Tag Archives: General

Jul6

What I Want to Do vs. What I Have to Do.

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What I Want to Do vs. What I Have to Do.

I’ve been up for only a little more than an hour, but my Adderall hasn’t kicked in, so my brain has been busybusybusy. I can’t really get started until I can separate out, mentally, which things have to get done, and which things would be exercises in futility. Heh. I must go grocery shopping and do laundry. I need to clean up my sewing table, get the clay stuff put away neatly so I can use it again (and transport it Sunday) and spread out my pattern pieces so I can tell my friend how many yards of fabric she needs to buy for me to make her a slipcover. I want to finish a couple of clay pieces so I have something to play with on Sunday, but I can do that Saturday.

OK, as I’m posting this, I can feel my thoughts calming down. The competition is narrowing, and I can concentrate on one or two things at a time. Amazing. The problem is that I borrowed a bunch of landscaping books from the library yesterday. We want to hire a landscape architect to draw up a plan for us. We can’t afford to do everything at once, but if we have a plan made up, we can figure out which steps we can afford from year to year. The idea was that we’d collect some pictures so we could point out elements we wanted incorporated into the plan, but the reality was that it filled me with all kinds of ideas of possibilities, and got the brain going on a million different potential projects. I had a lot of trouble staying asleep last night, and the moment I woke up I was thinking of things I could do. Yeah, in this heat, I’m going to pull up the slate patio, dig it out and lay sand, make a cinderblock border, fill it with level sand, stucco the outside of the blocks and re-set the slate, and then I’ll rake out the back corner and level that and set up the tent, and then I’ll make a raised cinderblock planter, stucco that and cut slate to make an edge, fill it with dirt, and plant bamboo, then dig in some posts around the patio, bolt in some crosspieces and plant wisteria, which will grow (miraculously) all across the supports, providing dappled shade. . .and I’ll still have time for grocery shopping, laundry, and sewing. Oh, my.

Heck, I haven’t even done the stuff I have planned to do for ages, or the stuff I bought supplies to do. . .whatever. We have no construction guys coming today, because even though our window arrived yesterday, one of the guys is off, and they need a full crew. Tomorrow morning, a woman is coming to take some fish off my hands, hubby’s going to a funeral far, far away, but other than that, nothing on the calendar. Sunday I’m claying with friends. I have enormous amounts of time on my hands, but when I’m not pharmaceutically enhanced, I can’t grasp that concept and run around in circles unable to do anything. (My therapist is trying to introduce me to the concept of “relaxing”, but I’m trying to get him to understand that for me, doing things IS relaxing. Heh. Here, Dr. P – have some beads!) Plus, you know, I’ve found that if I do outdoor stuff after dinner, I can get a lot accomplished with that extra few hours of light, and less heat.

So, anyway, now I’m focusing even better, and I know I’m going to exercise, shower, put the thank-you notes in envelopes, make the menus and shopping list, do the shopping, and have plenty of time for laundry, sewing stuff, and then fit in some other things as well. It’s all good.

Jul5

Toms River Diner

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Toms River Diner

Well, we decided to hit the library after music lessons this morning, and the girls were hungry after we picked out all our books. Well, Rag Shop is going out of business, so I suggested we eat at the Toms River Diner on 37, across from Rag Shop. We had a very nice, attentive waiter, and the food was good, not too expensive, and plentiful. (we couldn’t finish it all. . .) As nice as it was, the folks there went above and beyond when we discovered that Carolyn had left her retainer wrapped in a napkin. She went back, and of course our table had been bused, but our waiter went through every bus tray and the trash until he found it, washed it, and brought it out to her. We were going to go back again anyway, but this was just more incentive.

Jul4

Freecycle.org

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Freecycle.org

Stephen Colbert might have “dissed” them on his show, but I think he was really giving them a little publicity. I managed to get a bunch of loose bricks picked up the same day I posted them, someone’s taking my massive collection of hangers this weekend, and someone else wants a few of the extra fish. The site gives you links to a local yahoo group, because freecyclers go and pick up what they want themselves. If only I’d heard about it a few months ago, our IKEA furniture would have been in use instead of in a dumpster. Oh, well. So I’m telling youse guys. The main link is here (it’s an easy URL, but clicking is easier than typing, n’est-ce pas?) and you can go from there to your country, down to the local level and join the group. There’s no obligations, except that no money is ever supposed to change hands. Replies go directly to the e-mail of the offerer, so your personal info remains private except to the receiver. Good stuff.