Keyless, Carless, and Braless?

I ended up at our little yellow house without my keys or my car. I found my bra after it had been missing for two days. On Thursday last I was at The Beauty Junction. Getting some help in the beauty department. I had an ache in my back that spread and pretty much exploded. In nurse speak I had a "syncopial episode". I nearly fainted from the pain. I layed on the massage table and disrobed a bit. An intense feeling of warmth always precedes actual fainting. Then the nausea arrived. Oh Joy. Not. Joe was called. Everyone at the beauty shop took wonderful care of me. I managed to pay my bill and send my car out to be washed! That's how I lost my car and keys. Joe arrived and whisked me away. I threw up in his truck. I was so sorry. Joe loves me so he didn't care at all. He cleaned it up while I was in the house still being violently sick. We went to the ER. No, not the one five minutes away. We drove seventy miles to another ER because we are NUTS! That is where my bra got shoved in my purse not to be found for two days while I recovered at the yellow house. Friday morning found me braless, keyless and carless in a drug-induced fog. Stoned from the kidney stones.

Olive Out

Cheesestraws and Pie

What does a sense of place mean? I have been reading for the second time Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes. The movie is not at all like the book. She is from Fitzgerald, Georgia. She discusses being a Southern woman at length. How we have a sense of place. Her house in Tuscany, Bramasole, called to her. Call me crazy but I feel the same about our little yellow house. I don't feel it as a status or prestige thing...."my house is better than your". No never that. The yellow house feels right for us. As if it was waiting for us. I am overjoyed that pink camillas are blooming now by the deck. The neighbors have given me their phone numbers and all have said to call for "anything". They say come borrow whatever you need. Is that not all kinds of awesome? This little yellow house has enveloped us and so have our neighbors. They brought homemade cheesestraws and pie. Choclate pie. I sit here in the old house, chilly, cat on lap knowing we have a charming place with delightful people and pie.

Olive Out

Until It Leaks

It has been raining here since midnight. A nice steady rain. We have a tin roof, or rather some sort of metal roof on the old house. The rain on that roof is soothing. Until it leaks. Which did not happen today. Yet. One morning, a Saturday that Joe was working, rain was falling hard. Really hard and the wind was blowing from the east said Joe. I heard a waterfall. Waterfall? In my sleep it didn't quite register. In Joe's office rain, a lot of rain, was falling. I was instantly awake. I had to grab bowls from the kitchen. Where are the buckets? I didn't have any. Sweet.

Olive Out

What? Who Me?

Our child CC is a college freshman. As a teenager she can make me mad or drive me to madness, all in the same moment. It's her mission. Really she is an awesome person. This morning one of those tender moments happened. I was very sleepy. I nearly missed it. She is not feeling physically well today, has a heavy class load. She said, "talking to you Mom always makes me feel better." What? Who me? There she goes sweetness and light. I love her guts.

Olive Out

Why Painters Drink

I know why painters drink beer. After painting nearly every surface of our *vacation* house I need a beer, a prayer, or something. The worst part is I am not finished. I or I should say we just stopped. For a while. Joe my Wonderful Husband does his share by far. He has a job. Somebody in this marriage has to go to work every day. I do have a retirement salary. I attempt to make Joe's life easier any way I can. That is my pleasure as I love him dearly. But back to the painting. I picked out Behr Opal Cream for the main living spaces. It is the color of real butter. Pale pale yellow. It's warm and comforting. All my old and found objects look good in the room against it. Last week I painted two walls before I realized they were not as yellow as the rest. More white. Really? I thought. The Home Depot had mixed the correct color in the wrong base. At that juncture I went with the flow. Close enough I say. I do not drink beer. I do pray. No one except for me and Joe will ever know. Joe knows cause I told him ninety times. Olive Out

A Wimp With Sparks

The electrical wiring in our old house is not for wimps. I am a wimp. I nearly caught the house on fire the other day. It was a freak accident. The house is made of fatlighter. One tiny fire and whoosh! It's gone. We don't use candles and such for this reason.
I read, type, watch TV in a large ugly recliner. A table is to my left and a stool to my right with books and whatever. On the floor is a four prong plug. This is where the phone, laptop and everything gets juice. On that eventful morning it was before eight am. It was early for fire. Not that one wants to scheduale it. I placed a many strand sterling silver necklace on the stool. I bought this necklace at Express in the mall. It's the only thing I would buy from that store. Not being a size 2 and all. I'm just saying. The Express necklace fell directly into the four prong plug. Sparks flew up. I saw fire. I tired to move fast. I had the precious internet in my lap. The electricity went out. It was quite dark. The plug ate my necklace. It has a burned bite mark on it. The outlet is burned. The breaker on the spider porch tripped. Dear Lord I was shaking . At that very moment Wonderful Husband walked in the door. He turned on the electricty and calmed me. That's how he got his name. Olive Out

Old House and Eight Legs

Having lived in a house that is over one hundred years old for over six years now I have a new view of old homes. That mine comes with the most wonderful husband is why I have lived here this long. For no other reason. So many reasons not to like this house. The main one has eight legs. Multiply that by eleventy thousand times and that is how many spiders we live with. Wonderful husband says they do not bite. For the record he has never been bitten in thirty years of living here. Well I am overjoyed by that. No joy is found in the copious amount of webbing they put everywhere. Spiders don't spare anything from these hideous webs.
Wonderful husband insists they benefit us by killing insects. An actual cockroach would not stand a bat's chance here. I see a roach carcass on the backporch on occasion. Spiders are efficient that way. The backporch is covered in webs. I cringe. I shudder. I need to clean it. I cannot. The spiders won it. The inside of the house I keep relatively clean. Vacuumning is essential. I worry about that porch at times. So many nooks and crannies. Would an exterminator ever kill all of them? No.

Olive Out