Misfits and they slipped on the bananas

The squirrels were out Thursday morning to check on the pumpkin seeds. Word has got out.

This is a favorite food and they lost no time in finding and setting up to guard and eat them. 

Thursday the misfits insulated bag and ice block went out early, good thing because the delivery came very early shortly after nine am.

And, yes, we have no bananas. They were supposed to appear on top of the box in some fancy bag. 

I wonder if the drivers didn't get the message, since for years they've been delivering just a box. I reported it and their system must be blinking, because they only credited me with one bunch, instead of both. No doubt they'll fix this. They're good about it.

So, extra canned goods for the food pantry, cranberries for next week's sauce. I'll make it ahead and freeze it, not knowing when we celebrate this year, HS always working Thanksgiving.  

Here's the cranberry sauce in progress

Garlic paste because it's so useful everywhere I use garlic.  Spinach and parsley for greens, to be added into tofu, see it there, dishes and other things. A bunch dropped into hot soup is good, just wilts it enough. 

Apples as usual, blueberries for desserts and maybe muffins this week. Sardines for quick protein sandwiches. Diced tomatoes get in everywhere. One of my easy meals, really more assembly than cooking,  is chickpeas and tomatoes heated together with seasoning. It works like a stew, spinach gets in there, too. 

Thursday early the car buyer called, wondering if I'd like an earlier appointment, he had cancellations Thursday. But I left it at Friday, not wanting to be rushed. I didn't want to be wrangling groceries and the car sale together.

About anniversaries: I remember none of the dates of death of any relative other than one brother when I was young, and Handsome Partner, because that was also Handsome Son's birthday. I remember everyone's birthday though. I think it's better to remember them then, anyway.

Happy day everyone. It's okay to remember or forget, often it's not our choice.

Curry leaves, knitting/stitching group, Textiles and Tea

 My neighbor stopped in with these curry leaves, from  her garden

Curry leaves, great deep flavor for practically any savory dish. I'll share with friends.

A few leaves have now gone to friends at the Tuesday Knitting Group.

New participant today, crocheting a scarf for an October trip to Wisconsin, she'll be ready for fall.

She also won a ribbon recently at the County Fair for a mancala board she crocheted, featuring waves and 3D ducks in the design. She's very creative, good to know her.

I did a brief demo with the spurtzleur, using a length of yarn, so a spinning friend could see the action, and try it.

Our conversation ranged over state fairs, spinning, flax, Viking ships, library work, heat waves, the DMV, kitchen renovation cooking with curry leaves, slot and tab fabric books, the art of teaching, YouTube demos, Sheep and Wool Festivals, and housing regulations.

Home again, just in time, as I pulled in, to see the first hummingbird of the year,  working on the Russian sage flowers. Too fleeting for a picture, but thrilling.

Then I sat out on the deck,  with a cup of tea, having a stare-off with a squirrel,  probably waiting for me to go away and let him collect the cantaloupe rind he left lying around on the deck

Textiles and Tea brought Caroline Hicks Sawyer, a weaver in floating warps, making massive installation art.

Here's a work in progress on the loom

earlier she used to create functional clothing

She was an electrical engineer, then in retirement developed her lifelong weaving interest into a serious art career. She uses various looms including the rigid heddle loom, and likes to move the warp relative to the heddle rather than the other way around.

Her physicist husband collaborates on some technical aspects of the work, designing bits of equipment to help float the warp threads evenly, hang installations and other ideas needing a  second opinion!

Happy day everyone! Weave the way you want, whatever anyone says.

Pi Day and puzzles

 Also Einstein's birthday.   Happy birthday, dear Albert.

Meanwhile the powerhouse of the small wild animal world threw bits of sticks at my front door, landing on the mat, and defied me when I looked out. You lookin at me? And got busy either burying or retrieving nuts in the lavender.

After a doctor visit for a bone density injection, when she pronounced me and my blood doing fine, I had a walk in the warm 70°f  sunshine.

Pictures of the pond taken between gangs of old golfing duffers, and I tossed back a couple of balls from many yards outside the boundary

And here's a thing to consider, picture taken while waiting for my doctor.

This is where I think  artists, this one, anyway, diverge from the rest of the world. At first I thought this was just a little graphic to break up a dull space.

Then I thought, no, this is a multicultural community, it's probably something written in an alphabet I'm not familiar with.

Finally, after ages I realized it was a literal drawing of how the paper towel dispenser dispenses. I just read things like this so differently from the way the designer intended.

There was a series of graphics like this on the Garden State Parkway, warning people, back before Ezy-Pass, to get ready to toss toll coins into containers. 

One of them I used regularly, having read the text without understanding the graphic, was apparently a really lovely graphic design, balanced, harmonious, contrasting shapes. After  several years of driving the Parkway, I realized it was an image of a hand throwing coins into the container. Oh.

Never mind, my doctor thinks I'm lovely. And there's a baby elephant who really dgaf.

Happy day, everyone, let your ears fly at will!

Shrimp and glove ministry

Mild and lovely day, and I got a half hour walk in, such a treat, my strength was up to it. Sometimes I'm not quite up to it, but the mild weather, nearly 70°f, made it much easier. The cold weather takes energy just keeping warm.

And the squirrel is no doubt getting his trace minerals from the cherry tree branches next door.

I made a great lunch, curried shrimp over jasmine rice, with pineberries and blackberries, yogurt and cane sugar for dessert.

Here's the shrimp, rice ready, and the sauce reducing. I really enjoy making this dish, enough for two lunches.

Getting it to the table was not without incident. I served it, then there was a young real estate agent at the door, inviting me to her Open House down the street, which I declined with thanks.

Then the shrimp was cold, so I warmed it and served it again. Then Gary was at the door needing help with little lidded containers, did I have any, for his oil based stain. So if it spilled, not so traumatic, I suppose.

Then the shrimp was cold so I warmed it again and served it again, and it was very good, likewise the dessert, a favorite combo of fruit and yogurt.

This afternoon I finished the first of the current pair of gloves, using two yarns together, warm tweedy effect.

After the second is done I'm wondering about making a neck gaiter in the same yarn in Tunisian crochet. I'm thinking simple stitch, which gives a nice flat fabric, not lacy, so anyone could wear it. I'll see. 

I need a new project and it might as well be for the knitting ministry.

Still reeling a bit from the fireplace verdict, also knowing the condo water heater is required to be replaced this year, very expensive,  I keep remembering to breathe, and

This is a helpful thought just now.

Happy day, everyone, good Monday! Stay strong and, if you can't, lie under your cape for a bit.

 

Squirrel antics, package, postie note

Yesterday was a full day, every minute packed with seconds, as they say.

Nextdoor neighbor with broken fridge can't get repair done till the fan they ordered arrives, five days.

So I cleared space and he came over with some stuff he won't need before the repair. Left it outside. Looked as if he'd sprayed with sanitizer. So I brought it in with gloved hands, stored in the bottom, unused fridgedrawers, shut them. Washed gloves on hands, washed hands. The new normal.

Then he texted me for a shopping list since he was going anyway. He even scored toilet paper.  I washed the fruit in a bit of detergent, bowl of water.  Other stuff for freezer. I wonder if the virus survives freezing. That would be nice.

Later other neighbors from across the street came with fresh-baked banana bread, left outside, and an offer to shop. Other friends texted. Son texts every morning anyway, always has. And we message in the evening. So I'm pretty well supervised!

And my lovely letter carrier, wanting to save my walk to the postbox, left a package on the step, complete with personal note.

I will write about the contents of the pkg in https://beautifulmetaphor.blogspot.com in a bit.

Meanwhile a squirrel doing acrobatics to get the little thorns on the wild cherry tree, what's left of it. They only like the thorns, eat them all winter after the fruit's gone. Does any naturalist reading here, we have a few, know what's the attraction?  My researches have yielded nothing.

Pictures today not great for various reasons, but you blog with the pictures you've got!

Boud vs Squirrel update

As you see, the squirrels continue to get more than their fair share of the suet.

But they have been completely unable to steal the container, so birds are getting a look in. I'm calling this a draw.

That giant begonia I used as a hide to shoot from is the one I blogged about a while back, part of which I started from a single leaf stuck into potting soil then left alone. Now taller than I am.

Hard-won knowledge, human and squirreline

So I had to scan and print some documents, important stuff for the HOA, and there's tax season coming up where you can't get the forms from the IRS any more. You have to go online, download and print.

So Handsome Son and I got to work last night  scanning and printing.  The scanning went just fine. The printing hardly went at all.  All the hardware worked fine, all the little lights and beeps and machines talking to each other.  But the printing was so faint it wasn't there.  

Many workarounds later, involving two sets of cartridges and two printers, and adjustments to the software, and all the permutations thereof, and still no success, I said to HS I didn't want to waste any more of his time, I'd postpone the printing until I got my temper back and tempered my language somewhat.

Then it occurred to me that the printer and scanner setup is in a room that gets colder than the rest of the house.  And when I had my downstairs fireplace insert working to warm the place, the thermostat didn't come on for ages.  

The houseplants upstairs love this, they don't mind a bit of cool, but I wondered if the actual ink in the cartridges had gone thick and slow, like oil in a cold engine...hm.  Anyway, I brought them downstairs overnight, and tried again to print this morning, and it actually worked. Such a low tech solution to what we both assumed was a high tech problem.  Throwing our energies into the wrong place.

Where the squirrel comes in is that the other day, you'll recall I caught him knocking down and dragging away the suet holder and being foiled by the fence and the weight of the suet block.  I put another cake of suet out, separately, which he quickly found and tried to swipe.  Again too heavy for him to get under or over the fence.  So he abandoned it.

This morning crowds of birds at the big suet block he'd abandoned and forgotten, while the squirrel applied his whole strength to yanking around the almost empty holder, tossing it, stamping on it, throwing it around gnawing on it to open it, and seemingly unaware of the whole free block of the stuff three feet away there for the taking...

As I watched him this morning, probably cursing in squirrelese, I thought, yeah, I know you you feel!