Happy September

And off we go, into fall.  I'm ready for the change of seasons--what's the point of living in a climate that has 4 different seasons if you don't change from time to time?  If I wanted summer all year I'd live in California.  As if.  Anyway, I look forward to September; May and Sept. are 2 of my favorite months.  Clear days, mild temps.  And color is starting to show up in the woods.  Some subtle signs, some not so subtle.

I had a good Labor Day.  I labored just enough to feel good about the day but not enough to feel put-upon.  I cleared off the dinner table, the coffee table and the wood stove.  And packed 100 bottles & cans, which I took to the redemption center (I love being redeemed at the redemption center).  And packed up my impressive collection of plastic bags, which I took to be recycled today.  And swept the living room.  And did lots of dishes.  And rounded up the juicer I'm giving away, finding all its parts.  I even have the manual.  Once a co-worker prepared a whole policy statement referring to the corresponding procedures manuel.  Oh did we get some mileage out of that.

I scored well in the neighborhood Chicken War on Sunday.  I started cooking on Saturday, fried lots of zucchini and eggplant, which I combined with diced tomatoes, olives and capers for a delicious pasta sauce (Boathouse Pasta, created by my sister).  Sunday morning I cooked lots of chicken and some onions in olive oil.  My but it takes a lot of olive oil to fry enough food for 8.  It was all worth the work, though, my meal turned out very well.  My sister was a huge help in preparing a menu (an actual written, illustrated and in-Italian menu), showing me how to prepare the meal, and giving lots of moral support.  I was nervous--there are a bunch of competitors, and everyone is scored, from 1-15 points on presentation, flavor and 5 subjective points.  HONESTLY!  What kind of neighborhood do I live in?  It was fun, and now I'm done.  Time for others to take their turns.  Already talk of what we will do next year.  My mother says we should do NOTHING, this is all too much pressure and too complicated.  I think she's right but I'll play along.

Saturday I went to cocktails at some friends' camp, followed by dinner at another group of friends' camp.  Then I went home and collapsed.  Sunday I spent hours at the boat house after lunch, reading on the porch.  Can't hate that.  I ended up sleeping there, it was a nice night and I realize there won't be many chances for that from now on.  It rained dramatically during the night, which only added to the nice experience.  We had a huge thunderstorm on Sun. morning, and a friend of my got a huge electric shock while taking her boat out of the water.  Yowiee, I guess they're right when they tell you not to swim in a thunderstorm.  Who knew?

Last night I went to friends' camp for cocktails, then a quick drop-in at Linda's.  She has company from Michigan and they were all watching tennis.  I sometimes watch tennis, but I don't know the rules or scoring, so it's sort of like a blind person watching it.  I go by the crowd's reactions to things.  Oh, that must have been a good shot.  Wonder who gets points for it?

Today I have the department to myself, Kim is off.  I've done her tasks and have cataloged a bunch of local cookbooks--the kind that are put together as fundraisers.  Some from the 70's, some from the 90's.  There's a huge collection at Plattsburgh Public, and we're cataloging the whole collection, so this is the current project.  There are dozens more to do.

I'm also deleting thousands of barcodes from the data base--Upper Jay has lost 40% or so of its collection as a result of flooding, and volunteers peeled barcodes from each book and put them on strips of tape so I can scan them.  This is a BIG project, something to work on a bit at a time.  many, many barcodes.

My plans for the week?  Well, thankfully the week is well underway so before I know it it will be the weekend again.  Supposed to rain a lot between now & then but then be sunny & 70.  The water in the lake is pretty cold so I'm not sure how much more swimming I'll do, but if it's warm enough I'll try to stay at the boat house.  The dogs are happy to be there.  Kitty will come down if I stay more than one night, whining and nagging.

Some summer people are leaving now, some will stay through Columbus Day.  Or mid-Sept.  Then it'll be back to normal for me.  I have many sticks of firewood to stack, but it needs to stop raining before I'll do that.  I've stacked almost 4 cords, which is half of what I have to do.  And I've had weeks and weeks to do that paltry amount of work.  Oh I am a lazy girl.