LIMINAL LIVING #35: 25 AUGUST to 1 SEPTEMBER 2024

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LIMINAL LIVING #35: 25 AUGUST to 1 SEPTEMBER 2024

September 1, 2024

Weekly recap of my ritual of existence in this liminal space called life. (See here for more info.)

Weather

Temps are feeling lower, especially at night right now. The average high temperature this week was 74°F, ranging from 78.6°F to 67.3°F, and the average low temp this week was 55.6°F, ranging from 48.7°F (twice) to 64.2, with the rest in the 50°Fs. We received .23 inches of rain, on Mon/Tue (with some thunder) and Sat.

Beginnings/Firsts

September! Already?? Nooooo!

Wild Flora, Fauna, Fungi besides what’s shown elsewhere

Wandering

I took a long walk to mail a birthday card on Tuesday and we took a short walk after dinner. Gave a garden tour to a friend on Wed. and took a short walk later. Took a couple of short walks on Thursday and a longer walk (to Salon) on Friday. Took an hour-long walk and visited a permaculture garden on Sat. and walked at a nature park on Sunday.

In town walks

college permaculture garden

nature park

Curiosity & Discoveries

Found our first stinkhorn of the year in mulch at a college permaculture garden on Saturday.

In the same garden, came across these curious creatures on a beach plum shrub. From BugGuide comments, I think these are red-humped caterpillar moth larvae (Oedemasia concinna) and a bunch of wasp mummies, which are created by parasitic wasps (genus Aleiodes) who inject their eggs and polydnaviruses (which suppress the caterpillar’s immune system) into caterpillar hosts; the wasp larvae are living inside the caterpillar and will kill it when they emerge.

wasp mummies and red-humped caterpillar moth larvae

Creating

Nada.

Repairing and Maintaining (everything but the house & yard)

Body/Mind: I walked more than 9,000 steps on 6 days and more than 14,000 steps on 2 days, including one 19,340 step day. Worked out three times (3 hours) this week. Starting to add “mobility” exercises to my strength training — most of the moves are already embedded in the warm-ups and workouts I use (Body Electric, streaming or dvd) but some aren’t so I’m adding those. We both got haircuts on Thursday morning. I had a negative Covid rapid test on Thursday morning and on Thursday afternoon we both got the new Covid vaccines (Pfizer) at a CVS.

Cat: Made appt to have his nails clipped next Wed.

Gardening/Yard

We spent all week picking, sorting, and processing peaches to their best and highest use, and tomorrow (Monday, Labour Day) it all comes to an end. Peach season is glorious, tiring, time-consuming, a fun social event, and just about the right length, which this year was exactly three weeks. We have great neighbours and friends who are bakers, canners and freeze-ers, smoothie-makers, peach lovers and appreciators, who help us use our peaches well. In all, at least 25 people/families came to get peaches, many every day or every other day. Love that. (And peaches that were rotten on the tree and ground were seen to by admiral and Eastern comma butterflies, wasps, yellow jackets, and others, also good uses.)

I processed the rest (majority) of the garlic harvest on Wed., after it dried for a few weeks.

I also finally pruned the tulip poplar suckers this week.

the garden this week

Nesting

Cleaning/Maintenance: My husband replaced the fridge water filter on Monday. I did clothes laundry on Tuesday, cleaned a toilet on Thursday. My husband made the dump trip on Wednesday. Oofy the robo-vac vacuumed the family room and hallways on Sunday.

Food: I made three more loaves of peach cobbler bread (this recipe, altered a bit) on Tuesday. My husband made more peach scones on Saturday, peach pancakes on Sunday, and dehydrated peaches all week. We grilled shishitos for dinner one night, ate out on Wed. at a restaurant (outside), and had dinner with four friends on Sunday. I made a version of the bucatini-shrimp-arugula-corn-herbs-garlic-Pecorino dish on Friday.

restaurant dinner

Supplies: Cat’s Chewy delivery arrived on Wed. (litter and food). I ordered another pair of Kizik shoes (brown) on Sunday.

Sleeping & Dreaming

I slept an average of 7 hr 42 mins this week, with a high of 8 hrs 52 mins and a low of 6 hours 27 mins. My sleep scores (FitBit) ranged widely, with two in the high 70s and two in the low 90s, averaging 85 this week. I had 12 hours 42 mins of REM sleep and 9 hours 11 mins of deep sleep.

Reading / Words & Ideas / Listening / Watching

READING: Finished The Identicals (2017) by Elin Hilderbrand this week. It’s set on both Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard as deeply estranged twins, fun-loving Harper and regimented Tabitha, switch islands after their father dies and their mother falls and breaks a hip. One thing I particularly appreciate about the novel is how the plans and desires of the characters evolve as they encounter new circumstances, which mirrors real life but not all novels depict this realistically. I’m now reading Barefoot (2007), also by Hilderbrand, shown here with cat on moth alert.

These things resonated this week (the middle one is from The Comfort of Crows by Margaret Renkl)

WATCHING: We finished watching season 5 of Shetland on dvd on Friday, and on Sat. we watched the first (new) episode of season 4 of Only Murders in the Building on Hulu.

I watched and love this beautifully filmed 17-min video, ‘That’s What I Would Have Liked, to Live in a Wild Sea’: An 86-year-old woman’s decision to end her life raises complex questions about life and death for a filmmaker. (This is a gifted NYT link)

Connections & Community

Local Support: We ate dinner on Wed. outside at a local upscale-ish restaurant, splurging on drinks, appetizer, and dessert (plus entrees) — it was a gorgeous evening. Shopped at regional co-op on Thursday and brought back a requested item for a friend (LM).

Relationships: Dinner at friends’ (AS & AS) with another couple (CF & JRS) on Sunday night for 3.5 hours, with guitar playing, singing, and lots of conversation. Mailed a birthday card to my brother-in-law on Tuesday. Checked in during/after friend’s (ChN) cardiac surgery on Wed. and we gave a friend (JS) a garden tour that afternoon. Friend’s daughter texted after her mother’s (MBW) medical procedure on Friday morning. Permaculture met on Zoom on Thursday with 8 of us, and Salon met in person Friday with 6 of us, including a new member, and we had cake and ice cream to celebrate a member’s 88th birthday! The host’s cat also joined us.

Flurry of awkward emails about poetry meeting next week but in the end we decided to cancel it due to Covid wave and possible Covid exposure; we’ll try again in early Oct. Planned garden tour here for two friends (GV & RL) for next week.

Endings/Harvest

Peach season has just about ended for us for this year.

Harvested 3 jalapeños, 3 Bloody Butcher tomatoes, a handful of sungolds, a cucumber, and some parsley on Monday; harvested a cuke, a jalapeño, a Bloody Butcher, two paste tomatoes, sungolds, parsley, and basil on Friday. Processed the rest of the garlic I harvested a few weeks ago on Wed.