Indian Summer

I got up at 6:45 am to go to the imaging lab at the hospital for a mam.....procedure. The technician was upbeat and heading for Anchorage tonight to see the Lion King. Where else but Alaska do you drive 360 miles to pay $75 to see a musical? Granted, not just any musical.

Today was a fabulous Indian Summer day. The balmy weather prompted me to ride my bike downtown with Sandy to have a salad at Gambardella's, followed by a stop at the library. The salad was significant to mention- pear/walnut with carmelized walnuts, sliced pears and apples, sliced chicken and raspberry creamy vinaigrette. Yum. I had to drag the bike out from under the backporch where it was stored for the winter, but it was worth the extra effort.

My job as a desk jockey is causing me to get the slows. I'm going to have to pace my access to Facebook, blogs, Backpack, email, skype, iPhone and eLive. It is preventing me from really feeling retired, since I can be contacted all hours of the day and night. Okay- from now on, I'll only be checking computer applications twice a day- morning and evening. I'm resolved. That and doing the planning for my conference presentations (which are still only a paper concept right now). Then I can be free to do outside work, like putting up new house numbers and hauling lumber back from Lowe's. Also on my to-do list, making curtains from an old sheet to prevent curious neighbors from inspecting our ongoing apartment project. I'll make real ones when we've painted the walls, after we empty the rooms, after we build the shelves and so on.

Recycle idea of the day: We're building our shelves from the old garage doors- 9 feet long and 2 feet wide. Thatsa shelf! Extension idea: I wonder if the garage door company is looking for ways to recycle the doors they remove? Paul needs to get on that.

Other recycle idea of the day: Make soup from the chicken carcass. Oh, yes, Ben had a "Thanksgiving dinner" on his last day here. We were thankful he came to visit. The soup was good with dillweed and marjoram and smoked gouda cheese on the side.