Another Life In Lloyd Post

Well, it was bound to happen. I just wasn't expecting my granddaughter to reach my height when she was in the fifth grade. I've still got an inch on her or maybe a little more. She was wearing shoes and I wasn't. It delights the grands when they become as tall as I am. It's like a badge of honor and sign of maturity around here. I haven't seen August in a few weeks so it's quite possible he's right there with his cousin. 
Lily and Lauren and the Magnificent Magnolia dropped by today. Lily recently bought a new car which is new only to her but it does have AC which her old one did not and let me tell you- when it's 97 degrees, all driving around with the windows open does is to blast you with hot air. It's not just like being in an oven, it's like being in a convection oven. Or air-fryer. 
It's not in the least bit enjoyable. So anyway, of course Lily wants her Daddy to sell her car for her and they dropped it off here today and that was the main reason for their visit. Actually, Glen volunteered to sell her car for her because he doesn't really like the idea of strangers going to Lily's house, especially since she has children. As Lily pointed out today though, he doesn't seem worried to have strangers coming out to our house even though his wife is here and when it comes right down to it, she said that her kids could probably fight off an attacker a lot better than I could so there's that too. 
I'm not worried about the issue. I can't tell you how many things (including cars) Glen's sold from our house and no one has ever come back to do any sort of mischief. 

Now where was I? Oh yeah. Lily and Lauren and Maggie. They left after just a little while because they were hungry and I really didn't have much here to offer them. I mean, I have plenty of food but nothing guest-worthy. 

I hardly did a thing today. It was one of those ugh days. And you can't spell rough without ugh, can you?
Gosh I'm clever. 
Nothing really wrong at all, just one of those days. I took the trash and dropped by the post office where I had a chat with Ms. T. We discussed the new business going into the old boutique which is probably a hundred yards or so from the post office. She doesn't know much about it either. I told her I'd visited their web site and it seemed to be mostly about their faith. We agreed there might be eggs. That would be nice if they don't charge twenty dollars a dozen. 
We talked about a few other things and she thanked me for coming in and chatting as she had not had one customer all day. It was already almost 11:30 and they close at noon. I'm sort of surprised we still have a post office here. I probably should have discussed this whole mail-in ballots mess that Trump's trying to do to prevent people's votes from counting. What's the end-game there? Are there far fewer Republicans who use mail-in ballots than Democrats? 
I swear. I can't figure out a damn thing anymore. Nothing makes sense. I just didn't feel like talking about it so I didn't bring it up. 

I watered porch plants and I admired the firespike. 

It's doing well by the front gate. I actually set the sprinkler on them yesterday. The rain we got wasn't nearly enough to really matter although some things do look a little greener. 

I think the crows left me another token of exchange. I found a magnolia cone on one of the tree stumps this morning when I fed them. It was an older cone and the seeds in it were softened with age and I wonder if that is how the crows like them because they're easy to eat whereas the new seeds might as well be made of plexiglass or something, making the aged ones more valuable in their estimation.  

The new ones are pretty, aren't they? 
But once again, it's hard to imagine how an entire cone could have gotten onto the stump without some help. In this case avian help. 
Not to be ungrateful but it sure would be nice if they found and gifted me with the earring I lost some years ago and still miss. 

I decided to use one of my pumpkins in making the creamy, curried, cashew, butternut squash soup I love so much. 
There is going to be a learning curve as pertains to these vegetables. 
Here's what they look like when cut open. 

Beautiful color. And a whole lot of seeds. Seed to meat ratio is a little disappointing but these are heirlooms and that makes sense. Their desire to live and thrive which I have truly appreciated is reflected in the number of seeds and I'll never have to buy any more seeds again. 
There was no way I was going to be able to peel the raw pumpkin so I steamed the halves for awhile after I'd removed as much of the guts and seeds as I could, and then cut them into smaller pieces which were far easier to peel. I do the same with butternut and acorn squashes. Delicatas do not need to be peeled. Their skin is imminently thin and edible. 
I threw a sweet potato into the soup along with the pumpkin and I think the soup will be good. I've good dough for naan bread rising. Mr. Moon is not the biggest fan of curry flavors (or so he says) but if I make naan to go with the soup, he is far more enthusiastic. 

Fishing didn't go smoothly today due to something about the trolling motor but he wasn't too disappointed. He got to come home earlier, he's not as tired, and he doesn't have a cooler of fish to clean. He also stopped on the way home at My Way Seafood and bought me some gorgeous shrimp so I am quite happy too. 

The only other project I worked on was patching a place in a pair of Mr. Moon's overalls that he'd snagged. They are practically new so of course they deserve a patch. I asked him when he showed me the snagged hole, what sort of a patch he wanted and what he said charmed me so much. 

"A heart is good," he answered. 
I agreed. So I'm sewing a green flannel heart-shaped patch over the snag in his overalls and I think I'll try to fancy it up a bit. I remembered something about patching or sewing on pants as I was working on this today though, which is that stitching and embroidery require one to be able to access the patching area from both sides, inside and out. And by golly- it's not that easy to get your hand down the leg of overalls, especially when they're the britches of an extremely long-legged man. It's just awkward. It can be done but it's not nearly as easy as stitching or embroidering on, say, the front or back of a blouse or dress. 
This may not make sense to you if you've never done any sewing on a pair of jeans or even a shirt sleeve, but if you have, you know what I'm talking about. 
And that's something I'm pondering about the Levi's patching project. Would it even be worth it? 

Who knows? 
Not me. 

Love...Ms. Moon