a litany of three days

Monday I hung the giant tarp enclosing the plumerias and other tropicals in the garage to help protect them from the coming two nights of below freezing temps (it will come down after it warms up a little more today), 

covered the ponytail palm and the pink angel trumpet (the one I had just planted in the ground the week before), opted not to cover the yellow angel trumpets because they always freeze to the ground anyway, took another bucket of pecans to be cracked, and started on the finish work on the two recent finished castings while Marc made the molds for the leaf and flower, went to yoga, and shelled pecans.

Tuesday my only accomplishment was completing the finish work on the two castings while bundled up in four shirts, long underwear, and my polartek pants 

6" x 5" x 1 3/4"

5 1/4" x 5 1/4" x 3/4" excluding frame

and then spent the rest of the day trying to convince the dog and the cat that I have no control over the weather. And shelled pecans

Yesterday I replaced the catches on two lower cabinet doors in the kitchen because the old ones no longer functioned which involved laying on my back and struggling to get the damn things screwed into the underside of the shelf because, of curse course, the new catches didn't use the same holes. Then I drove out to Glen Flora where Chuck the metal artist lives to pick up the stands for the tiles, 

took the dog for a long walk because even though it was still cold the sky looked like this

and filled the leaf mold. And shelled pecans. I now have 13 pounds of shelled pecans and one more box to go.

On the national scene I am heartened by the election and while we may not get the Florida senatorship or governorship or the Georgia governorship, we have picked up a few more Democratic wins and the Republicans are freaking out to the point that they are furious that the law has required recounts in Georgia and Florida and that all the ballots, including the ones they tried to ignore and the ones they are trying to disqualify, are being counted. I tweet at them 'All votes count and all votes should be counted. Don't like democracy? Move to Russia. Problem solved.'

And Trump is in a tailspin of despondency (not sure if this is good or bad) and lashing out like the spoiled toddler he is by our wins and control of the House, accusing Dems of voting and then changing clothes and going in and voting again, really, the man has no idea how voting works, and the coming scrutinizing and the looming report from Mueller and his ostracization by other world leaders (except Putin of course and did you see the picture of that shit eating grin Trump gave Putin in France?) and being called out by Macron and social media for his refusal to honor our WWI dead in France because, as a WH insider tells us, there would be no tent for him to stand under and he didn't want to get his hair wet (all the other reasons given were spin) and his refusal to travel even the mile and a half on Monday to Arlington National Cemetery to honor our war dead on Veteran's Day while leaving over 5,000 of our troops on the border with nothing to do, missing the holidays with their families, and eating MREs.

And now McConnell, the poster boy for putting party over country and obstruction and hypocrisy pens an op-ed piece wondering if Dems will work for bipartisanship or put party over country and then two days later refuses to bring a bill protecting Mueller and his investigation to the floor for a vote. Apparently he doesn't understand that compromise take two willing sides.

So all in all, I'm feeling pretty optimistic. It's nice to be back in that place. And today I plan to get the last mold filled, the flower, in preparation for the open house.