love/hate

5 things I love today:
- my friend Nadia's new book
- wooden knitting needles
- my boots
- a fantastic blazing orange sunset
- espresso at home

5 things I could do without:
- seeing people walking their dogs toting around clear plastic bags of dog sh*t
- milk that goes bad too soon
- beets
- too-small parking spaces
- legalism

Dippin' Dots

As I was getting ready to leave Gallery Cuvee tonight after attending a friend's art opening, there were a couple of pops of thunder and a couple of flashes of lightning. Then snow. Snow falling from the sky in fierce little balls, much like an explosion of styrofoam pellets from a bean bag. Or Dippin' Dots.

Strangely, driving home on snow covered streets, I felt at peace. I say strange because I often have a fairly acute case of snow anxiety. Maybe it is the fact that I'll not be getting up at dark thirty in the morning that leaves me at peace. Or the fact that after living here four years I'm finally getting comfortable being here.

But I still miss the azaleas, hydrangeas, wisteria, and gardenias.

what's up

- just back from a belated birthday beach trip. yeah, i milked this one for all it was worth. squeezed two more birthday celebrations out of the big 4-0.
- got to catch up with my birmingham buddies.
- played a lot of boggle.
- ate a lot of firecracker shrimp (this involves the best remoulade sauce in the world).
- slept a lot.
- sat on the beach a lot.
- watched the sun set and the moon rise.
- had some great conversations.
- did a lot of nothing.
- read Bless Your Heart, Tramp. and random magazines. deep, deep reading, in case you can't tell.
- did read a bit of Breath for the Bones, by Luci Shaw, so all was not mindless.
- enjoying the new foo fighters album - echos, silence, patience & grace. isn't that a great title?
- found the perfect music for the treadmill - florida state's marching band doing the best of college football fight songs.
- drove up to the mountains today so i could catch the aspens in all of their fall glory.
- just spruced up my porch with a pumpkin/mum display to officially welcome fall.
- trying to plan my week now so that i can ease back into work and maybe even a daily routine that doesn't feel like chaos.
- have a huge need for great amounts of creative energy to come bursting forth in the next week or so.

weeding out

My Memorial Day weekend plans are to whip my yard into shape. Or at least get a good start on it. I spent the better part of today pulling weeds and trimming trees and bushes. I’ve neglected it far too long, and the weeds are out of control. Some of them are a bit more steadfast than they should be. That’s not what I had in mind when I chose steadfast as my Word of the Year for 2007.

Basically I have two kinds of weeds. Some of them are hardy dandelion weeds. You’ve gotta get them from the root to keep them from regenerating.

Aside: Not that I am going to try it, but did you know that you can cook dandelion greens, just like you would mustard or turnip greens?

The other weeds are creepy vines. I think one is called Creeping Charlie, and I don’t know the name of the other one, but it is evil. Left unattended it gets out of control, and quick. Creeps along masquerading as a ground cover, winds its way around the plants and chokes the life out of them. There may be a spiritual parallel here, don’t you think?