Got My List

I sat and listed the few things I want to get done today, "few" being a euphemism for "crap-ton" (ahem) so I'll try to keep this short.  (heh, like I don't ramble on into infinity once I get started)  Maybe I'll start where I usually end...  Today's Photo a Day theme is "coin" so I took a picture of my coin cup.  It's a red plastic picnic cup that holds about a soda can's worth of Coke; it sits under the paper towels on the kitchen counter.  At the end of every day I put my coins into it (I try not to spend any coins) and when it's full I cash them in for paper money that goes right into the "mad" zipper pocket of my wallet.  I think that I'll take it in on Tuesday or maybe next Friday even though it's not quite full so it can be "trip" money instead of "mad" money this time.  That'd be good, don't you think?  I also need to check that we have the ingredients to make coffeecake dough tonight and the coffeecakes tomorrow.  Ooh, it's going to be difficult not to cut into one before dessert time at Family Supper on Sunday.  We might have to have a taste test to make sure it's good enough for the rest of the fam.  I want to do some sewing; put the zipper in Durwood's fleece pullover I'm reworking into a jacket and maybe knock out the August BOM quilt blocks while I'm at it.  Or maybe I'll do those first as a kind of warm-up... NO! fleece first, then quilt blocks.  No fooling around, Barbara, work before play, set a good example.  And I need to pop into Office Depot to return something, get a new black cartridge I just discovered that I need when the pages I printed came out blank (I hate when that happens), and look into maybe getting a mobile hotspot to take along if it's not too pricey.  I'll see.  I might be learning thrift in my old age.  Might.  Hey, I'm trying.  Durwood lectures me (gently) quite often about my spending habits because he doesn't see the struggles I have not buying things, he only sees when I do buy things.  (I am totally the grasshopper and he's the ants in this marriage.  Aesop's Fables, click the link to read the story)  I'm learning, really I am.  I am being very conscientious about knitting and sewing with what I have on hand, only buying the barest minimum of things that a project calls for if I don't have the item or a reasonable facsimile.  For instance, I already have long separating zippers to put into Durwood's fleeces; I just need to buy a couple of barrel clamp-y things to keep the elastic cord from sucking back into the bottom casing.  See?  Not much to buy at all.  Although I think I might have a coupon...  No!  Geez, Barbara, get a grip, you want to have money for the Yellowstone trip and to go to The Clearing next month (next month!!! woohoo!!!!) and to Nova Scotia next year.  Dollars add up, especially when you don't spend them.  Imagine that.  Do you even have times that you'd like to scrape out everything in your house and start over?  I'm feeling that right now.  I want less stuff (not hobby stuff, stuff stuff) and I want the house to look different.  Maybe I'll paint in the fall and rearrange the furniture.  Maybe the flooring fairy will come while we're away and lay down new carpeting... nah, probably not, there probably isn't one, just like there was never a "Bridget" to clean Mom's house.  Okay, this is getting long again, I need to eat and tackle my list.  Errands first, sewing second.

August 3--Syria, Plaques in the Form of Sphinxes.  "They're looking at me."  "They are not."  "Yes, they are, I can see that they are."  "They're not real, not alive.  See?" (knuckles rapping on bronze) " They look alive.  I think one of them blinked."  "No, it was a shadow flickering on it; neither one is alive.  They are bronzes from the eighth century B.C.  B.C., Jean, nothing can be alive that long."  "Shh.  Did you hear something?"

That's just weird.  Sometimes even I wonder about myself.  The oddest thing happened on Wednesday night.  We ate at Tony Roma's and I used the little towel they give you to wipe my lips and I evidently wiped the base of my nose and alongside it because it hurt like I'd been blowing my nose for days (you know, that mid-cold feeling?) and now it's dried like a healing burn.  So beware of the caustic towels at Tony Roma's.  Jeez.  I'm a veritable festival of weird.  Toodles.
--Barbara