a small favor, please

Ohhhh friends, there’s so much to say, so much to tell, so much nothing that I could have been reporting to you during all this time I’ve been away.

Instead, I’m just going to ask for a little favor (or favour or favore – depending on where you are when you read this)…please send positive vibes to our refrigerator tonight. I’m afraid I might have jinxed it.

Everything electrical and mechanical has been working swimmingly for I don’t know how long when I went to pee tonight and noticed, across from me, the washing machine flashing lights in a way it’s never done before. (ok, we did have a little scare with the toilet the other day, still unexplained but problem rectified, so to speak. Who has ever had their toilet tank NOT refill after flushing when there is NOT a water shortage? Anyway, it’s filling consistently and reliably now, who cares why.) After not a huge investigation of the washing machine, we discovered that we had a little clog – no, not a small wooden yodeler shoe but rather a big wad of dog hair plugging the drain. We took some tubes apart, read the owners’ manual (yes, in that backwards order), unplugged it from the wall for 40 seconds (I counted), the light-flashing stopped and the washer started.

Here’s the trouble…can you predict it? Yes, over dinner I brought the subject up. I reflected on the fact that every and any electrical and mechanical thing that we own seems to have a propensity to stop working….(and I quote), “except for the fridge”.

Please send positive vibes, we've got stuff in the freezer that really needs to stay cold.

Thank you, Oswaldo

Neighbor Gianni: You guys got water?

David: Well, we do now but 2 days ago our vasca was completely empty. Someone had turned off the water coming to us.

Neighbor Gianni: I don’t have any. Let’s go check it out.

Gianni and David walk up the road about 50 meters, cut through an olive grove and arrive at our (that’s a collective “our” – shared by 4 property owners) water source. The only one still with water. You might remember it as the potential swimming pool – yeah, that was wishful thinking.

The tube going to Gianni’s land is cut – NOT just turned off, CUT.

Gianni: Mannaaaaagia (that means, “shucks”). OH, GIUSSEP! (he hollers blindly up the side of the mountain in the direction of Giuseppe’s house).

Giuseppe: OH!

Gianni: DID YOU CUT MY WATER TUBE?

Giuseppe: YEAH.

Gianni: WHY?

Giuseppe: I INSTALLED THAT FOR OSWALDO AND HE ISN’T USING IT ANY MORE.

A little note – Oswaldo was the husband of the woman who owned the upper half of our house before us. Oswaldo has been dead for about a decade.

Gianni: Mannaggia.

And so the water saga continues. We count ourselves lucky for just having periodic turn-offs rather than cut-offs. Oswaldo must have put in our tubes himself.

The olive trees are blossoming, the fig trees are buldging and the neighbors are arguing about water - It must be summer in Maberga. More to come...when I'm not needing to sleep.

Frosted mamma...

I used to try to ignore the mothers’, fathers, grandparents’, secretaries’, favorite second cousins’ type days. Not because I didn’t think that my favorite second cousin deserved to be recognized once a year but rather because I held a secret paranoia that Hallmark was trying to take over the world.

Ok, that’s not true. Usually I just forget.

Anyway, this year I would like to tell you, with just one anecdote, why I think my mom is a pretty terrific gal, deserving of recognition, and perhaps a candidate for mother-of-the-year:

When the Carol Brady hair frosting was in fashion, Mom would let my sister and I (aged 12 and 7 respectively) pull her hair through the little plastic cap with that crochet hook thing. That was fun. Very fun. Thank you, Mom. In addition, she didn’t even care that Laurie’s side of her head had big, wide frosted stripes from Laurie’s large chunk pulling method while my side was just about all white because I pulled through each individual hair.

I think that sufficiently sums up exactly why I love my mom so much. That and the fact that it was actually about 10 years after Carol stopped frosting that we still were.

Happy mothers’ day, Mom.

Abundance

Five abundant days in Denmark. Five days with the great pal, great knitter, great lady, Mette (aka: reader/commenter Mentor Mette, and One of the Danes). An abundance of wonderful conversation, tasty fish dinners, and not-so-bad wine.

She showed me her stash. Abundant.

She taught me to read Danish. Ok, it’s really just reading knitting but it sounds cool to say I was reading Danish. (I’ll post photos of the Danish shawl when it’s Finnished – ha ha! Get it? It's an old joke when in the company of Danes but I still laugh every time)

We watched a bee lay an abundance of eggs on the kitchen window. That was kind of gross but Mette thought it was cool so she took a photo.

We knit a little.

I got to see an abundance of Bente (another one of the danes who is a reader but sadly, a non-commenter and a non-knitter. That’s ok – she’s still pretty nice).

We stood in an abundance of rape. Denmark is quite beautiful at this time of the year.

We listened to some flowers at Bente’s summer house before she fixed us an abundant (and rather luxurious) lunch.

Mette and I also shopped, played, chatted and did a bunch of other girly things.

Thanks Mette for sharing your abundant life with me for a few days.

Then I came home to my abundant life.

David had been puttering while I was away and mom and dad sent me a little care package.

I meant to do that!

I just finished putting some undies in a carry-on for my trip. I've decided to wear the same clothes for the whole week while in Denmark (except for the undies) so I can carry more yarn. It seems very sensible now. I will tell you if it was a good idea or not when I come back. I figure that since I wear the same thing here night and day from one bathing to the next (I won't tell you how frequently this is because it might embarrass my parents) why not while I am away. So now I get to go to my yarn stash and pull out a bunch of stuff to fill my suitcase. I think this is a good decision.

In other knitting news. Check out these photos.

Clara Parks' 1 skein shawl has just become a two skien swimming suit wrap! You can call it pure knitting designer genius, or you can call it what it really is....the bed was too short on the right side to continue pinning the shawl down. Thus, I decided to leave the points of the triangle unblocked and therefore ready to be tied around my waist.

Come on ... it's genius.