Mockingbird Hill Cottage

Mockingbird Hill Cottage

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Random Thoughts on Saturday

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A quick little post today, as I don’t have a whole lot to say! It’s a beautiful Saturday and Autumn is officially two days away. We had a lovely but hard summer with lots of extremes in temperature, rain, no rain, air quality warnings from smoke, and excessive heat warnings.

So, Don and I are definitely ready for Fall. Oh yes indeed.

A little grocery shopping today, a lot of reading (I didn’t read enough yesterday,) and I’m not sure what else. I was going to mow today but I’ve pulled a muscle in my upper back. I’m sure it will calm down but I don’t want to aggravate it by mowing.

We’re getting our Covid vaccine and flu shots on Monday morning. None of this “no vaccine” nonsense for us. We’ve never had Covid because we’re very careful and we’ve renewed our vaccines every year. Heck, if I have to wear a mask again, I will. I wore a mask for 15 hours a day when we were shooting Spoiler Alert. For six weeks. No one on that set got sick – and we worked all over NYC. We have a responsibility not only to ourselves but to everyone around us.

End of lecture.

I’m really loving Katabasis. Lots more reading on the docket for today.

Jessie resting in the basket right before we set out for New Jersey.

Jessie in the hotel room.

These girls are great company when I have to travel solo.

The play opened last night and it went really well. Hurrah!

Stay safe.

Happy Saturday.

Pink

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I love that limelight hydrangeas turn pink. It’s the kind of thing you’d expect to happen in the spring – pinkish pastel flowers – but no, limelights turn everything upside down and give us this delicate pink in the fall. What an unexpected treat.

This week has been quite beautiful, with temperatures in the 70s, cool mornings, and abundant sunlight. We’re still in a drought and the rivers are very low. This is a repeat of what happened last year. I’m not so stressed about it this time because I know at some point we’ll start getting a ton of rain. Just not now.

I’m reading Katabasis, by R.F. Kuang. It’s quite magical, in fact, it’s about doctoral students at Oxford University studying to be magicians. It’s much more than that, though. Two of them travel to Hell to bring back their recently deceased mentor. The first Kuang I read was Babel. I really loved it. I then tried The Poppy Wars Trilogy (maybe her first books?) and I got about halfway through them and lost interest. Then I read Yellowface, which was wonderful. And now, Katabasis. Rebecca is a truly wonderful author. I love the way her mind works. Fantasy fiction is not a genre I am drawn to, as a rule, but Babel was so impressive that I vowed to read more of her work. And she is impressive. If you ever read her bio, you’ll see what I mean. I can’t conceive of accomplishing all she has at such a young age. I’m reading at least 100 pages a day so I can finish it and get to the next book in my queue. Katabasis  is due on the 25th, and The Hallmarked Man  is due on the 30th. A note about the latter book. It’s written by Robert Galbraith who is really JK Rowling. I’ve read all the books in this mystery series, and hesitated about this one because of Rowling’s hateful anti-trans stance. I’ve been disgusted by her actions. So, I vowed not to buy the book and I haven’t. No more money in her coffers. I got in a queue for it in our library system. It clocks in at 897 pages, so I’ll have to do the same kind of scheduling I did for Katabasis. Luckily, I have a fair amount of free time at the moment.

I also have the newest in Mick Herron’s Slough House series, Clown Town, which I preordered a few months back and promptly forgot about. It arrived here last week. And Louise Penny’s newest is on the horizon. It’s a good time for losing myself in books, and heaven knows, I need that. We all do.

Tonight is opening night for the play. Break a leg, my friends! (I’m also happy because that means I will get the second half of my fee and a check for travel reimbursement sometime next week.)

Stay safe.

Happy Friday.

 

Fall, Books, and Redford

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The landscape has changed so much! Leaves on the ground, flowers decreasing, the light changing. It’s definitely autumn around here. I have to get out and do some weeding, but I’m still a wee bit tired from the job in New Jersey. Don has been urging me to rest.

I love autumn, but it leaves me a bit melancholy, as it means winter is just around the corner. But mostly, I love it and it’s always quite beautiful around here. The black walnuts started dropping leaves a month or so ago. The maple leaves are turning gold, and the limelight hydrangeas are turning pink. (I’ll get some pictures today.)

I just finished Daniel Silva’s newest mystery and returned it to the library yesterday. While I was there, I picked up another book I had on hold. I now have two rather large tomes to read before the end of the month. One is due on the 25th, the other is due on the 30th. I have mapped it out; I have to read a certain number of pages a day in order to finish both of them on time. Will I finish them on time? Stay tuned.

The news that Robert Redford passed away has left me feeling so sad. Don, too. What an amazing man he was; so talented, so dedicated to his work and to Sundance and to the environment. His was a noble life and we are all better for ‘knowing’ him. I had a poster from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid  on the wall of my dorm room. Three Days of the Condor  and All the President’s Men  are two of my favorite films. And his direction of Ordinary People  was simply exquisite. He was a true movie star in the best sense of that phrase and there aren’t many of them left. He was also an extraordinarily good man. Rest in Peace.

The girls are getting a change of clothing. Four down, many more to go.

Stay safe.

Happy Wednesday,

 

Lambs Like to Party

Lambs Like to Party

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