14 June …
Explanation for lateness …
The replacement of the forty+-year-old windows in the house was to have begun tuesday. When George put them in, they were top-of-the-line noted as “double paned”. The inner panes were removable. Now those are called “storm” windows and double paned windows are those with two panes sealed together. Interesting …
Replacing the windows requires rearranging every room in the house to provide access to wall space. Can you imagine pushing EVERYTHING into the center of a room and finding a place for all the tschotkes (and I most likely spelled that incorrectly)?
Well … the crew was to have arrived by 0900 wednesday morning. When they weren‘t here by 0920, I called to find out what the plans were and was told there had been a snafu in ordering the windows. Great Northern had filed the order but the hardware store had failed to place the order. Great Northern had been alerted that the windows had arrived, but when they went to get them tuesday afternoon … no windows.
So … no window replacement.
I spent wednesday afternoon and all day yesterday putting everything back in place and re-sorting since it will be two or three weeks before the windows arrive. In the process, a couple of necessities got misplaced.
Surprise …
In a few weeks I get to do it all over again.
Moving stuff and sorting was the second go-round after George’s death and more stuff got throw or given away. I’m sure it will happen again and possibly again before I am down to the bare necessities.
But as Mark says … That’s the way things are.
And as George used to say … Things are as they are.
All in all, wednesday was a very bad, awful, even terrible day.
Thursday was a bit better.
I have high hopes for today.
~~~
Last week featured attendance at Paul’s first grade “recital”. They did “Goldilocks” … and they did it as an opera. The entire show was sung (and danced). Later, I asked Paul if he knew they were performing opera and he didn’t. I wonder if the teacher knew?
At a couple of spots other folktales tried to take center stage (Red Riding Hood, the Three Little Pigs, and Cinderella), but they were emphatically sung off the stage.
The repeat chorus was “Grab your socks. Grab your socks. Here comes … here comes Goldilocks.”
It was fun.
~~~
Weather has been quite “summer” … hot and dry. There are fire preparation issues around this area having to do with planning for if-and-when. We are not yet completely ready, but we’re getting there.
Flowers are spreading their shows. No white, yellow, or black iris yet.
Red peonies have started.
And glorious poppies.
~~~
Reading headlines last week left me wondering (I do a lot of that) about Gaia’s take on population control. It started with someone on facebook posting about reproduction control. I read it as referring to choice … just replace yourself … but someone else saw it as eugenics and got quite angry.
Then there are reports, too many reports, mainly (or so it seems to me) of disappearing and dying women and children. Human trafficking, spousal abuse, starvation, war, school shootings …
And one book I picked up recently started off with the mourning mother of a child who had been beaten to death by its father.
This is not the world I expected when I was young.
~~~
Our area (northwest US) has been having small earthquakes. There was one day last week when over 350 quakes were recorded along a corridor from Seattle to Medford in just over a 24-hour period. Thinking connects them to the Cascadia fault line and opinions differ over whether they are relieving the stress or building up to the big one.
According to geological records, the BIG one is overdue. Any resultant tsunami won’t reach us, but a strong shaker could trigger something in a Cascade volcano … www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-volcano-california-20181025-story.html
Stay tuned …
~~~
Last tuesday was the monthly meeting of the landowners’ association. The Deputy Watermaster was supposed to be there to explain to us about water on the Ranch. She was a no show. That situation is becoming quite interesting. Water wars were common in the Old West. Maybe we’re going to go ’round again.
As I have said, fire readiness issues are a main concern. There had been a plan for an emergency evacuation road through a piece of private property on the north side of the Ranch. The owner was willing and several of those who would profit from it had donated money. The Landowners’ Association had pledged money in support. But when it was presented to the Firefighters’ Association requesting financial support, it hit a snag. There was a brouhaha in that association over the composition of the Board, and who could vote, which resulted in non-approval of donating to the proposed road. As a result, a resident of the Ranch who served on both that board and the HLA board, and was instrumental in implementing the involved road issue, resigned from the landowners’ association board. I don’t understand that resasoning and I still don’t know if he resigned from the firefighters’ association board as well. Oh well …
Fire preparation is the BIG issue around here right now. It is on everyone’s minds, especially when wind and thunderstorms come up. But there are new owners in the area who are city people and don’t really understand the care-for-yourselves aspect of living in a WUI (Wildland Urban Interface) area and are not immediately cooperative.
Again … oh well …
~~~
I’ve told you before that I am the first one up in the morning … to pour juice, start the coffee, and set out yoghurt and/or fruit. Kamille is second … to pour and fix coffee for herself and Mark. The interesting one is Mark. He is usually third and usually turns on the radio. His choice of Sirius channels is always interesting … country, 50s swing, 60s rock, disco, etc. I think my favorite for early morning is disco. Why? Because its beat is twice the normal heart rate (120 per minute) and it gets me moving.
School ended last Friday. No more mandatory 0500 mornings until next fall. Of course, I am still awake shortly after 0500.
~~~
The chicken flock is integrating. This year’s “chicks” are nearly as large as the hens and some of them have begun checking out the egg nests.
There is one red hen not yet adjusted to the “interlopers”. She is becoming a bully. Even where there is plenty of room on the roost, she will move around chasing off the new ones. We will see what happens when the new whites reach their full size. If the bullying continues, we may have to put the red hen in a separate pen for a few days. I read about that in one of the chicken magazines I’ve taken to reading.
~~~
I had lunch a week ago wednesday with my “grief” buddies. It was a good time. We had each had a “change” moment since our last lunch. I’ve already told you about mine (being able to say “George is dead” without crying). One of the others had been able to clear out her husband’s art workshop and give away stretched and/or previously used canvases for reuse. The other had been able to hold a yard sale and repurpose her husband’s tool collection.
Those may seem insignificant, but they are important.
~~~
The coasters for the Litha kitchen set are done, but I’m having trouble accessing the sewing machine to do the napkins. They may have to wait a while … until rearranging life has made a bit more progress.
~~~
Am still reading “Lincoln” (700 pages in regular print is a big book). Long, interesting read.
In addition to the nicknames for Lincoln which we’ve all known since childhood, such as “rail splitter” and “Emancipator”, and the ones I recently discovered such as “Ancient” (about which I’ve already told you), my reading has added “the original gorilla” (by a Cabinet member named Cameron) and “the undecided” by General McClellan who himself was known as “the Little Napoleon” and “the Great American Tortoise” (both because he did little other than strike a pose).
Lincoln’s wife called him “Father” even when speaking to the President as opposed to speaking to her husband. She was called “the Republican Queen”, “Hell”, “the Cat”, or “the Hellcat”, none of which was truly complimentary (and when added to the loss of three sons, a severe blow to the head in a carriage accident, migraines, and then the assassination of her husband makes her emotional instability a bit more understandable).
Nicknames move folks out of legend into humanity.
~~~
Ever heard of the “Bohemian Grove”? Look it up. Then see if you can locate the letter Lynda Hopkins, a Sonoma County Supervisor, wrote to them.
~~~
And to close, an interesting thought from one of my favorite authors …
The first thing you learn in life is you’re a fool. The last thing you learn in life is you’re the same fool.
― Ray Bradbury, “Dandelion Wine”
So … ‘til next week …