December

It seems that I've gotten in the habit of celebrating my birthday every other year (maybe I'll age more slowly that way?)  Four years ago I went skydiving.  Two years ago we went to Universal Studios--specifically Harry Potter World.  This year I hopped up to Boston for a few days to visit Mike and Margo.

Mike had just been for a visit for the Halloween Howl, but during those visits we tend to be a little preoccupied with the Howl itself and don't get to visit as much as I'd like.  Besides, Mike had a workshop built several years ago (which he keeps calling his "shed" and  I insist is his "maker space".  He reads too many British woodworking magazines--in the UK a "shed" is where a guy makes stuff, whereas in the US it tends to be a place to store junk.  But I digress.)

It's always hard for me to be away from cats, if only for a few days, but we all thought I'd be OK because they do have a cat, Moonlight.  Little did we know that Moonie would take an immediate and intense dislike to me.  I got glared at.  For three days.  She didn't hide, and she wasn't aggressive (except for a time that I attempted to casually scratch her ears and got hissed at) but she glared (well, one morning I came down just as she finished her breakfast and she barfed at me).  The most disconcerting times were when I got out of bed and opened the door to find her in the hallway glaring at my room.  To assuage my ego, we all came to the conclusion that she really really dislikes other cats--and, of course, despite the fact that I do bathe and wash my clothes, I *have* to smell like a whole herd of cats.  Especially since my slippers by this time are probably 50% wool, 50% cat hair. 

Despite my intentions to mostly hang out in Mike's "shed" we of course had to go to at least a couple of museums.  The Fullerton was having a steampunk exhibit paying homage to the area's history of producing shoes (and odd combination, but it worked) so that was a must-see.

And I had to go visit Mike's museum--meaning the one where he volunteers.  The Charles River Musem of Industry and Innovation--the name about sums it up.  Lots of 19th century tools (from steam engines to fly shuttle looms, printing presses, and Mike's particular toy that he's worked on--a paper-bag-making-machine). (hmmm--too much talking, no picture-taking . . .)

But, as planned, a lot of time was spend playing in Mike's shed (giving Margo time in the house to placate Moonie).  The shed is not large--about 10' x 20'--but it's a good thing it's built on bedrock because he has managed to pack it to the gills.  Lathes, grinders, engravers, all the stuff to make stuff with--it's a heck of a playground.  Not too long ago he had built a machine to do engraving via computer program.  His experiment while I was there was to see if he could replace the engraving head with a small laser.  Which he did, and could burn intricate designs on pieces of wood.  I had just happened (cough, cough) to bring a couple of bone discs with me (I use them for spindle whorls for spinning) and, being that bone is organic, he was able to burn a delicate design on it (have to admit that burning bone stinks a bit).  What I found most charming was the way that the machine "sings" while it's working.

 

 

And on my last morning there we even got a sprinkling of snow.

 

Fun trip, and after I got home I overcame my slight trauma by scratching/hugging every cat I could find--mine, the cat at the feed store, the cat at the hardware store, a friend's cat--just to assure myself that most cats like me.  It wasn't me--it was her.

The rest of December was mostly doing December stuff--getting ready for Christmas (including our traditional viewing of "The Hogfather" while having meat pies and sherry), having Christmas eve with friends, and a quiet Christmas day at home.  Quiet except for a bit in the late evening when we heard a knock on the door (a rarity--out here someone knocks on our door about once every 10 years) and it was a couple of sheriff deputies.

Back story:  When we moved out here we had problems with trespassers in the woods behind the house.  We posted signs, which were of course completely ignored.  Later we took to nailing baby dolls to the trees, which worked quite a bit better.  Seriously--who wants to risk going on the property of someone who nails baby dolls?  But there is a stream on the border of our property and people still tend to paddle down that (officially we own only one side of the stream).

This year, after the Howl, we were cleaning up and got ready to toss an old plastic skeleton--there was only the top half left, and even that was missing an arm.  But--what the heck--we brought it home and took it down to the woods, and hung it where it could be seen from the stream.

Hence the deputies knocking on our door.  Someone was paddling down the stream, saw it, and freaked.  Fortunately the gentlemen of the law thought it was pretty darned funny.  And it's nice that if they had to work on Christmas, at least they got a good laugh out of it.

And that about wraps up 2016.  New Year's Eve was spend quietly at home (although we did manage to stay up until midnight, but opted for a glass of eggnog rather than open champagne).

November

I really just want to skip the rewind and jump into NOW--but I'm just OCD enough that I have to at least give a nod to November (and, next post, December)

Not a lot went on in November.  The first week or so was to finish cleaning up after the Howl--cleaning and boxing and dragging stuff back to storage.  Not nearly as much fun as dragging it all out in anticipation of making the magic (i.e. entertaining 1000+ people and scaring the heck out of some of them).  It's odd that even people who help out and participate on the trail think that there's some "they" out there who takes care of such things.  One person asked (as she helped me lay out and label costumes) "do they ever wash these things between Howls?"  I looked at her and said "if 'they' is spelled A-N-N, then yes--'they' wash the costumes."  It takes some time to wash, dry, sort, and box them all.

There was quite a bit of spinning and knitting.  Every year Rob and I make a few things (hats and mitts) out of the wool from the museum's sheep to put in the gift shop.  She doesn't have the best fleece in the world, but after it's been washed and combed it's pretty good.  So I washed, combed, and spun until I was really tired of it.  Rob got tired even faster--he knit two hats, and I did two hats and four pairs of mitts.  I actually had a skein of yarn left over (enough for another hat) but I was sort of over it by then.

 

 

 

Then I started some rather posher spinning and knitting.  In Ed Wood's "Glen or Glenda" he defended the idea of being a transvestite because women got all the things that feel really nice--like angora sweaters and satin nightgowns.  Men don't.  Well, why not?   One of my favorite hats is one that I made of a blend of camel down and silk--that's usually used for something like a fancy lace shawl, but I made a watch cap out of it and it's very soft and very warm.   My brother lives in Boston (i.e. cold) and is rather challenged in the hair department, so I made him an equally posh hat of silk and yak (yes, yak. Turns out the big hairy cows have an undercoat that's close to cashmere).  May he wear it in good health.  (Not saying that he has any tendency to be a transvestite.  Love you, Mike, but you would make a really unattractive woman)

 

 

(really should get a new wig head.  This one gets used a lot for various projects, usually making masks)

 

 

 

Of course, November means Thanksgiving--which we skipped this year.  No, not really.  We had a really pleasant Thanksgiving with just the two of us.  Some time ago--32 or 33 -- Bob's mother and sister decided that Thanksgiving would be at our house, since at the time we were living halfway between the two.  After that, it was just sort of accepted that we would host it.  With a couple of exceptions (one time his folks wanted to go out for dinner, and niece Amanda hosted it the first year that she and Robert had their own house) we had always done the Thanksgiving gathering.  After his folks passed and mine moved to assisted living, I instigated the "day before Thanksgiving" party for our friends so that I could take dinner into my parents on The Day Itself (ever try to fix T-day dinner for four people with one small microwave?  Yes, it can be done.  I am that good)

 

But time has done it's thing, and I realized that I didn't *have* to cook the big dinner this year--so I took it off.  Next year we'll probably go back to the "day before" dinner because it's actually fun, but every 3 or 4 decades it's nice to take a break.

 



Bob has pointed out that there has been a serious lack of cat pictures on the blog recently so he supplied one.  We do have occasional cold days (not often--the saying around here is what we do over the winter depends on whether or not it falls on a weekend) and the cats really appreciate their heating pads, even if they do have to share.

 

 Fiona, Noko Marie, and Nazgul

Happy New Year!

And did I do the catching up I intended?  Obviously not.  Life keeps going forward, and it's hard to remember what I did yesterday, much less details of months ago.  So I just have to hit the highlights, and move on.  New Year's resolution--keep the blog updated.  If only for myself, to help remember my life.

So--gee--what happened in September?  Anything interesting?  Something . . . oh yeah.  We got hit by Hurricane Hermine.

We feel a little guilty that we came out of it smelling like a rose (not quite--it's still pretty darned hot in Sept. in Florida and without power we couldn't run AC or even fans).  Of we lost power, along with 80% of so of the rest of Tallahassee.  And we're on a well, so without power we don't have water.  But we had many many gallons of water set aside (because I like to be able to flush the toilet) and a gas burner to cook on so we were set.  We were planning on at least a week without power--but it was on in two days.  There were a lot of limbs and trash down in the yard but no damage.

But what still gets to me was sitting on the porch listening to the radio about what was going on in Tallahassee.  The storm came through during the night.  The next morning, with trees down and power lines down and power crews trying to work and no traffic lights--the streets were filled with people driving around trying so find someplace to get coffee and breakfast.  Lines were around the block at one McDonald's that had power.  We were dumbfounded.  Hurricanes are big lumbering monsters--with emphasis on the lumbering.  You get at least a week's warning that they're coming, and that you're likely to lose power.  And yet after the storm centers had to be set up to pass out bottled water because people didn't set any aside.  How about getting a can of Sterno, a jar of instant coffee, and some granola bars?  I don't understand anyone willing to be helpless.

Of course, with late summer storms come tons of orphan baby squirrels--I raised 9 of them.  Usually I don't name my fosters, but I will always remember little Milagra (miracle).  Getting blown out of a tree in a big storm can be rough on babies, and of one litter of four two died the first night, and one little girl was very weak (the fourth was fine).  I got her on Friday--by Saturday she was paralyzed and barely breathing.  Sunday I assumed she was dead until I picked her up and found that she was still breathing.  If I was careful she could swallow a tiny amount of formula.  I did injections of saline solution to keep her from being dehydrated.  Monday--still breathing.  More injections, and I massaged and moved her legs to keep them from stiffening.  This continued for Tuesday and Wednesday--and then Wednesday night I swore that I saw a leg twitch.  Thursday she started waking up and trying to move, and by Friday she was fine.  It was, indeed a miracle.  Eventually she went back in with the others and I couldn't tell which one she was.

(yes, I actually raised 9 of them but you try getting a group of squirrels to hold still for a picture.)

Other things in September and October--I taught a couple of workshops (indigo dyeing and felting) and did the usual programs and working at the Museum.  And, of course, prepared for the Halloween Howl.  It was definitely tricky this time--our trail is "the walk through the spooky woods" and by some miscommunication--the woods had been cut down.  We debated not doing the trail at all, but ended up doing a somewhat abbreviated version through a small area that still had some trees.  Bob and I opted to entertain the line (we still ran 1000 people through on Saturday night alone, so the wait in line was pretty long).  Bob wanted to be a plague doctor this year.  As he is bigger than the average bear, there was no way to find a mask to fit him.  So, of course, I made it--and I was right proud of it.

 

 

 

 

 

One of my favorite materials to work with--kid's craft foam.  It took a few tries with paper models to get a mask that fit him, and then some work on the foam to get it to look like leather, but I was quite happy with the results (and yes--plague doctors who had to be on their feet for hours would wear Crocks).  What I loved was that kids would come up to him and ask if he was a plague doctor, or parents would explain to kids about putting herbs in the mask to try to protect the doctor from disease.  Even waiting in line at Halloween can be educational)

 

While I was working with craft foam, I also made some gauntlets.  A couple of the scenes needed wraith figures, and I wanted something more dramatic than just plain black gloves.  Eventually I regretted it.  The first one was a challenge, to get all the pieces made, textured, painted, and attached.  At 23 pieces of foam each, the other three gauntlets were a bit of a slog.

 

 

But they did add a lot to the costume.

 

As the saying goes, the cobbler's children have no shoes.  I had costumes for the 30 or so actors, the wraith robes (two of them) and gauntlets done, and Bob's plague doctor costume (I also made the robe and hat).  But what about myself?   It's amazing, when you're desperate and don't have much time, what you can do with PVC pipe and some sheets.

The head was a couple of big candy bowls glued together, and the eyes were smaller bowls.  Beak and talons were more fun foam.  The forearms were trash tongs so I could move my claws.  I was inside in a PVC harness, and a piece of PVC ran from a bicycle helmet I was wearing up to the head so I could turn his head.  It was a tremendous amount of fun walking around in this thing, and I had dozens of pictures taken.  I did need a keeper (Bob hung around nearby, asperging people with a spray of herbs from a decorated skull he was carrying, but he kept an eye on me) because-- to put in mildly--both vision and mobility were rather limited.  Totally worth it.

Gazing into the Past

A friend has archly pointed out to me that I haven't posted for a bit--say, about four months.  I've gone a couple of weeks here and there, and sometimes a month or so, but this is my record.  Consider my wrist slapped.

Weird thing is--if you don't record your life, you forget it.  I look back and just sort of figure that I haven't written anything because I can't remember doing anything.  But, of course, stuff has happened.  I'm just going to do a few quick Cliff's Notes posts to get caught up again.  So . . . .

August

Actually I had August pretty well covered, mostly with The Great Kitchen redo.  We celebrated that with a day trip at the end of the month.  We have a friend who lives in Texas but was visiting her parents in Panama City for a few weeks--so we went and scooped her up to go do the Tourist Stuff in Panama City Beach.  Kim is smart and sassy and pretty darned snarky, hence a lot of fun to be around (truth be told, she and Bob think at the same speed, which is a lot faster than my thinking speed, and I just sit back and nod at the obscure jokes as though I understand them).  We spend hours at the Ripley's Believe it or Not, which is the ultimate of cheesy fun.  I forgot to take pictures, but Kim took a couple, mostly pointing out that Bob is bigger than either of us.  That's such a surprise.

 

This is a casting of the hand of the world's tallest man, with, respectively, Bob's hand, my hand, and Kim's hand.

 

 

We had some really good seafood, and then headed off to the aquarium (trying not to feel guilty about eating fish).  Bob found a stingray petting pool (a perennial favorite of his) so we spent much time feeding them, and Kim's highlight was getting kissed on the mouth by a sea lion.

 

That wrapped up the end of August.  Now I have to think about September and try to remember it.  Did we do anything in September?  Did anything happen in September?  Something is nagging at me.

 

Oh, yeah.  We got hit by a hurricane.  Funny how one forgets little things like that. 

Intermezzo

So about the time that the kitchen was getting finished (albeit with a great deal of it still in the living room) the Hauntforum (an online group of people who are obsessed with Halloween) had it's annual "prop under $25 dollar" challenge.

What a good excuse to walk away from the mess and go make another one in my cottage.  At that point I had less than a week to make something, so really no time to design something and then go shopping (while trying to stay under budget).  So I just dug around, pulled out anything that looked like it might become something, piled it up, and waited for something to happen.

 

 

I raided the garden for an old tomato cage and covered it with brown packing tape

 

 

Eventually some water bottles got turned into legs, and some wire became wings, and a milk jug evolved into a head, and some old burlap covered everything.  Teeth and claws were made from hot glue and voila!  A swamp wyvern.

 

He's kinda cute, and after he was created I was in more of a mood to finish up all the kitchen stuff.  Believe me,  a great deal of the stuff that came out did *not* go back in.  It's actually rather nice to open a cabinet and not have stuff fall out.

 

And then I had to be an adult.  The baby armadillos really weren't babies anymore--and I let them go.  I usually get a bit sniffley when I do a release, but this time I had a good hard cry.  They were just so darned cute, and so friendly.  But alas--they were ready to go.  They were all playing with me and jumping in my lap and sniffing my ankles, then I propped open the door and they discovered a whole new world and suddenly I no longer existed for them.  But they looked happy. (and we did find a new den the next morning only about 10 feet from their cage)

 

 

 

Tah Dah!

It's finished.  So am I.  And the stuff piled in the living room has been sorted, purged, and returned (more on that later)

I love those commercials where someone picks out a paint color, and the next scene is them in their newly painted room looking happy.  They seem to have left the middle part out ("at this point, a miracle occurs").  The part where you drag everything out of the way, put down drop cloths, scrub things clean.  And, in the case of painting cabinets, taking off all of the doors (28 of them), removing the hinges and door pulls (total of 328 screws), taking the doors outside to the sawhorses and painting them, painting all the cabinet frames, and putting those 328 screws back in.  Oh--and I did a copper wash on the hinges and [lizard] door pulls.

And deal with the drying time. I had space out on the porch to paint four doors at a time.  According to the paint can, allow "1 hour to dry to touch, 2 hour before recoating."  Not in Florida in the summer!  One day I thought I'd get ambitious and try to paint a set before I went to work (at 11:00).  I got the first coat on at 7:30, went out to do the second coat at 10:00 and absolutely no drying had taken place.  About the time I was sick and tired of the whole process the kitchen looked like this:

 

Getting there--when I was waiting for one set of doors to dry, I could put the hardware back onto the previous day's painting and hang those.  But it was one of those cases of being *almost* done but never quite getting there.  Especially for the last set of doors--I knew I had about 15 minutes of painting to do--and I had to wait 5 hours to do it, then until the next day to hang them.  Arrrghhhh!  The drawers had been painted earlier, but it was easier to re-attach the doors without them being in the way so we pulled them out, which mean running into the living room every time we needed a spoon.

 

But it's done (almost.  It will always be almost.  We still have to put in some trim and decide what to do with the window frame and maybe get a new light over the sink).  And I'm happy, because I think it's beautiful.  So here's where we started

 

 

And here's where we are.

 

 I'm going to go have a cookie.

 

Baby Bear Paint

Which is sort of a play on words because I'm using Behr paint.

Remember all those color chips on the counter?  I finally decided that I wanted a bluish green, or more likely a greenish blue, and the color that I finally chose turned out to be  "green meets blue", or, to be more precise, Behr color S 430-4.

 

Only I thought that was a little light.  So when Bob went to Home Depot on Sunday, he picked me up a sample of "Long Meadow" aka S 430-5

 

I painted a sample cabinet door, admired it--tried to admire it--realized that I was going to be sad seeing my orange cabinets go.  The color was . . . pretty.  Pretty in a nice, innocuous "oh, don't pay any attention to me" way.  I'm used to cabinets that slap me in the face in the morning.  Cabinets with personality.  This color was . . . nice.

 

I pondered it for awhile.  I decided that the color was perfect with the new counters--there just wasn't enough of it.  What I needed was the next shade down.  So off to Home Depot on Monday to get the gallon of paint.  Smart ass that I am, I showed the nice man at the paint counter the streak of paint on my arm, and said "I want this color, only one shade darker."  After he got the "I'm dealing with a crazy woman" look on his face, I laughed, handed him the paint chip, and we chatted as he mixed it and I went home to start painting.

 

Then I took the lid off.  Apparently when I handed him the chip, he thought that was the same one that Bob had used the previous day (he remembered Bob--people do), and I wanted a shade darker.  In reality, the chip I handed him was the one I actually wanted.  In other words, the paint at hand was two shades darker.  S 430-7, "Fir"

 

I wanted more color, I *really* got more color.  I was going to get my statement.  It was dark.  Really dark.  Darker than it shows on the monitor.  But color is what I wanted, right?  Besides, I had it, and Home Depot is some 17 or 18 miles away and we had already been there four days in a row.  This would be fine, really.

I painted a bit.  Took a break and called my brother to chat.  Mentioned that this paint was really dark, but maybe I liked it that way.  Maybe I would go ahead and paint with it, and if I ended up not liking it I could always repaint it in a few months.  It would be fine.  Of course it would be fine.

Tuesday morning I woke up bolt upright at 5:30 a.m. saying "it's too dark!" 

Bob, bless his heart, offered to drive me to Home Depot, but I just rebelled.  I was over it.  Didn't want to go.  We stayed home, and I sorted and put away some of the stuff we had dragged out, did laundry, fixed up the small release cage and moved a couple of opossums into it to, and otherwise did stuff not connected to paint or trips to Home Depot.

Wednesday morning I had five (5!) museum programs (short ones), and we ran some other errands, and then to Home Depot where they were very nice and exchanged my paint for the one I wanted.  S 430-6, "Forest Edge"

 

And today I spent many hours painting (and there are many hours to go) but yes, Goldilocks, this color is juuuuuust right!