Life in Strange Times

Well, it looks like I've been MIA for about 4 months.  Sorry about that.

Christmas lasted for almost a week, which is to be expected, given that everyone has their own schedules.  The good news is that the fun lasts longer, and the post holiday letdown is gradual, more like a sigh of exhaustion.  The bad news is that it's exhausting cooking many Christmas dinners.  Oh, well, I hope for many more.

For my Christmas present, my girls took me to Washington, DC for a ballet the first weekend of February.  It was wonderful; the ballet was beautiful, the weather was nice, we walked around plenty, and I got to spend 2 days with my girls.  They couldn't have done anything better for me.

And then the Corona virus hit.  Oh, Thatcher is delirious with joy; Patrick never leaves for school!  He stays home and plays!  It's a great time to be a dog!  Me?  Well, I don't like being ordered to stay home.  I didn't really have any place I wanted to go, but I don't like being told I must stay home.  So, while I've heard that everyone else is cooking like it's their obsession, I'm not motivated to do so.  Well, I was motivated on Pi Day.  I'm not sure why.  But I made a quiche for brunch, served with radish soup (which was great, BTW), then fish pot pies for dinner, and dessert was Apple Pie and French Market Pie.  The Best Pie Crust Ever was the star of everything.  Like I said, I got up early and just started cooking; it was weird.  Of course, the quarantine was only about a week old then, so I wasn't mad yet.

I've been walking Thatcher the mile down and back up our driveway every day, except when it's raining; Jeff gave me a long puffy coat for Christmas so I would be warm enough.  My first tree, a crabapple, is finally in bloom.

And I have these daffodils.  I managed to cut 2 batches of them from my yard.  A rare bit of sunshine in my breakfast room.

And I think I'm going to jump start my car and go to the gas station this weekend.  I'm pretty sure I have 1/4 tank.  But I'm going to fill it anyway.  And probably drive at least 5 miles up the interstate, just to be sure the battery's charged.

So, stay safe, everyone, stay well, and stay sane.  Go outside and get some sunshine; it lifts the spirits!  And remember, it's Friday!  I mean, Day!  Because they all pretty much blend together now....

Ice Cream

Who's going to tell me this isn't the truth?

Happy Monday, everyone!

Book Sale!

I'm trying here, I really am.  But I'm not inspired in cooking, and there is so much still going on that life gets in my way.

So...I went to a used book sale with Ryan and Patrick, and came back with these prizes.  The brewing book is for Shannon's husband, who has set up an elaborate home-brew station in their house (and grows hops along their fence: talk about ambition!), the paperbacks are for me to take on vacation in a few weeks, and leave them for someone else to enjoy when I'm done.  After all, paperbacks are perishable!

And the rest I'll read while I'm watching TV.  Because after all, with the exception of Masterpiece Theater, there isn't much on TV that requires actual close attention.

And I love the re-usable bags they gave out at a book sale a few years back.  They gave me 2, and that tells me how many books I can buy.  There are rules, people....

Happy Saturday, everyone!

Dog-In-A-Box

What's more fun than a Jack-In-A-Box?  A Dog-In-A-Box!

Jeff has Tank trained so well that he pointed at the box, and Tank obediently sat in it.

Then Tank got out, and Jeff put Thatcher in the box.  You can see from his expression that this did not please Thatcher.

No matter; there were treats for both after they'd sat in the box.

Happy Thursday, everyone!

Ugly Produce

Last week, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal, which. as you all know, is my go-to for everything, about so-called ugly produce.  An enormous amount of food is wasted because it doesn't meet the cosmetic standards for retail sale, and the Journal profiled 3 companies which sell said produce directly to the consumer.  One even delivers right here in my little corner of the world!  I thought about it for a couple of days, then decided, "Why not?"

Misfit Markets has 2 sizes of organic produce box: the 10 to 12 pound and the 20 to 24 pound box.  Of course, I opted for the larger box.  And when I opened it up, this (not quite as blurry in real life) was what I saw:

There was an enormous amount of food included in that box.  I unpacked it under the supervision of one of my daughters and my son-in-law, and with the "help" of 2 year old Nora, who didn't want me to line things up on the table to see what was there.  Still, I did manage to get it set out, and this is the bounty I received for a total of $38.99:

Kale, 2 kinds of lettuce, onions, potatoes, garlic, apples, pears, mango, blueberries (which I had to feed to Nora right then), peppers (which I promptly gave to Chris and Cass to remove from my house), spaghetti squash, tiny little cucumbers.....

This is considered an "ugly" pear, presumably because of the wart.  I'm not gonna lie; it was pretty delicious.

I cooked the spaghetti squash Saturday night for dinner with the hungry horde.  Patrick refused to even try it (despite his girlfriend trying to feed it to him), and everyone else liked it.  Of course I didn't take a picture!  That might mean remembering to do things when my hungry horde is milling about, with 2 starving dogs in the mix.  Overall, I'm calling this experiment a success, even though I don't quite know what to do with kale....

Happy Sunday, everyone!

Election Day!

I voted around noon; Patrick and Ryan went with Thatcher shortly thereafter.

No, they didn't let Thatcher vote, but he was good for amusing a few people while he waited.  And I'm thinking it should be a finger food dinner tonight, so we can opt to watch the news stations. Or just share with Thatcher.

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

Drive-by Posting

You all probably thought I disappeared off the planet, right?  Nope.  Just trying to get my outside work wrapped up as the weather turns abruptly cold.  I can't tell you how much fun it is to go out in the rain at 47 degrees every 30 minutes or so to make sure I like what the garden guys are replanting in the front of my house.

But, I did make a trip to a little farm stand down at the bottom of my hill.

Blue potatoes, sweet potatoes, fresh carrots and some kind of squash I've never seen before.  Ryan was pretty pleased, but I'm betting Patrick will be less than impressed.

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Hanging In There

It's been 5 weeks since I lost my dearly beloved, and it still feels like 5 minutes.  If I didn't have the boys to feed, I'd probably be subsisting on frozen dinners, if I even remembered to eat.  My next door neighbor has been a rock, dropping by with a cup of tea to visit every few days.

Yesterday, we had a fierce thunderstorm roll through - in and out in 20 minutes.  Afterward, I looked out the front door, and was amazed at the myriad shades of green, and sunshine, against the dark sky where the storms were still rolling through to the east of us.

And, who's excited about the PBS Great American Read?  OK, maybe "excited" is a little strong.  But I downloaded the list, and was pleased to see that I've read 30 of the books on it, and have at least 5 more in my house.  I might as well read; the insomnia is going to drive me nuts otherwise.

So, tell me, how many of these books have any of you read?  And are you all enjoying the colors of spring after our rather cold April?

Our Great New Lawn Service

So, last Thursday, our new lawn guy showed up at the back door.  Of course, he wanted to be paid for the fall cleanup work he'd been doing, which is absolutely phenomenal.

How phenomenal, you ask?

Well, Tank was here for 5 days, romping about our 10 acre lawn.  And Mr. Lawn Guy was returning Tank's tags, which he found somewhere on said 10 acres.  That's some phenomenal work.

On that note, I thought you'd all enjoy one of the tags Tank usually wears; I hadn't seen this before.

Happy Friday, everyone!  Christmas preparation is about to get serious!

Chairs

So, recently, I threw out a couple of 30 year old, beat-to-crap sofas - hey, decades of kids leaping on a sofa will do that.  They were in my upstairs hall, which is actually about 6 feet wide, with wider spaces at each end.  So I decided to replace them with a pair of chairs and a table at each end of the hall.  I bought all of the chairs secondhand, so I had two pairs.  They were kinda butt ugly and a little beat up, but still very solid.  So I covered the scratches with a liberal application of Old English Furniture Polish (it contains stain), and I got the first pair reupholstered - it was the uglier pair.

After polishing up, but before repadding and recovering the seat:

The finished product:

And these are the chairs that have yet to be reupholstered.  They are much more ornate; this is how they look in their permanent position.  The seats don't exactly match, but they're not as bad as the others.  Can you believe I paid only $100 for the pair?

Happy Thursday, everyone!

"You Do You!"

Both Mark and Cass said that to me on the same day last week; first time I'd heard it.  I don't recall why Mark said it.  But I do remember why Cass was encouraging me.

The guest half bath here is absurdly tiny.  It's 4 by 3.  That's right: 12 square feet.  And it's always looked marginal, at best.  So we bought fixtures last October to renovate that half bath, but I refused to move forward, because the heat would have to be shut off for however long it took, and I wasn't fine with that in November.  Call me crazy, but I want heat when the nights are below 40 degrees.

So a guy finally came in to start this project 2 weeks ago.  He isn't a slacker, it's just that hard to get anything done in this house.  Start with jackhammering the floor to change the water lines and drainage, and you get the idea of the scope of this stupid 12 square foot project.  42 other little things went wrong, too, and before you knew it, it took 3 weeks.  Then my dearly beloved was telling him to paint the whole room white.  I told him not to paint at all; I'd take care of it.  Then I painted the outside wall....emerald green.  Dearly Beloved was not best pleased when I started down this road, in the semi-dark, at 7PM, while the light fixtures were still off the wall.  But Cass said, "You do you, Momma Bear!"  And the next day, in broad daylight, with cream walls and white trim, I got unanimous votes of confidence.  Even Mark told me, "Ignore Dad, because it looks really good."

And I was so pleased by that endeavor, I had the same guy take out 27 cracked tiles in my kitchen floor; he started today, and will be replacing them tomorrow.  Sounds like a good excuse for takeout to me.

Happy Wednesday, everyone, and when in doubt, take the advice of Cass and Mark: "You do you!"

It's Eclipse Day!

So, we are nowhere near the total eclipse, but I didn't care.  I ordered the package of genuine eclipse glasses months ago, and we all wandered in and out to watch it.  I even took a couple of great blob pictures with my new, spiffy cell phone (yes, it's sad, but I can no longer say that my phone doesn't take pictures...I still claim it does nothing else).  Of course, the phone wore the eclipse glasses when it took a turn looking at the sky.

It was a little cloudy here, but that's OK. I'm just happy that I got to enjoy it with people I love.  And I'm going to make an eclipse cake tonight to celebrate!

Happy Monday, everyone!

Overbought?

So, I often order pantry staples online, and let the guys in brown or purple take care of hauling it in.  Yesterday, Ryan dragged (okay, he carried; I'd have dragged) in a big box for me.  He and his father had a good laugh when they saw what I bought.

"What?" I demanded.  "It was the best price.  And it isn't like I won't use it fast.  You guys do like to eat, you know."

They should consider themselves lucky I didn't find a 50 pound bag for even less!

Happy Tuesday, everyone.

London Broil...

A conundrum: When the sale is "Buy 1, Get 2 Free," how many London Broils are the correct number to buy?

Evidently, the largest multiple of 3 in the store.

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Setting the Clocks Back

In my house, that's a daunting task.  The Grandfather Clock, the two stove clocks, 3 alarm clocks in my room, 3 mantle clocks, and many others.

But one of my favorites is this guy:

My Uncle George brought him back from Germany to my grandmother in the 1950s.  A couple of months ago, he decided he wasn't going to run and cuckoo any more, and that made me sad.  So my son in law found a cuckoo clock repair man down where they live, and took my clock to that guy.  It cost me an absurd $250, but my grandmother's cuckoo clock is now cleaned, with new hands, and new bellows, so the cuckoo now has a nice resonance (and now I know that my clock is from the 1930s, in the Black Forest in Germany).  I think many members of my household aren't fond of the bird, but I do love him.

So, be sure your clocks are set back, so you aren't late to work, school or play tomorrow!  Happy Sunday, everyone!

Bebop's Back!

Playing with Ryan while his human was off babysitting for a friend's dogs (how disloyal can you get, really),

and demolishing a squeaky candy corn she brought him as an expression of penitance for leaving him with his second favorite person.

Happy weekending, everyone!

Sunday Miscellany....

Just a drive-by posting.

I got mad at the prices I was getting to repair and repaint 5 ceilings in my house, so I've been working on it.  They're not perfect, but I don't know that the quotes of around $3000 per ceiling were going to give me perfection in a 95 year old house, either.  Besides, do you really look at your ceiling, as long as it's all the same color?  I rest my case.

Between Bebop and humans, we had visitors for 2 weeks, which was fun.  Bebop and his girl are moving back to Philly in a couple of weeks, so they'll be here much more often now!  It's a lot easier to drive 120 miles than 350 miles!

Ryan went back to college, but locally, so he's living at home.  He still doesn't know what he wants to do, so he's attending 2 different colleges with 2 very different majors.  And Mark starts his senior year on Tuesday.  Can you believe that my baby is almost 17, and starting his last year of high school?  He will be driving his Lincoln Town Car to school.  Of course he's driving a "land yacht."  First, he's almost 6'6", which is hard to squeeze into a small car, and, secondly, I want him safe.  Surrounded by iron.

Jeffrey is buying a house!  His closing is Tuesday!  I am so proud!

And Kellie and her fiance are buying a house; their closing is in October.  Imagine; I will have four children who are homeowners.  That makes me very proud, and feeling very old.

And, no recipe, but I made zucchini apple bread (think zucchini bread, with shredded apple, grated nutmeg, crushed allspice and cinnamon added).  It was durn good.

Happy Labor Day, everyone; I'll try to regain some semblance of posting once life is settled into the fall routine.

Garden Tuesday, On Wednesday

Our visitors have gone home.  The house is quiet for a little while.  Reflashing of the chimneys is underway this week, because....

The slate is done!  I have rocks on my roof again!

(Man, that garage and porch look massive, since I'm standing at the far end of the garage roof to take this picture!  But it's a fun place from which to survey the roof and yard.)

The color match isn't great, probably because it's hard to match freshly cut slate with that which has been weathering 90+ years.  You can see on this stretch above my bedroom, which is visible from nowhere except atop the garage roof, how different the color is.  Mostly, though, they mixed old and new, dark and light, and it looks pretty good.

And, yes, I painted that window and all of the trim around that dormer after I was finished with the camera.  I was standing on top of the porch roof.  Since I wasn't a dullard, and didn't walk off the edge, it was all fine. 

(But I do have to confess that the roofers had a ladder up next to another dormer which they had repaired, and I climbed up to paint that dormer's trim, too.  Hubby footed the ladder to prevent it from tipping over, if that really is a thing.)

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Happy Book Lovers' Day!

I wonder...do you think I qualify as a book lover?

I do have a couple of books around.

I learned to read when I was 4, and have never stopped.  Bobbesy Twins in kindergarten and first grade, Nancy Drew in second grade.  These 3 bookshelves are probably about half of the books we have in this house (or maybe a little less; who's counting?).
 

I read an article in my Sunday paper about the author's favorite book, and realized that your favorite book must change as you get older.  I loved The Secret Garden when I found it, maybe in 3rd or 4th grade.  I reread it a few months back, and still loved it.  Then there was A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.  I found a copy of that one at the book sale the week before our house fire; I'm going to read it again soon.  Gone With The Wind?  Yep, 6th grade.  I've read it several times.  I realized while thinking about this post that all of these books have something in common: a girl/woman in difficult circumstances who does what she must to survive.  Poor Mary, cranky and unloved.  Francie, well loved, living in a tenement.  Scarlett and Melanie, the same and so different.  I'd have liked to think I'd have been Scarlett, but without modern medicine, I fear I'd have been Melanie.

Then, the summer before 8th grade, when we'd moved yet again, and I didn't know a soul, I took up walking the mile-and-a-half to the library every other day to get myself 2 or 3 books, and I found Taylor Caldwell.  Historical fiction set in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which gave a great look at how people lived and thought not so long beforehand.  My favorite of all of her books was Captains and The Kings.

Of course, there have been a gazillion other books - too many to mention - but the ones which stay with me the best are the ones where the main character speaks to my heart, moves me.  Most recently, The Little Paris Bookshop and Delicious! come to mind.

So, what about you?  Favorite books, currently or in the past, or even a favorite book ever?

And, just in case you wondered, here is Mark's summer reading selection.  He also had to read Night by Elie Wiesel for history, along with the first quarter of the textbook (and a bucketload of questions to answer for that).  I'll probably read some of these, too.

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

Garden Tuesday on Wednesday, Sort of.

So, a few weeks back, we learned that no one has bothered to get my mother in law's name put on the in-laws' headstone, despite the fact that she died over a year ago.  I have ordered that problem rectified, because evidently my husband is the only of her children who thinks her grave should be marked.

That caused us to look into his grandparents' headstone, because one of his brothers visited the cemetery where they're buried about 25 years ago, and brought us pictures of many headstones, but not theirs. So, he called that brother, who just happened to be going to New Hampshire, and stopped by the cemetery in Monson to look for that gravestone.  It does exist, but my dearly beloved thinks that stone is small and weaseley, so I'm looking into getting it replaced, as well.

(I don't know why some pictures insist on orienting themselves sideways.  Just pretend it looks right.)

And look what BIL found.  I know these markers to indicate the 8 year old and 3 month old daughters of a different relative; both have been dead 80 to 90 years.  And the sad thing is that I don't think anyone knows of the existence of these girls except me, because BIL had to clear dirt off the stones to photograph them for me.  And he had no idea what they meant; he said they looked like surveyors' monuments to him.

So, I'm thinking of having the current gravestone for my grandparents-in-law (now dead 38 and 55 years) refaced, and carved for these babies.  Someone ought to remember them, after all.

OK, not your typical Garden Tuesday.  But it's what I've been chasing for the better part of a week, and it beats pictures of 3" of rain.

Happy Wednesday, everyone!