Saturday, October 13, 2001

I can't get used to these new versions!

Posted at 11:30 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Very tired, very dirty (well, mostly clean now, I guess, except for some impossible bits under my fingernails), but very satisfied. We spent 6 1/2 hours digging, "soil amending," planting a zillion bulbs, and mulching (to describe lots of heavy physical labour in a simplified way). As always, we finished way after dark. The clampy lamp came in very handy. For once, the weather was good, though--not pouring rain, not freezing cold, but gorgeous and warm and cloudy. I took some really cool photos of the clouds reflected on the side of my Beagle; I don't know yet how they came out. I also got three pounds of nice black rocks for the top layer on my indoor forcing bulbs (narcissuses--one bowl of five whites, and one of five yellows) at Smith & Hawkins. And a tall vanilla dry cappuccino at the Glastonbury Starbucks, of course, since it's right across from S&H. :-) There are so many beautiful trees out right now--all colours, all along the highway. And the maple at the bottom of my road is completely orange today, flaming.

My new set of basement tapes boots arrived today, too, to my ultra-surprise and delight. (!!!!!) It's the improved four disc set, A Tree With Roots. Wow. Wow. Wow. Thank you soooooooo much, Susan. (I don't think she reads this blog, but thanks in any case!) I'm listening to disc one right now. "One For the Road." It sounds different. Slower, somehow. And so clear. "People Get Ready" is playing now. Richard. Oh, gosh, Richard.

Posted at 11:12 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Friday, October 12, 2001

MY TREE!!! On the way home from Murasaki, we visited my tree in the dark. It's so incredible lit up at night, the big white branches luminous, alive. I jumped out of the car and ran over to touch it, to crane my neck backward and stare up into the white white arms reaching into the black sky. I smiled and smiled so much that my face hurt.

Posted at 9:31 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Thursday, October 11, 2001

All right, that clinches it. My favourite character is clearly Xander. And the second season premiere (minus the Xander and Willow parts) was almost as tiresome as "Angel." It also gave me a nosebleed...

Posted at 6:18 PM by Laura W. Petix.

I'm completely behind on reading The Band guestbook (with not much inclination to catch up; lately, they hardly ever discuss Band stuff that I care about), so I was just glancing over some of the recent entries. I found Peter Viney's post interesting:

"Today the Guardian ran a feature where several major figures in various fields responded to the question, 'Did the world change on September 11th?' While it has no relation to The Band, I think some of you may appreciate the reply by novelist Ian McEwan: 'In company, conversational monomania; in solitude, brooding worst-case daydreams; addiction to TV news and newspapers; unwarranted fatigue; loss of concentration; tendency to sighing; heightened distaste for religions; troubled sleep; uneasy dreams; suspicion of certain passengers in airport lounges; fear of flying; wariness of crowds; aversion to enclosed spaces; generalised anxiety; paranoia; misanthropy; cultural pessimism; indefinable melancholy; darker sense of humour. Otherwise, everything much the same.'"

The subject of how other people have reacted fascinates me... mostly because I can't relate to it at all. All right, there, I've admitted it in public. I haven't experienced even one of those responses.

Posted at 3:27 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Oh man oh man oh man oh man... the basement tapes are so flipping great, it's flipping mind-blowing. Singing along to "A Fool Such As I" while walking back up the hill, weavening drunkenly, visions of sycamore bark overfilling my brain... God, I can be happy these days!

Posted at 2:52 PM by Laura W. Petix.

I'm off for a walk to visit my local sycamore tree, with Genuine Basement Tapes volume one. It's gorgeous outside.

Posted at 2:09 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Oh, so I've watched the whole first season now? No, I still wouldn't call myself hooked, although I did feel a little more "connected" a few times during the last one. Here are my purely subjective reactions:

"Best" episode - "Prophecy Girl" (basically, there were just a lot of good parts)
"Worst" episode - "Nightmares" (it didn't make any sense, it was too fantastical, most of the dreams were nothing special, and it used the reset button) (also, Xander should've really been naked... that boxer shorts thing was a cop-out)
Most enjoyable episode - "The Pack" (part of it might have been my mood; I don't know...)
Most tiresome episode - "Angel" (bleah... I could barely get through it; I kept checking my watch and had to force myself to watch the whole thing... this was the only episode I actively disliked, though)
Favourite character - Hmmm... I don't really know yet. I'm not obsessed with any of them, let's put it that way. However, I do like all the "scooby gang" members.
Least favourite character - All the vampires. I can't stand the vampire stuff. Including and sometimes especially Angel. The MOTW episodes are such a relief.

Posted at 4:04 AM by Laura W. Petix.

I can only recall having visited two other Starbucks. One was in Greenbelt, Maryland, near the now out-of-business Super Crown bookstore where my niece January used to work. Actually, maybe I actually didn't visit there... I think I wanted to go there, but it was closed at some absurdly early hour, much to my disgust. The other one was (I think) near Yale University... if I remember correctly, they had nice chairs or couches or something, and sold Krispy Kreme donuts (where they got them, I do not know... there are no Krispy Kreme branches in Connecticut).

Posted at 1:41 AM by Laura W. Petix.

Ha, "starbuckseverywhere.net"... one fellow's mission to visit all Starbucks everywhere. The cool thing is, he has photos of all my favourite Connecticut locations (for some reason, the page is titled "Hartford," but really only one is actually in the city). Not that it's anything special to look at, but the Oats Starbucks (a.k.a. Bishops Corner in West Hartford) is here. Actually, I parked in that spot right beside the lamppost today. The Glastonbury branch (famous for its mauve chairs) is a little prettier. And good old Manchester... well, they all look pretty similar, don't they? (You know, he really ought to take photos of the insides of the stores, not the fronts.) I've also been to the LaSalle branch (that's the one in West Hartford Center) and the one on Rt. 4 in Farmington, but none of the others. I'll have to try the Avon Marketplace... that can't be too far from the My Tree area. I think there's also one in Bristol which isn't on his list (I haven't been there, either).

Posted at 1:24 AM by Laura W. Petix.

Wednesday, October 10, 2001

I liked that almost-redshirt guy on Enterprise today. He reminded me of Kevin Riley, my all-time favourite minor character from TOS. Of course, we'll probably never see him again.

Posted at 10:28 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Is publishing ever going to be available? Blogger's been wacky since last night. Anyway, today was a really gorgeous afternoon (no wonder--I went to Wild Oats). I've been playing my Blood On The Tracks tracks CD-R (a mix of songs from the actual album and outtakes from the New York sessions, plus a few more) for the past two days... "Little rooster crowin', there must be something on his mind..." Wow, "Meet Me In the Morning" with my moonroof and windows open, perfect temperature air flowing past... amazing. "Something There Is About You" has also been particularly incredible. It's so alive. Oh, I got a closer look at that great tree across the street from Oats. It's a really big and spready white birch. Nice.

We dropped my Beagle off for its 20,000 mile service appointment tonight (really it's only driven 11,111 miles, though), so I can't go anywhere tomorrow. Maybe I'll take a walk down to see the sycamore near the cemetery! Since we have to take the Beagle to Glastonbury now that snobby New Country (home of BMWs, Mercedes, and the like) has stopped servicing VWs, we met at Smith & Hawkins and looked at all the bulb forcing paraphernalia. We got two cool shaped clear glass vases for the top of the tall Bonds, to force some in rocks. One will be for hyacinths; for the other I got three paperwhite narcissuses. :-)

Posted at 10:20 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Things I exclaimed just now:
"Pick up that teacup, Giles!" (he didn't listen, and of course it broke)
(also, it looked as if it could have been Darjeeling with cream)
"Yes!!! Ha!" (Patsy Cline!!!)
"Ha! Oooh." (re: the cross and "How can I say this clearly? I don't like you.")
(I don't like him either. I did like that episode, though, despite the vampire elements.)

Posted at 2:17 PM by Laura W. Petix.

The lyrics to "This Wheel's On Fire", according to the speech recognition software on Dean's new laptop:


  "Day We Know" (read by Laura & Dean)

In your man wearing their way where
They are in the NBA
Signs I'm surprised by online main
Fans say the 46 to eight
No analyzing, he
Women not a stampede pass
From now and in San Jose
Issue in memory serves me well

This week 055
Rolling-member of
Back notify my mouth of the
This annual shell exploded

The median memory serves the U.N.
Heard done to have a hearing the
San Rafael, and say why is not
Been trying the game or a
Invited ratio area that every yours
But the world goes so far to sell
Buy a new magazine when the am
A young man race area where

This new York bonfire
Rolling down the road
Race in those five nine months of shame
That we will sell its load

If you're a man race series in my
Your free man there's no idea why
That, I two five--
Be an easier game. I
Enhance their memory lane and a
In more and more detail
New menu in the NBA
In your memory serves me well

This week 055
Rolling down the road
That notify my next step in
The studio Foulkes low

Posted at 12:57 AM by Laura W. Petix.

Tuesday, October 09, 2001

Twelve! You have to buy twelve drinks, not ten, to get a free one from the Coffee Beanery. How hideous. One of my tree books from the library says that American Sycamores can live to be 500 years old. If My Tree is 400 years old, that means it will only live another 100 years!!!

Posted at 10:47 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Success on the ornament front today. I got my first store-bought (as opposed to Internet-bought) one of the season. Oh, and the Coffee Beanery makes much better cappuccinos than Borders does! They're sort of inconvenient, as it's a pain to have to walk through the mall (although I'll have to do that when the "coming soon" Starbucks comes, too, of course), but they are pretty cheap and very scrummy. The foam isn't thick at all--it's quite bubbly--but at least it's fairly abundant, and the main thing is that for some reason their cappuccinos taste really good. I don't know if it's the type of syrup they use, or the espresso, or what, but they are almost creamy flavoured. They also have that "buy 10 get one free" card thing like Borders does. The bad thing is that I can't use Borders gift cards there, and I like using Borders gift cards. They're so much better than cash, because then you don't wind up with a ton of useless change every time you buy coffee.

I picked up my mauve book at the Middletown library; I hope it's interesting. I also got a zillion tree books. Ha. Oh, and my free patterns arrived in the mail... will I ever actually use them? Knowing my extreme lack of knowledge in the field of how to use patterns, I have my doubts. Besides, I'm so fond of making things up as I go along. Maybe I'll give it a try, though. Maybe.

Posted at 6:21 PM by Laura W. Petix.

"Maybe it's a vampire bat." Okay, I actually laughed at that one.

Posted at 1:13 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Oooh, "Freeze warning for tonight... While touches of frost or pockets of freezing conditions occurred in the warning area this morning, tonight freeze damage will be far worse. Freezing temperatures overnight will damage cold sensitive plants which remain unprotected. In addition, windshield ice scrapers may be of help for some early morning suburban travelers. ...Near record cold is expected in parts of southern New England early Tuesday." My blues are going to be toast! Or, more accurately, frozen lettuce-y smush. We brought in the smaller bonsai and covered the chrysanthemums. Oh, and in doing so, saw evidence of some naughty creature who had dug up some of the bulbs! I'm not sure if it actually ate any of them, though, because there were still bulbs in the uncovered spots. I've never seen squirrels around here, so maybe it was a mouse. In retaliation, we laid out sliced-open habanero peppers. Heh heh heh...

This pomegranate is insanely great. Nearly two hours later, I'm still eating it.

Posted at 12:58 AM by Laura W. Petix.

Monday, October 08, 2001

Eating pomegranates is such an art form.

Posted at 11:29 PM by Laura W. Petix.

I'm right now this very minute eating my first pomegranate of the year. It's a good one--deep red, huge, beautiful and delicious.

My socialization today with my sister and her husband was successful. As always following such activities (social contact in general, not seeing my sister in particular), I am somewhat drained. I gave them a tour of my place, and we went to West Hartford (in my Beagle; I drove) for lunch. Quite a few places were closed because it was after 2:30, but Elbow Room wasn't, and we had a tasty meal. Their "chicken pot pie with huge cheddar biscuit" should not be allowed to be called that, though: it doesn't have any crust! It was still good, however. Yes, I hate chicken, but I was cold. Oh, and they had a Farmington Valley guide thingy there, which revealed some very exciting news: a Starbucks is "coming soon" to the Westfarms Mall! Ha!!!! Borders' cafe will soon be seeing a lot less of me, I predict... (Good riddance to that curly-haired dude!) I've always thought it was strange that the Westfarms area doesn't have a Starbucks. Of course, there's a huge possibility that they won't make consistently good drys. I'm sure the Oats Starbucks will always be the best.

I wish this horrible ragweed (or whatever it is torturing me) would leave. Maybe the cold weather will kill it off? A bunch of the upper blossoms on my blues in back were frosted this morning. But no doubt ragweed is a heartier beast.

Posted at 11:05 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Sunday, October 07, 2001

Buttery English muffin with splotchily-spread fig jam: Mmmm. And P.S., My Tree's descendant is named Gifford (for obvious reasons). It suits him.

Here's another photo of My Tree; this gives you an idea of its size, but not its beauty. Most of the gorgeous white camouflage branches are too wide or tall to fit in the picture. The tiny figure standing to the left of the trunk is Dean.

Oh, one other thing I forgot: my first eBay ornaments arrived today! I like them a lot.

Posted at 2:05 AM by Laura W. Petix.

Things I did today (Saturday, not Sunday):
1) Woke to the sound of hard rain beating against my chaise window; opened the cellular shade (top-down) to watch.
2) Got up at 11:00!
3) Talked to my sister on the phone; she's going to come on Monday!
4) Bought 150 little early spring flowering bulbs (a zillion different varieties of crocus, snowdrops, mini-iris, grape hyacinth). They look like garlic.
5) Bought 18 fat tulip bulbs (six varieties; 2 each of four and 5 each of two) and 10 beautiful round hyacinth bulbs (5 purple and 5 pale creamy yellow). The hyacinth bulbs look like onions.
6) Visited MY TREE!!!!!!!!!!
7) Touched one of the gorgeous high-up peely branches on My Tree (by climbing up the steep hill to the top of the road); it was so smooth and soft.
8) Had dinner at Puerto Vallarta in West Hartford, which was actually quite enjoyable even though I am not fond of Mexican food. The coffee was very good (it reminded me of the coffee at the Four Seasons hotel in Boston) and cured my excruciating headache.
9) Helped Dean pot My Tree's extremely cute descendant (which I bought for him from Famous & Historic Trees); snuggled it with pieces of fallen-off peely bark I stole from under My Tree and carpet-style moss harvested from our land.
10) Cleaned my room and my bathroom like mad whilst listening to 1966 Hotel Room music (still didn't remove the pieces of thread, though; it was too late at night to vacuum).

Posted at 1:16 AM by Laura W. Petix.