Over and out

So what day is it? FRIDAY! And it's time for my famous time-to-myself vacation, until next Thursday. Let's hear it for me. I would ordinarily plan to spend forever getting out of town tonight, stopping to do errands galore, but NO. I'm planning to visit Martha in the hospital, then go home. I'm coming back to town tomorrow, hoping to stop at the dump on my way in. I've big purge plans for my time off. Though as Joe pointed out to me, each trip to the dump will cost the minimum ($18), so my approach is not the soundest fiscally. But I have to get rid of some of my things--like broken chairs and broken lamps and an old lawn mower that needs a new carburetor and so on the list goes. We'll see how much headway I make.  I've talked and written about it enough, let's hope I actually do something.


Just as important are my plans to paint in the living room and kitchen. I'm really hoping to get my cabinets painted, though I've yet to select a color. I'm so sick of Woods Run Green! I have just 1 piece of furniture left to paint, a small chest, but must must must get to the kitchen. I was going to paint cabinets, etc. black, but I think maybe that's not so wise after all. Very appealing, it would cover the green easily enough, but I guess I'll go for something lighter.

I also have things to plant. Plantlets. My acre of cosmos plantlets is doing well, plants are strong & eager to make their way in the world. I have too many lilies to plant, and some containers yet to fill. I may also get more/better geraniums and get to the cemetery to plant there. No more do I do the aunts & uncles who weren't nice to me or my family, I only do the NICE people now. I was thinking of putting alyssum on Spaulding's & Henry's graves (got the idea from Joe). That would do well without constant deadheading.

It poured and stormed yesterday in Hawkeye--there is debris all over the road, and evidence of a big pine limb down near OHR. Nothing at Woods Run got damaged. Duncan's dock parts arrived without incident, nice delivery man left them covered in plastic to protect from wet. Because docks shouldn't get wet.

The big news for me is that yesterday Joe put up my new mailbox. This is a major deal, I've been trying to figure out how to get it put up for a year or so. My old mailbox had no door and was very sad. I got a Fix It note from mail lady this week, which prompted me to whine about it at Pat's. Joe offered to cut the right size board for mounting it, then took it further yesterday and put the box up. Let's here it for helpful & caring friends. I see a big bottle of Bombay Sapphire in the future. Mail lady left me a note that said "Looks great. Thanks." She's always good about my mail.

I've been working on cleaning up our book collection, starting an inventory of the non-fiction. What a pile of crap I've gone through so far, and I just started this week. We use a PDA to scan the barcodes, then when we're all through Dewey the system will tell us not there that's supposed to be. Swell, how many books have been stolen over the years. Good to clean up the data base, though. So far I haven't even made it to the self-help books. Old books on how to publish your own book (as opposed to someone else's?), important essays of the 20th century (not), Ann Landers, Bill Gates, a huge bunch of old computer books. I've banned Windows 98 from CEFLS. No more help for people using it. Likewise for the Apple IIe.  Geez I've been here a long time.

Annie Holt may come this weekend, I don't know for sure. I believe Ann & Kathy are due in from Baltimore for a week to open Sally's camp. Brian & Ginny Ruder will be here. Fred's in camp. Linda? A mystery no one knows the answer to. I'm sure there will be more people I haven't thought of yet, though Memorial Day is not as busy as 4th of July. I hope to stay in the boat house some, but I'm pretty sure I'll have to walk down. The road was a mess before yesterday's storms, I can only guess what it's like now. Boot sucking gravel & mud.

Work is going well. I worked at Plattsburgh Public a bit this week, cataloging some pretty boring stuff. Until I got to the stuff on Junior Plattsburgh. Account of an encampment in the early 20th century. Other things on the Plattsburgh Barracks. Again, the beginning of Dewey is deadly dull. I plod along. I'll go back to Tupper Lake in 2 weeks, then to AuSable to help figure out a classification scheme for her local history collection. And finish up cataloging a few odds & ends there that I missed.

Next week I go to the dentist for new wires for my braces. My second replacement trip--I go every month. My front teeth are amazingly close together--I feel like saying "Take them off, all is as it should be now." But there's more to go. My journalism teacher once told me to never start a sentence with BUT or HOWEVER. Or, of course, AND. And that "over" means above, so you don't say "over 20 people attended," you say "more than 20 people attended." That was in high school, and was such good advice I've kept to it. Anyway, I also have an appointment with my GP next week. He'll be proud of me, I lost more weight. Hopefully have walked away some of the cholesterol in my veins.

Dogs and cat are thriving. All are shedding. Last night I opened the drawer where I keep the furberator (brush) and Tess ran outside to hide. And yet (oh no! did I just start a sentence with "and?") when I finish with Chances, Tess presents herself to me like a gift. Kitty likes being brushed, rolls and purrs. Chances tolerates it, reminding me of someone who's having a procedure done that she knows is good to have done, but must it really be necessary? Last night Kitty appeared in the bedroom in the dark, and just after her arrival I heard Tess crunching something. Yum, delicious rodent. I told her that's how you get tapeworms (don't make that face or your face will freeze that way).

Weekend bog

013, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Walked the bog yesterday morning with the dogs. Before the black flies woke up. This is what the tamaracks look like now. They look like conifers but are really deciduous trees. They're tiny leaves look like needles but are soft.

This is Tamarack Green, widely known in the North Country. "That obscene green." Very bright and pretty. Tamaracks (aka larches) turn a beautiful gold in the fall and are just about the last thing to color, when there's nothing else to see.

The black flies are healthy and hungry. I had lots of outdoor time over the weekend & they are fer shure out. My cousins were here and worked on the camp road for hours. Stirring up the mud, which really gets the black flies 'a pumpin'. They couldn't believe how bad it was (the cousins, not the black flies).

I walked to Fred's camp on Saturday and there was enough of a breeze to deter the flies, so it was a really nice walk. We sat on his porch and drank rum while the dogs swam, rolled, poked around under the porch and lay in his lilly beds. oops. He's very proud of his lilies.

I planted a bunch of lilies on Sat., too. I always fall for the 'buy one get one free" deal so I have about 50 lilies to plant. I'm running out of good places to put them. These are Asiatic and oriental lilies, plus a few day lilies (All Summer Long collection). Some of the lilies I planted last year have actually come up this year. Will wonders never cease.

I opened the boat house yesterday. Or started to. The water's not in at camp so I can't wash everything that needs it, will have to bring things home. But the road is a mess and I won't drive on it. So there you go. How industrious will I be? I hung up the hummingbird feeder. Well, I filled it first, of course. I have at least 2 male hummers at home--they fight a lot. Not a relaxing sight.

It's warm enough to sleep in the b.house now. I'm planning to stay there this weekend, at least sleep there.

011

011, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Just little tufts silhouetted against the sky.

011

011, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Just little tufts silhouetted agains the sky.

POISON! POISON!

006, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

This is sheep laurel. So named because it's toxic to sheep. Why would they name a plant after the animals it kills when ingested? Like, shouldn't it be Wolf Laurel, or something?

We don't have regular laurel here, but southern RI is known for it's spectacular laurel. It blooms in June,usually late June. My mother's house is surrounded by huge laurel bushes (wild) and it's reallly beautiful when it blooms. I planned my wedding (held in her backyard) around the laurel blooming, but that year there wasn't much that bloomed. The NEXT year, however, was a banner year. Should I have suspected something about the marriage then?

001

001, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

I don't know what these are, we used to call this fern something having to do with gold. Unless I dreamed it, my father told me that this kind of fern supposedly grew where there was gold. But we KNOW that's not true.

Fiddling heads

002, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Don't they just look as if they're having a conversation, like, at happy hour in a bar? They're growing quickly, won't be long before the bog will be a jungle.

Catching up

And it's the end of the week. May goes by so quickly! Next weekend is Memorial Day, I have 5 days (count 'em 5) in a row to spend in Hawkeye. My annual Mem. Day break. I used to divide the house into zones & try to clean a zone a day, but that plan was never terribly successful. Now I just make a big list of big projects, a bigger list of small projects, and hope for the best. I need to weed my clothes, which is now a priority. I need to weed my garden, which is also a priority. I have annuals & perennials to plant and gardens to re-create. I have blackberry bushes--very mean ones--to kill. Pardon my eco-political incorrectness, but I'm using the strongest weed killer I can find. It works well, but of course leaves bare spots for a couple of years. Which is way preferable to the sticks full of thorns that have taken over way too much territory.

This weekend some cousins are coming to put docks in & open their camp across the lake. Wow. Must be some sort of a record for earliest dock-in. The road to camp was damaged by water so we've had 2 loads (or maybe 1--I love my family) of crushed stone delivered and one cousin will spread the stone with his cute tractor that he's bringing from Syracuse. I have some really nice relatives who do a lot for camp. I have some (nice) relatives who do nothing for camp but use it. Then there's me. I don't do much for camp, but keep an eye on it throughout the year. I guess. I'll open the boat house by next weekend, hoping to spend the nights there. I'd be staying there now if the road were good & I were more industrious (you figure out which is the real reason). It's warm and lovely at night. The black flies are out, yes, but it's still nice.

It's been raining for what seems like weeks. It might even be weeks. This means that spring was slow to start in early May but has now sped full-throttle to become the season in Hawkeye. There still aren't real leaves on trees, but the grass is green (and growing) and the birds are noisy.

I spent the day on the road yesterday. Drove to Alexandria Bay (1000 Islands) for a conference. 2.5 hrs each way from home. Not a bad trip. I left at 5:30 a.m., which turned out to be too early, but then left before the luncheon & keynote speaker (who was reporting on the State of Libraries and Librarians, duh). I got home around 3, which was nice. Enough time to walk the dogs in the bog in long shadows of late afternoon. Very pretty. The sun finally came out, which hurt my eyes. Has it really been THAT long? Yes, I think it has.

I planted some containers for my deck last night. Even though I decided not to have as many containers this year, I still bought a bunch of annuals. Not as many as usual, and some are notably absent, but I have 4 or 5 containers planned. Got about half the stuff planted. NOT BAD!! Right, Fred? I do have some perennials in need of dirt, but I also have some perennials I have planted already. And some in pots waiting for attention. All are healthy and will be planted hopefully this weekend.

Work is going well. Much ado about e-books, including one of the programs I went to yesterday and a workshop we had here this morning. We'll be getting a subscription to one vendor's list of e-books by fall, I think. If the vendor pulls through.
 
I've given up on my aquarium at home. Death toll was way too high. I have 3 goldfish here at work, only 2 of whom appear to be healthy. My 2-year-old goldfish died recently and his partner seemed lonely so I got 2 more (for 13 cents each). Big Man is LARGE, newbies are small. One of the newbies is sort of floating around, not really swimming. Geez, I can't even succeed with new goldfish. Big Man is more than a year old and is doing well. Perhaps I shouldn't have assumed company was wanted.


Dogs and cat are all fine. HUGE chipmunk body on the living room floor the other night when I got home. Yesterday Tess was parading around with a jumping mouse corpse in her mouth. Long tail hanging out, a dead giveaway. Why does Kitty insist on sparing the least desirable rodents? Get me some red squirrels, cat, and a regular mouse or two.

Someone says he's moving into his camp tonight. That would be nice, a destination for long peaceful walks, with a glass of rum at the end of the walk. Lin is cleaning Linda's camp this weekend. We'll have a coffee break, then a glass of wine when she finishes. Oh wait, wine at home, rum down the lane--pick your poison, girlie. Poisons. Which I'll enjoy tonight when I get to Hawkeye, planning to stop at Joe & Martha's.

Life is good but not exciting. Which is pretty much my preference.

Take cover quick!!

From today's NYTimes:

Thousands of people around the country have spent the last few days taking to the streets and saying final goodbyes before Saturday, Judgment Day, when they expect to be absorbed into heaven in a process known as the rapture. Nonbelievers, they hold, will be left behind to perish along with the world over the next five months.

016

016, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

I drove to Alexandria Bay (in the 1000 Islands) yesterday for a conference. 2.5 hours each way from home, not a bad drive. I went through Ogdensburg, then drowve along the St. Lawrence River. Here's how it looked in the morning, through mist. The St. Lawrence really is a pretty river.

017

017, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Scenery.

020

020, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Pretty, in a different way from a lake.

025

025, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

There were 2 sets of geese with goslings right next to the road. Of course I had to stop and harrass them. They were on the grass but moved into the water as I got closer. What cute fuzzy babies.

021

021, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

And away they went.

027

027, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Purple trillium. Stinking Benjamin. Sign of spring.

029

029, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Not such a great shot, but it shows long shadows in late afternoon light, and something approaching greenery. This is the entrance to the boardwalk/bog

030

030, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Fiddleheads are up. They hadn't come up yet the last time I walked the bog, but it's been nearly a week.

033

033, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

They make quite a community, don't they. I think they look strange.

Mother's Day bog walk

Mother's Day bog walk, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

We all walked the bog yesterday--the entire household (fish are all dead). Kitty sometimes goes with us, it's always up to her of course. Yesterday she was quite perky and cheerful. Usually she saunters behind us, complaining and whining. This time she ran ahead and waited for me silently. She never comes out with us, apparently we're not really THAT interesting.
The peepers have started. Very loud in some places, just a few near my house. They'll get louder soon.

Chances waiting, as usual

Chances waiting, as usual, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

We went for a walk down the shoreline, too. That's Silver Lake Mountain from across from my driveway. i do like early spring--the woods look bleak to some, but there's enough pink/red to make them seem optimistic to me.
And, of course, that's Chances.
Now you see her,

005

005, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Now you don't

Whiteface still has snow

Whiteface still has snow, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

You can just see Whiteface over the shoulder of the mountain (Douglas) that's on the other side of the lake.

Ansel Adams art shot

Ansel Adams art shot, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Not really special, but the bark looked nice.

001

001, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

The bog. That's Chances, paitiently waiting for me. It's good walking again and I've been taking the dogs there every day. Today maybe we'll go in the opposite direction, check on some camps down the lake.

002

002, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

The last of the bog snow. It was there on Sat., gone on Sunday.

004

004, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

My Weekend Station. Sitting in the sun on the deck. I read 2 books and my skin got pretty pink, but oh what a great time I had.

011

011, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

This is what's on the railing right now. Too soon for my containers, but I'm spreading violas throughout a bunch of planters. Strange, but I guess I just want to play with flowers.

013

013, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Tess on the lookout for ANYTHING.

014

014, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Tess isn't really irritated, she just hates to have her picture taken.

015

015, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

Oh wait, I think she wagged her tail.

017

017, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

I'm surprised there isn't an indentation on the deck in the shape of Chances' supine body. This is a pose that's very, very common for her. She, too, looks irritated.

018

018, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

What does kitty do while we're enjoying the fresh air? She sleeps in the living room chair. zzzzzz.

005

005, a photo by woodsrun on Flickr.

And this is what a girl with braces looks like.