twisted mysteries

chilly!

2012-01-04T08:07:00.001-05:00

7:45 am

Brrrr it’svery very chilly as in 8 degrees. Sounds more interesting in celcius though I don’tknow that offhand. Don’t have to go in until late today, since I am staying formy spinning class until 10. Early afternoon we have a meeting for 200. I don’t knowyet if we will be having any student TA’s, or what our schedules will be oranything.

I didmy first tutoring yesterday. It went well, or at least I enjoyed it and heseemed engaged. We’ll see if he finds it helpful as time goes on. And it wouldbe nice if I could hear something from his teacher about what he plans to focuson. I just went over some really basic stuff about energy, the purpose ofphotosynthesis, atoms and molecules, things that I hope will help himunderstand what his teacher is talking about better.

Asfor this morning, I must do buns, meditate (I have decided I am going to TRYvery hard to meditate twice every day in the hopes that it will help mystomach), pull things together to leave (need to get bobbins and a dye pot tobring for class) and then I hope there will also be time to finish spinning thewhite angora I have on the old lendrum. I spun a bunch of it last night atWebs. There were a lot of new people there. I guess that is a good thing. In fact,2 new people were at First Person Sunday night too – wow, expanding my socialcircle I guess. One person last night sat and spun away on a drop spindle quiteintensely. Another did that also, then she had one of the demo wheels and wastrying that but had trouble, so I finally helped her with drafting. Then therewas a young couple who have somehow just been bitten by the spinning bug. They wentto a bunch of ag fairs and saw spinning and it looks relaxing, so now theybought a wheel and need to figure out what to do with it. It seems funny to bein a place where you can be struck by something and just decide to take it onall in a whoosh. There’s no way right now I could take on some big new thing. Orif I did I’d need to rearrange a lot of other things – give a lot of otherthings up I suppose. Well, they did not bring anything to spin with so theyjust watched and asked questions. I picked up a friend who brought knitting,but she did not actually do any, she just sat and talked with another friendand looked forlornly at her knitting instructions because it has been so longsince she was working on the mittens she brought, that she cannot rememberwhere she is or what needs to be done. She is going to come over Fri for tea(while I must wait for the furnace folk to come service the furnace) so maybe I’llsuggest she bring it and I can help her.

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Sleepless in bloggerville

2011-12-22T09:22:00.001-05:00

9 am

Man am Isick of all this stuff with the dog. He was up all night again last night, onlythis time K got sick of dealing with it and told me to get out of bed and takecare of him. Basically he is just up all night, pacing, woofing, not sleeping. I’vegotten better at sleeping through it with my lovely earplugs, so that manytimes I do wake up when K gets up or when I hear him tell T to go to sleep etcbut then I manage to go back to sleep and I don’t actually get woken up bytigger himself. Many nights K has taken to sleeping out in the living room tokeep him quiet. Well we have a vet visit scheduled today. It sure would be niceif they could say what is wrong and we could do something about it. I suppose Ishould bring a stool sample, which means I’ll need to take him for a walk sincethat always seems to stimulate the pooping reflexes.

As forthe rest of the day: I have grading to finish, nearly done, I have presents towrap, the photos to cut and frame, something to make for the party at theneighbor’s tonight (roasted Kale). Must also start knitting the muff for theperson who ordered it at the fair. And the usual: feed buns, laundry, workthrough the stack. And spin more – finish the orange stuff. So that next week Ican start a big carding project of blue stuff.

The girlsare going on a “Quest” today. Meaning I’ll have the afternoon here to myselfwhich is actually very nice. Been more social lately than I am used to. And thereare no plans for Friday which is lovely. Need to figure out if we have all theBouche ingredients, and make more truffles with L. They came out great! And wefigured out how to temper the chocolate and everything.

Let’ssee. I’ll start by getting dressed. Then feed buns. Then start another laundryand bring up a wet one to hang out. Then I guess I’ll pull out the rest of thegrading – just finish up a question on one page and one more page to go. Not bad.I’ll do some spinning when I need a break. I may need to take a nap at somepoint since I didn’t get much sleep from 3:30 on with me on the couch andtigger first of all outside, then in on the couch with me.

Ok timeto get to it. I feel like I also have a lot of emails to do. That kind of goesin the deal with the pile section. And clean out email boxes.

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grumps and booth photos

2011-12-21T08:57:00.000-05:00

8:20 am

Been gettingup really late these days. Lazy bum I guess, but also I have not been sleepingwell and I can blame it in part on the dog. He has not been sleeping well andthat makes for rough nights for the rest of us. I have an appointment to takehim to the vet tomorrow. They, as happens with doctors in general, willprobably have no idea and won’t say much. Well, he also has that lump near hisbutt and we may need to get that removed.

Boy haveI also been in the worst mood. Happens when classes end. I guess I no longerhave that schedule or stimulation to keep me going. just grading. The collegeis being completely closed Dec 23 – Jan 2 and after that the prof is off to aconference to SC so we need to figure out when we are doing grades. I am annoyed(mad, upset) because of his announcement the other day that he will not beteaching next fall (which I expected) but that his post-doc will probably alsonot be here (the dept has to way limit the number of visiting faculty it hires)so who the hell knows what I’ll be doing or teaching, but probably not thiscourse we worked so hard on. It may never be taught again, who knows.

Anothermood factor is having the girls here. Makes no sense, right? I am so glad theyare here, I really like seeing them, I want them around so much…. But it isalso stressful. And it is not always such a happy thing. They don’t really seemto want to be around me very much, they do want to be together which is good,they just seem to see me as an intrusion and more annoying than anything. And theytell me how annoying I am and when I do things wrong. It is wearing. And sad. Rememberthe days…when I was the center of everything. When I was the best and theyloved me most of all. Well those are gone. Expected, normal, how it should be,but still hard as hell. And it just feeds my own crap of feeling inadequate andunimportant etc etc etc. oh well. There will be some good things.

Tonightwe’ll go to Wed Night Dinner so that should be good. Latkes. I need to makesomething with squash to bring. Tomorrow we were invited to the neighbor’sacross the street – annual Solstice gathering. We’ll see how that is. I maybring more roasted kale which is what I brought to the bio lunch. Only I think Imay have eaten too much of it and maybe that is why my stomach felt so badyesterday. I’ve been having a lot of trouble with the regurgitation thing. It isannoying, uncomfortable, and after it happens for a while (after pretty muchevery meal) it gets painful in my throat. One thing to try is really slowingdown when I eat, keeping things very unstressful, and eating not very much.

Today:grading, bunnies, make the squash thing, get out the gifts I have and see if I stillneed to do any shopping. I do want to go to Michaels to get picture frames forthe photos of the girls I printed up.

Good stuff,I did manage to meet with the new tax person for mom and I met with a financialadvisor that he knows. He pretty much reinforced what I already knew which isthat there is not much sense in moving all Mom’s stuff anywhere and that weshould stick with the guy she has. He’s doing the best he can. We just need tokeep better track of her spending and all. It is good to have done all that, not that I feellike it is off my plate so much, just not on top of the pile anymore. But thepile is still way too big and that’s another chore for the day: keep on pluggingat that. And maybe just maybe I’ll do more spinning. In fact I know I willbecause to some extent that keeps me sane? Or just that I am compelled? It is agood thing to do when the girls are together in the kitchen and I want to benearby and to listen, but they don’t necessarily want me in the middle ofthings. I can’t hear everything they say, but at least I feel like I am kind ofpart of it all.

Here's some photos of my booth from the latest fair, just to add a bit of color:

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Lists!

2011-12-11T09:47:00.001-05:00

12-11-11 Sunday

9:30 am

Man Iam astoundingly glum today. I suppose because there is so much yuckola stuff Imust do, and little fun. Oh I should amend that – I’ve been spinning some reallynice variegated orange stuff so there is that to do. I have the bookclub bookto finish which is theoretically a good thing to do, except that it is the Scarlet Letter which is not exactlyuplifting. Pretty glum stuff. And then there is all the actually yuckola stuff:look at fair stuff, look at mom’s stuff, finish grading the power points (Ionly have 2 to go, what is the problem?), finances finances finances. As ever Ihave this green around the gills feel. I feel like my eyes are just drooping andsad. I’ve been feeling crappy stomach-wise. What I must do is just gird myselfand start tackling things. Fair stuff first since I was supposed to meet with theworkshop coordinator but she postponed so I might as well use the time figuringout what I should have done before the meeting. Funny: last weekend I was atthe fair both days, all day. The weekend before I had the fair meeting. thisweekend I had nothing (just this meeting and bookclub tonight) which shouldhave been lovely ecstasy, but has been truly glum. Well, I spent a big part ofyesterday doing errands. I managed to do some xmas shopping for the girls, andget all kinds of suggestions from K who spent the time telling me what he wants(to be fair I had asked) in great detail while I was wanting to think aboutgetting things for the girls. Then we got groceries and things from cvs. Allstuff that needed doing and was the only time to do it, since I so rarely havethe car these days. Still it took up most of the day. Today, once K gets homefrom church I must again take the car and pick up the CSA share. At least itgoes all the way through today. I was afraid I had missed it.

Reallythe whole reason I am writing is to avoid doing the crappola stuff. Like goingthrough the huge piles of papers. And paying bills. And looking at Mom’sfinances. I guess I’d better break it all into tiny steps:

· Get out the fair notebook

· Look up the things I should do before fair meetingnext week

· Put the piles of paper on the table

· Go through one at a time

· Do the things that need to be done from the pile

· Check into bills on line

· Pay any that need paying

· Pull up the 2 power points I still need to grade

· Pull up the grading rubric

· Write comments on them

· Add grades

· Check back at all the others to see if the finalgrades make sense

· Put final grades on them

· Send off the filled out rubrics

· Get out Mom’s finance papers

· Decide what next steps I need to take:

o What questions to ask her financial adv

o What to talk to the accountant about

So does thisnot all seem like “enough”? I think I will print out this list and get to it.

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Grading, Bills, All That Junk

2011-11-12T07:43:00.001-05:00

7:20 am

Goodnews is that I am close to done with grading the quizzes. I should be able tofinish them this morning. Bad news is that I then have to move onto the labmethods and materials and results. And somewhere in there revise the jumpinglab again so the steps are accurate and really clear. And pay bills. Note that Ihave had that on the todo list for a long time. It is a problem. I must mustmust find a way to simplify that process. I am not stupid. I am even capable ofdoing things I don’t especially like (as in going to the gym every day). So whycan I not take care of bills in a timely fashion? I need to find some sort ofsystem that works regularly and I can keep going. I will have to really thinkabout it. Right now one of my solutions is to set up automatic bill pay for asmany as possible. That way at least they are not late and incurring late feesetc. I just have to figure out for the other bills (those that can’t be paidon-line) and how to keep up with entering things in Quicken, since at thispoint I am WAY behind with that. It will mean some long days/nights of enteringsometime soon.

Nicer thoughts:I finished carding 2 sets of batts. One is an interesting orangey blend, the otheris a nice soft brown. Now it is just a matter of spinning it…. and maybegetting more angora spun before the next 2 fairs. Actually more angora for theHartsbrook fair, then more things knit for the Big Brother Big Sister fair. I’vebeen working on the mittens but I think I had better put those aside for now.

I’m ina pretty crappy mood and have been for several days. Looming dark? Missing thegirls? Too much work? Maybe any or all. Last night I got home around 6 havingtexted the suggestion that we go out for cheap Chinese. I had in mind thelittle place near Moan and Dove, but K didn’t want to go there. So we went toPanda East and instead of cheap Chinese we spent $50 and got stuff I didn’teven like that much. And now we have tons left over to add to the left overcasserole, the rabbit stew and all kinds of cold cuts/etc left from his retreatat the farm. I guess the good news is that I need not cook all weekend. It justall better get eaten.

Crapola.I would like to go out to the sunroom and spin while listening to Enders Game. Exceptthat it is nearly finished so I’ll need to get to the library to get anotherCD. And it is too cold to knit out there. Carding is more do-able in the cold,just bundle up, but spinning is harder. I have my wheel in here, so that isfine, it is just harder to listen to something I want because it will annoy K. Well,I will finish the quizzes and that will be satisfying. First I had better dothe bunnies. I THINK it is warm enough that waters will not be frozen. I havetons of bunny stuff I should do. And anything I don’t get done this weekendwill not get done next week as I must teach all three labs and will not havemuch home time. I suppose I could set things up so I could pluck inside sincethat is one of the things that needs to get done. Of course that assumes I willnot have to spend every second getting the reports graded.

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Lazy Day and CARDING

2011-11-08T08:04:00.001-05:00

7:40 am

I lovethe time change! I am having one of my “lazy mornings” and it is still only7:40. I even managed to meditate this morning, though I spent most of the 20minutes coming up with things to say in a research guide for the students. I didnot do my stretches today and I will not run – what a lazy bum! But I mighttake the T to Misty Bottom for a walk later. What I will also do is happilycard while I listen to Ender’s Game. And maybe move the table downstairs –while I can still open the bulkhead. Andpluck some rabbits. And MUST DO’S:

· Laundry

· Empty dishwasher

· PAY BILLS

· Call accountant, Leader, furnace people, chimneysweep

· Write out grading rubric and START GRADING

But first I willeat my oat bran cereal, get dressed, feed buns and start carding. As usual I amkind of obsessed at the moment. I have carded up a bunch of orangey colors andneed to make a decision about what to combine. Sunday I started blending somenice fine brown wool with some kind of bright and lumpy orange angora. I willfinish that first and re-card it because it is not blended very well. Then, inthe daylight, I can look everything over again and decide what to blend so thatonce I have decided I can do it even if the light is bad. I will probably endup with several different combinations which will give me lots of things tospin. Oh, and L wants some white and dark wool spun up so she can knit somepatterned gloves. And I really need to get things ready for the next fair. I hopeI am inside, I have not heard back from them yet.

So I am hoping this is a niceday. The week is a busy one. Not only the usual busy-ness of labs, but I amalso collecting and fixing water for the instructor for the 160 labs. And nextweek is the jumping lab…… we’ll see how that goes. The Post-doc is supposed tobe writing it up. I think we will have to give upon using the LITS flipsbecause I just can’t get the computers to work with them. Though maybe I canmeet with the librarian about it on Wed. It, also, is a bit of an obsessionwith me.

Funny to have Thanksgivingcoming and we have already had ours! Makes for an unexpected Free Time which iswonderful. K will leave Tues, L will arrive Wed, I’m not sure what we will do. Iwas just thinking that if I must take K to get a ride to work Tuesday morning, Imight just continue on and take Mom out to lunch at that lovely tea house. Thoughit would get me there awfully early. I would have to find something to do,maybe in Worcester (there is an art museum there I think) until closer to lunchtime, say 9-12.

My friend’s daughter has gone offto her boarding school. My friend emailed her snail mail address. I think I willwrite her a letter. I also must write to L and it would be nice to write Gsince she does like mail (though from me, maybe not so much). But first: getdressed and eat oat bran. Then: CARD!

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corgi concerns

2011-11-07T07:18:00.001-05:00

7 am

I’mquite worried about the corgi boy. Saturday night he was clearly not feelingwell, and I noticed a rather large swelling or mass on his belly. Last night I showedK and found a second smaller one. I’m hoping he can bring Tigger in to the vettoday. Of course, if it turns out to be something awful, well then what? He is gettingolder and we have to get used to the thought that he will not be aroundforever. I think I’m ok with the concept, I’ve seen so many critters come andgo, but K will be devastated. It will be far far worse than having the girlsleave home. He is just so utterly attached to the dog. The other issue is, thatwhatever the vet might find, I know vets, and she will probably tell about allthese procedures that could be done, without really going over the advisabilityof them. In other words, surgery, treatments, whatever that could cost manyhundreds and might not even help that much. But K’s first reaction will be todo anything. And it is not for Tigger’s sake, but for his own. After all, whywould Tigger opt for anything that would be unpleasant or uncomfortable? Well,we will have to see. It is tricky because as of now he is still very robust andseems happy. It is not like he is really old and feeble.

On amore cheerful note, I am quite proud of myself for fixing my small table. Well,I put new legs on it, we’ll see if that means fixed. I am going to bring it andall the carding stuff inside because it is getting too cold out there. And maybeafter that I can straighten things up out there. Right now I have one of thebig tables there which takes up most of the room.

Damn, Ibetter go. I want to get to work early so I can have time to run and do adecent bit of prep for lab before lecture.

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ToDos and Dones (microwave!)

2011-11-06T06:37:00.001-05:00

6:15 am

My turnto get all kinds of things done 6-7, but it is because it is really 7:15…daylight savings has ended. Nice early starts, but it will be quite miserablethis afternoon when it gets dark so quick. I really will need to get thespinning/carding stuff set up inside.

Lots ofhousehold stuff needs to be done today: laundry, dishwasher, bill paying. I hada very long list that I wrote out fri night and I think the only one I managedto do was install the microwave. And I’m not even sure it was actually on thelist. The other biggie I must do today is look at the stupid hot water faucetthat K has been bugging me about. Of course he wants to just call the plumber. Butit seems like a small thing to call the plumber about. Even if I cannot fix it,I would want to think of other things to combine. It may be time to getourselves a new upstairs toilet since that one has been having trouble. I don’t even remember the things that I didinclude on the list. Paying bills I know that one. And starting in on gradingthe labs the students turned in weeks ago. And later this morning I need to goto a friend’s for a little “send off” for her daughter. Not that she willprobably be there. I imagine she will be hiding in some way as she is notexactly happy about going. I am going to pick up some frierhoffers coffee caketo contribute. I did manage to get out to pick up a few things for L which I willpack up today to send Monday.

K wentoff to his friend’s to watch a football game last night which was nice. I basicallyjust cooked while he was gone. Seems like we barely spoke all yesterday. Well, Iwas pissed about how hard it was and how long it took to install the stupidmicro (as L said when I mentioned it – “why do you need a microwave?” goodquestion). It took no kidding about 30 minutes just to get these two screws outof the stud. And there were various hassles all along the way, as these thingsgo. And of course K’s reaction was that we could have hired someone so I shouldn’tcomplain. But it would have cost a good $100 so that was good. I did thinkabout the reality that in many ways it is much smarter to find something youlove to do, get paid well for it, and then pay other people to do the tedious annoyingthings that you don’t have much experience/skill with. The whole specializationthing. But it goes against my NE independent nature. I want to be able to dothings for myself. It’s just that if all my time is taken up by doing all thesemaintenance things then I don’t have time to do the things I like. I didmanage, after the micro, to card a bunch more, though I have not yet settled ona combo to card together and spin. The test bits I made are not that inspiringto me. I’ll play more today when I can. After I do buns. And eat. And tidy thekitchen. And pay bills. And get some laundry going.

Tigger justburped and it reminds me of how worried I was about him last night. He waslooking really uncomfortable. I think his belly is bothering him. I hope K willtake him in and find out about getting him re-tested for worms.

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work and storm

2011-11-04T07:39:00.001-04:00

7:30 am

No time to write this morning as I must feed buns, eatbreakfast, get dressed and get out the door by 8:30 to get a ride to work withK. Once there I will run at the gym then get a move on for the day. Must startgrading the feeding kinematics lab. Must finish getting ready for thepractical. Must think about the library. Must continue to get ready for thejumping lab. It has been like this all week. And doing bunnies takes extra longbecause I am feeding them the branches that fell in the storm. I guess I’ll takethe bus home today, as K comes home early. All week I’ve been staying late and gettinga ride from him at about 6. Long days. I did manage to do a tiny bit of cardinglast night. Night before K’s friend came over to shower and do a laundry and itwas nice to sit and visit with him. This weekend: NOTHING! As in planned thatis – lovely time to do a few nice things. Of course it will get sucked up by grading,messing with firewood, and things like fixing the faucet and installing the newmicrowave.

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oatmeal

2011-10-28T08:00:00.001-04:00

7:15 am

Up abit early and I hope to have time to do a bit of carding before I have to leaveat 8:15. First I must drink my lovely psillium and eat my lovely oatmeal(pretty much the last of any breakfast cereal in the house, time to go shopping)so I might as well write. I went last night to a talk by Frances Moore Lappewho wrote Diet for a Small Planet inthe 70’s. Her organization is http://www.smallplanet.org/aboutIt was a pretty good talk, and I worked on the mitten I am knitting for myniece so that was ok, though it went late, and then I had to take the bus home and it was *SNOWING*!So that was exciting and I got home late and then had to make a fire (somethingK seems incapable of doing) and feed the buns.

Good news,I heard back from the woman from the Hartsbrook school and I can have a boothat their fair. Now I must decide if I want to go for an inside one (and riskhaving problems again with mothball scent, though I have been trying hard toair things out) or have an outside one. Inside are $125, outside are $50 (seemslike they all used to be $50, I guess they realized they were asking toolittle). I would say it is worth the extra money to be inside instead of out inthe middle of November, it is just that I don’t want to worry the whole timethat I am annoying anyone with the smell.

Not sureI’m going to get in any carding, and besides that, it is freezing (literally)out there, so carding will hardly be a cheery thing to do. I guess I reallymust bring the carder inside, down to the basement I suppose. I kind of hatebeing down there, but if I set up my cd player and a nice table that I canspread out on, it won’t be half bad.

This oatmealis kind of hard to get down, the bread I made yesterday is like a brick…. And Ineed to find something to bring for lunch – boil eggs! That’s always a goodsolution. At least we don’t have to do much for lab conference, so I should beable to leave early (come home to a cold house and card!). Man I sound cheerfulthis morning. maybe I should just read the Balzac I was reading last night.

No moredelay – time to get out there and feed buns!

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blah blah blah

2011-10-25T07:53:00.001-04:00

7:30 am

Yesterdaywas a really long and busy day, so today I feel justified in lazing about abit. That said, I REALLY want to be sure that the whole day is not taken upwith MUST DO’s. I want to be sure I get some time to do good stuff, creative stuff.Specifically I want to do some carding. The spinning I have happening now isjust fawn angora which is fine, but not especially creative.

YesterdayI had to take care of the exams before lecture, then finish getting thingsready for the lab. And finish grading last week’s assignments. I spent a reallylong time making up some sheets showing cat muscles to have on lab benches forreference. We’ll see how useful they are.

Also todayI must get into town for a haircut at 10. And I arranged tentatively to do aquick trip to Black Sheep before with a friend. We’ll see if she is actuallythere by 9:30. She is ALWAYS late, so I may have to be prepared to just have mytea on my own, which would be fine. I was thinking I might bike in to town, butit looks like it is rainy, so maybe not.

At somepoint today (tonight) I need to grade the Wed assignments, tomorrow I won’thave time as I will be meeting with a student in the morning. In fact, it mightmean that there is no time to run tomorrow, but I guess I can leave at 8:15,have time to run and still get to the meeting at 10. Just means that I must getall the grading done tonight. I guess thurs morning and Fri I will have to workon future labs. Really the only biggies to work on now are the jumping ones –human and toad. Not too bad.

I amkind of rambling here. Maybe later today I will also take a few more skeinphotos and post them…. And I want to make a sweet potato soufflé for supper. Itis certainly sweet potato season at the farm right now. I will have to searchout recipes that do not involve marshmallows.

I wonderif I could gird myself to write a Seasonal Letter this year. I used to enjoy itso much, it just turned into something not very nice with the way K reacted. Itkind of soured it for me. Hard to be amusing when I don’t feel that way so muchany more. If I wrote one it might be really just totally boring. And who do I sendthem to? – lots of family which is completely stupid since I don’t think a lotof them care so much. And it seems kind of egotistical. And so now K writes hisversion and sends it out to his connections. Very much a typical kind of aren’tI great kind of thing. Which I guess mine were too – at least the egotisticalpart. Who the hell cares about random details of my life? Who wants to hear myramblings (certainly if the number of “hits” to this blog are any indication…….Not too many!)? Well I guess part of the impetus is to reconnect to some of thefolks I have been so bad about staying connected to. So many folks do all that throughfacebook, which is really not my thing at all. Can’t see wasting my time withit. I’ll have to think about it, or meditate on it, or cogitate over it, orconsider it over the next bit of time.

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Very Short Post

2011-10-20T08:25:00.001-04:00

8 am

Having trouble getting startedtoday. I woke up at 6:30 but it being dark and all, I just lay there for awhile thinking about my odd dreams. Finally got up and, though I gave gobbersto do, I have been reading Madonnas ofLeningrad for book club instead. I got it out of the library at work, butit has now been recalled so I only have until next Friday. I think I willmanage to finish. I think. Considering all I really need to do, maybe not.Mainly it is the test I am worried about. And the fact that there won’t be muchtime this weekend, what with Family Thanksgiving and all. Meaning that I hadbetter get going on it today. I have only done 2 questions thus far, I must dothe third on the first page, then I have that whole mess of definitions on thenext page, plus the T/F which are easy. Then there are the labs to be gradedbefore lab next week. As I said I’d better get a move on instead of readingMadonnas and writing this stuff…….

The day at Rhinebeck turned outsurprisingly pleasant. I have discovered the secret which is to go ALONE! And Ifocused on paying attention to how people display yarn. Wrote tons of ideasdown, even make sketches. And I did the wine and cheese tasting which is alwaysgood. Well I sure as hell better get going here……

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Daughter and TG

2011-10-15T08:07:00.002-04:00

7:30 am

It isalready 7:30 so I guess I should get a move on. The truly Big News of the day:G is coming home tonight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!WOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! Kent is picking her up at the airportaround 6, she’ll get here around 7, and we’ll go straight to Panda East. Mainlyshe has said that she wants to go out to eat a lot. ok by me. I am just reallylooking forward to having her here. Hearing noises upstairs, having her comingand going, all that. I think she is hoping to spend a lot of the time workingat the NBO farm. I think I’ll check the weather forecast: well it looks like itis going to be cold, rainy and windy for the first half of the week. Not muchfun for working at a farm. And it will feel really cold to her, coming from NC.Well, she is young and flexible I hope….

I guessI defacto skipped stretching this morning, since I am really hungry and soabout to eat some cereal, and after that I won’t want to do stretches. And I don’tsuppose I will run today as it is supposed to rain all day. Lazy bum I guess,but I have been doing well with getting to the gym at work. I think I will tryto spend the day spinning the fawn angora that I started the other evening, andcontinuing to work on the photos. I did more last night and some came out ok,some not so good.

And another thing that is annoying/concerning me is that,though I laid all the skeins out in the sun the other day, and all smelledpretty good, now that I brought them in and laid them on the bed to choose onesto photograph I am getting a return of the mothball smell. Well, I guess itjust means they need more airing out. In the sun is best, but that won’t be anoption for a few days. I think the knit stuff is better, I bet some of thetrouble with the skeins is that many are wound up tight and probably hold thesmell longer. Maybe I will untwist them all.

Next weekendis our family Thanksgiving, which is going to be kind of manic. What we usuallydo in several days will all be done in one. I already made 2 apple pies, which Ileft there, sometime this week we need to make a peach and a blueberry pie. FriI need to get to Millers Falls to pick up the turkey. I guess we can do that onthe way up to the farm. Then Saturday I’ll cook it, everything else will getcooked, we’ll eat, and everything will have to get packed up to leave prettyearly Sunday (to get Gback for her flight).

Somehowthinking about all that is making me feel anxious and is bringing up all theother stuff that I need to do and haven’t yet gotten to: like calling theaccountant, contacting people for the fair (met with cochair on Sunday and havenot yet done anything I said I would do). Here’s another anxious thing: metwith the prof yesterday for lab conference and spent most of the time listeningto him go on about the bad stuff coming down the pike for the college. Big badchoices needing to be made. And what will happen to lab instructors in all thatI do not know. For years I’ve had to listen to K vent about how he might lose hisjob, I try not to obsess, but of course it leads to underlying anxiety. Now I havethis additional anxiety that in fact my job may disappear. They seriously mighthave to cut back on staff in the bio dept. I guess several are below me on thetotem pole but that’s about it. Everyone else has either been there longer, issenior in terms of what they do, or really both. Well, I will keep doing thebest job I can and be as flexible as I can.

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photos

2011-10-14T08:57:00.000-04:00

ok I will post a few of these photos i have taken. Not sure how i feel about them and it sure is a lot of work...... The hardest part of course is getting colors right.

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Winter and Dark Are Coming!

2011-10-13T06:57:00.002-04:00

6:30 am

Up early.I decided to get myself up and write in spite of the dark so that I could getdown my thoughts on the day ahead. And speaking of which (the dark) I am NOTready for winter! Cold. Dark. I am NOT ready. Oh well, not much I can do, ashere it comes! It is nearly 6:45 and dark as anything out there. Makes it hardto get up.

Today. Feedbuns, get dressed……. Eat breakfast….. well besides all that, I must teach labat 1, but I want to be there by 12 so that I can get over to the library andget those computers turned on and the videos loaded. That took forever with thecart computers last week. We are in a different room today, so I hope it is notso bad. I also want to get to the gym and since I need to at least be availableafter lab for a study session if anyone comes, I should do that before. So getthere by 11, meaning leave here by 10:15. That gives me plenty of time betweennow and then. Very nice. And I don’t even have to take a shower since I’ll dothat after I run.

I finishedup the second blue skein yesterday. I have more, but I think I will wait tospin it to see how the mittens start to spin up, I think I’ll have enough withwhat is already spun. So I also measured out some fawn angora to startspinning. I have 4 ounces measured out to make 1 ounce skeins. So I think this morningI’ll get started on that. It feels like it is warm out, so I can spin in the sunroom for a while. I also found the camera guide, so I’ve been reading throughit and am getting some ideas about how to use it more effectively. So anotherthing to start working on is taking photos. Maybe after I feed buns I’ll get afew more things from the sun room and take them downstairs where I have thelight tent set up. I really need to put it on a bigger table, or use 2 smalltables.

I fixedtwo of the bunny cages over fall break. The second one especially took foreveras I had not used the crimping tool when I made it, but instead folded thewires over and it took forever to unfold them all. It pretty much took allmorning Tuesday, but is now done. Now I need to look into fixing the woodenhutches. They need wire for the bottoms of the inside parts, which right now,with wooden bottoms, just accumulate tons of droppings. Now if the bunnieswould learn to go elsewhere and not inside…. But don’t suppose I can trainthem. Amber is not bad about it, but the others are. So I just want to redo allthose cages and that will be a big chore.

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moth issues

2011-10-11T08:31:00.001-04:00

8 am

StillFall Break! Woo Hooo! Meaning I do not have to go in to work today. Tomorrow Imust go in for lecture, but no lab. Thurs I do have lab since we missed lastweek for Mountain Day. Then Fri things are back to normal, in that we will havelecture and lab conference. I think I will really need to stay on Wednesday toget things ready for lab next week. And for the weeks after, though I don’tthink most of those will be too bad.

Yesterdaywent pretty well. I wrote myself out a huge ToDo list and of course only gotthrough a few of the items, but what can you do? I did manage to spin up onestrand of the next skein of the blue stuff, so that is getting close tofinished. I’ve been knitting up a nice sample with double knitting (angorainside). In two weeks I’ll be able to really check on sizes of niece and nephew’shands and start the actual mittens. I’m feeling like I should also knit up atiny angora hat for other niece’s baby. And one for OTHER niece, too.

Seems likea huge chunk of yesterday went to “errands.” Isn’t that they way it goes? Well,we also stopped in town for lunch. Miss Saigon was closed, so we went to theSouper Bowl and it was pretty unexciting. Won’t go there again. But I managedto get a bunch of stuff returned, which is always satisfying, and I got a bunchof ingredients for herbal moth repellant which I will mix up today. I also putall my finished stuff out on the porch in the sun to air out. Once I add theherbal stuff, I imagine everything will smell pretty good. I should check otherplaces in the sun room because I know there are mothballs in other boxes. I didn’treally air out the angora since it is all in plastic bags and I don’t want toput those in the sun as they will get condensed water in them. I could emptyeach one, air out the angora and then store them again. That would be tedious.

What abouttoday? Anything good? I will spin more blue, maybe I will even get to startsome angora. Maybe… and this would be fun, I could do some carding/blending. I’vebeen wanting to card up some sort of fiber blanket thing of really wacky stuff.I was thinking it would be fun to have something like that for the Hartsbrookfair, but I don’t know if I’ll be at that. I guess I should think positive andhope that even if I can’t be inside, they’ll let me have an outdoor space.

Oh, can’t remember if I wrote aboutthis yesterday, who cares, I played with M’s ipad at the farm and I reallyliked it, and just think – I could get one of those for about $500 instead of$2000 for the Mac…… It seems like it really would do more or less what I need acomputer to do. One can get an application for the mac writing program. Seems likethe trickiest part is printing. But things can get emailed to another computer andprinted that way easily enough. Oh dear. Kent needs to use the computer……

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Cooking and Knitting

2011-10-09T08:20:00.001-04:00

8 am

At the farm. Depressed. Oh brother. And really bad case ofButt Burn which I imagine is due to eating apples yesterday. I in fact spentthe entire day yesterday cooking. Why? I must wonder? And I wonder why thisversion of Word on K’s computer is making such a narrow document. Perhaps itwill look normal on the blog page. Perhaps not.

There arelots of people here at the farm, and I am actually finding it more stressfulthan fun. Well I shouldn’t really say that, there have been fun moments. Mostlyaround the baby monkey on a pig video that my students showed me on Wednesday.I have also done some knitting. Mostly on Mom’s blanket that she wants tofinish for my niece but has not worked on for about 4 years. She can still dostraight knitting, but following a pattern is too hard. She mostly likes justlistening to her books on tape. She used to knit while listening, but now shejust listens. Hmmm. I wonder if that will be me in 30 years. Well I guess itcould be worse. I also managed to knit up a few more tiny rabbit ideas. Theseare just the cylinder with ears idea. They are cute and very tiny but stillkind of a pain to make.

We need toleave this morning because K has a meeting around noon and I set up to meet re MASheep & Woolcraft in Goshen.I might need to change that some since K has to be there earlier than Ithought.

I can’tbelieve I spent the entire day yesterday, which was gorgeous after weeks ofrain then freezing cold, inside cooking. I didn’t go up to the woods even for afew minutes. I was thinking after I made the pies that I could let them bakethen go up before I started making the soup, but then my sister & husbandshowed up, and I felt like I could not then just disappear. And so by the timewe visited and it might have been reasonable to go up, it was time to make thesoup. Isn’t like that should take so long, but with so many people, it meansthat many carrots to peel and cut up, that much chicken to cut up (I put themin the pot to boil Fri night and had cooled the stock and chickens overnight, Ijust had to cut it all up). It turned out fine, I was worried that therewouldn’t be enough and there was plenty left over.

Oh, morebad news: I heard back from the woman at the Hartsbrook school fair, and shesaid people complained last year about the mothball smell from my booth. I feelterrible about it. Not that it comes as a big surprise. I have had a few otherissues with mothball smell. Now I just have to figure out what to do about it.I don’t think they are going to offer me an inside space at the fair, theymight let me set up outside, which will be freezing and miserable. Still I willtake it if offered, and hope that I could move back inside some day. I feelchastised, though rightly so. I think I will still use mothballs for theunwashed fleeces, but take them out of the bins for the skeins and finishedstuff. I’ll need to air it all out over the next several weeks, which will be apain. I hope we have some sunny weekends. Then I need to find some other smellystuff that can deter moths – like lavender, or better yet, cedar.

I’mactually glad we are leaving today. It will be better to be home. I need tograde the Thurs lab graphs, and I would like to do some spinning. I brought thewheel with me, but I’ve just been knitting, it is easier. And maybe I can playmore with the camera set up that I put in the basement. If I can just leave itset up, it will be not too bad to throw something in there and take a photo. Ialso need to play with the camera and figure out how to use it better (how toadjust things).

There wastalk about having a farm meeting this morning. Yuck. There is not much that anyof us will say except we need more money and there are all these and such jobsto do and who is going to do them? I need to focus on Mom’s finances and untilI get that under control I can’t take on anything else.

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Etsy - ish photos

2011-10-07T07:58:00.001-04:00

7:30 am

I justwatched a video that one of the teachers at the HS made last year. It was shortclips of a kindergarten class, and last year’s senior class which of course wasG’s. It was very sweet and there were a bunch of her friends that I recognizedand now I feel all sad and miss my girls so much. Sometimes it just aches.

Well yesterday,in spite of being lovely mountain day, did not turn out so well. I did manageto get several rabbits plucked with is a good thing. I also set up and triedusing the little lighting tent that I bought from Hunts, meant to make takingphotos of skeins etc super easy. Well it doesn’t. It might eventually, once I reallywork out all the bugs, but right now they did not turn out that great. Part ofthe issue is that I was using Grandpa’s old camera and I do not really know howto use it. He gave us a huge manual along with the camera, which of course I can’tfind. Last night though I looked on line and I did find it so when I have manyhours to spare maybe I can sit with the camera and the manual and figure outthings like how to adjust the exposure. Here are a few of what I came up with:

They are actually not that bad, part of the trouble was thata friend was with me and she seemed to think we were going to come up withthings that look like what would be on the cover of Spin-Off magazine. Well I amnot going to be able to do that. I do not have the equipment, skill or time forthat. I just have to do the best I can.

Today Igo into work, pretty soon, I will run in the gym first thing so that I canshower there, I meet a student at 11 then I should spend some time grading. Kcan pick me up around 1 as he comes through. He’ll drop me home on his way to ameeting and during that time I WILL tackle the pile of junk in the kitchen. Partof my impetus, besides the fact that it is in general a disaster and needs tobe done, is that L called asking about a letter from People’s with a PIN forher debit card. It was not in her room, so I am wondering if it just might bein THE PILE. So I WILL tackle that. Once K gets back we are scheduled to testdrive a Volt car…… I guess just because he wants to. We’re not exactly in themarket for a $30,000 car just now… and once we do that we will drive up to thefarm. So somewhere in there I must pack. And right now I must get dressed andfeed buns and mix up lots of pellets for the neighbor to use while we are gone.Oh and also somewhere in there I need call Diamond Farm about getting apre-thanksgiving turkey.

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Mountain Day 2011

2011-10-06T08:39:00.002-04:00

8:30 am

MOUNTAIN DAY!!!!!!

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Yes,today is Mountain Day and about time I say! Means no lab today, and I will notspend all morning frantically grading the Results from last week. Instead it willbe bunny day. I have gobbers and gobbers of bunny stuff I must do: mostly pluckor clip a bunch of rabbits, clean out some cages, and do some spinning. I did alovely skein of the blue stuff and it is really nice. Niece and nephew will beat the farm this weekend so I can knit up a sample for them of what I will dofor their mittens. I need to spin up more white angora for the lining. I havedone up a bunch of Crystal’s wool which came out great, and I have a lot offawn angora waiting to be spun. I alsoneed to get going knitting stuff in preparation for the winter craft fair andthe Hartsbrook fair. I also need to call about the Hartsbrook as I have notheard anything from them. So there is certainly plenty to do. And filing…. I playedaround will my filing stuff Tuesday, and I need to keep working on that. What Ireally need is another filing cabinet as the one I have is quite full. And towork on the pile in the kitchen…… well, I will spend at least an hour later inthe day doing that. I find if I give myself just an hour then I can forcemyself to do just about any odious task. And I also find that once I get going Idon’t mind much of anything, it is the getting started that is hard. Or stoppingwhatever else I am doing. Or keeping myself from doing real time wasters likereading a magazine. Or dumb book. Recently I have read Brigit Jones Diary, I amreading an Agatha Christy book, and I skimmeda dumb autobiography by Gene Wilder that was on the take it or leave it tableat work. I should have left it. Of course if I could actually get the bookclubbooks to read that would help. Speaking of which, it is bookclub this weekend. Iwonder if anyone will even be there. We are going to the farm, but Kent has tobe back around noon on Sunday, so I guess we’ll be here. Or maybe I’ll stay atthe farm while he comes for this meeting and maybe I can get a ride back withsomeone. Most of the sisters will be there, some of the younger folk, butreally K doesn’t much like being there with family. My plan is to do a lot ofcooking. I said I would make Saturday supper – chicken soup with 2 of thethree(!) chickens from the meat csa this month. And I think I’ll make up somepies and freeze them in prep for our thanksgiving. In fact I am going to usesome of the apples that are on my apple tree that I planted, oh, 30 years ago!!

Ok,right now I am going to go out, feed buns, and get things set up so I canpluck. Oh and yesterday I bought myself a present: a little light tent fortaking pictures. It is designed for just the thing I need – taking photos ofsmall items for something like Etsy. It looks like it is easy to set up/ takedown, so I’m hoping it will simplify that process. I’ll try that today, too, andsee if I can even post some new things!

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birthday!

2011-09-28T07:32:00.001-04:00

7:15 am

It’s my birthday today! Wish mehappy birthday. And here’s an idea:

What if everyone that reads thismakes a happy birthday comment????? Wouldn’t that be cool?

Except here’s something weird: onthe sideboard of my home page on the computer is a calendar. But today thecalendar is blank. What is that saying?

I don’t particularly have time towrite. I must get breakfast eaten, mix up some tuna fish for lunch, feed bunsand get on the bus. I’m actually going to stop at the store to pick up achocolate cake to bring into work. Silly I know and it means I then have towait there for a full half hour for the next bus to come by to get to work. Wellthere is always plenty to do. At 10 I meet with a student, 11 is lecture, 1:15is lab, today it is at the art museum. After lab I meet with a student. I thinkthen I will take the bus all the way to town and pick up some pizza for supper.

The whole rest of this week is abit of a blur. Biggest issue is that we must leave my work (K will pick meup) by 2:30 to get to the top of Mt. Greylock for a friend’s wedding rehearsalon Fri. it will be a bit of a haul and means Fri will be in general veryrushed.

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Fair Aftermath

2011-09-25T08:03:00.002-04:00

7:30 am

Questionof the morning is: can the computer handle my using Microsoft Word at the sametime that it is copying all my photos to the external hard drive? We’ll see,seems to be doing fine so far.

Fairyesterday. Apple Harvest. I actually did not too badly. And I like the factthat the fee goes to the Family Center after all. The worst part was loadingthe car on Friday. This “new” car is smaller, or at least it is shorter, thanthe old station wagon and it is way smaller than the camperbus (oh, NOW I missthe camper) so it takes far more effort to fit everything in. Plus it was rainingpretty steadily which made it all that much more of a pain. Plus I just plainwasn’t feeling good. So I ended up doing a lot of cursing and talking to myselfto get through it. The setting up was not bad at all (though I am a completelazy bum and absolutely hate getting up at quarter to six in order to: shower, takepills and psillium, feed buns, try to eat something, gather last minute stuffand get going). The best part is that they have tons of lovely college studentsthere to help and it made the set up relatively painless (or less painful). Difficultpart was that I have yet again changed things around so I was trying new ideasand that takes time to arrange. I decided to use the metal shelving, but as twoshorter shelves on tables, and not the tall one standing on the floor. I’m notsure I liked that so well since the shelves take up a lot of table space. I alsodecided to try using the metal squares differently and that worked well. Insteadof making boxes that things could sit on, I made them vertical pieces that I hungskeins on, using S hooks I found at Home Depot. It worked well and I think I’llexpand on that. Maybe do more of those and not use the second shelf. Once I wasall set up, it was a matter of sitting there. What I generally like best istalking to the kids. And I love watching the really little ones that arefascinated by the rabbits or the spinning. That is usually pretty fun.

So onto today. Blah. I must first, I suppose, empty the car. Just didn’t have theenergy to last night. Breaking everything down was really nice because, onceagain, of the students. And loading up was not so bad (I wasn’t worried aboutthe order of what I put in which I was for loading to go to the fair since I wantedto be sure to get the tent out and up first so everything wouldn’t get wet). ButI was still too tired of it all to unload last night. I got home around 5:30,and I decided to meditate, then I had to feed buns and after that I reallyneeded to cook some. I browned some meat then put it in the same sauce as I hadmade for the curry last week since there was a lot left. I hope it turns outwell. It smells good anyway.

So thismorning: finish this, I have already taken psillium and pills (yuck), getdressed, feed buns, unload the junk, then walk into town to Black Sheep. My mainjob for today is grading. I need to do the quiz page (the prof gave me the easyone which is nice) and I have the graphs. I’m thinking it would be really niceto get those done to hand back today so they could get some feedback beforethey hand in the assignment due this week. We’ll see how that goes.

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fairs and what-not

2011-09-20T07:57:00.002-04:00

7:30 am

Ok. I amgrumpy and my butt hurts and my tummy feels crummy. So there. And not reallyany good reason for any of it because today is….Lovely Tuesday when I don’thave to go into work, so I can be home and do all the home stuff that needsdoing. Like work on some knitting that I would like to finish in anticipationof the fair on Saturday. Speaking of which, the fair last Saturday was ok. Not great.I made about $200 after taking out the fee, so that is, as I said, ok but certainlynot great given the work involved. And I do NOT like the space since there wasa fan going the entire day that gave off a high-pitched whine that made mecrazy. If I go again next year I will ask for a space away from the fan. I neveractually walked around to see anyone else’s set up so I don’t know if the soundwas as bad on the other side. I did seelots of folks and did lots of socializing which is probably a good thing,though it is a lot of it packed into one day. I really wish I had a booth setup that felt good to me. I tried some different stuff this time – I used mysister’s old metal shelving unit for example. I liked the part that I put on atable, but the part that I made tall and used for hanging skeins I didn’t likeso much. Everything takes so much space and I feel like my use of space is notefficient enough. One thing I forgot was the spinning rack I have used for hatsand I want to be sure to remember that this week. I just feel that I have nothit on a really good way to display skeins. I have some hanging, and that is okbut they do get kind of tangled, especially the angora or heavily blended ones.I much prefer winding the skeins up, but then how to display them? I used myniece’s set of metal squares that go together in a variety of ways, but I’m notsure I like it. The skeins just sit there and I feel are not really displayedwell. Maybe what I need are some of those metal racks that attach to the easyup tent and from which you can have those metal bars extending out. Skeins couldthen be hung on those, one color to each bar. If any of that makes any sense asI doubt. I guess I’ll look on line and see how vastly expensive they are.

I wentto the csa yesterday (switched from Fri pick up to Mon) and got a bunch ofeggplant which I want to roast today. Cut them up, toss with olive oil and putin the oven kind of low for a while. A different form of ratatouille than theusual frying. AND I want to get a solar food dryer. Some day. Or rather makeone. Some day.

One thingI won’t do today is work, or at least nothing much. I suppose I could try toget the mailtool working on Ella so I can send a message out to my groups. Anyway,I’ve been working really hard with all the labs and it will be nice not to.

Oh,another idea I had: instead of morning pages or daily poem, I “ought to” try aDaily Photo. Or rather a Daily Etsy Entry. Try to get that all started again. Ofcourse, even thinking about it makes me think of Roxanne and that kind of makesmy stomach hurt. Oh brother. Anyway, the idea would be to get some location setup so that it would be actually easy to, every day, take a photo of a skein, aknit object, whatever, and then immediately post it on Etsy. It’s an idea.

Yet Another Busy Day

2011-09-16T07:37:00.002-04:00

7:30 am

Not muchto write and not much time to write it, except to say that I have really beenbusting my ass at work for the past 2 weeks and other things have kind offallen by the wayside – like paying bills and keeling with Mom’s finances. Ugg.I did manage to get 4 skeins of white angora spun up. Now we’ll see if any ofthem sell at the Fiber Twist. I am not really looking forward to it. I willhave to spend this evening loading stuff into the car, then I will have toleave really early tomorrow morning to get there and get all set up. And ofcourse, K cheerfully said no he does not need the car tomorrow, meaning that hewill not be dropping me off, meaning that the entire unloading and setting upis up to me. And sitting there all day feeling discouraged and fieldingquestions about how much yarn would be needed for this and such project, andtalking about spinning and rabbits and angora. Of course the topics areinteresting to me, but it gets really tedious sitting there and I will be tiredfrom the start. Then I’ll have to break it all down, bring it home and unloadit all.

Before Ican do any of that I must get bunnies fed, myself and the bike to work, finishthe revisions on Lab 2, finish setting up for next week’s lab, go to 4^thhour, go through the lab with the prof, take the bus to Atkins, get off andride the bike to the farm to pick up my share, and bike home. Blah. And before thatI must finish drinking my psillium which is not going down easy this morning.But I did not take any last night, mainly because I did not really eat supper. Iwas spinning the angora and not really that hungry (I got home late fromworking on the lab revisions) so I just had a small glass of Irish Cream (!)and some toast, and boy in the middle of the night I woke up with some wickedButt Burn. It was not fun. So back to Psillium Diligence. Doesn’t my day aheadsound great? Thank god I enjoy interacting with the students and I very muchlike my co-workers and the work itself is satisfying, even if right now a bittoo much. And I am very grateful that it looks like it will be a nice day today– better for biking than yesterday which was rainy. AND I am grateful to have afunctional computer again.

Ok,better GET TO IT!!!

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computer and transport woes

2011-09-15T07:54:00.001-04:00

7:45 am

Reallyshouldn’t write as I need to feed buns and get out to the bus in about half anhour. And it doesn’t help that I seemingly can’t type – every other word is amess up (backspace, retype, backspace, retype). Been a crazy week. Computerwent on the blink, and the next day K left for PA to do a first respondertraining. Meaning I was left with the task of getting the computer to the shopwith no car. Which I did on the bus Tues morning; I put it in my padded spinningwheel bag! Then Wednesday I realized that I had left my digital scale at Webswhen I was there last week for spinning. So I had to get there by bike, which Idid (it was actually quite a nice ride and a very nice evening). Yesterday I tookthe bus from work straight to town to the computer shop to pick the computerback up and wonder of wonders I was able to hook it back up and it works great!I need to get to work early today, even though there is no lecture, because I wantto use the gym first, then I have a lot to do to go over next weed’s handoutand revise it and get the dissection stuff ready. On top of all that, I’ve beenspinning a good bit in the evenings, while listening to my cd of Moll Flanders.I wanted to get more pure angora spun up for the fair on Saturday.

Ok. Gottago.

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Getting Up

2011-09-11T08:11:00.000-04:00

8 am

Not goingto go with the big 9-11 commemoration thing, that is being done up the wazooelsewhere. Instead I will just put in my poem for this morning. And add thatour desktop computer is seemingly on the blink which sucks. I guess we’ll needto call for help on it tomorrow. As well as call re the upstairs toilet whichhas a slow steady constant running problem and is driving me crazy. Maybe I’llsee if I can get an appropriate part at Home Depot this am since I must gothere anyway to return some tools. And – at least some excitement to lookforward to: I’m going to see Wicked this evening!

Getting Up

It’s hard to get up some mornings

My joints feel stiff

My mind feels stiff

And nothing especially beckons

Long gone are the days

When a quivering ball of energy

Would leap into bed

To pull me from the depths

With eager babble

And constant needs

And gone are the days

When I would wake to commotion

A clattering in the kitchen

With arguments and breakfast

Compelling enough

To draw me forth

Now all is quiet

There is a dull monotony of tasks

Never ending

The prospect of quiet satisfaction

Mingled with annoyance

Frustration and fury

Then back to the tasks

And for these

It is hard to get up

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