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Welcome Brazil and Chile!

My husband will have been away for two weeks this time, for work and will be home tomorrow night.

As he always eats in restaurants during the week, I thought I’d try an old favorite and perhaps a new one. Dinner.

Meat loaf. He hates leftovers but loves a meat loaf sandwich the next day. Spatchcocked Cornish Game Hen marinated with lemon grass et al. If it’s not snowing/sleeting/raining on the same day we may be able to cook it on the grill.

He’s been gone for two weeks. I like for him to have some home-cooked foods on the weekends. We try to get out for lunch.

Oh, he found this game we played at a restaurant/beer place a while ago. It arrived this evening and I decided not to cook, rather go to the place where we played it with the entire box and let them know that we now have one as well. Bears & Babies. I had the wrong glasses so could not even read the rules, but I won.

This one is sealed in plastic, that he will open tomorrow. It was supposed to be sent to his family but it ended up here, where it will remain. He’ll send another to family. I’ve better glasses so can read the rules while I make a stew or something in the slow-cooker. Dee

of people and things. I preserve art by framing it and placing in under 98% UV preventive glass.

We have sconces here that are under my husband’s height so I’ve placed thickly framed artworks under badly placed sconces so that he will not hit his head and need to go to the hospital. He would not wish to ruin one of my photographs in the hallway, so he won’t hit his head. Don’t question me, it’s worked for years.

I’ve now 14 works of art stacked in our kitchen because when he is home, he likes to make spaghetti and meatballs and inevitably gets tomato sauce on the walls. I call that self-preservation. The paint ain’t all that great and regular scrubbings would probably take us through to our neighbors. Right near the trouble spot is now a framed photo of him in high school at Christmas, by the tree, putting together a grill his father got for his mother. It’s a favorite photo for both of us, as it shows his personality. Driven, methodical.

Canine preservation. A dear pup who loved our Zoe has grown up. In less than a minute last evening (we call it “last chance” outing because after that she wants to be lifted up to our bed right away to sleep as she has no hips) she was attacked twice by said dog. The owner never apologized but I told him Zoe did nothing to provoke the attack and he agreed. He’s a good guy and has never seen that kind of behavior before. Zoe is 100 in “people years” and was just standing there at the time. They sniffed noses, he attacked.

Just as “Mama Bear” protected her cubs, my husband and his younger brother, I take care of him and our old dog as best I can. I’ve also made limoncello once, and a blueberry/blackberry ‘cello still in the frig for tastings, so that is preservation as well. Right now I don’t have room for canning equipment but when I do, I’ll ask my mother-in-law about her pear preserves. Pears with cinnamon. Delightful! Dee

No, I’m not talking GFCI, electrical outlets. OK, perhaps I am. We keep people and things safe through grounding.

My dog was the first official photo to be sent out on Instagram by our lessors. That was about 15 minutes ago. She wore her Greyfriars Bobby collar and brought the book that I just received. Greyfriars Bobby is buried next to his master at the kirk in Edinburgh, Scotland. We went there, saw the church, cemetery, statue and his favorite pub where little Skye terrier would go every day for a free meal at the 1:00 cannon to place all the ships in harbor on the same time. The Scots are frugal, why have a 12:00 gun and waste 11 cannonballs when you can make it 1:00?

Bobby has been grounding children for 150 years, by a book and movies of him sitting on his master’s grave for fourteen years. While I’m not in the grave as yet, our Zoe has been by my side for fourteen years and I need to be by hers as she loses her sight and hearing. She has grounded me.

My family has grounded me in a way, one parent said I could do anything and the other said I could do nothing. They’re both gone now.

My husband of over 15 years, a genius, has provided a GFCI for me, that is a ground fault circuit interrupter for those overseas who have more advanced systems. He is the rock my life is built upon.

My brother the other genius is there, intermittently, Over the past ten years we’ve only seen each other at our parents’ funerals.

I think about grounding as I do food, even flowers now. Food requires a French education (see my cookbooks) then an Italian tempering with a Greek je ne sais quoi. Once you know the rules, you can stretch them, even break them. Grounding.

Flowers are not easy, nor is picture framing. Everything requires a brain, an eye, a heart and a soul. Life and loss are not easy. I put up flowers every week for my immediate family in small vases, and always have two to remember Dad, this week it’s sunflowers. Greens help ground my food, flowers, family as they are a base on which to build.

Dad built great institutions and they were always grounded in purpose and perseverance, ingenuity and imagination. I inherited some of that, learned more from him and to think outside the box. I am a thinker and a problem-solver.

My husband’s family grounds me. They think he’s in an air balloon and I’m tethering him. As a joke we have a hot air balloon piece of art next to an abacus. While they’re both magnetized now and on the refrigerator I’ve never been the abacus, I’m up in the balloon. So much for grounding! Dee

Yes, it is one of my favorite Nat King Cole songs I hope my husband will play at my funeral.

I was up early and the ancient dog was sound asleep but breathing properly, so I saw the movie Mona Lisa Smile. It was set in the early 50’s at Wellesley College with Julia Roberts as an art history professor. All the students cared about was getting married to a wealthy man and having a spectacular house and probably less spectacular kids.

When I decided on a college, at the tender age of 16, my father said I was going for a Mrs. degree. I went at age 17. I married at age 42. Dad knew he made a mistake there, and agreed on my choice of husband and never gave him the “eagle eyes.” Believe me, every boyfriend was scared to death of him, but I always knew he was marshmallow inside.

I’ve actually asked Pope Francis to give blessings for two of my favorite professors, both Franciscan priests and both with Him now.

Mom used to vacuum in a dress, pouffed hair and heels and that was the 60’s. What they did not say in the movie, outright, was that the days of Rosie the Riveter were over, the men were back and needed jobs, so they made marriage, babies and appliances a way of life. My mother lived it. I did not, and set out to work after I graduated from college. I considered law school or even a doctorate in fine arts or even government administration, not right at the time.

Thank goodness I never did any of those things. I wear pants, shirts and sweaters now, and am retired but still looking for work, at least volunteer work. I believe that people have to talk to other people and learn at least one thing new per day.

I cook for my husband and take care of old dog Zoe now. This weekend (he’ll be gone two weeks this time) he’ll perhaps have my homemade from scratch pizza, next night his favorite meat loaf. Last night before leaving again, a spatchcocked Cornish game hen in a lemon grass marinade. Perhaps next weekend it’s leg of lamb Robert (look it up on google, great marinade) from Jacques Pepin. My butchers are good to me not only because I look around, but because I cook their meat and bring back tastings.

Be nice to the folks who provide you with good food. Cheers! Dee

Childhood games. I would like to welcome Azerbajian as a reader of this post. My younger sister and I had a puzzle of the world and we would compete to get half done. I nearly always drew north and south america, and she drew europe and the east and africa. I usually won. That was because Canada, USA and South America was easy.

So many countries have changed during that time. She could still possibly beat me at the game but so many countries have changed, broken up like Russia and the Czech Republic. I’ve been in government and politics, they’re not necessarily the same. Think about what’s happened in Africa over the past decades.

We thought that as children, through paper we were putting the world together when it was being taken apart before we were old enough to know of national and world affairs.

As to poker, Dad taught us. We used matches at first, then pennies. All the matches and pennies were collected along with the cards. No-one had anything but bragging rights. That’s how Dad dealt with his kids. I don’t remember how to play poker and would be horrible at it.

We did plays and dance recitals in the basement and issued two tickets for our parents. Plays were a no-go even through hours at the local library. Instead we turned to Peanuts and I was always Lucy, sister was Charlie Brown and three year-old brother was Snoopy.

We made our own world back then with creeks and swings and working with a sand pile. Wouldn’t we love to go there again. Dee

Hello India! Welcome.

I took the dog out this morning. It was raining and so windy that I thought we were going to go over a split rail fence and down a large hill. With arthritis, a bad ankle and wrist I was unable to open the doggie bag to pick up after, ten feet from our front door.

We were both soaking wet and I asked the person on duty to keep old Zoe for sixty seconds. She opened the bag and said she didn’t feel comfortable taking care of our dog for sixty seconds so I took her out again with me, into what seemed like hurricane-force winds. No-one here would have gone in to have a bag opened and gone out again with a 30# dog to be swept into a crevasse, just to pick up her poop. As it was, half of it was swept down the crevasse.

I feel bad for asking for permission, not forgiveness. I could have shut her in the downstairs bathroom for one minute while I picked up and no-one else here would bother to pick up or would have known that she was there.

A few years ago I had her out and it was windy. There was a gust and I immediately wrapped her leash around my hand three times and placed both arms over a concrete bridge rail, head down. I think today was just a gut feeling. If the wind had taken her under the split rail fence down the hill or across the street into traffic, I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself.

There’s something to be said for Martingale collars. She has three. She’s an Australian Shepherd mix, quite small, and has had her hips removed as a pup due to severe hip dysplasia. She’s also over 14 years old, 100 in “people years.” She can get out of any collar but this, because it is two loops, one around the neck and one for control. No snap closure. Combined with a 6′ leather braided leash (no stitching) I can keep her safe even in heavy winds. Martingales are made for dogs with small necks and pointy noses, and Zoe looks like a fox, color and all.

During Cat 5 Hurricane Ike all the dogs went swimming in the Bayou except Zoe, because my husband insisted on giving her a bath, before we lost water for a week. Then she joined them in the pool. My husband and Zoe slept through the entire hurricane, where every loft in the building was damaged but ours. Once I stopped being afraid, for no good reason because all the downtown windows were blown out, that I did not know, I got out of bed and blogged Ike until the power went down. It took some folks weeks for power, us only a few hours as we were on the mayor’s grid.

Next morning four of us took the task upon us as there was no help for days. Our husbands got standing water out of the garage and cleaned storm drains of leaves. We wives went door-to-door on the flooded first floor making sure all residents were OK.

The sun is coming out, here and now. I still can’t tell the wind because the trees are bare and they take down the flag for six months every year. Still tiny whitecaps on the lake. I was just so afraid that with her age, loss of eyesight and hearing, that she’d be swept away. That is a mother’s duty.

Staff would not help me this morning. It might have been inappropriate to ask for one minute of assistance but we’re old and I went out to clean up after my dog in horrific weather. From now on, it’s forgiveness, not permission. I’ve been through storms of storms and we are old and infirm. We’ll do what is needed to be safe. Dee

We had a neighbor from there years ago. She was a brilliant scientist who worked on oil rigs around the world. Thank you, New Zealand, for reading.

She adopted a dog, a rescue from Hurricane Katrina. Good dog, needy and used to get under our pillows to take a nap from time to time, as I’d let him stay in a thunderstorm, knowing what those memories might be. I offered to take him out for a few moments at lunch time, free, of course.

One day I had another dog in the house. His folks were moving and he was barking at the movers so I took him in with our now ancient dog Zoe for a few hours. I took them out at lunch time and brought them back. We had two locks on the door, one inaccessible from the exterior.

Then I went to get the New Zealander’s dog for a quick walk. I got him back safely and could not get into my home. The visiting dog was taller than Zoe and turned the upper lock that had no access from outside.

I talked to management and said I couldn’t get into my loft. They handed me the master key and asked me to get it back asap. No, I have that key, we’ve a dog here for a few hours that has tripped the deadbolt so I cannot get in or care for them.

They laughed hard, then sent maintenance. It took hours. First we had to use my neighbor’s key to open her door and measure the distance so they could drill a hole in our 3″ thick wood door to negate the interior lock structure and pull the deadbolt from the frame.

I was the only person with two exterior locks and it was a source of amusement for our neighbors and friends. After we left, the lofts were sold and deteriorated and thieves used axes to get inside those doors to steal everything inside. All I can say is luckily, we moved way away to get rid of the mean element. I’ve seen and heard them, been called names verbally and in print.

Politicians look to keep graffiti and illegal activities like skateboarding, from their front door. They find a donor and put it off-site with no input or information from the community. No trash facilities, no bathrooms, no parking, no water fountain, nothing. The kids had a facility but skated our garage, holding us hostage because we don’t want to hit a kid with our car when we’re going to the grocery store.

We’ve been away a long time, and if we were to return we would never live at that place. It’s sad, because we liked it there. Dee

Welcome to France, Estonia and India! I enjoy and respect your presence on this site.

My picture framer is moving away next month. I will not have the wisdom of her counsel in a month’s time but she has taught me well and I have chosen the art for her last month here in town and believe I know some of my framing choices. It always helps to narrow it down and chose the colors and pare down. If one chooses a silver frame, there are dozens from which to choose.

I believe it was she who inspired me to get into floral arranging, simple flowers in miniature arrangements and classes on specific techniques for larger ones.

Summers in college I taught gymnastics every day, then went to another job, recruiting students for a local college. In gymnastics my favorite group was the 3-5 year-olds because they didn’t know anything about boy stuff or girl stuff and we’d do 15 minutes of training and go play a singing game for a few minutes.

Both genders had to walk along a balance beam 1′ from mats, holding my hand if they needed to do so. I taught them to not look at their feet, look at the end of the beam for balance and an end to the exercise. Your feet will lead you there.

In work, life, framing and floral arranging if one looks at the goal, it is easier to achieve. It is difficult for me to be out of my pond or on a small branch on a big tree. My Dad always told me I could do anything I wanted to do, and I love him for that.

Oh, one of the 3-5’s in gymnastics, a boy, always got a crush on Miss Dee during those summer months between my college courses. One told his mother, when she picked him up, that Miss Dee was coming to dinner that evening. Surely she and her husband had other plans. Mom looked at me, I shrugged my shoulders and nodded “no.” She explained it kindly and fairly to her son. I’m sure he’s married and has college kids now. I like to think that I helped him and others to see the goal and not just the impediments. Dee

Welcome, Sudan! This is Dee the cook, bottle washer, dog owner and very amateur weather person.

I have clues. The flag. There is one on the beach below but the government takes it down for six months a year during the winter. It allows me to know in which direction the wind is blowing, and how fiercely.

The trees. Unfortunately they lose their leaves for six months each year (same as when the flag is gone) so they tell me nothing.

The lake. Calm or strong waves (whitecaps) going in a particular direction give me a clue. I don’t have time in the morning to check the weather because I need to get out of pajamas and dress and take out the dog immediately. Above are the signs I normally use, but there are more.

After all I need to know shoes or boots, denim jacket or winter coat. Today it is foggy and I can barely see lights below and no houses. That means warmer air is coming in.

When it’s cold and the skies are clear there are more signs. One is the direction the planes are landing at the airport. They always land against the wind and start coming in at 5:00 a.m.

Signs of spring include squirrels finally leaving their safe tree “apartments” and bird sounds. Of course bulbs start sending shoots up from the ground but when that happens everyone knows it is spring.

To judge cold, I look at the “quality” and direction of smoke from chimneys below. Living in a cold climate much of my life I’ve learned to do it by sight so I can’t explain. If it’s not snowing but very cloudy, I know it is probably under 20 degrees and with wind chill probably below zero. Heated coat, boots for warmth, scarf, fur Cossack hat, serious gloves. Then I need to decide if ancient dog Zoe needs a jacket, even though she is wearing fur, always, as her dog-ness dictates.

If it’s a two minute walk before her breakfast I don’t take all these precautions, but in the few moments when I dress (long undies or not?) I take clues in and decide on outerwear for the both of us. I can probably get us out of here in under five minutes if I quickly read any clues available at the time.

Even in cold weather I know Zoe needs four walks a day. The first walk of the day is the test. The rest I know what to do and have time to check weather online to see if it became spring when the sun came out! The weather here is crazy. Flag people, return it to its rightful place. Trees, send out some buds. Birds are welcome from everywhere, geese, even our resident turkey who is pardoned every year. Cheers and enjoy the day, Dee

My husband can be asleep within a minute or two of lying down. He snores all night. The dog sleeps instantly as well.

Why am I awake? Ok, I worry, about anything and everything. It’s late morning and the dog has been out and fed, Zoe. I need to mention her name. She is our only “kid.”

My cat Nathan, who was named for Kevin Kline’s character in Sophie’s Choice and yes, I was visiting a legislator on Coney Island and believe I saw the original Nathan’s hot dog place. Before I named this five week-old kitten I had to look up the name. Apparently Nathan is “gift” and Nathaniel is “gift from God.”

He was a gift, “surprise” from my sister at five weeks of age. My brother bought a crate at the airport and took him under the seat for 3,000 miles. I didn’t know anything about his presence or about cats.  Switch to 13 years later, of him always getting the last word.

When I went to see Nathan at the hospital I knew he was asking to go. The folks there always said “Nathan’s Mom is here to see him.” When I gave them the OK I drove there and they said “Ms. H is here.” I am no longer considered a part of his life. Heart problems and pneumonia. The vet brought me outside for specifics and I held him through the procedure and afterward.

I know that my dog will have a peaceful passing, hopefully in my arms and with a straight shot, not a catheter. If my husband can make it home, he promised to do so when we adopted this dear mutt 14 years ago. Our vet will not acknowledge requests for euthanasia procedures, well she has been off on maternity leave. Do you see why I’m up at night? I worry about my family. That is my job to assure that they are happy and healthy. Dee