On to Easter

Christmas is officially over at my house. Yesterday I took down the tree, and this time I actually carried it out to the woods, instead of just tossing it out onto the deck. Yea me! A sign of Homeowner Maturity. I took all the ornaments off, one by one (like, there would be another way to do it?) and patted them gently, putting them in their paper towel nests. I made 2 shoeboxes full of "These are the Good Ones," and put them on top in the tub labeled CHRISTMAS--FRAGILE. Who do I label this for? I live alone, for god's sake. The tree was easy to take down, for a real change. I moved the loveseat back to its appointed position in the corner, where it gets sun from 2 floor-to-ceiling windows. Both dogs immediately jumped up on it, curled into little donut balls and went to sleep. How cute are they? Because I really liked the effect of glowing colors in the corner I lined the windows with the tiny colored lights from the tree and plug them in at night. Effect not the same as the cluster of lights a tree gives, but it's nice nonetheless.

Yesterday was MLK Day and I made the most of it. Had spent the two previous days sleeping (what's up with my weekends these days? I spend hours and hours sleeping), with the exception of a few hours spent making lentil soup and watching part of Million Dollar Baby. I cut out all the dead fronds of the huge fern that hangs over the railing down to the living room. Since these fronds are about 7' long, this is no small task and took about an hour, resulting in little brown pieces of dead fern spread all over the living room below. Also resulting in thorns stuck in many of my fingers. Does everyone know that a mature asparagus fern has thorns? This plant is about 12 years old. It may be time for the whole thing to die; I think I'm doing my best to kill it, frond by frond. It looks much better now, all green.

I cleaned the bathroom, vacuumed living room and kitchen, attached the bookcase where I keep my clothes to the wall, washed my down jacket, brought in the 12-pack of frozen but not exploded Diet Coke from the car (when will I learn?) and spent a lot of time playing with the dogs. I love staying home with the dogs. I went to Ken's last night for a pretty long visit--2 hours of discussing the state of the world. I told him I'm tired of being angry about American politics and bad diplomacy (see Jon Stewart's coverage of Bush's diplomacy last night for something really funny). I'm just tired of being fed up, disgusted and angry. Don't have it in me any more. I give up. I reach this point from time to time in my life, when America disappoints me completely.

I did something I really love doing Saturday night: watched a dog show for 3 solid hours. I love watching dog shows. I even watched the Toy Group, which I never do. I got to see 4 Groups: Toy, Sporting (MY group), Hounds and Non-Working. Sunday night was Terriers, Working and Herding. I only saw Working on Sunday because I had to watch Grey's Anatomy (oh the torture of television) and I never saw who won Best in Show. I just love watching dogs, that's all. But it turns out I like watching Patrick Dempsey more. Thank goodness! I'm normal! I still really like the American Field Spaniel:


http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/fieldspaniel.htm