Just a Bowl of...

Monday, and nominal Day Off – Vestry/Parish Council meeting tonight, however.  We have begun the transition process at St. Curious Too – the Rambler departing, fading gently out of sight like the Cheshire Cat, Fab New Rector arriving, all this happening in just about a month from now.

And then the Rambler has stipulated for a couple of weeks OFF.  A little awkward to negotiate vacation time from part-time appointment, but we’ve done it.

Time Off will probably coincide with … RENOS to Tether’s End.  The eventual response to the basement dampness;  it is just boring to be in such a panic every time it rains.  In the process there will be construction of two new “approaches” to the abode—an elevated deck on the east/kitchen side (at present I can if necessary exit the back door, but the first step is a doozie) …and a replacement to the original concrete front stoop.

This prospect all makes me very happy.

In the meantime I am spending the day in the kitchen.  Made a fine batch of cheesy baking-powder/sourdough biscuits…In lieu of buttermilk, I used a generous dollop of my new batch of yogurt, which is extremely tasty too.

And I’ve just pitted a generous four cups of local sour cherries (Nanking, possibly?), gift of a fruit-picking friend, with a PIE in view – double-crust type, for the freezer.

I have this relationship with cherries, and cherry pie, dating back to the winter 60+ years ago when my mother had included ONE CAN of cherry pie filling in her list of provisions for the winter.  It was all duly delivered, and midwinter she baked the cherry pie I had been drooling for for months.  She set it on a high shelf in the back entry to cool.  And the local red squirrel came and had a complete hey-day right in the middle of it, before she brought it in again.  Mom was not open to my suggestion that we eat all around the edges.  So we had no pie after all.  Oh, the bitterness.

Then after taking up residence here in Prairie Metropolis, I rejoiced in the availability of big black sweet cherries, in season, from Neighbouring Super, Natural Province.  I bought a cherry pitter -- the type where you push with your thumb, like a syringe.  And I pitted so many cherries for canning, that I pinched a nerve and numbed my hand and wrist (not to mention dying the whole appendage deep purple with cherry juice).

Onto this scene of Domestic Martyrdom (temporary) arrived one of the Spousal Cousins, with Wife.  Wife sympathized: "Oh, I had exactly the same problem from working the slot machines when we went to Tahoe last winter."

Never did manage to find points of commonality with that woman.   But I did go and buy a heavy-duty pitter, and have avoided further injury.

Trying to get space re-organized in the fridge to accommodate the provender I have acquired with a view to PICKLES.  It's time to go downstairs and inventory JARS, lids, etc.

There are two kinds of people in this world -- this is the polarity that cuts across generations, ethnicities, language, class -- there are those who know what a Mason jar is, and those who don't.