180 Degrees

I should apologize to someone.  Most likely it should be directed to Sam, the previous mayor of our town.  Since he's no longer listening (actually never was listening), perhaps it could just be a public statement, witnessed by blog readers from around the world.  That should be good enough. (See post "And My Mayor Loves Me" 10/24/11.)

One handsome bucket.  

"I'm sorry I said all those nasty things about the compost bucket put on my curb nearly two years ago. I know that you meant well, and I used it for a purse only once.  I've never used it for its intended purpose:  putting kitchen scraps into the yard debris for pick up each week.  My kitchen scraps are way too precious to give to any mayor, even one that I liked and admired.  But as I was cleaning out the pantry in the middle of Things I get to do today, I came across that compost bucket.  My other one was a little small, and I had a purpose in mind for it, so I decided to try this one I pay extra for each month.  I am chagrinned to observe that I absolutely love it.  It's wonderful.  Let me tell you why:  it holds about a gallon; it has a lid that pretty much seals off the odors; it is already brown, so won't stain from decomposing vegetables; it has a handle that is sturdy; it is designed well for dumping with a little lip for ones fingers to grip when it is inverted.  In short, it's a "beauty" regardless of where it came from.

The bottom line is that I love the bucket.  But, Sam, don't even think about getting any of my kitchen scraps.

Quick Fix

Little black chips around "Twelve O'clock"

Handy Andy could have been more careful over the years.  The damage is beginning to be noticeable.  Now that the gold is scraped off in small areas, the black shows through. She's shrugged for the last year, trusting that most folks are not careful observers and will not see the black where gold once was.

Close up of chipped area

Gold nail polish drying over the chips

Then Handy Andy remembered the broken wrist, the purple cast, the gold decoration and the gold fingernails to match.  Gold nail polish would save the day and the tray.  Daubing a tiny touch of "hiding the carelessness" took only a minute in the Things I get to do today.

Slightly visible at "Three O'clock" but so much better than black marks

Close inspection is not desired on this project.  Hold this baby at arm's length, and most folks will never have a clue that the tray was damaged, ever.

Savior of the Garden

The flowers of summer are gone.  If it weren't for the Rudebeckia, there would be no color in the yard--the Rudebeckia and the Zinnias.  The seeds for the Zinnias were started late, so instead of the plants finishing off the season now, they are just now getting their second and third blossoms.  In spite of the wind and the rain, they are blooming, blazing and brilliant all over the yard.

Dried Zinnia

This is the third generation of seeds from a single gifted plant two years ago.  Last fall I saved the most developed bloom of the most Righteous Red I could find in the yard.  All winter the wad of brown, twisted shards dried and waited.

Arrow-shaped seed still attached to the dried petal

Then finally it showed up on the list of Things I get to do today:  extract the seeds.  In that process, the Zinnia held a surprise for me:  the seeds were attached to the petals!  I know little about Zinnias except that their intensely brilliant color thrills my soul.  I certainly never knew this.

Among the beans

The odd, shard-like seeds found soil, sprouted into seedlings, and then were tucked into all the places of bare earth around the yard and garden.  And now the payback!  On a grey, rainy day, Righteous Reds reign as the savior of the season.

Lining the front walk.

Green Mountain Girls

The girls are not a militia.  Well, in some respects they are.  Earwigs, earthworms, cutworms, flies, spiders, little creepy critters of all kinds would definitely consider these chickens to be armed.  Sharp beaks and strong toe-nailed feet count as lethal weapons.

Mountain of gifted greens

When my hens bellied up to the mountain of grass clippings and clover dumped from the five-gallon bucket, they meant business, and they became the Green Mountain Girls, for just a minute or two.  Collecting the bucket of greens from my sister's place was one of the Things I get to do today.  Dumping it in the hen house where they could forage without concern for the rain was another.  Eating their way through the pile as tall as they were was their job which they dispatched with the precision of a platoon of soldiers.  What they didn't eat, they scratched.  Days later whatever is left will have dried and become the pickings for a boring day inside coop while a fall storm thrashes its way through.

Fall is Fell*

Nothing is forever.  Not last year's leaves, even if a tree is "evergreen."  What that means for a Giant Sequoia is that their leaves do not last only a spring/summer/fall, but for a full year, plus a few months, and every fall they loose the leaves from the previous year.

Golden carpet

Today while the Things I get to do today kept me safe and warm indoors as Nature assured us rather wildly with wind and rain that it was no longer summer, fall fell. Leafy needles everywhere.  Brown/black earth turned gold-orange in a few hours.

Nourishing itself with litter back into the soil

*An old rhyme that delighted a friend in high school in the 1960's:

Spring is sprung.

Fall is fell.

Summer is here,

And it hotter than
the average.

Best Answer I've Seen

Rotary cutter makes this quick work

Not a "keeper."  Don't save mementos.  Not a "collector" either.   But I have to say that throwing away fabric of any kind, as in into the garbage, is really hard for me.  So sorting through the linen cupboard and coming up with four old pillowcases that were no longer fit to lie ones head upon really put me into a conundrum.

An online search for ways to recycle pillowcases yielded nothing helpful.  You can, if you have one, put the pillowcases over the individual paddles of your ceiling fan to clean them.  We don't have one. Pillowcases make very poor rags for cleaning--too smooth, not absorbent.

Waxing (as a depilatory) grew its way into Things I get to do today, and the idea struck like lightning.  Cut the pillowcase into the little strips needed for pressing over the wax and jerking the hairs out.  Works like a charm.

These are 1 x 3" strips, perfect for brows and small areas

And free of charge here are two more ideas.  Use cut strips for rag curls.  If you sew, toss the pillowcases into your drawer of interfacing fabrics--just right for soft interfacing treatments.

Tale of Two Tapes

Masking tape was her best friend.  It allowed her to fasten a message to nearly any object.  She loved things properly identified.  My mother-in-law, Evelyn, with the help of a black marking pen and masking tape, kept the world in order.

When cleaning and sorting are in the Things I get to do today,  history pops up in unexpected places.  Here in the bottom of a box jam jars not used for over a dozen years, I found Evelyn.  When I pulled one particular jar from the box to wash it, the stiff, adhesive-gone-gritty masking tape fell off on the counter.  Memories flooded back.  My name in her easily identifiable hand had been on one of the jars.  The bread-and-butter pickle label was still affixed to the container, filling in the details of the story.  She wanted to return what was mine.  Masking tape was the vehicle.

Ruth on the left.  Evelyn on the right.

But just last week during a serious cleaning of the chest freezer in the garage, Apple Sauce from 2003 showed up.  This was from my own mother, Ruth, a saver of all bits of edible produce on her property.  Waste not, want not must be inscribed in her at the cellular level.  Her favorite occupation, after weeding, is canning.  Freezing comes in third.  The masking tape on the recycled plastic dairy carton was fresh and gummy, belying its age.  The sauce was, however, ten years old.  We ate it for breakfast the next couple of days, remembering both mothers and their tales.