Keep the Coffee Comimg

Today is yesterday only it’s Saturday. The translation: it is cloudy, damp and chilly just as it was yesterday. It’s supposed to be partly cloudy, but there’s no partly about it. Sun, where are you?

This morning I noticed a vine was taking over a part of my clematis. I changed into my Superwoman outfit, threw the papers on the grass and started pulling. The bees were not happy. They hummed and flew around me. The bees love the clematis, and there are always several on the flowers. I didn’t stop to think about that. I piled the vines on the grass then threw them way. I didn’t get stung but I did get a couple of cuts on my knuckles. My coming away unscathed would have been so contrary to the usual results.

I’m not doing a thing today. I’ll just read and eat bon bons. Okay, I have no bon bons, but I still have some of those Tropical Necco Wafers with the strawberry flavor. I’ll be trying to emulate a Victorian woman on a chaise lounge.

Did I mention the laundry? It is no longer in the hall. It is now at the foot of the cellar stairs the I threw it. That is a new step (sorry about the inadvertent pun) in the laundry process.

My dog and cat are driving me crazy. The dog is jumping on and off the couch. Usually that means he is hungry or needs to go out and wants my encouragement, but not this time. He has already eaten and he went out just a short while ago. The cat is meowing for attention. I kept patting her, but she wanted more so I scratched around her ears. She purred then meowed. I am being held hostage by my dog and cat.

Usually I have two cups of coffee. I’m on my third.

We had a thunderstorm yesterday and some heavy rain. Today is cooler than it has been, and it is damp and cloudy. The high today will be only 75˚. Right now it is 73˚ and showers are predicted. Today is a perfect stay at home and read while curled up on the couch day.

When I was a kid, I loved rainstorms. I loved when the drops pelted the windows in my room so heavily I couldn’t see any of the neighbor’s houses. I’d watch the drops slide down the window until they disappeared into the bottom pane. When it thundered, I always thought of Rip Van Winkle and the men in the mountains playing nine-pins which I guessed from the sound of thunder was a sort of bowling, but I used to imagine candlepins instead. Lightning was always awesome to me. I always hoped I’d see the jagged flash of lightning brighten the sky.

I used to like to color. Every year I’d get a new box of Crayola crayons at the beginning of school and in my Christmas stocking. My mother and I would sit at the kitchen table and color together. She was amazing. Her colors were nuanced. Mine, in comparison, were  straight from the crayon, and I wasn’t all that imaginative. The sky was always blue, the grass always green. Flowers were mostly red and yellow. Hair was brown. I did mix up house colors, but shutters were always black, the chimney brick red. The only thing my mother and I shared was we both colored inside the lines.

My mother and I used to read outloud in a contest to see who could read the furthest without making a mistake. We used to read from the books she got each week at the grocery store. They were hard cover books and each book had three abridged classics. I didn’t realize at the time they were shortened versions, but that didn’t matter much. I was thrilled by them, and those books introduced me to stories like A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, books I probably would never have found on my own at the library. I remember my mother and I would lie on the living room rug and take turns reading. Hoping I’d catch a mistake, my eyes would follow along with the words as my mother read them. She seldom made a mistake, and she would read for the longest time, but eventually she’d make a mistake, and it would be my turn. Much later, I realized my mother made those mistakes on purpose or I’d never get a turn.

I am already behind closed doors and shut windows as the heat and humidity are still here. It was cool enough last night that the AC was off, but it is back on now and blowing its little heart out.

I had a surprise this morning. My mouse trap had an occupant. Even before my coffee, I took the trap, left the house and drove about a mile before I freed the wee creature. It was small and brown. When I swept the kitchen floor the other day, yup I do occasionally sweep, I saw mouse poop so I set the trap. Later, I’ll reset the trap by adding more peanut butter.

When I was a kid, my father hunted bugs in the house, especially mosquitos. He’d arm himself with a rolled up newspaper and go from room to room. I remember being awakened by my father walking on my bed while he swatted mosquitos on the ceiling. The rooms in our house had blots of dead bugs on all the ceilings. My father was a mighty hunter.

I remember mosquitos buzzing my ear. I’d brush them away with my hand but the mosquitos always came back. In Ghana, my language instructor Lawal told us why the mosquito buzzes ears. It seems mosquito fell in love with ear and proposed. Ear thought the proposal quite funny and said no. Mosquito, undaunted by ear’s refusal, buzzes ear every night to say he is still around, waiting for a yes.

Today is dump day. Henry doesn’t yet know the joy of riding in a car so no dump for him. Poor Henry has no idea what he’s missing. All my girls loved the dump.

I have a few chores for today. I need to change my bed and do a wash even though I swear I just did a wash the other day. I remember the filled pillow case lying against the cellar door for a few days before I got tired of seeing it and finally took it downstairs. This load,though, is still upstairs, the first stop on its way to the washing machine.

Today the school buses rolled. One even went down my street. That’s about as close I ever again want to get to a school bus again.

The sun is just breaking out. There is a breeze which ruffles the leaves, but it is already hot and humid. It will be an ugly day.

Maddie and Henry are asleep. I’d like to join them as I’m tired. For some reason of late my sleep is filled with dreams which I tell myself to remember, but mostly I don’t. A couple are offshoots of what I’ve watched on TV except I’m part of the action. Last night I was in the Middle East.

Acorns keep falling off the trees and bouncing on the deck. One end of the deck is filled with them though the deck was cleared on Friday. Wearing something on my feet is a necessity.

When I was a kid, most of the stores were closed. The only ones open were the small corner stores like the Red Store and the White Store ( I never knew them by name, only by color) near my house. I don’t remember any particular celebrations. I don’t even remember if we had barbecues. What I do remember is taking my night before school starts bath and laying out my clothes. The opening day was one of the two days I didn’t have to wear a uniform so we always had new clothes for the day. I readied my new school bag, and I put my new pencil box inside it. My mother made lunch and packed it in my new lunch box. When I was young, the lunch box had characters on it like Annie Oakley. When I got older, it had colors and patterns. I remember one in a black and red tartan scheme.

This is from a previous post, “The real meaning of Labor Day has been blurred. It was first celebrated in the early 1880’s as a day to honor laborers, “who from rude nature have delved and carved all the grandeur we behold.” The first states to recognize the day were Massachusetts, Oregon, New York, Colorado and New Jersey. It became a holiday in 1884 and was a day for parades and speeches, all meant to honor workers and the contributions of the American labor movement.”  Perhaps it’s time to bring back the real meaning of Labor Day!

Today is another beautiful day. It will be the last for a bit as the heat and humidity are  returning tomorrow. We’re talking 90’s again and air conditioning. Mother Nature did it. She lulled me into a false sense of fall by the last couple of days.

I have a few errands today. One is to the farm stand, and that one is my favorite. I get to buy all those wonderful fresh vegetables and more salsa chips. I know that last one sounds strange, but the stand does sell the best tasting chips.

Today is sunny and bearably warm. The Sox are playing a day game. I’ll be watching.

I prefer swimming in fresh water more than salt which is a bit ironic given where I live. I like the beach, the sandy part, and I like watching the waves. I chuckle at the seagulls.

My mother made the best brownies. She made them from ingredients, not a box. She always iced them in chocolate frosting and use jimmies for an added touch. I never ate just one of those brownies.

Yesterday I planted the flowers in the deck pots. Now I just need to plant the two remaining flowers in my front garden. A couple of them have bloomed. The flowers are purple and puffy looking.

Charlie Baker, the governor, is running for re-election. He is quite popular here even though he is a republican. I like that people in Massachusetts vote the person not the party, but I am already sick of Charlie Baker. His ads are all over the place. I can’t watch a youTube video without him popping up first. The same ad is on TV over and over. He does have an opponent in the primary, but I have no idea who it is. I doubt anyone knows so pull back those ads, Charlie.

I haven’t baked in a while. I use my oven as an extra cabinet for storing mostly crackers and cereal so when I use the oven it has to be cleared first. Once I missed something in the back, and it turned all black from the preheating. Now I always double check.

I read an article which discussed which was correct: dwarfs or dwarves. I would figure dwarfs was and there is no reason for the change in form to dwarves. It seems “dwarves” was coined by Tolkien about 80 years ago to give his dwarves a dignity that dwarfs could hardly attain. So successful have his stories been that “dwarves” seems to be superseding “dwarfs” as the regular plural of “dwarf”,  but don’t worry: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs will stay the same.