Sunday, July 3, 2022

Lemonade Or Lemon Juice?

I'm not feeling very patriarchy, I mean, patriotic this 4th of July weekend. I think I'll turn my negativity into thankfuls, kind of like making lemonade out of lemons. Of course, we all know you need sugar to make that lemonade any good, otherwise you've just got lemon juice. Let's see how I do:

1.-3. I have to watch for deer every morning when I drive to work, as they can't tell time and don't seem to know when it's time to go back to the woods and hide for the day. On the way home, in the middle of the afternoon and especially in this heat, it's not a worry. Then there was Wednesday. I was driving between a wooded area and a big, grassy area when a large deer came bounding across the field and across the road in front of me. I stopped the car as I saw her coming, knowing deer have NO BRAKES and can and will run right into the side of the car, and as I watched her bound across the road and disappear into the brush, I looked to the grassy field (deer are seldom solo animals, so I was looking for her friends) and saw not one, but two fawns bouncing along after her. The first one boinged across in front of me and into the ditch on the opposite side of the road and froze as the second one boingedy boinged onto the road, then stopped in front of the car and looked at me. Cars are lining up behind me as I rolled down the window and told him to keep going, finally clapping my hands out the window to scare him into running to the ditch, where he joined his twin. Then instead of running into the brush like their good-for-nothing mama, they ran DOWN the ditch, me keeping pace with them, trying to protect the little goofballs from running back into traffic. A few yards later, they passed the brush their mama disappeared into and off they ran for the woods. Whew! 

I didn't hit them.

They didn't hit me.

I held up traffic for several minutes and no one honked.

4. The air conditioner in my car has not been working very well. It blows coolish air about 75% of the time, and 25% it's just plain warm. Then I read a little blurb that popped up on Facebook (Huff Post, maybe?) about the recirculated air button on the dashboard and that it should be turned on in hot weather. Without the button pushed, the a/c is using hot air from outside and trying to cool it down, but when you get in the hot car and turn on the a/c, that air is still cooler than the air in the car, and if that air is recirculated, it gets cooler and cooler until it's as cool as it can possibly be. It appears I have saved myself servicing on my a/c with the push of a button.

5. I baked a turkey breast this weekend that we had in the freezer. It was a chesty turkey, weighing almost 10 pounds, and when I was taking it out of the oven a few hours later, I didn't spill ALL the drippings in the bottom of the oven....

6. Brown recluse spiders are very common in the midwest. We seem to have more than our fair share of them, between the lake house and our own house, and they are not so reclusive in hot weather. Like now. My daughter was down for the weekend, and one ran across the back of the couch where she was sitting and down the arm and disappeared. There was much screaming, but she didn't get bitten!

7. My daughter brought her cat Calvin with her to the lake house. He's a big ol' funny guy except around 4:30 every morning when he becomes possessed by the devil and races around the house, knocking things over and otherwise wreaking havoc. During his early Saturday morning zoom session, my husband was awakened when he could no longer breathe, and as he yanked his CPAP mask off, he saw Calvin sitting on his bedside table with a foot on the air hose. Was Calvin trying to kill him? Possibly, but it didn't happen THIS time!


8. Sunday morning, I walked into the kitchen to make breakfast for my family and found my dad's pill organizer on the floor with pills scattered around it. We all know who did it, right? Fortunately for Calvin, the only little door that popped open was one that he used to store extras. Had it been more than that, well, I don't want to think about what a mess that would have been to straighten out.




9. I cleaned out the pantry at the lake house. It's been a disaster for months, but it's nice and neat now. I had to throw out some boxed food that had expired (we laid in a lot of food when the Covid lockdown started), but it means we had plenty and can be thankful for that.

10. My friend and co-host Pat of A Season and a Time is stepping down, but I am thankful that the Ten Things of Thankful allowed me to meet first her daughter (and original co-host) Kristi, then Pat herself, and I am blessed to call them both friends (AND cousins!).

Did I add enough sugar to those lemons to get lemonade? I think maybe I did!


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4 comments:

  1. Congrats on coming up with ten thankfuls during these trying times.

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  2. Those are beautiful thankful things.

    My husband would have been honking, not at you, but at the deer. He is convinced that honking at the squirrels and other animals that run out on the road scares them into staying off the road. So far i've seen no evidence that it works, but he continues to do so. I'm just glad you and they were safe.

    That recirculate button is a blessing.

    Brown recluse spiders love this area, we have to always be on the lookout.

    Cats are not nocturnal, as most people believe, they are crepuscular meaning most active at dawn and dusk. That's when their prey is most active, too. The cat is running around because his instinct tells him it's time to get up and hunt for his breakfast, but with dry kibble in the bowl, the only way to expend the energy is to rip 'n run.

    More than once Ms. S knocked over her full pill sorter, and yes, it came open and yes, it was a mess to fix, but fix it we did.

    Ms. Pat will be missed.

    Hope you are having a blessed and beautiful Independence Day!

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    Replies
    1. I don't honk at the deer only because I don't want them to run the wrong way, because they obviously have an agenda and need to cross in THAT direction. So waving my arms madly and pointing is my MO, and it's obviously VERY effective!
      Mr. Calvin does not lack for kibbies, as his waistline will attest, but at least he's not too heavy to run like a maniac and "hunt"!
      Thanks for always being here, Mimi!

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