Three-Day Weekend
8:25 a.m. - 2004-05-31
What a week. I had a whole stack of difficult files at work involving lot line adjustments. All the bases I needed for them had to be ordered from the warehouse, and I ended up with a big box of giant heavy files by my desk. One advantage of all this work was that the days flew by. And Marshall came and took away the Mare Island files, hallelujah! On the home front, Friday the fixer man came and fixed the dryer, which it turned out had burned out its motor, so that was expensive, but we are now back in the laundry business.
He and I have been working on the garden this weekend, planting veggies and flowers. I decided to splurge, because I do love looking out the windows and seeing flowers in the yard, so I went down to Home Depot and bought some already started flowers, instead of doing it all myself. I got snapdragons, blue salvia, cosmos, lobelia, some perennials, and some seeds for nasturtiams. He is digging up the side bed and taking all the dirt out so he can fight the good fight against the roots of the dratted acacia tree, then he is going to amend the dirt and put it back. I will plant impatiens there when he is done. And more snapdragons. The nice thing about this mild climate is that some annuals act like perennials. I have had snapdragon plants that lasted for years, until they got too big and fell over. I also have a geranium that has been out there in the yard, unpampered, for about 10 years. They can grow as big as bushes if you don't hack them back.
I only have about 5 more squares to go on my first afghan. This last burst of activity was caused by Jane Austin, because I got Sense and Sensibility out of the library, and Abby brought home her DVD of Pride and Prejudice. I know I recorded Persuasion years ago, but must have forgotten to label the video tape, so in disgust, after looking through all the tapes, Abby and I just went on Amazon and ordered it. I love that one the best, and have watched it many times over the last years. We also found Mansfield Park at the library and I just finished watching that, though I thought the female lead was a rather stiff actress, unusual in an English production. And, to add a little diversity, we also watched Baghdad Cafe, a very weird but wonderful movie, though not Jane Austin (as a matter of fact, it would have given JA a heart attack).
On Friday, I was coming home for lunch and was caught in a huge traffic jam right by the Expo store. The police were directing traffic at two intersections, and I waited at the light for a long time while huge trucks poured out of the commercial area off to the right. Many many huge tractor trailors, dozens and dozens. I wondered what was up, but since it was the last day of the month, I never got around to reading the paper properly. On Sunday, Jason dropped by to give me a watermelon, and when I mentioned the trucks to him, he said he was caught in the same mess on the freeway exit. He said "Didn't you hear the news? It made the national news!" He told me that there was some big truckers' demonstration, and truckers came from all over to protest the high gas prices and a trucking company nearby. So that explains that.
Today I am going to get some big hunk of beef and try cooking it long and slow, as if I had a smoker, but in the oven, with a rub et al. On Saturday, I finally got the Eggstractor to work, using some eggs that he had boiled about an hour before and left in the pot to cool slightly. This was totally not following the detailed instructions in the box, but worked much better. Which reminds me: When the repair guy was finished with the dryer, he came in to get the check while I was cooking dinner, and he said, "It sure smells good in here!". I told him what was for dinner (Pappy's chicken, homemade cornbread, strawberry shortcake) and he said "Life sure is good in this house!" Which was nice, and true.
