GRACE UNCENSORED

sunday morning…

and i’m having trouble getting motivated.  kevin went off to the shooting range bright and early, and i’m still sitting on the screened porch in my nightgown.  i walked down to the dock, which took a lot of effort.

the president of the gun club where they had the civil war skirmish, and where they do the cowboy shoots every month, had some neighbors to the property put lots and lots of mud on the property.  this was mud that was dredged up from the neighbor’s pond, and it was full of runoff from the pesticide-chocked farms nearby.  the resulting sludge is stinky, awful stuff, that isn’t going to be good for planting any grass over any time soon.  clearly the gun club president doesn’t know much about farming or dredging. The skirmishers came from wisconsin and northern illinois, and most if not all of them camped at the club.  one guy told kevin that as he was lying in his tent, if he turned to face the wall he could smell the pungent sludge odor.

not the greatest camping experience.

here’s a pile of the sludge.

i went out to the club to pick up kevin, and he was there with his friend garrick.  i thought it was funny that they were wearing almost identical shirts.  they had a good time, despite the stinkiness and their jobs of carrying water and doing all kinds of tasks to make sure the shoot went smoothly.

yesterday when kevin was at the shoot, i wasn’t just lollygagging around here like i am today.  mom and a couple of her friends came out for a boat ride, and i also invited erica to join us.

it was a beautiful day for a boat ride, and mollie was, as usual, happy to go along.  but then we stopped at a park on the other side of the lake for a bathroom break, and we tied up the boat at the edge of their dock.  mollie was anxious to get on shore, but she slipped stepping off the boat onto the dock and fell right down into the water.

the problem is that, well, she’s kind of heavy to pull up when she’s wet.  luckily she was wearing her harness, so there was something to grab onto, but sharon and i were pulling and she just wasn’t coming up, plus the boat kept trying to bump into the dock which would have squashed her.  i kept shrieking and pushing the boat away from the dock as we struggled to pull her up, as she paddled furiously while looking up at me so heartbreakingly that i couldn’t stand it.

then there was a SPLASH in the water.  erica, the only person on the boat wearing jeans, jumped in to save her.  she swam over and pushed mollie from below and we pulled again and up mollie came.  WHEW.

i said that at least everybody can know that i can be counted upon to panic in a crisis.

mollie was just fine after her rescue, and she was happy to sit next to erica when we all got back on the boat.  when we had all gone up the hill at the park, erica stayed in the water swimming.  i’m pretty sure she really wanted to swim anyway, but it must have been a little challenging, swimming in heavy heavy jeans.

when we set off again, erica wrapped a towel around herself and took off the jeans.  luckily sharon had an extra t-shirt, so erica changed into that.  here’s grateful mollie with her rescuer.

the rest of the trip was without incident.

after i picked up kevin, we drove to his friend wayne’s house.  remember when kevin was helping with wayne’s extensive basement remodeling?  after months and months, the basement is now completely done and i can’t believe i totally forgot to take any pictures of it.  it looks fantastic, plus his daughter, fresh from culinary school, prepared a delicious meal for a crowd of people.

when we went outside, the sky was beautiful.  my camera phone couldn’t do it justice.

i have SO MANY FAIR PHOTOS that i must put up here, but now i really have to get up since soon it will be 11 o’clock and mollie needs to go for a walk even though it’s almost too hot for it.

ok then,

sunday slow-moving grace.

trying to catch up with all the photos…

i keep taking pictures, but then i don’t sit down long enough to put them up here, so i’m trying to KEEP UP.

here’s winnie, constantly trying his best to chill out.

the lake was just so sparkly and glistening and beautiful on sunday morning.

and here are the hostas which are blooming like crazy.

the enormous hostas in back of the deck.

even though it was insanely, crazy hot last week, and so humid that sweat was dripping off my face, we had to plant the many many day lilies we bought last weekend at the fabulous sale at washington park.  we bought about nine bags, i think, and each bag had multiple plants.  LOTS AND LOTS of lilies.  we went the weekend before the weekend we just had.  so technically, two weekends ago.  MAN the summer continues to shoot by in an alarmingly rapid rate.

anyway, the big liles on the left and right were there already – dad planted them quite a while ago.  we planted about seven more, and spread the last of the red mulch we had.  we’ll spread much more mulch next spring.  it was really hard to dig up the many many things growing around the tree – many of the weeds had turned into little trees, and it was a struggle to dig out the roots.  this area had been one big forest of stuff before we started digging.

kevin tore out some of the shrubs along the side of the deck (DON’T TELL DAD!!!!!!), and we planted these little bushes plus lots more lilies.  at first we planted about six of them, then amy came over to observe what i was doing.  this is where i planted the first clump and she read that they were TOO CLOSE TOGETHER.  ugh, i didnt’ want to dig them up and move them.  she said “that’s ok, you can move them in a couple years.”  the next morning, though, i decided i didn’t want to have to do it in a couple years, when they would be bigger, so i pulled them up and re-planted.  she then showed me a MUCH MUCH EASIER way to dig a hole.  i had been doing it all wrong, and so that first day of digging i did much more work than i needed to do.  at least she was there to show me.

last year we had exactly one peach growing on the two peach trees down by the water, and eventually that peach just vanished.  the year before we’d had a huge crop.  this year there are quite a few, so on wednesday i started picking.

they’re so beautiful.

this is the nifty peach picker, perfect for reaching the high ones.  it’s maddening when they’re so high that i can’t even reach them with the picker.  there are now quite a few peaches on my screen porch, and a lot in the fridge, and still more to be picked on the tree.

this beautiful peach has been picked, and maybe even eaten already.  i just ate one that was on the porch that must have fallen on the ground; it was really soft in places.  it was delicious.

beautiful shimmery lake.  there are quite a few peaches hanging out over the water, but i think if we try to pick them from the boat, the boat would crash into the rocks.  surely there’s a solution to this vexing problem.

ah, more lilies i planted.  this is sort of a terrible picture; the lilies are down there on the lower right, and then there are two little lilacs, and more lilies that you can’t possibly see on the upper left.

last week amy was outside and saw a guy on a riding mower out in the grass in the lane.  suddenly the guy screamed, jumped off the mower and ran away…and the mower was still running.  we surmised that he’d run over a  hornet nest.

that must be what happened, because here’s part of a nest that kevin found out there.  i know that hornets are bad and sting you and all of that, but isn’t this beautiful?  i mean, they create these delicate nests, and the material looks and feels just like paper.  it’s really extraordinary.  maybe i’ll have to throw away the nest now that i’ve taken a picture of it.

kevin is now telling me how a hornet builds a nest:

“they chew plant fibers, then take that mixed in with their saliva and spit that out along the edge where they’re working – the different variations are because they’re getting different plant fibers they get as they build the nest, and that’s what makes it like paper.”

he added that he didn’t bring back the innermost comb of the nest because there were live larvae inside, and they’d have hatched in the house.  this would have been problematic.

we went outside this morning to see if the inner comb part was still on the ground, but it had been mowed over.  but they hornets have been hard at work building a new nest.

one lone hornet came crawling out to get his picture taken.

we had quite a day at the fair yesterday; it was really hot and sunny, and we walked around a lot and when we got home i couldn’t figure out why i was so exhausted.  this morning when my calves were sore it dawned on me that we did lots and lots of walking.

i’ll be posting the photos later, maybe when i take a break from the many activities today.

ok then,

friday grace.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ERICA!

Today is my friend Erica’s birthday.  she’s working at the fair, at the St. Johns booth in the Illinois building, so if you happen to be in the Illinois building buying honey ice cream, stop by and wish her a happy birthday!  she’ll be the one with the birthday balloon.

ok then,

off to the fair grace.

oh brother oh brother oh brother oh brother. oh. brother.

one count.  the jury only found blago guilty on one count.  it was nauseating to hear him blather afterwards about he isn’t guilty, justice will prevail, etc etc etc.

we’ll just have to grit our teeth and wait.  they will get him, but it’ll take time.  i wonder what he’ll be doing before the next trial.  it would be really nice if judge zagel would put him in jail, so he can start getting used to it.  if he doesn’t, does that mean that rod will prance around the country again, spewing all his garbage?

it’s also amazing that they’ll find 12 more jurors who don’t have an opinion.  won’t these 12 people be the most uninformed people in the state?  but maybe not – i assumed that all the jurors didn’t know anything about blago and all his smarmy smarminess, but this morning i read that one juror said that another juror wanted blago’s head on a platter.

this too shall pass.

on a happier note – on sunday night we went back to the fair, after seeing all the resplendent chickens sunday morning.  we got our hands stamped so we could get back in without paying another five bucks admission.  i did wash my hands during the day, but luckily they must have used very strong ink because it didn’t wash off.  jim said he took a shower after getting home but held his hand up in the air and that worked well.

sunday night – we went to the ethnic village to hear a latin jazz band…why can’t i think of their name right now? the amazing AMAZING thing was sitting there and it wasn’t hot at all and then there was a COOL BREEZE.  it’s been forever since anybody around here has felt a cool breeze blowing.  lovely.

after a while we decided to look around a little bit, and went to see the butter cow.  i have to say it wasn’t very great this year.  there were a few kind of pathetic-looking corn stalks surrounding the cow, and the big bovine looked like the sculptor had accidentally cut its head off and stuck it back on.

not impressive.

the hobby building wasn’t open, and i’m excited to go there another time to see bev’s SPAM-TASTIC turkey tetrazzini.  actually, the SPAM-TASTIC creation wasn’t there yet on sunday night anyway.  by the time i get there it should be looking a little less appetizing, i’d imagine.

we strolled down the street and watched people cramming huge gobs of food into their mouths, then we stopped in at the coliseum.  the place was pretty well packed, and what looked like clydesdales were competing.  they weren’t clydesdales, though, they were percherons and belgians.  kevin told me that, because he knows almost everything about almost everything.

after the big horses were some really really cute little tiny horses.  there were only three little horses pulling each cart, and there were only three carts in competition.

i had once again not brought my camera, so i took pictures with my phone.  they didn’t turn out very well, i guess because the horses were moving plus it was darker.  here are a few not so great photos.

can you see, sitting up there on the wagon, the woman in the purple dress with the sash?  that was the queen.  i don’t know what she was queen of, exactly, but she was the hugest queen i’ve ever seen.

a blurry photo of the cute little horses.  i bet jim knows what they are called.

i suppose this means that the next time i go to the fair i’ll have to take my actual camera, but i don’t want to take ONE MILLION PHOTOS like i have a tendency to do, especially at the fair.

i have many more photos of various things to put up here, including some great video of kevin practicing on his new wave board thing.  sail wave?  wave sail?  it’s like a surfboard, but with a sail.

the neighbors down the way had a garage sale over the weekend so we decided to have one, too.  we did pretty well, and then we walked down to see what the neighbors had left.  kevin bought this wave board, but it’s missing a mast and a couple of other things.  he’s trying to figure out exactly what he needs, but in the meantime he went out to see if he could balance on the board.

soon i will post that video, but right now i have to go for a bike ride even though it seems awfully windy right now.

ok then,

wednesday morning grace.

SPAMTASTIC GRAND CHAMPION…BEVERLY SANDERS!!!!!

you may or may not recall that my friend bev is crazy about entering stuff in the state fair.  she used to stick to baked goods and other foodstuffs, but then she branched out into other things, like collections of…i can’t remember the collections she says she’s been entering, except that on saturday she called me to see if we had any animal-shaped salt and pepper shaker sets, because she wants to enter them maybe next year.

this year bev entered eight things in food, and four of them placed, four did not.  i don’t know if any were first place winners; i’ll have to find them for myself when we go to the hobby building.

these were all things she had to enter before the start of the fair, but then she also entered or will enter things for the different specialty contests.  a few years ago she got first place for some kind of butterscotch somethings, and last year she won for some kind of pizza; i think it was a pizza she’d never even made before.  bev is very creative and also takes risks, state fair-contest-entry-wise.

this year she was going to enter the SPAM contest.  i called her one day and left her gobs of great suggestions for tasty SPAM creations, like spam flambee, spam cookies, and spam shakes.

she didn’t take any of my suggestions, though.  instead she created SPAMTASTIC turkey tetrazzini.  she said she used her turkey tetrazzini recipe, which she LOVES, but instead added turkey spam instead of regular turkey.  SHE DIDN’T EVEN TASTE THE COMPLETED DISH before rushing it out to the fair yesterday afternoon.  entries had to be submitted between two and three, and she got there just before the deadline so it would be piping hot.  because who would want to taste lukewarm spam tetrazzini?

last night she returned to see the results and they read off a bunch of numbers and she was chagrined because hers wasn’t listed.  but then she realized they were reading off the JUNIOR numbers…and then they read off the winners – third, second, and first place – AND SHE WON!!!!!  WHOO, BEV!  WAY TO GO!!!!!

afterwards she really wanted to take some of her award-winning tetrazzini home with her to eat, but since nobody else was doing that, she didn’t.  she said now it’ll just sit there in the case looking more and more yucky as the days go by.

she got a hefty cash prize and i said DO SOMETHING NICE FOR YOURSELF WITH THE AWARD!  YOU DESERVE AT LEAST A NICE MEAL OUT OR SOMETHING!

she said she’ll probably use it to fix her basement.

so if you happen to see bev, tell her to GIVE HERSELF A TREAT!  because of all the people i know, she does that less than anybody.

we went to the fair on sunday morning to see the chickens, because they don’t hang around for the whole run of the fair.  i wasn’t going to take any pictures because i took lots of them in years past, so i didn’t even take my camera.  but then as i was walking around i started taking pictures with my phone and then all of a sudden i had taken yet another whole gob of them.  i can’t resist photographing the chickens.

here’s the FEMALE GRAND CHAMPION CHICKEN.  she’s probably not nearly excited about her blue ribbon as bev was about hers, plus what’s a chicken going to spend the money on anyway?

chicken feed.

a big black champion.

these two ENORMOUS CHICKENS look like they’re doing a synchronized move.  tandem feeding competition.

this was the BIGGEST CHICKEN EVER.

this one, not a champion, was a curious chicken.  he came marching up to the bars of the cage to look at me.

i love the feathers of this one.  so many of the chickens had fabulous feathers.

here are some of the more splendiforous plumages.  they remind me of one of the costumes nearer the end of “priscilla, queen of the desert,” when i think the guys were dressed as some kind of australian birds.

i imagine these four champions are conferring about pooling their winnings and taking a trip to vegas.

this chicken was SO TIRED that he couldn’t keep his eyes open.

mom wondered how they judged the chickens, and here was a contest.  that kid second from the left kept running something loud up and down the cage, trying to get the chicken to do…something.  the guy on the far right was more zen-like.  there were three judges sitting there watching, and there were drawing some squiggly lines down their papers.  maybe they were just doodling, hard to say.

in addition to the chickens, there were also ducks and geese on display.  i didn’t see if there were any champion waterfowl, because i didn’t like to see them in cages.  chickens seem to be used to being in cages, but a duck should be swimming.  i don’t think there are domesticated ducks.  one of them was all alone in his cage and kept pacing around and didn’t seem very steady on his feet and i just wanted to SET HIM FREE.

these black ducks were clearly planning their escape.

we didn’t see anything except the poultry in the orr building on sunday morning.  it was still very hot outside, so we got our hands stamped to come back later.

that’s all for right now because it is beautiful and cool and delightful outside and it’s time to GO FOR A BIKE RIDE.

ok then,

tuesday morning grace.

kevin, tirelessly trying to keep me sane…

here’s kevin’s reply to my crazy middle of the night but actually very early morning rant:

boat covered – check
daylillies watered – check
ducks fed – check
goose fed – check
mollie fed – check
winnie fed – check
coffee drunk – check
garbage out – check
plumber work area prepped – check

coffee break time – in process…

yes, he rocks.  right now we’re taking a little break from planting the daylillies.  we’ve planted about five of them, with approximately one million billion to go.  my fingers hurt just typing this.  we have to at least plant a few more before we melt into a steaming puddle of exhaustion.

ok ok ok,

digging grace.

5:16 a.m.

i finally got out of bed after lying there since four.  i groped around in the dark looking for my earplugs because both mollie and kevin were snoring, and then i finally broke down and turned on the light but all i found were THOUSANDS OF KLEENEXES under the head of the bed plus OH MY GOD SO MUCH DUST.  where are the earplugs?

but then they both stopped snoring anyway.  winnie was lying next to my head with his little paw on my hand which was so cute but i really really wanted to move my hand.  he finally moseyed down to the end of the bed and so there was no reason why i couldn’t just go back to sleep.

except for the being wide awake thing.

even though it’s now 5:18, there’s no light in the sky, which clearly shows how the days are getting shorter and shorter and before you know it WINTER WILL BE HERE.

except yesterday it was so hot that it might have well as been winter because whenever i went outside i almost passed out from the heat so i spent a lot of the afternoon inside in the cool.

will i ever get back to work on my scotland videos?

“and what about “gracetalk #5?” after making those videos for randy’s b’day i was inspired to start working on it but i have done NOTHING so far.

we bought a huge amount of daylilies at the daylily sale at washington park on sunday and THEY HAVE TO BE PLANTED TODAY.  amy bought some, too, and yesterday she told me that the daylillies would be fine, that i should pour a little water into each bag so the roots stay moist.

I COMPLETELY FORGOT ABOUT DOING THAT.  so they’re all probably dead or dying.

as are the flowers outside which i looked out and saw that they were drooping sadly in the heat but of course then i FORGOT TO WATER THEM.

what was i doing all afternoon, sitting around smoking crack?

hmm, if i WAS sitting around smoking crack, would i remember?

you’d think i would but then again i’m lucky to remember my own name.

i did get five and a half hours of sleep already and i know there are some people who can manage on that.

maybe i could if i drank coffee.  the other day i had a half cup of kevin’s new chocolate coffee and it was delicious but afterwards i felt a little nauseous and lightheaded from the caffeine.\

i guess i could try drinking more of it so i’d get used to it.

but then i’d be a COFFEE ADDICT.

that would be a good movie, about all the coffee addicts who have turned into zombies.  maybe zombies because they died because the world’s coffee supply disappeared.  or maybe they just all drank too much coffee and went way beyond being all zazzed and then they turned into zombies.

i cleaned the kitchen a little, but really, seriously, what’s the point of that?  i clean, it gets dirty again.  unless we switched to all biodegradable plates all the time, but they haven’t invented biodegradable cookware.  i guess i could start cooking everything in the microwave.  but it’s not really even the dishes so much it’s the NEVERENDING STACKS OF PAPER AND MAGAZINES AND CATALOGS.

winnie is trying to figure out how to get me to let him out already, damnit.  it’s too dark out there for you kitty.

i guess there is a little bit of light in the sky now.  but no boats.  probably because it’s supposed to rain, or it did rain.  i should have put the cover on the boat.  the front seats are covered with towels to keep the bugs off, but i know that in the past few days since the cover has been off, the other seats are all starting to crack and look like crap.

somebody keyed the side door of the car.

the plumbers who came to fix the burst hot water pipe last week are coming back today.  the pipe burst so kevin had to turn off the hot water – WHAT IF THAT HAPPENS AND HE’S NOT HERE?  WHERE THE HELL IS THE TURN-OFF PLACE FOR THE HOT WATER?  HOW DO I KNOW NOTHING AT ALL ABOUT EVERYTHING IN THE WHOLE HOUSE? – and i had to take a shower before a client came over, so i went to amy’s to shower.  luckily i wore a robe instead of just a towel because when i was walking back across the little stone steps, kevin’s friend garrick was on the front porch and TWO trucks of plumbers showed up.  since i was halfway across the stones i couldn’t have very well fled back to amy’s, so i just kept walking, pretending that i always sauntered around in my robe.

hopefully i’ll be fully clothed today when they show up.

some neighbors have posted signs that they’re having a BIG BIG GARAGE SALE this weekend, so we decided we’ll have one too, but we have done nothing to get ready for it.

nothing.

i’m not getting the tooth implant.  so i was lying there thinking about them grinding down my perfectly good teeth.

still no boats.

it is important that i get back to bed soon, before it’s suddenly so late that i’ll then end up sleeping really really late.  BECAUSE I HAVE MANY THINGS TO DO.

must plant the daylilies.

i guess i could start doing it now, except i don’t want to get out of my jammies plus i really don’t have the energy for digging a bunch of holes right now.

MUST SLEEP NOW SO I CAN PLANT IN A LITTLE WHILE.

winnie is meowing at me, so incredibly annoyed.

right now it’s 75 and feels like that, but by nine a.m. it’s supposed to feel like NINETY FOUR.  i must plant before then.  but i have to sleep for at least two and a half more hours and let’s say i get back to sleep by six…i could get up at 8:30, leap out of bed, throw on my clothes and start digging.  because by 11, it’s gonna feel like 102 and then it’s supposed to rain.

MUST COVER THE BOAT.

i can’t add any more new categories here on my list of categories.  this is extremely annoying to me.

i hear ducks quacking out there. HEY, WHERE’S MY FOOD? i think is what they’re saying.

i could go feed the ducks on the way down to covering the boat, then i could start digging the holes, and i could water the flowers.

BUT I REALLY JUST WANT TO GO BACK TO SLEEP.

gee, i’d get a lot done if i got up this early every day.  i could always take a nap later if i decide to stay up…

ok already,

wednesday morning grace.

sunday afternoon fun

on sunday we went to the mackinaw winery, which is between bloomington and peoria.  i’d never heard about this winery.  kevin wanted to go as part of his ongoing BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION.  some people from the 10th IL cavalry were there, “performing.”

it was a pretty winery, in a nice building, with a little lake out back.

in addition to the 10th cav, there were some other “actors” from bloomington, i think.  some of the women were dressed like saloon girls.  one of them, a big girl, wore a big dress made of silver lame.  it didn’t look very authentic.  “miss kitty” was wearing cat ears and a pink fluffy tail, and a short skirt.  also not so period.  my favorite, though, and i really wish i’d taken a picture of her, was this young woman wearing a red and black striped skirt and a sequined red top – not completely authentic-looking, but not bad – but she also wore huge brown-rimmed glasses, high-heeled patent black pumps, and lugged around a huge camcorder.

as part of the entertainment, three of the cavalry rode in from in back of the lake.  here they are.

they were supposed to be the “three amigos,” and when they finally arrived at the “camp,” there was so ad-libbing and finally a shoot-out.  at first they shot a lot but nobody fell down, but then they shot some more and everybody fell all at once.

very exciting.

here’s a video of what the place looked like.  at the very end is the first shot of the shootout; i don’t know why i didn’t keep taping.

actually, you can get a quick glimpse of the videotaping girl in the red dress – she’s just to the left of kevin, who is in the middle wearing his beige cowboy pants and big brown boots.

here’s david, looking very dapper.

it was hot outside, and the entertainment went on for a while.  erica said it reminded her of when she volunteers at a school, trying to get little kids to do improv.

they were serving a nice lunch, and then we went inside for some wine-tasting.  here’s the view out the back window.

erica wanted to square dance, so we did that for a couple of songs.  it was fun.  it’s nice that erica always wants to do everything; it usually forces us to not be lazy and join in.  it was highly entertaining watching david square dancing.  he’s not the most agile dancer i’ve ever seen, but he’s very very enthusiastic and when we were supposed to walk in a circle, he always vigorously skipped.

then everybody needed to get their pictures taken with wanted posters.  kevin wins the prize for most emoting.

erica also wanted to go for a buggy ride, and here’s where we waited for the buggy to show up.

here’s the buggy. the horses had snagged some grape leaves and were munching away.

you can see the one on the left is chewing.  at least that was something nice for him on that hot day, besides pulling the wagon around and around.

here’s some video of the ride.

and here’s erica and mom having a good time.  i showed erica this picture after i took it and she said DELETE IT RIGHT NOW!  erica refuses to believe that she ever looks good in a picture.

not that she’s really really hard on herself or anything.

here’s a little cemetery on the outskirts.

the winery with the lake in the background.

kevin and me.

we met the other buggy and that was very exciting because what if the horses had CRASHED INTO EACH OTHER?

as you can see by this ACTION-PACKED VIDEO, we came DANGEROUSLY CLOSE to a crash, with the crazy horses being all crazy…

i kept trying to get a perfect picture of the grapes as we rode by.

you can see the white tents which were part of the set.

kevin kept jangling his spurs, so i took a picture of one.

the winery was a nice place, but i have to confess that i wasn’t crazy about the wine.  usually illinois wines are cloyingly sweet.  i had five ( miniscule) samples, and none were super SUPER sweet, but i just didn’t like them so much.  i was hoping to like at least one and buy a bottle, but at least i saved all that money by not buying any.

this is the lovely garden area.  david asked how much it cost to have a wedding there and they said 4k and up.  is that a lot for a wedding location?  it seems like a lot to me, but of course we got married in our back yard.

i took this last picture as we were leaving.

it was a fun day, and it’s too bad it wasn’t better-attended.  this was just the first year for the even, though, so many next year will be EVEN MORE EXCITING.

right now, at 4:21 p.m. on tuesday, it’s 97 but feels like 111.  kevin is going to the tomb ceremony despite the fact that that’s an INSANE idea.  i probably won’t join him.

ok then,

tuesday grace.

definitely a boat!

a boat just zoomed by.  wait, now i think i hear another one, or maybe it’s the same one, running in circles.  so that guy, or those guys, got up earlier than me, and theoretically they did it because they wanted to.  i wonder if they’ll take a nap later today?

also, come to think of it, what do they do when they get to their fishing spot? wouldn’t it be really really hard to put a worm on a hook in the dark?  i know they’re probably more high-tech than that now and they don’t use worms but some other more…hi-tech kind of bait, but still, it must involve a pointy hook.  pointy hooks in the dark, i couldn’t even be trusted with a pointy hook in broad daylight.

it’s one thing to be sitting here at least knowing that i’ll eventually, after i stop reading about wyclef jean running for president of haiti, go back to sleep.  i can’t imagine driving to the lake towing a boat, then launching it IN THE DARK then zooming around out there.  THERE GOES ANOTHER ONE.  crazy fishermen.  it must not be a fishing contest because kevin says they don’t start till six.  plus, when there’s a fishing contest i can hear a big gaggle of them all roaring past at the same time, or in quick succession.

i should go out on the dock and see if i can see any more of them.  NO THIS IS A REALLY BAD IDEA.  what if the brisk morning air wakes me up even more?  i’ll never get back to sleep, and i will not be a happy camper on five or so hours or sleep.

back to bed i go.

for real this time.

winnie would thoroughly enjoy it if we went out to the dock.  he’s desperate to get outside right now and leapt to the window when i got up just now to look at the boat.

WAIT, THERE’S ANOTHER ONE…but this one is slowly cruising in the opposite direction, away from the famous hot ditch next to the power plant.  is he done fishing already?  did he go out in the REAL middle of the night?  he he been out there all night?  does he have sandwiches so he won’t starve?  do they bring snacks out there with them?  surely they must…but who wants a sandwich at four in the morning?  FOUR THIRTY NINE NOW.  maybe they bring doughnuts.  mmmmm, doughnuts.

i’m really really stopping this madness now.

ok ok ok again,

grace still crazy very early on saturday morning and if i’m not careful it’ll be just “saturday morning” and my day will be shot due to crabbiness because of lack of sleep.

the middle of the night…

since it’s now 3:59 a.m., i guess it’s maybe technically more like really really early morning.  i know that there are crazy people out there who get up at four a.m.  i thought i saw the lights of a boat going by about 15 minutes ago, so i got up to see, but maybe it was just a car.

winnie desperately needed some food, since i was getting up anyway.  kevin and mollie are still fast asleep.

so why am i up in the middle of the night?  i woke up feeling anxious, but it’s not any kind of feeling that i can even pin down.  there’s no reason for feeling anxious, and when i was lying there in bed i couldn’t even think up something trivial to blow all out of proportion.  well, i’m probably getting a tooth implant to fill the huge gap left by having my newly-crowned tooth pulled because it suddenly hurt more than anything in my life.  i won’t have an actual new tooth till next july, and meanwhile, in a month they’ll cut open a flap of my gum to push the low-hanging sinus up so that they can then insert some bigass metal screw up there.

yeah, it sounds kind of grim, doesn’t it?  amy keeps pointing out that what if something goes wrong with the pushing up of the gum.  what if they puncture the gum?  will my sinuses all ooze out into my mouth, and then i’ll have lost all my sinuses?  ok, probably that won’t happen, maybe it’s not technically medically possible, but if they did puncture the gum, wouldn’t that hurt like hell?  i had so much pain from the rotting tooth before they pulled it, so i don’t want any pain from the gum above the tooth.   some friend of mom’s had the procedure done and the gum-puncturing ensued and i’m really not interested.

but i don’t know, i actually think amy is more worried about it than me.  i wonder if she’s lying in bed tossing and turning right now.  i’d text her, but if she is, by some miracle, sound asleep, the noise of the text would probably wake her up and that would be bad.  plus i’d have to turn on a light to do the texting, and this bright glare from the computer is almost more than i can stand.

i think i’m hungry, but there’s definitely nothing i’m interested in eating right now, at 4:19.  4:19!  i really need to get back to sleep.  i’ve been awake since three, and kevin and i want to ride our bikes downtown to the farmer’s market in the morning and we can’t wait around all morning while i sleep in because of being up for hours.  i guess it would really be kevin waiting around, wondering why i’m sleeping so long.  and also, realistically, even if i’m awake for a while more now, i’m not going to be able to sleep very late anyway.

boy, my hands look old by the light of the keyboard.  now THERE’S something i could get all worked up about, looking older and older and older, not to mention actually getting older…but nah, that’s not enough to worry me right now.

ok, clearly, there’s no reason at all to be up right now.

i’m going back to sleep.

after i read a couple news stories online, i swear i’ll only read one or two, definitely no more than three…

ok ok ok already,

really really early saturday morning grace.