emptying nest

ok, so...on this day the youngest goes to 4-h camp...which will leave us temporarily empty-nested......a reality that will be remedied on friday when all re-converge for a few weeks of togetherness......before scattering once again......as for this MM....i have enjoyed the time spent with my adult children passing through the homeplace on their ways to where-ever......

spell check

ok, so.....i have a hankering to read a book i have blogged about before.....one of the few novels my grandmother c. kept at her house....i read it over at least one of my yearly solo summer visits to her farm....i have no idea which of my cousins was lucky enough to have gotten this book when she died.....i recalled it as a girl of the linderlost....and recently when i decided to do a google search so that i could buy a copy for myself......maybe even a similar volume published in 1909 rather than a newer version......but my google search came back fruitless......except for my original blog about the book...which meant that i had the title wrong.....how does one find a title when one does nto know the correct title?......this morning there was an email from alibris books in my junk folder...surely they would have a line on this classic tale.....they had no girl of the linderlost........ what they did have was a girl of the limberlost...what a difference a single letter can make with insensitive search engines.....alibris does have several original copies...some in better condition than others.....eureka...

petunias.....

ok, so.....i walked out onto my back deck this morning, and startled a squirrel who was busily munching my petunias.....no wonder they did not seem to grow.....what with a furry creature trimming them back on a daily basis......i also suspect the furry creatures have shirred off my kale and spinach plants....such as they are....it is a good thing we do not have to survive off of our home grown produce.....i began my errands with the displaced library......and have already polished off a cozy murder mystery that features a middle-aged widow living in a cozy cabin with rosa new dawn at her doorstep......i borrowed the 2 sequels........based solely on the name of the grand rose mentioned in the first paragraph......a bulb catalog was in my saturday mail stack.....in addition to my middle child's grades 3 A's, and A+ and an A-.......i could not be prouder of a child who takes an extra class each semester.....but i digress from bulbs.....i am already thinking to my new bed in the spring....and basically planning around frittilaria.....an unusual spring plant sold in a trio....orange-ish.....which could go well with some lovely daffodils and tulips.....and iris....to bloom just until all of the perennials i planted this season come up.......gardening is such a hopeful hobby......speaking of which...while i was in the aldi this afternoon, i spied the missionary who wanted so badly to proselytize underneath my arbor rose a few weeks back.....she did not seem to recognize me.... which is just as well....given that i have spoken of her visit far and wide......and i must say...that i feel every bit as optimistic about the future of our country at this very moment as i did that day.....the lexington herald leader featured a piece by its religion columnist...paul prather...this morning...who chimed in with yet another disavowal of dr dobson......i have read so many i am getting them all mixed up in my mind.....and so i will close this entry with a few thoughts of my own.....for the bible-thumping right to put forward a candidate who is married to another woman while his first wife still lives.....jesus called that sort of person an adulterer.....then nothing that his supporters can say about the religious thoughts of my candidate holds any sway.....

mccain mashup

ok, so this youtube offering has mccain enmeshed in a madonna video......it is bloody brilliant.....

dobson versus obama

ok, so i am highly amused that dr. dobson decided to throw his weight around in this election cycle.....by accusing my man obama of misconstruing the bible.....the tired evangelical focus on social issues like abortion and gay marriage are not playing well these days, with so many of those who used to be associated with the christian right now wanting to focus on global warming and protecting the earth god gave us all.......dobson's base is shrinking, and i am pleased to see that obama is not afraid to court those folks.....

9 kids.....

ok, so....at the 1st home swim meet on wednesday night we marveled at the family of 9 children that participated on the local rec team.....well....not all 9...the three oldest sisters are either in high school or in college...and they were in charge of their younger siblings who appeared to be between the ages of 4 and 12....neither mamma nor pappa were in evidence...which made we wonder if there were not more children at home.....and so these young swimmers had only the cheers of their sisters, who likely wished they were somewhere other than at a swim meet in the 90+ degree sun......which reminded me of my spouse and his multi-child family.....he recalls (sadly) that the year he was mvp for little league baseball, his parents did not manage to come to a single game......whatever one says about having lots and lots of children......having so many that one cannot manage to be there to cheer them on seems like just too many children.....

celebration

ok, so this lovely english-style rose by David Austen...celebration is blooming in my new bed...and it is just lovely....

seeing eye cat....

okk, so this from jezebel.com.....Take the heartbreakingly angelic goodness of a seeing-eye animal, add a dash of inter-species friendship, and you've got a recipe for tears. "Cashew, a 14 year old Labrador Retriever owned by Terry Burns in Middleburg, Pennsylvania, is blind and deaf. Her best friend is a red tabby cat named Libby. Libby has become Cashew's seeing-eye cat. She guides Cashew around obstacles, leads her to the food dish and even sleeps next to her every night."

power sweaters....

ok, so....i enjoy a good piece on power sweaters......

teary-eyed.....

ok, so....the olympics are coming up sometime in late summer....seems like a long time off...but the tear-jerker stories have already squeezed my heartstrings.....i cannot pick up a paper or surf a site without some story of tissue proportions.....like the iowa gymnast whose gym was flooded despite the efforts of everybody she and her coach every knew in iowa.....filling sandbags and such.....and this story of a runner and coach.....i could just sit and cry rather than read these heart-wrenching tales of personal achievement....and yet...my youngest cries out at the screen when watching the 15 year-old divers....and admonishes their dedication.....this from someone who knows not a shred of personal commitment......if i cannot do it today it is not worth doing...or some version of this mantra......teary-eyed awe is worthy only of teary-eyed accomplishment.....

stuff

ok, so.....i was saddened to hear that George Carlin died suddenly over the weekend.....NPR did their post-6:30 am piece on his supreme court case involving his 7 words you cannot say on television...but i shall remember his for his piece on stuff....this is just an excerpt....i encourage you to watch it on youtube..

A house is just a pile of stuff with a cover on it. You can see that when you're taking off in an airplane. You look down, you see everybody's got a little pile of stuff. All the little piles of stuff. And when you leave your house, you gotta lock it up. Wouldn't want somebody to come by and take some of your stuff. They always take the good stuff. They never bother with that crap you're saving. All they want is the shiny stuff. That's what your house is, a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get...more stuff!

power

ok, so......after a powernap.......i rallied to complete the bushtrimming with a repaired powercord.......i finished just before the winds started to pick up and i felt a few drops of rain....must not tempt fate with electrical appliances in the rain.......i did not manage to get to the semi-circle of low boxwood in the corner of the yard......these started out as tiny edging shrubs....and i let them get out of hand so that they are not almost too high to a frame to the solomon seal in the middle.....trimming them has always been problematic, as they are on a hill....does one try to make each bush squared off, of make the flow downhill smooth across the tops........luckily one's mistakes grow out like a bad haircut.....speaking of power...i have discovered that our smokies campground has neither electric nor showers......which i can take for 2 nights if the company is good...and going off the grid for a couple of days could only be good for me.....i WILL problem-solve a way to make my morning coffee.....i vaguely recall us having a small camp-stove here.....i cannot recall my last coffee-less morning....i CAN recall my last showerless day......it can be done......i have visions of a 4 day hike across the southern island of new zealand......which would require several showerless days...might as well get in training for such things now.....got to keep these goals and dreams ahead of me like a carrot in front of the mule....in these post-midlife crisis menopausal days, i feel a power surge coming on....

rhythms

ok, so.....i was studying my sunday school lesson the on the 104th psalm.....which alludes to life's rhythms.....and my spouse informed me that two of our longest married friends were no longer a couple.....seems she went to new orleans to help with the hurricane relief and never came back.....their children are the same ages as our two eldest........how can people married 26+ years just walk away?........their children dropped out of school after they broke up...and we have offered their eldest refuge while he regroups (he knows bikes and the bike shop needs help just now)......we are not their only d-ville contacts, and we are certain that others will lend this fellow a hand in rebuilding his life......

cutting the cord.....

ok, so....i had a little incident this afternoon, and i lived to tell the tale.....i went big, as we say around here......and not only trimmed and weeded, and pruned....but i got out the long extension cords and the electric hedge trimmer, and prepared to do battle with our overgrown shrubs.....i got through the taxus and boxwoods by the front porch, and had moved to the boxwoods along the fence by the road.....when it happened.....a flash of sparks, a jolt, and then...nothing.....i had cut through the electric cord....gentle readers....i have been trimming hedge and shrubs for years and years with this appliance.....and have somehow managed to avoid this sort of semi-disaster until today.....probably scared me more than anything......as i was into my 5th hour of yard work, i declined the suggestion that i trudge up to grandmas to borrow another extension cord.....the remaining shrubs can just sit tight until i get up the nerve to finish the job.....

saturday

ok, so....i am determined to go big today....which in c-dub terminology means to either go for a large distance (as in running or biking), or to get a lot accomplished.....which is the route i am taking.....thus far i have made omelets and fried potatoes....must keep up my strength...i have planted all of the seedlings i have been tending from my flats that have languished on the back table waiting for this moment.....they are rather spindly...but if only part of them take off it is still a success...most have been eased into pots on the back deck...amongst other flowers or vegetables......i put some stringy sweet peas alongside my potted tomato plants.....might look kinda special at some point.....and so now i am heading back outside to deadhead rose bushes....and to trim back the volunteer shrubs that seem to burst forth every day.....and then maybe i'll take a shower and do some grocery shopping....i seem to shop twice as much with the extra mouth to feed.....which is just fine as i enjoy cooking for someone who complements each and every meal....i absolutely must make our rental reservation in the smokies for the (now) annual runner/walkers weekend .....we went to north carolina the year before last, and our rental cabin was idyllic...the ones available to us in this locale seem so baby blue and pink country with ruffles as to be almost unbearable.....there was one cabin with a bear motif.....a little too many bears for my taste......ah well...it is only for the two nights.....must make myself do this simple task.....

flowering tobacco

ok, so.....i stopped in at the lowes on my way home from lincoln county last evening.....just to see what plants they had in the back 'mark-down' section......and there was an entire trolley of perfectly lovely flowering tobacco plants (nicotiana alata) blooming in a lovely shade of pink for 99 cents each.....i also invested in a few black-eyed susans (rudbeckia hirta), some pink coneflowers (echinacea purpurea), and blue speedwell (veronica spicata)....i got up early this morning to water them again.....having already watered them when i planted them, and again when it was nearly dark.......i have placed these plants in amongst my new rose bushes.....and while i still see a few gaps....i could consider this bed 'done' if i so chose.....but i digress from the flowering tobacco.....i leaped at the chance to buy it, because i was quite certain that tobacco grows well around here........

board meeting

ok, so i survived my second board meeting, and managed to get our budget passed without much to-do.....this is a great relief, as the budget is a huge deal and this was my very first experience in the process.....i am so very relieved....

the times.....

ok, so the times, they are a changing.....this couple, aged 87 and 84...were legally married today in california.....who could not look upon this happy couple and be glad.....?

bloomsday

ok, so....it was not until rather late in my workday that it dawned on me that today is june 16....which means that it is bloomsday......the day in 1904 featured in james joyce's ulysses........there is still time to raise a glass to leopold, stephen and molly.....

rien ne dure comme la provisoire

ok, so.....my eldest quoted this sentiment this afternoon when the topic of my interim-ship came up...nothing lasts like the temproary...to make this quote in conversation i would have to write it on my hand...which does detract from the drama.....