News Roundup

One morning a couple of weeks ago – one of the first actually cold mornings we'd had this winter – M.M. decided she wanted to have a picnic outside before breakfast. So she got a blanket and a bowl with wheat thins (the organic kind with no sugar, obviously) and raisins, and took it all out to the farthest corner of the back yard and sat there by herself for a long time eating her pre-breakfast snack. She even came in to replenish her bowl a couple of times. Go figure. Anyway, the above photo is my pseudo-artistic documentation of her little outdoor adventure.

Since then, we've been to Massachusetts and back. I did replace my glasses, and I really like the new ones. The sunglasses clipon is much better than the old ones, but I'm very very unhappy to have had to shell out all that money to replace glasses that were themselves new less than a year ago. However, what's done is done. Move on. Accept reality. All that crap.

I'm having February Funks as Anne Margaret called them. It's cold, I'm tired, M.M. is getting over a cold and has been a cranky mucous factory all week, I need a haircut, and some exercise, and a social life, and a job…

But, we did get the woodstove going, so the kitchen is nice and cozy, and the laundry is clean, for the moment anyway. When we got back from Massachusetts the dining room and one living room wall had been painted. I had chosen the color before we left. I loved it on the chip when Melissa, the helpful and cheerful and talented painter, was here, but as soon as she left I got a scared sinking feeling in my belly that I had made a terrible mistake. I wanted it to be bright and cheerful, because these rooms don't get a lot of light, especially in summertime, and I was afraid of making it depressing and cold in here. So I chose a pastel yellow-green color to complement the dusty plum colored couch and the jewel tones in the funky curtains I got from Pier 1 about 6 years ago.

When we got home it was late, I was tired, and the paint looked horrible. I hated it. It looked like snot-green, pee-green, electric, intense, flourescent… I was sure it was horrible and I started trying to figure out how I was going to fix it. Now I'm happy to say that living with it for a few days, seeing it in different lights (boy does it change with the light, this color!), I'm coming to like it. It's definitely cheery and fun. Here it is on the walls. Please ignore the unholy mess that is my entire life house dining room.



Of course there's no hope of getting a true color in the photo. So use your imagination.