Garden!

Cilantro, Sage, Parsley, Chives. Thyme, and Lavender

Tomatoes and Basil

Kale, Lettuce, and Asparagus

Peppers and Beans and Peas, Oh My!

A pound of fresh oregano

Yesterday morning, today was going to be a nice quiet day at home. Yesterday afternoon, today was going to be spent in town, running a few errands after picking up some now-working power wheels for a wheelchair. And this morning, the phone call came in which said that yesterday morning's plan was actually correct, and today WAS going to be a nice quiet day at home. So we get to pick up the wheels when we're supposed to be getting 1-2" of rain (followed by 1-2" more at night. I don't think I need to water much today.) I now have rhubarb-pineapple jello in the fridge, along with a quart of rhubarb syrup for rhubarb-lemonade slushies, 2 cups of oregano pesto, and a half-gallon of minty sun tea. A kale-banana-rhubarb smoothie is in the plans for lunch, and homemade yogurt will start incubating around then. Three loads of laundry have come out of the dryer, too. But it's been a quiet morning.

Yesterday was another matter.  Yesterday we ran some errands in town (mostly to get groceries for starving teenagers), did some work at my mom's in 90+ degree heat, and then came home to an Utter Mess.  Our poor pooch (whom we have had for 5 years as of today, according to Facebook's memory thingy, making him 13 years old!) had stayed at home and things had not gone well.  Puddles and a pile greeted us, plus a dog that wanted OUT.  NOW.  My first thought was that the chocolate he had consumed Sunday (sniff.  MY chocolate, from the 4th shelf of a bookkcase) had given him some tummy issues.  So out he went, and I began cleaning things up.  Then Filia noticed that the electric smoke detector was giving the 'low battery' beep.  On a scale of 1-10, where 1 is l put it on a to-do list and ignore it for a few days, and 8 is clean the poop off the kitchen floor from in front of the sink, low battery beeps are around a 3.  So I didn't think anything of it, grabbed a mop, and began to make the kitchen a safe place to walk-n-wheel.  I wondered if the pup had gotten into the compost bucket as well, since there were things that looked like sweet potato peels laying around the kitchen too.

Oddly enough, the glass with asparagus in it had been knocked over on the counter, but the asparagus hadn't been eaten.  That's a serious indicator of an unhappy pooch.  He will, given a chance, climb into your LAP at the dinner table to remind you that you must share your asparagus ends with him.  He adores asparagus.  (And radishes, and dill, and parsley, and sweet potatoes, and pea pods, and and and ... but not iceberg lettuce)

As the clean-up progressed, I found four piles, a knocked-over trash can, a knocked-over harp (EEEEK!), and zig-zaggy splashes all throughout the downstairs.  And the windows were a mess.  Kinda like some kid with dirty hands had reached up as high as he could and then dragged his hands down each windows several times. 

This was strange. 

So I checked on the pooch, who was laying down in the shade outside but quite happy to come in. He came in, had a huge drink of water, ignored the food in his dish, and looked most unhappy. 

Until the smoke alarm beeped.  At which point, he jumped out of his skin and halfway up the stairs. 

Poor thing.  For whatever reason, our electric smoke detector, which has not had a battery for some time, decided that it was going to beep once every few minutes while we were gone.  And the pooch got stressed.  So stressed that our house looked like a textbook example of 'What happens when a dog experiences severe stress.'  (Except the textbook left out the asparagus on the floor, the paw-streaks on the windows, and the splinters from trying to chew and scratch his way out of a door or two.  And the harp.  They didn't mention anything about knocking over a harp.)

Fixing the beepy thing became much more a priority.  But how do you make a smoke detector stop the low battery beep when there is no battery in it?  Happily, my intuition gave me an answer that worked: whap it a few times with the mop handle. 

(we interrupt this blog post to accept a box of unexpected chocolates from the UPS man. I will keep them UP two feet further than the last box of chocolates was kept.  The one which met its demise on Sunday.)

Clean-up continued for an hour, and I still have some windows to clean (didn't notice yesterday that he reached the upper pane of the windows) and will probably mop again today, and maybe if the smell lingers still tomorrow, wipe down more walls and cabinets.  The stressed pooch just wanted me to settle down so he could sack out and collect his poor tender nerves.  Eventually things got tidied up, the groceries got put away, and he settled down.  He's not letting me out of his sight today. 

Poor, poor pooch.