45RPM: Oh what a beautiful morning.

Where I match a song to a specific memory.

One summer, I worked the night shift two days per week at a budget motel.  There were a lot of “betweens” that summer.  I was between colleges and boyfriends, my parents were poised between marriage and divorce and my brother was between residences.  I loved and hated the night shift.  It was fun being on my own, the only one awake among hundreds of sleeping motel guests.  I loved that I was an official “creature of the night”.  But it was exhausting, pushing myself all the way to 6:00 a.m., and sleeping during the day was a challenge.  There also wasn’t much to do in the middle of the night after all the grumpy traveling families had checked in and were tucked away in their beds, and all the truckers had wandered from their endless conversations in the lobby to their slumber.  I listened to cassette tapes to keep me company and every morning at 4:30 I would take a “security walk” around the parking lot. It was really just an excuse to get out of the office before people turned out to complain about the toast bar.  By 4:30 the dawn had broken and the clear Boise sky was melting into blue.  No matter how tired I was, no matter how boring the night had been, it was always a beautiful morning and I sang this song aloud as I ambled through the lot.  Oh what a beautiful day.

ps.  Hugh Jackman! He’s the man! He’s rather broad, but you have to picture him much further away from you, up on stage.

Postcards from Spain and Limburg

O! Postcrossing, why do you give me two postcards on the same day instead of spreading them out?

Those Boise, Idaho readers know that I loved this Basque Country postcard. For those not in the know, Boise has a pretty strong basque community. The postcard is from Dani, who asks me to send her something.  I’ve not yet done so, but I’m not ruling it out.
 

And where is Limburg?  Why the Netherlands, of course, didn’t you know?  (I didn’t, I had to look it up.)  Peggy sends me this card and remarks that it’s funny she is sending a postcard to me in Portland, Oregon as she will soon be leaving on a trip to the Pacific Northwest, traveling from Seattle to San Francisco.  She was planning to visit either Portland or the Gorge, depending on weather.  When I registered the postcard, I told her that sounded like a fabulous trip.

Reading her Postcrossing profile, I found that Peggy is also very cool because she requests the tourist cards (some Postcrossing people don’t like them) and then uses them to plan her travels.  You are a smart lady, Peggy.

Stay stiching the neckline, joining the shoulders

Now that all that basting is done (three movies worth, geez-almighty) I can move on to the next step: stay stitching the neckline. we do  this to ensure it doesn’t stretch out with repeated wear.  I’m in.

Here, I have traced my sewing line in disappearing marker so I know where to sew.
 

I’m choosing the organza strips and I get to not only pin, but also to baste the organza.  That Gertie lady is crazy for basting.
 
The finished stay stitched neckline.  You can’t really see it, but it’s done.  And I got to sew together the shoulders!  Very exciting.
 

Three sentence movie reviews: Argo

Matt hadn’t seen this and so we watched it together. It was a good one to watch a second time as I wasn’t so tense and worried and had time to notice details, plus ponder if John Goodman is one of the most under-rated actors of our times; because that man always delivers. I will conclude by saying that this movie still has the best toast of all time.

Cost:  $2.00 from Videorama
Where watched: at home.

(special bonus posters because I think they are great.)

Dead Relative’s Tour 2013

Yes, it’s that time again:  time to put flowers on the graves of the dead relatives.  You can come along too.

In Rose City Cemetery I snapped a picture of this gravestone because someone I know has this same last name.  And Joshnston-with-a-“t” is much less common than Johnson.
 

I strode far away from the family grave to see who this large stone belonged too. From the space left on the stone, it looks like Rudolf was expecting company who never arrived.  Gravestones like this leave me a little sad.
 
I love headstones with photos.
 
A little something for the fans of the Waldorf method.  Plus, look at that great detail on the top!
 
(Argh. Didn’t rotate this one)
I was intrigued because it had fresh flowers, so someone is still coming around.  But it’s in a section of 1930s era deaths and has no headstone.  There’s a story here.
 
Basil and Basiliki are bedecked for another year.
 
The tools of the trade.  Also, this is the first year we haven’t gone in the Jeep Cherokee because my aunt has a new car.  It’s a silver car.  I can’t remember which kind.
 
That is so meta.
 
This hedge was gorgeous in color and undulated marvelously.
I wish I’d taken a bit more time to properly capture it.
 
Much speculation ensued about the family relationship here.
 
I love this epithet.  You go, Tyyne, with your double “y” in your name and all.
 
Working on Grandma and Grampa’s grave (with the new car in the background)

This year we learned that the cemetery is not providing the green vases to stick in the ground.  I flagged down a maintenance worker to ask him for one and got an earful about how the cemetery is now cheap and doesn’t want to give them out anymore because it just causes more work to pick them all up.  Then he gave me one on the down-low.  Thanks guy, you are awesome.  We will bring our own next year.

Sometimes, you just need a good grilled cheese.


All week long I’ve been craving grilled cheese.  Thanks to my sourdough starter, I keep myself in homemade whole-wheat sourdough bread, which is good for many things, but not the grilled cheese I was thinking of.  So I made a some perfect sandwich bread, bought some delicious ham, sliced up some Tillamook medium cheddar and made a pot of tomato soup to boot.

It really hit the spot.

Three sentence movie reviews: Explorers

This was a great favorite of my mother, brother and I when I was 11 and so in the present, I was happy to realize that it stars not only a very young River Phoenix, but also a very young Ethan Hawke.*  It’s still a very sweet film, worth watching for it’s totally 1985 computer generated effects and copious pop culture references.  It’s a great movie for the 8-12 year-old in your life and you, the adult might enjoy it too.

Cost:  free from library
Where watched:  At home while endlessly basting material together.

*Jason Presson, the other guy in the movie was my favorite actor of the three, at least during this viewing.   His acting was pretty contained and had the most amazing voice.  Ethan Hawke’s voice was still quite high and really bugged me by the end, but Jason Presson, since you don’t seem to be acting anymore, I hope at least you are a radio DJ or doing something with that great voice.  [one Google search and 10 minutes later, here’s a picture of him from 2008 and a bit about what he’s doing now. http://americanvirus.com/2008/08/americanvirus-30-jason-presson-on-hollywood-boulevard/]