David Gales, our hero!
He brought a bucket down, and now seven baby skunks are happily ensconced under a log in the mountain-bike trails. He even dug a den for them before he left.
And I've learned that baby skunks are just crazy about scrambled eggs.
All but the last skunk were remarkably calm about being picked up with grabbers and dropped into a bucket. And he didn't struggle much, though the grabbers are airing outside the garage.
The scrambled eggs helped.
When picking up for the Roomba yesterday, I decided to put my wool slippers and fleece slippers away for the summer. That would involve sorting out all the shoe boxes in the closet and finding out what is in them.
This morning I dragged the library stool into the closet and began — only to discover that I would have to sort out *everything* on the shelf, except for the pre-computer Banners, which, being heavy, are at the bottom of the stack and the ends of the shelf.
I ought to drag the air compressor in and blow the dust out, but I think I'll settle for waving a rag around.
Most of the stuff on the shelf is yarn. Perhaps I'll finally find my 000 needles.
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My shoe collection isn't quite so ridiculous as I'd thought — four of the boxes are empty. On the other hand, some of the remaining nine contain more than one pair each, and there are two pairs of boots that won't fit into boxes.
Plus two pairs of sandals that are in current use, and the ragged cloth slippers I put on in the evening to keep my feet off this cold concrete floor.
Odd that the thick layer of vinyl and whatever is under the tiles does nothing, but the wool innersoles of the slippers keep my feet perfectly happy even though they were made of a thin double knit that has worn into tissue-paper felt with a large hole in the right heel.
Sorting the yarns is not going to be so easy. Just for starters, I'm inclined to knit with embroidery yarn, so there is no clear division between knitting yarn and darning yarn.
And there is no telling what else is in those boxes and baskets. I found a wool car blanket in the pile of pillows. In a pillowcase. (Apparently a case made for the purpose: it's coarse muslin and hasn't been hemmed.) [I later remembered that I'd sewn a coarse case onto Dave's double pillow, but the rough surface made it hard to put into a case, and he liked seeing two pillows when he was hunting for the double one.]
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Just found an old "F=ma" button. I'm going to knock off and add a design to my collection for the embroidery gig.
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I tried and tried and tried to do it the easy way; I tried two different programs.
I guess I'll just have to draw the letters by hand.
I left a message on Dr. Hollar's answering machine this morning. While eating a hamburger at yesterday's anniversary party, I heard a snap and felt something hard in my sandwich. One of the teeth supporting my bridge had snapped, and that pulled the crown off the other. I'm glad that the crown could pull off without damaging the tooth!
Like a fool, I had granola with raisins and chopped pecans for breakfast. I can chew just fine, but it didn't take long for my left jaw muscle to complain about having to do the work of two. My face is still a little sore when I think about it.
Lunch was "Nongshim Shin Black Noodle Soup" that I found in the clearance bin. I was curious as to what black noodles were, but on closer inspection, "Black" turned out to be a trade name, like Kroger's "Private Selection" and Aldi's "Specially Selected". It's ramen-noodle with three packets of soup base. It was greatly improved when I added a little sesame oil, and I ate more than half.
I had intended to cook only half the noodles, but they were in a round cake that wasn't convenient to break in half. The cheaper noodles are in a rectangular cake made by folding a longer rectangle in half, so it's easy to split.
Anyway, this was easier to chew, and I could ask my remaining right molar to do some of the work, so my jaw muscle was much happier than it had been at breakfast time.
The removal of the bicuspid reveals that my lower fang has worn away some of the upper fang, which felt, at first touch, as though a blob of something was stuck to the tooth.
Both Farmers' Markets were closing up when I got there. The courthouse market is open an hour later, but I spent a lot of time walking around Lowery's before getting there. And it would appear that one o'clock is the time the vendors have to be out of there rather than the time they close up and start packing. Rather annoying that they don't advertise customer hours to the customers.
And just as I'd left the courthouse market, it started misting rain, so I skipped stopping for milk and all recreational stops. Met Brent and Karen leaving on their bikes when I was nearly home, and wondered whether he knew something about the rainstorm I didn't. And the rain never did get serious — I think. I stopped paying attention as soon as I got under a roof.
My all-plastic gloves were sweaty when I undressed, so I threw them into the wash intending to wash them and put them away for the summer — but I can't remember where I put my cotton-back gloves last fall. Perhaps I should take *everything* out of the cupboard where they belong.
I still haven't sorted my yarns, or even started, but I did move the two boxes and two baskets into the sewing room so that Dave won't be tripping over them.
I also put two pillows from the bed onto the closet shelf, because we tended to have pillows on the floor *before* I bought two dollar-store pillows. One from the Dollar General on Market street, and one from the Dollar General in Sprawlmart.
I just DuckDucked "dollar specific" in hope of finding a parody, but it appears that "dollar specific" is a frequently-used financial term. So is "dollar particular".
I came back from church through the art festival. Noa-Noa's truck was selling "pulled-pork slaw". I was tempted to buy some just to see what it was, but went home and made a fried-egg sandwich.
On Bunny bread. The "Healthful" bread is unbearably sweet.
The Lord looks after bats as well as sparrows. The frightened and disoriented bat flying around the sanctuary found its way outside unharmed. Probably exhausted.
I wonder what will be found when the roofers take the belfry apart to repair the leaks in the roof?
I don't recall exactly how much roof repair is going to cost us, just that I flinched. There was an audible gasp from the congregation.
Hollar's office returned my call this morning, so I rode there at noon and he scoped out the problem, we decided what to do about it, and I have another appointment for Thursday. He'll pretty much re-create what I had before, but first he has to do a root canal on the broken tooth and put a steel peg in it.
I bought milk and eggs at Marsh on the way home. And ate a plate of fried dumplings next door. I wish I'd ordered hot and sour soup instead.
I dithered over supper until Dave took me to the great wall. Their moo-shoo pork is made with smoked pork! But we ate only half; I intend to serve the remaining two burritos for supper tomorrow. (We also had orange beef.)
Great disappointment: while looking for something else, I discovered that there is a Salvation Army Pettit Store in Fort Wayne. A mini-mart thrift shop? Turned out to be a store on Pettit Avenue.
I looked out the kitchen window this morning to see a duck standing on the rim of the marigold bed, eating the weeds. A drake stood by in the lawn. No ducklings in sight.
The last batch of ducklings I saw were close to the stage where you have to look for the worried expression to identify the adult.
The basil in the marigold bed needs pruning. I should shake some up in a bottle of water and keep it in the fridge.
Since I was squeezed between other patients yesterday, I spent a lot of time reading "The Daleth Effect" in the chair, and studying the uniforms of assistants who had come in on unspecified errands — mostly looking stuff up in my records, I think. They are off-pink scrubs with something embroidered on the shoulder — I presume it's the name of the clinic, but when they were facing me, I paid attention to them, not their clothes, so I never got a good look.
And when I was studying the pockets down the leg of one of the uniforms, I had one of those "Well, duh, you dummy" moments.
I'm down to nothing but sweat pants for old pants to slop around in, — and I'm increasingly unhappy with working in the garden wearing sweat pants. I've been thinking of patching up an old pair of linen slacks, but it wasn't a good quality of linen to start with and I'm not sure the repairs would last long enough to be worth the effort.
Duh! Big R has a wide selection of scrubs! Buy an all-cotton pair of scrub pants, cut them off to pedal-pusher length, and I've got perfect garden pants.
Now to find time for a Sprawlmart tour. I was thinking that tomorrow was out because I don't want to be tired on the day of the root canal, but Weather Underground says that Wednesday will be a lovely day for a ride and on Thursday I've got a 46% chance of getting .42 inches of rain on my head. On the third hand, I'm a little bit tired today and hanging up laundry anyway, and I really, really don't want to duplicate what I did on Easter.
I stayed home to work in the garden yesterday, but I think that pruning the oregano and hilling the potatoes was all I got done. I did pull out some weeds that were near the oregano.
Today's surgery did not go well, and we had to go to Plan B. (I knew going in that my undersized broken bicuspid might not hold, but we both expected it to take a few years for it to fail.) Dr. Steve said that it will take three months for the extraction to heal enough that he can put in the permanent bridge — all those fresh vegetables in the garden and the Farmers' Markets, and I'm wearing purely-decorative temporary teeth.
But after the stitches come out the Thursday after next, he'll grind down the temporary teeth enough to let me use the real teeth on the other side. They come pretty close to meeting now, and I should be off soup tomorrow. In the meanwhile, I put some onion tops and assorted fresh herbs in simmering broth about three o'clock, and intend to eat them at half-past five.
Riding home wasn't any particular problem, except that I had to get home before the local wore off, for fear of distracted driving. I can continue to hope to work my way back up to a twenty-mile tour — but if I can't stop for fried chicken along the way, I've lost a lot of motivation.
He gave me a prescription for a strong painkiller, but the pain faded pretty fast and I never took anything. While napping, I dreamed that I took one of Dave's vicoden, but considering that the pill I took was a deep-purple capsule and the vicodin is a white tablet, not to mention that I was a cartoon shark riding in a wicker pannier on a donkey at the time, I'm pretty sure I didn't.
I don't think my nap was any longer than usual, despite having gotten up three hours early. When I got up in the morning, I thought "awk scrickle, I forgot to check the time of sunrise before I planned to go out on an un-lighted vehicle", but it's close to the solstice, so all was well.
Figured that going out before seven would show me what all the fuss over the intersection of Pope and Detroit was about, but there was very little traffic, and it continued to be an easy turn. Of course, it's a lot harder to see around the corner in a car than on a bike — but in a car there's nothing unpleasant about staying on Winona until you get to Detroit. (The shoulder on Winona isn't continuous.)
For lunch today I made sausage grits: I broke up a sausage patty in olive oil in a hot skillet, minced a few celery sticks and stirred them in, then cleaned a handful of winter-onion tops. I threw the bulbils in whole and chopped the sprouts. Also added a pinch of ham-flavored boullion and a sprig of basil.
Then I stirred in a quarter cup of yellow-corn grits, half a cup of vegetable cocktail, and half a cup of water.
It was delicious!
When I was trying to think of something for supper that we could both eat, I suggested spanish hamburger. Dave said he'd prefer his hamburger in a patty. Much easier! He can have a four-ounce patty with bread, I can have a two-ounce patty with grits.
Goofed up the grits. Started thinking "plain grits with butter", added some more winter-onion tops, the top of a garlic spathe, a mustard leaf, and a beef bouilion cube. The seasonings were fine, but I didn't realize that grits made in a pot require less water than grits made in a skillet; I had thick soup poured over my slider patty. Wasn't bad, particularly with a pinch of horseradish stirred in.
For bedtime snack, I'm getting rid of the last of the gazpacho, with bread, chopped kow choi, and a bouilion cube.
For several decades, I've been thinking about making a circle skirt by cutting a rectangle into trapezoids and sewing them back together with every other one turned upside down.
Today I tore a piece of black broadcloth off the roll, and I'm going to do it!
If it works out, I'll make another one out of good fabric.
Put on my long-sleeved linen jersey for the first time — as a jersey; I'd worn it over my cotton jersey in the cool of Thursday morning — started to put on my sheer linen scarf, reflected that sheer or not, linen or not, I did not want anything wrapped around my neck today. So I tucked it into the pannier just in case, and dug my white linen do rag out of winter storage. Since I've been wearing my summer gloves for a week or two, I smugly reflected that I was finally in full summer kit.
An hour or so into the ride, I realized that I lack one more item: an insulated pannier with ice in it. I tucked stuff down in my bag of crumpled grocery bags, and got home with un-melted beeswax.
I bought one small cake because I have a bunch of sewing stuff in the arm of the futon, but I have to go into the sewing room to thread a needle. After putting the wax into my saddle bag, I realized that always, one more spot one needs it will pop up, and since they were only a quarter each, I went back and bought another.
And while typing this, I realized that it would be good to have beeswax permanently in my Embroidery-Gig supplies. So I'll have to buy a third wax thimble if she comes back next week.
After touring the farmer's markets, I rode to Open Air Nursery and back, then lunched at Peking and bought milk and bread at Marsh. And we used up all the old bread at supper, so that was just in time.
I bought some whole-wheat noodles at the fairgrounds market, and a box of potato flakes at Marsh, both in deference to my non-functioning teeth.
I thought I hadn't developed the spectacular bruising Dr. Hollar warned of, but today I found a red mark, and when I showed it to Dave, he found another.
I wonder whether it's characteristic of facial bruises to stay red instead of turning blue? Encouraging circulation can turn a blue bruise red, and the head gets a *lot* of circulation.
On the other hand, it was ninety degrees out.
I undressed into the washing machine, then took a shower.
I did a triple take after the service. "And now we are all going to Pizza King." Oh, er! I forgot we were doing this, and I didn't bring seven dollars and ninety cents. Wait! I always carry a twenty-dollar bill in case of just such an emergency. Wait again! If that pizza is anything like halfway decent, I can't eat it.
So I didn't go.
When I told Dave, he said "You could have brought it home."
Brilliant idea for supper tonight: hamburger steaks with mashed potatoes and pickled beets.
Melon haul today.
I wanted to do the Sprawlmart tour because I'd realized that cotton scrub pants were perfect for working in the garden. Alas, I'd never been interested in Big R's scrub suits before, so I hadn't noticed that they have been replaced by "Medical Uniforms".
Uniforms have to be permanent press, and permanent press has to be polyester. If I'm going to wear polyester, I might as well go on wearing my old sweat pants.
But I did pick up a muskmelon at Sweet Corn Charley's on the way there.
Also picked up a pair of white sandals at Payless — the grommets make them a bit more informal than white sandals ought to be, and they've got heels, but I'm going to give them a try next Sunday.
And I found a pair of mesh-backed weight-lifting gloves that fit better than my current pair at the sporting-goods shop. I've put them in the back-up bike-parts cupboard, but the next time I put my current pair through the wash, I'm going to swap.
I'd put them into the wash now, but they need darning.
Found everything I'd come for at Aldi. The potato salad and slaw must be selling well, because they have added macaroni salad and some pasta salads. The pasta salads were made with fine noodles, and now I wish I'd bought one, but at the time I reflected that I already had potato salad and slaw in my cart. (And I just barely got everything into my panniers, so it's just as well.)
I'm happier about the slaw being ground instead of shredded than I was! But I can't eat much at a time because my teeth don't meet well enough to crush the small bits.
I suspect that there is something on McDonalds' menu that I can eat, but I couldn't read the menu, so I bought a container of yogurt at Aldi. (I have a plastic spoon in my emergency-tool kit just for eating yogurt.) The regular yogurt was all low fat. so I looked at the greek yogurt. Ah, the "pineapple" off at the right end, in a separate box with "strawberry", looked good.
When I started to eat it, gaack! It was stickier than any glue I've ever seen, the rubbery texture made library paste look like a gourmet treat, and the "fruit" was canned pie filling with plenty of cornstarch-thickened syrup.
"Fat free". Oops.
But I was hungry, so I ate it. And had a slice of avocado and some potato salad when I got home.
I made Malt-O-Meal in a skillet for breakfast, and when I sat down to eat, Dave said that it looked like sausage gravy.
So tomorrow morning, I'm going to do the same thing again, but with sausage instead of butter.
I melted butter in a skillet, stirred three tablespoons of Malt-O-Meal into it, stirred in a cup of milk, then brought it to a boil while stirring constantly. Then left it to thicken for five minutes. I ate it with maple syrup and more butter. Didn't really need sweetening, but I love maple syrup.
Only two small loads of wash today. I don't think that undressing into the washer reduced the size of pile in the laundry bin significantly. We've been awful clean or awful dirty, or I've missed something.
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I spent most of the afternoon typing a verbose entry in my training log:
<quote>
I spent seventy-five years thinking that a "water haul" meant that you hauled water back and forth uselessly. After water bottles were invented, that even made sense: you went out to haul something, but all you hauled was your drinking water.
Yesterday I learned that a literal "water haul" was hauling up your nets and finding nothing in them but sea water. Fishermen along the coast of Canada started using "water haul" as an emphatic form of "fruitless effort", and it spread inland, then down into the states.
And the phrase is much more emphatic now that I know what it means!
The title of this tour: I went out to buy scrub pants, but found that the store that used to sell them now sells permanent-press medical uniforms — which look something like scrub suits, but would not be at all cool for working in the garden.
But I did buy a melon at Sweet Corn Charley's on the way. The tour started very well: at my first stop I bought new meshback weight-lifting gloves, at the second I found a pair of sandals that fit! I wasn't as pleased as punch with the style, which features a wedge sole — less than an inch thicker at the heel, but a sandal isn't supposed to have *any* heel — and two conspicuous shiny grommets.
A week or so ago, I found meshback cycling gloves at the Trailhouse, but only in size large.
<sorts receipts> there were no further fits. After I left Big R (with an oregano plant, but no pants to wear while planting it), I went to McDonalds. They *might* have had something on the menu that I could eat, but the type was small and hard to focus (I think it was yellow on a dark ground), so I went to Aldi and bought yogurt. I bought fat-free yogurt by mistake, and it was *dire*.
I tried the dark-brown sandals on this tour, and found the soles less stiff than the light-brown sandals. Also, these sandals fit better — which means that there isn't a half-inch of sole sticking out to keep my toes away from the toe clips. Only noticed the bumping once, but I'm going back to the larger sandals. The toes are velcro, so I can adjust them to fit socks that I can wear with my Duegis.
I got the pain in the sole of my left foot noted on Feb 20 and other entries, but only for a few steps. It did not seem related to any of the places where I could feel the pedals through the sandals.
I got very itchy about the ankles in bed that night. I strongly suspect the elastic in my Pearl Izumi socks.
<end quote>
On my last trip through the intersection of Detroit and Pope, I realized that the driver of a car at the left-turn stop line on Pope can't see *any* of Detroit.
I like meatloaf, and most starch is soft anyway, but having to eat all my vegetables cooked gets old really fast. I put shredded lettuce in my corned-beef hash for breakfast.
The winter onion bulbils are well past the stage when they are easy to clean, but I've been picking some every day: they retain character when cooked.
Dave hates the smell of cooking onions, and winter onions go beyond the call of duty.
Finally went to the Pill Box. I learned that, except for one walker that insurance doesn't cover, the only differences among the various walkers on display were wheel size, paint color, and basket material.
The non-covered walker has the biggest wheels, but it is also the largest, heaviest, and ugliest. I'd been dithering about rejecting it before finding out that it wasn't covered; I'm pretty sure the second-largest wheels are large enough.
At first glance the cloth baskets appear to be the most convenient because they don't have to be removed before you fold the walker up. But they do have to be emptied; if there is a large number of things in the basket, it would be more convenient to lift it out contents and all. I think I prefer the cloth baskets. If I make a habit of carrying large numbers of small things, I can put a bag in the bag — and a drawstring bag, unlike a wire tray, won't spill if you knock it over.
Before leaving, I said "I sure hope this is a waste of money!" — but be careful what you wish for. I *could* go straight to a wheelchair.
From the Pill Box, I rode to Walmart. Didn't find any scrub suits; after looking at the "active wear", I didn't look very hard. But I did happen to walk by a display of glue sticks and say "awk scrickle". The glue sticks I used at last year's Day of Helping were rather old then, and I suspect that I have thrown them out.
So I bought one. I had my choice of a bag containing a large number of the size I want, or one huge stick — I bought the huge one because I didn't want a bunch to keep track of. Of course, I could have given away the surplus glue sticks, but I didn't think of that then. Anyhow, a big stick is easier for small children to handle.
I'd better read over my check list.
Just did — everything else is stuff I've definitely got. Except the child assistant, and Rick Swaim said that he'd find me one.
I would like an eighth of a yard of happy-face yellow fabric, but can do very nicely without it. I may stop at Lowery's on Farmers'-Market day.
Supper is all taken care of: there's a meatloaf in the fridge, ready to pop into the oven at 4:30, and a dish of instant mashed potatoes ready to pop into the microwave at fifteen after five. I think I'll serve cold pickled beets for veg; Dave will eat them, and I can. Or maybe I'll warm up some peas. Peas cook up soft, and Dave likes them.
Every time I make meatloaf, I think of Nancy telling me "and now you have to put your hands right down in that mess."
That's the way the Fellowship Committee did it under the supervision of a food-service professional, and we didn't even wear gloves. I picked up the box of gloves saying "I guess we gotta" and he said "We're going to heat it to 160F." We got to do it twice! We forgot to put in the eggs, so we had to dump it all out of the pans back into the mixing bowls.
I'd best write down what's in tonight's meatloaf, in case it's good:
1.38 pounds of 73% ground beef, minus what Dave pattied for his supper. (Yesterday was fend-for-yourself night.)
I minced up all the celery sticks in the raw-veggie box, because Dave won't eat them and I can't. That was about one stalk.
One small head of winter-onion bulbils. I minced the sprouts and threw away the flowers and secondary heads. I should have cut the bulbils in half; they wanted to pop out of the mixture.
Two mustard leaves, chopped fine with my big chef's knife. The flakes stuck firmly to my hands and the bowl. I hope none of those I couldn't scrape off were the thymenoregano. I stripped the leaves from one stem of common thyme, and nipped a terminal bud off the "spicy Greek Oregano" and minced it.
Two eggs, one tablespoon of Malt-O-Meal, one envelope of gelatin, and a quarter teaspoon of salt.
I put the gelatin in because I want to slice the left-overs cold.
I plan to glaze the top with ketchup just before putting it into the oven, because Dave likes it and I don't mind.
And it was a *delicious* meat loaf.
I went to the farmers' market hoping to buy another piece of beeswax, but didn't think to bring a pill pouch to put it in. I dropped it and got it dirty. But I managed to pick the dirt off with a paring knife before putting it (in a pill pouch) into my embroidery-gig supplies.
It's shaped like a robot, and a young child who was present spontaneously informed me that it was cute. But then, he was the son of the seller.
I am not going to like my new wedge-heel sandals. Even though the heel doesn't show much, I fell off them twice just walking around the bedroom getting dressed.
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The heels do just fine when walking straight ahead, which is most of the time.
All of a sudden Day of Caring is this coming Saturday. Rick called for volunteers to pack food into bags on Tuesday, and I thought "Nope. I don't want to repeat the Easter incident; I'm going to spend this whole week treating myself like an eggshell."
But I also don't want to be atrophied and stiff — I think I'll increase my biking range, but not by very much. I *think* I'll be all right as long as I don't get into "I hope I can make it home" mode. All my rides of late have been well within my capacity, including the eleven-mile trip to Walmart.
Current outlook is for a clear, hot day on Saturday, and the odds for Thursday, when I get my stitches out, are improving. I sure hope the thirty-seven percent chance of rain early on Monday afternoon comes through; we can use the water. There's also a chance all day Wednesday. Come on, Wednesday, wring it all out and leave me a dry afternoon on Thursday!
Lowery has lots of yellow fabrics, but no happyface-yellow broadcloth. I guess the yellow-orange scraps from my sheer jersey will do. I might want to glue yellow paper to some of my cardboard circles. That would test my glue stick while there is still time to get something else. I'm pretty sure that Owen's carries Elmer's school glue.
But then I was absolutely certain that Big R sold scrub suits!
I glued yellow paper to three pieces of cardboard, and the glue stick works fine, both as a glue stick and as a burnisher. I found that after gluing the back of the cardboard, I should glue the edge, slap the cardboard onto the backing paper, press with my hands, turn over and burnish, then cut the paper about half the thickness of the cardboard from the edge and burnish the flange onto the edge.
But I was on the third cardboard before I figured everything out. Pity I don't need any more. I didn't need three, since I have only two pieces of translucent yellow-orange linen.
Several days ago, I ate a slice of left-over Malt-O-Meal and it was quite good cold. Which made me think that the solution to carrying a sack lunch would be to season up some mush, chill it in a loaf pan, and put a thick slab into a sandwich bag.
So yesterday I set out to do it. Not a grain of corn meal in the house — anyone up for an expedition to Bonneyville Mill? — just corn flour and grits and, down at the bottom under the rice, a sack of fine grits "also known as polenta". So I boiled up a cup of polenta with a quarter pound of ground beef and a lot of other good stuff, including lots of tediously-peeled winter-onion bulbils, all the leaves the wild mustard can spare, and a can of tomato paste.
And it is good. I was sorry that there wasn't more that didn't fit into the loaf pan.
But hello? I'm getting my stitches out on Thursday, and since I haven't told anyone else how to conduct my embroidery gig, I've sworn to treat myself like an eggshell until after the Day of Caring. That means no bike rides that call for a packed lunch even though tomorrow is predicted to be perfect.
But the stuff is better warmed up anyway. It made a good lunch today — I put a hint of chipotle in it.
For eating cold, cornmeal would definitely be better than polenta.
Thursday's probability of rain continues to shift toward Wednesday.
I've been saying "come on, roundabout!" every time I go through the intersection at the entrance to Winona Lake, but find the prose in Monday's paper's article about the proposed roundabout a bit overblown.
The artist's sketch was drawn on top of a photograph of what is actually there, so it isn't a wild flight of imagination like the previews of the chicanery on Market street. (I suspected those of being clip art, rather than wild imagination.)
It looks like a straightforward, functional roundabout, with the welcome sign off to the side where it's always been, so it doesn't block your view of the traffic. On the other hand, there's no guarantee they won't plant trees and bushes in the central landscaping instead of low-growing plants. (Or low-growing plants that get neglected into high-growing plants.)
The roundabout consumes hardly any extra space, rounding two or three corners and indenting one. It helps that the tunnel has a left-turn lane which will no longer be needed.
My first reaction to the bullet "Provide for safer bicycle and pedestrian connection" was "say what?" Continuous traffic that never gets piled up behind a stop light would make it even harder for pedestrians to cross Winona Avenue. But those white streaks directing the entering drivers to turn right probably double as safety islands, so that a pedestrian could cross one lane at a time instead of waiting for overlapping holes in the traffic.
They've got a logo over the intersection of Winona and McKinley, so I can't see how it will work for people walking on the recreationway.
For bikes coming out of Park Avenue, right turns are exactly as before. No cyclist who knows about McKinley would go straight. (The climb on Argonne is horrible, and there isn't one inch of extra space.) I always turn left there — I'd go up Chestnut if I wanted to go right — and I'm of two minds about that. On the one hand, I'd have to check for entering traffic on two lanes instead of one, on the other hand I will have undisputed right-of-way over the traffic on those two lanes. Which doesn't mean that I don't have to watch them! This is a town where people frequently fail to notice that a railroad train is crossing the street.
Coming out of Winona, anyone who wanted to turn left would have turned at McKinley. Right turns are the same as before except that you don't have to wait for the light. Straight through: same as any intersection where the side street has a yield sign, and there is no oncoming traffic, so you have to watch in only one direction: clear improvement.
Coming out of King's Highway: I've never tried to turn left there, so I don't know to compare with the new system. Left Seems equivalent to coming out of Park Avenue, rest equivalent to Winona.
And I wouldn't be coming down Argonne on a bike. Down doesn't have the sprainful climb, but it still has poor sight lines and bumper-to-bumper traffic.
But I did do it once, and the roundabout will probably keep traffic from backing up past Hendricks. But McKinley is so close, and McKinley is actually pleasant — if you already know that the pavement under the viaduct is horrible; the shadow of the viaduct renders the roughness invisible and might fool a newbie into hitting it at speed. But of course anyone who has been taught how to use the roads has been told that streets under viaducts are very expensive to repair and you have to look for bad pavement in those places.
And it's a danger only coming down; going up, you pass under the bridge while you are just beginning to speed up after slowing for the turn, and the roughness is easy to see from that direction.
The new system will be a definite loss for the owners of the billboard beside the tunnel: instead of sitting at the stoplight studying it, the people coming out of Park Avenue aren't going to see it at all.
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Grrr. I made a special trip to Owen's to buy Kroger seltzer; the only other item on my shopping list was translucent cups.
There was only one package of seltzer left — and they were completely out of cups.
I bought LeCroix seltzer even though a package costs more, and it's put up in a less-convenient three-by-four package instead of two by six.
I didn't notice until I got home that LeCroix packages are still four cans long, but only two cans wide. At least LeCroix was three for ten dollars instead of the usual $3.99.
Dave requested Mountain Dew and Pepsi as I was leaving. The soda was also threefer, so I bought Dr. Pepper too. I read the ingredients on each box as I was putting it into the cart; I've bought caffeine-free soda by mistake more than once.
Label reading once saved me from buying a bottle of cherry soda labeled "seltzer beverage". I don't like the taste of aspartame and Dave doesn't like soda in bottles, so that would have gone to waste.
I pondered "what's for supper" — the Woo-Hoo! meat bin was clear full of lovely steaks, which I won't be able to eat until Thursday. I cruised the deli aisle: fried chicken, fried chicken, fried chicken. I *can* eat fried chicken, but it's no fun if you can't crunch the bones. Then I spotted a dish of macaroni and cheese, and hared off to buy eight ounces of extra-sharp cheddar and a can of spam. I had noticed a box of elbow mac in the freezer when I was hunting for the corn meal.
And we've got deli-sliced ham that's been around long enough; I may cut some up and stir it in — it would make it a little less carby.
The box of macaroni turned out to be a twelve-ounce box that had already had eight ounces taken out for macaroni and cheese. So I weighed out eight ounces of the whole-wheat egg noodles I'd bought at the fairgrounds farmers' market — and it was delicious! If I see them again, I'm going to buy another bag. But we can't have noodle-based dishes very often, because Dave is diabetic and I'm fat.
It was also good left over: I'd packed it into a more-or-less cubical refrigerator dish, so it made neat slices with pink stripes of spam and yellow stripes of cheese on a background of noodle color. I feel the urge to go cut myself a slice, and I just finished breakfast!
Yesterday, I took everything out of my backpack to get it organized for tomorrow's embroidery class — and one of the first things I took out was an un-opened package of three glue sticks. Apparently I had decided to keep my glue in the backpack instead of under the Necchi. I'm going to take both; the three sticks are school glue and the big stick is permanent.
I should be writing a log at the bottom of EMBROGIG.HTM so I don't forget what I learn by doing this. Since I don't come on duty until 12:30 (the guests start arriving at 1:00), it's theoretically possible for me to go to the farmers' markets — but I think that lying down would be a better use of the time.
We heard a rumor that swimming had been replaced by kayacking at this year's triathlon, but when we looked out after waking up, there were swimmers in the water. But when I went out to comb my hair, I saw kayaks. Also eight ducks waddling across the lawn with little regard for my presence; the Smeltzers have been feeding them.
For supper yesterday, I went to the Great Wall and bought an order of Moo Shoo Pork to go. We'll have to do that again! There was one burrito and rather a lot of rice left over.
I just made up another batch of tooth powder, this time with four fennel seeds ground into the salt. Every time I make tooth powder, I note it in the Banner so that I can tell how long a half cup of soda lasts, and every time I empty the jar, I realize that I need to know the date in order to look up the date. It would help if I'd given the files consecutive names so that I could search all of them in one go, but using letters to indicate the month has too many advantages for me to switch to numbers.
I should get around to making a Web page out of the recipe, because I never did find one when I got tired of hunting for unsweetened toothpaste and started searching the Web. On the other hand, by now other people must have had the same experience, so my account would be redundant. And all the confounding "I know nothing about it but it will Save The Planet and make you immortal" pages are still out there.
Last night, I laid two chocolate bars on the card table so I'd remember to take them with me this afternoon. When I went to add a handkerchief to the pile, there was nothing on the card table but the fabric I plan to make into a trapezoid skirt. I still have no clue as to where I actually put the chocolate.
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I found the chocolate when I got dressed: I'd been afraid I'd forget it, so I'd put it into the pocket of the shirt I intended to wear.
I didn't really need tea and chocolate when I was up to my kneecaps in small children. I counted the scraps when cleaning up, and I'd mounted six medallions. We also sent a couple of designs home with thread, needle, etc., and some got bored before finishing and carried them off unmounted.
Megan was an enormous help — and she finished her design. Of course mine is carefully designed not to be finished, but I put only a few stitches into it. I don't know what all she did, because she was most helpful when I had my back to the table, and when one boy needed supervision for every stitch. The supervision went better after I got the idea of making a hole with a darning needle where the next stitch goes. And he did the spokes at the finish mostly on his own. If he comes back next year, we'll have a new needleman in the world. I hope that I get around to pushing into some of the other events for children this year; it's less stressful with recent practice!
I didn't get nearly as tired as I did the Monday before Easter, but I went up to Club 56 and did some back-stretching exercises before walking home, just to be safe.
On the way to the church, I passed a trailer loaded with porta-potties that had been in the park's parking lot and said "The triathlon is over", but when I came back, the tent in the parking lot near Cerulean was still up and a party was going on. I wanted to ask whether this was a warm-down party for the staff, but wasn't curious enough to walk to where I could talk to them.
I unloaded the surplus glue sticks on Jennifer Near, who will use them for Kiddy Kollege.
The happyface designs drew no interest whatsoever. But one boy was delighted to use the black floss I bought to go with them. And someone used the dark navy I put in in case I couldn't buy black. Perhaps I should add dark brown to the package.
I need to add tape winders to the pack; somebody *always* plays with a skein of floss when my attention is elsewhere. I wound this year's tangled skein on one of the cardboard sewing kits I brought to give needles away. We used at least two of them, one of them with a razor blade in. (People under twenty-one don't get razor blades.)
Both times at least one pair of notches got used twice; when I make more, I'll put in the usual four notches. I'd notched three times because it's easier to space three evenly, and I thought I'd be sending only one or two colors home. Didn't think of wanting to send multiple needlefuls of a color.
Thanks in large part to Megan, I got things back into the bag pretty much in order. I'll need to sort it out only to replenish depleted supplies, etc.
Had trouble with my hat and my backpack both going to the church yesterday and coming home today. Going, I knocked my hat off putting the backpack on. Coming home, I got all ready except for putting on my hat — and realized that while cleaning up, I had packed it. So I had to put the backpack on a second time, and both times I tried to put my right arm through the handbag handle.
That was the third time; I'd done the same Friday night.
The backpack was a little heavier coming home than going out despite having less in it, but not bad.
When I got home about five, Dave was getting ready to eat, but I'd had my second hot dog late in the party, and only sampled. But I'm getting hungry now. No wonder, it's six-thirty.
On Friday I went to the pencil mug for Sharpies to take to my embroidery class and the red, black, green, blue, silver, and copper were there, but no gold. I looked in all the places where writing implements might end up, no gold-color Sharpie. So I shrugged and packed, and the kids never missed it because they didn't know it existed.
The copper sharpie is hard to tell from the gold one anyway.
When I was dressing this morning, I found a gold Sharpie in my top drawer. No theories as to how it got there.
The Stills dropped in to give us an estimate on cleaning up the willow. And apologized for disturbing us on a Sunday; it was *their* Sunday that was spoiled. They said that they've cleaned up or stabilized most of the dangerous damage in the county.
We plan, as long as they have to bring their equipment out here, to have them cut the top out of the dead birch and trim up the three oak trees. She said it will be Thursday if they don't have time on Monday.
They came on Monday. I had wash on the line. Place looks a lot better, and it's now safe for the firework watchers to go down to the beach.
Which may have an antique seaplane beached on it. Apparently, the local airport doesn't have a wet runway.
Winona Lake has recently been declared an official emergency landing strip. The map says "no services", but if you can burn boat fuel, and if you fit into the canal, you can fill up at the marina.
I'll have to notice, the next time I walk to the village, whether the fuel pumps are still there.
I opened the loveseat to put sheets on the foldaway bed, but found it already made up. The sheets stashed under the armrest pillows are for the futon.
In the process, I got all the junk off the love seat, and now I can sit on it to consult the dictionaries — but I also moved the dictionary table.
The corner of the parlor is knee deep in throw pillows, and we don't use any. Perhaps I should hand them out as party favors.
I've piled all the spare bed pillows in front of the throw pillows, with the decent pillow on top.
I'm down to one clean pillow case. Perhaps Friday would be a good day to wash the hot whites.
I couldn't sleep at naptime yesterday, so I got up and did the shopping I intended to do this morning, then in the evening, I put the hot whites in to soak.
Turned out that there were two more pillowcases blending in with the sheets — I keep the pile of pilllowcases on top of the pile of sheets — but the hot whites were way overdue and this should be a good day to dry them in sunlight.
I forgot to buy frozen blueberries, so I'm making a raspberry pancake for breakfast. Dave is eating a bowl of cold cereal.
I checked this morning, and the candle warmer I use for the cheese dip is in the cupboard, second place I looked. I bought a pound of extra-sharp cheddar last week, and plan to use half of it.
I believe the recipe is "melt altogether too much butter in the little iron saucepan, stir in an eighth of a cup of whole-grain white-wheat flour, stir in a cup of milk, add half a pound of cut-up cheese, stir until blended.
Shouldn't there be salt in there somewhere? Well, the butter is salted.
Today's the day I'm supposed to send the Banner, so you'll have to wait a month to see whether it worked. Unless you go to http://wlweather.net/LETTERS/2016BANN/2016BANN.HTM and read the July draft.
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While distracted with the embroidery gig, I left my black skirt-in-progress on the card table. On a horizontal surface. Next to a window.
Now it's a furry gray skirt. Busy washing, I didn't touch the skirt today, but I did cut a few backing papers to replace those used last Saturday. I wish I could find a die to cut them.
So I just Froogled. It suggests that it would be worth my while to try the scrapbooking store again — but I think they went broke several years ago.
So I DuckDucked — various pages say that they are in Big R plaza, but the Web is notoriously out of date. I must remember to look the next time I'm out that way.
No need. Street View shows a Great Clips where Simply Scrapbookng used to be.
Hah! Buffalo Street Emporium has scrapbooking supplies! I never thought of looking there.
Also carried a wheelbarrow of dirt to fill in the skunk grave. One more should do it.
When we thought the skunks were going to starve, I dug a hole big enough for six in the southwest corner of the garden. Since I'm trying to build up that end of the garden with dirt dug from under the compost heap, instead of raking up the dirt scattered in the rows, I'm carrying dirt from where I'm digging out to make a place to rake the compost heap back to where it was.
I was surprised — and grateful — when I realized that the church isn't having a Fourth of July picnic this year. It made too much partying for one weekend.