Lovely sunny days!

What a wonderful weekend! Well, beginning about noon Saturday, it was wonderful. That was after I had risen early and run old Abe all over the place and worn myself slap to a frazzle. But I rested up, and Jed came over from Atlanta, we ate dinner at Ruby Tuesday, and had a good visit. Then today we went to McAlister's for lunch, where I got reacquainted with their tortilla soup and other tasty fare. I'm telling you, that's the best soup I've ever put in my whole mouth.

Jed also brought me a frozen sample of his chicken-vegetable soup, which I ate for my supper after he had returned to Atlanta, and which was bowl-scraping delicious. Another thing that has put me in a good mood is the book he brought me to read--to re-read, actually, though I had forgot that I read it several years ago. It's the second in the Jack Aubrey series of sea stories, which is just about my favorite kind of story, especially with Patrick O'Brian's writing style. And knowing that there are a whole bunch more in the series, which I KNOW I haven't read before, gives me a whole lot of good reading to anticipate.

Every time Jed comes over, he gives me really valuable, essential, help around the house and the computer, in addition to his good company and inspiration to get out of the house one more time. This time, one thing he accomplished was a tutorial on how to use (successfully) the new scanner he gave me for Christmas or my birthday. So above is the mule picture I tried to scan and post last Wednesday (from the New Yorker article).

Dam and Blast!

This was going to be my catch-up day, but I have not been able to complete a single thing that I tried to do. One unsuccessful attempt after another. I know tomorrow's another day and all, but I can't help getting aggravated. Mumble, grumble.

Anyway, I've sold all the eBay items I had listed. Think I'll spend the rest of the day listing some more. It's too late to get out of the house and do anything now. If I hit a few more snags, I'll just go to bed.

Whew!

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What a silly word! It really is a dictionary word, but defined as "a sharp breath sound," as opposed to saying "whyou." When I do it, it also involves an "sh" sound in there somewhere. It perfectly describes the way I felt yesterday when I got all the running around, mailing and shipping done. Toting all those boxes, padded mailers and envelopes to the post office made me wish I had a mule.

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Speaking of mules, there's a fine article about them in the February 15/22, 2010 issue of The New Yorker.

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Shown above are some of the things I mailed to eBay buyers. The quilt blocks and pieces filled a big box, but didn't weigh very much. The platter came from the thrift store, I think; it's like the dishes I chose when I got married, but I had long ago sold off all of those at yard sales. The little missal (1-1/2 x 1 inch, but complete and readable) was printed in 1935, a favor from Elmwood Cemetery where SDS and Grand-Daddy Will are buried; I found it at a shop that used to be across 7th Avenue from Hanna Antiques.

Quilts, books, and a charming author

The book club meeting on Friday was fun and noisy. We discussed two books; Jean had chosen Three Cups of Tea for the meeting, and as I've already said, I thought it was a marvelous book. Everyone seemed to agree. Mary is hostess for the March meeting, but she'll be out of town, so we also discussed her March selection, Miss Julia Speaks Her Mind, by Ann B. Ross. This was also good, a rather short novel, mostly humorous.

Then we decided that on the day the March meeting is supposed to be held, we'll bring refreshments and watch a movie in the meeting room.

On Saturday at 10:00 a.m., Ramey's friend, the author Irene Latham, had a book signing in the library for her book Leaving Gee's Bend. This book is a novel based on the women of Gee's Bend, a small isolated community in Wilcox County, Alabama, who are famous for the primitive/ antique-looking quilts they make and have made over the years. Irene's book is set in 1932 and concerns a young girl who leaves the community for the first time in her life, on a quest for medicine for her sick mother.

I worked in Camden, which is some distance from Gee's Bend in Wilcox County, when I worked for Social Security, and Mable is from there and knows a lot of the history, so we were especially interested in Irene's story.

Irene Latham is a lovely young woman whom I'm very glad to have met. She told us practically the story of her life, showed us a little "book" she wrote as a child, and related how she came to write Leaving Gee's Bend, including the six-year process of writing, rewriting, and getting it published. I think everyone at the book signing bought at least one copy. I bought two, one for myself and one to lend before the April book club meeting, as Mondretta only bought one copy for the library.

Ramey had arranged a group of quilts along one wall, including one that Irene brought which was made by her grandmother-in-law. One of the quilts was made by Ramey's daughter India when she was a child, one by our mother Mary Ramey, and one made by my daughter. Another quilt Ramey brought was a beautiful crib quilt made of tiny squares, which was given to her by Mable when Reed Daniel was a baby.

Saturday evening, in a fit of pique, Ramey and I moseyed over to the Big Saver thrift store. I came home with an armload of books, most of which I listed on Amazon.com for good prices totaling about ten times as much as I paid for them. I also got a lovely tall glass candlestick which is pictured above, and a pretty china coffee mug for me.

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I've got six items that I've sold on eBay that I have to mail tomorrow. They should have been mailed last week, but I was having problems getting PayPal to print postage. I finally got a clue from their customer service and figured out how to fix it. So today I've got to finish packing five items and print the postage. I've also got some bills to pay. If I get all that done today, then tomorrow I can have some fun. Or do some cleaning and laundry.

What was I thinking? Or was I thinking?

I fervently hope no one is planning to give me a puppy for Easter--or a kitty or a bunny or anything else with hair all over itself. The other night, or the night before the other night, it suddenly occurred to me that I DO NOT WANT A DOG! And I remembered that it's a lot easier to love stuff and critters that I don't own.

Thanks to Ramey for bringing me the book for the meeting tomorrow, which was postponed from last Friday because of the snow. It's a wonderful book. I wish a few former U.S. presidents and cabinet members, old and decrepit as they are, were forced to do penance by accomplishing exactly what Greg Mortenson did. Dodging bullets all the while. Instead of giving them a pension, we ought to require that they do public service for the rest of their days. That would appreciably cut down the field at election time.

Goals

Last fall, the Lakota Indian school sent me a little memo book for 2010. I decided to use it as my Goals book. My goal for today is to finish binding the Una quilt. I cut all that bias binding from one little fat quarter of fabric. It had been so long since I'd cut and put together such a piece, it took me a whole day (yesterday) to get it right. I think this is one quilt I won't be willing to part with. I used to think I didn't like machine quilting, but Donna has changed my mind.

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Shiloh (a Walker coon hound mix) is at the Bham Humane Shelter. If he were mine, I'd call him Gordy.

And a pleasant surprise: The UPS guy just left me this. Plus all that great packing material for book sales that I hope to get.

The Kind I Love But Don't Want

Fireball is his name, listed on FCDF in January. Just look at this little toy poodle! Looks like a real stuffed toy. He's five years old, blind in one eye, and only weighs 4 pounds. What in the world could you do with a four-pound dog? If you stepped on his foot, you'd have to take him to the hospital.

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And this is Barney, a "maltipoo." He's a cutie, but I can just feel those little sharp teeth closing on my ankle bone or fingers.

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Jack called me last night. He said he was in the UAH library when the professor killed three of her colleagues and wounded three others. Academia is a risky world, in several different ways.

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Jack said he has applied for a Pell grant and thinks he'll get it. He wants to study history, and meanwhile take an X-ray technician course so he can get a better job.

Houndstooth Tweed Snowmen

Today when I went to the store, I saw small snowmen in three different yards, and one yard even had a rather free-form Nativity scene made out of snow. I guess because the snow was skimpy and they had to scrape it up, all the figures had a substantial content of brown leaves, making them all look like brown-and-white tweed.

Yesterday I ordered a new cookware set, red porcelain over cast iron. Can't wait till it gets here.

Toby

The FCDF dog whose picture I posted yesterday is Toby, another enormous canine who's too big for me to own without a fenced yard. Purebred animals, especially the larger ones, have a wonderful look about them that I can only describe as refined. But the mixed breeds are always prettier and friendlier looking, in my opinion. The person who listed Toby said jokingly that he's "small," 65 pounds, and wants to be a lap dog. I would treat him like a king, but Mo would either make his life miserable, or leave home.

Actually, I don't know how Mo would react. He wouldn't leave, I'm sure, because he has never been farther from this house than the strip of woods between here and the next house behind us.

It is indeed snowing, or was a few minutes ago.

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Later: About 3 p.m., I saw the young teen who lives across the street garbage-can-lidding down the slope, and added the photo above.

Looking Up At the Worm's Belly

That's what Mrs. John R. (Bessie) Thomason used to say she was doing when she was depressed. Depressed doesn't necessarily mean you're moaning and groaning and saying poor poor me, why does it always rain on me. It mostly means a big universal blank, where you don't have enough energy/ambition/ability to open a door even if you could see one. And you wonder vaguely why you don't even care.

So something forces you to stand up, straighten your back, flex all your musckles, and go get a handful of pills and another cup of coffee. Eventually, things get better, because that's all they can get, mindwise.

You know that tomorrow you'll get out of the house and look at the snow (yeah, snow, I'll believe that when I see it), and there will be people, and sounds other than head noises or yourself whistling in the dark.
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Someone, I think Sylvia Plath, described this state before. Since it's a true description, I'm going to leave it in here instead of erasing it. I think this is probably the reason Sylvia was so damsilly when she was being vocal; she was so glad to be temporarily out of the trough.

You have to keep getting up and constructing something upon which to rejoice. Some poet said that a little better.

Showers, and Blessings

As everyone knows by now, there are days when I cannot get out of the house. But I'm glad I bundled up today and went to the mailbox.

Sharon sent me all these lovely fabric remnants, scraps and swatches. I guess I'll just have to use the large piece as sashing, to strip the horse blocks together. Or maybe I can find some more of the fabric online.

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Yesterday I found this little ladybug on the coffee table, dead as a doornail. They come into the house; if you put them out, they die of exposure. If you leave them in, they die of starvation. But I still think it's a blessing when you see one, alive or otherwise.

Dirty Jobs

Did you ever have one of those days when you felt like you could tackle the worst job anyone could hand you, and just DO it? Neither have I. But today I'm sort of close to that, and I've identified the 3 worst (little) jobs that need to be done around my house. Got a good start on one of them, and my clockworks are still ticking.

Trouble is, while I'm working on #1, I think of 3 more that are just as bad. Excelsior! Or peanuts.

Psalm 48

When I woke up this morning, I was thinking, "Psalm 48." I had no idea at that moment what Psalm 48 says; the only ones I know all of by heart are 1, 23, and 100. So I read it, and then I read some online commentaries on it.

Psalm 48 (King James Version)
Psalm 48
1Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness.
2Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.
3God is known in her palaces for a refuge.
4For, lo, the kings were assembled, they passed by together.
5They saw it, and so they marvelled; they were troubled, and hasted away.
6Fear took hold upon them there, and pain, as of a woman in travail.
7Thou breakest the ships of Tarshish with an east wind.
8As we have heard, so have we seen in the city of the LORD of hosts, in the city of our God: God will establish it for ever. Selah.
9We have thought of thy lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of thy temple.
10According to thy name, O God, so is thy praise unto the ends of the earth: thy right hand is full of righteousness.
11Let mount Zion rejoice, let the daughters of Judah be glad, because of thy judgments.
12Walk about Zion, and go round about her: tell [count] the towers thereof.
13Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation following.
14For this God is our God for ever and ever: he will be our guide even unto death.


One commentary said that the Temple was built upon Mount Moriah, which is one of the hills of which Mount Zion is composed. Apparently, this psalm is a source of one of the problems about rebuilding the Temple, as it says "on the sides of the north." To experts, this indicates that the Dome of the Rock does not mark the situation of the first or second Temple, but the actual location is either north or south of this marker. Which one is controversial.

Wouldn't it be wonderful to "go to the Holy Land," as people used to do! Of course people still do, but you don't hear so much about it, in recent years, as a sort of pilgrimage.

1215

I thought I knew the history of England, and I guess I did. But I still learned a lot from this book, mainly confirming or modifying my feelings and opinions on the subject. I've always had a tiny warm spot in my heart for King John, at least in comparison to his mother (Eleanor of Aquitaine) and his "lion-hearted" brother, Richard I. Eleanor was French to the bone; Richard, who spent almost no time in England, tried to sell not only London but his sister Joanna. John was acting king of England from the time his father, the great Henry II, died. He wanted to be king. He wanted England. He was a bad man, but I've always considered him the first truly English king.

Well, children, according to this book, Richard really was lion-hearted, although he was a bad man--but maybe not as bad as John. Richard was the darling of Eleanor's heart, and she didn't like her son John. However, she did save John's heinie once, when he was the only son she had left. And then she died.

John wasn't such a bang-up good king. It seems nobody liked him. He lost most of the Plantagenets' French lands. But somehow, during his reign, England grew from a speck to a star on the map of Europe. On analysis, this was due mainly to the irresistible forces of Process and Progress in Europe. However, England stayed together somehow and grew rich, partly because John liked to party and rest and avoid being bothered.

I learned that Magna Carta wasn't called Magna Carta from the beginning, but only called that later to distinguish it from a smaller charter concerning the forest lands.

I also learned, not from this book but from links to it, about another charter:

I. Charter of the Jews of England:
John, by the grace of God, &c. Know that we have granted to all the Jews of England and Normandy to have freely and honourably residence in our land, and to hold all that from us, which they held from King Henry, our father's grandfather, and all that now they reasonably hold in land and fees and mortgages and goods, and that they have all their liberties and customs just as they had them in the time of the aforesaid King Henry, our father's grandfather, better and more quietly and more honourably. ... (1200 A.D.)

It was a good book.

I love Thom Filicia!

He's the best of the TV-show interior designers, according to me, and one of my favorite TV personalities. Eight or ten years ago, there was this male fashion show called "Queer Eye For the Straight Guy," that started out super-cool but got too--ah--characteristic, and I quit watching it. Thom, although an interior designer, was one of the guys. Now he's the designer on "Dress My Nest." His rooms are always really delightful; I've never seen an exception. I've never seen one of his rooms done in orange and brown and shiny leather, which I can't stand. But he could probably make a success of that combination, too, if he put his mind to it.

Thom has just about the nicest, most lovable personality of anyone on any of the design shows, Niecy Nash included. I guess you could call Niecy nice, but lovable? My second choice for favorite designer is Kim Myles (Myles of Style).

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I had the nine-patch blocks laid out on the living room carpet, which is my favorite "design board," notwithstanding the three dining-size tables in my house. And last night Mo threw up on a couple of the blocks. Woe was I! But I couldn't speak sharply to Mo, as I knew all along that that's one of his favorite activities. Well, they've been washed again (for the third time) and hung up to dry.

Change of plan

Well, I made "Dis-appearing Nine-Patch" blocks for the horse quilt, then on eBay I found three separate listings of some old Laurel Burch fabric that I wanted for this quilt in the first place. I bought all three, for a total of about two yards. So I'm going to hold the horses until the orders arrive, and decide which settings I want to use. The 9-patch blocks will make a pretty table runner or something.





(Thanks to Susan for posting the link for the "Disappearing 9-Patch" directions.)



The fabric at lower right in the picture (above right) is the one I like for the horse quilt. It also suggests a good quilting pattern for the setting blocks. I bought another two-yard piece from Sharon in Nevada, in addition to this grab-bag of big scraps.

The tablecloth shown on the dining room table was given to me long ago by Flora Cage, my late mother-in-law. She had owned and used it for many years, probably since the 1940s. It had a tiny cranberry-colored fruit stain, which used to be very obvious but which has faded to pale pink. This is one of my favorite fabric items; it seems to be a knit fabric, but on the table it looks like old lace. I've machine-washed it many times, with no apparent damage.