Month by month the year has passed: current activities

               As of two weeks ago, we are empty nesters again: Billy (no longer a Kid, but still a grandson) moved to Hot Springs. He’s lived with us (again) since August of 2017. After one early disagreement, we got along famously. He had kitchen privileges, and separate bed-and-bathrooms. Now and then, we would buy each other favorite foods. And he left quite a bit of food here, plus an empty cupboard that I moved canned goods back into. He cleaned his carpet with Resolve, moved the rest of his stuff against the wall, and brought down the twin bed that he’d moved upstairs to accommodate his larger one. He will work at the local Cracker Barrel.

                 Pear season has come and gone. For some reason, the crop wasn’t as large as usual. I brought in a 5-gallon bucket of windfalls, laid them out on a cookie-sheet-sized pan and placed them on the bottom shelf of the fridge, rotten spots and all. Soon, a friend called to see if there were any left; friend came, and we picked up the good ones, then shook the tree for the ones high up. Friend took home parts of four bags of the fruit, from which s/he made preserves. After s/he left, I returned and gathered the mostly- good pears and added to my stash. I’ll eat them raw, unless they continue rotting in the cold. I DID cook one batch of pear sauce that’s good on vanilla yogurt.

                After many years, we’ve divorced Schwan’s. Or they’ve divorced us. Too many discrepancies toward the last for me to accept. And they never got back to me after I complained, so perhaps the feeling was mutual. We’ll miss the raspberry-white-chocolate scones and the frozen yogurt the most, but at the same time, we’ll save money.

                The new grocery that replaced our nearby Harvest Foods has a different way of charging for merchandise: The prices on the items show the store’s cost. Then at checkout, they add ten percent, plus a “food tax.” We’ll see.

                Meanwhile, I’ll keep buying all but fresh fruit and vegetables at Dollar General, also nearby. I may have to search for a good recipe for scones.

                Two seasonal projects now loom: one is to replace summer clothes with winter ones, which usually means washing, or at least airing out, what has been packed away. The second one is prepping plants to move inside. I have several more to move in than I moved out, so making space in the Green Room-cum-breakfast room will be formidable. And maybe impossible. Again, we’ll see.

                My myriad poetry submissions since mid-March have not done well, either in contests or in outright submissions. Two honorable mentions out of seven entries in one venue, and one honorable mention out of eleven entries in another. Mid-October is the final contest date. If I don’t do well there, I might just publish my own writings. Or perhaps write better poems.

c 2018, PL d/b/a lovepat press, Benton AR USA