We were celebrating three generations of birthdays together.

One way not to run out of yarn to work on is to bring lace weight.

I bought this at Stitches West 2019 from (this is as close as I can find to their bright and shiny 80/20 merino/silk lace weight in the Isabella colorway) Western Sky Knits in Montana.

I did a not quite the usual hat on the way to Seattle; out of sheer boredom, a few rows into the stockinette I found myself doodling k1, p9, then k3, p7, k5, p5, k7, p3, k9, p1 as I went round the rows. Then half a dozen or so plain stockinette again–and then I reversed the triangles, p1 then 3 then 5 then 7 then 9, and finished it plain from there.

I found myself laughing in surprise mid-flight: I had just knit Charlie Brown’s shirt.

Anyway, right before the trip I’d grabbed that Western Sky stuff that had been waiting so long and wound it up so it would be ready to go.

At one point there was a “whaddya you gonna do” shrug from Lillian’s mommy that her daughter adored unicorns. As three year olds do.

How could I knit anything else after that?

I was a few inches along when Mathias, busy with Legos with Grampa, looked over at my hands and said in wonderment, “That’s PRETTY, Grammy!”

I suddenly realized all he’d ever seen me do was practical hats. Travel knitting. I’ve made so many. They’ve gone to so many. And that white cashmere/silk afghan that I’d splurged on to make him as a baby that was now proudly on their couch–so soft, it’s nice, but it was white.

All these colors!

It is now officially child approved.

And by an older child: there was a sullen teenager in the airport waiting two hours for today’s flight, as did we, trying not to let on who his parents were. As teens do. I had my phone out and was reading the news (Fox fired Tucker Carlson today?!) so my hands would only have to knit for the length of the flight.

Once we were boarded, though, it was all rainbow knitting all the time.

Yonder teen passed us as he came on.

He saw what was in my hands. He stopped.

He looked at my knitting. He looked at me.

I looked back beaming my best grandmotherly-wisdom-love in his direction.

He went on his way with a noticeably lighter step.

I don’t know his details on why I suddenly felt considered an ally, whether the unexpected project simply gave us a moment to see each other and see good in each other and that was enough. Or if there was more to it for him.

All I know is, I’m so glad my hands were speaking in colors.

It was vaguely reminiscent of our five hour round trip to Antioch two years ago to get him his first Covid shot: it was driver’s license renewal time and there was no point in not doing the Real ID thing–why pay the fees and the DMV time and the bother twice.

We gathered the documents, submitted them online, set the alarm and drove to where and when he could get an appointment–across the Bay a few minutes after that office opened.

Their website didn’t let us schedule both so I came along for the carpool lanes and in hopes they might do mine anyway. They didn’t. I’m next week. But at least at a much closer office.

When we got home It was hard to fathom that we’d done so much in the day and it wasn’t even ten a.m. yet. Wasn’t it lunch time by now?

I waited for people.

I carried the KitchenAid to someone’s car.

I carried my late MIL’s toaster oven to another person’s car.

Not only were she and I moms of the same age, we drove the same car and looked like each other surprisingly much. It was great fun. I noted that there were wooden spoons and a spatula tucked inside her daughter’s new toaster oven because every first apartment needs those.

That delighted her no end.

The contractor having brought up the choice, I did research on fiberglass vs polycarbonate roof panels and brought my results to Richard and let’s get this done.

His reaction was, That’s nice–but what I really really want done is the taxes.

The taxes! That’s what I was going to do today…!

Yeah, when they made some announcement awhile back about declaring California a disaster zone for the floods and said that that meant the tax deadline was helpfully being put off for months for us, my reaction was to groan, Noooo. Don’t tell me that! I don’t need any help procrastinating them, I just don’t! I deliberately did not Google to see if that was a counties-specific or a state thing. Pretty sure it was state, don’t want to know.

And I could tell you all about the fun *that* was this evening, but I’m sure you all did yours and that’s enough of it to have to deal with for the year.

They. Are. Done.

And for the first time ever, the IRS let me file electronically after accepting my name. Maiden one, but that’s huge!

And that’s a whole ‘nother blog post about Bush, the Patriot Act, the Social Security office suddenly seeing half the wives in America now that states making the legal changes were no longer good enough, the IRS never getting the memo and claiming discrepancies and that I was never me–unless my returns came by mail. And then somehow I was. Go figure.

Till today.

Next year maybe they’ll even let me use my actual legal last name!

We were talking to our grandson Hudson and he told us he’d been asked to speak in church today.

So he started out with a joking, What I really wanted for my birthday was to give a talk.

…And then at the end of it, referring to his older brother, he said, And if you really liked this talk you should ask Parker.

Brought down the house.

His migraine. So I ran off to Safeway to try to buy a leg of lamb for Easter, but there wasn’t much to be found but flapping tags and empty shelves. So I did what I could and yes that ham was, um, cute. Definitely for people who don’t like leftovers.

But he wanted it to be what he wanted it to be more than I’d realized, and after a few hours of psyching himself up and a quick toasted cheese sandwich each to keep us from shopping hungry we found ourselves heading for Costco quarter after 5. They close at 6 Saturdays, normally; today, turns out, they made it 7. Because customers.

Going to Costco on a Saturday is never my thing and going right before Easter Sunday was really not my thing and I simply wasn’t going to, but if he was that determined even while feeling like that then of course I would go with him.

And he found one!

A few goodies in the cart, a few practical items, and then I headed for the lines while he went looking for one last thing.

It felt odd. Most of the lines were now self-checkout, but a number of people were like me and wouldn’t use those. And yet…

Well if they’re not going to get in this one I certainly am, look how fast that woman is scanning things and her bagger is tag-teaming with her to speed it up. They’ve got this down! Wow, I’m going to look for them next time.

And yet.

Even though it kept becoming the shorter line, people were coming up, and in an echo of what I’d seen on approaching that I hadn’t quite put my finger on, were starting to turn in behind me and then abruptly pulling away into the other lines that were quite a bit longer, and at one point there were five people waiting there and there that I could see while my stuff was going onto the conveyer as they rang up the guy in front of me, and still nobody was getting behind me. And now another person coming up started to, took a look, and moved into one of the longer lines, too.

The clerk was an older heavier black woman. The young bagger was mixed race and part black.

And the people who turned away out of her line after they saw her, every single one of them was Asian.

This is not to stereotype. This is to report what I saw. Note that the guy in front of me was Asian. But it took me straight back to the college American history class where the professor said that one of the things about immigration to the US over the centuries is that unless they were black, every newcomer had someone they could punch down at and wrongly think they were better than. (Edited in the morning to add by way of explanation, 64% of the local Asian population are immigrants, and by their accents at least some of these were.)

Finally, a Hispanic man turned in behind me, quite happy to somehow snag the short line on such a day.

She was checking me out now. I had to do something. I made a point of looking her in the eyes and saying, “You are amazing. You are so fast. Thank you!”

I saw in that moment that she’d been keeping it all in check but at those kind words and the noticing implied behind them, she suddenly nearly burst into tears and she thanked me, the  bagger thanked me, too. We could have given each other a hug on the spot if the counter hadn’t been in the way.

I left wishing them a happy Easter and meant it as fervently as I ever have (even while thinking, I should have said and Passover and Ramadan, too, since they all come together this year and you never know.) They both wished me one as well, and clearly meant it, too. I felt befriended.

I know I’m choir-preaching here, but, man, just go love one another. What else matters? I wanted to tell those people who made their bigotry visible how much they were missing out on because that is one gracious, lovely woman there who was trying her best to give them a better day in the one way given her to do so, and the young man, too.

I am so glad we went to that store when we went to that store near the end of her day. Richard had no way to know that’s the real reason he so strongly felt we had to go there.

And that going at the last minute was the only time to go.

The Amazon driver had been called in at the last minute to help with the unexpected crush of deliveries. Which we found out when Michelle was at the door thanking her with feeling: her friends had so hoped that she would get it in time to put it in her luggage because shipping to their country was so prohibitive.

It had made it in under two hours before she was to leave for the airport.

And somehow those two very rushed women found the time to share that brief exchange that made the one glad she’d filled that extra shift and both of them glad to see the other so glad–and even more, knowing that the recipients at flight’s end were going to be absolutely thrilled.

Dislike the drive (freeways in San Francisco are a mess, the Cypress Structure that collapsed in the ’89 quake was never rebuilt) dislike the driving around and around for blocks to find a parking space but for Dandelion Chocolate and celebrating a birthday? Count us in.

And so she and I did. We decided to make it a to go in order to get away from someone who was coughing, but not before getting some finger puppets to some parents whose little kids were antsy waiting for their cocoa. Brought goodies home for her dad.

As we were sitting at the table at home munching away and sipping the last of the hot chocolate I gave a nod towards the calorie count of the day.

Her: When you’re 60 you should just enjoy life!

I guffawed–as she instantly realized her math was off. Oh wait…

“When I’m 64!” (thank you Paul McCartney.)

At that point we both lost it and laughed ourselves breathless. She topped it off with, You should just enjoy life! Not every day! (gesturing towards the Dandelion bag), but, enjoy life!

But see, that’s why I brought a few of their bars home. So we could break off a small bite. Every day! And when we run out we’ll just have to go back. Right?

Amazon boxes for all three of us today.

Michelle opened one after dinner while we were sitting chatting.

I’ve mentioned how when the pandemic hit, her sister had a baby and a two year old and a suddenly frantically busy job and Michelle decided, I can work from home anywhere, and volunteered to be backup child care. She drove north and spent most of the first two years there.

The trouble with Amazon boxes is that unless you address them to, say, HappyBirthdayAuntie or some such there’s no way to know it’s from someone else if your orders overlap.

She opened it (not knowing it wasn’t time to yet), fully expecting…

Her face. Dumbfounded. She showed it to me. My turn. (Thinking, You didn’t–did you??) I went, Is that…!?

It was. She is now the proud owner of pj’s of colorful unicorns dancing sprightly across a bright pink background. (This would be a novel application of color for her before we even talk about the graphics.)

Me: “Lillian picked it out.” I was so sure. And so proud.

Michelle grinned back: “Just as likely Mathias.”

Because at three and five, bright happy unicorns are everything one could ever hope for.

(Update: an old friend of hers in New Zealand confessed it was her.)

Caramel pecan-topped brownies, dairy free, for the one who didn’t think she wanted anything highly caloric while I was baking tortes for the dinner last night so having butter in them was fine. But the whiffs of baking chocolate…and so today was round two. It was only fair.

Meantime, I have a problem. I’ve fallen for a cooktop from a company that makes commercial kitchens and the lifetime-warranted cookware to go with, multiple patents, etc etc etc and apparently they only recently branched out into the residential kitchen market. It all sounds so good.

But there are no reviews to be found. Only their own descriptions of how excellent and award-winning their customer service is. Given how completely Thermidor messed us over and left us with a half-useless expensive cooktop that should have been repaired under the warranty but was refused, this matters a lot–assuming Hestan lives up to their words.

Which they would have to if no one outside the restaurant business has heard of them and they’re trying to break into a new market. Customer satisfaction is a great, and greatly undertested marketing maneuver. Make a good product, stand behind it, get good publicity. It doesn’t have to be hard.

I’m hoping that’s a point they want to make and not just wishful thinking on my part.

I’m open and eager for all opinions on the subject. Tell me what you think.

There was some unusual ingredient to be hunted down and we decided to make a mother-daughter quest of it. We found ourselves at a large grocery that had underground parking–always a nice thing for the sun impaired.

She headed up the stairs that wound around the glass elevator and I followed.

Changing altitude and direction at the same time are not my damaged brain’s strong point, not to mention with a wall moving up and down on the left, and as two people came out of the garage behind us I scrunched up to the side and told them not to wait for me.

The man did a slight nod and hurried on past.

The older African-American woman looked at me with my cane and chuckled like an old friend and, holding onto the railing on the other side to make sure she didn’t fall either, accepted the invitation, too. She moved back to the right in front of me in case someone around the corner started coming down.

I found myself figuring out how to catch her as we continued up the steep steps–not that I thought I’d have to nor that I would be much good at it.

So. We did our bit of shopping and headed for checkout. I do not do self-checkouts. I do not enable the doing away with what was once a decent middle-class job and I certainly have no problem with paying a few cents more on my groceries to take better care of their workers.

And there was our stair climber with her impeccable manicure and lovely braids.

Something, I have no way to know what, had happened.

I caught her wiping away quickly at an eye and the expression on her face and knew I had to do something as I was putting my wallet away and my purse was sitting there in front of me unzipped. To somehow be the friend I would be if we knew each other, while wishing we did. (Not that one… Oh that’s perfect.)

Have a fish! I said to her as I put a bright cheerful pink finger puppet that some knitter in Peru had made with white stripes knitted into its slightly wavy fins and tail into her hand. Tiny stitches on that one, lots of detail. Quite pretty.

Instantly her expression changed to one of disbelief and delight and she marveled at the handwork in the little thing.

Happy Birthday! I told her as we grabbed our bag of that’s-not-what-we-came-for-but-it’s-fun-stuff and headed back towards that staircase and the next store. Which had the ingredient.

I went to go make sure we were seeing this the same way.

That stove is 29 years old. Do you want me to call a repairman on that switch?

He did a little wince/laugh like, why would we ever… No.

So: it came as a set up, the stove and the vent set up behind and not above it, with the switch to the fan built into the stove. Suddenly today we were stuck with a gas stove with no working vent, which is not safe, and Thermidor has long since ditched any stove with that switch.

Maybe I wasn’t the only one whose sweaters caught on fire (twice!) from those burners being set so far forward.

Only one burner was fully functional at this point anyway. Good riddance.

I’ve mentioned before (probably often enough to get really boring about it, sorry) that the original contractor goofed and put a 36″ stove below a 30.4″ inch wide cabinet gap above it. Which has helped ruin the finish on the wood. You could never sell the house like that and we don’t want to look at it either, a 30″ cooktop has to go in.

But the cutout for it is still 36″. So the countertops have to go.

So. I need a contractor, like, now. I have no idea if the guy who didn’t get back to me yet with an estimate on the patio roof after the storm is available for that, but I just shot a query his way.

I guess that electric skillet we inherited four or five years ago will finally get put to use. And I will finally soon not have to look at the Corian color anymore that my husband liked so much because he does not have an artist’s sense of color when seeing it against the cabinets and at the time I didn’t think I cared enough to object. Corian wasn’t supposed to chip? It did. I can out-klutz anything.

Man, I can’t wait to see it go. Out! (But we’ll see what the contractors say has to be done.)

Four peach trees just starting to burst into bloom in sync with each other, which never happens. Just as the deluge begins. Hey honeybees, work fast for me, willya?

So, confronted with a bag of thawed cranberries from Michelle’s freezer, I reacted as one does: I baked. I used her Miyoki cultured vegan butter and skipped the baking soda in the recipe, although it probably is the one thing that needed it if anything does but given my antipathy to it nothing does, so, anyway, so I did that. I squeezed out nearly a quarter cup of Meyer lemon juice (glad to pick and use up two off that tree, so many dozens more to go) and shorted the unsweetened oat milk accordingly. (The dairy allergy thing.) I added a tablespoon of Penzey’s powdered lemon peel rather than grating the ones off the tree because Meyers may have the best lemon juice but the white pith is very bitter.

That’s my excuse for that laziness.

So those were the changes I made to the cranberry lemon cake recipe. I made 24 cupcakes out of it. 350F, 25 minutes was just right, and that brown sugar on the bottom and cranberries on top of it was heavenly.

I can only imagine how much better with real butter and buttermilk these could be, but they were very good as is and that time will come all too soon. It’s great to have her home.

Massive rain is coming, with tomorrow alone expected to be 10% of a normal annual amount (we’re already at over twice that total.) So after a quick visit with Richard’s sister who’s in town to fill in on some childcare, he and I ran to Michelle’s apartment and between the three of us got it very nearly empty tonight.

The first of the Anya apricot seedlings, at 16 days old in this morning’s bright sun. Soak it in while you can, little one.

You know how the beep beep beep makes you go spend way too much time looking for which smoke alarm it is that’s going off?

That sound was driving us nuts one day last week, but we could not find it and at the end of the day we had to give up and go to bed: I took off my ears. He wished he could.

And somehow in the morning all was silent. Huh.

Then this morning it was back; the only difference is there were more people here now for it to annoy.

Michelle started staking out smoke alarms, waiting for the sound to coincide with the flashing light that would nail the culprit. Won’t work, we told her; we did all that.

It somehow sounded to me like it was coming from the printer, which made no sense. I touched all kinds of plugged-in things to see if they felt too warm. Everything was fine.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

It might not end this time. It had to end.

It was somewhere in this room–we all decided that much.

Much deep cleaning behind stuff and much squelched frustration later, they found it. At least they hadn’t had to move the piano to get to it.

I did not believe that that could in any possible way be what it was, much less be the source. It was. I could not believe that thing was still in this house. It was.

In 2015 our 20-year-old carbon monoxide detector finally started screeching the alarm it was made for–five minutes after Joe Lerma turned off our furnace up on the roof and knocked on our door, white as a sheet, exclaiming, Are you guys okay?!

That furnace had been damaged by its installers and with the air intake filter now burned away, was pumping carbon monoxide down our air vents. No we were not okay, all we’d known was that it wasn’t working well so we’d called him to come inspect it. But we’d barely turned it on because it had just felt wrong somehow, so our exposure had been thankfully low.

That’s when we learned you’re supposed to replace those alarms every six years whether they seem to need it or not–they do. It’s not worth risking your life over. Given that we were hospitalized with CO poisoning at our old house in 1985, we’re a little antsy on the subject. How many people get hit with this twice?!

It is safe to say I am not fond of the alarms that failed us. I had no idea the one had been put down and fallen behind the speaker and had never left the house.

It has not been plugged in for eight years. Eight. Years.

And yet it went off from dawn till sometime in the middle of the night last week and it did it again today.

I disabled it, he assured me a few minutes ago.

That wasn’t good enough.

The electronics recycling is being picked up in the morning, I assured him.

And it is out there sitting in that bin and it is not coming back.

We’ve replaced the smoke and CO alarms we replaced after that one and its peers were supposedly thrown out the first time. 2028 (for when I go to check out the date later) we’ll need to do it again.

I don’t know that scrubbing the back of the fridge and getting out the stuff that had not aged well or had frozen at the bottom and all the details one would probably be better off not mentioning (Really? You do eat year-old kimchi? Who knew. Well then that’s why it’s still in there, honey. Do I have to keep it? –Nah, toss it– ) would count as a blog post.

But it sure felt like it at the time.

—

Editing to add a link to a short video of the yearling male and the female falcon. Rarely, a yearling can succeed at starting a family but it’s more likely an adult will take over.

Somehow it reminds me of a high school dance.

We laid out all the pros and cons again this morning, trying to balance out how badly I wanted to go see old friends after four long years away vs what the most right thing to do was and finally threw it up to G_d in prayer because we couldn’t decide. We figured He knew better than we did.

Richard wasn’t going to say it till I did: I felt an immediate, loving answer that driving to Stitches was not what was most needed of us today nor would it be where we’d be most glad we’d been. And somehow it now felt okay that that was so.

It was Michelle’s moving day.

225,000 tech workers were laid off last month and she was one of them. The kicker is that most of those companies are actually doing quite well. She was told there were 400 applications coming in for every job posted.

Her yearly lease was coming right up and it made the most sense for her to cut the biggest expense for now.

Which is hard for her and we know it but already it is so good to have her back.

Her day had its moments (like, the key is *where*?!) and it turned out we were glad we were around and not just coming home after she and her friends had done all the work. A notable one of those unforeseeable moments happened later after her friends had left, and I was glad we were there for her and not off somewhere else.

Next year. Sacramento drive or no.