Suzy Says

On Sunday, I woke up to the sound of birds singing and the ocean pounding against the rocks and cliffs.

I drove homeward through the same striking scenery, really pleased that I had taken the time to explore a different part of the County. I stopped in the town of Elk (population 200 or so, and originally named Greenwood, after the founders of the town, whose father was one of the rescuers of the ill-fated Donner Party) and bought a newspaper in the little local store:

The one person serving was busy with other customers, so I left the money on the wooden counter and told him as I was leavng. He saluted and thanked me while making a sandwich.

I took the paper with me to Queenie’s Roadhouse:

It had been years since I had been there. It used to be that they were open irregularly, so it was wise to call first and make sure they were open before making the drive. Now they are open from 8:30 to 3:00 every day but Tuesday and Wednesday.

It’s still wise to bring the paper with you. There is no cell service or wifi there, and since every order is made from scratch with organic and/or local ingredients, it’s not fast food. It gives you time to enjoy the lovely view:

I had an omelette with fresh broccoli, balsamic onions, chicken apple sausage, and sharp white Cheddar, accompanied by house potatoes, fluffy rye toast, and two home-made jams (apricot and raspberry).

Replete, I set off for home, noting that it took a mere 20 minutes to get to Hooterville. I will be back soon!

Nothing takes a girl’s mind off divorce paperwork and restraining orders like a drive down the coast to see a burlesque show, n’est-ce pas?

After work on Saturday, Miss Scarlett and I drove the serpentine road to the south coast. The scenery was breathtaking and I wished more than once that I didn’t have to keep my eyes on the hilly, curvy road. The ocean crashed against the rocky cliffs, and a migrating whale flipped a tail at me in greeting as I drove past. Fields were dotted with placid cows and swept with bright wildflowers. California poppies and wild mustard blazed in the green grass by the side of the road, and the trees, bent and twisted by decades of ocean winds, were positively Seussian.

I checked in at a little inn by the ocean and then made the short drive to the lovely Arts Center:

arriving just as the sun was setting. The room was set up like a nightclub, with little tables dressed in candles and black tablecloths. Red lanterns hung from the high ceilings, and the place was packed.

Soon, the show began, with Les Filles Rouges singing and dancing and making the audience laugh with delight. Unfortunately, photography was strictly forbidden, but you can get a little taste of the artistes’ playfully sassy style in this video (and see them both in the shop where Megan and I finally learned the truth about bra sizes, and sashaying down the street where the jobette is).

True to the famously eccentric nature of the County, the Filles were not your everyday ecdysiasts. Some were far thinner than most dancers, and some much curvier. One had blue hair, another was dramatically tattooed, and one was quite pregnant. She stole the show dancing to “Like a Virgin”, ending up with red, sequined, heart-shaped, tasseled pasties on her belly button as well as the usual places, which brought down the house.

It was a lot of fun and I don’t know who had a better time, the girls or the audience.

After the show, I made my way back to the inn, where I had a glass of wine by the fire and later fell asleep to the sound of the waves crashing and the frogs joyously greeting the gentle spring rain.

On Monday, I went to the courthouse at lunch to file the divorce papers.

I kept setting the metal detector off, but they must have deemed me non-threatening, since they let me in so I could get in line.

There were two women ahead of me in line. One of them was trying to get a restraining order, and the other one was trying to get a restraining order against her overturned. She apparently failed, since she raged away from the clerk’s window, spitting “I don’t think yelling and screaming constitutes a threat!”

Clearly.

When it was my turn, I handed the understandably embittered clerk my paperwork. While I did have two copies, I had left one (my copy) at home, and brought the original and John’s copy with me. Unfortunately, I needed the clerk to stamp and approve all three copies. It makes sense when you think about it, but as you know, logic and thinking about it are not my strong suit, just one of the reasons that made me end up in this situation.

I went back to the jobette, where E said, “That was fast!” I explained what had happened, and she told me to just make another copy and go back. I felt weird about using the office copier for my personal business, but she said that I needed to get it over with, so I did.

Back to the courthouse, where – stop me if you’ve heard this one before – the woman in front of me was, yes, getting a restraining order. Between the restraining orders and the people waiting outside the probation office, I began to have serious concerns about the entire “jury of your peers” concept*.

Finally, it was my turn, and this time the clerk was able to stamp and file my paperwork. Thirty days after John is served with the paperwork, I will go back to the clerk and request a summary judgment. I will give the clerk stamped, self-addressed envelopes so the court can mail the final decrees to John and me six months after that date.

She also gave me a summons to appear on August 16 – what is it with me and summons to appear in August? – but explained that it’s only in case I don’t file for the summary judgment. The court wants to make sure that the case is concluded one way or the other, and this is their way of making sure that the case isn’t just out there unresolved forever, like my nine year (unofficial) separation.

I then went to the post office and sent John’s paperwork to Deborah. By the time I got back to the jobette, it was long past the half hour allowed for lunch, which is why I’m lucky that my coworkers are so awesome.

While it’s good to get this dealt with, it’s still sad, and I can’t help feeling that Dad would be disappointed in me. When he died, I was still married, living in a beautiful apartment which we owned (and which sold last year for half a million dollars more than we paid for it – we should never have sold it) in the best neighborhood in the most beautiful city in the world, and had a good job which made good money. Now I’m living in a weird hippie house, barely scraping by, and struggling to pay my freakin’ divorce fees (it’s only fair to note that we split the costs 50/50), and don’t own anything other than a 16 year old car. Not exactly an improvement.

I told my boss/partner about this – he knew Dad well – and he said that Dad would be proud that we built our business together and we still have it, even though times have been hard. He said, “You’ve been through a lot, but you’re still out there swinging.”

Maybe that’s all any of us can do.

*I told Megan about this, and she said, “The ER and the ambulance did that for me a long time ago.”

I wish my days “off” were more like Ferris Bueller’s…

On Friday, I got up early for a conference call, then did a load of laundry and hung it outside. First time this year!

Then I packed my dysfunctional vacuum cleaner into a huge, unwieldy box and stuffed it in the backseat of the car. The vacuum cleaner is still under warranty, so theoretically it will eventually be returned to me fixed or replaced.

Then I set off for the Big Town.

I pulled up in front of the courthouse and parked, went through the metal detector, and then waited. Despite all my practice at waiting, I am still no good at it, even though I had the latest Jo Nesbo to read.

After a couple of hours of waiting, a nice older woman named Deborah came and ushered me into a little room. I explained to her that I needed some help and advice with my divorce paperwork, and showed her the package I had received from LegalZoom.

She described LegalZoom as “bullshit” but noted that they do get most things right.

I could have filed that very day except LZ (note the appropriate initials) neglected to include copies of the documents and the courthouse (believe it or not) does not have a photocopier. So I will copy them and file on Monday. The good news is that I don’t have to go to the county seat to file (a 4 hour round trip drive), but the bad news is that it’s $435 to file.

Deborah said that I can mail her John’s copy and she will send it to him. I asked about the process server thing – the LZ paperwork says you have to have one – and she said that it just has to be a third party who sends the paperwork to John – Jonathan or Megan could do it – and John just has to mail Deborah the form stating that he received the paperwork and she will file it with the court. So at least we can save process server fees.

John has 31 days from the day he signs the paperwork to contest or respond, but if he does (which he won’t), he’ll have to pay yet another $435. Notice a theme here?

I think after the 31 days are up the judge will give us a temporary decree or whatever the actual term is – and then it becomes final 6 months from then. So we should be able to wrap it up by the end of this year.

I ended up talking to Deborah for about 15 minutes. This seems to be the way with waiting, whether it’s the airport or the doctor’s office.

After that, I went to the drugstore, the library, and the feed store (baby chicks peeping up a storm – happy spring!) before dropping off the giant unwieldy box at Fed Ex and finally heading home, where drink o’clock came a little early.

Big River

Usually, my idea of traffic is having to wait for two other cars to turn onto the highway from our rough country road – especially if they’re not related to me. Actually, the major annoyances for me when driving are people who drive below the speed limit and won’t pull over, and the people who jump out in front of me and then drive below the speed limit, usually when the road behind me is completely empty. Extra credit (or demerits) to the cars with “local” license plates frames who do all of the above and brake at every curve.

A few days ago, a cement truck overturned in the afternoon in what we call “Dark Gulch” – a low and curvaceous part of the two lane highway signposted at 15 miles an hour – and when I drove home more than four hours later, it was still a one lane road as they cleaned it up.

As you come out of Dark Gulch into the light, you now find signs warning of road work and flaggers. Only problem – at least for me – is that the actual road work is about two miles south of the signs, and more importantly, about a mile past my turn off. Those not in the know immediately start driving about 20 miles an hour in a 50 zone, annoying the Suzy who just wants to get home.

On the way to work on the same day as the cement truck spill, there was some kind of work going on at Big River bridge which required some kind of enormous drill looking thing and which also reduced traffic to one lane (the other side) or a total stop (Me). Not only did it make me worry about being late for work, it also deprived me of the not inconsiderable pleasure of sweeping across that curving bridge (see above) with the ocean on one side and the river on the other. In any weather, it lifts my spirit.

At the jobette, I learned that a movie will be filming on the notoriously zig zaggy roads around here in the first two weeks in April. The road to the city is a motorcyclist’s Mecca, and it just makes sense that it will be the filming location for Need for Speed, starring Aaron Paul, my crush from Breaking Bad. Oh, and Michael Keaton.

I was the only one who knew who Aaron Paul was, and although this was less shocking than the time that my boss brought in a Wines That Rock bottle with the iconic image from Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon and I was the only one who could actually identify the image (my favorite guess: “Is it some kind of gay pride thing?”), it was still a little surprising. Have none of you people seen Breaking Bad? And if not, why? Or more importantly, why?

Of course, I am scheduled to go to San Francisco on Jessica’s birthday, when filming is allegedly going to be complete, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it runs over, as filming is wont to do. Apparently the film crew will be equipped with helicopters to film the chase sequences, so maybe they’ll give me a lift if need be.

Yesterday was the first official day of spring, or the Vernal Equinox as the scientifically and paganly inclined would have it. Here in Hooterville, it looked a lot more like winter than spring, being rainy, windy, and cold-ish.

It’s been a strange winter. We were slammed with storms early in the season, racking up six power outages by the end of November and so much rain that I had to empty it out of the flooded containers in the garden. I got tired of picking up the purple honeysuckle by the side of the house and just let it lie there dejectedly, waiting for Spring.

January and February were the driest ever recorded in California, and then the first day of spring was heralded with a mini-storm. Maybe it’s all part of the joy of climate change.

The second day of spring looks a lot more like Spring than the first day, sunny and breezy.

The calla lily my neighbor Jim gave me last year is in bloom:

The orchid is just beginning to blossom, making me glad that I kept hauling it inside when the overnight temperatures dipped to the freezing point or lower, which happened a lot this winter. Sunny skies mean starry nights, and starry skies are always cold ones, without clouds for insulation.

Today the PG&E meter reader stopped to look at it and smell it (it doesn’t smell like anything, unfortunately).

I meant to dig up the tulip bulbs and plant new ones, but one way or another it didn’t happen. The tulips were undeterred by this neglect – and possibly enjoyed the cold temperatures – since they sprung up and bloomed anyway:

The persistence of tulips!

On Dad’s birthday, I woke up in the 4:00 darkness. I tried to go back to sleep, but gave up around 5:00 and just got up. Sleeping is not something my family does well, and once we’re awake, that’s pretty much it. I was hoping to sleep in, since it was Sunday and one of the few days when I don’t have to get up in darkness and keep the fretful cats in until it’s light enough for the monsters to punch out and go home for the day, but it was not to be.

I used the extra time to do some cooking, which only seems right on Dad’s birthday. I made broth and then I made soup out of the broth, and also put together spaghetti sauce. I often make dishes on Sunday that I can just heat up during the week. For dinner that night, I made fresh snapper escabèche, a new recipe for me, but one I will definitely make again. Here it is:

Spiced Escabèche
(Sautéed Snapper in Citrus Vinaigrette)

For the sauce:

1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander seeds
1/4 cup olive oil
Zest and juice of a lime
2 green onions, sliced
1/2 cup fresh cilantro, minced
Cayenne pepper to taste

For the fish:

1/2 cup flour
1 tablespoon chili powder
Cayenne pepper to taste
4 snapper fillets
5-6 tablespoons olive oil

Blend together ingredients for sauce and set aside.

Mix together flour, chili powder, and cayenne and place on large plate. Dredge fillets in flour mixture.

Heat oil in large, heavy skillet over moderately high high until hot but not smoking. Sauté fish until golden brown, about 5 minutes a side.

Arrange fillets on plate and pour sauce on top.

I had broccoli and pine nut couscous with it, not quite a menu meal, but I think Dad would have approved.

As always this time of year, Dad has been on my mind more than usual. Having said that, not a day goes by that I don’t think about him, and I don’t expect that to change.

On Thursday, Megan and I shared a glass of wine and toasted Dad: “Here’s to the Old Bear. He wasn’t so bad!” This was a joke Dad used to make – he said that he’d leave us his wine collection in his Will, and every year, we should drink some and toast him in this way. I think the wonderful Margaret inherited the wine – and I hope she drank it – but my siblings and I do toast Dad this way, more than once a year.

On Friday, Megan and I ran a few errands in town and then took Star for a walk on the headlands. It was a beautiful day:

Dad loved the ocean, and he loved to walk. And he loved to walk with dogs. I’m sure he would have appreciated how Megan rescued Star and how happy Star is now:

After all, his beloved dog Jesse was rescued* by Megan as well, and Dad adored that dog:

Not too many people would have paid a couple of thousand dollars to fly and quarantine a 9 year old mutt so he could live out his golden years in golden splendor in Wimbledon. But Dad was a special person.

We enjoyed the sunshine and each other’s company and the smell of the ocean. In a way, he was there with us. After all, he is always in our hearts.

*You can read about Jesse’s rescue here.

Even though it’s no longer the New Year – when does a year stop being new, anyway? – I’ve been trying to get the chaos of my life a little more in order. Or, you know, in order at all.

I started by collecting all the crap I need for taxes. Mine are kind of complicated, with the job and the jobette and my lack of any kind of math brain, so I have someone do them for me. Needless to say I forgot to include some things and then had to track them down, but in the end, I have a (very) modest refund coming my way.

The Tax Lady noted that if I were divorced, the refund would be less modest – it would be about four times what I am getting. Realizing that John would be in the same position, I emailed him to reopen the divorce discussion.

We tried to do this a somewhat embarrassing number of years ago (at the rate we’ve been going, we’ll be separated almost as long as we were married), but encountered technical difficulties. Neither of us could afford a lawyer, and there was no question of alimony or child custody or anything that tends to lead to acrimoniousness, so John just got the forms online and tried to file them after I signed.

The clerk at his courthouse said there was something missing, but wouldn’t tell John what it was, since he “couldn’t offer legal advice.” Since we couldn’t afford legal advice and neither of us was at all interested in getting married again (some things never change), we sort of dropped it.

There is a walk in family law clinic here later in the month, so I’m hoping to stop by and get them to look over the forms if I have them ready by then. You *have* to fill out the forms completely on line. I called the company and told them there was required info about John I didn’t have. They told me to put in 0s as a “placeholder” and then have John log in and fill it out.

I told John, and he tried to do that, but the website said it was under review and couldn’t be edited. I just checked again today and there is an alert saying that they need more information. What do you know? So clearly the entire placeholder thing is bogus.

Of course they’re only at work when you’re at work, so I’ll have to try and find time to call them on Monday. Presumably John will have to do the same thing. Oh, and did I mention that the online forms cost $300? And the $300 does not include the filing fees – who knows how much that will be. It’s no wonder it’s taken us so long to get around to this.

If I ran the world, it would be hard to get married and easy to get divorced. One thing I have (finally) learned is to follow your heart. I never wanted to get married. I think you should be together until you don’t want to be, instead of dragging the state and/or church and/or families and/or everyone else’s expectations into your relationship.

But it meant a lot to John, so I went along with it. Kids, this is not a good reason to get married. Having said that, we were happy together for many years, so I can’t exactly say I regret it. I don’t regret the time I spent with John, just the messiness of the ending.

Lesson learned.

At the vet’s

Megan and I took the 15 year old Miss Schatzi for a check-up last week. It’s been over a year since Dr. Carl alerted us to the Swiss Cheesiness of Schatzi’s bones, and five months since she last saw Dr. Karen, so it was time for a check-up.

When a dog gets to this age, a girl has to wonder how much time her dog has left. Dr. Karen did some blood tests, which revealed that Schatzi is perfect, other than her fragile bones, arthritis, and a little heart murmur which was noted on the last visit and which has not gotten worse. Basically the only thing that’s really wrong with her is what the ER staff around here call TMB (too many birthdays).

She prescribed some new meds for Schatzi’s dementia – apparently loss of calcium in the bones affects the brain as well, at least in dogs – and renewed the many other drugs which allow Schatzi to go prancing by my house every day. Megan is very dedicated and careful about Schatzi’s diet and pain management, and it has paid off.

Schatzi is still enjoying life, playing in the woods, sometimes with her boyfriend, Yellow Dog, napping in her hay bed, or basking in the sun and sniffing the smells. Dr. Karen is pretty sure that Schatzi will make it through the summer and we can revisit her situation then.

Dr. Karen said, “She’s a surprising animal.”

She doesn’t know how surprising, though. Last week, I was getting ready to leave for work when Megan called, saying that Schatzi had taken off on her. She’d been seeking her for half an hour with no luck. I hurried off and we met up over at our brother’s property, where Megan walks the dogs after getting home from work and before going to bed.

We split up and started looking for the missing dog. It’s hard to find a deaf dog in a densely wooded area. My hands were aching with clapping for her. We had been looking for about half an hour when I saw her trotting merrily down the driveway as if nothing had happened. I managed to get her in the car and then found Megan.

I was afraid that Schatzi would be sore from racing around so long, but she was fine. Surprising, indeed.

The other day, I got up early, and reheated some leftover coffee instead of making new coffee. I know this unsavory practice horrifies many of you, and I will blame it on early indoctrination never to waste anything. When your father has been through World War II as a child and teenager, his experiences are passed on to you (sleeping in utter darkness; a horror of wasting food). Especially since he’s not here to say it’s just his daughter being a cheapskate. After all, he didn’t turn the heat off at night.

The leftover coffee proved to be insufficient to jumpstart my cold, dark heart, so I went to make more.

However, the coffee grinder did not agree with me. It had worked fine the day before – hence, the leftover coffee – but refused to budge this particular morning. I tried it in a couple of other outlets, to no avail.

I knew there was coffee at Megan’s house (and I learned later that there was actually pre-ground coffee* there – a rarity), but there was no way I was going to set off the Star alarm and wake up my seriously sleep-deprived sister. What to do?

It was Thursday morning, and I recently re-reinstated the Thursday night dinner tradition. My brother has fire training on Thursday nights, so it’s nice for him to come home to dinner already made, and Thursday marks the end of my sister’s long night shifts.

I packed up the chili I had made, some coffee beans, the errant grinder (in case my mechanically-minded brother could figure out what was wrong with it), and set off for my brother’s place. The gate was locked, and when I got to his place, I could see his car was gone. I went inside, put the chili in the refrigerator, wrote him a note, and went to grind the coffee.

Guess what? I couldn’t make his grinder work, either. I spent a few minutes struggling with the recalcitrant appliance, again trying different outlets, and finally gave up. I poured the remnants of his coffee into some Tupperware and went home.

When I got there, I discovered that the Tupperware had leaked into the shopping bag it was in and through it into the upholstery, which I had just had cleaned at the awesome car wash in San Francisco.

Thoughts were unprintable at that moment, but at least there was enough coffee still in the container to heat up again. Later, I got a coffee grinder at the hardware store, though on actually using it, I discovered that it is smaller than the old one, necessitating one and a half grinders’ worth for a pot of coffee, but I’m glad I have one that works. At least for now.

What is it with me and coffee appliances?!

*She bought a mocha at Starbucks and there was an incredibly good deal on a pound of pre-ground coffee to go with it. You never know when you – or your appliance-challenged sister – might need it.

In case you didn’t know, my brother totally rocks.

He has been a volunteer firefighter for many years (yes, he runs into burning buildings and fought the terrifying wildfires of 2008 for no money) and is a Captain in the fire department. He is a teacher and works with the mentally handicapped. He is a great (formerly professional) cook, a certified scuba diver, can make a circuit board or a robot from scratch, and is a Number One Groover on Life.

On Saturday, he also jumped in the ocean. The cold Pacific Ocean. On a windy February day. Of course Megan and I were there to cheer him on. I actually took Saturday off to do it – the first Saturday in six months! And it was so worth it.

The event was called Polar Plunge, and it was a benefit for Special Olympics. My brother and his team raised around $1,000 or maybe even more!

All the teams wore costumes. My brother’s team were the Soggy Bottom Boys. He’s the one on the far right:

I love it that the only girl on the team – wearing adorable Tigger-embroidered overalls – had the letters “GY” (or “guy”). 🙂

Before jumping – well, running into – the water, they regaled the crowd with “Down to the River to Pray” (above), and it reminded me of how our atheist father used to merrily carol out hymns every time we happened to be in a cathedral or other situation which called for it. In his tone deaf way. Without a hymn book. Because when he was a boy, school days started with prayers and hymns. Dad sure would have had a blast on Saturday.

After the song, my brother ran into the cold water (far left):

and went in up to his shoulders or higher – the rules state that you have to go in up to your waist, but of course that’s not enough for my brother, who perused the list of other places in Northern California holding Polar Plunges on the same day, and thought the one in the Sierras where you would probably have to cut a hole in the ice to jump into would be “fun”. Maybe next year!

Here he is running out again:

He said he felt “great” and “invigorated” as he toweled off:

Only my brother. I am so proud of him!

Little Miss Scout

It was a Valentine’s Day spay for my brother’s mini-cat, Scout!

As our local Humane Society’s slogan has it, “If you ♥ your cat, have it ♠!”

Since we do ♥ Scout, it was time to do the deed, before some amorous boy cat showed up. It’s unlikely in the depths of winter, but you never know. And you may remember that the precocious Miss Audrey went into heat before she was six months old (and that was delightful*).

Over the past four months since she made her surprising début, Scout has become accustomed to the fabulous lifestyle of sleeping inside and having food and pets on demand. And demand she does. If she wants to be petted, she lets you know. Despite her diminutive size, she has the loudest purr of any cat I have ever known.

At the vet’s, we learned that Scout is at least a year old, so our calculations about her age were pretty close. She weighs 6 pounds, so at this point, I think it’s safe to say that she will remain a cat-ette. I’m guessing that lack of nutrition as a baby (and maybe before that) has stunted her growth. Other than her smallness, though, she is in good shape.

She hid for a day after the surgery, but got over it surprisingly quickly. The other day, my brother saw her playing for the first time, batting a pinecone around in the sunshine. Now that she’s not in constant fear for her life and struggling to find food and water, she has time for things like that.

I’m so glad they found each other.

*A drawback of this look is that it doesn’t show hyperlinks, like on “delightful” and “Scout” in the first paragraph. Maybe I should bold these so you’ll know they’re there…

Every month at the jobette, we feature a different artist and try and have a theme for First Friday, the day we and other downtown businesses stay open late and pour wine and serve nibbles, alomg with book signings and meeting artists.

This month, we featured the fine woodworking students’ work from our local college, which was displayed at a gallery on Main Street this month. The students installed a wonderful window display at the jobette. Here it is from the inside – I couldn’t get an outside shot that wasn’t totally glare-y:

This is a very prestigious program, and students apply from all over the world for one of the 22 available spots. The students must be dedicated to their craft: they will be at school six days a week, eight hours a day. As you can see, however, the time is well spent.

This set is inspired by “Mad Men” and is called “Don and Roger”:

Here’s a better look at the top of the “Don” table, which certainly conveys the complexity and elegance of the mysterious Mr. Draper:

This corner cabinet is beautiful in itself:

But when you open it, the door looks like a wing, and you can see that the texture of the wood inspired the artist to make an altar to his totem animal, the owl:

It’s a very spiritual and moving piece. Guy, I thought of you when I saw it.

This was my favorite, an exquisite roll top desk with elegant, willowy legs:

So feminine! And so cleverly designed: the roll top vanishes into the body of the desk when it is rolled back.

I’m so proud of these young artists and what they have achieved. Their fiutures look bright – and beautiful.

Growing Up!

I know you’ve all been wondering about how Jarrett and Archimedes, the World’s Cutest Puppy, are doing.

The answer is: great! Archi had doubled his weight by the end of December:

I think this dog is the best thing that has happened to Jarrett in a long time.

They have a great routine. In the morning, Jarrett takes Archi for a walk, plays with him and feeds him. Archi then retires to his enormous crate, which fits Archi’s bed (but doesn’t fit in Jarrett’s giant, 1970s vintage car) and naps while Jarrett heads to work.

At lunch, Jarrett comes home and walks Archi again, before taking him to doggy daycare, where Archi is a staff favorite and welcomed with joy. Archi likes playing with the big dogs – yes, the ones that are four times his size – and they like playing with him, too.

At the end of the day, Jarrett picks up Archi. The daycare is about five minutes from their home – about as far as Archi can walk after playing most of the day. As Jarrett says, “Picking up a tuckered out puppy after a long day of work – priceless!”

I’m so glad that they found each other and are so happy together.

The Inner Me

Well, the record remains unbroken. Two good pictures of me in half a century. If I were playing professional baseball, I’d be batting…something really bad.

I hate the pictures for the website, but I’m stuck with them. I think I look like a lunatic in them. In the first one, which the photographer selected, I can almost hear Jack Nicholson hollering, “Heeeeere’s Suzy!”

Hide the kids and sharp implements!

On the other hand, my blow out does look fabulous. Ditto the pearls John gave me for my long ago 30th birthday. And to think I felt old then!

Megan combed through the photos with me, agreeing that they are unflattering. Before you say that my sister is prejudiced, I will tell you that she is the first to tell me if an outfit is unflattering or I don’t look good, feeling, very correctly, that it’s better to tell me so I can fix it before unleashing it on the unsuspecting public.

We think this is marginally better:

They might let me out of the straitjacket in that one.

I hesitated to even show these to you, but as I said, I’m stuck with one of them (not sure which) on the website, and I made such a big deal about it that I felt obligated to unveil the denouement.

After I finished crying over the pictures and the fact that they would be out there for anyone who googles to ridicule, I realized that the two pictures of me which I do like were both taken by men who loved me: the first by my beloved godfather, the one and only Spencer Steele, and the second by John. Maybe that’s the real secret of a good photo: the look of love.

It’s been a cold winter by California standards: at or below freezing many nights, though as I said before, the clear days are sunny and the nights are starry. The Ridge is often icy in the morning, and there is hard frost on the grass at the side of the road, looking all winter wonderland.

I know that doesn’t seem all that cold to all of you back East, where they keep the real weather in all its extremes, but your house probably has insulation, and you probably have heat in your bathroom. You probably also have closets and walls that don’t curve and more than three feet of counter space, too.

But Chez Suzy, the flash heater is located outside, instead of inside, the way it’s supposed to be, even out here in the boonies. For those of you wondering what this contraption is, it heats water on its way to your shower or kitchen sink (not the washer, though – that’s only hooked up for cold water). This winter, the shower has been just about warm enough, not quite, which is kind of unpleasant with the window in the shower blowing a draft on me in the cold mornings.

I figure this is because the water is being pre-cooled outside. But last week, it started getting colder. And then it was just plain cold.

Rob came and took a look at it, but it’s not really his forte. I emailed Mark about it, and he replied with some suggestions that didn’t help. A couple of days without hot water and it got pretty old, not at all like “Little House on the Prairie”, as you would think.

We called in the cavalry in the form of my brother, who took the flash heater apart – well, the plumbing part. Even a fireman didn’t want to start in on the gas part, and if it came to that, I’d have to take the whole thing to Willits to the one guy in the entire county who can repair one of these expensive German contraptions.

Apparently it is top of the line and costs something in the luxury neighborhood of $700 or $800. Jonathan complimented the German engineering and reminded me of one of our father’s old jokes:

“Heaven is where the police are British, the cooks are French, the mechanics German, the lovers Italian and it’s all organized by the Swiss. Hell is where the chefs are British, the mechanics French, the lovers Swiss, the police German and it’s all organized by the Italians.”

Dad was never afraid of the politically incorrect.

Jonathan discovered a mini pebble in the works, so small that it’s hard to believe it was the big problem, and a valve that was sticking. He removed the pebble and lubricated the sticky valve and voilà! The flash heater was restored to mediocrity instead of freezulation. Mediocrity never looked so good.

Jonathan mentioned that he has some insulation we can put on the outside pipes to help make it warmer, but in the meantime, I’m enjoying the (relative) warmth.

Update: I picked up and installed the insulation. I guess the water is a little warmer, though I still don’t need at add cold water to my shower, which I was kind of hoping for.

The worst thing about getting up at 5:30 in the morning – other than, you know, the getting up at 5:30 in the morning thing – is that it takes so long to get light enough to let the boys go out and play. Audrey, as the undisputed winner of “Survivor: Hooterville”, is allowed to go out in the pre-dawn (and post-sunset) darkness, but the boys have to wait until it’s light enough outside that I’m pretty sure the Monsters have clocked out.

Roscoe often gives up and goes back to bed. Roscoe is very clever at finding cozy nests to nap in, and his latest discovery is the pillows on the bed – he sits on top of them. He also sleeps under the covers with me almost every night, especially because it’s been so cold lately.

Clyde, on the other hand, usually perches on the heater until his patience runs out. Then it’s time to start clawing the couch and or rug, with maybe some jumping on the counter action thrown in for variety. He’s always anxious to go out in the morning, even though he’s usually the first one in at night, with an eye to the welcome home treats and dinner.

The other day, one of Mark’s chickens came by to say hello:

It was interesting to see how the cats reacted. Roscoe, in keeping with his ultra cool character, merely observed the intruder:

No point in getting all excited about a chicken.

Clyde, on the other hand, got ready to pounce:

But the chicken eluded him.

Audrey the Enforcer swung into action:

She ran the chicken off her territory and then sat on the porch in the sun, having a victory bath. Earlier that day, she had reared up on her back legs like a little bear and growled and clawed at poor Luna, who ran away in horror. Luna is about 75 pounds’ worth of dog, and Audrey is the size of her head. Go figure.

The other day I gave Rob a ride home from the Big Town. As usual, we had fun chatting in the car, and it was really hard not to look at the spectacular pink and gold sunset over the ocean. One of the many drawbacks of driving is that you can’t really admire the scenery, even though you’re driving right through it.

At Rob and Megan’s house, I carried in the Chico bags of groceries while Rob brought the dogs in. When I got home and started changing out of my work clothes, I discovered that my mother’s silver bracelets, which I wear every day, were missing.

My heart sank, and I looked through my pockets and handbag. Nothing. By now, it was too dark to look in the car or the driveway, but I thought that perhaps I had taken them off at the jobette and left them on my desk. I do that often when I have a lot of typing to do.

The next day, I looked in the car and the driveway and asked Megan to search her house and driveway. Arriving at the jobette, I rushed to my desk and there they weren’t. I asked my coworkers to keep an eye out for them, and called Starbuck’s, where I had met Megan and Rob the evening before. I talked to the girl who had closed that night and she said she hadn’t seen them. She checked the lost and found, and nothing.

Megan texted me later to say she hadn’t found them, either. I was surprisingly upset by the loss, and tried to tell myself that we shouldn’t get too attached to things and objects, but inside I just wanted to cry. We don’t have much left from our parents, so what we do have is especially precious.

Later in the day, I was putting things away in the storage room when I spotted my bracelets by the side of the sink. I had taken them off the day before when washing the dishes! I grabbed them and ran to show Erin, who hugged me and said, “Yay!” That pretty much summed it up for me.

Well, hello there!

Things have been really busy (and somewhat stressful) at the job and jobette ever since I got back from San Francisco. And as you know, work = no fun = nothing to blog about. I have the last three quarterly due diligence conference calls at 6 am on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday this week. Then I have to write up all ten of them, arguably the hardest and most time-consuming part of the process.

We had a little spot of rain the other day, but other than that, it’s been what my sister calls “Junuary”, sunny and in the 50s during the day, though cold and starry at night and frosty in the morning, the Ridge glittering with ice. I was surprised to see in the paper that we have received 27 inches of rain this season, versus 19 inches at this time last year – must have been those early season storms. Last night I noticed the first full moon of the new year beaming through the skylight of the sleeping loft.

I made a little time to head over to the property a couple of days ago. I realized that I hadn’t seen my brother for exactly a month, ever since Christmas Eve. Megan and the dogs came with me, and together we inspected the orchard in progress, which will be right next to the garden they created about this time last year.

There will be apple trees, peaches, and cherry trees. Olives and almonds are under consideration, as are raspberry bushes. Jonathan thinks they will have to electrify the fence, like the one around the bee hives. Otherwise, the bears will move right in and eat everything.

I picked up a hitchhiker this past week. I know what you’re thinking, but I only pick up people I know or the occasional woman. This was an older lady, who turned out to be a delightful German named Heidi, who has been visiting here since the 1970s. There seems to be a mystical connection between Germans and the County. My fabulous stylist is from Germany, as was Rose, my house’s previous owner and occupant. Even Rob was born in Germany. I asked Heidi what brought her here in the first place, and what kept drawing her back.

She said, “We Germans find all the best places. And there is nowhere on earth like Mendocino.”