L---p----1----+----2----+----3----+@10-r----T----5----+----R----r----7--T-+--r E:\LETTERS\MayBan09.txt This file posted at http://davebeeson.home.comcast.net/LETTERS/MayBan09.txt 7 May 2009 Reading this morning's email: the Dharma newsletter says that rayon stockings are at long last available again -- but they are white anklets. On the other hand, they come in sizes despite being 6% Spandex. On the third hand, adult sizes are "9-11" and "11-13", and if you are size 8, you are out of luck. I must get around to going back to Middlebury. Pity that all opaque stockings are black, but I do need some black socks. Yesterday was beautiful, and Dave went to a Tin Caps ball game in Fort Wayne while I took a tour of Warsaw on my bike. Only hit Marsh, the library, and the emergency room this time. Didn't even stop at Subway, since I'd bought a banana at Marsh, and planned to go more or less straight home from the library. I didn't even bother to straggle back onto the Beyer Trail to meander through the residential streets, but went straight down Harrison. I may not feel so frisky today. Just as I was drifting off at nap time after yesterday's ride, the phone rang -- must have been important because the caller let it ring so long that I was *almost* able to pick it up. (Dave said, why not answer the phone beside the bed? Because I'm still asleep, and only remember the phone I actually use, that's why.) Caller ID had no name, and when I punched the number I got a raucous noise. Didn't sound like a busy signal to me, but I haven't heard one in years, since I almost never initiate a call. There was a message in the voice mail, but I didn't know the password. (And it turned out to be several seconds of silence when Dave came home and gave me the password.) Naturally, I was too stirred up to get back to where I left off before it was time to get up again. Then Dave came back from Fort Wayne by way of Spring creek, and I couldn't resist eating chocolate-covered peanuts late in the evening, so I didn't get to sleep until after three. I think I got up on time today, but it's almost time for lunch and I've just now finished dressing. Did dead-head the tulips in the raised bed; they all started shrivelling and dropping petals yesterday. Dave rented a tiller and plowed up the garden Monday; on Tuesday I reset the ties that had floated away, pried the one across the end more-or-less level again, and made a start on raking the dirt out level. Now that the ties on the lake side are level, we need a lot more dirt to fill up the garden. (When originally set, the second one sloped sharply toward the park.) I plan to rake what's there to the lake side and start planting, but it's kinder wet out today. Not too wet to work the soil, but too cold and damp to go out there. I can remember when I wouldn't have minded weather like this at all. I've not only given up trying to get all the cottonwood gunk off my feet, I've given up trying to scrub them well enough that the glue won't rub off on my socks -- I do turn the socks inside out before throwing them into the wash. Shouldn't those bud covers have weathered away by now? I don't remember the sticky-foot season being this long last year. At this rate, the bud covers will still be there when the cotton comes down. 8 May 2009 A busy Saturday the day after tomorrow: it's the first Saturday the Farmer's Market has been open, and I don't want to miss it, and also church clean-up day. And we will need milk by then. I figure I'll hit Farmer's Market on the way to Marsh, then put the milk in the church fridge while I help with clean-up, if I get there before the work is all done. There's a rule against un-marked packages in the church fridge -- but I'm the one in charge of enforcing it. On the other hand, I do have address stickers in my wallet. Found 'em when I took everything out to wash it last Monday. I *think* I put them back. The wallet stood up to washing beautifully, by the way. It could use ironing, but after it's been wooled around a bit the wrinkles will be lost in the crowd. When I signed up for banner-making, I didn't realize that it meant I'd have to give up teaching embroidery at the Pinewood Derby. (They need "crafts" to occupy the children who finish with their cars before their parents come for them.) The rushed schedule is too strenuous anyway, said the fox. 11 May 2009 I've spotted my first goslings of the season. When I got up this morning, there were two swans sitting in the park and two families of geese eating our lawn. Last time I looked, the swans were elsewhere, two geese and a bunch of goslings were in the park, and two geese and two goslings were in the creek -- the young ones splashing occasionally, as if bathing. 13 May 2009 It's raining today, so no work on the garden. Not much will get done indoors, either: we slept until nearly eleven this morning! We weren't up late or working hard yesterday, either. So I had a brat on a mini-sub roll with fried pepper and onion for breakfast, and plan to skip lunch. (But I'm still hungry!) When I re-set the railroad ties that had floated away, I figured that leveling the two ties opposite them could wait for another year, but yesterday they got to aggravating me, so I pried them up and hauled a few wheelbarrows of dirty sand to hold them in place. When I need fill, I clean the beach. I also waded into the water and dug a hole to get two wheelbarrows of clean sand, to get fill that wouldn't rot and let the ties settle. The next high wind we get will stir up enough waves to smooth it out. I don't see how we ever kept house before we acquired that railroad iron! I can just barely lift it, but you can move *anything* with it. We call it a railroad iron because the story is that its original use was moving railroad cars by prying at the wheels. Haven't set out any herb plants yet, or even cleaned out the herb bed. They look pretty jammed into the hanging basket with Dave's three four-packs of jalepen~os. The fennel is well up, the chives, garlic chives, apple mint, common thyme, and oregano are doing well, and last year's parsley hasn't gone to seed yet, though it couldn't meet the demand if I didn't have a new pot waiting to be planted. I've got so many chives that I've been pulling them up by the roots and eating them bulb and all. I started doing the same with the garlic chives that came up in the raised bed, but they go down so deep that I think I'll wait until tulip-digging time to harvest them. Except for pruning a few as if they were chives, I haven't harvested any winter onions this year. Those that I moved out to the windmill pad are thriving in the increased sunlight, and the flood doesn't seem to have bothered them. The catnips by the windmill started to grow, then died back -- but there are plenty of seedlings coming up. Both rhubarb plants look healthy, but can't spare me any stems. 14 May 2009 When I hung out my socks on Monday, they had yellow-green stains on the soles, but they had faded considerably when I took the wash in. I'm still getting cottonwood gunk on my feet, but they aren't *completely* covered, and more often than not the pod falls off after depositing glue. Hauled another couple of wheelbarrows of fill -- mostly maple seeds -- and hoed at the dirt a little this morning. Starting to be a nice-looking garden, but I still can't plant anything. But there is a clump of garlic, catnip, and oregano in the corner Dave didn't till. Dave and I also moved the remaining pile of branches so that he can finish mowing. They shrank considerably in the process -- I broke or cut off all the smaller branches I could, and have a pile in front of the fireplace that is almost enough to bake bread. Won't be any trouble finding enough twigs to fill it out -- there was a high wind in the night and now there are small branches everywhere. Also a very large branch in the park. There's nothing big enough to shed such a branch except our willow, but it doesn't seem to be missing anything. And the wind surely couldn't blow it so far. Yup, it's a willow branch, and there's a fresh stub on the side away from the house. The distance from the tree is even more impressive when you can see the dent where it bounced. And neither of us woke up while it was storming. There was about half an inch of rain, too. 15 May 2009 Finally got some of the multipliers planted -- the little basket that's supposed to be two-year-old bulbs, but none of them had shriveled or sprouted. I'm planning to plant the whole garden to multipliers, since it's too late to plant potatoes, and make Dave eat chopped onions on his hamburgers. (I may relent and buy a single bulb now and again!) So far, only one row with dirt arranged in it, and that one was stretching it a bit. I may have chopped too many chives to put in tonight's noodles. 16 May 2009 Nope, they were delicious. Looked for more "Jo-Asia" noodles when I went to Aldi today, and couldn't find any. And I'd just figured out how to prepare them. (Ignoring the instructions, dump the chicken chunks in broth and all.) Now is the window of chocolate, but I think the piece in my mouth had better be my last one -- it's a quarter of six. Too wet to go to the farmers' market this morning -- not to mention that it was too late to go when I woke up -- but it turned lovely while I was in Aldi's. When I started setting out the herbs, I reached into my pocket to get my knife to cut the label off the german thyme -- and it wasn't there. I haven't seen it since, but still hope that I put it down somewhere in the house. Only paid fifty cents for it, but I was rather fond of it -- and my swiss army knife makes a big lump in my pocket. Dave has planted four Jalapen~os in the herb bed, five in the strawberry bed, and three beside the windmill pad. Think the deer will miss any of them? I wonder how the homeless chickens are doing? One of Creighton Brothers' henhouses blew down the night the willow limb hit the park. The newspaper said that the owners were going to try to sell them. We'll be going to Nat's graduation party soon. 20 May 2009 On the one hand, when I changed the bed Monday, it was full of cottonwood bud covers -- and they stained the sheet. On the other hand, when I washed my feet that night after running around in the yard barefoot all day, I didn't have to peel anything off. So when I scrubbed them before putting socks on the next morning, I resumed using the pumice stone and they should be worn clean before too long. Also hoed the garden a little on Monday, did two or three loads of wash, and baked a loaf of kettle bread. Nicely browned top and bottom, and cooked all the way through: I'm getting the hang of this. Tuesday I went downtown, partly to return my library books but mostly because I hadn't been on the bike for a while. Checked out a collection of Asimov's essays and stories. Inquired at Domino's, the bread bowls came only in white -- I like white-bread pizza, but a white-bread *macaroni* pizza is going too far. So I had "spicy Italian" on a toasted whole-wheat bun at Subway. Left me feeling a bit hungry, since I'd gotten a late start and had eaten a light breakfast, but "sated" isn't a good condition to hop on a bike in. Went to the official end of the Beyer Trail, since I didn't have any magazines to drop off at the emergency room. Today, mostly I sorted and bundled papers that had gotten *way* out of hand. Didn't finish before Dave left for the recycling center, but by good luck, rather than wisdom, I had begun with the piles that one can't put in the bin out by the road. He says he paid seven or eight dollars to get rid of the CRT monitor, because it weighed forty-five pounds. I can just barely lift thirty, and I'm pretty sure I could carry that monitor. Perhaps it's easier to get hold of than bags of cat litter. It still worked, too -- if you wait a few hours after turning it on and never turn it off. I also hemmed two pieces of blue duck that I brought home from the church after Handwork Circle (which time I spent reading the aforementioned Asimov book). Meant to sew it with the white thread on the treadle machine, but when I opened it, I saw that it was set up with black thread. Well, if I have to re-thread a machine, I might as well use the light blue thread (which turned out to be a perfect match), and that, in turn, meant using the electric machine, which can spare a bobbin to wind with thread useful only for basting. Realized, while re-threading the machine, that I'd gone through the same bobbin-saving line of reasoning the month before last -- and that orange thread was still on the machine. And the last black thing I made was my newest bra. I think I haven't been sewing much. I'm going to have to patch the old herringbones after all -- the iron-on patch didn't hold. I was able to re-iron it, (with trimmed corners), so that will hold the tear closed while I patch. and cover the raw edges on the inside. If I ever get around to sewing! I didn't go into the garden today, either. 24 May 2009 It's going to take all the shopping energy I can muster to get a pair of knee hose before next Sunday. My last pair gave its last gasp this morning. Wish I thought I could find opaque hose somewhere. Well, in Middlebury, but that's too far and they only have black. I saw an Amish lady wearing sheer hose the last time I went to Aldi's, so I don't have a lot of hope for finding something that will hide my dirty toenails at Elder Berman. But I plan to schedule the trip so that I can have lunch at Taco Bell. Been a long time since I had a taco salad with kraut on it. (I'll take the kraut in a little cooler; too much flak when you try to order it -- and I don't think Taco Bell would have kraut, since they don't sell hot dogs.) 26 May 2009 It would seem that they also don't sell taco salad. Lots of yummy things on the menu, but I'd come for taco salad and wasn't about to settle for a taco. So I went home and had "green chili sauce with chicken" on toast with spicy-jack cheese. The "chili sauce" was a can I spotted on the Manager's Special table, and thought looked interesting. No wonder they had trouble getting rid of it: it's nothing but weak chicken gravy, faintly green. Nobody who wants chili sauce will ever buy a second can, and nobody who wants chicken gravy will even look at it. I went out despite a prediction of 70% thundershowers and had a lovely ride, aside from lunch, in beautiful weather. After visiting Elder Berman, J.C. Penny, and two shoe stores the nearest I could find to grandmother-beige opaque sandalfoot knee hose was "little-color" "silky-sheer" knee hose with "enhanced toe". I did see knee socks that would have passed as opaque hose if they hadn't been bright colors. But I was expecting to buy unsuitable stockings -- I wasn't expecting to find a pair of weekday sandals in one of the shoe stores. (If the shoe fits, buy it!) Took a look at the subsidence on CR 250E on the way back. The crack runs neatly down the double yellow line and shouldn't be any trouble at all, save for being a place for wear to start, and they seem to be on top of that. Got my first look at Argonne on the way out. Smooth, black, and beautiful! It actually seemed to be easier to climb the hill, but they couldn't possibly have done anything to make it less steep. I hadn't realized how much of my strength had been going into battling the rough pavement. Improvement stopped sharply at Jefferson, halfway through a patch of broken pavement and loose stones. Jefferson was where I turned off, so I don't know what the intersection with Center looks like. Same as before, of course, but I've always avoided it as much as possible. It was raining so hard in the evening that I considered chickening out of Handwork Circle, but it wasn't too bad when it was time to step out. I got my feet wet, but I'd brought dry socks. Storm had blown through by the time I came back, but the second pair of socks was also wet before I got home. Surprising amount of dirt in the water I dropped the socks into, so instead of spinning them out and hanging them to dry, I changed the water and left them to soak some more -- then forgot about them. (So I dashed out to wring and hang them.) 29 May 2009 I saw the first onion sprout in the garden yesterday. Wanted to wear my new sandals Wednesday night, but I must have been so excited at finding a sole the same shape as my foot that I neglected to check the straps: the ankle strap lacks an inch of meeting. Can't take them back, either. And I was *so* looking forward to throwing out my broken sandals. I may up and sew a ring to one of the holes in the strap, thread a ribbon through the ring and the buckle, tie it in a bow, and say "I meant to do that". I was in bed soon after two this afternoon, but was still out of it at 5:00. Riding to Owen's & back isn't all that strenuous, and I don't recall having a restless night. Got my bias lines marked Wednesday & cut out two bras on Thursday, but didn't do any sewing today. Quite the reverse, in fact: I wore a hole in the seat of my dirty- work jeans. 30 May 2009 The real Memorial Day. Haven't seen any sign of anyone noticing, but I haven't been to the cemetery. I came straight back from the Farmer's Market. Bought a greenhouse tomato; I heard the other customers saying that Yoder's tomatoes are as good as summer tomatoes, so we are having hamburgers for supper tonight. I stopped at Sherman & Lin's on the way back and got ten cans of seltzer at ten cents a can, two bottles of V-8, and some chocolate. Then I went to their Bargain Barn and bought a ball of twine. Also stopped at the pawn shop and looked at the pocket knives, but all the small knives had big uncomfortable-looking bumps on the blade instead of nail grooves, so I postponed replacing my missing knife. Then I came back, ate breakfast, and my bod said "that was lunch -- take a nap." The sore spot in my left foot never went away, but I've gotten used to it. In the first row planted, enough of the multipliers are up that I could run the cultivator, and one of the three shallots has sprouted. 1 July 2009 Last night's rain seems to have washed off the last of the cottonwood fluff. It didn't wash the bud covers off the picnic table. When combing my hair yesterday morning (which I do bending over on Sundays, when I wear my hair up) I had plenty of time to reflect that my black slippers look really dorky sticking out of white pants. Luckily, I was wearing a black-background cotton print shirt, so I said "I meant to do that." My first choice of shirt hadn't been ironed (and I had worn it the previous Sunday), and my second choice has to be pinned to my bra -- having slept until half-past nine, I didn't want to take time for that. We both slept until ten this morning. We each got to bed at a reasonable hour, and Dave says he slept straight through. I had a lot of dreams, but didn't get up as often as usual. When I woke up, I was trying to lure a flock of little red hens (with chicks and a rooster) into coming home with me. I was planning to give the chicks -- which were yellow, like domestic chickens! -- stone-ground corn meal, but hadn't thought about the cats and dogs in our yard, not to mention that there are foxes in the woods. But then, as usual in my dreams, "home" was someplace I'd never been before, sleeping or awake. There was a house-type door on the path through the grass, for example, which I closed to -- keep out predators, now that you mention it. Back to the slippers: one of my white sandals fell apart last Sunday, and I haven't shoe-gooed it yet. In the evening, I discovered that I could have worn my new sandals with hose. Which is still weird, since when I tried to wear them Wednesday night, I was wearing socks identical to those that I was wearing when I bought them, and it might have been the very same pair. So I have a pair of sandals that not only fit, but are so well made that I may be able to wear them next summer too. I'd like also to have a dressy pair, but these are quite plain and look a *lot* better than my black oxfords. On the mending front, my grubbier pair of grubbies has been pinned and ready to stitch for days, and the Necchi has the correct thread in it, so by way of motivation, I'm running around in my underwear until I can put them on. I'd *better* get them done before the wash comes out of the machine! At which point I got up and put some wash into the washer. And, I'm wearing my grubbies. The cotton blew away or washed down, but the patio is littered with bud covers, spent flowers, and the pods the cotton was in. Ain't cottonwoods wonderful? -- Joy Beeson http://joybeeson.home.comcast.net/ http://roughsewing.home.comcast.net/ http://n3f.home.comcast.net/ -- Writers' Exchange http://www.timeswrsw.com/craig/cam/ (local weather)