Still nuts

 My sister and her husband came for black bean soup and fajitas. I was disappointed with my tortillas. The were passable, but not nearly as nice as my daughter-in-law's are. I will try again.

Two games of scrabble. I won the first by the skin of my teeth. She trounced me on the second game.

I watched Hamnet today. What a remarkable film! So very well done. Cried my head off. 

I saw Phantom, stray cat. I also saw him attack Possum. We can't have that. 

My smart watch uses an app. It did not adjust the time one hour ahead for daylight savings time. The watch said I needed to sync it to my phone, but my phone would not allow me to access the account without providing a credit card. It is a free app! I was assured that the card would not be charged...that this was for 'verification' only. 

I clicked out of it. They had no need for that information. My watch reset itself to the proper time.

Country Joe died today. He was 84. 

What it sounds like here.

 The mushroom class was fun. I have a log inoculated with lion's mane. Met some neat folks. The 'teacher' fell into the whole thing by accident. He lived in Virginia. There were limestone caves. He started growing mushrooms. It went so well that he wound up growing high specialty mushrooms for high end restaurants. He had a lot of knowledge. 

I met a bee keeper. There are bee keeping meetings. A chance to learn something new. So that is an opportunity. 

I met a woman who hasn't had a TV since the 1980s. She said, 'I am a weirdo...' A very serene weirdo, I have to say. 

We had our first thunderstorm. Short, sweet but it was a doozy. I love thunderstorms.

Our owl is a Great horned owl. He sounds like he is calling from the swamp. 

No what else is calling from the swamp? Peepers! That is a sure sign of spring.

Lots of little joys. 

But our president is still a lunatic. Stark raving. We have boots on the ground in Ecuador.  He is saying that Cuba is going to be attacked.  I can't believe that our military is violating the Geneva Convention. Every day brings us to another level of crazy.

Thanks Phillis

 Phillis id'ed  my videographer. His name is Lucas Bean. His stuff on cults is very interesting. I am not able to put them on the blog, but I hope you can find him. He showed up on my facebook.

This morning, gas prices were $3.79, up 50 cents in just five days. What are you folks seeing?

We have an owl hooting tonight.

Tomorrow I have a mushroom growing class. Looking forward to that. Also looking forward to a 70 degree day. 

Of course next week, we are supposed to get 3 inches of snow.

I am starting tomato seeds.

It is the little things.

Cult

I was shocked to see a post from a family member today. It basically stated that she always saw 47 as a great man. However now that she has watched him being attacked from all sides, she realizes that to have so many enemies fighting against him, he is undoubtedly the greatest president America has ever had. 

WT actual F? 

I tried to find a video I saw. The guy was making the point that all cults die. He felt that there are 4 ways they end. 

1) the death of the leader.

2) the people inside realize that the promises/prophecies the leader is trumpeting at them are not coming true. 

3) divisions/infighting/power struggles within the cult. (The cult is broken from the inside.)

4) people leaving the cult, and speaking the truth about what is happening inside the cult to people outside the cult. (The cult is broken through outside means)

He stresses that this cult will end just as every cult before it has ended. I find this reassuring for no particular reason. I thought you might too. 

(I cannot find the video. It is raining cats and dogs and the internet is slooooow tonight. When I find it, I will link it here.)

Kristi Noem got fired today. 

https://www.newsweek.com/kristi-noem-mocked-with-jokes-and-memes-after-firing-11630643?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook&sfnsn=mo&fbclid=IwdGRjcAQXB39jbGNrBBcG8GV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHNydGMGYXBwX2lkDDM1MDY4NTUzMTcyOAABHvpGnIjqkbtX6j7Fw5fcf-UD6_b4EPoPv_2hR66nCL0HTPF4V-fpgH1_9UWN_aem_Fe_-47Yn9vG7PV4Br-bP1g

Her 'promotion' is a made up position.

I am trying to be cautiously optimistic about her replacement. 

Catching up.

My God. 

Hegseth:

 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/03/us-israel-iran-war-christian-rhetoric

Trump appears to be rotting before our very eyes:

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/us/politics/trump-rash-neck.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&fbclid=IwdGRjcAQUZ1hleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAwzNTA2ODU1MzE3MjgAAR4OzIbz3AnD7FOq4ZCyLHTJSFYrJVngUHnRN68CcyF6HysoJzAc-FFv6GTtcQ_aem_NUkYi-7cBz4hR5H7ablarA

Gas went up 20 cents a gallon over night.

I am a bit overwhelmed by the big picture lately. I am sure everyone is. 

In local news:

I had a trip planned to spend time with my son and his family. The weekend before I left I got hit with quite an intestinal bug. I will spare you details, but I really, really was afraid that I would have to delay the trip. 

I got over myself the day before I was supposed to leave. 

I strongly advise any overwhelmed person to borrow some kids to rebalance your soul. 

The youngest wanted me to come to her art show. I wanted to see it. She was so proud. She likes to give gifts. A painted rock last time. This time it was a plastic heart on a keychain she'd won at preschool. She brings these things to you in cupped hands as if she is presenting you a treasure, and the only response is to cup your own hands and to receive her offering with all due reverence. I immediately clipped that heart to my purse and assured her that I will love it always.  I will, too. Her art show was grand and I loved watching her confidently striding through her preschool showing us around. 

The oldest is 7 and we have our own little thing. Our fairy tea parties have become increasingly fancy.  Her six fairies gather around a table set with fancy miniature china. They carry on polite fairy conversations as quiet fairy music plays in the background. We sit in the middle of her room and have the most wonderful imaginary adventures. The last evening, the fairies, all six of them, told me how sad they were that I was leaving. I told them that we would have a grand party when I returned and that I would have tiny fairy gifts for all of them. My grand daughter was thrilled at the thought of a party of this caliber. She lined them all up in a row to bid me farewell, and I promised to miss them all until we met once again. Then they went back on her window sill, all in their assigned place.

Such sweetness. 

My son and his wife got two date nights in a row. 

I hit their Amish store, which is huge. They had, of all things, cranberries. You know, I had to resort to canned cranberry sauce at Christmas. I could not find the bags of berries to save my soul. After Christmas, I usually buy them up when they are heavily discounted. The bags are tossed in the freezer and pulled out one at a time. I like cranberry relish on my toast. I like it stirred into my homemade yogurt. At 35 cents a bag, a dozen of those went into my cart as quick as a wink. Tim likes blueberries and they had pints of organic blueberries for 75 cents. I also love their cheeses. So many different kinds. 5 lbs of cheese made its way into the cart ss well. No meat this time. We really have so much venison, pork and poultry in the freezer. A good problem to have, to be sure.

My daughter in law showed me how to make tortillas. An old dog learned a new trick. We had a beautiful day. We got in a family hike. We tried to fly a kite. We went out for lunch. We did crafts.  

It was a beautiful weekend, and I needed that. 

Funny story: the morning I was supposed to leave. I could not find my car keys. My oldest granddaughter said 'I hope you don't find them and you can't go home!' It was so fervent that it really touched my heart. It also made me wonder if she had hid them. (She had not. They had fallen out of my coat pocket in their car. )

I am once again home. 

It was too cloudy to see the lunar eclipse. We started the day with freezing rain. 

My sister is coming over to make tortillas with me Sunday. We are going to have fajitas. One old dog reaching another old dog.

I found a cream colored lurex sweater to deconstruct to make my moon for my planned weaving. 

I got a letter from gz, which was exciting.

I got the perfect haircut.

If it wasn't for the fact that we have a lunatic for president, life would be pretty okay.

I am behind in blogs. I will have to catch up.

Productive

 This morning, I got up and went to the gym. Tim did not go today. He is siding the garage. He had an appointment at 1 to get new tires on the car for my trip to see the kids and my granddaughters. 

So off I went to class. I got there early enough to do my mile before class started. I did my class and came home.

I have been on mighty productive streak lately. I got a pan out and sautéed green, red and yellow peppers along with some red (purple!) onion. I added some venison. Tossed in garlic and Adobe paste, some jalapeño tomato sauce. I cleaned as I went. When the rice cooker beeped, I added the rice. It sure made a pretty dish.

Tim walked in as I put the finishing touches on things. I said, "Want me to make corn bread to go with the rice tonight?"

He looked at me in amazement. "We are going out for supper. We are taking William out for his birthday."

I am so productive, I already have supper made for tomorrow. 

Thursday

 Well. Life is sure a mixed bag, isn't it?

It has been a warm week and the snow is melting off rapidly. 

For Christmas, my daughter-in-law sent me a bag of daffodil bulbs. I set them outside in a snow bank, with the idea to let them winter for a couple months, and then bring them inside to make an early spring for myself. Probably makes everyone in the UK laugh. Seems like you had daffodils within a month of Christmas. They are not something we see until well into March. 

Anyway, the snow melted off enough that I finally saw those bulbs again, so I went to the greenhouse and got four large terracotta pots, scooped some gravel in the bottom, filled them with potting soil, and planted six bulbs in each pot.

It was nice working in the sun. A 50 degree day. Possum wound around my legs, and tolerated some petting. 

I wonder what cats know. Yesterday, my sister messaged me that a cat had been killed on the road. It was pouring rain, but by the time we got there, something had made away with it. The circle of life and all of that. Tim had heard the bald eagle screaming from that direction, but it just as easily could have been a fox or a coyote. Although I did not see him, my guess would be that it was Dusty. He was not around at dinnertime.

So, I petted Possum, and wondered what she knew. Maybe nothing. Maybe I just have a fanciful imagination.

So now we are down to two ferals, from the original 12. Five went to new homes. You can only help a cat (or a person, for that matter) as much as they will allow you to.

Once my planting was done, I set the bag of bulbs against the house foundation. Once the snow melts off, I will plant them along side the northern side of the house.

I invited Possum inside. She politely declined my invitation.

So I cleaned the kitchen. Cleared the counters, oiled the butcher block and cutting boards. scrubbed the tile. Polished the  stainless. Replaced everything slightly rearranged. 

The wind picked up and I opened doors and a couple windows as I worked, vacuuming, tidying, sorting. It felt like spring.

Andrew, the man formerly known as 'Prince' is arrested. I hope he comes to the realization that it is never too late to begin to behave with honor. The best thing he could do for this world is spill it. All of it. Names. Details. Tell the story. 

I think the whole world will feel better once we know. No matter how awful, we can deal with the criminals and move on. 

My niece posted today. She says that anyone who discusses sexuality with a first grader is a pedophile. Three observations. The first: my granddaughters know about their bodies, proper terminology. Age appropriate. Their mother is a nurse. Second observation: it is not part of any first grader's school curriculum. Third observation: trumpers have zero right to call anyone a pedophile.

That's it really.