Posted tagged ‘sunny’
February 6, 2016
The sun is melting some of the ice and snow, but the shaded areas are still slick. I had to take mincing steps this morning on the icy street to get yesterday’s mail from my box. My front path and back steps are clear. This morning I put more deicer on the back steps so they won’t get slippery. I worry about Gracie. She and I are tied. We have each fallen once down those stairs. She was fine, but I got knocked out when I hit the ground. I’d like to keep it a tie.
The snow is melting off the branches and falling in clumps. I’m hoping the sun will beam its rays and melt the branches on my deck so they can bounce upright again. This happened one other time, and I used a broom stick to try to clear the branches. The snow fell on me. Now I’ll just wait for the sun.
Another storm is coming though the weatherman is not exactly sure which day yet. He is leaning toward Monday into Tuesday. I think the cause of all of this was our reveling in a warm winter with no snow. It was a jinx. We should have knocked on wood.
The knock on wood got me to thinking. Step on a crack, break your mother’s back was a kid’s idiom in my day. I don’t think I believed it, but I didn’t dare test fate so I jumped over any and all cracks. Idioms come and go with the times. You sound like a broken record makes no sense to kids today, but I heard it many times from my mother when I’d bug her for something I wanted. On the flip side goes along with the broken record. I don’t even remember the last time I heard either of those. I don’t know why saying it was a piece of cake came to mean it was easy. When my sisters bothered me, I told them to take a hike. They never did. They told my mother I was being mean.
Some sayings made no sense to me and some still don’t. Bob’s your uncle is one of them. Others have no relevance to life today. Nobody burns the midnight oil anymore. We just leave the lights on. Only Mr. Ed spoke so none of us really heard it straight from the horse’s mouth. I was a little older when I finally figured out if wishes were horses, beggars would ride. I thought it was cruel to keep the cat in a bag and was glad when it was freed.
Once we were interviewing a candidate for a secretarial position. Someone asked a question and she replied, “You’ve hit the nose right on the head.” I had to leave the room.
Categories: Musings
Tags: another storm, Bob’s your uncle, falling snow, iced road, icy, idioms, jinx, kid idioms, knock on wood, melting snow, mincing steps, pat and steps clear, snow coming, Sounds like a broken record, sunny, tree branches low
Comments: 12 Comments
January 11, 2016
This morning I was at my neighbor’s at ten then came home and went back to bed; hence, the late hour. I am just tired though I haven’t really a good reason to be.
It finally stopped raining last night, but the warmish air has deserted us. It is seasonably in the 30’s today. I guess I ought not to be complaining but I figure that’s what the weather is for. It is a common topic of conversation and great for the line at the supermarket.
My aunt was a nun. We always called her my aunt the nun and seldom used her name. When I was little, we’d put on our church clothes and ride to Connecticut to see her. We used to stop close to her convent, go to the bathroom and be tidied by my mother so we’d pass a visual inspection. This aunt was not real to me in the same way my other aunts were real. She wore a habit and didn’t have a whole lot to say to us. It was always questions about school. We answered in short, quick sentences hoping she’d move on to my parents. Meanwhile another nun would show up with a tray. It had cookies, milk, coffee and a few soft drinks. The nun would put it on the table and then leave without saying a word, but she did make a swishing sound the way all nuns did. After our snack, we’d go on a tour of my aunt’s school. I never thought it was interesting but it did eat up some time for which I was grateful. We’d head back to the convent and start our good-byes until the next year.
In time nuns were freed from their habits, were allowed to use their own names and could travel anywhere they chose, but my aunt the nun was still my aunt the nun to us. She started to wear skirts and blouses and jackets and always a big cross she used to wear on her habit. All those years of not having to choose her outfits left her with a really bad taste in clothes. My mother and I used to give her clothes for Christmas, clothes with a bit of style. She began to spend every Christmas at my parents’ house. My mother was a trooper about it, but she drove my father crazy by calling him brother instead of his name.
I was always polite when my aunt the nun stayed at my parents, but she never seemed to like me all that much. It was no big bother to me. I could live with that!
Categories: Musings
Tags: aunt the nun, chilly, sunny, weather
Comments: 6 Comments
December 4, 2015
Today is lovely. The air is still, the sky a light blue and the sun winter bright. It is in the 40’s, colder than yesterday but warmer than last night. It hasn’t yet been winter cold, the sort which takes your breath away. I’m glad for the reprieve.
When I watch TV programs supposedly taking place in winter, I always look for breath. In the one from the other night, a Hallmark Christmas movie, snow was in piles on the ground and the characters were bundled as if for an Arctic expedition but there was no breath. It was a fake, a movie winter, but I wasn’t taken in by the trappings of a Hollywood winter. I know cold.
I remember watching One Magic Christmas, a Disney movie where winter is real. Some key scenes take place at night. When the characters walk, you can hear the sound of crunching snow. Under the shine of the streetlights, you can see their breaths. Everywhere is snow: on the ground, piled on the sides of the road and in front of houses. It is really winter. I appreciated that.
In Bolgatanga, in Ghana, Christmas takes place during the harmattan when winds blow sand from the Sahara, the days are brutally hot and the nights cold. The first year there I was twenty-two and had never been away from home at Christmas. I tried not to think about it. My mother, however, saved the day. She sent me a package by air to guarantee a delivery before Christmas. The postage was a small fortune. My aunt helped fill the package and was nice enough to pay half of the postage. When I opened the box, it was filled with Christmas. I’ll never forget that box. It had a small artificial tree, some new ornaments and some from the family tree, cookie cutters, some sprinkles for the sugar cookies, small stockings to hang from the fireplace paper also in the package and a few small wrapped presents to put under the tree.
I learned how to make sugar cookies that year. I spent Christmas Eve with friends at my house where we had a small party. We sang Christmas carols, ate Guinea fowl, yam chips, donuts and sweet balls of coconut. The sugar cookies were the big hit. I had even decorated them. That Christmas is one of my all time favorites.
Categories: Musings
Tags: fake winter, Ghana Peace Corps, lovely day, One Magic Christmas, piles of snow, real winter movie, seeing breath, sunny, winter on TV, winter warm
Comments: 18 Comments
November 3, 2015
Today is absolutely beautiful. The breeze is slight, the sun is strong and the temperature is in the 60’s. I think Gracie and I might be taking a ride later. I have a few errands to do then off we’ll go with no destination in mind, a ride just for the fun of it.
Every now and then we’d skip part of the way to school. There was a sense of exhilaration, of joy, when we’d skip. First we’d hop on one foot then we’d hop on the other and we’d keep hopping until we were so tired we had to stop. Skipping wasn’t as fast as running but it was faster than walking and was more fun. Learning to skip looked easy but it wasn’t. My feet seemed to get tangled in the hopping, and I’d lose the rhythm. Finally after many starts and stops I got my feet to work and I was finally a skipper.
Jumping rope was another one of those get your rhythm and your feet working together. We used to jump rope at recess. It was a single rope as none of us knew about double Dutch. We had rhymes we said while jumping. They helped us keep the cadence, the rhythm. I was okay at the slow jumping but once we hit the fast jumping, pepper, I was doomed. I always ended up being the rope swinger.
Probably around the sixth grade we stopped jump roping. We were on the second floor of the school and felt older. We thought jump roping was for kids. During recess we’d just stand around in small groups of friends and talk. Boys started to be a conversational item. We were still too young for dating but we were poring the foundation (sorry-that was the only analogy I could come up with). We’d decide who among the boys in our class was the cutest. We never talked about the nicest or the smartest. It was always the cutest.
Categories: Musings
Tags: beautiful day, jumping rope, recess, Shopping, skipping, sunny, taking a ride, talking abut boys, warm day
Comments: 12 Comments
October 26, 2015
Today is the epitome of a perfect fall day. The sun is shining with that sharp glint it seems to have only in the fall and winter. The temperature is in the mid 50’s. A small breeze is blowing. Some trees still have color, but others have brown leaves clinging ever so slightly. The last of my flowers are still in bloom. The rest of the garden is filled with brown stalks. Soon they too will be gone as it is close to clearing the garden time. The deck is still open but I’ve called Skip to come and cover the furniture and the umbrellas and stow away the candles and decorations which made the deck so inviting last summer. I think when winter comes I miss the deck most of all.
When I was in elementary school, in the lower grades, art was mostly cutting and coloring. I remember coloring leaves. On a single piece of paper, there were a few outlines of leaf shapes each with a vein down the middle. We’d color them with our crayons then cut them out using those little scissors which always seemed to get stuck on my fingers. The leaves were yellow or red as all the real leaves were. After we’d cut them out, we’d paste them on construction paper to make a collage. I remember the paste seemed to get on everything, including my fingers. We used a round bottle of paste which had a brush attached to the top. I could never get just the right amount of paste on the leaves. Sometimes the leaves stuck to my fingers and when I pulled them off, the leaves stuck to my other fingers. My collage took a long time to finish, and sometimes the back of the paper was wet from the paste leaking through. I’d wave it in the air hoping it would dry. I always put it between books when I was going home or it would curl.
My mother made a big deal of my art work. I beamed.
Categories: Musings
Tags: art, blooming flowers, clearing the garden, closing the deck, coloring leaves, dead stalks, fall day, sunny
Comments: 9 Comments
September 26, 2015
The morning is again lovely with a strong breeze and a wonderfully bright sun. When I went to get the papers, I sat on the front steps a while to check out the neighborhood and to let the sun wash over and warm me. The leaves were rustling and the chimes in the backyard were ringing every now and then when the breeze was the strongest. The sound of the chimes is sweet. I finally went back inside drawn by the thought of my first cup of coffee.
We never had fresh orange juice. My mother always bought it frozen in the can. I can still remember how much of an ordeal it was to get the juice to the drinking stage. First you had to open both ends of the can to slide out the glob of frozen juice. The silver hand can opener sometimes cut not just the top but also the sides of the can making it harder to get the tops off. More often than not one of the tops would fall into the pitcher with the frozen juice. When digging it out, you had to be careful as it was easy to cut your finger on the sharp edges. I know from experience. We never had the foresight to take the can out of the freezer and leave it on the counter to let the juice melt. Come to think of it we probably didn’t have the patience either. I remember holding the pitcher under hot water to help along the melting, and we’d use a spoon to smash the glob into smaller pieces so it would melt quicker. When it was finally melted enough by my mother’s standards, we’d run the cold water until it was as cold as it could be from the faucet then make the juice.
We went through a Tang phase for a while because John Glenn and the Gemini astronauts drank it. Besides, it was easy to throw a few teaspoons in water then stir and drink. There was no can opener, waiting or hot water baths before drinking it. The only problem was it really didn’t taste all that good.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Bolgatanga, canned orange juice, chilly, chimes, hand can opener, hot water melting, lovely day, rustling leaves, sunny
Comments: 17 Comments
September 17, 2015
Today is another glorious day with temperatures in the low 80’s, a brilliant sun, a sky filled with that blue color even Crayola can’t replicate and a small breeze just enough to keep the heat at bay. For all intents and purposes this is a summer day. Next week is the official opening of fall, and the temperatures will be in the 60’s, perfect weather for the close of one season and the opening of another.
Today is dump day, and I want to go to Agway to buy some flowers to plant as the perennials are marked way down, and my landscaper said planting now will still guarantee they’ll come back next spring. In the bed right in front of the house is a plant with stall stalks and beautiful white flowers blooming for the first time, a perfect time to bloom as most of the other flowers have already had their days in the sun. The plant has spread and almost covers the whole bed. I don’t remember what the flowers are. I bought a couple at a flower site on the internet. My landscaper keeps calling them the internet flowers and is amazed that they’ve thrived and multiplied. I bought them on the recommendation of Christer, the Swedish plant whiz ( The Cottage by the Crane Lake, life goes on). He might remember what they are.
The whole neighborhood smelled like skunk the other night. Gracie was outside at the time. I don’t think a skunk can get into my yard because of the fence, but I was careful anyway. I called Gracie to the deck and gave her neck a sniff. She smelled the way Gracie should so we both went into the house. Today, though, I’ll buy Nature’s Miracle skunk smell remover. It is one of those things I like to keep around the house. Before the fence, Gracie got skunked, and Nature’s Miracle worked wonders. The smell disappeared. In the old days, we thought to use tomato juice but the juice really doesn’t work. It is best fit for bloody Mary’s, not for skunk.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 80˚, blue skies, dump run, flowers, more like summer, Nature's Miracle, perfect day, skunk smell, stalky flowers, sunny, tomato juice, white
Comments: 8 Comments
September 12, 2015
Today is the finest of almost fall days. The sun is brightly shining, only a few clouds drift around the blue sky and the temperature is 71˚. The house is cool but standing outside in the sun is warm. I was on the deck for a while which partially explains my lateness. Sloth explains the rest of it.
I have nothing to do today. Even the dog laundry was done yesterday. That amazes me as usually my own laundry is moved from floor to floor and then sits around for a few days. Gracie jumped right into her crate and went to sleep on the fresh, still warm bedding when I put it back on the bottom of her crate. I could hear her snoring most of the afternoon.
In Ghana, Thomas who worked for me did all my laundry except for the unmentionables. I did those myself. I had to use a bucket and hand wash them. I hated it and after a while went commando. Keep in mind I wore dresses all the time as that was the custom for women. It presented a problem only when I had to climb up to get into a mammy lorry. The only way to get to the seats was to climb then swing one leg at a time over the side of the truck while holding on to the top. I made sure nobody was waiting below me for obvious reasons. There were a few advantages to going commando and the most important was the ease of going to the bathroom over a hole. Squatting was minimally involved, but I won’t describe the rest of the process; just use your imaginations. I was an expert.
Peace Corps gave me a whole new skill set. I had expected to learn new things about Ghana: its history, its culture and most of all its wonderful people. I never expected to learn to pee over a hole or go to the bathroom in the bush. Those were just extras.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 71˚, beautiful day, going commando, lateness of the hour, laundry done, mammy lorry, Peace Corps Ghana, sloth, sunny
Comments: 13 Comments
September 6, 2015
Sorry for today’s late start but it was one of those mirror under the nose mornings. I slept until 11, but as my mother always said, I must have needed it.
It is another beautiful day with lots of sun and no humidity. I have no plans except for doing a few house things like water plants, fold laundry and oil my old desk. It is an antique children’s desk and needs periodic oiling as it gets quite dry. With no humidity, it’s a great oil the desk day.
My neighbors are on their deck. I can hear them talking. I can also smell their dinner cooking on the grill. I think today is probably universal cook on the grill Sunday. Both my sisters also mentioned a barbecue. Some meat, fresh corn and a salad is the perfect menu. The local corn is now in the farm markets. It is so sweet you’d almost want it for dessert. Adding homegrown tomatoes raises the salad to culinary heights. The meat is secondary; anything will do. I’m partial to cheeseburgers but won’t turn my nose up at ribs or the lowly hot dog. I best stop now. I’m making myself hungry!
The summer has passed quickly. We might have one or two movie Saturdays left before it gets too cold. The last one has to be a blockbuster, but I haven’t yet decided what it will be, maybe The Adventures of Robin Hood or North by Northwest. I do have a couple I can’t wait to show as they are both so very bad, The Terror of Tiny Town (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pehsws6QYEo) and Chopper Chicks in Zombietown. That last one doesn’t even rate as a B movie.
It has been eleven years of being retired, but I still have a lingering distaste for Labor Day. It used to mean back to work and it was the symbolic end of summer. It wasn’t a day to celebrate. It was a day to mourn.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Barbecue, beautiful day, Chopper Chicks in Zombietown, corn, fold the laundry, homegrown tomatoes, household chores, local corn, Meat, no humidity, oil the desk, on the deck, salad, sleeping late, sunny, The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Terror of Tiny Town
Comments: 11 Comments
August 28, 2015
We are blessed with another lovely day, sunny but cool.
In the Cape Times was an article about the cranberry. The article explained how the cranberry is one of only three native fruits, the others being the blueberry and the Concord grape. It is close to cranberry harvesting time which usually starts in late September. I have sometimes been lucky enough to happen upon a harvest, always a wet harvest. I love seeing those beautiful red fruits floating in the water. The color is extraordinary.
There are two kinds of harvests: the wet and the dry. In the water harvest, the bogs are flooded the night before. The next day a paddle boat of sorts churns the water. The berries are dislodged and float to the surface because they are hollow inside then they are gathered together and finally loaded onto trucks. The other sort is a dry harvest. A mechanical picker acts a bit like a lawnmower and combs the berries off the vine and deposits them in burlap bags hanging off the harvester. The best berries come from the dry harvest.
Once my brother, urged on by me, ate a red berry. It was poisonous and he had to have his stomach pumped. Now it makes me wonder who was the first to try cranberries or anything growing wild. I can imagine it now: the circle stands around the tribesman who volunteered. He takes a few berries, chews then swallows. The circle waits to see if he’ll survive. If he doesn’t, that’s one more berry crossed off the list. I’d watch the birds. I read it is safe to eat what they eat.
In Ghana I saw pineapples and bananas growing. I thought it was kind of neat to see them, not many chances around here. The pineapples surprised me. I figured their weight kept them close to the ground, but I was amazed to see them standing tall in the middle of a plant, one fruit to each plant. Bananas grow just like I imagined.
I like fresh cranberries and cranberry sauce from the can. I have made my own sauce but I have a warm spot for the canned sauce with the decorative rings. I love pineapples and bananas.
I would never volunteer to taste a berry.
Categories: Musings
Tags: bananas, cool day, cranberry, harvest, lovely day, pineapples, poisonous berries, sunny, wet and dry harvesting
Comments: 12 Comments
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