There are four things I hear from the 15th floor overlooking sunny Lake Michigan. They are: car horns, folks here love to beep at people if they’re annoyed for a millisecond in traffic; squealing brakes, a lot of those at night; sirens, yep, a lot of them, too; and Harleys. In the home of the Harley-Davidson and brief summers, they’re out in force.
We don’t hear cars or people, just these things. We’re used to living at ground level (but 6.400 feet above sea level) and now we’re about 550 feet above sea level and can breathe real air and have some humidity in it. Not Houston humidity, that’s over 90% most of the time and we were living at three feet above sea level there and when the Bayou rose, it took out trees and Hurricane Ike flooded our building and garage.
I really miss the mountains. The Lake partly makes up for it but I miss our neighbors and pot luck dinners and knowing we had each others’ backs in a severe winter storm. There were only a few of us there year-round in a resort community.
We’re not in a resort community now, but are getting to know the neighbors slowly, except out of seven on our new floor, two that we know are moving out at the end of the month! Hope it’s not that we’ve arrived three weeks ago.
While the sun comes up at 4 a.m. it does go over top of the building by 12-1, then later in the afternoon the sun shines from the other side onto the Lake and it reflects up so I have to put the shades down again.
Remind me, I have to make a trifle (pound cake, lemon curd/whipped cream and fresh berries) for the staff here. I now have two trifle bowls, one in storage. I’m thinking of having a “sale” of my duplicate kitchen equipment, encouraging folks to just come in and take something off the kitchen counter and leave a donation for a worthy charity.
So, that’s what life is like on the 15th floor. I don’t hear neighbors upstairs or next door but due to gaps around our front door, I hear every key in every lock in the other six units on this floor. I actually don’t listen for them, but a certain canine of ours does. And I say “Tchhhh (Cesar Millan) We have neighbors, get used to it,”
For the record, my husband took up balloons for work (he’s a software engineer and wanted candy in his desk for kiddos who visited but I told him to find something more unique so he started watching YouTube and ordering latex balloons from Sweden). Yes, I created a monster.
He has a presentation today out of town and made a Wile E Coyote as a “door prize” for a question well-answered. Our dog Zoe was OK with it when he started two summers ago, but has become more fearful and yesterday when he made two Elmo’s she got her 35 lb body all the way under our bed, underneath my pillows, to get away from the squeaking.
We decided he would not ever make balloons in the house when she’s present, or anywhere she is present. She has never been hit or kicked by her owners like my old dog was by the Deputy Sheriff, but if this balloon-making gets her that upset, I’ll take her home or elsewhere while my husband makes balloons for the kiddos. Oh, work has just drafted him to do their annual company picnic next month! He’ll have to practice and get up to speed elsewhere. Cheers, Dee
Cooking with Dee 