The surface of the lake at sunset. Nice colors & shapes.
Friday, June 30, 2006
clouds
There were really nice thunderheads above the mountain across the lake at sunset. I didn't really capture them but this was sort of a pretty shot.
the mountain
The Mountain in its summer glory. It's just so huge and pretty from the boat house porch that it begs to have its picture taken.
It's Friday, people!
Some disk jockey used to start his show like that--who was it? I just finished the work of my clerks, both of whom are off today. I've asked them not to be out at the same time because it makes it hard for me to do their jobs and mine, but of course they wanted a long weekend and could I really be a bitch and say no? No, that's not my style. So I spent 2 1/2 hours doing interlibrary loan, including filling out mailing labels. But now it's done and I have to catalog little plastic animals. Hard to tell which is worse, no?
Spent the night in the boat house last night. It was hot when I got home, but got pretty chilly once I was down there. Actually was under a blanket sitting on the porch once it got dark. It was a restless night--the dogs kept barking and barking at noises in the woods, once at 12:30 and again at 4, then at 5. They were sure something terrible was happening there but all I heard was rustling. It made me have weird dreams, though--first I thought/dreamed that thieves were there, but then I realized that they'd already robbed us twice so there was nothing left to take. Then I decided my cousins had arrived (unannounced, of course) and didn't see my car so didn't know enough to be QUIET! When I got up at 6:30 of course there was no one there. I took a quick dip (dip in the most earnest sense of the word) and left for home. So it was not a restful night.
Nor was it a restful morning: I forgot to get gas last night, and after I left for work I realized I didn't even have enough to go the 10 miles to the gas station, so I had to turn around to use the gas I keep for the lawn mower and emergencies. That got me to the gas station, where I had to take the time to fill up (and get coffee, natch) so I was 10 minutes late to work. Oh well, there are only 5 of us here today so the director is grateful for anyone she can get.
There were 3 mergansers swimming past the boat house at dusk. It was really cool--I heard a strange splashing sound when they surfaced, then they swam about 2' from the end of the dock with their heads half submerged so they could watch for fish. Tess watched with great fascination but when she went out the screen door she slammed it behind her and they flew away, quacking with great indignation. I wonder if they're the ones who've been pooping on the dock: someone sure has! Yuck.
I had physical therapy last night and amazed not only my therapist by myself as well. Did 5 minutes on the elliptical, which doesn't sound like much but I'd struggled to do 3 at first. Did 30 reps of almost everything. Still can't stand on my right foot & toss the weighted ball, though--5 times is my record. Julie finally admitted that she can't really do that, either. The rat! Anyway I was winded & had to use my inhaler, which means I got a good workout, and I felt good. Stopped at Ken's and had a nice visit with him (so I don't have to stop there tonight). Tonight I'll eat at home, then head to the b.house for the night and hopefully tomorrow, which is predicted to be a dock day. Yes, that's the meteorological term they use, Dock Day. 82 and sunny.
Saturday Linda comes, as does Ken's nephew Joe and who knows how many other people. A lot. The lake will be busy and sort of icky, but I can tune some of it out. The jet skis haven't been bad yet this year, it's the party boats that have been driving me crazy. Putt, putt, putt, right past the dock, about 20 feet from the end, staring at me and the dogs. Last night Tess, then Chances took off in the water after 2 kayakers. First the yakers thought it was endearing but when I told them Tess might try to climb into their boat the man got really nervous. I told him to splash her with his paddle. "You really want me to do that?" If you want to. "How far can she swim?" I don't know, I've never put her to the test. "I don't think I could swim that far." (about 35'--pathetic)
Back to work.
Some disk jockey used to start his show like that--who was it? I just finished the work of my clerks, both of whom are off today. I've asked them not to be out at the same time because it makes it hard for me to do their jobs and mine, but of course they wanted a long weekend and could I really be a bitch and say no? No, that's not my style. So I spent 2 1/2 hours doing interlibrary loan, including filling out mailing labels. But now it's done and I have to catalog little plastic animals. Hard to tell which is worse, no?
Spent the night in the boat house last night. It was hot when I got home, but got pretty chilly once I was down there. Actually was under a blanket sitting on the porch once it got dark. It was a restless night--the dogs kept barking and barking at noises in the woods, once at 12:30 and again at 4, then at 5. They were sure something terrible was happening there but all I heard was rustling. It made me have weird dreams, though--first I thought/dreamed that thieves were there, but then I realized that they'd already robbed us twice so there was nothing left to take. Then I decided my cousins had arrived (unannounced, of course) and didn't see my car so didn't know enough to be QUIET! When I got up at 6:30 of course there was no one there. I took a quick dip (dip in the most earnest sense of the word) and left for home. So it was not a restful night.
Nor was it a restful morning: I forgot to get gas last night, and after I left for work I realized I didn't even have enough to go the 10 miles to the gas station, so I had to turn around to use the gas I keep for the lawn mower and emergencies. That got me to the gas station, where I had to take the time to fill up (and get coffee, natch) so I was 10 minutes late to work. Oh well, there are only 5 of us here today so the director is grateful for anyone she can get.
There were 3 mergansers swimming past the boat house at dusk. It was really cool--I heard a strange splashing sound when they surfaced, then they swam about 2' from the end of the dock with their heads half submerged so they could watch for fish. Tess watched with great fascination but when she went out the screen door she slammed it behind her and they flew away, quacking with great indignation. I wonder if they're the ones who've been pooping on the dock: someone sure has! Yuck.
I had physical therapy last night and amazed not only my therapist by myself as well. Did 5 minutes on the elliptical, which doesn't sound like much but I'd struggled to do 3 at first. Did 30 reps of almost everything. Still can't stand on my right foot & toss the weighted ball, though--5 times is my record. Julie finally admitted that she can't really do that, either. The rat! Anyway I was winded & had to use my inhaler, which means I got a good workout, and I felt good. Stopped at Ken's and had a nice visit with him (so I don't have to stop there tonight). Tonight I'll eat at home, then head to the b.house for the night and hopefully tomorrow, which is predicted to be a dock day. Yes, that's the meteorological term they use, Dock Day. 82 and sunny.
Saturday Linda comes, as does Ken's nephew Joe and who knows how many other people. A lot. The lake will be busy and sort of icky, but I can tune some of it out. The jet skis haven't been bad yet this year, it's the party boats that have been driving me crazy. Putt, putt, putt, right past the dock, about 20 feet from the end, staring at me and the dogs. Last night Tess, then Chances took off in the water after 2 kayakers. First the yakers thought it was endearing but when I told them Tess might try to climb into their boat the man got really nervous. I told him to splash her with his paddle. "You really want me to do that?" If you want to. "How far can she swim?" I don't know, I've never put her to the test. "I don't think I could swim that far." (about 35'--pathetic)
Back to work.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
They smell better than they look. This is my rose bush, the one I brought from Rhode Island, which is about 30 years old (I moved to RI in 1975 and the bush was there then). It used to be big and bushy and covered with blossoms, now the center is dead and it has lots of canes growing in a circle around the center and this year those are covered with blossoms. Very encouraging--last year there were hardly any blossoms. It smells so good you just take deep breaths when you walk by it, and you walk by it every time you go up the stairs to the front door. I love this plant (yes, I love plants). This is a blurry picture because I was dashing to the car, late for work.
I'm having problems with my well/water again. I don't know what's going on, whether my well is truly going dry or there's a problem with my pump. I went to a friend's for dinner last night and when I came home the pump was running and no water came out of the faucets. I think this weekend I have to bite the bullet and struggle with the wellcap to see how much water is in the well. Don't want to, too much work. Haul ladder down to well, cut down balsams blocking the way, prop ladder against well tile, struggle with heavy (40 or so pounds) wellcap inconveniently located in center of well tile and shine flashlight down well without dropping it. Don't want to know how much brown gunk is at bottom of well. Sometimes the truth hurts, no?
Last night I ate with Mary Kay, a former camper who is staying at Linda's camp this week. We had a great time, as we always do together. Mary Kay was a high school guidance counselor who got to retire early (last year). Lucky, lucky her. She's now into geocaching. How cool is that. She found a bunch of caches not far from Silver Lake, which is really amazing, I think. We talked about good places to hide things at Silver Lake but decided we don't want more people to come here. She's going to look for a cache that's accessible only by boat while she's here, and the body of water is in a non-motorized chain of lakes. Sounds pretty neat. She said I should take my kayak and join her but of course I won't. I said I need to get used to it first, and will practice on Silver Lake before venture elsewhere. She showed me this really cool place she and another friend went last year (on a great map she has) that ends up on a pond I want to go to. I must say having the kayak and feeling better makes me more interested in getting out and doing things.
I had company for dinner on Tuesday night. Duncan, David and Ken came. We had cocktails (beer) on the deck, where there was a nice breeze and it was really pleasant, then we ate inside. I had thought we might be able to eat on the deck, which I sometimes do in the summer, but it was drizzling so we didn't. I served meatloaf, which was very mediocre. I need a good recipe for exceptional meatloaf. I made good chocolate sauce and we had ice cream with real whipped cream and choc. sauce for dessert. That was really good. As I've mentioned, I'm crazy about Duncan and David, so I had a great time with them. I even gave them a tour of my house, which I had spent a few hours cleaning/organizing before they came. It was humiliating but since I've turned the master bedroom into a storage area it was better than it's been in the past. David even went into the cellar hole to look at the live wire. He marveled at it and said I was lucky, that's all, after my experience touching it to the metal ladder earlier this year. I think it's wired to the breaker that controls the light down there so I can't shut it off. I'm not sure what Jamie had in mind when he put that wire there, or why he never capped it off, but I should ask someone to cap it for me. Someone either brave or stupid. Anyway, D & D have now left and I won't see David again until November, sadly. Duncan and family will return in 3 weeks.
Linda and Erdvilas come on Saturday, as do a number of other people. The season will be in full swing. I'm not sure anyone will be at our camp for the 4th, which will be strange but nice for me. It's supposed to be sunny and hot on Saturday (maybe--it all depends on which forecast you believe) so I'm hoping to spend time on the dock (as opposed to looking down my well). It's pretty much rained all week.
And now it's on to cataloging and revising records. I have to catalog 3 multi-media kits for a grant we got. They have little plastic animals. I won't list each animal individually, though.
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
| Your Power Color Is Indigo |
 At Your Highest: You are on a fast track to success - and others believe in you. At Your Lowest: You require a lot of attention and praise. In Love: You see people as how you want them to be, not as how they are. How You're Attractive: You're dramatic flair makes others see you as mysterious and romantic. Your Eternal Question: "Does This Work Into My Future Plans?" |
| Your Personality Is Like Acid |
 |
What Drug Is Your Personality Like?
Early to rise
For some reason I woke at 5 this morning and couldn't get back to sleep. Tess was thrilled, put her nose right next to mine and breathed carbon dioxide into me, then slipped her tongue oh-so-quickly up my lip. pig. I hate it when she licks me and she knows it but she just can't resist, especially face to face like that, first thing in the morning. The Dog Whisperer would have a field day with me.
I had a very productive hour and a half until 6:30, cleaning the bathroom, living room and part of the kitchen. I'm having David and Duncan come for dinner and they've never seen my house. When I look at it through the eyes of someone like that, seeing my house for the first time, I'm appalled, but there's only so much I can do. I have no closets, hence nowhere to put things. I have a place that was supposed to be the library but instead it's full of plastic tubs, backpacks and tote bags, an unfinished chair, a rotten extra chair, a wooden box full of letters & papers, jigsaw puzzles, books and lots of other things. I don't know where to put these things but suspect that they will end up in the master bedroom, which will become my storage area now that there is no bed there. I think I'll start with that movement this afternoon. I'm hoping to leave at 2:30 and continue cleaning--company comes at 6. Menu=meatloaf, asparagus (broiled in olive oil), salad, boiled new potatoes with parsley, and ice cream with homemade chocolate sauce & whipped cream. I have to stop for wine on the way home. David is no longer drinking so I had to buy seltzer and ginger ale to give him a choice. I didn't get Southern Comfort for Ken because I don't want that in my house (blech).
And now I'm at work and there's too much tension between one librarian and the director. It's making me very nervous because it reminds me of my time with the former director. It's like work hell by association. I'm so thrilled it's not me--I'm really enjoying working for this director, but I feel awful that it's happening. Stay in my cubicle, stay in my cubicle.
My rose bush is blooming! This is really nice. Last year it had barely any blossoms but this year it's much better. Still not what it used to be but when you walk past it you can smell the wonderful scent of tea roses. I love it. No pictures today, of course I ran out of time, and besides, it's very dark and raining.
Today I'll catalog very peacefully. I finished the Collection Development Policy and it was given to the board last night. The director was pleased with it and told the board about 3 times that I had written it and done a wonderful job. They approved our Lost In Circ. Policy so now we can start charging people who lose our books. We're giving amnesty for the $30,000 worth of lost materials we currently have out there.
I finished The Hawk Eye, the newsletter of the shoreowners' association. I picked it up from Staples yesterday and folded, taped, put mailing labels and stamps on 96 copies last night. Today I mail it to everyone. It's not an issue I'm particularly proud of, but it's not bad for the amount of effort I put into it. I forgot two really important articles so we'll have to do another one soon, but that will be a good thing.
And now it's off to coffee with the director and the four librarians. I'm trying to relax.
For some reason I woke at 5 this morning and couldn't get back to sleep. Tess was thrilled, put her nose right next to mine and breathed carbon dioxide into me, then slipped her tongue oh-so-quickly up my lip. pig. I hate it when she licks me and she knows it but she just can't resist, especially face to face like that, first thing in the morning. The Dog Whisperer would have a field day with me.
I had a very productive hour and a half until 6:30, cleaning the bathroom, living room and part of the kitchen. I'm having David and Duncan come for dinner and they've never seen my house. When I look at it through the eyes of someone like that, seeing my house for the first time, I'm appalled, but there's only so much I can do. I have no closets, hence nowhere to put things. I have a place that was supposed to be the library but instead it's full of plastic tubs, backpacks and tote bags, an unfinished chair, a rotten extra chair, a wooden box full of letters & papers, jigsaw puzzles, books and lots of other things. I don't know where to put these things but suspect that they will end up in the master bedroom, which will become my storage area now that there is no bed there. I think I'll start with that movement this afternoon. I'm hoping to leave at 2:30 and continue cleaning--company comes at 6. Menu=meatloaf, asparagus (broiled in olive oil), salad, boiled new potatoes with parsley, and ice cream with homemade chocolate sauce & whipped cream. I have to stop for wine on the way home. David is no longer drinking so I had to buy seltzer and ginger ale to give him a choice. I didn't get Southern Comfort for Ken because I don't want that in my house (blech).
And now I'm at work and there's too much tension between one librarian and the director. It's making me very nervous because it reminds me of my time with the former director. It's like work hell by association. I'm so thrilled it's not me--I'm really enjoying working for this director, but I feel awful that it's happening. Stay in my cubicle, stay in my cubicle.
My rose bush is blooming! This is really nice. Last year it had barely any blossoms but this year it's much better. Still not what it used to be but when you walk past it you can smell the wonderful scent of tea roses. I love it. No pictures today, of course I ran out of time, and besides, it's very dark and raining.
Today I'll catalog very peacefully. I finished the Collection Development Policy and it was given to the board last night. The director was pleased with it and told the board about 3 times that I had written it and done a wonderful job. They approved our Lost In Circ. Policy so now we can start charging people who lose our books. We're giving amnesty for the $30,000 worth of lost materials we currently have out there.
I finished The Hawk Eye, the newsletter of the shoreowners' association. I picked it up from Staples yesterday and folded, taped, put mailing labels and stamps on 96 copies last night. Today I mail it to everyone. It's not an issue I'm particularly proud of, but it's not bad for the amount of effort I put into it. I forgot two really important articles so we'll have to do another one soon, but that will be a good thing.
And now it's off to coffee with the director and the four librarians. I'm trying to relax.
Monday, June 26, 2006
It couldn't have been better
I had a great weekend. The weather was fantastic--80 and sunny. Friday night I had my physical therapy, which was torture and I'm not sure is helping much, but my knee is getting stronger. Right knee definitely weaker than left knee so who can argue with strengthening it. I went to dinner with my male friends at their camp: Duncan, David, John, Ed and Paul (the published author). Ken was there and Bill showed up later. I really adore Duncan and David so it was great to see them. It was Greek night so we had kabobs and this huge, huge salad with feta cheese. Duncan kept passing it around, saying "Have some Greek salad!" It was nice to be part of their group.
Saturday morning I read on my deck in the sun for a little while, then my cousin Tom showed up. It was Work Weekend at camp and no one but Tom and Bill showed up, naturally. Tom's business partner from France, Laurent was also here. Tom, Laurent and I drove Tom's huge truck towing a trailer with the remnants of the old shower house to the dump and unloaded it there. That took a long time. Then we went to camp, where my ex-inlaws and Bill were working. Keela (ex-mother in law) was pulling weeds, something she loves to do. Jim was standing around getting ready to tell everyone what to do (something he loves to do). Tom had brought his pretty big tractor and they had a load of gravel delivered so chores for the day were to remove trees that were to be cut up, remove piles of rotten firewood from around the camp (plenty of those), remove debris left from shower house and spread gravel around driveway and road going into camp. I mowed around main camp. I toted and hauled with the rest of them but I am so not as strong as they all are. They were incredible. I worked from 11 until 4:30 and could do no more. They went on until 7:30, putting in the docks as a final project. Keela did a fantastic job of cleaning off the rocks on the path going to the boathouse--they were practically invisible because of the grass growing over them. They look great now, the way I wish my stone path looked. Jim did a lot of gravel raking. Tom drove the tractor and the rest of us hauled stuff to and loaded up the tractor. Whew! Keela fed us dinner, then everyone went home and I slept in the boat house.
Yesterday morning I got up at 7 and had the place to myself. Set myself up on the dock at 8 in wonderful sunlight with the lake like glass and no one on it. Read for 3 hours, swam (barely), found the thermometer Molly brought from Italy (it was tied to the dock, Jenica). It said the water was 70 degrees but I can't believe that. It was cold but not unbearable. I went to Sunday dinner, which was quick because Bill had stuff to do. I was back at camp at 2 and Bill and Laurent showed up to finish everything. I asked Bill to move an annoying rock in my driveway with the tractor and he did--wowie jet what a difference it makes! I used to hit that rock with my undercarriage sometimes and now have to retrain myself not to drive into the bushes on that stretch.
They left, I cleaned a little bit at home (Duncan and David are coming to dinner Tuesday night), talked to Liza, then went back to the boat house for the night. What a satisfying weekend! I need to get more work done at my house, but it was good to contribute to work effort at camp. The grounds look much better now. They even moved a pile of birch logs by the boat house, even though I told them that was a boat house job, not a camp job. They're so cute.
Now I'm rewriting the Collection Development Policy for the 3rd time, but I think this may be the last. Raining today, supposed to rain all week. Board meeting tonight. They'll discuss the policy I wrote on Lost Items. Hopefully they'll approve it so we can start billing in ernest for stuff people "can't find."
I had a great weekend. The weather was fantastic--80 and sunny. Friday night I had my physical therapy, which was torture and I'm not sure is helping much, but my knee is getting stronger. Right knee definitely weaker than left knee so who can argue with strengthening it. I went to dinner with my male friends at their camp: Duncan, David, John, Ed and Paul (the published author). Ken was there and Bill showed up later. I really adore Duncan and David so it was great to see them. It was Greek night so we had kabobs and this huge, huge salad with feta cheese. Duncan kept passing it around, saying "Have some Greek salad!" It was nice to be part of their group.
Saturday morning I read on my deck in the sun for a little while, then my cousin Tom showed up. It was Work Weekend at camp and no one but Tom and Bill showed up, naturally. Tom's business partner from France, Laurent was also here. Tom, Laurent and I drove Tom's huge truck towing a trailer with the remnants of the old shower house to the dump and unloaded it there. That took a long time. Then we went to camp, where my ex-inlaws and Bill were working. Keela (ex-mother in law) was pulling weeds, something she loves to do. Jim was standing around getting ready to tell everyone what to do (something he loves to do). Tom had brought his pretty big tractor and they had a load of gravel delivered so chores for the day were to remove trees that were to be cut up, remove piles of rotten firewood from around the camp (plenty of those), remove debris left from shower house and spread gravel around driveway and road going into camp. I mowed around main camp. I toted and hauled with the rest of them but I am so not as strong as they all are. They were incredible. I worked from 11 until 4:30 and could do no more. They went on until 7:30, putting in the docks as a final project. Keela did a fantastic job of cleaning off the rocks on the path going to the boathouse--they were practically invisible because of the grass growing over them. They look great now, the way I wish my stone path looked. Jim did a lot of gravel raking. Tom drove the tractor and the rest of us hauled stuff to and loaded up the tractor. Whew! Keela fed us dinner, then everyone went home and I slept in the boat house.
Yesterday morning I got up at 7 and had the place to myself. Set myself up on the dock at 8 in wonderful sunlight with the lake like glass and no one on it. Read for 3 hours, swam (barely), found the thermometer Molly brought from Italy (it was tied to the dock, Jenica). It said the water was 70 degrees but I can't believe that. It was cold but not unbearable. I went to Sunday dinner, which was quick because Bill had stuff to do. I was back at camp at 2 and Bill and Laurent showed up to finish everything. I asked Bill to move an annoying rock in my driveway with the tractor and he did--wowie jet what a difference it makes! I used to hit that rock with my undercarriage sometimes and now have to retrain myself not to drive into the bushes on that stretch.
They left, I cleaned a little bit at home (Duncan and David are coming to dinner Tuesday night), talked to Liza, then went back to the boat house for the night. What a satisfying weekend! I need to get more work done at my house, but it was good to contribute to work effort at camp. The grounds look much better now. They even moved a pile of birch logs by the boat house, even though I told them that was a boat house job, not a camp job. They're so cute.
Now I'm rewriting the Collection Development Policy for the 3rd time, but I think this may be the last. Raining today, supposed to rain all week. Board meeting tonight. They'll discuss the policy I wrote on Lost Items. Hopefully they'll approve it so we can start billing in ernest for stuff people "can't find."
dock day
Perfection. I got to sit in my chair on the dock from 8 to 11. No cousins, no boats (well, there was one party boat that went by about 15 feet from me, staring at me as they crawled by). It was truly grand.
one dog
Chances takes her place for the morning. She likes that spot. The lake is high enough this year so she can drink out of it without really bending over much.
two dogs
Then there were two. They like to lie on the end of the dock while I read in my chair. Not much going on in the morning, but there was a loon swimming up the lake for them to watch.
fish
and this is what we watched. My family all know what this is: a rock bass. Trash fish. There were also a bunch of little basses, good ones, circling like shark. They were very pretty. Rock bass, not so pretty, but fun to watch.
bosco gaze
My cousin Bill has a 12-week old choc. Lab named Bosco. I got to babysit a lot. This is what Bosco looks like when he's ready for a little nap
create your own personalized map of the USA
or check out ourCalifornia travel guide
I love this game. I think I've added one or two since I did this before. It's pretty obvious where I've concentrated my travels.
Friday, June 23, 2006
I stayed in the boat house last night. 60 degrees is my cut-off temperature and last night we just made it. I went down at 8:00 and worked on my lead article for the shoreowners' newsletter. I'm the editor of this issue. I've been the editor for years, but last year another woman decided she was the editor. She'd been helping me, formatting the stuff I gave her and mailing it out. I don't really care who the editor is, but I like having the job back. I have a bunch of stuff to put in the issue and Linda and I are having fun working on it long distance together--Linda's President of the organization this year.
I usually write a long article about what it was like in Hawkeye during the winter. I always get a lot of positive feedback about the article, which includes mostly nature stuff and stories about how cold it was, when the ice went out, etc. I go through my journal and report everything. My trip down memory lane last night was very telling: lots of weekends when I did nothing but lie on the couch and watch bad TV, feeling depressed. Sort of a sad waste of time. I feel better now and last night I spent half an hour in the garden, digging and planting. I never would have done that a month ago, I always felt sluggish and unmotivated when I got home from work, just wanted to watch bad TV. Partly it's because I've been moving around more (physical therapy) and partly it's the new medication--and partly no doubt it's because the sun is finally shining.
Anyway, I got to sit on the boathouse porch, working by candlelight. Not quite as nice as relaxing and reading but nice nevertheless. There was a very persistent bull frog next to the b.house the whole time. Bugs were fierce but I covered myself with a blanket. The other night I was lying in bed in the dark there and I heard a huge CRASH! and SPLASH! along the shore. A tree came down and hit the water. I shined my flashlight down the shoreline but couldn't really see what was going on. Last night before dark I walked along the shore to investigate. No tree sticking out into the water, but the skyline of the shore is very different. Wait until my sister sees it--her lone tall tree is gone, like a rotten tooth that's been pulled. Broke off at the top, it did, and apparently the log floated away. It's very strange that it disappeared like that but there's no sign of it. Now all we have is my sister's paintings to remind us of that poplar. Lucky thing she painted it.
I just finished work on our Collection Development policy. Big rush to get it done so we can give it to the board to ponder for the next month, then hopefully approve it at their next meeting. Sent it to the director and other librarians this morning, will see what they think of it.
Cousins arriving today to put docks in, tomorrow to cut up trees I guess. I'll mow and mow. Rain south and east of here, sun in the Adirondacks. I hope. I'm very sore from stooping and bending in the garden and have PT tonight, which will make my knees and butt muscles sore. Make it burn, make it burn.
I usually write a long article about what it was like in Hawkeye during the winter. I always get a lot of positive feedback about the article, which includes mostly nature stuff and stories about how cold it was, when the ice went out, etc. I go through my journal and report everything. My trip down memory lane last night was very telling: lots of weekends when I did nothing but lie on the couch and watch bad TV, feeling depressed. Sort of a sad waste of time. I feel better now and last night I spent half an hour in the garden, digging and planting. I never would have done that a month ago, I always felt sluggish and unmotivated when I got home from work, just wanted to watch bad TV. Partly it's because I've been moving around more (physical therapy) and partly it's the new medication--and partly no doubt it's because the sun is finally shining.
Anyway, I got to sit on the boathouse porch, working by candlelight. Not quite as nice as relaxing and reading but nice nevertheless. There was a very persistent bull frog next to the b.house the whole time. Bugs were fierce but I covered myself with a blanket. The other night I was lying in bed in the dark there and I heard a huge CRASH! and SPLASH! along the shore. A tree came down and hit the water. I shined my flashlight down the shoreline but couldn't really see what was going on. Last night before dark I walked along the shore to investigate. No tree sticking out into the water, but the skyline of the shore is very different. Wait until my sister sees it--her lone tall tree is gone, like a rotten tooth that's been pulled. Broke off at the top, it did, and apparently the log floated away. It's very strange that it disappeared like that but there's no sign of it. Now all we have is my sister's paintings to remind us of that poplar. Lucky thing she painted it.
I just finished work on our Collection Development policy. Big rush to get it done so we can give it to the board to ponder for the next month, then hopefully approve it at their next meeting. Sent it to the director and other librarians this morning, will see what they think of it.
Cousins arriving today to put docks in, tomorrow to cut up trees I guess. I'll mow and mow. Rain south and east of here, sun in the Adirondacks. I hope. I'm very sore from stooping and bending in the garden and have PT tonight, which will make my knees and butt muscles sore. Make it burn, make it burn.
garden before
This is what the garden looked like Wednesday morning, before I started digging up the grass. It didn't even look like a garden. I don't know what I can do about the mint (in the lower left corner), which started out as a sweet little patch, planted in a plastic container to keep it under control. Now the plastic container has disintegrated and the mint is out of control. I should have used a ceramic container. I wanted the mint for mint juleps on Kentucky Derby day and to make iced tea the way my father did. We always had a pitcher of nice, sweet iced tea with lemon and mint kept in the refrigerator. My mother still has the large glass pitcher he always used.
garden after
This is what the flower garden looks like now--after I spent hours digging up grass, planting snapdragons and planting 21 lilies. Those big clumps in the middle are phlox and bee balm. The bee balm is also called Oswego Tea and smells like Earl grey tea. I think it's what the tea is made of but I'm not sure. When you brush against it it smells just like that tea. There's that pesky mint in the lower left hand corner. I pulled a bunch of it but haven't really addressed the mint issue yet. There's still grass to be dug up before I can plant my new echinachea plants. Someone from work is getting rid of a bunch of her echinachea plants this weekend & said she'd bring me in some next week. YAHOO! I found one tiny stalk of my mountain bluets when I dug. That's all that's left of my huge plant that was 10 years old. Only the strong survive.
Thursday, June 22, 2006
wag more
Jenica gave me this bumper sticker. She's always been so good at honoring my dog obsession.
jestr
This is a charcoal that Jenica did of my first Lab (whose name was an acronym of my boyfriend's and my initials). I got that dog in 1979. Jenica wasn't 3 when she did this, but she wasn't very old.
A perfect 10
My day off yesterday was fantastic. I got up relatively early, though I stayed up too late on Tuesday, wasting time. I sat on my deck reading magazines and drinking coffee for 2 hours, then got to work. I dug in my garden (which was HELL because I should have done it in May but it rained all month and I was depressed and had no ambition). The grass had taken over and was very tall so I had to work really hard to get it out of there. I only did a little more than half of it then I was exhausted and could do no more. Saved the rest for another day. I made enough bare ground to plant my 36 snapdragons (which are about to bloom) and my 20 or so lily bulbs (which will replace the ones that died during the winter). Couldn't plant the lilies because I was too sore to bend over for that long. Still need to make a spot for my 2 new echinachea plants. Also need to dig in other gardens. These things will happen, though, now that I'm apparently feeling better. Also planted 35 nasturtiums I grew from seed and about 30 morning glories I also grew from seed. Very pleased with that. Then I mowed the lawn, which turned out to be very tiring and hard on my asthma (asthmatics are not supposed to mow the lawn or shovel snow: but what am I supposed to do? who will do it if I don't?). I huffed and wheezed and just about collapsed, but it was finished! Not one of my better efforts but at least it's done. The third mowing and it's not even July yet. Yikes.
Then I changed the fish water. There was some black slimy goo all over the gravel and the fish were very logey. Something was definitely wrong. I started out just doing half of the water but it was obvious that I needed to scrub the gravel and change the whole tank so I did that. It takes more than an hour but was worth it and all survived. They are much perkier now. Don't know what was wrong in there but something strange was growing there. YUCK!
All in all I worked from 10:30 until 5:00 with a few short breaks thrown in. This is an incredible day for me. I can conclude that I am feeling much better. I would never, never be this industrious in earlier days. I actually broke a sweat, which is something I avoid at all costs. I hate to sweat. It was a beautiful day, sunny and warm. Maybe a little too warm. Deer flies are out and there are still residual black flies. But even that didn't deter me. Amazo.
Dinner with Ken last night. He didn't have a good day. Had to go to Plattsburgh in the morning, plus his usual Weds. foray into Ausable Forks. Then he didn't feel well so he did nothing in the afternoon. He said he felt better by the time I got there. Two of "the boys" stopped by to say hello. These are the men who have the camp next door to Bill's, former campers. There are five of them there right now doing work & opening camp. Two of them are my favorites, Duncan and David. They weren't the two who stopped by last night. They invited me for dinner on Friday, but they were really inviting Ken and only asked me because I happened to be there so I don't consider the invitation to be sincere. They never invite me when all 5 of them are there, only when Duncan and David are there alone, so I don't know if I'll go.
It's Work Weekend at our camp this weekend. Not quite what it was supposed to be: only my cousins Tom & Bill, plus a friend of Tom's and my cousin's husband Wayne will be there, plus my former parents-in-law and ex-husband (Sunday only) will be there. This is all, out of 40 people who were at last year's meeting, who could muster it up to come to work. Yes, we all agree there should be a Work Weekend, but we won't come ourselves. Well, Tom and Bill ALWAYS come and ALWAYS do work at camp even though they have a camp of their own, so this is nothing special for them. I've been emailing Bill like crazy this morning and he and his wife just got an 11-week old chocolate Lab puppy named Bosco. Bosco is coming this weekend so I must introduce Tess to him. I will call my former in-laws tonight to see what's up with the food. I offered to mow grass around camp as my part, even though I would much rather dig in my gardens.
Not motivated to work today. Not sure of what work I will undertake. Catalog, I suppose. Have some local history to work on. Blech.
My day off yesterday was fantastic. I got up relatively early, though I stayed up too late on Tuesday, wasting time. I sat on my deck reading magazines and drinking coffee for 2 hours, then got to work. I dug in my garden (which was HELL because I should have done it in May but it rained all month and I was depressed and had no ambition). The grass had taken over and was very tall so I had to work really hard to get it out of there. I only did a little more than half of it then I was exhausted and could do no more. Saved the rest for another day. I made enough bare ground to plant my 36 snapdragons (which are about to bloom) and my 20 or so lily bulbs (which will replace the ones that died during the winter). Couldn't plant the lilies because I was too sore to bend over for that long. Still need to make a spot for my 2 new echinachea plants. Also need to dig in other gardens. These things will happen, though, now that I'm apparently feeling better. Also planted 35 nasturtiums I grew from seed and about 30 morning glories I also grew from seed. Very pleased with that. Then I mowed the lawn, which turned out to be very tiring and hard on my asthma (asthmatics are not supposed to mow the lawn or shovel snow: but what am I supposed to do? who will do it if I don't?). I huffed and wheezed and just about collapsed, but it was finished! Not one of my better efforts but at least it's done. The third mowing and it's not even July yet. Yikes.
Then I changed the fish water. There was some black slimy goo all over the gravel and the fish were very logey. Something was definitely wrong. I started out just doing half of the water but it was obvious that I needed to scrub the gravel and change the whole tank so I did that. It takes more than an hour but was worth it and all survived. They are much perkier now. Don't know what was wrong in there but something strange was growing there. YUCK!
All in all I worked from 10:30 until 5:00 with a few short breaks thrown in. This is an incredible day for me. I can conclude that I am feeling much better. I would never, never be this industrious in earlier days. I actually broke a sweat, which is something I avoid at all costs. I hate to sweat. It was a beautiful day, sunny and warm. Maybe a little too warm. Deer flies are out and there are still residual black flies. But even that didn't deter me. Amazo.
Dinner with Ken last night. He didn't have a good day. Had to go to Plattsburgh in the morning, plus his usual Weds. foray into Ausable Forks. Then he didn't feel well so he did nothing in the afternoon. He said he felt better by the time I got there. Two of "the boys" stopped by to say hello. These are the men who have the camp next door to Bill's, former campers. There are five of them there right now doing work & opening camp. Two of them are my favorites, Duncan and David. They weren't the two who stopped by last night. They invited me for dinner on Friday, but they were really inviting Ken and only asked me because I happened to be there so I don't consider the invitation to be sincere. They never invite me when all 5 of them are there, only when Duncan and David are there alone, so I don't know if I'll go.
It's Work Weekend at our camp this weekend. Not quite what it was supposed to be: only my cousins Tom & Bill, plus a friend of Tom's and my cousin's husband Wayne will be there, plus my former parents-in-law and ex-husband (Sunday only) will be there. This is all, out of 40 people who were at last year's meeting, who could muster it up to come to work. Yes, we all agree there should be a Work Weekend, but we won't come ourselves. Well, Tom and Bill ALWAYS come and ALWAYS do work at camp even though they have a camp of their own, so this is nothing special for them. I've been emailing Bill like crazy this morning and he and his wife just got an 11-week old chocolate Lab puppy named Bosco. Bosco is coming this weekend so I must introduce Tess to him. I will call my former in-laws tonight to see what's up with the food. I offered to mow grass around camp as my part, even though I would much rather dig in my gardens.
Not motivated to work today. Not sure of what work I will undertake. Catalog, I suppose. Have some local history to work on. Blech.
DSCN06240680
This is my pot of pink and white flowers. I have to laugh at myself because mostly I just plant pink, purple, blue and white flowers in my pots. No oranges and only a few reds. This year I stuck a few yellow pansies in the pots and a few red verbenas here and there. Very daring by my standards
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
Good weekend
Yes it was. It was hot, but I have a haven to escape to. Friday night I stopped at Ken's after physical therapy. PT was harder than usual, she had me on some elliptical-type machine that was a killer. The rest of the stuff is getting easier and she increased everything. I went grocery shopping and spent way too much money. Bill's friends stopped Ken's house en route to Bill's camp for dinner to celebrate a birthday (annual event there). I went home and was just eating dinner at around 7:45 when Bill called, insistent that I join them down the hill. OK, I went. It was nice but two of them are having big crises in their lives so they were in strange moods, having spent 1.5 hours discussing this. I stayed a until 10 and went home. I had planned to stay in the boat house but it was too cold that night.
Saturday was warm, bordering on hot. I got up early and planted almost 190 flower plants (I counted the 6-packs afterwards). I filled all the containers I'm going to and I didn't do as many as I do some years, but I felt great about the number I did. And really relieved to have them all with their roots in pots at last. I still haven't dug in the gardens, this is a huge task which I hope to start on tomorrow (plan to take the day off). After that I went to Lake Placid and bought my kayak, all by myself brave woman. I'd been checking them out online a lot Friday afternoon and had made some calls about what was available in LP and Saranac Lake. Read reviews written by kayak owners online and had decided on what I wanted so it wasn't hard. Had been quoted a price on the phone that was $30 less than what they were willing to sell it to me for (which he said was still $40 less than list but who believes that) so he threw in the roof straps and foam blocks that go on the car roof for free. Big whoop. Then he strapped it to the roof and pronounced it secure ("Shouldn't I tie the bow and stern?" No, you don't need to when it's this tight). Well, guess what happened not even 3 miles from Placid? One of the foam blocks came loose and the whole boat shifted on the roof, all the way over to the other side. Boy did the motorcyclist behind me brake and back way off. I found a place to pull over and tied the bow & stern with the rope I had taken along to be safe. Sometimes men can be very funny.
I picked up the dogs, packed stuff for the night and next morning and moved into the boat house. What a wonderful night--except for the bugs. I sat on the porch and enjoyed it immensely. The punkies were miserable (no, I was miserable, they were happy, the bloodthirsty little devils). I finally went to bed and tried to read under the covers but my flashlight wasn't bright enough. I turned out the light (which is what attracts them) and lay in the dark trying to go to sleep for half an hour or so, finally succeeding. Up at 7 on Sunday to sit on the porch and drink coffee, enjoying peace and quiet. Really, really nice. The dogs love times like that, I leave the door open and they swim, run in the woods, come in, go out, come in, etc. the whole time. They had barked up a storm at about 10 Sat. night, and when I looked out the door I saw a blinking light up by main camp. No one there, though, and the light--I guess--was a firefly. No other explanation that I could figure out. No one around for half a mile and it was pitch black.
Went to Sunday dinner and ate the hugest, most disgusting but delicious steak Bill cooked on the grill for Father's Day. Then back to the boat house because it was 87 and humid. Spent the afternoon there, even swam. The Holts were in camp and Rush said the water was 65 degrees but it didn't feel that warm to me. Bill came down late afternoon and we sat on the porch together, reading magazines in what Lin calls "companionable silence." Very nice. I went to the Holts' for dinner and we sat on the second floor of their new house--no walls so we sat on the edge and dangled our feet, drinking beer. Really great. There's a hawk's nest not far from the house, about 20' higher in the crotch of a tree and Mama Hawk stared at us the entire time we were there. We had pancakes for supper because Annie knew I'd eaten a huge lunch.
Back to the boat house for the night, more punkies. Up at 5 to see the last of the sunrise, back to sleep then up at 6:45 just in time to leave for the house, drop off the dogs, make lunch and get to work 5 minutes late. Very satisfying weekend.
Long meeting yesterday with member library directors. Trying to get them to think of what their patrons will want during the next 5 years so we can write our Long Range Plan for the Division of Library Development (our bosses in Albany). Turns out they are incapable of thinking in terms of their patrons, they can only really think in terms of what they want. It was really frustrating for me to listen to them prattle on and on about themselves. The other consultants, our director and I kept saying, "But wouldn't your patrons want..." in attempts to get them on track, but it was hard.
And today I will catalog Die Hard with a Vengeance, widescreen edition, yet another video version of Snow White, and Baboons, Butterflies and Me. After I have my 3rd cup of coffee. It's a beautiful day today, we had a massive front come through yesterday that took the heat and humidity with it when it moved out.
Yes it was. It was hot, but I have a haven to escape to. Friday night I stopped at Ken's after physical therapy. PT was harder than usual, she had me on some elliptical-type machine that was a killer. The rest of the stuff is getting easier and she increased everything. I went grocery shopping and spent way too much money. Bill's friends stopped Ken's house en route to Bill's camp for dinner to celebrate a birthday (annual event there). I went home and was just eating dinner at around 7:45 when Bill called, insistent that I join them down the hill. OK, I went. It was nice but two of them are having big crises in their lives so they were in strange moods, having spent 1.5 hours discussing this. I stayed a until 10 and went home. I had planned to stay in the boat house but it was too cold that night.
Saturday was warm, bordering on hot. I got up early and planted almost 190 flower plants (I counted the 6-packs afterwards). I filled all the containers I'm going to and I didn't do as many as I do some years, but I felt great about the number I did. And really relieved to have them all with their roots in pots at last. I still haven't dug in the gardens, this is a huge task which I hope to start on tomorrow (plan to take the day off). After that I went to Lake Placid and bought my kayak, all by myself brave woman. I'd been checking them out online a lot Friday afternoon and had made some calls about what was available in LP and Saranac Lake. Read reviews written by kayak owners online and had decided on what I wanted so it wasn't hard. Had been quoted a price on the phone that was $30 less than what they were willing to sell it to me for (which he said was still $40 less than list but who believes that) so he threw in the roof straps and foam blocks that go on the car roof for free. Big whoop. Then he strapped it to the roof and pronounced it secure ("Shouldn't I tie the bow and stern?" No, you don't need to when it's this tight). Well, guess what happened not even 3 miles from Placid? One of the foam blocks came loose and the whole boat shifted on the roof, all the way over to the other side. Boy did the motorcyclist behind me brake and back way off. I found a place to pull over and tied the bow & stern with the rope I had taken along to be safe. Sometimes men can be very funny.
I picked up the dogs, packed stuff for the night and next morning and moved into the boat house. What a wonderful night--except for the bugs. I sat on the porch and enjoyed it immensely. The punkies were miserable (no, I was miserable, they were happy, the bloodthirsty little devils). I finally went to bed and tried to read under the covers but my flashlight wasn't bright enough. I turned out the light (which is what attracts them) and lay in the dark trying to go to sleep for half an hour or so, finally succeeding. Up at 7 on Sunday to sit on the porch and drink coffee, enjoying peace and quiet. Really, really nice. The dogs love times like that, I leave the door open and they swim, run in the woods, come in, go out, come in, etc. the whole time. They had barked up a storm at about 10 Sat. night, and when I looked out the door I saw a blinking light up by main camp. No one there, though, and the light--I guess--was a firefly. No other explanation that I could figure out. No one around for half a mile and it was pitch black.
Went to Sunday dinner and ate the hugest, most disgusting but delicious steak Bill cooked on the grill for Father's Day. Then back to the boat house because it was 87 and humid. Spent the afternoon there, even swam. The Holts were in camp and Rush said the water was 65 degrees but it didn't feel that warm to me. Bill came down late afternoon and we sat on the porch together, reading magazines in what Lin calls "companionable silence." Very nice. I went to the Holts' for dinner and we sat on the second floor of their new house--no walls so we sat on the edge and dangled our feet, drinking beer. Really great. There's a hawk's nest not far from the house, about 20' higher in the crotch of a tree and Mama Hawk stared at us the entire time we were there. We had pancakes for supper because Annie knew I'd eaten a huge lunch.
Back to the boat house for the night, more punkies. Up at 5 to see the last of the sunrise, back to sleep then up at 6:45 just in time to leave for the house, drop off the dogs, make lunch and get to work 5 minutes late. Very satisfying weekend.
Long meeting yesterday with member library directors. Trying to get them to think of what their patrons will want during the next 5 years so we can write our Long Range Plan for the Division of Library Development (our bosses in Albany). Turns out they are incapable of thinking in terms of their patrons, they can only really think in terms of what they want. It was really frustrating for me to listen to them prattle on and on about themselves. The other consultants, our director and I kept saying, "But wouldn't your patrons want..." in attempts to get them on track, but it was hard.
And today I will catalog Die Hard with a Vengeance, widescreen edition, yet another video version of Snow White, and Baboons, Butterflies and Me. After I have my 3rd cup of coffee. It's a beautiful day today, we had a massive front come through yesterday that took the heat and humidity with it when it moved out.
juneberries
The blackberries are in bloom. If the blossoms stay on the bushes and all goes well, it will be a banner year for berries. Sometimes the blossoms get knocked off by rain and sometimes the summer is too hot and dry so we don't get good berries. Bill loves blackberries so if it's a good year and everyone else doesn't pick them first I pick quarts and quarts of berries and freeze them, then I can make him pies and cobblers throughout the winter. Let's see what this year brings.
Monday, June 19, 2006
yawn
We spent all of yesterday morning and afternoon after Sunday dinner sitting on the boat house porch. It was the only place cool enough to be. Tess and Chances had a great time running through the woods and swimming, but Chances got tired and had to take a nap.
spider
This spider slept too much last night and didn't eat enough bugs. The no-see-ums (I prefer punkies as a name, but not everyone recognizes that) were horrible Sat. and Sun. nights. I read my book in bed with the sheet up to my neck and my hands covered like gloves, holding the book. And still they bit my scalp. But I liked being there a whole lot anyway.
candles
This is my little corner of the world when I'm in the boat house at night by myself. The cure chair looks like a shrine, doesn't it. I sit there and read or do crossword puzzles. Usually there's at least one dog curled up between my calves while I'm sitting there.
sunrise0619
This is what I saw at 5 a.m. this morning when I first woke up. It's very hot these days--too hot for me. My family has seen this picture in various forms and colors hundreds of times. Each time it's very pretty. Nothing special about this one.
kayak
This is what I bought in Lake Placid on Saturday. I just wanted a kayak. It's quite nice but I haven't used it yet. I think my family will have fun with it. It doesn't have a name, just "Featherlite." We can do better than that. Right now I call it my yak.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Mom & Pop operation
I watched this (presumed) family of geese eating in the grass along the Saranac River on my way to work this morning. The goslings are incredibly huge. It was interesting that one goose was always at one end & the other at the opposite end the whole time. They didn't mind the fast-moving traffic but when I stopped at the side of the road they moved closer to the river and got nervous. Then they got used to me but eventually I made them nervous and they went into the water. They were very sweet. I can't believe how big the babies are! When did they hatch? I guess there will be another hatching this summer.
I had a dentist appointment this morning. I really, really hate going to the dentist. He wasn't in today so I just saw the hygienist. She was very nice and said I practiced good oral hygiene but I might have a very small cavity (CAVITY!!! I don't get cavities! I haven't had one of those in more than a decade!). I may be able to help the tooth heal it if I floss diligently and the dentist decides not to fill it right now when he looks at the x-ray. Yikes. Anyway I don't have to go back until next year (unless he decides to fill the teeeny tiny cavity now rather than wait until next year). And I got a new toothbrush.
A beautiful, very red deer loped across the road in front of my car this morning, followed a bit later by its friend. They both flicked their incredibly bushy white tails when they leapt into the woods. It was great. It's supposed to mean good luck to have a doe cross in front of you like that. Shortly after that a mouse ran really fast across the road in front of me. He looked like a super fast wind up toy. I wonder if it means bad luck if a mouse crosses the road in front of you.
I did a lot of research on kayaks yesterday. They don't make affordable Walden Paddlers anymore--the company went out of business in 2004 and has started up again under different owners. The boats are very expensive now. I called 3 places around here--2 in Saranac Lake and one in Lake Placid. I was looking for an Old Town Otter. They didn't have any, could order me one, get in in 7-10 days. What else did they have like that? Oh lots of things. Guy in Lake Placid sounded good, has something that sounds really good. Read online reviews of the makes & models they mentioned, seem to favor the Heritage Featherlite. 9.5' long, weighs 39 lbs. Sort of tubby looking, but these short flatwater ones all are. And they're very hard to tip over--that's all that really counts. So I think tomorrow I'll go to Placid and check it all out. He's got a paddle (all the way "down" to $60) and the car roof rigging I want too. I took the money out of my savings account and everything. We'll see what I feel like doing tomorrow.
If it's as hot as predicted I hope to be staying in the boat house this weekend. Supposed to be 80-90 and muggy. Maybe rain Sat. afternoon and Sun. afternoon. I need to mow & plant. Stack firewood. Ken wants me to arrange to have a load delivered to him so I'll get another load from the woman we've been buying wood from other years--give her another try. She delivers 4 cords at a time. Saves me $110 when she does that.
Now I have to correct 40 records put in manually by someone at Platt. Public who really, really wants to be a cataloger, but she put in all the authors in the wrong format and made up media formats and didn't use the right fields for the right things in our short record templates. This will take me a very long time and I will get grumpier and grumpier as I go along. And I'm getting very sleepy from the tranquilizer I took before I went to the dentist. yawn.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
The screened gazebo after the rain storm. Now I understand what we were supposed to do with those tie-downs. I've bought a sturdier version that has a dome-shaped roof for the rain to roll right off of. Must pick up the debris of this one and pack it up for future use (now that Jenica has solved the mystery of how to assemble it)
View from my living room. Lawn needs mowing--ALREADY! This once a week stuff is more than I like. Taken when there was a low cloud cover and you couldn't see the mountain across the lake.
The view from my bedroom. Unbelievably lush.I spent yesterday barcoding books in the Mooers Library. Mooers is a tiny town next to the Canadian border. We had about twice as many barcodes as we had books, which doesn't bode well for that collection. I suspect the reason for this is a high loss rate, something that's really common in these small libraries that don't keep good circ. records, have lousy (or no) shelf-lists and don't charge overdues. Anyway, we pretty much got the whole collection finished in one day but she wants us to come back. What for? I wondered, but we agreed we would return with laptops to barcode books which didn't have barcodes sometime in the future. There aren't very many of them so the whole team shouldn't have to go.
Also working with us was my really good friend Ann, who worked here at CEF when I first came. She was laid off in 1991 when we had big cuts in funding and had to take one bookmobile off the road (now it seems so strange that we would have 2 bookmobiles, but we did--and they both went on overnights, one in the south and one in the north. Those were the glory days!). Anyway, Ann and I became really good friends and my best friend in those days was her daughter Brook. Brook and her boyfriend Dan lived on the next road over from us when I first moved up here (in that cute little former schoolhouse in Peru). They had no indoor plumbing, lived in this barely-more-than-a-shack that Dan had built. Dan was a farmer, milking the last of his family's herd. Then he realized he'd have to make some real money so he worked for Jamie at the sawmill for a while but he really hated that and started his own landscaping business. We ate dinner together every single night. No exaggeration. Every single night. They usually came to our house, where there was plumbing. We went out for dinner a lot, too, pretending we could afford it. We did everything together. After we moved to the house we bought (for a whopping $22,000) they broke up, Dan built a grand addition with indoor plumbing (even a washing machine), which I thought was the meanest thing a man could do, but Brook moved on. She now lives in Saratoga, married to a liquor and cigarette distributor and has lots of money. She hasn't had to work full time for the past 15 years but now teaches English full time at the college level. She got her master's degree. She still considers us to be close friends but we saw each other for the first time in more than a decade 2 years ago. It was easy to pick up our friendship, but the circumstances of our lives are so entirely different now that the dynamics of our relationship were entirely different.
Poor Ken is having a bit of a tough time these days, too much to do (he puts too much pressure on himself) and at the mercy (he thinks) of the schedules of others. He didn't know until yesterday morning whether we'd be able to have dinner together last night, but he didn't communicate that well to me and I missed his truck when I drove by so I tooled on home. He called at 6:30, as I was starting dinner at home, to see if I was coming over. OOPS! So I put aside my meal and went to his house. He was pretty flustered and not in great shape but pretty cheerful at what he had accomplished during the day. His riding mower needs a new muffler so he's using his small mower, too hard really and he won't accept help. Anyway we had hot dogs, which I never eat but packed with pickles and good mustard were delicious. They weren't even hot dogs, they were "ball park treats." Ugh. He had 3 and pronounced them delicious. It made him happy and that's what counts.
The neighbors on the lake put in their new dock on Monday. It's 40' long. I have to check it out from our camp--I'm expecting it to be an eyesore. No more discreet wooden dock, this one has a metal frame with cedar plank pallets you put in the frame. I figure it cost $5000. 10 units at about $500 each (I priced a similar dock for us but when I realized that a measly 2 units would cost $1000 I gave up). Ken thinks it's nice because one man can put it in alone, but he said last night "Of course, there's nothing like a wooden dock." He thinks we should figure out a way to attach our dock to shore and raise and lower it without taking it out completely. I think we need to build a new dock altogether, since ours is old and was a freebie, Fred's old dock that he gave to Jamie and me when we were still together: at least 12 years ago.
I'm really tempted to buy a kayak soon. I've been looking at one online and yesterday I talked to a friend about hers. Hers is a Walden Paddler, which you have to like for the name alone. It's made of recycled materials and she bought it locally. That's a huge advantage. I have to call the guy she bought it from in Westport, today I think. I just think I would enjoy having a kayak I could paddle around the lake on calm days, and I know my sister would like using it when she was here. It's the non-tippy kind, very stable and non-threatening. We'll see.
Our automated system is down right now--server problems. This presents a big problem. What to do, what to do. Print out stuff from OCLC, I guess. Then what? Oh, I'll think of something.
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
| Your Bumper Sticker Should Be |
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What Bumper Sticker Should Be On Your Car?
Who are these beauties? That's me on the left. This picture was taken in 1973, just before my senior year in college. That's my friend Kathy. We went on this wonderful camping trip to Colorado, staying near Aspen. We drove out in her VW station wagon and had the most fantastic time. We both remember it really clearly. We talked about it a lot last year when we were in Colorado together again. Here we're standing at Independence Pass. Look how thin I am! I found this picture when I cleaned my bedroom over the weekend.
This is a view I've posted before, in early spring. I really like it. I took this yesterday. It's from the road between my house and Lin's. If you turn right at the foot of the hill you're in Swastika, which consists of 3 houses and a crossroad. I don't know the names of the mountains you're looking at. Everything is so lush and green right now, it's really amazing.
This is the Silver Lake Mountain bluffs from yet another angle. You can just barely see Mud Pond in the foreground. It was taken in front of Bill Strong's house (he's dead). There's a famous little sign hanging in front of his house that says "We shoot every fourth visitor--the third one just left!" Everyone knows that sign. The sign's been up as long as I can remember--at least 40 years.
BONEHEAD
This morning our bookmobile driver hit the steel bar on the edge of the garage with the metal plate on the bottom of our new $300,000 bookmobile when he was backing it out. Bent the garage bar and the metal plate on the bkm. His solution? Don't tell Julie, his supervisor, but get out the sledgehammer and start whacking both the garage support and the bookmobile plate. The bookmobile is less than 6 months old and is still under warranty. We don't know how important the beam is to supporting the garage: what is this man thinking of? Someone finally told Julie, but not before the rest of the clerks all knew about it and didn't tell her. I guess it just proves that we don't really need supervisors, do we?
The day is dragging on, but it's noon now. I haven't done much this morning. The 4 consultants had a meeting with the director. She suggested we have it at the coffee cafe rather than in her office (this is our monthly meeting with her, which we have after we have our monthly meeting with each other) so that it would be less formal and in a relaxed atmosphere. It turned out really well, we sat outside and it was more relaxed. Everyone left in the building was, I'm sure, in a tizzy about the fact that the consultants and the director met outside of the building. What were we talking about? Must have been the rest of the staff, huh, and that's why we had to leave the building. No, not at all, but they'll never believe that. We talked about the budget, about grant funding, member libraries, conferences, schedules, being in charge when the director's not here and other stuff.
The sun was out this morning but I heard it's raining not far from Plattsburgh right now. Swell, we can't even have one day without rain! I bought Ken's tomatoes last night and got myself some more annuals. The guy at Lamoy's was really nice and helped me pick out the right kind of tomatoes to get. I really appreciated the help and ended up with a totally different kind that I never would have picked. He said they plant 25,000 of that kind. We'll see what happens this year. Yesterday I ordered a bunch of lilies online because they were on sale cheap. My lilies are definitely dead. I lost a lot of perennials this year--it got too cold with no snow cover. I lost my mountain bluet (centaurea), which was at least 12 years old. It was a nice big plant but there's no sign of it now. My echinachea is also gone and it was coming along really well. I ordered 2 new plants.
My lemon lilies are blooming and they smell wonderful. I'll have pictures of them later. My rose bush has good buds, which is nice. The center part of this huge bush, which I've had nearly 30 years has died and there are huge new canes sticking out all over and sprouting up into the lawn. Last year there were very few blossoms but it looks as if it'll do better this year. I don't know what to do about its unruliness but I suppose I could prune it extensively once it stops blooming. I read recently that early spring is the best time to prune--oops.
Time to eat a peanut butter sandwich and investigate the cataloging backlog. I know I have some old, old local history books from Plattsburgh Public to catalog. Those aren't really so bad to do, and sometimes it feels really cool to handle a book that was published nearly 200 years ago.
Monday, June 12, 2006
This is an excerpt from an article in today's New York Times. For some reason I think it's really funny. Maybe it's because I spent my entire childhood dealing with a father who had hearing loss but all of a sudden could hear us talking about him in low tones in the other room. Then there was my grandfather: we'd sit at his knee and yell into his ear to visit with him. My mother is now quite deaf and sometimes (not often) wears her hearing aids. I have to speak very loudly to her at times. I speak loudly almost all the time, for a variety of reasons. Mostly I do it because I talk to Ken that way: he's very deaf, but also I do it because I have bad tinnitus (as did my brother) and I spent my childhood speaking loudly so my father could hear me. Anyway, this ring tone would doubtless work like a charm for me. I think my sister should be on the alert for this in her classrooms, and all librarians should bring dogs to work because doubtless dogs will be able to hear this.
A Ring Tone Meant to Fall on Deaf Ears
By PAUL VITELLO
Published: June 12, 2006
In that old battle of the wills between young people and their keepers, the young have found a new weapon that could change the balance of power on the cellphone front: a ring tone that many adults cannot hear.
In settings where cellphone use is forbidden — in class, for example — it is perfect for signaling the arrival of a text message without being detected by an elder of the species.
"When I heard about it I didn't believe it at first," said Donna Lewis, a technology teacher at the Trinity School in Manhattan. "But one of the kids gave me a copy, and I sent it to a colleague. She played it for her first graders. All of them could hear it, and neither she nor I could."
The technology, which relies on the fact that most adults gradually lose the ability to hear high-pitched sounds, was developed in Britain but has only recently spread to America — by Internet, of course.
Recently, in classes at Trinity and elsewhere, some students have begun testing the boundaries of their new technology. One place was Michelle Musorofiti's freshman honors math class at Roslyn High School on Long Island.
At Roslyn, as at most schools, cellphones must be turned off during class. But one morning last week, a high-pitched ring tone went off that set teeth on edge for anyone who could hear it. To the students' surprise, that group included their teacher.
"Whose cellphone is that?" Miss Musorofiti demanded, demonstrating that at 28, her ears had not lost their sensitivity to strangely annoying, high-pitched, though virtually inaudible tones.
"You can hear that?" one of them asked.
"Adults are not supposed to be able to hear that," said another, according to the teacher's account.
She had indeed heard that, Miss Musorofiti said, adding, "Now turn it off."
The cellphone ring tone that she heard was the offshoot of an invention called the Mosquito, developed last year by a Welsh security company to annoy teenagers and gratify adults, not the other way around.
It was marketed as an ultrasonic teenager repellent, an ear-splitting 17-kilohertz buzzer designed to help shopkeepers disperse young people loitering in front of their stores while leaving adults unaffected.
The principle behind it is a biological reality that hearing experts refer to as presbycusis, or aging ear. While Miss Musorofiti is not likely to have it, most adults over 40 or 50 seem to have some symptoms, scientists say.
While most human communication takes place in a frequency range between 200 and 8,000 hertz (a hertz being the scientific unit of frequency equal to one cycle per second), most adults' ability to hear frequencies higher than that begins to deteriorate in early middle age.
"It's the most common sensory abnormality in the world," said Dr. Rick A. Friedman, an ear surgeon and research scientist at the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles.
But in a bit of techno-jujitsu, someone — a person unknown at this time, but probably not someone with presbycusis — realized that the Mosquito, which uses this common adult abnormality to adults' advantage, could be turned against them.
The Mosquito noise was reinvented as a ring tone.
"Our high-frequency buzzer was copied. It is not exactly what we developed, but it's a pretty good imitation," said Simon Morris, marketing director for Compound Security, the company behind the Mosquito. "You've got to give the kids credit for ingenuity."
A Ring Tone Meant to Fall on Deaf Ears
By PAUL VITELLO
Published: June 12, 2006
In that old battle of the wills between young people and their keepers, the young have found a new weapon that could change the balance of power on the cellphone front: a ring tone that many adults cannot hear.
In settings where cellphone use is forbidden — in class, for example — it is perfect for signaling the arrival of a text message without being detected by an elder of the species.
"When I heard about it I didn't believe it at first," said Donna Lewis, a technology teacher at the Trinity School in Manhattan. "But one of the kids gave me a copy, and I sent it to a colleague. She played it for her first graders. All of them could hear it, and neither she nor I could."
The technology, which relies on the fact that most adults gradually lose the ability to hear high-pitched sounds, was developed in Britain but has only recently spread to America — by Internet, of course.
Recently, in classes at Trinity and elsewhere, some students have begun testing the boundaries of their new technology. One place was Michelle Musorofiti's freshman honors math class at Roslyn High School on Long Island.
At Roslyn, as at most schools, cellphones must be turned off during class. But one morning last week, a high-pitched ring tone went off that set teeth on edge for anyone who could hear it. To the students' surprise, that group included their teacher.
"Whose cellphone is that?" Miss Musorofiti demanded, demonstrating that at 28, her ears had not lost their sensitivity to strangely annoying, high-pitched, though virtually inaudible tones.
"You can hear that?" one of them asked.
"Adults are not supposed to be able to hear that," said another, according to the teacher's account.
She had indeed heard that, Miss Musorofiti said, adding, "Now turn it off."
The cellphone ring tone that she heard was the offshoot of an invention called the Mosquito, developed last year by a Welsh security company to annoy teenagers and gratify adults, not the other way around.
It was marketed as an ultrasonic teenager repellent, an ear-splitting 17-kilohertz buzzer designed to help shopkeepers disperse young people loitering in front of their stores while leaving adults unaffected.
The principle behind it is a biological reality that hearing experts refer to as presbycusis, or aging ear. While Miss Musorofiti is not likely to have it, most adults over 40 or 50 seem to have some symptoms, scientists say.
While most human communication takes place in a frequency range between 200 and 8,000 hertz (a hertz being the scientific unit of frequency equal to one cycle per second), most adults' ability to hear frequencies higher than that begins to deteriorate in early middle age.
"It's the most common sensory abnormality in the world," said Dr. Rick A. Friedman, an ear surgeon and research scientist at the House Ear Institute in Los Angeles.
But in a bit of techno-jujitsu, someone — a person unknown at this time, but probably not someone with presbycusis — realized that the Mosquito, which uses this common adult abnormality to adults' advantage, could be turned against them.
The Mosquito noise was reinvented as a ring tone.
"Our high-frequency buzzer was copied. It is not exactly what we developed, but it's a pretty good imitation," said Simon Morris, marketing director for Compound Security, the company behind the Mosquito. "You've got to give the kids credit for ingenuity."
This is the way the weather makes Chances feel.
This is the only thing Tess feels like doing in this weather.
This is what Tess did when she heard the sun is supposed to shine later this week.
This is how Chances reacted to news of sunshine. I don't think she believes it will really happen.Domestic bliss
Maybe the meds are kicking in, because even though I wasn't terribly productive this weekend, I did clean my bathroom, sort clothes, do a small load of laundry (with great trepidation: I still haven't looked down my well, but feel confident enough, based on my conservative use of water, that there's enough to do only small loads every few days), and, get this: VACUUMED my living room and kitchen. Yes, now I can stop talking about it. A relief to all of you, I know. I didn't accomplish much more, but exercised my brain with crosswords (and read in two more places how important it is to do crosswords to keep your brain in shape and improve your memory). I watched The Interpreter, with Sean Penn and Nicole Kidman. I really like him and I really don't like her but it was a respectable movie. It was on HBO, I still haven't watched the films I have on DVD.
I did not go to the memorial service. I feel badly, but it was raining and I did not feel like driving to Plattsburgh on my day off. I don't feel this makes me a bad person, nor do I feel that I didn't go because HE wouldn't have gone to my memorial service if the situation were reversed. I'm sorry I didn't go because his daughter would have liked it, and because I should have gone to represent the organization. But I refuse to feel guilty. Just sorry that I didn't go. I'm lazy, not bad.
My friend Peter stopped by to invite me to his house on Saturday. He does this periodically. Sometimes I go and sometimes I don't. I usually know some of the people there, seldom do I know all the people there. The woman from the next camp down from ours called to invite me to dinner Saturday. Fred and Ken would be there. She's a caterer and an excellent cook and I haven't seen her since last year. You can guess which invitation I accepted. I went to Ann's and had a wonderful time. I love visiting with Fred and look forward to seeing him a lot this summer when he lives at Silver Lake ALL the time. We watched the Belmont, which was a boring race because neither the Derby nor Preakness winners ran it. It had been a cold, miserable day but Ann had been stoking 2 fires all day so the camp was nice and warm. Good food and good company (and good rum). I really enjoyed it.
Sunday dinner was pleasant with Bill and Ken, then 2 of my favorite campers stopped by on their way home. They're from Canandaigua (Finger Lakes). He's a glassblower and she's a nurse/training. I just adore both of them. They were each married before--she to another glassblower, what are the odds. They each have a camp on the lake. His was his parents', hers is one of the cabins from the girls' camp at the end of the lake. Anyway, I had a really great visit with them. They spent 2 weeks in Italy this spring so we talked about Venice, Rome, gelato and how much we love Italy. It was really nice. Then we talked a lot about other things, then Ken told some stories (which he does in a much more animated and entertaining way when he has more than just me as an audience). I finally figured that out, and know now that if I want to capture any of his anecdotes on tape I will have to do it at social gatherings rather than during the evenings we spend alone together. I tried taping him but his style wasn't as good. It didn't seem to be the presence of the recorder, just the way he told the stories.
I did my physical therapy exercises last night--did not do them on Saturday. Oops. They're really very easy and don't take long at all. My knee muscles were sore on Friday from the workout on Friday, but it felt good to have done something constructive. I rode the stationary bicycle, pushed against this sled-type thing, stood on my bad leg and threw a weighted ball, slid down the wall, did leg-lifts and did some other stuff. More activity than I've had since Julie and I used to go to Butts 'n Guts excercise class at the Y a few years ago. I'm hoping this will motivate me to do things like...STACK MY FIREWOOD! It's just sitting there in a big soggy pile.
Now I need to get motivated to do something about work. I was thinking maybe today I would work on a collection development policy. Is that too lofty a goal?
Friday, June 09, 2006
Nature lessons
It was a good year for balsams--look at all the new growth on the tips of the boughs of this one.
This hemlock had a good year too.
There aren't many wildflowers blooming right now--here's one:False Solomon's seal. It's sort of pretty. There is no wildflower called "Real" Solomon's seal, just something called Hairy Solomon's seal.
And these are the domestic flowers that are blooming right now: a couple of very soggy irises. I don't know where I got them or when I planted them, they just show up every year.
This is what the Holt's house looks like now. I think they're making very slow progress because of the weather.
It's still raining today. It's supposed to rain all weekend. I'm not pretending I'll be motivated to do much of anything for the next two days. I have two movies to watch, so maybe at least I won't watch dumb tv (although The Dog Whisperer is usually on some time on Saturday, I just have to surf around to find it). I will vacuum, this I promise myself. I hope to go to the memorial service of an old man who was a staple of the Silver Lake neighborhood for decades. He was a dentist in AuSable Forks in the early days of his career. His first name was Adolph, if you can imagine anyone naming a son that (though he was born pre-WWII, he died in his 90's). I worked with him for several years on the newsletter of the shoreowners' association. At first he was a pain in the neck and would edit the articles I wrote, making changes that drove me crazy, but in later years he was incredibly sweet and did the publishing work that I didn't want to do, leaving the writing to me. He was a very nice man in his elder years. His daughter now lives in the family camp year round, though I can't imagine it's very warm. It's over "behind the island," in the area we on the north shore of the lake consider to be an undesireable location because it's so densely populated and the camps are close together. The trend over there right now is for camps to be sold, torn down and huge $300,000 year-round houses to be built on the site. There's a brand new one just being finished directly across from Linda's camp. It's really an eyesore. This trend is bad for the health of the lake because winter is a time the lake rests and the water is cleansed. If people live on the lake in the winter, sewage inevitably seeps into the water and the lake never has a chance to rest. She said self-righteously. Although it takes a very long time and very little of it actually does, my sewage eventually seeps into the lake.
And that concludes our nature/ecology lesson for the day.
I will now catalog a 15-volume set of 1955 Nancy Drew's for the Peru library.
It was a good year for balsams--look at all the new growth on the tips of the boughs of this one.
This hemlock had a good year too.
There aren't many wildflowers blooming right now--here's one:False Solomon's seal. It's sort of pretty. There is no wildflower called "Real" Solomon's seal, just something called Hairy Solomon's seal.
And these are the domestic flowers that are blooming right now: a couple of very soggy irises. I don't know where I got them or when I planted them, they just show up every year.
This is what the Holt's house looks like now. I think they're making very slow progress because of the weather.It's still raining today. It's supposed to rain all weekend. I'm not pretending I'll be motivated to do much of anything for the next two days. I have two movies to watch, so maybe at least I won't watch dumb tv (although The Dog Whisperer is usually on some time on Saturday, I just have to surf around to find it). I will vacuum, this I promise myself. I hope to go to the memorial service of an old man who was a staple of the Silver Lake neighborhood for decades. He was a dentist in AuSable Forks in the early days of his career. His first name was Adolph, if you can imagine anyone naming a son that (though he was born pre-WWII, he died in his 90's). I worked with him for several years on the newsletter of the shoreowners' association. At first he was a pain in the neck and would edit the articles I wrote, making changes that drove me crazy, but in later years he was incredibly sweet and did the publishing work that I didn't want to do, leaving the writing to me. He was a very nice man in his elder years. His daughter now lives in the family camp year round, though I can't imagine it's very warm. It's over "behind the island," in the area we on the north shore of the lake consider to be an undesireable location because it's so densely populated and the camps are close together. The trend over there right now is for camps to be sold, torn down and huge $300,000 year-round houses to be built on the site. There's a brand new one just being finished directly across from Linda's camp. It's really an eyesore. This trend is bad for the health of the lake because winter is a time the lake rests and the water is cleansed. If people live on the lake in the winter, sewage inevitably seeps into the water and the lake never has a chance to rest. She said self-righteously. Although it takes a very long time and very little of it actually does, my sewage eventually seeps into the lake.
And that concludes our nature/ecology lesson for the day.
I will now catalog a 15-volume set of 1955 Nancy Drew's for the Peru library.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
A little bit of heaven
We all have our own ideas about what heaven on earth is. Guess which of these is mine?
The home on wheels is parked next to one of the busiest roads in the county. The road is the hardtop I live half a mile from. Looking in that direction, there's one house in 2.5 miles.
Rain is forecasted for the next 4 days. That includes Saturday and Sunday. Let's hope I have a better reaction to it this weekend than I did last weekend. Like, maybe I can vacuum my floors. My living room rug has a nice coating of brown hair, so thick you can barely tell it's really supposed to be navy blue.
Today I will catalog children's videos for Upper Jay. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (anyone remember them?) and Peppermint Rose (anyone even heard of her? not me). Then I hope to work on a book order. Must order Anderson Cooper's new book. Wait, does he have an old book? I don't think so.
Got car fixed yesterday, all appropriate hatches now reputed to open and close as they should. Nice man Jason at the dealer's told me to either come back within the next 300 miles or not come back at all (only 300 miles left on warranty). He and I have become good friends. I got hysterical waiting for my ride from them at 4 because I thought I had to be there by 5, so I called twice between 4 and 4:30, finally being reassured by New Guy in Service that yes, Rob was on his way in a gold Accord with the sticker still in the window, he just had to pick another customer up who was farther out than they'd thought, and no, I had until 6 to get there (I could hear his eyes rolling as he said all this). After a WHOLE LOT OF EFFORT on my part I managed to make him laugh. It was hard and I had to say "but the the singing man in your message said" about 4 times first. All's well that ends well.
I went to physical therapy and met Jill, my body's therapist. She had a student named Madonna working with her. Yes someone named their daughter Madonna (she seemed very nice and was not wearing cones for a bra). Jill says we will try to strengthen the muscles in my knee and this is not a "no pain no gain" situation. I'm going $120 a month worth for the next 4 weeks. Farewell, last of my tax refund.
Last night was dinner with Ken. We had a long talk about the memorial service he went to earlier this week for his friend who died at the age of 94 (I think this now makes Ken the oldest resident of Black Brook, but I could be wrong). Ken had known Wilfred for 80 or so years and was really upset about the service. It wasn't a funeral, there was no body, Wilfred was cremated ("the first LaHart to be cremated"). Wilfred was never married, thus had no children. His brother's and sister's children were in charge and Ken was sure Wilfred's wishes were not followed. I think I managed to convince him that it was possible Wilfred wanted his ashes scattered over his land. The LaHart farm is legend in this area--it has one of the most beautiful views of Catamount Mountain, is a huge piece of property, and that family struggled and worked incredibly hard over the years to farm it (Ken tells the story of Wilfred's father falling asleep in the field one night while he was plowing, from sheer exhaustion). I told him about my family, about me and my wishes to be cremated and have my ashes mixed with the soil. I reminded him of his friend who wanted his ashes sprinkled on top of Duncan Mountain, so they all went up there on their snowmobiles one beautiful winter day and spread his ashes on the snow in a place he now calls "Nick's Notch" (I said I do NOT want my ashes sprinkled on the snow--he said "What difference does it make?" maybe he has a point. I'd rather have a hole dug and have my ashes dumped into it, though). He just feels strongly that Wilfred was very religious and a memorial service with no body was not what he would have wanted. Well, who knows, but I think I comforted Ken a little. I certainly like the idea of having Wilfred's ashes scattered on that land.
On to the Power Rangers.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
This is how Tess looked after she did about 15 really fast laps by herself around the car--that's what she did while I played in the dirt.
This is what Chances did while I dug in the dirt.
This is what Mr. Hummer did while I gardened. My feeder is about 5 feet from where I stood but the hummers will come even closer than that to you if you stand still. This male is less tame than the 2 that Tess killed, but he's coming around. The females are pretty tame and are less bothered by my presence.
I'm not really an angry person, I just play one on tv. I look like my mother and my aunt here. You have to wear a goofy hat soaked in DEET in order to be outside during black fly season. 
You have to get your hands dirty (nice ring). I think one of my father's favorite things was to clean his fingernails with his pen knife when he finished gardening. Me, I just scrub them with a scrubber and soap. There is something satisfying about dirt under your fingernails when your gardening, though.
Good day sunshine
Amazing the power of the sun, isn't it?
When I got home I had lots of clean clothes to dry, like money in the bank, and lots of plants to play with. I planted some flowers in containers, sorted them out (never have enough!), unloaded the dirt, peat moss and "organic" manure (is there another kind?) from the trunk in prep. of future playing and surveyed my kingdom.
I had a good time but wasn't particularly pleased with the results: I call them works in progress, "things can only get better." They will look good in a few weeks.
I cleaned the fish tank and miracle of miracles, they were all still alive this morning. I nearly killed them all until I figured out that I had stirred up all the ammonia at the bottom of the tank when I tried to suck out all the debris on the bottom. I added Ammo-Lock and it was like a miracle--they stopped sucking for air on the surface and started swimming around. WHEW! Was I ever relieved. This is a nice batch of fish, 3 rasboras who school nicely. I can watch them for an amazingly long time, which is supposed to be very healthy.
Today I have too much going on in my personal life: it will interfere with my work. I have physical therapy and a car appointment at nearly the same time. This means I have to get my car to the dealer, at the other end of town, have the dealer person drive me back to the library, using up personal time to do that, and walk to my p.t. Somehow the notion of walking to the session that's for your bad knee seems counter-productive, but the place is only about 5 blocks from the library. I've stopped taking ibuprofen to see what my knee really feels like. Today I have a sinus headache. If it's not one body part it's another.
I'm not sure what I'll work on today. I need to dig up statistics to prove how much busier we are now than we've been in the past. Hmmm, wouldn't know it by me, now would you.
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Mixed state
is the psychiatric term for what's going on with me these days. I am both manic and depressed, simultaneously. Imagine what that does for you. I feel like crap. I spent wonderful hours with one of my favorite people (Linda) over the weekend, but couldn't drag myself off of the couch during nearly all the daylight hours. I can go from cheerful, witty, clever and creative to tears in seconds. I obsess about things that don't really matter and that I have no business obsessing about. I can't stop thinking about things that other people are doing.
Well, we're taking a course of action to fix this. Immediate course and long-term course. Dr. Rubin is a good doctor, my doctor for 10 years now, knows me very well. We'll try the quick fix and will introduce a new drug that will take at least a month to take effect, then wean me off some of the drugs I'm taking now. I cried when he described all of this: it's really awful to live a life in which your mental state is chemically determined, but I try to remind myself that the quality of my life is so much better than it used to be that this is all worth it. Anyway, I'll not name the new drug because the potential side effect will scare my sister. It's supposed to be really good for treating bipolarism and he's used it with great success for 4-5 years. He didn't try it with me because things were going pretty well with what we were using up until now. As we know, sometimes long-term use of depressants causes depression.
So I try to look for the good things in today. The sun is shining and it's green. Last night I mowed my lawn and that cheered me up incredibly. I used Lin's wonder mower and it took a fraction of the time it would have otherwise. What a huge relief to have that done! Tonight I will do my wash here in town then go home to put some plants in containers and maybe even plant those snaps in the ground. Must get the lilies and astilbe in the ground, too.
The no-see-ums were fierce last night. Really miserable. Something about sitting in your living room, watching Without a Trace, doing crossword puzzles while miniscule bugs bite the shit out you is both frustrating and satisfying. I love my new screen door and Tess of course has already poked a hole in it by jumping up to ask to be let in. I can patch it easily enough, but will I?
So far I've managed to rescue 2 female hummingbirds in the living room before Tess got to them. I think she's learning to leave them alone when I shout NO! as they bat against the window. She is fascinated by the process of catching and releasing them, though. Well, who wouldn't be--they chirp really loudly when you put the dishtowel over them.
I'm the only one in the department today, can listen to my music without earphones. Unfortunately our automated system is down so I'm not sure what to do. Look up my new drug, for a long time. Read book reviews. Find records on OCLC I guess. I suppose I could prepare some statistics for my director's upcoming interview with the media. nah, don't feel like doing that. See--work cheers me up! I just hope that people who find me difficult, or who say I'm always the problem will try to understand that I can't always control by behavior, especially when things are going on in my life that provoke strong chemical reactions. People don't always get that. I do my best, but mostly I'm just not like other people. I'm working on it, I'm working on it. I've been working on it for a very long time. Think how sad and frustrating that is for me.
is the psychiatric term for what's going on with me these days. I am both manic and depressed, simultaneously. Imagine what that does for you. I feel like crap. I spent wonderful hours with one of my favorite people (Linda) over the weekend, but couldn't drag myself off of the couch during nearly all the daylight hours. I can go from cheerful, witty, clever and creative to tears in seconds. I obsess about things that don't really matter and that I have no business obsessing about. I can't stop thinking about things that other people are doing.
Well, we're taking a course of action to fix this. Immediate course and long-term course. Dr. Rubin is a good doctor, my doctor for 10 years now, knows me very well. We'll try the quick fix and will introduce a new drug that will take at least a month to take effect, then wean me off some of the drugs I'm taking now. I cried when he described all of this: it's really awful to live a life in which your mental state is chemically determined, but I try to remind myself that the quality of my life is so much better than it used to be that this is all worth it. Anyway, I'll not name the new drug because the potential side effect will scare my sister. It's supposed to be really good for treating bipolarism and he's used it with great success for 4-5 years. He didn't try it with me because things were going pretty well with what we were using up until now. As we know, sometimes long-term use of depressants causes depression.
So I try to look for the good things in today. The sun is shining and it's green. Last night I mowed my lawn and that cheered me up incredibly. I used Lin's wonder mower and it took a fraction of the time it would have otherwise. What a huge relief to have that done! Tonight I will do my wash here in town then go home to put some plants in containers and maybe even plant those snaps in the ground. Must get the lilies and astilbe in the ground, too.
The no-see-ums were fierce last night. Really miserable. Something about sitting in your living room, watching Without a Trace, doing crossword puzzles while miniscule bugs bite the shit out you is both frustrating and satisfying. I love my new screen door and Tess of course has already poked a hole in it by jumping up to ask to be let in. I can patch it easily enough, but will I?
So far I've managed to rescue 2 female hummingbirds in the living room before Tess got to them. I think she's learning to leave them alone when I shout NO! as they bat against the window. She is fascinated by the process of catching and releasing them, though. Well, who wouldn't be--they chirp really loudly when you put the dishtowel over them.
I'm the only one in the department today, can listen to my music without earphones. Unfortunately our automated system is down so I'm not sure what to do. Look up my new drug, for a long time. Read book reviews. Find records on OCLC I guess. I suppose I could prepare some statistics for my director's upcoming interview with the media. nah, don't feel like doing that. See--work cheers me up! I just hope that people who find me difficult, or who say I'm always the problem will try to understand that I can't always control by behavior, especially when things are going on in my life that provoke strong chemical reactions. People don't always get that. I do my best, but mostly I'm just not like other people. I'm working on it, I'm working on it. I've been working on it for a very long time. Think how sad and frustrating that is for me.
Monday, June 05, 2006
This is the Saranac River, on my way to Plattsburgh this afternoon. It looked soooo inviting, down the bank from the road. It reminded me of the rivers in the Midwest, wide and flat, no rapids.
This is a favorite view of the Saranac River. I see it every day on my way home but have to look over my shoulder to see it on the way in. It's incredibly green right now.
I didn't realize a river could be a public highway--A beautiful day in the neighborhood
It finally stopped raining and the sun is blindingly bright, the sky is a wonderful blue and the forest is lush and green. It's a really gorgeous day and I was able to enjoy the scenery this morning when I drove to Lake Placid to a new orthopedic surgeon to have my knee checked out. I had to wait nearly 2 hours to see this doctor, which is a really long time when there's no reading matter in the waiting room and the television is next to you, not in front of you. OK, I could have moved, but it was just the news anyway and I'd heard it and seen it at home earlier in the morning anyway. Was it worth the wait? Well, wowie jet is this doctor ever cute! He's really attractive, charming and everything you want in a doctor. Hit the jackpot on this one. I even lost my frustration and feelings of abandonment as soon as he walked into the room. He twisted and yanked on my knee, make it crack ("That's your ACL, it's supposed to do that") then had me hop on it. I haven't hopped in years, told him I was too fat to hop but managed to do it anyway. He suggests physical therapy twice a week for a month or so, then visiting him again to see if I can stop taking massive doses of ibuprofen. Surgery to relieve pain isn't terribly successful, he says, it's better for mechanical problems, which is not what I really have right now.
I had a sort of crappy weekend, but did have nice times with Linda. It rained constantly, which drove me to my couch. I'm surprised I don't have bedsores. It was very depressing, I'm depressed, the whole thing was the pits. This is the down end of my mild mania. Anyway, Friday night we all had a great time--dinner at our favorite spot, Bill, Linda, Erdvilas and I. We didn't even spend that much money, just enough. Good food and great company. I ate monkfish, very tasty. Saturday I spent the entire day on my couch and slept for hours. I hate days like that if there are things I'd rather be doing--like planting, digging and mowing. Really depressing. Sat. night I went to Linda's for dinner and Fred joined us, a really nice surprise. We had a lovely time and it was a nice break for him. He's retiring on July 1st and has to be out of his apartment at the museum so will be moving to Silver Lake then. I'm looking forward to having him in the neighborhood.
Sunday was the annual SUNY Credit Union meeting/brunch, which Bill, Ken and I go to, and Linda and Erdvilas came along for the second year. We had a nice time, but it was raining so I was in a manic/depressed mood. Strange. Went home and did guess what? lay on the couch. Back to Linda's for cocktails and Bill and a friend showed up, so it was a really nice social hour. The friend is putting in a downstairs bathroom in Bill's camp so I asked him lots of questions about pumps, tanks, water supplies, etc. He gave me some great advice. Now I just have to follow through. My water supply seems ok right now and my sump pump is running a lot so presumably my well is healthy. I need to take off the well cap and look down it, but that is not easy: have to take a ladder down there, climb up, heave off the cap (which is really heavy) and look down. When it comes to my water situation I really do feel that ignorance is bliss.
So the sun came out today and I drove to Lake Placid, through some of the most beautiful vistas in the Adirondacks. Very uplifting. Lots of mottled mountains--the hardwoods are now bright and the fir trees are dark. It's a stunning effect and one of my favorites. We missed out on the brilliant green because of all the rainy days, but I had a really nice drive to and from Placid. I always feel funny going there--my ex-husband is the mayor, his parents live there and though I never see them when I'm there I always feel I should be hiding behind mailboxes and looking over my shoulders.
I had to drop off my glasses because one lens had compression fractures. This is a real drag, as Cat can attest to. I walked into the office, gave them to Barbara and said "I hope you know you're taking them right off of my face." She said she'd send them right out and get them back to me as soon as possible. I have my icky tri-focals to wear in the meantime, and my computer-focus bi-focals. Nothing good for driving, except for sunglasses. Those will work for today and tomorrow, but then it's supposed to rain again.
I didn't get to work until 2--was due in at 1, will work until 5. Hope to mow my lawn tonight. Stopped for gas, running on fumes, and the cable to the lid release stuck so I had to disconnect it (luckily it had done this before and I watched the guy at the dealer disconnect it). Then the trunk latch stuck so my trunk is stuck open, too. My car has 35,600 miles on it: 400 miles left under warranty. I put 300 miles a week on it just driving to & from work. Dealer has not returned my call this afternoon to schedule appointment for repairs. I am frustrated and depressed about car.
Will things improve?
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