A cooking lesson in progress

A very curious cat teaching a lesson to or taking a lesson from a disheveled D.

Sunday + work

We highed ourselves to church this morning (20 degrees above normal out), where Mother J's homily was especially good and pertinent, hymns all singable AND familiar, and fellow parishoners in a good mood. L sat with other girls and focused on "Ben Franklin," somone new with long, flowing grey locks, petty wife, and several children.

So it was with heavy heart that I returned to the office and my desk, laden with the dread accounting text and other such tomes, requiring me to get down to business. Here is where I spend a considerable amount of time:



Wish it were, I don't know, more CREATIVE! Which is what I overheard a college-age student say on the subway quite a while back: "I don't care what I do, as long as it's creative." Sigh.

Have a good Sunday and a creative week.

our new space!

This is the outside of our new space! We're very excited about our fiber arts co-op (I think that's what we've agreed to be). We have the arts council next door, an art gallery down at the end, a yoga studio, and many artists' studios.















And here's the inside, all 1200 sq. feet, being used as storage right now for several entities there. But one of our group's husband is an architect, and he was there yesterday making drawings for the bathroom to be installed and the various sinks and outlets to be installed. Those plans should go to the building's owner on Monday; we hope work starts in there in early April.

We're going here to look at furniture and fixtures, as a group. I'm not sure what I'll be doing, because someone has just alerted me to the greatest second-hand furniture store that imports stuff from England! (Why here? I'll ask next time I'm in, which should be soon.)

I bought a great chair for $20, which I'm dragging in there to sit and knit. I'm not concerned about what someone else things. It's pretty plain (someone of our group has already decreed, "No chintz"!!)

Saturday, someone else went out and bought a 10cft refrig, on sale; it has a very important component--a freezer for ice.

So, one chair, one refrigerator.

I haven't

been in front of my screen as much; meetings with nine of us take up some time. But I will say that we have signed our lease for our knitting coop space, and we're talking decorating, sinks, areas for classes, areas for ourselves to knit. I can't quite believe it's happening.

I'll try to post some pictures of our building and of the way it looks now in our space in the next few days.

Happy Spring!

I'm really worried

about my tooth. You see, I had a crown put on almost three years ago by a dentist who turned out to be most incompetent. This crown has come disattached twice since it was installed (an appropriate word). This caused much distress on my part, but on HIS an almost accusatory manner. This dentist had been recommended by a neighbor who should have known better, too.

I've since switched dentists, but today my gum is somewhat uncomfortable under that tooth, and I'm getting obsessed with the idea that the tissue there is harboring bacteria. This tooth is on my heart side, so I'm getting convinced this is all leading straight down into a sepsis involving internal organs. ARRGH.

But in happier occurrences, we visited our soon-to-be leased site for the knit-coop. We're getting psyched!

Various

Spring is here; I'm in shorts and a T shirt, getting down to basics on the business end of a sponge and BonAmi in the bathrooms. I can't stand looking at L's anymore; her notion of clean and my notion of clean seem to be quite divergent.

Leaves need raking; the herb garden has woken up and is starting to go. Chives are up, oregano is flourishing, thyme is creeeping all over the place; the mint is rearing its rhizomal head everywhere, looking to take over. I'm not sure about the pineapple sage and the lemon verbena. No shoots next to either bare bones of last year's stalks. Of course, it's too soon to put in the very tender annuals: basil, dill, parsely (although last year, my parsely wintered over), and others.

Cooking tonight something from the Whistlestop Cafe, but I did alter the recipe just a bit. It's already made and in the fridge, awaiting being popped in the oven later! I feel very organized today.

I was away overnight the night before last, taking in the big city with three other women. We saw a great show featuring Matisse and Picasso at a museum I had never been to. Then, after our knit-in, which was the reason we went, we took over one room, had a port tasting, drank lots of wine, and gossiped away. It was quite liberating to be away, let me tell you. The next morning, we consumed a most delicious breakfast in a very lovely setting and set out back down the road to home.

And tonight, I have a meeting to go to concerning this yarn shop/knitting coop. I'm hoping we stick to an agenda, because anyone who has been on a committe knows that these things have a way of expanding to include asides, descriptions, remembrances, a sudden good idea that requires lengthy explanations. We'll see what happens. I hope it happens soon.

we met

today to talk over our yarn shop idea, which has become a yarn cooperative, and I think we are committing to renting space in an old factory building that now houses an art gallery, yoga/massage studio, local arts council offices, and some artists' studios. I'm feeling that this is a firm step in a direction; we've pulled back on some of the more grandiose plans, and this is good. The smaller the steps, at this point, the more firm our footing will be later; at least that's the way I'm feeling. I'm very interested to see how things shake out over the summer.

We are also gearing up to go back to the library knit-in and again stay overnight in a great hotel next week. From this vantage point, all looks positive.

We got

new specs today; and mine are, hmm, bifocals.

"Watch your step. Stairs may seem to rise up at you when you look down," said the very nice and vivacious eyeglass receptionist. "It may take two weeks to get used to these." (?)

I so hope not! My greatest trouble is arms-length sight. I've been having to take off my glasses to see the person I'm talking to properly. And even then, I have to bob and weave to keep them focused. It's become a kind of dance; I lean back; they lean forward. I move back; they move forward. You get the idea.

And I have to renew my drivers license this month. In person. Which means an eye test. Which means frazzled nerves beforehand. I don't deal very well with bureaucratic type situations. I tend to panic. Not good.

Will let you know. Now I've got to reach out and find my glasses.

L got very trendy ones, by the way, and certainly not bifocals.

Second in a series:

Dinner: broiled salmon, rice, green beans, bean and celery salad, lime pickle

I sure didn't feel like cooking,

last night, so imagine my delight when D bustled about the kitchen for an hour, to produce this:





homemade chicken potpie, with homemade biscuits, from scratch, on top.

AND he cleaned up!