Coffee Time

An early start to the day. I didn’t plan it that way, it just happened. It started with a noise? That woke me up and after scouting around the house and finding nothing out of the ordinary; I tried to get back to sleep. After about ten minutes, I decided that was impossible. So on my feet again; I made a pot of coffee and I can hear it brewing all of the way from the other end of the house. Now I have to get that first cup of coffee if I want to continue here. Ah! That’s much better. A shot of Ginger Spice syrup and a shot of Hazelnut creamer, microwave for 22 seconds and then fill the cup with coffee. Now that’s a good cup of coffee.

I got in a great walk yesterday, 9 miles at a fast pace. Afterwards, I decided to indulge myself by mowing the front lawn. Yes, that right, mowing the lawn is now a treat as the new mower is definitely fun to operate! And it’s very fast. I would bet that I had the front lawn mowed in ten minutes less time than I could do it before, with the old mower. And I had no clogs at all in the grass catcher system, which was something that used to irritate me every time I mowed when using the old Sears mower. The catcher system also holds all of the grass from the front lawns; where I used to have to make three trips to empty it, I now make one. Also I’m starting to get a feel for the lever steering system now and I’m not leaving any marks in the lawn where I might have turned too fast. These mowers can definitely turn fast!

I will try for a longer, slower walk this morning, maybe 11 or 12 miles. Then a short and fast walk for tomorrow. With any luck I can get in an 18 mile high altitude walk on Saturday.

After the walk, we have to work at the Friends of the Library book sale this afternoon, from 3 till 6. This is the second day of the sale and the sales have probably started to slow down a little; I’m sure the first day was hectic. There were over 500 boxes of books to sell, with perhaps an average of 15 books per box. That’s a lot of books and there are two of these sales each year, plus a continuous “sale” from a couple of racks in the library itself. I’ve really been surprised by the interest in libraries here in the north state. The Chico library has a book sale every weekend and they wouldn’t do that unless there was plenty of interest in it. But the disappointing part of all of this is the fact that almost all of the members of the Friends of the Library are over 70 years of age. I’m a youngster, according to one of the volunteers I met in the Chico library. Who is going to continue this work in the future?

I heard from my old friend, Alex, the other day. He was driving by Orland on I-5 when he called, heading to Las Vegas but promising to return (and stop this time) on Friday when he and his son make their way back to Seattle and Vashon Island. So we have some sort of a lunch appointment to get together; he will call when they make it to Sacramento.