July Ramblings

 Almost two weeks from the last post.  What can I say?  It's July.  Hot, sticky, humid (100% in the mornings). And the rain it raineth every day.   July is just here to be endured.  Time for randomness.

I took this picture the other night, trying out the night mode on my phone.  Mundanely, I was just going out to put up the chickens for the night.  But the view has such a lovely fae magical quality to it.

My favorite picture of Bob, in the water with the ray, popped up in my FaceBook memories.  Seven years ago.

And, of course, a dozen people or so hit the "like" button.  But when I looked at the list of names, it hit me that half of them have never met him - they're FB friends, or people that I met after I lost him.  They're just being nice to me (which, indeed, is nice) but it sort of underscores that I now have a Life Without Bob.  I'm just Ann.

I got another hit yesterday.  Rob, Amanda, and Zeke came over for a visit; Amanda wanted to eat at the Volcano Hot Pot.  Zeke has recently gotten interested in the idea of remote control planes, so we were going to go look at some afterwards - the hobby shop is in the same strip center as the restaurant.  Except that it was permanently closed, and my first thought was "where will Bob get his paint and supplies now??"

I do sometimes still get out for a bit of yardwork in the morning (if I wake up early enough).  A few mornings ago I was clearing the driveway and thought, as I have a few times for the last couple of years, that there was a pine tree that really should come down if I ever got anyone out.  I looked at it - it was full, and maybe 15-20 feet high, but the trunk was only 4 or 5 inches in diameter.  What the heck - went and got my chainsaw and took it down.  Of course, then I realized that I had a rather full pine tree lying in my driveway that needed to be cut up and dragged off.  It still feels sometimes like there's a stranger living in my skin; 5 years ago I would never have thought that I would just grab a chainsaw and do something like that.

Infinity Con.  In the previous three July blogs I have talked about going to our local Infinity Con. Not this year, because I didn't go.  I've written a bit about doing a lot of other stuff - cleaning out the barn, downsizing, yard work - but I'm in a creative slump.  A puppet did not get made this year.  The real reason I go is to put myself out there - to walk around with a puppet, get noticed, talk to people.  I look at my post last year and saw that I mentioned that I could pretty much see everything there in an hour.  The tickets are $30.  So if I'm only just another face in the crowd wandering around for an hour, well, it's not worth it.  I think that in previous years I thought something would come of it, more than a "how cute!  Can I take a picture with it?"  That maybe someone would want to talk about making, or what they make.  Maybe we would sit down and have a Coke and talk.  In three years, that didn't happen.  I don't think I was in the proper "make believe" mindset for this year.

Not that I mind "short connections."  Those are important too.  The smile you see one someone's face when they see a dragon puppet (or an owl if I'm at the museum) and want to talk for a couple of minutes.  I have a couple of the cashiers at Publix that recognize me now - I get in their line if I see them.  A couple of weeks ago when I took my trash to the dump, I saw that the beekeeper down the road had set up his table.  I had just gotten some honey (his - the feed store carries it) earlier that week, so I didn't need any more.  But honey keeps, so I pulled in, got out, and had a nice chat for a few minutes and got another jar.  He's a sweet man, and when I left he said "I hope you have a wonderful day, because you certainly made mine."

I had another connection with the writer of a blog that I follow.  She writes of fiber and weaving and life and illustrates it with little watercolor. I've mentioned earlier that she wrote about the garbanzo beans that are grown where she lives (an area of Washington State called the Palouse), and also that another person I know wrote about Palouse garbanzo beans, and I tried some, and they're really good.  So I put a comment in one of her posts about "garbanzo terroir" and she got a kick out of the phrase.  But I must have made her think about them, because the next week's post had this painting.

In some of my spring yardwork I spent some time clearing underbrush and vines from a small fig tree out front.  I thought about cutting it down, but it looked like it was still alive.  Last week I walked past it, and lo and behold - figs!  Just a handful of small ones, but there they were.  And they have been appreciated.   While I am a person who thinks that pineapple on a pizza is an anathema, I believe that roasted figs on a pizza (white sauce, proscuitto, and goat cheese) is pure bliss.

Closing these ramblings with the cute video of the week.  As usual, it's from the museum.  On these hot days, when we clean the aviaries, we sometimes aim a spray of water at the birds.  The hawks are neutral.  The eagles don't particularly like it.  Most of the owls sort of like it - they'll sit there and puff up their feather a bit.  But one owl, Topaz, really gets into her showers.

And that's my ramblings for now.  Next post may be in August.

Almost July 9

 Last post, a week ago, I said I hadn't done much for four days.  I still haven't.  But that's where the blog comes in handy - I look back at past years about this time, and every time the first few weeks of heat really knocks me out.  I think it's because Florida doesn't ease into it.  You go from the highs being in the 70's to the highs being in the 90's and the humidity being insane and it just takes time to adjust.  I've also had a couple of days of almost being sick - little bit of a sore throat, glands swollen, aching all over - and now it's easing off.

I did one bit of cleaning which unexpectedly kicked up a lot of memories.  In the kitchen, there was a gap between the refrigerator and the wall - only about 18 inches so not big enough to do anything useful.  We got a heavy wire shelf, put casters on the bottom, and made a roll-out pantry, big enough to hold a dozen baskets.  I had visions of something like on TV, baskets with supplies neatly lined up and easily grabbed.  But Bob - - - well, he did have that need that if there was space, something had to go in it.  So the baskets soon were filled to overflowing with jumbled stuff.  I did put my foot down when he was thinking that he could put a narrow shelves on the wall, wide enough to hold one can in depth (because the rolling was only about 14 inches wide, so that left a few inches.  I pointed out that we would probably knock whatever was on those narrow shelves off every time we pulled out the rolling shelf, and that we wouldn't be able to access those shelves without pulling the rolling rack completely.  He then started eyeballing the bit of blank wall over the telephone and thinking we could put shelves and canned goods there - and I nixed that idea as well.

He contented himself with putting hooks along one side of the rolling rack to hang water bottles on straps, lunch bags (why did two people need 6 lunch bags?) and whatever else.

So those were memories as I took off all the baskets, emptied and washed them, wiped down the rack, and replaced everything, organized and one layer deep.

Neater, more organized, easier to grab whatever I want . . . and so damned empty.

While I had the rack out I thought I'd check the overhead cabinet - I couldn't remember if I had anything in there - and if I did, it was something that I hadn't used in years and could probably go away.  There was a vacuum sealer and a plastic food mill - yep, they could leave.  But also - YUCK!!  it was apparently the ancestral home of many generations of cockroaches.  Disgusting.  So much for a quick job.  I got that scrubbed out and the roach goop put in.  That left me to deal with the two pieces of equipment.  I really just wanted to throw them in the trash, but there's that big part of me that can't toss something that's still in perfect working order, merely covered in roach . . . . detritus.  But I couldn't bring myself to just take them to the donation site in that condition, so it was another hour with soap and water and Lysol and the steam cleaner, and *then* they could be donated.

I took advantage of my few days of not feeling well and wanting to rest by working some more on my medieval dress.  In addition to all the hand stitching I did on the edges, I needed to make a couple dozen eyelets up the front to lace it shut - more handstitching.  And in a grand moment of "it seemed like a good idea at the time" I decided to lace the sleeves on instead of sewing them into place.  My logic was that I might want to make this dress part of a costume to wear with one of my puppets, which would mean I would need to have a shoulder seam open to free up my working arm.  But needing the lacing holes mean another 74 stitched eyelets.  Oh, my.

Mostly, I've just been dreading tomorrow.  June was bad enough, with the memories of having the first inkling that something wasn't quite right with Bob's bloodwork, to our first trips to the oncology clinic and a bone marrow biopsy and trips to Shands.  In the background of all this was noticing that Fiona, now 20 years old, wasn't doing well.  She had kidney troubles for a few years, but usually if she was having a bad day we could do a sub-q fluid infusion and perk her up.  But it wasn't working.  We got up the morning of July 9 and she was bloated and couldn't eat or drink and we knew the time had come.  But we also had Bob's appointment to get the test results that morning.  We had to take her in as soon as the vet opened, say our farewells, and then, still numb with grief, looked blankly at the doctor when he said I'm sorry, but it is leukemia.

So July 9 is a damned hard day for me.  I thought about calling out from work (I haven't worked a July 9 yet) but I'm seeing if I can handle it tomorrow.  But I'll be thinking about them.  It had been a comfort to him (and me) when I suggested that I could put their ashes together.  He had softly said "Yes.  I would like to have Fiona with me."

So they're still together.  But I'm left behind.