Let it rain

It's been really dry this spring, but this morning the bottom fell out. The robin nesting outside my bedroom window was all hunkered down over her pale blue eggs. Under the opaque sky, the grass and trees were glowing green with their early spring leaves. Rainy spring days are some of my favorite (except when I have to walk outside).

The downpour gave me a chance to see/remember where the great waterfalls drain from my gutterless roof. Turns out the spot that had seemed perfect for a hydrangea transplant was bare because it's the exact target point for a gush of rainwater. Oops! Guess I'll have to dig up what's left of the tiny hydrangea (it only has about five leaves) and relocate it again.

The job

I have exactly nothing interesting to say today. The weekend was good. Went crazy and bought too many plants, and now am trying to devise ways to plant them and avoid the scorching heat that followed our one week of pleasant spring weather.

Back at work, chaos as usual. Looks like some software updates from our IT department have interfered with the system we use to update the web site. This is a very bad thing. Other boring stuff is happening, too. Honestly, there are many wonderful things about my job--especially the people. But when I look at it closely, beyond the endless distraction and flood of tasks, I think this is probably just a way to make money and enjoy good benefits for a while.

Who knows, maybe I'll feel more fulfilled after we launch our redesigned site next fall. My job will definitely be changing, and it's worth waiting around a little longer to see if I can steer it in a direction more to my liking. But really, this summer is going to be hellish and there are days that I resent the impossible workload I've been handed.

TGI quasi-religious employers

Thank god I work for a "loosely affiliated" religious institution that grants an employee holiday on Good Friday. Just for kicks, I'm taking off Monday, too. The burnout is so high right now that the fire may go out completely. Four blissful days off will surely quench the flames a bit.

Ok, I drew the metaphor out as long as I could.

This weekend I plan to sweep the patio AGAIN since a whole new crop of oak pollen tumbleweeds is scattered everywhere, and I'll rake out some flowerbeds and maybe purchase and plant a few shrubs. But mostly I am going to sit on my patio in the beautiful baking sunshine and read Billy Bathgate, which has been fairly engaging so far. I figured I love mafia movies, so maybe I'd enjoy a gangster (but not gangsta) book.

And I'm going to stare at the glorious irises that are starting to open all over the yard--pink, purple, yellow, boysenberry.

Sunday my family and I will have Easter brunch at one of my favorite special occasion restaraunts that serves fan-cy European food like crepes and eggs "Hussard" and popovers. They have a hot fudge crepe that is to die for. I'll need Monday off just to recover from the gluttony of it all.

Swish swish

Picking up from last week, the countertops were put back into place last week, so I have enjoyed a house with unobstructed hallways and a refrigerator all weekend. I do still have the Sears showroom of stove, washer and dryer lined up in my living room, but hey. Looks like they'll be there another 2-3 weeks, so we'd better make friends.

Yes, it'll be about 2.5 weeks before the tile has arrived from some distant, tile-producing country and the tile-setters have time in their schedule. By the time I have a kitchen, I may have forgotten how to boil water.

Indeed, I find myself fantasizing about all the impossibly complex, delicious things I will cook when I have a kitchen again. Paella and profiteroles? Sure! After a year of semi-coasting with easy meals, I was starting to try new recipes and techniques right before the kitchen closed. I was making pizza dough and some damn good calzones. Maybe on the same par as baklava, but I was always intimidated by doughs of the world.

The weekend was stormy then beautiful, so I spent part of yesterday moving plants around. The former owner of my house inexplicably planted hostas in withering full sun, so I managed to move one to a shady bed in the front. The other was too big for me to life, so it'll have to sweat it out until my brother-in-law can dig it up next fall.

I've decided the digging and planting is my favorite part of gardening. Pulling weeds provides a certain satifaction and I'm lukeware about pruning, but some tasks are just boring--like watering. Maybe we'll have a rainy summer this year and I won't have to water.

Raking is also pretty fun--a moderate activity that accomplishes visible, immediate results without power tools. That's what I like about raking. Just the swish-swish and you outside in the sunshine.

Baby steps with short legs

When I got home from work yesterday, I found two signs of marked progress:

1. I can now get to my refrigerator. Hello, milk! I've missed you in my coffee. Luckily, I had the sense to get rid of all moldering vegetables before they sealed the kitchen off a week ago.

2. The was one fewer loud wind-generating machine in my house, so I could actually watch TV without the volume turned all the way up. I watched the "Lost" and "ER" I taped two weeks ago, so now I'm only one week behind.

Watching last week's shows will be interesting, though, b/c I got my sister to Tivo them and my VCR is not currently ejecting the one videotape I've been using to tape shows over and over for the last three months.

In other news, I picked out some beautiful ceramic tiles (neutral/pinkish, to go with the Baby apsirin walls) and blue-gray clear glass accent tiles. The glass was bound to make it in somehow. Now, if I could just get the floor installer to call me back....

Still, just having a refrigerator again is a huge step forward. I can live with appliances in the living room, too. The one really big hindrance right now is the gigantic countertop in my hallway that's blocking the bathroom door and requires legs slightly longer than my own to step over it easily.

Toast

Toast is how I feel today. It's not even so much the living with all my appliances in the living room, an inaccessible fridge and a giant fan creating too much white noise to hear oneself think. I think it has more to do with work right now -- found out yesterday the project manager for our vendor is quitting.

That's the second pm to quit in this now-more-than-a-year project. I'm like, should I take the hint here? I mean, I'm the one who's stuck with the project forever. They at least have a delivery date, whereupon they will deliver it unto me.

Anyway. I could go on at length.

On the positive side, let's celebrate a virtual toast--to MC's brand-new Baby Beatriz! Hear, hear!