Hummingbirds!!

I was just minding my own business, looking out the window, and saw a bright green hummingbird dart right up to where the feeders usually hang, give a "WTF!?!?" look and then take off. I feel so guilty! It's not very warm and heaven knows there aren't a ton of flowers out to keep their energy up. But it really hadn't occurred to me that it was already that time of year. In less than five minutes I had put up a feeder with the last of last season's store-bought nectar. I really hope it comes back. And I hope the damn thing doesn't freeze.

OOC

Ok, these elk are seriously out of control. I looked out my window this morning to see that SOMEONE had taken a big chomp out of my chives. Now, since my chives are planted exactly 12 inches from the wall of my house, I was curious. Surely an elk wouldn't get that close to my house for a little snack? Maybe my neighbors saw that they were getting a little bushy and came down and snipped a few? No. When I investigated I found more hoof prints the size of dessert plates right next to the house. As well as some neatly trimmed grass in front of my living room windows. And more battered and abused tulip bulbs in the flowerbed under my eaves. When did elk become so bold!?!? And how could I possibly have MISSED them being so close??

Potable Water

I can't find a post where I mentioned this last spring, but the tap water has turned its annual spring brown and EW. I stopped drinking unboiled well-water the first time this happened, but when it's actively brown I can't make myself drink it boiled either. I'm sure it's not actively dangerous, but it just looks too gross to ingest. Which is very annoying because it means I have to go into town more often to fill my three gallon water jug. The next person who lives here might want to invest in one of those five gallon water jug holder thingies. Just a suggestion. My Belizean parents have this cool little pump thing that fits on the top of a five gallon jug, maybe I'll ask them to bring one back for me? Seems weird to import such a thing from Belize, but I've yet to find one here.

Just as much as fat robins and yellow daffodils, bathwater the color of (very) weak tea is a sure sign of spring.

April Showers

Does the old rhyme about April showers bringing May flowers hold true if the showers come in the form of two inches of snow? I told myself not to do it, I knew better, but I'd really gotten attached to looking out my window and seeing green grass. The poor fat robins huddled in the leafless trees look so pathetic!

More of the Same

I'm trying to think of things to write about, but this blog is supposed to be about my life and my life is really pretty small right now. This weekend was crappy. To fight a sudden assault of overwhelming sadness I went for a rather miserable hike in the mud and the rain. Oddly enough, it worked and I felt significantly better. Monday was gorgeous and I walked down to the river and took tea on a really comfy rock while I watched the cars coming and going from the hot springs and the occasional hawk riding the thermals. In spite of diligent sunscreen application my nose got a little red. I've made a couple of necklaces and a bunch of earrings and they're all packaged up to ship to my mom for (hopefully) sale at the gallery she manages. It's snowing right this minute. I'm wearing flip flops in the house in spite of the resulting purple toes because I'm just THAT READY for warm weather. But I'm willing to settle for cold weather with sunshine. I just need to be outside and it's so much nicer when it's not spitting sleet/snow/rain in your face and the road isn't all greasy mud and patches of ice. Even one day a week where I can risk a little sunburn is enough to keep me from wanting to take a long walk on a short pier into an icy lake.

Spring. Ew.

Yesterday was the first day of spring and it was completely gorge. The sun, the little birdies, the temp, it was perfect. I worked. Today? The day I don't work? The sky is grey, the wind is howling, the temp is back in the 30s, and there are even MORE bugs outside. (Speaking of: I am alone in this invasion. Pauletta doesn't have these bugs. No one has these bugs. I don't want to talk about it.)

I've gotten back into making jewelry this past week. I'm really enjoying it even as it destroys my fingernails and aggravates my old wrist injury. But it's a little creative outlet I really enjoy and might bring in a few dollars here and there so I'm hoping the inspiration lasts for awhile. So today, with spring doing it's worst to irritate me and make me miserable, I'm going to enjoy the fire, try not to kill the cats as they literally climb the curtains with excess energy, and work on another necklace. It is a small life, but it is my own. And summer will show up eventually. Yesterday was a promise.

The snow is in retreat.

I repeat. The snow, it is in full retreat! These last two weeks have seen an amazing amount of snow melt and it is embarassingly thrilling. I mean, don't get me wrong, you could still go blind looking at the landscape on a cloudless day without sunglasses, but the cover is . . . thinner, and the edges of the snow fields are gettting farther and farther from roads and foundations and tree trunks. And, I can hardly believe this myself, and I check on it every day to make sure it's still there (in fact, I just went to the window to make sure it didn't disappear overnight), but there is GREEN GRASS growing against one corner of my house, the one that gets the most sunshine. Green grass, inches from the snow field. It's so promising! (Of course, the retreating snow is revealing all kinds of trash and detritus and general uglyness that had been beautifully covered for the last few months. Like these cars. Believe me, they looked much more . . . picturesque surrounded by green grass than they do by rotten snow and mud. But lets focus on the positive, hmmm?)

On Saturday I drove down to Boise because the weather report was promising temperatures approaching 70 degrees, and lo it was wondrous. As I wound through the canyon, following the snow-melt swollen river down from the mountains, I honestly started grinning like a fool, alone in my car, when green growing things replaced black and rotten snow on the side of the highway. I might just have let out a little squeal when I saw buttercups (!!!) flowering between the boulders. And then . . . in Boise . . . I wore FLIP FLOPS! All day long! And I wasn't cold at all! In fact, I was a little warm! And then yesterday? When I left the spa? FOURTY SEVEN DEGREES. I drove home with the windows down. I may have almost cried a little. Living here has definitely given me an appreciation for the little things, like grass, and unconfined toes.

Thanks for all your congratulations on passing the bar. I really appreciate it. It's strangely comforting to know there are people out there (even people I've never met!) thinking positive thoughts for me. Not to be all gooey or anything.

I miss . . .

inexpensive fresh flowers. It would be really nice to be able to pick up a $5 bunch of daffodils or tulips at the grocery store. A little something to counteract the black/white/gray gloom outside.

A great friend I'd made here moved to Texas at the beginning of March and is back in town for a few days to finish packing up her house. I spent a long time with her yesterday, and as unideal as her current Texas living situation is, she couldn't stop mentioning how much she didn't miss the snow. And it just fed into my current dissatisfaction with the mountains. Everyone hates this time of year here. I'm not alone. But I need to find a way to enjoy it anyway. Either that, or get a job so I can not feel guilty about spending some of my last nickels to fly someplace warm for a week.

Oh Loathesome March

Monday I decided it was time to get out of the mountains again. I mean, it had been a WHOLE WEEK since I'd gone anywhere . . . antsyness, thy name is Corina. So I drove down to the Valley and did all those little things I can't do here. Like go to Anthropologie, browse used book and antique stores, see a movie in the middle of the day, find cross stitch fabric, eat Vietnamese food, and walk on snow/ice/slush-free sidewalks. The weather in Boise wasn't the spring-time idyll I was hoping for, but for March it wasn't bad. And when I got home yesterday it was RAINING. The temperature hovered in the mid 30's, and it was raining and the air was damp and cold and the wind was creaking in the eves. This is a horrid time of year. I tried going for a walk last week, and between the squelchy mud and slick ice and bitter wind, I lasted 20 minutes and then returned home with dirty hems and a headache.

And . . . I'm sounding awfully negative. I've just always hated the long tease that is the end of winter. And I have to go into the resort spa this aftenoon for more training. And work makes me cranky, because I don't wanna! I want to sit by the fire and find the perfect font for the fist cross stitch project I've done since I was 8 instead of showing people to the steam room and asking if I can get them another glass of water and "your therapist will be with you in just a minute" and "would you like to put a gratuity on the card?" But this afternoon will pay for the new jeans I bought at Anthropologie (they were on sale). And that's good.