The Days Are a Blur....

What on earth did I do before we got Savannah?  Every day starts out early and busy... I haven't seen this many sunrises since we went to Hawaii. I can thank Savannah for every sunrise and sunset, though.... I'm out the back door with her as soon as it's light enough to see in the morning, and the last time I walk her is when the sun is setting beyond our back pasture. And then our last trip outside just beyond the back door at night lets me see all the stars........ who knew we had this many stars in our own backyard? Somehow, the dark of night doesn't seem quite as frightening when you have a 40-pound puppy whose roar is quite deafening.

As I type this, our cat Sweet Pea is in my lap, actually sitting up in my lap with his paws on the table in front of the keyboard. He's waiting for me to look at the pictures on Pinterest.... I honestly think this cat lives for Pinterest. Thankfully, Savannah and Sweet Pea have become friends... Savannah tries to play with the cat but the best Sweet Pea can offer is an audience.  Savannah will be tossing her toys up into the air and Sweet Pea will be sitting on the edge of a chair or a counter-top, just watching the circus going on but not wanting to participate.

The invitations for our Halloween party have all been given out and mailed out now, and we will have some new faces being that we have new neighbors across the road and a couple of the tea ladies have invited their friends to the weekly Waldorf Wednesday tea parties here. No matter where we have lived, our home has been the party house, and I can't ever say I regret that. To repeat a phrase that I read on "Humans Of New York" ---  "When you have more than you need, build a bigger table instead of building a taller fence."

Speaking of "Humans Of New York," that Facebook page has been filled with stories of the refugees that are escaping terrorism overseas in the hope that a new and better life awaits them in another country. The stories are heart-breaking, to say the least... and you just can't help wanting to find safe places for all of those people so they can raise and educate their children and make new memories which would become part of their family history.                                                                                  

It just continually astounds me that such blatant hatred is so rampant in certain parts of this world. We are all living on just this one planet, people.... just this one planet, which is smaller than you think. This is the year 2015.... and supposedly the human race is not made up of barbarians... or so one would hope.  One planet... we have this one planet..... which we can all share quite nicely if everyone, every blessed one,  just gave a damn. Is that too much to ask???

One scarecrow... one flat tire.

First, the happy part.... friend C came by this morning for a minute to say hello (or so I thought) and minutes after she got into the house, she looked out the back door and said "Who's that in the courtyard over there?"  I wasn't expecting anyone, so I didn't know who on earth was outside.... and when I looked....... there was a painted scarecrow standing there.  I'm familiar with C's artwork now, so I knew she had made the scarecrow and brought it over as a surprise.  C had the scarecrow secured in a tin can with some sort of weight inside the can.... and it was so cute that I couldn't bear to put it out in the garden to be blasted by the sun, so it's sitting up on my porch near the back door. (The scarecrow is actually a she, not a he, and certainly not an 'it.')

C is a very creative artist, one whose sense of whimsy is just beyond anything I could imagine doing myself.  This isn't the first time she's surprised me with a piece of her artwork, but being that Halloween is just around the corner, this adorable scarecrow made me laugh out loud. It's so cute that calling it a 'scarecrow' is an injustice to the prettiness of it.  The head is made of a dried gourd, which C has long used for a lot of her art... the arms are made of jointed wood so they can be moved in different positions, the hands have polished fingernails... she's wearing a black wig, her expression is smiling and welcoming... and before C went home, she told me to "Dress her up and bling her out!" and that's what I did before this afternoon's tea party.

My scarecrow lady (who really does need a name) is now wearing a black witch's hat, a gold and orange beaded bracelet, a gold Mardi-Gras necklace, and she's holding a small black cat (stuffed toy) in one hand. I will look for plastic rings in the thrift store to complete her blinged-out jewelry wardrobe.  

I'm also thinking that the scarecrow lady could be kept out there and dressed up for different holidays and seasons... once Halloween is over, I can dress her up for Christmas. The possibilities are endless. That surprise was the best one I had all day.  The other 'surprise' --- not such a good one.

On my way home from town this morning, as I got nearly up to the bottom of our hill, I felt my car wobbling a bit and just not driving the way it always does. When you drive one car and get used to how it rides and feels, you just know when something is wrong. 

Being that I was so close to home, I just kept driving up the hill and pulled into our driveway and then into the garage. When I got out of the car, I walked around it... and there it was... the back passenger-side tire, flat as the proverbial pancake. And looking at it closely... there was either a nail or a screw embedded in that blasted tire.  Give me a blessed break.

No one needs a flat tire, but at least my car was on our property, in our garage, and not out on the road or in the parking lot of one of the shopping centers. Oh well. What to do... and of course my husband was in his office at work, not in his office right here at home. Oh well... it always happens that way.

I decided to call our latest handyman. (And now I do indeed use that term loosely.)  My thought was that handyman R could come out here today, take off the flat tire, put on the spare, and I could drive to the repair shop and either have the tire repaired or just buy a new one.   So  I called R.... told him about the tire... told him that I would pay for his time to come out here... and he said "No problem. I can be there within an hour and a half."

Silly me. I believed the man. Shoot me now.

My husband happened to call from his office to ask me how the day was going... I told him about the tire... told him I had called R... told him that R said he'd be here...

My husband said "And you believed him?"

Silly me. Shoot me now.

Husband suggested that I call neighbor J up the road.... and I did... and he was here within 5 minutes and fixed the tire within 20 minutes. Done. Truly, no problem.

When the spare tire was on my car and  J went back home up the road, I got my phone and sent a text message to handyman R which said  "The tire is fixed. Thanks anyway."

The response from R:  "Oh. Sorry."  (Probable translation:  "Oh. I forgot.")

I am done. Done. With. That. Handyman. Finished. Period. End of story. 

Handymen come, handymen go.  My husband and I had such great hopes for this one. Silly me. Shoot me now.

This is just a test...

.... An on-line test which tells you which career you were meant to have... found the test on Miss C's Facebook page and thought I'd take the test for fun. (My career, by the way, was in books and libraries, and I wrote two newsletters for the library I worked for... nearly 20 years' worth of the best job ever.)

And this is what the test told me I was suited for:

"You are an authentic author. You are blessed with creativity and full of ideas. You want to create beautiful things that can make others happy. You have a scary ability to create masterpieces out of sheer nothing."

Well, bless my hopeful-author's heart....

It was just a test.

What day is it?

It's Puppy Day, of course. If I thought the days were flying by before we got Savannah, I was sadly mistaken.  We are still in puppy-time, and the hours and the days are just disappearing one by blessed one.

I haven't polished my nails since Savannah arrived, but that's no fault of hers... I've been trying to catch up with my reading and just haven't taken the time to give myself a manicure.  And Pinterest... that's taken a hit as well... except for looking at pictures of dogs who are the same breed as Savannah--- a mix of Border Collie and Great Pyrenees.  As I type, Savannah is sound asleep on the floor of the breakfast room, about six inches away from the expensive doggie-bed that we bought her this morning. In time, I'm sure she will prefer the plush bed. She has already defended that bed--- our cat Gatsby tried to get into it and Savannah bounced up to him and Gatsby ran the other way.

The vintage bookplates that I bought on eBay have all arrived, and now I need to find the time to write my name on them and choose which books I will put them in... definitely the 'keeper' books rather than those I probably won't have on my shelves forever. Problem with that... about 90% of my books are keepers. (Not exactly a problem.)

I sold both of my big 'Beatrix Potter Treasury' volumes in the shop, and ordered a set of the smaller, vintage books instead. The package arrived today... 23 little books, all in excellent condition, each of them filled with the original artwork of Miss Potter's.  Love those little child-sized books, and I'll be re-reading all of the stories, as puppy-time allows.

Our inside cat Sweet Pea finally came out of the TV room this afternoon. While I was out walking Savannah, Sweet Pea went into the kitchen and he was there when I came in the back door with the puppy. Sweet Pea meowed... Savannah stared... they had seen one another through the wicker magazine rack that I put on the threshold separating the TV room with the breakfast room... but now they were in the same room together. What I thought would be a disaster was actually a Kodak moment.  Sweet Pea was up on the counter-top and felt safe, so he rolled over and put a paw out towards Savannah while his mouth opened up in a great big yawn. Savannah just put her nose up towards the counter-top and quietly sniffed. I think they'll be great friends in time.

Time. I would like more time. More seconds in an hour, more hours in a day, more days in a week. Definitely more weeks in a year. Absolutely more years in a life-time. Simple as that. (Too much to hope for?)

Post-puppy....

Let me think now.... what did I do before we adopted Savannah.... Oh yes, I remember now... I read one or two books a week, I answered letters and eMails promptly, it was very easy to keep up with my Blogs, I made all of my greeting cards and invitations, I baked every week for the Wednesday tea parties, and there was no reason to damp-mop the kitchen floor every 22 minutes because a certain puppy sticks half of her face into the water bowl when she's thirsty.

But I wouldn't change a thing. Savannah is the sweetest puppy, and because of her size (36 pounds according to the vet's scale) it's like we already have a dog, not merely a puppy.  When I said that to the assistant at the vet's office yesterday, he told me to wait a few months and then I'll really have a Dog with a capital D.

As I type, Savannah is in the corner of the breakfast room, watching me type. She watches me at the computer the same way she glances at the television when she's in the TV room. She likes bright colors and crazy sounds on the television, and -- heaven help me -- football games.  Football?  If a dog of mine is going to watch sports, then it had better be baseball. (Puppy lesson #23)

There was a big garage sale up on the main highway today... a friend of one of our Wednesday tea ladies. I drove up there not once, but twice... each time finding books. (I could find a book in the middle of a forest... if I ever were to be in the middle of a forest, that is. --Don't hold your breath on that one.)

The girl having the yard sale had an endless supply of things that no one needs, which makes me wonder why she had all of that stuff in the first place.  The books I bought looked as if no one had ever read them (which is a crying shame) and there were boxes upon boxes of movies and TV shows on DVDs.  I was not about to look through those boxes because I don't spend much time in front of the TV, but on top of one of the tables was the 20th Anniversary 4-DVD set of the Oprah Winfrey Show..... and I couldn't leave that set there for just a couple of dollars, so it came home with me.

Also calling my name at that sale was a bracelet made of vintage typewriter keys.... and of course it fit my small wrist, so how could I leave that there?  I love old typewriters, and I keep looking for an old but inexpensive one to put upstairs in my third floor library. Not to use, mind you, just to have it sitting there and adding to the vintage feel in that room. (Another decorating idea from the Pinterest boards.)

Oh yes.... that's another thing I had time for, pre-Savannah.... 'pinning' on my Pinterest boards and looking at the boards of those I follow. But Savannah will be a puppy for just a short time, and Pinterest will still be there waiting when I don't have to keep an eye on her every minute of the day.

Puppies.... how can you not love them?

We're on puppy-time here...

My mornings used to be fairly slow and easy... breakfast was quiet, sitting at the little table in the breakfast room and either looking at Pinterest boards or looking out of the window to see if any deer were feeding in the pasture.

However, now we have a puppy who has been in her crate all night.  When I first come down the back stairs into the kitchen, Savannah lifts up her head and her tail starts thumping on the blanket in her crate. I make it a point to say not only 'Good morning' to her, but to repeat her name at least half a dozen times (so she'll learn it quickly).

This morning, I made her wait in that crate until I fed the cats (really quickly) and then I opened the door of her crate so she could come out. First thing she did was go to her water bowl... she puts half of her face into that bowl, which wets her face and neck fur as she drinks, then as she walks away from the bowl, there is a constellation of water drops all over that part of the tile floor. The kitchen tiles are dark green... you can see every drop from the other side of the room. (I've already made a note on my shopping list to buy extra boxes of those Swiffer wet-cloths for the floor.)

Out the back door we went this morning, up the road with Savannah on her leash like a little lady--- no pulling, no walking back and forth in front of me... and when a neighbor's truck came along, she sat behind my legs till the truck had passed. Yesterday, we met friend J and her daughter (with their two dogs) and Savannah now has two doggie-friends. This morning when we got up to that part of the road, she sat there as if she were expecting the same little parade.  I may have to schedule doggie-walks so she will have a canine social life on the road here.

Happy day.... we have a very well-behaved puppy who has slept quietly in her crate (except for barking at 3:00 that first morning because there were coyotes in the pasture). Savannah seems content with her toys, her puppy-food, and her new life.  She is still getting used to both my husband and myself, and she's wanting to play with the cats but they're not taking her up on her offer just yet.  Sweet Pea is still keeping his distance (mostly on his cat-tower in the TV room), Mickey and Gatsby are both outside cats but they have followed Savannah and I up the road on our morning walks, keeping their distance without relinquishing their innate curiosity.

All is well in Savannah's doggie world, and I think we made a good choice with this puppy. I hope she feels the same.

New Puppy = New Blog

So much to write about this new puppy... so of course I couldn't sleep last night and came downstairs after midnight to type.  I've started a new Blog which will be all about Savannah.  To get to the link, click on 'View My Complete Profile' and all of my Blog links will be there at the top of the page.

A Puppy Named Savannah.... sounds good to me for a title.  Speaking of 'sounds,' we haven't heard her bark yet... but she's just getting used to us and to the house, so maybe she doesn't have much to say right now.  Sweet Pea (our inside cat) has had a lot to say since we brought Savannah home yesterday.

Note to self: Do not (do NOT) pick up Sweet Pea when Savannah is in the room.... I now have skid marks on my neck and back, as a result of Sweet Pea trying to get away from Savannah, whose only insult to that cat was to look at him with a big sweet puppy smile.

It was time to 'get real' --

I love that phrase:  "Get real... get a dog."  It's from one of my favorite books, "The Mountaintop School for Dogs," by Ellen Cooney.

My husband and I got real today..... we adopted a Border Collie/Great Pyrenees puppy.... gorgeous honey- and white-colored five-month-old female with the sweetest disposition and the most gentle eyes.... I named her Savannah, after one of my most favorite cities in the US.  (I tried to think of a name from somewhere in England, but nothing seemed to 'fit' her as well as Savannah.)

Our dog Gracie passed away over five years ago, and we've been without a dog ever since.... just couldn't get ourselves to go puppy-shopping, and we kept coming up with reasons why we shouldn't get another dog.  This week, we couldn't come up with any more reasons.  It was time, it was just time to be a real family again.  And even though we have one inside cat and two outside cats, nothing quite makes a family than having a dog in your home. (Unless one has children, of course, which we don't.... and our pets have always been our four-legged furry kids.)

So we started looking for dogs and puppies on the Internet.... I found a two-yr-old Great Pyrenees.... my husband found some Border Collie mixes.... we settled on this particular Border Collie/Great Pyrenees mix because the puppy's pictures on the Internet were very cute, the owner said her daughter just didn't have time to take care of the dogs (there was also a male, along with the female), and the owner was willing to meet with us today so we could see the dog.  (It seems funny to me that as I was looking for puppies and dogs on the Internet, I didn't look at the fluffy little lap-dogs.... I was looking at the larger breeds.  Out here in the hills, I guess my old dream of having a little fluff-ball-puppy to dress up isn't part of this reality anymore.)

Off we went..... to a McDonald's in Hempstead.... and right there in the Big Mac parking lot, we met this beautiful dog waiting in the back of the lady's truck. Waiting, and very scared.... probably the dog's first very long ride........ she had been used to being an outside dog, with the run of a very nice and well-kept kennel, along with her brother.  So there we were, trying to make friends with this very nervous puppy who clearly wanted to say hello but didn't exactly know what to do.

We took our time... my husband kept talking to the dog... I kept talking to the woman and her daughter, asking questions about the dog's food and daily habits.... and then I looked at my husband and he smiled and nodded his head, silently telling me that we had found a great dog.

I had brought along the leash we always used for Gracie, plus one of Gracie's old blankets.... we paid for the puppy, got her into our car (after hugging the lady and her daughter and promising to give the dog a very good home).... and I sat in the back seat with the dog so she wouldn't be scared.  It took her about two minutes to settle down onto that blanket... she put her head on my lap, her two front paws on my hand, and she went into a sound sleep and only opened her eyes if the car went over a bump.

Instead of going directly home, we stopped at the store and my husband went in and spent nearly $80.00 on food, biscuits, toys, treats, water and food dishes, grooming supplies, and a container of Blue Bell ice cream to celebrate the newest member of our little family.

All the way home, we had been tossing names back and forth.... the name that sounded the best and seemed to 'fit' best for this beautiful little (soon to be big) dog was Savannah.... one of my favorite places on the planet.  We've been to Savannah twice... it was a gentle and old-fashioned city, filled with charm and goodness, southern hospitality and friendly people who were always smiling.  I think of Savannah as a city filled with endless hope and happy dreams.... and when I remember our two trips to that beautiful city, I just have to smile and feel blessed to have gone there.

As I type, Savannah is in Gracie's old puppy-crate, which she may out-grow before she gets out of the puppy stage.  Which is fine... we'll just buy her a larger crate if she needs one, or she may be able to 'graduate' to a plush and soft doggie-bed.  Savannah slept for most of the afternoon, curled up on Gracie's old blanket, which I used to make the bottom of the crate nice and soft and cozy for her.

This beautiful honey and white puppy has no blessed idea of just how spoiled and loved she will be in the years to come. But... the love she will give to us will be beyond measure.

Ex Libris

I have become fascinated by bookplates.... who knew there were so many vintage designs out there in the book world?  (Pinterest knew, that's who.)

The Antioch Bookplate Company seems to have been the most popular back in the day when every serious reader would pick their own 'Ex Libris' ("From The Library Of") design and paste those little paper labels into their books.  "Back in the day" in this case translates to personal libraries filled with hardcover books, not softcover re-issues. (And certainly not softcover re-issues with pictures of the actors who are starring in the movie version of any particular book.)

I've looked through hundreds of bookplate designs... so many great choices--- who can pick just one? The Antioch Company isn't out there any longer (they were taken over by another company) but the vintage Antioch designs can still be found on eBay, and for much less money than if you chose a new company to create your own unique bookplate design.

Personally, I like the vintage designs, especially the ones with the library scenes.... I have ordered some of those on eBay.  Actually, I've ordered a lot of those on eBay, and expect to get them all by the end of next week.

I did some research on Google about bookplates... do they diminish the value of a hardcover?  Some say yes, others say no... some say the 'Ex Libris' labels add to the volume's history... others say that once your bookplate goes into the book, then you cannot 'gift' that book to another reader.

As usual, I beg to differ.  Somehow, having a book with someone else's bookplate adds to the history of the book.... and you can always add your own bookplate to the volume.  I don't often lend my books out, but when I do, it would be nice to have them marked with my 'Ex Libris' label as they go out the door.

I am anxiously awaiting the delivery of the vintage labels... and then I'll be upstairs in my library, deciding which books deserve a vintage Antioch bookplate.  (All of them.)

"A Walk in The Woods"

We went to the movies this afternoon to see the film adaptation of Bill Bryson's "A Walk in The Woods."  Definitely my favorite book of Bryson's, and I've read them all.

When I heard that Robert Redford would be playing Bryson, I shook my head in disbelief... not that there's anything wrong with Redford, but he just didn't seem to match the look of Bryson.  That being said, Redford wasn't bad in the role, but still, he didn't fit the image or character of Bill Bryson. I don't know exactly who I would have put in that role, but it wouldn't have been Redford.  Hats off to Redford, though, for aging gracefully without plastic surgery that would turn him into an unrecognizable face in the Hollywood crowd.

As I was reading "A Walk in The Woods" years ago, I was laughing in each of the chapters, and telling my husband that he really needed to read that book. For a man who reads technical volumes but hardly ever reads for the simple pleasure of reading, he did read Bryson's book, and loved it. Actually, we both liked that book so much that I started buying it as gifts for friends.  And I've re-read "A Walk in The Woods" since that first reading.

So there we were in the theater this afternoon, waiting for certain scenes from the book to appear on the screen... some of the best parts from the book were omitted in the movie. And there were scenes in that movie that weren't in the book at all, and didn't need to be on the screen. I have to wonder why the Powers That Be in the movie industry don't trust the insights and creativity of the authors of these very popular books. Honestly... if a book is that good  then cutting some of the chapters out of the film isn't going to make the movie better and adding things that never happened in the book isn't exactly proper either.

Oh well.  The movie was fine. The book, however, was great. I hope Bill Bryson was pleased both with Redford and the adaptation of his work.  And I also have to wonder how many people will want to be walking along the Appalachian Trail after seeing this film... the panoramic scenes along the way were just beautiful.  (I can count myself out of those trail-walkers.... if I want that experience, I'll just re-read Bryson's book.)

Labor Day Weekend

I spent time yesterday and today taking out the Halloween decorations and arranging black cats, smiling witches, and happy pumpkins all over the inside of the house. We are ready for Halloween..... the outside doesn't get decorated at all except for a few ceramic pumpkins here and there around the yard.

We don't get trick-or-treating kids out here... and what's the sense of putting outside decorations up when the end result is nesting wasps and bees and mounds of fire ants. So thank you, but no thank you.... I keep the decorations inside the house and that's that.  Invitations are made for our Halloween party next month, and until then, we get to enjoy the happy/friendly faces of the cats and witches and pumpkins. (No horrible Halloween here... it's all happy, happy, happy.)

Handyman R was here today.... he spent some hours pulling up weeds and cleaning out flowerbeds. The previous owner of this property was either a gardening saint or a gardening martyr..... way too many decorative flowerbeds around this house, considering that rainfall up here in the hills is not exactly normal or even remotely regular.  I keep thinking of our small yard back in Clear Lake, with the so-convenient sprinkling system that came on after midnight and kept everything green and watered and growing so nicely.  Out here in the hills, growing anything at all seems to always be such a challenge. (And for someone who doesn't like the dirt, the ants, the spiders, the scorpions... it's more than a challenge... it's a nightmare of the utmost proportions.)

With that in mind.... I called the father/son landscaping duo that we used to have here before my husband bought the riding mower.  I spoke to the son (who is now in his third year of college) and asked him if his family would know anyone who would be interested in taking the apartment over our barn in exchange for taking care of the landscaping on our property.  Seems like such a great exchange... someone who loves to cut grass and pull weeds and plant flowers..... they get the apartment, we get the work done. (Without having to wait for handyman R to pull into our driveway at nearly noon when we expected him to be here by nine o'clock in the morning.)

So... we'll see what happens... I'm keeping my fingers crossed.  My hopes are high right now because I just finished reading one of the memoirs of Beverley Nichols.... he had a very old home in the English countryside that came with its own gardener, Mr. Oldfield.   For nearly 40 years, Oldfield took care of growing, cutting, mowing, planting, trimming, pruning, weeding, seeding, fertilizing, watering.... whatever was to be done in the gardens, Oldfield did it.  The man worked from morning till night and loved it all as if it were his own..... and stopped working in his mid-80s only because his body just couldn't do the work any longer.

Now.... I'm not looking for someone to work from sun-up till sun-down until they're 85.... but it would be very nice to have someone to just take care of things outside without having to be told what to do and when to do it.... and my wish would be for that person to really enjoy the work, and the 'free' apartment.

In my dreams... only in my dreams... and in the books of Beverley Nichols.