Butterflies all over

I went to get my camera so I could show off the bracelet I made this week, but I was hijacked by some unusually amenable butterflies (names are links). They really do like bergamot and buddleia, and oregano. It's glorious here, more bumblebees than you can count. Still too hot, though.

Eastern Tailed-Blue


American Copper


Atlantis Fritillary


Two-Spotted Skipper


This one I haven't figured out yet. There are also Monarchs and cabbage whites and pale yellows


And daylilies and frogs.


I can't begin to do justice to the hummingbirds, them with their special-effect flying and dysfunctional family life. There is chittery cursing everywhere and deeply-involved dive-bombing high-velocity chittering UFO's. Flying knots. I worry they will be so intense they'll forget to miss my eyes.

Update update

I finally wrote something about the archaeological field school, to which I return tomorrow night for the last week. I have been having a decent time despite spending this week at work instead of in the field. It has been sickeningly hot (which I am handling worse and worse) and I am glad Doug and everyone survived. All cats are well and the archaeologist's lady has been getting better after her lumpectomy. Every time I move my right arm I think of how glad I am to be healthy right now. Aches and pains, yes, many, though MUCH better once I remembered to take Ibu or aspirin first thing in the morning as well as after the damage of the day occurred. Opinion now suggests the muscle spasms in back were stress-related, since they got better on the the dig and went away altogether in Quebec. I have not had them back this week, though it was very definitely low-key semi-productive at work.

More soon, perhaps tomorrow.

On vacation

For the next two week sI am on vacation. The weekdays will be spent digging, and I will likely be blogging them from New Hampshire Underground. Any crafty things will probably get put here. I do wish I would sleep later henceforth, lovely and quiet though it is. And the cable internet was a wonderful surprise.

A nice damp 4th

Well, I caught up on blogs (be sure to catch the sensitive artistic rendering on New Hampshire Underground). Then I finished weeding the small flower garden in the front and mulching it with well rotted horse-manure. The soil was dry enough to pull some excellent long grass rhizomes out, though bindweed needs something like a Mohole-borer to actually reach roots. I need to plant some more mid-season daylilies or something.The cosmos has self-seeded from last year very nicely.

Then Doug and I dug a small adjunct pond near the main puddle. This is in pure clay (this year I really will make pots out of it) and since it has been so dry it didn't quite fill while we were digging. It was noticeably wet and heavy with very clean worms. We called quits after four little cartloads of dirt apiece to a dip in the location sort of near the compost heap. Which cartloads were small but pulled up a short hill were quite heavy enough. It will be a nice size.

I wanted to work on "deep" and tidy up the loose at the bottom. Doug kept saying it wasn't going to rain, so he gets to try to tidy the bottom now that it's wet. I haven't said I told him so but he knows.

I should mention, because I forgot, that last Sunday we killed and ate Spike. My friend the ThD/DVM was here. She knows how to kill and gut things. I know how to cook. On the one hand, both of my parents and 99.99999% of the human species throughout history have eaten things they knew before the things became groceries. On the other hand, even though he was tasty and I know eating him is reasonable payback for a LONG life for a chicken (16 free-range months, with rapine and pillage), and good except for one minute of angst, I just was not entirely happy about consuming him. It was good chicken, not "the best I have ever eaten," though (it tasted, well, like chicken). Now it is much quieter here; Faith only crows a reasonable amount and doesn't attack anyone. It remains to be seen whether the hens grow back their feathers.

Anyway, after several nice rests and cans of seltzer, we bottled wine. I got to
use the new corker which really is nice. The wine, however... I made a batch that stayed in the carboy for two years after I moved here. It tastes strange to me, oddly grapey and as though someone had used Welch's grape juice. By the time I bottled it I had forgotten what kind it was (I know. Keep better records. I mean to use sunscreen and eat a more balanced diet too) and I thought perhaps the taste was a result of its cavalier handling. I have about a dozen bottles left; it's better it you leave it open for about three days; aerating helps some and is slightly faster. So for the first wine kit after this semi-debacle (I wonder if it would be tastier mixed with orange juice? Or grenadine? [Or run through a still?]) I took care. Unfortunately I didn't go with one of the Cabernet kits I have used before; I tried a Zinfandel . It tastes remarkably like the batch I made three years ago and mistreated. I think I really don't like kit zinfandel. Live and learn. I wonder how much I can unload at the dig?

It began to rain. We needed rain. I am sorry for all the holiday makers and campers-out at fireworks displays, but we needed rain. About 2/3 of the tadpoles have apparently transformed and gone, but we need the puddle to stay wet for the adult green frogs and the newts. To say nothing of my neglected perennials.

Then I washed up and we went to see a friend's new apartment, which is in a
house not an apt. complex, in Nashua. Nashua is Far. It is lovely (hardwood floors, interesting walls) and much more tranquil than her old place, where she could hear when anyone flushed the toilets somewhere down the hall. Curiously, I was not much company and kept zoning out. I must really be in crappy shape, as Doug was lively and
cooked the steaks. Our friend apologized for the cancellation of the fireworks, but I was okay with it, pointing out I had come to see her new apt., not fireworks.
She was pleased. It was pleasant. She killed us at Skip-Bo. I tried to stay awake all the way home.

Doug says the new pond has a frog in it already. Who says there's no need for
affordable housing?

And continues well

The operation went well and nothing untoward was found outside a well-encapsulated slow-growing malignancy. Summer can continue.



The weather seems to vary between God-awful hot and rather on the cool side. I like the cool side, although it is sometimes unnerving to have to wear a long-sleeved shirt in July.

As a way to deal with my anxiety over Deb (I think the archaeology boss's wife can have her own name) I thought about talismans. I made her one, realizing that the best ones always give people only what they already have, though one hopes it will enhance the quality and make it easier to draw upon. Since Deb does InformationTechnology in a public school she can always use more:



and the lily pads are the ones in the back yard.

I had another crown prepped and my tooth keeps hurting.

My boss is often on vacation and I am working (ineffectively) on inventorying the Bibles. Next week I will be on vacation. This is a good thing, because my office work ethic is flickering out. Inventory by yourself is really slow.

I should craft more and play Solitaire less.

All is well for now

My Only Beloved Daughter remembered the ancient technology known as a telephone. Worked remarkably well. She is alive and not doing too badly, despite a journey from hell (wrong stops of trains, five sleepless hours in a country train station, you know) and says Murlo is a sweet mediaeval village. Unfortunately the house the FORTY of the student-diggers are staying in is too small and the dig boss spent today fixing the showers. The fact that he could make headway fixing the showers is encouraging.

My archaeology boss's wife is having a lumpectomy on July 2. Since she is probably the only woman in the world who deserves him (oh, now, she hasn't done anything that bad) and they love each other rather sweetly, for 35 + years of marriage, I ask your help in sending good thoughts. I have very few relatives so I have very little experience in people I care about. (Really, in general. Insert whatever verb you like about what I have little experience in.) I so disapprove of people having any intimations of mortality. I hate it when I can't do anything. I hate it when anyone I love is unhappy. Nothing should happen that can't be cured by a good book or a chocolate cake. We have had approximately TWO sightings of honeybees this year. I know it is all going to hell in a handbasket, I know that's what entropy is all about. I don't know why I cry about it.

It was the most perfect early fall day this morning. The climate is seriously deranged. Doug and I went to a weird gem shop an hour away where we had hoped to find dichroic glass cabochons. There were very few, but there were many other things. I think I behaved pretty well except for the string of peridot beads. Cheap turquoise, inexpensive amber. A bad place for people who like to look at pretty rocks. We had lunch at a little non-chain snack bar overlooking a lake. The fish and chips were not much good but I am not poisoned, and the people were friendly, and the seating was available outdoors. When I complained that a lake that big ought to be able to afford loons, Doug found two distant black dots, who dove and surfaced very satisfactorily.

It's an awfully nice planet, and I am sure that in a million years it won't care much about the warm period in this interglacial. We who are not here for long are obligated to care about the other phenomena that aren't here for very long: rainbows (several lately), hummingbirds, one another.

The post before the previous post

The post before the one about sustainability actually brings us up to date, so you might scroll down. I should note, as it is unusual, that by and large I am not complaining about the weather; it hasn't been too hot and yesterday evening was lovely. The Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks are having a great year around my feeder. The tadpoles have yet to show legs and we have not seen more than two frogs at the puddle this year (as opposed to 20-some, last year).


floribunda rose by the mailbox

we have the right to expect adaptation only from ourselves.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/19/opinion/19tue4.html?th&emc=th

"In our everyday economic behavior, we seem determined to discover whether we can live alone on earth. E.O. Wilson has argued eloquently and persuasively that we cannot, that who we are depends as much on the richness and diversity of the biological life around us as it does on any inherent quality in our genes. Environmentalists of every stripe argue that we must somehow begin to correlate our economic behavior — by which I mean every aspect of it: production, consumption, habitation — with the welfare of other species.

This is the premise of sustainability. But the very foundation of our economic interests is self-interest, and in the survival of other species we see way too little self to care.

The trouble with humans is that even the smallest changes in our behavior require an epiphany. And yet compared to the fixity of other species, the narrowness of their habitats, the strictness of their diets, the precision of the niches they occupy, we are flexibility itself.

We look around us, expecting the rest of the world’s occupants to adapt to the changes that we have caused, when, in fact, we have the right to expect adaptation only from ourselves."

I was going to write about how the male in my life is only using me, but complaining about an 18-year old cat--well, of course he's getting difficult. But I swear, although he likes sitting on me the only time he shows me much attention is when he wants me to give him something. Milk, usually.

Wrote that last week. Nothing has changed.


Here finally are the two brooch-type things I made in the wire class now about a month ago. Last week I finished the first project a ring:

the silver one, remarkably featureless

I have the third silver-smithing class this evening; I think we are going to undertake the Bezel.

(I was just thinking I felt silly calling it a silverSMITHING class when mostly I file and sand instead of hitting things with hammers, when I realized smith was almost certainly connected to the word smite. No wonder.)



This is the coin of the lost tribe of cat people, with terrible production values and an artificial patina. Below is a somewhat better one of a coin of the Lost Tribe of Bunny People:
. The reverse needs work.

I am getting a tremendous kick out of carving slabs of half-baked Sculpey into dies and smooshing silver clay in between. I hope to do a coin of the Sheep People soon.

I am still spinning and actually knitted a bit while driving with Ellie into the Boston area before taking her to the airport Monday night. I had an e-mail from her from the Rome airport on Tuesday, in her late afternoon, as she waited for the luggage to catch up with her from changing planes in Paris. A 45-minute connection is not enough. If I know that, why did they schedule her for one? She was a bit concerned as to whether she would get to Siena that night, where she could take a cab to Murlo. Murlo barely shows up on Google Earth. Nor have I heard from her, and now the rest of you can help me wait. I am not worried, exactly, but I wish she would use that outmoded form of communication, the telephone.

BWI

Neither Baltimore nor the British West Indies. My back has been peculiar since the inital wire work class. It is, in fact, somewhat Out, and I should find a cheiropractor.

So I came home, forgoing the bank (bad Laura) but somehow managing to stop at the Garden Center. My peonies - I got three cheap year before last, and one bloomed last year and one looked like it might die, undermined by chickens. Last year I happened on a peony sale at the garden center in Hadley, MA (Does everyone use visits to her daughter as an excuse for horticulture?) and one of those has not opted to bloom, but the other two look great (yes, I should have taken pictures). I may have mentioned this is not a year when the desire to garden has been noticeable. The peonies haven't changed all that, but together with a couple of Siberian Iris...

So I stopped to look for more Japanesian iris, not that regular bearded are bad, and also got a peony. The one that wanted me to buy it was in full bloom and has no buds. I could not turn it down for the one with three fat buds. The fully-blown one was too much.
And this was before I even got home and opened a bottle.

And a Solomon's seal and a somewhat hybridized Ragged Robin of cheery pink. They're all perennials, which means it's practically not like buying them at all, since they will likely be back next year.
Not only is my spinal column only really happy when I am in my ergonomic driving carseat, but it was stinking hot and even the nursery guys were fading in the humidity. I managed, with rather suspect perfect posture, to unload the four pots and went inside. I found a bottle of mead, which is, of course, a muscle relaxant. I went upstairs just as thunder rolled and Toby dashed under the bed. If any of the peonies survive the battering, there will be pictures.

Also of the coin of the ancient Iron Age British Cat People (Catuvellauni?) I found out what I seem to want to do with PMC is make ancient British coins.

decent Father's Day promotion

This is the first Father's day come-on I have seen that has not made me ill. Check it out. http://www.changingthepresent.org/ And I _like_ my father.

Could be worse

You are The Moon

Hope, expectation, Bright promises.

The Moon is a card of magic and mystery - when prominent you know that nothing is as it seems, particularly when it concerns relationships. All logic is thrown out the window.

The Moon is all about visions and illusions, madness, genius and poetry. This is a card that has to do with sleep, and so with both dreams and nightmares. It is a scary card in that it warns that there might be hidden enemies, tricks and falsehoods. But it should also be remembered that this is a card of great creativity, of powerful magic, primal feelings and intuition. You may be going through a time of emotional and mental trial; if you have any past mental problems, you must be vigilant in taking your medication but avoid drugs or alcohol, as abuse of either will cause them irreparable damage. This time however, can also result in great creativity, psychic powers, visions and insight. You can and should trust your intuition.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

The real question is whether it will stop raining sometime and yet not be 85F. I have annuals suffering on the front porch. Some of the grass is as high as an elephant's eye.

Yesterday Doug forced me (You'll have fun." "I donwanna. Costs money." "I'll pay.") to go with him to a silver (and brass and copper) wire workshop. The teacher was really nice and had brought flexible-shaft machines (think Supercharged Dremels) and a grinding/buffing wheel. Apart dodging brooch pins--grabbed by the buffer and thrown across the room-- (all right, maybe this only happened to me) everyone had a good time. Much too good a time: Doug and I have signed up for a silversmithing class. I do not expect to become Leslie Wind over night, or even ever, but it seems like a reasonable thing to study, particularly in light of the metal clay, and either Doug or I already have most of the tools, and the (Web siteless as yet) teacher lives and works out of Concord. Because I don't have enough hobbies. As it is I already have to succeed in making a shawl, because I have two nice pins.

Birds and books

This morning I managed to put my glasses on without disturbing the bird at the feeder, and it was indeed an Indigo Bunting. For other blue, I have Blue Jays.

The cardinal was here today, and the Rosebreasted Grosbeak and both of them seemed to have young ones (the cardinal might have been a female, but the grosbeak was definitely a growing child). Scarlet Tanagers were around a couple of weeks ago, but I haven't seen them again. I love my allegedly Red-Breasted Nuthatches very much, but the coloring is subtle and more of a rose than a red. Or maybe a rosy ochre. Red-bellied woodpeckers, heard but not seen.

For yellow I have Evening Grosbeaks and Goldfinches.

I haven't seen any Baltimore Orioles, who would do for orange and maybe green, or female Scarlet Tanagers, who are definitely green. I do have Purple Finches but they are a color I would call Pahnk.

And lots of very pleasant less-distinctively colored birds, like Hairy and Downy Woodpeckers, Chipping Sparrows, some kind of flycatchers, the sounds of Great-Horned and Barred Owls and Pileated Woodpeckers, and Ovenbirds and Woodthrushes and a Veery at the lower end of the driveway (which is a nice sound to hear as I leave for work), and the hummingbirds shooting past the deck. It is really really nice.

The bear has not been in evidence lately. The raccoon is still trying to get in and eat the birdseed. The tadpoles are huge, and there are two newts in the puddle with them. The frogs are much thinner on the ground and shyer than last year's. I hope the chickens have not been eating them.

We are looking for someone to take our roosters. To eat them would be just fine. Spike crows _all_ the time and keeps attacking us, which is unwise of him. Faith isn't as obnoxious to us but the feather-picked appearance of the hens is upsetting, though the hens don't seem to mind much.

There was a delightful article on a Harry Potter convention in New Orleans in Salon. I am not alone in having the mixed feelings in my anticipation of the next book, because it will be the last book, at least as far as I know, in that universe. I still don't quite understand why I like them so much; the silly names bother me a bit (I mean, was poor Remus Lupin doomed to be a werewolf from his birth, or did he change his name when he got infected?)but they are a great place to go, even if lately Harry feels lousy most of the time. So I am going to have a small in-advance-of-publication J.K. Rowling festival. In September the fourth Temeraire book is coming out, which will give me something to live for (other than the inauguration of a different occupant of the White House), and I have gone insane and ordered a copy of the first one (les Dragons de sa majeste) in French. I know it's feeble to read only stuff in translation, but it does practice my French and I know it well enough to actually figure out the words I don't know, and I like it enough to put up with the slowness of reading another language. Which all impel me not to try to read anything I don't already know I like a lot. You can never tell when you might have to go back to Quebec and get a chance to speak in foreign.

Sticky

The weather is sticky. It may thunder soon, in which case Doug will have to rescue his freshly washed (NH S&W) fleece and I will have to rescue the alpaca drying on the reflector-ovenlike warmth of the hot tub lid. Meanwhile, God (Bacchus, Ceres) willing, I have one red zinfandel kit and one Breakfast Stout (low in alcohol, but probably not compared to, say, orange juice) kit making billions of yeast cells very happy.

The kitchen floor is sticky, strangely. The part where they say "Remove cap from bag of grape juice concentrate _carefully_ (my emphasis)..." well, I was careful, and it erupted anyhow. And there's the dribble of roasted barley and oatmeal tea. Anyhow.

If things go all right I will make the kit with the expensive varietal grape juice from Italy next month. If they don't, I'll get a new sachet of yeast before I try it.

My feet are also sticky.

Next thing: locate the camera

It is not even 9 a.m. and it's already too hot, which does not augur well for a humid day in post-agricultural New Hampshire.

Last weekend was GREAT. The OBD had come home, which improves my standard of living all over the place. I cleaned the kitchen. She and her boyfriend _cleaned_ the kitchen. She cooks. She is a little rigid about not letting me go to the grocery store alone, but as she is probably right (I had three kinds of Caesar salad dressing in the fridge, at least two coagulated beyond (word for tastiness/attractiveness/low bacterial count), I cope.

On Friday, however, I left her behind to go to Northampton, where I met up with blogless Tiffany, a nice young woman who graduated from Smith in 2006. She knits hats with tentacles. She has been at both of my Smith science fiction convention-spinning classes, and I must admit that has something to do with her becoming a kickass spindler (though she has my weird habits, like not using a leader and leaving space between the cop and the whorl). She and I stayed with Grace and Dahlia, some of my oldest friends, and we went to a very tasty Chinese restaurant in Florence, recommended by another friend of OBD's who graduated in 2007. _Her_ name is Eleanor, like the Only Beloved Daughter. Anyway, the next day Tiffany and Eleanor and I went to the Mass Sheep and Wool Fair. The day started off gross and humid and turned pellucid and warm and delightful. I kept running into people I knew, which is possibly the nicest thing about sheepandwoolfests.

As I may have mentioned I bought a few things at NH Sheep and Wool, so I was trying to restrain myself at Cummington (some roving. Hardly any, really. A little angora, some lovely mixed red Romney, four ounces of regular pleasant greyish Romney shot with silver Firestar...) Also we were bummed that the needle-felting was a demo rather than a workshop, so we acquired pads, needles, and roving and had our own workshop. Eleanor was fighting illness and cheered up considerably when we sat down and began stabbing things.

I really enjoyed shopping with other people; enabling is nearly as much fun as acquiring and the guilt is different. Tiffany's beloved had told her any animal she brought home had better be stuffed or Katy would eat it (Katy is the beloved). Tiffany was considerably tempted by the baby rabbits. She has two rescue Angoras at home and wanted one who had been well socialized, who would be her friend. She decided to postpone this till her fiancee could be involved in the adoption.
She did buy a fleece (this is a spindler with a set of handcards, people. She is insane),which isn't so much a stuffed animal as an empty one. And some bright yellow roving. She had been going to get another spindle or so but she was seduced by my Golding and planned to get one by mail-order.

We dropped Eleanor off at her dorm to finishing packing and took a quick rest and then went to MamaCate's party. Can you say drunken rout (see definitions 3-7)? I have never been to such a rowdy party where everyone was sitting down. Some knit, many spun, very many tippled. Amazing. Delightful. I walked in and announced that Tiffany ,who had never met any of these people until that day and was showing considerable bravery, needed to learn to use a wheel. MedStudentWhoKnits offered the spare she had in the hall (I only travel with spare spindles. She is way cooler). I announced that Tiffany needed roving. Mamacate made Romney appear. I announced that Cheryl, who was sitting on the other side of Tiffany on the couch, should show Tiffany how to use these things. She looked surprised but she did, and now Tiffany thinks she might like a wheel for her birthday... Another life ruined. My work there was done.

I did get to show my tarted-up wheel to David the Merlin Tree.I think he was appalled. So I gave him some home-brewed beer and he oiled my wheel.

Tiffany went back to Brighton on the bus the next day, and I went and loaded my car at Eleanor's dorm room. Then I met Grace and Dahlia at the Paradise City Crafts Fair, which is too high-end for me. I bought five mugs from three vendors. There were many lovely things there I cannot afford. There were many lovely things there I wouldn't have if they gave me free with a pound of tea. There were many lovely, well-made things with no personality at all, that look to me like they belong in a really nice furniture store. It was weird. I didn't see anyone I knew there other than Grace and Dahlia, and our cell phones got a workout as we tried to stay in the same buildings.

Exhausted, I went and moved one load of Eleanor's stuff into her summer apartment and we checked out some dumpsters, scoring a desk and a nice end table. We headed for a place famed for its ice cream and alleged to serve sandwiches, but there were no sandwiches by that time of day. We were forced to have ice cream for dinner. Very good ice cream. The cows responsible for the raw material watched us watch them. Eleanor remarked it would not have been as much fun if we had been eating burgers.

We got back to Henniker about 10pm and I collapsed, having brought two Eleanors together.

Monday of Memorial Day, since I had done nothing for months but tell people how important it was to scour their fleeces ASAP, I washed my NH SheepandWool fleece, Hezekiah of Brimstone Hollow Farm and more of Jazzmine the incredibly dirty alpaca (she washes up very nicely, though). The horse trough works very well.

On Tuesday, OBD and I caught the small elusive orange ex-kitten and forced him into a box so the vet could do awful things to him. Toby came through fine, no angst about Losing His Manhood, and has been spending a lot of time in my room. He is not supposed to go outside for two weeks, which seems excessive since it's the same guidelines for abdominal surgery. He seems much happier confined in one room, though, and lets us pat him and purrs a lot. I think Marten is glad of the break, since Toby ALWAYS wants to wrestle him. Marten is too cool for that.

Now the extra Eleanor has departed and I should plant annuals. Mostly, I spin. I have spun some of the Hezekiah, and it is really lovely. I have spun about 2/3 of one of my three 4 oz scores from Friends' Folly Farm. Spinning is easier than knitting. And I tell myself it _is_ stash reduction.

I want to go dig. I don't want to work. I want to spin. I want to sleep, and make wine and beer.

Meanwhile

So I did another session of PMC and it was still hard, and Doug found the same thing and seemed doleful, so, as it rained, and rained, and rained, I suggested we bottle last May's dandelion wine. And maybe the three gallons of 9-month old Barkshack Gingermead, and the two gallons of pomegranate mead, and a gallon of sweet-fern and yarrow mead... I was busy last September. In the end we ran low on small bottles and racked (siphoned off its sediment and into a fresh gallon jug) a gallon of pomegranate and a gallon of blueberry mead. Perhaps they'll get bottled next week.

This involved hygrometer testing and of course you can't return those tubes-full to a sterile batch, so we drank them. And there are dregs, full of B vitamins. Which you will need, because the mead seems to be a tad alcoholic. All of them were relatively dry, which was a good thing. The blueberry seems the sweetest of the lot; Doug is planning to pour the lees over ice cream, because he is a sicko. The pomegranate, whose recipe I made up and named Persephone's Lament, is complex and very tannic.

Sarah called around 4pm and decided to come visit, which was good because Doug and I were walking into walls and giggling a lot. Around the same time the sun came out for the first time in perhaps a week?

Sarah made tofu yellow curry (we were still able to feed ourselves, despite giggling)and I made labels and Doug applied them. Sarah is a heroine. Doug and I are in surprisingly good shape. The kitchen is a bit sticky. Brewing is one of the hobbies that gave me excellent results right away. It cured the doleful just fine.

Toby spent the time the Daughter was here last week hiding and acting like a kitty who needed Halcion, hiding under things and slinking. Now he is sitting on my foot being as cute as possible (quite, in his little orange way) and it would be nice if he would act similarly calm for her when she returns. I wonder if he would like some mead?

Speaking for the Differently Animated

(the non- and formerly-human), that would be. I support Dulaan and Knitters Sans Frontieres and people like that, but I haven't been prone to appealing for causes myself. Here's a good one, though:
Wouldn't you like to save a major Hopewell site and 325 acres of Appalachian forest? Follow the link to an excellent presentation. Or first follow this one, print and mail (look, it's okay to be antique in more than one way) them some money.

Why CAN'T I be the Kumkwat Haagendasz?

I've had the materials for the Precious Metal Clay for almost a week without touching them. I got quite clear that I was acting crazy: as long as you don't _start_ a new craft, you have infinite potential.

And silver clay is made of _silver_. It costs money to play with, and once it's fired that's it (although apparently you can sell it to Rio Grande as scrap silver). Before it's fired it's recyclable as clay, just smash and mix with water. And you save and reuse your filings, which is amusing.

I finally (after a nice nap) opened the packages. Asterix was fascinated. Dave Barry has some nice remarks in his book on DIY about the Time-Life Series of DIY books about the man kneeling next to a pipe with a wrench in his hand, smiling slightly, and how Dave Barry had knelt there with a wrench _for hours_ and nothing happened. They sent me a lovely DVD with tranquil music about making little silver leaves out of real ones. I went out into the garden and picked tiny leaves. First I rehydrated the bottle of slip. I removed Asterix from the work area. I laid out the non-stick work surface,and I removed Asterix from the work area. I put a thin coating of slip on the leaves, which tried to shed the water-base. I repainted them, and I removed Asterix from the work area. I got a slightly thicker coat of slip onto the leaves, removed Asterix from the work area, fed Asterix, took the afghan off the couch and put it on the far end of the dining table. Asterix lay down on the sheet of parchment paper I was using as an adjunct work area (you can't use tin foil and I didn't want to try Saran Wrap. Parchment paper is not a good substitute for Teflon; it soaks up water and wrinkles. Next time, polypropylene).

I became emotionally involved with the violet leaf and and after about five thin coats it cracked the whole way through. Would it help to press the leaf and coat it on the other side with spray varnish? The tiny Lady's Mantle leaf and the dandelion are still holding up.

I also started a flat pin sort of thing that looks like a really bright 10 year-old made it (apologies to the real 10 year-olds who might well do better). It has a folky charm but I wanted Stark Beauty. I want to be Hadar Jacobson, is that asking so much? She can't have been doing this medium for more than about ten years, tops.

ON the plus side, I am now so old and so drugged, I mean successfully and appropriately medicated, that I stopped before I became discouraged and ate dinner. I find myself thinking, "You know, it took a while to learn to spin. Or knit, and you're pretty competent now."

Nothing is ready to fire, but next time I won't have to put off starting to try it till so late in the day.

Women (and some men) behaving badly

I went to NH Sheep and Wool. It was good. My mother and father drove up from Boston to see the 'rural frolic' and were surprised by how many people were there and how happy and friendly everyone was. Eager to talk about their interests: the llama, the lambs, the spinning or weaving or knitting. My mom took pictures of animals. They did not buy themselves spinning materials.... but Cassie warmly complimented me on my enabling skills, and at least one person said I had taught her to spin on a spindle in the awful weather last year and now she has a wheel... It warms the heart, it really does. Which may make up for the peer pressure that got me to buy a Golding spindle...

I met up with a number of alpacas



Cassie and Juno and Etherknitter and Julia and Kelly and Theresa and MamaCate and Helen and Marcy and Jessica-who-works-one-day-a-week (not often enough) -down-the-hall-from-me and the effectively blogless Sarah...

Doug vended. I believe he also encountered a Golding.

I bought a whitish Romney sheep fleece from Brimstone Hollow Farm and a black alpaca fleece (Jazzmin).
( not a very good picture, sorry)
And roving for three pairs of socks... and a felting mat and Juno and I split a pound of roving of perfect beauty... I should NOT go back today.

Yay! Rain!

Helen writes:
"And speaking of that[New Hampshire Sheep&Wool], there will be a blogger gathering by the Roby Building facing the goat barn at noon on Saturday. I hope we'll see you there!"

What she said.

Doug said he was not vending this year. So I did not intend to vend, even as he has spent the last several days getting things together, so he can not-vend. At the Huntingdon Barn.

I explained to Etherknitter that I do not need a thing, almost do not want a thing (because I haven't seen them, probably). But Doug and I were at the Feed&Grain store, where it smells good, the people are friendly, and I could buy a entire, mostly John Deere-themed, wardrobe,and they had a horse trough. We looked at it and saw a lovely utility sink. Just the right height.



When Doug gets time he will put a proper drain in it.

So either I have to homebrew and wash bottles or buy a fleece, ideally both. This weekend only one thing is possible. The Only Beloved Daughter is returning, briefly, from Italy. (The Only Beloved Son is suffering from a recrudescence of the mono, which is most unfair.)

Meanwhile, we had a couple lovely days of spring and then a couple of hideous Dawg Days. This morning began with a pleasant thunderstorm and some badly-needed rain--not enough, but it will slightly reduce the forest fire potential. Yes, this is the part of the country that just had its third hundred-year flood in 18 months. We needed gentle rain. We still do, but the tadpoles and other amphibia will be grateful for even this much.