Best laid plans, and all that . .

DH (and almost everyone else in the shop) has mandatory overtime this weekend, so I am left to my own devices. I have frittered away hours trying to decide what to do with my day. It's an embarassment of riches. So, after I blog, I am going to put out a few more query letters for the western, and then I am going to spin to books on tape. And wait for DH to come home. He really is the center of my universe; the sun of my planetary orbit; the axle of my wheel; the god of my idolatry. I didn't intend to build my life around him, but he brings me such happiness. And I can't even think what to get him for his birthday. He's hard to buy for since he doesn't want much. His inner heater is too efficient for him to want wool socks or sweaters or other knitterly stuff. He has most of the tools he will ever use. He likes computer games, but gets what he wants when he wants it. His birthday is the 17th. What to do, what to do? Maybe some coupons . . . One thing I will NOT do today is go shopping for presents. Saturdays are too crowded.

Thursday night was our first freeze. On Friday, headed to the GED training session, I had to scrape frost off the car windows. I couldn't find the scraper because, since I was carpooling with two co-workers, I had cleaned the floating mass of detritus out of my car and thrown a bag of dreck away. I think the ice scraper was lost amidst the dreck. So I used a credit card. Cold fingers but clear windows. Note to self: Get ice scraper.

I got a LOT of knitting done at the training session and have the body of the orphan sweater finished. Shades of red plus purple elicit varied responses from people. I think I'm falling into the stage of life where I will put any colors together if I want to, whether it's chic to combine them or not. Also, my stash goes back decades, so I can combine colors from many different eras. I remember when turquoise and a certain shade of olive green was THE coolest color combo. I know people would definitely blink at it now. And remember the mauve phase? Red and purple (and certainly these shades of red and purple) are quite pretty, but still a bit startling, especially to the young. Ahh, if only I could get a photo.

The season has brought poetry out of my subconscious. Here ya go:

Wishes

A room
all mine
with windows and a chair;
an oversized, overstuffed, grandmother’s lap of a chair
yellow as a ginko leaf in autumn.

A quilt like a calico hug.

A side table big enough
for book, reading lamp,
cozied pot of darjeeling, steam
dreamily rising from the spout.

Amber light pooled around me,
and outside
in the sharp dark . . .
stars.