Friday in the middle of moving...

I originally wrote this on December 9th...

There are two inviting things drawing me forward: one, my new fingering yarns, two balls of mixed soft purples, and one of a softer, slubbier fiber - cotton, wool, nylon & silk - that seems like a mix of greens and cool colors, with flashes of bright flowers blooming in the forest shadows. I think the red is minority... And there are new skeins of applique thread as well that I feel excited about. A rich purples mix, a rich mix of deep greens, a sunny light bright yellow green mix, one called Nefertiti which is exotic and luxurious, a couple of sunsets and another mix. So I have more applique and some new delicate, colorful knitting to look forward to, when our stuff is all moved - into Pine Hill, and into storage, and hopefully books taken to the library and thrift store stuff all donated, not just abandoned - and we get to tidy away, organize, and finally sit, begin new projects and return to old ones.

I always forget I can't tab here - it kicks me out of the post...

The second inviting thing is my batch of new photos of Lulu, the yummy little pug puppy. For her, I imagine getting out my pencils or my paints, and drawing and painting shapes and roundnesses, curled tails, round wrinkled heads, beautifully muscled hind legs, wide-legged stance, and the intriguing photos where she looks like she's in a - darn, who's the Spanish painter who did portraits of royalty - Las Meninas, and all? With mirrors, himself in the mirror, toy dogs and mastiffs? Velazquez, yes (got this information from Duane Keiser, with a wonderful post on Las Meninas; before that I had written Goya). This one photo, with its low angle, light from along the corridor, leaning mirror and another painting in view, looks a bit palatial and Old World.

Meanwhile, I've been eating almond M&M's like crazy today, but I did go through all the workshop's worth of stuff, with Paul, packed up a carload to bring back, myself, and designated a truckload for storage. The rest, scattered around the floor, to be cleaned up and disposed of, or just abandoned, as time permits. And then I did some sorting in our bedroom and bathroom, and made a small, alarmed stab at dealing with my studio. Omigosh! I still have a whole Letraset-file of drawers of Letraset... oh, dear. Well, I think that's for getting rid of, and I hope someone still wants it. Probably quite obsolete, another sadly, wrongly useless artifact... Anyway. I did actually make some headway, I think, and I think next time I tackle it I'll get a lot packed up - maybe just about all of it. I can imagine that. I hope to get to Maidu class tomorrow, if Paul's okay with taking the day, or part of it, off. I was stopped today by hunger, actually, not just overwhelm, and that's why I ended up at Safeway stashing up on M&M's.

Oops, tabbed again. I will brush my teeth, take Chief out, change into pajamas, and do my homeopathics and drops, while rereading the next to last Wimsey-Vane mystery, which I'm enjoying more than I remember doing the first time. But maybe it gets bleaker. Anyway.

Salamanders & Dreams

This is a post from 2007, April 8th - finally publishing it...

Hey! Long time...

Well, today Tim and Al (the grader) have our front driveway and side yard all dug up, laying septic, electrical, water and all, with Paul, and Paul & Tim found a whole bunch of salamanders. Paul called me out to see; he'd named the first couple, Jimmy and Mabel, and I named the others as we found them and I picked them up: Judy, Jeffrey, Robert and Richie. Meanwhile the drain had been interrupted, in order to hook up the new septic connection, so we weren't supposed to use the toilet or run water down the drains; and I suddenly realized that I was holding these toxic salamanders in my bare hands, and should wash my hands afterwards, but was I going to be able to do so? And I'd been eating chocolate... eating with my fingers without washing my hands first was definitely out if I wanted not to get sick.

Well - the piping was all hooked up, so I was able to wash my hands right away. Paul, who'd been wearing gloves, opened the door for me and turned on the bathroom light and the water. I could have turned on the light with my elbow, and the water using a piece of toilet paper over the faucet handles... but it was nice to be treated to some help.

More later. I want to write yesterday's dreams.