Getting organized

A week ago Wednesday, all the boxes and furniture came through the door. The three fellows moving me were ahead with a first load, and were shoulder to shoulder, facing me and blocking the door when I came up. Welcome Home, Joanne they said in unison, then went on about their business.

Kamaria made this sign to greet me. Still sorta raises tears. But down to the nuts and bolts. Or other house mates. This is Kai.

A week plus later, and all the boxes are empty and much is put somewhere. I'm well into the point of recognizing mistakes in organizing that will be rectified soon.

The problem with changing things is that change has become painful. Truly painful. My ribs are the smallest fraction of the new pain. Laura and I struggled manfully over the weekend to shift my living room chair to its new home. It was about the same as moving the loom, except we did not remove doors. The chair remains blocking a small space. Laura is back in school and I am in too much pain to try it myself. So, here's a tour.

Before she left Sunday, Laura put a new warp on the loom.

That the warp is on a ready to be tied comforts me. There is my towel inventory! I had to cancel the last two shows for want of inventory. On a happy note, Beth and I are going to pick up the new table this Saturday, the date of the last Flea show this season.

I am tackling tying on one bout at a time. Two tied, nine to go. That is my heating pad, there on the table.

The tables are a small error to be corrected. The larger table with two sewing machines needs interchanged with the longer table of "stuff". The book case in the front left needs to be in another place!  I hope Laura is here this weekend!

Remember my lovely 6x8' bathroom! Still here, and so are the purple towels!

And finally, for now, my nook. Look what fits! My stone lamp, the Fat Man, and my tens unit, charging at the end of the white cord. I finally fell for a tens unit, which arrived yesterday. I've used it three times, so far. After all these years of avoiding one for not knowing how it worked, I see I was a woos. Having none of the electrical implant contraindications, there really is no reason not to paste one on for a go.

I find the tens unit to be exactly like my dentists' heated massage chair, sans the heat, and with a very short battery life. Has anyone else tried a tens unit? Have one implanted?

Going dark for a couple of days

I truly do not know when I'll show up again. I have little faith in "wireless", and it won't be up to me to fire it up, either, so I'll just unpack boxes and take naps.

John and Mike moved the loom last night. Thank goodness they both understood reconstructing things the same way they deconstructed. Every door encountered had to be removed. More and more of the loom had to be removed. 

I tried very hard to keep the warp beam intact, but when all four cross members of the legs were gone, it tumbled to the floor. Oops! That finally did the trick, and the brake assembly was far easier to reassemble than I could believe. I vaguely remember my sister and I encountering that brake for the first time and wondering what  LeClerc had been thinking all these years.

It was a long evening, and the only picture I took was the floor of lint. I will have Kamaria set up the air filter before I turn the first warp.

When I was home again, I took a shower and fell into bed. My stint in the country, one block away, left me congested, and choking on post nasal drip. Eventually I got up and took a decongestant. Just one. Then I might as well have been a toddler, jumping up and down in the crib, not about to go to sleep.

I fired up the computer, brought up EBay and typed in "enamel top kitchen table". Yes, K was as disappointed as I was that the one we anticipated was no more.

I went through two pages of enamel tables, then went back to the first page and emailed K that there were two tables on the page that I would have in a heartbeat. Was she up for a day trip? I went back to bed, and still did not sleep for more than a couple of hours. That put a dent in today.

When I conferred with her this morning, K and I had the same first choice. I hung up and bought it. Too bad to the fellow who put in a low bid! It goes in 61's kitchen now.

Closer and closer

I wonder what is more personally saddening than a house in transit. I'm posting pictures as a reminder to not do this again. This morning Blake, his dad and a friend came as arranged, at 8:30 a.m., to remove the washer and dryer to Blake's new house! Together with Hamilton and another friend, they have bought a house. No more rent, which is especially high in downtown Cleveland, where Hamilton lives.

There is most of my bedroom and some of my kitchen, plus a void for a new tenant's laundry appliances.  Remember when I fell several weeks ago and the local fire brigade came and picked me up?  They could not bear to walk past that door and they left me with a stern lecture on the need to evacuate in an emergency.

There are the minor effects of my studio, against this wall. The loom, the sewing tables, the shelving and, oh, yes, the spool rack. remain inside. For the first time the quiet has overwhelmed me. The radio is packed, so I turned on the news program on the television.

I spent much of the day outside, working on transport of flower equipment. My neighbor Larry came over to gossip and to help.  Lambie and Pig had been cleared from the steps to facilitate the trip of the washer and dryer, and I was cogitating on where to put them for the time being.

Larry admired them, and I offered him their care and upkeep. He reached down to take one in each hand, and was stopped cold by their weight. These were poured forty years ago, when concrete was concrete! Now they grace the short wall in front of Larry's house.

Tomorrow will find me out again, for an organizational trip to the shed. My plan is to put all to be moved to the front and what I will abandon to the back.

Living rough

Blogging is the end of my day, the full circle bit of a day done and dusted. A check on everyone and then to bed. Bed is just behind me, a good part of small living.

Amazing what an old lady with a cane and a chair on wheels can make happen! There was one unexpected occurrence. Linda told my sister to just take the table away. That was a wrench, in several ways. And so, I made the red chair my table.

I intended to begin emptying outdoor flower pots today, even in the rain. But I've been distracted by a conversation with John, who will move my loom. He cannot bear to do it in the rain, and we put it off to next week. In any event, all timetables are continually thrown to the wind.

In another misunderstanding, I thought the rooms would be available this coming weekend, and began making plans for important preliminaries to begin this weekend. However, I missed by a week! So, there will be a mad flurry commencing next week.  I have put next Wednesday off limits; that is the actual moving day.

Before that happens, I must get the rug put down in the new studio. There it is, on wheels, ready to rock and roll. I figure worst case it will be the last thing in and first off the moving truck. It must go on the floor before boxes and furniture and a loom are put on top. 

Every cupboard, closet, drawer is empty and mostly packed. Much is in motion. Blake will take the washer dryer. That's great. I intended to abandon them to the next tenants. Perhaps he'll take the little red sofa, too. 

Well, morning is up. I think I'll fold laundry and wait for the next event. I am sleepy from the rain. I'll find more to say next time.

Early to bed, early to rise, blablablablablabla

Unless I have a damn good reason, I get up at eight in the morning. But since I've had the impending move on my mind, if (when!) I wake earlier, I think "Why not?", and get up and face the day. I'm afraid this could become a habit, and one thing this move will have me doing is getting up with the birds. I remember I used to wake with the birds at 61. The crows! Oh, those crows!

I really have little to talk about. Or, a lot. I listened to an NPR show recently, a round table of NE Ohio leaders, discussing what we are going to do to accommodate the coming influx of immigrants from other parts of the country. My first thought, as I began listening, was "where the hell are they coming from? Africa? Asia? Eastern Europe?"

The answer is No, they are coming from our West, South, Midwest. They are leaving heat, fires, coastal erosion, hurricanes, water shortages. But NE Ohio? Come on! We have lost population annually since the decline of unionized manufacturing, in the fifties.

It was a good listen, however. They discussed our infrastructure, our housing stock, our people, our power grid, our water, our ability to improve and increase what we do have to offer. Ann happened to call that afternoon, and I told her about the influx of population apparently set to happen. And she said I'd better believe it; it's happening all over Wisconsin!

She has several new kennel customers who are transplants from California, Washington, Arizona. Their biggest adjustment was the cold. The consensus was, "back home" they would have hunkered down behind closed doors to wait for spring. "But these people! They go out in it! Put on a lot of clothes and a hat and gloves and ski. Sled ride. Hike."

So that's something to look forward to, a lot of new people to meet.

Back when Beth was doing the Flea with me, she told me about a new recipe, Zucchinibutter Spaghetti. The first word is Zucchinibutter. She said the zucchini becomes the butter. I finally made it, earlier this week, and texted her, the only thing better than Zucchinibutter Spaghetti is ZBS the second night. Recipe follows.

My house is turning into a cardboard box. I got up this morning at seven, and was packing shortly.

Cathy brings boxes most every day; these are all that I have left. I should come out even.

Not this weekend, but next, I should be out disassembling my plants. With apologies.

I love how the mandevilla twine around their pole, and I hope they forgive me next year.

And with no further ado, Zucchinibutter Spaghetti. You won't be sorry.