I’ve spent the past forty-five minutes musing about the temerity of time in introduction after deleted introduction. It seems about right for the place in which we find ourselves as we head into this traditional start to the summer season. In the end, none of it matters while all of it matters, and I add it to the tally of things I have let go over the past three months. With a sign of resignation, instead I’ll turn to face forward again and consider how I’ll spend this long weekend:

• Reading. I’ve got a couple audiobooks that are likely to wrap up, as well as Chasing Vermeer.
• Knitting on the shawl that never ends. If I wrap it up, that means there’s hope for the rest of this, right?
• Baking. I want cookies or bars or something. And scones. And bread. And waffles. (Apparently, my supper has worn off. Regardless, I’m hoping to make something tasty.)
• Talking to loved ones. Karen and I have agreed we should phone. The details will sort themselves out, history has shown.
• Going for a bike ride. Rudi tells me baby wildlife is out and about and that if I can get myself down to the waterways I can ogle baby ducks at the very least.
• Putting away winter. It’s strewn about the apartment, with winter coats draped on the coat rack and sweaters still in my drawer. The spring has been cool, and I love having the window open, which means it’s been chilly in the Burrow, but this week’s forecast suggests weather got the memo that we’re heading into summer, and it’s time to have tshirts and tank tops more accessible.
• Tending to the garden. Rudi picked up stakes and twine at the hardware store this morning and I was able to spend some time this evening getting the peas upright again. We invited many of our garden slugs out for a final happy hour in a capful of beer, and the word of mouth spread like we were holding a kegger on the beach in a teen movie. We’ll only slightly apologetically refill the beer tomorrow. (I’m not really heartless enough to be a successful gardener, but the slugs are out of control with all the rain we’ve had this spring.)
• Painting my nails. While my toes are still fully covered, my spring manicure is down to a glittery dot of varying size on each finger. It’s time to wipe off this polish and decide on some new colors to adorn the digits.
• Carefully breaking some rules. There is an abandoned gas station a couple blocks away that spent last summer as a paid parking lot. They have some rose bushes along their sidewalks, and I think that as long as I cut a few blossoms from the station side, as opposed to the side that faces the apartment building across the street, that no one is being hurt. Similarly, I may consider taking a lawn chair to the circle that I walk around or maybe the 19th-century cemetery nearby and sit outside for a little while if it seems like not too many people are about. My local park is too crowded and even the large park by the garden tends to attract a lot of people. If there were a way for me to get a little sun, without the stress of being near people who still can’t be bothered to wear masks, I think this subterranean dweller would feel so much better about things.
• Write some mail. Because if I can’t give hugs in real life, at least I can send some paper ones.

How about you? What are you hoping this weekend holds?

We had a nice weekend. The bartender at our local grocery store/bar was super helpful in picking out some birthday present beers for Rudi on Friday night (it was luck that someone who knew Rudi’s taste was working the check stand when I stopped in), which I wrapped while he was out on a bike ride Saturday.

Rudi had requested scrambled eggs for his birthday breakfast, and I’d hoped to combine it with fresh sourdough bread. But I clearly did something wrong when assembling it in the breadmaker, because instead we had a sourdough brick. I mean it was tasty (particularly with jam), but it was impossibly chewy and dangerous to try to slice. I’m going to turn it into pain perdu (aka French toast) or maybe bread pudding. Anything that will soften it up.

We did some video chats with friends, ate Chinese takeout (the ginger snowpeas I added to the order were the surprise hit of the night), and Rudi blew out the candle on his homemade strawberry shortcake just before midnight.

This morning, I toured the farmers market, bringing home a variety of tasty spring things, including cream, strawberries, fiddleheads, and asparagus. Then I drank half a pot of tea and dozed all afternoon on the sofa. (I was pretending to read.) I managed to rouse myself in the evening to head to the garden, where I planted a few things, marveled at my six-foot-high pea vines (I also have pods, but they need a few days to fill out), and picked a bag full of arugula, kale, and spinach. We need to get back in the next day or so to get our garden snails drunk, so they leave our strawberries and spinach and basil alone. I checked in with my folks and with Grey Kitten and his husband and got in some walking. And I ended the evening by finishing my Veronica Speedwell novel while sipping on hot chocolate.

Five more days until a long weekend and the unofficial start to the summer. Remember way back in February when we thought it would be eons until our next official holiday? How right — and wrong — we were!

… to my favorite fella, who turns a prime number today.

I know this isn’t how you’d choose to spend your birthday, going on solo bike rides and drinking with your buddies over the computer. But you’ve dealt with the past couple months with grace, translating your multitudes of experiences into positives for essential workers, for the local political scene, and for us at home in the Burrow.

May you soon get to go riding up mountains with your friends, stopping at country stores for ham biscuits and beer gardens for refreshing libations, in places further afield than the 25 square miles you’ve stuck to the past couple months.

But in the meantime, have a most wonderful May 16th. Happy birthday, Rudi!

It’s Friday night, which means it’s time to think about the next couple days and how to differentiate them from the rest of the week.

Here’s what I’m hoping it holds:

• I have already started the weekend by finishing the print book I was reading. I am looking forward to picking out which book will be the next one I spend chunks of time with.
• If I get up before noon (and that’s a big if), I’m going to try to get to Georgetown before the bank closes at 1, so I can get quarters so we can do laundry. (Rudi discovered that the branch of his bank closest to our apartment has also closed temporarily.) If that doesn’t look likely, maybe Rudi will go instead, since he’s sure to get up before me.
• Even if I do not go to the bank, I am going to leave the apartment. The past two days have been huge fails on that front, with the furthest I’ve traveled is the sidewalk outside the building to take out the recycling bin. There will be trips to the garden and to the farmers market. I may even ride my bike.
• I would like to order pizza. I didn’t wrap up work early enough to do it today, so I will give it a shot tomorrow. (I got caught up at the end of the day trying to write a legal contract and then explain in an email to the people on our staff with that expertise what it was I actually wanted the contract to do.)
• There is going to be some serious vacuuming going on in the Burrow this weekend. Maybe I’ll even dig out some of the vacuum’s accessories. (Yes, I do know exactly where they are.)
• I’m going to knit some more on my sock. I’m going to darn at least one pair, because I’m out of clean unholey pairs and tomorrow is going to be cold. And I’m going to wash all the pairs that need laundering.
• Baking will happen. Dessert options are limited right now, but only because I keep taking naps instead of spending time in the kitchen.
• There are birthdays and Mother’s Day to be celebrated this weekend. (I should probably also think about Rudi’s birthday next Saturday, because that’s definitely going to arrive before I realize, and winging it will be less possible this year.)
• I have mail to write! The post office is clearly not going to save itself!
• And I’m definitely going to work on getting some sleep — starting now!

How about you? What’s on your weekend to-do list? (It can totally be a not-to-do list, too.)

How is it already Sunday night? I swear, I am the most unproductive person!

Friday night, I chatted with my folks while I took my evening constitutional, then finished my audiobook. Rudi made us a delicious pizza for supper. It was the last of the dough from the pizzeria, which might mean we have to order out later this week. I’m just going to tack on dough from them every time now, because for $5, it gets us two otherwise homemade meals.

Saturday, I slept in, at least until 13 airplanes buzzed my apartment. I think Corey, who was curled up next to me, thought we were under attack. Or maybe that I’d added a new, horrible alarm to my phone. I made waffles for brunch (breakfast for me, lunch for Rudi) and then finished reading my print novel. There may have been a nap on the sofa after that while Rudi finished his all-day conference call.

We took a walk after that — nearly five miles! — and stopped at the grocery store. We won’t be going back to that one for a while, so we stocked up on whatever we could carry.

This morning, I headed over to the farmers market, where my haul included another bucket of strawberries, asparagus, lettuce, fiddleheads, potatoes, carrots, and the gigantic five-pound box of what the mushroom people considered “seconds.” I mean, do you see anything in that box you wouldn’t actually want?!

I also bought a bunch of seedlings — six tomato plants, two peppers, and a cucumber — from the nursery that comes to the market, so Rudi and I took them down to the garden this evening and put them in the ground. It may have been the fastest we’ve ever turned around seedlings, but more rain was expected tonight, so we wanted them to have a nice dousing. (Plus, Corey enjoys munching seedlings he discovers in the entryway.)

I browsed some yarn — this weekend would have been the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival, and I’m contemplating buying a skein or two as a treat, not that I need it. But I decided to give it a day or two, to see if the urge wears off once nostalgia isn’t as heavily at play.

We watched the season finale of Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, which (pun intended) hit all the right notes in what is one of the tightest shows on tv this season. We did, however, need some lighthearted watching to finish the night off, so I introduced Rudi to Agatha Raisin. Rudi made a delicious cottage pie, which we enjoyed as thunder rumbled overhead and Corey dozed on my chest.

And, now, the workweek looms. But while it does, I’m hoping you can share your favorite meat-free mushroom dishes. Because we have a fair few more fungi to finish.

And, there, my friends is the best, most succinct and accurate title I’ll ever write. I could rename the blog…

But in this instance, it summarizes my weekend:

I went to the farmers market and also bought a print of our local bookstore online, which benefits the local soup kitchen. I failed to actually support any of our local businesses, but do so in the future.

We came up with a temporary fix to the toilet seat, which meant that I did not get to see if our local hardware store had strawberry plants. The market did not, but they did have herbs, so I bought basil and thyme, but did not go down to the garden in between storms, because I realized that it should drain a bit more.

I rode across town to drop off a care package at a friend’s back door, but then her kitchen door was open and I unintentionally got to say hi when I startled her. I also got to say hi to a friend further afield on the phone. We both made cocoa and got caught up. (On an utterly tangential note, I biked through the sand volleyball courts, where they’ve taken down the nets for the first time ever since I’ve lived here. It’s like a ghost court, filled with watery courts and unadorned poles and boundary markers that have been washed askew.)

I watched a number of video sessions with authors, and, because my camera wasn’t on, it felt more like I was watching them on tv. That meant spending all that time on my laptop didn’t tire me out like actually being on a video chat does. I did doze off during the first session today, but who knows that besides me and Rudi (and now all of you)? I also added a number of authors to check out when the library reopens. I did not finish reading any novels, but I am further along than I had been, so I’m counting it as a win.

Rudi had bought ice cream last week when he went shopping, so that removed the urgent need to bake. But I did pick up a literal bucket of strawberries at the market today, so shortcake will be part of their usage. We also ate the last of the brownies so I could use the pan, when I do get to the kitchen.

A campaign volunteer asked for a task, so I did not have to stamp 8,000 postcards. I like campaign volunteers, because then I don’t have to be one.

I failed at the tidying/organizing bit of the weekend. I moved some things around on one surface and cleared off a corner of the coffee table so we could have both my laptop and a cheese board on it, but that was pretty much the extent of it. There’s always tomorrow, right? (Cue Jessica from Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.)

I hope you also had a nice and productive weekend, and that if tidying was something you actually wanted to do, rather than something you felt you should include in your weekend plans, that you got to it.