November 30, 2024

Facebook Knows Me

It offers me the following ad:

I thought it was a personal degaussing device, but it's for not having to hold hands with your kid but still being quasi responsible on Black Friday.

Or something.


Coincidence

I'm trying new things these days. A person in one of my local fb groups suggested a meetup for people who do craft projects. I took up the needle and joined in, admitting that most of my handiwork is aspirational. I brought some of my projects. I even went to the yarn store prior to the meeting, in order to get some thread. And I showed up at our local bar.

I very much admire the work of the person who had suggested the meetup. She does visible mending and has amazing taste.

We ordered beers. I was judging her taste a bit, it seems.

The bartenders were playing some great music while we talked -- Os Mutantes, some reggae, Beatles songs that we both like that aren't overplayed. Then they played a song -- already forgot which one -- that I used to play in a band 800 years ago. I mentioned this fact, and she asked me what instrument I play.

"I played bass"

"I also play bass." Then she listed her basses, most of which I didn't know but she *did* play a Rick. Ooooh. I've always loved that bass for its sustain. It really feels special when you're playing it.

Then she said:

Her: "I played in a band called (very obscure band name)"

Me: "After (name of previous girl bass player) left? My husband is mrguy"

So she had recorded with my husband at his studio. Also I remember meeting her in the basement of a club in the City. Her band had opened for his the week we got married.

My mind was completely blown. She had replaced my former friend in that band, and my ex-friend had long-term unpleasant feelings about that band and its members back in the day. Like my former friend, this girl had a hard time in this band and felt separate from the other members. Well the first part of that last sentence is accurate and the second applies only to her. My ex-friend wasn't very open about her own experience in that band. Or perhaps I wasn't listening. There were many things you weren't allowed to ask that person about.

Anyway, we talked and talked. Had many common interests. And we sewed.

November 28, 2024

Winter Garden

Boy am I loving my winter garden. Leaves are my flowers, mostly, because the deer around here eat almost anything that blooms, and the leaves are leafing!

First, some traditional friends:

First camellia of the season (Debutante):

and the other camellia whose name I do not know is finally producing nicely:
These succulents have been really satisfying this summer and fall. Also thriving is the one that my friends hate that smells like burning tires (not shown):
What's driving me wild right now is the variety of colors and textures:

And red-on-red:

For some reason the maples that are in the front of the house somehow turn colors and lose their leaves at different times even though they are presumably the same kind of maple. At the upper left in the photo below is the maple that turns color last. The leaves on the lower branches are still green. And hidden behind it is the Bloodgood maple that we moved from the driveway to a more shaded spot earlier this year. This is how it's thanking us. It is still caged until it gets bigger and is deer proof:
Which brings me to my last photos from the morning. I am eagerly following the progress of the baby fruit on the citrus tree that has never fruited in the 11 years we've had it. I went into the back yard and as soon as I opened the door, there was loud stirring in the bushes and a juvenile deer scrambled to his feet. He had been sleeping in a tiny patch of leaves on the cement, in between the two statues of Thompson's gazelles (George and Emelda). Weirdest thing. This is George, with the patch of leaves behind him.
And a closeup of the bed the deer had made in the leaves, with Emelda's flank on the right:
Go figure.

November 23, 2024

Celebration

I am enjoying being super subliminal this weekend.

Friday kicked off with Pilates, therapy and a buns of steel walk with a friend.

Saturday I went to the Mormon library and did some research you can only do on the library wifi, which was nice. Things have changed over there. Nobody asked me to put my bag in a locker. I sat on a couch with my laptop and did my research in comfort, which is basically what I do at home. They had ten cent Laffy Taffys. I bought a lime and a banana. The ride home was super dull, but I'm listening to Alison Hammond's memoir and she's great company. Plus she's a really nice person. I got to do a segment with her once about 15 years ago and it was super fun. I felt like she was my new best friend, but now I realize that she is the entire world's best friend. Great gal.

I did a supermarket shop before coming home, and bought bogels (bogus supermarket bagels) for our birthday breakfast. A blueberry for mrguy, which is traditional (and gross, in my opinion). I had planned for us to get a mani-pedi, but mrguy's saying no. I don't want to get a mani-pedi alone on my birthday. 

Mrguy: I support your mani-pedi

Me: How is this support? This seems like saying no

Mrguy, laughing: By allowing you to have a mani-pedi

Me: Will you help me put up my Christmas arch?

Mrguy: Yes

Me: Would you make me more coffee?

Mrguy, incredulously: You want more coffee?

Me: That also sounds like a no.

Mrguy: I said I'd help with your arch

Me: Will you get the thermos from my desk and bring me my throat coat? Basically I want to ask you to do things and for you to do them.

We put up the arch together, and it looks fabulous. I sat underneath it in my dad's chair and listened to 1960s Japanese music. That, alone, was divine. I had a bit of a scare when my glamor boy decided to chew on a lower branch of the tree, but he lost the taste for it and moved on to other things.

Meanwhile I went on an extra buns of steel walk with a friend who is part goat. She was unaffected by the steep grade of the main drag over here, which we were trudging up. I usually drive, and have to hit the gas to get the car up that hill. Then is suggested we finish with the super steep stairs. She made an amazing lemon cake for my birthday, which we ate without (for me) worrying about calories.

We finished up by ordering sushi and watching some tv. The cats were very good boys. 

It was a lovely day.

Not bad, Birthday!

November 10, 2024

Election Week

Well that didn't go to plan. Less said, the better.

I filled my mind with work, and a visit to The Club Of My People, where I ate meatballs during a presentation about Norwegian Black Metal. One young man blurted out "My uncle was in that band but he wasn't good enough at singing or explosives," which was pretty funny. I sat next to a woman who showed us photos of her son mowing the grass on the ship burial mound in the backyard of their family property in Norway. A lot of us were people of a certain age coming full circle at this point in life. I met the secretary of the club who had been there ten years ago and felt too young for the scene. He now fits in. His sister dated someone in the Black Metal scene. I ate vegetarian meatballs and one of the best creme caramel of my life. The person who gave the presentation brought his own akvavit. We sang skol a lot. It's kinda like "the wave". You don't know who starts it or why, but once it's happening you have to go with it.


And here we are. New on the horizon is an examination of whether ADHD might frame some of my life's more special / least favorite moments. I don't think that this thought of would be surprising to the people who know me well. More on this as it develops. In the meantime, it's time to go grocery shopping and prepare for sumo tonight. Maybe I'll make some clam dip in celebration.


UPDATE: I looked up the ship burial. The site is recently being re-excavated. I thought the unusual name of the ship sounded familiar and realized that my 3rd ggfather had lived there on that farm in the 1860s.

Kinda cool.

November 5, 2024

And Now We Wait


Yup. Today's the day. I will descend into the garage and pull out the "Jessie Jackson Urges You To Vote" and hang it in the window, as is the custom. And there's nothing really to do. I'll wear my Vote earrings for one last time this year and hope for the best.

My guess? Kamala by a nose. 

Anything else would be tragic. This is not a drill. 

If he wins, his people will do everything they've been threatening / promising to do, and the world will be worse for it.

November 3, 2024

Near Miss

In the countdown to election day the old impulse control is really in abeyance.

Witness: two kittens on my "I just want to get rid of this now" group. I was almost going to see them this weekend, but luckily someone else got to them. They were adorable and fluffy and cute. I think that mrguy needs a new kitten now that his little girl is gone and the inky boy has decided that he's obsessed with me (at the age of 14). His response? "To be honest, those cats will outlive me and you will have to take care of them." And when pressed further at a different time he said that even if he lived a normal dude lifespan the cats would outlive him. Boo. Nothing like bringing us down. Undaunted I went back to the lady who was helping her friends adopt out the cats and they had found a family. I am happy for them.

In the meantime, the last cat I brought into the house found his way into the cabinet with the garbage can last night and he bit the electrical cord for the under-cabinet lights, which went dark. Oy. Well I wanted to ask the electrician a question anyway, so tomorrow I'll take care of that. Am I sure I want kittens?

Well of course.

The other thing that got away was the world's ugliest lamp, which would have really tied the pink Lady Bathroom together. It was also on the "get rid of" group. Wow. I wanted to see it in person. And even when I learned that it was 3' high, I wanted it and found a perfect ugly lampshade for it (I was planning to add some pink touches to it, to help integrate lady painters, angels and motorcycles). But then a woman said she had a friend who would love it as a housewarming gift, and I was given the perfect out. I told the giver to please give it to the other lady. For several hours I had the perfect amount of joy from this lamp without even owning it. Whew!


Happy Halloween 2024

I was late in finding this, but please enjoy and know that there are more ancient holiday post cards coming your way. This collection was saved by mrguy's grandmother when she was a child.

I would like the black cat to know that we share his feeling of horror in seeing two pumpkins kiss.

November 1, 2024

The Mom Report

I did it. I went to see my mom. It wasn't horrible. Her caregiver had told her I was coming the day before. She doesn't know who I am, but when the caregiver tells her that I live up the hill, she knows she's been to my house. The sofa is right next to the bed, so I sat there and held her hand. She said "What's new?" and of course I can't tell her because she is hard of hearing and hard of understanding. I showed her pictures of cats and she liked that.


I have really missed our caregiver and we had a really long hug. She's the best. She has *such* high standards for my mom's care and for what my mom gets for the money at the place where she lives. She told me one of her really long stories. Remember when we were interrupted once about 20 minutes into an engrossing story where she had just said "Nobody gives you a goat for nothing"? It was kinda like that.

The regular team of caregivers is a mother and daughter. Then the daughter's sister-in-law came over from Hawaii to help. She and her teenaged son lived with the daughter. She had a horrible abusive husband back in Hawaii who everybody in the family hated and wished she'd divorce.

Toward the end of the time the third lady was working for us she had really terrible health problems. Sounded like endometriosis or something. It would regularly cause her to stay home or go to the doctor or ER. Pretty devastating stuff that was life changing for her and for the family and for my family. Everybody was concerned, but luckily she was going to have surgery this year and get it taken care of. She hasn't worked for us for several years now, but she had clients in the building where my mom lives and I'd hear about how she was doing.

Fast forward to this week. I was asking about the daughter, and our caregiver started talking about the third lady. I heard that she'd gotten married, and that sounded like a good thing. I also see that either she or her new husband looks me up on Facebook, because they're suggested as friends. Anyhoo, the story goes like this: our former caregiver comes to the daughter one night, crying. She says I'm getting married. The daughter asks a bunch of questions, because as far as she knows there is no boyfriend, definitely a current husband, and what the heck? She says "You better tell my mom".

In her community our main caregiver is a person of substantial standing. She's the head of her family line, and everybody knows her. The idea that this side-relative, who everybody else at church knows, is getting married and there has been no preamble makes it look as if our caregiver's been hiding this knowledge. And once the daughter has shared with her that the relative is getting married, our caregiver senses what's up. So she sets a trap to get the woman to confess. She was over at her daughter's house after work, sitting at the dining table and eating dinner. She calls over to the woman: "Come have some dinner with me and we'll talk," she says. The lady keeps folding her laundry in her bedroom and says thanks but no. "Come get a bowl. There's plenty," she says. Then she encourages her to have a second bowl. The woman starts to cry. "Why are you crying? Is there something that my family has done to hurt you? What is wrong"? In the telling of this she seems to be saying this in all sincerity (also cause that's the person she is). "I'm getting married tomorrow". "Whaaaaat?"

The woman tries not to tell our caregiver the name of her future husband. She tells her the name of the father, who lives in Salt Lake City. Our caregiver knows him and figures out who the son is. He has eight children. And more than that our caregiver has figured out that all of the times she went to the doctor and the ER and was sick and maybe was going to have surgery (which was mysteriously canceled) she was with this guy. All of the extra shifts that those guys worked to fill in for the woman and times when we all jumped to rearrange schedules -- that was because she was lying to her family and my family about what was happening. Argh. Nothing to be done about it but I feel bad for our caregivers being lied to. Our primary caregiver also a son and he, too, would kindly rearrange his life around this woman. There's more to the story, but the punch line was that her new husband mopped the floor and then they both skipped town when rent was due.

At this point in the story a PAL (caregiver who works for the Facility) came to give my mom a shower and I pounced on the opportunity to leave. I kissed my mom on the cheek and she smiled.

Nobody gives you a goat for no reason.