spring fever

The daffodils have come and gone this crazy spring we are having this year.  Now we have lilacs in full bloom and the dogwoods are very stunning this year.  I wandered our yard today and took photos of blooming things that make me happy.  I was trying to get a nice photo of our lilac when a butterfly happened to land right in front of me.  What luck!

Our yard is becoming a swamp again.  We have continual drainage problems.  The grass is dying and in place we have a lawn of moss and weeds.  The good news is that we have more violets and bluets this year.  Someone just ran the mower over our violets but the bluets were low enough they survived.

So here we are into another week of relative freedom and I still don't know what to do with myself.  I cleaned the kitchen today, and cleaned the oven (believe it or not).  We have a self-cleaning oven and I had no idea what a spectacular invention that was until today.  I have cleaned ovens the old-fashioned way (with Easy-Off and a scouring pad).  Easy-off is a euphemism - there's no such thing as easy chemical cleaning of ovens.  The self-cleaning oven, however, is sheer brilliance.  Set it and walk away for 3.5 hours.  At the end of the cycle, I wiped away white ash...a 5 minute cleanup and it looks almost like a brand new.  WOW!!

Me and someone hit a bucket of golf balls this afternoon.  We also went to see Hunger Games yesterday.  I liked the movie but it was kind of disturbing.  It made me dislike government and rich people at the same time.  What a horrible means of controlling people.  Surely intelligent people could have come up with something better than that!

Tomorrow, back to the grind.  The kids are on spring break.  I might try to take a day off toward the end of the week.  The girls want to go ghost hunting at Trans Allegheny Lunatic Assylum.  Perhaps we will go and I'll check myself in for a long stay.