Recount Requested

 My snow drops are up, and in full flower—the first flower of Spring at my house.

 My Jiffy Pots have been plumped and hydrated--- 

ready for the corn and bean and peas seeds that are putting in their 24 hours at the veggie seed spa that is my kitchen table.

 

I have made a plan to acquire my straw bales and start the “seasoning” process. I am ready for Spring. Let’s DO THIS THING!

Then I woke up to a mini blizzard on Monday. That’s right—snow.

It was my understanding that we were all on the “been there, done that, over it,” page. Did I miss a meeting? Is the consensus that we go back to colder temperatures and shoveling driveways and power outages? Because I don’t remember voting for this. 

Annie & Abby vote 
"Can haz Spring please."

I have lots of gardening chores that are still on my To Do List: giving my private hedge a high and tight haircut is near the top and I’d prefer not to do it in the snow. I’d appreciate it if ya’ll would join me in some magical thinking and get winter behind us.

Even the Indian Plums are ready...

Outdoors Indoors: Gardens, Books, and Some Talk about Cake

The weather the last few days have been glorious. Sunny. Warm. In February! Perfect time to go do those early spring garden chores—you know, the ones put off last fall. Cleaning debris from the flower beds, pulling a few early weeds, looking over the remains of the straw bale garden and planning a future one. I find myself lingering in the outdoors, savoring the scents and signs of new growth. Clearly, we are experiencing an early spring and I am all for it.

At the same time, I’ve been on a Good Book Roll—reading back-to-back-to-back novels, with excellent storytelling and enticing characters. All I want to do is indulge in the next chapter. And the chapter after that. And then on to the next book! READ ALL THE BOOKS! I stay up late reading and have to remind myself to go outside and play. Because-- as much as I am ready to declare SPRING HAS ARRIVED--I am aware of the transitory aspect of Mother Nature’s moods. She rarely—if ever—minds me, and the rain will return.

In the summertime, my way of solving the good book vs. play outside dilemma is talking books. Instead of bulky CDs, Timberland Library has a new and improve format for listening called “Playaway.” Playaway is a small, compact pre-loaded audiobook that is powered by AAA battery (included.) And by small I mean about the size of your old iPod, very pocket friendly. No other device, tech, or Wi-Fi connection is needed—but you do need to supply your own earbuds. Or an auxiliary cord if you want to listen in the car. Look for Playaway in orange cases-- about the size of a DVD case. Timberland has about a thousand titles available, which makes it easy to have your indoor cake and eat it outside. If the outdoors is cake—and a good book is like eating cake—then this metaphor seemed much better in my head.

Speaking of good books—Friends of the Library have books for sale at deeply discounted prices. Proceeds go to fun summer reading programs and other fun activities. In Packwood, books are also available for—literally—pocket change, at both the library and from The Mt. Goat Coffee Shop. Caffeine and books—an excellent combo! C.S. Lewis said, “You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me,” and I couldn’t agree more.

If you’d like to join Friends of the Library, their Zoom meetings are 6 pm, 3^rd Tuesday of each month. E-mail friendsofpackwoodlibrary@gmail.com for a link.

One Little Wordle

You may have seen strange little green and yellow boxes popping up on social media lately that 

look something like this:

If you’ve managed to stay above the fray—please allow me to change all that. Nothing makes me happier than to drag people down into the depths of my favorite obsession.

As obsessions go, Wordle is relatively benign. There is only one five-letter word, once a day, and you get six tries at it. Type in your word, hit enter. There are no clues to what the word is. Everybody gets the same word.  After the first try, the letters you used on the game board –and the keyboard—will show colors along with the letters. Dark Gray=wrong letter. Yellow=right letter, wrong place. Green=right letter, right place. Unless you are highly intuitive or super lucky, you now have five more tries to figure out the word. Isn’t this fun?!

Obviously, the key to success is having a good start word. Statistically, “ROATE” is supposed to be the most successful word. Yes, it’s a word. I looked it up. I still don’t know what it means—something to do with taxes and net earnings and my eyes crossed and I no longer cared-- but yes, it’s a word. If your word isn’t a word, the game will just “shake it off” and not let you enter it. The good news is it didn’t cost you a try. The bad news is you can’t deploy the Wheel of Fortune strategy and RSTLN the board.

Since I am all about those vowels, my favorite start word is “ADIEU.” I usually follow it up with “STORM” because—except for “and sometimes Y”—that’s the last vowel standing. And it employs some very popular consonants. In words, popularity counts. 

As do consonant blends: BL, CL, BR, CR, SPR, STR, etc. Getting the “wrong” answer can still be a clue, which is probably why I like this game, I am informed by my mistakes. 

I am often well informed. It is unlikely I will get the win in one or two tries—because the real guessing doesn’t start until round three. And yes, the game sometimes uses words with repeated letters. 

Sure, some people claim this game is highly addictive—BUT ---and here comes my rationalization--YOU CAN ONLY PLAY ONE WORD, ONCE A DAY—HOW COULD IT POSSIBLY HURT? 

Psst! You can find Wordle at powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle  

UPDATE: The New York Times bought them, so find it here:

https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle/index.html

The NY Times is why we can't have nice things...

Like a Boss

So, here’s the scenario: it’s a dark and stormy night, you are two hours away from home. You need to find directions to your overnight accommodations, confirm dinner plans, and pick up a loved one at the airport early the next morning. You may or may not remember exactly when they are expected to land, or the flight number. You do remember the airline.

Here’s the complication: you have no cell phone. Totally expected plot twist—it is completely your fault. Also, it’s snowing but I’m pretty sure that’s not your fault.

So, what are you going to do? Problem solve like a BOSS, that’s what you’re going to do. And when I say problem solve like a boss, I mean like a mob boss. Specifically, Walter White. Actually, your game plan for problem solving like a boss looks like a combination of Breaking Bad meets Six Degrees of Separation.

Step One: go to Target, channel your inner WW, and buy a burner phone. Pretend you are researching how easy this is to do. Spoiler alert: super easy. However, I forgot to pay cash, so not really good at this Mob Boss thing, but I digress. It is less than $40, much cheaper/faster than a four-hour round trip to retrieve own phone.

Step Two: after the kind person at Target has set up the phone for you—because hello, Mob Boss here, not I.T. guy—call the one person whose number you know by heart. Yes, it is a landline.

Step Three: leave message, because of course they aren’t going to pick up a number they don’t recognize, who does that?

Step Four: call them back, hoping they’ve listened to the message and will now accept your call. They do, thankfully. You explain how pretty you are. They are aware.

Step Five: ask them for your son’s cell phone number. I would mention their car’s impending warranty expiration, but now does not seem like an ideal time.

Steps Six thru Eight—Repeating Step Three as necessary: get all the numbers you need to solve your dinner, accommodations, and airport pick up problem.

Step Nine: congratulate yourself on not letting “Pretty” be your only defining characteristic. “Problem Solver” is a good antidote to “Pretty.”

Step Ten: still manage to be an hour late for airport pickup because A) no map app, B) no traffic alerts, and C) PRETTY.

Moral of the Story: Memorize at least one phone number of someone who knows Your People. And pay cash. If you’re going to be a Pretty Mob Boss, might as well be an untraceable one. Because yes, I totally entered my name as Walter White on the burner phone.

Probably because I've left my keys somewhere...