Confessions of a Grandma

A bright sun rising woke me up at about 5:30 this morning. (Note to self, close curtains at bedtime.) By the time I actually got out of bed, there was such a thick grey haze that I thought maybe I had just dreamed that sun. If you looked straight up into the sky, the bright blue was there, but the haze was all around...smoke from Canadian forest fires that is blowing across northern New England. I went out for my walk, but I don't know that that was the healthiest exercise to do today. I could actually smell the smoke. We worked on the deck for a bit. Otherwise it was a quiet, largely unobserved Memorial Day for us. We had our picnics while camping earlier this week and I went to the cemetery yesterday. Given its purpose, I wonder why some people so happily wish us "Happy Memorial Day" but at least I have not seen Memorial Day greeting cards. I kind of like the Rolling Thunder idea as a tribute. As a kid, we had to memorize Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. Now I have re...

Chittenden, VT Camping Scene Today was a busy one. I made out Sunday morning breakfast and I was reminded of another Sunday morning ritual. Mike and I were visiting his brother (may he rest in peace) and sister-in-law (of whom I can say nothing nice, so I'll say next to nothing), and they toasted each other with orange juice in champagne glasses. SHE explained that they had a champagne toast on the Sunday after they were married in Las Vegas. So they celebrated that precious moment every Sunday morning, substituting the orange juice. This caused Mike and I to look at each other with major eye rolling, I'm sure even though I don't remember that specifically. What I do remember is that Mike and I had failed to celebrate out tenth wedding anniversary three weeks before that because we had both forgotten it entirely. We may not have an ounce of sentimentality between us, but we can, and did, silently communicate that we would not share that particular story at that par...

Gee, go out of the loop for a few days and look what happens? Arkansas Patti is bowing out of the blogosphere? Can that be true? Oh, that makes me sad to think of no more "The New Sixty." We had a relaxing few days of camping and canoeing. The hot weather broke before we left with a most spectacular lightning and thunder storm--very glad that was before we were sleeping in a tent. Tomorrow will be a big garden day. I put out my cucumber plants before we left and came home to find that some critter had eaten them right up. GRRR.

It was an easy week of substituting. I have to say, though, that the whole "working" thing really cuts into the effortless routine of my retired life. Nice to have a change and then appreciate my real life all the more. It's getting up to an alarm clock buzzing that I just really, really do not want to do anymore! Tomorrow, Mike and I are taking off for a camping trip. The record has been broken for high temperatures for this time of year so it will be very nice to sit in a quiet, shady spot near some cool water. I hope the bugs that are usually so problematic in June have not come out early just because it's been warm. If they have, we do have a screened "porch" on the tent and we always carry bug spray. Because we canoe into the camp site, we try to travel light. All the same, I will be packing a book, some magazines, and a knitting project--can't just sit and watch fish jump for three days. If you click HERE , you can see views of the reservoir. We w...

Oh. boy! It looks like we are in for some nice weather in the coming week. I skipped the deck today and mowed the lawn instead. Mike spent the two plus hours it took me to do that scraping the deck and helping me "help" him. First, I could not get the lawn tractor to start. I checked the fuel; I tapped on the carburetor; I tried again and again; I walked away and then went back and tried again. Nothing. I finally went to get Mike and told him I couldn't start the lawn tractor. He stopped his scraping and went into the garage--that darn tractor started with his first turn of the starter. He went back to his job; I could not get the tractor to move. Once again, I interrupt him. The parking brake was on. I did not even know the lawn tractor had a parking brake. After a half hour of mowing I went around the lilac bush in the back yard. It's on a small but fairly steep hill. I tipped the tractor into the bush and got it thoroughly stuck. I couldn't back out and I could...

We put in a few hours of deck stripping today. My usual mode of attack is to keep going and going until I can't move anymore, but Mike is all about doing a section at a time and stopping before the job seems overwhelming. This is a good thing in that there are still the other things that need to get done--meals, laundry, basic clean-ups in kitchen and bath. Everything else is going to pile up and I'll need a solid week of housework to tidy up the inside and outside. Cleaning one thing always seems to make something else dirty. We are making progress but it is slow and it is a grind. This may tu rn into a summer long project. Some of my irises bloomed out yesterday. That made me happy. I'm still nursing tomato and cucumber plants in my basement window. At least the deck project keeps me from putting them out prematurely. Mike is sitting down with a beer. I am going to relax by heading out to the garden store for a look around. "Idea" shopping.

Mike and I have been slowly chipping away at the old, peeling stain finish on our back deck. It is a tedious and tiresome task. We bought some cheap stuff that was supposed to lift off the finish. It didn't. Today, we bought a can of stuff that cost two and a half times as much , but actually seems to have some effect. So between goopy chemical solvent, back-breaking scraping, and a pressure washer, we actually saw some progress tonight. Not so much progress that this little project won't take the whole of the weekend, though. I think that we read the last time we did the deck that an opaque stain lasts longer. That didn't work out for us and now we are stuck with trying to get it all off so we can go back to the clear water seal coating. At least this has cured me of any grand plans to redecorate inside the house. I so tired now that a soft chair with a firm pillow for my back, a cup of sleepytime tea, and mindless television look just like the perfect home to me.