Observation #1:
Claude and I have the best answering machine response when you call and we don't answer the phone. Instead of us saying something we are both singing a song to the melody of "My Old Kentucky Home". This is the state song of Kentucky. The words we put to this melody are:
The sun shines bright on our cool Kentucky home
We're sorry we missed your phone call.
Please leave your name and number at the tone
And maybe we'll give you a call.
We've received several comments from people who happen to call and not find us at home or we're out in the yard and don't hear the call.
This last weekend we were not home. I called home to check messages. There was one from the vice-president of our bank. Then, there was a second message and it had giggling and rustling of papers and other noises I could not make out. I was just not sure what this was.
Claude returned the call from the bank. It was just a reminder of an event the bank was hosting in Sadieville. Then he learned what the second message was about. It was Jackie, the vice-president of the bank, and Kathy, the teller at the bank. Jackie was so taken with the song when she called earlier that she called back, knowing we were obviously not at home, so that Kathy could hear the message. They were laughing and enjoying the music.
It is so nice to give someone a chuckle.
Observation #2:
Last Wednesday I had to be in Georgetown to sing with Papa at the nursing home. Claude also had meetings but at a totally different time than me. We had a dinner meeting in Lexington that evening. We asked Papa if we could meet at his apartment and leave my car in his driveway while we went to the dinner. After the dinner and meeting, Claude dropped me off at Papa's to pick up my car.
As I drove down the 460 By-pass in Georgetown I noticed the sun was getting ready to set. There was an enormous cloud in the sky. As I reached Cherry Blossom before I would get to I-75 the sun was behind the cloud and it was shining out in rays from the cloud. The edges of the cloud were reds and oranges from the sun. It was stunning. I was suddenly transported to Maui when we watched the sunset behind Haleakala (a volcano). We had returned to the cruise ship for the departure from Maui. The sun was setting right behind the top of the cone of the volcano. It was like sunshine was coming out of Haleakala. While there was no volcano on the horizon in Georgetown, there was that enormous cloud with place for those rays to shine through.
I got up on I-75 headed to Sadieville and the scene was breath-taking. I was enjoying that view so much. I was wishing I had my camera. But I had no where to pull over unless I tried the Pilot Station. So I just determined I would make the best mental picture memory I could that I would be able to pull up and enjoy in the future. Click...Take a Pic!!
I got home before Claude. When he arrived I asked him if he saw that beautiful sunset. Amazingly, he didn't. I'm happy I looked and saw it and sure wished my good hubby had as well.
Observation #3:
This last week some men rang our door bell. I was having a pajama day and was on the phone. I called to Claude to answer the door. He did, talked to the guys, and came away chuckling. I found him chuckling when I came out after getting dressed.
It seems these men were in our neighborhood because they were upgrading the water meters. These poor guys were searching all around our front yard and couldn't find the water meter. Hence, they range the doorbell to ask where our water meter was. Claude was chuckling because he pointed to this mass of vine and told them it was under there. Dismayed, he assured them they could move it anyway they needed or wanted to without worry. He assured them this vine would come back with a vengence after they messed with it.
Claude built me a flower bed ring around the water meter since it stuck up over the ground. The intent with this vine was to fill that bed around the meter. The reality is this vine just grew and grew. Since the meter is read with a scanner there was not a concern about the vine. It really has pretty purple flowers on it sometimes.
Again, I got a chuckle out of these poor guys looking for a water meter.
Observation #4:
I didn't weed my flower beds before our trip in June. Then we came home and dealt with mom's passing, the funeral and family. Saturday a week ago I got up early in the morning, donned my long sleeves and long pants and gloves and headed out to the back yard to weed. I got the hosta bed first. That brought it's own chuckle.
Claude planted in a special flower pot some leaf lettuce. The two rows of little sprouts popped up and stopped growing. They stayed that size for a long, long time and never grew larger. Claude assumed he had no lettuce crop this year. However, while weeding the hosta bed I found something a lighter color of green in the corn of the bed by the patio. To my amazement I found a nice leaf lettuce plant that was quite happy and growing larger and larger. It was fun to share Claude' s success with him.
Then I weeded the flower bed under my sewing room window. I think I'm going to have to pull up my two remaining hydrangea plants. They are full of poison ivy and I just can't get it out because the roots are entwined with the roots of the hydrangea.
Then I weeded the terraced beds that should be the garden and can't because the animals LOVE to eat whatever we plant there. Some of the weeds in these beds were the size of small bushes. Goodness!!
Then I walked a little further down the hill and weeded the ledge with the concrete bench and the rain garden bed for which I need to buy plants.
Now, I just had my flower beds by the altar to do. I was so pleased things were moving that quickly. We had rain the day before and the ground was soft enough I could pull out weeds without having to dig under them. Yippee!!
Observation #5:
This last weekend we went to LaGrange. We stopped in LaGrange at the Kroger to pick up some flat leaf parsley for Andie. As we exited the store we passed the floral section. There was a whiteboard there and I happened to read it. I was stunned and called Claude back to read it. It said, "Due to a world-wide shortage of helium, we will not be filling balloons."
What??? There is a shortage of helium? What is helium? Does it occur naturally? Do we make it? What is it made from? What is it used for besides balloons? All valid questions. Once we settled in at the Marx home I pulled out my Blackberry and set to research helium.
It is a by-product of oil production. The biggest storage place for helium is in Amarillo, Texas. One third of all the helium used in the world is produced between the Amarillo area and Kansas. During the last World War the government needed the helium for something to do with the war. They set up the storage and an agency to manage it. Since then they have been in the helium business. They wanted out and proposed a date for it to be privatized. There was the assumption that private industry would grasp this chance to make helium and money in the process. It hasn't happened like that. The current belief is that by 2015 to 2018 we may be out of helium. Oh, one of the other real important uses of helium is MRI machines. There are others but balloons and MRI machines are the two I'm most familiar with after doing this bit-O' research.
As I shared these facts with Andie and Claude, we all found it quite amusing that the fuss that will be made over not being able to fill balloons with helium is what will get the attention. When getting an MRI is soooo much more important than a helium filled balloon.
Observation #6:
One morning I noticed this at breakfast time in our home.
Observation #7:
The Friday after the funeral I had to go to the cemetery to pick up signed paperwork. We signed paperwork to open the grave and close it the Saturday prior to the funeral. It seems this paperwork is not official until someone in the state offices signs it. This necessitates my returning to pick up the final signed paperwork.
After getting the paperwork I headed over to the gravesite. The headstone was not in place yet. We are only supposed to put flowers in the headstone vase. I had a tiny glass vase with flowers from mom's funeral. I did not follow the rules but made sure there were some flowers on my mother's grave.
My parents plots are right by the road through this part of the cemetery. We chose these spaces so Papa could get to the gravesite easily and not have to walk a lot. I took these pictures of the view from the road over mom's grave and then from her grave across the road over the cemetary to the tobacco barn outside the cemetary. There are also lovely ponds with geese in them. It is a beautiful place for her final resting place. The trees on either side of the grave will provide shade.
Observation #8:
We had the privilege of an invitation from a friend to go to the temple in Louisville and act as proxy for some of her family members to be sealed to each other. It was a lovely evening with another couple and our Bishop also acting as proxy. Such a blessing to enter that beautiful building and feel that peace and strong spirit there.
Observation #9:
Papa and I are back singing at the nursing home. His voice has broken a few times but I truly believe it is a good thing for him to be doing this. The first time it was a little odd for me to know they would not wheel Mimi out to listen and sit with us. This was our family time each week. But the residents were so very happy we were there. Last Wednesday Clyde had a toy guitar. Clyde used to play and sing when younger. He set his hands in a cord of some kind on his play guitar and strummed and sang something that only Clyde knew what was the entire time we sang. Papa and I got a chuckle out of him enjoying the music so much. It was good to be doing this for others and, I must confess, for ourselves as well.
There you have it. A few observations from the last few weeks. Life does go on...and that is a good thing.
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