Last Tuesday, Larry stopped by for lunch. He was on his way to Platte Center, 8 miles
to our north, to get a haircut. His long-time
barber retired, and after a couple of regrettable attempts to find a barber in
town who can cope with his thick, straight, coarse hair, he was glad when a
friend with similar hair recommended a lady in the little village of Platte
Center, and she gave him an acceptable haircut, first try.
When he pulled into our driveway, a neighbor
lady – let’s call her Mollie – from over on Old Highway 81 was visiting with the
neighbor lady across the lane – let’s call her Rose. Mollie had brought along her medium-sized
dog, which might possibly be an Australian cattle dog, as she matches that
general silhouette; or she could merely be a DUL (Dog of Uncertain Lineage). Let’s call her Zuma.
Rose’s Australian shepherd – let’s call him Boomer
– was holding court.
When Boomer saw Larry arrive and climb out of
his BMW, he did his thing of barking ferociously and charging down the hill at
him. If he ever gets close enough to us
after this performance, he wags and accepts lots of pets and scratches before
trotting jubilantly back home again.
Boomer has known us all his livelong life, and this is what he does,
just for the enjoyment of it (and to make his owners yell).
Rose, as usual, shouted for him to come
back. Boomer, as usual, ignored her
until he was good and ready to ‘come back’. To be fair, her shouting does
sometimes convince him to stop halfway across the lane, as he did this time.
Trotting back up his driveway toward the
visiting Zuma, Boomer strutted as best he can, tail up. He can’t strut like he once did, as old age
is creeping up on him. Approaching Zuma,
he poked his nose into her face and neck as if to say, And that’s how it’s
done.
Zuma, ears straight up and watching Larry,
glanced quickly at Boomer, stepped nervously from one paw to the other, and
then, with one last glance at Boomer, raced down the driveway, giving a few
high-pitched yaps as she ran.
After arriving at the intersection of
driveway and lane, she turned around and went scampering gaily back up the
hill, tail wagging happily. She bumped
against Boomer, ears going up, down, up, down, clearly asking, How’d I do,
huh huh huh? That was pretty good,
right?
While Larry grabbed a quick lunch, I
had a late breakfast of half a toasted cinnamon bagel with lots of butter on
it, apricot preserves on one side, and blackberry jam on the other, and a tall
glass of milk. (‘Sides’ as in ‘left and
right’, not ‘top and bottom’, you understand.)
I opened a new bag of coffee beans,
this one chocolate-raspberry flavored, from Christopher Bean. Did you know that grinding coffee beans can
generate enough heat to alter their flavor and make them taste burnt? This is particularly true with electric blade
grinders, which create friction and heat through rapid blade movement. Excessive
heat can cause volatile flavor compounds to evaporate, leading to a loss of
aroma and taste, and alter the coffee’s chemical composition, resulting in a
burnt or bitter flavor. I counter this by keeping coffee beans in the
freezer. I know for a fact the beans are
not over-warmed during grinding, because the stainless steel cup is so cold
after grinding them, it nearly freezes my fingers! Furthermore, frozen beans are more quickly
ground, and the grounds are less likely to clump together. All this results in a noticeable improvement
in flavor.
My supper that evening was a bacon, lettuce, and
tomato sandwich. Bacon hurts Larry’s
mouth, so he had chicken corn chowder instead.
I sewed for eight hours that day and got eight
blocks done for Jeffrey’s Safari Animals quilt.
Wednesday, I had an appointment with my eye
doctor in Lincoln to get the Botox injections for Blepharospasm. My oldest daughter Hannah went with me.
This old bridge over the Loup River is
about to be torn down and replaced with a new one. It was built in 1931, and was listed as
‘structurally deficient’ some time back.
It’s the oldest bridge on the list of ‘Top Most Traveled Structurally
Deficient Bridges in Nebraska’.
Everywhere we looked, we saw new
little calves gamboling about the pastures.
They’re so cute.
Getting to Lincoln a bit early, we
used up a few minutes driving alongside Holmes Lake. We didn’t get out, as it was quite windy, and
I didn’t really want to get all mussed before my appointment. Blossoming trees were in bloom all around the
city. Lincoln, being farther south than
Columbus, has a little warmer weather than we do, and their trees and flowers
bloom a week or two sooner than ours.
Hannah and I went to the Bánhwich Café
after leaving the eye doctor’s office. Hannah had half of one of these sandwiches,
and hers looked even yummier than this one, and smelled scrumptious.
I had a papaya smoothie with fruit
bubbles in it, and it was totally delicious. I’ve never had fruit bubbles before!
The eye doctor had told me, as usual,
that the Botox injections would take effect in 3-5 days; but, as usual, I could
already tell a little improvement by the time we got to the café, just 15
minutes later.
We then drove to Prairie Meadows in
Omaha, because one of the staff members had called to tell me they had found Loren’s
Bible case. It had a handful of photos
in it, but no Bible. No one has any idea
where the Bible went, though it had his name in it.
On the top of the stack of photos was
an old picture of a man in a sailor suit, probably from World War II. It was nobody I knew, so I gave it
back to the staff. I wonder, did Loren
start telling people he was a vet from World War II after finding the
picture and thinking it was himself; or did he tell the story first, and
then think that was his picture when he spotted it somewhere later? The stories he told were our father’s
stories. Daddy was in the Pacific
Theatre during the liberation of the Philippines.
It was an hour’s drive from Lincoln to
North Omaha. This old barn that has
weathered many years was no match for the bad weather of the last few months.
By the time we got to the nursing
home, there was a very definite improvement in my eyes.
We got back to Columbus a little after
5:30. I dropped Hannah off at her house
and got home at a quarter ’til 6 – time to get ready for our evening church
service. And yes, my eyes were absolutely
better. (Are you convinced now? 😄 )
I had enough time before leaving for
church to allllmost finish another block for the Safari Animals quilt. Larry didn’t get home from work in time to
come.
We had a quick supper of soup and
crackers when Larry got home half an hour or so after I did.
Thursday, I quick-washed most all of my
summer clothes, adding those good-smelling Downy scent beads to each load. I don’t like pulling out clothes to wear that
have been stored for several months, and discovering that, despite being put
away nice and clean, they now carry the vague scent of the pine drawers in
which they’ve been residing. The summer
clothes are now taking the place of the winter clothes, which get stored in
upstairs dressers. I don’t have to
exchange all of them, as there’s enough room in the main floor closet
and shelves for most of my everyday clothes. There would be room for all of them, if
Larry didn’t think he had to have a few nails in there! 😅
When my clothes were done, there were a
couple loads of Larry’s work clothes to wash. In the interludes of the GCM (Great Clothing
Migration) (aka CMC = Clothes’ Musical Chairs), I put together more Cock’s Comb
blocks for Jeffrey’s Safari Animals quilt. It really didn’t look like the pile of
four-piece units was going down at all; but it must be, because the
stack of finished blocks was definitely getting taller.
It was windy that day, with gusts up to 40-45
mph, and we’d been issued a Fire Weather Warning.
For supper that evening, I fixed
chicken in the Instant Pot. The Instant
Pot is handy, because I can keep Larry’s food warm in it until he gets home
from work. We had lettuce and tomatoes
with the chicken, and strawberry yogurt for dessert.
It was 10:00 p.m. before I transferred
the last load of clothes to the dryer, and put away the dry load. Then I retired to my recliner to edit
pictures.
“Do you ever set [sic] and do nothing?”
someone asked me a while back. “That is
my favorite pastime.”
“Nope! 😆” I answered. “That would be my least favorite
pastime.”
And anyway, I have arthritis in my
hips. If I sit very long at all, I get ‘a
hitch in my get-along’, as Larry’s Grandma Ruby used to say. 😄
I was late getting the bird feeders out Friday
morning. Midmorning, I saw three or four
red-winged blackbirds land on the deck railing and a couple on the rebar that
holds the feeders, all craning their necks and looking about for the
feeders. One looked straight at the
patio door, then the window, then back at the door, and chirped loudly in his
funny metallic voice. Then, apparently
giving up on me, he hopped up to the Nyjer-seed feeder (I don’t bother taking
it in at night, since the raccoons leave it alone), perched precariously on the
small tray at the bottom, and commenced to eating finch seed.
Hey, Mr. Red-Wing, I’m not rich enough to pay
for a diet of thistle seed for the likes of you and your ilk! I scurried right out to refill and rehang the
sunflower-seed feeders. Red-winged
blackbirds like that better, so when those feeders are up, they ignore the
Nyjer seed.
I cleaned the bathroom, paid some bills, placed a large
pick-up order at Walmart for groceries, put away the last load of laundry including
the hang-to-dry
things (why do I have so many of those??), finished editing photos, and headed
back to the quilting studio.
If I acquire any more clothes, some closet or
dresser somewhere is going to explode and shower clothes all over the whole
house. In addition to everyday summer
and winter clothes both in our bedroom and in upstairs dressers, there’s a closet
in the little library upstairs where I have my good church clothes, aka ‘glad
rags’. Summer clothes are on the left;
winter clothes are on the right. ‘They’
(whoever ‘they’ are) say you should get rid of anything you haven’t worn in six
months. (For those of us in parts of the
country where there are wild variations in the weather throughout the year,
they should extend that time to one year.) But I like and wear the clothes I have; so I
keep them until I either a) run out of room (usually because someone
gives me something new), or b) decide I no longer like the item(s). I rarely wear them out.
It’s fun when we go on vacation, and I pull
out some comfortable-but-nice things that I haven’t worn for quite a while to
take with us.
Larry is then liable to remark, “That’s a
pretty outfit!” And then, after a moment’s
consideration, “Did you get me anything new?” haha
Larry does wear out his
clothes, so I do sometimes grab a few ‘new’ things for him – usually at the
Goodwill or the Salvation Army. There
are almost always nice things there, contrary to the way they were when the
children were small. Back then, people
evidently waited until clothes were in pretty bad shape before giving them
away, and I didn’t care to purchase things for the kids that looked like they’d
already been through the Boer War. It
was just one of the reasons I sewed so many of their clothes.
We were issued an Air Quality Alert because
of ongoing fires in Kansas, but it was a bright, sunny day, 69°, with nary a
trace of smoke that I could see or smell.
Now, here’s a twist on there/their/they’re
that I haven’t seen before; this was in a news article online: “They are really showing what there’e capable of...”
It was Teddy and Amy’s oldest son
Ethan’s birthday that day, the 11th.
Larry and I dropped off his gift, an electric lunchbox, on our way to
Walmart to get the grocery order.
I sewed for 6 ½ hours Saturday, and got nine more Cock’s Comb blocks
done. I’m getting faster! I think (maybe) that means there are 28
blocks done and 17 to go.
I used leftovers from Friday night’s chicken to make chicken and rice for
supper. I added green beans, corn,
carrots – and a few lima beans by accident, thinking they were peas. 😄 They were
actually quite good in that mix.
Sunday was Palm Sunday. I love these
verses in Luke 19, especially where Jesus said if He stopped His disciples from
praising Him, the ‘stones would immediately cry out’:
37 And when
he was come nigh, even now at the descent of the mount of Olives, the whole
multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice
for all the mighty works that they had seen;
38 Saying,
Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord: peace in heaven, and
glory in the highest.
39 And some
of the Pharisees from among the multitude said unto him, Master, rebuke thy
disciples.
40 And he
answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace,
the stones would immediately cry out.
Matthew adds (and the other gospels also
record) the ‘Hosanna in the highest’:
8 And a
very great multitude spread their garments in the way; others cut down branches
from the trees, and strawed them in the way.
9 And the
multitudes that went before, and that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna to the
son of David: Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the
highest.
We have a whole lot of Pharisees in this
time and age, too. They just go by
other names, these days.
After church yesterday, Larry made us a
Sunday-afternoon lunch of French toast, using that scrumptious Nature-Crafted
12-grain thick-sliced bread. Mmmmm.
After our evening service, I finally
had the chance to see my friend’s baby for the first time since he was born
December 11 weighing just 3 lbs., 5 oz. He’s
so cute, little arms and legs getting plump, and working on a little double
chin. He looks bright-eyed, healthy and
well.
Last night, it sounded like the house was
about to get blown over. One of my
weather apps reported a ‘fresh breeze’. 😄
Reading the news this morning, I came upon
this comment made during an interview with one of the men who conspired – and
failed – to haul off with the Millenium jewels back in the year 2000: “I knew
something was up when the police put the gun through the window to my head. I thought, ‘something’s not quite right here.’”
Smart guy.
We’re having high winds here again, with gusts
to 50 mph. The birds at my feeders think
they’ve gone to the amusement park, and are on some wild rides! 😅
Now to wash some dishes and get a quilt block
or two done before bedtime.
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
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