Fleabane by the gate.
Friday. I’m very tired; didn’t sleep too well. Plus, my allergies are a wee bit haywire.
Record high temperatures predicted for today. Hopefully, thunderstorms this afternoon and early evening. Then much cooler weather tomorrow. So we just have to get through one more day of this.
It’s been a pain in the tush without a/c but we’ll install them next week. I didn’t want to strain my back, neither did Don. So, we toughed it out, just like I used to when I was a kid and we didn’t have any a/c. In fact, I never had an a/c unit in my bedroom window the entire time I was growing up. And it used to get very humid in Michigan. I distinctly remember sleeping with my head at the bottom of my bed so I could get the benefit of the fan. That is a very strong sense memory for me!
I have much to do in the big garden bed. It’s already looking rather wild. I will probably wait until tomorrow, however, as it will be much cooler then.
We started watching The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel from the very beginning. We decided we need to watch something brilliant and beautiful and witty, something that makes us feel good. We need an escape. It was the right decision.
That’s about it for today, my friends. I need some more coffee!
Stay safe.
Happy Friday.
fleabane is beautiful … i think they look like young little daisies that are scruffy for having been out in too much wind. :)
hoping some rain will, at least temporarily, cool and clean the air for you. and that you and don feel better soon.
i agree that re-watching a favorite tv show or movie is a good thing. a break from something (work/chores, the heat …), a bit of self-care, some guaranteed enjoyment. for me right now that show is “the andy griffith show” (two episodes are shown each weeknight on an over-the-air tv channel).
more than six weeks ago, i took in a chair and fabric to have a seat cushion made. still waiting for a call that it’s ready so i can pick it all up. :l the chair is a rather rusty, old cantilevered lawn chair (about which i am very sentimental) and a very comfortable place to sit … so there is an empty corner without it. trying to be patient … everything takes time.
looking forward to a quiet day today.
neighbors said yesterday a friend of theirs has covid for being on vacation. stay safe! and may you, don and everyone else have whatever kind of day you want/need.
kathy
We’ve watched Andy Griffith in its entirety several times. It’s lovely.
I hope you get that chair back soon, Kathy!
Stay safe.
I didn’t sleep well last night either. It’s supposed to hit 90° here today and all next week looks like high 80s without much rain. It’s too hot for early June in Michigan. Fortunately, we do have AC.
We never had AC when I grew up either. I don’t think many people did. I had an upstairs bedroom and a fan but it didn’t help much. Sometimes I slept downstairs on the sofa because it was cooler. I remember running through the sprinkler on those hot, humid days and laying in the grass watching the clouds make shapes. Life was a slower pace then.
Take care
I remember the sprinkler, too. Something very old-fashioned and lovely about it.
Stay safe, Marilyn.
I think Fleabane looks like a cousin to Shasta daisies. Very pretty.
Our high temps are going to continue for a few more days. We lucked out yesterday, and got a downpour for about 30 minutes. I swear my plants stood taller after that! Not enough rain to make up for our deficit, but very welcome, nonetheless.
Enjoy your day…,and stay cool! ;)
Two minutes of rain yesterday. Sigh.
There is some in next week’s forecast, but I am wary of these forecasts!
Stay safe, Donnamae.
I don’t have a/c here or at the cottage. There are generally about five days in a summer when if I had it, I’d turn it on but unless it’s super humid AND 90, the fan is good. And, you know those little beanbag things you can micro or freeze to put on your next or elsewhere? I’ll freeze those and take one to bed to just “touch” or hold onto or put by my feet and they seem to do the trick. (Better than wrapping up the hard blocks of fake cooler ice in a towel!)
I’m a little worried though. Rick is having a house concert with a wonderful guitarist from Turkey on Saturday (tomorrow) and he doesn’t have air, either. And we’ll be inside for the concert — 30 people. He doesn’t have a big living room. I might stand in the kitchen and just keep the freezer door open. (Not really, though it’s an idea!) At least the afterglow will be outside!
Oh boy. It might get a little hot for that concert. Rub an ice cube on the back of your neck, Jeanie.
Stay safe.
Your photos always enchant me. I miss a lovely wild garden. I remember sleeping at the foot of the bed for the fan also. Rest up. I’m going to get some physical therapy for my back and see if it helps at all. My Doctor is hopeful.
I sure hope the physical therapy helps, Linda. You deserve a break from back pain.
Stay safe.
attention all “marvelous mrs. maisel” fans!
just now on the local news was a commercial that the cast of “mmm” will be on “the kelly clarkson show” this afternoon. sorry … didn’t catch what time … so please check your local programming.
hope you can watch it if you want!
xo,
kathy
xo
I grew up in Miami, Florida without air conditioning as did all of neighbors; slowly everyone had either room air conditioners or central air installed, not my parents. Summers were absolutely miserable and sweltering. Finally, in my late teens when crime was so bad you couldn’t leave windows open anymore did they buy a large room air conditioner but would wait until 5 pm to turn it on. I have no desire to relive those days.
Are you getting any of the smoke from the Canadian wildfires? Take care, Jen
I can’t imagine Miami without air conditioning! But it wasn’t the norm in those days.
No smoke from the wildfires that I’ve noticed, Jen.
Stay safe.
I loved your picture of fleabane. I’m familiar with the pretty flowers but never knew what it was called so thanks for the education. It was a very hot day here. We need rain right across Canada to help put those fires out. So sad the loss of people’s homes. Let’s all pray for rain. I can relate to having no AC growing up. The bedroom I shared with my sister was hot in the summer and cold in the winter but we survived, lol. Take gentle care. Hugs, Elaine
I hope you get rain, Elaine. Wildfires seem to be more and more of a reality these days.
Yes, our bedroom upstairs was really cold in the winter!
Stay safe.
Hope you felt better as the day went on.
We took a drive this afternoon because the sun came out for the first time midday in WEEKS and WEEKS. Of course it felt swampy as we’re in June now and warming up with summer sun in Southern Calif once we get it; still, I’d been hemmed in for two weeks by choice, involved in various tasks at home, so it was good to get out and the Friday/tourist traffic wasn’t too bad. Good to get in some ‘ocean’; good to still see green in the coastal cliffs; good to see the local lake FULL from abundant rain a few months ago. It was so pretty and blue.
I’m feeling anxious about all I have on my plate; enough to where just now, tonight, I had to write it down, strategize on paper WHAT (and to do WHEN; a serious step-by-step plan; just like I’d have to do in my working years for an employer with a deadline assignment). It’s pressure although a lot of it I’m putting on myself. I just wish I had double the amount of hours I get in a day. I have friends and relatives (retirees) whose days drag and they don’t seem to know how to fill them up. I never have that problem. I just wish I could feel more relaxed like them (it would be healthier!).
hej, vicki! :)
glad you had some sun, hillside greenery and ocean to enjoy! hope you can get that every day.
i very much relate to what you said of yourself … anxious, busy …. also having some self-induced pressure. a year of retirement hasn’t really changed that for me so i don’t have any “tips” for you … just prayers that you get done what needs to be done, that you have and take plenty of time for rest and relaxation and, most of all, that you feel better soon!
hope you have a nice, easy weekend!
kathy
To a subject you can relate, Claudia; we got a notice, not unexpected, that they hiked up our offsite storage unit rate by ANOTHER $50; you can count on it, that at June 1 of each year, it’s another $50. I’ve had it with them. We’ve put up with it and put up with it but no more. I’m paying $500 more per month for this unit than how we started. There is no way on fixed income in retirement years, struggling with ‘finances’, that we can continue with this for another year. What was once a ‘temporary’ necessity is now a luxury, not for us! Shoulda-woulda-coulda emptied out the thing long before now.
They know they have you by the you-know-whats because to move all your stuff, like in a huff en masse(!!), is a major effort, often costly if you don’t have a truck and brawny guys in your circle, and to exactly WHERE if you’re not ready yet, which my husband and I are not. I have a former doctor who keeps his records out there (he’d retired three years ago; he wasn’t part of a large medical practice; was just him); he has to pay to keep all those paper files (patient privacy) under lock and key for a long time and probably keeps them longer than he needs to; but there’s no way he’s going to pay movers to take these boxes and boxes of patient records somewhere else (he lives in a retirement condo; he’d downsized; he has no space himself!); so, he’s stuck, too; it’s where the stuff has to stay for now.
What’s disappointing is that I spoke with someone at this offsite storage facility a few weeks ago, asking about it, how to plan for a rate increase which was probable, and the woman told me, to my surprise and hesitant relief, that the rent this year was only going up $10/month. Somehow, I knew I was fed a load of bull but I did SO want to believe it.
Thing is, with me, and it’s something only I can face and admit to, I’m never ready to go thru the stuff in this offsite unit; I don’t want to do it; it’s a huge amount of work; it’s physical, it’s emotional, there’s sentiment involved; responsibility/obligation; anger; self-loathing; makes for a long to-do list once you get into it; so, I’ve practiced ‘avoidance’ to my detriment. (Sounds like I need to get over myself.) My husband and I are of course ten years older than when we first got the unit in a pinch (our backs aren’t great either; it’s a lot of moving, bending, overuse of hands going thru stuff; you need good energy); OF COURSE we should have found a way, in that first year, to get it emptied; but, we didn’t. We took the ‘easy’ route, I’m ashamed to say; again, we reap what we sow.
I have to deal with stuff at home to make room for what I want out of the unit; it’s like the thigh-bone connected to the knee-bone concept. I have to ’empty’ the house first. This way, we can finish remodeling even though we have to still do it in stages because of lack of funds, only paying as we go so as not to incur debt over it. (We’re not remodeling out of pleasure or curiosity; it’s not fun; it’s an old house and it needs important work; this isn’t cosmetic stuff like new wallpaper and new kitchen countertops just because we want quartz now instead of tile. Number one, it’s the roof. It’s plumbing. It’s … a lot.)
I can’t just bring the offsite boxes here, to the house, and have a place for them in the meantime; I don’t have a place, not yet, which is why of course they’re in an offsite unit in the first place.
Grrrr; it’s so head-knocking that I’m stumbling over my words.
So, be solution-oriented! Starting tomorrow at 7:30am, my husband and I are cleaning out two backyard buildings (sheds/storage). I’ll work for two hours outside, then retreat to the house to work inside (weather; we’re humid here; it’s been getting to my asthma). He’ll keep at it outside; he can now, as he’s almost fully recovered from his own surgery in March; just had the last doctor’s appointment yesterday and all is A-OK; yay! Each day will be the same and the only breaks will be for eating and exercise and falling into bed exhausted at night (or the very-very-occasional ‘drive’; necessary errands and appointments). Dedicated to a cause, like a new religion.
On Monday, we’re ordering a dumpster. When I’m done with the backyard sheds, I move on to the home’s garage. Same schedule. We’ll move out a few boxes from the offsite unit each week; whatever my husband can handle with his back; however much space at home we’ve cleared for the boxes. Once each room of our small house is ready, I can then complete a task, like get books out of packing boxes from the garage and put them in new bookcases on the wall of what will be a freshly-painted living room. Anybody with even half a brain can figure this out, which means I can, too! (It’s the cascading effect of you can’t do this til THAT, headache-inducing but boring details which make ‘normal’ people who aren’t in this kind of mess [nobody should be!] shake their heads in disbelief, disgust, sympathy, etc.)
I will pray for discipline; I will pray for focus. I absolutely HAVE been working for a solid ten weeks now at the home downsizing; it’s just that I have a long way to go. But everywhere I look seems like another major task. Dad would remind me to partial it out; can’t chew down the mountain in one day. (This offsite unit we rent … the situation is intimidating; the thing is the size of a double garage and it is full to the brim; hundreds and hundreds of packing cartons. How did we ever get to this point? It’s scary; being buried by ‘stuff’. It’s not all ours and that’s what makes my blood boil [I am not interested in the lifetime possessions of my mom’s best friend; who, yes, was like an aunt to me, but I don’t need her stuff AND mine AND Mom’s AND the other aunt’s And the other aunt’s AND Grandma’s, etc. {what did Mom think I’d ever do with all this stuff she-herself clearly didn’t want to cull thru either?}]. The tipping point is when my mom died, we moved into her house too soon because we had no choice when our other house sold more quickly than we’d anticipated; her house didn’t get cleaned out; our own house didn’t either; I was newly-diagnosed with cancer and was quite ill for a few months before and after life-saving surgery [I lost a year to recovery; I really just couldn’t do anything with any of this other stuff going on, so my husband {working three jobs} had to do everything with no time to sort; he just packed it all up saying we’d have to do it later together; well, later has happened].)
Everybody’s got problems; I’m oversharing mine. But it’s a cautionary tale. You can’t wait on these big projects like my husband and I have done. My parents obviously waited too late to make downsizing decisions, but they knew they had me. Well, I don’t have a ‘me’ and I can’t keep putting decluttering-downsizing off. Put up or shut up; I blather on and on about decluttering, saying not doing. Well, no more. I’m old(er) now; there’s less time ahead than behind me. It’s time, overdue, for a manageable life in the home. We crave ‘space’ and we’re gonna get it!
It’s so frustrating (I realize this is a personal problem!) because I have other projects and things I’d rather be doing in the present than ridding myself of lifetime possessions of the past (or even remodeling a house for that matter; been there, done that, I’m over it; this is two houses in a row for us where we never live fully in the home because of it always being in stages of overhaul). For instance, in companion to the column I now write for my small-town newspaper, one of the wealthy pioneering-ranching families has just offered up to me the privilege of pouring thru their ancestral papers which include personal diaries from the 1800s; no one here has ever had this kind of access to this particular family; only the historical society has some of their records, archived from years ago and not public-available. I’m so honored with the offer, but I don’t know how I can make time for it. I believe it will be a missed opportunity for myself. And what a shame. But this other stuff, like a life busting at the seams with material possessions (which has finally come to a ‘head’ with the storage-rent increase), is diluting my concentration; I don’t have time for anything else except my surroundings, my living space, which shouldn’t even be an issue by now. It has to be the priority (but what a waste of valuable, precious TIME).
In terms of downsizing at this age, the oft-talked ‘decluttering’ with which all of us at a certain age seem to be confronting, one of my friends who lost a home in one of the wildfires out here in Southern California just shrugged her shoulders and said, “I’m so relieved I don’t have to do all that in my 70s; the fire did it for me.” (One way to look at it, I guess.) When my husband and I were at the beach today (something we can’t do again for awhile as it takes time away), we saw a Tiny House parked along the shore; somebody is taking their home on the road for summer vacation. Fun! I’d never really seen one of these types of houses actually on wheels, going somewhere, fully furnished. But we had to laugh to ourselves, ruefully. It was like the tiniest Tiny House I’ve ever seen; so narrow; we’re sure it wasn’t more than 200 sqft.
But if the homeowner is smart, he/she will keep it that way … like, refuse inherited belongings (put the stuff in a museum if need be; find another relative; don’t let others junk up your space with THEIR stuff)! Don’t accumulate too much of your OWN stuff in your own lifetime (use your money for experiences and travel and ‘pet’ causes; save it for your old age)! Enjoy them, but severely limit your hobbies; curb your ‘collecting’ instincts (sometimes less is more)! It’s what I’d tell a granddaughter if I had one: “Don’t be like me. Don’t do what I did. Learn from my mistakes. (I didn’t need to amass so many reproduction Barbie dolls! I didn’t need to buy all those Christmas ornaments! A house only has so many walls for ‘art’!!) Really adhere to what ‘they’ say about bringing in one thing, ONLY if you discard another at the same time; don’t ADD. Pay attention to what you’re doing; be wiser than I was.”
All I know is from today, this next six months will be very busy but not in vain (then I’m never doing it again!).
Glad you’re going to deal with it, Vicki. I still have more purging to do inside the house.
xo
It is so freeing to get rid of the storage space, Vicki. Ours went up TWICE a year. And it was more than $50. When I would call them to complain, I would hear ‘it’s on a par with the market rate.’ Blah, blah, blah.
It’s a racket. Anyway, it forces you to deal with stuff that you mostly don’t miss. I got ruthless about it. That’s my advice.
Stay safe.
My days sometimes drag. It depends on the time of year and what’s on the docket for the day.
Stay safe, Vicki.
I’ve resisted turning on the ac so far. It’s humid but only 79 or 80 degrees each day. How DID we get along without when we were kids? Spent lots of time today watering everything but the grass. No rain for at least another week yet. I also discovered the doe I’ve chased out of the back garden the past 2 mornings ate all the hostas next to the pergola. All of them!
We’ve been invaded by stink bugs too. As I type, one is doing laps around a side table. I killed four today and found the bodies of six more. I don’t want to get the exterminator involved but this is the worst it’s ever been.
Hope you sleep better tonight.
K.
I’m so sorry about the hostas! Sometimes we have deer that eat the plants, but more often, they don’t. I should knock on wood!
I just capture the stink bugs and put them back outside.
Stay safe, Kay.