Monday, July 25, 2016

Silly Me

Boo-hoo! I was packing the Big Box that goes on the rack on the back of the van - just to see how much I could stuff in it - when I pinched my finger in closing the lid. Now I have a blood blister:
 
 
Not traumatic obviously except that I CAN'T KNIT!!! It's located right where I push the stitches and it hurts. Sigh. And here I was hoping to finish the long-suffering Spring Forward Socks that I started months and months ago before we leave. Not going to happen. I still have half a sock to go. Plus we may be leaving a couple of days early in order to meet up with Thom's brother and sister-in-law at our first stop, Kettle River. All scheduling has been pushed forward. At least we are ahead of the game so far anyway and we mostly only have last-minute stuff to do - including getting my hair cut on Friday. I can barely last 5 weeks and it will be twice that long before I can have it done again. I may be snipping at my bangs myself when they get too long! Other than damaging an important part of my anatomy I've been dusting and washing and clearing and gardening. Whew! I harvested the garlic and let it cure for 10 days or so. Today I pruned the stalks and gave them a root haircut. 30 heads this year:
 
 
It's so pretty! Yummy too. Now the garlic is hanging in bunches from a hook in the basement where I just snip off a head when I need one. We didn't get much produce out of our truncated veggie patch this year but we did get lots of greens, snap peas, kale and garlic. There's one cute little cabbage that volunteered and some unidentified squash that sprouted in the compost box so we transplanted several. It was late getting started though so it may not amount to much. It's barely starting to flower and hasn't set any fruit yet. I think they're butternut. Whatever, now we have to leave it all in the inexperienced hands of our house sitters and the weather so we'll either come back to a desert or a jungle! All depends. It'll mean more work to do in autumn whatever happens.
 
So nothing else exciting to report. Just trying to remember everything that needs to be packed. It's not that much more stuff than when we go away for a week or even a month but we do need clothes for every weather, from hot/dry to hot/humid to cool to wet to possible freezing. You never know. It can all happen in a single day! Seriously. It's not like flying somewhere and staying in a hotel. We are much more attuned to the environment, changes of altitude and temperature, rain/snow/fog, road conditions and time zones. We will be stepping back through 4-1/2 hours and then forward again on the way home. I don't know if it's any easier moving an hour every few days vs jumping it all at once. But you try getting up at 6am, then 5am, then 4am, then 3am and then 2:30am. No wonder we end up going to bed at 9! It's much easier going back but by then it's close to the Autumn Equinox so daylight hours are shorter. You really get to experience the Real World on a road trip, don't you?

2 comments:

Sharon in Surrey said...

To heck with everything else, just go & enjoy while you can. Too many people sit at home & never do anything while you're out there seeing the world. Well, the world on this continent anyway . . . . Send pictures!!

Louisa said...

I'll post pics as often as I can! Promise.