1) I’ve been away from most social media during the past week, except to post a column, and generally that’s been good.
2) Dining with a friend on Wednesday, the sudden horror of realizing that Thanksgiving is NEXT WEEK! How did that happen?!
2a) Thank goodness all I have to do is bake a cake and show up.
3) The contractor’s estimate for the kitchen renovation has come in. My first thought was that we are not going to get started in January, as I’d hoped. Next I remembered Robert Lawson’s definition of “estimate” from his amusing glossary of country life in WWII Connecticut, Country Colic. It begins: “A form of light fiction, generally in four parts, each increasing by 50%.”
3a) I am going to have to rethink some features of Howard Johnson’s at Versailles . . .
4) Yoga last Sunday, and last night (Thursday). Movement in my right leg has become stiffer, which indicates a need for . . . more yoga!
5) After maybe or maybe not being almost followed home one night last week, I was surprised when waiting to cross my street at the stoplight this afternoon to find two young men of high school age stop about two feet behind me. Usually the kids talk to each other, but these two, obviously together, did not. I grew the distance between us to the curb. When the walk light came on I continued on my way, and they were perhaps 6-10 feet behind me. One went into the corner hangout, the other slooooooooowly continued in my direction. He didn’t pass my house until I’d moved the trashcans back to their proper places and gone inside. Through the parlor window I saw him continue slowly down the street.
5a) Doyle’s closing means there’s less public traffic here, and I don’t think that’s a good thing.
6) This afternoon I finally started moving boxes from home out of the dining room, with only a bit of unpacking. But I found two bags of chicory coffee I’d bought last March - just as my supply in the freezer was running out!