Journal: Table Toppers and Venison and a Great Horned Horn

A young friend from an online quilting group is job-hunting.  “I wonder what being a security guard at a hospital would entail?” she pondered.

I’m a helpful sort, so I told her:  “You watch the monitors, trip drunks and laugh at them as warranted, strap li’l ol’ ladies to gurneys and race up and down the halls with them, just to restore their sense of Grand Larks and Adventure; and now and then you go see how many koalas and alpacas have moved in on the parking lot.

“And you’re welcome.”

She wondered if she’d even get through the first interview without them deciding she couldn’t cope with the job.

I helpfully responded, “Do your best to look big and tough and square of jaw, like Lucy Van Pelt (of Peanuts fame):  ‘keep a stiff upper lip – and keep your chin up!’  Both at the same time.  Speak in a deep, melodious voice, move heavy objects frequently throughout the interview, and smile in a friendly but seriously diligent fashion.  They’ll hire you on the spot.”

Speaking of jobs, look what a lady with a new job just wrote:  “My last check with 40 hours was $340 after taxes. My insurance will start March 1^st and it will cost $295 a paycheck.”

Now, how in the world can that work out for anybody??!  She has a house payment to make, for pity’s sake!

A friend asked me if I would care if she used colors in a quilt she is making similar to the table topper I’ve just put together.  I assured her that I never mind anyone copying me – and in any case, these are fairly common colors for this particular pattern.  I really doubt if anything I do is my own idea, really; I’m a hotshot copycat – or think I am, and then things go wrong, and I wind up with a unique design, entirely by accident.

Last Sunday night after church, we went to Wal-Mart for a few groceries.  Before heading into the produce department, I dropped off four watches at the jewelry counter, asking that batteries be put into them.  I didn’t have a single watch that was still running.

“I’d better give you my name,” I said to the girl behind the counter, when she didn’t seem inclined to ask for it, “in case I forget to come back for the watches after we get our groceries.”

This made her look alarmed (do employees get fired if customers forget to come back for their watches?), so I hastily assured her I wouldn’t forget.

I forgot.

Mind you, I don’t have Alzheimer’s; I just have too much stuff and fluff stuck up there in the old grey mattuh, and sometimes the fluff obliterates the stuff.

So Larry stopped at Wal-Mart after he got off work Monday and picked up the watches.  Two are now running; two are not.  The two that Loren gave me are Elgins, and Wal-Mart doesn’t have the tools to work on them.  I’ll have to take them to a jewelry store.

Here’s a question that was discussed on a quilting group the other day:  What modern-day conveniences would you miss most, should you lose them? 

Some went back to the basics and said that they wouldn’t even want to try to live without running water.  Well, I’ve toted pots of hot water from stove to bathtub when heating elements on water heaters went kaput, and while I agree, that’s a bit of a chore, what I’d really miss would be my computer.  And the Internet now and then, of course, though much of what I do is all on the computer.  I find out that I want Internet too, however, about the time we’re driving along late at night, Larry at the wheel, and me typing away.  Wondering about the history of cloisonné enamel objects, I pull up Google, type in my question – and wind up with a page informing me, “This page cannot be reached.  Please check your Internet connection.”  Aaaaaa!  Now I don’t just have a niggling curiosity about cloisonné enamel, I have a burning desire to know!!!

“Where’s your phone?!” I cry.  “I need to turn on the hotspot!”

I remember the days when search engines were quite limited, as data was limited, and the way searches worked was rather narrow.  Words had to be in the same order as whatever the search pulled up, similar words were overlooked, etc. ----- and, the biggest bugaboo of all, I didn’t know computer lingo well enough to even ask the questions properly enough to get any good answers! 

One simply didn’t get beneficial responses when one typed, “Where did the moving thingy go that used to be at the bottom of my screen?”

(I was looking for a **status bar** that had gone AWOL.)  heh

Tuesday afternoon was bright and sunny, and 31° – only 3° warmer than it was in Skagway, Alaska. 

My blind friend Penny and I were emailing, and I used the word ‘offspring’.  She wrote back, “Speaking of offspring, isn’t that a great word?  It’s like little cuties in booties springing up and down in the air.  Boing boing boing.”

Hee hee... I doubt if I’ll ever think of that word again, without remembering her description!

I got one set of four units for the Storm at Sea table topper done Tuesday, plus another set about half done. 

Wednesday before I could go sew, I had a pile of dishes to wash... bills to pay... and later, grandchildren to pick up after school... then church service that night.

About noon, I heard a loud, howling (non-animal) noise outside.  ?  Larry makes loud noises.  I went to see what in the world it was.  Sure enough, there was Larry on the back drive, cleaning out the Traeger grill with a variety of loud pieces of equipment.  It was a shop vac, at the moment.  He was preparing to smoke the venison he’d been marinating the last 12 hours.

Soon the Traeger was smoking away... but there weren’t many pellets in it, and Larry couldn’t find his new bag of pellets.  He came in to ask me if I’d seen it.

“I used the pellets as batting in the last quilt I made,” I told him, “because I ran out of batting.”

Guess he didn’t take me too seriously, because with hardly a pause he headed on out into the garage to continue the search, and was soon successful.

It was 16°, and with the wind blowing at 32 mph, the wind chill was -1°.  How much shellac does it take to keeps one’s lovely coiffure primly upon one’s cranium in such a gale?  And why do these gales so often tear through on Wednesdays, immediately after I get all gussied up for church??

Have you heard the allegations that the Russians have compromising information about Donald Trump?  Both Trump and the Russians say it’s a total hoax.  A spokesman for Russia, Demetri Wqietkaksdwiuadhgsdkh (spelling mine), said that the Kremlin “does not collect compromising information on anyone.” 

Ha!  If Demetri wanted to be believed, he should have reworded that!

At a quarter after three, I headed to school to collect the grandchildren.  One of the little boys had his steel slinky that my brother Loren gave him for Christmas; he’d taken it for Show and Tell.  The kids think I’m a wonderful, hilarious Grandma just because I called it a ‘stinky’. 

Home again, and time for a little snack:  vanilla yogurt parfait with slices of strawberries in it, and granola on top.  With vanilla crème coffee to polish it off.

Larry came home about 6, checked on his venison, and found that the smoker had quit smoking, possibly because he had the temperature set too low for the weather.  But it had put a nice brown ring of flavor around each piece, so it had smoked long enough to add a good flavor.  He put it into the oven and baked it a little while.  It didn’t take long until it was done.  And mmmm, mmmm, was it ever good.

Caleb and Maria, and Kurt and Victoria, came over after church to share some with us.  We put it on toasted sourdough bread.  Caleb and Maria shared the tacos they’d picked up just before we called them.  We had applesauce for dessert... and that was our just-before-midnight snack.  Good food... and even better company.  J

Before going to bed, I finished all the units for the Storm at Sea table topper, so they were ready to be put together into blocks.

For Christmas, Loren gave me a pair of scissors with a laser light, to aid in cutting a straight line.  They’re fairly heavy-duty, and cut well, though nothing like my big Fiskars shears.  They work great for such things as trimming the edges of blocks I’ve sewn on newsprint for foundation.  When they come to a dog-ear (a piece of fabric sticking out), they go through it a lot better than the paper scissors I generally use.  I don’t like to use the good shears on paper.

Loren was so pleased with the scissors, he ordered a pair for Hannah, too, for use with her card-making, quilling, and so forth.

That afternoon, Lydia came to borrow Victoria’s ice skates; she was taking Jacob and Jonathan skating.  Meanwhile, Larry and Bobby went hunting.  Together they got three deer this hunting season, one less than their quota.

Late that night, I finished the center of the table topper.  Friday, I started the borders.  The middle border has 75 pieces; borders 1 and 3 are simple.

Perhaps you’ll recall my little spiel about the Tarocco lotions, shampoos, conditioners, gels, soaps, etc., that were in the Hilton Gardens Hotel where we stayed in Pascagoula, Mississippi, last year?  I looked for the brand online when we got home – but it cost so much, I hunted up a substitute:  Naked Bee Orange Blossom Honey.  It’s good stuff, too.  They also make lip balms, soaps, and other products.

Well, Hester gave me Tarocco Sicilian blood orange shampoo and conditioner for Christmas, after giving me Tarocco Sicilian blood orange bath wash and lotion for my birthday. 

Friday, I sent her a note:  “I smell like Tarocco Sicilian blood oranges from head to toe!  Mmmmm!”  Then...   ((...thinking...))  Ooooo. 

“I hope no orangutans get in the house,” I added.  (They love oranges, you know.)

Friday was Joanna’s 14^th birthday.  We gave her a fleece robe in white with a black leopard print scattered on it, and the insides of each print is either bright fuchsia or bright lavender.  We also got her a soft fur cowl scarf.  It’s so pretty, I wanted to keep it myself.  I should go get another one... they’re on sale, and it matches the fur on my new thick black knit gloves.

There’s one of the things I like about winter:  all the pretty, soft, warm things to wear.

When I quit sewing that night, the first border was sewn on the table topper, the second border was sewn together, and the third border was cut.

It’s going a little slower than it might, since I’m taking photos as I go along, so that I can post the pattern when I’m done.  I sold 5 or 6 patterns last week.

Saturday was the last day of hunting season.  That morning, Larry found a Great Horned owl with a broken wing.  He wrapped it in his coat and went back to Bobby’s truck, and then they took it to Bobby and Hannah’s house and put it into Misty’s large cage. 

Levi promptly named it ‘Hooty.’

Larry posted pictures on Instagram, writing, “We found Owl while we were out hunting, but we don’t know where Piglet or Pooh were.” 

After calling the Raptor Recovery group, Bobby and Hannah took the owl to Schuyler, where they met a handler who took the bird from them and returned with it to Elkhorn, where they will bandage, feed, and rehabilitate him.  Eventually they hope to release him in the area where Larry originally found him.

This is what I have to step over every time I go from sewing machine to ironing board.  When he lies there on his back like that, with his front paws folded and tucked up on his chest, we think he looks like some sort of little feline kangaroo.

You know how people are always losing their marbles all the time?

Well... get this:  I found mine.

Yep.  Right smack-dab in the middle of my sewing room floor, there was a tiger’s eye marble.  (No, I don’t know when I lost it, and no, I don’t know how it got here.)

By 6:30 p.m., the second border was on the Storm at Sea table topper, all 75 pieces of it, and I was ready to attach border #3.

But I got interrupted by supper:  beef/barley soup, a bit of salmon, mixed vegetables/ bowtie pasta mix, Fruplait strawberry yogurt, golden fruit mixture, chef salad, and peach pie with frozen vanilla yogurt.  There are only two of us these days... and when I make that many entrées, I have to remember to keep the amounts small.  It’s a whole other world, from when there were eleven of us around the table, and more on date nights!

Caleb, who didn’t dislike it as much as you might think (upon reading this, cover your eyes, all ye who have, uh, sensitive sensibilities), called that kind of soup ‘Barf and Bealy’ – and taught his little sister to say it, too. 

I got the third border on the quilt and started putting together the backing.  I pieced it, because I didn’t have enough of any one large enough piece of matching fabric.  It’s a bit asymmetrical – because I didn’t have any choice.  I always feel all frugal and thrifty and parsimonious when I use up fabric on hand... but using up all these browns is liable to force me into a trip to the fabric store in the future.  If I’m appliquéing flowers or animals, I’m going to need a variety of browns! 

I need to get some batting, and then I can load it on the frame.

Sunday morning, the sun was shining when we headed to church, but a big, bad storm was moving in, and we were warned that there would be prolonged freezing rain, starting that afternoon, with significant ice accumulation. 

The forecast was not incorrect.

At about ten after six, we headed out the back patio door. 

Teensy wanted out.

We didn’t want him out, on account of the weather.  I ordered him back.  He backed off, a little bit. 

I stepped out onto the wooden deck.  It was slippery.  Like a glaze of greased glass, it was.  And I’d even picked some sorta low-heeled shoes with rubber soles that I thought would let me walk gracefully on ice.  I clutched the railing and informed Larry, “It’s slick!!!”

Larry, worrying about me, forgot to block the stupid cat. 

Teensy, spying his opportunity, dashed past Larry and out onto the deck.

Rubbery little paw pads and nice sharp claws didn’t do him much good, either.  Skidding and sliding, nearly falling flat, he rushed past me.  I yelled at him, which nearly upended him – but he didn’t slow down.  Stupid cat!  Some of my cats would’ve come back.  But Teensy was done growed up when we got him.  That always makes a difference.

I took a few more steps, hung onto the railing, and looked at the long stretch of stairway that glistened and shone in the porch light.  “I can’t go down those, in these shoes!” I told Larry.

So we went back inside, and walked through the construction-stuff-filled, carless garage to get to the Jeep on the back drive.  I crept along on the sloped, icy drive, and managed to get to the Jeep all right.

Salt had been spread on walkways and parking lots around the church, so there was no problem walking in.  After the sermon, as the congregation started singing the last couple of songs, a number of young men headed out to spread more salt.  The roads were a little slick as we drove home, but the Jeep is like a stalwart little donkey, and only slipped when Larry practically forced it to.  We stopped for some salt before coming home, and Larry sprinkled it all over our drive and sidewalk before I got out of the vehicle, and we made it into the house without mishap.

And there came Teensy, rushing along with us, heading into the house, meowing all the way:  “Hey, you left me out here in this freezing rain!  It’s cold!  Didn’t you know I’d get cold?!  Where’ve you been?!  I’ve been waiting and waiting for you!  I’m cold!  I’m all wet, and cold!”

He was indeed cold, with rain freezing on him – and he was sneezing.  Stupid cat!  Siggghhhh...

Look at him, using his tail as a lap quilt.

We ate some supper, and then Larry brought up the boxes for the Christmas tree and ornaments.  This is the latest we’ve ever been at putting it away – there are no kids to help us!  ;-) 

The box for the tree is too big for me to bring up the curving basement stairs, and I kept forgetting to ask Larry to bring it up when he got home from work.  If it was up to him, he’d just leave the tree there year-around, and consider the plugging it in next November ‘decorating’ and unplugging it the following January ‘undecorating’.  Ha!

We made a fun time of it, and had it down in nothing flat (and only broke one ornament).  As we put ornaments into little boxes, and little boxes into big boxes, we could hear freezing rain falling.  It sounds sorta like normal rain, only crinklier and sprinklier (should be a word).

A friend wrote and asked if I knew where to find a list of closings in our area.  I hunted around online, and discovered that lists of closings around these parts are hard to find.  I thought I finally found one:  the person who posted the first question wrote, “Schools?” whereupon the next poster asked, “Really?” and then I noted that the original poster posted a year ago, and poster #2 replied 9 months ago.  The headline hadn’t been updated since January 13^th, when someone wrote this:  “Due to the predicted winter storm, some city services may be closed on Sunday and Monday.  Those included may be:  The Aquatic Center and the Public Library.  If you would like to use these services on Sunday or Monday, call to confirm that they are open.”

Well.  Isn’t that helpful.

I finally found our city schools’ Facebook page, and this post:

This is Dr. Blippendip (name changed to protect, uh, me, of course), Superintendent of Public Schools. Due the ongoing winter weather, there will be no school on Monday, January 16th.

“Designated staff report” will mean full-time secretaries in the High School, Middle School, Administration Office, and elementary schools; all administrators; building/grounds supervisors; full-time maintenance, full-time custodians, and district technology staff report for duty at the regular time or by 10:00 a.m

“Teachers” do not report. This student contact day will be made up at the end of the year.

Employees not expected to be on duty when schools are closed include: food service personnel, paraprofessionals, lunch-playground aides and other part-time non-certified employees.

Huh?  Are ‘designated staff’ underpar and underprivileged individuals about whom no one cares a fig if they slide into telephone poles?

Note that Dr. Blippendip should take a punctuation course, and he should also reread his note before posting it on Facebook, and add omitted words if necessary.

I went on looking for closings lists, and discovered a somewhat short one that included towns from West Point to Atkinson:

38th Street Coffee would closed, as would the Catholic schools and Educational Service Unit 07.  So would Immanuel Lutheran school... Lakeview... and Meadows Behavioral Health, Inc.  {Everyone can behave any way they jolly well please.}

Pampered Paws and Sacred Yoga (not to be considered one and the same business) of Norfolk were also closed.  Smeal Fire Apparatus of Snyder was closed.  {Let’s hope all the li’l ol’ ladies of Snyder, Nebraska, firmly instructed their cats to refrain from getting themselves stuck in the tops of sugar maples.}

Smiles Dental was closed.  The Frowny one was open.  {I think.}

Oh, dear; they closed The Little Green Treehouse of West Point.  The Little Lambs Preschool of Tilden was closed.  {Toddlers would get to stay home and be lambs in wolves clothing.}  Awwwww... the Adorable Lovebugs Child Care in Grand Island was closed.  {Tsk.  Buzz-buzz.}  And no Barbershop Chorus in Kensington!  {Well, there’s a revoltin’ development.}  Oh, but the Blue Ox would be opening, though late at 8:00 a.m.  {Whew.  We can go to the Blue Ox.}  {What’s the Blue Ox, I wonder?}

Women’s Health Care was closed... the Nebraska Heart Institute...  {We are not allowed to have heart attacks today.}

Earlier this afternoon, I went out and filled the bird feeder.  When ice blankets everything, birds have a hard time finding food.  There was a fine rain coming down, it was a degree above freezing, and that deck was slippery.  But don’t worry, I put handfuls of sunflower seeds in my pockets before I walked out there, so if I had’ve fallen down and been unable to get back up, at least I’d have had some snacks handy.

Supper tonight was venison on little 12-grain loaves, fresh out of the oven, California vegetable mix (cauliflower, carrots, broccoli), applesauce, and a fresh vegetable tray (orange, red, yellow, and green peppers, carrots, and cauliflower) with Ranch dip.  And now we’re having dessert:  chocolate chip/peanut butter chunk cookies (soft on top, but a little too brown on the bottom, because I stupidly used the pizza sheet pan with the holes in it to bake them, since I’d already used it for the little loaves and thought I’d cleverly save myself another item to wash).  And a fresh pot of coffee.  :-)

And here’s me, unable to get up and fill my empty coffee mug, because I have COL (Cat on Lap).

Time to hit the hay!  I need to go to Hobby Lobby tomorrow, and the temperature might not be warm enough to melt much of this ice.  And I have no cleats!

,,,>^..^<,,,       Sarah Lynn       ,,,>^..^<,,,