Cooking - August 13, 2026

I am so tired of cooking.  It's not so much the actual cooking as it is planning the meals and getting the ingredients.  

Last night I asked The Husband to think of something for dinner tonight.  "It can be anything," I said.  "I'll go to the grocery store tomorrow."  

He pondered a while and said, "Well, we haven't had Mississippi pot roast in a while."  

Google it if you don't know what it is.  It's good, as far as pot roast goes, but it has a lot of high-sodium packaged seasonings.  

I went to the grocery store this morning and got the stuff to make it, but I also got ingredients for crock pot Cajun chicken penne, which we are having tonight.  The pot roast can wait until Sunday.

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There is what I believe to be a honeybee crawling around on the screens inside the back porch.  One gets in here almost every day.  I send them mental vibes to fly over to the door, where I will let them out.  

There was also a large, hairy spider inside the screen.  I am not so tolerant of spiders when they invade my space.  I got the fly swatter and whacked it, and it dangled down on a web thread.  I whacked it again, and it sailed somewhere.  There is a mountain of stuff on my worktable - multiple bowls of beads, a tin for wire remants, a couple of caddies for tools and paintbrushes and pencils.  The spider could be anywhere, and I don't know if it's dead.  

This is the stuff of nightmares.

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I wish I knew more science about polymer clay.

Recently, I have been sort of fixated on the baking process.  When I first started fooling with polymer clay, I dragged out some old digital thermometers - the kind with a probe on a cord - and set my oven for 275 degrees, with the probe laying on a pan.  When the oven said it had reached 275 degrees, the thermometer said 230.  It never got to 275 in an hour of baking time.  This week, I got a new digital thermometer, again the probe type.  Same deal; WAY below 275 degrees.  Thinking that it was maybe the fault of the thermometer - maybe the cord in the door let the heat out or soaked up cool from the room.  So I ordered another thermometer, the dial kind that sits on a base inside the oven.  Tomorrow, I'll let you know how it did.  

To be honest, I'm not real keen on baking polymer clay in the oven where I bake food.  When I bake clay, I always run the fan over the stove, and after the oven turns off, I open the door a little to let any fumes out.  But I am not comfortable that the clay isn't leaving oven residue that might somehow work its way into our food.  I know that we eat, drink, and breathe plastics every day, but I like to avoid it where I can,

  

Today in the craft room, I said to myself, "Don't make anything else you don't like."

Yesterday, being fresh out of fresh ideas and running low on some supplies, I worked on organizing the ring display and the earring display.  (The bracelet display isn't here yet.)  I hadn't handled some of it for months, and organizing it helped me see it with new eyes.  I thought once again that I wouldn't wear most of that stuff to a cat fight.  It's not that the workmanship is bad; I culled the ones that had flaws.  The colors are pretty.  It's just that most of it is too gaudy for my tastes.

Anyway, today I decided to make something I, personally would wear.

And I did it.  Made a polymer clay pendant and some earrings for myself.  Assuming I don't screw it up somewhere down the road, I will wear them to my class reunion.  They're baking right now and will need finishing.  Lots of pitfalls there.

Speaking of the class reunion, the committee had another meeting yesterday.  Only people who like to talk and socialize will come to a meeting.  This makes it hard to stay on track.  I had to call the class to order a couple of times to get a consensus on the menu and the venue.  Several people are keeping their own count of attendees, and nobody's count matched.  It was a mess.  I think we finally got everything straight until the next meeting after the registration deadline has passed.

Heat Wave Coming - August 11, 2026

Yesterday morning, after I said I wasn't going to rake up the grass clippings in the back yard, I womaned-up and raked up the grass clippings.  Filled up the big yard wagon TWICE, dumped the loads onto the compost pile.  Set the mole trap in the new tunnel that had popped up since I mashed them down with the lawnmower.  

I briefly considered cranking up the weed eater, but it was already seriously hot.  Enough womaning-up for the day.  

According to this morning's weather report, we're in for more serious heat for the next TWO WEEKS.  I had considered taking my jewelry to the local farmer's market this weekend, but . . . nah.

The LRB's first day of kindergarten was a success.  On the way to the gym for after-school pickup, when two little girls behind her toyed with the "charms" on her backpack, she told them, "I don't like people I don't know touching my stuff."  

We never doubted that she'll stand up for herself.  ;)

This afternoon I am going to another class reunion committee meeting.  (50 years.  It doesn't seem possible.)  The reunion is coming up in October, and we still haven't firmly decided on a venue or the menu for the reunion.  Hopefully, we'll straighten that out today.  Registrations are still trickling in, but the deadline happens this week.  

I don't know how I let myself get roped into this thing.

Weekend - August 10, 2025

I'm sitting here on the back porch, looking out at the back yard, which is strewn with glass clippings from the weekend mowing.  Mounds of grass clippings, which is highly unusual considering that we never had much grass in our back yard - only a variety of wild ground coverings, like clover, creeping charlie, henbit, etc.  I believe the bird feeder is to blame for this new grass.

I should have raked the grass clippings after I mowed, but it started to drizzle just as I was starting on the last section of the yard.  The drizzle didn't last long, but by the time I figured out that a drizzle was all we were going to get, I'd already showered and changed clothes and didn't want to expose my clean self to a new barrage of chiggers.  I should rake them and compost them today . . . but I probably won't.  It's going to be hot again.

Yesterday, there was a birthday party across the road for Granddaughter #2, who recently turned 16.  The theme was an Hawaiian luau.  Grass skirts and leis for everybody.  The Husband took his ukulele for the "Happy Birthday" song.  #2 seemed a little mortified.  It was kind of funny.  ;)

Granddaughter #4, formerly known as the Little Rotten Baby, started kindergarten today. The LRB is gung-ho about it.  Her mom is about to have a come-apart as the last chick leaves the nest.  For the first week or two, the moms get to walk the students to their class.  I think my daughter-in-law was relieved - and also a little sad - that the LRB went into the classroom, took a seat, and never looked back.  I'll walk across the road later today to quiz the kid on how her day went.

Last week, I ordered jewelry display items JUST IN CASE I work up the nerve to actually try to sell some of the stuff I've made so far this year.  I got an earring rack with 64 hooks, some necklace displays, a ring display, and a bracelet display.  They came yesterday, and I started filling them.  The earring rack is almost full, as is one of the necklace displays.  And there is a pile of pendants that still need to be strung.  I haven't started on the rings, yet.  Or the bracelets.

The sad part is that I don't *love* any of this stuff.  Wouldn't wear it to a cat fight, as they say.  Not my personal style.  It'll be hard for me to try to sell this stuff with a straight face.

Lunch with The Sibs - August 6, 2026

I had lunch with my brother and sister yesterday.  We met at a local family-style buffet.

I did not eat the salad.  ;)

Kudos to me for not going to the hobby store while I was within spitting distance of it.  However, while I was at Walmart, a little bit of craft stuff fell off the shelf and into my basket.

This morning I did a little bit of crafting with clay and wire.  Made some earring components and pendants.  There's a whole pile of earring components and pendants on one end of my craft table that need to be assembled.  This is where I hit the stump.  Because I have been using cutters and molds, all of these pieces are shaped the same, and I am bored with them.  Maybe it's time I just "do me" and stay out of the molds. 

This afternoon, I've been cooking.  I try to keep breakfasts-to-go for The Husband and The Grandson.  This morning, as The Grandson was wrapping up a blueberry muffin to take with him, he said that he'd shared yesterday's banana nut muffins with his supervisor, who said, "These taste just like my grandmother used to make."

I said, "She must've used the same Martha White muffin mix I used!"  ;)

Memory Exercise - August 3, 2026

Do you wonder why I bother writing about such mundane crap?  

It's memory calisthenics.  I'm trying to keep my "pencil" sharp.   And mundane crap is about all there is to recall, most of the time.

Last week there were a couple of non-mundane events.  I had lunch with The Old Boss on Wednesday.  When she retired, we made a pact; we'd have lunch on the first Tuesday of every month.  We kept to that schedule for a couple of years, but I do believe that last week was the first time we'd had lunch since January.  One or the other of us couldn't make it.  It was so good to see her.  We sat and chatted and caught up for nearly two hours.  After visiting with her, I went to my niece's house to pick up some cast-iron cookware that had belonged to her father, who passed away last fall.  I have more cast-iron cookware than I need, but my sons said they could use it.  It was all in pretty bad shape, but the boys know how to clean and season it.

Another non-mundane thing we did was an overnight trip to Nashville.  It was The Husband's thing, a work-related dinner.  We ate at Fleming's restaurant.  The food was really good. The best part was that I didn't have to cook!  

Yesterday, I tackled two weedy flower beds.  July was hot and rainy, and I let the flower beds get away from me.  While I was pulling weeds, I felt a sting on my arm, looked down, and saw that an ant was munching on me.  I squished it and kept weeding, and when I worked my way around to the flower bed where jewelweed grows, I crushed a leaf and rubbed it on the bite.  Evidently, jewelweed is not all that great at neutralizing ant bites, for a big red knot rose up around the bite and itched like crazy.  For the rest of the afternoon, I dosed it with every anti-bite anti-itch medicine I could find in the cabinet.  The itching woke me up in the night.  I got up, dosed it again, put a band-aid on it, and managed to get a few hours of itchless sleep.  

I have to drive Nanny to the doctor later today.  She had a "spell" Friday - while we were gone - chest and back pain - and DROVE HERSELF to the hospital.  They ran some test but did not detect any heart issues.  Gave her some antacid, which made her feel better.  Her doctor wants to see her, anyway.

When we get home, I think I'll mow the yard.

Another Monday - July 27, 2026

Saturday night, The Grandson came home with a few ripe home-grown tomatoes that a friend had given him.  I was thrilled.  Although I planted a few tomatoes this spring, I did not take care of them, and we haven't had ripe tomatoes.  (We ended up mowing the entire measly garden plot down last weekend.)  I said to The Grandson, "We'll have one of these with some gravy tomorrow morning."  So, yesterday morning, as soon as the household began to stir, I started cooking our breakfast.  

Sunday morning breakfast with us is something that The Grandson remembers fondly from his childhood.  I decided to go all-out and make scratch biscuits to go with our gravy and tomatoes.  Fried some sausage patties, scrambled some eggs.  It was yummy.

As we were cleaning up the breakfast dishes, the kitchen sink stopped up.  We tried baking soda and vinegar.  Didn't work.  We got out the plunger.  Didn't work.  We ended up having to snake the drain.  Big old greasy clog. 

Kinda ruined everybody's post-breakfast lazing.

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I got out early this morning to do the grocery shopping.  Now I'm sitting here on the porch, watching butterflies swarm the lantana in the sunny flower bed.  I got out there one day last week to pull weeds in the hope of finding the clippers I lost the week before.  It was hotter than hell, but I stuck with it and made a big dent in the weed/grass situation.  Never did find the clippers.  It's a mystery.

There are a lot of UFOs in that flower bed, plants I've never grown or even seen.  I believe that the cause of these alien invaders is the bird feeder on a pole just a few feet away.  There's no telling what's in that seed mix we've been feeding the birds.  While weeding, I pulled up a chunk of grass with the biggest seedhead I've ever seen on a grass, barring pampas grass.  Reminded me of milo.  And could've been milo, I guess.  There's another unidentified plant that I'm watching to see what it does.   It's taller that I am, and bushy at the top.  If it makes a pretty bloom, it can stay.  Also taller than I am are some purported rudbeckia plants my niece gave me.  I've never seen rudbeckia this tall and am beginning to wonder if that's what it really is.  It's not showing a sign of a bud yet.  It may be something that came out of the bird feeder, landed amongst the rudbeckia I'd planted, and shaded it to death.  Imposter!  

You won't catch me doing any work in that bed today.  It's supposed to be 98 degrees today, and 99 tomorrow.  I don't see how even the butterflies have the energy to work in this heat.

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I did not have many successes in the craft room last week.  Or this week, so far.