Posted tagged ‘cold’
September 16, 2016
4 Days to go!!
Last night was downright cold. When I woke up, Gracie was lying against me, and Fern was on my hip. It seems both of them wanted my body heat. I, meanwhile, was under the comforter and was warm and cozy.
I checked the thermostat when I got downstairs, and the house was only 62˚. It was sweatshirt time. Lately I have had food cravings. First, it was pizza, and we had it for dinner on movie night. Next, it was fish and chips, and I had that for dinner last night. Chinese was a week ago. I don’t seem to crave Mexican though I did have a quesadilla on pizza night, and it was delicious. In Hyannis is the Brazilian Grill and Pavilion Indian. Neither one tickles my taste buds. I have a shepherd’s pie in my freezer. It has sat there a few weeks. Maybe that’ll be dinner.
Fern is quite unhappy now when she gets her medicine, especially the mouth one. She sees me going to the desk where I keep the medicine, and she is gone like a flash. I fill the syringe then sit and wait until she figures all is clear then I get her. The ear stuff is easier. I distract her with treats and slathered her ears while she is eating. Food trumps ear medicine.
Television is boring especially right now. Yesterday I watched WBINclassics. It airs old programs, some from my childhood like McHale’s Navy, Father Knows Best and Leave It to Beaver. I ignore my internal critic.
My garden is looking forlorn. Most of the flowers are best their prime. A few white ones are still on the fence, and the front garden has a couple of new flowers, fall bloomers. A mum sits by the front steps, my acknowledgement of fall.
I knew all the commercial jingles when I was a kid. They just stuck in my head. Oscar Mayer was a favorite. The old Frito Bandito makes me cringe now. Snap, Crackle and Pop make the world go round, and Rice Krispies is my favorite cereal. Everyone knows it’s Slinky. I still have one, the old one, not the plastic new one. I wish all those Texaco guys would reappear especially when it rains. Mr. Clean is still around. I always loved his earring. You’ll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent. The Campbell kids have disappeared but luckily they didn’t take their tomato soup with them or grilled Velveeta cheese sandwiches would be very lonely.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 62˚, cat medicine, classic television, cold, Fish and chips, food cravings, freezer, Indian food, Mexican food, mums, Pizza, sweatshirt, treats
Comments: 10 Comments
July 25, 2016
It is change the air day so the AC is off for a bit, a short bit as the house is getting hot too quickly. There is a breeze, but it is doing little good. It might thunder shower this afternoon. That would be a most welcomed storm.
I have a couple of errands I can do today or I can wait until cooler weather. That might be Friday or Saturday. My friend Peg, one half of my Ghana travel mates, reminded me I need to get used to the heat. I remember the last time I was there every time I did anything I was soaked from sweat. The dry season is easier to get used to as the rainy season brings the humidity. We’ll be there at the tail end of rain.
It seems the older I get the less tolerant I am of weather. I hate the heat in summer and the cold in winter. The AC is now on days at a time. In my earlier life, I didn’t even have a fan, and I was always comfortable. All winter I now wear a sweatshirt even though the heat is on 68˚. I used to need only a long-sleeve shirt. My mother always kept her house far too hot in the winter. My sister and I wore tee shirts and complained. Now we both understand.
I have stuff to do on the deck like check lights, put the adapter on the umbrella and water plants. These are wonderful intentions but that’s what they’ll stay, intentions. I use the heat as my reason, not my excuse.
Across the top of one chair was a spider’s web. When I was going to clean it, I noticed many tiny spiders were attached to the web. In August my house is inundated with baby spiders. Now I understand why. In that one web were about twenty not ready to be born babies. I left them there. I’ll complain about all the spiders, but I just could’t bring myself to swipe away that web. It was sort of neat to see.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 68˚, AC, baby spider, change the air day, cold, Consumer Cellular, hot, humidity, spiders, sweating, thunder shower, web, winter
Comments: 18 Comments
July 11, 2016
I am beginning to think I am an extra in the movie Groundhog Day. I wake up to the same weather every day: overcast, chilly and damp. The rain sneaks in, just spitting rain my mother would have called it.
The week ahead is a quiet one for me with nothing planned, an empty dance card. We have yet to have a movie night as the nights have been quite chilly, down to the low 60’s. I’m hoping as the days gets warmer toward the middle of the week the nights too will be warm.
Yesterday I spend over an hour scrubbing the chairs and the table on the deck. They had been scrubbed once already, but it doesn’t long for the caterpillars to leave their frass all over the deck wood and the furniture. What is frass you ask? It is caterpillar poop. There’s a new word to add to your vocabulary. Think of ways you can pepper your conversation with the word frass.
When I was kid, we used to capture caterpillars so they could walk all over our fingers and go from one hand to another. We thought they were fun to watch. I flicked a caterpillar off my deck the other day. I’ve had to spray some plants which have holes from munching caterpillars. They are eating machines who eat and poop and eat and poop.
When I was young, I was far more fascinated by bugs and snakes than I was afraid. The grasshoppers were great to watch as they jumped in front of us while we walked through the field. They were brown and not very big. They also weren’t all that fast as we could catch them with our hands. We always let them go. It was the fun of the chase we loved.
We didn’t often see snakes but the ones we did see were garter snakes. We’d find them in flower beds. I loved the way they moved. We’d stand and watch. We had no need to catch them unless it was to scare someone afraid of snakes. We’d hold the snake and run after the ‘fraidy cats and tell them the snake was going to bite them. We knew it wouldn’t but they didn’t.
The other night I went outside for a bit. My yard was aglow with fireflies. They were blinking in and out of the trees and along the fence. I stayed and watched for the longest time. I didn’t want to go in and miss them. They have always seemed magical to me though I know the mechanics of the glow. Science has its place and so does magic!
Categories: Musings
Tags: 'fraidy cats, bugs, caterpillar poop, caterpillars frass, cleaning the deck, cold, damp and cloudy, fields, garter snakes, snakes
Comments: 4 Comments
June 10, 2016
This morning it was 5:30 when I woke up. It was cold, only 57˚. The dog and Fern were huddled beside me. I decided to get out of bed, grab a cup of coffee and read the papers. By the time I had finished reading, it was time to get dressed and meet friends for breakfast. We met at a cafe by the water, an outside restaurant, and it was really cold. The nautical flags were flapping on the breeze, and I could hear the clink of their grommets hitting the pole. That cold wind changed our minds so we opted to find an inside restaurant. Breakfast was delicious.
Tonight is the first play of the season at the Cape Playhouse, a summer theater since 1927. I’ve had season tickets for decades. I remember when I first started going people dressed up for the theater. Men wore suits and ties and women wore dresses. The few tourists looked uneasy and out of place in shorts and t-shirts. Well-known TV and movie stars were in the plays, and we saw a new play every week. Over the years much has changed. Dress is now haphazard, the plays change every two weeks, and the stars are mostly from Broadway, and I really don’t know many. That, however, hasn’t changed the quality of the plays. Tonight is Last of the Red Hot Lovers, and it got wonderful reviews. I always think of the first play as the start of summer.
Rituals change the seasons for me. The first play is the start of summer. The first tree with its leaves changing color is fall. Thanksgiving is fall’s last hurrah. Winter begins with frost and light snow early in December. It seems to last the longest of any season. Even when the days start to get warmer, the nights and mornings stay cold. Baseball, the game of summer, is played in temperatures befitting winter. Watching the game on television is far better than freezing in a stadium. When a game is played on a warm Sunday afternoon and the crowd is in short sleeve shirts, I’ll start to believe in summer.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 57˚, Broadway, Cape Playhouse, cold, early morning, out to breakfast, summer theater
Comments: 15 Comments
June 5, 2016
The sun is toying with us. Yesterday it came back in the afternoon, and it was hot. I was delighted to see the sun after three or four days of clouds. Today, however, is sweatshirt cold. I had to close the windows. Bleak is the word which comes to mind.
The morning was leisurely. I woke up early but took my time as it doesn’t feel like a day for haste. I do have chores, always a list. I emptied the litter boxes and put them in the trunk for the dump run later in the week. I have yet to change my bed, do laundry and shower though laundry is a maybe. A nap is not a maybe.
The only occupant of this house not on some sort of medicine is Maddie. She is supposed to have some for her thyroid but she has proved far too elusive. Whatever hiding places she finds are perfect as I can’t find her. If I do happen to grab her, she runs away from me for a few days afterwards. Gracie is the easiest. I just drop a half pill in her food. Fern isn’t happy with her oral medicine, but I give it to her just before we go to bed. I figure she’ll get over it by morning. The ear medicine is just rubbed into the folds of her ear. She doesn’t mind that.
I want to come back as a cat. They are waited on hand and foot though it is really paw and paw. They have great fur to keep them warm, some of it in neat colors. They let you know how content the world is by purring. They sleep a lot in comfy places. They have varied diets of different kinds of canned meat and fish. What they don’t like is never served again. Mine, besides that can food, have dry food and treats. I think the only draw back to being a cat is self-cleaning. All that licking leads to fur balls.
Usually I have something to complain or whine about but I don’t today. I’m liking the day. Despite its bleakness, its coming rain storm and cold, it just feels right somehow.
Categories: Musings
Tags: bleak day, cats, cold, Laundry, leisurely day, medicines, nap, pet medicine
Comments: 17 Comments
April 10, 2016
The evening was perfect. The appetizers were a success as only a few were left. As for dinner, the chicken was scrumptious. The sauce had cilantro, a serrano pepper, garlic, lemon juice, coconut and salt and pepper. The blender emulsified it perfectly, and that sauce gave the chicken a wonderful taste, a different flavor. I love chicken thighs. They are, to me, the tastiest part.
The cold is coming back. I’m stymied by that forecast as I didn’t even know the cold had gone. I guess 55˚, yesterday’s temperature, is the new norm for warm days. Despite the cold, the day is lovely. The sun is bright and the breeze has disappeared.
I am going to beg off today. Not only am I exhausted but I am also hurting so much I’m walking bent over. On the female evolution chart I am second from the bottom but without the body hair.
Have a great Sunday!
Categories: Musings
Tags: chicken thighs, cilantro, coconut, cold, sauce, serrano peppers
Comments: 10 Comments
April 5, 2016
I saw the sun this morning. The day was lovely for about a half an hour. The sky was so blue it didn’t look real. It looked painted, a combination of blues, maybe even by Van Gogh. I can hear the drops from melting snow so we’re above freezing. If this were January, I’d be happy with melting snow.
The sun has just come out again and I can see blue appearing from among the clouds. I’m hopeful that the sun will decide to stay for a while.
The Sox and the Indians were postponed yesterday because of the weather: no surprise there. The game is today and starts at one. The Sox are now being introduced to boos, of course. Most of the team is wearing the jersey head coverings just in case. The stadium is fairly empty. The announcer is wearing his winter coat.
When I was young, I didn’t care about the weather. It wasn’t as if I could do anything about it. My day to day didn’t change come rain, snow or sun. I walked to school no matter what. I tended to hurry on the rainy days and saunter on sunny days. On winter days my friends and I huddled to walk together, the better to stay warm. I remember it was hard to breathe on the coldest days and sometimes my nose would run. I’d use my sleeves for that problem because no self-respecting kid carried a Kleenex or even worse a handkerchief, besides that’s why sleeves were invented. It grossed out my mother so she’d sneak and tuck a Kleenex into my jacket pocket but it usually stayed there most of the winter. Sleeves were far more convenient.
I always moaned and groaned at the trials and tribulations of being a kid. Life was ordered so I didn’t have a whole lot of choices. What I didn’t realize was I didn’t have a whole lot of responsibilities either. I had to go to school unless I was close to dying. I had homework to do. I had to bathe occasionally. When I got home from school, I had to change from school clothes to play clothes. My vegetables had to be eaten, but my mother generally served the ones I liked so that was no big issue. I had to go to bed early on school nights. Early was contested all the time. My mother and I differed on its definition. I usually lost. That was part of being a kid: losing arguments with parent, but I’d start one anyway. I was always hopeful.
Categories: Musings
Tags: being a kid, blue sky, cold, handkerchief, head coverings, Kleenex, melting snow, Red Sox and Indians, runny nose, sun, walking to school, weather
Comments: 16 Comments
March 24, 2016
We’re back to dreary and cold. I had put away my flannels only to pull them out this morning. I’m even wearing socks. I spent a couple of hours earlier with my neighbor, the one who became a citizen. We just chat, my way for her to learn better conversational English. She is still having trouble with has and have. I don’t speak any Portuguese beyond please and thank you so I am quite amazed with her grasp of English, a language with weird rules and odd spellings.
I remember workbooks from elementary school. We had one for arithmetic and one for English. My most vivid memory of a math page was the one on coins. It had a line up of a reasonable facsimile of each coin. I had to figure which coins and how many I needed for something like 35 cents. The answer had to be the smallest amount of coins. A quarter and a dime would get me a check; three dimes and a nickel would merit an X. Dollars were self-evident and didn’t appear in my workbook. We’d do a page or two during the lesson, and sometimes had to finish at home.
The English workbook was filled with things like contractions, subject-verb agreement, singular and plural words and verb tenses. There were pages filled with sentences which had one blank. You had to choose between he or him, she or her and all the rest of the pronouns. I’ve come to believe that many people were either sick at home or sleeping in class and subsequently missed that particular lesson. TV dialogue is rife with errors. I hear things like, give the book to him and I or to her and I, and it makes me cringe. I’ve been told that’s the way people talk now so I should accept it, but what’s wrong is wrong as far as I’m concerned.
I think music and language are similar. If someone plays or sings a piece of music off-key, people don’t find that entertaining. They cringe. They don’t say that’s the way people sing now. I wish language was given the same respect.
I find language beautiful. The right words strung together can fill you with love or longing. They can make you laugh or cry. They have the power to hurt, to cut. Our memories are images described in words.
I accept new words and I know old ones disappear from lack of use. Language is fluid, but the form doesn’t change. A name is a noun. An action word is a verb. The object of the preposition is objective case. It’s him, not he. It’s me, not I. That’s all I’m asking.
Categories: Musings
Tags: arithmetic, coins, cold, conversational English, dreary, English, flannels, has and have, language, music, objective case, off-key, pronouns, workbooks
Comments: 21 Comments
March 19, 2016
The day is beautiful with lots of sun and a clear, deep blue sky. The only problem is the cold. It isn’t take your breath away cold, for which I am thankful, but it is wear a jacket or a vest cold. The prediction is for snow starting tomorrow night and continuing into Monday. We could get up to 8 inches, but the forecast is still filled with maybes. Sadly the snow isn’t a maybe but the amount is.
Even when I was young, I don’t think I’d have welcomed snow this time of year. It’s bicycle time. Sled time is over. I’d have already put my sled in the cellar and brought out my bike.
I was a pretty good roller skater on the sidewalks near my house. My skates were the key kind which attached to my shoes, always shoes, never sneakers. I’d sit on the front steps, loosen the sliders on the under part of the skates then put my feet in and move the slider up and down until the skates perfectly fit my feet. I’d then tighten the slider bolts. The next part needed my key which I always kept on a string around my neck when I skated. The string was a necessity because losing the key was about the worst thing to happen. That key loosened or tightened the clamps at the top of my skates, the clamps which held on to my shoes. Once the clamps were as tight as I could get them the last thing to do was to buckle the leather strap which went across my foot.
I loved how strange the bottoms of my feet felt as I skated. It was like a tingling sensation. Coupled with that was the great sound of skates rolling across the sidewalks. It was almost like the sound of a revving motor.
The skates never really glided and didn’t do well dealing with big bumps or cracks in the sidewalks. I didn’t care; however, I did sometimes fall after encountering a crack and often skinned my knees. Blood trails went down my legs. They were like badges of honor because I’d get right back up and skate again, blood or no blood.
We went to the skating rink occasionally and rented shoe skates. The rink was in Medford, the next town over, and was called The Bal-A-Roue. It looked a bit like a hockey rink. The skating part was oval and surrounded by a railing. The surface, though, was wooden. An organ played the music so easy even now to recognize as skating music. I love going there.
When I’d get home, my skirt or my pants were usually dirty from the number of times I fell on that wooden floor. I admit the railing and I were great friends.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Bal-A-Roue, bicycle, blue sky, clamps, cold, key, metal skates, roar of the wheels, roller skating, shoe skates, skate sliders, Snow, sunny, tingling, vest
Comments: 10 Comments
March 14, 2016
I woke up late this morning and rushed over to my neighbor’s house in record time for our Monday’s at 10. My back was so bad I stopped three or four times before I got there. Today is cold and dank and doesn’t bolster my spirits in any way. I am sick and tired of winter and the few days of pseudo spring we’ve had.
The first load of wash is in the machine. I got tired of looking at it leaning against the cellar door. A second load sits on the floor waiting its turn. Adam and Eve before the apple had it easy.
When I was growing up, I never realized how much work my mother actually did around the house. I’d see her making dinner but that was about it. While I was at school, she cleaned, vacuumed, made beds, washed clothes and ironed. My empty bureau drawers would magically fill. My bed would be made and my room cleaned. I never gave any of that much thought. I don’t think I ever said thank you. I just supposed it was what mothers did.
I am living by myself which I quite enjoy. There are no expectations. Today I might do this or I might do that or I might do neither. I make lists only when I have lolled far too long. I believe a written list of chores is binding much like Moses must have felt walking down the mountain with the ten commandments. If the chore is there before my eyes, I have to do it though that’s where the comparison with Moses ends. His was mostly a don’t do list though there were a couple of have to’s. I am quite faithful to finishing my lists, and I cross off each completed item with a flourish.
Coffee was going on hiatus today but then I got started and the words just poured out. My two typing fingers had quite the work-out. I do have to stop, though, my first load of laundry is done and needs to go into the dryer. A woman’s work is never done, sort of.
Categories: Musings, Uncategorized
Tags: Adam and Eve, cold, dank, finishing lists, lists of chores, living alone, Moses, other's work, ten commandments, two loads of wash, washing clothes, written lists
Comments: 10 Comments
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