the last of the warmish days

readers, it's getting cold where the baron lives. summer - and those really warm, wear-only-shorts-and-tank-tops-and-flip-flops-days - is long gone, so now she's trying to trick herself into believing that 60 degrees can pass for a mild day. it's not really working, sigh. sometimes, though, she sits on the wall at the top of the yard and looks out at the green expanse of the lawn. in the shade of the old oak tree, in her jeans and sweatshirt, she can almost feel a hint of summer.

happy, happy

reader, today is the brother's birthday! the baron is staggered by the fact that jonathan is 28 years old - she remembers him younger, softer around the middle, with a haircut only a mother could give. his face - always so round, and his eyes, so big and mischievous - has changed into something leaner and harder; it has beautiful edges now. reader, do a mash-up of the two faces below... he kind of looks like that now.

something interesting

the baron is thinking about halloween, still, but her mind occasionally wanders away from the costumed holiday - after all, woman cannot live on candy alone! today, in the afterglow of barack obama's infomercial, her mind wandered over to tax plans (a subject that the baron, alas, knows VERY LITTLE ABOUT). fortunately, the good people at vanityfair.com have made it easy for her. take a look, reader, if you have the time.

fall walk with fido

last weekend, last sunday, the baron and the husband participated in 'fall walk with fido'. the event was held at lake artemesia, a lovely scenic spot very near the baron's house. vendors - both for-and non-profit - set up tables in the center of the lake's walk, where goods were sold and free literature was available for anyone to take. the event was meant to bring people and their dogs out for a walk around the lake and to advertise the work of the baron's city committee. and, frankly, if some dog and his owner wanted to buy a gift basket or a canvas bag, or donate to the committee, that was just fine too.





the day was a modest success, though not as successful as it could have been: 'fall walk with fido' was originally scheduled for saturday, but saturday turned out to be a horrible weather kind of day. sunday, though much nicer on the clouds-in-the-sky front, saw fewer visitors, many of whom just happened on the event and decided to stay. it turns out commerce DOES bring people together.

below, the husband and tucker enjoy the weather and the walk.

the baron, for the most part, sat at the registration desk, announcing to all manner of visitors that an event was going on, and were they here for it? even when they looked her square in the eye and grumpily said 'no', she made her pitch anyway. the day was so nice, harlan was so comfortable... what was there to be grumpy about anyway?

below, harlan sits like a king on the baron's lap.

hot dog

has the baron mentioned how excited she is about halloween? the candy, the neighborhood out together, a good reason to spend the early evening hours outside and fire up the chiminea, the candy, the weather (which promises to be lovely- no rain in sight)...

the baron is most excited about the dogs, because she knows that the dogs will be delighted to spend time outside, watching all the foot traffic. those dogs, they like a little bit of distraction now and again, something different from their usual squirrel watching.

also, they will be wearing costumes.

for the baron's amusement.

baron, below, has had his costume picked out for WEEKS. he can't wait to get put it on. he only hopes his siblings are astute enough to get the pun, though he fears they are not.


he also fears that tucker might mistake him for an actual food product and try to eat him. the baron and the husband have promised to keep an eye on tucker, on baron's behalf. there will be no wieners eaten on halloween night!

pumpkins

halloween's a-comin'! this fact excites the baron very, VERY much, both for the sense of community spirit invoked by the holiday, and - frankly - for the candy. the baron and the husband carve pumpkins every year. below, their 2008 entries:



a friend of theirs couldn't tell who had carved what. the baron was offended at that... and knows that you , reader, can tell which is her handiwork, right?

here to stay

a little while ago, the baron and the husband offered to foster a cat. his name was avery, and he was supposed to stay for a short while only. things didn't quite work out that way. the baron and the husband, after some very serious consideration ('do you think we should keep him?' 'do you?' 'he IS black, and he IS kind of dog-shaped, so he does fit in with our small black dog aesthetic.' 'yeah.'), decided that avery-now-named-chester-copperpot-but-called-jinxy-cat is staying.

so far, he fits in very well with his new brothers and sister, all of whom mostly leave him alone. jinxy cat has even taken up some of their habits, though: he flops onto the floor, loiters around the kitchen waiting for food scraps, and helps himself to whatever piece of furniture he wants. below is the sun room couch:


the only one of the dogs who has any real problem with jinxy is baron, and though baron IS the kind of dog to get his hackles up for NO GOOD REASON, it appears that - when it comes to jinxy cat - baron has a very good reason indeed for avoiding him. it turns out that jinxy weighs 20 lbs. - a whole three pounds more than baron - and is taller than baron too. sensing that he's not the smallest (cat-who-acts-like-a-)dog in town, jinxy follows baron around swatting at his tail or pawing at his, ahem, bottom. baron mostly runs away and looks put out, occasionally turning on jinxy with a gruff grumble. it must be love.

oprah says

today the baron is thinking about oprah winfrey. she doesn't often think of oprah, though it must be noted, the baron is mostly a fan. some episodes of the oprah winfrey show just don't interest her at all, others, she watches from start to finish.

today, though, the baron is fixated on oprah's call to follow your passion. she crows it - find your passion! follow your passion! that's how you will be happy! this missive, on the face of it, seems like a good - a GREAT - idea. follow your passion, do what you love, and the rest will fall into place.

the baron wants to know about the particulars. how, for instance, does one identify her passion? how does one parlay that passion into a monthly mortgage payment? why aren't more people following their passions? do all those hotel maids/garbage men/untouchables find their bliss cleaning other peoples' messes? what about doctors/lawyers/mid-level administrators in government jobs? auto mechanics/teachers/diner waitresses? isn't it more likely that most people are just doing what they can to get by, to make the mortgage, to accrue two weeks' vacation time per year? what would happen if everyone found and followed their bliss?

if it's true, that most people are trying to make house payments, but some (few) people are happy in their jobs (really, REALLY happy), how can one make the jump from the former to the latter? really, reader, the baron wants to know how SHE can jump from the former to the latter. she likes her job well enough, but it doesn't stir her soul, not in the way this does.

it's probably to do with hope, or faith, right? to make the transitional leap from mortgage payer to I AM SO HAPPY, one must have a wishing well of hope, the faith that things will look up, that everything will work out, that by following vegan baking or florence, italy or jonathan or her heart's desire or four legged family, or paris, france, the baron will find I AM SO HAPPY!

she's still missing the connector pieces. anyone have any advice for her?

outside living, when will it end?

reader, the baron is tired of outside living. it used to be, outside living actually meant 'outside lounging'. the baron could take a book or a magazine, along with a cup of something tasty, to either of the yard's two sitting areas. sometimes, she would dispense with the book and/or magazine entirely, sitting outside for the sheer enjoyment of nature and bird song.

lately, though, outside living has come to mean 'outside working', or actually, 'outside slaving away WHEN WILL IT BE FINISHED?'

'oh, little the baron', says the husband, 'it will be finished when home depot restocks the wall stones we cleaned out last weekend.'

but you know what, reader? it won't really be finished then. because after the wall is done, they'll have to lay a patio, then some sod, then buy and erect a shed, then buy and erect a fence (to go around the formal garden that seemed like such a good idea earlier this year when the baron was all like 'YES! a formal garden, like at versailles! with pebbled walkways and a gate and a place for a bistro set! YES!' ahem), then frame and plant the garden, then lay the garden's pebbles.

then, only then, will the baron and the husband be able to relax. of course, buy 'then' it will be 2010 and they'll be on the i-10 west to california, but whatever.

see progress, however slow, below. all four photos are from the very back of the yard. these two are from the same angle, the first taken sometime in mid-august, the second taken last weekend.

these last two are from approximately the same perspective. the first one was taken in early august (notice the trees apparent in this one that are missing from the very first photo, above). the second one, also last weekend.

*sigh*.

squirrel meets walnut

the baron and the husband have a large walnut tree in their yard. it's a lovely old tree, easily 40 feet high; it's currently playing host to one of the yard's two bat houses.

this tree, every fall, drops A LOT of walnuts, walnuts that litter the yard like the plastic cups on bourbon street after mardi gras. the walnuts are, at best, an annoyance, and at worst, something that might badly muck up the insides of the husband's lawn mower. the dogs are indifferent to them, except that one will occasionally get a shell piece stuck to the bottom of his or her paw, at which point s/he will gimp around the yard halfheartedly licking at the paw in question and giving the baron and the husband a look that quite plainly says, 'help'.

the squirrels LOVE the walnuts. they grub them around in their tiny little paws, using their teeth to peel away the outer shell. once they get the walnut open, they dig out all the meat, leaving a picked-clean empty shell. in the photo above, you can kind of see faint teeth marks on the outside of the shell. they're industrious, those squirrely bastards.

the first quilt

reader, you may remember that the baron had recently been working on a quilt (one she began calling the-quilt-of-no-completion, given the amount of time it took to finish). well, happy days are here now (!), because that quilt is DONE!!

here's a long shot of the quilt, on the baron's bed... the quilt does a really nice job of keeping her and the husband warm at night.

here's a closeup of some of the squares, and a little peek of the backside. the baron's blog seems chronically afflicted with 'low light-itis', and these photos are no exception... apologies.

here's the baron's signature and the date of completion... more than one person recommended she sign and date her quilt and, with the help of a fabric pen (one of the best inventions ever), she did. because the final product is so PRETTY, and because the memory of her impatience with the-quilt-of-no-completion is receding with the passage of time, the baron is now optimistically thinking of this one as 'the first quilt'.

decorate the garden

right now is usually the baron's favorite time of year (when she's living in maryland, anyway), and this fall is no exception. the mornings are chilly, she's pulled out her tights for wearing with wool skirts, the trees are still mostly green but have begun changing colors just at their leaves' edges... it's a glorious and lovely time of year.

one of the things the baron particularly likes about it are the number of special days coming up. her father's birthday is this saturday, and will give her a nice excuse to think of him, maybe throw back a budweiser in his honor. her brother's birthday is at the end of the month, just before (literally, the day before!) halloween. then thanksgiving, which the baron loves for turkey-eating, then christmas, which the baron loves for the snow and the undivided time and attention she gets from her husband.

ahem.

before the baron gets too excited, pulling out the pine-bough wreath and whatnot, let's start with THIS month's celebrations. this outdoor votive holder, below, gets the party started.

welcome to the house

the baron and the husband, until very recently, had 3 wreaths that - depending on the season - they hung on the front door. winter, spring and summer are all well represented, with wreaths of pears, grape vines, pine boughs and the like.

fall was the lone holdout, the unrepresented season. last fall, the baron made a wreath herself, on a wire wreath frame and using autumnal foliage, but it didn't keep very well and was - frankly - kind of ugly. this year, she cheated and bought one from her local craft store, above. it's some kind of berry something or other, and twigs too, so it's very twiggy with berries. anyway, it's a nice way to enter their house... until, of course, you look past the wreath to the dusty dog lounging on the white love seat and her three brothers pawing to get out.

keeping those herbs in place

having successfully created one retaining wall in her yard, the baron recently felt empowered to build another one, just off her kitchen, to keep her herb garden in place.

(apologies in advance for the darkness of the photos.)

the baron constructed the wall the last sunday in september; it took most of the day, and was kind of tricky, given that she had to account for both a corner and a downspout. this first picture shows the almost finished product. see how the stones are kind of crooked and only mostly level?


these next two pictures were taken the first weekend in october. the baron spent the better part of last friday, october 3, measuring, cutting, and gluing these capstones in place:

the baron has decided that the beauty of the capstones, besides giving one a place to sit, is that they effectively address the 'crooked and mostly level' issues, don't you think?


really, the baron wanted to put this retaining wall in so that she could avoid working on the larger retaining wall project that's slated for the back of the yard... but, alas, the husband made some headway on that larger project over the weekend (digging out and leveling the trench), so she can't dodge it much longer.

but, the good news? more masonry pictures for you, reader! yay!

what? here i am!

the baron and her dogs have developed a nice weekday morning routine. the husband leaves for work around 7:00am, at which time the baron lets three of the four dogs out while she attends to her, ahem, toilette. (the fourth dog follows the baron around the house, usually coming to rest on the bath mat while she brushes her teeth.)

around 7:30, the baron is ready to leave for work and forcibly encourages the fourth dog outside, so he can, ahem, relieve himself. he hops to the bottom of the steps, makes his business just off the front walk, and hops back up the stairs, at which time the baron lets loose a LONG whistle. this whistle is a noise the other three dogs know - they know it means, 'mom's calling, time to go inside'.

dexter and tucker are very obedient dogs, and answer the whistle almost immediately by running up the front steps and into the house.

harlan, on the other hand, fakes deafness to get himself an extra three minutes of outside time, at which point he bursts up the stairs like a rocket with this look on his face:



as if to say, 'hey! where've you been? i've been waiting for you the whole time, but here i am! also, can i have a treat?'