Saturday morning coffee pot post

I see that it’s been nearly a month since I’ve posted. I was busy and anxious, then we went to Mexico for 11 days, and now I have the “back to real life” blues. I’m going to post the Mexico trip in about a dozen posts, postdating them as has been my practice for our travel in the past few years, but I have photo editing to do, and right now I want to do my coffee pot post instead.

I did post pretty faithfully to my personal Facebook account and a few photos went to Instagram and from there to the Slow Turn Studio Facebook account. I enjoy looking at my memories on Facebook, especially from May when we tend to travel the most, and the main reason I post about my travel here is because I enjoy looking back at it later. Also, when we disagree about a memory from a certain trip, I can look back and find the answer.

One thing I am grateful for here at home: I don’t have to worry about the safety of the water that comes out of the tap. At least, not yet. I usually filter our drinking and cooking water anyway.

I’m going to say this now instead of referring to it later in the travel posts: Sandy has got a lot of physical challenges when it comes to traveling. At least this time I was prepared for it, unlike the trip to Portugal which surprised both of us and scared me half to death. This trip was better because he is not in heart failure, but his polymyositis causes pain and weakness. This time I scheduled in lots of rest time and we called Ubers to take us uphill and then walked downhill with lots of breaks. I didn’t even consider any tours that involved walking. One afternoon he got on a bus and just rode around Saint Mike, as some ex-pats call it.

The art in Mexico, especially San Miguel de Allende, was so amazing and inspirational that one of the first things on my list, now that the laundry is done, is to clear off my studio table. Then I’m going to warp up the Mirrix and the other small metal frame loom for tapestries. I’ve got a tapestry workshop with MJ Lord in 10 days and the theme is Birds, Bugs, and Butterflies. Trust me when I say that I’ve got plenty of ideas!

But mainly I want to do collage and book binding again. I bought some wonderful sheets of amate paper. Also painting. Just before I left I ordered a couple of bottles of Golden High Flow Acrylic Quinacridone Nickel Azo Gold, which is magic paint. I stopped putting it off because I learned that Golden’s supply of quinacridone has dried up – it has been bought by the auto industry. Once the supply out there is gone, it’s gone.

I’m sad about my garden. The pepper plants and one of the tomatoes never really recovered and their growth is probably too stunted to produce. Two died. Most of the wildflower seedlings have been eaten or died and few of the second round of planting have germinated. The lettuce didn’t germinate and a few carrots did. I do have sweet peas tumbling out of a couple of containers now. I don’t know why I bother sometimes. I spent a lot of money on those plants.

The cats are happy that we’re home and as usual they want to eat paper and plastic instead of their expensive dried prescription food or the canned Fancy Feast food. I have never had such picky cats. They won’t even eat Pill Pockets or treats any more but I can pill Diego quick as a wink if I catch him asleep. He looks at me very confused and then settles back down.

But mainly I want to do collage and book binding again. Also painting. Just before I left I ordered a couple of bottles of Golden High Flow Acrylic Quinacridone Nickel Azo Gold, which is magic paint. I stopped putting it off because I learned that Golden’s supply of quinacridone has dried up – it has been bought by the auto industry. Once the supply out there is gone, it’s gone.

I’ve got a massage scheduled this afternoon, and I need to grocery shop. It’s been at least two weeks since I have cooked anything.Reading: I finished “Here Be Dragons,” which I loved, and “Black Leopard, Red Wolf,” which I didn’t love, but I bought it for a Marlon James event here at UNCG. It was too gruesome for my taste in books. I can take some violence, but too many body fluids and bug/body infestations and demon possessions are not my thing at all. I am a wienie when it comes to that, and have been known to walk out of movies.

I haven’t had the focus to watch much TV or movies, but we did watch this incredibly long Mexican farce while in San Miguel de Allende that was pretty funny. I’m looking forward to getting back to Ted Lasso, finishing Picard, and a few others now that life has calmed down for a couple of months.

Okay, next I’ll be posting the trip, probably beginning early next week, but right now I need to catch up on ordinary life stuff.