Leaving August Behind #weekendcoffeeshare

Common Evening Primrose

The end of August is fast approaching, and I am sorry to leave it behind. This week saw the clearing of the garden plots, with the exception of my fenced-in chives garden. The seeds from this year’s flowers have been carried away with dead branches and fading flowers. Next week I must order some more wildflowers seeds, looking toward next spring’s planting. I have hopes of tending the garden better, as I am feeling much better and getting my allergies under better control.

I would have hoped that we could sit in the sun and visit, but time has gotten away from me. We must settle for indoors. There is fresh tea, if you would like some, as well as the makings for a couple cups of Toddy coffee. Al overbought for his camping trip, and so there’s a lot of different cheeses to sample.

This week, finally, I am getting back to work on my “Quietude and Tea” WordPress blog. I will miss daily outings with my camera, but as the temperatures begin to drop along with the autumn rain, I am finding myself hungry for writing and for new directions in non-recreational reading material before the snow arrives.

I hate to think about getting out and about, even though it’s for dental appointments and the Scampers’ grooming appointment. I will welcome the return of the online Zoom editions of Poetry Heals on the first and third Wednesdays of each month. As the climate changes and continuing COVID-19 outbreaks continue, it’s important to me to find outlets for tension and enjoy heavy sprinklings of humor. Speaking of which, I am planning to use National Novel Writing Month (November) for the self-challenge of writing and posting at least one poem for each day. I am now contemplating several possible themes for those thirty days of writing.

Looking back over the decades, it seems to me that Novembers have been troublesome in general and in particulars. Don’t suppose that “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” would be an appropriate theme…

My thanks to Natalie “the Explorer” for so ably hosting Weekend Coffee Share each week (Loving Life in August 2022).

Hugs & best wishes,
Lizl

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Cool breeze, raindrops, thunder #WeekendCoffeeShare

Charlie

Welcome! I am happy that you’ve stopped by for a visit, today. Grab a cup of coffee or what you will. What’s happening? Here, the weather has been iffy, and ragweed season is in full force. The scattered rain showers help clear the air a bit, though.

Al is shopping, and I am waiting for an order to arrive this afternoon– electronics for one of his projects. I got some photos of raindrops. I must remember where I left the photo flash drives, so that I can add a few pictures from Thursday.

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I participated in Ronovan Writes Poetry challenges, this week: a haiku for Monday and a sijo for Wednesday: Wild umbrellas| Ronovan Writes #Weekly #Haiku #Poetry Prompt #Challenge 423 and Different Paths | Ronovan Writes Sijo Wednesday Poetry Challenge #23. I also went back for the sijo challenge prompt for the previous week.

Our older (by 3 days) Cocker spaniel, Charlie, took his turn with the vet for tooth extractions and a cleaning on Wednesday. Threw off everyone’s sleeping schedule. Both of them are currently enjoying canned beef stew with gravy, not wanting Thaddeus to be left out of the feast during Charlie’s recuperation. A couple weeks before they both return to dry food.

With the new mixture of allergens at this time of year and my spending much time in the backyard and barefoot, I think I’ve got hives on my legs, now. Contact dermatitis, I suspect. Or allergic dermatitis. Or both.

I read Modesitt’s Councilor for the third time and have gone on to others in my to-be-read list before the third novel (Contrarian?) in 2023. Mercedes Lackey’s next is the one that I wait for with anticipation. That novel that is coming out toward the end of this year.

Theoretically, Saturday and Sunday the grass will be dry enough for mowing the lawn. Hoping that we can get down another application of grass seed rooted during the rainy spell to crowd out more of the weeds, like happened earlier in the summer.

The usual weekend Zoom get-togethers on Saturday afternoon and Sunday over the meeting for worship, social time, and then meeting for worship with a concern for business, also via Zoom. (The Scampers get long naps on my lap, on Sundays.)

Best wishes for you this weekend and the coming week!

Hugs & much love,
Lizl

P.S. Our host Natalie’s weekend coffee share post for this week can be found here: Postcard from St. John’s.

a splash of tea #weekendcoffeeshare

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  Copyright © 2022-07-24, by Lizl Bennefeld

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  Copyright © 2022-07-24, by Lizl Bennefeld.

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Welcome to my blog! If we were enjoying a morning cup of coffee together, this morning . . . I would not be writing with one finger. Our younger dog, Thadd, has fallen asleep on my left arm. And he snores, for which I ask your forgiveness.

At this moment the sunrise begins. In another hour or so, I can make kitchen noises and switch from water to hot Toddy coffee.

The pollen count is moderate, and so I hope to take some photos, this weekend, between rain showers. This afternoon, computer willing, I will attend Liz Danforth’s Zoom gathering. I have not yet found a computer to meet all my needs. I may need to majorly adjust the budget to accommodate.

This was/continues to be an unstructured week. I think I may read and sleep more, and continue sorting and tossing kitchen stuff we have not used over the past decade or more. There comes a time …

Hugs and best wishes,
Lizl

Thank you to Natalie for hosting our Weekend Coffee Share!

Becalmed: the summer doldrums

Neglected Corners

Natalie the Explorer, Host for #WeekendCoffeeShare:
These Icebergs Made My Day.

Welcome! Early, yet, but I can warm up some black tea from last night. Or, would you like some hot Toddy coffee? This last batch is a bit more robust, but I can add a bit more water to the mix. This week seems cluttered and endless. I have gotten started on a lot of need now unfinished projects, but they are running into one another, which does not help.

My major concern right now is that my other laptop also has had a critical structural failure. At the moment, it still works (mostly), but the plastic housing comes loose when moved. I need to get some external hard drives to back up the data. Which I think I can cover with my next allowance. This is the second one in four months. That one fried the socket for the recharging cord; I was able to back up all the data before it ran out of juice. That laptop also was made with hard plastic. My old Lenovo desktop computer is more than 10 years old, which poses compatibility problems. I am currently using a Lenovo tablet with a detachable keyboard. Which works for the time being. I have had good experiences with Lenovo products over the decades. Will see what I can afford.

Otherwise, things are moving along. I have been enjoying the presence of the gatherings of crows along our street. They have so much fun mock fighting and playing catch and rolling on their backs in the grass in our front yard.

We are getting enough rain to keep the grass from drying out totally. Our temperatures have been in the 60s at night and mostly in the 80s during the day. I have seen a few more pollinators, but not enough. I am letting the asylums go wild for lack of other flowers that did not make it through the late spring frost and freezes.

I am running out of time, and so must cut this short. Best wishes for you during the week to come!

Hugs,
Lizl

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door into summer | week 27 #weekendcoffeeshare

Host for Weekend Coffee Share, Natalie the Explorer: Three Amazing World Heritage Sites.

New Growth

Welcome to the (filtered, cooled) kitchen. We have hot brew and cold brew coffee; also loose-leaf English breakfast tea and the sample teabag packets that Stash Tea sends out for free with each order. I drink English Breakfast Tea, which leaves a broad range of choices for my visitors.

Summer has come, with dry ground and higher temperatures, and I, who dislike the hot weather, find myself befuddled when it comes to conversing coherently. Hence the photography and photo art off and on until the first frost of autumn.

"Guessing Games"

without words . . .
Schrodinger's cat has my tongue
or does she? 

I wonder if Schrodinger also had dogs, but was too timid to suggest any other-dimensional allusions to them.

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  Summer Morning

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  Summer Hollyhocks

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  Cascading Blooms

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  Wild Flax and Alyssum

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  Walking Stick.and White Campion

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  Sunbeams

My weekend is to be busy, here, with Zoom meetings (social meet-up and meeting for worship), and sibling and spouse visiting (on short notice) and possibly a short outing with them. I have 183 more photograph files from this week to go through, deleting the pictures I will not be using.

Making some headway with the breathing and allergy problems, including wearing a face mask whenever I am breathing the outside air, and taking a shower and changing clothes a couple times a day. Relaxed enough to take naps and enjoy leisure reading. (Still not back to Fukuyama! ::sigh:: ) Avoiding the news as though it were all old news. I am back to L.E. Modesitt, Jr. and his most recent book. Rereading it again in anticipation of book 2 of the series, which I think comes out in November of this year. I seem to remember his saying that book 3 in the series is also written and ready for publication early next year.

I have been writing little poems during the week. They just seem to pop up when I am working with my photo art. That is lots of fun. I did not have any problem coming up with poetry challenge prompts, this week. Quite pleased with what turned out; my RonovanWrites poems are, as usual, on my QuiltedPoetry WordPress blog.

Despite the frequent forecasts of rain showers, the grass has not retained moisture, but is turning brown wherever there is not shade from the sun during most of the day. Saturday is to be HOT, followed by promises for thunderstorms from Saturday night through Monday night. The thistles are doing well, and I hope to keep them growing to the flowering stage, when the flowers are fresh and delightful. Trick is to get rid of them, again, before they go to seed. I am already pulling up the smaller thistles around the gazebo. The gravel is deep, and I can easily pull them out, tap roots and all.

I had been worried about the absence of the spiders who spin the large webs in the grass along the bottom of the workshop’s base. Today, I at last discovered one spider in its customary spot, setting up a web. They are the ones, I think, that maintain large networks of sticky webs that catch all sorts of insects, but also dew on misty mornings and raindrops from nighttime rain. I love the dewy mesh and the shiny, metallic-looking drops as they catch the light.

Thank you for stopping by! Feels good to just sit down and chat about what’s been going through my mind, lately. Writing/talking/listening is the most relaxing part of my days and nights. Where do we live, after all, but in our minds, which convey to us realities as well as dreams?

Best wishes for the weekend and the coming weeks and years!

Hugs & much love!
Lizl

Warmer Weather #weekendcoffeeshare

“Wild Violets”
Photo by E.W. Bennefeld.

After the break in torrential rains and cold winds, we enjoyed time to catch up on the water seepage and wash essential laundry. To the West, ditches are overflowing, roads are crumbling, and dams are giving way. At one dam, helicopters have been flying in to drop one-ton sandbags to build up/shore up dikes, no overland vehicles being able to access the area. Here along the eastern border of the state, we are expecting rain again Saturday night into Monday night.

None of this has actually affected our household, since the grocery and other stores and most other places that are not in the way of the flood waters, are open for business. I am emptying the dehumidifiers in the basement only once a day, now, and for now, everything is drying up nicely, between those and the floor fans.

The two of us are sleeping later and getting to bed earlier. The Scampers are … uncertain. Routines have fallen apart, and I have taken to putting out bowls of dry food where they can eat when they choose. Monday marks the second week of Spring Clean-up in the city. I will have to put out the items to go before Saturday night’s rain. Our collection day is Tuesday. That would be our second chance. Except that if there is no rain, the city crews will be digging up the sewer line on our street, beginning Monday. Hm-mm. I wonder how that is going to work. ::sigh::

In the meanwhile, Friday night I took in the first of three segments of the readings of the short poems nominated for the SFPA’s annual Rhysling Awards. I have a social/co-working Zoom get-together on Saturday, with morning and/or evening SFPA Town Hall meeting(s). The state of the organization and planning for the future.

Aside from that, we are good to go, with the groomer this coming week and the Scampers’ visit with the vet.

Looking forward to diving into Coffee Shares this week in particular.

Hugs & much love,
Lizl

Natalie the Explorer, our amazing host for Weekend Coffee Share: Weekday Walk: Exhibition Place and also the Inlinkz link party app for contacting others taking part this weekend.

End of the month #weekendcoffeeshare

Part II of this weekend’s coffee share can be found on my Quietude and Tea blog: Dark and Stormy Night.

Weather Frog

We awoke this morning to the sounds of rain on windows and roof. According to the National Weather Service, we are to expect the rain to continue off and on until next Friday or Saturday. The flowers that should by now have been in bloom, have yet to emerge, but for the daffodil and tulip leaves. The rabbits are eating those in lieu of grass. (I now am wondering if the grass is so poor because the strong winds through autumn blew away all of the leaves before any snow fell.)

If we were having coffee, this morning, I could offer milk, water, and coffee concentrate to add to either, hot or cold. I wish that I could invite you to share in the Jarlsberg or Gouda cheese and gluten-free crackers. I was late getting to my breakfast, having to get the Scampers squared away, several visits outside, before the installation team began their work.

I spent a quarter of my available writing time on reassuring the Scampers that the noises from the garage are benign. This morning the garage door was replaced before it falls apart. The ice and snow have been hard on it, and ice sometimes freezes the door to the cement floor. This time, we are going for an insulated door. If nothing else, insulation will moderate the summer/winter temperatures.

This felt like a long week. Al was playing catch-up on outside chores—raking the front and back yards and putting down abundant grass seed that is supposed to flourish under shaded conditions. If this doesn’t work, I am going to order seed for low-growing, no-mow meadow flowers and clovers. Perhaps with some herbs mixed in around the edges.

I have felt quite uncomfortable, this week and last, which interfered with sleep patterns (tight muscles, sensitivities to sounds and to textures, heightened allergic reactions, &c.). I have not pushed myself to get anything done, the past couple of days, other than what is in front of me. I am pretty sure, still, that I have written poems to cover each day, so far. Still do not know where or how far they have scattered. A lot are on my Facebook account. I had thought to take my camera into the back yard to take more photographs, but although the breezes are mild, the temperature is not as high as I would like.

I think I most enjoy writing when I first wake up. At night I often find it comfortable just to lie down and sleep. Or wander through my photograph archives; that can swallow many hours. When that happens, the words blossom, the rain on the petals, the tulip’s cup overflowing with silent song, raindrops keeping time as they fall off green leaves to the ground. Nature’s tears, the raindrops on the leaves and the dew all around.

This week I am looking forward to gathering all the disposable items: e.g., 30-year-old cassettes of classical and ethnic music, DVDs that I never want to watch again, and [hopefully] the overly large and diverse CD music collection as Al works to transfer the classical, jazz, blues, and other selections to a music server. I was fortunate to receive my late Uncle Jess’s collection of New York style jazz. When I was in school, he would send me reel-to-reel tapes that he made from jazz radio stations in NYC. I enjoy revisiting that music so many decades later. We are fortunate to be in line for the second week of Spring Clean-up Week, here in town. I want to get rid of so much stuff that I know I will never return to.

At this point, it is much easier to sort out what I want to keep in my life, going forward, and what I can happily turn my back on. It is, I think, not a matter of too little time, but an acknowledgement that my interests and focuses are changing. Deepening? Maybe.

Well, so much for nattering, here, as the next round of rains and possibly thunderstorms make their way here. I must check the radar and see if I can get one more load of laundry through the wash/rinse cycle before I have to open the floor drain again. Just in case the water rises.

Wherever you are, stay safe!
Hugs,
Lizl

Natalie the Explorer, host for Weekend Coffee Share: Inlinkz link party at Loving Life in April 2022 post.