Looks Like More Rain

Well crap, it looks like it's going to rain on my walk but I'm going to go get Porter and set out anyway.  That's what they make umbrellas for, right?  It rained out the outdoor portion of the Knitting Guild annual picnic last night.  VJ's lovely husband grilled burgers in the rain for the second of only three times there's been a guild picnic.  He's a good sport, that AJ.  It's definitely too wet to dig up the blueberries to transplant so I guess today's the day I'll make some fragrance-free lotion to take along to The Clearing with me NEXT WEEKEND when I go up for a week's writing workshop.  I'm so excited to go up there for a week with no job and no husband (although I have one of the best husbands ever) and no one to think of but myself for seven whole days.  I should start packing, or at least make a list or three.

Mrs. Boss came to the dive shop yesterday to mow the lawn and then have me measure her for a custom drysuit.  I told her that now we're going steady since I had my hands all over her.  It's a challenge to measure people because you have to measure ALL of them and still preserve their modesty and privacy, and mine too.  That "crotch to floor" measurement's the most challenging but we have the measure-ee help by holding the dumb end of the tape measure in their, uh, their downthere while we take the smart end to the floor to get the measurement.

I just heard on the morning TV blabber that WI will be having a $500 million surplus next year and the lawmakers are debating what to do with it.  They should call me, I have a list.  School aid and tax relief are at the top of my list, but there's a lot that can be done with that kind of money.  Just so they don't all give themselves raises...

May 10--Eva Zeisel, Inkwell.  The rain kept falling.  The wind rose and fell and rose again but the rain didn't stop.  It slowed a bit just before sundown but it never stopped.  Not that day.  Not the next day.  Sylvia stood at the window, her left arm crossed over her midriff, her right hand clutching a cigarette near her chin where she only had to shift her arm a bare inch to get the cancer stick to her lips.  She had quit smoking eight years earlier but the week of rain constantly drumming on the roof, splashing on the pavement, and roaring through the downspouts made her so crazy she had slogged to the Stop & Rob convenience store on the corner and bought a pack.  Gilroy would kill her if he knew she was smoking again but Gilroy was dead and the constant rain had eroded any self-control she had managed to cling to.

Okay, time to get dressed and go get Porter to walk between the raindrops.
--Barbara