Quiet Wednesday

 Wet cold windy weather, just right for reading and making soup.

I made a large pot, enough for about eight meals, of pumpkin (off the front step), sweet potato, yellow potato and leeks. Seasoning was berbere, turmeric, seasalt, smoked paprika, cumin. Added whole milk and called it cream of all-the-above.

With broiled whole-wheat spread with butter and garlic paste, it worked out well. Plenty more in the freezer.

I've been surprised to find I like the Ruth Galloway series of mysteries. I'd expected books about an archaeologist to be set in Egypt for some reason, to me the most profoundly boring of settings. Sand, heat, camels, hard writing, no. I don't like any of the Christies set there.

Then I find she's in Norfolk, and there are interesting characters at work, sometimes so many I have trouble with who's who, but I like it a lot. 

It's very cinematically written and I wonder if there are TV series about the books. It would lend itself to long shots of sea and sky, car chases, hair raising kidnappings, nice dogs, cute kids, druids, the pitch dark scenes beloved of TV producers, the lot. No doubt I'm the last person to discover I like this writer.

I have a small personal milestone to mention. Usually November is a difficult month for me, containing two late sisters' birthdays, the 7th and the 17th, and my parents' wedding anniversary, the 18th. This year I decided I'd mourned long enough for people who didn't value me as I valued them. And it went very smoothly. I got past all the days. Dues paid. Probably about time, too.

Happy day, everyone. It's okay to decide how much is enough. Sez Ted and Big Ursy 

And I'll purr to that sez Fluffaluffagus

Rimbaud, colored vowels, Textiles and Tea

Tuesday morning the sun, which had now swung right around, was casting great shadows through the trees onto the fence.

After that the wind got up and it got very wintry cold 

More about synesthesia, now in US spelling, in response to S. When I first realized my experience wasn't universal, was in my last year of high school. We got a new French teacher, new Oxford graduate, Daphne Nutbrown, great name and interesting teacher. 

This was an advanced class, doing explication de texte, a kind of close analysis, and she introduced us to Rimbaud's poem Voyelles,  on the colors of vowels. Here's an extract

I was thrilled about this, though my own colors were different, and plunged into discussion. I noticed a couple of other girls looking completely baffled, then one said "I've no idea what any of this means".  

Then I realized most of the group agreed with her. Oh. To me it seemed obvious. I remember being amazed in my turn! Up to then I'd never discussed it, any more than you discuss other senses, so normal. I thought. But Daphne was on it, and her colors were different, too.

About what senses are involved for me -- some, not all, of them. Every sensation or sound doesn't have a corresponding reaction. Many sounds evoke color and shape, color evokes taste, but taste doesn't evoke anything, names evoke color, shape, movement. Touch doesn't evoke anything, I think. 

So that's my best try for now.

I decided to skip the knitting group this week, a weird superstitious feeling that I'd rather not drive the car, just in case.  I wanted it to be in good shape for Friday. 

And I thought I'd wait on a ride service till next week, when I'll drop off food then go to the library to pick up my expected book and attend the group, all in one sequence.

Also I'm hopelessly congested, sneezing coughing. No it's not a cold. It's boyz with toyz.

Six guys with noisy tools and vehicles rounding up leaves and filling the air with dust and mold spores. I skipped walking, too. That's not fog, it's dust.

Textiles and Tea featured Andrea Blackmon, multi talented crafter, who aside from weaving, beading, crocheting, doll making and quilting, teaches weaving to young students with a range of learning issues. 

Here the focus was on her own work which she has exhibited, and these pieces are from a joint exhibit with another weaver based on squares. Her smallest one, the beaded tree, is 4" and her largest is 30" square. 

She uses a table loom, and it needs a skilled weaver to grasp what she said about weave pattern and structure. There's a lot of double weave here. 

On the right the image is by her colleague 

This is front and back of the same piece 

Happy day everyone, do what you can, don't pressure yourself the way I do!

Windy walking and car bids

This morning was a two hat day, wrist warmers and gloves, extra socks. It's not the temperature so much as the wind, blowing hard. It made clouds scud across the sun and I got pictures like this, taken seconds apart 

Now shade, now sun.

The pond is looking wintry,  most of the leaves gone, you can see how small it really is.

It's a lovely scene year round.

Then the morning was taken up with car business, calls needing more info including the VIN, crikey where's that written, and once I'd given all the items, they upped the offer. Evidently my car has a posher trim than at first appeared. I also got a text with an improved offer from the dealership.

I think used cars are in short supply so I may do well out of this. The process is that someone comes to the house Friday morning, inspects it, takes a test drive, checks the paperwork, makes an offer. If I accept I get payment right away. Then the car stays with me about a week while they set up transportation for it. 

At that point they remove the plates, which I have to return to the DMV, and take the car. Then I'll call the auto insurer to report it's done and claim the prorated refund on my insurance.  And figure out who else needs to know.

Then I will stop thinking about cars! I've learned quite a bit, and that's fiiiine. I'm doooone. I was amused when they asked me why I was selling the car, and I explained I'm very old and giving up driving. Little pause, then awwww, I understand! Unspoken: poor old soul.

So the poor old soul made pumpkin spice, it being the season. And used a glass AsEver jar to store it. 

When this week's groceries arrive, there will be pumpkin puree for making oat and pumpkin flatbread, and pumpkin spice is needed, too. I know, the excitement's almost too much. 

Happy day everyone, get a walk, even a short one, even if it's cold and windy, or at least get a while outside just breathing. Even in the Southern hemisphere, I hear, it's not very summery yet.

Begonias, synaesthesia, car to go

Today I invited a neighbor friend over for tea and cake, and we spent the afternoon reorganizing the known universe. She's a serious introvert and lovely woman, so the deal is that if it's not a good day, just say, no problem, no persuasion. Today was good though, so she enjoyed the sweet potato etc cake. I always hugely enjoy her company.

Later Gary came dashing over to arrange foster care for this begonia, which he grew from a cutting I rooted for him. I'd prune it to keep it bushy but he loves the height, so I'll refrain.

He'll be away two weeks starting Wednesday, so it needs watering in his absence. He's got a visit set up for the other plants but this one needs more care. 

On Janice's blog on Sunday, she mentioned synaesthesia. Since I'm one of the fortunate people to have this in many forms, I thought you'd like to see this.

He sent me this signed paperback of Musicophilia after I'd read the hardback and been in correspondence with him as a result. Here's the footnote about our exchanges.

what a nice man he was, very interested in my observations, some of which had been dismissed by other doctors. He pretty much sums up my experiences very succinctly here.  I felt honored that he gave my ideas serious attention. He really was a lifelong learner.

Synaesthesia is a real gift. When colors have literal taste, music has colors, names and numbers trigger color, movement and shapes, your world is so rich. The same effects have been triggered throughout my life, unchanging, as far back into early childhood as I can remember

It does have a downside -- clutter literally interferes with my hearing and creates physical stress, and some colors -- purple, some browns -- cause me nausea. But mostly it's lovely. And the passage of time has a kind of scrolling effect, rolling left into the past and right into the future. Each century has a blocky shape, too. 

Speaking of the future, I've arranged for a car buying company to come to the house Friday (crumbling dark green material, curving down, fyi!), to check out and buy the car. They can do all this on the spot without my having to go to a dealership.

They already gave me a decent price estimate, based on my reporting.  So I'm hopeful that this will go well, and I can start using rides. I already signed up with a preference for women drivers. 

Happy day everyone,  enjoy your day, whatever's in it. There's bound to be something nice, even if it takes a bit of finding.

Filling food and patterned oriental rugs

The weather being cold, grey and dampish, it was time for a warm filling Saturday lunch. Like this 

Roast tiny potatoes, bean and carrot croquettes, with Annie's Ketchup, the best. Since beans and carrots are bland, you can get very generous with spices. 

I used smoked paprika, berbere and home mixed umami seasoning. I mashed it all up with an egg, rolled the results in panko crumbs, and fried in olive oil, very hot. 

This is one of the advantages of partly cooking the vegetables ahead. They still taste good, but are quicker to cook. And there's more for tomorrow, as usual.

Dessert was the favorite blueberries in lime juice and yogurt beaten together with a bit of pure cane sugar. 

I did a session of free weights, leg exercises, before this and the combination of the exercise and the filling lunch caused me to fall asleep a couple of times while I was supposed to be watching a great gallery of Oriental rugs. 

It was a New England Rug Museum event with a couple who've been collecting marvelous suzani, embroidered (?) rugs for years.

As usual with collectors, there wasn't much about the actual rug making, size or material, more about dates and circumstances of their acquisition.  

These are so lovely to see that I just want to show you a few, including a page from a notebook of patterns you might like to take as ideas if you're an embroiderer.

Then later, cake.

 

A loaf of sweet potato honey bread with

cranberries and chocolate chips 

And the cook's privilege, first slice with a spoonful of plain yogurt.

Happy day everyone! It's okay to doze off now and then.  

Sez 

Ted and Big Ursy.

Mme. Fluffapalooza agrees. She should. She dozes off about twenty hours a day.