Suzy Says

Surprise!

I came home from the pool* on Saturday to discover that the generator fairy had paid me a visit.

Those of you who live in civilization may scoff at the generator fairy, but when the power goes out this winter – and it will – it will be a lot more useful than that $20** the tooth fairy leaves or candy*** from the Great Pumpkin. Assuming he shows up, that is.

Someone gave this generator to my brother because it wasn’t working right, and Jonathan spent a lot of time working on it until it did. Now it can power my whole house, and more besides. It’s a reassuring thought as we slide slowly into winter.

Coincidentally, he gave it to me the day after the official start of Fall, and the day before the first rain of the season (a third of an inch). It inspired me to check my power outage drinking water supply (OK) and look for the buckets (where are they?). Oh, and I should put up the rain gauge my neighbor gave me after that surprise snow exploderated mine.

Be prepared, right?

*I still owe you a post or two abut swimming.

***Not that the candy would have lasted from Halloween until winter. Not around here.

So I have kept up with aquafit, even though the year has clearly turned its face resolutely toward winter and it’s now dark when I leave the house at 6:30 am.

The splendid pool where aquafit takes place has been struggling to stay open, so they have slowly decreased the water temperature to about 79 degrees in the interests of saving money. It was 84 when I first started going, and I can tell you that you feel the loss of every one of those degrees early on a foggy morning. Although I would find 84 on the warm side in the air, in the water is another matter.

I love the teacher and the class, though. Many of the ladies are vintage and they are all delightful. In the locker room, we discuss the latest plays and art shows in San Francisco, as well as the (usually lamentable) performance of the Giants the night before. One of the ladies has a relative who works at the gym where the Giants’ beloved catcher, Buster Posey* is rehabbing from the terrible injury which has sidelined him for most of the year (and which I think was the beginning of the end for the team this year). She says that Buster is as charming in real life as he seems to be on TV, and is hoping that he’ll be back next year. Let’s hope so.

Megan has started meeting me at the Wednesday class, after her long night shift, and she told me that when I was in Napa, everybody missed me. It was nice to hear. Along with the exercise, I love the company of my sister and the Pool Ladies, there in their jewelry with smiles and an encouraging word early in the morning.

About halfway through, one of the ladies calls out our imaginary breakfast after our workout: a big burrito and a Margarita! Nachos and a beer! Her husband just gave her a yellow Porsche convertible to celebrate their golden wedding anniversary. That’s the kind of girl she is.

*Surely one of the best names in sports.

The thing about having unplanted plants on your hands is that you have to plant them. Sooner is better than later. But since the soil around my house is hard and unforgiving, dirt had to be imported. Also, it occurred to me that I might want to bring the twin palms with me if I ever move. And since half wine casks were on sale for about $20 apiece, it seemed like a good idea to invest.

The long-suffering Rob took the money and ran – well, drove carefully – to the Big Town and came back with the back of his truck full of dirt and wine casks (which helped to hold down the tarp and keep my investment from flying away down the highway).

All I had to do was shovel the dirt and roll the wine casks around. He even drilled holes in the bottom for drainage.

After rolling one of the palms around on a dolly I borrowed from Mark (who is doing fine so far), I decided to put one near the daisy tree in the middle of the yard:

And one at the front of the house. It had occurred to me one day as I was driving home that there was no particular reason that I couldn’t grub up the huckleberry tree in the front of the house and replace it with a palm.

At the time, I didn’t realize that this involves borrowing a heavy iron pointed thing, like some kind of medieval weapon, and piercing the root ball of the bush repeatedly before yanking it out of the ground, which led to borrowing gravel from Mark. But it also led to Mark filling in the trench in front of my house from the great water project last year, thus avoiding a Calamity Suzy incident. You will be pleased to hear that I removed the berries from the bush before uprooting it (though this led to further berry picking, temporarily diverting me from the palm tree planting at hand).

So, yeah: the huckleberry bush was out, the dirt was smoothed over with gravel, and I was ready to place the palm:

I think it makes a nice entranceway to the house:

That’s Rob’s trusty truck, temporarily in the background.

I hope the twin palms are happy in their new home. As for the bamboo, I have placed it at the corner of the house, right outside the shower window:

I’m hoping it will grow a bit more and give me a tropical oasis feeling while I’m in the shower. At least I can see the palm from there. I have to say, it’s quite exciting, being the proud owner of not one, but two palm trees.

Mugshot

Megan was getting ready for work when she discovered that she couldn’t find her handbag.

In all fairness, it must be said that she is a little careless of it at times. Mostly it lives on the backseat floor of her car, just as her keys live in the ignition, except when she’s at work. How else would you know where they are? And when it’s sunny, she often leaves the car doors open so the car doesn’t get too hot inside.

We knew she had her bag when we were buying the last-minute items for our brother’s belated birthday barbecue, but we couldn’t remember seeing it after that. She and Rob scoured their house-ette and the car while I called the store.

No luck. Megan was late for work, so she had to leave after borrowing some money for lunch – when you work a 12 hour shift, you have to eat twice while at work, so planning is necessary, especially in a place where everything is closed overnight.

After she left, Rob was watering the garden when he stumbled over something.

It was Megan’s wallet.

Then he came across the little pouch with her hairbrush, etc., in it. Eventually he found the bag and the rest of its contents, including a now-empty treat bag. We had taken Star to Big River and used the treats in a training session, and Megan had left them in her bag when we got back to the car.

We know it wasn’t Star, because she was in the house. Remembering the sunny day and the open car doors, Megan realized that Schatzi had taken the bag from the car and brought it into the garden to eat the treats. Whenever you give her a treat, she always takes it back there to enjoy it.

So there you have it. You can teach an old dog new tricks. She can sneak out of your brother’s house at the dead of night and go home, or jump out of an upstairs window without hurting herself, or help herself to your handbag in the back of a car.

It takes a Schatzi!

The dilemma

Ah, the joys of the listserv…

I joined the local listserv back when Erica was looking for a place in or near Hooterville, and Jessica was attending the local school. Now, of course, they are basking in the joys of high speed internet and home-delivered food in Portland, but I got attached to the listserv and stayed on it. How else would I know about bears being spotted a couple of miles away, or about the lost sheep blocking a road? And then there are the yard sales and inter-village bickering.

On Saturday, there was an announcement about free plants. They are my favorite kind. I was the lucky first caller, and even luckier, the plant donor lives about three miles away. She also has a cute little red truck, and offered to drive the orphaned flora here if we could get them into the truck.

Fortunately, Megan is the kind of sister who isn’t surprised when I call her up and ask her if she’d like to help me wrestle some palm trees into a total stranger’s truck. Between us, we managed it, and then unloaded them, as you see.

That was the easy part. Now I have to decide what to do with them.

And in the “never a dull moment” department…

My brother woke me up at 1:00 am on Saturday night. Oddly, when the phone rings late at night, I still instinctively think “Mom”. Once I wake up a little more, I think “Rob”. In this case, it was Jonathan, who got a fire call for our address, making sure I was OK. I was, and so were Rob and Megan.

It was Mark, our neighbor and landlord. He had suffered an epileptic seizure and was unconscious. By the time Jonathan called me, Megan was already at the scene and EMS was on its way. Not for the first time, I was impressed by how quick and how good our little volunteer fire department and our little hospital’s EMS staff is.

They took Mark to the hospital, and he was home in time to celebrate his younger daughter’s birthday yesterday. He has a lot of tests ahead of him, and can’t drive for six months. Apparently it is unusual for someone over 40 to start having seizures, and lately he’s had migraines and very strong memories of his childhood – he feels like he is reliving certain moments. Apparently this is also not a good sign.

He seemed fine when I spoke with him yesterday, so I hope the doctors soon figure out what is wrong and can fix it quickly.

Last night, we belatedly celebrated Jonathan’s birthday with a barbecue in the chilly fog. His friend Carrie was visiting from the city, with her daughter Miranda, and Lichen was there, too. He cut my hair while there was still enough light. Yay! We had a wide variety of sausages, grilled zucchini, pesto salad made from basil Jonathan grew and pie made from huckleberries Carrie and Miranda picked around the property. It was nice to sit by the fire as darkness fell, laughing and reminiscing.

Ready for fun. Or trouble. Whatever comes first.

I really thought I’d get more blogging material out of the trip to Napa. I guess that’s what happens when you plan a trip around an event, rather than a place. No wonder I’ve never done it that way before.

I find it interesting that I blogged more often when I spent most of my time in Hooterville. You wouldn’t think that much happened around here.

Here’s a couple of things you missed:

I am slowly learning the wily ways of wildlife. One day, I was driving down the Ridge in a fog (inside and out), and suddenly, a young deer loomed in the mist. I stopped, and it ran into the woods. I waited, because there’s never just one, and sure enough, its buddy came prancing out, stared at me in the regulation manner, and then took off.

Megan one-upped me as usual by telling me about the time she was stopped in her car at Point Cabrillo Lighthouse* and a deer ran into her. Literally. The deer’s head plunged into the car’s open window, its huge black eye just inches away from Megan’s own. It’s hard to say who was more startled. The deer ran away in horror, leaving no sign of what happened other than fur stuck to the car door.

Recently, Megan and I were walking Star on the property when she flushed some quail. Both Star and Schatzi love to chase quail. I called out, “You’ll never catch one, Star!”, but she surprised us both by doing just that. I told Megan that I thought Star had a quail. She went into the bushes and flushed Star, who had a strange look on her face. One wing tip was sticking out of her mouth.

Megan told Star to drop it, and she did, opening her mouth. The quail beetled away like a wind-up toy, and Star cocked her head to one side, looking at Megan as if to say, “Not good?”

*When you come to visit, I’ll take you there. Great whale watching place, and the setting is amazing.

Of course, the other problem with using the date as post titles is that it merely highlights how long it’s been since you last posted, much like that accusing bowl of cherry pits showing just how many you actually ate (instead of how many you’d like to think you ate).

It seems that there is just no good answer to this title conundrum. And as I always say, compromise means nobody’s happy.

One of the reasons that my blogging has become less frequent is because I’ve started going to aquafit class before work on Monday and Welcome Wednesday. I leave the house at 6:30 am for a 7:30 class. The class ends at 8:30, after which it’s a scramble to get dressed, made up, hair styled, and at my desk by 9:00.

I get home around 5:00, so it’s a long day, especially since I have to catch up on my other job when I get home, along with important duties like feeding the cats and making dinner. Answering emails and blogging have kind of gotten back-burnered. Maybe I’ll miraculously regain my long-lost efficiency, but I’m not holding my breath.

Almost as disappointing as the discovery that painkillers do not in fact kill pain is the discovery that cars do not get fixed and stay that way. Also more expensive and inconvenient.

When I first got Miss Scarlett back in Oaktown, she was already vintage, but her previous charioteer had practically ignored her, only putting about 5,000 miles a year on the odometer in 11 years. So I figured that with such light use – before we moved to Hooterville and both of us were consigned to eternal dirt roads and rutted, rough, curvy paved ones, that is – that the car would stay in pretty good shape.

As usual, I was wrong, and things and stuff seem to have gone wrong quite a lot this year. Thankfully the boys have come to my rescue on these occasions. But there are some things, requiring specialized and pricy equipment, that they can’t do. Hence my maiden voyage into the world of Hooterville area mechanics.

Up first was the only transmission place in town. The transmission is slow to engage, though it’s usually fine by the time I get to the next driveway down the Ridge. The Transmission Guy did a test drive and then informed me that in order to figure out what was wrong, he’d have to pull it apart for a labor charge of $700, not including the actual fixing after pulling it apart.

Also? A new transmission is $2,500.

The whole car cost $3,500.

A survey of friends turned up Mike the Mechanic. He gave me directions to his place, north of the Big Town. When I got there, it was a metal shed behind some stores. Hmmm.

I asked in the store, and they said, yes, that’s Mike’s place. So I left the keys and the car there and hoped for the best.

Mike called me and said that he’d like to change the transmission fluid and filter and pour in some goop that would make the pumps work better. He figured this would cost between $120 and $160, so after conferring with the boys, I said OK.

When he called me to say it was ready and doing better, I asked how late he’d be there, since Megan was going to drop me off after we went to aquafit that evening. He said to just put the money in the cast-iron frog on his porch.

Small town.

It turned out that Mike was there, so we actually got to meet him and give him the money in person. It was $120. So far, Miss Scarlett seems to be doing fine as far as the transmission goes.

There is still the front end shimmy to deal with. The diagnostics place said that there were a couple of things that needed to be fixed before the alignment could take place. I brought the estimate ($407!) to my brother, who said that he could fix the two things and then I could have the alignment done for a mere $60.

Hopefully that will end the saga of car repairs for the rest of the year, though I have to buy two new tires to replace the two 8 year olds before the winter rains start…

Am I the only one who is sick and tired of trying to come up with a title for each post? Sometimes it’s harder than writing the post itself. Or balancing a checkbook. Or opening a jar if there’s no boy handy. I always leave it until last. Why can’t I just use the date? Maybe I will, and strike a blow for freedom.

We’re stuck with the twice yearly madness of the time change, but this I can do. Take that, powers that be!

Sometimes three times isn’t the charm. For example, seeing your cats with the third bird they have caught in one day. The last of the series was still peeping horribly as they ran off into the woods with it. I know my stepmother always said in her rich, plummy voice that “Nature is red in tooth and claw”, but I practically cried. I hate it when they kill birds. Mice? Fine. Feel free to rid the house of vermin. But birds? Those hollow-boned beauties who give us nothing but pleasure, in plumage and voice? No way.

Old habits can be hard to break, especially when you’re emerging from kittenhood to catness, the way Clyde is. You may remember that when I removed the litter box from the house, he expressed his displeasure by peeing on the bed. I thought I shouldn’t confuse him by bringing the box back in, so I let it go, being careful to bring him in after 9:30 at night. I figured he’d be OK until 6:00 or so.

But for the past couple of days, he’s mewed at the door and clawed at it Audrey-style, so I’ve let him (and Audrey) out at 3:30 or 4:00 am, which I do not enjoy, and hoped for the best.

Nothing has happened yet, but I figure it’s crazy to let something happen to Clyde because I don’t feel like cleaning out the box every day. Better safe than sorry. So I reinstated it this evening, and Clyde wasted no time reuniting with his old friend. He even sat by it afterwards, basking in the glow of once again having an indoor bathroom. I can’t say as I blame him.

When we used to go Maine every summer, it was long enough ago that there will still some remnants of the grand old days when the Island was populated by Vanderbilts and Rockefellers and others of their ilk in the summer months. My parents met a gentleman who used to be a butler for the Vanderbilts, and he said that they would have party favors which involved giving each guest a miniature silver bucket and spade with which to dig out jewels from a box of white sand.

Though that sounds pretty good, which really struck me as a kid was the story of how Mrs. V tossed a priceless Oriental rug onto the lawn and told the gardener to duplicate it in flowers. In retrospect, I suspect that her maid did the tossing, but I love the image. I also love her gardening style, which would be mine if I were a V instead of a P.

I do have help, however. Last weekend, Megan turned up with a bunch of good soil in Rob’s truck, which she proceeded to shovel onto my gardening mistakes (the big pots needed more soil) and then onto a tarp she borrowed from our brother. How’s that for service? Very nearly V.

Rob came over yesterday evening and added some plants to the pink jasmine planted by the garbage bins. The idea is that the jasmine will cover up the lattice and shield my delicate eyes from the unsightly sight of the garbage cans, but apparently this will take years. In the meantime, it looks like this:

I also planted a potato vine:

by the slightly sagging trellis near the shed:

I have to get some twine to fasten it to the trees, since trees sway a lot, especially in the winter. Again with the trying to prettify things. Sometimes it feels like an uphill battle. I’m still trying to figure out a way to camouflage the trailer with Rose’s pottery stuff in it which hulks beside the house.

I bought this red bush for some color, especially in winter. Those of you in northern climes will find this next remark ridiculous, but you get kind of tired of all green, all the time. This should stay red year-round.

This hosta seems pretty happy here. I like the variegated foliage, and I think it elevates the rusted old stove from junk to garden art. At least, I hope so.

The passion flowers are in bloom, giving an outer space look to this garden of earthly delights:

This is a volunteer plant, one that planted itself here. Apparently it is an Egyptian lily, which makes me wonder how it has survived in the hard pan and gravel so long. I have been rewarding its persistence with water lately.

I rewarded the fuchsia with fertilizer this year, and it repaid me with dozens of buds and flowers. Fuchsias are the Suzys of the plant world: shade-loving and showy.

Last but not least, check out the mini carpet of wildflowers that have grown from the seeds in the birthday card Monica gave me this year. Here you see Clyde doing an inspection:

Not a priceless Oriental, but a priceless gift from a priceless friend.

Well, the oil change was $50. When I told Jonathan and Rob about it, they were horrified, mixed with surprise. My thought was that they had enough to do working on the brakes and not much time – my brother works 52 hours a week – and Rob is still recovering from people rummaging around in his spine. Jonathan suggested that next time, he’ll do the oil change and I can put $40 towards the property’s mortgage.

It turned out that the brakes are A-OK and not the cause of the roughness/wiggle (which my brother describes as a “front end shimmy” – sounds to me like a dance from the 1920s). It will require professional diagnostics, which are free at the tire store*. Hopefully once we know what the problem is, my brother can fix it.

Also, when he was test driving the car after putting it back together – he always does this when he works on his sisters’ cars – it dropped out of gear. It went back in after he revved it a bit, but now I have to take it to the one transmission place in town and get it looked at on Monday morning. And they will have to fix whatever is wrong with it. Here’s hoping it’s not too expensive.

I guess it’s not all that surprising, considering the car is 14 years old and gets routinely driven on rough, potholed roads, but I can’t help but feel that cars are just holes you pour money into. I hate spending money on things that aren’t fun. Or at least sparkly.

*Amazingly, two of the car’s tires are 8 years old! I’ll probably have to replace them before the winter rains set in.

The cause of all the trouble. Seen here in the surprise snowfall in February.

As I mentioned, my hard-working and long-suffering brother was not able to attend the social event of the season, aka Erica’s and Jessica’s farewell barbecue, which also marked the first time in months that I hadn’t pulled up to his place only be told that there was something tragically wrong with my car.

But I was not to escape so easily…

When Megan, Rob, and I went to see the Harry Potter movie last week, we took my car, partly because it has more room than their Saturn, and we had two propane tanks to fill and Star with us, and partly because their trunk has been on strike for a couple of years, and we were getting two households’ worth of groceries.

Needless to say, I let Megan drive (Rob is still on restricted driving), and she noticed that Miss Scarlett’s brakes are not all they should be – not something a girl wants to hear when she drives serpentine local roads three days a week or more.

I don’t think I ever told you that when we were in San Francisco for Rob’s surgery, we drove some of the steepest hills in the city, with a post-surgical Rob in the car. My brother inspected the brake fluid after we got home and found it was low, apparently something that should never happen. This discovery left Miss Scarlett marooned at his house until I could buy and apply brake fluid.

I tried not to think about what could have happened in the city. And I’ve been checking all the fluids every two weeks ever since. I even have an oil change lined up for this afternoon.

After I get home, I’ll take the car over to my brother’s, Rob following in the truck. I’ll leave the car at Jonathan’s place, and then drive home with Rob in the truck. Jonathan will then install the $169 worth of brake parts which I bought yesterday on my way to work, list in hand. I could even answer the questions they asked at the car parts store. Admittedly, only the make and number of doors, but still!

I’m so lucky to have the boys around to fix things. I can’t imagine what a mechanic would have charged for fixing my brakes.

Well, actually, I can.

Gardening is really not a suitable occupation for Self. It’s boring, it’s dirty, and it causes sweat, all extremely un-Suzy things. Also, the gratification is far from instant, and even instant gratification isn’t fast enough for me. I don’t want to watch things grow. I want them to look nice now. Preferably without any effort on my part.

Come to think of it, that’s pretty much how I feel about everything, especially housework.

I should have thought of that before I made fixing up the outdoor space (can you call it a garden when it’s basically huckleberry bushes, pine trees, gravel, and rhododendrons?) one of my resolutions for this now middle-aged year. I wish whoever my windowbox fairy was back when I lived in the T* made housecalls to Hooterville. Overnight gardening: that’s Suzy style!

With no fairy to be had, I’ve had to put on my lavender gardening gloves and get grimy and annoyed. But things do look better, and when I look back at pictures from last year, I can see, for example, that the honeysuckle has definitely grown:

Then

Now

Here you see an attempt to disguise the hideousness of the propane tank. I had originally thought of having a sort of hedge around it, but was dissuaded by the reality of having to bring in truckloads of dirt and having to wait years for it grow enough to provide the desired camouflage. Reality bites.

From the house:

From the driveway:

I think it looks better. Also I’m pretty sure the propane delivery guy (who waved at me from his truck in town last week) can still access it, though I’m hoping not to see him in his professional capacity until sometime this fall. I might ask Mark if I could paint it, too. Every little bit helps.

*Now, I realize, the Good Old Days. I never did find out who the fairy was, either.

Something about July seems to inspire me to paint.

Last year’s paint-a-palooza included the side of the house, as well as the bathroom doors, the front door and window, and my desk area. Not to mention the hall floor, which Rob changed from electric lime green to bearable grey.

This year, Mark replaced the rotten board on the side of the house, so it was time to paint. I’d been meaning to paint over the weird red and green parts ever since I moved in, anyway.

The kitties thoroughly enjoyed the painting – at least, the drop cloth part:

Roscoe in particular liked to nap up there. I think he was sorry when the cloth went away. Audrey was happy in the plastic one on the back porch:

It looks pretty good now that it’s all done:

The house has come a long way from when I first moved in almost two years ago:

I volunteered to deliver some jobette-related materials around Hooterville a couple of weeks ago. I meant to do it on the way home, but the desire to get the hell out of the car won out over convenience, so I went home instead. So a day or two (OK, about a week) later, I finally ventured out in the fog on a non-work day.

One of the first stops was a charming inn, which used to be a stage coach stop:

In the living room, which has a lovely view of the ocean, as well as a charming garden with hummingbirds buzzing around, you can still see the bullet holes in the wooden ceiling from the Wild West Days. Is that cool, or what?

The owner’s mother passed away in February (my brother responded to that final 911 call), so I spoke with her son, who now owns the inn. He told me that he and his wife had welcomed their first child, a son, just two day before – and two days before their 22nd anniversary. His mother lived long enough to know that the baby was coming, and because of her illness, she forgot, so every day, she heard the joyful news as if for the first time.

As I left through this rustic gate:

I thought what a wonderful place it will be for the new baby to grow up in. Maybe he will be yet another generation of innkeepers in the same historic place.

My next stop was a restaurant, which turned out be closed, but that didn’t stop me from admiring its setting:

Or its lily pond:

All in all, not a bad extra-curricular (or extra-jobette) morning.

To continue our family timepiece theme, here’s a clock my brother made with nixie tubes and framed. It’s at the foot of his bed. I asked him if it had an alarm, but he said no. He added that he didn’t need one, which seems to be a family trait. I think I’ve been woken up by my alarm clock once since I started the jobette, nearly five months ago.

I noticed the clock while Megan and I were over there on Saturday. Dave and Jennifer, the co-owners of the property, were visiting from their home in distant Grass Valley. Megan catered dinner, making chicken tikka masala, brown rice, grill bread, cucumber salad, and an apple pie. Due to work, my involvement was limited to putting the marinated chicken on skewers (and later, on the barbecue) and holding the pie while we drove over there. Oh, and eating.

It was delicious, and it was nice to sit by the fire and catch up with Dave and Jennifer as the sun began to drop toward the ocean. Hopefully they will be back soon for another visit.

Yesterday, Rob and I (well, mostly Rob) finally took the grandfather clock out of its box.

It was the first time the grand old timepiece had seen the light of day since I sold my apartment in San Francisco nearly six years ago. There was no room for it in my tiny Oakland house, so it languished in Mom’s storage unit in Santa Rosa until the long and fateful day when my brother and I finally emptied it out.

I couldn’t find a place in my present place, either, so it stayed in the Box that Rob Built. When Rob makes something, he does it right. He made the case out of several pieces of wood, which he transported on the bus to my apartment. My brother thought the case was too big, but he reckoned without the styrofoam and bubble wrap Rob was planning to use to cushion the ancient clock within its case. Always trust the Rob.

While driving to the jobette one day, it occurred to me that perhaps I could put the clock beside the staircase. Now that I no longer have a bathtub, the seemingly endless drives to Charlottesville and back seem to be my best place for thinking, even though driving itself uses up both of my brain cells.

I suggested the idea to Rob, who thought it just might work. He came over yesterday morning, bearing a huge basket of laundry, and while I dealt with the clothes, he dealt with the clock.

It took him quite a while to unscrew the many screws holding the box together, even with an electric thing to do it with. Then he carefully removed the front of the case, revealing the clock’s face:

Here it is, still in its case. Rob remarked that he probably won’t end up in as nice a box as this, and he’s probably right:

Here it is in place, finials (oddly untarnished) and all:

Somehow, it seems appropriate that we set it up on the weekend of Father’s Day, since the clock has been in Dad’s family (on his mother’s side) since it was first made, in the mid to late 1770s. It is probably older than the country it now lives in. It was made by John Jullion of Brentford, England, who also made what is the oldest clock on public display in Australia. That clock was made in 1770, the year that Captain Cook landed at Kurnell. It now resides in Cronulla’s clock tower.

Audrey decided to show Roscoe how it’s done. She sashayed out around 9:00 last night, and didn’t show up again until 5:00 this morning. It was a full night’s work for Miss Audrey. And being so dedicated, she was out the door again before 7:00.

You can imagine that Audrey’s absence led to a restless night for her neurotic maid, partly from worry and partly because I find it hard to sleep with all the outside lights on, even with the help of sleep mask.

I was just dropping off to sleep when Luna started barking her head off and wouldn’t stop. I gave up on the whole sleep thing and went downstairs. As I passed my front door, I saw a bearded older man emerging from the woods near where Rose’s daughter Catrin and her boyfriend Zach live. So maybe there was a reason for Luna’s barking. When it gets to be a more decent hour, I’ll call them and see if they know who he is. I watched him walk down the driveway toward the road, so hopefully nothing is really amiss.

A slightly worrying morning when you live in a house with no locks.

And in the worrying department, Rob is once again slated for surgery on his neck. They are going to take out the old titanium piece and put in a new one from vertebrae C3-C6. Apparently these are not good vertebras to be messing with. Also, the surgical coordinator loftily told Megan on Tuesday that no surgery was being scheduled until September. Megan said that was too late, and suggested that the surgeon review Rob’s x-rays. The coordinator said they would and they’d call back in a week or ten days.

They called the next day with the operation date, two weeks away, and said it was “critical”. This was unnervingly like the time Rob went to the city to consult with the surgeon and was instantly admitted, the surgeon coming in to operate on Rob on Superbowl Sunday.

It looks like I will be able to take that week off – June 27 – and go with them to the city to help in any way I can. So much for the party I was planning for their 20th anniversary on July 1.

Update: Turns out the mystery man was Zach’s Dad. And Rob’s surgery has been moved to 10:00 am on Friday, June 24.

Updates: The car is fixed! It seems to be working well. So far, so good. If it doesn’t rain – a fairly big “if” – Megan and I will test drive it to the farmers’ market this afternoon.

Also, A is now allowed home on weekends, though she spends the rest of her time at a rehab center. She still has no feeling in her feet and walks with two canes or a walker. She’s getting pretty impatient with the slowness of recovery, not surprising for a girl who’s spent the entire YEAR in hospitals. I still can’t believe it really happened, while being simultaneously relieved and delighted that she is still with us. Thanks to everyone for your support and caring.

And now, back to our (ir)regularly scheduled program….

While spring cleaning (sort of) a couple of weeks ago, I came across a treasure which I’d forgotten about. I’m not sure what you call it, but it’s from a Toronto streetcar, long ago. Back in the days when you had to crank a roll of fabric to the correct destination. Now that I think about it, I saw one – in better condition – selling for piles of loonies in a gallery not far from my old abode when I still lived in the T.

Anyway…it occurred to me that someone with a certain amount of talent and savoir fare – say, for example, Rob – might be able to find a way to display it in my current residence, curved walls and all. He rose to the challenge, as always, and here you see it in its new location:

Here’s the whole thing, in all its vintage glory:

I kind of like it that I have Toronto on one side of the room and San Francisco on the other – my own east and west coasts, as it were.

And speaking of Toronto: the jobette led to me to a website where I learned that my former home was the National Casket Company, and that it’s a heritage building. There are some great photos* of the building on the website, which is fun to browse, too.

And how, you are wondering, did the jobette in Charlottesville lead to my old place in Toronto? Here’s how. Someone emailed a request for brochures to be sent to a certain address in Toronto (which turned out to be in a posh neighborhood), but forgot their postal code. So I Googled it, and the link I clicked turned out to be a list of heritage buildings. I scrolled through it looking for Posh Street, and passed my old street on the way. Imagine my surprise when I saw it was in fact my old building.

Small world, isn’t it?

*If you look carefully at the photo with the CN Tower, you will see a little brown cottage. That’s where June and Audrey were born and their mother still lives.