2/28/11
Hidden talent...
...maybe not hidden talent, but certainly under-used, Ryan has taken some really marvelous photos during the past year. He even gets great shots out of a moving car window. We see him mostly in his work clothes managing construction jobs, or on his barn roof with a pressure washer, but there is a fine photographer lurking under the Carhartts and there's more to him than meets the eye...
2/22/11
The egg
I wish I had a nickel for every egg I've ever eaten. I really wish I had a nickel for every egg that Bob has eaten. I wish I could send my servings to someone who really needs them. If I had a nickel for every egg I've ever loved, I could by a twinkie.
My pleasure in eggs is in direct relationship to the sauce, butter, herb, chutney, pesto or almost any other substance applied to them. But all the health articles recommend eating the whites only…THE WHITES ONLY. I can think of many uses for egg whites, but ingesting them isn't one of them.
Breakfast is Bob's favorite meal. He prefers his eggs poached and likes to fix his own because of what happens to them when I cook. He scrambles mine because he knows I like at least a molecule of yolk in every bite.
My hat is off to anyone who can eat a cold hard boiled egg.
2/21/11
Susan Wray made this...
pastel: Susan Wray, Lute player, Jerry Wray
I took this from Elsa's website...she posted this pastel drawing by her sister. I wish I could work with pastels like this. My son asked me to make a picture of a grain elevator—one of the old wood ones that are antiques now & more rare every year. I've started 3 times, but just can't do it. Maybe I should ask Susan...she captures the essence of things.
Got tight last night on absinthe. Did knife tricks.
Actually, Ernest Hemingway said that, but I always wanted to. Carol & Debbie gave Bob & I each a knife from Uwajimaya. Mine is red, Bob's is blue, and they are wonderfully & exquisitely sharp. They can slice through a tomato just by gravity (as seen on TV). They have little scabbards to keep them from mingling with the dull implements in our knife drawer. Sometimes it's hard to learn about these things...because you can NEVER go back. We love them!
Inspiration
In response to Jennevieve's "give away-felted bird"...my favorite thing to do in Spring is to stalk the first crocus with my camera. Once I find it...all is well.
2/19/11
Real class...
The days are getting longer and we're preparing for some new projects. I keep hoping to inspire lofty and intellectually stimulating efforts, but the kids want to follow their own bliss. Jack is working on a mosaic of the Mighty Boosh logo, and Ryan is starting a 2' long paper maché slug (as a guardian figure for the garden?) One glitch in the slug construction is that newspapers are very scarce…we used to have stacks for recycle, but now we have to solicit them from the odd souls who still take them. No offense to odd souls (family, you know who you are)...
2/18/11
Anticipation is more than half the fun...
Three trees, a large wooden play set, assorted lawn furniture and the left side of the greenhouse were demolished in the windstorm that blew through the Veazie valley just before Christmas. Everything's been cleaned up & the greenhouse is under repair just in time to outfit it with flats, tools, hoses and all the provisions necessary for Spring planting. We'll be scrutinizing seed catalogs and hoping we actually have a growing season this year.
PS: To everyone who asked about our "early seedlings" shown above, these are actually from last spring...the miracle of digital photos.
2/17/11
The Rhododendron
2/16/11
Desperately seeking Spring
Thinking of e.e.cumming's poem every morning as I look for crocus...here's a verse:
in Just-
spring when the world is mud-
luscious the little lame baloonman
whistles far and wee
and eddyandbill come
running from marbles and
piracies and it's
spring
I know why I love him…
Bob just announced that he was going to make bean soup. I got out onions, carrots, celery, bay leaves, and Savoy cabbage thinking that would be a good combination. When I turned around, there he was behind me wearing his bicycle helmet with the rear-view mirror. After I closed my mouth, I said, "Why do you need a bicycle helmet to make soup?" I was relieved when he answered, "I'm riding over to the store for a ham hock…". Tomorrow is our anniversary. We've been together nearly 30 years & it's never been boring.
Beauty in the old tools...
Ryan brought food grinders, pickle crocks, old bottles, electrical fans, decoys, and radios back from the farm in Wisconsin. They look amazing all lined up together. The barn is turning into a museum.
2/15/11
Gathering the pieces
"The story comes around, pushing at our brains, and soon we are trying to ravel back to the beginning, trying to put families into order and make sense of things. But we start with one person, and soon another and another follows, and still another, until we are lost in the connections." — Louise Erdrich
I liked this quote so much I used it on my other blog, but wanted to put it here, too.
