E:\LETTERS\AUGBAN11.TXT 1 August 2011 Despite immense labor expended on meeting Thunderbird's requirements, it made a mess out of the hypertext banner, so I'm reverting to plain text. At least the link at the top works, and connects to a functioning copy on the Web. On the other hand, five proof-reading passes failed to notice a typo in the subject line. 3 August 2011 While eating lunch, I dribbled tomato on my freshly- laundered housedress. I ran cold water on the stains and hung it up to dry, because I don't really have anything else that's cool to wear outside. It was a good sandwich, though. It's time to re-thread my treadle and mend Dave's flag. If the "HemBob" fits a White bobbin case, that is. If I have to re-wind the thread, I'll use the Necchi, because I'm short of White bobbins. New bobbins don't quite fit the bobbin winder. I keep intending to show the mechanic at Lowery's one that fits and one that doesn't, in the hope that he can sell me a dozen of the right kind; in the meanwhile, I use the White only for threads that I'm going to use more than once. Surprise bonus when I tried on my new "curry" bra: in dim light, "curry" matches my skin. I think that I'll go on wearing white bras with my translucent blouse, though. Better to see the bra than to think I'm not wearing one! 4 August 2011 I've got to get my homework done so I can get all these stupid icons off my desktop. 5 August 2011 Okay, today's the day that I get around to those "oakwood" pants that have been hanging on my "to be mended" hook for months, so I went to the hook, confidently reached up -- and they aren't there. Or anywhere. The hook was extremely crowded, and now it's not. Something has gone someplace. I have found a few things that I'd forgotten losing. At that point I looked around and saw them peeking out from under a bandanna on top of a pile of scraps. So I spent the morning throwing out scraps. In the process, I found a piece of white interlock to make a pocket for the white T-shirt I found while hunting for the pants. Only 11:18, but I feel like a nap, which is good: I need to roll out at 1:00 for my appointment at 2:15. 9 August 2011 Overslept, had to drive. February's appointment is in late morning -- but odds are the weather will be lousy. My gums are in good shape but I'll probably need a filling next time. I found a fresh red bruise on my leg this morning, and was on the verge of accusing Dave of leaning his elbow on me in the night when I remembered that I had had an awkward time dismounting the bike a couple of times yesterday. We were practically out of bread, so I made a Sprawlmart loop my first job yesterday morning. I found that as aggravating as the rumble strip is when a storm is brewing, it's even more aggravating when you are carrying a gallon of milk, a gallon of vegetable cocktail, fifty fluid ounces of laundry detergent, and a whole bunch of groceries, off- balance on account of leaving room for bread. I had to stop and rest several times before I got through the narrow place. Someday I'm going to measure the width of the danger|danger bike lane. Aunt Millie was picked over, and I didn't get anything but two loaves of bread and one bag of steak rolls (mini- subs), so I'll have to go back soon. Perhaps I can ride to Aunt Millie's by way of Wooster Road, then leave my bike in the gas station and cross 250E on foot. There's a tape measure on my bike-key ring. I came home from the ride sweaty. A rinse would have sufficed, since my jersey had been washed recently, but Dave's coolest shirt was dirty, so I put a load of light clothes in to soak, washed them after my nap, and got them on the line just in time to go out and celebrate our anniversary at the Golden Corral. We ate entirely too much, then went on a boat ride instead of walking. It's the first time I've been on the lake this summer. The weather was perfect. Wish I'd thought of taking off my sandals and stockings first, though. I did take them off before crossing the beach on our way back. This morning, after ironing the shirt, I pressed the back of the dress I wore yesterday evening. The seats in the boat *looked* dry, but I found out different when I got up! Lucky it was the black one. (Well, inevitable, since all my other non-winter dresses are ankle length.) The clothes weren't quite dry when the rain started, so they are on racks in the parlor. Together with most of the black load I did Sunday night. Yes, my scarlet bra (which I suspect of bleeding) is finally clean. When it came out of the washer, I hung identical black, scarlet, and yellow -- curry looks yellow in this context -- bras in the hallway, then said "That's somebody's flag". Still can't remember whose. Can't be *too* many tricolors in the world. Umm . . . there can, once you realize that *order* matters. There could be six distinct red, yellow, and black flags. On the other hand, the number of countries, though shifting, is finite. The first glance at Wikipedia's "tricolor flag" page reminded me that you can have *twelve* black, scarlet, and yellow flags: the stripes can be either horizontal or vertical. But the one I'm thinking of is horizontal. [Further reading] It's Germany. 10 August 2011 I lost my favorite bodkin yesterday. I sat down in the church parlor, took my stuff out of my bag, took the bodkin out of the sandwich bag, went back into the sandwich bag for threaded needle, thimble, and elastic, prepared to sew the bodkin to the elastic -- where's the bodkin? After checking all the crevices in the furniture, standing up and brushing myself, etc., I sewed the back-up bodkin to the elastic and went on with the job, pausing at intervals to crawl around on the floor looking under things. Thought it might turn up when I packed things away, but it's just purely gone, even though it has to be within arm's reach of where I was sitting. Grump. I can probably buy another when I next visit Lowery's, but it comes in a package with two other "weaving needles" -- one is my back-up bodkin, and the third is completely useless. I finished the next-to-the-last "topic" of the em-com course yesterday. Long way from finished, because I have yet to do any of the "activities". If the final exam uses the end-of-topic quizzes as a question pool, as I've been told, I can pass the exam after a quick review of the twenty-nine topics -- but I'm a long way from having even a clue as to what to do in a real situation. Except that I want nothing to do with being Net Control, and I'm not at all sure about logging. One of the topics listed the characteristics of a good net-control operator, and described my exact opposite except for "must be able to hear and speak". And hearing and speaking would be optional if I knew code. Frittered the whole day playing with my computer. I did move my sewing from the ironing board to the bed and back again a couple of times. And wash a load of pillowcases and dish towels. I took the big bowl out to make a batch of kettle bread, looked out the window at the trees thrashing in the wind, and put it back again. And the wind hasn't let up. It dried the pillowcases real fast. 12 August 2011 The #10 needle I found in the carpet yesterday or the day before is back in the carpet. Getting stepped on had bent it just right to baste underlining to patches lying flat, so I was over by the patio door trying to thread it when it leaped out of my hand. I saw it sparkle as it did a double flip, but I didn't see it land. Later on I tried closing the drapes and crawling around with a flashlight. I found a white hair, a bit of dry grass, and two snippets of thread, but no needle. I greatly fear that I'll find it again the same way I did the first time. I rode to Marsh by way of Lowery's and the vet yesterday. A teeny little piece of stamped steel costs $3.65, plus tax. But now I have two back-up bodkins. (And two utterly- useless sacking needles.) Perhaps I'll try threading all three pieces of elastic at the same time on the last bra. Googled "sacking needle" to make sure that that was what I meant, and found a web site that sells five of the bodkin I like for $3.00. Plus shipping. Five of the kind I don't like are $4.00. They ask $2.40 for a 4" sacking needle and $3.60 for a 6" sacking needle. My two are 5" Spanish rice for supper. I ate too much. I put in two of the delicate little yellow squashes I bought last Saturday, and liked them very much. When they are that young, you can slice them up stem and all. Mostly fiddled today. Worked on patches for my linen- blend jeans a little, and watered the jalapen~os and the pussy willow tree. The park has been mowed and he didn't mow the willow. It has new growth. 13 August 2011 The grape tomatoes I bought today aren't nearly as good as the cherry tomatoes I got from the Yoders last Saturday. Supper tonight will be steamed sweet corn with real butter, and hamburgers on sliced bread with a big juicy tomato and a great big onion. I bought more squash -- two zucchini and a yellow -- so I'm going to have to cook something this week. I still have one of the baby yellows from last week. And five more wax peppers. I cut up the last of last weeks batch and put some in my lunch. I fried minced pepper and onion in sesame oil, then covered that with rye and white-wheat pancake batter, and laid a slice of sharp cheddar on it after I flipped it over. When I came back to eat it after the cheese melted, I realized that I'd made a pizza. It would have been much better with a touch of tomato sauce. 15 August 2011 Now that the weather has turned cool, I've found another cotton sundress at the back of the closet. It doesn't have pockets, though. Two loads of wash -- I put the colorfast darks in with the light colors, so my scarlet bra is languishing unwashed again. Went in to bring in the sheet before lying down for a nap, and found that everything was dry, except a heavy pair of shorts and a white sock that had gotten into the second load by mistake. (The other thick socks had been washed with the sheet.) My twelve-quart steel bowl got a workout today. I started by scraping an ear of corn to make fritters for breakfast, which I like to do in the big bowl because it's easier to clean than the kitchen. Then I made five cups of white-wheat flour into bread dough, divided it into nine rolls, and froze them in sandwich bags so I can make fried dough for lunch. It was a lot softer and stickier than the dough I've been making from red wheat; makes me want to look at the bag to see whether I got pastry flour by mistake, but I think I emptied it when I filled the cannister. Then I measured five cups of red-wheat flour, made exactly the same recipe, and had trouble kneading all the flour in. Woke up from my nap early, put the dough into the well- oiled kettle, formed it into a loaf, and built two fires: big sticks in the fireplace to supply coals, and small sticks on the hearth to pre-heat it. By the time the fires had died down to coals, the dough was ready. My fire wasn't symmetrical, and the bottom of the loaf baked unevenly. I corrected by sweeping all the coals on the lid to one side after I'd taken the kettle off the fire and turned the loaf over. For supper we had canned mushroom soup and warm bread. -- I forgot to change the cat box today. Since we have two, I think I'll scoop one and put the other out on the patio to deal with in the morning. 18 August 2011 As of Tuesday, I have nine bras. I don't think I've ever been that wealthy before. Still feels queer to toss one into the laundry with no thought as to whether I have enough clean ones. I think it was the day before yesterday I had another fried pizza for lunch. I'd put a ball of frozen dough in the fridge the night before; when thawed, it seemed much less sticky than when I'd made it. But then I oiled all the balls to keep them from sticking to the bags, and greased the skillet heavily. One roll was just enough to line a six-inch skillet; I think that I'll bake a couple of pan pizzas for supper, if I still remember this when it's oven- lighting season. I covered it with the other six-inch skillet until it had risen, filled the shell with fresh vegetables, including the last baby squash, covered the vegetables with a thin coat of canned salsa, and topped it with a slice of provelone and a pre-cooked sausage patty cut into bits. I thought it would need to be run under the broiler when it was done, but about three-fourths of an hour over the lowest-possible heat left the top nicely steamed, and the bottom was crisp enough that I could lift the pizza out of the skillet and put it on a seven-inch paper plate, which it fit perfectly. I am definitely going to do that again. Perhaps with pepperoni and Mozzarella. I don't think I'll be able to buy any more baby squashes, but some of the vendors pick their squash and zucchini while they are still fit to eat. Tuesday morning we left the truck off at the Toyota dealer, and ate breakfast for six at the Red Apple. My Belgian waffle was only a little more than breakfast for one young person, but Dave had biscuits and gravy for one and a half young people, three eggs (he'd ordered two), and enough hash browns to make three generous side dishes. And we ate every last crumb. Well, there was a smear of gravy left on the plate. It was white sauce with cubes of pre-cooked sausage in it. I've been reading Mom's bread-and-butter recipe. I went into the cookbook because an Arachnerd who went to a link I posted on Lace-Chat found that Mrs. Stanley's Spice Cupcakes called for ` cup butter. I changed it to 1/2 cup. The URL I posted was http://joybeeson.home.comcast.net/~joybeeson/COOKBOOK/COOKBOOK.TXT , but she said that it worked better to go to http://joybeeson.home.comcast.net/~joybeeson/COOKBOOK/ and click on the link. Her browser downloads text files if you go to them directly, but opens them properly if you click on a link. I was unable to duplicate the error with Firefox. Perhaps I should write back and ask what browser she was using. But there's nothing I can do about it anyway. I've been thinking of buying some assorted vegetables and making a batch of bread-and-butter pickles. Perhaps putting in some flower stems from the volunteer squash in the garden, since the stems of the baby yellow squash had a pleasant spiced flavor. But I'm not at all sure what any of the vines are; poking around out there I saw two yellow gourds, one with a green bottom -- the other might have one too; it's hard to wade among the weeds for a closer look without stepping on something that isn't a weed -- that don't resemble anything I've ever eaten. I've heard that some gourds are toxic, so I'm not real big on eating anything I can't identify. The flowers on the melon vine in the strawberry bed have wee threadlike stems, so I sampled a cluster of buds, which tasted like cucumber. I'm fairly sure of what that vine is, because it has melon blossoms on it, and because I cleaned melons on the rim of the raised bed last summer. 19 August 2011 I made the chicken-liver recipe in the old cookbook for supper yesterday. I substituted sunflower-seed oil for the butter oil and a pat of butter for the buttermilk, and added a chopped onion. I cooked the onion a bit before dumping in the box of pre-sliced mushrooms -- I should have added the mushrooms as soon as I'd stirred the onion around enough to be sure it got its fair share of grease. Two onions wouldn't have been amiss, as I had a whole pound of chicken livers. Offered Al a piece of liver; he didn't deign to notice. He prefers pate'. On my last trip to Kroger I picked up five three-ounce cans of Iams pate', forgetting that the reason I don't buy Iams is that they put much too much guar gum in and it makes the canned food tough. But the quarter of a can I fed him yesterday squashed nicely when I pressed it with a knife, and Al ate all of it. Perhaps they put in less thickener when it says "pate'" on the label, perhaps it doesn't get tough until chilled. If the last, I can zap it a few seconds. Which will annoy Al very much. Once he has managed to herd me into the kitchen, he expects his treat NOW. I think that for lunch today, I'll chop up a bunch of garlic-chive flowerbud stems and mix them with chopped liver. Better get a chunk of kettle bread out of the freezer now. [Hasty departure.] 22 August 2011 Zapped Al's food too many seconds yesterday, so the poor dear not only had to wait for me to heat it, he had to wait for me to stir it with an ice cube. (Memo: three seconds, not fifteen!) This looks like a lovely day to take a bike ride. Unfortunately, we are nearly out of dry cat food, so I'm making the Aldi loop by car. I *can* carry a bag of food on the bike, but that doesn't leave room for groceries and bread. I started clearing weeds out of the garden, and got a path about wide enough to push the Culta-Eze half the length of a railroad tie. It is surprisingly easy to pull the grass; I hope that isn't just that the soil is looser near the ties. (It may have gotten some sand mixed in when I was setting the ties.) I was surprised that the soil is dry, even though we've had a lot of rain. Perhaps the grass sucked it all up. I dug up a hill of potatoes and put them in the vegetable soup. Canned chicken broth that I'd cooked a package of gizzards and hearts in, a zucchini, half a yellow squash, a small piece of red pepper, a banana pepper, half a pimento, celery, a little onion, a few chunks of canned turkey. It was very good and we ate most of it even though the saucepan was nearly full. Now what do I do with most of a can of turkey chunks? ------------------------------------------------------------ I get to make the Aunt Millie trip by bike after all. The whole point of this expedition was that we are nearly out of bread -- but when I got to 250E, I absent- mindedly turned right instead of going straight, and traffic was such that turning around would take longer than going home and coming back. And at 2:00 p.m., too. Spent over a hundred dollars at Aldi, and didn't buy any frozen entrees. Also got the cat food, and a bag of litter while I was at it. We already had an unopened bag of litter, but I might not get back to Big R in the car for a while. Finally remembered to buy waxed paper at the dollar store. And if I ever remember why I wanted empty lip-salve boxes, I can get them at Sally's Beauty Supply, where they are called empty nail-art boxes. I had lunch at the pizza buffet. I wasn't nearly as pleased with it as I was with lunch at the Red Apple Bagel Bakery, but it was adequate. I finished weeding the strip I started yesterday, and pushed the Culta-Eze through it. The next strip will be harder, because I don't want to disturb the potatoes -- not even those that have died back, because the dry stems tell me where to dig. I found a pretty little vine, and was feeling bad about pulling it out because it might be a gourd -- though the leaves looked more like a bean -- then I saw a morning-glory flowerbud on it. Awk scrickle yank yank yank. It was going to be a pink flower, not white, and I've never seen bindweed with three-part leaves, but I don't want to take any chances. 26 August 2011 According to Wikipedia, there are hundreds of convolvulus plants, and they are all noxious weeds. Bindweed proper -- the one with the tubers halfway to the Indian Ocean, and no roots that you can find when digging it up -- is a close relative of the sweet potato. I don't think the sweet potato is noxious -- but I don't know how it does in places where it can survive the winter. Not much more accomplished in the garden, but I have exposed the potato plants enough that I can dig them. I'm digging only as required -- I found one potato in a hill for Dave to hash-brown for breakfast, not quite so big as the set it grew from, the shell of which was still on the plant. The two other hills I've dug were more prolific -- but each was just enough for supper for two. (I do have one small potato in the refrigerator.) We had a skillet of steamed cabbage with canned corned beef yesterday; I should write it up for the Cookbook. 28 August 2011 I woke up at half-past eight this morning. I don't know how to behave when I have time to eat breakfast. I went to a SAR meeting with Dave yesterday. He attended the meeting and I messed around in the library. Then we went out for lunch -- very late because it was a long meeting. On the way to a sports bar we spotted a hot- dog stand called Rally's, and ate there. I had a very good barbecue gyro (Pronounced yee-row, according to the sign, but I asked for a gee-row and got it.) Dave had a Chicago hot dog and found it good, but thought he should have ordered two. Luckily, my gyro was a little too big, so that worked out. We left deeply regretting the french fries we didn't order. Now that I've seen Fort Wayne, I'm more pessimistic than ever about ever shopping there. It's too confusing to drive, too big to walk, and too crowded to ride a bike. Not to mention that one of the streets had a bike lane on it -- too narrow, and carefully situated in the door zone of a fully-occupied parking strip. Beats a "bike lane" I read about on Usenet: The bike lane is plenty wide because it's also a parking strip. Bike are expected to dart in and out of the traffic lane to get around the parked cars. And the fellow who posted this description thinks it's just wonderful! We plan to go to a softball game this evening, so it will be hot dogs for supper. Probably nowhere near as good as the Chicago dog. ------------------------------------------------------------ So I relaxed enough that I was still in my underwear at step-off time, and the cat's dish still needed to be emptied, cleaned, and re-filled. And if I wanted to come back into the house after emptying the dish, I had to shake the foot-wiping mat. (Dirt settles exactly in front of the bedroom door, just where a welcome mat would go if that area didn't flood every time it rains. The foot-wiping mat doesn't stay shaken very long.) I still managed to get to church early enough to get lost in a book in the library and sneak into the sanctuary after the service started. For lunch, I made a stew of a stalk of celery, some chopped garlic-chive flower stems, a small squash, a small onion, a wax pepper, and the remains of a can of turkey. Would have gone better with a little potato. 30 August 2011 The recycling was gone at eight this morning, Dave says. It is usually still around at noon. The coffee can I used to keep Al's dry food in went with it. When I emptied it Sunday, I noticed that the outside is rusty, the lid is starting to crack, and we have three more of those big cans hanging around just because they are too nice to throw out. So I cut the ledge off one with a rotary can opener, cleaned it well, and put the last of the old bag of cat food into it Monday morning. When selecting a can, I found a partly-used bag of brown sugar in one. ?? It is still good, so I put it in the freezer. On Sunday evening, Dave liked the cheese sauce we had on our chili dogs, but I grumped continuously because it was stone cold. Usually he likes food boiling hot and calls it cold as soon as it's safe to put it in one's mouth. Washed everything together yesterday, and still didn't have much of a load. The basket of hot whites is piling up, though. I like to soak them overnight, and hadn't thought of it Sunday evening. 1 September 2011 Exciting day: I changed the bed, and washed a sheet and two pillowcases. Aren't as much dishtowels etc. in the bottom bag of the laundry sorter as I'd thought. I'm making progress toward cutting out a pair of linen drawers to wear under summer dresses. Scored 94% on the final exam of my EmCom course yesterday, but haven't even thought about doing any of the important work. Since the deadline is September third, I suppose I might as well forget about it -- I'm the exact opposite of what's needed for a Net Control Station operator anyway. Well, I've thought a little about the plan-your-jump-kit activity. I would need to buy another pill stick and use them alternately so that I'd always have a week's worth of medication packed and ready to go. Which is a good idea anyway, because it would give me at least a week of warning when I run out of omaprazole. (Generic Prilosec.) I've put "pill stick" on my shopping list. I must correct the stovetop pizza recipe in the Cookbook -- when letting the steam out, it works much better to set the lid-skillet beside the pizza skillet and lift up the pizza to rest across them, instead of leaving it in the skillet. Then the crust stays nice and crisp and you can eat it out of hand like a sandwich. (But I still needed a plate to catch the drippings.) I want a pizza -- now! I did measure the bike space on SR 30 where it intersects CR 250E: 24" from rumble strip to loose gravel. It feels like a lot less than that. But instead of leaving the bike at Aunt Millie's, I rode it to the Ziebart place, and left it leaning against the end-post of the fence between them and 30. The guy-wire of the end post, actually.