Archive for the ‘Musings’ category
August 23, 2016
This morning I starred as Sleeping Beauty, but no prince woke me up. I just did. It was 10:15. My mother would have said you probably need the sleep.
Last night we had movie night on the deck. We watched Dick. I had seen it before, but my friends hadn’t. I was glad they enjoyed it. We sat and ate appetizers while we played Phase 10. I lost. It was then movie time. We ate dinner while we watched. It was hot dogs and salad, a perfect summer meal. The night quickly got windy and chilly. I actually had to wear a sweatshirt. The screen fell down blown by the wind. It was undamaged.
Last night’s weather morphed into a beautiful day. It is in the 70’s and dry. I’m thinking deck time.
I totally lack ambition. I’m guessing I used all of my weekly allotment yesterday and last night. Being the consummate hostess takes energy and a lot of lists.
I’m not a fan of commercials, but I figure they are the price to pay for watching network television. One commercial, however, drives me crazy. It is for Dole fruit bowls. Two couples are at a picnic table after playing tennis. One couple stabs the tops of their fruit bowls then drains the liquid. The woman from the other couple looks at them with pure disdain and says, “Oh, they’re drainers.” She explains why she and her husband don’t drain. “We drink it,” she says with a haughty, superior look. That’s when I’d have thrown my drained sugary fruit cup in her face.
Categories: Musings
Tags: ambition, cool, Dick, Dole's fruit bowls, hot dogs, lists, movie night, salad, Sleeping Beauty, windy
Comments: 6 Comments
August 22, 2016
Today is perfect in every way. It is sunny, breezy and dry. To top it off, it rained last night. I heard it against the window, a heavy rain. I don’t know how long the storm lasted but the deck was still a bit damp this morning. The weatherman says today and tomorrow will be beautiful with cool nights, even down to the low 60’s.
When summer starts to wind down, it seems to die quickly. The darkness sneaks in a few minutes at a time until we realize how early we need lights. We don’t think about the cool nights as we’re glad for a reprieve from the hot days, but then the days get cooler. Labor Day arrives, schools open and summer is unofficially over.
I wish summer were longer. When I was a kid, I wanted it to last forever. My days were filled with bike riding, berry picking and sleeping in the backyard. We had picnics in the woods. Bedtime was late. Dinner was casual. The clock had stopped controlling our lives.
I don’t wear a watch. The last time I remember wearing one was in Ghana, probably the one place where you didn’t need a watch. When I taught, tbells started and ended classes and every room had a giant clock so a watch was superfluous. I’m retired. I don’t clock watch unless I have an appointment. I have no bedtime. I go when I’m tired. No alarm jars me awake. I open my eyes, stretch, say good morning to Fern and Gracie at the foot of my bed, figure out what day of the week it is and if I have anything on my dance card then I get up, and it’s time for coffee and the newspapers.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 60's, Alarm clock, appointment, breezy, clock watch, cool days, cool nights, darkness, dry, end of summer, giant clock, Labor Day, sunny, Watch
Comments: 12 Comments
August 21, 2016
Oh, what a beautiful morning. Oh, what a beautiful day! It is cool and sunny with that clear light of morning. Last night I didn’t even need air conditioning. Tonight we’re getting rain, but not just rain; we’re getting a thunderstorm. I don’t even remember the last time it rained.
I have noticed the darkness creeping in earlier now. We are losing two and a half minutes of light every day. According to the weatherman, a couple of nights this week will be in the high 50’s, a warning that cool nights and crisp mornings are getting closer. They are harbingers of fall. I love when it when late flowers color the front garden. The white clematis are starting to appear on the sides and tops of the front fence. Black-eyed Susans are still in bloom. A white flower whose name I’ve forgotten is budding in the garden next to the house. Soon it will bloom. That unnamed flower has spread across one whole side of the garden. When it blooms, it looks so lovely with the green house as a backdrop.
Tonight we are having our first movie. I have chosen Dick, but it is on order from Amazon prime, and they are saying by eight tonight. I’m hoping for sooner or we may have to choose another movie. The main dish for this evening is hot dogs. I have a hot dog machine which rolls the dogs over and over and also warms the rolls. It needs no tending. I’m going to pick up an appetizer or two, popcorn and some movie candy. We have birthday cake for dessert. I’m hoping my friends find Dick as amusing as I do.
I have two errands to do which makes this the third day in a row I have joined the outside world. Goodbye to comfy clothes.
Categories: Musings
Tags: beautiful day, beautiful morning, clematis, cool, Dick, flowers, front garden, garden, hot dogs, movie candy, popcorn, sun, sunny
Comments: 13 Comments
August 20, 2016
The mornings are fresh and cool. It is in the afternoons when the days become uncomfortable, hot and humid. I turn on the air conditioning and shut out the world. I prefer comfort.
Another birthday celebration was last night. We had appetizers on the deck, played a game which I lost then dined inside. We had ribs, one of my favorites. I opened my present which was a hoodie with a boxer outlined on the front in a facsimile of the flag in muted colors. It is perfect. We watched the Red Sox win handily. I drank cosmos. It was a wonderful finale for my birthday.
On TCM today is Humphrey Bogart day. This morning I watched Across the Pacific, a movie filmed in 1942 reuniting Mary Astor, Sidney Greenstreet and Humprey Bogart. In a secondary role is Victor Sen Yung, famous for being Charlie Chan’s number 2 son Jimmy and Hop Sing, the cook for the Cartwrights. Humphrey stars as Rick, a familiar name for Bogart from my favorite movie, Casablanca, also released in 1942, which will be on later. In Across the Pacific, Bogart is a passenger on a Japanese ship and working undercover: pretending to be a disgraced US military officer who is willing to trade information for money. One of the minor characters was described as having dipsomania, much more polite than calling him a drunk. Aside from the pidgin English of the Japanese, I liked the movie.
Saturday used to be my chore day. I’d clean the house, grocery shop and do an assortment of errands. Today I have only one errand: Agway for animal food. The house doesn’t need any cleaning, but I just might change my bed.
I have been retired for twelve years. Even I can’t believe how long it has been. Leisurely days have been an easy fit for me. I found out that most things, other than appointments, can be delayed. I used to feel guilty if I didn’t get everything done. Now I don’t care.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Across the Pacific, afternoons, air-conditioning, appetizers, Birthday, Bogart, cosmos, hot and umid, Mary Astor, mornings, ribs, Sidney Greenstreet
Comments: 10 Comments
August 19, 2016
This morning I was up and out early to have some lab work done. On the way, I had to stop to let a turkey hen lead her brood of five across the road to the other side. The five were walking all in a row and moved quickly to stay behind their mother. After the lab, I went to Dunkin’ Donuts as I hadn’t yet had my coffee. The ride through had fifteen cars in line so I parked out front and walked inside. I was second in line and got my coffee quickly. I also treated myself to a croissant lemon donut. It was my prize for remembering to get the lab work done.
Today is quite hot but dry. The doors and windows are still open. My neighborhood was noisy earlier. I could hear a radio blasting from the house next door, and I could hear voices from the rental. I shut the door, started to read the papers and fell asleep for about an hour, a weird time for me to be napping. I must have inspired the animals as all three are in the den here with me, and all three are asleep. Gracie is lightly snoring.
Only two weekends left until Labor Day weekend. The summer is speeding away. This has probably been my quietest summer in a long while. We didn’t see a movie on the deck though I am determined to have three, one on each remaining weekend. I have spent most of August behind closed doors and windows with the AC at full blast.
Tonight is another birthday celebration at my friends’ house down the street. They are the balloon friends. We’ll play a few games, drink a little and have dinner. I’ll open another present. Nothing is better than celebrating a birthday over and over.
Categories: Musings
Tags: baby turkeys, croissant lemon donut, dunkin-donuts, hot and dry, Labor Day, long line, movies, naps, turkey hen
Comments: 8 Comments
August 18, 2016
Yesterday was a wonderful birthday. I walked outside to get the papers and right away saw balloons tied to a new solar garden light stuck in the grass. Now, every time I see that light, I’ll remember how fun the morning was and how wonderful my friends are. My sisters called to wish me a happy birthday as did Grace from Ghana. She once was a student of mine, but now she is a friend. More friends called during the day and the internet was crushed by the number of well wishes on Coffee and on Facebook. Two of my friends took me out to eat at Karoo’s last night. It is a South African restaurant we all like, and the food was even better than we remembered. My friends gave me a beautiful puzzle box which I could not open because I am spatially incompetent. Step by step instructions got the box opened. Instead of a cake, my friend made brownies. Chocolate is perfect for any occasion. I still have one more birthday celebration to come. It is like birth-week instead of birthday. How wonderful!!
My house is open to the air. The morning has gone from sunny to cloudy and back again, but this den where I spend most of my time stays dark and cool until the afternoon. There is even a slight breeze. If I can last through the day, the temperature will get down to the high 60’s tonight, and I won’t need the air conditioning; however, I do like the sensation of feeling cold on a hot summer night.
Around here Hyannis is the big city. It has lots of heavy traffic and stores tucked into a variety of big and small malls. The main route in and out of town has four lanes, two of them for turning. Most times I avoid Hyannis. There are stores I love, but I don’t want to hunt for a parking space or sit through light cycles. The exception is when I have an appointment and have no choice, like today, but I’ll do some shopping because I’m there. It makes the trip fun and worthwhile.
Categories: Musings
Tags: air-conditioning, balloons, Birthday, birthday wishes, breeze, brownies, cloudy and sunny, Hyannis, Karoo's, puzzle box, solar light, South African, the big city
Comments: 14 Comments
August 15, 2016
My doors and windows are open. I have rejoined the world if only for a while. There is a breeze coming from the north, the window behind me, keeping the den cool, and the sun is still working its way around so it’s also dark. The weather report is for heat but less humidity so I’m taking advantage and giving the house some fresh air before the onslaught of the heat.
My life of late has been boring. Staying inside the house doesn’t make for adventure, for stories. I do have to go to the dump, but that’s not a plot line for a good story. It’s just trash.
My neighborhood is quiet. I have no idea where the kids are. There are 9 of them on this street. I’m thinking it’s difficult to hide them all. Perhaps their parents are using gags and tricking the kids into thinking it’s a game. When you’re little you believe everything your parents tell you. That’s why I didn’t eat Chinese food until I was around ten or eleven.
I’ve tried salmon a couple of times but I still don’t like it. It’s the only fish I haven’t liked. No respectable fish is pink and why don’t you pronounce the l?
I make a great chili. It is a recipe from my brother-in-law. In his recipe, Rod has beans listed. For my copy, he also has a footnote: if making chili for me, don’t add the beans. I have never made chili with beans. My defense is that real chili has no beans.
I eat a lot of chicken. It’s not all that expensive and chicken recipes number in the millions. I like chicken thighs and think they are the tastiest part of the chicken.When I go out for a casual dinner, I usually order a cheeseburger.
When I go out for a casual dinner, I usually order a cheeseburger with onion rings on the side, but one pub where I eat doesn’t make onion rings at night, only during lunch, so I order French fries. I don’t eat my fries with ketchup; instead, I dip them in mayonnaise. I seldom use salt, but I do salt my fries. They seem to taste better that way.
My mother told us stories about World War II and rationing. She said they seldom got butter so they used oleo instead. It was white but it came with packets of yellow to make it butter-like. When I was a kid, my mother never bought oleo. Having it in the war was enough for her; instead, she always bought butter. My sisters and I still do.
I remember a lunch at a friend’s house. She made sandwiches with salmon and dessert with peaches. I ate both of them out of courtesy. It rates as the worse lunch in my memory drawers.
Categories: Musings
Tags: boring, cheeseburger, Chicken, chili, cooling breeze, dump, fries, gags, games, Hamburger, old wives' tales, onion rings, open windows, parents, pink, quiet, salmon, salt
Comments: 10 Comments
August 14, 2016
Big surprise: today is hot, already 88˚, and combined with the 70% humidity it feels like 100˚. I was on the deck earlier checking the plants. They have to be watered again, but I’ll wait until later in the day hoping it will be cooler.
When I arrived in Ghana for Peace Corps training, I knew nothing about Africa. The books and mimeographed materials from Peace Corps didn’t do much in helping me understand where I was going. Knowing there were two seasons, rainy and dry, had me picturing what rainy and dry look like here, that was all I had for reference. Descriptions of Ghanaian culture were like excerpts from a geography book. I read about the different tribes and where they lived. The country was divided into regions, a bit like our states.
Before we left Philadelphia for Ghana, I found out I was going to be posted in the Upper Region, only a place on the map to me. The Upper Region spanned all the way across the whole top section of Ghana from east to west. I was to be posted in its capital, Bolgatanga.
When I went to Bolga for a week during training, it was the rainy season when everything is green, and the market is filled with all sorts of fruit and vegetables. I figured that would be Bolga all the time. I was totally wrong.
When training was over, I made my way home, to Bolga. I stopped overnight in Kumasi, about the halfway mark. I always added an overnight so I could visit friends along the way. The trip from Accra to Kumasi was a wonderful train ride. From Kumasi to Bolga was a bus or lorry ride, always hot and always crammed with people.
Bolga was still in the rainy season when I moved into my house. The rains stopped a month or two later. Everything dried. The ground split. Nothing stayed green. My lips and the heels of my feet split. I walked on tiptoes. I learned to take bucket baths. My meals never varied. Breakfast was two eggs cooked in groundnut oil and two pieces of toast. Lunch was fruit. Dinner was beef cooked in tomato broth, a necessity to make the meat tender, or chicken. Yams were the side dish, sometimes in a mash and sometimes cooked with the meat. I always drank water except in the morning when I drank instant coffee with canned milk.
I never minded the same meals or the dry season. I was astonished every day that I was living in Africa. I loved Bolga whether rainy or dry. My friends and I would often look at the sky and say it looked like rain. That was a joke, and we never got tired of it. We knew the rain was months away. If we found something new in the market, it was cause for celebration. If we didn’t, it didn’t matter.
In about five weeks, I’ll be back home in Bolga.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 88˚, beef, dry season, Ghana, Ghanaian regions, hot, humidity, Kumasi, looks like rain, onions, Peace Corps, rainy season, Train, Upper Region, yams
Comments: 9 Comments
August 13, 2016
This morning I felt like a mole stepping into the sunshine after living underground for too long. I shielded my eyes on my way to the driveway to get the papers. I was blasted even in that short while by the heat and humidity. After getting the papers, I ran back into the house, into the cool darkness.
Last night I had to go to Stop and Shop to pick up a few things Peapod couldn’t deliver as the warehouse didn’t have them. It was close to eleven o’clock. I walked inside and had to look around as the store had changed considerably. I went from aisle to aisle reading the signs until I finally found what I wanted. That one short shopping trip reminded me why I use Peapod.
I love cheese, all sorts except blue cheese and gorgonzola. When I was a kid, my mother always bought Velveeta. It made the best grilled cheese sandwiches. I still buy it to make a quick dip with salsa, jalapeños and sometimes crumbled hamburger. I haven’t a favorite cheese so I usually buy a variety of cheeses. We have a new store which carries Italian cheeses many of which are unfamiliar so I usually need a taste before I buy. Any sandwich I make aways has a cheese of some sort. I even spread Brie. Crackers and cheese are a favorite snack of mine so I always have crackers in the cabinet. When I was in Ghana, there was no cheese. Even now it is scarce and expensive. Obruni stores, as in white man stores, do carry it, and you can find it in Accra. Ghanaians don’t eat cheese. Now I wonder why my mother never sent me Velveeta. It doesn’t need to be refrigerated, being processed cheese.
With my trip to Ghana getting closer, I’m thinking of all the Ghanaian food I’ll have, all my favorites. I’m also thinking about the Middle East restaurants which used to be all over Accra but are now difficult to find. Luckily, down the street from my Accra hotel, is a Middle Eastern restaurant where I had dinner the last time I stayed and hope to visit again. The safari lodge where we’re staying has a combination of European food and Ghanaian. In Ghana I am a European which just means white to Ghanaians. All this talk of Ghanaian food has my mouth is salivating for kelewele, Guinea fowl and, yup, even fufu.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Brie, Cheese, crackers, grilled cheese., heat, humidity, Mexican dip, mole, Peapod, salsa, Stop and Shop, sunshine, Velveeta
Comments: 16 Comments
August 12, 2016
I didn’t leave the house yesterday except to water the plants on the deck. That has become a daily chore. The plants dry and wilt from the sun and the heat so I feel guilty unless I water them. I do have to go out today, but I figure the traffic will be light. Tourists will be wherever they can feel cool, and I doubt in cars and on the road won’t be their choices. The weather report has the possibility of rain here today and tomorrow. I don’t believe it.
Before I had AC in the house, I used to go to a matinee and sit in the air conditioning to watch a movie. It was a wonderful way to spend an afternoon.
In the paper today was an article about Massachusetts investigating the possibility of changing time zones from Eastern Standard Time to Atlantic Standard Time. People are dreading winter when the sun sets at 4 o’clock, and it sometimes starts to get dark at 3. We already fall back and spring ahead so changing wouldn’t be all that unfamiliar. The only drawback was being on a different time than New York and Washington. Someone suggested Massachusetts Savings Time but that seems a bit ego-centric.
I’m not doing much in the heat, but there isn’t really a whole lot to do. I have a couple of cabinets needing to be organized, but cabinet organization is really far too deep on my list to consider. It seems more like a winter chore.
When I worked, my life was far more departmentalized. My daily stuff mostly revolved around work. I got up at 5 or 5:15, watched the early news as my papers weren’t delivered yet and had two cups of coffee. I left for work around 6:20, arrived by 6:30 and then organized my day. I got home around 4. I read the papers and my mail, made dinner, showered and went to bed no later than 10. Monday to Friday never really varied.
The weekends were for cleaning the house, doing the laundry and going to the dump. Friday and Saturday nights were empty dance cards waiting to be filled.
Now, despite having all the time in the world, I run out of time. My lists seldom get finished so I move the undone items to the next day. I do the same thing every day so I always have a never ending list, but I have learned not to care. It took some time but I’m now quite comfortable with lazy days, with being a sloth and with unfinished lists.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Atlantic Standard Time, chasing time zones, chores, departmentalized, dry and hot, dump run, errands, fall back, Laundry, lazy days, plans, possibility of rain, run out to time, sloth, spring ahead, watering plants, work
Comments: 8 Comments
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