In Which I Had a Great Day Off
The spring has come at last, though I'm still wearing my coat in the morning because it's been in the high 40s when I leave the house. Other than that everything is green and pretty, and it's hard to stay indoors. The weather is supposed to be perfect this weekend for Croquet and MTT, which will make being outside for two days really nice.
Wednesday was my compressed day off from work. I got so much done, and having a day off in the week is really nice - when I came back to work on Thursday it felt like it was Monday but it was really almost the end of the week. Will and I walked to Bakers & Co in Eastport for croissants and coffee - freshly baked croissants are well worth walking a mile for, and they're a real treat. I dropped him off at work and then ran errands:
-bought picnicking stuff for Croquet (soda, iced tea, plates, cups)
-bought potting soil, pansies, herbs (chives, basil, thyme, oregano, and rosemary), tack cloths, and varnish brushes
-stopped at the fancy consignment store on West Street and got two J Crew dress shirts for $10 to supplement some old dress shirts that had to get patched and are now slowly moving down the chain from office shirts to boatwork shirts - I can wear a shirt with a patched elbow under a sweater in winter, but frayed cuffs and busted shoulders mean it's time for the shirt to either go into the weekend clothes drawer or get cut up for rags.
For lunch I made baked pollock cooked in a lemon-thyme sauce, with sauteed kale and garlic on the side. Cole had to go to the MVA so he came down when he was done and joined me, and then sat on the back porch grading papers while I did yardwork: washed the front porch siding and porch railing, cleaned up the front and back porches and the back yard, potted my new plants, cleaned up my other pots, and threw away broken/rotted things.
The front porch after tidying
When I was done we walked downtown to get ice cream from the Annapolis Ice Cream Co. and bought beer for the weekend from Mills. That night I went to the chantey sing at Galway with Thea, and then started my Mitchell Gallery calligraphy piece (a miniature 'Ainsi qu'on oit le cerf bruire' in a mid-15th c batarde)
Yesterday I got lunch with a Johnnie (mmm, naan and lassi) who worked at the Folger with me and we talked history and Wolf Hall. By the time I left the office after work it was raining out so I didn't bike to Alexandria, but the rain stopped midway through my walk from the train station and I got to enjoy the beauty of the stream valley. At home I spent the evening finishing up hull work on the boat, sanding and painting the last few spots. On to varnishing!
It's Croquet and MTT this weekend so I'll be a little busy, but my Wednesday off really restored me. Maybe I should do it more often instead of saving for a three day weekend. Something to consider for this summer.
Wednesday was my compressed day off from work. I got so much done, and having a day off in the week is really nice - when I came back to work on Thursday it felt like it was Monday but it was really almost the end of the week. Will and I walked to Bakers & Co in Eastport for croissants and coffee - freshly baked croissants are well worth walking a mile for, and they're a real treat. I dropped him off at work and then ran errands:
-bought picnicking stuff for Croquet (soda, iced tea, plates, cups)
-bought potting soil, pansies, herbs (chives, basil, thyme, oregano, and rosemary), tack cloths, and varnish brushes
-stopped at the fancy consignment store on West Street and got two J Crew dress shirts for $10 to supplement some old dress shirts that had to get patched and are now slowly moving down the chain from office shirts to boatwork shirts - I can wear a shirt with a patched elbow under a sweater in winter, but frayed cuffs and busted shoulders mean it's time for the shirt to either go into the weekend clothes drawer or get cut up for rags.
For lunch I made baked pollock cooked in a lemon-thyme sauce, with sauteed kale and garlic on the side. Cole had to go to the MVA so he came down when he was done and joined me, and then sat on the back porch grading papers while I did yardwork: washed the front porch siding and porch railing, cleaned up the front and back porches and the back yard, potted my new plants, cleaned up my other pots, and threw away broken/rotted things.
The front porch after tidying
When I was done we walked downtown to get ice cream from the Annapolis Ice Cream Co. and bought beer for the weekend from Mills. That night I went to the chantey sing at Galway with Thea, and then started my Mitchell Gallery calligraphy piece (a miniature 'Ainsi qu'on oit le cerf bruire' in a mid-15th c batarde)
Yesterday I got lunch with a Johnnie (mmm, naan and lassi) who worked at the Folger with me and we talked history and Wolf Hall. By the time I left the office after work it was raining out so I didn't bike to Alexandria, but the rain stopped midway through my walk from the train station and I got to enjoy the beauty of the stream valley. At home I spent the evening finishing up hull work on the boat, sanding and painting the last few spots. On to varnishing!
It's Croquet and MTT this weekend so I'll be a little busy, but my Wednesday off really restored me. Maybe I should do it more often instead of saving for a three day weekend. Something to consider for this summer.