I fly!

Hey, yeah, I'm a country girl, but I don't always creep around in the garden looking for evil weeds.
Sometimes I FLY.  Not just in dreams, but in aircraft.  And I LOVE it.

I have spent the last twenty years of my life taking very intermittent flying lessons. I'm not stupid; it's just that at this point in my life it may not be totally important to get my license. Or, to get a plane... So I just fly.

I FLY!  Look!

 Today!

(I love this wondrous feeling!)

And here's music to go with it:
Straighten up and fly right - The Andrews Sisters

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A funeral

He was not a close friend of ours. Still, it's always so sad when you know somebody who loved life is gone forever, and they had a family, and kids who are adults but they are still too young, way too young to lose their father.


After the ceremony there was a memorial reception at the family bar. Outside in the back, where the band was playing country songs. I sat there scratching my toes in the ground, and there, I dug up a little key chain type metal thing that reads, engraved onto a heart: "Each day is a gift from God".


Thank you, God, for today.

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A legend is very much still here

Some birthdays are on our calendars or on our minds all year around, but this one I didn't see coming until I was stuck right in it.  And a good thing that was. Leonard Cohen celebrated 77 years old yesterday. He was very famous when I was young, and I still listen to a couple of his albums now and then.

I set out to find him on the internet.  Oh man oh man oh man, there are so many wonderful songs by him, and with him, out there! I just about didn't feed in the evening because I was re-living memories, and also discovering some songs I don't remember ever hearing.

There is one concert from London (in 2009, I think) that is just wonderful.  In his humble and touching and intimate way he gives away waltzes, prayers, lust and lament.

Happy Birthday to you, this year and many more!

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Celebrity

Recently, there was a small dinner party in the neighborhood. A super famous celebrity was introduced to me.  That was cool, and we were chatting for a while, about this and that, and the night wore on with good food and wine. I didn't really think of being star struck, though I probably should have been, since this person was all over the map about a hundred years back when I was a kid.

So, it surprised me a little when I thought of Mr.Celebrity today.  I might have been looking for recent happenings in my life to blog about, or I thought of this person and then thought I could blog about the dinner. Not sure.

In any case, I did the youtube thing, of course, and yes, there's Mr. Celebrity as young, and recent performances, too. Then I ended up listening to Nina Simone, and had a well rounded morning of associations and memories.

Now I am wondering how all this came about, and why I have followed the path of trying to tell the world that I had dinner with a super star. Is it because, maybe, I am thinking that a little of the glory would rub off on me?

And I wonder, even though it's weeks late: What do you say to Mr. Celebrity when you meet them?  I guess, in my case, the conversation was not going that way.  But if you are really famous, am I supposed to start out there, or do they get tired of that?

Well, in any case, the person was really nice, the wine was equally nice, and the barbecue, and there was a fennel casserole that was wonderful.   I don't have an answer to fame.

The picture is from my own kitchen, with eggplant parmesan cooking.

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Tried to make bread

It was to be a zucchini bread. A sweet one. I don't like sweet bread, but people around me do. So I looked up recipes on the internet, here in the office, which is by the barn yard. Wrote down some stuff. Carried ingredients back to the house, which is not too far away, but a few minutes. Set to work.

I'm not really a baker, even though I do make most of our bread at home. I make it very basic, and in a bread machine. This was different. The recipe called for eggs and baking soda and baking powder, and such.  I heaped things in the bread maker. Then I thought about the ingredients, and realized the author must have forgotten the water. I was having a glass of wine at this time, since I was having an adventure in cooking, and we were going into the evening. Cabernet.

I added water. About a cup. (I'm OK, but not great, with a measuring cup. Or a glass of wine.)  Oh, it got runny. Added some more flour. Then some more corn meal. Still runny, but I tried to cook it anyway.  Twice, and again this morning.

It's not going to happen. I don't know what to add next. Now, if I try to lift this out of the bread machine, the whole mess will go out through the bottom and I will have to kill myself.

Guess I'll have to go to the house to deal with it before the ants arrive.

Update and photo.  The thing settled into a semi solid mass, and I fed it to the turkeys. It smelled good.

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Dear friends - and yes, they are dear.

Why do they always show up when I have no decent clothes on? Or none at all.

I love our friends.  I also love, when it's a hundred degrees out, to shed most or all of my clothes.

That's when they drive into the ranch. And I scramble for whatever it may be that passes for... ranch wear. Yesterday it was a coat. Don't know how that one was still hanging in the barn since winter.  Prior to that it was a Chinese black robe with a red dragon on the back.  I also have had on a long-ish skirt that served double duty as a mini dress. More, I'm sure.  They must think I'm really bizarre

I'm not really a nudist. I don't much like any -ist and -ism things.  I'm also not suggesting that friends do not drop by to visit. I'd love some to come here right now, and we could have a beer and I could joke about the.subject.

And I do have clothes on right now.

Here's a photo I took of another naked ranch resident:

At my age, if I'd been a lizard, I'd be a pair of boots by now.  So no picture of me.

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