A Little More Making

I'm not showing you outside because if you have an old gray dress, wrinkled and tattered, you'll know what the last couple days have looked like, gray and dreary and depressing.  They've threatened us with sunshine tomorrow.  We'll see.


This morning I cooked up three pounds of ground beef into Sloppy Joes to have on hand when DD comes next week.  I know it looks weird and orange, but it smells great and tastes just as good.  Ok, I had to sample a few spoonfuls, just to make sure it's good enough for guests.  I solemnly swear that I won't touch it until they get here.


After lunch I went to the Dollar Tree looking for gift bags and hoped for gift tubes.  Got the bags and some tissue paper, and found a couple tall boxes that might do as gift tubes.  Time will tell.



Once I got home I fired up the TV and sat down to knit on the little mitten.  I'm up to the top decreases so it should get done quickly tomorrow.  I like that I ran out of the dark purple and had to tie on the medium purple.  Plus there's a shiny thread in there. 


As I was checking out at Dollar Tree there was a commotion on the sidewalk right outside the door.  Three women had jumped out of a car and proceeded to beat the crap out of another woman. !!!  A few people tried to break it up and the victim made her way into the store, shoeless and crying.  A clerk called 9-1-1 and by the time I was leaving it was over and a squad car was slowly driving up.  Crazy.

14 December--Barbara Malcolm, Spies Don't Retire. 

In just about two weeks a package notice was in George’s mailbox.  He slid the note in his pocket, told Sonia that he had to run into town, and hopped in the Rover and took off.  He drove past Dimitri’s place tooting his horn twice and then parked around the corner.  Within fifteen minutes he saw Dimitri in his side view mirror turn the corner and walk toward him.

Dimitri came up on the passenger side and opened the door.  “Sorry it took so long to get here, George.  Irina did not want to let me out.”

“That’s okay.  I’m not in any hurry.”

“What is up?”

“I got a notice of a package.  I think it’s the laptop.”

Dimitri got in, eager to be more in touch with George without all the hassles and tricky coordinating of signals.  The men drove into town careful to avoid places where someone who would report back to their wives might see them.  They scouted the streets around the post office and George parked in a lot behind the auto parts store.  Dimitri stayed in the Rover while George went in to claim his package.  He was back in about a half hour lugging a medium sized box bound with miles of tape and dotted with Fragile stickers.

Dimitri hopped out and opened the rear hatch for his friend.  “Here, it will be easier to open back here,” he said.

George smiled at Dimitri’s eagerness to have what was in the box.  He pulled a box cutter from his pocket and carefully slit the tape.  He opened a garbage bag.  “Scoop out the packing peanuts into here.  I need to get the router out of there.  Then we can repack it and relabel it with your address.  I will take it back inside and tell them they gave me the wrong box.”

“Will that work?”

“Of course it will work.  They are always screwing up like that, putting mail in the wrong box or handing out packages to anyone who asks.”

They carefully corralled the packing material in the garbage bag chasing any of the peanuts that wafted away into the vehicle or tried to escape across the parking lot.  Neither man wanted to admit it to the other but they both hated littering and were in the habit of patrolling the beaches and roadsides for it.  George annoyed Sonia regularly by pulling over to pick up large items that had been left or blown by the roadside.

I sent Christmas cards today to those I've gotten cards from, just in time to see the mailman strolling away.  Good thing there's a mailbox a block away.  Tomorrow I intend to wrap gifts.  I miss Durwood.  In the past I'd box up the gifts and hand them off to him for wrapping.  He was better at it than I am and I'm not getting any better with practice.  Hence the gift bag shopping trip.
--Barbara