The first tulips opened yesterday. They're gorgeous, and they're DIL1's favorite flower. I'll have to keep my eyes peeled for inexpensive tulips in pots for her to transplant in her yard. Everywhere you look there are signs of Spring; the trees are budding, the forsythia's blooming, the chives are up, the lilies and poppies are leafing, there's rhubarb unfurling. Yay! I didn't manage to put the snowblower away and get out the lawnmower but I will... tomorrow probably.
I didn't do anything fun yesterday, I had a stubborn headache that wouldn't go away no matter what I threw at it. I thought it was a sinus headache but a double dose of nasal spray didn't knock it out so I tried a full dose of Aleve but that didn't work either. Sleeping all night did work. Mostly. I'll take it, I was miserable yesterday and no one wants to spend the day with a miserable Barbara. It's not pretty. But the sunset was, look.
May 6--Goya, Giant. The clouds blew away and the cold, blue moonlight lit the face just under the surface of the marsh. The water was stained a dark, clear brown by all the trees downed in years of storms so Fiona only saw the face of the huge man. She held her breath and her fingers trembled as she fumbled her phone out of her pocket but her voice was steady. "The giant's dead," she said into the phone. "Yes, I'm sure. He's floating in the marsh. Come." She closed her phone with a snap and heard the first blare of the siren as the squad left the station behind the town hall. The wind kicked up and ruffled the surface of the marsh obscuring the face of the drowned man. She kept silent watch until the lights loomed behind her and the sirens rent the serenity of the night.
Today's payday again. I love payday, how it comes around every Monday and replenishes my stash, my deep stash, the grocery money, my mad money, and my wallet. It's a lot for a little money to do but I'm better and better about making it stretch. You enjoy your Monday too.
--Barbara
But I'm not giving up yet. Both of the Rustic Roads were within 10 miles or so of the city and both showed signs of serious incursion of house building along what were obviously quiet country lanes very recently. But the sun was shining and the air was warming so I enjoyed every less than rustic mile.
I drove us out to the bay on Lineville Rd. (or whatever it turns into when it gets across Hwy. 41) to see if there were any visible northern pike still in the spawning marsh at the edge of Barkhausen Waterfowl Preserve. There weren't, but there were swifts swooping over the marsh and lovely tannin-brown water running swiftly over the reeds in the roadside ditch on its way to the bay of Green Bay.
On the second Rustic Road we saw a tom turkey and two hens crossing. When we approached the tom had his tail erect and fanned but he quickly tucked it away and led the ladies across into the woods. Durwood promises to go with me next Sunday to look at more Roads. (tempting him with a Joe Rouer's burger worked, teehee) Are you old enough to remember when a Sunday drive was part of most people's weekend? Gas was a lot cheaper then, true, but salaries were a lot smaller then too; the percentage cost is probably pretty close then and now.
I was cutting up strawberries and a pineapple yesterday when I got home so I'll have lots of fruit for putting on my breakfast yogurt and eating with my lunch next week and heard a House Wren singing in the bare honeysuckle. Grandpa Stephan like his "Jenny wrens" and he was always keeping an eye out for a cardinal at his feeder. I think of him every time there's that flash of red orange out back and the piercing wren song reminds me being a kid in Evansville, IN.
May 5--Goya, Giant. The face barely emerged from the dark water. The eyes were closed and there was a puzzled expression on the lips. Fiona stood at the edge of the marsh listening to the wind clatter through the weeds and watching the play of light and shadow on the water. The moon played hide and seek with the clouds racing before the wind and she thought at first that the light was playing tricks on her.
I swear, cross my heart, that I'm going to bed a whole lot earlier tonight (it's a school night) so that I can complete the thought before I crap out. Oh, and Happy Cinco de Mayo. Eat a taco. (but that's not really Mexican, is it? it's
more TexMex, I think)
--Barbara
This afternoon Skully and I are going off on our inaugural Rustic Roads adventure. We were looking for a free or cheap adventure and she came across Wisconsin's system of Rustic Roads. According to the website, they're "an effort to preserve Wisconsin's scenic lightly traveled country roads for the leisurely enjoyment of bikers, hikers, and motorists." There are 24 of them in the Northeast quarter of the state, 111 overall. Should be fun to see how the land's waking up in this year's reluctant spring. And, I don't want to say it too loudly but it even looks as if the sun may shine. Shhh.
I knuckled down yesterday afternoon and got the sewing for DIL1 done. As I suspected it was mostly hand sewing (one of these days I'll learn to use the blind hemmer on my machine) but as long as I have good light I'm not bad at it, not as good as Mom was but adequate.
Durwood's off to breakfast with his Census 2000 pals. He missed it most of the winter because it was just too cold for him to breathe outside so he's ready to go off for the morning. I have to confess that I am too; it's my only chance to be alone in the house for any length of time. It's funny how I miss that even though he's not climbing into my pocket when we're here together but it's different being here alone. I plan to rope him into going along with me to see a couple more Rustic Roads, maybe tomorrow maybe next week, since they're what I plan to write about during my week at The Clearing. (Judy, the workshop teacher, demands that we have a specific project in mind, no airy-fairy waiting for what the muse brings. Oh, and there're spots just reopened in the workshop if you're interested.) Hmm, I just had a thought; if we go tomorrow we can have a burger at Joe Rouer's. What a good idea. Durwood thinks so too. Yay! He's pretty easy to lead astray. That's one of the things I like about him.
~~~~~
May 4--Henri-Edmond Delacroix, Boats Near Venice. Jilly could smell the water long before she could see it. She loved driving along through the country smelling the crops and the hot, dry dust but then suddenly there would be a coolness in the air like a thread of moisture, refreshing in the summer heat. She smiled knowing that over next rise, or myabe the one after that, the sea would lay before her like a jeweled robe with the sun sparkling on the waves. Gulls would scream and wheel overhead and under it all would be the faintest hint of fish.
~~~~~
Today looks to be the day that I put the snowblower away and get the lawnmower out. And I'll put fresh sheets and towels out too. Whew, I've got a lot on my plate. Not. I'm off to find something weekend-y for breakfast. Toodle-oo.
--Barbara
I can not be trusted leaving yarn loose because I just go downstairs, grab some, and start knitting even though I have perfectly good projects OTN. It's a compulsion; I have an idea and it nags at me until I succumb. Take this poor yarn. It began as a wrap that looked great on the pattern and like dog doo on me. Then instead of unraveling it I just picked out the end and started knitting a Rib Warmer from the corpse of the wrap, but before I was halfway through the first half I realized that I didn't have enough yarn and couldn't get enough yarn because the black wool/cashmere I carried with the thick/thin colorful wool is discontinued. So I shoved it all into a bag and left it in timeout downstairs. Then I knit the wonderfulness that is the Green Shrug. It used about 2 lbs. of yarn and that's how much the wool & cashmere blob weighs, or near enough. The idea has been rolling around in my head but I've been telling myself that I should finish at least one of the projects OTN before casting on another. That worked until yesterday morning when I went downstairs before work, grabbed the yarn, pattern, and one set of interchangeable needles, took it to work, cast on, and started knitting the Reclaimed Shrug. In the back of my mind I can finish it before I go to The Clearing in 15 more days, especially if I don't extend the body beyond the pattern directions as I did with the Green one. We'll see if my hands hold out.
I did knit the last 10 rows of the leg of the Spring Boot Sock and segue into the heel flap and heel turn in lime green, then pick back up with the pastel-ly shades of the main yarn. I think for the next sock I'm going to use a different yarn for each sock part. That should keep me interested and monogamous, right? Maybe.
Skully and Porter and I walked most of the Baird Creek Greenway Trail this morning and we saw a bald eagle--twice. The first time it was flying away and Skully spotted it and the second time it was up in a tree and I spotted it. Of course I left my camera in the car so Skully pulled out her phone and snapped a few pix for me. I saw blue jays and lots of robins and a few wrens and some sparrows but the eagle is the icing on the cake.
It's back to being chilly, overcast and windy. We wore long jeans, fleece jackets, knitted caps and gloves to walk this morning, and not just because it was 8:30 and not warmed up yet. Honestly. We had enthusiastic rain yesterday afternoon and evening and into the night but rain's way better than the snow they got 100 miles to the west of us. I remember shoveling a snowstorm on May 2 but that was years ago and I don't want to repeat the experience.
I had one entire customer yesterday. A paying one it's true, but only one makes for a long day. I got a couple phone calls but most of them were those robo-calls from someone who wants to sell something. I hang up on them. I try to be nice to the young people who call and are obviously in a boiler room with fifty-jillion other people telemarketing their little butts off and so I tell them to call "Constance" who makes those decisions, that way Mrs. Boss knows they're selling something and doesn't waste her time. Pretty clever, eh? Few customers means a lot of knitting with the accompanying sore wrists & hands and burning, blurry eyes by quitting time. I wish I could knit all day and all night but I just can't. I like to be able to see clearly beyond my fingertips and to have my hands work for other things like eating and sewing, which I need to do this weekend, I've got some fixes to do for DIL1.
I didn't write last night. Not only was I tired beyond all comprehension but the "art" photo of the day was singularly uninspiring. See? I just couldn't muster up even one thought about that except about the taste and lifestyle of the wearer. Crazypants, in more ways than one. You have a lovely day. I hope the sun's shining where you are. I can tolerate chilly if it's sunny but there's not a chance for sunny today, tomorrow maybe, but not today.
--Barbara
And look at that sky. Beauty. I opened the shade this morning and saw little yellow blooms out the window when I made the bed. Yay, forsythia! I hot-footed it out there (with pants on this time, it's around the side of the house and way more exposed to view than the birdbath) to take its picture. I also pictured the blue squills under the leafless lilac, the masses of grape hyacinth in front, and the enthusiastically blooming hyacinths and daffodils. I especially like the red variegated dogwood twigs against the leaves of the bulbs. When I went out the front door to snap pix of the hyacinths, etc. I felt something fall into my hair. I brushed it off and a hornet fell onto the walk. Eek! A hornet! I squashed it tout suite, you'd better believe it. Stomp. I'll be keeping an eye on the lintel and soffit also around the mailbox and downspout to squash any extemporaneous nest building. Don't you worry, I'm on it. (and no, DD, it's not the one that was crawling on you in the basement after Christmas, I dispatched that one long ago)
It was a different day yesterday at work. It was dead quiet (okay, I had one phone call but it was a customer one, I made a note for Mrs. Boss because I couldn't answer the questions) until after about 2:00 when MB dropped in to visit after picking up his first wave of garden plants at Lindsley's, a relatively secret greenhouse in the neighborhood. He and I had a grand visit talking about travels and adventures. He still owes me a lizard story, a bird story, and... and... well, another story and I'm putting it here so I don't forget. I'm hoping to go along when he does Sunday Fun Dives this season because we'd like to dive together at least once. Then my knitting pal, MW, stopped in to drop off a jump drive with photos from the Spin-In in Waukesha so I can put them on the knitting guild's blog and we talked about birds. After MW left, KJ & JJ(the 15-yr-old version) stopped in to make copies but the copier's broken (a new one's on the way). We visited for a few minutes and I found out that JJ's in an alternative school and doing great. It sounds like the class C & AH work in down in Goshen and JJ's finally liking school. He looks like a new boy and that is a VERY good thing. He was almost out of the store as they left but he came back for a hug and to tell me he misses me. I got a little misty. Finally at 2 minutes to 5 o'clock (closing time) a guy came in to look at wetsuits. He didn't buy anything but he was my first and only customer of the day so I was happy to stay late and help him--and I didn't charge Mrs. Boss for that extra 20 minutes because I'd spent the previous, oh, 7 hours knitting a sock. Seemed like a good trade-off, 7 hours of knitting for 20 minutes of work. Yup, good trade.
I (finally) had a brainstorm about something to write about at The Clearing in 16 days (but who's counting?). Skully wants to drive the WI Rustic Roads for a cheap adventure so I thought we could do a few (and I can make Durwood go with me other times too) before I go away for the week so I'll have fodder to write essays up at TC. There's a new magazine called Our Wisconsin that I bet would be an excellent place to publish little short pieces about out of the way stuff like that. I feel better now.
May 2--Netherlandish or French, Triptych with the Way to Calvary, the Crucifixion, and the Disrobing of Jesus. It was dark in the narrow antique shop. Heavy walnut tables were stacked three high nearly touching the pressed tin ceiling. The lights bore decades of film from the oil furnace and there were generations of dead moths silhouetted in the shades. Ranks of glass-fronted cabinets lined narrow paths that twisted and turned like a labyrinth. Clea was glad she had a penlight in her purse because the place was so dim. She wondered how anyone ever found things in the over-crowded cupboards and shelves. All she wanted was a sugar and creamer set and she was afraid she'd break more than she found to buy.
~~~~~
That's when the sandman took over and slammed my eyelids shut. Remember how hot it was on Tuesday? It was in the mid-80s. Well, it got up to around 70 yesterday and then a front came through around 5:30 yesterday afternoon and now it's supposed to maybe get up to 50 degrees today and snow 6" in the northwestern part of the state. Ye gods. I think I'll wear a sweater, my new one that I made. Time to rev up my day. Ah'm outta here.
--Barbara
In 17 more days I'll be driving away to The Clearing for a week-long writing workshop. I have no idea what or even if I'll write but I sure am looking forward to a week away from the everyday. I can't wait. This is the first time in a long time that I'll be going without a friend and roomie. I'm still on the fence about whether I'll pony up the extra moolah for a single room but for now it's a moot point since there isn't one available, but I think I might if I have the opportunity. That's what credit cards are for, right?
I was going to trot out that tired old rhyme about today being May 1 and outdoor screwing starting today but I decided I'm way too mature for that sort of foolishness. But then I thought I should lead off with that as a salute to Dad who's the one who told me the thing in the first place. But then I thought that it isn't a very proper way of saluting Dad. But then I thought, why not? So: "Hooray, hooray, the first of May, Outdoor screwing starts today" says Hank. (bring your own blanket)
I really suffered with barometric aches yesterday, so much so that 2 Aleve barely budged them, and that's not fair. I keep myself moving, I walk and do chores and carry things thither and yon. I try not to knit too long before I stretch my shoulders, arms and fingers, and bend my back this way and that to work out kinks. So I spent yesterday achy and pouting, whined a bit too, it didn't help but I felt better about the whole thing. Durwood had the blahs too. We were a fine pair. We usually are. I did get all the feeders and bird houses hung yesterday so the birds can move any anytime. Durwood made birdie juice for the hummingbird feeders but we suspect they won't get here until the honeysuckle blooms and that'll be a while since it doesn't even have leaves yet, but we'll keep the juice out just in case.
May 1--Paul Cezanne, Gardanne. The Mediterranean sun beat down on the tile and stucco buildings of the town stacked together on the hill between the harbor and the fields. Rene stood with his back to the stone wall and watched the goats wrestle over an old jacket lying under the brush. He frowned and shaded his eyes with his hand. If his eyes weren't playing tricks on him there was an arm in the sleeve of the jacket. Perhaps he should go to work in the far vineyard and let some other unlucky villager make the discovery. Maybe a tourist would happen by. No one would suspect a tourist of ending Maurice Grand's miserable life. Dammit, he recognized the denim jacket Maurice always wore without knowing he was doing it. He wasn't a good enough liar to pretend he hadn't seen the body so he turned to walk back down into the village to tell the police what he'd found.
~~~~~
It's a workday. That means I get to go eat while I read the paper, then shower, dress and zoom off to keep the world safe from SCUBA diving. Oh, I need to stop to pick up a tank at Van's and the Mason St. bridge is closed this morning so I'll have to go over Walnut. Good thing I made myself a note, I forget stuff like that all the time and then I'm late and when I'm late is the only time someone's waiting for me when I get there. If I'm early or on time there's no one there and no one for hours. It confuses me how that works, but then I spend a lot of my life confused.
--Barbara
The first tulips opened yesterday. They're gorgeous, and they're DIL1's favorite flower. I'll have to keep my eyes peeled for inexpensive tulips in pots for her to transplant in her yard. Everywhere you look there are signs of Spring; the trees are budding, the forsythia's blooming, the chives are up, the lilies and poppies are leafing, there's rhubarb unfurling. Yay! I didn't manage to put the snowblower away and get out the lawnmower but I will... tomorrow probably.
