what happened to me, I am here. Somehow the days go by, filled with dinner and dishes and hairballs. The children are taking a few tennis lessons this summer, much more enthusiastic about that than fencing. We watched pretty much the entire U. S. Open golf tournament, and today William tells me he wishes we had cable. I asked what he would watch, and he said he would watch the first nine holes of the playoff. I didn’t bother to tell him there’s an entire golf channel. Plus, I still don’t get the whole golf thing. My dad was in La Jolla watching the Open, but their plan was to leave Monday, so I am not sure if he delayed it so he could watch the playoff. One thing’s for sure, you would think that with all the money spent on golf, they could find some better commentators. The Monday ones were better than the weekend ones.
The garden is alright, the cat has not returned, but neither has the sun. It’s been one day of hot and windy and three days of chilly lately. I know it’s only mid June but I predict snow in three months so these plants better get a move on.
Today I took the children and drove down to the Sears store at Cherry Creek. They have a Lands End store there. It creeps me out to even enter a Sears, they are identical to how they looked in 1982 when they refused my mother a credit card to buy a new stove for her newly purchased house (you know, back in the days when people with a good job and credit history were actually denied credit), and she swore she’d never buy anything from them again. And she never did. And I, continuing to carry her grudge, haven’t either. Even after I met John, whose family believes the sun rises and sets on Kenmore appliances, I was steadfast. He being the reasonable person that he is, allowed me to insist on getting our stuff from Best Buy. Then Sears had to go and buy Lands End, and I’ve had guilt ever since. So. They do have a few things that I like that are impossible to find elsewhere, like plain ole short sleeve solid color sweaters. I almost ordered them but after tax and shipping (and tax on the shipping), knowing I would have to send some stuff back, I thought I’d just go try it on and save some trouble.
William loathes clothes shopping, even for himself. He is not a whiner, though, and I rarely go shopping even without him, so I figured he could suck it up and join the legions of bored children before him who had to shop with their mothers. Plus I told him to take a book and I offered him a McFlurry afterward if he cooperated.
So we drive down there, and it’s about 30 minutes away. I found the parking garage, found the Lands End store and thought I must have been on the wrong floor. Surely they had to have had more stuff. But no. The sweaters in question were not there, even though 6 weeks ago the store was packed with them. (I tried to shop that day, with John, but it was still spring and even though it was 80 degrees outside, they still had the heater on and I was about to suffocate, so we left, after complaining.) All that driving for nothing. But at least I got to pay $2 for parking. I’m pretty sure the quality of their stuff has declined since Sears took over. Hmph.
I did have a good idea, though, driving behind a wimpy hybrid car: there ought to be some kind of cruise control that automatically kicks in when a person starts using their cell phone. I don’t care if they drive slow, but the speeding up and slowing down really annoys me. Two times the hybrid waited to the last second to merge in front of me and each time I let her in, but the stupid back window was so small I couldn’t tell if she gave me the thank you wave. (I very much believe in the importance of the thank you wave.) I’m guessing no, because when I passed her she was yakking on her phone.
We finally made it to the golden arches. I had a buy one get one free Mcflurry coupon, plus a $1 certificate. Even with those I paid $4 for three small ice creams. They were so small I had to squint to find them. Back in the day they were large! And practically free! I know it’s been a million years since I bought ice cream at McDonald’s, but it looks like it might be another million before I go back. Ouch.
I am bummed about the shopping, but I feel a little wiser. Too bad wisdom doesn’t match my blue skirt.
John is a big Nero Wolfe fan, having read many of the novels, and now we own the DVD series from A&E. Nero Wolfe is a genius private detective in NYC ca. 1940s-50s. Archie Goodwin is Nero’s right hand man, smart in the ways that Nero is not. This series was written by a man named Rex Stout. I have no idea if that was a pen name or not, but given the names of the author and the genius detective, you have a clue about the men in the stories. Nero cannot stand an hysterical (aka crying) woman. It’s really a pretty funny series, with great clothes and lots of cars with chrome.
We were watching an episode last night, “Die Like a Dog” where a dog follows Archie home. He thinks it will annoy Wolfe, but Wolfe warms to the dog immediately and begins to wax nostalgic about a dog he had as a boy. Now, do you remember your first beloved pet? Maybe it was a dog…loyal, true, stinky, slept on your bed, whatever. Maybe it was a cat…furry, soft, full of personality, etc. Perhaps you get a little wistful when you think of this pet, remembering how much you liked it. But Nero Wolfe? The man is not capable of wist. To describe his beloved boyhood dog, he says, “I don’t recall the dog having a defect.”
And that is the difference between Nero and everyone else. While most of us find our pets’ quirks endearing, the best Nero can do is to note a lack of defects. Pfui.
Some gardeners have to deal with rabbits, or raccoons, or tomato worms, or maybe even deer. Me? My biggest problem so far this year is the neighbor’s cat. Just as I feared, it has found my garden. It called to the cat…and the cat answered. But so did I. I sprayed some stuff called Critter Ridder on the dirt. It has oil of black pepper and other capsaicin substances. Supposedly one spray is good for a month. I also sprayed by the sunflowers, the other preferred potty spot. Lousy cat.
This is easier than driving down to pick up a trap then driving back to deliver the offending animal. Although I did see a trap for sale at Home Depot. That could be fun…
Somehow I feel like one of those movies…the kind where the bumbling homeowner constantly combats invasive pests, losing each time, but amusing the audience nonetheless.
I’ll give you a report on how well the pepper spray for cats worked.
Today was great. Liturgy this morning was beautiful. I hardly even yawned, which I was remarkable, having stayed up so late (um, early?) watching John play Raving Rabbids. And I might have been playing a game on the computer and drinking lots of iced tea. We finally rolled into bed around 1 a.m. We are partiers, for sure.
After we got home, John got to work on his back yard landscape project, part one. The dump truck that brought our garden dirt also brought a load of rocks, and they’ve been sitting in the driveway for two weeks. He had to finished digging out a little trench to put the edging material down in before he could put down fabric and rocks. Now, our back yard is composed of 85% clay and 15% cottonwood roots. You could build houses with this stuff. It was a lot of work, and he did it all himself! I was very impressed. He also drank about two quarts of iced tea. Whew. Thirsty work, that.
I spent some time refashioning some of William’s pants into a pair of shorts. (Note that these were not made from scratch so I am not violating my promise to make myself something. Plus I went to get my skirt fabric and somehow I managed to forget to buy thread. But I have five different shades of pink! I have a daughter and four nieces. Sigh). They had a hole in the knee and a missing button. I cut them off and hemmed them! I was pretty proud of myself. I guarantee you won’t notice that the hems are a little uneven, because he won’t be still long enough for you to get a good look at them. Not like he’s going to wear them to a wedding, anyway. I found their missing button and now he has another pair of shorts! Lately I have a lot more time than money, so where before I might figure, “I can just go to Target and buy another pair of shorts for $9.99,” now I realize that’s not necessarily true. Kind of wasteful anyway, when I have this time, and if I weren’t sewing his shorts I’d be doing something really useless like surfing the net.
We had planned to have steaks for dinner…a really, really rare treat around here, maybe once a year or less. I picked up some nice ones from the clearance meat bin (which as I’m typing, sounds kind of bad, but there are some great deals in there on good stuff. At least I’ve never seen anything green). John was still working so I prepped a caesar salad, baked potatoes, set the table, etc. I even remembered we had a bottle of wine and got that out. So then, not wanting to do nothing while he was out breaking his back working, I prepped some berries and taught my daughter (and myself!) how to make creme anglaise.
We sat down to a fabulous dinner (the perfectly cooked steaks totally forgive all the burnt hamburgers from last summer) and I looked out to the yard and was startled to notice our neighbor’s big rose bush just starting to bloom. And I thought, how did I miss this? Years past I always look forward to the end of May to see the roses. And suddenly, there it is. I felt especially thankful.
I was trying to think of some deep theological tie-in here, but I can’t just now. This morning there was a memorial for several people, and a goodbye blessing for two families going to seminary. And I was sad, but even more than that, I had this overwhelming feeling that everything would be okay, because in the end we’ll all be together. And I am grateful.
Pictures! Woo-hoo! Now you can see what I spent my Saturday doing–making purses for our nieces who are about to turn 5. And start kindergarten. Some kind of nerve, those girls have. Anyway, one digs pink and one prefers purple. You can see which is which, I call one “Explosion at the Pink Factory” and the other “Purple Power.”
And here is the first purse I made with this pattern, which just goes to show how really cool it can look if you use coordinated fabrics from the same line (in this case, Amy Butler fabric. Also an Amy Butler pattern.) I really like this one. I just like to look at it and smile.
And finally, some pictures of the most recent dress I made for my daughter while I was technically on vacation. I promise, next thing I make will be for me! Like a skirt! I really like this green and white paisley fabric. It’s like stretchy twill. Notice the cute little sleeves? This is the combo I used for Lucy’s purse a couple weeks ago. Plain cotton is much, much easier to sew with for this than stretchy twill. And once Carolyn’s jumper is finished drying, I might get a picture of that too.
Have a great weekend!