Thursday, May 28, 2009

For the record

My friends with the biopsies have had good news. Hers was benign and his was encapuslated and nothing bad found in his lymph nodes.

It has been raining for three days and I am wearing what I was wearing last winter and lit the woodstove this afternoon.

Monday, May 25, 2009

a placeholder until I actually catch up.

Lets' see. Tuesday, May 5, I flew to Dallas, where it was immoderately humid and not all that hot, but I still thought I might die. My aunt and her housemate were kindness itself and I saw the new Michael Caine movie. It is good acting and one unforgiveably funny moment (you can forgive the movie, but not yourself for laughing, a lot) but maybe I was not in the mood for old age and death and Youth's Resilience. They did a fine job but it seemed nothing new.

Saturday I flew to Austin, which from Dallas is possibly even a little shorter flight than from Boston to New York. It was really, really hot and bright. Thought I would succumb to heat prostration. Nearly did while just putting up my tent. Collapsed in the unA/C, Internet-free, equipped with adequate but uncomfortable furniture, and thought it was a pity to come so far, to such a lovely place, only to die.

While I was calling my parents (my cell phone worked actually fairly well) a scissor-tailed flycatcher came and did aerobatics in the sky, catching flies and looking more like one of those phoenixes in Chinese restaurant art than anything I have ever seen. I had known about S-T Flycatchers but only ever seen them sitting, looking overdressed, on telephone lines. I am here to say they may possibly be the best thing ever.

Was on an interesting dig with tolerable weather (no snow this year, no rain, either) and a bunch of people I really like for ten days. I did not die; in fact, I think I did just fine. More to come, I hope.

Flew home on Sunday, May 17, to be met late at night by Doug at the Manchester Airport, and at home by delighted cats.

Returned to the bosom of the Interwebs, I was happy to hear that _Castle_ (ABC, 10 pm Mondays, starting again in September, but you could do worse than to check it out on iTunes). I was less pleased to hear one close person was awaiting the results of a biopsy and a less close, but still good friend, had failed his and had the full prostate cancer surgery. 'But he's only in his 30's,' I said, 'he's barely older than I am!' (Pause.) Well, that was the case 20 years ago, yes, and now I doubt if he's much over 55. I hope both of them will be all right.

Scratched fire ant bites and slept a lot. We will not speak of the amount of _Firefly_ fan fic I read, but there's still another 130 pages of titles to go. I am being selective, for all the good that will do. I also made a batch of dandelion wine (it is labor-intensive: I watched 2 Middleman, 1 Better Off Ted, and an episode of Castle while I prepped just over half of the dandelion blossoms). I also bottled my cheap-and-fast Malbec, which still tastes too grapey but, unlike the last two batches of Zinfandel-in-a-box, will be drinkable. I have done some extensive research to make sure.

On Friday, May 23, I got in the car and drove to Northampton, MA, where I stayed up late talking to Grace about theodicy. God isn't looking too great, Obama notwithstanding.

Then I picked up Miriam (aka The Dread Pirate Roberts; she has been in my Smith science fiction convention spinning class twice) and we went to the MA Sheep and Wool Festival. We both behaved ourselves, and I saw: MamaCate, Robin, Mary Pratt (Tiffany bought a fleece), Tiffany and Katy, Robin, Marcy, Cindy Baehr, Cheryl and Sherrianne (?) from Doug's guild, Etherknitter, Deana,Jess (I know her face, I'm bad at names), Kristen, Leslie Wind... a generous helping of people I haven't seen for two years, what with missing both NH Sheep and Wool two years running now, and MA Sheep last year.

Then I drove home. The cats were relieved.

The next day I got up early and went to Concord, where I succeeded in packing most of Bryn (community organizer from last December?)'s worldly goods into my car and took them to her new place in Brighton. She did the heavy lifting and I watched her stuff and my illegally parked car, and talked spinning with strangers who wondered what my drop spindle was. Then I had lunch with my parents and went home.

Today Deb D came to visit and the weather was lovely. Paul continues to work on the bathroom; we wait in joyful hope for the second coming of the counter, since Home Depot LOST the first one: and Marten thinks Nigel needs a lot more polish before he's ready for the big time (that would be why they had a dust-up, right?).

Pictures of the dig to follow. Sometime soon, honest. Before the next one, anyway.