How to really, really lo

I am inured to sleep! Add to that extra hours sleeping off broken bones, and I’m a prime example of a sleep slug. I reveled in hours of sleeping off my craniotomy, took a year and a half off and broke my femur. A sleep addict bonanza.

When I retired from weaving, I took to sleeping nine or ten hours a night.  I remember I also had my hip replaced and then suffered a stroke, so who knows. I slept and enjoyed it. 

Going on nine at night my eyes begin clapping shut. I must be involved in something really, really good to make it to ten. In my defense, I am up by eight in the morning. Unless I go back to bed for half an hour.

I was up at seven this morning (mother nature), and saw, down at the other end, Laura might not be up. She wasn’t. “What are you going to do?", I asked, and she mumbled “I don’t know”. It’s been seven years, and she’s missed the bus exactly once in the past.

Eyes still cranky from yesterday’s exam, I said, “OK, we’ll leave at 7:30,” to drop her at school something before eight.  I got dressed, put eye drops in my cranky eyes, which I seldom must. I took care of the cat, and met the kid in the living room. She got to school on time and I came home for breakfast.

Then I went to Ravenna, Ohio, to sign some custody paperwork. Google maps put me on the backroads, an interesting half hour plus looking at all the storm damage from the weekend. Fortunately, I knew my own way back; Google was oblivious to a bridge out and I listened to that exasperated tsk-tsk, click-click (U turn!) a couple of times. Turned that off!

Now, real trouble came right up on me. Cards! Cake, from Birthday Sunday! Not any cake, but cake with custard filling. Peter was absent, and his piece couldn’t go to waste. Or the half piece Greg passed over. When I took it, I admitted to being pretty darn high on sugar. Afterwards I admitted I might as well be drunk. The two of them shuffled and dealt and chatted. I just played. Oh, yes, and I won.

They were thoughtful enough to ask if I would be OK driving home. I was, and took a nap until Laura came in. No, until she called me for supper. Now I’ve read blogs, read the news, wrote a blog. I’ve stretched time out to eight in the evening.  If I get ready for bed very slowly I can stretch bedtime to almost eight-fifteen.

I have things to do tomorrow, and I intend to be up to them! No sugar!

Monday morning, rescued

                         

If you live west of the Mississippi, it probably wasn’t a great weekend, either. I can tell you about the weekend east of the Mississippi. Rough.  The warm temperatures were completely ruined by the heavy, pelting drops of rain and then the increasing force of blowing wind.

I went out to investigate some rattling down the street, and discovered a length of my downspout bouncing in front of one neighbor’s house, and another piece in my opposite neighbor’s front yard. 110 pounds of me had a sore trial against sixty odd mile per hour wind gusts vs. gutter rescue.

First I took the uphill, wind to the back side. It had to be done, but the wind almost put me down. I had to park myself and jam the cane tip at an angle and lean against it. But I got the little curvy end from Dan’s front yard, and turned back down the street for the long length of downspout actually dancing up the road toward me.  I got it, too, and stashed both pieces leeward of the trash cans.

By the time I went to bed at ten, my exterior walls took solid blasts, but my trash cans were intact, and I was tired. I also was not looking forward to today, and an eye exam and the need to select new frames. I hate eye exam day, and being sight impaired for the rest of it.

This morning trash cans remained intact, but the rain barrel was toes up, faucet down at the foot of the steps. Laura passed it further down the drive on the way to school, so it blew there. I got it on its bottom and left for the dreaded appointment.

Last year I needed one lens upgraded, but passed. I like my frames too much, and could not bear giving them up for a week to have new lenses made.  This year both lenses needed another boost, as I knew they would, and I made my way from the exam to glasses, shoulders sagging.

There was a new optician at the desk.

I sat down across and launched my tale. I like these frames so much I did not get new glasses a year ago. But this summer my glasses were involved in the tragic accident to my femur, and have never been put right in spite of several trips here for re-adjustment!

“Well, put them down on the table,” said the new optician, and she rocked them up and down on their current pivot point. Axis? Who knows. “This is a very simple fix,” she announced. It wasn’t that simple; three trips to the back room were required. Then they fit perfectly.

And there I sat, torn between perfect frames and new lenses.

“Now,” said Ms. Magic, “let’s see if these frames are still in production.” Two and a half years later, they still are! She apologized for the extra couple of days to get the lens templates, but so what!? I will be seeing again, through perfect frames.

Weather or not

I really haven't a lot to say about the weather. We have just a slice of the current storm going by. Wind, large rain bullets, and fifty degrees, though it's not pleasant out there. The wind is up to fifty miles per, so the entire scene is weird. When I hear a trash bin go by, I look to see if it's mine. 

The power has been iffy all morning. Never exactly going off, but setting off my battery back up for the computer. Eventually I gave in and shut down. When I went to make lunch, I see the electronic clocks in the kitchen fared poorly.

My towel flags are on the downhill side now. There are almost 150 around the world, doing their job. I am pleased for them. That many towels only mean 75 kitchens, but that's good. 

With luck, I can be done and have the loom battened down for the move. Then I believe I'll try a pop-up venture that's been on my mind a while. I do need to talk to the gallery owner, but nothing will happen before fall, so plenty of time.

I need to make some sample fabrics this summer from the sort of thread now available to me. Gone are the days of my pick of the gleanings from any sweater factory or dye house in the East. But I still see wild and crazy in my head, and I can make it work.

Here is a garment I lifted from Pinterest, and have no attribution except that and its negative number. Too much fabric for me, but an example of putting so many things together.

I'll see if Diane would represent me on an "if come" basis. Not even a dedicated space, but silly things here or there, on a pop up basis. Now you see it, now you don't.

It is what it is; we are what we are

Stephen Colbert said last night, concluding his monologue, "Donald Trump isn't committing a crime, Donald Trump is a crime." The sun is shining today, the world is relatively good, and so you see how I drifted into a post title.

What do I have to talk about? Almost nothing. Have you read the news this morning? But, it's out of our control. It's like the Yellowstone geyser. When will it blow, not if.

So, here in my little corner of Boston Township, USA, my goodness, you all sure do like the red that I already decided will be the only red I will use in future. 

My new weaving career began with towels I intended to give away. I bought and wove several colors, including a red that appealed--on my computer's screen.

It was a screeching color, and I will not confess where the first towels are now. My new red is called, by the red namer, cerese. It makes me wonder if there are vials named red, green and blue locked up somewhere, like a meter and a kilogram are perfect, precise, and locked away.

I don't see my cat first thing in the morning. Sometimes I hear Laura leave at 6:30. That's nice; I turn over and go back to sleep until 8:00. I get up, fill Toby's food and water, clean his cat box, and then take care of my breakfast. 

Mr. Cat may appear by then, or I go looking. It's so big here! I look on the sofa. Then I look in the studio. Studio it was today, as it has been most of the winter, on the bench, by the register.

That's the next color, down there on the floor, periwinkle. I assure you, there is no standard periwinkle locked in a vault, but this is a nice rendition. I'm also amused at this little scenario.

The box of bobbins originated about where Toby's back end is on my bench. That means he pushed them far enough along to jump on, then pushed the rest of the way off. Any further retribution he considered, for being on his bench, seemed to be put off until this morning. Now it's 1:30 p.m., and his morning has yet to commence. The bobbins are cleared away and put where they really belong.

And finally, here is where I live now:

Laura has the master, the living room has a sofa and two chairs. Bedroom #2 has the loom, Bedroom #3 has me.  It was fine for three people, or two and a loom. But for one, come this June, way too much. 

The final choice of floor plans isn't in yet, but one bedroom units are pretty much the same. Living room, kitchen, laundry room, bathroom, bedroom. So I downloaded a typical plan:

Pretty close to perfect, don't you think! And going on half as much. Mr. Cat and I will be in pig heaven. I'll pass on the cottage garden, but all the shabby garden concrete decorations will come, and all the spiffy ones, too.

Another winter storm

There is a storm warning for tomorrow for winter weather, ice, snow, freezing rain, from the time tomorrow begins, at midnight, until the temperature rises above freezing tomorrow afternoon. The high temperature will be thirty eight degrees. 

There I am in northeastern Ohio. In the blue belt of rain is a weather symbol I cannot interpret. A couple of chicken feet. Are they attached to a chicken, head first in a gutter overflowing with  icicles?  I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt and calling it sunshine emerging from freezing rain.

There is so little to tell you about, aside from slippery slush as I came home from cards today. I told Laura she should salt or risk a fall in the morning. She came in and said she saw what I meant.

Nancy had a double pinochle today. Woo-hoo. We still lost.

I'm ready to start again with towels. Here are the first three dozen plus I will begin with.

The colors are back, left to right, cerise (red), pumpkin, cayenne (an orange/brown spicy). In the front are four cream and two plum. I'll start tomorrow sending emails. I'm not going anywhere, until the sunshine melts the chickens out of the gutter.