Ahhhh, a day off. Although I slept later than planned, at least I've been productive so far today. I really, really wanted to mow the lawn, asked Lin if I could borrow her new self-propelled fancy mower which she delivered last night, but it rained this morning (again) so that was out for today. Instead I attacked the pantry, cleaning the shelves of old food, sorting out the good stuff, and sorted my silver. My god I have a lot of silver. Thank you Liza and Keela. Mostly I have Grannie's and some of Nan's flatware, with miscellaneous serving things. Very nice to have, and I use it all the time. I have a ton--really, a ton, of silverplate flatware which I seem to have collected over the years. I saved some for myself but will offer it to Jenica when she comes and give the remainder to camp. So now I feel self-righteous at having completed a project, but have to go to the dump with a big load. Am waiting for a check from sale of paltry bit of stock so I can balance my checkbook and hopefully buy some firewood for next year (or maybe just pay mortgage for May), so after the mail comes I'll go the the dump, then hopefully to town to deposit a check and do some grocery shopping. The dogs got to eat: pasta (bowties), ramen noodles, pecans and granola bars. Can you imagine the farts tonight? They were skeptical of the pecans (except for Chances, who's never skeptical about ANYTHING I feed her) but decided they really liked them after all.

Had a great meeting of the book group last night. We seem to have settled on a group of 7, really nice people (including the one who's mother I worked with in RI). We had a great time discussing the book (East of Eden) and talked about a lot of other stuff as well. It was really nice, lasted 2 1/2 hours. We covered the book really well this time, everyone had a lot to say. Not everyone had finished the book, only 4 of us had (including me!) but the others had plenty to offer anyway. It was really nice, Lin and I rode partway home together and raved about it on the way. The woman hosting it lives in AuSable Acres (remember when that was just started being developed, Molly--in the '70's, really controversial, now just part of the area) in a really small house designed to be a vacation home. She has 2 Chessies and a Jack Russel terrier.

Yesterday I went to the area network's annual meeting in Lake Placid. Had a morning session on communication in the workplace, focusing on confrontation. It was good--I offered some nuggets about how my boss deals with confrontation (separate the individuals and forbid them to discuss the topic ever again). Then we had lunch and I got to sit with Fred and Julie. Julie really makes Fred laugh so that was fun. The speaker was the editor of Publishers Weekly, really hot shit, so that was really cool. She was great. I came home afterwards instead of going to work, which meant I got home at 2:00, a bonus. I meant to mow my lawn but discovered my mower is broken, the safety cable is snapped so it won't pull start. RATS! I feel helpless now but will find a place to get it fixed.

It's cooler here now, only supposed to be in the 60's. That's not great, I prefer it about 10 degrees warmer. Maybe it will help with the black flies, which are ferocious and plentiful. So are the mosquitoes. Nasty stuff, makes being outdoors less pleasant. I need to do lots of gardening, planting and weeding, but digging in the dirt really stirs up the flies. I don't think I'll have as many containers this year, just don't feel like getting that involved. Will do cukes and tomatoes again, and Lin gave me hundreds of carrot seeds so I may plant them as well. That's tougher, though, have to do them in the ground I think.

So things are good, not perfect but good. Lately I've been feeling sad at night, it comes over me like a wave but doesn't last too long. That's progress, I figure. I don't have the blues the way I did, have more energy and interest in things, but there's a pall hanging over me. I still have my moments of "Henry, are you really dead?" but maybe that's because I live here, where he always loved being and will never be again. I expect to see him here. I look at his pictures (not quite the way Margaret does, but yet somewhat the same way) and sometimes I smile and sometimes I feel very, very sad. Since the pictures are all over my house, and on my desk at work, he's always there.

Time to check on the mail. After that I had sworn to myself I would go to the granite company to talk about Henry's headstone. But now I'm feeling maybe I'll wait until Tuesday for that, it's supposed to rain that day too. I can't keep putting it off, I know, but I have so many errands to run today and I feel I need to make that more of a single activity. I also need to go to the cemetery to figure out where we want the headstone to be. I talked to Charlie, the undertaker, and got the information about what needs to be done. Kristen has the paperwork we need, and it'll cost $40 even if we dig the hole and do it all ourselves. Don't know how much the headstone will cost, that's one of the things I need to find out. And I have no idea how we'll pay for it.

On to the back room/library. That's a HUGE job. Need to get it well underway before NYPD Blue comes on or I have to head to town, whichever comes first.