coffee and peanut butter toast

…and night terrors about the latest storm, presently moving over arizona into new mexico and beyond: they’re warning the dakotas and and ”northern” minnesota, so it doesn’t sound like it’s coming here, but still i awoke thinking o my god, what if i’m iced in by another one?

well, what? obviously i need to get out of here, i’m making myself nuts. but on the other hand, i don’t need to drive out of here and slide off a cliff, either. likewise, i don’t want to just sit here and then get dumped on again, so do i try to move my car at least up to the big house if i can today? to the folk school lot? what?

i’m going bonkers here, i woke up worrying about this. i set up my sub plans yesterday and emailed the admin; i can email judy today from folk school to warn her about possible further delays and that will get me through till thursday. the only thing i’m running out of is coffee, now, which should last through the weekend anyway. and they’re warning northern minnesota, for god’s sake. the dakotas? not north carolina. cool it. as far as the current weather forecast says, plan to drive out sunday morning, the end.

this has been quite a vacation.  dance week--although i went there yesterday for the afternoon and saw so many friends who were glad to see me--has commenced without me; i don’t even know if i’ll be able to get to the new year’s eve dance tonight, or rather get back from it.  i got almost no painting done (and the one i did work on, warmth, proved prophetic!) and i’m so flustered by all this that i had to reknit the heel on my second ruffly boot sock at least five times, the last this morning, and then lost a knitting needle!  i really just need to get home and chalk this one up, is all.  it was still good, really good, just not at all what i’d imagined.

i handed in my contract for little/middle yesterday, and kisha squealed when she saw me and gave me a big hug.  june’s coming :)

happy new year.

(i found my knitting needle :)

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

options

they’re more important than one might think, options.  i came up here to get some work done in the daytimes and break it up by socializing in the evening.  i knew i’d run around gadding the first week, before christmas, but thought i’d have the second week o buckle down.  it didn’t turn out that way for, as soon as i saw i was stuck here, and although you’d think i would be able to get lots and lots of work done, i kept thinking about my finite amount of time and what i wasn’t doing, and i wasn’t able to concentrate.  then i kept thinking of all the work i had planned to be doing and all i really ended up doing was knitting.  is that because that’s comfort—i know the outcome, i’m in control of that? or because it isn’t nearly as hard?  i don’t know, but i never was able to settle my mind down enough to get to painting beyond what i started early in my stay.  i had enough uncertainties already to throw myself into that cauldron of the unknown.

now here it is thursday and i have only one or, at most, two days before i drive back, and i once again have options, since we can at least get out in the guys’ car, even if mine won’t move for another few days yet.  i turned off npr since i don’t need that link to the outside world anymore and it was depressing me anyway, and put the cds back on.  i still knit and think about all the things i’m not doing that i had planned but, of course, i planned about 4 times more than i ever could possibly have done anyway.  but still, i learned that i cannot just sit and paint on my own, it makes me very freaked out. is that a clue that painting isn’t right?  or that i’m simply not yet ready?  what will i have to find once i’m home to get it going, a class of some sort?  i don’t know.  i didn’t think classes were the thing after last summer, but i my have been wrong.  perhaps i’m just not yet at the point where i can just practice what i do painting again, like i do knitting.

same with the spindle: i never even turned the instruction on yet and don’t know that i will now.  i want to get out of stewing about what i didn’t do and just enjoy what i have left yet.  i only lost two days, really, tuesday and wednesday, although it seems like far longer.  monday, what was monday? maybe i lost monday too, i’ll have to go back and look. (eta:  yes, i lost monday, but i was still happy about it, so it wasn’t really lost :)

but i still have today and tomorrow, and if i don’t drive back then, saturday. i have just about decided to put in for an emergency sub on friday for monday, just in case i don’t get out until sunday and then can’t get all the way through until monday.  it’s these contingencies that are driving me nuts, the not knowing, and i have  allowed it to—have watched it-- rule my time, when really i just wish i could relax and take it as it comes.  especially since i can’t do anything about it anyway.  will i drive saturday? did karen get here and need me to, is that another consideration or not? i will need to see if karen’s still in the equation for, if she’s not, i don’t want to drive that soon by myself in the weather—if i can get the car out at all!  rainstorm is called for and, while it would be nice to have someone to ride with me…i don’t know. see what i mean?  anyway, i don’t want to be stuck with no sub in case i can’t make it all the way back on sunday but i’m still on the road on monday.  i need to see the weather forecast again when i’m up at folk school this afternoon, to see what sunday's  weather is supposed to like. and find karen. and and and…see what i mean? stop!

will i go to the new year’s eve dance? how much time will i spend at the folk school vs. here now that here is not a total necessity?  gah. i’m freed up now, let’s just enjoy it, whatever it is.

 

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

woo-HOO!

randy got the 4-wheel out of the ice!  we went to walmart!  i’m sitting here with ginger snaps and cocoa (i had been rationing the latter to put in my coffee in the morning; it seems silly now:)  i bought oranges and soymilk and bread, much more of each than i'll use, but i can always take it all home with me when i go.  if i ever get my own car out, that is.

the guys assure me that tomorrow i’ll be able to get out, too. and if not, they want to drive me to the folk school!  and pick me up!  christmas dinner, folded laundry, now chauffeur service--life is niiice :)  they’re thinking of leaving now on saturday and will have to find somebody else to take care of the animals.  i told them i’d search out charlotte to see if she wants to.

i checked facebook: gayle’s been iced in just like me. kathy drove her car out and got it stuck in the ice two days ago.  will seems to be back in atllanta. donna and lynday don’t seemed to have made it to dances yet, and nobody else has posted much about dance week—too busy dancing, i guess.  so i don’t know if karen axelrod actually got here or not.  i posted on her wall, but she doesn’t check facebook often it seems.  i’ll have to find her.

tomorrow!  yes, tomorrow! randy says he’ll take me over in the early afternoon.  i’ll need to work on that little/middle contract in the morning so i can hand it to kisha.  i considered putting in for a sub for monday, but wednesday simply seems too soon to tell…and the brasstown follies is tomorrow night, not wednesday. not that i’m going, but is seems that people adapt.

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

well, that didn’t work…

i did get out and did go to kathy’s, but kathy wasn’t home.  i took lots of video of the journey, but that’s as far as i got.

obviously, i’m not being in the moment, here.  i’m not meant to get to the folk school today either, so just go with it. i sat out on the porch when i returned for another hour or so as it seemed briefly that the sun was going to come out, but it went back in and then i got cold. randy is supposed to come by later and take me up to post a bulletin on facebook. but i hope he waits until i get warm again.

and i need to make sure i turn off npr when all things considered and morning edition come on, too, as they just  take me further out of the moment.  and it’s such a nice moment, i really need to just accept it.  there will be other dance weeks.  keith house isn’t going anywhere; it will be there in  june, as will i. meanwhile, this is nice.

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

i trek to kathy’s, to no avail

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

noontime

i sat out on the porch, all bundled up, and that helped a great deal to alleviate my cabin fever. it’s very beautiful out there.  randy called down that it’s still all frozen solid, and it’s in the 20s—he’ll bring the mule down later and maybe i can go up to the house to get on facebook at some point, but there won’t be any getting out today, i don’ think. nothing’s moving. the goats went back in—and while we both were out i could smell goat funk all the way over here, so it’s been quite awhile since they were out!

but knitting on the porch was great.  this is a magical experience, for sure, completely safe, but isolated like another century.  i’ll get to dance week next year, but this is rare.  i sat out there for over an hour, and finished my boot sock up to the toe, which i came in to work now. my own toes risked frostbite, i think, despite my mountain colors socks and sheepskin boots, but everything else is fine, and now i’m having some tea in my raku’d teacup. all is right with the world.

i took some video of myself, being really the only thing to take video of that i haven’t already, and i discovered i look like flay.  i hadn’t realized that before.  coming up on the last year of my 50s, and it seems in winter, bundled up in hand knits, i’m a dead ringer for mr. flay.  which, i realize gratefully,is so much better than being simply dead.

 

FLASH:  RANDY, WHO JUST BROUGHT BY MY LAUNDRY (FOLDED EVEN!) SAYS I SHOULD BE ABLE TO WALK TO KATHY’S—AND MAYBE SHE CAN SHOW ME THE ROAD TO THE FOLK SCHOOL! I’M GOING TO TRY THAT RIGHT NOW!

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

THE GOATS ARE OUT!

this has got to be a good sign, especially since the sun is not very bright today.  must mean the ground under them, at least, isn’t frozen solid. maybe i might get the car out late this afternoon?

i realize what i miss most is sitting in the keith house coffee room knitting among folks and listening to the music of the dance.  perhaps today, or tomorrow at least…tomorrow would give me two days, i could live with that, two days?

meanwhile, i putter on here, doing what i would at home and trying not to think about it. i worked out a ruffly boot sock from martha’s wool

and today i plan on painting and examining the spindle.

and then, perhaps in late afternoon…?

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

snap out of it!

stop feeling sorry for myself, just because i haven’t been able to see the people i came here to enjoy yet!  it’s only tuesday; perhaps i can get out tomorrow.  i need to stop feeling like i do at home, when i really don’t see anybody—i see randy and michael, after all. and i had a great christmas dinner. last week i saw folks; i will this week, too.  i’m just missing the contact of facebook, is all, as well as not seeing people either. but maybe tomorrow. maybe i can go to the dance for awhile. thank goodness i didn’t sign up for winter dance week, itself—i’d be frantic!

this is what it looked like by the time the sun went back over the mountain this afternoon:

i won’t think about driving up the frozen or mucky hill right now. it will just work somehow, is all.  tomorrow is another day!

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

solipsism sets in

well, i found my mouse.  it wasn’t, in fact, lost; i’d just forgotten i’d put it back in the media bag.  so now it’s in the portable bag where it belongs, only i don’t have anywhere to port it.  i am beginning to get flustered, like i was on that first morning here.  things don’t work as planned and i can’t fix them right away, as i am used to.

first off is painting. this, it seems is not a day for painting. i futzed around, and then decided to set up the picture of the big jar, see if that would work for jackie, and decided to print it out since the glare on the computer screen is too bright to see it over there where i paint.  set up the photo printer (which was when i found the mouse) only to discover that, for some reason, it isn’t installed on the netbook. i thought i had when i set it up on the worktable at home, did i just plug it in? i thought i had printed on it there, but it is not installed, and now i can’t get the driver to install it, of course, until i can get online. so then i took down the printer, by which time the glare had moved onto table itself and had become too bad to work there.

obviously this is not the time to persist.  but what?  sit and knit some more? read?  argh.  this must be what cabin fever is like—i have many things i could be doing and i can’t seem to settle on any of them.  this is when i’d take a turn over to the folk school, but it seems to be too icy out there.  radio says the temp is up to 30 in asheville.  they say it will be a little warmer each day until friday is in the mid-50s. hope that lasts long enough to let me drive home saturday morning—i wonder if karen ever got here? i haven’t even seen the guys today, the 4-wheel is still parked next to my corolla. 

so here i am, back on the daybed, being frustrated and chilling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

poor me.

 

update:  boy, is it too icy! randy hiked down with a cane (!) for ballast, to report that the access road between rivercane and their place is a sheet of solid ice.  so is the one between their place and my meadow, the one kathy was sliding down the other day.  both of them are almost constantly in the shade, so there’s not a lot of hope they’ll clear today, i guess.  perhaps the one to the meadow, so i can get up to the big house again easier? i don’t know.  but the road up to the mailbox gets none but dappled sun, so i don’t think there’s a lot of hope there. it melts quite rapidly when the sun hits it, but at night when it goes way down it refreezes, and where the sun doesn’t hit? solid ice sheet.

randy even slipped on my steps, pointing out that they look fine, but are all ice underneath.  

not cotton bolls, but all the snow left on the tree outside my door.,

cars in muck.

muck.  under the muck: ice. and this is where the sun hits in full; where it doesn’t hit is up the hill behind that big tree on the left, the road up to the big house, and from there up to the mailbox on the street. straight up, of course; i remember videoing driving down it in summer.  the mail got delivered today, anyway, first since friday, which is a good sign.  the rest of brasstown is out and about, i think.

perhaps on thursday?  the guys won’t be able to leave after all, if we can’t get out tomorrow, and they’ll have to go instead after i leave and get someone else to feed the animals—as randy pointed out, no one could get in to us to feed them either.  we be stuck.  i’m beginning to wonder if i will get back to work on monday, but that’s nearly a whole week away and i will wait until friday to arrange for a sub if i need one.  sigh.  it’s so weird not to be able to get over to the folk school, but even walking is treacherous (hence the cane) and so perhaps i might not even get to one dance, can that be?

oh well.  relax and enjoy it; i couldn’t be in a more agreeable place. the melt is dripping off the roof like rain, and randy is even throwing my bedraggled laundry in for me! i just wish i could bring myself to paint the whole time, perhaps later this afternoon and evening, when the sun is off the table?  we shall see.   perhaps i shall wind up some of martha’s wool and make some more stripedy socks.

but now?  leftover christmas feast! times is tough! :)

 

 

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

moving on…

showed-in day four. it’s 13 degrees  in asheville, so the radio says, so i guess it’s around that here, i don’t know.  i forgot to turn the heat up last night, so i woke up stupid.  but heat’s easily remedied (not so much stupid) and now i’m having coffee and toast, and am gearing up for the shower.  the meadow looks trashed now, after randy tried to clear it some yesterday by making a circular drive with the heavy 4-wheel.

then he couldn’t get the 4-wheel back up the hill so it sits parked next to my little corolla.

i sure hope i can get out of here by tomorrow, at least—not that i mind being stuck here, believe me, but i’m out of milk for coffee and i’m also a bit concerned about running out of batteries as the camera seems to be eating them up at a rate of about a set per day. not looking forward to the guys leaving, either, but i do really need to make sure i can get in and out before they go; surely by tomorrow?

meanwhile, i’ve decided to move on to the next painting; warmth is becoming overworked and currently is mostly taken back to the under painting in the darks, waiting for a new direction.  yes, i know, one doesn’t underpaint watercolors, but that’s what i’m working on, getting as many layers of color in as i can before it goes to mud.

 

a possible new direction is i’m thinking of adding some slippers and socks on the floor southwest of the chair leg, in the shadow of the heater, where there seems to be a place readymade for them, and i shot some pics of my slippers as they lay this morning for the purpose. also, these photos are pointing out to me that grave` shadow on the left is important; i’m not even sure how prominent it is in the actual painting, camera picked it up, but it will be:)

but not now. it’ll wait in its unfinished state until it doesn’t make me so crazy. so that means i start another one today, instead. i had said i would spend the time painting, and it seems the only way to make me actually do that is to snow me in.  my new goal is five paintings, one each day now,  and we’ll see what states they get to by the next mornings.

so what’s for today?

 

 

 

 

Flickr Tags: crossposted:untitled,brigadoon

noonday

i went out for a walk because the painting wasn’t coming together yet and i decided to go see humans.  i walked up to the big house to say hi to michael and randy, and connect with facebook on their computer.  julie already had warned people off of the christmas morning brunch that i didn’t get to, and john posted last night that he was snowed in so we couldn’t do lunch today, so i didn’t miss anything.  pam howard said there was a dance at the folk school last night, but bob apparently couldn’t get down so i wonder who did?  lots of musicians frozen out, and they say the web page says people should come in this afternoon now.  taija posted wondering what the road was like, and he’s right next door; i don’t know if he ever went out, though. i’m so lucky this happened this year when i was already here and staying longer anyway, since that’s what i was always so worried about when i did winter dance week: losing any minutes at all of these precious days!

randy and i walked up the sun-dappled drive to the road, and he moved the limb that was blocking it so we can get out now (although i can’t, in the corolla, and have no intention of trying!)  took peanut, and the dog who wants to eat my left foot.

it’s supposed to be 15 tonight, which means icy, but then up in the high 30s tomorrow so maybe i’ll get to a wednesday dance? the sun is out full now and things are rapidly melting.  consensus seems to be around 8-9” we got and it seems like it’s all going away at once this afternoon, or that’s what it feels like anyway!

speaking of icy, walking back down the hill i went down twice, but it was in a foot of snow so no damage done, except to the landscape :)

(where i landed—the second time  ^ )     

hmmmm, lunch?  i’m thinking creamed corn, green beans and potatoes, sweet potato casserole and a chicken breast…

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

second monday

 

 

 

 

i found npr from asheville on the radio, and now it’s morning edition as usual.  this is the third day of the great snowstorm of 2010. even snowed in, i run into more people (3) than ever i would in tampa (0) !

michael and randy brought me more feast leftovers yesterday afternoon, and then when i went out to sample the falling snow i ran into kathy dudek, who was sliding down the drive to my meadow (as you can see in the video i posted yesterday,)

 

i didn’t write anything for the past couple of days, but the pictures and videos show more than ever i could have done, i’m sure.

      

i watched cold mountain on the vcr the other night.  i had forgotten that it was about this very area, but then i had never been to this area yet when i first saw it, had i?  as beautiful as it is, it doesn’t really do it justice, though.

and now i am realizing i am running out of milk.  if i don’t get out tomorrow, i will be relegated to putting hot cocoa mix in my morning coffee—o horrors!  as for food?  yeah, a total dearth of cookies here, how will i survive?

i’ve been thinking about the great depression and how what we’re going through—the economy, not the snowstorm—is so very different.  we may have little money at present (and in my case, not even that as i have a job, just concerns for its long-term feasibility) but we’re still amidst the opulence that we spent it all on so it sure doesn’t seems like hard times yet, just a temporary shortage of necessities amidst the luxury…and it would be such a shame to lose it all.

i bought wool and i’ve been knitting like crazy, in between video making.  i even happily ripped out all that i spent yesterday morning working on, but i did finish two more hats and the peace fleece socks i’m showing to pam silva. if i ever get out of here, that is. (i’m hoping not:)

i haven’t been over to the folk school at all, except that first night i went for wifi to find the were actually closing up!  they should be open now, since dance week was to have  started yesterday; i wonder if many people got in yet? was there  a dance last night? i doubt i’ll get out of here before tomorrow, and that may be walking: kathy said she would show me the trail, but i don’t know if i will take it after all. i’m pretty happy (very happy!) right where i am.  who would have thought i would ever not mind missing dance week? perhaps a dance on wednesday?

i do regret not being able to get out to lunch with john today, nor even being able to let him know :(  he’ll figure that out though, i’m sure.  i hope there’ll be a time to meet later in the week, although i know he has chemo tomorrow, so maybe not. oh dear. this not having internet is quite an upsetter of what is now daily life, isn’t it. how we suffer. perhaps i’ll climb up to the big house and ask to use the guys’ computer…

‘IT’S 20 DEGREES, BUT IT FEELS LIKE ONE BECAUSE OF THE WIND…”

 

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

sliding on boxing day

 

   

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010

still snowing…

        ice.i walk out.  i walk back. 

Flickr Tags: brigadoon,snowstorm2010