Blanket Update

The new black blanket got itself washed (laundry is not something I can do, so anything different, that takes soaking, for instance, is kind of hit and miss as to when it gets done.)   Somewhat to my surprise, it looks fairly good on the bed.  It's lovely and soft and rather light weight, which is good for summer.  But oh my goodness, does it shed.  Their are little black balls of fluff on just about everything.  So now, not only am I covered in cat hair despite many de-fluffing attempts, all my clothes (and sheets) are now polka dot.

Dressing Dilemma

Have you ever noticed halfway through the day that your T-shirt is on inside out?  And then you can't be bothered to fix it because no one's going to be there to see you anyway?  And truly, the cats have no more fashion sense than I do.

Kaliko has just done her multi-times-a-day walk up and down my body, from toes to chest, placing those delicate little feet on my leg bones as if they were a highway, making sure to step on all the sore spots (and I adore her so much I rarely stop her.  She has this delightful  way of sitting on my chest and touching my lips ever so lightly with one paw, just as if she was kissing me.  Who can not love a cat.)   She didn't say a thing about my shirt.  (Crazy cat lady alert.)

An Afghan 30 years in the making

Today I finished putting together the 100+ granny squares for an afghan that I made 30 years or so ago.  The wool was so old it cost $1.39 a skein and was from Woolworths.  This was pre-internet and done without any kind of a pattern.  I think I had an example or picture and worked from there.  So I had all these blue varigated squares, each one incorrectly made.  And  after searching the internet for a way to put them together that didn't involve sewing them, I picked a method and in about a week I finished a task I started when I was just out of high school.  I remember working on it, sitting on my green loveseat between my parents in thèir almost mstching recliners.  This memory brings tears to my eyes, as I remember how much I was loved and how much I miss those two wonderful people.  Now if I could only decide what to do with it.

The Cat's Meow

I heard somewhere, or read somewhere recently that cats don't meow among themselves.  That it is something they do amongst humans.  I guess they make other noises to each other.  Certainly Kaliko seems to have enough to say at night, at the top of her voice, to fill a Russian novel.  No cats could be more spoiled than mine are, so what is she complaining about?

A Black Blanket

Shopping.  Hassel.  That one word just sums up the total experience for me.  First there is the total struggle of getting my scooter in and out of the mini van.  Then there is the fact that one afternoon, two to three hours of shopping, so totally exhausts me that I sleep for hours when I get home and am pretty wiped out the next day.

I desperately neede a new blanket, because the one I had looked like it had been dragged out of a trash can, having lived there for a year.  I wanted a nice soft blanket.  They seem to be available.  But I could not find a soft blanket in a colour I could live with.  Lots of different shades of brown, which I hate.  And for some reason, an entire shelf of bright red.  But no soft colours to go with the texture.  No blue, no green.  So I ended up with black.  It sounded odd, and I spent many minutes staring at the paltry selection trying to decide.  And what do you think?  It actually looks great on the bed.  So the trek turned out fairly well.  Nothing startling to say.  Just a good end to a pasttime I often dread.

Deer Don't Eat Daffodils

So said my counselor.  Can't remember how we got on to how the deer eat all her tulips and roses, but don't seem to like daffodils.  Just had to record that phrase.  Would'nt it make a great book title?

Cleanliness is Next to Impossible

I've been trying to move for about 20 years.  I still live in the house I was born in.  The odd house that has never moved but has had three different addresses as the city moved out to engulf us.  Now where there were fields and trees behind my house, there are houses upon houses.  I have a very clear recollection when it started.  I was 17 and our next door neighbours of forever years had sold up and now the bit of land between the two houses was being made ready for its own house.  I remember going down to the garage, which had the only window facing in the right direction, and being horrified while I watched bulldowzers destroy the lovely pussywillows.  This became the quintesential image that stuck in my mind as all future devestation in the name of progress, and, yes, needed money, happened.  My childhood was gone and life would funtamentally never be the same again.  And it hasn't been.
Fast forward to me going to graduate school only because my wonderful parents let me live at home.  FF to my Dad's terminal heart disease that lasted 17 years when they had given him two years to live.  My mother would take care of my father and then I would take care of her, putting her to bed because she was so exhausted.  FF past my father's death 10 or 11 months to my mother's terminal cancer, pancreatic and liver, diagnosis and the 24 hour a day care so she would not have to die in the cold hospital.  I regret none of this care.  In fact it warms my heart that I was able to give back.  But after they were both gone, I clung to the house as the only source of security I had.  Now 20 years later and I have rheumatoid arthritis and find I cannot take care of such a large house with so many stairs.

But the problem is I now have 3 generations worth of stuff to get rid of.  (My grandmother's things were shipped here when she moved and then died,)  We are of Scottish ancestery and I find it very difficult to throw anything away that might be useful in the future.  Consequently I seem to move things from place to place.  The city only allows one bag of garbage per week.  How can you clean things out in only one bag?

That is probably more of an excuse than anything.  But moving m



Fast forward to me going to graduate school and only being able to afford it because my wonderful parents let me live at home.  FF