For all five years that I was a full-time park ranger and had to work on the weekend, I had this recurring daydream about the “lazy Sunday morning.” It would involve sleeping late, perhaps some reading in bed, a Sunday newspaper, coffee, and maybe a fire (if the season were appropriate). Certainly, there was nothing preventing me from re-creating this same scenario on a Tuesday or Wednesday (except that the newspaper would be a few days old by then), but there is just something about Sunday that seems special somehow…
Today hasn’t quite proven to be one of these ideal Sunday mornings. For one thing, it began far too early– at about 5:30, when I awoke to use the bathroom and realized that the heat was blasting for some unknown reason. So I had to go throughout the house looking for forgotten open windows, and then chastise the programmable thermostat for disobeying its program and coming on too early (I suspect it might be smarter than I think, but dumber than the US Congress, because its “Daylight Savings Time” feature probably now thinks we’re back on Standard Time). By then I was feeling pretty awake, so when I crawled back into bed, I just laid there in the dark and thought about things for awhile.
After about an hour, Bo got up, probably because I hadn’t been perfectly still and was flitting about to do things like check on whether the licking sound from the corner was Joda worrying at her bandage. She had a little tumor removed on Friday, and thus far she has avoided being subjected to the “cone of shame” (apparently, the official name for this silly-looking contraption is “Elizabethan Collar Buster”), but she might lose her privileges if she doesn’t behave. So, I made Bo wakeful and he got up, which meant that I could now turn on the light. I just started The Year of the Flood, Margaret Atwood’s latest, and I read this for awhile. Then I grabbed my knitting bag and did a few rounds on the sock I’m making, just to remind myself of where I was on the pattern.
By now, it was fully light outside, so I went upstairs to make the pastry for a pumpkin pie I’ll finish later– but all the butter was in the freezer, so I took some out to thaw while I puttered around the kitchen cleaning up after last night’s dinner– a wonderful meal of miso soup and Vietnamese spring rolls (for anyone who wants to make these but feels daunted by the rice paper, have no fear! they take a lot of time, but were not very difficult at all!).
I was emptying the dishwasher and listening to a podcast about the Archeology program at Fort Vancouver National Historic Site when Joda came up and looked hopeful, so I gave her some breakfast. This reminded me that I need to finish making her latest batch of dogfood (basically chicken, rice, and frozen veggies). But first, I decided to sit down, finish drinking my coffee, and write this blog post. After that, I’ll go over to the fitness center with Bo for a swim and sauna, make dogfood, and finish unpacking my books and setting up the office, with a break to take Joda for a short walk (she’s forbidden from the long, fast variety, but I think her stitches will hold for a short and slow stroll on the road).
So, the newspaper and few other elements were missing from this Sunday morning, but overall, it was quite a nice beginning to the last day of the weekend.
The rolls look great!…though I don’t think I have the patience…