No Useful Title

7:30 am

                Well now what. What will today bring? I did spin those 1 ½ ounces, so now I can ply. And I did a little bit of work on the cages, that needs to be finished. I measured and cut the wire for the bottom, but getting it to really fit in there has been a chore, and now I must nail it down with big staples and it is kind of buckling so that is hard, especially as it means reaching way in and there is not much room.

                L is home today.  She is mostly doing things to get ready for her trip – drying lots and lots of food, she needs to go to EMS and she needs to get the car inspected – good thing she realized the sticker is for September!   Oh, that is the other thing I spent a lot of time on yesterday, was looking at computer listings on Craigslist, emailing and reading responses. I did figure out that a 15.5 inch is too big for her and that is what most laptops are. And the tiny 9 inch are too small, so that limits it a good bit. And I want to find one with Windows 7 not XP so that limits it more.

                Today I also need to work between: haircut at 11:15 (and I really should contact A about getting tea before/after) then I need to leave at 3 to get to Mom’s at 4:30 so we can eat at 5 and I can leave around 5:30 to get to Framingham to get L. At least she said it is ok to take her car. I guess I also need to get down there to get it. I will bike there, that will be fine. And bike up for the haircut. I should leave G’s bike at Bike Exchange to get the tire fixed…. And I need to drop things at the library. I finished the dumb Wherever I Leave My Hat tape. Now I am listening to a tape of Terri Gross interviewing comedians. It is very funny. And I started reading Gabriela, which I do like. Don’t really remember it, though I do remember that I was reading it while visiting the zoo in Guatemala city. And I don’t remember anything at the zoo except some really dusty room with natural history stuff…. And watching families.

                Got the official note from work about the start of the new year. It was odd because I also had a dream early this morning about S and some lockers and she got really mad about something. It wasn’t me she was mad at. And of course, as is so often true with these sort of anxiety dreams, at some point I was naked.

                Another big project that needs to be worked on is the compost. I need to do a big clean under cages. At least the cage repair work got me to clean inside the two hutch areas which were really gross. Those are the other two that I must replace with wire. Eventually.

                Next week is going to be a bit tricky. I must start on Tuesday, if not Monday, but there is no bus until the week after – after Labor Day. Some days I can get in with K, some I can take the station wagon, and I might even bike once or twice, though it is damn far. I would take K’s bike which can get to a really low gear. Use that for the nasty hill on rt 47.

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Again Inspiration

 

7:45 am

                I am feeling decidedly uninspired today. Inspiration. What is it? What inspires me? Well, I was inspired last night to take a long walk with not even my own dog by the desire to do something for the girls. That will basically inspire me to all kinds of things. After all, it inspired me to drive all the way to Bar Harbor and back, not something I would normally be at all inspired to do. Last night, we went to hear G’s band concert. It was very nice (well, mostly the same music as for July 4) and we had a little picnic on the South Common. After, the girls were wanting to get together, but L had to do work on her room and stuff at home, G had to give this dog a long walk. So I offered to do the walk so that the girls could spend time together and do sister bonding. Was that not nice of me? The walk was fine, of course, and it got me some good exercise. The dog did not seem to want to go at first; I kind of dragged her up to the woods, which by then were getting quite dark. The way back was one big rush. She ran the whole way pulling at her leash. Then when we got back to her road, I made her go all the way around which she seemed fine with. She no longer tugged, but she still kept up a good pace, so much different from taking walks with Tigger which involve lots of me tugging and coaxing.

                So what will inspire me today? Actually it is very nice that everyone is off and busy. L may be home mid-day, though she will still be busy as she is trying to get ready for her wilderness trip. Another thing that inspires me

                *note – I just heard L come back from the store where she went to get more fruit to dehydrate. Just hearing her come in inspired me to immediately get on Craigslist to look for a laptop for her….       

                So what else inspires? As I’ve said before, getting things done, taking care of things, going through piles…. So it helps me if things are left out and are obviously “in the way” so that I am inspired to deal with them. Right now the small hutches are on their sides waiting for me to finish fixing the bottoms. I got pretty far with getting the bottom off the second one yesterday, then had to stop to make emergency picnic supper since the plan to get the church chicken barbeque fell through (they required reservations which we did not know). Now the tools are all still out, so I think I will be pretty inspired to finish. Yesterday I did more anti-moth cleaning. This time it was drawers, so I took everything out and cleaned the stuff and the drawers. And then….ready for it….I SORTED PLASTIC CONTAINER TOPS!!! Wooo Hooo. But very satisfying. The basic deal of figuring out which tops actually go with containers and throwing away the rest. How so many accumulate I do not know. How long has it been since I have done this??? Also do not know.

                Besides the cages, and continuing to look at computers on Craigslist, and doing more answering emails (and I’ll write up notes from our Fair Fiber Folk meeting, yesterday I wrote notes from the workshop meeting) I must also do a bunch of laundry stuff, and I hope I can spin more gray. 1 ½ ounces of singles to go then I can ply. And that will make 6 ounces, 3 more to go of the gray. That is satisfying.

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Snakes and Verizon

7:30 am

                Man I am in a sour mood. I did not sleep well, or rather, for some reason I was up at about 3 for at least an hour, just tossing. Maybe from the chocolate brownies I made. From a mix that was in the cupboards that I am cleaning. There are packages of food way past their expiration dates; I figure they should get used if they are use-able. When I got up at 6:30, L and K were kicking around doing stuff and maybe that helped put me in a bad mood. What I really should do is try to sleep more. Well, there will not be a lot of time bc I have a dentist appointment at 9.

                I managed to clean out the fridge yesterday, that after spending the morning helping K at the rental house with moving furniture. And that after dropping off the car then walking into town for breakfast at Wheatberry. It was tasty but a pretty darn expensive egg bagel sandwich. They have a grain CSA that might be good to try. We may decide not to do the meat CSA anymore, it is kind of a lot of meat for us. The grain would be interesting, but it would mean having to figure out what to do with the grains I am not used to. And getting K, who would usually prefer canned soup, to eat them. One nice thing about meat is that it is easy to cook… Anyway, we had our breakfast and walked home, then took the station wagon to the rental house and moved furniture around, and then got caught up in scraping flaking paint off the door. I finally said I had to stop and go home, so K took me home and he went back to continue scraping and prime the door. I managed to finish my book on cd and spin up more gray angora. I have 3 skeins done, am working on 3 more. At some point they called to say the car was done, so I called K (except his phone stopped working, so finally we managed to text) and he came back, we went and got Mom’s car, which was fine and did not need all kinds of major work, and left the station wagon to get the light repaired while we did errands: got keys made for L, stopped to see about getting a new phone for K, stopped at the College library so I could get Gabriela Clove and Cinnamon. Of course I got several others by Amato also. We got the station wagon which by then was done, and I went home while K went back to the house. I picked up some grain on the way home. I managed to spin a bit more, then L came home with a tiny, lovely green snake that she had found on the road while biking!! It is so so beautiful! She went to see G at work and I finally started to cook up some pasta (from the stack that needs to get eaten). K did not get back until about 7:30, L around 7. I ended up eating by myself which was fine, except I kind of wish I’d known ahead. Anyway, it was not until after that that I started in on cleaning the fridge. And it was around 8 that K was on line looking up phones (at the store they were all going to be like $100 after rebates and upgrade fees etc etc, so they suggested we try on-line). He was finding them all really expensive there, too, with this odd monthly $10 service charge for texting…. It sounded really dicey to me, so I got involved. Long story short, I decided to call Verizon and finally got a very nice guy (sounded like from Tennessee) who walked me through all kinds of complicated stuff, the result being that we used an old phone we had kicking around (had been G’s), and we managed to get all K’s contacts into that phone. And set up the contact back-up for my phone. So there. It was very successful and saved us a bunch of money so well worth it, but it did take about an hour. And THEN I finished the fridge. Well now we have a clean fridge and K has a functional phone. We saved his old one with a note that explains that the speaker does not work, so if we ever needed to, it could be used for just texting. And while cleaning the fridge I found another container of what must be more fat. Maybe it is butter from something, I can’t tell. I am trying to purify it and maybe I’ll try more soap……

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Moth Worms and Cars

7 am

                Kind of nervous about my lovely computer because it has had trouble starting up lately. It keeps having to run some sort of start up repair. I think I will figure out how to install the McAfee antivirus since we have it for the other computer.

                I am still feeling oddly dead tired. But…Mapleline came this morning, so I will have half-and-half so I can have some tea. What a stupid thing is that to be excited about?? I managed to go through pretty much all the food in the cupboards and toss out everything with worms. Then I washed the kitchen cupboards. Still need to wash off the pantry shelves. And I need to still go through the fridge. And while I am at it I should probably take all the pots etc out of the rest of the cupboards and clean them, too, as they might have moths living there. And I need to buy more moth traps to put around. I did nothing about planning for a Wed night dinner. Not too late, but I’ll have to do it today to see if it is possible for anyone.

                The other big thing that will need to happen is dealing with cars. Mom did say that L could use her car to get to Maine, so that is really helpful for her. Now we need to find out what kind of repairs it needs and get them done. She had said she would get it done, but we called again last night and suggested we get the car and do the work here. So K and L drove out there last night (I’m so grateful I did not have to go) and we now have it here and will need to figure out getting it fixed. And the station wagon needs work, too. G has the red car today bc she needs to get from work to Community Band quickly.

                So I am feeling unsettled and not really like I can do any of the stuff I need to do.

                Ok, we can take Mom’s car in this morning, so we will do that now and get breakfast and walk back. Good to get in a bit of a walk, of course it will be cancelled by getting bfast. Like yesterday when (on my suggestion) we walked over to Maple St farm store along the bike path and got ice cream. Sure, good to get in a bit of a walk, but the double scoop cone was not especially helpful. Oh well. I really should feed the buns before we go, they are probably hungry.  

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Home Again

9:30 am

                Well that is a damn long drive, from Bar Harbor. I did manage to sleep well enough which truly surprised me given the coffee thing (a frappichino thing from Starbucks) that I bought at a Maine Thruway rest stop at about 7:30. The last part of the drive really sucked because we only realized Friday night that one of the headlights is out, so we drove a lot of the way once dark hit with the high beams on, but once we got to Rt 2 and had oncoming traffic we had to turn them on and off and with them off one could barely see the road. Well, L drove all that part and I think she was fine, but I was a nervous wreck. We got back around 11 and I pretty much went straight to bed and then got up pretty late. And I am still exhausted. And there is a ton to do. The car needs to be unloaded, and I MUST tackle the moth problem in the cupboards. L has lots of food she has brought back with her and I don’t want her to just put it in the cupboards to get all moth-y. And I need to clear out the fridge which is a disaster. And, of course, I still need to do buns. But I really needed to come out here to the sunroom to have a bit of quiet alone time. Not sure I’ll meditate. I already ate breakfast; I ate while L was on the phone to Grandma asking her about borrowing her car. I wanted to hear how all that went and it sounds like she is fine with it, though the car needs some work and that will have to be figured out. I’ll tell you what I’d like to do today – sit here in the sunroom spinning and listening to my cd. Oh brother, what a lame thing is that? But two whole days of driving, with lots of packing and helping out in between was kind of exhausting. And it has all put me in a bad mood.

                So before I got up I was thinking about a brain-storm I had. Did I write about this already? Well, I have had the idea of giving the MHC knitters kits to try out and evaluate. My new idea is to have an evaluation party. Invite a bunch of people, kind of Tupperware Party style (not that I’ve ever been to one, the closest was the make-up [Mary-Kay???] party 20 years ago) but instead of selling things it would be for people to evaluate my stuff. I would lay all kinds of things from hats to scarves to skeins out, give everyone some sort of evaluation forms, and let them go at it, checking things out and answering all kinds of questions about what they like/don’t like. And of course I would have refreshments and maybe even some sort of small gifty thing. Maybe not games like a Tupperware party has (I think).  It is a thought.

                Yesterday L said that she would like to get a cheap (should say inexpensive) computer from Craigslist like I did. So now I will need to check out the listings. That can be quite addictive. And I need to see if I still have those questions that are good to ask. I got them from a website and can probably find them again if I hunt for a while. I know I saved them to the big computer, but I may have trashed them.  There was one promising computer listed, but the seller does not speak English, so I don’t suppose asking lots of questions would be very effective.

                Well it is late and I still need to feed the buns. This is my final week of (relative) freedom. Next week work begins. No classes yet, but I will need to go in for meetings to and start getting ready. I am a bit nervous I will confess about having Juniors. They will not be as malleable as the new students I usually teach. Well, there are often upperclass women in the intro classes, but they are new to bio and so pretty anxious about that. This group will have been through the ringer of Cell Bio, so they will be pretty confident. 

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Driving and Hitch-hiker

8 am

                Very odd. I am sitting on L’s bed while she is packing up, so it is kind of distracting. She very muck likes my little computer and wants me to find her one on Craig’s list when we get home. We’ll see.

                Ok, yesterday… it was a very long day bc a very long drive. I didn’t leave until noon, of course. Well first I did my morning stuff, then I packed what I needed and what L had asked for, then I actually spun a little bit of gray stuff while listening to Bluest Eye. It was good to do just a bit of that. Then I realized that I really needed to clean the kitchen which was a disaster, and there was a laundry to start….. so I ended up leaving at noon. Oh, and I went up to town to stop at CVS to get a camera battery (man, those things are expensive – like $15) and stopped at the library to get more books on cd to listen to on the ride. I’m glad I did because Bluest Eye got just too depressing, so I listened instead to some dumb one called maybe Where ever I Hang My Hat. It is just a kind of dumb story, but entertaining enough. So I managed to leave town at noon, but then there was the detour on Main St for paving, which I went around, intending to go to 202 and eventually rt 2 and go that way, but Main st east of town is actually closed so I ended up going the Pike and so that was a bit of a delay. Other than that the driving went well enough, though I did run into some traffic heading north from Boston. And then after driving driving driving (and several bathroom and disgusting snack stops) I picked up a hitchhiker on the Maine Turnpike. That made the rest of the drive go much faster. He was a very nice guy, heading to some festival north of Bar Harbor on Rt 1. He mostly travels around to different kinds of farms doing harvesting: pumpkins, sugar beets, whatever is needing work. This trip has been a hitchhike from NC and it has taken about a week. I will confess that he smelled a bit ripe, so though I had broken down and started using the AC (so I could close the windows and hear the cd better, and I would just turn it on for a few minutes, then off for a while….) I did re-open the windows for ventilation. He was an interesting guy and I figure, given all the hitching I did so many years ago, I am still paying the universe back. And he was basically the age of my kids, so I would rather he get a good ride from me than a bad ride from someone else. Anyway, it was kind of fun. I left him in Ellsworth to take Rt 1 north. It was coming on dusk, so I don’t know if he got rides last night, or maybe had to sleep somewhere random til morning. But that is how he does it, so it is ok.

                As for now. Oh, finish yesterday…. I arrived here around 7:30 to big and very welcome hugs. We hung out in L’s room a bit. She has been all summer in this COA house – says it was originally the carriage house for Davis which is one of the big houses the college owns. What does that mean, carriage house? Anyway it is really a nice place with nice woodwork and cool wood floors, but it is definitely pretty trashed and she says her housemates are really messy. I hope we don’t have to do a lot of cleaning. Of course the good thing is that she does not have a lease here, so no security deposit, so it is not like we have to clean it spotless in order to get that back. Anyway, we hung out for a bit, then at 9 we drove to the Burning Tree restaurant for dinner! It was good, though I confess it was not like oh my god perfect. We decided to get 4 appetizers instead of 2 entrées and that was a good idea, kind of like having tapas, not that I have ever actually had tapas, but seems like that is the idea. Then we came back here and I gratefully went to bed. L went to visit with a friend of hers, crazy youth energy. I slept reasonably well, we got up and now here we are. I guess the next few hours will be mostly packing the car, then eventually we will drive off. I am looking forward to tea at Morning Glory and L needs to go shopping. Originally there was a thought of doing some sort of hike, but I have a feeling that won’t happen.   

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Making Soap!!!!!

7 am

                First the soap. Did it work? Hmmm, well, I guess I won’t really know for several weeks. At first it decidedly did not work. I mixed the lye in water and it got really really hot so that I was afraid it would melt through the yogurt container I was using. I poured it into a second container to help cool it, then I got a jar to pour half into to help it cool. Meanwhile, the fat was still melted but not very hot. So I came inside to wait for it to cool. I think I was messing with this little computer that was having some issues. And I think they started after I clicked on a link on the blog stats page. The page lists the sources of traffic to the blog, and I am often curious – if the stats say there were 7 visitors yesterday, well who the heck were they???? I think they are mostly people that get to the blog via some random google or other search (and here’s an odd thing – the entry from 2 years ago about frog muscles from when I was labeling images to use for class is I think the most visited one, odd). So when I clicked on the source url it took me to a weird place and I bet that put something nasty on the computer. Anyway, after that I was having trouble shutting down and starting back up so I was messing with it, and eventually ran a full scan that took forever. When I got back to the soap, the lye was still hot but not as hot, the fat was warm, so I decided to mix them and stir and hope for the best. I stirred and stirred, expecting it to take quite a while to reach “trace” which the info I had warned about. Nearly every site says to use a power stirrer, but I do not have one and damn it, people have been making soap for, how long? Centuries anyway with no power stirrers. So I used a wooden spoon and mixed and it seemed to very quickly get really thick and gloppy. I decided that was “trace” and poured it into the mold (such as it is, just a plastic bin). It almost immediately separated, with thick gloppy stuff on the bottom and clear fat on top. That did not look good. I went back to the computer and looked up trouble shooting, which did not help that much. They said the cause of separation would be adding the wrong kind of scent…. Well this was goose fat and lye, nothing else. There was a lot about reheating it, though it sounded like that was to be done with a batch that did not work but not for a few days. It was confusing. I am glad, though, that I had found a site that really explained the chemistry involved (I guess I did not bookmark it, too bad) in terms of the NaOH removing part of the backbone of the fatty acid chains in the grease. Anyway, it certainly seemed to me that a lot of that free-floating pure looking fat sitting on the top had not properly saponified, so I decided just to mix it all more. And so I did that. Oh, one more thing, once I mixed the fat and lye it got really hot. I had not expected that to happen. I guess the reaction is very exothermic. And according to the sites I read, you are supposed to wrap it up once poured to allow it to stay hot to continue the reaction. Anyway, I stirred and stirred more to mix the fat in with what was underneath, and it indeed helped. The whole thing got thick like applesauce, and once it finally seemed like there was not more separate fat, I stopped, smoothed it off as best I could and wrapped it in towels. I still left it outside, not wanting this hot stuff inside. When I got back from my meeting last night I brought it in. It looks like it actually worked and is still warm though no longer hot. Pretty exciting, eh? Of course, the trouble-shooting sites talked about things like if your soap is not completely smooth, if it has bubbles, if it is grainy. I don’t care about any of that. I just want it to be soap that one can use to wash things. Now I must let it “age” for about 6 weeks so that it will not be caustic from excess lye.

                As for today – I head to Maine in a while to get L. Yay!!!! We have her for all of a whole week before she is off again. That will be nice. I don’t have to leave real early because she’ll be busy until 6. And she asked if I was interested in going to the fancy restaurant she has always wanted to check out. I told her to make a res – and the earliest she could get was 9:30! So I guess we’ll be having a very late supper. We don’t have to leave right away in the morning, so that is good, we can take our time packing up. Maybe we’ll do a bit of a hike or walk or explore, maybe not. Anyway I want to go to the MoGlo for breakfast. Odd. She will no longer be in Bar Harbor. No longer any reason to go up there. End of an era.

                Meeting last night was very good.  I now have the job of writing up the things we talked about, as well as writing up the things we talked about in the workshop meeting last week. And I need to do that before I forget everything….. We went over lots of ideas about locations, where to put things like the contests and drop in spin. We talked about new ideas for how to run drop in spin. It was very productive.

                Ok. Time to do buns and eat lots of fruit for breakfast since I have a lot. 

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So Many Projects

6:45 am

                It is pouring with rain again which for some reason made me want to come out here to the sun room to write instead of to do my stretches, which I really need to do. It feels kind of oddly cozy here – I sure am glad I never put in the screen windows – but still closely connected to the rain. A bit like being in a cabin at Three Mile. Wow it is really coming down now. And lots of lightning, too. I suppose I could get hit by lightening, or a tree near me could, but really no more likely than if I were in the house.

                What I will need to do right off today (after the much-needed stretches) will be the kitchen. I cooked supper (which no one but me ate, since by the time K finally came home he said he had already eaten…), cut up tomatoes, peeled them and started them cooking down to sauce, I dyed the wool in the onion, then left it to cool and started reheating the onion skins to see if there is more color in them, and late in the evening I finally made chocolate zucchini bread. By the time I started it I realized I needed more cocoa and more chocolate chips, so I had to text G to pick some up while she was out getting pizza and GoBerry with her friend who arrived from Oregon for a few days. The result of all that is that the kitchen is a disaster. Well I guess that gives me an early on job to tackle.

                Sounds like the storm is moving off.

                Yesterday was a bit of a zoo, though I managed to get a lot of good stuff done, including finishing Robinson Crusoe and I am not at all sad to be done with it. On to Barnaby Rudge read by the same person who read Martin Chuzzlewit so I look forward to that, plus it is very long and will last a long time. Yesterday I did start in on the compost and got a bit done before M arrived around 9:45 (it had stopped raining, a lot like today). We did this and that. I showed her how to join when you are knitting in the round. She had forgotten her main project that she wanted help with, so we couldn’t do much besides that. She said on-line videos had helped. I spent some time checking on Ravelry to see if there are any local groups that she could join with and it looks like there might be a couple. Then we took a walk with the T, then went out to return all the sample tiles to Summerlin and to pick up the repaired window for the rental house, and we stopped at Black Sheep to get sandwiches to go. I will say, mine was terrible. I have had that kind before and it was good, but this was terrible. I feel like I should tell them next time I am there. We came home, we ate, we chatted a bit more, she left.    

                After all that, I talked to 2 friends on the phone for about 2 hours. After all that I managed to finish the compost, cut the bottom off one of the small cages, start the next batch of tomatoes stewing, and make the zucchini bread. Oh, AND I finally wrote the letter to the family re invasives!!!! That was a big deal and I did it while I was sitting in the kitchen late waiting for the bread to bake. There was nothing else to do (I had brushed my teeth, gotten changed, I was just waiting). Why was it so hard to write? I don’t think the writing itself was hard, and it turned out pretty well. The hard part comes next with sending it. Why? Because I don’t do well with asking for help, with trying to influence people or convince them, especially family. Strangers are easier. It means trying to inspire all these people to help. With lots of hands, this would not be too bad of a project, but if it is just me, well, that won’t work. Ok, I guess I’ll send off the letter and see what happens. Some nice fall work weekend?

                Today: I must clean the kitchen and do my stretches. I must write up some ideas for the fiber meeting this afternoon. Then I should do something fun….. maybe do a bunch of spinning of the dark grey stuff while listening to the Chief from Carmen Sandiego (yes, it is her) read Bluest Eye. And of course I need to feed buns and eat breakfast. Oh, and I sure better clean out the fridge. If I find tahini maybe I will try to reconstitute the dried eggplant and make baba ganoush. Not as if I need any – I have a whole tub of delicious pate that needs eating.

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rainy day plans

7 am

                It is pouring with rain today. Not bad, I kind of like it. It has a somewhat soothing effect. But it does impact what I had planned for the morning. My sisiter will be here at some point, maybe late morning? And I had figured I would work really hard on compost until she arrived, then settle down to some knitting. I guess that won’t happen. Well, I suppose it still could, I will just get mightily wet and messy. And I guess I will have to put off dealing with the cages that I flipped yesterday. I was going to get the bottom wire off to get started on fixing them. Right now they are just getting wet. And the poor bathroom rug I put out to dry days ago just keeps staying wet. I should have brought it in damp last night.

                Maybe what I’ll do this morning is get everything set up for making the soap. I did more research last night and think I have everything I’ll need. I could lay it all out and do it when M leaves this afternoon.

                *there is a chipmunk exploring inside the flipped cages right now, very cute*

Won’t be a good day for dehydrating today, as it is so damp. It would be good for bunny plucking, though no one really needs it. I did manage a bunch of dehydrating yesterday: I did the jerky which turned out really well. I hope L likes it. I have more I can do, maybe after she gets home. I also did a whole eggplant. I first cooked it in the micro, then I mashed it all (I peeled it some, but the peel was pretty soft so I left some of it) and put it on a cookie sheet (slightly oiled) and left it to dry for hours. It took a long time bc it was so wet. AND, it took up the darkness from the pan. It did not taste bad, which I was worried about. I’ve done tomatoes and if they were on the sheet they would discolor and taste terribly metallic. This does not, and it got pretty darn dry. I bagged it, and I think I may go ahead and rehydrate it and try making baba ganoush with it now so I see how it all turned out. Don’t want to make more like that if it is not useful.

                Spent the morning yesterday going to the dump – we got rid of lots of stuff, yay! – then to breakfast at Kelly’s, then on to Greenfield where I picked up my new glasses. I think they are going to work out much better than the old. I do have to get used to actually wearing them, which I have not been doing much. I’m hoping they will be better for work.  The other thing I did, after all the dehydrating (oh, and peeling and cooking and straining and cooking down to thick sauce of a bunch of tomatoes from my own plants that appeared on their own in the unfinished compost-filled raised bed) was to start a new rug. I pulled out the one with orange yarn which I did not like. This one has the darker of the 2 wool blankets, with some wool from a skort and wool from the old coat added in. I do not like it as much as the first wool one, but it is ok. I may go ahead and make even another wool one; I really like them and I think they will be nice in the end. And I got rid of a lot of the excess clothing and fabric from downstairs. It is much better; still cluttered but not as badly. I also started the dark grey angora. The fiber is quite short, but I am spinning it tight and so it will be ok. And I am listening to The Bluest Eye  by Toni Morrison. It is pretty sad, but I like it so far. The narrator sounds just like the woman from the old Carmen Sandiego video game, I will have to research that!

                Oh, and one last thing I did last night was to start stewing some onion skins. I gave up on trying with the solar dyer as it has been too cloudy. Today I will strain it and add the mordanted wool. I may even include some un-mordanted to see if it dyes also.

               

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freezers vs drying

7 am

                Today is going to be a bunch more food putting up. And I am fast running out of freezer space. Should I buy a small chest freezer? What I really need to do is cook the 2 huge pieces of meat from the meat share – I have a pork butt roast and a beef roast. Kent has to get a new dehumidifier from Sears, maybe I should see what they have in terms of chest freezers. Ok I just spent 20 minutes looking at them on line. Looks like to get a reasonably sized energy star rated one would be about $500 which is too much in my mind. It’s just that our little freezer is pretty much full. I’m thinking of roasting some eggplants today, then freezing them to use for baba ganoush later. I wonder if the roasted stuff could then be dehydrated. Don’t see why not, but today I am also going to start some rabbit jerky. I am currently freezing a bit that I finished boning yesterday, not to freeze all the way but just enough to make it easy to slice up small. Then I will marinate it and make the jerky. I’ve done it before but without the marinating and it was not that good. I am hoping some nice tamari will make it tasty.

                Finished the 9 skeins of dark fawn, now I will wash then and hang them out to dry. And then start the dark gray. Tomorrow my sister is coming for a knitting lesson, that should be fun. Then there is Thursday, then I leave for Maine. Of course I’ll be back either Saturday night or Sunday. I think I will also look at the soap making video again and see if I can gather materials needed. Then maybe on Friday I could actually do it. I already fed the buns, and looked to see if I need another pallet. I could probably get by on the ones I have. I truly need to mow the back lawn today, I guess after that I can start in on moving compost around.

                Well, I have not written much, but I am feeling like I ought to get going. I wasted a lot of time looking at those sites about freezers.

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Busy-ness and more Invasive Thoughts

7 am

                Middle of August. Oh dear. I have this week, or most of it – Friday I must leave to drive to Maine, then back late Saturday. And Thursday night there is the meeting in Plainfield of fiber folk. Next week L will be here. I have a dentist appointment, must drive to Framingham to pick up a friend on Thursday, and want to do a Wed Night Dinner of Butt Roast which will take all day to prepare. I did manage to find the Physio lab manual in my MHC network space (duh, been there all along) so I can look up what parts of the text they read and check those out. And I have realized that, along with all the ToDos not yet done, I must add that I really have to clean up under the bunny cages and deal with compost. I guess I’ll need to turn the piles I have – best would be to cobble together another space with more of those flat wooden things whose name I can’t think of right now – pallets…. Then turn the old piles into that so I combine them, then make a new pile. That would leave an empty one for turning into.

                I spent most of the weekend (at least it feels that way) at the kitchen sink and stove. Yesterday I prepared and dried 2 more eggplants. This time I blanched them. It would be good to try soaking/cooking both types. I assume the blanched ones will cook more easily. They sure took a lot longer to dry because they were so wet after steaming and cooling. I suppose I could try squeezing them dry with paper towels. I still have several squash and more eggplant. Not to mention whatever G will bring home from the share today.

                I’d really like to spin more of the fawn today. Oh, I should add that I made a really good pâté of liver, onions, eggplant. And I cooked down the stew from Saturday and added some wine. It came out very tasty. Back to the angora. I would like to spin more fawn and listen to the rest of the book on cd. It is reminding me a lot of a friend, except in the book it is all so much worse and the parents are so blind and stupid. But now I am of course caught up in it so I want to get through the rest. See whatever happens.

                Met with workshop folks yesterday morning at Raos. That was good. We went over a lot of workshop stuff, and I ought to write it up as a summary. Then I did all the stuff described above, and left at 4 (well, closer to 4:30 actually) to walk to the mall to Panera’s for book club. Nearly everyone was there, miraculously! Our next book is Gabriella Clove and Cinnamon which should be enjoyable. Yesterday I did not run since I figured I would be doing all that walking. What about today….. oh yuck I suppose I “should “ run. While walking along the bike trail I got it in my head that, the same way I was using my run to pick up trash along East Hadley rd, I could, while walking the bike trail, rip up invasives. But as I got closer to the mall, the bittersweet was completely overwhelming. Good lord, it would take all day to walk that part of the trail and pull up all the bittersweet. And that would only be a tiny swatch while the plants go far deeper. Discouraging.

               

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More Dehydrating and Skeins!

7 am

                Well what did I do all yesterday? I wrote, I meditated, I prepared veggies for the oven dehydrator. Did 2 more zucchini and 2 green peppers. It is really humid these days which probably makes it take longer. Wouldn’t be working at all if I were trying with a solar dehydrator as it has been raining the past few days. Still, one can’t complain about that. Then I finally started in on the rabbits. I completely boned 2, froze the large pieces and started stewing the small ones, and used all the bones for stock. So that is good. One more to go. For this one I will separate out a few large pieces, freeze briefly, then slice them thin and make some rabbit jerky for L to try. I have made it before and did not like it very much, but this time I will try marinating in some tamari first. If it works I will do the same with the rest of the large pieces. And then I still need to deal with livers – I want to make a pâté.

                Later in the day K suggested we walk down to the Mexican place south of here for margaritas. It was nice to have him suggest something, especially something that involved walking. So we did that, and boy that one margarita did me in for the rest of the evening. We got chips and salsa and I got a taco so that was supper, too. Unfortunately it was spicy for me – even when people say oh no it is not spicy, for me it always is. And I paid during the night with some nasty butt burn. Makes me realize how good it has been for quite a while compared to how badly I used to get it all the time. So it wasn’t so very bad. If I had taken my psillium before we went I might have avoided the problem.

                I meet about fair workshops at Raos this morning – 10 am. I will walk there, so I should leave around 9:15. Then there is book club this afternoon at the mall and I will walk there, too. I should leave for that at 4.

                Oh, the other thing I did yesterday morning was to wind and label all those blue/green and angora skeins. So that is done. I’m working now on another 9 skeins of fawn, then the 9 of brown and the 9 more of gray. I should be good for Apple Harvest at the end of September. Of course I have done nothing more about kits. I really need to find a better, more professional looking packaging method. I have thought of labels to stick onto the outside of a plastic bag, or maybe a sort of paper envelope. Or a box of some sort. I spent ages the other day researching companies to make photo cards, maybe I need to look into packaging, even if I do stick with plastic I ought to use something besides food baggies.

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dehydration and the gym

6:45 am

                We went to see Beasts of the Southern Seas (not sure if that is right) last night. Went to get a pizza at the new place next to the theater first.  I enjoyed the movie though it was strange.

                Today will have to be spent mostly in the kitchen.  I have a box full of veggies that G brought home last night that I need to dehydrate for L. I ought to figure out if the dehydrated raw zucchini cook or rehydrate well, or whether I really ought to steam them. There is also green pepper which I can do raw, and some eggplant which I could try raw, but I think ought to be blanched. Then I also need to label all those washed skeins. I actually finally found my notebook listing skeins so that is good. And I plied up 3 more dark fawn. 3 more of those to go.

                It is going to be getting too cold to write out here pretty soon. That will be sad. And the time is running down pretty quickly to when classes will start, then all hell breaks loose with my schedule. I will need to be at lecture for (gasp!) 8 am. I guess I will try taking the bus in, then going to the gym after. I suppose it will be ok not to shower before lecture. And I can wear my shorts under my lecture pants, even wear my t-shirt under whatever else I wear. Early on that might all be too hot. But then, I won’t be in such a hurry to get in and out as I was when I had to get to lecture after. So I could also just leave running clothes there to change in and out of.

               

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Books and Bunnies

7 am

                I actually lay in bed late today because I did not want to have to be the one to feed Tigger. How lazy is that? G is housesitting for the next week, and K was still asleep. Well I decided that was stupid and I did get up and feed him.

                It is reasonably nice out right now, but it is already getting hot and it is really muggy. It got pretty bad yesterday and I expect it will be bad again today. I didn’t feel especially productive yesterday but really I was. I managed to dehydrate more stuff – 1 ½ melons, I plied the angora and spun up 2 more half ounce bits and started the next half, and I did 3 rabbits. Oh, and one more thing I did yesterday: I spent quite a while researching companies to make photo cards. I think either Zazzle or Staples would be easiest and cheapest. Because Wednesday when Cl was here the other thing we did was, she helped me photograph baby bunnies. I edited them and chose the best, so I could use them to make more photo cards for my booth. I ought to do some xmas bunnies, use some of the tacky xmas decoration stuff we have…. It is a thought.

                Today I will do more of the fawn angora. I am still listening to Anne Lamott, thought it is Imperfect Birds not whatever I said yesterday. And there is a lot of laundry to do. And I have the big pile in the bedroom to deal with, and all the usual stuff that gets put off. And I can move a rabbit cage back into the frame where I removed it to deal with the wasp nest. Then I can put the black bunny back into that cage and turn both the small “extra” cages on their sides to prepare for putting new bottom wire on them. They both have inside sections and really need those to get wire bottoms as the rabbits go in there and poop.

                I finished Little Dorrit (sob) and have started on Robinson Crusoe but I do not like the reader at all at all. I might have to go back to another Dickens. And I am still reading the book about The Ambassadors, I will be a regular expert on Henry James by the time I finish. I still have Wings of a Dove  (in book form) that I could go back to reading. I guess book club will be this Sunday, meaning that I can start in on the next book soon; I need to figure out what it is.

                I’m feeling decidedly fat these days, and the reality is that I have put on weight. Oh for those good old days when I could not eat sweets. That is my downfall. I guess I’d better run again today…

                I wrote this whole stuff without even mentioning Mom’s news that she called with: her cousin died. It is very sad. Well, he’d been sick for a bit, I think his heart was having trouble. Still I feel really sad about it. End of an era in a way, since he is the last of any of those cousins we have any contact with. Of course I regret that I did not get up there to see them this year. I stopped up either last year or the year before. You know I bet it was several years ago. Well, what can you do? I will send a card. And I also really regret that I never got him to describe things in his house, since we now own it. Odd. And there are few odd little things, like the tiny unused door in the kitchen, that it would be fun to have explained. I said something to G about feeling delinquent that I have not better connected her with all these extended families, but she made the point that it is too many people to care about. And you know, I had been thinking the exact same thing. I like knowing who they all are/were, all Mom and Dad’s cousins, all the grandparent siblings, things like that, but I can’t really put time or emotional energy into staying connected with all of them. I also had thought about my old “Christmas” letters that I used to send so long ago. I really had fun with them, and am sorry that they soured. I am not sure how to get past it. Somehow the idea of writing one now seems so dull and uninteresting. Sigh.

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Little Dorrit

8:45 am

                Well I am really hungry, but first I am going to write and then meditate and then eat. And I did already do stretches, run (well, sort of, I did pick up lots of trash) and feed buns. And I think once the next few steps are gone through, I want to spend a lot of the day just stolidly spinning this dark fawn stuff. I am working on the 1 ½ ounces to ply with the first bobbin. And listening to Flying Lessons by Ann Lamott which I am not completely taken with, but I guess I will work through it. Finished Little Dorrit which got terribly sappy at the end, most Dickens novels do. He likes to tie everything up smoothly which is satisfying in a slightly shameful way. In other words, I’m kind of embarrassed that I do so like having everything tied up nicely. The good guys  and bad guys all get what they deserve in the end. Funny how really happy I felt when Taticorum appeared at Mr. Meagles door. She had renounced the terrible Miss Wade and was going to really try to be better and would her old master please take her back. Vomit vomit. What happened to the firey girl who denounced these people who gave her such a stupid name and made her into their servant? But still, it made me feel so happy: Taticorum was back! Well, now I am on to Robinson Crusoe. I had thought about downloading The Mill on the Floss but it is read by a whole series of readers and I really can’t stand the switching back and forth. I get used to one reader and want it to stay the same throughout the book.

                 I finished the wool rug, and started another one, this time using the darker of the blanket wool and some thick 3-py orange yarn from the stash. I have about 8 inches woven but to be honest I don’t really like it. I might just take it out and start again. It is too pale. I think I will cut up some of the other wool that I have and use that with the blanket wool, maybe just add a bit of the orange for color.

                I really ought to mow the lawn today, but I want to get some spinning in before it gets too hot, and by then it will be too hot to mow…      

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Plucking

6:30 am

                Supposed to get hot hot today so I may end up in the basement as I ended up yesterday. It wasn’t so hot, but I still went down towards the end of the day and started another rug. I really like it; it is wool from a couple of old blankets that I must have cut ages ago. They are slightly different, one browner, one creamier, and I am inserting small lengths cut from the old beaver coat lining. I have enough of those wool strips for at least 2 more rugs, so maybe I’ll make another. I also plucked 2 rabbits yesterday – finished Bathsheba and did Cassandra. I don’t love Cassandra’s coat. She has really coarse guard hair which is plenty long, then a very soft coat beneath which is kind of short. I do love the color since it is black with silver highlights. It will be interesting to see how the coat on her black baby that I am keeping turns out – Ebony. I really ought to take photos of the latest babies since they are at the adorable stage right now. C is coming over for lunch, so maybe she could help me.

                 I also “should” mow the lawn, though I hate to do it early in the day. I can do that when it is hot and just get all sweaty, then go take a shower. I may also start spinning the angora I measured out. It was spinning at Webs last night and I brought the Lendrum, so I also brought a big bag of dark fawn – from Amber and Dinah and others. I weighed it out there and spun up 2 half ounce bits. I think I will spin one more half ounce on that bobbin, then the 1 ½ ounces on another and then ply them on the other wheel as those bobbins will hold the full 3 ounces. Maybe I will work on that. I brought a big box of books and old Spin-Off magazines to the meeting and gave them all away – YAY! I still need to list a bunch of stuff on Freecycle, like the old boat seat from the camper bus. I could take photos of those today. Oh, one more thing I did yesterday was to dehydrate more veggies – zucchini and green pepper and I just started some carrots – for L. I think I will text G to ask her to bring home anything she can that I can keep drying.

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Skeins and Organizing

6:20 am

                I was just dreaming that I was in London. Very exciting. I don’t know why I was there, but I was in the train thinking how exciting it would be to just continue on to Paris, then I remembered that I had to get back for work at some camp or day care. Strange.

                Well. This morning is lovely just like yesterday. In fact, it stayed pretty darn nice all day yesterday, we’ll see what happens with today. And it was a pretty productive day. I managed to do one of the hard things by calling Summerlin about the faucet and they came and caulked it so that was good. I had also found that the downstairs shower faucet was spraying, but decided to try to just tighten it myself, and by gum it solved it. I also did errands, not too exciting, but ok including taking one box of clothes from downstairs to Salvies. It is a start. And I returned the Artisan Bread book to the library, and met a friend for tea (and an incredibly greasy cheese scone like thing). When I got home I spent the afternoon sorting the sunroom which was very good. And I organized some bins with kids workshop stuff to take to and store in the other garage. So those are out of here and that is very good. I kept the needle felting stuff because all the bits of colored wool are in there and if I ever do felt that knitted/felted purse that is laying around, I will need them.  Besides all that I washed and hung out 3 loads of laundry, finished drying the skeins,

 and …… even finally sorted the castings out of one of the worm bins and gave it new newspaper. So I still need to do the other bin, but that will have to await more paper. A very productive day! Oh, and I started a batch of bread, which I’ll bake today. Good since I’m pretty much out of what was in the freezer.And i finished knitting what I will felt to be another hot pad.

We'll see how it looks felted.

                There are still lots of things on the list, and plenty still of hard things. Along with some of them, I think I will start the 2 big batches of angora that I want to spin. I have 9 ounces of brown and 9 of dark gray. That will do me for Apple Harvest, maybe even for the winter fair and Hartsbrook. Well, I ought to do a big batch of white, too. Oh, and one big need to get to today is to pluck a few buns. Now that the sun room is a bit more functional, I can do it.

                I’ve been obsessively listening to Little Dorrit through everything. At first I found the voice of the man reading it kind of odd, but I have gotten used to it and really like it now. Funny how that is. Kind of like personalities. I will be sad to finish it and not hear his voice any more, as I was sad when I finished Martin Chuzzlewit. I only have about 10 chapters to go. Which will I listen to next?

                I was inordinately lazy and did not either run or do stretches yesterday. Naughty naughty. AND we went and got GoBerry after supper. Really naughty naughty. Boy I sure don’t want to go running now. I have been very good about taking my pills am and pm, but I still wake up feeling blah and uninspired. Sitting to immediately write probably helps. I guess the first thing, after I feed the buns, that I should do is to wash the dishes. Or maybe I will stretch and then wash dishes. Or maybe I will stretch then run, then be too exhausted to wash dishes. I also need to decide what I am going to cook all week. And I told L I would try to dehydrate some veggies for her which is mostly just a matter of cutting them up and leaving them to do their thing in the oven. I guess I will bake a loaf of bread, then put the veggies in. And the solar dehydrator will await another time, maybe next year. I got out all those books and have not even really read them.

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HOT and rain at last!

6 am

                Well, here’s one thing: it is lovely outside right now, which is nice since it has been SO HOT!! I believe it is supposed to get hot hot hot again later today, but at least it rained over night and so cooled off. K has been chopping and piling wood like crazy in this heat. Not sure why he got so inspired but it is a very good thing. A lot of what he has worked on has been the huge slices of pine (from somewhere in the neighborhood) that is all rotted and full of carpenter ants. He is stacking all that in the corner of the yard under the spruces near the road. So we now have that big pile of rotting stuff as well as the huge brush pile behind the bunny cages. G has also been working like crazy in this heat, at the farm. She goes in at 6 and gets home usually after 6:30. Good thing she still loves it. On her one day off, Sunday, she did some cooking, went out somewhere, sat in the hammock a bit and tried to get cool. Saturday she spent a long time cleaning the kitchen which I think made her really mad that I had let it get messy. But when I got home Friday there was no time for anything except pulling stuff together for Shakespeare (and I emptied the car), then in the morning we ran off to do errands which of course takes forever. We went to Home Depot, Target and Bed Bath and Beyond looking for shower curtains etc for the newly tiled tubs. I hate that kind of shopping. I absolutely hate it. I hate those stores, I hate the people I see in them, I hate trying to find stuff, and all the row after row, aisle after aisle, stack after stack of just plain stuff. It is way overwhelming. And then we come home to a house already crammed with stuff……

                Which brings me to today. I truly must do some sorting today. The sun room is in bad shape and the basement is worse. I have ended up with several boxes of kid craft materials from the fair. It was useful for my class, but now it just takes up a lot of room. I suppose I could move them to the other garage. I was very good this year about not buying any new fleeces but I still have box after box of wool. I have one bag of stuff that I think I got at the NH fair a couple of years ago that I think is pretty worthless. I think I should just toss it. Or maybe bring it to spinning on Tues and see if anyone there wants it.

                I made it to Ko – the last one of the year – yesterday. It was a puppet group from Putney VT doing a show about dementia. The performers were the attendants and the puppets were the old folks. It was very moving. The best part was when I left to bike up there at 2:45. K, who had been watching the weather radar all day, as usual, said the storm was coming immediately, that I was going to get rained on….. but I decided to go anyway, if I got wet, so be it. And I did. Oh boy. Big drops started falling as I left Columbia Dr, by the time I was at the DPW is was pouring down. But it stayed hot and it was actually really fun to ride in the rain. I knew I had to keep going if I wanted to get there in time for the cheap tickets. I did make it, absolutely soaked through. Then, instead of biking up to get a GoBerry, I biked home, got changed, then I biked back since by then the rain had stopped. It rained again during the show (we could hear it on the roof) but stopped by the end so I could bike home. Big adventure.

                Other than that, yesterday, I did manage to do a few ToDos. One thing I did was to wash (finally) all those skeins I have been accumulating. Several fawn angora and a bunch of the blue/green. I even hung them outside for about an hour before I had to bring them in to avoid the rain. They looked lovely out there and I am sorry I did not get a photo. If the weather seems appropriate in a bit I will put them back out. Along with acres of laundry that needs to get done. I will not have enough room on the line.

                Also today I have some hard things I have to do: get back onto figuring out a fair fiber folks meeting, call Summerlin, and crappy stuff that I just put off and off like write to the family about invasives, and contact Pamela about the Trust. Writing those things here is good because they don’t seem so bad.

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Tidying and Shakespeare

7:30 am

                I woke up this morning feeling pretty decent – no class, can spend the day doing whatever I want, maybe spin all day. Then I looked around and reality struck. All the massive mess everywhere – bathroom from the new tiling, kitchen and … most of all, sunroom. I managed to empty the car last night which was plenty bad enough, but I just shoved everything into the sunroom. Now it all needs to be reorganized and put away.

Went to Hampshire Shakespeare last night; the set up at the Renaissance Center is weird, it is not nearly so nice as at Hartsbrook which I really miss. The good part is that the actors did an excellent job and besides – it was Shakespeare that in itself was wonderful. Or maybe because it was As You Like It which is silly and lots of fun. I have certainly seen Shakespeare mangled, or done it a dull and uninteresting way, and usually by these big fancy companies. Anyway, this was fun.

                So I guess a lot of today will be sorting and cleaning and putting away. Maybe I will run. Maybe not. I certainly don’t really want to. But it is not too hot, so I should just stick Little Dorritt into my ears and go. Except that I am at a kind of miserable part, the family has come into their inheritance and they are all being awful and now they are about to loose all their money which I guess will serve them right. The only sympathetic character in this section is Little Dorritt herself and she is really more pathetic. So simpering, one just wants to smack her.

               

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Tiles Motivations and ToDos

8 am

                Been remiss in writing bc I’ve been so busy with my class. And to be honest I must have been anxious all week bc I’ve have stomach aches. I feel pretty good this morning, probably bc it is the last day. Makes me a little concerned that I will feel sick as fall approaches and for a good part of the early fall as I get accustomed to the new class I’ll be teaching in. I’ll manage, but it is tiresome to feel sick all the time. The kids yesterday really enjoyed drum carding, so we’ll do that again today, as well as more spinning (we’ll work with the wheels again) and they wanted to make felted treasure bags. The felt balls came out very well. The roving that I got from E is good for that, and the roving they dyed early in the week worked well. They don’t want to do more dyeing, so I brought that stuff home. It will certainly be a chore to haul everything home today, I’ve accumulated a lot of stuff there. I think in retrospect that I should have done stick weaving instead of using the cardboard TP rolls. They are just harder to work with.

                Tonight we have plans to go to Hampshire Shakespeare – As You Like It. Never made it to the kid version of 12^th Night, it was raining. This time I do not mind going inside if it rains. I may get tickets before or after class so that we cannot bow out.

                The new tub tiles are almost done. It has been quite distracting all week between the class and having these guys here doing the tile. After class today I will go to Target or somewhere to get a new shower curtain and new bathmat for downstairs. I put the blue curtain upstairs and I want to get something more on a pink side to better match the new tile. Maybe someday we will even repaint the upper walls so they are no longer blue. Some day.

                Funny, I talked to G last night (she wanted to go out for supper, so even though we had already eaten I happily complied, and ate Mochi while she had tea rolls and fried rice) about motivation. I told her how I find I must put myself into situations that I might otherwise never get around to in order to do interesting things. I was saying that I will be glad when the class is done. It has gone well and I have enjoyed doing it to a certain extent, but it has also been wearing, and of course, it has kept me from doing any of my own spinning. She found that all odd and thought that I should do what I want. But I told her that, if left completely to my own devises I would basically do nothing. Well, that is not completely true. After all, at the farm I was definitely left to my own devises, and I spent the entire time carding wool. I could pretty effectively card and spin all my time away. But that does not really feel like “enough.” Well, there are also lots of ToDos that I do anyway, like the dishes/laundry/bills stuff. And there are all the huge list of ToDos that don’t get done, that are part of stuff, like fixing bunny cages. They get done eventually. I just feel that I must push myself a little and that requires setting something up before-hand, like teaching this class, that will just come up and then have to be done. I have scheduled to teach an adult class in the fall. I hope that works out ok with the new class at work.

                Maybe this morning, after I do the dishes, I can do a bit of my own spinning before I must leave. I am spinning up some grey angora that I will ply with the last 3 half-ounce bits of the blue/green. And then TOMORROW I must wash all those skeins and hang them out.  And there will be a lot of putting things away that will need to be done tomorrow.

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