Month: August 2011

I’ve been in heaven the last two days: Irene dragged the sweetest air of the summer behind her, and having taken down power at the office, allowed us to enjoy it.

This late August/early September air is evocative of the happiest times, something I don’t understand since it’s mostly associated with back-to-school, and I’ve hated school, well, forever.

I’ve managed to catch up with a lot of garden chores the last couple of days. I don’t mind the loss of income. I am happy to be here with Ron, Fluffles the cat and the gardens.

The netting we put up before Tropical Storm Irene saved the tomatoes. Unfortunately, about half the corn was knocked over. It remains to be seen what effect this will have on the crop.

We lost power around 2 in the afternoon yesterday, but NStar had us back on the grid around midnight. The frig lost only about 3 degrees, from 45 to a normal 42.

I went out around 6:30 or so to figure out the extent of the power outage (East Falmouth) and take a look at the ocean on Surf Drive.

We recently had some minor tree-pruning done at Dixon. Over the last couple of years, we’ve had major pruning at Edgewater. Maybe just as well with the high winds anticipated later today.

I went out around 8:15 this morning and was surprised at the number of stores that were open.

We’ve been prepping for the hurricane. No D batteries anywhere, and we got the last lantern at Botello (there were none at the local True Value).

I watered with Miracle Gro this morning, figuring it’ll soak in (ha), and planted a coreopsis in an empty spot in front of the fence, figuring it’ll get a good watering.

Ron and I put in about an hour’s worth of work in the grass garden at Edgewater before some heavy rain.

The airways are filled with annoying and predictable news person braggadocio about their region’s toughness in the face of the hurricane:

“New Yorkers are tough enough to handle Irene – we have muggers and subway strikes.”
“We’re tough in California – we have earthquakes.”
“We’re tough in the Midwest – we have tornadoes.”
“We’re tough in Idaho – we have … potatoes?”

The truck is back!

Since heavy rain is predicted for tomorrow, Ron had the good idea to load it up for the transfer station tonight. Given that there was almost two weeks of trash, it was amazing that we got everything to fit.

Should make things much easier tomorrow.

My truck is my best friend.

It’s been in the shop for almost a week and a half, getting new engine parts, and I miss it terribly.

My truck doesn’t care what I look like. Same with computers: they don’t have ego demands around having a thin, beautiful owner.

My truck is there, 24×7, to help me when I need it. It asks nothing in return besides maintenance and gas. Doesn’t care how flat my stomach is or how much I weigh or whether I compare favorably to old operators. It doesn’t pine for them, correspond with them or “friend” them on Facebook.

When the truck comes back, I’ll have to do something nice for it.

The last two days have been quite nice, and this morning, temps are in the high 60’s and low humidity.

We got a lot done over the last 24 hours: watering, dead-heading, planting (sedum), spraying a hornet’s nest at Edgewater, lighting a fire under our septic contractor, grocery shopping. Ron is making progress on unpacking.

I think the change of weather is helping everyone.

Peter and James did the lawn and I trimmed the bushes at Edgewater, which pretty much finishes the front yardwork, at least for now.

I continued work on weeding the grass garden. Was able to pull out a lot of Evening Primrose, which I usually love, except that these were 5-6 feet tall and out of control.

I uncovered a hornet’s nest under one of Emme’s windows. Very happy that no one hit it with a lawnmower.

More work to be done on the grass garden, the goal being to weed out as much as possible before it seeds.

No pix (I was on the phone with Ed at the time), but a hummer visited our feeder this morning!

After some minor aggravation in Mashpee yesterday morning around disposal of non-electronic computer peripherals and the officious attitude of DPW Director Catherine Laurent, we headed up Route 3 to bring Ron’s computer to the Apple store for troubleshooting (the problem was resolved by downloading a patch to his OS).

Traffic was light and we got to the Derby Street shops early enough to pick up some groceries at Whole Foods. While Ron was in the Apple Store, I did some sale shopping at Crate & Barrel and Kohl’s.

I’d purchased a half-price voucher a while back to The (Ocean) Deck in Green Harbor Marina, Marshfield. It was the perfect day to be outside and we enjoyed our meal and the view. I asked Ron to please drive around so I could show him some of the neighborhood where I used to live.

We stopped at the Stop & Shop gas station on the way back to fill up the van. According to the manual, we had less than half a gallon left: unlikely, we so think.