In a mood entirely unusual for me, I felt the urge to travel to the water. I enjoy showers but that's about as watery as I get. But when I met up with my friend Laurie and she recommended places we could visit together- after a delightful lunch- I seconded something watery.
So we wound up at an Old Lyme preserve; a delightful easy walk (especially after a hearty lunch!) that wound peacefully through trees and an open meadow and finally arrived at an inlet of Long Island Sound. It was lovely.
Why me? Why have I, one the leftiest of the left, received a Ronald Reagan 2026 calendar!??! And they're seeking a donation to some ultra-conservative camp for (unfortunate) right-wing brain-washed children!! Yikes.
It gets worse. Lookee at some of these dreary photos; poor horse!!
And look at his toes sticking out!! hahahaha!! One's toes should turn very slightly inwards to the horse... Bob couldn't think of Reagan's nickname, and said, "Wasn't he called something like "Gibbons?" I believe he was thinking of monkeys...
Oy! A fucking "schoolhouse for Reaganism". Just what we need! To be reminded of where all this bullshit "populist" conservatism and the dread Neo-Cons began?!!?!? Although Mr. Reagan would no doubt not even recognize his own party, what with the orange menace cozying up to Putin. What a crazy world we live in.
But here's the worst picture yet. Don't blame me! This was sent- unprovoked!!- to our house. What have I done to deserve this?!?!!?
That's a really big YUCK right there!!!!!
Nice picture of me by Bob taken in New Bedford at a sort of "second opening" at The Co-Creative Center. We did manage to miss the actual opening as COVID came to call... but it was fun to finally make it to the show "Adjacency" celebrating the adjeacent relationship of my self and Liv Haines and Elizabeth Wilkinson to Swain School of Design alum and faculty. I am twice adjacent as both Bob and my sister Cathy went to Swain!
So we had fun and a mini-get-away and saw lots of art and people. One of the most fun pieces of civic art was this giant rooster made from entirely recycled/upcycled plastic and metal junque. Twenty feet tall and absolutely great!!
Pretty cool, right? The artist Artur Bordalo (who goes by the name Bordalo II) created this piece with the help of residents who gathered and "donated" all kinds of street finds- crushed shopping carts and orange traffic cones and even a plastic spring horse! It's monumental and fun and the way public art should be. (many "public art" pieces are bland and pretty easy to ignore...)
we had a splendid time and were even able to park for free overnight downtown as the code on our ticket refused to be read and we were ushered out for freeeeeeee!!
Here's a lovely picture of Bob's truck. In general Bob really likes his truck; it's been great. But one truly annoying problem kept arising and our local garage couldn't seem to fix it.
Bob's battery kept going dead. Granted Bob doesn't drive a whole lot, but really? Any car/truck should be able to sit for three days and not be dead. This has happened too many times to recount, and our local mechanic kept having to replace the battery as it's always still under warranty. The mechanic actually suggested that Bob "drive more""... but what kind of a suggestion is that? Drive where? Just randomly to charge the battery? How does that benefit anyone, let alone the environment.
When the battery came up dead this past week, Bob called AAA and they got the truck jump started. The technician tested Bob's battery and said it was okay. This confirmed what we'd been thinking: it has to be an electrical problem of some sort.
Bob decided to try another/different garage, expecting maybe a different set of eyes on the issue might solve this once and for all. Lo! and Behold! They solved it and the answer turned out to be crazy. Because the truck had belonged to a company, it had a tracking device installed to make sure the drivers weren't joy-riding (or something). The device had never been removed (or deactivated) so it continued to drain the battery. Who would have thought that??!?!? Anyway, it seems to be working now...
This is Bob standing in the horse field, next to a truly heroic squash plant. Bob threw a old squash on a composted manure pile in the bottom of Neko's field and this plant erupted and has really gone to town. I rode past it when I was riding Neko yesterday and was awestruck at the heroic dimensions- it has to be at least thirty feet across!
It's spreading out in all directions... soon it may engulf all of Neko's field. We're hoping the squashes produced are edible. Bob has pulled some of the leaves back and claims there are several differently colored fruits. We'll see what happens when we harvest them!!
Well it has been the week from hell- make no mistake! ( And I had just remarked how happy I was and how "things" seemed to be humming along. Dangerous, that!) Maybe it's drawing to a close and I can soon cease to suspect that some bad juju had come to call. It was hot as hell, too, thereby making all the misery all the more miserable.
I'm not going to dwell on all the stupid bad stuff that happened except to give a quick update: I got COVID, Bob got COVIDand Robin the Good had major emergency surgery. Lordy.
Hence the guest appearance by Robin as Donut Dog. I bought her this attractive, plush (suitable for the princess she is!) plastic cone-of-shame alternative as I could not imagine her struggling through the house in that crazy plastic Elizabethan collar. She got used to it pretty quick, although I'm sure she'll be glad to be rid of it!
Anyway, I think I'm over my COVID bout, despite a couple of small residual reminders. I feel pretty good. Bob is in early stage but he seems to have missed the worst of the headache/dizziness aspects that I endured. But he's got the cough! Our first episode... a friend blithely informed me that he's had COVID like 3 times. Yowzah! I don't want that! Once was enough.
So we're on the mend but running out- masked- to do some errands, my car's maintenance light came on (automotive COVID?! No just wants an oil change). Anything else? How about I got a summons to jury duty!! Stop!! I need a vacation.
I thought I was getting a cold, as I was just a bit light-headed and my nose was a little stuffy. And my throat a tiny bit scratchy. I also considered allergies as my phone kept telling me pollen was high. But last Thursday night, there was no denying I was sick and I thought I had the flu.
I am well aware that despite being vaxxed, you can still contract COVID or the flu. Ironically Bob and I just inquired two weeks or so ago whether an updated vaccine was available. We were told a new one was coming. Ha! Bad timing.
So, here I am, three days laying a-bed. The first two days were pretty rough. I had every symptom: dizziness, chills, headache, sore throat, stuffed up nose. (Fortunately, I missed out on stomach involvement except when I attempted to take some of that night-time cold medicine and my body rebelled immediately and up it came! I threw up so quickly it was laughable; similar to my experience with natto.)
Anyway, I believe I'm on the mend even though I'm still in bed because I'm bored. That's a good sign.
And as an aside, keep getting booster shots because my experience proves COVID is still very much out there! I suppose I'm fatalistic enough to assume that at some point- no matter how careful you are- you'll get COVID. I think it's interesting that we flew to Italy last year on a crowded plane with only a couple of people wearing masks and we didn't get it then. And we've been to NYC, traveling on subways and trains and never got it. Just plain old bad luck!
Life is full of mysteries, is it not? Here's one for the books.
As we all know, our beloved doggo Robin the Good loves her rawhide chew bones. She doesn't really eat them so much as deconstruct them carefully. She chews off the knobby ends and sometimes walks around with the central shaft portion sticking out of her mouth like a cigar. Entertaining!
The knobby ends are then presented throughout the house in an intricate and highly personal manner. It is entirely possible to step on one or more of these knobs. I attempt to gather them in a box in the living room but this presents an alternative game that Robin and I play. I collect the bone leavings- several dozen! and complain (kiddingly) as I gather them, that "someone has made a big mess!" Once the box is filled it is Robin's delight to grab the box and hurl it mightily through the air, bones flying in every direction. Then I repeat the bone collection phase. It's pretty funny and Robin is very good at tossing them around!
Robin's other pleasure is to take a carefully curated bone and bring it outside. She scatters them around the yard where it is entirely possible to run over one (or more) with the lawn mower. We do check the yard to prevent this.
On one particular occasion, I gathered all of Robin's bone ends into a section of the lawn right off our terrace and remarked as how it looked like a bone yard as there were at least ten or eleven of them. It did look funny.
However, the next morning when we went to feed Neko, there were no bones to be found. None! I imagined that Bob had picked them up and either brought them inside or deposited them in a pile somewhere. But Bob suggested he had done no such thing.
Therein lies the mystery: who took Robin's bones? Either there was a single very industrious thief that precured them one at a time, or there were several robbers working in tandem to remove all the bones. We may never know.
But we now have an empty box until Robin gets to work on her new collection!!
Anyone who has visited us in the last... oh eight years(??!?) is familiar with the labyrinth that one needs to negotiate to enter my "Studio Annex". I inherited (no.. warehoused) my deceased mother's small pile of (possibly) auctionable furniture blocking the way ever since about... eight years ago. No coincidence there! I have vowed, time and time again, yes, I will get to it sold/removed/donated whatever!! (*1)
So maybe because the weather is truly awful, maybe because I decided I actually NEED that space, several days ago, I actually began to get the heap out of the Studio Annex. What a revelation!! There's space! Bob and I started dancing in there, until we almost collapsed because it's so bloody hot.
Now the pile is in my studio but that's a big motivator to call the auction house and see if they're interested. I already photographed these items several years ago... yeah maybe I move more slowly than I think but at least it's done and I can clean in my studio annex!! Some spots haven't seen the light of day for years.
And would you look at that?! The door closes! And there's nothing behind it. Even Robin didn't know what to think.
And from the other side in the hallway:
Shocking! Really, it has taken years to get to this point; we'll see what happens next. Marie Condo would be proud!
(*1) And maybe because it's been so hot, I forgot to photograph the room as packed as it was. I was half way through moving stuff when I thought, "Damn! I should have documented the complete and awesome pile!" Too late. Bob waggishly suggested we move it all back in... not over my dead and sweaty body!!!!
So I apparently experienced something delightful called a "migraine aura". I was minding my own business, finishing up drinking coffee in the morning, and I suddenly had this truly weird visual sensation. No headache, no dizziness- nothing!- except this entirely original phenomenon that there was a disco ball's worth of odd, colorful, geometric shapes dancing in my visual field. It looked sort of like the fringe on the piece above. Hard to describe, but like overlapping translucent shifting shapes. I think the fact that they were geometric was the strangest part. All of this only lasted a couple of minutes and then it was gone.
While I thought it was a singular experience, I thought maybe it had occurred because I had some like sleep goobers in my eyes or I had looked at the window where it was much brighter and the light had scrambled my brain and eyes for a minute. I actually forgot about it for a week.
Then I had a second episode in the middle of last Sunday afternoon. Bango! I'm feeding Robin the Good and Lo! The little geometric visitors were back!! This picture captured from the Internet is actually close to what I "saw". I decided I'd better make an appointment with my eye doctors as it was really odd and pretty alarming. Once? Okay... but twice? My eyes or brain was onto something, and I've known several people who had retinal detachments so yikes!
I played phone tag with the doctor's office on Monday (gave them my cell and they called the home phone, unbeknownst to me!). But in the meantime, my sister Cathy said it sounded like migraine aura and I have to admit that was a more attractive alternative to brain tumors and retinal detachments. And the pictures and description sounded accurate. Although I've never had a migraine in my life!
So the doctors (all three of them waltzing around in my head and behind my eyes) confirmed my sister's diagnosis. They said it was unusual for it to only last a couple of minutes- typically it's more like 15 or 20minutes. (*1) They asked if I'd been hit in the head. No. Have I had sleep disturbances. Yes. Was I under any stress?!?!!??! To which I blurted out, "Half the country in under stress!!! Things have gone crazeee and who can sleep or feel normal??!?!?!" The young doctor who was administering to me at that point laughed and agreed there was plenty to be stressing about. At least he understood!!
So I'm fine; which is a good thing to be assured that you're not nuts- the whole world is nuts. I'm also really, really glad that I got the aura minus the migraine!! And- I realize this is going to sound really peculiar, but the colors and shapes and general aesthetic of the episode was kinda cool. Like if you have some weird visual anomaly or medical sensation, make it look good! (*2)
(*1.) At which I informed my doctor that if it had lasted that long, I'd probably be screaming!!! I mean it was creepy enough for only a minute or two.
(*2) And I will amend here that I actually have consciously reduced my exposure to the news and "him". We watched part of that interminable address to the Congress last night but I half watched. And we turned it off and I got a good night's sleep!! I think I need a week of sleeeeeeep!
The last thing I was considering doing this morning was going to get 20 bales of hay. But a quick reminder from The Weather Channel assured us that 1.) Today it's going to snow, 2.) Tomorrow it's going to rain and 3.) Monday we're supposed to get high winds... so today it was! Having fortified ourselves with coffee and breakfast, off we went.
Bob stacked the hay on the truck as a previous outing had four men throwing hay up on the truck while I furiously attempted to stack and keep track of how many bales were being flung at me. I thought my shoulder was dislocating, so I switched places with Bob. Much better!
Here's the conveyances we use to transport the hay to the hay area of our small horse barn. You will understand that because of recent snow and icing events, we can't drive down to the barn (Hahhaha! Much easier!) So... we drag them across the ice field that is our back yard.
Well what can one do when the Democracy you've always enjoyed is being burned to the ground by orange bullies and their twisted billionaire pals? In my case, I togged up for a chilly- but pleasant!- tootle around the lower horse field. (*1)
It was slushy and icy in places so we took it easy... no cantering But Neko seemed happy for the diversion as this winter has put a freeze (so to speak) on riding as it's been alternately 1.) really cold 2.) super windy 3.) cold and windy 4.) icy and slippery. I've had to cancel several lessons and both Neko and I are getting fat and sloppy. Neko's ears were forward for most of my time aboard; a sure sign that she was having fun.
So while not astride, I have (of course) been producing political zingers... so much fucking raw material!!!! I would have wished for a different election out come and the ability to create pieces with different subject matter. Yikes! Here's one now:
(*1) My booted foot looks so funny in my shadow! It makes Neko look as if she has an oddly placed penis or a short fifth leg.
(*2) For those that don't know, "samizdat" literally means "self-published" in Russian. It was a term used for hand copied works of forbidden writing. Lots was banned in the Soviet Union!!
