Options...

It was a choice to either have some coffee or go take a nap. I chose for the coffee and am waiting for the coffeemaker to finish brewing it so I can have a much needed cup. I will forsake the nap and save up my sleep for tonight when I will go to bed at a fairly decent time. I won't have to watch any football matches anyway after last night's debacle when the Dutch team lost against Germany. They haven't won a match yet. It's a terrible situation and I'm much disgusted and so is the rest of the population of this country.We're all walking around in a bad mood. 

I mustn't let that press my fun and immediately move on to other things more uplifting. I will not let the defeat of the Dutch football team determine my outlook for the rest of the day.  I'm sure there are other more important things that are of influence such as this cup of coffee I'm having now and the fact that the sun is shining into the living room. That does alter your mood and make you more cheerful. There's nothing as welcome as a bit of sunshine after all these days of cloudy skies and showers. I'm going to enjoy it as much as I can. 

I knew I would cheer myself up writing about that. Just making a note of it is enough to make me happier. The fact that it's getting warmer in the living room does also because it was a little bit chilly in here and I wasn't about to close the windows. It is June after all and that would be admitting defeat. For the same reason I can't turn on the heater even if it does get cold in here. I am bound and determined to keep believing that summer will get here yet and that it will happen in my lifetime. 

I'm wearing a summery top that is new, but at the same time I'm wearing my jeans and a jeans jacket. I'm not quite as warm and comfortable as I'd like to be. I'd like to wear a pair of socks too and a scarf around my neck, but I thought that might be a bit too pessimistic and not in keeping with the time of year. It's always a bit of a struggle to decide what to wear in the morning because I want to wear my summer clothes, but the weather discourages me from doing so. Wearing layers seems to be the best way to deal with it. 

The dog is watching the maintenance people from the city clean up the municipal flowerbeds. They are making an awful lot of noise because they are using power tools. I liked it better in the olden days when things were done by hand and it was a gentle occupation. I'm sure people were more skilled back then too. Nowadays everything seems to get cut back indiscriminately. The dog was sleeping in the sunshine on the dining table. He was very rudely disturbed in his sleep. 

I will now go take him for a walk and enjoy some of the sunshine. Hopefully, it will be warmer outside than it is in here.

Have a great day.

Ciao,
Irene

There are other things in life...

I took a three hour long nap this afternoon. That goes to show you how short of sleep I was. I do have to admit that I took 10 mg of temazepam to steady my nerves, because they became slightly unhinged at about 3 pm like they used to in the olden days when I was still married. Three o'clock in the afternoon seems to be the magic hour for that. That's when whatever I was holding together becomes undone and I become frazzled.

It's a good time to go to sleep, and you will all remember the sign I used to have that said something like, "This is a Rapid Cycle, Go to Sleep Now." I don't know what's become of it. I never did find it again after the Exfactor moved out. Maybe I thought I wouldn't need it anymore and threw it out. I did blame him for my daily rapid cycles, because I got them usually around the time he came home in the afternoon. Now I just seem to have rapid cycles all on my own, without any body's help. That's a pretty good trick.

I have to pay better attention to these things, because I think this has been going on for a while. I always seem to forget the most important bits of information about myself. Knowledge that I have and that seems to get lost in the vagueness of my mind, but that's very crucial to understanding myself. I don't always feel a certain way. I feel certain ways sometimes and not all the time. I go from elation to despair and back again repeatedly and I have to remember that, otherwise I'll ignore my whole realm of feelings and claim that the whole 24 hours were one and the same thing when they were not.

Anyway, Tyke behaved beautifully while I was asleep and I can only surmise that he takes the lead from Jesker. I thought he might get into all sorts of trouble, but he didn't. He was happy when I woke up, but then so was Jesker, and I both let them out back for a piddle. I cleaned up the patio and now have a lot of mulch in the flowerbed and Tyke has decided to poop there, which is good fertilizer. The only thing I have growing there is the nearly out of control winter blooming Jasmine and nothing can kill it. I did invest in some large plastic bags, so one thing I can do is clean up the flowerbed regularly. I really don't think the dog poop is going to compost that quickly and it will turn into a mess in no time.

One thing I'm finding out tonight is that Tyke is a sex maniac and wants to have sex with everything and everybody. Even the cats aren't safe. Now I will have to look into having him neutered, so I better start saving my money for that. The hormones must be raging through his body.

Well, if you missed the photos of the dogs go here. I'm going to get ready for bed. It's been a long and exciting day, believe it or not.

Have a good night!

Ciao.

On Bushes and Trees.

Well, the weeds in the pot with the jasmine are growing really well, but it is with some degree of optimism that I convince myself that the jasmine is growing as well, though I do think that I see some new growth. It is getting watered very well anyway and not because I go out there with the watering can, but because it is raining again and the soil is soaked all the way through and draining very nicely through the hole in the bottom of the pot. I will be disappointed if it doesn't grow, because it was with some effort that I dug it out of the flowerbed out back, but I can easily walk to the nursery around the corner and buy a new plant and put it in instead if all else fails. It's just a matter of pride that it should grow and sprout very many green buds.

I am waiting to see new growth on my three alder berry trees. Nothing is happening there yet, they are as bare as three totem poles, but I know that before long they will sprout new branches and new leaves and have a big growth spurt, because they do this ever year. The first year I thought they had died, but now I know better.

And then there is that mysterious bush that grew up in the jasmine in the flowerbed. It is almost as tall as I am and I have no idea what it is, but for now I'm leaving it there and maybe this summer I'll figure out what it is by the shape of it's leaves. Maybe it isn't a bush but a tree, because it sure grew quickly.

I really appreciate these gifts of nature and am loath to take them out of the flowerbed. I assume the are meant to be there and that they are a present to me. I did have flowers in the flowerbed once, but I took them out when I realized that I didn't enjoy gardening anymore and that I didn't like the fussiness of taking care of plants. I did in another life, but now I like bushes and trees, so I am happy with what is growing out back.

The Golden Rain will be beautiful again this spring, as it always is. Before you know it, it is covered in yellow blossoms that are as magnificent as anything I've ever seen. There are two bushes of unknown origin growing beside it in that very narrow space. One has prickly thorns and is best avoided, but the other one is bright green and lush, though I've had to cut it back because it interfered with the washing on the clothes line.

I obviously need a book on all the native plants and trees that grow in Limburg. I am so ignorant of trees and bushes that grow here. I can only identify two or three trees and there's not a palm tree among them. That would have been easy. At least in California you had those and the shrubby oaks. And the endless rows of eucalyptus trees. Here you see many poplars planted along the highways as windbreakers and for you to have an accident with your car with. The elm trees really do get Dutch elm disease and have to be felled, which is a darn shame when there are many planted along a road.

It has stopped raining, but I'm waiting for my package and have to stay inside until noon and I hope it is not for naught. I'll check on the website in a little while and see to the state of affairs and make some phone calls.

I've been unable to walk the Überhund and so far he's being patient and has been out back once, but I don't know if that suffices. I think he really needs to be walked, but we can't go anywhere now. This is the first time that I am having a confusing situation with this mail order company. In the past everything has always gone spotless. It's very frustrating to have it run differently now.

Right, this was my treatise on bushes and trees. You will have guessed as much. I just felt like talking about that. I really care about my alder berry trees and, although they are growing in completely the wrong spot, I can't cut them down, so they will stay there forever.

Have a brilliant day, whatever the weather and don't let the rain get you down.

Ciao...

An ordinary Tuesday.

I called the supermarket to find out if they were open for business again as usual and they were. I wanted to make sure, because today is the last day of Carnival and even that is mournfully celebrated with a ritual, which is very unclear to me, except that it involves people mourning and crying, because it is over, and other emotional outbursts. I am not conversant in all the details of the various Carnival rituals and just pick thing up here and there, making them all the more mysterious.

So I went to the store and picked up supplies, including good cookies, and for a change it wasn't real busy, so there was no manhandling of the shopping cart in the aisles and pushing around for position at the check out lane. Listen to me, I make it sound like we're uncivilized barbarians.

After I checked out, I remembered that I had not bought an energy saving light bulb for the hallway, so I'll have to move around in the dark there another couple of days. Or steal a light bulb from someplace else, but I think I have already done that once and it won't work again for a second time.

When I got home, I put the first bag of groceries down on the ground and the Überhund stuck his nose deep into it to see what I had gotten. He saw many goodies and wagged his stubby tail extra hard. After that, Nouri climbed into the bag, but couldn't make any sense of it. It was the same way when I got the second bag of groceries and the Überhund barked at me in frustration, so we shared three cookies. I think we showed a lot of self restraint.

I sat down on the sofa with a mug of coffee and a cigarette, but realized that I was so tired that I started to nod off and I laid myself down and took a tree hour nap. I don't know if you can call that a nap anymore. That's a regular sleep. I must have needed it though, because when I woke up, I felt ever so much better and not all discombobulated anymore. Sometimes I work on half a cylinder and I don't even realize it until I lay down and go to sleep. It's like before I do things in a half dream state, but I don't catch onto that until I have had some more sleep and am really properly awake.

I was supposed to have cleaned the apartment, because my friend Lucien is coming over tomorrow afternoon and I have ergo therapy in the morning, but I think I can clean the kitchen and the bathroom tonight. She'll have to excuse the rest of it, I'm not too bothered about that. She's coming to see me and not how clean my apartment is. Besides, a bucket of suds will do a lot of good. That and a little elbow grease.

I've just fed the animals. It's a real trick to keep the cats of the counter until I'm done filling their dishes. I keep telling them, "No, off you go," and pushing them off the kitchen counter. Slowly they are catching on. They are stubborn animals, because they jump up as quickly as I push them off, but the persister wins and that is I. I guess I'm more stubborn and I will have it my way.

The Überhund loves his food so much and it is doing wonders for his digestive and intestinal tract, that's as detailed as I'll get, you can imagine the rest. Let's just say that things are very easy to pick up. Now he is laying by my feet being perfectly satiated and waiting for me to take him out in a while. I always wait a bit for mother nature to take her course, although he watches my every move.

Right, I'll go take him out then.

The last couple of days the temperatures have been mild and you almost start to believe that springtime is around the bend. Weeds are popping up in the flowerbeds. Soon I'll have to weed my own little patch. I'll keep laying the weeds down as compost and as a place for the cats to do their business. Anything to keep them out of the neighbor's garden.

I'm curious to see when the three trees will start to show their little buds, they are barren still and so is the bush that shot up in the jasmine, that I have no idea of what it is. The jasmine needs to be cut way back, because it is so invasive. I'll have to go at it with the garden clippers. I'd like to dig it up and be rid of it completely. I wanted a climbing jasmine vine and the Exfactor came home with this bush. That's been a major regret ever since. Maybe I'll ask him to dig it up for me.

Okay, I have some house cleaning to do and I better do it now.

Have a great evening.

Ciao...