Journal: Gardening or Weeding? That Is the Question

As I wrote in last week’s journal, we had our Teensy kitty put to sleep last Monday.  We miss him.  He was probably the nicest kitty we ever had.

Scattered through this letter are more of my favorite pictures of him.  Here he is again as a YouTube junkie, watching squirrels.

At least we still have ol’ Tiger kitty that someone used to be mean to.  He has such a sweet disposition, in spite of whatever he endured before he wandered his way to our house, scared to death of men and their boots.  He was even scared of boots when no feet were in them!  How could anybody be mean to him?!  It’s beyond me.

Nowadays Tiger is delighted when Larry gets up in the morning to get ready for work.  He wraps himself ’round and ’round Larry’s ankles, boots or no boots, purring his heart out.  Larry stops with the boot-tying periodically and scritch-scratches on the side and back of Tiger’s head where he likes it most. 

Larry puts his socks and boots on whilst sitting down.  And that man has ‘taught’ the cat to run underneath his feet when he lifts them up to put on his socks.  It gives the cat a little free petting, you see.  Now, that would be all right, except... I put on my socks whilst standing up.  Do you know what happens when you’re putting down a foot, and discover there’s a cat under that foot?!  I certainly don’t want to step on him, so I’ve nearly been upended time and again from that happening.  I can’t make him stop it, because I can never keep from laughing.

Tiger knows good and well Larry will never, ever be anything but a milquetoast toward him.  If Larry is eating a piece of cheese and Tiger says, “MRRRRoooowwwWWW!” – Tiger will get a little piece of cheese.

When he first came here, he didn’t even know how to take a piece of food from our hands – no one had ever handed him food before.  He was also the fattest cat I’d ever seen.  How does a stray cat get fat?!  He’s slimmed down a lot since then, as we feed him special ‘Senior Diet’ food from Iams, with a spoonful or two of Fancy Feast every time I gave Teensy his food with the medicine tablet crushed into it.  I didn’t want Tiger to think I liked Teensy more, after all.  Now and then he gets a small handful of Feline Greenies, those treats that are especially for teeth health, better breath, and hairball control.  But all that extra weight he used to haul around has made him pretty gimpy on his hind legs.  We have no idea how old he is, but he’s getting a little gray around the muzzle.

There he is sleeping, one big ol’ paw wrapped over his eyes... and here he is following me around last Monday, quite as if he wondered if I knew something was wrong with Teensy, and wanted to know what I was going to do about it.

Loren was very quiet and subdued last Monday, after Sunday’s fracas over whether or not he should go on a vacation.  He was a little better Tuesday, and by Wednesday he was pretty much back to normal (whatever that is).  I hoped he was rethinking his position, and it wasn’t just the calm before the storm.

I love my brother, and never want to speak to him unkindly.  But I will do what I must to keep him – and everyone else – safe.

My nephew Robert’s wife Margaret has been helping Lura Kay label her photos and put them into albums.  Last Sunday night, she gave me an envelope full of photos, mostly of my family, that needed to be labeled and dated.  So Tuesday I went through them all – and was pleased to find a few I’d never seen before, including one of Lura Kay and me together.  I hadn’t had a single picture of me and my sister together, except for a couple taken when I was a baby.

These were taken at our church’s Christmas dinner, 1992.  I was making that silver and magenta silk jacquard suit on the evening of September 14, 1992, when Larry called from Central City to tell me my father had passed away on their way home from Grand Island.

I made Lydia’s little dress from leftover scraps from my suit.  She was 18 months on Christmas Day, 1992.

I also found this picture of Joseph amongst the photos.  It was taken at our Fourth-of-July picnic, 1988.  He was 3.

After Lura Kay’s pictures were labeled, I got back to scanning my own photos.  I would’ve started quilting the Colorwash quilt, but quilts would be arriving soon from a customer, and I didn’t want the quilting machine tied up.  I intend to do custom quilting on that big quilt, and it’ll take a while.  When I quit scanning for the night, about two-thirds of an album was done.  This album has photos from August of 1997, when we went to Branson, Missouri, to retrieve a friend’s van after it went kaput there.  It was one of the last trips we took with all of the children.  We camped in tents at a big, nice campground beside Table Rock Lake. 

Wednesday, three quilts arrived from a lady in Phoenix.  Wouldn’t you know, it was the first morning since I ruptured a disc in my back that I finally went out to do some weeding in the flower gardens.  I managed to fill the Gorilla cart heaping full of weeds twice before I decided I’d probably better stop, as my back was protesting.  The jungle didn’t look a whole lot different, but I could see the difference.  If I can give it at least an hour each morning, those flowerbeds should soon be looking nice again.

I happily splish-splashed in the tub for a while... and was just getting dressed when I heard someone at the door calling, “Hello? Helloooooo???”

Delivery persons will wait for hours, if need be, until you are unable to get to the door.  Then and only then will they knock on that door.

I scrambled a little quicker, and hurried for the door.  The lady had already gone back out to her van with one box, though she’d left one inside the door (just to tantalize me, or what?); but she saw me and came back, then did the digital signing for me (customers can’t touch her hand-held pc, on account of Covid-19).  It was a different mail lady this time, a friendly, jolly one, for once.  I asked if she would be able to just sign and leave packages for me, if I couldn’t get to the door in time.  I pointed at my wet hair and said, “It doesn’t matter what time I decide to take a bath, that’s when----”

“That’s when we show up!!” she laughed, nodding.  She said she’d check.  A mailman we used to have had me sign a paper permitting that; did the permission expire?  I hope they still allow it.

Anyway, I had the quilts, and would soon trot upstairs and get started on them.

One of the boxes looked like the United States Post Office used it as a jack to hold their truck up while they changed a tire.  Really, it was totally smushed.  Fortunately, the quilt was undamaged inside the box.  Since that box would be unusable, I ordered a pack of ten more large, flat-rate boxes online.

By the time I quit quilting to go to our evening church service, one and a half rows were done.  I didn’t burn any midnight oil after church that night, because I planned to get up early and work in the flower gardens again before it got too hot.

Here’s Teensy helping me sew a few years ago, and there he is on the bench on the porch.

A friend recently sent me a picture of a big drum set her son plays in a band. 

I got a drum for Christmas once, when I was about 7 or 8 years old. A bright red little toy snare drum.  Exactly what I’d asked for.  Except... what I’d wanted, and what I’d expected (since I was much too naïve to know anything at all about the cost), was a large drum set, complete with multiple drums including snare and tom-toms and bass and kettle with foot pedals, cymbals, a triangle, and so on.

This, because we had recently visited friends in California, and their teenage son had cranked up a rousing version of ‘Battle Hymn of the Republic’ on his boombox, and then handed me a couple of mallets and a couple of sticks, pointed to the stool, and told me, “Go to it!”

I went to it.

I loved it.

I wanted drums.

I got a toy.  I was mightily disappointed.

However, I had long been thoroughly taught by my mother to be thankful for a gift, no matter what it was, so I tried really, really hard to be pleased and thankful with my gift.

It was a cute little drum. And it was red, so there was that.

Thursday morning, I got more gardening done; then, after a bit of housecleaning, I went back to work on my customer’s quilt.  I used white 50-weight So Fine thread on top, and white 60-weight Bottom Line thread in the bobbin.  The pantograph is ‘Kim’s Butterflies’. 

Later that afternoon, I walked around outside taking pictures – and found a baby blue jay on the back drive, fresh out of the nest.  Isn’t it funny how they put their feet flat on the ground, not even using their claws much, and then press their short little wings and tails into service as balancing props?  And look how the yellow part of his beak turns down in a sad little curve just under his eye, in the way of baby bird beaks everywhere.  That’s an expression guaranteed to make mama and papa birds all sympathetic and willing to feed their offspring.

He can fly, though.  When I got too close to him, he gathered himself together and, wings pumping hard, flew right up into a tree.

That evening I posted some pictures of my customer’s quilt on a Facebook quilting group and got the following comment:  “Would be nicer if hand quilted!!!”  (And yes, she did indeed put three exclamation marks.)

Do you think it would be out of line if I wrote back, “You would be nicer if in a mule-drawn cart.”

Okay, okay... I didn’t do that.  I just leave such remarks lie there; I don’t click ‘Like’ or ‘Love’ or ‘Angry’ or anything.  But I did look at her personal Facebook page.  Whataya know, she’s single.  Why in the world would such a sweet, personable person be single?!!!

Question:  Are we shocked to discover she’s single?

Answer:  No, we are not.

Here’s a mud dauber looking for a drink... and there’s Teensy at the bathroom window, the best viewpoint for watching the birds at the feeders on the back deck.

By midnight, the first quilt was allllmost done...  but I quit for the night. 

I got more weeds pulled Friday morning; the front yard was definitely looking better.  That afternoon, I finished the first Tumbler quilt and got started on the next.

I had not seen the sparkles in the fabric until the sun shone through my windows and fell on the quilt that day.  Then I had to try and try until I caught a few twinkles with the camera.  😃

When I got this quilt all loaded and ready to be basted at the edge, I discovered there was a bit of excess fullness in the gray borders on either side of the animal border.  Mind you, in the photo it looks a little worse than it really was, because of the low angle of the camera and the lighting being at the far end of the frame.

So... my handy starch bottle to the rescue.  I gave it a good spritz, waited a minute or two, then smoothed it gently with the iron.  Afterwards, I was able to baste it with no tucks or wrinkles.  And with that, I got on with the quilting.

As with the previous quilt, I used 50-weight white So Fine thread on top, and 60-weight white Bottom Line thread in the bobbin.  The pantograph is called G’Daisy.

It turned out fine, nice and smooth.  I finished two rows that day.

Saturday, I spent some time on the flower gardens; all but one of the front-yard gardens were looking nice.  (We won’t talk about the back-yard gardens yet.)

That afternoon, Victoria invited us to their house for scrumptious pecan rolls fresh out of the oven.  We visited, played with Carolyn and Violet, then went to Subway to get a steak sub for Loren.  We picked up a few things for him at the grocery store, too.

By evening, the second Tumblers quilt was finished.  There’s one more to go; I’ll start on it tomorrow. 

We drove to Dairy Queen that night and treated ourselves to Royal New York Cheesecake Blizzards.  All around us, lightning was flashing and thunder was rumbling.  It started raining when we were halfway to town.

It looked like half the town had the same idea – the line at the Dairy Queen snaked all the way around two sides of the building, out into the street, and down one entire block.  We got in line and waited.

It wasn’t too long before we got to the speaker and placed our order.  We pulled forward... and waited some more.

And the Jeep’s engine temperature began climbing.

We turned off the air conditioner. 

The temperature continued to rise.

Larry put the vehicle in neutral, and the rise of the temperature gauge slowed a little.  We wondered if we should pull out of line and turn off the Jeep, but feared it wouldn’t start again.  The temperature was still on the low side of ‘too hot’.

There were evidently turtles in the DQ fixing people’s food.  It was taking a year and a day for them to make a couple of milkshakes, and half a century to grill up a hamburger. 

We waited with all our might and main, while the temperature gauge crept ever closer to redline.

Finally, finally, they handed over our Blizzards, first doing the obligatory upside-down-Blizzard demonstration (after which Larry does his obligatory upside-down demonstration – over my lap), and then we drove away, planning to stop at Walkers’ shop so Larry could take a look under the hood and see what ailed the Jeep.  By now it was raining fairly hard.  The temperature had dropped from 77° when we left home to 68°. 

But whataya know, the temperature of the Jeep began falling, too.  Soon it was back to normal, so we drove it on home.  Larry hasn’t had a chance to look at it yet, so we’re driving the BMW.

We were glad for the rain; we’ve been needing it.  A wildfire has burned about 2,500 acres in Banner County, Nebraska, way out on the western edge of the state.

But in Omaha, they got 5 inches of rain in a short amount of time that night, causing flash flooding in the downtown area.  Three friends who lived in the Old Market Lofts nearly drowned when they took an elevator down to the lobby to observe the damage wrought by ongoing hail and flash floods, only to find themselves stuck in that elevator on the ground floor as water rushed in from the lobby and engulfed them.  While two of them called 911, the other person called his roommate, who works in maintenance for the building.  Before emergency responders arrived, the roommate, a brother, and a third person were able to pry open the elevator door from the lobby side.  

At this point, the water was up to their necks, and they were standing on the elevator’s railings.  When the doors finally opened, the water rushed out, “and we went swimming out!” said the man.

Last night a friend was asking for correct wording to a couple of hymns, and something she said reminded me of the time another friend and I were practicing a duet.  There was a short musical break... and then the next verse. 

I sang verse 4. 

My friend sang verse 3.

Now, she could clearly hear that I was singing verse 4; but she, being sure she was right, kept right on with verse 3. 

I, being just as sure that I was right, stubbornly and steadfastly continued with verse 4. 

Suddenly I realized I had not sung the words she was singing yet.  I was singing the wrong verse.

I stuttered to a stop.  There was a moment of silence, and then I said, “Why must you be so stubborn, when I am wrong?”

Then we all laughed ’til we cried, and had to take a small break before we could sing again.

I got the last flowerbed in the front yard weeded this morning.  I’m catching up, after that six-week hiatus necessitated by the herniated disc!  ’Course, there are already new weeds growing in the gardens I weeded last week; but I need to work my way on around the house before I worry about them.  The gardens on the east, the south, and the west look baaad.

No, I am not pulling up any more sequoias, redwoods, or oak trees.  I march forth, Fiskars snips in one hand, loppers in the other.  En garde, ye malicious volunteer trees and large, economy-sized weeds.

Sweet-tempered old Tiger kitty follows me around everywhere I go, whether outside gardening, on the main floor doing laundry, or upstairs quilting.  I pet him and give him a Feline Greenies treat now and then, in order to encourage the habit.  And he purrs loudly.

I managed to work outside for an hour and fifteen minutes before I petered out.  Last week, it was only an hour.  Yep, I’m a-gettin’ bettah.

It’s Loren’s 83^rd birthday today.  When I called and wished him a happy birthday, he knew exactly how old he was.

This morning, his sons Richard and Paul, who live in Texas, came to see him.  This evening when Larry stopped at his house to fix a slow toilet and work on his sprinkler system, Loren told him that a couple of men from Texas had visited. 

“One was Dolly’s husband, and the other was his brother,” he said.  “Norma was here while they were visiting, but I haven’t seen her since then.  She must be visiting relatives.”

Dolly was Loren’s first wife, the mother of his four children; she passed away several years ago – and her husband passed away quite a few years before her.

Larry let it go, as we do whenever possible.  That’s a sad thing, though.

For his birthday we’re giving him a vintage-look bronze skeleton pocket watch.  The turning gears can be seen through the glass sides.  Also, we’ll give him a pair of suede-and-canvas work gloves.  I have a raspberry-peach pie in the oven; we’ll share that with him.

And now I need to pay a few bills, do some laundry and a bit of housecleaning, and then get back to my customer’s third Tumblers quilt.  I have a tall Woodwick candle burning; it has three fragrances layered in it:  vanilla bean, caramel, and biscotti.  I smell vanilla bean, at the moment.

The hostas with the big, white, bell-shaped blossoms are beginning to bloom.  They smell like lily-of-the-valley to the fifth power.  Mmmmmm.  😊

Here’s my big rag rug drying on the deck.  I poured hot water mixed with Tide all over it, and then Larry and I took turns scrubbing it with the brush part of a long-handled mop.  Then I doused it with water from the hose while Larry used the brush to squeegee it off.

That thing was so heavy when it was wet, we had a hard time lifting it up on the railing and the iron bench to dry.

It wasn’t quite dry when I checked a little while ago; I’ll leave it until tomorrow afternoon.

Good thing we bought some Cameron’s coffee at Hy-Vee Saturday, because the coffee that was supposed to come from Christopher Bean got all discombobulated and, after arriving in Norfolk, Nebraska, Thursday night, just 40 miles to our north, went back southeast and landed in Memphis, Tennessee, Friday evening.  After that, it went to South Bend, Indiana, arriving at 6:13 a.m. Saturday.  At that point, it apparently gathered its wits about it and headed back this way, getting to Norfolk once again at 12:43 p.m. Saturday.

Evidently concluding it really, truly did not like that location, it hip-hopped straight back to South Bend, Indiana, getting there at 6:16 this morning.  By 6:30 a.m., it was supposedly on a FedEx vehicle ‘for delivery in South Bend’.

The next entry on the FedEx tracking page is listed at 9:49 a.m.:  “Delivered, Columbus, Nebraska.”

Riiiiight.  Sherrrrrrrr.

It came via rocket, I surmise?

Except... it’s not here.  What if it’s now in an eternal loop between Norfolk, Nebraska, and South Bend, Indiana?

I wrote to the Christopher Bean Company, located in Daytona Beach, Florida, “Contrary to popular opinion, the coffee has not been delivered,” and I sent them the schedule from the FedEx website.  “That’s gotta be the most confused box of coffee to have ever left your company,” I finished.  “Well-traveled, though.”

Who’s drinking my coffee, I wonder?

I posted a few photos of flowers on my Facebook page, including some of these purple coneflowers.

 

“‘Purple’?!” wrote one lady.

I responded, “Flowers sometimes neglect to read the gardening manuals in order to learn what color they’re supposed to be.”

For instance, the tall ‘lavender’ phlox in the front yard is pink, while the phlox in the back yard is fuchsia.  

There are about a dozen generous stands of it all around the house now, and it all came from one original flowerpot, years ago.  And sometimes it really is lavender.  But not this year.

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