Moving Toward Something

Spring!

See here, in the picture!  There is no snow!  There is green!  There are leaves budding on the trees!  Spring is here!  This means that in about three weeks, it will be summer--muggy and hot.

I've been learning about dogs.  N's dog is the first I have ever had prolonged contact with.  Here is what I have learned so far, although I am positive there are more lessons to come:

• They do not purr. Do not be alarmed; it doesn't mean the dog is never happy.
• They desperately want whatever it is that you're eating, even if it's a salad, something spicy, or something poisonous (like onions or chocolate).  If they find it not to their liking later, they'll generously throw it back up for you, no questions asked.  They believe this is an excellent arrangement and cannot understand why it is not adopted in more households.
• That ghostly sound with intermittent thumping coming from the living room is NOT a poltergeist.  It is the dog harmonizing with a passing firetruck and whapping his tail against the sofa.
• Dogs will alert you to any nearby wildlife.  I have now seen deer in the area, as well as a gray fox with at least two kits.  Also included under "wildlife" are the lady who walks her mini collie down the street every day, and anyone using an outdoor grill in a 1/2 mile radius.

In other news, there have been a lot of family visits.  For Easter, N and I got together at my cousins' farm place near Spring Green.  I'd never been out there before, so we got a walking tour of the property.

"Oh look," said my cousin Ian, "A dead deer!"

"Oh.  Huh.  Yep!" said his grandfather.

"I'm sorry, but I have to take a picture of this," said I. 

They were amused.  Then we went and had a lovely Easter meal.  Here is the picture (of the deer, not of the meal).

Most recently, my parents came to Madison to visit.  It was a great time for it; the flowering trees had just begun to bloom and the weather was nice.  Dad got to see the farmers' market at the capitol (which is back for the season, yayyyyyyyyyyyy!!!), Mom finally got to meet N, and we toured around for the bulk of the weekend. We even paid a visit to New Glarus.  It's nice that they've been here now, because now when I talk about Madison they'll have an idea of what I'm gabbling about.  They departed on Tuesday.

I'm in the process of buying a house, but I don't want to jinx it by writing about it here until the deal is done and final.  I'm very excited, though.  Tired of renting!  I was spoiled by owning my own home in MN for a decade.

The Days Are Finally Getting Longer!

Sorry it's been a while since I last updated.  My excuse is that I've had nothing that interesting to report since my last post; I've just been working, sleeping, eating, and doing chores on weekends.  As atonement, I offer some pictures of octopi.

This dull and humdrum routine will soon change, as a boyfriend (who gave me the lovely item at left for Valentine's Day) and a dog are about to move in with me and the cats.  That will be an exciting introduction, but not in the way most dog/cat introductions are exciting.  This dog is fine with cats.  He's lived with them before and doesn't much care about them unless they get near his rawhide bone, at which point he growls a little bit out of insecurity.  The cats...well, we'll have to see.  I am definitely going to trim their nails so that they don't beat up on the dog.

I eagerly await the return of the farmers' market to the Capitol Square.  I haven't managed to go to its winter location, and it may be that I don't make it there this winter.  My priority on weekends has been to catch up on sleep.  We shall see.  In the meantime I have been gradually exploring the everyday places in Madison.  The photo at right is the rotating fiberglass octopus from the Octopus Car Wash.  It got warm enough to wash cars recently!  Don't worry, it's back down into normal Wisconsin winter temperatures now.

I don't have any travel plans in the near future, but friends are coming to visit in March (the friends with whom I went to Hawaii), and I'm looking forward to that quite a lot!

And now it is time for bed.

Miscellany

Nothing terribly exciting to report, just a bunch of little things.

First, it is now Fall.  Apart from the date, I mean--the weather and trees are taking a definite turn.  Here's what I can see in my neighborhood.  Autumn is pretty in Madison.  It feels like it's taking longer for the world to turn grey, as happens when the leaves finally fall off the trees.  Maybe it's just happening that way this year and it's a fluke; I did notice before I left Minnesota that the trees hadn't started turning yet, which was unusual.  Sometimes the sickly trees start changing color in late August.

And speaking of Minnesota, I may have a buyer for my house!  I don't want to jinx it, so I'm not going to talk about this much until after the closing.  I'm in a state of hopeful disbelief because it would be just wayyyyyy to cool to sell the house this quickly in this market.  It's a good house, but there's a lot of competition out there.

Other minutiae:

• Last week I was driving up to Target and rubbernecked a little bit because there was a kite festival  going on.  It was a perfect day for it, with strong winds and all, I just wasn't expecting to see a whole bunch of floaty things in the sky while I was driving.  I was happy to see a big sign that said "KITE FESTIVAL," or I might have pulled over to check my eyes.
• There exists a place called the Mustard Museum.  It is in Mount Horeb, Wisconsin.  I must go to this holy place.
• I've been getting around town without constantly peering at Google Maps, so I guess I'm learning my way about.  The only thing that consistently confuses me is the downtown.  It is full of one-way streets, the names and directions of which I have not yet memorized.
• My camera has miraculously recovered from whatever was ailing it.  For a while it would make crackling sounds instead of the chirping bird sound effect it was meant to.  And in Hawaii it would intermittently decide it was having a lens error and refuse to work until I turned it off and back on a few times.  Now both problems have fixed themselves.

Someday I Will Tire of the Farmers' Market...

...but today is not that day.  I went to the farmers' market and got fresh horseradish (made last night), rainbow Swiss chard, daikon radish, some leeks, and I registered to vote.

It is now root vegetable season, gourd season, and "spicy greens" (arugula, mustard greens, etc.) season.  It is also apparently the season of strange cauliflower, as seen in these photos.  I considered buying some, but then realized that this familiar process would result:

1. I bring them all home and look at them for a while.
2. I fail to make anything with them because I'm not that great a cook.
3. I end up having to toss them out when they became decrepit enough that the cats attempt to bury them.

That would be very sad.  But this is what photographs are for!  Now I shall have my pretty cauliflowers forever and ever, and so shall you.  Look at the crazy green romanesco stuff!  It'd be like eating fractals.  OM NOM NOM.

My Wisconsin driver license arrived in the mail today, and it's fabulous because it has a picture of a little farm in the upper right hand corner. 

A Fair and Balanced Report of the Weekend's Highlights

Saturday morning I went to the farmers' market in search of leeks.  The week prior there had been loads of beautiful leeks, and I wanted some. This week, there weren't as many and they weren't as pretty.  But I found some that would work in soup, and that's all that matters.  Then in the evening, I found my way over to the home of my coworker and his wife, and along with ~10 other people I played Mafia.  Also there, to my surprise, was the creator of The Non-Adventures of Wonderella, a webcomic I follow.  If you read webcomics and haven't yet read Wonderella, I highly recommend it.

Sunday was a bit of a wash.  I had planned to clean up the apartment a bit, since on Tuesday I'm going to get a preliminary visit from the folks who will watch my cats while I'm on vacation in Hawaii for a week.  Instead, after talking to my parents who were worried that I wouldn't find proper attire for a wedding I'm attending in late November, I went on a frenzied tour of two malls before I remembered that I have two months in which to deal with this issue.  But anyway, I suppose it was good to find the malls and get to see a bit of local mall flavor.  West Towne Mall is a regular mall with shops, and Hilldale is the "lifestyle" mall where they have boutiques (not shops--horrors!) and you should never expect to find clothing in your size.  I have yet to explore East Towne Mall.  That will be another weekend.

So, currently on my plate is:  cleaning up the apartment (still), and getting ready to go to Hawaii.  The latter involves excavating a suitcase--they're all still full of stuff from the move--and refilling it with Hawaii-appropriate clothing and items.  Do I even have any of those?  For sure I don't own a pair of shorts.  I know I have a bathing suit somewhere.  I do have sandals.  This is all very complicated!

ARRRR!

September 19th is International Talk Like a Pirate Day, ye blaggards!

Stuff continues apace.  I finally made spaghetti sauce, having found the proper pot for it, and this weekend I think I will make potato leek soup.

Today on my way home from getting new checks at the bank, I went to investigate a bakery that someone said was delicious, but it had moved up to University Avenue.  Luckily, there was a library branch next door so I stopped in and applied for a library card, which was a much healthier thing to do than visit a bakery.

We Interrupt This Broadcast

Upon opening the box labeled "mixer & attachments," what did I find?

MY SPAGHETTI POT.  Yes, that's right, thirteen days after moving, I have located the spaghetti pot.

Yes, I am a person who blogs about finding her spaghetti pot.  Cue the marching band and ticker tape parade, please.

The Brightness, It Burns...

I just discovered that whoever was here previously had installed four 75-watt regular bulbs in the little light over the kitchen sink.  Or maybe it was the landlord.  I think I'm going to go on a lightbulb-changing spree, because I bet all the overhead lights are 75 watts, too.  These are what I just put in the kitchen sink light.

So Far:

Number of times I've gotten lost in this new city:  0

If you know me, you know this is a miracle.  My sense of direction is laughable at best.  I even went downtown today to have lunch with a coworker, found not only the correct restaurant but a parking spot nearby, and got home with no issues.

Current unpacked box count:  10.5

One of those was a really big box full of mixed regular cups and good china, and I had to unwrap each thing and wrap it back up if it was the good china, which is going into storage.  That's my excuse for the slow progress.

What I'm doing tonight:

Unpacking some more, missing having my Friday night dinner dates with Jen and Anders, and probably playing some Spore.

Boxes, Unpack Thyselves

Unpacking is tedious.  The motivating factor for me is that I still haven't found the box that holds the pot in which I cook spaghetti sauce, and I want it because I want to make sauce with those fabulous farmers' market ingredients!  Arrgh!

It's so easy to get distracted by shiny things and wander off in the middle of unpacking a box.

Current unpacked box count:  12