Margo

Main Street Margo.

There's still no place like home.

In the Graveyard

Everett and I went for a sunshiny drive this afternoon and stopped at the Margo cemetery to visit Mom's grave. As I gave him the tour of the resting places of his great-great-great grandparents and suchlike, we noticed this tombstone. I like the epitaph. It's not often enough that words on the marker tell us much about the departed other than their birth and death dates, how they were related to us, and sometimes how we felt about them -- our dearly beloved, ever missed, darling ones. This pithy sentence gives me a pretty lively image of the lady herself.

Everett remarked that having a name like "Sunshine" has to be a good thing, for anyone.

TNT Cafe

An unexpected early run to town one morning to deliver a truck for repairs bought me breakfast in one of the local eateries on Main St.

Why I Don't Have a Tattoo

Little Gal

Her Sweetness got all dressed up for a wedding.

I stopped over at Cara's and Trea gave me a smile and showed off her walking. But when Scott came in and squatted down, she ran right into his arms. I swear that man is a baby magnet.

Workin' Men

Poor ol' Shnevy was enlisted to spend the day mucking out a mouldy basement on one of Scott's jobs today..

The Finger

How drivers in rural Saskatchewan acknowledge each other when they meet on the road.

Usually it’s men who do this (I think); I’m the only woman I know who does. Speak up, gals, if you do it too. Figure I must have picked this up from Dad.

Do drivers do this where you live? And if not, is there another signal they use?

***

Grandma enjoyed her drive, and we dined at Scott's grandma's, and then Emil started coughing and ended up horking up his meal, and almost causing me to lose mine, since I have no stomach for hearing the heaves or cleaning up the mess. It must have been quite unpleasant to listen to us both gagging. Strangely, no one offered to help! Heh.

He's fine. Musta had some post-nasal drip or just caught some cookie in the wrong tube. Sounds like he's considering coming home for the long weekend. Maybe. Oy, you'd think he couldn't wait to get out of here or something.

Stopped in to see Cara's new place (Cara's my niece) and admire it and her two adorable children. Oh, and her fella Chris of course. They've bought this house in Kelvington so will be able to put down some roots to raise their kids.

Warm starry night. Gorgeous. I might just go outside and admire the sky for a while too.

Routine Weekend

Me 'n' Smartypants

More than a week ago I sat here in front of Photobooth and took a picture to post on the day this page was "Blog of Note" and then, in my usual absentminded way, forgot all about it till just now when I happened to run across it.

Five days in a row without rain. This is the first rainfree stretch longer than four days, since May. Unless I'm mistaken— which I probably am.

Everett and I are just back from town, where he did laundry and I picked up Emil and went for groceries.

That's my day: uneventful, routine, and fine with me.

What Everett Made This Week

Fafard Horses Adorn Banks of St. Lawrence River in Quebec City

Read the full story here.

Gorgeous Day

Looking north from the end of our driveway. Yes, some people can combine.



















Looking across the road.



















Looking south. My usual route for walking.



















Looking up, my first sighting of a bald eagle this year.

Last Blooms

Heron in Tree

Usually we see the great blue heron either standing on its flamingo legs in a slough, or flapping slowly away, as herons are shy birds. When I startled this one it flew off and landed in a tree, something I've never seen before.

A Good Time Was Had

Flooded land on both sides of the highway on my way to the WomenOnlyWeekend.

There are so many dead trees out in the water that it's almost eerie driving past.


















Gals chit-chattin on the first night.


















Our host hosted a house concert; these two gals from Vancouver have been touring Western Canada and stopped in to give us a show in the sunroom.

Sara Ciantar and Hilary Grist are their names, should you care to check out their music. We were a small audience, only eight or so, but we bought up lots of their CDs so we assume they went away happy. We certainly enjoyed their show, those talented girly-sues.



















This was the weekend of the pumpkin fest in the hamlet we were in, so there was a parade — one horse-drawn cart that gave rides that passed by the sunroom during the concert.



















While the travelling minstrels packed up, they were serenaded by the house band.


















And on Saturday night, there were fireworks so we strolled over to the community centre and enjoyed the show.


















Of course we had shooters.

And representing the canine contingent was Ebony, the one-eyed wonder:

Blog of Note Today

Wooden glasses. Picked up at a garage sale.

***

Life at Golden Grain Farm is mentioned on the Words of Wisdom webpage (thank you kindly, folks) and I’ve been asked to link to three entries that I consider my best. Heh! Easier said than done, as my entries don’t adhere to themes nor are they given much more thought than what it takes to dash ‘em off and be done with 'em. For readers visiting this page for the first time, I’ve simply chosen three entries that might give a taste of what you’ll find here and that didn't require me to read too far back:

•Sneaky Bugger, in which my sweetheart pulls a fast one.

•The Corn is as High as an Elephant’s Eye, in which, in spite of loss and change, life seems pretty good.

•White Knucklin’, in which I take a drive with Everett, age 17, and offer a glimpse of son Emil, age 21.

Various and Sundry

This ladyhead vase belonged to Aunt Jean, who would be 95 or 96 if she was still living.

I have other treasures to remind me of Aunt Jean, too. I'll show them to you as time permits. Grandma, her youngest sister, remains the last of Aunt Jean's immediate family alive today.

Aunt Jean followed Mom to wherever it is we go when we die, just months after Mom's death in 2005, but not before leaving me her photo albums and a scrapbook made by my great-grandmother, who collected songs, poems and stories published in newspapers of her day, cut out graphics from greeting cards (I assume that's where she got them), and glued them into a scrapbook with wooden front and back covers. It appears that I come honestly by my propensity to save paper and graphics of all sorts and to collage with them or paste them into journals and onto book covers, or just tuck them between the pages of my handwritten notebooks.

***

I've been reading the Jane Austen mystery series, written by Stephanie Barron. She's written fictional whodunits starring Jane Austen as the sleuth, using facts from Austen's history and times. They are a pleasure to read, particularly since Austen died young and a good many of her personal papers were destroyed by a trusted sister after her death. These mysteries, written in the first person, allow the reader to imagine a deeper look into Austen's personal life, though they are only stories of Barron's wild imagining. Mostly I enjoy them because I love the English manners of Austen's social class: the sophistication with which the characters structure their conversations, and the conventions and niceties that were such a part of how they lived. Must be some of Grandma's English ancestry bleeding through or something.

In the books there are numerous footnotes explaining words and phrases that were in common usage in the early 19th century, but there are also words that I have to look up in my Canadian Oxford Dictionary. For instance, a rest or a certain treatment might "dispel a fit of the megrims" -- megrim being a migraine, or a whim or fancy, or depression and low spirits. Someone might be told "Don't preach fustian," fustian meaning turgid speech or writing; bombast.

Never hurts to learn something new every day. Eh? When I read the characters' words, I realize how paltry my own vocabulary is.


***

Tomorrow I'm off to spend the weekend with some women friends. There will be fire, food, song and lots of laughing.

Pitcher Collection

Grandma Benson collected pitchers and these are among several that now grace my china cabinet.

I might as well start showing off some of the family heirlooms that have been passed on to me. Now if only I can figure out how to take a close-up that displays them to advantage.

The sun is shining here today. I wonder if it will last long enough for me to get some clothes on and get out for a walk. We haven't had more than three weeks of summer weather this year, and never more than a couple days of warmth in a row, so now that the forecast is for some fall heat I've got my fingers crossed. The weather man says that October will be dry, which means that just maybe we can leave our wet basements (still have the old house to look after, too) and get out to Kelowna for a visit before snowfall, without worrying about a pump failing in our absence. Maybe. At this point it doesn't look promising; I may have to leave Scottie at home to hold down the fort. Which would be too bad, as he's the one who needs a holiday the most.

He's just phoned home with a request that I make some lunch for him and his cousin Perry, so I'll have to get out of this chair and come up with something. And hope that the sun is still out there by the time I'm through.

There's a young gal coming to do some housecleaning for us this afternoon — yay, I finally found someone who wants to come on a regular basis and knows what she's doing! She's agreed to give me two hours every two weeks, which I pay for without blinking an eye because she does the jobs that I always notice need to be done and never get around to doing -- the bathroom, and washing the floors. I have lived in this house for a year now -- eight months with the kitchen flooring in -- and never mopped the floor, just spot-wiped it. And you don't even want to know what shape the toilet could get into. So I will sit here at my desk while she's scrubbing and I will work for two hours doing a job I like, earning more per hour than I will be paying her to do a job I do not like. Makes sense to me, though most women in my income bracket would never allow themselves this luxury.

To me, it's worth every cent.

Kids Who Cook

Sunflower sourdough bagels.

So tasty you can eat them with nothing on them. Not even butter.

Seen at My House

Inside.
















And out.

We've had a serious freeze, but a few things keep on blooming. Flocks of snow geese are floating overhead, though I haven't spotted the usual influx of American hunters in town yet.

I've had a last-minute supper invitation so will roust myself from this chair, which I've been in most of the day (work work work), and head off into the wild blue yonder.

Seen in the local laundromat.