her able hands

A quick walkabout in the garden before I went off to the harmony sing last night revealed an almost-ready-to-pick Costata Romanesca growing up out of the cluster of stalks like a, well…you know.

I didn’t have time to grab the camera, but here’s a shot of the same one that I took on Sunday last.

I’ll pick it tonight for sure, along with some more haricots and whatever else looks ripe enough, but I’ll take a picture first so you can see how ridiculous it looks thrusting itself up out of the smallish plant. Indeed, I’m surprised to see such a robust fruit coming off of this vine that just hasn’t grown very big leaves at all. This variety has a very thick base attached to the plant and grows almost straight up with what looks to me like pure male aggression. But a touch of olive oil and garlic in the sauté pan tames him right down.

We’re due for yet more thundering, torrential rain today. It’s been quite the deluge around here, some folks I know who have a rain gauge measured 5.5 inches over two days. But more than 3 of those came down in one hour.

The humidity has knocked me somewhat senseless. I don’t know how I ever lived without central air.

Technorati Tags: zucchini, costata romanesca, humidity, rain

Ye Old Blogroll was getting a bit unwieldy, so I’ve put it all on its own page again. Up in the top navigation bar, click on Links.

Aaah. That’s better.

I haven’t felt it this bad in a long time, this Mercury in retrograde wire-crossing madness. Chris and I can’t even have a conversation. It’s as if I’m speaking an alien language and he understands absolutely nothing that is coming out of my mouth. I can’t understand why he doesn’t understand, so I say it again, this time with feeling. Not warm fuzzy feeling, either. My brain can’t seem to call up a different wording, a better way to explain what I’m trying to get across. I just say the same thing, only a little bit louder and with just a touch of venom. Still the blank, exhausted look on his face. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I haven’t spent more than two minutes in the garden all week, and I’m feeling it. The discombobulation. Gardening is my therapy and right now, I need some back-to-back sessions to get myself on track again. But it’s Friday. One more day of institutional, corporate, unintelligible marketing lingo bull crap communication, then five days off. Of course, the middle day is surgery day, and you can measure my level of frustration by the fact that I’m so looking forward to having two days off to get my shoulder sliced like a roll of bologna. I intend to spend great chunks of Saturday and Sunday with my hands stuck in the dirt, not talking at all.

Yes. That’s what I’ll do. A vow of silence until Mercury moves out of retrograde on the 9th. If you need me, I’ll be in the tomato patch, that soft, sweet place just the other side of the woods.

Technorati Tags: garden, mental health, mercury in retrograde, effective communication, therapy

Some bits and pieces:

I just woke up from a dream in which we were looking at a penthouse apartment in Chicago. It was an artists cooperative, with a big community garden on the roof. A woman who had the topmost apartment (it was seven floors of so-called penthouses and she had the best one, though the rooms were open to the hallway)–anyway, she was ordering MacBook Pros for everyone in the building and ordered one for me without my okay. It was zero interest and no payments for one year (like Sears!) and then after one year you could pick how much you wanted to pay and stretch it out over as many years as you wanted to. No questions asked. I was kind of excited. Both about the MacBook and about the prospect of living in a big city again, especially under such bohemian, yet comfortable, circumstances. The apartments were beautiful, overlooking a funky downtown neighborhood with a farmer’s market on one side, and somehow looking out over a huge expanse of prairie on the other. I’ve only ever driven through Chicago once.

I ground the coffee extra thick this morning, and it tastes smoky.

Lila’s still asleep. I’ll bring her to daycare when she wakes up on her own, then come back here to do some cleaning, then head next door to help my MIL with getting the house ready for an influx of people over the next four days.

Calling hours on Sunday. Funeral (cremation, no ceremony at the cemetery) on Monday.

Mom looks good. Tired, but stronger than I’ve seen her in recent months. Said she intends to travel, and to spend part of every winter in the southwest.

I used the words “anal probe” in reference to my week in a staff meeting and everybody laughed heartily. Phew.

This was after I was called out of the meeting to the daycare. Lila was playing on the slide with a child again, playing the “pull me up” game. I was running back to the meeting to grab my things and let them know that I had to take her to the doctor to put her elbow back in place.

The doctor showed me how to do it myself, and suggested she wear a sling for outside play, at least for a few weeks.

Our neighbor felt so bad about what happened the night before, she brought over dinner and a gift for Lila. Her son even brought her a helium balloon on a string, which entertained her all night long. That was so incredibly thoughtful, and the dinner smelled so good. But still, I wish she didn’t torture herself the way it sounds like she did. The kids play that game every time they get together. It was an unfortunate accident.

When I got home, I thinned the salad beds and made a big, spicy salad to bring next door to go with the Italian they ordered (and put the neighbor’s delicious smelling dinner in the fridge for tonight).

A mosquito got me right at the edge of my ring on my finger, now the finger is swollen and the ring is cutting off the circulation. And itchy.

The sun is cutting an angle through the living room window, lighting up the blue glass vases on top of the black shelf. I’m too lazy to take a picture.

It’s tempting to not clean this morning, but instead to get out in the garden. Maybe I can do a little of both.

I didn’t have enough energy to do much around the house today, just weak and tired all day. So I figured I’d do a little spring cleaning around here instead while the rain dibble, dibble, dopped on the roof.

Only problem is my images in posts are sized too narrow. No way am I going back in and resizing them all, that’s crazy talk. Time to dig around and see if I can adjust the column width instead.

I love this new look. Love. It.

ETA: if you can’t see it, you can empty your cache and refresh.