the audit

ok, so......this week was dominated by a local accountant and his very pregnant assistant.....who performed, under a pricey contract, our required yearly audit.....yikes.....the former director was asked to leave upon the results of an audit....and even though i have done my best to avoid his controversial ways.....i still hold my breathe that all of our accounts are in order.....

million (and a half) dollar houses.....

ok, so......i took 2 vacation days off to drive my mother and my daughter on a whirlwind tour of ohio memories.....including dresden where my favorite aunt and three of her four children live on the family orchard....and then through holmes county...the amish country where i was born and thrived til 5th grade.....and then on to cleveland where my mother was born/raised and where her only sibling still lives and where her niece lives in the family homestead that dates back before the war( read that as civil war).... when my mother's father died, the newspaper published not a photo of him, but of the house and its role as one of the last stops on the underground railroad.....but i digress from the trip....made tolerable by 'the help' on cd.....the lives of my cousins (on both sides) make my life seem like a cake walk by comparison.....and may i say for the record that my mother is no more senile than either her blood kin or extended family.......my aunt's catch-phrase 'million-dollar houses' has become family legend to describe all that is ostentatious, indicative of northern ohio and better than anything we (from the south) could aspire to......on this trip the price of this standard jumped up to a million and a half......which i immediately texted to my middle child....and then covertly angled the text message to my daughter in a conspiratorial gesture...... we had a quiet chuckle of the inflation.....that moment may have been the best on the trip.....

amen, amen, and amen....

ok, so.......i have three reasons to rejoice.....my eldest is back from his two-year Fulbright stint, mu middle child has a (perfect) job lined up for after his internship, and the first-ever meeting between our youngest child and her birth father went better than expected.....

beating back nature.....

ok, so......i am convinced that should i neglect to weed my beds for more than a a few days....such as a 9-day vacation....my beds would be taken over completely by vines......time was when honeysuckle was the plant to rip out whenever it raised its ugly head....but this is clearly the year for vines..... thick, ropey vines....vines with thorns.....vines with pods (milkweed?)......vines that snake up the long canes of rambling roses, and hydrangeas, and.......even the dead daylily stalks......i have alrteady spent time this morning ripping vines off of the back fence....i swear they were not there yesterday.....i heard on NPR that the excess of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere makes for exceptional vines growth...as evidewnced by the huge poison ivy clumps that i must get around to ripping out with disposable gloves.....on the other hand, there is a lovely trailing ground cover that has hybernated in the boxwood oval that is peaking out from the nooks and crannies of the stones and bricks....it is from an Amish farm in northeastern Ohio.....Miss Fanny Schlabaugh gave me the original clump.....we were there with my parents, spouse and children.....visiting her father who was nearing 100 at the time....when we arrived he was out on the thresher......and he came rising into the barnyard waving his arms at my parents who had known him since the mid-50's....but i digress from the vining ground cover......which could possibly get out-of-hand and be just as pecky as the vines i did not plant and do not want in my beds......

jane austen's fight club

ok, so this link is to the youtube version of jane austen's fight club......

"The first rule of fight club is one never mentions fight club. No corsets, no hatpins, and no crying."

book club selection gathering.....

ok, so....we hosted the annual book club selection dinner last evening......and it was preceeded by a months of property upkeep projects....like restaining the deck and latticework, relaying the brick walk behind the garage, repainting the porch, spraying for chiggers, fixing the pond lining......last night the temperature at 7:00 pm was still above 90 degrees.....so we opted to eat inside rather than on the pristine deck area....and we found a workable solution to a gathering that exceeeds the maximum of 12-13 at the table expanded with all leaves....we left the table as it was and borrowed 2 lightweight folding tables from work that sat 6 each....and so we could have accommodated 18 folks for supper.....we dined on grilled citrus marinated salmon, pasta salad, a bean and barley salad, marinated asparagus, cumcumbers in sour cream, strawberry/spinach salad, and strawberry-pretzel salad...plus jan's peppermint patty cupcakes.....we will be reading several books that i have already read....which works out well as my spouse can take his time reading those books......we selected a book that our eldest was asked to read for discussion purposes.....which means we will host the january gathering and worry about clearing snow rather than upkeep projects......

humboldt fog....

ok, so i dragged myself out of bed early to water the flower beds before driving into town to go to the farmer's market......i bought yellow tomatoes and 'bodacious' sweet corn from the only gut who appeared to be selling his own produce.....the other stand appeared to have boxes clearly labeled tomatoes under the tables......and then i popped into V-the market for the humboldt fog as promised on her facebook page.....omg.....i came close to eating it all when i got home from the stop at the aldi store.......if there is a flavor of this earth better than goat cheese i would like to know what it is......

incorrect spelling.....

ok, so.....in my dreams i was editing the headlines for a blog that looked like the huffpost......and every time a word was spelled incorrectly i would correct it....and this tedium went on and on....no action, just spelling errors...i had my fill of headlines yesterday....especially the one that i found on the clipping ripped from wednesday's newspaper by my spouse......uk student in critical condition after police tazing.....seems we know this fellow.......seems he was on the roof of a two story apartment house.....a bit out of his right mind...and the police came to save him from himself by tazing him twice...he got back up after each tazing.....and when they went to taze him the third time he jumped off the roof.....omg.....i feel great sympathy for people who find themselves temporarily out of their right minds.....it is only by the grace of god that i cling to sanity on most days...i cannot fault those who struggle with their own....

world cup......

ok, so.....we talked to our dear middle child after lunch, after church....then rather than heading outdoors to do manual labor....we settled onto the sofa for a nice afternoon of air conditioned world cup final play....which i am certain involved short naps for each of us.....i have no recollection of the first half after the group photo ops and handshaking.....and then i waited for the brilliant professional soccer moves that i have been led to believe comes with this level of play....but mostly all i saw was chaps dashing to the ground and holding various parts and screaming indignantly....well, all except the guy who got kicked in the chest.....that looked like a bonafide foul.....in my humble opinion, the dutch looked a bit meaner and rougher than the spaniards......

riding for reading

ok, so.....my eldest child blogged his way across america last summer.......62 entries give or take.....with the blog hosted by the local newspaper....at some point after the ride was finished, the paper took down the blog.....which made the links to the blog broken, and made the actual content of the blog inaccessible.....phone calls and emails to the newspaper asking for access to the content by the author have produced no results....sad to lose such a valuable piece of writing and scrapbooking.......and then yesterday, while i was whiling away my lunch hour catching up on my favorite blogs on google reader......i saw riding for reading as a blog that had not been recently updated.....and there, drawn up into that site, was the entire blog, pictures, verbal descriptions and all.....and so i have copied and pasted my way through 160 pages of blogged memories, tidied them up a bit by downsizing the photos a tad...and downloaded them onto my thumbdrive......the days are not in actual order, and the end is somehow in the middle....but i will leave the final editing to my child when he gets back from his latest ride.......

true

ok, so.....i was driving back into d-ville with errands plotted out for minimum carbon foot printing, when the song that was playing just before ATC was scheduled to come on had a lyric that almost brought tears to my eyes....'so true'......and i missed my friend gail so very much at that moment.....she who often described realities as 'so true'...or just 'true'.....and she has been gone for so very long...or has it been just the other day......i last talked to her on my birthday.....but i cannot remember which birthday it was.....

stain.....

ok, so......i spent the afternoon staining the latticework that hangs below the deck.....mostly because now that the deck has been restained, the latticework looks grungy.....because it has never-ever been stained....and because i have a planting scheme for the bed beside the under-deck gate.....i figured i might as well go ahead and stain that entire area before i planted the new things and before the existing roses grow back from severe pruning......and so i managed to get all but the higher parts....and i found myself in a curious daydream as i dabbed down the long strips and across the counter-ribs.....even more curious is my reluctance to record the daydream for posterity...suffice it to say that gardening was involved.....

a moment of feline amusement.....

ok, so...on this freebie day-off i started out early with the mid-summer weeding, removal of dead day lily stems, etc....and i ventured outside the fence to weed out the wild shrubberies that want so badly to grow between my boxwoods.....and 'all the sudden' as we like to say in these parts...i noticed that the dog had strayed off and so i called out to him with several extra-loud rounds of Buddy,Buddy,Buddy......but instead of the dog running obediently my way....the cat sprang out of the underbrush and came scurrying to me.....i decided to reward her with a little morsel of leftover porkchop out of the refrigerator......one must reinforce such loyalty......eventually the dog came home, but he missed out on the treats....

zones.....

ok, so.....i appear to forget from sunday night to saturday sometime midday that our house is temperature and time controlled to maximize comofrt while we are home and/or sleeping to save fuel when we are not at home and/or sleeping......and so when i try to take a nap on saturday or sunday afternoon i wake up almost feverish only to recall that the daytime temeprature upstairs is way higher than the evening temperature....this is not huge news, gentle readers......just a window into my current state of confusion...

torn....

ok, so recap my life for the past 4 weeks.....i discovered the day before we were to travel to our middle child's college graduation that she had not submitted her tax return...and soon after figured out that she was not taking her medication....and since that day i have been granted power of attorney, and have taken over her finances, cancelled credit cards, confronted the shysters who were soliciting repetitive charitable donations......tripled her loan repayment for early payoff....and entertained her nightly with supper and observed medication dosing.....and felt that she was really getting back to 'usual'.....and then the letter came today from the state folks advising her that she had failed to submit medical reports that supported her continued driving liberties....and that is where the angst comes into play......i was with her when she renewed her license....and nobody mentioned a medical statement.....and i have seen every bit of mail she has received in the meantime...and i have seen no request for a medical statement....and so i am torn.....this would be the perfect excuse to take her keys.....but then again...she is so much herself these days it seems wrong to take the keys without an exhaustive study of the facts...so i will call the state folks on tuesday, and take her to see her doctor, and suggest an evaluatuon of her skills before i relingiqush her license.....

sick and staying home.....

ok, so...i was up at least four times in the night....lost count....and i have decided that sick time is for staying home when one's body is out of sorts.....and so i am getting ready to go back to bed......

just to recap...

ok, so this from the daily kos...Let me see if I have this straight: in the last few days members of the GOP have savagely screwed the unemployed, protected the bankstas, trashed Thurgood Marshall, implied rape and incest is part of God's plan, defended BP, threatened to either end social security or screw over 20 million plus people who have paid into the system for at least 20 years by making them wait until age 70 to see their benefits, and screwed homeless veterans with children. That about it, or is there more?

a trip on the horizon

ok, so....i booked a trip this morning on Expedia, with airfare from Lexington to London through Charlotte.....only the single stop.....and 4 nights at a South Kensignton hotel that managed to have only good reviews in non-Expedia forums....along with a bus/fully escorted 12-hour side trip to Stonehenge/Bath/Windsor......all for far less through Expedia than I could do on my own using RSteve's hotel picks...go figure.....

painter's remorse

ok, so.....i stained the upright and cross pieces of the deck.... all sides......which involved getting out the ladder and carefully holding the paint can in one hand while i leaned in and painted with the other.....clearly this side was never stained when the deck was built.....neither was the fence or gates.....or trellis..........but i digress from the remorse part.....i should have left my glasses in the house, and covered my hair, and drank more fluids....as now my hair smells of paint remover and i feels quite out-of-sorts.....and now that i have started in on the gate nearest the deck...the rest of of the fence looks wretched......and old and frail.......could be a long summer of staining

saturday and sunday

ok,so.....i got up early on saturday to plant the amethist mist heuchera plants that i have accumulated from the half-price tables of area road-side nurseries....12 in all.....in the space once-removed from the trellis rose....and then i cleaned up and drove to h-burg for the first annual books and arts festival to hear ed mclanahan read......holding my book-club (hard-back) copy of a natural man in hopes of a dedication.....enjoyed the reading from his newest work.....which included tales of high school basketball, courting of young women, and egg-tossing drive-bys......he did dedicate my book...to my eldest who knows him....and i bought the newest volume as a gift to my eldest as well......and then back by the plant-stand by the taco bell to buy their last remaining heucheras (6 of black currant) to put behind the deck......at half-price.....too hot to actually plant them soi watched wimbledon tennis, and then world cup soccer.....gentle readers......i have spent 25 years, give or take, watching children of varying ages play the game, and i have yet to recognize 'offsides' when it happens.....ah well.....but i digress from the heucheras....which have lovely burgundy foliage.....a pleasing contrast to the grey of our fence/deck and the silver of the lamb's ear....those that i planted by the trellis rose look out of place.....so i will move them elsewhere and figure out something else to place by the rose......my sunday morning was less ambitious...coffee on my terrace studying the lesson to teach, then a last-minute rush to water the beds before getting ready for church....i impulsively selected a little worn pair of strappy sandals, which broke when i stumbled on uneven pavement coming in from the parking lot.....i took them off and walked the rest of the way barefooted.....i suppose as god intended.....we are waiting for grandma to come home from church to eat lunch.....our youngest found her cell phone under her sofa, so she is not likley to call and let us know where she is....she so rarely goes to church that i never thought to make a plan with her for afterwards.....there is a sweet rain coming down now, with just a hint of thunder in the distance......a gift....as we cannot go out to stain the fence until it has dried......might try to take a nap in the downtime......

nightgown gardening.....

ok, so i got in an hour of weeding, trimming and other assorted garden maintenance chores before 8:00 am......i even tackled the task of staking up the shasta daisies, which have become so leggy as to fall backwards into surrounding plants.....all this work while still in my nightgown....and robe for a short time until it got too hot and too damp from the dew.......the downside of this weekend habit of come-as-i-am work is that i cannot wear the same nightclothes to bed, and my fingernails get pretty nasty for lack of gloves......the upside is that i get a lot done and still maintain the illusion of leisure......a woman who is still in her nightgown is technically lounging about.....and a working woman needs to have lounging about time.....

weary

ok, so.....the week really got away from me....in so many ways at so many levels.....dealing with my mother's decline has started to resemble a video game......just as i resolve an issue, another issue is revealed which takes the magnitude of the scenario to the next level......i have no hope that the shuttle will go off and the russian dolls will dance as they do when one wins at tetris......and i feel all the sadder for admitting that i feel no hope as we hit the three-week mark of the 'grandma takeover'.....i know that i am not the first and certainly not the last to struggle with this reality.....

ok, so we watched this quirky Dave Eggars film on netflix last night.....it is a sweet piece about a couple who search for the pefect place to raise the daughter they are expecting after they discover that the parents they have moved cross-country to be 'near' are moving to Belgium just before their first grandchild will be born......they visit friends/family in Phoneix/Tuscon, Madison, Toronto, and Miami before realizing where they really need to set down roots......I enjoyed the movie......cnanot say that others with me like the talk/talk sort of non-action film....

digging up daylilies

ok, so.....given that i was already hot and sweaty after my 5k walk this morning, i changed shoes and headed out to do battle with nature.....on this morning i chose to dig out the daylilies that had been between the privet hedge, now gone, and the limelight hydrangeas that are now the back-bed focal point......and when it was all over i had a huge bouquet of daylilies....a flower one does not usually consider for cut arrnagements.....but given that the bottom end of each plant was gone...might as well enjoy their single 'day' on my table.....

twenty-nine

ok, so......it just occured to me that tomorrow is a triple-dip day of sorts....sunday at the band festival, father's day, and our 29th anniversary.......which means that monday is our eldest's birthday.....he was just starting his cross-country bike trip this time last year.....this year he is getting ready for his rhine ride.....i do treasure all of the years we were able to celebrate birthdays together, but i suppose it is most important that we were together for the first.....

brass band 5k

ok, so.....i got up early and walked the brass band 5k.....out of nostalgia mostly....the race directors have been doing this event in some fashion for 12 years.....the first version being the montessori run for reading......all four of us did the event.....which was memorable as my best ever 5k time- just over 30 minutes.....a feat accomplished not out of fitness or competitiveness, but out of material protective instinct.....my youngest (at the time) child was jogging with me slowly through the green acres course when he decided that he wanted to go faster....and he took off in an outright run.......i can recall panicking over potential hazards, like 'would there be somebody at the intersections to make sure he doesn't get hit by a car' and i took off running to try to catch him......for the record, there was no catching him.......i thought of that episode this morning as a mother of five we know asked me if her little one could walk with me to the pavilion after i finished the course.....the mom called after us 'i just want to make sure somebody is with her when she crosses the road'......

commencement and closure

ok, so.....we are trying to get back to status quo after a very long weekend of commencement activities in New Jersey. We missed the P-Rade, which is a transitional activity between The Reunions and Commencement. This parade is a procession of classmembers, wearing their distinctive class beer jackets. Seems this year's event was led by a 105-year old member of the Class of 1920. Wow! Kinda wish we had been there, but we were driving the obligatory 13 hours from Ky at the time. Sunday's Baccalaureate was our first taste of the pomp that is Princeton graduation. The procession, led by a mace-bearer and gonfalons (residential college banners) filed solemnly into the Gothic-style chapel, which we watched from a remote location given the restrictive size of the chapel. Jeff Bezos, '86 spoke of choices and challenges. Next came the Class Day procession, whereupon the Class of 2010 filed into the Cannon Green wearing their own jacket (orange and black and white with 2010 across the back), and listened to several student speakers as well as Charles Gibson '65, who regretted skipping out on his own Class Day. We did not arrive in time to find seats in the shade, and ended up moving our chairs when the heat became offensive. Box lunches followed, then on to the departmental receptions. French and Italian had a relatively small graduating class, so the reception held in Rockefeller College's vaulted common room was intimate and convivial. Commencement festivities started early with the finding of the shadiest seats possible that still had a decent view of the dais. The salutorial address was given in Latin, with the text provided. Clearly, it is a testament to the caliber of Princeton professors that they laughed heartily at jokes in the presentation that alluded those of us who do not know this ancient language. Ruth Bader Ginsburg was on hand to receive an honorary degree, which was a special moment given her health, and the state of the current SCOTUS nomination. The president of the university gave the sermon, and then it was on to Forbes College (our child's residential college) for the actual presentation of the diploma. The reception was quite lavish with white table clothed tables under huge tents and a lovely champagne buffet lunch. Whew.......a three-day lovefest. The diploma is entirely in Latin, and the only words i recognize are his name, and Summa Cum Laude. We are so very proud. And thankful that his summer internship with the Princeton Community Garden project is manual rather than acedemic. A little downtime might be welcome after the rigors of the intense final semester. I hope that gardening's cerebral qualities will be healing and restorative.

Hyphen lower level

Ok,so......E. and i are hanging out in Air-conditioned Nirvana in Hyphen lower Level......Til 2:00 when we will Meet our Special graduate At the French reception in the Rockefeller Common Room.....Class day ceremony was enjoyed by two out of Three of us ....but i digress from the Events that we drive 13 hours to attend......i especially appreciate the old-ness of the buildings, the Awards,and the traditions......this is the 265th graduating Class....and i am in awe of the intense dedication to Learning that inspired it all.....

ok, so this from the mudflats blog from alaska.....

coffee

ok, so i was supposed to have the afternoon off to make up for travel time the next two days.....but early on it was clear that leaving early was neither prudent in terms of budget completion, nor politically correct given the last-minute tasks that would be left to others......and so i got home nearly an hour late....and dragged myself into the house with the starving cat and hyperactive dog.....and at some point after feeding the cat and dog..and strolling about my blooming roses......i smelled coffee......seems i had lasped into my morning routine of putting on the coffee, letting out the cat and dog while i walk to the mailbox for the newspaper..... and feeding the cat and dog when they come back inside.......omg.......i have too much going on to be senile at age 54........heavy sigh....and so i turned off the coffee after it brewed, with plans to simply heat it up just before i leave for an early meeting in frankfort......

ok, so this from the huffington post....

ok, so this from The Mudflats.....

up in the air....

ok, so....since i cannot remember the last time i blogged, i should be asking for both forgiveness and understanding....thanks.......we signed up for netflix this week.....a huge move for us in that we skipped cable and satellite entirely as media options......and since we have signed on we have only watched a single dvd- Up in the Air with George Clooney...more on George later......the best part about Netflix is the streaming.....I have watched 7 episodes of The Tudors, mostly walking on the treadmill.....wow!...despite the historical inaccuracies .....I have been enanamored of HVIII since PBS showed the Six Wives of Henry VIII in the 70's.......and after every viewed episode this week I feverishly research the accuracy....which has already been researched by Wikipedia.......saves time.....but I digress from George.....I am distressed that it was not George but the female lead who was un-truthful.....though she never actually lied about having a husband and children....she never corrected our assumption that she did not......and George seemed so very lonely as he flew off at the end......must focus on Henry VIII whose life is an open book and less open to fret............

James Joyce Pilgrimage

ok, so...Andrew and I walked nearly 9 miles round-trip through Zurich and up the mount overlooking the city to find James Joyce's grave and statue......maybe not quite as long as Bloom's circuit of Dublin but certainly an adventure....

easter with extended family

ok, so....i have enjoyed a lovely day with two of third cousins in Lassee....Gunther and Werner...and their spouses and children....19 in all.....brunch was eggs and meats and bread....afternoon was a jause (pronounced yow-sa) that was a buffet of desserts....they are loading up the table for round three.....looks like champagne......

bon voyage...

ok, so my plane leaves at noon...first leg to cincinnati...then to paris for a three hour layover between 6:00 am and 9:00 am.....will be lucky to find cafe creme available at that hour.....then on to vienna at 11:30 am....where upon andrew and assorted kindred are to meet and greet me....a few days in austria and then we travel to zurich....where we will pilgrimage to the grave of james joyce among other things.....a side trip to luzern and then on home.....lots to pack into a week.....nice to get away.....and it will be nicer to get back home to my blooming garden.....the redbuds are just coming out......

pruning

ok, so......i have unloaded 3 scoops of mulch in the past 8 days onto my weeded beds.....or mostly weeded....after a while one figures out how to smother the finer of the wild onions with mulch rather than taking the trouble to yank them out......i also dug out yet another section of daylilies and random perennials to make way for a line of shrubberies the variety yet to be determined....the phlox i transplanted...the daylilies are in the compost pile......my aim is go for more year-round interest, especially along the fence......thinking of boxwood, but then i already have oodles of boxwood....i have plenty of time to worry over the particulars when i get back from my trip.....maybe the gardens in vienna will be inspirational....after lunch today i took to pruning the city of york trellis rose.....lots of dead wood to cut away.....thankfully the rain came again just as o managed to cut away a length that was only mostly dead....yikes...i felt sick as i tossed the greening strand onto the pile....i did a practice packing run today as well.....pruning away this and that until i have only the really useful clothing in the carryon.....of course, the really useful clothing are the things i wear most days......and now that they are carefully arranged in the bag i will attempt to finish out the week wearing my least favorite clothing.....life is complicated, yes?

mulch and mayhem....

ok, so.....i took my mother to lunch at the red lobster in lexington today, before stops at j.beth to purchase a travel journal and tuesday morning.....and then home again....whereupon i traded out my car in her driveway for the truck...and drove over to h-burg where one can stil purchase bulk mulch....and a topiary alberta spruce that is delightfully twisted....the spruce is now in a pot on my newest terrace....the mulch....is spread over the spots closest to the truck......i calculate the need for at least 3 more truck-loads of mulch before the critical beds are done.....thankfully the whirlpool bathtub is there to negate any pain and suffering.....

another sandwich generation installment......

ok, so.....i tried to call my mother this morning, only to hear from the recorded message that her phone number had been temporarily disconnected.....and so i stomped up the street clutching my cell phone with the intention of finding the unpaid bill and getting her service re-upped.....and what i found was piles of mail beside each of her sitting places......as well as beside her bed and on her desk....and on the round table in the back room.....actual bills mixed in with scads and scads of solicitations to charities i have never heard of......and by the time the dust settled she had paid the 9 real bills and i had tossed three bags of junk mail.....i know that my mother gives to many of these groups through loyalty to my late father.....the Parkinson's people, the Alzheimer's people, numerous veterans groups and the heart association....the list goes on and on.....but it is also clear that she has gotten on so many lists that even the better groups seem like vultures........ah well....she is caught up for now and i must find a way to keep her that way.....

vivid details

ok, so.....i dreamed last that i was working again at the hospital, somehow attched to the kitchen, andf i was meeting with kithcen managers in an office with 2 doors that empited out into the same hallway. The first door opened into a tiny area just big enough for three people to sit with their backs to the wall and their knees to the low counter......the remainder of the office was essentially emty behind the counter....except for the boss who sat on the other side of the counter....i asked why we were squished into the smaller side of the room, and i was ignored......there were candy bowls on the counter.....wrapped cinnamon hard-candy but no little red-hots....and i clutched my belongings (purse, cell phone, coat) and asked if i was to have a desk and a place to hang my coat, and i was ignored....and handed a printout for doing inventory of the storeroom, but no pen, and when i asked for a pen i was ignored....another curious detail is that i do not remember smelling any cooking aromas.....and i asked why nobody was cooking for the next meal.....and was ignored.....

in the zone.....

ok, so......one my favorite places to be emotionally is in the travel-planning mode....whereupon all options are available for lining up sites to see and places to eat once the plane ticket has been purchased and sleeping arrangements made......this time around i have also added some serious clothing purchasing to the mix.....a chili pepper red nylon rain coat with hidable hood and zippered and snapped pockets as well as a black vest that has zippered pockets inside and out.....and to make sure the ensembles all matched i invested in a chili pepper red sweater set and a few classic longsleeve tshirts in white and black....oh yeah....and european-style long scarf to wrap and drape casually......i suppose with enough time i could have assembled the same sort of travel garb through the area goodwills.......but it was ever so much more fun to buy it all to match and to fit perfectly.....

senile senator

ok, so i took the time to contact senator bunning yesterday, about his foul language on the senate floor,m hius rude hand gestures and his blockage of the extension of unemployment benefits, citing deficit spending....seems in his dotage he has forgotten that he voted for 2 wars, medicare drug benefits and a host of pork projects,,,with deficit spending.....

a special thanks

ok, so a heart-felt thanks to Dixon Design for my new avatar, designed especially for my birthday. i think it is lovely.....

the silver- make that gold- lining....

ok, so i went to the dentist this morning to have a loose front filling replaced.....and when the dentist found that he could wiggle a back tooth with a gold crown i was a bit surprised.....this was a tooth that had given me no trouble whatsoever.....and to be loose.....yikes....my first thought was that i could have scurvy and my teeth were starting to fall out.....the xray confirmed that the tooth had to go.....and it was only after it was extracted that it was clear that the root had cracked and the tooth had died.....the anethesia is wearing off and i am fixing to take a little something for the pain.....i have to look on the bright side in this situation......the tooth lasted 30 years with that crown, and the gold in that crown is worth a whole lot more now than it was then......i lost the crown directly below this tooth a few years back....and i suppose i could look for the baggie that holds that bit of dental gold.....eventually i will have enough gold to make something nice, but i would rather have the teeth with intact crowns than the jewelry from the gold.....

the last of the mohicans

ok, so sometime around 3:00 am i woke up and could not get back to sleep because of sinus congestion....and for some unexplainable reason i could not get the film version of the last of the mohicans out of my head......i could not quite recall the story line, and could not recall why the younger sister throws herself off of a cliff.....and so today i looked it up on wikipedia......the next tiem this movie keeps me awake i will have a better shot at recalling the particulars...

hedging my (travel) bets....

ok, so after weeks of serious deliberation i have finally purchased a plane ticket......lex to cincinnati, cincinnati to paris, paris to vienna.......the return is zurich to atlanta, and atlanta to lex.....my theory being that terrorists have no reason to fly into CDG, and certainly no reason to fly to the USA out of Zurich where the bankers keep their terrorist dollars safe and sound....in between there will be an easter dinner with our austrian kin, a train trip, and a side trip to luzern......i btw...i have walked 60 minutes a day since december 12 to make sure i am up for the see-it-all tourist challenge....

from Mudflats....

ok, so i wish I had this refrigerator magnet....

103 degrees.....

ok, so when i got to my office at 9:00 am this morning...after our one-hour snow delay.....our ustairs offices were 103 degrees.....so much for the guy who spent all day friday 'fixing' our heating and cooling system by installing new thermostats......

rice milk

ok, so...today is valentine's day.....whereupon I remembered to buy my valentine a card weeks ago, but forgot to buy milk for his cereal at the grocery yesterday...thankfully there was a container of rice milk in the basement refrigerator bought wad the best intentions for a vegetarian child, but never used.......sometimes these things work out....i take the non-vegetarian son back to the airport this afternoon.....and this week plan to actually buy my ticket to visit him in austria.....the highlight of this adventure will be easter sunday with our austrian/german relatives.....descendants of my grandmother's 1st cousin.....the ticket i plan to buy involves an open-jaw....into vienna and out of zurich....with a train ride and a side trip to lucerne.....it is not venice but is a german-speaking country not yet visited by my german-speaking child....and that is good enough reason for this doting parent.....ah well..must figure out what to eat for breakfast that does not involve rice milk....

back to four at dinner.....

ok, so our eldest child has returned for a brief visit...he is interviewing for a TFA spot....sadly, TFA has no program spots in Ky....at least my boy will be living in this side of the atlantic.......he arrived at the airport in lexington wearing his xmas gift from our astrian family- a full lederhosen costome, complete with hat, knee socks and shoes......sadly, i had arrnaged for one of his Uk friends to pick him up.....his flight was delayed til near midnight.....so i missed the grand entrance.....he did wear it for lunch with grandma yesterday.......he really does look quite european in the get-up.....glad to have him home.....looking forward to visiting, though i cnanot decide on my itinerary and have not yet bought a ticket....

finding fault....

ok, so yesterday someone in my sundayschool class was lamenting the possibility that arts might be shaved from schooldays to make way for more physical activity, and this heinous change would be obama's fault......fault?......the fault is not with obama as much as it is with parents who find it easier to sit their children in front of televisions and computers and video games and let them eat highfat packaged snack foods rather than fix them meals that include vegetables and fruits and whole grains and play with them outside.....we are raising a generation of diabetic hypertensive heart patients.....who are projected to live shorter lives than their parents for the first time in recorded history.....and while this reality is tragic, we cannot blame a president who clearly exercises most days a week and encourages his wife and children to do the same.....and one who makes a point of eating fresh fruits and vegetables so his children will emulate him and do likewise......no, we cannot fault the president for this....

snow on table

ok, so.....a lovely overnight snowstorm.....a timely 48 hours of off-time.....an hour walk already taken.....life is good....

loading up the car....

ok, so......the long-awaited return to school begins shortly....after we stuff a semester's worth of stuff into a small car......

poetry panties....

ok, so at some point in my scattered dream sequence i was getting a massage, and a pair of sales clerks were showing me a line of panties that had lines of poetry covering the surface, handwrtitten with a quill, or so it seemed...the underwear were wrapped in cellophane, so i did not get a clear look at exactly what sort of poems were available.....i make otu that several sizes and colors were available......an amusing notion to lighten my monday morning doldrums.....

a carrot in front of my cart....

ok, so.....i am going to vienna over spring break......by myself.....to spend time with my eldest child and to meet our extended austrian family.....and now that this decision to travel has been made.....i am amusing myself with numerous scenarios...such as flying into vienna then taking a night train to venice midweek and flying home from there......i have also priced similar variations with prague and berlin.....i would feel much more comfortable with the german=speaking options if my child were to travel with me.......i suppose i could navigate venice on my own with my trusty rick steves guidebook......i am also toying with the possibility of traveling with my youngest to london over fall break.....with a chunnel trip to paris before heading home.......she and i have been to paris, but one can never spend too much time in paris.....to pay for this second trip in a single year i am further toying with the notion of teaching a 6-week summer version of my eku health class......sadly, this would mean teaching 3 nights a week for 6 weeks.....yikes.......i am thinking of 5:30-7:30 mtw......it would still be light out when i got home so i could conceivably keep up with my gardening chores.......then again, by late june i would have already finished the mulching and would have planted all of the annuals....so i could just sit amongst my flowers when i got home and relax.......but i digress from my spring break plans.....figuring out travel schemes is one of life's greater pleasures....

the day-off shopping circuit

ok, so......we dropped off 3 boxes of cast-offs at a nearby goodwill, then sifted through the cast-offs of others at a few area locations before arriving at orchid thai cafe in lexington for a lovely lunch of crispy spring roll and shrimp fried rice......ahhhh.....and then on to j-beth and wild foods.......where i spent far too much money on delights like yellow beets and pine nuts, and punjab simmering sauces amongst my selections......and though i had intended to stop at a few more goodwills and marshalls before heading back to town, i was suddenly exhausted and wishing i could take a nap......but after i got home i could not manage to fall asleep in the sunshine of my upstairs loveseat reading a magazine in a prone position....and i ambled back downstairs to make spinach and onion-stuffed wontons to go with the baked tofu and vegetable sushi rolls and vegetable dumplings.....also from whole oats....wish we had a trader joes instead of this wildoats/whole foods combo.....maybe one fine day...

the new steak house.....

ok, so....the running community (30 folks) decided to have its annual gathering at the new steak house.....which proved disasterous on so many levels......beginning with the band.....the band was decent enough, but it is hard to chat and catch up with folks over the sound of a harmonizing trio.....and then there was the service...or lack therte-of.....we arrived at 6:30....and by 8:50 pm the folks in my section had been served only drinks and salads......2 couples actually got up and left rather than continue to wait on food.......the waitress appeared unseasoned and only a few steps up from 'deer in the headlights'......the manager tried to comp our food....which is fine and dandy for everybody else, but it would have been unethical for my meal to be comped in a county where i regulate certain aspects of the business.....so i pulled out a twenty to cover my beer and my meal.....and tip.....the poor waitress needed something to show for her time....

the painted bathroom....

ok, so.....after 25 years of wallpaper in the upstairs bathroom we have finally finished and primed the wallboard and painted in a lovely honeydew melon shade......every time we took off old wallpaper we surveyed the walls and decided it was easier to paper over the imperfections than to fix them.....ah well.....so now that i have washed the 25 year old curtains i find that they have disintegrated in spots along the rod end.....and now it is time to make new curtains......thankfully there is fabric onhand that matches the walls enough to use without having to go out and buy more.....and at least one un-hung piece of art complements the new scheme......the only question now is whether to make the curtains using the old as a pattern, or do something new.....ah, to have so many choices.....

time trap versus blessed diversion

ok, so.....i spend far too much time trying to beat the bejeweled blitz scores of those with far quicker reflexes than me.....to the point that i hear the sound effects in my non-facebook moments......and while the time spent playing games could be far better spent elsewhere....it does serve to keep my mind off of the impending doom......

aging in place.....

ok, so on the way to work yesterday i heard a piece on npr about the 50th anniversary of sun city in arizona....a planned senior retirement community......and one of the issues covered in this piece was the need for such communities to expand from the original premise of these locations....such as a loosening of the minimum age restrictions.....seems more folks desire to 'age-in-place' in their current homes rather than to move to such communities because of these restrictions......i especially liek the notion of aging-in-place.....given that i intend to stay put in my own home until the bitter end....i really like where i live, and i like most of my home's features.....yeah, if i won the lottery i would install an AGA stove, and a greenhouse and a lap-pool......but other than these embellishments i think my house suits me just fine.....

happy new year...a day late

ok,so.....pictured is the group that ventured out from our house on nyday morning to walk/run...not pictured is our youngest child, who opted to be contrary by RIDING her BIKE in sub-20 degree weather.......i walked a single mile partly because i was juggling brunch items in the oven, but mostly because the windchill was far below my idea of a good time......but i digress from brunch....i got up at 6:30 am to make pineapple kuchen, a yeast-dough breakfast patry that my grandmother taught me to make......and so i slept in this morning til 8 to make up for not sleeping in yesterday......still glowing over OUS's Rose Bowl win......amen to small mercies.....

coffee crisis

ok, so.....i shop in the same stores, and reach for the same products unless there is a compelling reason to choose otherwise.....minimal decision anxiety....on to the next task....until this morning, when i reached for my usual ground coffee (8'o'clock hazelnut)...a bargain with or without the shoppers card discount.....but my usual brand was not there.....its shelf tag was also gone.....seems it made way for additional varieties of starbucks or store brand.....i have been using this coffee for as long as i can remember.....at least 10 years and likely more.....and so i was forced to select a different brand of hazelnut coffee.....and i studied and i contemplated and while i was deep in thought a fellow holding a huge slab of raw ribs (shrink-wrapped, of course) asked me if i knew where he could find sauerkraut....... that i did know....and i suggested the bush's bavarian with caraway seeds......but back to the coffee.....i ended up going random with the non-starbucks flavors......just in case they were to blame for the disruption to my routine.....

still life....

ok, so my art lectures have reached northern european genre paintings, which include both landscapes and still lifes (still lives?)......i had forgotten just how much i enjoy the still life......especially those with the peeled lemon and the wine glass.....both indications that the artist is very skilled....the still life pictured is by Willem Kalf painted in 1653......possibly for a guild on commission, as the horn is a guild symbol.....

the christmas art lectures.....

ok, so i asked for a set of 24 art lectures on dvd that i saw advertised in the new yorker sometime in early december....as a christmas gift that would entertain me as i walk the treadmill.....as well as expand my limited knowledge of painting beyond the notion of 'liking only what i would hang in my own home'......we are up to the early 1600's....and thankfully we are moving slowly away from religious art and into heroic scenes and portraits and landscapes and even portriats with landscapes/still life elements.....i have a soft spot in my heart for the madonna and child paintings......not so much because of the subject matter, but because of how the subject matter is portrayed in such a range of interpretations......take for example, the scrawny baby Jesus...popular with both Italian and Northern European painters.....this baby is painted with scanty flesh on its bones and one wonders if the painter was unfamiliar with the story and had no idea the baby would survive to adulthood....and then there is the disproportionate head baby- either too small or too big for its body.....and the non-swaddled babies......didn't the painters catch the part about Jesus wrapped in clothes.....certainly nothing in the Gospels about the baby Jesus flashing his private parts on the cold winter night.....and then there are the Mary variations......Mary as a middle-aged woman, Mary as a child, Mary with a single breast positioned under her chin so the nursing infant can be shown in the center of the composition.....though Mary is usually in blue...bright blue (UK rather than North Carolina)there is nothing in the Gospels to suggest that she wore this color on the night that the baby was delivered...and why does Mary look so calm and thoughtful when she has clearly given birth to a difficult baby who neither sleeps nor smiles (or at least on canvas).....and then there is the fact that none of these mothers and babies look the least bit Middle-Eastern.....enough of this curmudgeon rant about early art.......I suppose that this has something to do with the treadmilling.....I have walked for a solid hour each of the last 11 days.....and I have yet to feel the first bit of endorphin uplift......11 hours of walking with no afterglo? what is up with that?....a new wave of artists might find this visage worthy of a portrait....endorphin-deprived middle-aged woman talking back to art lecturer during daily treadmill work-out.....

knitted hat pattern

ok, so i knitted three of these hats last week, using yarn from my late mother-in-law that i found in a drawer......

KNITTED MINNESOTA WINTER HAT by Beth
(Copyright 2001 Beth Koskie)
Materials:
Size 10.5 needles
Double strand worsted weight (or you can use bulky/chunky yarn)

Note: size given for men; ladies, teens and schoolage children give in ( ).

Start at lower edge:
Cast on 70 (66 – 62 – 58) stitches.
Row 1: Work in ribbing of k2, p2 across.
Row 2: Work in ribbing of p2, k2 across.
Repeat these two rows for pattern, for 12 (11 – 10 – 9) inches, ending on wrong side (row 2).

To shape crown:
Row 1: K2 tog, *p2, k2 tog, repeat from * across.
Row 2: P1, *k2 tog, p1, repeat from * across.
Row 3: K1, p1 across.
Row 4: P1, k1 across.
Row 5: K2tog, p2 tog across. Cut yarn, leaving approximately 15-20”; with yarn needles, draw yarn through remaining stitches and pull tight. Sew seam along side and turn right side out; fold “cuff” back.

dumbest passwords....

ok, so the twitter people have released a list of the 370 dumbest passwords.....so dumb that they will not allow new subscribers to use them.......my own twitter password made the list........which eithe rmeasn that i am not clever enough to come up with a 'stronger' password, or it means that simple is best for those of us who are getting a bit feeble.....

oh, come oh come thou mostly forgotten blog.....

ok, so......the purpose of this blog was to chronicle those details in my life that i would not want to forget....as well as interesting pictures and/or commentary on the day's events....and for the most part that is how things have turned out......but lately the details of my life are such that i would prefer to forget them.....i am still seeking the silver lining in all of this....

ok, so a friend sent his today....and rather than to pass it along to my emaillist, i am posting a copy to help me remember this sage advice.....

George Carlin's Views on Aging

Do you realize that the only time in our lives when we like to get old is when we're kids? If you're less than 10 years old, you're so excited about aging that you think in fractions.

'How old are you?' 'I'm fourand a half!' You're never thirty-six and a half. You're four and a half, going on five! That's the key.

You get into your teens, now they can't hold you back. You jump to the next number, or even a few ahead.

'How old are you?' 'I'm gonna be 16!' You could be 13, but hey, you're gonna be 16! And then the greatest day of your life !You become 21. Even the words sound like a ceremony.YOU BECOME 21. YESSSS!!!

But then you turn 30. Oooohh, what happened there? Makes you sound like bad milk! He TURNED; we had to throw him out. There's no fun now, you're Just a sour-dumpling.. What's wrong? What's changed?

You BECOME 21, you TURN30, then you're PUSHING40. Whoa! Put on the brakes, it's all slipping away. Before you know it, you REACH 50 and your dreams are gone...

But! wait!! ! You MAKE it to 60. You didn't think you would!

So you BECOME 21, TURN30, PUSH 40, REACH 50 and make it to 60.

You've built up so much speed that you HIT 70! After that it's a day-by-day thing; you HIT Wednesday!

You get into ! your 80's and every day is a complete cycle; you HIT lunch; you TURN 4:30; you REACH bedtime. And it doesn't end there. Into the 90s, you start going backwards; 'I Was JUST 92.'

Then a strange thing happens. If you make it over 100, you become a little kid again. 'I'm 100 and a half!'
May you all make it to a healthy 100 and a half!!

HOW TO STAY YOUNG
1. Throw out nonessential numbers. This includes age, weight and height. Let the doctors worry about them. That is why you pay them.

2. Keep only cheerful friends. The grouches pull you down.

3.Keep learning. ! Learn more about the computer, crafts, gardening, whatever, even ham radio.. Never let the brain idle. 'An idle mind is the devil's workshop.' And thedevil's family name is Alzheimer's.

4. Enjoy the simple things.

5. Laugh often, long and loud. Laugh until you gasp for breath.

6... The tears happen. Endure, grieve, and move on. The only person, who is with us our entire life, is ourselves. Be ALIVE while you are alive.

7. Surround yourself with what you love , whether it's family, pets, keepsakes, music, plants, hobbies, whatever.Your home is your refuge.

8. Cherish your health: If it is good, preserve it. If it is unstable, improve it. If it is beyond what you can improve, get help.

9. Don't take guilt trips.. Take a trip to the mall, even to the next county; to a foreign country but NOT to where the guilt is.

10. Tell the people you love that you love them, at every opportunity.
AND ALWAYS REMEMBER:
Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.

wishing my life away.....

ok, so...i attended a publ;ic hearing on potential sewer service to a local community on monday night, helped with an h1n1 clinic at a school wednesday night, gave my last exam of the year on thursday night, and lived through another quarterly board meeting on friday.......board meetings have become problematic not because i have anything to hide, but because the headlines of late are about other groups who have gotten caught betraying public....and so i was especially pleased to drag opn into the house last evening.....ready to......start knitting a hat.....i got it into my head that i really needed to 'knit-up' the drawers of yarn i have in the upstairs guest room...mostly from my late mother-in-law.....and sadly mostly too itchy to make good hats....those skeins i will pass along to the goodwill when i have exhausted the hat-worthy materials.....i am ready to cast-off hat #1 already.....and then on to hat #2....i am using inherited needles, and i pattern i downloaded for free.....it is a minnesota tobaggan hat, for the record......i also made another batch of havarti/almond bites and pecan tarts...and and apple cobbler.....and graded the exams and posted the grades....and now i will go back to playing those wretchedly addictive facebook games until it is time to eat supper......more essential activities penciled in for sunday......all i haver to do is to make it through three days of work before i have 4 days off.....

ok, so...the final remarks from President Obama's Nobel speech

Let us reach for the world that ought to be -- that spark of the divine that still stirs within each of our souls. (Applause.)

Somewhere today, in the here and now, in the world as it is, a soldier sees he's outgunned, but stands firm to keep the peace. Somewhere today, in this world, a young protestor awaits the brutality of her government, but has the courage to march on. Somewhere today, a mother facing punishing poverty still takes the time to teach her child, scrapes together what few coins she has to send that child to school -- because she believes that a cruel world still has a place for that child's dreams.

Let us live by their example. We can acknowledge that oppression will always be with us, and still strive for justice. We can admit the intractability of depravation, and still strive for dignity. Clear-eyed, we can understand that there will be war, and still strive for peace. We can do that -- for that is the story of human progress; that's the hope of all the world; and at this moment of challenge, that must be our work here on Earth.

Thank you very much. (Applause.)

mamma's day out....

ok, so.....i left the house at 6:15am yesterday.... heading north......dropped child #2 at the n.ky. airport, then proceeded to the wyoming-area of cincinnati to visit my friend jan ein her assisted -living facility.....where we enjoyed mimosa's at 9:30 am.....drinking champagne is a tradition with jane and i.....and so we added the orange juice so as to not upset the staff......had lunch with my sister-in-law lisa at grand finale.....a lovely old home-restaurant conversion in glendale that specializes in crepes.....i ate there a few times in grad school so was pleased to find it still in business.....and then i turned back south....i had intended to shop my way home, but the cold rain started just after i left trader joes.....and i opted for the quickest way home rather than following my original goodwill/tuesday morning gameplan......for the record, there are at least 3 tm near to I71/75 and as many goodwill stores.....but they must wait for another day......i digress from my trader joe experience.....i have purchased vegetable sushi a lovely pastry tray for the 23rd birthday of child#2 on friday.....as well as numerous indian middle-eastern treats for his dining pleasure....and i decided too take advantage of the 10% off a case of random wines......sauvingon blanc and proseco mostly......today is our christmas brunch followed by the remainder of the day off.....i am considering using my time to take the wallpaper off of the upstairs bathroom.....not necessarily a christmas-related activity, but one that needs doing.....

havarti-almond nibbles

ok, so...i cannot find my recipe for my little baked cheese nibbles., so here is a new version:

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 12 minutes
Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter, softened
2 cups grated hot pepper havarti
1-1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. salt
dash or two of hot sauce
2 Tbsp. chopped almonds

Preparation:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In medium bowl, combine butter and cheese. Mix together until well blended. Add flour, salt and almonds to butter mixture and mix until blended. Roll out dough on floured board; cut with half-moon cutter from Dehillerin. Bake crackers at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes until very lightly browned around the edges. Remove to a wire rack and cool.

a house in town...

ok, so in my fitful dreams we bought a house 'in town'.....a flat town with large front yards in the downtown and lots of trees.......the house was in two parts......a front section with 2 rooms down and 2 up....then a vacant sort of area......then 2 rooms up and two rooms down right behind.....like a chunk had been taken out, or part of the house had caved in and the rubble removed.....and we had plans to reconnect the sections with an atrium......and i was planning to move furniture from my mother's attic into this 'townhouse'......where we would stay only occasionally.......mostly we would plant roses and fanciful boxwood knot gardens on the flat yard......what a strange thing to dream.......

mrs. weasley-style tennis outfit....

ok, so......not only did i sleep the night completely through til 7:15 am.....i managed to recall these many hours later several scenarios of incredible detail........one of being in a home in hyde park in cincinnati that i have only seen form the street but never entered.....that involved visiting my grad school room-mate and her extended family while i was in cincinnati for some errand......and my room-mates mother arrived home wearing tennis garb....and the outfit she was wearing was of the same kinda crazy-color knitted milieu that mrs weasley wears in the harry potter films...down to the bloomers under the tennis dress.....the crazy-color mother tells me that she will fix dinner as soon as she is done with her tennis match, i only i can locate the kabab skewers......as i have never before been in thsi home, i wander aimlessly through the rooms in search of skewers.....at some point my car has been stolen, but reappears in the neighbors driveway.....and an unidentified woman is taking her children to the dentist and needs help getting them in their coats.......such vibrant details to a nonsensical dream.....i AM driving to cincinnati early on tuesday on an airport run...and i DO plan on meeting a sister-in-law for lunch as well as shopping at the trader joes.......my ex-roommate DOES live in hyde park, just not in the home featured in my dream sequence.......dreams are so vary curious.......

damp pajamas

ok, so.....in my dreams i was carrying around a baby.....wearing a clean diaper but no undershirt and wearing pajamas damp from the diaper-change and cleanup.....i spent far too much dream time trying to locate undershirts and pajamas......not really pajamas but a one-piece zip-up longsleeved sleeper......no clue as to the baby's identity....could have been one of mine,,,,could have been random dream-seqence baby......at some point i stopped at a farm for coffee.....no clue how i managed to get to the farm carrying a damp baby.....or why i thought coffee would be available......bottom-line is that i am exhausted this morning and filled with the feeling that i failed the mystery baby.....

the decemberist.....

ok, so i like this time of year.....the preparations, both in terms of gift selection as well as the baking of goodies and the creation of greenery accents.....i like that i have some freebie time off coming up.....and that when i have to work most folks are in jovial moods.....and most folks in my family manage to make to most of the highlight holiday events......and i get around to making the charitable donations that i have been meaniong to make since last december, when i vowed that i would do better at supporting worthy causes.......ah, december...

too liberal.....

ok, so in my dreams i was explaining to someone why i could not support something or another...no recollection what it was...other than i turned and walked away from somebody with the dismissive...' i am far too liberal to support your position'.....hmmmm....that statement could include a multitude of positions......gay marriage, marriage of priests, wine sales less than 28 miles from home, full library access to all books in the collection, full coverage of undergarments.....i appreciated the front-page opinion in yesterday's lexheraldleader about banned books...... as well as the paper's coverage in general.....i have taught several x-rated Sunday school lessons this fall..... direct from the good book.....about lust, incest, rape, murder, covetousness...(the curious should look to the books of Kings and Chronicles)......those who desire to censor libraries must be careful not to shoot themselves in both feet, as their 'guidebook' contains themes worse than most soap operas....sadly most folks do not bother to look up or validate most of what they hear......which is why the far-right has such a gullible audience in these perilous days........

impromptu protester

ok so i laughed out loud at the audacity of this photo,........gotta love the impromptu protester....

a cold rain on cybermonday.....

ok, so.....i am bundled up in my new silky throw as i type.....the throw that i bought for this very purpose while i was out christmas shopping on saturday......i could have given it to someone else and casually taken over its use during the post christmas days and weeks......but i am cold now and i figure that honesty is the best policy when it comes to gift-giving......i have purchased items that are really for other people.....just not as many things as i found that i could not live without on my short weekend outing.....i may have to make use of this year's cybermonday to finish up my christmas purchasing, or at least research what is out there to be bought that loved ones cannot live without once they have opened the special gift on xmas morning.......or so the mamma-fantasy goes.....at least i have gone beyond the mamma-worry that i have not spent equally, or has not presented an equal number of wrapped gifts under the tree.....i would prefer to work out these parity issues all wrapped up in my cozy throw....but in order to pay for these purchases i must go to work....after 4 days off i can barely remember how to find my way back there.....and sadly my coworkers will be just as loathe to do actual work, so may be in equally foul moods......is it too early to wish it were friday?.......

the bathroom phone...

ok, so.....in one of many dream sequences i was in my cousin's bathroom in cleveland trying clean up the phone.....i say my cousin's bathroom, but i was my grandmother's house before it was my cousins, so i could be confused as to current ownership.....and i could also be confused about the phone, as there was never a phone in that room, let alone a white princess-style with a black handset.....and the white part was not the typical plastic of yester-year phones...it was more resinous and less glossy.....kinda like it could also double as a cutting board.....the phone had been used by someone likely digging in the garden, and i was spraying it with some sort of bathroom cleaner i found under the sink....in this dream i do not recall actually seeing my cousin, or my grandmother....and while i am certain there is some sort of explanation for why i would be in her(their) bathroom cleaning off the phone....i cannot imagine what it might be....

poems

ok, so...from billy collins

. Thanksgiving Morning

The crossed multiple blades of the blender
set out to dry on a counter.
The corkscrew unsheathed and ready
to enter whatever cannot resist its twisting.
The carving knife waiting alongside
the sharpener for its abrasive touch,

The blue box of matches, the white candles.
The branch of dry leaves brought in
Along with vines clustered with red and yellow berries,

All of which points to the anonymous turkey,
soon to be trussed with string
but now soaking on the cold porch
in a bucket of salted ice water,
in brine, as they like to say this time of year.

And we must not overlook the oven,
radiating in a corner of the kitchen
set at first at 500 degrees
then lowered almost mercifully to 350,
still hot enough to lift the bird
into the condition of sacrificial edibility,
yet short of what would incinerate a book,
the oven that swallowed the witch and Sylvia Plath
and now the oven of our pleasure,
our forks and glasses blindly raised.




2. The Gathering, a Thanksgiving Poem

Outside, the scene was right for the season,
heavy gray clouds and just enough wind
to blow down the last of the yellow leaves.

But the house was different that day,
so distant from the other houses,
like a planet inhabited by only a dozen people

with the same last name and the same nose
rotating slowly on its invisible axis.
Too bad you couldn't be there

but you were flying through space on your own asteroid
with your arm around an uncle.
You would have unwrapped your scarf

and thrown your coat on top of the pile
then lifted a glass of wine
as a tiny man ran across a screen with a ball.

You would have heard me
saying grace with my elbows on the tablecloth
as one of the twins threw a dinner roll across the room at the other.

happy thanksgiving...

ok, so we are spending our first t-day in years with child #2.....and our first in years with the collection of folks either from cincinnati, or who are driving there to be with this gathering of extended family.......happily, this is the sort of crowd that will re-live last saturday's football win over michigan, and maybe embellish each and every touchdown.....sometimes it is nice to be amongst those who bleed scarlet and gray rather than blue.....

creamed spinach- the recipe

ok, so this is among the dishes i am schlepping to cincinnati- from the smitten kitchen:

Creamed Spinach

Serves 6

2 pounds baby spinach or 2 1/2 pounds fresh spinach, tough stems discarded
1 3/4 cups heavy cream or whole milk, or a mix thereof
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 small clove garlic, minced (optional)
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

Wash your spinach well but no need to spin or pat it dry. Place spinach in a large pot over high heat. Cook, covered, with just the water clinging to leaves, stirring occasionally, until wilted, about 2 to 4 minutes for baby spinach and 4 to 6 minutes for regular spinach.

Press or squeeze out the excess liquid any number of ways, either by wringing it out in cheesecloth (my favorite method), putting it in a mesh strainer and pressing the moisture out with a spatula or large spoon or letting it cool long enough to grab small handfuls and squeezing them to remove as much water as possible. Coarsely chop the wrung-out spinach.

Wipe out large pot so you can use it again.

Heat milk or cream in a small saucepan over moderate heat, stirring, until warm. Keep warm. Meanwhile, cook onion and garlic, if using, in butter in your wiped-out large pot over moderately low heat, stirring occasionally, until softened, about six minutes. Whisk in flour and cook roux, whisking, about three minutes. Add warm milk or cream in a slow stream, whisking constantly to prevent lumps, and simmer, whisking, until thickened, three to four minutes. Stir in nutmeg, spinach, and salt and pepper to taste and cook, stirring, until heated through.

Do ahead: Creamed spinach can be made one day ahead and chilled, covered then reheated over moderately low heat until hot. However, it really tastes best eaten immediately.

creamed spinach

ok, so.....i have already made the cranberry sauce, have already purchased the sweet and sour red cabbage with bits of apple, and today i will prepare the creamed spinach.....using a recipe from one of the food blogs....yeah, i am making it a day ahead so i can transport the dish cold and warm it up in cincinnati........taking it hot would be problematic......i have tried numerous creamed spinach recipes over the years....most i prefer to the original mother-in-law 'recipe', which nobody seems to have.......what i can tell you is that there is an unwritten expectation for creamed spinach to be at family gatherings, and that whatever i bring will not be quite like it should be.....which is why i volunteer to bring this dish year after year......i actually like creamed spinach, and i might as well make the kind i want to eat.....

looking for my purse and keys

ok, so for some reason i was in a doctor's office last night....in my dreams.....sitting next to my mother and watching some drug rep present some sort of educational program to office staff.....and when we got up to leave i could not find my purse or keys.....and so i was wandering through the halls of this office searching for these items.....finding only mismatched shoes and clothing......curious thing to dream about.....

pyrrhic

ok, so the word Pyrrhic popped in 2 vastly different nytimes articles today......the first time i skimmed over it, assuming it was an SAT-quality word thrown in for emphasis....the second time prompted an immediate google definition search.....and now i know that Pyrrhic means a victory with devastating costs to the winner......

lost

ok, so.....i spent the bulk of my spare time this week looking for my sunday school books.....the student guide as well as teacher's version and an independent commentary by a semi-famous retired baptist minister.....i looked in places where these books should be, as well as places where they should not be.......several times over...and while i did not find the books, even after sorting through the recycled newspaper/catalog/magazine bins the garage, my car, my spouse's car.....under the bed....you get the picture.....i did find the mate to an earring......looking in obscure locations did inspire the cleaning out of the linen closet, whereupon i gave the goodwill over 8 sets of sheets that i either do not like, or that do not fit our bed very well........and i was also moved to go through all of my drawers.....and the closet.......the backseat of my car was overflowing with stuff when i headed out to the goodwill.....sadly, this altruistic act did not translate into divine intevention with those lost sunday school books.....i was able to construct a lesson.....we are studying bathsheba.....and i knew what we had already covered, and i made a reasonable choice as to where we were going next......i was relieved to discover that i was not the only person who spent the week looking for something that was not found.....we collectively lost quite a lot fo things.....some much more important or costly than what i cannot find.....and none of these things is as important as what was lost by the family who sit behind us in worship service....they lost their house to a fire on thursday.....the father barely made it out, as he was asleep in the basement after working all night, and did not hear the smoke alarms.....losing a few books pales to losing all that one owns.....

resealable frozen shrimp....

ok, so.....i woke up with a splitting headache....not surprising in that i worked all night in my dreams......i was trying to cake care of multiple disasters.....there was loss of power, freezing temperatures, water shortage.....and there were people in their pajamas in what was meant to be my kitchen....and the mother of the group held up a resealable bag of frozen shrimp and told me that this was all she had and what was i going to do about it.....and i was trying to pick up the clutter on the kitchen counters......but the pajama family was strewing things about almost as fast as i could pick them up....there was a framed group photo that included my pastor....a curious touch for a dream sequence....no explanation as to why the pajama family was in my home, or in their pajamas.....or how they were connected to me....

silver-plated lasagna server....

ok, so.....on my veteran's day off i drove my mother on our yearly rounds....the beaumont plaza goodwill, liquor barn, red lobster, tuesday morning, and camp nelson national cemetery to see my dad's grave before we return home......my mother fussed because we did not retrieve the handicap tag from her car......we have never retrieved the handicap tag from her car....as hell would have to freeze over before i park 2 perfectly able women in a handicap spot.....as it happened the handicapped spots at the red lobster were full...and my mother was forced to walk an extra 20 feet to the door.....which she managed to traverse despite her pleas of disability.....ah well.....i did find a lovely brown linen shirt at the goodwill...and a silverplated lasagna server that looks exactly like one we used at the restaurant....i paid $2.75 for it happily......it was in a box so i am certain that it is NOT from the restaurant.....the sparkling wine i selected at L.barn was much sweeter than i remember from the last time......still mighty tasty for my friend anne's visit.....i especially appreciate her words of wisdom....a mother is only as happy as her saddest child.....i am aging into the no-news-is-good-news portion of my life for this very reason....the less i know the less i can obsess about.....i also found 4 champagne flutes that match those i already own...perfect for my scheduled bookclub gathering in july..... i will surely find a dryer sparkling wine by that date....

poetry reading......

ok, so i had a hard time getting by the fact that the poet looked very much like my long-deceased neighbor, who was both a poet (haiku) and an artist and a gardener........we fell out long ago over her use of the n-word in front of my children when uk basketball was on her television....which was often.....and the knowledge that she kept loaded guns under many of her seat cushions....i treasure the pair of framed watercolors she once presented to me because they 'went' with my front room......but i did not go to the auction where her larger pieces were dispersed after her death even though i knew there to be a watercolor of a brick wall/gate with a perennial border that i would have enjoyed....ah well.....i waas amused by the poem where the mother and her daughters are at a pilgrimage site in ireland.....and the daughters are mortified that the mother was going the last bit of the journey barefoot, and they huddled at the bottom of the rock stairs as she climbed ever higher toward the ancient cliffside monastery in conspiratory debate over just how many of their mother's embarassing pilgram affectations were deliberate......and i admit that i would probably climb to heights that i feared if i knew it would adequately un-nerve my children.....

reese's (skinny) boyfriend

ok, so in my dreams i was sitting in an auditorium with green upholstered seats....and my middle child was sitting next to me, followed by reese and a person reese introduced as 'her skinny boyfriend'......and we were all holding small cats .....not kittens, just scrawny cats like our cat....and i happened to be holding our cat, though mostly the cat would wrangle herself out of my death grip and jump off somewhere until i called her back.....and there was a chorale group on the stage singing songs by the 80's group kansas....and the choir wore robes that were not quite on or off.....more like huge shawls than robes.....and the guy playing guiatr backup stood below the stage rather than on the stage......and some guy saw me brushing my hair and tried to take my brush.......and then we walked 'home'...down the hill to the place where my parents no longer live.....and the new owners had taken out the fence and built very loe stone walls....which we stepped over to get into the back yard, and peered into the backroom where the new owners were moving the kitchen.....the cabinets were not yet attached to the walls, and the fireplace was now behind the kitchen island......curious.....

repeat

ok, so......there is a sweet ballad in repeat....playing over and over while the youngest child gets ready for school.....or at least the song seemed sweet the first 10 or so times.....curious that fine line between entertaining and annoying.....

the annoying whine of motors on a lovely fall day....

ok, so....i weeded in the last of the beds this afternoon.....dug out daylilies and repositioned irises and mulched and such......which would have been an idyllic way to spend a gloriously sunny day in november, had it not been for the whine of leaf-blowers.....

books....

ok, so.....i brought my driving to-and-from work book on cd in the house on friday evening so that i could finish it up....yeah, i had 2 discs to go before it was over, but i was anxious to find out how it ended....The Messenger by Daniel Silva.....part of a series of mystery-thrillers that feature an art restorer/spy for the state of Israel Gabriel Allon......i heard about this series on npr in a 'books you ought to read' sort of piece......though the library has all of the books in this series, i prefer to listen to them on cd so that i do not miss any of the clues and nuances that often allude me when i read book in print.....with actual books is it too easy to skim through the pages to get the gist of the story line.....and while this method gets the job done by the deadline (read this as bookclub meetings).....i do lose out on much of the word pictures.....such is probably the case with the book i read yesterday after weeding out the hydrangea bed.....A Parchment of Leaves by Silas House.....i was ensconced in the red lounger on my new terrace, with a glass of wine....and i managed to get through the book from start to finish.....ideally i would reread the book to get all that i missed the first time, but i have no interest in reading about these characters a second time.....and i will go to book club having finished this assignment, and i will bite my tongue when the cozy, flowery prose is talked up to the point of worship.....my oldest child refered to this same author's previous work as precious prose.....meaning that with ky authors we are less apt to judge the work critically than we would the work of out-of-staters.....enough of precious prose....i am on to the second book suggested on npr as thrillers worthy of my time.....The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo.....written by a Swede who turned in to his publisher three novels in a series and then promptly died....i had to start over in order to remember the plot as it has unfolded thus far.....the time line has jumped back and forth a few too many times for my taste.....the prose is spare..which i much prefer to the alternative......to the point.....too bad the library did not have this book on cd......i would have enjoyed listening to this plot unfold...

saturday....

ok, so....i am so very glad it is saturday.....an exhausting week on so many levels....

reply to my comment...

ok, so i commented on a sweet article in the nytimes by a woman who walked/ran the recent nymarathon....and the author took the time to comment on my comment, which was unexpected and a nice touch......

yes, we have no bananas.....

ok, so in my spare time i am attempting to configure this song to the H1N1 vaccine......i will keep you posted....

a room of one's own....

ok, so.....this tale is often told in this forum....and i bring it up again because it is timely......way back in my college days....maybe graduate school....my history of procrastination goes way back....the literature text books were in the same aisle as the nutrition texts.....and i happened upon several stacks of appealing book covers as i searched for those on my list.....and i walked away with books assigned for a class i would never take.....the yellow wallpaper, the vagabond, a room of one's own.......oh, my.....how those books changed my course more so than my nutrition of disabled children courses.....and this evening, when i have already been brought to tears by a deja vu article in the nytimes by a woman who walked/ran her first marathon at 6 hours and 58 minutes...i came across this piece about a woman who inherited $75,000 from her feminist literature professor.....i have read Woolf's essay "A Room of One's Own" almost as many times as I have read Hemingway's 'A Movable Feast'....which says that I lack the attention span required to digest a weighty novel......or that I appreciate brevity in my social commentary.......and admire those who voice the purist sentiments of feminism......the unadulterated urges to be all that one can be.....i read with sadness about the passing of the young women of middle eastern descent run down by her father because she had become too westernized....there can be no quarter for a father who would kill his own daughter because she had the audacity to think for herself.....the world would be a better place if more women thought for themsleves and acted accordingly.....and it is not just me 'sayin'......

block-a-thon

ok, so......i especially enjoyed this nytimes article about a guy who decides to walk a marathon by doing 75 laps around his own brooklyn block.....his piece reminded me of my own walked marathon......if you take the time to savor this article se sure to open his multimedia diagram of the 75 laps.....

home again....

ok, so....i took the long way home yesterday from the state park....i will admit to taking a peak at the atlas that is kept tucked behind the driver's seat....but the route was somewhere in the fold by the staples....and so i took my chances by heading 'south' figuring i would eventually run into frankfort......glorious day with leaves falling and the sun shining....and my eldest's 'sunny day' mix in the cd player......very few cars on these backroads.....life is good.....