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Never a Camera…

16 Jun

The Squire went out to the barn late this afternoon to feed the raccoons and foxes. He heard a rustling noise and stopped walking, but crept up so he could see beyond the barn, into what we call “the back f0rty”.  (Actually, the electric company right-of-way.)

There was a young buck and a fox frolicking in the clearing, play bowing and chasing each other around. The buck saw The Squire and stopped, stared at him and stomped one foot, which is usually a warning sign that “one of us is going to get hurt”. When my husband didn’t move, the deer apparently figured he was harmless, so he sort of shrugged, turned around and walked back into the woods. The fox didn’t notice my husband, and after his  playmate left he sat up on his haunches, with his back to The Squire, and turned his head his way and that, apparently seeking some movement in the tall grass that would indicate a stray rabbit or a squirrel for supper. After a few moments, he turned his head far enough to spot The Squire. He looked at my husband for a second or two, with this “How long have you been here?” expression, and then bolted across the stream and up the hill.

Never a camera when you need one.

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I Should’a Stood in Bed

12 Jun

When we got home from church, I put two fish fillets into the oven, with a sauce of tomatoes and spices, and stuck the probe into one of the pieces of fish to make sure they got cooked thoroughly.

When the alarm went off, I tried to remove the probe, and the fish came along for the ride, letting go when it reached the edge of the oven, and falling down between the oven and the door. I sat the pan as close to the fillet as possible, and took two spatulas (spatulae?) to use as tongs to get the fish back into the pan. The fish landed with a plop, splashing hot, greasy tomato sauce all over the oven, the floor, the door – and me. While The Squire got the fish on the table and cleaned as much of the mess as he could, I went into the bathroom to soak my clothes in hot water. From time to time, our hot water will run brown;  you just have to let it go until it is clear again. Naturally, this was one of the times when it was brown, so now I had two stains  my white blouse.

Nothing a bit of clean, hot water and strong detergent won’t cure – I sincerely hope.

And then as I was going from the kitchen into the dining room, I managed to cut a corner too close and banged my left arm against the china closet, and sloshed the vegetables around in the bowl. Fortunately, I didn’t drop or spill anything.  This is a recurring problem for me; I keep walking into things – door frames, furniture, etc. – and always, always bang my upper left arm.  Between that and walking into dressers and such, if I ever end up in the ER, The Squire is going to be arrested on general principles.

On a happier note, we went to a neighbouring church for a bell choir concert, which is something both of us enjoy tremendously.  We did chat a bit with one of the choir members, as she has the same last name as the rector of the church in Newport, and her middle name is (I think) the same as Mrs. Rector’s maiden name. Really weird.

We have been watching the news for the last hour or so since we got home, and are just horrified by what we are seeing and hearing. We have a dear friend, almost a son, who is Muslim and is beyond worried about this, afraid of backlash, and several friend who are gay, so it must be awful for them also.  Second Amendment or not, there is NO  legitimate reason for a civilian to own what amounts to a machine gun. A pistol or hunting rifle is one matter, a military weapon is another matter entirely.

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The Nerve of Some People

10 Jun

Several years ago a dear friend from church moved to West-by-God-Virginia. Her daughter just graduated from high school, and we have been working for quite some time on plans for said daughter to spend Monday with The Squire and me.  Talk a bit, have a cuppa, play with the Blazer (whom she adores). maybe a trip to IKEA for lunch, and just generally hex around.

When I checked my email about an hour ago, there was a message from a local company, saying the regular operator was taking off for her birthday – and I would be taking the switchboard for the day! This was a CC between the operator and HR, not even sent directly to me, other than what seemed to be an afterthought. I wonder if it had been discussed to the point everyone assumed I’d been included from the beginning.

Normally, this is no problem, as I like working there, and I usually don’t have anything else going on that can’t be shuffled around; it’s one of top-10 Best Places to Work, the people with whom I do work are delightful, and switchboards being what they are, I generally get paid reasonably well to read a book. However, it would be nice to have a bit of advance warning. For all they know, I could be in the middle of an ocean voyage, scheduled for open heart surgery, or any number of other things which would render me unable to show up at 8 AM on Monday.

As it is, I am the only switchboard operator on the payroll, other than the regular gal, and I have too much self-respect (or whatever) to refuse. I’ve written to my friend to see if her daughter can come on Tuesday – maybe spend Monday night here in our fancy new guest room, and head off early on Tuesday, or any number of other options.

And we are going to have a little talk at work about taking people for granted.

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Best Bread Ever!

7 Jun

Several weeks ago, my BFF and I each bought a ginormous jar of Kalamata olives at Costco. She is on the “Whole Thirty” diet, and this is one thing she can have, but I used my olives to bake what we consider the best bread in the world. It does not, as The Squire admits, make very good jelly bread, but an egg salad sandwich on this bread is a glimpse of some Heavenly feast. (They eat a lot of olives in the Holy Land, right?)

I use a bread machine, but this can be made by hand if that is how you do things. Put the ingredients into the machine in the order listed; I take the bread out of the machine and let it rise and bake in a standard bread pan.

1 cup water

1-1/2 teaspoons olive oil                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         1-1/2 teaspoons oregano

1-1/2 teaspoons minced garlic

3/4 teaspoons salt

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

2-1/2 cups bread flour, or all-purpose flour and 1 tablespoon gluten

1-1/2 teaspoons dry yeast

About five minutes before the mixing cycling is done, add 1/3 cup chopped and well drained Greek olives.  (You may have to add a tablespoon or so more flour; watch it and see.)  Put into a greased bread pan and let rise about 45 minutes. Bake at 350-F for 30 to 35 minutes. If you have an instant-read thermometer, bake to 190-F. Perfect!

(I tried really hard to make this single spaced, but it just would NOT work. Sorry about that.)

 

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Equitable Nights

5 Jun

Last night, The Squire and I attended the annual Equitable Trust reunion. We met at the bank when I pulled a file cabinet over on myself and he rode in on his white horse and rescued me. The bank itself was bought out in 1989, but the former employees have gotten together once a year ever since.

Lots of funny stories, some of which we had heard before, and a doleful reading of those who won’t be coming to any more meetings, but a good time was had by all, in spite of the annual damper these deaths put on the festivities.

The Squire, bless him, printed up the name tags and dropped them into a folder without giving them to the Head Proof Reader. As a result, a lot of long last names got chopped off, so if your name was, say, Burkheimer, all that showed was Burk.  He’s cute, and I love him…

One fellow mentioned a trip he had been on, driving from Aberdeen to Baltimore to meet with some Big Wigs, when they were it from behind – hard – by a car driven by a Catholic priest. Somebody called the police, and a burly Irish cop arrived. He took one look at the situation, and then leaned into the window of the cleric’s car. “Begorra, Father, how did it happen that these fellows backed into you so hard?”

A man with whom The Squire worked for many, many years always makes us count our blessings. He and his wife had one daughter who is perfectly healthy, but then had two children who have some sort of muscular problems that put them into wheelchairs before they were in their teens. Just recently, his wife had a stroke which has left her also paralyzed.  They have been able to get aides for the two kids, but he is totally responsible for his wife. The aides had voluntarily lent a hand with the wife on several occasions, but somehow the nursing service found out about this – he did not ask for their assistance, they helped out of the goodness of their hearts – and are now suing him for “stealing” services.

And yet, he is always cheerful, laughing at the craziness which surrounds his life. But, looking at him we wonder if he’s not on the way to a stroke of his own – or worse.

 

 

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Why The Squire Resembles My Father

29 May

weddingPeople have often remarked, not without good reason, that The Squire and my dad looked enough alike to pass for father and son.  My dad used to have great fun taking The Squire places and confusing the daylights out of folks who knew he only had two daughters. We went to a viewing for one of my uncles and my cousin came over to me and admitted that he and his sister had spent five minutes trying to figure out “where  he fits into the family. I finally remembered he’s your husband.”

Even my mother-in-law greeted my dad by exclaiming, “Fr. Parker, you could ruin my reputation!” And somebody else jokingly told my dad “I’ll bet I know which side of the family you’re from.”

Both of us have been doing a lot of genealogy work over the last few years (well, The Squire’s been working on it for about thirty years, actually.) and a name came up in my DNA circle that looked vaguely familiar.

Turns out that about five generations back, we are fifth cousins, or some such thing. This line is on my dad’s father’s side. My mother’s people are all from Germany, and my dad’s mum’s family is from Oz, via Scotland. The Squire’s mother was a McKenzie, and my father’s grandfather was a McLellan; I suppose if we looked hard enough, we’d find something there, but oddly enough, this particular line is Cherokee.

Ya just never can tell about these things.

 

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It Was Spring, Yesterday

26 May

I missed it last year. I was in the bathroom. *

We had one or two days of lovely weather and then seventeen consecutive days of rain. Yesterday was soft and breezy, but today it was 84, and it is supposed to be in the 80s all week. Next Thursday, they are predicting rain, and temps “only” in the upper 70s.  At least, the night-time temps are in the 60s, so sleeping is pleasant, and we can make do with the fan, without turning on the A/C.  We finally got the papyrus plant out of the living room and into the pond last night. This is the best it’s ever looked after a winter in the living room.

We went over to Charlestown today to visit my brother-in-law. Shared lunch, and then he showed us some photos of his canal trip from Amsterdam to Alsace.  Such beautiful country side, and everything is so clean! They offered quite a few day trips at each city along the way. Some were free or relatively low-cost, but others were, to my way of thinking, outlandishly expensive. There was one beer-and-dinner night on the town which was $99 per person. George said he skipped that one. Lots of photos of castles and cathedrals, and one shot of a restaurant that sent me into a fit of giggles – it sold shish-kebob and pizza. He also paid particular attention to the various pipe organs, as he plays the organ, and often fills in for his church.

He mentioned how nice the organ is at our church, but we had to tell him it isn’t any more. We had a contract to get the leathers treated and the electronics tuned up four times a year, but it was decided to drop that, and the thing is getting, Sunday by Sunday, more and more out of tune. It is virtually impossible to purchase a new pipe organ, so in a fit of penny wise and pound foolish, we’ve let a valuable asset full (almost) to ruin. Ah, well. They won’t let me run it, so there you are.

He was an electrical engineer before he retired, and it amused us that he took pictures of outlets and such in the cabin. One thing they had on the ship was a gizmo that caught the sliding closet door about two inches from the end of its “run” and closed the door slowly and firmly. You had to click something to reopen the door, but this prevented closet doors from slamming shut and disturbing the person in the next stateroom as well as keeping the door closed in case of rough weather.

The river cruiser was fairly narrow and quite low, to go under all the old bridges, so as a result the ship was very, very long. He said he was never aware of any roughness, and they did have several days of rain and wind.

*That is not an original line, BTW. I borrowed it from the late Michael Flanders. He and his partner, Donald Swann, wrote some lovely, and VERY funny songs.

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The Flying Monkeys

26 May

Yesterday Eldest Daughter and I went up to Lancaster to do a bit of shopping, and just generally hex around. Even after having lived this close to Amish Country since I was ten, and shopping in and around Lancaster since the late 60s, I still feel as if I’ve stepped into the Wild West when I spot a hitching rail and water trough along the edge of a shopping center.

When I got to her house in the morning, I was dive-bombed by a vulture, which just about scared me to death. These are huge birds with a wingspan of about six feet. I felt as if I’d just had a run-in with a fair-sized aircraft, bent on my destruction.

When we got home, a half dozen of them were sitting on the fence around her pool, and several more were fighting over something in the tall grass. The fence is four feet high, which may give you some perspective of how large these birds actually are.

Turns out there is a dead deer out there; we smelled it before we spotted it. I hope they make quick work of it.

vultures

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Smack-Down at the OK Corral

21 May

We have one particular squirrel, a young male with a bright red tail, who is a real bully. He has made it his business to keep all of the other squirrels away from both the seed feeder and the pipe which holds the peanuts. It’s a wonder he has time to eat, as he’s so busy chasing off the competition. Of course, every time he leaves the feeder to chase away another squirrel, the blue jays swoop down and grab some of his precious hoard.

This morning, he was at it again, and two of the older, larger squirrels decided they’d had just about enough, and ganged up on him. They started a kick-boxing, biting, and snarling match, and chased the little dickens all around the yard.

He came back and sat on the wall that surrounds the flower bed, cursing and stomping his feet, so angry that he started biting and tearing at the wires on the Christmas lights, the very image of impotent rage.

Saturday Night Fever

15 May

Last night, our parish had a Sunset Serenade by the Reisterstown Jazz Ensemble.

It was originally supposed to be outdoors, but it has rained almost nonstop for the last two weeks – not hard, but a constant depressing drizzle – and the ground was too mushy for lawn chairs and blankets, not to mention too darned cold, so we moved it inside. The woman who was in charge made “camp fires” down the center of the hall, with a heap pf twinkling Christmas lights, and red, white and yellow tissue paper, surrounded by perhaps a dozen bricks, set in a wagon wheel design. Really nifty!

And, oh! the music! Several different sizes of saxophones, trumpets, a keyboard, and a drummer who was having more fun than anybody else in the room. And a cowbell! Admission was very reasonable, and a donation of canned goods got you a ticket for a free drink or a bag of chips, but there was plenty of other stuff to eat, even for a vegetarian such as myself.

And a good time was had by all.

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