some days are like that

it's been one of those days. you know the kind...where you're running around, doing a million errands and tho' it seems like there must be a rainbow there on the horizon, you simply can't focus on it properly. all the further ahead you can see is the next item on the list. pumpkins: check. cat food: check. return library books: check. green market which is the only place they have sweetened condensed milk: check. smashed screen iPhone to repair: check. 

although technically speaking, and in terms of the list of things that must be done for our saturday halloween party, i got a lot done, it felt like spinning my wheels. why is it we can't appreciate the little things? especially when collectively, they do add up to quite a lot. 

i also got a bee in my bonnet for my next knitted blanket (because i want to make another one) and was stymied in my attempts to buy yarn by three yarn shops. one, where they didn't have the colors i had in mind. and the other, because it wasn't there anymore and i didn't have time to go look for where it had moved. and a third one i didn't stop in because there was no parking nearby. i'm sure they would have had precisely what i was looking for. *sigh*

* * *

i spent the evening helping with a political event. there are municipal elections coming up in a few weeks and the women candidates for the city council (which is more like a county commission in american terms) were doing a speed dating evening and i agreed to help. my help extended to pouring glasses of white wine. i'm pretty good at that. it was also interesting for me to talk to the candidates. not very many people came, so i got plenty of chance to do that. i felt both educated and dismayed. this multi-party system they have in denmark (there were candidates from 6 different parties there and all but one of them had all of their own teeth) is quite fascinating. each party does manage to have its own personality and i would say the candidates that were there fit the profile (tho' the missing tooth was a little counter-intuitive), even tho' at the municipal level politics is something completely other than what it is at the national level. only a couple of the candidates that were there were already on the city council, so it was interesting to hear why the new folks wanted to get involved. and i probably did legitimately get closer to knowing who i want to vote for in a few weeks. because yes, as a foreigner, i can vote. i am a permanent resident and can vote in municipal and regional elections, but not national. danes are democratic like that. it's part of why they're so happy.

* * *

this series of photos of an old japanese lady and her cat are magical. 

we might have to name our new white cat fukumaru.

* * *

it only took about 8 hours before the first bossy, righteous dane reared her ugly head in the pinterest translators group. *sigh* i guess it was bound to happen.

but mostly, it's really interesting following the threads in the group (which is secret, sorry, i can't share), 

also for finnish. some serious language intricacies are being discussed in a very interesting way.

* * *

i might have to drag out the old canon AE-1 and try some freelensing to shake things up photographically. problem is, i'm rubbish at getting the films developed, so who knows when we'll see the results.

unfocused monday

oh my, did i lack focus today. even right now, as i'm trying to write this, i'm glancing through pinterest on my laptop as my fingers rest on the keyboard of my big computer. maybe it was a monday thing. maybe it was that my to-do list is of daunting proportions. maybe it was because i didn't shower, but just got dressed and rushed off to my first appointment. it wasn't a kind of you-shouldn't-go-out-in-public-stinky-woman lack of a shower, it was more of a that-would-have-really-cleared-your-mind kind of need for a shower. after my appointment (where i presented a good picture of being on top of things) i was so unfocused, i drove a strange backroads route home, which took me past a dairy where they have a cheese store. i wandered in and bought a huge block of havarti. not planned. then i got back in the car and noticed a nursery and popped in to see if they had any artichokes. they did and i also bought wormwood (tho' i didn't know that's what it was at the time) it's called malurt in danish and has absinthe in its latin name, so i thought "score." i also picked up a chili plant, some lovage, tarragon and sage. also rather unfocused. i stopped by the store to pick up milk and cat litter. i came out with nectarines, crackers, creme fraiche and toilet paper. no milk. no cat litter. unfocused, i tell you. i picked up the child and two of her friends. they ate some nectarines. we went home. we walked in the door and i was reminded of our need for cat litter. so i went to the feed store to buy cat food. i came home with bunny food and chicken food as well. i decided to go to another grocery store, where i would surely remember milk and cat litter, plus it was close to the library, where i needed to pick up a book i ordered. i got there and didn't have my phone with me, where the number of my reservation was, so i had to look at two entire shelves of books for a title that looked like i might have ordered it. it turrned out to be bakhtin's theory of the literary chronotope: reflections, applications and perspectives (apparently this lack of focus thing has been going on longer than i thought). this time, i left the store with milk, sugar, cream, flour, brown sugar, 4 pears, 4 apples and 2 bananas. and again, no cat litter. by this time, i was getting good at forgetting the cat litter (*silver lining*). home again, where i tried to settle in to work. but a restlessness came over me and i couldn't sit still. i went out and planted the herbs and the chili. and gathered a basket of elderflowers to make cordial. that made me feel slightly less restless, but then it was really time to do some work. so i settled in at my desk and then someone came to the door. it involved a lengthy chat and a wander in the yard. as if i needed to wander. and then it was time to make dinner. and husband came home and had a headache, so he had a little lie down. when dinner was ready, i couldn't find anyone, even tho' i called and called. so i ate by myself while i stared at my to-do list with a creeping sense of doom. after dinner, the sun had come out, and husband's headache was better, so we had to take a walk. that helped. at least with the restlessness. but i still only got about 3 hours of work done, when it should have been more like ten. let's hope tomorrow is a little more focused. and that i remember the cat litter.