Sunday, September 20, 2015

Late autumn coming along

We're usually approaching peak color by now but there's just a hint of some yellows and reds in the hills and woods right now.  The weather has been fantastic, if you like dock days (I sure do).  80's and sunny and not very humid.  Ahhhhh.  Today it's 60 and sunny and probably signals the end of dock days, though the water is still very comfortable for swimming.

I've been doing well, still on permanent vacation.  No, I have to remind myself, it's not a vacation, it's real life.  I have a lot more fun entertaining and cooking dinners (well, I've only done 2) because I'm not working, so it's much, much less stress to plan, prepare, clean, and cook.  Last night I had 4 friends eat dinner at camp, on the front porch with a great view of the lake, on a warm evening.  It was really nice.  I wanted to cook my turn at Sunday dinner at camp, too, but camp was full of other people that weekend so I had it at Joe & Martha's instead.  It was eggplant parmesan, cooked two very different ways, one by me and one by Linda.  Both were great, got lots of compliments, and it was a really nice time.

Joe & Martha are still here, so are Duncan & Sue and Linda & Erdvilas.  Do I mind being the single person among couples?  Not really.  It would be fun to share time (and work) with someone but I so much enjoy being by myself that it all seems OK.  And people are always very generous about including me (my mother would say "Well of course they do, that's because you're nice and they like you," which I suppose has a grain of truth to it).  We're creeping up on October, which is Departure Time for everyone.  What this means is that we all spend a lot of time together, lots of dinners at each others' camps and homes and it's a lot of fun.  No, we don't get sick of each other or run out of things to talk about.

I have a dentist appointment tomorrow, ugh.  Haven't been for a while and am past due for a cleaning.  My permanent retainer (which is what you get when you have braces) is busted in 2 places and it will be expensive to get them fixed, but if I don't get them fixed the teeth will float back to their original places and why did I get braces anyway?

Since my cousin took my dock out on Labor Day, I spend my dock time with Linda on her dock.  She has Dock Supreme and we have a wonderful time together so it's a treat.  The location isn't as fantastic as our dock is, but there are hardly people left on the lake so it's quiet.  And sooo pretty

I'm still reading a lot, hoping to carry that over to winter instead of my usual TV habit.  I'm reading Jane Smiley's latest, which is a continuation of a family saga.  It's sort of hard reading, not a fast-paced story at all but she's a good writer.  I still have a long list of titles to get to but keep buying new titles both for my Kindle and in print.  Sometimes I feel like reading a "real" book in print, other times I like reading on my Kindle.  I get a ton of ebooks for $1.99 each from BookBub, which just fills up the Kindle without my ever getting to read them.

I did some actual cleaning the other day, threw out a lot of junk and rearranged things in the library at the back of the house.  I have to get the heater there fixed so needed to make room for someone to get to it.  I have a lot more of that kind of thing to do but it felt good to do even just a little bit.

I have lunch with friends often, about once a week, in Plattsburgh.  I don't mind going to Plattsburgh sometimes, but man it seems like such a long drive.  How did I do that all those years?

I've been picking wild apples in prep. for Lin's cider pressing party next week.  Linda and I had great fun driving down a back, uninhabited road, picking lots of wild apples along the roadside.  I had scoped out a bunch of trees, and can't help but keep noticing apple trees loaded with apples still.  Must learn to notice something else.

Tonight is book group, Linda's last turn hosting.  After this it will be Lin, Marylou and me for the winter.  We still call it book group, and read a book each month.  We sure don't spend much time talking about the book, but we've been getting together for 13 years and have become a good group.  Getting smaller, but still nice.

The dogs are fine though a big pudgy because I haven't been walking them much lately and they get lunch every day.  They take each other for walks pretty much every day, which is not great but they seem to stay out of trouble.  Last night I was driving home from camp after dark and there was a huge porcupine in the road.  Treasure took off when we got home and I was fearful that she had her heart set on meeting up with Porky, but that didn't happen.

Life is good, very good.

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