Happy place

1. Bike Bell, 2. Bike Fix, 3. Spinach Salad, 4. 42.5(b), 5. '70s 'shrooms, 6. Laundry on the line, 7. Stacks of Living, 8. Tattoo 2, 9. Better crop…, 10. I only have eyes for you, 11. Gardening, 12. Roxie loves spring, too!, 13. Sleeve markers, 14. Saturday, 15. 365.113, 16. Last summer – barberry

A "happy place" mosaic of some of my recent Flickr uploads, and some randomness (which is what this blog seems to be about lately!)…

I waved to Ellie, our neighbor girl, as she rocked the front porch chair when I drove by their house last night.  By the time I pulled my car into the garage and went 'round to retrieve groceries, she was standing there — full of glorious, gap-toothed, first-grade cuteness from tip to toe.

Within 30 seconds, I learned that Ellie's bike was broken and that it was her brother Joe's fault.  He was supposed to move her bike to the side of the garage and "he just threw it there!"  Their mom, admittedly, doesn't know a wrench from a pliers, so Lord only knows when it would get fixed.  A 6-year-old needs her bike!  DH was getting the grill going, and told Ellie to bring her bike over so he could take a look while the coals warmed up in the BBQ flue.  It was a pretty easy fix to reconnect a brake cable.  Yay!!  Her bike bell — a red pepper with a crinkle-cut carrot slice striker — tickled me no end.  Crinkle-cut, even.

I had the most delightful salad at the coffee shop on Wednesday.  Ali has added some new, seasonal salads and sandwiches to the menu, as well as a summertime beverage menu.  I opted for tomatoes instead of red onion and nixed the bacon bits and oil, dressing it with only a splash of balsamic vinegar.  Yum.  I lingered over the salad and cut the time for my walk-in mammogram quite short, but they were very efficient (and happy that I was there) and I was in and out with plenty of time to walk across the hospital to my doc appointment.

"I've just been reading some ancient history," she said as she came in, my folder open in her hands.  She's the OB that delivered Ali and and it's probably been close to 22 years since I last saw her.  Insurance dictates, mostly, are the reason for that, and then I'd kind of forgotten about her until her name came up in conversation with someone else a while back.  We're pretty close in age and and that's kind of important to me right now.  Barring any concern over test results, I'm normal and doing well.

The other dreaded C-word — colonoscopy — came up and I've been given a referral.  Blech.  Dang, it's just a bit too late to enter the Colonoscopy Sweepstakes!  The biggest surprise was at the scale — at 2:00 in the afternoon, fully clothed (except for shoes), with both breakfast and lunch under my belt, I weighed a good 2.5 pounds less than on my own bathroom scale first thing in the morning, nearly naked, before consuming even a sip of coffee!  Hm.

My Mother's Day is going to be pretty quiet — my mother will be gone, DH will be at an art fair in Marshfield, and two out of three girls will be working.  This is not an altogether bad situation.  The weather isn't going to be that great, so I think it'll be a fine weekend for knitting… and maybe a movie!  I haven't gone to a movie in ages and it feels indulgent.

Happy Weekend!