body massage, with aromatic oils imported especially from Switzerland. He'll scratch all her itches, lubricate her aching joints, adjust her stitch width and length regulators, feed her only the finest oats and make her feel like a young filly again!

And since there'll be no full body massages, or pampering with aromatic oils going on here while she's off , having the time of Reilly, I hope she comes back with her work boots on! We've got a quilt to finish!

Wordless Wednesday....Or # 11

2011-02-09T20:14:00.000-08:00

Still Scavenging...

2011-02-08T17:54:00.000-08:00

No. 4 - Yarn

When I went to visit in Ohio last October, Lily let me play with her yarn. She knows I get twitchy if I don't have something to do with my hands when I'm out of my natural habitat so she produced this..........

There was lots more than this to start with, but I used it up making a cozy scarf........dashingly modeled for you here by Teddy, my ancient, blind bear.

[Aside from Teddy: "She'd be better employed knitting me a decent pair of socks. Do you see how shoddily shod I am? I'm just saying...."]

No. 6 - A Library:

This is not our library proper, but then I'm not a proper rule-follower. Besides, the Little Red Schoolhouse makes a more interesting picture than the actual library. This is where old library books go to die..... or, with a little luck, find a new lease on life.

No. 10 - Something out of Place.

I was stuck for this one, until this morning..........

"Hey Dude! Where'd you park the car?"

......................when I came across these two fellows looking a little distracted in the parking lot.

Only four to go!

Photo Scavenger Hunt, Straggler Style

2011-02-03T18:17:00.000-08:00

Here's that Photo Scavenger Hunt list I found over at Anna's. I'm sure there are rules, but rules are made to be broken, or so I've heard. There's probably some picky requirement about having to do it in January; probably another that you do all twelve in one post; possibly a requirement that all of your pictures were taken in January. But having spent the best years of my life following the rules I'm now indulging in some long overdue rebellion. To my credit, I did get #1 in on time, but got carried away on a tangent, so it had to stand alone.

Slow and [un]Steady also gets to the finish line....eventually! Usually about the time all those over-achievers have dusted themselves off and gone home. Besides, if you follow those rules you get one post out of it, whereas having already got one, I intend to get a few more before I'm done. Devilishly clever, don't you think?

This photo of a stained glass window, SL #2, was taken in a little chapel we wandered into on a visit to the OC's alma mater in upstate New York some years ago.......

A bit too modern for my taste; I prefer traditional church windows, like this one, taken on a trip to England when our youngest grandson was born........
.

Here's a reflective surface, SL# 9 [not a mirror] taken on a recent walk in the park.

Here's playground equipment, minus the players....SL# 5 .....Another violation.....photos out of proper sequence......I'll probably be black listed by the Scavenger Hunt Committee. Oh dear.....

SL#3 was "a goldfish." This fellow probably has another name, but he looks gold to me! I found him lurking under the aforementioned "reflective surface."

He was accompanied by a flotilla of little turtles, of whom, unfortunately, I could not get a decent picture. My camera's zoom is misbehaving, so the only way to have gotten a good picture of Mr. Goldfish's little friends would have been to go wading in after them. When it suits, I do obey the rules......

I wasn't even tempted !

That last photo wasn't on The List....Oops! More demerits! Five down, seven to go!

This Old House.....

2011-01-31T19:07:00.000-08:00

Thimbleanna made me do it. All she had to say was "Abandoned Building." Abandoned houses intrigue me. Look at this, then close your eyes. And Imagine!

what it was like when it was new,
and someone regularly mowed the grass, and pruned the shrubs;
when shouts and laughter echoed 'round the garden,
and bikes leaned at crazy angles 'gainst the wall;
when dogs barked joyfully and raced for balls tossed by freckled kids on reckless bikes;
and crisp white curtains fluttered at the windows, and panes, now gray and grimy, gleamed in the morning sun;
when flowers blazed where weeds now rule;
when "Honey, I'm home!" brought children tumbling out to greet him;
and delicious smells drifted from the kitchen.;
when all the relatives came for Thanksgiving, and parked every which way under the trees;
and Christmas saw a fir tree lugged up the steps into the living room, and there bedecked with ornaments and fairy lights;
when someone's dreams were in full swing......
."and the bird was on the wing."

Do you think old houses remember? As the weeds grow up and the Spanish moss hangs down, do they weep for all their ghosts?

Read, Laugh, Bawl....

2011-01-27T18:31:00.000-08:00

"What are you reading these days?" Ali wanted to know. My night table is groaning under the pile, but it's hard to say what, exactly, I'm reading. Everything and nothing. Let me see....

The book that's been in the pile the longest is "Bird by Bird" by Anne Lamott. I just dip in and out of there occasionally.....Eeeeeh....not inspired.

"Tinkers" by Paul Harding caught my eye on a sale shelf at the university bookstore back in November. Tinkers, with their horse-drawn caravans were part of the landscape when I was growing up, so I was intrigued. And more so by the Pulitzer Prize sticker on the cover. It is the author's first novel. I tried, but it was slow going, and so it sank down .....down.....down.

"The Art of Loving" was a Christmas present. I've read it before but I wanted my own copy and now I've got it!

"The God of Small Things" by Arundhati Roy has been on my TBR list for ages. It won the Booker Prize...

I finally checked it out from the library....and made it to page six. It's due back in two days.

The problem has to be me. I have not been able to focus or concentrate....

"Sarah's Key" and "The Lace Reader" arrived in the mail from my friend, Marilyn, a couple weeks ago. We pass books back and forth all the time. Started "Sarah's Key." It was really interesting....Really.. But my book marker is stalled on page forty......

At the library, one day, ["What on earth were you doing at the library with that unread stack of books at home?" you might well ask] I came across Jonathan Franzen's book "The Corrections." Big hit back in 2001, and he has, only now, written a second one. So I checked out "Corrections" to see what all the brouhaha was about. I like his writing style, but I haven't warmed yet to his characters. My book marker made it all the way to page one hundred and forty nine though. So there is hope..

And then "Room" by Emma Donoughue, hove into sight. She's Irish. That's got to be in her favor, right? And the reviewers were gushing.....While waiting, I tried to read another of her books. Decidedly not interested in the subject matter, I returned it to the library and thought I might take myself off the list for the raved about "Room." But before I could, I got a call saying "The book you requested is in. You may pick it up....." It looks like I was destined to give it a go. I'm on page eighty and stalled.

Marilyn e-mailed me again.....Always brief and staccato....."Read this." The link took me to "Lift" by Kelly Corrigan. The library only had some kind of media copy, which I could download to my computer. Ha! Do they know who they are dealing with? I actually went through the motions and it appeared to work. But hi-tech and me make very strange bedfellows. Totally not compatible. Sure enough, all I got was gobbledygook, computer hieroglyphics. I gave up. If only I lived within an asses' roar of a decent bookstore!

Had to be content with the book section at Target. Found "Chosen By A Horse" by Susan Richards. Never heard of her, but I couldn't put it down. I rationalized buying it rather than looking for it at the library with the thought that our horse crazed California Girl would love it too and I'd pass it on.

I read the whole thing!

It made me laugh and it made me sob. My grandfather was a vet back in the early part of the nineteen hundreds. He dealt mostly with horses. I never knew him as he died before I was born, but we had a collection of horse books on our shelves at home that came from him. I used to pour over the the illustrations and make endless drawings and think I loved horses. But though I thought they were magnificent animals, face to face, I was intimidated. My father was horse-crazy growing up, being around them so much. He wanted to be a jockey but he grew too tall! It's an abominable miscarriage of justice that he didn't live to meet his grand daughter, who obviously inherited the horse gene from him... Reading this book, by a woman who not only loves, understands, and is no more intimidated by a horse than by a pussycat, but also writes with sensitivity and humor, gave me a look inside my daughter's brain. Even if you are skittish around horses like me, you will love this book!

I want to finish all of these books. But I feel like a ten year year old on crack, with attention deficit issues. You've seen the ads---"This is your brain on crack..."

Well, this is my brain on stress!

Go read!

Making the Most of the Verb "To make"

2011-01-22T19:20:00.000-08:00

I've just been over at Jen's, reading her daunting list of New Year's resolutions. I could rattle off a list of my own recurring resolutions without even so much as a glance at a list. Assume a sing-song voice and repeat after me:

1. I will not start any new quilting projects this year because, if I swore off housework, reading, cooking, shopping, bathing, sleeping, socializing and gardening, and holed up in my sewing room, with catered meals slipped periodically under the door, it would still take me at least five years to finish everything in there that is half done.

2. I will not darken the door of any quilt shop this year, because I do not need any more fabric. Want is another matter entirely. One I will ignore this year.

3. I will organize my sewing room this year----- A little louder please--- with feeling!

4. I will organize my sewing room this year............That's better!

Well, you get the picture. Every year the same tired old resolutions, halfheartedly made, even more halfheartedly implemented.

So I made one resolution this year: To make something every day. The general idea was to work on one of my UFOs every day. No huge or daunting commitment, but progress at something, every day, even just a few stitches. I was good for the first few days. I made a little tote bag for one friend, a little doll for another. Then I made a cake for someone's birthday......Hey, that counts as "making something"........in a pinch! So far I've had to count "making" the bed, making supper, making a loaf of bread....Can I count "making" a wish? Or "making" a trip to the grocery store? Or "making" a comment on a blog? Or "making" sure I lock the house when I leave? Or "making" a face at the cat....Or "making" excuses for why I haven't "made" anything today?

I have "made" inroads in organizing the sewing room! I bought a wonderful wall shelf at Ikea with lots of square compartments, that covers one entire wall. With a little more organization, it should be pleasant, once again, to sit in there and make things more tangible than wishes and excuses!. One resolution that covers a multitude. I should be able to remember and carry out something so simple.......Any bets?

"Caw! Caw! Caw!" Said the Blackbird.....

2011-01-21T18:59:00.000-08:00

My dilemma: to drive home [twenty minutes], putz around with beds and dishes and laundry for an hour or so, then drive back, or park the car and wait. Not being sure, I had armed myself with a book, the newspaper and a scribble pad, and thrown my sneakers in the back. However, it was 9 a.m. Fields and trees still shrouded in fog. I'll stay, I thought, and hope the fog burns off. The campus is several miles out of town, set among fields and huge oak trees, which provide a haven from the heat, in summer, for the cattle always grazing there.

I parked overlooking the fields and opened the newspaper to the most important section: Sudoku and the crossword puzzle. While my brain did its morning work-out, my eyes kept tabs on the fog. The sun was slowly burning through; it was going to be a nice day. I set off walking towards a line of trees that stretched away, invitingly, toward the horizon.

The pine needles felt so nice underfoot, carpet-soft and springy from the recent rain. A fence paralleled the line of trees, separating me from a field of grazing cattle.The quiet of the morning was broken only by the distant hum of traffic and the twittering of birds. The cattle munched serenely, looking at me with only the mildest of curiosity. How now brown cow? Bet you don't lose sleep at night worrying about your calves. Didn't think so. Animals have so much more sense than we do.....Not much into fretting about things they cannot change.

The path narrowed to squeeze between the fence and the woods. It's a sorry reflection on modern times that my footsteps faltered for a moment. The raucous cawing of a blackbird mocked me for a Fraidy Cat, so I pressed onward, glancing apprehensively now and again into the trees on my left, hoping that none of the unsavory characters from Grimms' Fairy Tales, or their modern manifestations, would choose this increasingly sunny morning to visit Central Florida.

To my surprise, a bend in the path brought me to a familiar park. One where we'd spent many a summer evening, watching soccer games, back in the Bean's high school days. I had it completely to myself. I passed the soccer field, the kiddie playground, and several baseball diamonds, and found a bench, and sat and scribbled, and mentally chewed my pencil and wondered......I thought by now I'd be off this particular exercise wheel, moving placidly into my dotage, but the universe, apparently, has other plans. Thanks to what could be called, depending on your point of view, [and your gender] my worry gene, my naivete/ignorance, or my dumbass quotient, here I am, still stuck on the same old wheel, still going 'round and 'round, wondering when and where it will end. I've gone over and over it in my head and I still think I was right to be alarmed, but probably wrong to let bureaucratic pen pushers get involved. Who knew they could, with a few strokes of their uncaring, unconcerned pens, wreck such havoc with our lives?

What's that saying----No good deed goes unpunished? Ha!

Time to retrace my steps. The cattle have retreated to the farthest reaches of the field. The blackbird raucously taunts me. Caw! Caw! Caw! The fog is gone and the sun is high in a blue, blue sky.......

random, random, random

2011-01-14T19:57:00.000-08:00

Want to write. Can't write. Stuff in head too hot to handle. Glad the old year is gone, let him go! let him go! Don't let the door hit him in the donkey. Is it safe to be optimistic? Is it safe to answer the phone? Is it safe to get out of bed?Is it safe to hope the new year will be better? Or are we on a roll here? Will it bring more of the same? In which case I'll just go back to bed now.......That pious piffle about writing for its own sake? Hogwash! I write for the connection. Lonesome for the comments. Standing on the corner, hat on the ground, sign in hand: "Will write for comments!" My Pollyanna persona has taken a beating. I'm in danger of becoming a pessimist.

Just as I am sinking into the morass, a friend sends me a 40 point Guide to living in 2011.

# 8: Sit in silence for at least ten minutes each day. So I did. Talk about Miss Fidget! At least five times in the first ten minutes I thought of something I needed to get up and urgently do, right now, and then I remembered, and sat back down, and closed my eyes and breathed slowly until my timer went off. The second day was easier. Concentrate on breathing. Ten minutes goes by so fast. It's easy to spare them to do this. And it muffles the noises in my head!

#10: Walk outside for 10-30 minutes each day. It's been cold here. No snow, no sleet, no ice, but, by our usual standards, frigid! Tempting to huddle indoors, pour another cup of tea and wait it out. But once you bundle up and venture forth into the anemic sunshine, and listen to the birds twittering [or could that be their teeth chattering?}it's not so bad, and before you know it you've circled the garden twice and are heading towards the 30 minute mark and you have to run inside to get the camera, because, though mostly things are brown and brittle, there are cheerful berries, and creamy rosettes defying the brownness.

Part two of # 10 was---"And while you walk, smile."

So, maybe there is room in this new year for guarded optimism. I'll raise my [Irish Cream-laced] cup of cocoa to that!

"E.T. Phone Home!"

2010-11-30T20:37:00.000-08:00

You know you're having a bad day when you pick up the TV remote, punch in the telephone number you need to call.......And wonder why they're not picking up.

It's a Pup's Life

2010-10-21T07:03:00.000-07:00

I have been traveling, virtually, to Kazakhstan, on traipses around Edinburgh, and camping adventures in the Australian outback, all of which make my feet itch. Edinburgh, in particular, makes me long to live somewhere so similar to where I grew up, although the weather would probably immobilize me! Meantime, I have not been sitting home, wishing. Those itchy feet took me north recently, to visit Daughter, Lily, a once-upon-a-time blogger, who, sadly, no longer has the time to blog. That's what two small boys will do to you! Seven and a half and six. It's go-go-go from morning 'til night. But, as busy as her boys keep her, Lily, who always had canine friends growing up, recently adopted a puppy!

The trouble with being an absentee grandma is that you don't know your grand children as well as you would like to......

I got to see them in all their sports.......Training for the world cup.......................

In center field....


#2 Grandson as goalie.......

And as goalie, relaxing while the ball is at the other end!

Laying the groundwork for the NFL.......................

Endlessly riding their bikes up and down and around------Tour de France, watch out!..

But with puppies? No obstacles. You're here now---let's be friends!

Barely three months old, cute as a button, very calm, very friendly. And as you will see, very chatty! After he exhausted himself playing he'd sit by my chair in the garden. Between snoozes, we chatted. Of course I had to really guard my knitting from him as all that flickering yarn could get a guy very excited! When I wasn't knitting, he had a dozen suggestions for what we could do......

"Oh! You want to tickle under my chin? Here, let me move a little bit to the left, make it easier for you!"

"Perhaps you'd like to play tug-of-war with my squeaky toy? It's loads of fun....c'mon!"

"Say, do you like to dig? I can show you how! I love to dig! Especially right here, near these herbs....the soil is especially cool and muddy...."

"I can share my sticks with you if you'd like...They're lots of fun to chew on!"

"Come with me! Let's run around back and dive into the jungle [Lily's vegetable garden!] There are the prettiest round, red peppers in there. I'll pull one off and you pull one off [just grab it in your teeth and yank!] Then we can lie down in the grass and chew their deliciousness for at least half an hour. I do it every day. One drawback is that you get all these seeds in your poop, but Lily picks it up with her handy dandy pooper scooper; she doesn't seem to mind! I think they're all past being good for canning or freezing anyway..."

He twitches his ears and glances furtively around, then whispers "There's a lovely carpet in the living room. It's my favourite place to piddle. Lily gets very bent out of shape when you piddle on this carpet, so you have to be super sneaky. As soon as you feel the urge, don't wait. Scamper in there [make sure she doesn't see you] and do the deed. For some reason she thinks I should enjoy piddling in the grass. But between you and me, the grass can't even begin to compete as a primo piddling spot!"

"I absolutely love going for walks! I wish they wouldn't put that red, leash thingy on me though! It sort of cramps my style. For instance, every morning I get to walk my boys to school. You wouldn't believe how many other dogs we see along the way. I know they'd make great buddies, since they live in the neighbourhood, but that dang leash pulls me up short every time I try to dash across the road to say hello and indulge in a little mutual sniffing. It's enough to make a fellow feel downright downhearted! But, on a positive note, there are all kinds of pee-mail messages to sniff, at trees and bushes on my side of the road, so I guess I should be content with that.

"I really wish I could go to school with my boys.They have this rule about no dogs on the playground. I don't feel that should apply to me. I'm just a wee pup. Don't they know that wee pups need to bond with their boys? It makes me sad that they spend so much time at school! But oh, the joy! At three o'clock, I get to walk them home again! And Buck, the neighbour dog, sometimes walks with us. Buck is only a few months older than me but lots bigger. He's a black lab, very big, and sleek and he likes to play just as much as I do, except that one of his paws could squash me. Buck is my hero! Sometimes I hear him playing on the other side of the fence and I wish so much I could go and join him! He's a bit stingy with his toys when I do get over there. But I don't mind. It's enough for me to be on the same side of the fence with him for a while!"


# 1 Grandson

.
Marty Moose, # 1 Grand-dog.	It was a lovely visit. The weather produced some Indian summer days, especially for me; I got re-aquainted with my grandsons; introduced to Marty-Moose, so called because of very large paws---we all know what that means, right? He might soon be as large as his hero, Buck! Lily and I drooled over yarn and she produced some of her stash so I could knit! Will show off my scarf when I finish it.....Regulars here will know to keep breathing in the meantime! And now, I'm back in my own nest, having satisfied the wander-itch without having to travel all the way to Australia. It's lovely to go, but being at heart a homebody, even nicer to come home again! Note: And as easy as Blogger makes it, having gotten into this "caption" mode, I have no earthly idea how to get out!

What Would You Write On Your Hat........

2010-10-01T10:24:00.000-07:00

........If you were lost in the desert for six days and beginning to think the jig might be up?

Today is Friday. I'm off to visit Lily and family, which has grown to include, not only two grandsons, but a brand new grand-puppy, on Sunday. Soooo.....The List is longer than usual. But nevertheless, I carried my coffee back to the sewing room this morning for a quick e-mail check, and to see what was going on in the world.

Edward Rosenthal, a fit and enthusiastic hiker of 64, took a wrong turn after a hike in Joshua Tree National Park and wandered in the desert, like Moses, but only for six days [and I assume six nights too.] Mr. Rosenthal had a bit of a name for himself as a writer of poetry and such area in the Los Angeles area, so never left home without a pen in his pocket. He decided to write some thoughts for his wife and daughter, whom he was increasingly convinced he would never see again. He had his trusty pen, but no paper.

So he spilled his heart out on his hat.

By the time I finished reading about it the screen was kind of blurry. I sat there for a long time wondering....

What would I write on my hat if I were lost in the desert and thinking the show was over?

What would the OC write?

What would my children write?

What would you write?

Mr Rosenthal was eventually found, weak and dehydrated, but otherwise in good spirits, and is expected to make a full recovery.........I wonder though, if he will look back on this as a life changing experience?
Sometimes we need to take a wrong turn to see what is really important in life.

His wife is planning to frame the hat....Naturally!

Notes From the Loony Bin

2010-09-21T11:34:00.000-07:00

Stress.

I don't handle it well.

The pool pump gave up the ghost with a very loud bang this weekend.

While I was home alone.

A few feet from my ear. Outside my sewing room. Where I was sitting at the time

Causing my heart to momentarily stop.

In a word, stress.

Like cannon fire.

BOOM!

One loud and ominous bang!

I looked out the window in consternation. Old Faithful was spewing skywards---from the pool pump. I ran in circles, like a chicken with its head cut off, for just a few seconds, before some straggler of a brain cell told me

"Quick! Turn off the pump!"

A wall of water blocked my way---but, like a good chicken, I ran around from the other side, found the switches and turned them off. Old Faithful calmed instantly.

Whew! Thinking under pressure! Little Blister would be proud!

The menfolk returned from golf and stroked their chins.

Then one went to the airport and one off to school.

Leaving me to make phone calls, trying to sound confident and knowledgeable, so some charlatan won't get a gleam in his eye and think

"Aha! A pigeon, ripe for the plucking!"

Because pool pump parts are not cheap.

And Charlatans have a very strong union in these here parts.

Monday morning I had to go to work [avoidance tactic #1] I can't make difficult phone calls if I'm at work. See Molly smile!. Unfortunately I have lovely hours and was home by three. Plenty of time to make the dreaded phone calls. Hmmm.....

So, bracing myself, I made the calls, in great trepidation, being careful to sound like I knew all about lids and bands and filters and what-nots. It all made me want to curl up in a corner with my blankie. Make the world go away please....lalalalalalala! I told them I was just getting prices and would call them on the morrow.

Now it is the morrow. The OC is still up north. The Bean is still in school. I stand in my sewing room and think frantically

"I need to sew something!"

"No you don't!" declares a voice in my head, crossly.

"You need to grow some balls and make those calls!"

But, but, but I don't want to grow balls! Apart from the fact that it would be biologically impossible.... I want to sew....or, or, maybe I could make some cinnamon rolls? It's ages since I made any of those. Wouldn't that be nice? Mmmmmmm! Warm cinnamon buns...can't you just smell them? Divine! I even know where to get a great recipe!"

Cross Voice, losing patience fast, says " You need to focus and quit quibbling. The pool is the problem. It needs to be fixed. It needs to be fixed now. And you, Madam, need to do it!"

"But, but, its not fair! I'm not genetically wired for this."

Plucked as an innocent from the bogs of Ireland, I'm wired for long walks over the hills, making quilts, dreaming, scribbling, baking and cooking and growing things, with lots of help from the Bean, granted. I'm a persona non grata at the moment because the weeds have taken over the vegetable garden he worked so hard to prepare for me, and I've done nothing about it---because---it's been too bloody hot here! Which is why I should get myself re-wired so I can tackle all this pool fixing nonsense [so people can jump in and cool off.]

Maybe I should call the Little Blister? [avoidance tactic #3]

Maybe I should go for a prolonged visit with her? [tactic#4] Back to where I can handle what life throws my way? We sneaked, behind my mother's back, to the river at Corbally to cool off, in the summers when we were young. No pool pumps needed. It's been ages since we walked across the Burren together. Or walked along the Rine when the tide was out. And we're not getting any younger.

Now that I've decided which company to go with, the guy is taking his sweet [donkey] time about calling me back. Eating into my sewing, cooking, and cinnamon bun baking time.

I think I'll go make them anyway, while I'm waiting. Stay tuned.....

Pastry and Wit, a Match Made in Heaven

2010-09-14T16:30:00.000-07:00

Today was an un-working day. Which didn't mean I didn't have a list as long as my arm of "things to do," just that I didn't have to be up, dressed and clicking my heels at 6:30 a.m.

After the departure, for the Halls of Academe, of the Bean, always a blur of books, coffee and slamming doors, with exasperated eye rolling on the side from GF, who arrives in plenty of time and then w-a-i-t-s, I sighed with relief, fed the cat, and took myself and my coffee to the sewing room to check e-mails and catch up on blogs.

I planned on maybe half an hour. But I got side tracked [can you believe it?] I clicked on an interesting link on someone's blog, which led me to more interesting links...you know how it goes. If you put a gun to my head I could not retrace the path that brought me here. Pastry Methods and Techniques --- Fascinating, right? Bet you're not even tempted to check it out. But you should! The name is the only dull thing about it.

List as long as my arm of chores to do? It had to wait. I was riveted by her writing and laughing out loud at the wit and general snarkiness and the recipes.

Oh. Not interested in food blogs? Me neither. They usually put me to sleep. But this one is different. I would read this even if there were no recipes. I guess what I'm saying is this woman is a talented writer first. She just happens to write about food. I usually lurk around for a few weeks before adding a new blog to my list. I knew there was no need to lurk here. Signed myself up on the spot. Check it out. You just might love it instantly, as I did!

Meanwhile the "To-do" list was being sorely neglected. I place the blame squarely on the shoulders of the Pastry Chef! The OC recently bought a truck. Men must have their toys.....It was to replace the Beast, whose untimely demise was documented here. It needed a liner, but what with the OC being back up north and the Bean back at school, it fell to me to take it to the liner place----and me without a pair of bib overalls or even a straw hat to my name! It's been with us for a month but I have managed to avoid driving it until today. When I had no choice. Turns out it's a bit bigger than the Nissan, but otherwise not much different to drive. No one ended up in the hospital, and the truck sustained no dents. Done and dusted! Until tomorrow....when I have to go and pick it up.

Phone calls to insurance company! I'd been procrastinating on that one. Least favourite people to have to call ---but it's done!

Visit to Father-in-Law. The irony. Of all people, he's stuck with me....must be karma! But what did I do? But, see that notch in my halo? Sat there and listened for almost an hour! Which in real terms means I'm off the hook for tomorrow....

And I got a haircut--no more woolly mammoth look-alike!

I'd say I took care of that "To-do" list down to about the elbow.

Which is a good day's work for an un-working day.

My Life As A Scribe

2010-09-09T12:52:00.000-07:00

NYC - Manhattan - New York Public Library (NYPL) - Humanities and Social Sciences Library - McGraw Rotunda - The Medieval Scribe
Originally uploaded by cerdsp

*Warning: Long, rambling post ahead. A letter about letters to you, my bloggy friends. If you are at all inclined to read it, you might want to wait until you have a few quiet moments, a nice cup of tea and patience for a lot of blather and Blarney.....

Funny title from someone whose pen has been dry for almost a month! It doesn't mean I've stopped. It just means I'm overwhelmed. I'm in awe of all you bloggers---I'm lookin' at you Thimbleanna!---who work full time, run a household, bake cupcakes at the drop of a hat, quilt like someone's got a gun to their head, craft like there's forty hours in a day, and still manage to blog regularly!

Not content with the life of Reilly, I recently allowed myself to be sweet-talked into helping out at a friend's office. It's only two days a week, but what a difference those two days make! Life was passing me by at a gallop before. Now Monday is no sooner over than Whoosh! It's Monday again! It's making me dizzy.

The blog's been a wasteland as a consequence. But I'm on it! "Writer" magazine keeps repeating the same old mantra---If you want to write, you've got to write every day. So Molly Bawn has decided to heed that advice, for better or for worse....

Writing, after all, is how I bring order to the chaos. Whether what I write is good, bad, or indifferent matters not. The act of writing soothes me, satisfies me, and once in a while, something I write finds an echo out there. Of course there are exceptions. Take last night for instance. I'd been reading "Writer" magazine, which I borrow occasionally from the library, especially when the clue bag is on "empty." So, heeding the "Write every day" advice, I wrote down a word, and then another, and then a few more, in hopes that something would evolve. Something evolved alright. A few hours later I had a post. All I needed was a picture. Duly toddled off to Flickr and found an appropriate image. But between the hopping and the trotting, and "blog this" and "copy" and "paste," I ended up with a blank page. My howls of anguish were heard in Canada, I'm sure. So, add to my virtues Humility, hard won. Sometimes, though the blog gods seem cruel, one comes to the realization that they were right after all. It was a load of rubbish. Better not to have embarrassed one's self.

The scratch of pen on paper has always been music to me. After years of practice in the primary grades,I decided to go global in secondary school. Allison in Beloit, Wisconsin, was my first pen friend. She wrote faithfully for several years. Beloit, Wisconsin might as well have been on the dark side of the moon, but at least Allison wrote in English. She was crafty too, handy at the sewing. One year, for my birthday, she made me a red flannel nightgown. When the nightgown was washed it turned everything else in that laundry load a rosy shade of pink!

Then there was Anne-Marie who wrote from Alsace-Lorraine. In French. Which made me feel very sophisticated, though Mrs. Penny's drills on "La plume de ma tante" did little to help me understand letters from a French teenager, written in cursive. We were loved and sheltered and nourished, but there weren't many luxuries. So when Anne-Marie sent me a tiny pot of sweet-smelling perfume, I treasured it, eked it out for years. And I still have a letter-opener she sent me in the shape of a sword.

Anne-Marie sent photos of herself and her family, black and white with scalloped edges [the photos, not the family.]I poured over those photos, trying to imagine what it must be like to be Anne-Marie, to live in France and, [hardest of all to imagine] to have French dropping casually from my lips, something the long-suffering Mrs. Penny could only dream of!

Undaunted by the fact that the nuns didn't offer German at my school, I found another pen-friend, Gisela from Konigstein-Taunus. Gisela wrote to me in passable English, and I replied---in slightly more passable English. But I had a secret plan. Armed with a "German for Beginners" book I'd spent my scant allowance on, I planned to teach myself German. Now, who wants to say I'm not an optimist?

Eventually life moved on and letters to overseas strangers fell by the wayside, partly due, I'm sure, to my failure to advance, with any alacrity, beyond ""La plume de ma tante." How amazed I would have been back then if someone had told me that, in my life, I would live near each of the places those penfriends wrote me from!

Meantime, off to Dub-a-lin in the green, in the green.........to college, where I stayed in a hostel run by nuns. There was, apparently, no getting away from them. They were strategically positioned all around the country, bent on defending, for a modest monthly fee, the virtue of young innocents like myself. I'm sure my mother was overjoyed that I'd have three squares a day, responsible supervision and a curfew, all without breaking the bank. Not that I was financially in a position to be kicking my heels up with or without supervision of the nun-ly sort.

There were no cell phones, no computers, no texting, no voice mail, and telephone charges were astronomical, so that left the post office, whose services I used once a week to communicate with my family "down the cunthry." The letters home could have been as dull as ditch water. Life for a young "culchie" in the big city was fairly humdrum, especially for an impoverished young culchie, who got the princely sum of one Irish pound for pocket money every week. Besides, it was an all-girl college---what on earth had I been thinking? Not wanting to bore the folks at home to death, I set about making my letters interesting. I'd pick on small, inconsequential incidents and find the comedy in them. And so they looked forward to the weekly epistles and didn't forget me.

And when I went to a small town up near the border with Northern Ireland to teach, I hit a rich vein of material for those letters home. And in the fullness of time I met the OC, but most of the time there was an ocean between us, so that meant more letters! There's a box of them in a closet somewhere; better attend to it before I get much further into my dotage. Wouldn't want the children falling around after we're gone, helpless with mirth at the lovelorn ramblings of their staid parents!

I still have letters my parents wrote me after we were married. They're tucked away in the drawer of my night table...When I look at their distinctive hand writing it's like catching a glimpse of a loved and familiar face.....Faces I miss still, after all these years. In that same drawer I have letters from friends I've met and left, from all the places we've lived; letters telling me of the births of their children, the progress of their lives, of deaths and divorces, joys and sorrows, and asking about ours.

And now, even I, old time scribe [or chicken scratcher] that I am, hardly write letters any more. E-mail is so quick and convenient. But you can't hold it in your hand and it doesn't have the distinctive seal of a friend's unique hand writing. So, once in a while I do still write letters. And once in a while my old, scattered friends do too, particularly on birthdays, because we know the thrill of seeing our name on an envelope, in familiar handwriting, tangible proof that, though geographically removed from each, we still care enough to sit down and write. I never rip it open right away. I draw out the pleasure by tucking it in my pocket, waiting until I have a few quiet moments, making myself a nice cup of tea, and then settling down for a luxurious read.

"Dream A Little Dream Of Me"

2010-08-10T20:07:00.001-07:00

First love
Originally uploaded by mousebears

As you may have guessed from the recent silence in these parts, I'm suffering from severe summer slump. What could I have to say that wouldn't make you all yawn hugely, turn your computers off and take to your beds? Nothing, nada, zilch and so----silencio!

But an old friend with whom I e-mail back and forth, often just one-liners, recently inquired in passing "So how did you and J [the OC] meet?" And since it wasn't a blog post, and I didn't feel I had to edit and tweak and polish and rewrite until I had a headache, I shot an answer right back at her, and she was so highly amused and chuckling still today, that I thought "Here's a lazy-man's blog post, ready made, no headache required!" Not that blogging gives me a headache. Quite the opposite. But as I mentioned, summer slump and all that, steaming heat that saps one's energy, thundershowers every day--not conducive to scintillating posts.

"J and I met at Kennedy Airport where we were both working for the summer. He was at Lufthansa, and I was at Aer Lingus. His sister, O, was at Aer Lingus too, and she and I became friends. Her father would pick her up after work and sometimes drop me off at my digs. He was always blathering on about his brilliant son [yawn!] and eventually asked me [when J returned from AFROTC summer camp] if I'd mind if he came to one of our after work parties with me, to get him back in circulation. J had then, and still has, hermit tendencies, so his father deemed it necessary to meddle in his social life. The last flight for Ireland didn't leave until 9 or 10 at night, so the parties always started late. I agreed. J. of course, didn't know that he was being set up. When his father told him, he just blew it off, figuring the old man had badgered me enough that I just said "yes" for a peaceful life. Meanwhile, the other summer hires [all college students like ourselves] were disappearing from Irish Airlines like rats from a sinking ship. The guy driving the last car asked if I needed a lift to the party. J had been supposed to pick me up, according to his pater. I asked the guy to hang on [if he'd left, I'd have been stranded---trusting Irish lass that I was---with no way of getting home to my digs, let alone get to the party!] Hold on a sec!" I said and called J's house. He was sitting, unconcerned, in his boxers shorts, [I was furnished with these details many moons later!] watching a game on TV. I told him I'd been given to understand that he was going to pick me up, but [on my high horse] if he didn't want to, I'd understand, but would rather not be stranded, in the dark, at the deserted airport for the night.

" I'll be there in ten minutes!" And he hung up.

He was wearing AF issue eyeglasses [AKA birth control glasses] and snot-green trousers when he squealed up to the curb..........But I had never before seen such beautiful brown eyes. The rest, as they say, is history!

Years later, I learned that his father thought I'd be an amusing dalliance, a young innocent for his son to practice on [his father having been, in his day, quite the ladies' man himself.] The nerve! He was very annoyed when his brilliant son did not succeed in deflowering me [the nuns had done their job well] and was, as a result, so enamored [not quite the word I used in the e-mail to my friend, but this is a family friendly blog and I'd like to keep it that way] that he wanted to marry me! The old man fought us tooth and nail , saying we were too young to be talking of getting married, which only made J all the more determined. So, to this day, I don't know whether he married me to spite his father or because he was blinded by lust....

While I'm in reminiscing mood I should add that, in the middle of winter, when J was back at university in the frozen north, and I was back at college in Dublin, his father got on a plane at JFK, landed at Shannon, found his way to my parents' doorstep, rat-a-tat-tatted and brought them to the door, puzzled as to who might be visiting when the rest of the civilized world was getting ready for bed. They found a tall, aristocratic-looking man standing on their doorstep in the dark. He introduced himself in his broken English, and after they'd picked their chins up off the hallway floor, they invited him in. He had come to check on my pedigree. To ascertain if I was worthy.

Whether or not I was is a story for another day!

You really should know better than to ask such leading questions!"

So while we're on the subject---I'm sure mine isn't the only entertaining story of "How we met." Let's hear 'em!

Note: The Mamas and The Papas hit song "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" was the soundtrack to that summer, hence the seemingly irrelevant title!

Besotted By Sunflowers

2010-07-25T19:49:00.000-07:00

Mr. Bunny Hill, I love You!

2010-07-21T14:52:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure where I saw it first [on someone else's blog, undoubtedly] but in January of 2009 I fell in love. The object of my mooning was a series of free blocks by Anne Sutton of Bunny Hill Designs. She planned to dole out the patterns for the blocks, one at a time, at the beginning of each month throughout the year.

So do-able! So adorable. So sign-me-upable!

What harm could it do---one wee block per month? Speaking of blocks, I managed to block out the fact that, behind the closed door of the guest room closet, which itself was behind the closed door of the guest room, was a groaning shelf, laden with an [ahem!] unspecified number of unfinished quilt projects. What can I say? New projects hath charms....]

It was painless. The most fun was seeing the next block at the beginning of each month....Or maybe it was picking out the fabrics once I knew what the block was.....Or maybe it was the actual stitching.....To be fair, I think it was every step of the process! I bought several yards of a lovely cream fabric for the background...and nothing else. I had such fun [and made such a mess] every month, rooting through my stash for just the perfect scrap for each part of that month's design. I think Anne must have to pinch herself every day. Imagine making a living doing what you love to do----in this case playing with fabric! When I was a child, nowhere on the horizon did I see the possibility of making a career out of such fun. Which just goes to show that my imagination wasn't firing on all cylinders at the time. Of course I did love art in school, but art was associated with Beatniks and Teddy Boys and in no way to be encouraged!

But better in one's dotage than never. I finished January's block in record time. And February's.....March's.....April's...... Then there was the added incentive of posting one's finished block each month on Flickr [see sidebar], taking a bow, and handing out kudos to one's fellow stitchers as they posted theirs!

Every month I managed to keep up with the program, and every month I was loving it more. Christmas loomed and I fell a bit behind. New year came and I fell more behind. But this week I finally put all the blocks together.[Takes a deep bow...]

I had long ago decided I didn't want to do the simple sashing shown on the web site. The idea of an Irish chain setting appealed to me, so I made alternate blocks with the background fabric and a variety of yellows from my stash that would compliment, but not steal the limelight from, the applique blocks.

The last thing to do was to put on the borders. All along I'd thought that green would be good for a narrow border, separating the blocks from the outer floral border. But when I went to the quilt shop to buy the green, had it in my hand and was heading to the cutting counter, I spied a beautiful red, all dappled with sunshine and calling my name! So much for the best laid plans.

The borders are on and the corners are mitered. The first three came out perfectly, but wouldn't you know it [I got smug? or careless?] the fourth corner did not. But I have learned it is futile to fume. Far better to unpick an inch or so, tweak a little, and restitch by hand, coaxing things into the way you want them to go.

It's close enough to perfect now.

I need a break before I tackle hand quilting it. And let's face it, after all that applique, I think it needs to be hand quilted. Sigh. Which means I might be able to hang the finished product in my sewing room five years from now.

Besides, there are ladybugs in that closet clamoring to get out......

Pipe down in there ladybugs! I'm coming to get you!

Note: And thank you Anne Sutton....I had so much fun with this!

The Mysterious Case Of The Body In The Pizza Box

2010-07-17T08:49:00.001-07:00

Hot and Fresh Pizza
Originally uploaded by Question Josh ~ SB

I didn't get much rest that night. It's difficult to rest when you're involved in a murder. When the alarm went off at six a.m. it was still dark. I groaned. I don't do early risings at the best of times, but having stayed up very late the night before, I needed just a few more minutes. So I bashed the alarm and went back to sleep.

At ten past seven I bolted upright, rigid with panic. I'd been off in the land of my subconscious where the goings-on are much more interesting than those in my waking life. Trouble is, I usually can't remember them. As soon as my eyes open and the light gets in, the characters in my dreams scurry off around corners, and, try as I may, I cannot call them back.

But this time I did! It was all fresh in my mind.

I had murdered somebody.

I was very calm in this knowledge, whereas the waking me would, first of all never have done it, and secondly, if she had, would have been a mess of guilt and jitters and nerves. But no. There I was, cool as a cucumber, unencumbered by guilt or remorse, walking along in the half light, carrying a box under my arm.

I was in a place that my dream self knew well, but my conscious self does not know. It seemed to be a village. It was dark and the street was deserted. The box was made of shiny black plastic, with a hinged lid. It was flatish and rectangular, and it contained the remains of my victim. No blood, no guts, no gore, just facts. Cold, hard, dispassionate facts.

I went into a barn-like building where I met and was greeted by a man who seemed to know me. He appeared to be in a workshop of some sort. I was not alarmed to see him. But when he saw the box I was carrying he tried to take it from me, telling me it was one of his pizza boxes. [I never said this wouldn't be bizarre!] I clutched it tighter to me and refused to give it up. I knew that if he opened the box, I'd be exposed as a murderer[ess?]. Who my victim was, why I had killed her, how I killed her, and what I was planning to do with the body, were all mysteries, parts of the dream that scurried away as soon as I opened my eyes.

I have no idea what happened after that because that's when I woke, in a panic, realizing I had to be somewhere by 8 o clock and it was already ten past seven.

I am fascinated by the places I go to, and the things I do, when I close my eyes. I know that, often, when I am fretting and worrying about something in my waking hours, the solution will come to me when I am fast asleep. And while that is helpful and amazing, it reinforces my feeling of the unfairness of it all: that I am deprived of fully knowing who I am, when I can recall so little about the state in which I spend so much time.

Any thoughts?

Cussy Futting and Bavishing Reauties.......

2010-07-08T20:37:00.000-07:00

The title of Silfert's most recent post is a spoonerism. It took a second or two for the penny to drop here, as it does. I had just uttered one myself, so should have been quicker. It has always fascinated me how our brains can do that. I get tied up in knots if I try to think of some. Yet, when I least expect it, they drop, unbidden from my lips! No thinking, no plotting, no effort. I meant to say one thing today, but what came out was "cussy futting!" You quilters will know what I meant!

The OC's long time favourite is "bavishing reauties." When Silfert heard that she came right back with "beeping sleauty!"

There must be some howlers out there....Care to share?

Losing My Mind, One Marble At A Time

2010-07-01T17:02:00.000-07:00

The OC is away. He is not a demanding man, but if he's around I stick close to home, because, you know, he might need a sandwich, or a cup of tea, or he might go to the bathroom and find the roll was empty, and then what would he do? He doesn't know how to make tea, or sandwiches or find where the TP is stashed.....At least that's his story [wink, wink.] So, I stick around most of the time, and we play house. Well, maybe I'm the only one playing house. He plays the overworked program manager,sitting in his cave, tearing his hair out over demanding customers who want their rocket parts and want them now and no they don't want to pay another million dollars for the five million worth of extras and the additional man hours they decided they needed since signing the contract ......

We're both up for Oscars this year. Watch for us on the big night, decked out in dazzling duds, smiling radiantly, bowing, speechifying and thanking our mothers and great-uncle Boris.

But I digress.

The OC is away. It seemed a good time to go trawling around the shops. I never got beyond the first one because it's the kind that gets last season's merchandise, and discontinued lines of all manner of tempting things I really don't need, from luxury Italian linens to gourmet coffee to Polish pottery to gorgeous German dolls to scuba equipment to extra-fine quilting pins! I could have spent the entire day in there. In fact, I only realized how late it was when the manager moved into my orbit, coughing discreetly but insistently.

Paid and left. Clutching my pins and a nice pair of casual, gray pants, original price fifty nine dollars, mine for twelve ninety nine---and long enough!

Trawling around shops, even just the one, is exhausting work and I was gasping for a cup of tea when I arrived home. Started the kettle and put a tea bag in my favourite cup. Got distracted putting away my loot, but did remember to set the timer for five minutes.

Wherever I was, I heard the timer go off, and returned to the kitchen, eager for the restorative cuppa, only to find that I had never poured the water into the cup! Sigh.

I do all the right things. I exercise; I eat my fruit and veggies; I do crosswords and sudoku every day; and still, brain cells are dying.

Last week, late one afternoon, I wasn't in the mood to make a big production out of supper. The OC was fine with my suggestion of warming up some frozen pizza. I set the oven to preheat,and while waiting I put the pizza in the fridge because I wanted the crust to be crispy. The directions on the box advised keeping the pizza frozen until ready to bake, and who would I have to blame but myself, if I didn't do as I was told, and we ended up with pizza that tasted like soggy cardboard?

The oven beeped, we were good to go. I set the timer for the recommended twenty minutes and gathered up tomatoes, lettuce, mushrooms and onions; the least I could do, since I was off the hook for cooking, was to make a salad. So I stood at the counter, humming to myself, washing and drying, slicing and dicing, carefully cutting off a good chunk around the occasional hole pecked by the birds, whose mothers, obviously, never taught them to finish all the worms on their plate, or at least to only take as much as they intended to finish.

Salad ready. Table set.

"Supper's ready dear!" I really do play my part well [modest blush.]

"Ding!"

That'll be the pizza.....except.....it wasn't! Oven mitts in hand, I opened the oven door, felt the blast of heat and saw.....nothing! [Unless you count "seeing" that the oven needs cleaning.] I stood with my mouth hanging open....

"What the heck???" Mutter, mumble, mutter....

Then it dawned on me. The pizza was still in the fridge, maintaining its crispitude!

Meanwhile the OC sat down at the table, ready for his supper. He had heard me muttering, so asked with a smirk

"What did you do now?"

Among my other services I provide entertainment, albeit unintentionally.

But, on a positive note, the oven being so thoroughly heated, the pizza, when it was finally done, was nice and crispy!

I guess I'll have to up the ante on the mental gymnastics....Chess maybe? Bridge? [shudder!]Classes in calculus? Logic? Egyptian hieroglyphics?

Or,radical thought, slow down and do one thing at a time?

Wordless Wednesday

2010-06-30T21:54:00.000-07:00

Timber!

2010-06-29T07:02:00.000-07:00

Eating supper Sunday evening, the OC was congratulating himself on having cut the grass, in the nick of time, since it was raining now.

"Doesn't it look nice?" he asked. Of course it did. It always looks nicer after it's cut than it did before, when it looked all scruffy and uneven, like the OC himself with a seven day beard. But he craves the praise, so.....Yes dear, it's lovely. You're so good.....Small price to pay for not having to cut it myself! Though I might try, some day, after I've done a particularly stellar job of scrubbing the toilets, to see if anyone would be interested in coming to gaze into their gleaming depths and be rendered speechless........Some day.

Enough speculation, though. Back to my story! The grass was cut and it had started to rain. Just the thing to settle the dust.

But it wasn't just raining. It was bucketing down, and as we watched, the trees started to thrash wildly.

"Where on earth did that come from?"

Fifty percent chance of rain, they'd said. Ho hum. A normal Florida summer afternoon. But Whoa! This had the look of a mini hurricane. Right there, in the recently calm and sunny back garden.

And as I heard the ominous "Craaaack!" and instant splitting of wood, I knew why the trees were writhing so wildly...they were trying to escape! But the small matter of roots prevented them.... We stood rooted, ourselves, by the sliding glass door, not daring to breathe, as a huge pine tree crashed to the ground. It missed the pool cage by a couple of feet. That would have been a disaster. And the OC airport-bound in half an hour!

And then it stopped. As fast as it started; and by the time we got to Tampa, the sun was shining and the sky was looking innocently blue....

"What? Me? Have a tantrum? No way!"

Monday morning I went outside for a gander. Two stumps, sticking up into the blue.

They'd broken off up high, so let's be thankful for small mercies. Had the trunks broken lower down, there might have been lots more damage. Both trees were on our neighbour's property, but fell onto ours. I don't even know if Bird-Legs-Bob is aware of what happened, or if he's even home. I do think we'll need to put our heads together and take down a few more....Like these bad boys....

We still have miles to go before hurricane season is over. The next one might fall in a much more inconvenient place!

The Bean went out, chain saw in hand, to clear up this mess....

Chain saws make me nervous, especially in the hands of one of my children. It's not that I don't think he's competent, he is. But I have an over active imagination, which is why my heart stopped when he came back in, fifteen minutes later, barely able to drag himself through the door. I was sure he'd cut off a limb, and I don't mean from a tree.... He hadn't, but had twisted something in his back and was in pain. So there he was, long spawgs stretched out on the carpet, groaning. Definitely a tripping hazard. Ice was applied, Florence Nightingale summoned, and the chain saw retired for the day.

When you're on a losing streak it's best to quit early!

Of Little Blisters And Dresses On Backwards......

2010-06-27T07:00:00.000-07:00

My Dad came to get me from school for lunch and took me home on the back of his bicycle. Mum wasn't there when we got home and Dad told me she had gone to a special place in town to get us a baby sister. He promised to take me to see them after school. Then we had lunch and he took me back to school.

I was a quiet child, and shy. But this news was too huge to hold inside me! Breaking all the Senior Infants class rules, I left my seat and walked up to Miss McCarthy's desk, and whispered to her that I had a brand new baby sister and my daddy was going to take me to see her after school! To my mortification and astonishment, Miss McCarthy did not think this was a good enough reason to leave my desk without permission. She scowled at me and told me to return to my seat immediately. I crept back to my seat with a very red face. It was a cruel lesson, one I've remembered all these years. Anything nice that Miss McCarthy said to me, or anything encouraging or hopeful that I may have learned from her, were completely overshadowed by that scowl, and that dismissal of my wonderful news.

The OC had a similar experience. His family had just arrived in the U.S. from South America, where they had emigrated from post-war Europe when he was a baby. Having had his first few years of school in Argentina, he spoke fluent Spanish. He also spoke Ukrainian, which was his parents' native language and the main language spoken in their home. But,as yet, he did not speak English very well, though he was learning. His teacher asked him a question which he didn't understand, so she told him he was stupid.

My heart aches for that little boy, and for my six year old self, although the OC believes it is nonsense to dwell on such things. But I think events like these form and transform us. The wars and the toppling governments, the hurricanes and the tsunamis, the earthquakes and the collapsing bridges, the scandalous conduct of politicians, the abuses we are capable of inflicting on innocent children and defenseless animals all affect us greatly, but seemingly insignificant, personal events, like these, colour our thinking about who we are, about our place in the world and our value as human beings.

Imagine a world where everyone acted nobly; where no one abused the power they had over others. Imagine all children growing up confident that they are loved, and lovable, and worth listening to.....One day soon they will be the grown-ups. I doubt Miss McCarthy ever gave her sharp dismissal of my great news a second thought. Maybe she would be amazed that a woman, much older now than she was then, still remembers that day in Senior Infants. And if that insensitive NY teacher could see how un-stupid that little boy turned out to be, maybe she would have the grace to be ashamed.

Well! I seem to have gone off on quite the detour there. The Little Blister's birthday was last week, and that was what I intended writing about. Not that I was there to help her celebrate or anything so exciting! But it was a momentous day for me, the day she was born.

First of all, since Dad didn't have much of a clue about such things, I got to wear my dress the way I thought it should be worn. After school, I changed out of my school uniform and into a pretty cotton dress my mother had made for me. It wasn't until we got to the nursing home, and were admiring the new little sister, that my mother gave me an odd look, and asked my dad why I had my dress on backwards.

Secondly, it was the day my best friend was born. Of course, I didn't realize this until years later. I spent the first half of my life trying to give her the slip. I guess I was as much of an insensitive clod to her as Miss McCarthy was to me. Realizing the error of my cloddish, big sister ways, I have spent the second half of my life trying to spend as much time with her as possible. Which is problematical when you consider that pesky ocean that lies between us.

Even though she has not been blogging lately, she is still writing. She was recently short listed [out of 1500 entries!] in a flash fiction writing competition [Big sisters are allowed to brag!] Her duties at The Palace keep her on the trot and in spite of all my exhortations she steadfastly continues to un-blog. But I am not giving up hope.

And just so you know, even though my mum is no longer around to check on me, I don't wear my dresses backwards any more.

Have a great year Rise!

Note: That's us in the picture when I was home last year. She likes to think she's taller than me, but as you can see, she's standing on a rock. I rest my case.

The Keys To My Innocence

2010-06-16T20:44:00.000-07:00

I am prone to moving things [from places they shouldn't be!] tidying up, putting things in a "safe" place where I will be assured, maybe, of finding them next time they are needed. Somewhat like a squirrel. I recently decided to search, once again, for a key that went missing months ago. And, naturally, I'm the prime suspect. When something can't be found it is automatically assumed that I am the culprit, due to the aforementioned zeal for tidying up, or to my penchant for driving the men in the house crazy. So, in an effort to establish my innocence, and maybe even find the bloody thing,I decided to start with my jewelery box. Which, for me, was a logical place, since I often stash small items there which I want to keep "safe."

I'm not into wearing jewelery much,feeling a little like a Christmas tree if anything is dangling from my person other than a bona fide body part, but the jewelery box was a gift from my mother-in-law, who thought every woman should have a one. And at age twenty two, and clueless, who was I to argue? So it has sat there, on my dresser, part of the bedroom landscape, for forty years.

It measures 12"x7"x5".You wouldn't think it possible to cram large segments of a life into that small a space! But I seem to have done it! [Takes a bow...]

I lifted the lid and started my search.

No key was immediately visible, but looking at the disorganization of all the little compartments, I thought....

" I really ought to empty the whole thing out, and maybe, as I put things back, I'll find it."

Right. I'm nothing if not an optimist. I don't believe I've ever completely emptied it. Even when we moved, it would get taped shut, still bulging, and transported like that.I wasn't brave enough to just upend it, so I took things out, one by one, creating a fine mess,

examining each piece, puzzled by some, careening off down memory lane at the sight of others.

There is jewelery in there, most of it never worn. It would be more accurate to call it a memory box, because the jewelery is incidental; mostly it holds my memories and treasures, such as:

Hospital wrist bands from the births of each child;

Baby teeth, dried up and brittle, jumbled together so that it would take a DNA test to identify which tooth belonged to which child!

A tiny, silvery high heeled shoe that was on our wedding cake, forty years ago;

A Child of Mary sodality medal with my mother's maiden name on the back, probably from the mid nineteen thirties when she was in her teens;

Various Mary Help of Christians medals from my school days. She was the patroness of the order of nuns whose school I attended.

Two tiny saints's relics, which might mean that somebody's ancient bones are sitting, all these years, on my dressing table! Can you tell I grew up Catholic??

Two kilt pins;

A large sand dollar and a few random shells. Artifacts from the beach find their way into all kinds of unlikely corners of our house!

A newspaper cutting from the nineteen eighties about Lily's synchronized swim team;

A drawing of a dinosaur by a very young Bean, for my birthday in the early nineties;

A ribbon and lace garter from Lily's wedding, thirteen years ago;

Various academic and soccer medallions from kids' high school days;

A beautiful gold cross and chain of oldest son's, whose leanings these days are more towards Buddhism;

A high school ID card for California Girl;

Coins from various times and countries;

A small bottle of water from Lourdes; my mother brought it back from one of her trips there with my brother; it must be at least fifty years old! And not all evaporated yet, though what little is left is kind of dingy and discoloured looking.

No less than,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,eight watches, in various states of disrepair. One of them is the watch my father gave to my mother on their wedding day in nineteen forty seven! I never had luck with watches, so depend on my cell phone these days for the time.

The stub of my airline ticket from Munich to Cork, from when I went to visit my German friends about five years ago on a trip home;

A note to the tooth fairy from a small boy, asking her if she could please leave his tooth for him this time "because I haven't got to keep one of my toothes yet."

An envelope containing curls from Britboy's first haircut in 1979;

A medallion from the Royal Life Saving Society---proof positive that, at one time in my life,I was qualified to save a person from drowning. Between you, me and the wall,if I'd been the person in danger of drowning I'd have died of fright instead to see "me" coming to "save" me! Fortunately no-one ever tested my abilities.

A string of pearls that belonged to my mother. I do wear them occasionally;

Several brooches which I used to wear, but rarely now, since moving to Florida. Bare feet and T-shirts never seem to call for the addition of a brooch.

After several hours I gave up the search, closed the lid, order [or some semblance thereof,] restored.

What I did not find: The keys which were the purpose of the exercise, so I will continue to be presumed guilty! Or my original wedding ring which I had lost several years ago. Since the OC recently bought me a replacement, I am confident that it is only a matter of weeks until the long-lost original shows up!

I am curious now: What do other people keep in their "jewelery" boxes?

Into The Trees

2010-06-13T19:26:00.000-07:00

There was a frightful racket in the trees out behind us early this morning. I stumbled out of bed to see what was going on. From the window, I could see crows circling one particular pine tree, flapping their wings and squawking like fishwives. What was their problem? Didn't they know it was Sunday morning and people might want to sleep in, for heaven's sake?

And then I saw him.

The cause of their distress. A huge big owl, sitting on a high branch, imperturbable, while the crows circled and squawked. I grabbed the OC's field glasses and headed out to have a closer look.

The picture isn't very clear, but enough, I think, to give you the general idea. He could have had those crows for lunch. He just wasn't hungry. He certainly didn't look under-nourished! I watched through the glasses while he groomed himself. He looked like a baby bear sitting up there, confident that when he did feel a pang of hunger, there was a smorgasbord of little rodents available for the snatching in the brush down below. He lifted a leg at one point, and when I saw those massive talons, I was glad I wasn't a little rodent......

I've been making snails' trails blocks for a quilting project. I need to make forty of them [I know---what on earth was I thinking??] I've been a little obsessive about reaching number forty, sewing, sewing, day and night. Not healthy. Hunched over the sewing machine, muttering.....bubble, bubble, toil and trouble, 15, 16, 17, 18, ......[I got to #24 today!] So, to blow the cobwebs from my brain, I went along on a Little White Balls hitting expedition later in the afternoon.

I have a limited capacity for concentrating on watching people hitting Little White Balls, so it wasn't too long until my attention wandered.

This fellow helped.

He was up a nearby tree, chattering like a thing possessed, so I went to investigate. He looked down at me indignantly and launched into a long and involved rant, with much tail twitching and bristling of whiskers. He was very upset at having his peaceful afternoon shattered by men arriving to hit Little White Balls.
He'd been in the middle of a lovely nap when the first whack disturbed his slumbers.

"Don't you people have homes to go to?"

"It's Sunday afternoon, for Pete's sake! You'd think a fellow could take a little nap without having to worry he'll be whacked out of his tree by lunatics hitting Little White Balls!"

And so it goes.

The circle of Life.

Entertaining The Brother, Who Can Be Quite Entertaining. If You Have The Stamina!

2010-06-12T01:03:00.000-07:00

I've almost forgotten how to do this! Blame it on my brother's visit. Blame it on the gardening course. Blame it on my airport taxi service. Blame it on Quilt Camp......Or, just blame it on life!

The volcano in Iceland nearly scuttled his plans, but my brother arrived, nothing daunted, a week late. He stayed for a month and went home two weeks ago with a great tan, and enough sunshine stored in his bones to see him well into old age. The Bean was delighted to have his uncle's help in the garden, and between them they got it shipshape.

I even had the grace to feel a little guilty. But I needn't have. Even though it's way too hot for my liking, outside in the middle of the day, he gloried in it! He'd be out there at noon, sweating and smiling, working away and marveling at how much nicer this weather is than the steady diet of piddling rain he left back home.

He spent hours swimming at the "Y", perfecting his stroke, our humble home pool being inadequate for his Olympic aspirations! Since he is in excellent physical shape for his age, I'm sure he caused some hearts to flutter among the elderly ladies as he ploughed through the water in his tangerine Speedos!

It almost made me hanker for the days when race walking was his obsession. Have you ever seen race walking? For him it was serious sport, and for a while he was one of the best race walkers in Ireland. But, for me, it was serious comedy! All those locked knees, pumping elbows and get-out-of-my-way determination! When he was visiting us, he'd train for his walking every day. He'd take off out the door and be gone for hours. Low maintenance. We lived in Belgium back in those days, in a suburb of Brussels, and one time he went out walking and didn't come back.

And didn't come back.

And darkness fell.

And the temperature dropped.

And it started to drizzle.

And still no sign of the bould brother. Or his walking companion, our black lab, Maggie. I was on my knees, weeping and pleading with the Blessed Virgin [who probably had forgotten who I was, it'd been so long!] begging her to keep him safe and to please not let my deceased mother's ghost find out what a terrible big sister I had turned out to be by carelessly misplacing the apple of her eye!

This was before cell phones took over the world. And the workings of the Belgian public telephone system were shrouded in mystery, not to mention foreign languages, neither of which he spoke. And his English was delivered with a very thick Irish accent....

I was pacing the floors in the wee, dark hours of the next morning, wringing my hands and letting my imagination run away with me, when lo! A knock at the door!

And there he stood, barely, exhausted and bedraggled, with a half-dead pooch at his side, who immediately betook herself to a quiet corner where she collapsed, and from where she did not stir for several days. You can bet she ran [or limped] for deep cover the next time she saw him preparing to go walking! Not quite the "walkies" she was accustomed to! I would give a lot of money to be able to hear the exchange between him and the Belgian police who gave him a lift from Waterloo back to our house!

A few years ago, Rise gave him a present of a course of swimming lessons, so, since he was getting older, and swimming is easier on the joints, he gave up the walking and fastened his focus on the water! Unfortunately the "Y" is on the other side of town, and since he couldn't drive here, I was constantly driving him there or picking him up. High maintenance. When we went to the beach he wanted to start out early, cook his bones all day long on the sand and in the water, basting himself occasionally with the magic creams that were his insurance policy against skin cancer.... After a couple of hours I would wilt in the heat and glaring sunshine, in spite of sun hats, sunscreen, beach umbrellas and towel tents. But heaven forbid I should suggest heading home before sundown! By the end of our beach sojourn there was The Brother, hale and hearty, full of fresh air and glowing bronzely, while a grease spot on the beach blanket marked what used to be me.....

He's a great guy, and he didn't stink after three days, but after thirty I was tired of having to have an agenda every day. I hankered to have my life back. And my blog! If he saw me on the computer he'd roll his eyes and say

"Don't tell me you're wasting time again on that yoke, and the sun splitting the rocks outside!"

I hope they'll have a nice summer in Ireland this year. He's much happier when the sun shines. He works hard, restoring antique furniture, for which he is much in demand, even in these economically lean times. Give me a year or so and I'll be ready to take him on again. Meanwhile, I'm hoping I earned some brownie points......I sent him home safe and sound, Mum! Give me a little credit!

So, there you have it: one reason you haven't seen much of me in these parts of late.....

Note: You can read another post about my brother here.

Wordless, More or Less, Wednesday

2010-05-19T18:42:00.000-07:00

I have not died,

or been sold into slavery.

The Brother has been visiting,

We've been living in the garden,

Chasing dragonflies.

A Wondrous Thing Happened This Wednesday

2010-04-21T13:31:00.000-07:00

Look what the wind blew in this afternoon!

A mid week trip home because he couldn't wait 'til the weekend to see his birthday present......And no classes 'til the afternoon tomorrow.

El PussyGato was extremely pleased to see him ......

.....but didn't seem to notice anything different.

I did.

I'm still smiling.....

Because this is how he looked last month!

The OC is wondering what we've done with his "daughter!"

Lessons In Green Thumb-ery

2010-04-16T21:20:00.000-07:00

crossvine (ツリガネカズラ) #7394
Originally uploaded by Nemo's great uncle

I went on the internet the night before for directions, so I wouldn't be all in a dither the morning of the first class. Do the people at Mapquest subscribe to the notion that we are descended from apes? Their instructions are idiotically detailed! They map every quarter inch of the way, which serves to confuse rather than clarify.....But, if I take their fifty lines of instructions for getting from A to B, and eliminate 47 of them, I am left with the three that matter. Which I did, and arrived early for the first day of the master gardener course, which is being held, on alternate Fridays, in our county and the county south of us. Necessitating driving to an unknown location early in the morning before the coffee had it's full impact.

The trip was about 35 miles, through lovely rolling hills [a rare treat in flat Florida,] idyllic pastures with cattle grazing contentedly under spreading oaks, white-fenced horse farms, orange groves, and fields of blueberries. There was wisteria tumbling over walls, and blazing bushes of azaleas in full flower. From recent rains and warmer temperatures, trees and fields alike had burst out in green. Lakes sparkled through the hedgerows, and stands of wild flowers, in unexpected ditches, took my breath away......

And me without my camera!

My simplified directions brought me to my destination with fifteen minutes to spare only because I'd forgotten the camera.

Filing in, registering, pinning on name tags, everyone was quiet and nervous like the first day at a new school. Each one of us had to say a few words about who we were, where we were from, and why we were there. Then we played People Bingo, just to check that we hadn't been snoozing during the intros! After that the room started to hum.

The nicest surprise of the day was that there was such a great group of people taking the course; people from all over the U.S. and a few from overseas; people who love plants and trees and flowers; who care about the environment and conserving natural resources; people interested in growing their own vegetables and saving water and energy; people who want to educate children about where our food comes from. That apples, for instance, don't grow on the supermarket shelf....The children I know are aware of these things but, from what I hear, many children today have no idea.

There were a few farmers there; people who've raised cattle and chickens, rabbits and roses, horses and children; an entomologist; a dietitian; a retired teacher or two; a burly, bearded fellow whose hobby is fixing old tractors, a director of a wildlife preserve......and these are just the ones I remember. And of course there's me, and the Bean, who was late due to the pesky requirement that he attend his only Friday class first!

The course is run by the Extension Service of the State University. Each county has an extension office to provide scientifically sound information to residents on how to grow things in Florida, how to can and preserve the things you have managed to grow, how to raise chickens or cows or goats or pigs or pigeons; how to landscape your property with drought tolerant plants; not,for instance, growing acres of thirsty grass when water is scarce.

Master Gardeners help to get gardening info out by volunteering in demo gardens; in the Extension offices, answering phones; manning booths at plant shows, etc. Aiiiieeee! There goes my quilting time! I guess I'll just have to get up earlier.

That was last week. And already, today, it was time for class #2! Fortunately closer to home. My head is spinning with lists of invasive species, diseases that attack plants in this place and this climate, and plant taxonomy---fancy Latin names for plants and all the parts thereof. Amo,amas,amat was a very long time ago and did not prepare me for this! And quizzes too.... And homework....... We need to slow the days down so Fridays don't come hurtling at me quite so fast!

The instructors are friendly and knowledgeable, with fully functioning senses of humour; the material is interesting to anyone with a pulse: and taking the class would be worthwhile if for no other reason than to meet such a diverse group of people.

Meanwhile, quilt projects languish; laundry piles up; as fast as vegetables grow, weeds grow faster; Penelope Lively is calling to me from the night table, even though my eyelids are drooping---maybe just one wee chapter, to see what happens---and before I know it, it will be next Friday.......and my brother should be here, Icelandic volcanoes permitting......but that's a whole 'nother post!

Note: That picture at the top is of Cross Vine. It was growing in an arbor at the demo garden at the first class. Since I didn't have my camera, tyhis photo is courtesy of the internet!

Standing At The Kitchen Sink, Dreaming

2010-04-07T10:26:00.000-07:00

Long ago, in the last century, when I was up to my oxthers in raising children, I used to stand at the kitchen sink and dream. My hands were busy, scrubbing pots and pans, or peeling carrots, but my thoughts were off in the clouds. Blogs were not even a twinkle in the eye of the genius who invented them, but I was writing, in my head. I wrote in notebooks too, of which I still have a motley and highly disorganized collection. Some day, when I'm whiling the hours away, and dozing in my rocking chair, I'll pile them up by my side and try to make sense of them.

The trouble is, that by the time the rug rats were tucked into bed, and I had a few minutes to write, I was only semi conscious. But standing at the kitchen sink? That's where I "wrote" the blockbusters, in my head. As anyone knows who writes, or tries to, ideas are like quicksilver; if you don't grab them and nail them into a notebook with a pencil, they flutter out the window and are gone, never to be recaptured with the clarity and perfection of the original thought.

Today the youngest of my rug rats has a birthday. Yesterday I made Irish Stew [by special request!] for his birthday dinner tonight,and right now I have Lily's Apple Cake, his favourite, in the oven. Which means that, in the last twenty four hours, I've spent a lot of time at the kitchen sink, peeling potatoes, chopping carrots, onions and celery, breaking eggs, slicing apples....and dreaming.

Dreaming of the long ago, when the house was full of energetic children, and barking, dancing dogs, furry chinchillas and scaly lizards; when, as far as the children were concerned, I knew everything; when I was the best reader and weaver of stories the world had ever known, and a champion maker of cookies to boot; when extra sandwiches I'd made [because growing boys have hollow legs and entrepreneurial ways] were auctioned off at the school lunch table to the highest bidder; when there wasn't a problem in their world that I couldn't solve with a hug and a smooch, and maybe a back rub; when the days flew by in a happy, busy blur and I thought it would always be so.

Occasionally, I would long for quiet; for less frenetic comings and goings; for time alone; but, for the most part, I loved my life and was content. Time is a sneak though. While I wasn't looking, the rug rats grew up, and, ever so slowly, so I hardly even noticed, drifted off to their own lives. Which is the way of things,I know. And I'm fine with that.

I really am. But, if I had it to do again, I would sit in the sand box more often and make "cakes" with them [no apple]; I'd read that "one more story" before turning out the light; I would go and bring "one more drink of water" to reluctant sleepers without a sigh of exasperation; I'd get a sitter for the baby and go help in the classroom; I'd get on an airplane and go hold her hand when life was overwhelming and she was all alone and lonely; I'd get in the car and drive to the other side of the country when the bottom fell out of his world.

Can you make up with the youngest for your shortfalls with the others?

My eyes were stinging at the kitchen sink today. And it wasn't all because of the onions.

There Was A Little Girl With A Curl In Her Hair.......

2010-04-06T15:46:00.000-07:00

Seven year old grand daughter, the Divine Miss S, has been taking music lessons. They are coming to an end soon, and there is to be a recital, which is generating a lot of excitement under those golden curls, and, naturally, necessitating a new dress. I volunteered to make it. It's been a while since I last made her a dress. It gets complicated, what with her being a few thousand miles away, and growing constantly, not to mention that young ladies of seven, these days, have very specific opinions on the subject of dresses. The grown-ups and the Divine Miss S do not necessarily have the same taste, so I decided it was wisest to get suggestions from Herself.

She picked four patterns.

Dress # 1: her favourite, had a skirt made of tiered flounces, which initially made me flinch. On closer inspection, I saw that it was classified as "Easy." If I decided on dress #1 she would like it, if possible, in ocean blue with a dark lavender ribbon around the waist and a bow/flower of the same colour.

Dress #2:If dress #1 made me flinch, dress #2 made me cower in terror. It was a frothy little number that looked like a miniature wedding dress! It had short sleeves and ruffles, and Miss S fancied it in pink and green polka dots, if possible.

Dress #3: To my delight, this was a dress I would have chosen for her if left to my own devices! It was a classic shape, with short sleeves and a gathered skirt, a sash around the waist with an optional flower pinned to the bow. If I chose this option Miss S would like it to be white with red polka dots, a dark pink ribbon at the waist. And a red rose. She would like the length of this dress to be mid-calf.

Dress #4: A simple sundress style with spaghetti straps and a long skirt. If I decided on this one she would like it in yellow with an orange belt...

I hied me to the fabric store.

The pattern for dress #2 was out of stock. Whew! Sigh of relief. Likewise for dress #4. Patterns for #1 and #3 were available. Now for the fabric. As much as Miss S seemed enamored of polka dots, there were none in evidence, so I crossed my fingers and bought white cotton with little red cherries.

The Divine Miss S is very particular and knows what she likes. But she assured me on the telephone that she would understand if I couldn't find exactly these fabrics. I just hope visions of frothy wedding gowns are not dancing in her cute, curly head. I mailed it yesterday. She should have it tomorrow, several days before the big day. Time enough to rush to the after-Easter sales if it's not up to expectations. But, with luck, it won't come to that!

Now if I could devise a method of wiggling my nose and magically arriving at that recital.....

A Person Of Suspicion.....

2010-04-01T10:30:00.000-07:00

This picture has nothing to do with this post. But the azaleas are beautiful right now!

Hidden in among the bank statements and umpteenth notices for magazine subscription renewals we're no longer interested in, [have you noticed how, even after your "last chance" notice, they just keep on coming?] was something official-looking.....for me.

At long last! My shiny new Alien Registration Card, along with a leaflet welcoming me to the United States.

"Well," I said to the world at large, "Isn't that special."

I've only lived here since 1970 and now they want to welcome me? These would be the fine folks at Homeland Security, beloved of airline travelers throughout the land, and an even more recent addition to the US than myself.

Alien resident cards are issued for ten years at a time. Mine expired last summer and I applied for a renewal, the first time I've had to renew since Homeland Security took over the job of keeping us safe.

And, in case you had any doubts, they are working very conscientiously towards that end. They left no stone unturned to make sure I was not a menace to society, so that the good citizens of this country would not be at risk of their lives by having the likes of me living and breathing among them. After all, just because a person marries an American citizen and spends the best years of her life raising other American citizens, is no reason to assume she will not get a wild hair, one of these days, and embark on a life of crime. And the fact that one's husband was a career military man and served his country with distinction should in no way raise one above suspicion.

A terrorist until proven otherwise.

No exceptions. In the interests of national security, you understand.

I sent in the [considerable] fee, along with my renewal application. In due time I was told to report to an office in a distant city, so that immigration experts [the implication being that such specialized work was beyond the capabilities of the local sheriff's office] could take my fingerprints and my picture.

And when the powers that be deemed my fingerprints "unreadable," I was required to motor once again to the same distant city, so that the same [not so expert] people and their fancy-ass fingerprinting machines could do it all again.

And when they were once again deemed "unreadable," I was told to contact the law enforcement offices of each place I had lived in the past ten years, and obtain from them a copy of my criminal history record, which I should then mail to them within 87 days.....#$%@! What's with that magic number? And exactly what criminal history were they talking about, I wondered? A case, once again, of being a criminal 'til proven otherwise. Oh, and don't forget to include a check for the fee to each law enforcement office involved.

Insinuations to the contrary aside, I am a law abiding person, though it tries my patience when the law is implemented idiotically, so I sent off requests to the law enforcement offices of two states in which I have lived in the past ten years, complete with requisite fees.

Now, I understand red tape. I understand bureaucracy. But I was beginning to feel insulted. Beginning to feel I might be better off packing my bags and relieving the U S of A of the apparent hazard of having me at large. I could go home to Ireland. I'm sure the Little Blister would not leave me out in the cold and the rain...I would survive just fine there, as long as I was armed [or maybe that should be footed?] with a good supply of thick, woollie socks. At least there I wouldn't be viewed with such suspicion!

In the fullness of time I received reports in the mail from the investigative agencies of the States of Florida and Minnesota. They had snooped and pried and uncovered my dastardly secret...........

I had never been in trouble with the law!

Didn't I assure you that these folks are toiling, day and night, sparing no expense [on my part!] to keep you safe from the dodgy ones among us?

I now have in my possession, a shiny, new Alien Registration card, complete with its very own protective sleeve.

Which means they won't be looking to deport me for at least the next ten years....

And what else does it mean? The rest of the country can sleep easy tonight, in the knowledge that the chances of being knifed in their beds by Molly Bawn, are slim to none.

Birthday Mum and Birthday Boy

2010-03-27T20:50:00.000-07:00

Happy first Birthday to littlest Grandson and to his lovely Mum --- He was born on her birthday, one year ago today!

Don't Mess With The Tried And True

2010-03-26T20:11:00.000-07:00

Residents of the Chilly North, to wit Lily, Hubby and boys, breezed in to have breakfast with us last Saturday when we were barely out of bed. They'd driven all night, en route to a week at the beach, another hour south of us.

In anticipation of their arrival I had made a cake. I found the recipe in the food section of the newspaper earlier in the week. It was called Depression Cake. Two cups of hot, strong coffee were involved---always a good sign. A generous number of raisins, some shortening, some sugar and lots of spices were added. No eggs, no butter, no milk---hence, a cake that could be made when those commodities were in short supply, during the Great Depression. What the heck, I thought. I always like to try something new.

Lily could not help smiling when she spotted the cake on the kitchen counter. Lifted the cloth covering it, smiled, and said "Oh! Chocolate!"

"Oh-oh!" I thought. "Now I'm in trouble."

I should know better than to mess with the tried and true. Keeping my voice cheerful, I explained how I'd spotted it in the paper last week; how it sounded "interesting." How it was called Depression Cake....Surely she'd be intrigued by that.

"Oh. I think you mean 'Depressing Cake,'" she responded glumly.

"Why depressing?" I asked, knowing full well.

"Because it looks like chocolate...But it's not. I call that depressing!"

Looked like that cake was going to stick around for a while. Grandson number one said he'd try some, but one bite and he changed his mind. What had I been thinking,I wondered. Some of the pistons in my brain [brains have pistons,right?] must have mis-fired......No one was showing the least bit of enthusiasm.

The OC likes a smackeral of something sweet with his tea in the evening. That's something he has in common with Winnie the Pooh...As a result, he has something else in common with that endearing bear! But even he turned up his nose at my Depression Cake. So, if you want the recipe, you'll have to call the newspaper. Or dig down to the bottom of my rubbish bin.

Yesterday I made another cake. A Tried and True cake. A cake I've made a few hundred times before. And carried it to Lily at the beach. To atone for my sin. A cake I knew would not depress her. Because it has cocoa and chocolate chips. And, in case the calories incline her towards depression, the beach is right outside her door, so she can run it off......

By the time we left the beach last night, every crumb of the Not-Depressing cake had vanished.

Which just goes to show, if you have a sure thing, don't turn your back on it in favour of a depressing experiment!

A Little Rant By A Little Voice In My Head

2010-03-20T18:19:00.000-07:00

Emboldened by my success at growing radishes, [see above], albeit puny ones, in spite of impressive verdure [today's word of the day from Merriam Webster!] I decided to apply to take a master gardener course offered by the county. Bit of a leap from novice radish grower to master gardener, but, one should aim high I've always heard. Not that I'll be magically transformed or anything like that. All day, every Friday, for twelve weeks, will be devoted to trying to cram horticultural knowledge into the few wits remaining in my cranial cavity, if I'm accepted into the course.

I see-sawed back and forth about applying, but then figured, looking at it from a purely selfish point of view, I could only come out ahead, as my brain would be snatched from the gaping jaws of senility by the necessity of flexing and stretching it to accommodate all this seed and weed know-how.

Filling out the form was easy, until I came to a question near the end.

"Do you work?" was the question. As in, "Are you employed?"

This usually rattles me because I know the answer they expect from the likes of me. I'm possibly a little hyper-sensitive on the subject since my father-in-law, bless his aged, bald, and shiny pate, has made a point of needling me about my lack of "gainful" employment for the last forty years. He especially likes to tell tales from the old country. One in particular, about a new bride whose f-i-l informs her, soon after her marriage to his son that, in his household, those who don't work don't eat. All the while casting pseudo jocular glances in my direction. As though washing his son's underwear and raising his grandchildren were merely hobbies to fill the gaps between tropical vacations and frothy bubble baths....

Reluctantly I marked the "No" box. But a rebellious little voice in my head objected, and went on a little rant. Something like this:

No. Instead of working I like to spend my days cleaning toilets; sweeping floors; keeping ahead of clutter; changing bed sheets; doing laundry; folding clothes; occasionally even ironing them; shopping for groceries; planning meals; cooking meals; cleaning up after meals; trying not to trip over the cat; taking the aforementioned, decidedly unwilling animal, to the vet, which cannot be accomplished until he is in the cat carrier, into which he can only be wrestled by three muscular grown men wearing leather gloves and face protection.

Or one determined housewife who does not work.

Other desultory activities include, but are not limited to, staying in touch with the children; listening to problems; making sympathetic noises when I can offer nothing better; cheering them on when things go well; remembering birthdays; visiting my aged and cantankerous father-in-law, grinding my teeth and holding my tongue while so doing [years of practice]; pulling weeds; planting vegetables; pulling more weeds; planting more vegetables; making lists; losing lists; making more lists; wasting time looking for lists I've lost; writing on Blogger; searching, always, for a pen that works---in a house that has as many pens as a raccoon has fleas; making, remembering, and keeping appointments with doctors, dentists, chiropractors, vets and friends; trying to make regular dents in the UFO pile; trying not to start new projects that will ensure I do not make those dents......

Scratch, scratch, scratch.

Changed my answer to "Yes."

Next question: If "yes," what is your job title?

General dogsbody?

Don't get me wrong. I have a good life and much to be thankful for. As long as I keep the house from falling down, I can set my own schedule, and carve out time for the really important things in life --- reading, writing and quilting. I only think about running away to join the circus once every three weeks or so. Besides, the circus is here. Just because I don't get a salary for being the ringmaster doesn't mean it isn't a job...doesn't mean I'm not employed.

So, revised short answer: Yes, I work.

What else could I add that might tip the scales? Flexible schedule. Plus, I'm willing! Important because, in return for the knowledge, those who complete the course have to commit to many hours volunteering at garden and plant shows, answering phones---and, intriguingly, writing articles. Now they're talking! But one is probably required to have a clue about gardening before one can write about it! Ergo......

How am I doing Isabelle? I shouldn't blithely toss out vague promises, such as "I'm going to post something every other day." Because you never know who's listening and taking notes. I hereby amend my foolishness to "every other day, or two, or three, or four or even seven!"

And still waiting, and sighing, for reciprocation from the motherland [or maybe that should be the sisterland....]

Keeping Isabelle Happy..........

2010-03-17T18:30:00.000-07:00

Bumbling along from day to day, I sometimes wonder where I'm going, why I'm going there, what, if anything, will happen when I get there, and does any of it matter? When I was growing up there was no requirement to think, apart from muddling out the answers to arithmetic homework. In fact we were discouraged from questioning, especially in matters of religion. The Church had all the answers, even before we asked the questions. Don't worry, put your faith in God, say your prayers, do what you're told, go to confession on Saturday, to Mass on Sunday, don't pull your sister's hair or kick your brother in the shins, don't eat meat on Fridays and, for heaven's sake, keep your legs together.

But now, it seems to me, religion has lost its stranglehold on our lives. I find myself disillusioned, and vaguely angry that I was fed all those pat answers, and frowningly discouraged from asking "why?" and other impertinent questions. I have not suddenly stopped believing in God, but it does seem that a lot of what I was taught growing up were simply stories to make us conform, to make us behave a certain way, to make us easy to control. And who is it that wants us to be so docile?

One of the "givens" was that if we lived by the rules we'd go to heaven in the end and be happy there for all eternity. Heaven was a vague, pastel place, full of fluffy clouds, and angels sporting huge, feathery wings, making beautiful music on various stringed instruments. It was a place where you would be re-united with all the people you had loved who'd died before you. The party line was that the only thing that died was your body. Your soul, or spirit, that intangible that made you you, would live on. It was up to you, and how well you conformed with all the rules, whether you would spend eternity in the pastel place, or in a fiery, much hotter place, listening to horrible rap for all eternity.

Several people I loved have died over the years. When I was younger I just assumed they went to heaven. Certainly I hoped they did, since I wasn't anxious for anyone close to me to end up in the other place. But it has always bothered me that I have never had the slightest feeling that those people, who were close to me, are close or somehow nearby, watching over me, now that they're gone.

There's little comfort in the phrase "Life's a bitch and then you die." So, even though I'm suspicious now of a lot of what we "learned" in school from the nuns, I still cling to the idea of a life of the spirit, of the effectiveness of prayer, of trying to be "good," even if there is no "eternal reward." Just because I'd rather be good than bad. And then you get into definitions, and you could speculate all night!

I wonder if everyone is torn this way between the "life's a bitch..." attitude and wanting to cling to beliefs that comforted us when we were children? I really want to believe there is a master plan, that Someone with a clue is in charge, and that we can trust that Someone to ensure that the universe, and our lives, and our childrens' lives are unfolding according to plan.......

I hope St. Patrick smiled on you today...

Ladybugs Resurrected

2010-03-10T16:13:00.000-08:00

While blog wandering recently I happened upon this quilt. Birds sang, bells tinkled, nerve endings tingled----temptation beckoned seductively, "you know you want to!" But, in a display of supreme self control, I beat that monster down. Joseph's Coat has many charms, not least among them those clean, clear, singing colours, the really neat way those circles go together [yes, I read every word of the multi-part tutorial, which only served to increase the temptation] and the fact that it is applique.

But no. Not now. Not when the teetering pile of UFOs has not diminished one whit in the past year. At some future date, when that pile has been beaten into submission, it may be feasible. Until then, I'll just have to be strong.

The most immediate reason I shouldn't start a major new project now is this:

Started tentatively for Number One grandson,[eight years ago!] it was still not finished by the time he arrived, at which point it became apparent that
#1---he was a boy, and maybe the quilt looked a bit girly; and
#2---as he grew it became obvious that, not only was he a boy, he was a vroom-vroom kind of boy, attracted to machinery, and trucks [which he famously and hilariously mispronounced] and other things that made growly, gravelly noises. Back to the drawing board to plan a vroom-vroom kind of quilt. Which was accomplished with the able assistance of Rise who was visiting at the time.

IMG_3511
Originally uploaded by Mollybawn

And so the ladybugs and flowers slowly sank into the UFO pile. And then, a year ago, grandson number four was born, and came to visit at Christmas. I'd been embarrassed by the rushed quilt I'd made for him when he was a newborn, so consulted with his mum, who loved the ladybugs, and thought they'd go beautifully in her garden-themed nursery. You'd think I'd have gotten on the ball in the new year, but until now, lethargy.

Last week I spread it on the dining room table, thinking if it's out I'll start quilting it. But it intimidated me. The actual quilting of a project is the part of the whole process I'm least adept at. I gave it a wide berth, avoided making eye contact with it for a week. The weather was cold, my fingers were stiff and achy, and it just seemed too overwhelming. The first step is the hardest. Finally, today, I boldly grabbed the needle and took the first stitch. And then a second, and a third, and before I knew it I'd quilted a whole block!

I love how it looks and wish I'd started ages ago! It also helped that the weather warmed up and loosened my fingers. I have nineteen applique blocks to go---agh!--- and then the matter of the plain alternate blocks, but at least now I know it can be done. The question is can it be done in time for the little man's birthday at the end of the month??

Meanwhile, I'm adding Joseph's Coat to the list of quilts I'd like to make before I die, but after finishing at least a few of the projects in The Pile!

Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary.....

2010-03-08T19:12:00.000-08:00

"Wintering in Florida" has taken on a whole new meaning this year. Not since 1958 has the state had such a brutal winter, understanding, of course, that "brutal" to a Floridian is different than "brutal" to a North Dakotan. Still. It's been a lot more about huddling indoors, wrapped in multiple layers of whatever woollies you didn't blithely toss away when you made the decision to go south, than frolicking on the beach in your scanty bikini [not, my dears, that I would, even on the hottest day, subject the rest of humanity to the sight of this aging bag of bones in such a garment......]

So it was a long overdue treat to sit on the dry brown remains of what used to be our grass, yesterday, and indulge in an hour of catching up with the Little Blister, while the sun warmed my back. She'd been moaning earlier in the week in an e-mail, that I need to post more often; every day for instance! Whoa! Have you seen a blog post from her in recent memory? Didn't think so. And she has so much she could write about. Certainly she has a livelier life than I do. Which is part of the problem. She has dilemmas such as washing her hair or [and not being an option] doing the grocery shopping. Whereas I have time for both. But I'm guessing nobody would be enthralled by posts on either subject.

I decided to humour her. Because I love her. Not because there's a hope in hell that she'll respond by posting something new on her blog. Though where's the harm in hoping? I might not post every day, but I'll try for at least every other day, until the well runs dry. Which shouldn't take too long.

So, what subject does the normal Irishwoman, walking down O'Connell Street, love to talk about and find endlessly entertaining?

Why, the weather, of course.

If you said "The weather" before you read those words, you may go to the top of the class!

While the rest of the country was busy shoveling white fluffy stuff in the last few weeks, we've been shoveling [while shivering] brown stuff. Dirt. Soil. Found in a garden. Used to grow things. Like vegetables. Because, in spite of all appearances, we believe Spring will come!

We moved here nine years ago and it's taken me that long, and many unsuccessful attempts at growing tomatoes, to get it through my head that, just because Spring and Summer are the time to plant a garden up north, the same is not true down here. So in December, I bought a couple of tomato seedlings and boldly planted them, and behold! They grew! And produced beautiful, plump, blemish-free, green tomatoes, which, by now should be ripe and juicy and red, if the winter from hell hadn't intervened. My beautiful, blemish-free, going-to-be-so-tasty, best-ever tomatoes perished on the vine, in spite of all the mollycoddling, the shrouds of old blankets, and teepees of old sheets we erected around them to protect them from Old Man Frosty Winter. There were just too many really cold nights. Sigh.

Duly chastened, we modified our expectations, and planted rows of peas.

And radishes, broccoli, beets, carrots and lettuce for good measure.

The Bean did the donkey work and I did the fun stuff---poking holes, dropping in seeds, covering them up. Then off he went to school for the week and I set to watering,traipsing back and forth from the house to the vegetable patch, wobbling unsteadily under the weight of two heavy watering cans. To check on the babies and make sure they weren't thirsty. Normally we'd have water available right there, but the freeze cracked our pump so, until it got fixed, traipsing, wobbling and sloshing were the order of the day. Mercifully, we had several rainy days [and nights.] And now the pump is fixed, traipsing over.

Days to germination: 4-7, the radish seed packet proclaimed. Based on my own personal research, I'd have to say they're lying. Or maybe the seeds are bashful about peeping up when there's a mad Irishwoman bending over them five times a day, muttering, cajoling, willing them to pop. It seemed like forever before the first sliver of green poked up through the dirt. But they gathered courage when it became apparent that the mad Irishwoman was harmless, if a bit on the over-eager side. You'd think it was magic, I was so excited! You certainly wouldn't have believed I came from farmers; or that I've done this before, or that my mother had two green thumbs and a full set of green toes; or that the Bean only has to look at a seed and it coyly sprouts, or that all his siblings grow gardens too.

It's always magic.

Another weekend came, and with it the scholar, who planted parsley, chives and cilantro, just so those sweet little peas and radishes wouldn't be lonesome. My list for this week includes a trip to the garden store for a few more tomato seedlings. To have another shot at home grown tomatoes. But they'll be mollycoddled in pots until this crazy winter scarpers on out of here, back to wherever it came from.

Meanwhile, it's not as warm yet as it normally is in March, but the sun is shining and there's a sporting chance we might salvage a few typical "Wintering in Florida" weeks out of the tail end of the season. But even if we do, there'll be no sightings of this Irishwoman in a bikini!

Westward Ho!

2010-03-01T19:50:00.000-08:00

We went away the w.e. before last.......

To Paris?

New York?

Egypt?

Japan?

Disneyland?

None of the above. We went to Las Vegas where nothing is as it seems. We didn't go for the gambling, or the shows, or the nightlife. We're not much into that kind of partying lifestyle. A cousin, a rarity in the OC's life, was getting married there, and he wanted to show her a little support, as there wasn't a lot of it among family elders! He is very fond of her, figures she's a grown-up and deserves a chance to be happy. So off we went into the desolation of the west.......

The bride was beautiful, and radiant, and in full possession of her wits and her sense of humour!

Since Vegas is likely not a place we'll go again, we hoofed it all around town, craning our necks at all the touristy sights. It was interesting, but all so false, and mercenary, the glitz and bright lights signifying-----what?

We got out of town the second day to see the Hoover Dam. An engineering marvel to be sure.

What I liked even better than the dam, though, was the new bridge they're building.....I have always been in love with bridges, from the humpy-backed little bridge that signaled we were getting close to Granny's when we went on Sunday jaunts out the country long ago, to the Verrazano Narrows in NY to the Golden Gate In San Francisco. This one is scheduled to be finished in September, and, already, it looks amazing!

I'm glad we went to the wedding, though Vegas would be the last place I'd want to tie the knot. Which just goes to show there's room for all kinds of different ways of doing things in the world. If I had it to do over, I'd still head for the hills and the heather. But this was not about me. This was someone else's idea of bliss. And as they were headed off to the Grand Canyon afterwards, I'm sure they had a lovely time. Call me dull, call me boring, the nicest part of going away, anywhere, for me, is coming home to my own cozy nest at the end of it all.

Please Don't Drool On The Quilts

2010-02-18T15:51:00.000-08:00

One of the biggest treats for those of the quilty persuasion in these parts is the West Pasco Quilters'Guild Show. It is held biennially [with a nod to Suse for setting me straight!]

Anyway, guess where I went on the weekend? Excellent guess! To the West Pasco Quilt Show of course. Over the years I've honed my technique for making sure I see everything when I go to one of these shows.

First I get a choke hold on the programme so it doesn't float away.

Then I approach the first quilt that catches my eye and examine it from various angles, including, but not limited to, up close. When my eyes have drunk their fill [or others, impatient for me to move, jostle me on my way] I carefully tick it off in the programme and proceed to its next door neighbour.

[I can't resist quilts with houses and appliqued flowers, like this one.]

The goddesses of quilt shows have no rhyme or reason to the order in which they hang the quilts. Or so it seems to me. It would be nice to go smoothly from number one to number two to number three.....But no! Willy-nilly seems to be the preferred method.

[Please note: Purple quilt! Very Purple quilt.]

Which is better, I guess, than having all the appliqued quilts clumped together. That way, even if you have no interest in applique, you're going to see some anyway, because they'll be sprinkled around among all the others.

[This is what, I think, is called thread painting, something I could eat more easily than do, but I liked the blueberries-beads-since I have an enthusiastic blueberry grower in my family!]

The only problem is having to switch pages at every quilt, while hanging onto your purse, making sure you keep track of your camera, keeping the death grip on the all-important programme, making small talk with all the people you meet, and enduring the mortification of not remembering names --- "Well, hello there! I remember you! I took a class from you at the blah-blah quilt shop, way back when the earth was young! How are you?" [you really want to know? Suffering from profound amnesia.]

And fumbling for your phone in the depths of your purse when the friends you came with are wondering where you've vanished to.....Fun times!

[This log cabin quilt had wool applique blanket stitched over each block. Very unusual and gorgeous.]

This next quilt was my favourite. I voted it Best of Show. My picture of the whole quilt came out very blurry, so instead, here are some detail shots.

If someone had told me I could take home one of the quilts in the show I'd have taken this one.......

Or this one......

[I have the book for this delft quilt. It's on my list to make before I die!]

Or this version of the Dear Jane quilt.....

[These little four inch blocks are an ideal project for toting around in your purse for when you're stranded without a book miles from home. That never happens to you? Oh.]

There were a gazillion quilts to see. I think I saw most of them. The quilts I've shown here show my applique leanings, but there were lots of beautiful pieced quilts too. Hope you've enjoyed the show!

Fly Me To The Moon......

2010-02-16T11:58:00.001-08:00

Saturn I
Originally uploaded by fire starter 100

I couldn't find my Blistex anywhere and the thought of a month without it was stressing me out. Paper lips don't work for me. And they have been dry with this unusually cold winter we're having. Not to mention, everyone else was ready for liftoff. People were getting irate with me. Even my friend was already on board and yelling in exasperation for me to hurry up.

But I had to find my Blistex!

There'd be no opportunity to go to the store and buy more where we were going. And the thought of being Blistex-less for a full thirty days didn't bear thinking about. My lips would surely fall off. I ran back and forth like a headless chicken, pulling out drawers and reaching to check on high shelves, places where I was not remotely likely to find the familiar little white tube. But I'd already ascertained that it wasn't in the side pocket of my purse, where I usually keep it; it wasn't in the pocket of the pants I'd worn yesterday; not in my jacket pocket either; it wasn't on my night table; it wasn't on the kitchen counter; it wasn't on the table by my computer. Where in creation had I put the darn thing? I felt hot tears pricking my eyelids and my feet twitched in a jig of frustration. It didn't help that the shouts from across what seemed like a barnyard, were becoming more strident. Panic rose in my throat as I looked wildly about.

"Molleee! We can't wait any longer!"

They must have left without me because, when I woke up, I was warm and snug in my bed and there was no spacecraft in sight.

Just a moment. There's someone at the door.

Oh. It's a couple of men in white lab coats. They told me I should come with them.........I told them to hang on a minute, I'd be right back. So, quick. Before I climb out the back window and make my escape, what do you think it all means? Am I really so disillusioned with life I'd rather be on the moon? Do they have fabric there, I wonder? And books? And chocolate? And warm, cozy beds?

Maybe I can get on the next launch....

But first I have to find my Blistex.

How To Fill Up A Weekend

2010-02-01T12:22:00.000-08:00

No divorce proceedings yet! The OC is a kind and generous person but does not suffer fools gladly. All he wanted was to be done with airports, get home, put his feet up, do his crossword and sleep on his own pillow. Not so much to ask. But then a fool intervened, checked the wrong flight, and Voila! He got a bonus hour to enjoy airport ambiance. But, one's own bed, in one's own house, a weekend game of golf, albeit in gloomy, gray rain, a walk in the nature preserve, and not having to shave for a few days, have wonderful restorative powers. He is rested and refreshed. And gone on another trip. And, most importantly, the number of his return flight is chiseled on the inside of my forehead.

It was a good weekend. In spite of miserable weather, to which we are not accustomed in these parts, this time of year. [Is that my daughter I hear, playing a mournful tune on her tiny violin?] How can it possibly be Wednesday already? I think the gray weather, carrying over into the early part of the week, made it seem like the weekend had been extended.

Anne Tyler held me hostage with her latest book, "Noah's Compass." She drew me into the lives of her perfectly ordinary characters, to such an extent that I had to finish the book before anything else got done. And then I had to go to the library and rummage through the shelves to find another Tyler fix....

......which I am trying to hold at arm's length until I finish "Pomegranates" which, while interesting, does not carry me along so effortlessly from page to page as Tyler does.

I found a new recipe for Irish soda bread.......We polished it off in record time. Definitely a keeper!

And a project to sew on while listening to the rain spilling down outside......

I've had this cream floral fabric for more than a year. My sister-in-law bought it, but since she mainly buys fabric, then fondles it now and again, but rarely makes anything from it, I volunteered to make something for her. That something is a table runner. Which I started at the weekend. And could, with luck, finish by Friday! [Another manifestation of the New Me, the one who finishes things!]

But.

I'm not too sure I like it. That mauve-y-lilac-y-purple-y colour seemed perfect when I bought it. And the purple with the sparkle in it serenaded me from the sale shelf at the quilt shop. I seem to have an affinity for purple. Maybe from the purple cloth that covered all the statues in church, during Lent, when I was growing up? Or maybe white hair and shades of purple just go together? But purple has a bad reputation. My Bulgarian friend, Julia, told me once, that, in Bulgaria, purple is the colour for practitioners of the world's oldest profession, for which I do not have an affinity. After she told me that, I dressed very conservatively for our weekly voyages of exploration into Brussels! And then there's another dubious connection. Purple prose. Of which none of us would want to be accused.

Now I'm wondering if these two fabrics take the table runner out of the "demure lady" category, which is certainly descriptive of my s-i-l, and move it into "tart" territory, which would not suit her at all. I no longer trust my own judgement. That lilac/lavender/mauve has been luridly leering at me since I started. But, I am not ripping it out now! If she doesn't like it she can give it away, donate it to charity, or use it to wash her car. I started it, so I will finish it!

It has progressed to this stage:

Layered and pinned. After that there's only one more dilemma---to bind it in the sparkly purple? Or the more demure green? Or.....maybe two dilemmas......Which brothel to donate it to if the finished product is indeed too "tarty?"

If you'd like to weigh in on the matter, I'm all ears! But hurry. I want to get it finished before my next run to the airport!

Beware The Full Moon!

2010-01-29T22:40:00.001-08:00

My first moon shot.
Originally uploaded by emma lagunday

I had just finished reading an article about tonight's full moon, having noticed earlier, just as it was getting dark, that the moon looked particularly beautiful. I was interested to read that this full moon is larger than others this year will be. Something about it being at its perigee. Technical stuff. I have always thought that, when I'm feeling down, and oppressed by Life's Little Calamities, of which there have been many lately, it is helpful to go outside, in the dark, and look up at the moon and the stars. Kind of puts things in perspective.

And then my cell phone rang. I galloped through the house, trying to remember where I'd left it. In my purse, in the bedroom. It was about 8:55 p.m.

"Hello?" Breathless.

"Hey! I'm on the shuttle! Should be out in about ten minutes. Are you in the cellphone parking lot?"

"Shuttle? What shuttle?" Stupefied.

"In Tampa. At the airport!"

"But you can't be! I checked on-line and it said the flight was delayed! That you'd be arriving at 10 p.m.instead of 8:50!"

"Where are you?" Ominous.

"I'm at home...."

He didn't [couldn't] say anything. He didn't need to. I could hear the blood vessels popping over the phone.

"I'm out the door now!" Grabbing bag and keys.

Ten minutes pass. I've just turned onto the parkway. Cell phone rings.

"Hello?"

"Don't speed! Call me when you get here." He seems to have taken some deep breaths since our last little chat. He doesn't sound quite so apoplectic.

The silvery disc of the moon is riding high, illuminating the way. I'm at the airport in under an hour. I call as instructed. No answer.

I pull into the curb behind several other cars outside Southwest. Crane my neck to see if he's sitting somewhere, waiting. Nada. Call again. Still no answer!

Where could he be? Maybe he's waiting further up. Pull out from curb, pass entry to Southwest, pull back into curb. Crane neck some more. Nothing.

Call again. No answer. Phone is down to one bar. Oh! Won't that be swell if my phone dies!

But,hark! It's ringing!

"Hello?"

Annoyed, irate, very cranky voice wants to know where I am.

I tell annoyed, irate, very cranky voice that I am outside Southwest arrivals, where I've been for the last ten minutes, repeatedly calling a person who now has an annoyed, irate, very cranky voice, but somehow could not then answer any of my four calls!

It was a very
silent ride home. By the light of the silvery moon.
Maybe next trip he'll take the trouble to write down his flight number.....for the staff.....who are quite feeble minded.

Reading Assignment

2010-01-28T17:39:00.000-08:00

Okay boys and girls, I'll make this brief.

I can't stay today, but I have a reading assignment for you.

Toddle on over to Silfert. I'll be checking to make sure you completed the assignment. The sky fell in on me earlier this week [temporarily] and I've been feeling kind of glum, but after reading "Dogfights and Swordplay," I have a stitch in my side from laughing and the gloom has lifted.

This will get you out of the rut you might be in if you haven't ventured out of your comfort zone [reading the same old blogs]lately. Leave her a comment. No, I'm not her agent. I'm doing this as a public service.....

Don't let me down....

I'll be snooping and taking names!

"A Room Of My Own"

2010-01-25T08:41:00.000-08:00

It's Monday morning, the sun is shining, and for now, all's right with the world. The OC is off in parts northern for the week, the Bean is back on campus, so it's just me and the cat. Purrr!

The Writers' Almanac [thank you again Thimbleanna!] this morning, mentioned that it was the birthday of Robbie Burns. I won't be having haggis for dinner, nor washing whatever I do have down with whiskey, but "My luve's like a red, red rose," will be with me all day!

It's also the birthday of Virginia Woolf who wrote, among other things, "A Room Of My Own." I haven't read it but, according to Mr. Keillor, it's an essay on women and literature. Mental note: look for it at the library. And one thought led to another, as tends to happen, and I realized I have a room of my own. Which makes me very happy. So you'd think I'd keep it in better nick!

But project piles on project, and variety being the spice of life, they're all out at the same time, so I can flit, at will, from one to another. Call me Mme.Butterfly.

It is disgraceful, and I am ashamed to be such a slob. And still a little voice in the back of my brain defends me, whispering fiercely

"But, but, butbutbut! From chaos comes creativity!"

"Yeah, right!" the prosecuting attorney says with curled lip.
"No sob stories please! What is required here is Action! Toss and fling! Like together. Organize by colour. All needles in one place, please, not here and there and everywhere. And thread? Here's a radical concept---keep all those spools on the thread organizer! Get those Christmas boxes off the floor. No stammering about being ready, early, for next Christmas. Get them gone! And those sz. 4 jeans? Left, so hopefully, by California Girl who thinks I'm some kind of magician? Let her put on a little weight to fill them out! Chop Chop!"

"Yes sir!" whimpers the defense, "but can I at least finish stitching the binding on this before I start?"

The prosecution glares, then softens.

"Oh my!" In reverent tones.

"You're actually about to finish something you only started last week?"

The defense blushes.

"Yes, this is the New Me. The 2010 model!" Demurely.

Finish what I start.

Organize the Room Of My Own.

What a radical concept.

The prosecution rests.

And I will not fall back on Mr. Burns immortal words about the best laid schemes o' mice an' men ganging aft agley! I will not consider that an option at all at all!

OC vs. Mattress Update

2010-01-22T18:00:00.000-08:00

It's really just as well we can't see into the future. Dealing with the present is enough of a challenge! Today was the sixth day the OC woke up alive! He says it just wasn't his time to go. I say Someone Up There was looking out for him. He is a very capable driver. He also has lightning reflexes. He is strong enough, and was mad enough that night, to wrestle the Explorer off the road and away from oncoming traffic. I shudder to think what the outcome would have been had I been behind the wheel!

Whoever says you can't really know who you're dealing with on the internet doesn't know the compassionate, caring people who read this blog. I feel that you are all real friends, and I'm sure reading your comments [because he does lurk!] had a part in breaking down his cussed stubbornness! Binding, gagging, dragging or butt kicking wouldn't work to get him to the doc. After an injury a few years ago, he was helped enormously by his chiropractor. Guess who he went to see this afternoon? Of his own free will? He'll be going twice a week for the next few months. Meanwhile, he has put in a full work week at his desk, has talked to the insurance people by phone, has organized a replacement car, which is already sitting in our garage, and has managed to keep news of our little disaster from the ears of his father! Definite Superman leanings!

Thank you all for your concern, and for caring.

Note: As the Bean's GF was driving home from school a few days ago she saw another mattress, on another busy road. It was on the median, but sticking out enough onto the road to be a hazard. Are we being invaded by mattress toting aliens?

A few weeks ago, I was driving home by a back road. I'd been to the fabric/craft store and bought a ball of yarn. One ball of yarn. On sale. But, it may turn out to be a very expensive ball of yarn.....I was on a straight, lonely stretch of road, and, too late, spotted the cop car, lying in wait for me in the ditch. She executed a smart u-turn and put on all her fancy flashing lights and chased me down. So I was going a few miles over the speed limit. There wasn't another soul or vehicle in sight. A little bit disgruntled, I told her I found it remarkable that she was concentrating her law enforcement expertise on this little back road, and wondered aloud why more effort wasn't put into catching the rascals out on 19 who bowl along at 80; blythely whizz through red lights; dodge in and out of lanes with alarming speed and disregard for safety, their own or mine....She pursed her lips and drew herself up to the full stretch of her five feet and two inches, and told me that this wasn't such a deserted stretch of road as I might think. People walked their dogs out here. There were no people in sight; no other vehicles in sight; and nary a hound to be seen.

In light of Recent Events, I'm wondering if I could make a deal with the Law. I'll pay my fine if and when they find and ticket the mysterious mattress moron! Sounds fair to me. What do you think?