8 July 2006 Just when it looked as though we might be getting ahead of the lakeweed, some guy on the other side mowed his water grass again. Shortened my pink "floral basket" shift one inch today. Didn't get it ironed, so I'll be wearing my short-sleeved ankle-length "villa olive" T-shirt tomorrow. Took the pattern for the linen shift off the nail, then put it back up on the wrong nail. (I need a stool to reach the correct nail.) 9 July 2006 We took yet another load of lakeweed to the brush dump today. I think Dave re-filled the trailer later on; I saw him out there with a spading fork anyway. [He had been piling up wet weed to drain.] Erk. The clock just struck midnight -- and I just remembered leaving a blanket out on the line. And there is a thunderstorm predicted; perhaps I should turn off my computers before going to bed, because if we get any wind, the broken limb -- bigger than the trunks of several of the trees in our yard -- on that tree in the park is sure to come down on the wires. We should have thought of calling the police sooner. As soon as a *cop* reported a dangerous situation, the park board agreed to do something about it. 10 July 2006 A couple of guys came out, parked -- rather rashly -- in our driveway, looked the situation over, then one of them unfolded a cell phone and made a call and they got back into the car and drove away. The upper split has broken open. While I was out looking at it, Dave's new golf club arrived. The tree didn't make any loud cracks while I was talking to the UPS woman, but there were a few small but ominous pops. We did *not* stand in the lane! Had a turn while hunting for the sleeve pattern I used for the pink floral-basket shift. Still haven't found it; I think it's in the envelope underneath the forty-eleven variations that includes two long sleeves and one three-quarters sleeve, but no short ones, and I'm really *not* looking forward to taking them all off the nail again. All the pieces for my button-front smock (which I've never made up with buttons, only snaps or hooks) are marked "March 2003 floral linen-cotton". Now I don't recall ever *seeing* a linen-blend print before buying that lovely chickenfeed-sack weight border print that will someday become a fall suit, let alone making one up, and if I'd had such a critter in 2004, I certainly would have taken it to Australia. The dime finally dropped: my linen-blend suit has a white-on-white flower pattern woven in. As Dave was starting the truck to go to his appointment in Fort Wayne, the limb gave a mighty crack and settled down enough to scrape the top of anything driving under it; Dave turned and went out through the park. Cutting the limb looks like a risky and highly-skilled job; the parks department may decide that it's cheaper and safer to repair the data lines after it comes down by itself. But it just might mix the nearby power line into the mess. And I've heard only one of the plethora of children in the neighborhood warned to keep away from the willow tree. When I got up from my nap, the limb was gone and our TV cable was down -- which is also our connection to the internet. I dialed up on my old account, which we haven't canceled yet, and checked my main account by Web -- which Comcast doesn't make easy. I managed to log in, but couldn't find any button to click to get to my mail -- finally decided to click on "edit my web site" just to see what was there, got a message that I have no Wizard-created pages -- nice to know there is no chance of the Wizard messing with my hand-crafted pages -- and *that* page had a button to click to get to my mail. The Comcast people are to come to day, but the telephone repairman the tree crew called by mistake said that *she* wouldn't touch that cable: there's an electric wire across the cable it's broken off from. This is being pushed down by a limb the willow limb broke off our tree; why the guys who removed the willow limb didn't take it, I don't know. They also left a piece of willow in our tree. They did clean up all but a scattering of sawdust of what was on the ground. Hope I remember to pick up my fenders today -- the Trailhouse has had them for weeks. I haven't been riding much -- and after ordering them, I figured out how to cut down what was left of my old front fender, so it hasn't been preying on my mind. I took all that stuff off the nail again, and there wasn't any short sleeve in the envelope. Since I have the long-sleeve pattern, it will be easy enough to draft a new one, but I like to use a pattern that has been beta-tested when I'm cutting into linen! Got so far as to try the two main pieces on the fabric; frustratingly, it is just one inch too narrow to cut them side-by-side. Oh, well, when cutting them end-to-end, I can cut with the nap -- though this fabric is carefully designed to be used either end up. Also busy enough that I don't have to worry about matching the pattern. I've decided to make pocket slits instead of patch pockets. Now there's a cherry picker and two pickup trucks from a tree service out front. They seem to be starting work, rather than making an estimate. Oops! Dave says the people taking down the willow say that the limb in our tree wasn't taken down precisely *because* it is pressing down a power line. I should have thought of that! But this means that we don't get our cable service back until Nipsco gets around to a repair that is very low priority from their point of view. A yellow cherry picker just turned down Boys City. I thought the Sprint truck was following it, but it went straight. Getting crowded out there. The yellow cherry picker came back and turned out to be NIPSCO. He waited for an intermission in the rain of willow branches, and is now at work. Four in the afternoon -- everybody gone, Dave happily reading funnies on the Web, the paper just arrived, I just got back from Owens with (among much else) two pounds of Great Northern beans to use up the bacon pieces. Time to sort out the freezer. I'm *sure* I had a pound of Great Northerns in there. Found pinto beans, but Dave rejected them. I rejected the garbanzos. 12 July 2006 The bean soup was excellent. I don't have any bread corn meal -- only polenta corn meal -- so we had it with tortilla chips. I got the front and back of my linen shift cut out. Rained all day, so I didn't take my bike to the shop. Knitting class met in the ramp room for the first time -- and on Wednesday for the last time; we're changing to Tuesday, and changing the name to Sewing Circle. Nobody showed, so I did some much-overdue row counting before starting to knit. There are more than ninety rounds, so I'll be starting the toe decreases Real Soon Now. 13 July 2006 Al got his shots today. He takes it better than any of our other cats did, but went willingly into the cage when it was time to go home. I cut the underlining for the back of the linen dress, but haven't taken my bike to the Trailhouse yet. Hope they don't send the fenders back! I think I put too much paprika into the yellow rice we had for supper. I browned a couple of patties of hamburger and mixed it with salsa left over from our last batch of spaghetti -- so there was also a meatball or two in it. 14 July 2006 In the morning, yet another load of lakeweed to the brush dump -- which was largely occupied with pieces of willow tree. Then I rode my bike to the Trailhouse and left it, saying that it was fine to keep it overnight since I had no intention of coming back in this coming rain. Which showed up several times through the afternoon, but cleared up in time for our after-supper point seven. Lakeweed production, knock wood, seems to be slacking off. Last summer, we didn't even know where the brush dump was! The tiger lilies are starting to bloom. The rosebush in that bed seems to be done for a while; the remaining blossoms are ratty and there are no buds. 15 July 2006 This last rain seems to have put an end to my freedom from land weeds. And the guy on the other side of the lake has mowed his water grass again. I'm catching up on the wash today, wearing my last clean bra. My last *dry* bra now, there being a string of clean ones hanging on the line. And I've put the new dryer to practical, routine use for the first time: it shook the wrinkles out of two of Dave's shirts and two of mine. The new dryer has a larger door than the old one, and the inside is painted white, so I can just look in to see whether I've taken everything out. 16 July 2006 On the way back from the 4-H parade -- which still hadn't started, but I heard the calliope starting to play before I got out of earshot -- I noticed a sign in front of the police station saying the bike auction had been yesterday. I wonder why I didn't notice it on the way to pick up my bike? I think it was already too late then, though. Bike not ready; I'll pick it up Monday. Every fire company in the county sent apparatus, and all the tractor collectors were there. Lots of Farmalls, but if there was a C, I missed it. Some of those "antiques" might have been at the fairs I attended when I was in 4-H -- in the latest-tech display. An omnibus surrey -- well, it had a fringe on top -- had been refitted to be pulled by one of the antique tractors. There was also a wagon with seats on leaf springs. 17 July 2006 The bike was outside, leaning on a Village at Winona sign, when I arrived about noon. The new fenders match the paint! Al has thrown up every night since his visit to the vet, so we stopped the antibiotic prescribed for his belly sores. And I haven't heard any retching tonight. Had to run to Owen's in the evening because we were out of apples. I got a steak for tomorrow's supper while I was at it. I hope I don't forget to dig some potatoes ahead of time. It's a little before two a.m. tomorrow. Before going to bed, I check the radar: funny, it doesn't *sound* like it's raining like crazy. Went to bigger window: no rain. Turned on patio light: dry as a bone. But there is almost continuous lightning in the north. Thunder is seldom and faint. Closer look at radar: we are in a notch in the storm. West edge of notch is rapidly approaching, but we are to get only the green edge of the rain. 18 July 2006 We got .85 inches of partly cloudy last night, and it's still coming down. 21 July 2006 Finally got to the farmer's market Wednesday, and the only vendor with tomatoes didn't have any ripe ones. Then I discovered, while crossing a street, that my back quick-release hadn't been tightened properly, allowing the wheel to shift in the dropouts and jam against the chainstay. Thought I was going for a trifecta when a young rabbit ran across my path, but he was running just fast enough and I didn't run over him. I not only ran a load of wash today, I remembered to hang it out *and* remembered to bring it in again. But I forgot to have Dave help me check the quick releases on my wheels. To line the wheels up properly, one needs a third hand to hold the brake closed. Tomorrow is the last day of the county fair. I'm not going. Bought some rather poor tomatoes and a fairly good muskmelon at Aldi's yesterday. Then came home to find that we are almost out of chips -- what happened to that freezerful I bought for the Fourth? 24 July 2006 It isn't uncommon to see Al, tail twitching, watching the squirrels. But this morning I saw a squirrel, unsure of the efficacy of plate glass, watching back. I got a couple of real tomatoes Saturday morning. We had smoked-bacon and tomato sandwiches for Sunday supper. 25 July 2006 My wallpaper is back. When I finally got around to copying the damask swatch I'd used on the old computer, I was dismayed to find that the "appearance" section of the control panel of Windows 98e doesn't have any "set as wallpaper" button -- just a "convert display to HTML" button, which I don't want to mess with for fear that it's one of those "helpful" features that won't let you get back to where you want to be without starting all over from scratch. ("HTML" is now its own, seriously-flawed graphics-design thing that has a very thin and tenuous connection to hypertext.) But a day or two ago Dave told me that I could set wallpaper with Thunderbird -- Thunderbird calls it "background", and, really, that's a much better name for it -- so I tried it and it worked, and when I went after the file on the old computer, I found that it was already on the sneakernet floppy. Phoenix Textiles (fabric.com) no longer posts those huge swatches, alas. I miss being able to examine the threads of fabric I'm about to buy. I wonder how complicated it would be for them to blow up one square inch of fabric to fill the screen? The thumbnails, swatches, and enlargements are all the same shot at different resolutions, so making a detail shot would be a separate step -- and they have thousands, if not millions, of swatches, so anything that can't be automated isn't going to happen. It would be easy -- assuming the resolution is there in the first place; it could have been a change of cameras, rather than a shortage of disk space, that made them abandon the humongous enlargements -- for a program to filet out the upper left corner of a photograph, but writing the program and integrating it into their system is another matter. 29 July 2006 I got up early enough to buy three tomatoes, half a dozen ears of corn, and a quart of peaches. 31 July 2006 Then I forgot to serve corn Saturday night -- we did eat one of the tomatoes -- and Sunday night I went to an ice-cream social at the church, so I made corn fritters for breakfast. MMM . . . hot buttered skillet! As I was putting the scraps of flowered linen away, I realized that I hadn't cut flaps for the pocket slits on my shift. I've got gathering stitches in the sleeves, but haven't pressed the underlined pieces yet. (Pressing after underlining makes the fabrics cling together, and shows up any flaws in placement.) The tiger lilies seem to be peaking. We have deduced that the waves of water grass are chopped off with propellers during the weekends. -- Joy Beeson http://joybeeson.home.comcast.net/ http://www.timeswrsw.com/craig/cam/ (local weather) west of Fort Wayne, Indiana, U.S.A.