34 Big Ones!

Yup! Frost killed the basil on Saturday night and that means it was time for Bob and I to celebrate 34 years on non-anniversary. (I'm considering asking, "Where did/does the time go?" but it's rhetorical and a cliche so I won't.)

Savvy blog readers will notice that the basil is in a small plastic pot. Out basil did so badly that- as noted in a previous posting- we did not have pesto this summer... not even once! One day while at our local supermarket, I happened to spy herb plants (and organic no less!) and purchased the above victim. Pretty sad that this plant was born to be offered up as a sacrificial avatar of our anniversary. But it did its job and here we are.

 

We also bought a nice cheerful little chrysanthemum to celebrate our 34 years of un-married adventures, along with sushi and tempura and seaweed and teriyaki. It was a pleasant evening until we accidentally attempted to watch a comedy which was describing the relationship of two women (one of them ostensibly an asshole artist!!) who would spend much of the next hour and a half beating each other into bloody pulps- and comas- multiple times. Be careful of what passes as "comedy".

And then there was this:

Yes! An amazing full moon (Hunter's moon) that I just couldn't do justice to in pictures. The whole sky glowed and the abundant clouds were tufted and rippled and rumpled. It was pretty spectacular!

Hope everyone got to enjoy it and thanks for the anniversary good wishes!

Big 33

 

Hey look! The basil finally got zapped by a (rather late) frost! That mean that Bob ad I celebrated yet another trip around the sun together. Yes, 33 years of un-anniversary. In a nod to non-tradition, Bob makes an attractive (!?!!) arrangement of the deceased, now rotting basil.

I haven't much more to say than I can think of no one else I'd rather spend a year in COVID lock down with; we had fun! Now on to another 33... of course that's make me 98 and Bob 101 or something so I don't know if that's a good idea. 

So, yes, I look forward to this next year. Hopefully, we can crawl out of our quarantine isolation and once again show art in real spaces and maybe even risk taking a train into NYC to see some art. But let's just get through the upcoming winter first!

9th Year

This post was going to be several (innocuous) things. I wanted to celebrate the 9th anniversary of our house closing and the incredible saga of us moving in (amid three feet of crusty, frozen snow and all kinds of bizarre obstacles!) I also wanted to pay tribute to a new decade; a doubling decade! Happy 2020! May we see more clearly!*1
The hopeful little bowl of supermarket primroses*2 had cheered me up immeasurably: we keep having these dark, drizzly days (at least we're not on fire! Poor Australia!!) and despite the knowledge that the days should be getting longer, it really doesn't feel that way. I spent a day last week, laying in bed and reading seed catalogs and dreaming about this season's garden. That made me feel more alive!
But The Orange Menace and his cronies have other ideas and may have sparked World War III with some ill-thought out drone strike which will inevitably lead to retaliations... oh, hell do NOT get me going. You knew that the continuing impeachment saga was going to provoke tantrums and rash behavior and it did. No surprise! But really? Endanger life on this planet, why don't you?
I can't help it that I feel pretty grim right now. Despite having a house that I love, great companions- human and animal-, a show coming up and all sorts of exciting things afoot in my studio, I feel overwhelmingly troubled. Someone cheer me up... please!!

This bowl of berries has been holding its own since November. Minimal shedding and still colorful; I guess that's cheerful.
I don't know how, but I promise my next posting will attempt to be upbeat and lighthearted. Trust me!


*1 Why do I not think this is likely?!?!?!
*2 Supermarket primroses are the best! Cheap (usually on sale to boot) and if you plant them outside after the weather warms, they are hardy. I have a bunch of them in my shade garden and they come back year after year. Kind of amazing.

Our 31st Non-Anniversary!

And how better to celebrate our 31st non-anniversary than with me contracting a cold and a phone call from our driveway-sharing neighbors to say that there is yet another (!!!!) tree down, blocking passage? We've lost track of how many times the driveway has been impassable...
I was contemplating returning to bed as my throat was scratchy and my nose was stuffy and I just felt generally tired and run down when Bob provided the above intelligence. The tree decided to fall down late; we were in New Haven and didn't arrive home until a bit past 11:00. Our neighbor got home at around 1:00 to discover that she couldn't drive up the driveway. We were lucky!

(This shot is from the other side, by our neighbor's stranded car.) I rallied energy to assure Bob that I'd help drag limbs away, after he'd chainsawed the downed tree into draggable pieces. Fortunately, we have great neighbors and everyone pitched in. Bob sawed the side branches and when enough weight had been removed, we all formed a line and grabbed a rope that had been affixed to the biggest limb and we pulled. The third of the tree that was damaged gave way and no one got hurt and we quickly piled the truck high with debris to cart off into the woods.

You can barely see the truck for all the tree! It took an hour and a half or so but I think everyone secretly enjoyed the helping out and the cleaning up in the mildly chilly morning.
Which, of course, leads back to Bob and I celebrating our 31st anniversary! Yes, the basil was struck dead and blackened and tonight we're having a small occasion. (We'll wait until I feel 100% before we really congratulate each other on attaining a bit over three decades of unmarried bliss.) But I actually feel pretty okay after a low key day of laying around in the sun and getting picture books from the library. Sorry to see the garden go, but I guess it means less work!

Deja Vu All Over Again

As Bob and I struggled to lift tons of kitchen cabinets off of our pickup truck and onto the frozen tundra that is our current New England state of affairs, it occurred to us that we had done this before. Like seven years ago when we moved in: history does repeat itself.*

This is how we came to this particular episode in our lives. We have been bemoaning the state of our kitchen, especially the sink area. The particle board around the sink is soaked and exploding, the plastic sink is stained and nasty beyond description. Here, you see for yourself.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHH! Awful! And that's after a good cleaning. (Those stains just don't come out anymore and the faucet is all chipped and it's beyond redeemable!) So when friends- who thankfully live close by (in another modern house)- offered their old(er) cabinets because they're in the midst of a kitchen re-do, we said "yes".

Let's just mention that poor Bob had to make three trips to pick up all those cabinets and it got colder and darker as we offloaded. Then we had to maneuver them all into the house. By default, they all wound up in the living room as it was the only available "free space". It's a good thing we celebrated Xmas last week!

These cabinets are in much better shape than ours but it will be a bit of a Chinese puzzle trying to fit them into our kitchen and its configuration. But hey! We're always up for a challenge.
In all honesty, if the only area we redo is the sink (and maybe replace some of our obnoxious cabinet doors which fold out in this wonky and deadly way), I'll be happy.

This area. That stupid dishwasher is going as we haven't even used it once and we just store dishes in it. And under that sink... I'm not even posting a picture of that! It's been leaking through the back of the sink for a while and there's some sort of leak from the pipes underneath. So tackling this area will solve several dilemmas.
Bob did take all the cabinets and counters and drawers, not only as a favor to the friends (thanks Joanne and Eric!) for thinking of us, but because he wasn't sure what part went with which piece.

These are the ones we're pretty sure we can't use: triangular corner cabinets and odd floating islands. But this is a small price to pay for things we were considering purchasing from Ikea or Home Depot. It may take a while, but I can't wait for our new kitchen! Oh, and warmer weather...

*No kidding! I just realized that January 3rd IS the anniversary of our closing! And it is going on our seventh year here; time does fly and history does repeat itself.

Entering Our 6th Year!

Hooray! Today, the 3rd of January (in the year of our lord 2016) is the beginning of our 6th year at The Bauhaus Chicken Coop! That would be the "Iron" anniversary if we were talking weddings but it's appropriate as Bob works in iron. Here's some iron to celebrate:

(The now famous Birthday Fence that Bob made for me.) It's been a tumultuous and often crazy five years... including that initial day of our closing on this date in 2011 when it was like 6 degrees outside and there was three feet of snow on the ground- and much more to come! Moving our belongings on the "tableboggan" (an upside down folding table that slid well over all that snow) and other adventures too many to recall.Thank goodness for friends with large vans and strong backs!

Our house feels like home and while we have plans and projects in mind for 2016, it's simply nice to have a home that we like- just the way it is. Both Bob and I have studios, we've made great gardens and planted trees; we're standing upright and looking forward to this year in art and politics. (OOps! Don't go there!) Jules the Dog and Maggie the Mexican Pony have nothing to complain about (but they still do) and we're all looking forward to anther tumultuous and crazy year. Why do I think that's exactly what is coming?

Happy Anniversary to Us!!

Oh boy! It's Bob n Rita's 24th anniversary! Hard to believe we've been alive that long, let alone TOGETHER for 24 years! And as many of you may know, there is the Legend of the First Frost to celebrate.
It is tradition that we leave a basil plant in the garden when doing fall clean up so that we know exactly when our anniversary occurs. See, the first time that Bob and I "hooked up", we were going to make pesto, but it got cold and the basil froze and no pesto, but heap big whoopie anyway, if you get my drift. .
So despite not being married (and believe you me, many of our married friends have been divorced waaaaaaaaaaaaay before their 24th anniversary) we actually celebrate on a rotating calendar, because the frost happens on a different day every year. It's so appropriate that Bob and I, as two dedicated gardeners, acknowledge our relationship in an organic way. Some years, we celebrate several times, as we expect frost, but the basil doesn't die. This year was a slam-dunk sure thing as we were hit hard by a frost last night.
So happy anniversary to us! And many more...