grounded and floating bits

Esme and I walked up to the school bus stop this morning.  It is still raining, it has been off and on for a week or so.. but we saw where the lilies are starting to try to come up - I guess that must be what they are, and we planned to look for a place to put the Love in a Mist seeds we got free last year and never planted.  They say 'when ground can be worked at earliest point in spring, plant in well-drained soil'.  Mark suggested up there would be a good place, high up enough on the hill they might come back year after year.  We scoped out where we might put sunflowers later.

I came back and went into the main garden and uncovered the sticks and leaves off of the oregano.  I took a pinch of it in my thumb and forefinger and scored it so I could get a good smell of it.  It is so strong right now because the leaves are new.

I met the wild chicken halfway back from the garden and she is trying to live in the doghouse in the rain, the one I packed full of extra straw last fall.  Not a terrible place for a chicken, close enough to the house bad things probably would be worried about cats and dogs and the goat nearby.  I gave her some food scattered in the dry areas under the tree.  She walked within three feet of me to eat - so she has been having a hard time the past few days getting enough if she came that close to get the food I was throwing.  'Wild' means she runs at the sight of you - and doesn't come within six feet of you unless she has a reason.

The floating bits.
I found a great deal on  an item that could be our room divider.  We talked about that project but it seemed too expensive for something we didn't need right now.  Then it fell in my lap at ten dollars - so I get to pick that up after the rain dries up and hopefully we will find a way to install it over the next few months.

I've bound off the blanket and am tying in the ends.
Laundry, huge piles of laundry.
I need to get a bit more sleep.. but it is hard to go back to sleep for an hour or so only to get right back up.. there are so many things that could be done in an hour... like laundry... like planning ...

Someday this year I need to get the novel out and read it again, and see the next step.  I had thoughts about Paul and Isabel in the time rift and I never thought them through much because it entirely changes the story of Brian and Ingrid that was where I started... Ingrid and Paul are siblings.. and Paul has been lost since they were little more than children....the 'piece of Ingrid' he took with him, that makes her distant still.. I was going to turn that into a key but I never got there.  I need to brainstorm on paper but I never end up doing it more than just in my head.  It's been something like four years running and this  story seems to add to itself when I'm not looking but hardly ever when I actually WANT to make progress with it.  Even the title keeps feeling false.. like someday it will pop into my head and I'll know it is true, but it hasn't happened yet, so I just keep calling it the Magpie story in my head when really that is just Ingrid's nickname, and the story is so much more.

I wanted to read the Auster book again before I started.  I just remembered that was the kickpoint last time.  Something was reminding me of that book.. I bought it, read a few chapters but then got sucked into something else.  It's a slim volume.  In the Cities of Coin and Spice by  Valente made me think of the Auster book, which made me think of the writing project, which made me run in mental circles ruminating on what it was that I was trying to coalesce...

I should investigate a light for over the washing machine, even a stickup one... Esme forgot her necklace in her pants pocket last night and I had to dig through the wet clothes mid cycle with her to find it.  It was almost stuck around the washing machine agitator and was stuck partially in one of the holes in the bottom of the wash-basin... hard to get it out but we managed and it didn't even break.  So hard to see in there, though.

Made four mood playlists on my music... Deep, Rise, Bang and Scrape.   I need one more, a shortened group of Rise and Bang to make something like Fly.  I'm looking forward to getting my favorite song in the mail to add in.  I used to listen on Spotify and put those all in but after they became subscriber or you don't see anything at all (instead of subscribe not to see ads), I haven't been back.