On Saturday morning after breakfast I got started on the seedlings. They needed thinning and I hoped to move some of them out of the dining room window so I could pull the shades. It was to be well into the 90’s and high humidity. I wanted to keep the house as cool as possible.
I was on the back porch trying to condense the number of trays when there was this HUGE crash in the living room. I went in to see what had happened and it was a disaster.
Back in February I’d gotten a new Wallace Nutting picture and hung it above one of my best oil lamps in the living room. It had a nice paper backing on it and was pristine. What I didn’t know was that whoever put the eye screw in to hold the picture wire put it 1/16” from the edge of the frame.
It just let go, knocking the lamp to the floor where it completely shattered, spreading over a quart of lamp oil everywhere, along with glass shards.
Everywhere in the above photo had lamp oil or glass or both. The end table and couch were standing in a puddle of it. This was at 8:45 and at 10:30 I had to be ready to go to the Downton movie.
So I got a big roll of papertowels, a doubled plastic bag, and a large basin of very soapy water and set to work. First was to get the picture out of the mess. It had landed back down, so I tore off the oil soaked paper. There was a little on some thick paper and I wiped that off, there was a good amount on one corner and I wiped off what I could. That paper was nailed in and I didn’t have time to take it out. I had to get up the lamp oil! So I left it on the counter and hoped it would evaporate and not soak to the front. It did soak through on the corner. I doubt it will evaporate and disappear.
Shortly before this happened Tom arrived with his orange tractor to knock down the briars around the shed. About 10 minutes after the crash, he comes in. He announces he’s trashed the tractor. Apparently there’s a shaft that sticks down to drive the mower deck, which he had removed. He discovered there was another piece that should have been removed and wasn’t when the deck came off.
This piece or the shaft or both were flopping around under there and knocked the hydraulic seal off. He lost all the hydraulic fluid. So he went and got a new seal and put it back together.
Minutes later, Tom comes back in the house and he’s carrying the old cat! I’d opened the outside back porch door because it gets so hot out there and when the crash came, I’d dashed inside, leaving the inside door open. She, of course, took advantage of that and out she went. I am so glad Tom found her. With the dementia, I don’t know if she could find her way back to the house.
In the meantime I am frantically trying to mop up lamp oil and wash the residue off the bamboo floor. Trying to find all the tiny glass chips, and wipe the oil off the furniture. Fortunately, it looks like the couch fabric was unscathed. I don’t know how.
I finished cleaning the mess by 10:10 and dashed into the shower. I wasn’t going out stinking of lamp oil. At one point the end of my hair braid had fallen in a puddle of oil, so I washed that too.
I was only 10 minutes late to leave for the movie. It was pretty hot by then and we went inside when we got there. Fortunately they didn’t have the AC down low, it was pretty comfortable.
We sat through the mostly appalling previews of stuff I would never dream of watching or letting a child watch. Then the ads, which were nearly as bad. Finally the movie started.
I had watched the last season the night before, so I was pretty familiar with the cast. But it’s been several years and it took a while to figure out who was who because of that.
I thought the movie thing done at the Abbey was a bit farfetched, but did enjoy seeing the downstairs people all dressed up for the last scene. Overall, I enjoyed it and would like to see it again, not in a theater.
We’d decided to get something for supper at the Pie Bar in a neighboring town so we went there. I got an asparagus quiche and an asparagus ricotta roll. I got a lemon cheesecake bite for dessert. They were all wonderful.
White iris as you come down the walkway
It was still pretty cool in the house when I got home. There was no orange tractor and the briars were flat! Tom had won his battle. I ate my food and then I sat down to watch the last 2 episodes of the last season of Downton Abbey.
It was 95F outside and only mid 70’s inside the house by 5:30PM. The house had done well, even though I’ve not gotten all the screens in yet. My window lady is coming 3 weekends in a row starting May 28th and we will get the windows done.
I got the cats done and finished watching Downton. I stayed up late waiting for it to cool down so I could open the house up before I went to bed. I’d closed my room off because it had been 67F in there in the morning. It had retained much of the coolness during the day, so it wasn’t too bad to go to sleep.
Sunday I don’t plan to be outside at all. It’s very humid here. I’m thinking of going down to the cellar and sorting rags and putting them away. It’s a job I’ve needed to do for months. I also need to finish the seedlings and try to close up the dining room window.