4 November 2008 On the way to the polls, I finally figured out what my lawn sign should say: Vote for Bob Barr -- he's the only nutcase who can't embarrass you. Needless to say, I didn't put up a lawn sign. 7 November 2008 I'm beginning a long-overdue cleaning of the parlor. Since there are more books on the floor than I'll ever read, I've decided to sort the standard paperbacks into categories, pack them into boxes with the spines up, and get rid of the oversize paperbacks entirely -- if I ever decide that my education isn't complete without having read _East of Eden_, I can get it from interlibrary loan. So far, the Goodwill box contains: Julia & Romeo Get Lucky by Jeanne Ray /Murder at the B-School by Jeffrey Cruikshank Bait by Karen Roberts /Diving Through Clouds by Nicola Lindsay At First Sight by Nicholas Sparks/ Consigned to Death by Jane K. Cleland (Above titles are Reader's Digest doubles.) Let's Roll by Lisa Beamer Missing Joseph by Elizabeth George East of Eden by John Steinbeck The Cat Who Dropped a Bombshell by Lilian Jackson Braun The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd So that's eight down and knee-deep to go. I do have one box filled with mysteries. I wonder whether one can buy boxes that can be packed neatly with paperbacks and stored on wide shelves to be pulled out like drawers? That would be as good as having them on bookshelves, and a whole bunch better than shelving one row of paperbacks behind another. A few days ago, I put away the three sewing books that I bought at Bishop's because the store was closing and I'd never see them again. Which involved starting a new category for fiber books -- putting even one more book on my needlework shelf would push my brick bookend over the edge. So I pulled out all the complete-guide-to-sewing books and put them at the end of the complete collection of Threads. (Well, two issues are missing and I have a duplicate of one.) That shrank the section of shelf for the irons and my tailor's ham to sixteen inches. That space will shrink by three sixteenths of an inch more with each bi-monthly issue. I was thinking that it would be awkward when I had to move the irons, because I'm using one of them as a bookend. But I recently put a box on the next shelf, and it sticks up enough to keep books from falling over. Can't use that plan for the needlework shelf, as it ends in a large void for the rolls of paper. I could swap them, I suppose. But the upper shelf would have to be moved down a notch, so I'd have to have both shelves empty at the same time. 8 November 2008 While I was getting dressed this morning, Dave remarked that there were a lot of swans out there. I glanced out the window just in time to see an eagle land on the sandbar. The swans didn't notice him, but there isn't a coot in sight. Dave looked through the telescope and said that it was a young eagle, then telephoned the photographer we sometimes meet while walking around. He wasn't in. While Dave was on the phone, the eagle pecked in the surf as if finding something to eat; shortly after Dave came back to the window, the eagle flew off across the lake. From my point of view, he passed behind a tree at once and I wasn't able to pick him up again. Dave was able to follow him for a while, and said that he flew very low above the water. 9 November 2008 Wore shoes to church for the first time today, and again for our walk. (I've been wearing sandals or stage slippers.) It was misting snow when I went, and misting rain when Joe and Lois brought me back. They had taken us out Friday to eat at Teal's, which has just re-opened after the fire. Teal's was mysteriously closed, so we ate at the Bulldog instead. First time I've ever seen a restaurant decorated with basketball shorts. Good food; I ordered a Reuben because I haven't had one in ages; everyone else overate. I felt pretty well despite eating some of Lois's chicken and half of Dave's salad. We had supper early tonight; somehow I read the clock wrong and put the pizza in at ten after four instead of ten after five. Pre-heated the oven to 550, then turned it off after putting the pizza in; worked quite well, though I was worried for a while that it would brown too fast. But I forgot to put herbs in the sauce. Some pickled peppers would have been good, too. I followed Alton Brown's hint of making the dough ahead of time and keeping it in the fridge; it was, in fact, half the batch of eight hamburger buns I made a while back. Postponed baking it when Dave brought four cube steaks home -- I served cube steak two days in a row, with baked sweet potato the first time and mashed potatoes and gravy the second. Well, not two days in a row, because I'd planned to cook cube steak Friday, but when we were invited out, I stuck the pizza dough in the freezer, and took it out Saturday evening. All that setting around made the dough very tough; I took a *long* time pounding it out thin. First time I turned it over, it was warm on the bottom, because I store the griddle in the oven and the pilot light is rather high. I figured the chilled dough would warm up quickly when patted out thin; didn't figure that I'd be handling it with my warm hands so much! It was nice to take our evening waddle by daylight today. Think I can talk Dave into eating on DST? I like walking after dark, I can handle cold, and I don't mind wet when it isn't *too* wet, but yesterday I looked out at the cold and dark *and* wet, and said "I ain't going". 10 November 2008 Brrrly shiver! Putting on a coat would take more time than hanging out one sheet, so I just slipped into sandals and slapped on a hat. Naturally, a brisk wind rose up just as I was reaching for the first pin, which not only chilled me directly, but made it take significantly longer to hang up the sheet. 13 November 2008 Al E. Cat is *way* too trusting. Saw him asleep, utterly relaxed, in the middle of the living-room floor the other day. Pastor Rick called, yesterday I think, to ask whether I'd supervise adults making banners on Wednesday nights. He assured me that Martha would plan the art, and all I had to deal with was the technical aspects, so I said yes. The job starts in January. Hope I can stifle my "it has to survive machine washing" instincts; I have little experience with making things to hang on walls. Last Monday, I *finally* remembered to go to the church on Board Meeting night. Then I remembered that we aren't having any more Fellowship Committee meetings until time to plan the Christmas party. Oops. But I finished reading a Science News for the first time since they changed the format. That was accomplished, in part, by skipping several articles after a glance at the abstract. I'm 0 for two at the church this week. On Handwork Circle night, I embroidered two-thirds of the fours I'm going to need for page numbers for the alphabet books I started for Christmas last year. On *orange* fabric. Ah, well, the kids can give the books to their grandchildren. I've settled on a dark-blue medium-weight linen with white flowers for my new fall suit. But I don't know when I'll have the energy to lay out a ten-yard piece of fifty-inch fabric. Could take it to Handwork Circle next Tuesday and use the long tables in the Fellowship hall -- if the cub scouts aren't meeting. Rode around the lake for the first time in a long time Tuesday. Library was closed for Veteran's Day, but they have after-hours return boxes. Looked at the dam, went to Marsh, cabled up at the library, having forgotten that it was a holiday, had a pizza sub on whole wheat at Subway, rode the Beyer Trail, dropped off a pile of magazines at the emergency room, got milk at Owen's, took a *long* nap. While I was riding around the lake, Dave bought red-wheat flour at Spring Creek, so I made buns yesterday, and reserved enough dough to make a pizza tomorrow. Half red wheat, half white wheat. No gluten, and it seems to have worked, so that must have been hard red wheat -- all the package says is "whole wheat flour". I'm planning to make sausage pizza, but I bought a package of pepperoni for the freezer when I ran out for peanut butter and mozzarella this afternoon. Said I would hound somebody if I still couldn't find the peanut butter, but they had a woman with a clipboard walking around in search of bewildered customers. Not only told me where the peanut butter was, but volunteered that it was next to the bread. The other item I hadn't been able to find was sandwich buns! But I forgot to put red cabbage, yogurt, and cottage cheese on my list, and Dave forgot to tell me he was nearly out of salad dressing, so I'm going to have to go out again pretty soon. 15 November 2008 Tonight, I cut into the last of the good turnips that I bought at the Farmer's Market. About half of the leaf-stumps had fallen off, so I guess I bought about the right number. Supper was left-over pizza. Dave liked this pizza both times, so I'd better make another while I still remember what I did. Today I got sufficiently fed up with hunting and hunting for NovBan08.txt when I back up this file that I purged the LETTERS folder, deleting some old files and putting most of the rest into three archive folders. Then I discovered that the backups on the remote server are a *lot* easier to update than the backups in the living room. Last Monday the banner headline, the biggest story on the front page of the Warsaw Times-Union, was "Wagon Wheel Continuing Normal Operations". That beats out the wildlife photographs as an indication of what sort of town we live in! (The Wagon Wheel is a playhouse.) 'Course, today's banner concerns the indictment of a murderer, but that's in Minnesota. The victim used to work for the Times-Union. Dave said that Teal's looked open when he drove past it last Thursday. 20 November 2008 We're eating Thanksgiving dinner at home for the first time since we left New York. I know where the crystal and china are, but I'm not at all sure the white linen cloth fits our table. But it's a drop-leaf expansion table; something can be arranged. 22 November 2008 The eagle has landed in the tree behind the house again. Dave said he was looking out and saw all the small birds hastily depart, then here he came again. The geese, like the swans, didn't seem to fear him. I wondered what would happen if a goshawk flew in -- but I don't think wild goshawks hunt geese. 24 November 2008 Today Dave looked out and said "The eagle must be on the other side of the lake." Our side was completely covered with coots and other small waterfowl. Wikipedia says that mallards are about as large a bird as a goshawk cares to prey on. Last time I went to Owens, the new door was open. Looks like they are trying to rival Marsh in there -- including the shriveled-up jicamas! (I wonder whether wiki would tell me when jicamas are in season; I haven't been taking notes on when I buy the good ones.) (It didn't.) Still haven't found out where they hid the calcium chews. 25 November 2008 Went back for Thanksgiving goodies, and still couldn't find the calcium chews. Ran into an employee with a clipboard, but I made the mistake of saying that they'd put diapers where the supplements used to be, and she led me to the baby aisle. Nothing I could say would get her off the diaper kick. Must have been near the end of her shift. Hope I didn't forget anything. We have game hens, two kinds of potatoes, a box of Stove Top stuffing, and a tray of cranberry-pecan tartlets. Cranberries in pecan pie is not the best combination in the world, but I didn't want to buy a whole pie for two people. They were much improved when I stuck in some extra pecans. Netflix sent us Benny Hill last time. The show was at least three times as long as I remember it, and not even a tenth as funny. Consisted entirely of women in scanty underwear punctuated by hitting Benny Hill in the crotch, save for two skits featuring the male leads in ugly underwear, apparently intended as a spoof of the rest of the show. Dave canceled the other Benny Hill DVD. The Yahoo robot put the _How to Make Sewing Patterns_ mailing list on "adult" status yet again. The moderator told us that from now on we are to refer to the crotch seam as "the seam that joins the left leg to the right leg". By "adult", Yahoo means "dirty", which annoys me very much. (If they didn't think body parts were dirty, they wouldn't need a euphemism, would they?) It annoys me even more when puerile trash is labeled "adult". 26 November 2008 I went to Handwork Circle yesterday, but when I saw the church all dark and deserted, I kept walking. Wasn't mentioned in last Sunday's bulletin anyway, and it did specifically state that all of today's evening events were canceled. When I was shopping for birds, I saw a big fat stewing hen. I'm looking for an excuse to go back and get one! Also picked up a capon -- I've never roasted a capon -- but decided that a capon for two people is almost as bad as a turkey, and took game hens instead. Two to a package, and we have leftovers when I bake one, but I'm going to cook both of them. Current plan is to fill a skillet with Stovetop plus celery (the celery pre-cooked in 1-1/2 cups of the canned broth I simmered gizzards in yesterday), arrange birds (stuffed with raw apple) on top, maybe a chunk of zapped sweet potato in the remaining space. 5 December 2008 Once again, I'm mailing the Banner well into the next month. We took Al to the vet yesterday. Nobody knows what is causing his rash, but the vet predicted that a shot of (relative of Prednisone the name of which I have forgotten) would clear it right up. On the other hand, since he had this same rash last fall, he can expect to get it again next fall. But next time we can give him oral prednisonoid at the first sign and break it up before it gets bad. Steroids given so seldom probably won't have side effects. Wednesday, I said "I've cleared out to cut this fabric at least three times, this time it's going to happen." The first time I cleared out, there was a stack of papers to be sorted on the floor, and by the time I disposed of them, there wasn't enough time to finish such a long and involved job before the floor would be wanted for other purposes. The time before Wednesday, I got as far as laying the fabric on the floor, then realized that I should take the waistbands off the better selvage before laying out the pieces that would be cut beside them. Wednesday, I got the front and back of the shirt and both backs of the pants cut out. Two fronts, two sleeves, and a mess of pockets to go. I think I'll sew the darts and shoulder seams in the shirt before cutting the rest. Which is going to be more involved than it sounds, as I plan to put hooks and eyes into both shoulder seams to keep the front and back smooth. I don't like the looks of a placket in front, and one in back catches on my pigtail. Though I *do* plan to pin my hair up when I wear this suit. Got a start on learning to make banners last Sunday. I hope Martha and I can do it again soon. -- Joy Beeson http://joybeeson.home.comcast.net/ http://roughsewing.home.comcast.net/ http://www.timeswrsw.com/craig/cam/ (local weather) west of Fort Wayne, Indiana, U.S.A.