Weekly recap of my ritual of existence in this liminal space called life. (See here for more info.)
- Weather
Weather was warmer this week than last, until Saturday night when we entered another short cold spell, into early next week. Overall, the average high temperature was 23.4°F, with a range from 31.3°F to 6.3°F, with all the rest of the highs in the 20°Fs; and the average low was 2.8°F, ranging from -7.1°F to 11.8°F, with all the rest of the lows either negative or in the single digits above zero. We got about 4 inches of snow on Saturday. We have over 10 hours of daylight now, the sun rising a bit before 7 a.m. and setting about 10 minutes after 5 p.m.
- Beginnings/Firsts
PGA golf is on again! Watched some of Round 4 (and the short playoff round) of the WM Phoenix Open on Sunday.
- Wild Things (Flora, Fauna, Fungi) in addition to others elsewhere in this post
TOP row: all purple finches; SECOND row: purple finches and goldfinches; goldfinches (2); THIRD row: Carolina wren (2, one with goldfinch) and mourning dove; FOURTH row: mourning dove; blue jay; white-breasted nuthatch; FIFTH row: grey squirrel going after a seed; BOTTOM row: wild cat playing with birthday gift ribbon
- Wandering
Long walks on Tues. (lake), Thursday (in town), and Friday (in town), and shorter in-town walks on Wed. and Sunday. Barely left town this week.
lake
in-town
- Curiosity & Discoveries
Mildly curious: an ice disc around a bridge support above the lake’s dam.
- Creating
Yes, I have written a poem every day (evening) this week. Thank you for asking.
- Repairing and Maintaining the human(s), the cat, and the cars
Humans: I worked out four times this week (4 hours), with weights, stretching, dancing, etc. I walked more than 8,000 steps on six days, more than 11,000 steps on four days, and more than 14,000 steps on two days. We played ping pong for 4 hours this week. I completed the Sharon Salzberg Real Happiness Challenge meditations each day and I participated in Dharma Sunday for two hours with Lama Willa leading meditation (from Hawaii!) and teaching on The Radical Present, spoken of as “the time outside of [linear] time” in Buddhism. My husband had his annual PCP visit on Friday.
- Nesting
Cleaning/Maintenance: I did clothes laundry on Monday and Sunday. I vacuumed the kitchen and hallways on Thursday and watered the houseplants on Tuesday. My husband replaced the refrigerator filter on Thursday.
Yard: My husband cleared the snow from the driveway on Saturday afternoon.
Financial/Admin: I backed up my laptop every day — it’s showing signs of dying, and though so far it’s a slow death, I know how these situations can suddenly take a turn for the worst. Here’s one of its several communications with me lately:
On Monday I updated the Financial Information document I keep for those who survive me/us, listing information about our accounts, credit cards, insurances, mortgage, tax and financial advisor info, and the like.
Supplies: My husband ordered new xc skis and boots on Monday (his are quite worn out and not functioning well) and they arrived on Thursday but were the wrong item (skis)/size (boots). He returned them and should get the replacements next week.
I found a heavy winter puffer jacket in great shape for $48 at the local consignment store on Thursday! (I looked online and it retails for $250-$300). My husband found a good pair of heavy winter gloves ($6) and we got a dvd with 18 episodes of Julia Child cooking for $2. (Here, in May 1963, she’s making bouillabaisse with a giant cod fish head, a halibut frame, porgies, perch, clams, mussels, and many other things of the sea:)
I placed an order for flower and veggie seeds from Botanical Interests on Thursday when they were offering free shipping.
Food: We finished the vegan coconut curry on Monday, accompanied (the curry, not us, thought sort of?) by jasmine rice and papadums, plus roasted Brussels sprouts with a maple syrup and balsamic vinegar glaze. Veggie burgers on Tuesday, with mac & cheese and raw veggies (orange bell peppers and radishes) with that Maine Harvest celeriac dip. We went out to dinner on Wednesday for my husband’s birthday (he had fish & chips and I had a vegan pesto root vegetable ravioli dish, with carrots and red peppers julienned on top; see Local Support below for photos). We used a coupon that a local restaurant sends for these occasions, and we had our leftovers from that outing on Thursday along with sautéed fresh local spinach and garlic. On Friday, able to find some good (firm, stout) asparagus this week, I made the penne-asparagus-pine nut dish I love, with Old Bay shrimp, plus raw carrots and radishes with the celeriac dip; we had that again on Saturday, with more sautéed fresh local spinach and garlic. I roasted root vegetables (celeriac, parsnips, carrots, golden beets, potatoes, daikon radish, shallots, with fresh thyme, parsley, dill, and rosemary) on Sunday, which we had over rice (and my husband added chicken to his). My husband also made three loaves of honey wheat bread on Saturday.
- Sleeping & Dreaming
Sleep was excellent this week, with all sleep scores in the 90s (one was 96), averaging 92.3. For the week I slept an average of 8 hrs 5 mins per night, with REM accounting for 13 hrs 24 mins and deep sleep for 8 hours 41 mins. I had a lot of dreams most nights, especially on Monday night into Tuesday, when I had 1.5 hours REM sleep and Wednesday night into Thursday when my REM sleep was over 2.5 hours. I recorded some of the dreams to transcribe later.
- Reading / Words & Ideas / Listening / Watching
Reading
BOOKS: I finished reading Martha Grimes’ 26th book in the Richard Jury series, The Red Queen (2025) this week, and it was pretty bad. I used to love her books (and I still love the wealthy and eccentric Melrose Plant) but I can’t recommend this installment. The plot just didn’t hang together and there were lots of bits that seemed added to pad out the pages.
OTHER: Articles and essays and such that I read and found interesting this week:
“The Unsettling Rise of AI Real-Estate Slop: Generated images for listings are disturbing — and not just because they can feel like a scam,” by Franklin Schneider at The Atlantic (gifted link), mentions the unsettling uncanny feeling we have when looking at AI images: “Many of those who revile AI-generated images can’t quite put a finger on what it is they don’t like. … Psychologists have observed that AI images of humans fall into the “uncanny valley” — a term that describes how almost-but-not-quite-realistic images of humans are far more unsettling than, say, a drawing of Charlie Brown…. AI real-estate images seem to be just as unsettling. … Uncanny valley was coined by the Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori in 1970, though the concept of the “uncanny” was popularized a century ago by Freud. Uncanny is a loose translation of Freud’s phrase unheimlich, which, incidentally, literally translates to “un-homely”: the opposite of evoking a feeling of comfort, security, and safety. In his 1919 essay about the topic, Freud includes examples such as the mysterious recurrence of a number in your life, and getting lost and somehow ending up back in the same place repeatedly — experiences that make one wonder whether the everyday might be subject to forces that elude apprehension or control.”
“The reporter who tried to replace herself with a bot: Could a state-of-the-art chatbot do the job of a Platformer fellow?” by Ella Markianos at Platformer. She also compares two versions of the same chatbot (a new version came out while she was working on this project) and talks about the improvements in the newer one.
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This recipe looks simple enough! I mean, I’ve probably made it before but now I want to make it again.
Listening
Some songs I Shazam’d this week — which does not imply anything about whether I like them or not, just that they went in one ear and out the other.
Watching
We watched a “Death in Paradise” (season 11), a few “House Hunters” and “International House Hunters,” and some British comedies this week, as well as an old Julia Child episode, some PGA golf, the Super Bowl (or some of it), and the halftime show (one of us).
- Connections & Community
Local Support: We had breakfast at a local restaurant on Wed. morning and dinner at a local restaurant on Wed. evening. On Friday I shopped at the local farmstand (two free daikons, carrots, Maine Harvest celeriac dip, sweet potato, chocolate wafers; and exchanged hellos with the owner, GB, and the asst. farmstand manager, NL)) and at the local co-op (asparagus, lemon). We had breakfast at a local bakery/café on Sunday morning (and chatted with the owner, LS, for a bit) and bought birdseed at the local hardware chain.
Relationships: Exchanged emails with a friend (KKT) on Wednesday. Permaculture meeting met on online on Thursday morning with seven of us for an hour. Salon met on Friday afternoon with five of us for two hours. Also on Friday I talked with my sister by phone for 10 mins and I sent a Jacquie Lawson birthday card to a friend in Maine turning 88 (JSK) and she replied. Also dropped a daikon off at a friend’s (LM) on Friday.
Donations: On Monday, I renewed our membership in the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens (and bought a gift membership for a friend, MAB) and we became members of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston).
- Endings
My dad died during this week 16 years ago.
- All This Useless Beauty
I like the winter light through the window on this scone and coffee and the winter gear
and the overexposure of this goldfinch
the morning light on the mist from the humidifier (video by my husband)
about the most beautiful, sleepy, and fairly useless, in the best possible way
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