Sunday

In a month or two I will again get used to the cold outside, but right now, a walk down the farmette path requires nerve and determination. It's cold, wet and pretty miserable out there.







I am grateful that I brought back flowers from the market yesterday. Color once again becomes a welcome friend inside the farmhouse.






And here's another thing that requires nerve: as you may know, on Sunday, I clean the house. Because I've been sniffly, my work isn't as thorough as it otherwise might be. Ed does help by employing his robot friend to do the vacuuming. We try as best we can to make things tidy.

Too, I do laundry, which means that I take the rickety steps down to the basement where the ancient machines reside. (Yes, they are ancient. Ed picked up the broken dryer at St. Vinny's Thrift Shop and that was twenty years ago). While down there, I typically vacuum up some questionable dirt with the permanently positioned there vacuum cleaner. I mean, I would never bring that machine upstairs. Who knows what stuff it sucks in, what with mice, bugs and reptiles having the run of the land there! (Remember? I once found a snake skin in the basement! A snake skin!!) While vacuuming up a week's worth of stuff, I see a big puddle under the furnace. Ed!!!

He comes down, unscrews something, notices a stream of water gushing out, goes to the end of a long rubber hose, gives it a blow. I see backed-up water and yukky stuff come pouring out by the furnace.

You just blew back some yukky stuff!
What yukky stuff?
I can't describe it. Yukky.

We're at an impasse.

I tell him -- here, let me blow into the hose and you watch what comes out. Understand, this requires me to pick up the hose from the drainage hole where all bad stuff (sewage comes to mind) eventually makes its way to our septic system. But I want the furnace to function. It's so cold outside!
You're never going to blow into that!
Just watch me.

He gives me a look of utter admiration. I blow.

Eventually he decides that we've pushed a blockage through and all is probably trouble free once more. Time will tell.
Do you think I'm going to get some horrid bacterial infection from doing that? I ask.
No, guys don't ever get infections from doing stuff like that. And for this one day, you are an honorary guy. 

An honor indeed. Still, my lips feel tingly for the next hour or so, even after (maybe because of) thorough washing.



In the afternoon, Ed gambles his money away.

Yep, the same Ed who has no interest in doing anything with money, let alone gambling with it, is playing a Victoria University (in New Zealand) sponsored betting game. The point is to guess the odds of certain political and economic events. (You can read about this market here. I should note that it is a research project and that the betting sum Ed invested is $50).

For the rest of the day he tracks the market and finds his "investment" losing money. (The question he bet on has to do with whether or not Mr. Kavanaugh will get the needed endorsement from the Senate by next Friday. You can guess what Ed bet by my hint that he lost money in the course of the day.)



In the evening, the young family comes to dinner. Various members are no longer sick, others are just becoming sick. We are a motley crew. Well, maybe not. One rallies when food is before you!

(Snowdrop loves predinner munchies and conversation as much as we do.)







(Sparrow just likes being where everyone else is.)






(It only looks like corn is the one item served for dinner! Really truly there was more to it!)






One of Snowdrop's favorites things right now is to write a book. After dinner, she gets to work on it. Then she reads it to mommy...






Then to daddy...






And now that we're all familiar with her lovely work, she feeds us (toy) macarons.






It is a notable moment because (in a departure from normal Sunday behavior) we are all watching a Sixty Minutes segment, where Senators are being interviewed about the Thursday hearings, and there is Snowdrop, feeding us macarons.

Sparrow is more interested in smiling back and forth and back and forth...






Sweet little boy... So far from understanding (yet) what is going on in this room of familiar faces. Soon, Sparrow. Soon.